Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-hgkh8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-29T01:40:34.622Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

J

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2012

Ian A. McFarland
Affiliation:
Emory University's Candler School of Theology
David A. S. Fergusson
Affiliation:
University of Edinburgh
Karen Kilby
Affiliation:
University of Nottingham
Iain R. Torrance
Affiliation:
University of Aberdeen
Ian A. McFarland
Affiliation:
Emory University, Atlanta
David A. S. Fergusson
Affiliation:
University of Edinburgh
Karen Kilby
Affiliation:
University of Nottingham
Iain R. Torrance
Affiliation:
Princeton Theological Seminary
Get access

Summary

James, William The psychologist and philosopher William James (1842–1910) is best known as a founder of the psychological–phenomenological study of individual religious experience and the philosophical tradition known as pragmatism. In theological studies, James is best known for his books The Will to Believe (1897) and The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902). Following the publication of the former, James speculated that he should have titled it ‘the right to believe’. In it he rejected the widely accepted views of D. Hume (1711–76), I. Kant, and G. W. F. Hegel by choosing theism and the right or will to believe over absolutism, agnosticism, and determinism. James observed that for many persons religion is a ‘live option’ (defined as an unavoidable and significant choice, upon which a believer is willing to act) and defended the intellectual legitimacy of adopting a religious faith. In Varieties, he rejected objectivism and advocated a radically inclusive empiricism. He argued for the validity of sensory and religious experience and hypothesized that the human ‘subconscious’ functioned as a doorway between the ‘conscious self’ and ‘The More’ that, when open, allowed an individual to receive an experience of the ‘reality of the unseen’. For James, in both volumes, strict adherence to logical reason resulted in deterministic monistic systems, while reality – as it is shaped by free will – remains empirically pluralistic.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bridgers, L., Contemporary Varieties of Religious Experience (Rowman & Littlefield, 2005).Google Scholar
West, C., Race Matters (Vintage Books, 2001).Google Scholar
Abercrombie, N., The Origins of Jansenism (Oxford University Press, 1936).Google Scholar
Delumeau, J., ‘Jansenism’ in Catholicism between Luther and Voltaire: A New View of the Counter-Reformation (Westminster Press, 1977 [1971]), 99–128.Google Scholar
Furuya, Yasuo, ed., A History of Japanese Theology (Eerdmans, 1997).Google Scholar
Michelson, C., Japanese Contribution to Christian Theology (Westminster Press, 1959).Google Scholar
Curry, M. D., Jehovah's Witnesses: The Millenarian World of the Watch Tower (Garland Publishing, 1992).Google Scholar
Holden, A., Jehovah's Witnesses: Portrait of a Contemporary Religious Movement (Routledge, 2002).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Penton, M. J., Apocalypse Delayed: The Story of Jehovah's Witnesses, 2nd edn (University of Toronto Press, 1997).Google Scholar
Rebenich, S., Jerome (Routledge, 2002).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McGinn, B., The Calabrian Abbot: Joachim of Fiore in the History of Western Thought (Macmillan, 1985).Google Scholar
Reeves, M., Joachim of Fiore and the Prophetic Future: A Medieval Study in Historical Thinking, revised edn (Sutton, 1999).Google Scholar
Reeves, M. and Hirsch-Reich, B., The Figurae of Joachim of Fiore (Oxford University Press, 1972).Google Scholar
West, D. C., ed., Joachim of Fiore in Christian Thought: Essays on the Influence of the Calabrian Abbot, 2 vols. (Franklin, 1975).Google Scholar
Barth, K., Church Dogmatics (T&T Clark, 1961), IV/3, 70.Google Scholar
Ticciati, S., Job and the Disruption of Identity: Reading Beyond Barth (T&T Clark, 2005).Google Scholar
Murphy, C. M., John the Baptist: Prophet of Purity for a New Age (Liturgical Press, 2003).Google Scholar
Ashton, J., Understanding the Fourth Gospel, 2nd edn (Oxford University Press, 2007).Google Scholar
Meeks, W. A., ‘The Man from Heaven in Johannine Sectarianism’ in In Search of the Early Christians, ed. Hilton, A. R. and Snyder, H. G. (Yale University Press, 2002), 55–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, D. Moody, Johannine Christianity: Essays on Its Setting, Sources and Theology (University of South Carolina Press, 1984).Google Scholar
Boguslawski, S., , O. P., Thomas Aquinas on the Jews: Insights into his Commentary on Romans 9–11 (Paulist Press, 2008).Google Scholar
Boys, M. C., ed., Seeing Judaism Anew: Christianity's Sacred Obligation (Rowman & Littlefield, 2005).Google Scholar
Frymer-Kensky, T., Novak, D., Ochs, P.et al., eds., Christianity in Jewish Terms (Westview, 2000).Google Scholar
Kinzer, M. S., Postmissionary Messianic Judaism: Redefining Christian Engagement with the Jewish People (Brazos Press, 2005).Google Scholar
Soulen, R. K., The God of Israel and Christian Theology (Fortress Press, 1996).Google Scholar
Jantzen, G., Julian of Norwich: Mystic and Theologian (Paulist Press, 2000).Google Scholar
Hauerwas, S., Dispatches from the Front: Theological Engagements with the Secular (Duke University Press, 1994).Google Scholar
O'Donovan, O., The Just War Revisited (Cambridge University Press, 2003).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ramsey, P., The Just War: Force and Political Responsibility (Scribner, 1968).Google Scholar
Walzer, M., Just and Unjust Wars (Basic Books, 1977).Google Scholar
Lehmann, K. and Pannenberg, W., eds., The Condemnations of the Reformation Era: Do They Still Divide? (Fortress Press, 1990).Google Scholar
Mannermaa, T., Christ Present In Faith: Luther's View On Justification (Fortress Press, 2005).Google Scholar
McCormack, B. L., ed., Justification in Perspective: Historical Developments and Contemporary Challenges (Baker Academic, 2006).Google Scholar
McGrath, A. E.. Iustitia Dei: A History of the Christian Doctrine of Justification, 3rd edn (Cambridge University Press, 2005).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Oberman, H. A., The Harvest of Medieval Theology, 3rd edn (Baker Academic, 2000).Google Scholar
Pesch, O. H., Theologie der Rechtfertigung bei Martin Luther und Thomas von Aquin: Versuch eines systematisch-theologischen Dialogs (Matthias-Grünewald-Verlag, 1967).Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×