Religious booknotes

...What has Kung done in the past decade and a half since his encounter with the CDF1...

...In between are close studies of Kung's doctrine of God, Chnstology, and ecclesiology, as well as surveys of his work in the wider Oikumene And Kung himself...

...Since Pehkan frequently cites both the pnmary sources and secondary literature, it is an immense help not to have to look back to those wretched endnotes that so frequently appear even in scholarly books The volume ends with a glossary of technical terms, a bibliography, and indices of biblical, patnstic, and general citations Well done, well done...

...Some of these meditations appear in English for the first time while others are culled from already published volumes...

...This is a chastening work to read Stein (in religion: Teresa Benedicta of the Cross) was a woman of profound faith and deep learning Her letters exude a love for the liturgy (she had close contacts with the liturgical centers at Maria Laach and Bueron Abbeys), a vast experiential knowledge of mystical prayer (her favorite times of the monastic day were the two hours of silent contemplative meditation), and a wide compassion for others...

...RELIGIOUS BOOKNOTES T he relationship of Chnstian belief to the classical tradition of Greece and Rome has been the subject of intense scholarly interest since at least the time of Adolf Von Harnack Scholars of the stature of Arthur Darby Nock and Norm Cochrane studied this problem in order to clarify this basic issue Did classical culture somehow cloud the punty of the gospel or was it a vehicle for the clarification of the gospel message7 In his Gifford Lectures, Pehkan again takes up this question (the very title of his book pays tribute to Cochrane's earlier work) in a manner which can only be described as magisterial Pehkan's book has a very precise focus He examines in close detail the fourth-century Greek Christian wnters known as the Cappadocians with this question in mind How did these wntChristianity and Classical Culture, by Jaroslav Pehkan, Yale University Press, $40, 368 pp...

...Interestingly enough, Honecker is the same professor who failed (') Karl Rahner for being too "Kantian" in his reading of Thomas Rahner had wanted to work with Heidegger (whose seminars he followed) but did not think that the master wanted a Jesuit student under his tutelage The irony, of course, is that Rahner went back to Innsbruck, banged out a quick thesis in theology, and went on to teach and become one of the best known theologians of the century Ofelix culpa...

...it should prove to be an estimable vade mecum for those who would like to have a handy meditation text I have kept this volume on my desk, reading the homilies in a nonsystematic fashion (most are just a few pages long) and found them deeply satisfying because of Rahner's capacity to combine deep learning with authentically affective spirituality I agree perfectly with the German editor of this volume' It allows us to travel through the church year in the company of a powerful theologian...

...Employing a setup Pehkan used in his estimable five-volume history of the Chnstian tradition, the notes run down the left side of the page in a generous margin that leaves plenty of room for doodling...

...More generally, classical culture provided a vocabulary, a metaphysics, a view of nature and humanity, etc , as a matrix for a deeper understanding of revelation This book has a number of conspicuous merits First, Pehkan has that deep learning which makes it possible for him to read the two Gregones, Basil and Macnna, with limpid intelligence against the background of Greek thought...

...Soon her letters refer to relatives who emigrate, the "troubles" some of them are having in Europe, the tumult against Jews in the streets, etc...

...ers, steeped in classical culture, use the "natural theology" of the Greek tradition in their explication of the faith and to what degree did they cntique that culture in the light of the gospel9 It is almost impossible, in the limited space of these notes, to do justice to the careful, enlightening, and precise way Pehkan answers his twin questions His basic thesis is that all of the Cappadocians find Nicene orthodoxy congruent with the presuppositions of classical "natural theology " Indeed, they use much of it as a foundational presupposition and have no hesitations in showing how this theology becomes ennched, corrected, and enlarged by the revelation of God in Christ Thus, to cite one specific example, classical philology and the classical rules of hermeneutics aided in the interpretation of Scripture, but the metamorphosis of the text into an encounter with the Word of Legends ior their limes Lawrence S. Cunningham God came only through grace-impelled contemplation using the eyes of faith...

...Kung continues at Tubingen as the head of the Institute for Ecumenical Hans Kung: New Horizons for Faith and Thought, edited by Karl-Io$vf Kusckel andtiermann Haring, Continuum, $27.50, 402 pp...

...indeed, in the estimation of many, an honor roll History will have the last word, however...

...Jacobus divides his work according to the liturgical calendar (i e , he begins with the Advent season) and utilizes a catalogue of saints that would have been commemorated during the celebration of the sanctoral cycle...

...Quite a bit but not too much, is the answer Finally, let me praise Yale's press for turning out such a handsome and "reader friendly" volume...

...In August Edith Stein: Self Portrait in Letters— 1916-42, translated bv Josephine Koeppel, OCD , Institute of Carmelite Studies, $12 95, 357 pp 1942, while working on her posthumously published Science of the Cross, she was put m the Westerbork transit camp in Holland along with her sister Rosa and a number of other religious of Jewish origin...

...4950, 391pp...

...However interesting these intellectual crossings are, what one gets from reading the entire correspondence is a sense of foreboding and awful inevitability...

...With him, we do not find the horrible difference which is often to be observed in later theology, between theology and spintual life " The Great Church Year provides a series of homilies preached by Rahner and keyed to the Sundays of the liturgical year as well as a selection for the sanctoral cycle...

...In a letter from that camp she tells her superior that they were to be deported east and requests some clothing and the next volume of her breviary Within a week she was gassed at Auschwitz along with her sister, the other religious, and, as we now know, the Dutch wnter Etty Hillesum who mentions in her own correspondence seeing some nuns at Westerbork The Institute of Carmelite Studies has been publishing Stein's complete works from the German edition of the Edith Stein—Werke The volume of letters reviewed here is the fifth volume m that series It is a heartbreaking work to read, especially as one gets into the letters from the 1930s The letters range from her philosophical correspondence with the Polish phenomenologist Roman Ingarden in the 1920s to the vast correspondence she earned on with a range of persons after she entered the Carmelite cloister in Cologne The letters reflect an authentically saintly mind that was capable of enormous human generosity...

...In a helpful appendix, the editors give a list of further writings for the liturgical year not published in this collection There is also a useful index of Scnpture passages commented on by Rahner While this volume would be of limited use for cnbbing by the harried homilist (who could duplicate Rahner's style1...

...Jacobus de Voragine (? 1230-92) entered the Dominicans as a young man and later became archbishop of Genoa Posterity best remembers him for a vast compilation of the lives of the saints which he wrote around 1260 It was one of the most pop40 ular books wntten in the Middle Ages as the over one thousand surviving manuscripts attest It was translated into English, with additional material added by the printer-editor William Caxton in the late fifteenth century...

...This is not a book, I suspect, that will be read through (at least, I was not tempted to do so), but it is a browser's paradise...

...In practice that meant Kung was declared ineligible to be considered as a professor of Catholic theology In consequence, Kung no longer could be considered a member of the Catholic faculty of theology at the University of Tubingen, Germany (Kung himself is Swiss), or entrusted with the training of future pnests and theologians...

...He works as mdefatigably as ever but, of necessity, on the edges of the "official" church where he remains in the company of a whole roster of recent "dissenters," both rehabilitated and not" Chenu, Congar, DeLubac, Damelou, Teilhard, Murray, Rahner, Curran, etc Quite a roster...

...Since Jacobus also comments on feasts in the temporal cycle, it is interesting to read how he fleshes out details of the Nativity story (e g , about the Magi) or the Passion (eg, on the final fate of Pilate) which he draws from chronicles available to him at the time Given the cost of these volumes (perhaps a more affordable paperback version is to come, it would be desirable), few, beyond professionals, will be tempted to purchase the set Nonetheless, these books belong in any decent reference library that pretends to comprehensiveness in cultural history m general and church history in particular There is nothing "hagiographical" about the life of a modern Carmelite nun whose letters have just been published Her life cuts too close to the horrific side of human expenence Edith Stein (18911942), a student of Edmund Husserl, left a promising career as a philosopher to become a Catholic After teaching in Catholic schools and pedagogical institutes, she entered the Carmelite cloister in Cologne, Germany, only to be transferred to another Carmel in Echt (Holland) because of Germany's racial laws...

...there has been no other full translation into English until Ryan completed his task which he started two generations ago Jacobus de Voragine: The Golden Legend (2 volumes), translated by William Granger Ryan, Princeton Untversitv Press...

...Along the way one gets glimpses of German intellectual life between the wars I was struck, for example, that Martin Heidegger refused to take her on as a member of his seminar since she would later be seeking "Catholic" employment Heidegger refers her to Professor Honecker, the Thomist philosopher...

...The Institute of Carmelite Studies should be congratulated for this well annotated and careful edition of her letters which only enhances the other volumes in this senes on one of the authentic great souls of our century In December 1979, the current pope removed the missio canonica of Hans Kung...

...Research On the occasion of his sixty-fifth birthday many scholars contnbuted to a volume assessing his contributions to theology while pleading that the status of Kung as a Catholic theologian be reassessed That such a reopening of the Kung dossier (#399/57i at the Congregation of the Faith) will happen during the current papacy is more pious wish than a probability given the current atmosphere in Rome...

...I much enjoyed Jacobus's extravagantly wrongheaded etymologies of names, his earnest detailing of miracles, the oddball stories of mistaken sexual identities (the monk Theodore who was, in fact, Theodora), saintly wrestling matches with demons, long excursions that give background to familiar iconographical themes (Catherine's wheel, Barbara's tower), and frustrated executioners who stab, burn, strike, and boil without effect...

...In the early 1930s Edith Stem laconically mentions that she can no longer teach for the sisters because of the racial laws...

...For that reason alone, we are grateful to the translator and to Pnnceton University Press for making these books available...

...Apart from the sheer charm of the stones (along with a whole panoply of miracles that even Jacobus had trouble narrating with a straight face), there is a simple scholarly answer to the question The Legenda Aurea was an encyclopedic sourcebook which subsequent authors and artists drew upon for inspiration and iconographical details as they chronicled/depicted the lives of the saints Much of the standard symbolism that we find today, for example, in the stained glass windows of our churches, comes to us mediated through a long tradition that flows from the compilation made by Jacobus in the thirteenth century With fewer students of literature and art history studying Latm, one foresees that these two volumes will be constantly used in reference libraries...

...The ominous tone increases as mention is made (while Stein is in Holland) of the registration of non-Aryans, of "police permits" and the denial of exit visas, of her pathetic attempt (a month before she died) to transfer to a Swiss Carmel, and, finally, the op41 timistic note from Westerbork saying that "we were given a very friendly reception here" and the possibility that they would be freed "or at least that we may remain here " The footnotes to these letters are studded with the laconic phrase "died at Auschwitz...

...Second, as the acknowledged contemporary master of the history of Chnstian theology, he can prod the reader forward to see how these fourth-century wnters set the agenda for subsequent theological reflection, this is not an antiquanan enterpnse Finally, his basic thesis, stated economically in the subtitle of the book ("The Metamorphosis of Natural Theology in the Chnstian Encounter with Hellenism") is convincing as he shows just how far and with what care the axial figures of fourthcentury Greek theology did and did not use the intellectual culture that was their inhentance "What has Athens to do with Jerusalem1...

...It is an inspinng journey ? 42...

...Newman, in The Apologia, wrote something that was as true in 1865 as it is today "It is individuals and not the Holy See, that have taken the initiative, and given the lead to the Catholic mind, in theological inquiry " Karl Rahner, a sometime theological cntic of Hans Kung, was, despite his forbidding prose style and theological profundity, a deeply committed pastoral theologian who always saw his work as a service to the church In his fifty-two years as a pnest he preached homilies on almost a daily basis and was a gifted retreat master...

...Well, for one thing, he has wntten books on everything from Freud, literature, Mozart, and the coming new millennium to substantial studies of Christianity's encounter with the great religions of the East, a substantial volume on Judaism, and profound reflections on the need for a global ethic These works are scrutinized by a panoply of scholars ranging from Masao Abe on Kung's understanding of Buddhism to a Nobel laureate in physics (Nevill Mott) crediting Kung's On Being a Christian for his own return to religious faith This volume, as befitting one celebrating achievement, is not overly critical of Kung, but it does set out in bold relief the degree to which Kung has asked the tough questions that set much of the past theological agenda for the church and how his restlessly catholic mind sees the issues for tomorrow, the relationship of the world's religions in an age of instant communication and terrifying development, and the critical need for restating Christian belief in terms understandable for this age Currently, Kung is at work on a vast project on Islam which is a compelling area of study for anyone who reads both the newspapers and the signs of the times Those interested in the history of contemporary theology will benefit from a close reading of the contributions in this volume which range from an account of how Kung has been "received" in places as diverse as Latin America, the United States, and Russia to a fascinating report on the tensions between theology in Eastern and Western Europe by Peter Hebblethwaite...

...Why should anyone want to read the Golden Legend today...

...What Rahner said of Aquinas Karl Rahner: The Great Church Year, edited by Albert Raffelt and Harvey Egatu SJ, Crossroad, $2950, 396 pp was surely true of himself...