The Politics Of Salvation

Timothy W. Reardon uncovers thesalvation narrative developed within Luke-Acts and its key themes as they develop within the Lukan presentation of time and space, while being attentive to overcoming a facile compartmentalization of religion and politics. Reardon argues that Luke-Acts offers a complete, holistic, embodied, and theopolitical soteriology, cosmic in scope, that includes both the what and how of salvation. In contrast to recent arguments for some form of vicarious expiation in Luke-Acts, Reardon instead suggests that Luke-Acts' presentation of salvation - though exhibiting elements of multiple atonement models - noticeably takes a Christus Victor form, using Irenaeus's Christus Victorparadigm in particular as a point of comparison. Throughout this book, Reardon repeatedly demonstrates that Lukan soteriology is political, examining Jesus' role as herald of God's kingdom, the salvific space of heaven and the Church, and the mission of salvation. Reardon concludes that Luke-Acts is a theopolitical salvation unfolding in space, aiming toward the reconciliation of all things.

The Politics of Salvation takes a radical stance: it focuses on the significance of the state in the Hegelian system when it is viewed as inspired and motivated by the Christian notion of God. The book thus makes connections between Hegel's political philosophy and his explicit appropriation of Christianity's incarnational mode of thinking. In unfolding the implications of this position, Lakeland shows how Hegel's thought can offer the basis for a non-dualistic account of the human being as religious and political. This conjunction allows for a theology which sees politics as the arena of salvation providing a practical religious outlook relevant to the contemporary world and, in particular, to the commitments of Latin America's liberation theology. The author writes: "If Hegel can be understood (as he frequently expressed himself) as expressing conceptually in speculative philosophy what religion expresses in the form of image and representation, then the covenantal demands of justice and freedom from oppression, the Christian struggle for a free and authentic humanity, and Christian hope in the kingdom of God, will all find their counterpart in the Hegelian system." Thus this Hegelian political theology can "illuminate the connections between the expectation of salvation and the struggle for liberation."

The Politics of Salvation takes a radical stance: it focuses on the significance of the state in the Hegelian system when it is viewed as inspired and motivated by the Christian notion of God. The book thus makes connections between Hegel’s political philosophy and his explicit appropriation of Christianity’s incarnational mode of thinking. In unfolding the implications of this position, Lakeland shows how Hegel’s thought can offer the basis for a non-dualistic account of the human being as religious and political. This conjunction allows for a theology which sees politics as the arena of salvation providing a practical religious outlook relevant to the contemporary world and, in particular, to the commitments of Latin America’s liberation theology. The author writes: “If Hegel can be understood (as he frequently expressed himself) as expressing conceptually in speculative philosophy what religion expresses in the form of image and representation, then the covenantal demands of justice and freedom from oppression, the Christian struggle for a free and authentic humanity, and Christian hope in the kingdom of God, will all find their counterpart in the Hegelian system.” Thus this Hegelian political theology can “illuminate the connections between the expectation of salvation and the struggle for liberation.”

This is the credo and seminal text of the movement which was later characterized as liberation theology. The book burst upon the scene in the early seventies, and was swiftly acknowledged as a pioneering and prophetic approach to theology which famously made an option for the poor, placing the exploited, the alienated, and the economically wretched at the centre of a programme where "the oppressed and maimed and blind and lame" were prioritized at the expense of those who either maintained the status quo or who abused the structures of power for their own ends. This powerful, compassionate and radical book attracted criticism for daring to mix politics and religion in so explicit a manner, but was also welcomed by those who had the capacity to see that its agenda was nothing more nor less than to give "good news to the poor", and redeem God's people from bondage.

Ramsey employs a new method for the analysis of symbolic behaviors to reveal the relations between political and religious engagement and cultural change at a crucial moment in the development of the French nation."--BOOK JACKET.