Linkage: What Randal wants for Christmas

Philosophical theologian Randal Rauser has been blogging as the Tentative Apologist. This year, for Christmas, he says he’s hoping for “a coherent account of the incarnation“. In other words, he wants a way of understanding the incarnation doctrine which is apparently consistent. Will he get it? Word has it that the elves are working overtime on this request, as Rauser has been a very good boy.

But seriously, I’m a big fan; he’s doing philosophical theology for the masses, something we’ve tried to do here, and he does it well, in short, clear, but potent posts. He disses mystery cop-outs. He holds his nose at the qua-dodge (“reduplication”). In the latest posts, he is beginning to grapple with a “two minds” approach. Check it out.

Small complaint: in the qua post, he asserts that a “nature” in christology is a universal, a mere property or set of properties. It is pretty clear that a lot of the ancient disputants instead held Christ’s two “natures” to be concrete particulars, in our current lingo. Nor is it clear where Chalcedon comes down on this. On this, a place to start is Alvin Plantinga’s “On Heresy, Mind, and Truth”, Faith & Philosophy 16.2, April 1999.