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Peer-Review Record

The Death of God as a Turn to Radical Theology: Then and Now

Religions 2024, 15(8), 918; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15080918 (registering DOI)

by Philipp David

Reviewer 1: Anonymous

Reviewer 2:

Jeffrey W. Robbins

Religions 2024, 15(8), 918; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15080918 (registering DOI)

Submission received: 28 February 2024 / Revised: 25 July 2024 / Accepted: 25 July 2024 / Published: 29 July 2024

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Heretical Religiosity)

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Interesting, thoughtful and by and large well-written, the primary strength of this article lies in the rich genealogy that it provides of the 20^th century Death of God movement in theology, alongside the author's observation of its recent emergence as a counter-fundamentalist position in the early 21^st. Its exposure of suppressed lines of thought and less celebrated influences on this movement (especially those emerging out of contemporary German theological debates) is deeply interesting and should be of significant relevance to readers in the Anglosphere.

In addition, the author’s point that Protestant theology has generally failed to engage with the idea of the Death of God as a ‘genuine signature of modernity’ and thereby provide an opportunity for religious reform is, by and large, well made.

However, this claim I think is somewhat overstated. In this regard, there were some noticeable absences in the genealogy offered – most noticeably that of the radical, Nietzsche-inspired, liberal protestant theology of Don Cupitt at Cambridge and his Sea of Faith movement. Also absent is any mention of the influence of the Death of God motif on broadly Catholic theological reflection, in the work of Vattimo most notably, but also on those high church Anglicans who, influenced by Cupitt, viewed the post-metaphysical world announced by the Death of God as opening up new vistas for orthodox forms of politically radical theological reflection; most famously here the ‘Radical Orthodoxy’ of John Milbank, Catherine Pickstock and Graham Ward.

However, the main difficulty that I had with the paper is the rather rushed character of the argument offered at the end of section 2. There, the argument seems to be that, in the context of the seemingly ‘unexpected resurgence’ of religion at the end of the 20^th century - in this context, in the form of Protestant fundamentalism, with its prosperity gospels and so on - that Radical Theology is now going beyond merely announcing the death of God in its new role of assassin vis-à-vis a God now returned to complicate the standard secularisation narrative. The question here is why a Christian theologian of any kind would not welcome this development – perhaps lamenting its current narrowness and/or excesses, but nonetheless seeing in it the rudiments of a post-secular condition that offers the opportunity for Christianity’s ‘return’ in a form that positions it as a new type of critical resource for understanding the nature of the modern and its pathologies.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Good in the main. One or two sentences are rather poorly constructed and can be read as 'a little too clunky' to the English-speaking reader. But there is nothing here that distorts either the sense or the significance of what is being articulated.

Author Response

For research article

The Death of God as a Turn to Radical Theology: Then and Now

Response to Reviewer I Comments
1. Summary
Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript. I am very grateful for your helpful comments. Please find the detailed responses below and the corresponding revisions/corrections highlighted/in track changes in the re-submitted files.
2. Questions for General Evaluation	Reviewer’s Evaluation	Response and Revisions
Does the introduction provide sufficient background and include all relevant references?	Yes/Can be improved/Must be improved/Not applicable	[Please give your response if necessary. Or you can also give your corresponding response in the point-by-point response letter. The same as below]
Are all the cited references relevant to the research?	Yes/Can be improved/Must be improved/Not applicable
Is the research design appropriate?	Yes/Can be improved/Must be improved/Not applicable
Are the methods adequately described?	Yes/Can be improved/Must be improved/Not applicable
Are the results clearly presented?	Yes/Can be improved/Must be improved/Not applicable
Are the conclusions supported by the results?	Yes/Can be improved/Must be improved/Not applicable
3. Point-by-point response to Comments and Suggestions for Authors
Comments 1: Comments and Suggestions for Authors Interesting, thoughtful and by and large well-written, the primary strength of this article lies in the rich genealogy that it provides of the 20^th century Death of God movement in theology, alongside the author’s observation of its recent emergence as a counter-fundamentalist position in the early 21^st. Its exposure of suppressed lines of thought and less celebrated influences on this movement (especially those emerging out of contemporary German theological debates) is deeply interesting and should be of significant relevance to readers in the Anglosphere. In addition, the author’s point that Protestant theology has generally failed to engage with the idea of the Death of God as a ‘genuine signature of modernity’ and thereby provide an opportunity for religious reform is, by and large, well made. However, this claim I think is somewhat overstated. In this regard, there were some noticeable absences in the genealogy offered – most noticeably that of the radical, Nietzsche-inspired, liberal protestant theology of Don Cupitt at Cambridge and his Sea of Faith movement. Also absent is any mention of the influence of the Death of God motif on broadly Catholic theological reflection, in the work of Vattimo most notably, but also on those high church Anglicans who, influenced by Cupitt, viewed the post-metaphysical world announced by the Death of God as opening up new vistas for orthodox forms of politically radical theological reflection; most famously here the ‘Radical Orthodoxy’ of John Milbank, Catherine Pickstock and Graham Ward. However, the main difficulty that I had with the paper is the rather rushed character of the argument offered at the end of section 2. There, the argument seems to be that, in the context of the seemingly ‘unexpected resurgence’ of religion at the end of the 20^th century – in this context, in the form of Protestant fundamentalism, with its prosperity gospels and so on - that Radical Theology is now going beyond merely announcing the death of God in its new role of assassin vis-à-vis a God now returned to complicate the standard secularization narrative. The question here Is why a Christian theologian of any kind would not welcome this development – perhaps lamenting its current narrowness and/or excesses, but nonetheless seeing in it the rudiments of a post-secular condition that offers the opportunity for Christianity’s ‘return’ in a form that positions it as a new type of critical resource for understanding the nature of the modern and its pathologies. Comments on the Quality of English Language Good in the main. One or two sentences are rather poorly constructed and can be read as ‘a little too clunky’ to the English-speaking reader. But there is nothing here that distorts either the sense or the significance of what is being articulated.
Response 1: Thank you for pointing this out. I agree with your comment. You have seen correctly that there was a gap in the presentation in part II of the drafts of the theology after the death of God, which could lead the reader on a wrong track; I have dealt with these drafts in another publication and have now included a reference in a footnote (68), which I hope does clarify it for you and the readers. I believe that this is a fair consideration without going beyond the scope of the article, which, in view of the rise of evangelical fundamentalism in the USA, aims to highlight one possible approach from a theological perspective and at the same time seeks a connection to the biblical wisdom tradition that wrestles with the question of God’s hiddenness. Page 11, new footnote 69: “This radical leap from the 1960s to the mid-2010s does not overlook the numerous drafts in the Anglo-American world that attempt to think of a theology after the death of God in various approaches, some of which I also discuss in more detail in my study David, Der Tod Gottes als Lebensgefühl der Moderne. As in this article, the main focus of my book is on Protestant theology. I refer by way of example to the deconstructive theology of Mark C. Taylor (ibid. 475–499), the weak theology as a renewal of radical theology in John D. Caputo (ibid. 499–506) and the radical feminist theology of Mary Daly (ibid. 521–529) as well as the Catholic philosopher Gianni Vattimo and his impact on Catholic theology (ibid. 472–474) and the Nietzsche-inspired liberal Protestant theology of Don Cupitt in Cambridge and his Sea of Faith movement (ibid. 540 note 40). Cupitt, who saw the post-metaphysical world heralded by Nietzsche’s cry “God is dead”, interestingly also influenced new views of high church Anglicans in their orthodox designs of political radical theological reflection, such as John Milbank, Catherine Pickstock and Graham Ward. I would like to thank the peer reviewers for this last reference.”
5. Additional clarifications

Once again, thank you very much for reviewing my paper. Best wishes!

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This is a well-supported and documented article that does an admirable job revisiting the radical death of God theology of the 1960s and offers up an original argument linking radical theology with the wisdom tradition of the Hebrew Bible.

The author's coverage of the death of God movement of the 1960s appropriately signals the diversity of thought and its connection with the rise of secularism and post-Holocaust thought. The one strand of thought missing from this coverage is that of Mary Daly and how she connects her radical feminist theology with the death of God. In addition, I am concerned with how the article suggests that the death of God movement lies dormant from the 1960s until the effort to retrieve it with the Peterson/Zbaraschuk edited volume of 2014. This neglects the ways that the Postmodern Deconstructive theologies of Mark C. Taylor, Charles Winquist, Carl Raschke, et.al., made the central claim that the "deconstruction is the hermeneutic of the death of God." Likewise, the author seems to suggest that there is no systematic academic treatment of the movement of radical death of God theology. But this neglects to attend to the various edited volumes that have appeared even before Peterson/Zbaraschuk (e.g., Clayton Crockett's edited volume, "Secular Theology: American Radical Theological Thought" of 2001 and most notably the edited volume by Rodkey and Miller, "The Palgrave Handbook of Radical Theology"). Finally, the single most prominent figure who has renewed attention in the radical theological tradition is John Caputo who has written several original monographs on the subject.

So while I really appreciate the original connection of the wisdom tradition from the Hebrew Bible to the original radical death of God theology, I believe a fairer and fuller accounting of the ways that radical death of God theology lived on beyond the 1960s is in order.

Author Response

For research article

Response to Reviewer II Comments

1. Summary

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript. I am very grateful for your helpful comments. Please find the detailed responses below and the corresponding revisions/corrections highlighted/in track changes in the re-submitted files.

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript. Please find the detailed responses below and the corresponding revisions/corrections highlighted/in track changes in the re-submitted files.

2. Questions for General Evaluation

Reviewer’s Evaluation

Response and Revisions

Does the introduction provide sufficient background and include all relevant references?