THOMISM
226of the nature of God and the relationship
between God and the world. The term
was first used by Plato in the Republic
(Book II, Ch. 18). Theology is divided
into two main categories: historical theol-
ogy, wherein one describes the theology
articulated by previous thinkers, and con-
structive theology, wherein one articu-
lates one’s own picture and understanding
of God. See also NATURAL THEOLOGY
and REVEALED THEOLOGY.
THOMISM. See AQUINAS,
THOMAS OF.
TILLICH, PAUL (1886–1965). Tillich is
perhaps the most important Protestant
theologian of the twentieth century. More
appropriately labeled, he is a historical
theologian as well as a philosopher. At
the core of his work is the “method of cor-
relation,” developed in his three-volume
work titled Systematic Theology (1951–
1963). The “method of correlation” com-
bined philosophy and theology by posing
existential questions and then looking to
Christian revelation and its symbols for
the answers to these existential questions.
This method gave theology a more uni-
versal applicability. While this method is
defined in the aforementioned work, his
most popular work is The Courage to Be
(1952).
The Courage to Be discusses the anxi-
ety of the current age, defining the pre-
dominant anxiety of the time as anxiety
of meaningless, which is to say we are
worried about losing all meaning. In
response to this, Tillich proposes absolute
faith as the answer, meaning we accept
the fact that we are not accepted by any-
one or anything. Under this absolute faith,
God is not tied to any particular symbol
of a deity—God beyond the God tied
up in the symbol. With absolute faith,
God beyond God grabs control of us
and gives on the courage to be.
Tillich’s work is highly important in
the field of philosophy of religion. He
defines religion as when the uncondi-
tioned grasps us out of a state of purely
being. The philosophy of religion, for
Tillich, has a problem in that philosophy
cannot define areas closed off to it and
those that need reflection. In response to
this, Tillich discusses the subject / object
relationship, which is a form of condi-
tioned being. In discussing God, we bring
God into our finite world, which is a par-
adox. Philosophy of religion, then, is not
based upon a decision we make regarding
the nature of religion, but about a para-
dox. Now we can experience a critical
moment where we experience the uncon-
ditioned. Tillich’s other works include
The Religious Situation (1932), The Inter-
pretation of History (1936), The Protestant
Era (1948), The Shaking of the Founda-
tions (1948), Love, Power, and Justice
(1955), Dynamics of Faith (1957), Theol-
ogy of Culture (1959), Christianity and the
Encounter of the World Religions (1963),
and Morality and Beyond (1963).