Theology of Paul Tillich

THEOLOGY OF PAUL TILLICH (IST 3010), Spring 2017

Class Sessions: Thursdays, 8:30 a.m.-12:00 p.m.

Professor: Dr. Michele E. Watkins, Ph.D

Email: mwatkins@iliff.edu

Consultation- By email or scheduled appointment

Course Description

This course provides an introduction to the systematic theology of Paul Johannes Tillich (1886-1965). It explores the content and form of Tillich’s theological method and his unique contribution as a Christian existentialist. Key considerations of Tillich throughout the course include 1) his personal theological formation 2) the content and form of Tillich’s theology and method as shaped within the historical, religious, and cultural context of Nazi Germany to the McCarthyism, and 3) the relevance of Tillich as a conversation partner for thinking theologically about the contemporary intersections of theology and culture.

Course Objectives

Upon completion of this course, the student should be able to:

1. Identify and describe key structural features of Paul Tillich’s theory of religion and method of theological interpretation
2. Articulate the extent to which Tillich’s theory and method enabled him to be provide a sound analysis of culture and interpretation of the human experience
3. Apply Tillich’s theology, method, and cultural analysis to contemporary socio-cultural and theological issues

Required Texts

Paul Tillich, On the Boundary: An Autobiographical Sketch . Scribners, 1966.

Russell Manning, Cambridge Companion to Paul Tillich , Cambridge University Press,

Stephen G. Ray, Jr. “An Unintended Conversation Partner: Tillich’s Account of the Demonic and Critical Race Theory,” International Yearbook for Tillich Research.

Volume 9, Issue 1, 63–78.

Mark Taylor, Paul Tillich: Theologian of the Boundaries . Fortress Press, 1992.

Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology , Volumes 1, 2, and 3. University of Chicago Press,

1951, 1957, 1963.

_____. The Protestant Era . University of Chicago Press, 1948.

_____. The Courage to Be . Yale University Press, 1952.

Francis Ching-Wah Yip. Capitalism as Religion? A Study of Paul Tillich’s

Interpretation of Modernity. Harvard Theological Studies No. 59. Harvard

University Press.

Course Requirements:

• Regular class attendance and reading that is complete, careful and on schedule are essential for this seminar. Notice that the required texts vary in length. By planning ahead, you will be able to keep up with the reading and be well prepared each Tuesday to participate in the discussion.
• To help promote lively, meaningful exchange, each student is expected to complete the required readings and write a Weekly Talking Paper.

Guidelines for the Weekly Talking Paper

1. Connect the text with your real-life context by sharing a brief free-write of a place where you resonate with an aspect of this scholar’s life and a counterpoint of contextual (socio-political-cultural-economic) controversy.

2. Imagine Tillich or respective thinkers vigorously explaining his/her/their contribution to the study of theology and ethics, values, norms and/or taboos with a clear, strong statement, beginning “Considering my scholarship from the past that still bears relevance for today, I …”

3. In response to this person’s contribution to the field of study, imagine yourself as a critical reader questioning the meaning and merit of this work, beginning “But …”

4. List three significant images, words, and/or concepts in this text that stand out

in your mind signaling this person’s contribution to a) investigating contestable

issues, b) correcting previous data, and/or c) acquiring new knowledge.

5. Summarize an theological and or ethical issue, problem, question or controversy

in the required reading that genuinely interests you.

5. Restore a religious symbol of conscientization and/or create a new ritual of annunciation and celebration (i.e. a cinquain, painting, drawing, textile art, photography, music, poetry, sculpture, fiction, essay, dance, drama, political cartoon, etc.) that uncovers the lost voice of a woman/person of color/queer/disabled/underclass in your existential context.
6. Draft a comprehensive, one-two sentence metatheological problem (what/how/why) of a contestable issue emerging from the readings that genuinely interest you in the form of a question. With whom do you cast your lot in writing this metatheological problem ? What responsibility do you feel to this audience of accountability?
7. Submit your one-sentence metatheological problem on the Canvas discussion forum for your peers and the Conversant to view the day before class.

SEMINAR PROCEDURES

Each student will have the opportunity to lead class discussion as a CONVERSANT. Conversants have the primary responsibility of planning discussion for the seminar. They will formulate these plans on the basis of their own reading of the material and after studying the metatheological problems/questions submitted that week by all the other seminar members. Conversants will study these metatheological problems/questions, looking for ways to include them in the seminar by ordering and combining them in various relations. In other words, the seminar discussion is to be constructed out of materials provided by seminar members' questions .

At the seminar itself, conversants may make brief introductory remarks to set the stage for our conversation. In fact, I encourage conversant to offer, in these introductory remarks, some brief orienting thoughts about how seminar members interrogated and assessed the week’s readings. Nevertheless, long discourses or summaries by conversant should be avoided . The aim at each seminar is well-orchestrated conversation, deliberately exploring key questions and issues. Always presume that seminar members have done the readings and hence do not need summaries. I will serve as moderator for each seminar, and periodically provide short lectures.

All seminar members will submit their QUESTIONS to the conversants and to the professor , by noon, the day before the seminar in the Canvas Discussion Forum . Conversant will, then, gather these questions the day before the seminar, study them carefully, then sometime before the seminar create an agenda for our seminar discussion. It is usually helpful for the conversant to bring a one page outline of the discussion as they envision it. Usually it is helpful to include your seminar members’ questions within the outlined agenda you have constructed.

The questions submitted by each seminar member should be brief, crisp, clearly articulated metatheological problem/questions. Make sure your question has a clear, crisp, “sharp” edge to it.

You may formulate your questions out of your sense that the author is unclear on a matter, because of your bafflement concerning an issue, or simply because you want to hear the seminar examine a particular theme or topic related to the reading.

Here are further examples of the kinds of questions seminar members may ask:

1) Clarification - seeking greater clarity about the nature of a given writer's position, about connections between readings, or about issues that continue from seminar to seminar.

2) Critique - identifying and briefly developing weaknesses you perceive in an assigned text.

3) Implication - exploring the implications for cultural critique, theology or something else, which you see generated by the assigned reading of the week.

SPECIAL ADMONITION: Your questions are the material from which the conversant will shape the seminar dialogue of the week. So complete your reading promptly, and please submit questions regularly and on time by noon, the day before seminar in the Canvas Discussion Forum (this means, almost always by noon on Wednesday).

2) CRITICAL LOG (which I differentiate from a "journal") during and about your reading. "Journals and journaling" have often been used in many courses. In this class, a more rigorous form of that is the main requirement, beyond the above-mentioned points. I want members of this course to have the opportunity to read carefully and thoroughly, to make valuable notes, and to preserve the intellectual and other insights you have along the way of this course.

Below are the criteria for a good Critical Log. These constitute the major criteria by which I grade the logs. Fulfillment of each criterion will enable your Critical Log to have the important dimension that I list in bold for each point. Each of the criteria below is differently weighted. NOTE: "Substance" and "Critique" are the two most important, most point-worthy criteria . 45 points make up the topmost grade on the Logs. As percentage of the total semester grade, the Critical Log counts 45 percent.

• Signs that entries are made regularly, such that I can see development over time in the log. (5 points)
• Signs that the main points, structure and argument ofthe materials read are noted and carefully being preserved. (12 points)
• Signs of your own critical engagement with the material, i.e. that in addition to reading and understanding well, you are able to question it, challenge it, and say why you agree or disagree with the material. (12 points)
• Signs that you are reflecting on the implications of the material for other issues, for various contexts, for your life and/or others. (8 points)
• Signs of creativity, i.e. carefully crafted written notes, (these tob can be creative) also, outlines, charts, graphs, sketches, painting, etc. (8 points)

EVALUATION:

Weekly Talking Paper: 35%

Conversant/Panel Participation 20%

Critical Log: 45%

COURSE SCHEDULE SPRING 2017

March 30 ^th Introduction to the Course

Christian Existentialism

Tillich at a Glance

April 6 ^th Dialectical Theology, Ontology & the Prophetic

Conversant: Molly

Tillich, On the Boundary, p. 13-67, 74-90

Taylor, Paul Tillich: Theologian of the Boundaries, p. 11-21; 54-66; 95-104

Yip, Capitalism as Religion?, p. 1-34

April 13 ^th Easter Recess: No Class

The Protestant Church & the Prophetic

Tillich, The Protestant Era, 161-181; 327-352

Taylor, “Tillich’s Ethics: Between Politics and Ontology,” in Manning

The Cambridge Companion to Paul Tillich, p. 189-206

Tillich, “The Depth of Existence,” in The Shaking of the Foundations, 52-63

http://www.religion-online.org/showc~apter.asp?title=3 78&C=72

April 20 ^th Existential Elements of Identity and Theological Virtue

Conversant:  Jen

Tillich, The Courage to Be (Whole Text)

April 27 ^th Theological Method & Ontology

Conversant: Tamara

Tillich, Systematic Theology Vol. 1, p. xi-xii, 3-68; 211-89

Taylor, Paul Tillich: Theologian of the Boundaries, p. 21-24; 141-162

Tillich, “The Escape from God,”

Available here: http://www .religion-online.org/showchapter.asp ?title=3 78&C=71.

May 4th          Existence, the Fall, and Jesus the Christ

Conversant: Rahdearra

Tillich, Systematic Theology, Vol. 2, p. 3-96; 121-25; 150-180

Taylor, Paul Tillich: Theologian of the Boundaries, p.24-28; 212-232

Tillich, “You Are Accepted,” The Shaking of the Foundations, 153-163

Available here: http://www.religion-online.org/showchapter.asp?title=378&C=84 .

May 11th       CATCH UP- READING WEEK (NO CLASS)

Stephen G. Ray, Jr. “An Unintended Conversation Partner: Tillich’s Account of the Demonic and Critical Race Theory,” International Yearbook for Tillich Research. Volume 9, Issue 1, 63–78.

May 18 ^th Life in the Spirit

Tillich, Systematic Theology, Vol. 3, p. 11-30

Taylor, Paul Tillich: Theologian of the Boundaries, p. 28-34; 233-311

May 25 ^th Tillich & the Liberationist Traditions

Panel A: Lila & Tamara

Rachel Sophia Baard, “Paul Tillich and Feminism,” in Manning, The Cambridge

Companion to Paul Tillich, 273-86

_________. "Original Grace, Not Destructive Grace: A Feminist Appropriation

of Paul Tillich's Notion of Acceptance," Journal of Religion (July 2007)

Alexander C. Irwin, Eros Toward the World: Paul Tillich and the Theology o/the Erotic Fortress, 1991), 121-152, 153-96.

Panel B: Jen & Mallory

Carlyle Fielding Stewart, ill, "The Method of Correlation in the Theology of

James H. Cone," in The Journal of Religious Thought 40 (Fall/Winter 1983-

84): 27-38.

Lecture: “Paul Tillich & Delores S. Williams in Conversation”

June 1 ^st Tillich & Inter-religious Dialogue

Panel C: Nic & Rahdearra

Tillich, "Between Native and Alien Land," and "Retrospect: Boundary and

Limitation," in On the Boundary , 91-98.

Marc Boss, "Tillich in Dialogue with Japanese Buddhism: A Paradigmatic

Illustration of this Approach to Inter-Religious Conversation," in

Manning, A Cambridge Companion to Paul Tillich , p. 254-270.

Jong-chun Park, "The Korean Masses' Quest for a Theonomous

Society," in Park, Paul Tillich's Categories for the-Interpretation

of History:- -- An Application to the Encounter of Eastern and

Western Cultures . p. 224-247

Young-ho Chun, ."The Trinity in Tillich and Its Implication for Inter-

Religious Dialogue," Trinity and/or Quaternity-Tillich’s

Reopening of the Trinitarian Problem . Eds. By Gert

Hummel and

Doris Lax. Beitraege des IX Internationalen Paul-Tillich

Symposiums Frankfurt/Main 2002. (Muenster: Lit Verlag,

2004), p. 47-56