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521 - Nonfoundationalism |
Nonfoundationalism
By John E. Thiel
Minneapolis, Fortress, 1994. 123 pp. $10.00.
Nonfoundationalism is John E. Thiel's contribution to Fortress Press's promising new series Guides to Theological Inquiry. Thiel, Professor of Religious Studies at Fairfield University, Connecticut, presents, in this volume, a thorough analysis of philosophical nonfoundationalism, seen here as an emerging consensus about the epistemic criteria that shape so much of the contemporary American theological scene. Strangely enough, though, the fact that nonfoundationalism is arguably the most important philosophical motif behind various forms of postmodernism is all but ignored in this otherwise fine book. Thiel is, however, very aware of the fact that modernity has not been hospitable to religious faith, let alone to theology, and has often consigned both to the private realm of "opinion." Against this background, he takes seriously the attempt by nonfoundationalist theologians to move beyond even sophisticated forms of theological foundationalism, where theology is irrevocably isolated because it consis-
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tently denies the crucial role of interpreted religious experience in theological reflection.
In looking at the philosophical arguments against "foundations" for knowledge and the implications of these arguments for theological interpretation, the book has three parts. Chapter one introduces the reader to the work of nonfoundationalist philosophers like Sellars, Quine, Rorty, Bernstein, and Davidson and addresses several themes that have been prominent in their work. Chapter two examines the work of nonfoundationalist theologians like Frei, Thiemann, Tanner, and Lindbeck, who have consciously developed nonfoundationalist perspectives for theological interpretation. Finally, chapter three explores some of the critical issues raised by these various attempts to safeguard theology's integrity by developing nonfoundationalist forms of theological reflection.
Thiel's book is, first of all, a careful argument for nonfoundationalism. In the course of this argument, the objectivist expectations of modern knowledge are neatly exposed: Fearful of the ever-receding horizon of an infinite regress of justification, the foundationalist arbitrarily draws a boundary where none could possibly exist and then designates that boundary as the true foundation for all knowledge. Increasing attacks on modernist moves such as these have emboldened a number of contemporary theologians to embrace nonfoundationalism as a critical resource for their own discipline. Nonfoundationalism can, of course, also be coopted by theologians for merely confessional purposes, and, in an attempt to legitimate the theological enterprise, such theologians can generate theologies with little or no resonance with postmodern sensibilities. Using Quine's powerful metaphor of the "myth of the museum," Thiel shows just how easy it can be for theology to identify an objectivist conceptual scheme and then to spread its foundationalist assumptions through a whole network of theological theories.
With this, the difficult challenge for much of contemporary theology is clearly identified: Can a theology with postmodern sensibilities credibly adopt a philosophical position like nonfoundationalism, or is theology already and always doomed to foundationalism and fideism? It does seem that the nonfoundationalist critique of human rationality extends to the most authoritative claims of theology itself, which seems to warrant Thiel's conviction that nonfoundational criticism and theology do, at times, seem to represent completely incompatible modes of argumentation and stances on the possibilities, limitations, and authority of human knowing. Against this background, Thiel's analysis of the episternic complexities of using a metaphor like "foundationlessness" is especially convincing.
What is left unexplored, however, is the complex relationship between theology's radical contextuality and its cross-disciplinary intellectual commitments. For those of us who take seriously both the spiritual integrity of theology and the challenge to identify a plausible and public interdisciplinary location for theology, Thiel's book will be a valuable partner in our attempts to develop not an isolated and relativist nonfoundationalist/
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fideist rationality but, rather, a truly postfoundationalist model of rationality for public theological reflection.
J. Wentzel Van Huyssteen
Princeton Theological Seminary
Princeton, NJ