Read more
Zusatztext This lucid and thought-provoking study rehabilitates a conception of conscience that should never have been dismissed and shows why its recovery is vital to the moral life and the life of faith. The splendid readings of Kant and Kierkegaard, the incisive criticisms of their detractors, and the patient yet insistent case for the necessity of conscientious self-examination before God make this a compelling read. If we are now witnessing a recovery of conscience as a central topic in theological ethics, this book is poised to lead the way. I wholeheartedly (and conscientiously!) recommend it. Informationen zum Autor Jeff Morgan is Assistant Professor of Theology and Ethics at Saint Joseph’s College of Maine, USA. He is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame, USA, in Christian Ethics and was a Catherine of Siena Fellow in Ethics at Villanova University, USA. He lives in Portland, Maine with his wife and four children.Uses the thinking of Kant and Kierkegaard to develop a conception of conscience as an individual’s moral self-awareness – giving a fresh view on what it means, within the Christian tradition, to know oneself as an individual singularly accountable before God. Zusammenfassung Jeff Morgan argues that both Immanuel Kant and Søren Kierkegaard think of conscience as an individual’s moral self-awareness before God, specifically before the claim God makes on each person. This innovative reading corrects prevailing views that both figures, especially Kant, lay the groundwork for the autonomous individual of modern life – that is, the atomistic individual who is accountable chiefly to themselves as their own lawmaker.This book first challenges the dismissal of conscience in 20th-century Christian ethics, often in favour of an emphasis on corporate life and corporate self-understanding. Morgan shows that this dismissal is based on a misinterpretation of Immanuel Kant’s practical philosophy and moral theology, and of Søren Kierkegaard’s second authorship. He does this with refreshing discussions of Stanley Hauerwas, Oliver O’Donovan, and other major figures. Morgan instead situates Kant and Kierkegaard within a broad trajectory in Christian thought in which an individual’s moral self-awareness before God, as distinct from moral self-awareness before a community, is an essential feature of the Christian moral life. Inhaltsverzeichnis Acknowledgments Abbreviations Introduction1. The Dismissal of Conscience in Twentieth Century Christian Ethics2. Self-Knowledge and the Approximation of Divine Judgment: Conscience in the Practical Philosophy and Moral Theology of Immanuel Kant3. Self-Knowledge and the Enormous Weight of God: Conscience in the Søren Kierkegaard’s Second Authorship4. Conscience as Singular Moral Self-Awareness: An OutlineBibliography...
