Humanism and Religion: A Call for the Renewal of Western Culture by Jens Zimmerm

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Jens Zimmermann suggests that the West can rearticulate its identity and renew its cultural purpose by recovering the humanistic ethos that originally shaped Western culture. He traces the religious roots of humanism, and combines humanism, religion and hermeneutic philosophy to re-imagine humanism for our current cultural and intellectual climate.

FORMATHardcover LANGUAGEEnglish CONDITIONBrand New Publisher Description

The question of who 'we' are and what vision of humanity 'we' assume in Western culture lies at the heart of hotly debated questions on the role of religion in education, politics, and culture in general. The need for recovering a greater purpose for social practices is indicated, for example, by the rapidly increasing number of publications on the demise of higher education, lamenting the fragmentation of knowledge and university culture's surrender tomarket-driven pragmatism. The West's cultural rootlessness and lack of cultural identity are also revealed by the failure of multiculturalism to integrate religiously vibrant immigrant cultures. A main cause ofthe West's cultural malaise is the long-standing separation of reason and faith. Jens Zimmermann suggests that the West can rearticulate its identity and renew its cultural purpose by recovering the humanistic ethos that originally shaped Western culture. In tracing the religious roots of humanism from patristic theology, through the Renaissance into modern philosophy, we find that humanism was originally based on the correlation of reason and faith. In this book, theauthor combines humanism, religion, and hermeneutic philosophy to re-imagine humanism for our current cultural and intellectual climate. The hope of this recovery is for humanism to become what CharlesTaylor has called a 'social imaginary', an internalized vision of what it means to be human. This vision will encourage, once again, the correlation of reason and faith in order to overcome current cultural impasses, such as those posed, for example, by religious and secularist fundamentalisms.

Author Biography

Jens Zimmermann was born and raised in Germany. He holds a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the University of British Columbia, Canada, and a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany. He currently occupies the position of Canada Research Chair in Interpretation, Religion and Culture, and is Professor of English at Trinity Western University (TWU) in Langley, British Columbia, Canada. Zimmermann has published eight previousbooks in the areas of theology, philosophy, and literary theory. He is board member of the International Bonhoeffer Society (English Language Section), and co-editor of the IBI (International BonhoefferInterpretation) series. With two other colleagues, he also runs the Religion, Culture and Conflict group at TWU, shich organizes inter-faith conferences. The group recently published Politics and the Religious Imagination (Routledge 2010).

Table of Contents

Introduction1: Western Culture after Christendom2: The Theological Origins of Humanism3: Humanism from Vico to Dilthey4: Martin Heidegger's Post-Metaphysical Hyper-Humanism5: Levinas's Humanism of the Other6: Hans-Georg Gadamer's Hermeneutic Humanism7: Christian Responses: Maurice Blondel and Dietrich Bonhoeffer8: Toward a Religious Humanism?

Review

The critical retrieval of religious, theological and specifically Christian humanism, which has been gathering momentum during the past decade, has received a major boost with the publication of these two fine studies by Jens Zimmermann ... Each volume can stand on its own, but they overlap and complement each other in addressing the cultural crisis that faces Western society with secularism in confusion and religious fundamentalism rampant * John de Gruchy, Modern Theology *

Long Description

The question of who 'we' are and what vision of humanity 'we' assume in Western culture lies at the heart of hotly debated questions on the role of religion in education, politics, and culture in general. The need for recovering a greater purpose for social practices is indicated, for example, by the rapidly increasing number of publications on the demise of higher education, lamenting the fragmentation of knowledge and university culture's surrender tomarket-driven pragmatism. The West's cultural rootlessness and lack of cultural identity are also revealed by the failure of multiculturalism to integrate religiously vibrant immigrant cultures. A main cause of the West's cultural malaise is the long-standing separation of reason and faith.Jens Zimmermann suggests that the West can rearticulate its identity and renew its cultural purpose by recovering the humanistic ethos that originally shaped Western culture. In tracing the religious roots of humanism from patristic theology, through the Renaissance into modern philosophy, we find that humanism was originally based on the correlation of reason and faith. In this book, the author combines humanism, religion, and hermeneutic philosophy to re-imagine humanismfor our current cultural and intellectual climate. The hope of this recovery is for humanism to become what Charles Taylor has called a 'social imaginary', an internalized vision of what it means to be human. This vision will encourage, once again, the correlation of reason and faith in order toovercome current cultural impasses, such as those posed, for example, by religious and secularist fundamentalisms.

Review Quote

The critical retrieval of religious, theological and specifically Christian humanism, which has been gathering momentum during the past decade, has received a major boost with the publication of these two fine studies by Jens Zimmermann ... Each volume can stand on its own, but they overlap and complement each other in addressing the cultural crisis that faces Western society with secularism in confusion and religious fundamentalism rampant

Feature

Combines philosophy and theology as well as the topics of religion, hermeneutics, and humanismCovers key figures in theology and philosophy, providing summaries of the thought of Dilthey, Heidegger, Gadamer, Levinas, Blondel, and BonhoefferSeeks to connect Islam and Christianity, Protestant and Catholic sources through the theme of humanismAddresses the topic of secularism and religion in a timely way

Details ISBN0199697752 Author Jens Zimmermann Language English ISBN-10 0199697752 ISBN-13 9780199697755 Media Book Format Hardcover Year 2012 Imprint Oxford University Press Subtitle A Call for the Renewal of Western Culture Place of Publication Oxford Country of Publication United Kingdom DEWEY 144 Birth 1965 Affiliation Professor and Canada Research Chair in Interpretation, Religion and Cu Illustrations black & white illustrations Short Title HUMANISM & RELIGION C UK Release Date 2012-01-26 Publication Date 2012-01-26 AU Release Date 2012-01-26 NZ Release Date 2012-01-26 Pages 390 Publisher Oxford University Press Audience Undergraduate We've got this

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