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The Interest of Reason Is to Go Without G od. J acobi's Polemic Against Philosophical Theology
Author(s) -
Jonkers Peter
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
journal of religious history
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.117
H-Index - 13
eISSN - 1467-9809
pISSN - 0022-4227
DOI - 10.1111/1467-9809.12135
Subject(s) - theism , philosophy , revelation , theology , context (archaeology) , meaning (existential) , epistemology , philosophical theology , reductionism , history , archaeology
J acobi's polemics against philosophical theology is meant to show that neither S pinoza, nor K ant, nor F ichte nor S chelling have been able to think G od as a person, that is as a free, intelligent being. In order to elucidate J acobi's position I focus on two less well‐known texts of his, viz., A Few Comments Concerning Pious Fraud (1788) and Of Divine Things and Their Revelation (1811). In the second section I situate two key philosophical theological concepts — deism and theism — against the broader context of modern philosophy. The third section analyses J acobi's polemic against deism, followed by an examination of his positive attitude towards theism and an explanation of the reasons why he, at the end of his life, came to identify theism with deism and extended the negative meaning of the latter term to the former. In the final section, I give an outline of J acobi's alternative idea of philosophical theology.