Volume 10, Tome III: Kierkegaard's Influence on Theology Catholic and Jewish Theology Kierkegaard Research: Sources, Reception and Resources Series

Kierkegaard has always enjoyed a rich reception in the fields of theology and religious studies. This reception might seem obvious given that he is one of the most important Christian writers of the nineteenth century, but Kierkegaard was by no means a straightforward theologian in any traditional sense. He had no enduring interest in some of the main fields of theology such as church history or biblical studies, and he was strikingly silent on many key Christian dogmas. Moreover, he harbored a degree of animosity towards the university theologians and churchmen of his own day. Despite this, he has been a source of inspiration for numerous religious writers from different denominations and traditions. Tome III explores the reception of Kierkegaard's thought in the Catholic and Jewish theological traditions. In the 1920s Kierkegaard's intellectual and spiritual legacy became widely discussed in the Catholic Hochland Circle, whose members included Theodor Haecker, Romano Guardini, Alois Dempf and Peter Wust. Another key figure of the mid-war years was the prolific Jesuit author Erich Przywara. During and especially after World War II Kierkegaard's ideas found an echo in the works of several trend-setting Catholic theologians of the day such as Hans Urs von Balthasar, Henri de Lubac and the popular spiritual author Thomas Merton. The second part of Tome III focuses on the reception of Kierkegaard's thought in the Jewish theological tradition, introducing the reader to authors who significantly shaped Jewish religious thought both in the United States and in Israel. These theologians represent a variety of religious and political backgrounds: the spiritual world of Hasidism, Modern Orthodox Judaism of Mithnaggedic origin, and Modern Religious Zionism.

Contents: Part I Catholic Theology: Hans Urs von Balthasar: persuasive forms or offensive signs? Kierkegaard and the problems of theological aesthetics, Joseph Ballan; Eugen Biser: rediscovering 'Christology from inside', Ulli Roth; Romano Guardini: between actualistic personalism, qualitative dialectic and kinetic logic, Peter Šajda; Friedrich von Hügel: Kierkegaard as non-mystical ascetic and one-sided defender of transcendence, David R. Law; Henri de Lubac: locating Kierkegaard amid the 'drama' of Nietzschean humanism, Christopher B. Barnett; Thomas Merton: Kierkegaard, Merton and authenticity, Erik M. Hanson; Erich Przywara: Catholicism's great expositor of the 'mystery' of Kierkegaard, Christopher B. Barnett. Part II Jewish Theology: Abraham Joshua Heschel: Heschel's use of Kierkegaard as cohort in depth theology, Jack Mulder Jr; Abraham Isaac Kook: faith of awe and love, Tamar Aylat-Yaguri; J.B. Soloveitchik: between neo-Kantianism and Kierkegaardian existentialism, David D. Possen; Indexes.

Jon Stewart is an Associate Research Professor in the Søren Kierkegaard Research Centre at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark.