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A Community of Love? Jesus as the Body of God and Robert Jenson's Trinitarian Thought
Author(s) -
Burgess Andrew
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
international journal of systematic theology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.149
H-Index - 13
eISSN - 1468-2400
pISSN - 1463-1652
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-2400.2004.00135.x
Subject(s) - philosophy , personhood , incarnation , phenomenology (philosophy) , doctrine , converse , objectivity (philosophy) , epistemology , subjectivity , theology
This article is a critical engagement with Robert Jenson's trinitarian thought as shaped by his description of Jesus as the body of God. Jenson develops his doctrine of God's personhood using a phenomenology of spirit and body, subjectivity and objectivity, with an emphasis on the incarnation as the event in which God takes on embodiment and thereby becomes a personal agent. However, it is shown that Jenson's construction prevents proper development of the threeness of God, and that his thought finally implies modalism. In particular, Jenson's attempt to describe the internal relations of God as ‘mutual, loving, converse’ founders on his overdeveloped phenomenology of personhood.