Philosophy of Religion: An Anthology

by Louis P. Pojman, Michael Rea

Overview

PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION: AN ANTHOLOGY, 7E uses a balanced blend of classic and contemporary articles to make the philosophy of religion easy to understand. This engaging textbook begins by outlining the traditional concepts of God, then moves into other interesting topics, such as the problem of evil, feminist perspectives of God, and mystical experiences. In addition, PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION: AN ANTHOLOGY, 7E presents readers with both the traditional proofs of God's existence, and the counter arguments. This edition also discusses the interplay between religion and science, religion and faith, and religion and "knowing".

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781285197326
Publisher:	Cengage Learning
Publication date:	01/01/2014
Pages:	736
Product dimensions:	9.80(w) x 12.00(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Louis P. Pojman (1935-2005) was Professor of Philosophy, Emeritus, at the United States Military Academy and a Life Member of Clare Hall, Cambridge University. He received an M.A. and Ph.D. from Union Theological Seminary/Columbia University. He was a Fulbright Fellow at the University of Copenhagen and a Rockefeller Fellow at Hamburg University. He received his D.Phil. in Philosophy from Oxford University in 1997.His first position was at the University of Notre Dame, after which he taught at the University of Texas at Dallas. Later, at the University of Mississippi, he served for three years as Chair of the Department of Philosophy and Religion. In 1995, he became Professor of Philosophy at the United States Military Academy at West Point. He most recently was Visiting Professor at Brigham Young University in Utah and Visiting Fellow at Clare Hall, Oxford University. Pojman won several research and teaching awards, including the Burlington Northern Award for Outstanding Teaching and Scholarship (1988) and the Outstanding Scholar/Teacher in the Humanities at the University of Mississippi (1994). He wrote in the areas of philosophy of religion, epistemology, ethics, and political philosophy and authored or edited more than 30 books and 100 articles. Louis Pojman passed away in 2005.

Michael Rea is Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Center for Philosophy of Religion at the University of Notre Dame, where he has taught since 2001. He earned his B.A. at UCLA in 1991 and his PhD at the University of Notre Dame in 1996. He is has written or edited more than ten books and thirty articles in metaphysics and the philosophy of religion, and has given numerous lectures in the United States, the United Kingdom, the European Union, Russia, China, and Iran.

Table of Contents

Preface. PART I: THE CONCEPT OF GOD. I.A Concepts of God and the Ultimate. I.A.1 Selections from Ancient Greek Philosophers. I.A.2 The Concept of God. Thomas V. Morris. I.A.3 The Openness of God—Systematic Theology. Clark H. Pinnock. I.A.4 God and the World. Sallie McFague. I.A.5 The Reality of God. Paul Tillich. I.A.6 The Love of God and the Idea of Deity. Martin Buber. I.A.7 The Vedic-Upanisadic Conception of Brahman (The Highest God). Sushanta Sen. I.A.8 Emptiness: Soteriology and Ethics in Mahayana Buddhism. Christopher Ives. I.B Classical Theistic Attributes. I.B.1 Temporal Eternity. Stephen T. Davis. I.B.2 The God Beyond Time. Hugh J. McCann. I.B.3 Is God's Power Limited? St. Thomas Aquinas. I.B.4 Some Puzzles Concerning Omnipotence. George Mavrodes. I.B.5 The Logic of Omnipotence. Harry G. Frankfurt. I.B.6 Divine Foreknowledge and Human Free Will. St. Augustine. I.B.7 God's Foreknowledge and Human Free Will Are Incompatible. Nelson Pike. I.B.8 God's Foreknowledge and Human Free Will Are Compatible. Alvin Plantinga. I.B.9 Can God Be Free? William Rowe I.B.10 The Freedom of God Edward Wierenga PART II: TRADITIONAL ARGUMENTS FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD. II.A The Ontological Argument for the Existence of God. II.A.1 The Ontological Argument. St. Anselm. II.A.2 A Critique of the Ontological Argument. Immanuel Kant. II.B The Cosmological Argument for the Existence of God. II.B.1 The Five Ways. Thomas Aquinas. II.B.2 The Argument from Contingency. Samuel Clarke. II.B.3 An Examination of the Cosmological Argument. William Rowe. II.B.4 The Kalām Cosmological Argument. William Lane Craig and J. P. Moreland. II.B.5 A Critique of the Kalām Cosmological Argument. Paul Draper. II.C The Teleological Argument for the Existence of God. II.C.1 The Watch and the Watchmaker. William Paley. II.C.2 A Critique of the Design Argument. David Hume. II.C.3 Arguments from Design. Richard Swinburne. II.C.4 A Scientific Argument for the Existence of God. Robin Collins. PART III: EVIL AND THE HIDDENNESS OF GOD. III.A Historical and Literary Perspectives. III.A.1 The Argument from Evil. David Hume. III.A.2 Theodicy: A Defense of Theism. Gottfried Leibniz. III.A.3 Rebellion. Fyodor Dostoevsky. III.A.4 The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas. Ursula K. LeGuin. III.B The Problems of Evil and Divine Hiddenness. III.B.1 Evil and Omnipotence. J. L. Mackie. III.B.2 The Inductive Argument from Evil against the Existence of God. William Rowe. III.B.3 Evolution and the Problem of Evil. Paul Draper. III.B.4 Whose Problem is the Problem of Evil? Grace Jantzen. III.B.5. Divine Hiddenness Justifies Atheism. J. L. Schellenberg. III.C Responses. III.C.1 The Free Will Defense. Alvin Plantinga. III.C.2 Evil and Soul-Making. John Hick. III.C.3 Epistemic Humility, Arguments from Evil, and Moral Skepticism. Daniel Howard-Snyder. III.C.4 The Problem of Evil and the Desires of the Heart. Eleonore Stump. III.C.5 Horrendous Evils and the Goodness of God. Marilyn McCord Adams. III.C.6 Suffering as Religious Experience. Laura Waddell Ekstrom. III.C.7 Deus Absconditus. Michael J. Murray. III.C.8 Divine Hiddenness, Divine Silence. Michael Rea. PART IV: RELIGION AND EXPERIENCE. IV.A Mystical Experience and the Perception of God. IV.A.1 Selections of Mystical Experiences. IV.A.2 Mysticism. William James. IV.A.3 Mysticism and Experience. Grace Jantzen. IV.A.4 Perceiving God. William P. Alston. IV.A.5 Do Mystics See God? Evan Fales. IV.A.6 Religious Experience and Naturalistic Explanations. Jeffrey Jordan. IV.B Miracles and Testimony. IV.B.1 Against Miracles. David Hume. IV.B.2 Miracles and Testimony. J. L. Mackie. IV.B.3 Of 'Of Miracles'. Peter van Inwagen. IV.C Religion and Science. IV.C.1 Science Versus Religion. Richard Dawkins. IV.C.2 Non-Overlapping Magisteria. Stephen Jay Gould. IV.C.3 Faith and Science. Pope John Paul II. PART V: FAITH AND RATIONALITY. V.A The Nature of Faith. V.A.1 The Nature of Faith. Richard Swinburne. V.A.2 Can Faith be Rational? Lara Buchak. V.A.3 Propositional Faith. Daniel Howard-Snyder. V.B Pragmatic Justification of Religious Belief. V.B.1 The Wager. Blaise Pascal. V.B.2 The Ethics of Belief. W. K. Clifford. V.B.3 The Will to Believe. William James. V.C Rationality and Justified Religious Belief. V.C.1 Rational Theistic Belief Without Proof. John Hick. V.C.2 The Presumption of Atheism. Anthony Flew. V.C.3 Rational Religious Belief Without Arguments. Michael Bergmann. V.C.4 Intellectual Virtue in Religious Epistemology. Linda Zagzebski. V.C.5 Faith, Hope, and Doubt. Louis P. Pojman. PART VI: RELIGIOUS PLURALISM. VI.1 Religious Pluralism and Ultimate Reality. John Hick. VI.2 A Defense of Religious Exclusivism. Alvin Plantinga. VI.3 Hick's Religious Pluralism and "Reformed Epistemology"—A Middle Ground. David Basinger. VI.4 Buddhism, Christianity, and the Prospects for World Religion. Dalai Lama. PART VII: DEATH AND IMMORTALITY. VII.1 The Finality of Death. Bertrand Russell. VII.2 Immortality of the Soul. Plato. VII.3 Personal Identity and Immortality. Jeffrey Olen. VII.4 Death and the Afterlife. Lynne Rudder Baker. VII.5 A Hindu Theory of Life, Death, and Reincarnation. Prasannatma Das. Bibliography.

Editorial Reviews

"This is a more comprehensive collection of readings than is usual for this kind of course, with more serious consideration of different arguments for God's existence, and of such areas as pluralism, immortality of the soul, etc."

"This is an excellent text, probably for more comprehensive than could be covered in one semester. Fortunately, Cengage will prepare custom versions of excepts from the text."

From the Publisher

This textbook/anthology maps out the major controversies and key positions in the philosophy of religion. The traditional arguments for the existence of God are presented and critiqued (one is tempted to say, refuted), as is the argument from religious experience. The book then moves on to those other, equally thorny, problems<-->evil, the attributes of God, miracles, revelation, death, and immortality. Chapters also consider the relationship between faith and reason (currently a trial separation, with visitation rights), scientific and religious perspectives on evolution, the possibility of religious pluralism, and the connection between religion and ethics. The historical heavyweights are well represented, with excerpts from Aquinas, Hume, Anselm, Kant, James, Freud, Leibniz, Augustine, Plato, Russell, Pascal, Wittgenstein, and Kierkegaard. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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