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Deus Absconditus: A Dialogue

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2024

Chad Engelland Open the ORCID record for Chad Engelland [Opens in a new window]
Chad Engelland*
Affiliation:
University of Dallas
*
cengelland@udallas.edu
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Abstract

In the tradition of both Cicero and Hume, this paper explores the nature of God in dialogic form. Set at the tomb of Thomas Aquinas, in a church that is now a museum, the dialogue focuses on the central question of divine hiddenness, offering a novel alternative to both the atheistic interpretation of hiddenness in terms of divine amoral aloofness and the theistic account of hiddenness in terms of human indolence. Phenomenologically speaking, God the creator, in order to be God the creator, must be hidden to creatures. Divine hiddenness is, therefore, natural and does not necessarily call into question the moral status of God or of humans.

Keywords

GodHiddennessPhenomenologyAquinasCreation
Type
Original Article
Information
New Blackfriars , Volume 103 , Issue 1108 , November 2022 , pp. 795 - 808
Copyright
Copyright © 2022 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers

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References

1 The Gay Science, trans. Kaufmann, Walter (New York: Vintage, 1974)Google Scholar, §125.

2 https://www.europenowjournal.org/2019/10/02/the-catholic-ness-of-secular-france/

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14 1 Corinthians 13:12 (Douay-Rheims).

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19 Psalm 91:13 (Douay-Rheims).

20 Thomas Aquinas, ‘Prayer before Study’.