Post-theism

Post-theism is a variant of nontheism that proposes to have not so much rejected theism as rendered it obsolete, that God belongs to a stage of human development now past. As such, it is the opposite of antitheism within nontheism. The term appears in Christian liberal theology and Postchristianity.

Frank Hugh Foster in a 1918 lecture announced that modern culture had arrived at a "post-theistic stage" in which humanity has taken possession of the powers of agency and creativity that had formerly been projected upon God. [Gary J. Dorrien , "The Making of American Liberal Theology: Idealism, Realism, and Modernity, 1900-1950" (2003), ISBN 978-0664223557, p. 177f.] Post-theism thus recognizes the point made by criticism of atheism that atheism may lead to moral defect, but at the same time asserts that the only reason for theism is the prevention of such defects, and that once nontheistic morality has reached maturity, theism has fulfilled its function and may be discarded.

Denys Turner argues that Karl Marx did not choose atheism over theism, but rejected the binary "Feuerbachian" choice altogether, a position which by being post-theistic is at the same time necessarily post-atheistic. [D. Turner, "Religion: Illusions and liberation", in: Terrell Carver (ed), "The Cambridge Companion to Marx" (1991), ISBN 978-0521366946, p. 337. ]

Related ideas include Friedrich Nietzsche's pronouncement that "God is dead", and less pessimistically, the transtheism of Paul Tillich or Pema Chödrön.

References

*H. de Vries (Editor), H. a. Krop, " [http://www.peeters-leuven.be/boekoverz.asp?nr=7002 Post-Theism: Reframing the Judeo-Christian Tradition] " (2000), ISBN 978-9042908536

ee also

*Deconstruction-and-religion
*Humanism
*Neopaganism
*Postchristianity
*Postmodern Christianity
*Universalism
*Virtuous pagan

External links

* [http://cpxbrex.livejournal.com/167943.html Post-colonialism and Post-theism] by Christopher Bradley (2007)