Historical Knowledge: A Response to Hal Childs

In his book,The Myth of the Historical Jesus and the Evolution of Consciousness, Hal Childs undertakes to do something which is probably impossible. He wishes to show that my reconstruction of the historical Jesus is positivistic without becoming positivistic himself in his own reconstruction of the historical Crossan, a work which, unfortunately for him but fortunately for me, is still very much in process. Here I only use, as he does, publications up to 1995. That means, for example, that I do not cite either The Birth of Christianity or my recent memoir A Long Way from Tipperary. I discuss Hal's dissertation under three headings, moving from the less to the more fundamentally important.     

An Appreciation of Hal Childs' Critique of Historical Jesus Research

Biblical scholars have been exceedingly slow to grasp the implications of the Heisenberg principle, namely, that the observer is always a part of the field being observed, and disturbs that field by the very act of observation. In terms of the interpretive task, this means that there can be no question of an objective view of Jesus as he really was. Objective view; is itself an oxymoron; every view is subjective, from a particular angle of vision. We always encounter the biblical text with interests. We always have a stake in our reading of it. We always have angles of vision that can be helpful or harmful in interpreting texts. Historical writing does not treat reality; it treats the interpreter's relation to it, according to Brian Stock. All history, said the poet Wallace Stevens, is modern history. And historical criticism is a form of criticism of the present, according to Walter Kasper. All that is true, but only partially. For historical criticism can still help us recover an understanding of that past that holds out to us present meaning.     

A Review of Jesus: A Psychological Biography

Capps's book uses historical, sociological, and psychological methods to probe the personal identity and self-understanding of Jesus. This reviewer suggests that historical, sociological, and psychological methods are modes of discourse that are modern forms of myth. Myth is understood as any narrative form that is used, and/or taken for granted, as a way of self-understanding and understanding the world. These disciplines are useful critical tools with which to explore the text and its world, but they do not guarantee knowledge about the past. As modern modes of discourse they create narratives (i.e., myths) about the past, that for us are preferred epistemological pathways. Jesus Christ is the ultimate model of the God-person relationship in the Christian west. Therefore, any serious attempt to render a realistic portrait of Jesus using contemporary modes of describing reality has the possibility of effecting a profound transformation of the images of God and Jesus. This then can transform our own relationship with God. The value of Capps's book is not in any knowledge it might give us about Jesus, but in the transformation it can effect within the reader, and the author, of central religious images. Psychoanalytic and developmental theories are limited in their explanatory effectiveness because they are materialistic and personalistic (reductive). The analytical psychology of Carl Jung and the archetypal psychology of James Hillman are proposed in order to add a transpersonal dimension to Capps's approach to the personality of Jesus.     

Revisiting the Myth of the Historical Jesus and the Evolution of Consciousness

Hal Childs has written a solid, subtle, and courageous evaluation of the state of Jesus scholarship, focusing on a critique of the work of John Dominic Crossan. The impact of the fact that the scholars in this field are functioning within the limitations of Cartesian epistemology and ontology is addressed throughout this work, but in a subtle and respectful manner. More directly addressed is the fact that the historical Jesus cannot be discovered solely from that perspective; it requires what Childs terms a fundamentally hermeneutic, archetypal and psychological approach (2000, p. 2). The term historical is in quotes because Childs carefully distinguishes the object of the study from what we like to think of as scientific knowledge.     

A Psychological Biography for Jesus: Responding to Donald Capps'

Don Capps employed a Freudian Model and current biblical criticism models of Crossan, Borg, and others to evaluate the biblical data regarding the person and self-concept of Jesus of Nazareth. This article points to some vulnerabilities for serious criticism inherent in Capps's model and suggests the necessity of a wider range of psychological models for screening the data available on Jesus' development as a person in order to draw conclusions about his nature and motivations. Capps concludes that Jesus was a melancholic personality who was at odds with his society because he and his family were defamed regarding his problematic birth story, resulting in the violent symbolic action of cleansing the temple, thus expressing his arrival at self-confidence and self-affirmation.     

A Critical Evaluation of Hal Childs' The Myth of the Historical Jesus and the Evolution of Consciousness

The purpose of Childs' book an is integration of historical criticism and analytical psychology. I share Childs' interest in analytical psychology and his concern about the way historical criticism is practiced within the Jesus Seminar. However, I consider his proposed integration to be neither necessary nor desirable, particularly if integration really means amalgamation. Rather than adopting the concerns of analytical psychology, the historical critic would do well to emulate the procedures and rules of evidence of the secular historian.     

Spirituality,Culture and Mental Health: Prospects and Risks for Contemporary Psychology of Religion

This paper asks whether: (1) psychology of religion is doing what it is supposed to do, (2) the contemporary psychological attention to religion and spirituality is perhaps of a transgressive nature, and (3) conceptualizations of spirituality in psychological publications are biased. It makes a plea for phenomenologically well-informed research on real forms of religion and spirituality, from a perspective that is as broad as psychology at present has become, with due regard for both the cultural make-up of the phenomena and the unavoidable limits of psychologists' professional competence.     

Psychology of Religion: What One Needs to Know

This essay is an introduction to systematic nonsectarian psychology of religion—its nature and scope, and its history. Among major issues, the study of motivation for being religious and stages of religious development are discussed, as well as counseling and psychotherapy. I summarize current trends.     

心理学的历史编纂学：后现代主义的挑战

后现代主义思潮深刻影响了心理学史的研究与写作。传统的心理学历史编纂学接受真理的符合论,认为心理学的发展史是一维的和历时的。它习惯于在心理学的发展史中寻找某些“中心”或“标志”,并假定了不同的国家和民族、不同历史时期的心理学所面对的是同一主题。但是后现代主义的心理学历史编纂学强调了历史的社会建构特性,认为心理学史叙述的并非一种“客观实在”,而是史学家的一种话语建构。后现代主义的心理学历史编纂学使得心理学史家更明确的意识到历史知识的主观性,有助于心理学史家认识历史研究中的价值和意识形态问题,正视文化视角造成的认识差异,因而是有着积极意义的     

Crossan on the Couch, Along with the Rest of Us: Part One: The Silhouette of a Jesus Scholar from the Perspective of Psychological Realism as Developed by Hal Childs

This article is the first of two by the present author exploring Hal Childs' path-breaking book, The Myth of the Historical Jesus and the Evolution of Consciousness. Its purpose is to elaborate on Childs' analysis of historical Jesus research from the perspective of psychological realism. Childs uses the extensive corpus of John Dominic Crossan as a case study on historical Jesus research, advancing the claim that as an historian, Crossan is a closet positivist. Examining the roots of positivism in the thought of René Descartes in the seventeenth century, the article sets forth the theoretical objections Childs raises to Crossan's approach, using the resources of contemporary historiography, the analytical psychology of C. G. Jung, and the phenomenology of Martin Heidegger. The article concludes with a hint of Childs' proposal of a new paradigm for a psychologically realistic approach to the search for the historical Jesus.     

Interfaith Relations in the United States: Toward a Multilevel Community Psychology Approach

Interest in religion within the field of community psychology has steadily emerged within the last three decades. This interest has focused almost exclusively on the social benefits of religion, glossing over the often‐contentious nature of religious life and the ways in which religious individuals and institutions can disrupt healthy human and community development. Considering the recent surge of interfaith conflicts and discriminatory practices targeting religious minorities in communities across the United States, it is imperative that community psychologists begin to examine relevant trends in interfaith relations and potential directions for action research and intervention. This paper serves as the beginning point of just such an examination, proposing a multilevel model for addressing the microsystemic, mesosystemic, and macrosystemic levels of interfaith phenomena. More specifically, I present interfaith contact, congregation‐based community partnerships, and theological belief systems as particularly relevant to interfaith community research and intervention. Finally, I detail an interfaith organization that embodies these dimensions of interfaith relations and provides a concrete example of how a multilevel action research model may be effectively employed. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

美国宗教心理学研究的历史、现状与问题

在回顾美国宗教心理学发展历史的基础上,分析了美国宗教心理学研究的现状,并从中揭示出美国宗教心理学研究存在的问题。美国的宗教心理学经历了兴起、衰落、复兴的曲折发展过程。宗教观念、宗教体验、宗教行为系美国宗教心理学研究的基本维度,宗教同人格和心理健康的关系在美国宗教心理学研究中处于突出地位。两支研究队伍（心理学背景的宗教心理学研究者和宗教学背景的宗教心理学研究者）的分歧及心理学取向的研究者在研究方法方面的分歧,是美国宗教心理学研究值得重视的问题。     

My Soul to Take: A Phenomenology of the Struggle for an Authentic Gay Spirituality

This phenomenological study explored the “coming‐out” experience of 7 gay men who were significantly influenced by conservative Christianity in their formative years and who are living as “out” gay men. Four commonalities were revealed in their experience of this phenomenon: (a) a realization and acceptance of their gay identity, (b) a reckoning that action was required, (c) a rejection of the oppressive religious authority in their lives, and (d) a reorientation in their pursuit of a healthy spirituality. The study includes a review of the relevant literature and recommendations to counselors in addressing the unique needs of spiritually oriented lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning individuals.     

Religion,Health, and the Psychology of Religion: How the Research on Religion and Health Helps Us Understand Religion

An increasing replication of studies find a correlation between religious belief and practice and mental and physical health and longevity. This paper discusses some of the implications of this research for the ways in which religion might understood psychologically. Most interpretations of this data focus on the presence of one or more mediating variables. This paper argues that the presence of these mediating factors helps us understand more precisely some of the ways in which religion actually does impact on human life and in what the psychological uniqueness of religion actually consists.     

Religious factors in moral decision-making: Towards an integrated,socio-cultural,developmental, model

Abstract

For far too long, developmental approaches in the psychology of religion have paid insufficient attention to the richness and variety of social and cultural factors in human development and their relationship to religious belief, practice, belonging, identity, and world views, and often, related framing of spiritual questions, concerns, and disciplines. If scholars in the psychology of human development and psychology of religion have offered critical appraisals of the shortcomings of the neo-Piagetian, cognitive-developmental models that have dominated the scientific literature, and offered promising contributions and needed correctives to the omissions of cognitive-developmental approaches, the field is still in need of an integrated, socio-cultural developmental approach to human development and religious functioning. In this article we propose one way of moving toward a more integrated approach in these fields, with special attention to the advantages of such an effort in the study of religious elements in moral decision-making and moral development.     

Studying the specificity of spirituality: lessons from the psychology of religion

Psychological research on spirituality need not start from scratch: the psychology of religion provides substantial knowledge and experience that can be drawn on when psychologists want to do research on spirituality. Spirituality, while certainly not identical with religion or religiosity, is a human phenomenon to which many methodological insights from the study of religion may be applied, although it is also a domain where many mistakes from the history of the psychology of religion are likely to be repeated. After presenting some thoughts on the conceptualization of spirituality, and reflecting on the type of psychology required to do research on spirituality, the paper points out some hidden agenda's in the psychologies of religion and spirituality. Focusing on and keeping in mind the specificity of spiritual conduct, the paper discusses a number of practical aspects of empirical research on spirituality.     

Some contributions of a psychological approach to the study of the sacred

ABSTRACT

This paper examines some of the contributions psychology is making to the study of the sacred and its role in human functioning. The focus here is not on the ontological reality of the sacred, but rather perceptions of the sacred. We suggest that psychological theory and research on this topic offers: a clarification of the meaning of the sacred; new knowledge about sanctification – the process through which people come to perceive the sacred in daily life; a response to criticisms about the scientific study of the sacred; a sharper perspective on the meanings of religion and spirituality; a method for measuring sanctification; knowledge about the ways perceptions of the sacred predict important aspects of human behavior, and; an understanding of the sacred as a product of psychological, social, institutional, cultural, and situational forces. We conclude that the sacred represents a vital phenomenon of interest for religious and spiritual study.     

关于心理学历史编纂学的方法与原则

历史编纂学是研究历史的方法和原理。心理学历史编纂学探讨的是心理学史的编纂方法和原则。这些原则包括:1)描述对反思;2)客观性对主观性;3)现在主义对历史主义;4)内在史观对外在史观;5)伟人说对时代精神说。     

Original Sin and the Hermeneutics of Charity: A Response to Gilbert Meilaender

Looking for a way to read the classic texts of Christian antiquity without treating them either as if they were written yesterday or as if they were archeological artefacts, the author endorses Meilaender's endeavor to develop the insights of Augustine in the modern context. He nevertheless suggests that a different way of drawing the analogy between sex and eating would better capture Augustine's distinctive way of joining theology and ethics and would enable a more vigorous defense of Augustine against modern critics of his treatment of sexuality.