Dostoevsky on Evil and Atonementthe Ontology of Personalism in His Major Fiction

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Pages:212
ISBN:0-7734-9189-9
978-0-7734-9189-2
Price:$179.95 + shipping
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This work opens a door to a fresh understanding of Dostoevsky's version of the origin of human evil. In his philosophical novels, Dostoevski's view of original conflict and inevitable evil goes far beyond Augustine, Pelagius, and Luther. The authors are the first to build a case for viewing Dostoevsky as a philosophical personalist whose approach to nature provides insight to ecologists. They offer a radically new analysis of the themes of suffering, incarnation, and atonement that will appeal to both psychologists and students of religion and theology. The section on atonement and its relation to the classical theory of tragedy breaks new ground.

Reviews

"Their ability to draw from various sources, philosophy, the history of religion, theology, literature, psychology, and anthropology gives this work an interdisciplinary range seldom equalled in literary analysis. . . . the work is distinctive and credible, a worthy contribution to religious interpretation of literature." - Prof. Louis P. Pojman, University of Mississippi

"This book is an important contribution to the field of philosophy/theology and literature. . . . using personalist process theology as an interpretive guide Kraeger and Barnhart give us a sensitive and insightful reading of Dostoevsky's view of evil and atonement."-- Prof. Thomas O. Buford, Furman University

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements

Chapter I. The Laboratory of the Soul

Chapter II. Three Views of the Origin of Sin

Chapter III. Karamazovism: A Curse and A Blessing

Chapter IV. Original Conflict: A Broader View of Sin

Chapter V. Freedom, Suffering, and Love: The Fruit of Original Conflict

Chapter VI. Inevitable Suffering and the Unifying Power of Love

Chapter VII. Sacrifice, Tragedy, and Atonement

Chapter VIII. Beyond Anselm and Abelard

Chapter IX. Incarnation and Personalism

Chapter X. The Double Incarnate

Chapter XI. Theodicy and the Divine Abyss

Chapter XII. Is Everything Permitted?

Works Cited

Index

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