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The Beginnings of Wisdom

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 August 2024

Monica Lawlor
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Extract

Two things prompted me to think a little more closely about the relation between fear and Christian belief; one was reading a book by Pfister on Christianity and Fear and the other was a growing concern with the extent to which fear seems to rule the lives of many Christians and provides an apparent contradiction of the love and freedom which are formally acknowledged as the keystones of Christianity. I have taken this opportunity to offer you the result of some reflection on the subject in the hope that in discussion we may gain some further insight into the meaning of the psalmist's words:

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom; a good understanding have all those who practise it.

(Ps. III. 10).

Type
Research Article
Information
Life of the Spirit , Volume 18 , Issue 207 , December 1963 , pp. 221 - 234
Copyright
Copyright © 1963 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers

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References

1 A talk first given to the Southampton circle of the Newman Association.

2 O. Pfister, Christianity & Fear, London 1948 (trans.).

3 J. Bowlby, ‘Ethology and the development of object relations’ in International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 1960, vol. 41, p. 313.