A brilliantly original, profound, witty, provocative book inviting us to look again at the connections between a full-blooded traditional Christology and the work of critical historical scholarship. It is one of the freshest and most stimulating works of theology I have read for a long time. Whether you agree or not, it will make you think harder about the need to see belief in the incarnation of the Word as more than just some kind of judgment on an individual human life.
~Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury
In this highly original and theologically-challenging volume, Paul DeHart returns afresh to an issue that no thinking Christian can afford to ignore: what exactly is the relation between critical historical scholarship about Jesus and the later, conciliar, ‘orthodox’ claims made about the incarnation and the ‘hypostatic union'? This problem consumed generations of liberal theologians, but was then curiously sidelined by conservative ones who relied on ‘revelatory positivism' as an escape from it, or who come to eschew the whole project of theological 'foundationalism.’ Returning afresh to the fray, DeHart redefines the issues at stake in a most ingenious and spiritually releasing way: the link between the two poles of reflection on Jesus must be via a rich theory of ‘signs,’ inflected by a theology of the Spirit that ever undergirds the path to true christological recognition. This is a remarkably rich, wise, and demanding book, full of surprising novelties right to the end.
~Sarah Coakley, Norris-Hulse Professor of Divinity, Emerita, University of Cambridge, and Senior Research Fellow, Australian Catholic University
There are few who are better positioned than Paul DeHart to take theology beyond the mutual exclusivities that have plagued Christology. Long besieged by the Harnackian either/or, DeHart carves out a linguistic path toward a Christology that unites the ontological and the historical. Rather than negating orthodox affirmations of the full divinity of Jesus, DeHart sees the emergence of modern historical consciousness as part of the synergistic response to extend in language and culture the incarnation of the divine Word in the single, historically particular individual, Jesus. Insightful, probing, and daring—DeHart has provided a strikingly original exploration of Christology that is grounded in tradition and attuned to the present.
~Aristotle Papanikolaou, Professor of Theology and Archbishop Demetrios Chair in Orthodox Theology and Culture, Fordham University
Unspeakable Cults is a novel approach to Christology, tapping into the possibilities of conceiving the divinity of Christ in terms of the Word of God as a semiotic reality that unfolds within historical communicative relationships.
~Evan F. Kuehn, Reading Religion
This mature and wide-ranging work, whose character is perhaps best described as the convergence of Yves Congar and a fairly sophisticated account of dialectical theology, tackles a question that has bedeviled Christian theology for two centuries and more: how is it possible "to affirm both classic incarnational thinking and modern historical consciousness as necessarily in tension yet not finally incompatible" (p. 19)? DeHart’s answer articulates a vision of the Christian community’s fundamentally ambiguous and historically bounded exercise in the "constructive, creative, and interpretive work" (p. 115) that drives cultural meaningmaking, centered upon the "pneumatic socialization into the Christian body" that "ultimately enables recognition of Jesus’ humanity as God’s self-vocalization" (p. 117).
~W. Travis McMaken, Lindenwood University, Interpretation: Journal of Bible and Theology
Unspeakable Cults is a superlative contribution to scholarship. It is distinguished by erudition and insight and discloses a theological imagination of the first order. My hope is that it is carefully read, vigorously debated and enjoyed by many.
~Paul Dafydd Jones, Scottish Journal of Theology
