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DISABILITY, IMPAIRMENT, AND SOME MEDIEVAL ACCOUNTS OF THE INCARNATION: SUGGESTIONS FOR A THEOLOGY OF PERSONHOOD
Author(s) -
CROSS RICHARD
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
modern theology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.144
H-Index - 19
eISSN - 1468-0025
pISSN - 0266-7177
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-0025.2011.01706.x
Subject(s) - personhood , incarnation , normative , context (archaeology) , philosophy , epistemology , theology , history , archaeology
Drawing on insights from the medieval theologians Duns Scotus and Hervaeus Natalis, I argue that medieval views of the incarnation require that there is a sense in which the divine person depends on his human nature for his human personhood, and thus that the paradigmatic pattern of human personhood is in some way dependent existence. I relate this to a modern distinction between impairment and disability to show that impairment—understood as dependence—is normative for human personhood. I try to show how medieval theories of the resurrection of the body can provide, within this context, plausible accounts of what it might be for human persons to be redeemed.