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Document Details : Title: «Critical» Theology? Subtitle: Notes on Theological Method Author(s): TÓTH, Beáta Journal: Louvain Studies Volume: 26 Issue: 2 Date: summer 2001 Pages: 99-116 DOI: 10.2143/LS.26.2.906 Abstract : Recent theology can best be characterised as a plurality of interrelated disciplines and a complex variety of distinct discourses. While the article on ‘theology' in A Dictionary of Christian Theology (1969) registers merely a process of important specialisation within theology, the division into particular branches (e.g., OT and NT theology, dogmatic theology, etc.), and concludes that 'theology has become a generic term for a number of interrelated disciplines,' the recent Dictionnaire Critique de Théologie (1998) calls attention to a different kind of plurality, a plurality of discourses even within one particular branch. Thus, Jean-Yves Lacoste contends: 'Theology is a pluralistic discipline by nature. To maintain a plurality of discourses necessarily gives rise to an unstable balance. Were it a merely liturgical discourse, theology would cease to respond to the demands of missionary apologia. Were it merely scientific, it would not respond to the needs of believers' spiritual lives.' What we have here is the recognition that the language of theology consists more of a polyphony. |
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