I argue that Social Trinitarians can and should conceive of God as a group person. They can by drawing on recent theories of group agency realism that show how groups can be not just agents but persons distinct from their members – albeit, I argue, persons of a different kind. They should because the resultant novel view of the Trinity – that God is three ‘intrinsicist’ persons in one ‘functional’ person – is theologically sound, effectively counters the most trenchant criticisms of Social Trinitarianism, and enjoys independent theological support from the biblical notion of ‘corporate personality’.

While reflecting one day on the enormous difficulties that men have in knowing that there is a God, a completely unexpected and unfamiliar question drifted into my purview – perhaps as a kind of ultimate expression of my philosophical frustration. ‘Indeed’, the question asked, ‘can even God know that he is God?’ At first I thought this query merely amusing. ‘Wouldn't it be funny if God cannot know that he is God! But of course he can.’ So my mind wandered on to other things. The question did not leave me alone, though. It insisted that I take it seriously, and the more I did, the more legitimate, complex, and significant it came to seem - and still does.

The flaws in Fish's hermeneutics that were diagnosed in Part I (it is now argued) are consequences of his underlying epistemology. This is a version of anti-foundationalism which claims that facts are the product of interpretation; but a careful study of how this issue is handled by N. R. Hanson and Thomas Kuhn shows that Fish's epistemology is fundamentally unsound. An alternative account of the fact-interpretation relationship is then proposed, and the outline of an objectivist, readerindependent hermeneutics are sketched. This is further developed by showing how a common argument against objectivism (based on the historical situatedness of reason and knowledge) may be refuted.

In his reply to my original essay, David Hunt maintains that I do not discuss how his defence of providentially useful simple foreknowledge violates the Metaphysical Principle. Further, he claims that I try to force him into both affirming and denying the accidental necessity of future events and their role in explaining divine advice-giving. In this response, I attempt to articulate more fully why Hunt's defence of simple foreknowledge implies that dependency loops could unfold. Further, I argue that Hunt's scenario is not tenable, whether one affirms that future events are accidentally necessary or contingent.

Recently, Erik Baldwin and Tyler McNabb have brought Madhva's epistemological framework into active dialogue with Alvin Plantinga's religious epistemology and have argued that individuals within Madhva's tradition cannot make full use of Plantinga's epistemology, according to which, Christian belief resists de jure objections and can also have warrant. While I do not contest this specific claim, I demonstrate that an analysis of Madhva's epistemological framework reveals that this framework has its own resources through which it can resist de jure objections. I address various objections to the rationality of Mādhvic belief and conclude that there are no de jure objections to Mādhvic belief that are independent of de facto objections.

When Christians worship God, their cultic activities display, in widely varying combinations, attitudes of fear, respect, love, trust, awe, deference and obedience. They worship the Lord with all their heart, soul and strength, confessing their own insignificance in comparison to God, yet expressing confidence in the divine mercy which they believe will assist them through the trials of this life, toward a joyful existence beyond the grave. In the liturgical churches, the dominating mood varies according to the tables of feasts and fasts: Christmas and Easter are times for joyful song, brightly coloured vestments and festive activities. Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are days of penitence, sorrow and sombre hymnody. (‘Remember, Oh Man, that dust thou art…’) Throughout the year, the houses of worship are places of bowed heads and lowered voices, of respect and sobriety, and sometimes of veneration for icons and the objects used in worship. The inventory of revered objects varies considerably, as do the activities thought to be appropriate in this connection, ranging from the Low Protestant's respectful handling of the Bible to the High Churchman's prostration before the Monstrance, in the Benediction of the Holy Sacrament. But it is clear that divine worship normally involves reverence and awe and that it usually involves some form of self-abasement (bending the knee before).

This article develops a new argument – The Argument from Atonement – that commonplace Christian assumptions about heaven imply the existence of purgatory. According to this argument, many Christians will die with residual moral guilt due to possessing unfulfilled moral debts towards fellow non-divine humans. Some of these debts cannot be fulfilled immediately after death and are not completely fulfilled or cancelled by Jesus's atoning work. Christians with such debts are fit neither for heaven nor for hell and thus must occupy purgatory until their moral debts are fulfilled.

According to religious fictionalism, a non-believer can participate in religious life by playing a game of make-believe. Considering how games of make-believe build on imagination and pretence, I argue that religious fictionalism requires the non-believing participant to engage in role-playing. Turning to the literature on role-playing games, I demonstrate how religious fictionalism conforms to a qualified definition of such games. I also explore the theoretical consequences of adopting the role-playing perspective, by considering its impact on two key issues concerning religious fictionalism.

In his recent book, Evil and the God of Love,1 Dr John Hick examined various Christian responses to the problem of evil. He traced two related, but in important respects different, paths of thought, which correspond to the two main ways in which the genesis or origin of evil have been understood: either as a capacity for goodness which has not yet been realised (with life, therefore, as a ‘vale of soul-making’), or as an original defect which has vitiated all subsequent life. The former is a ‘minority’ report, which Dr Hick called ‘Irenaean’, since the first person of renown to put it forward in reasonably articulate form was Irenaeus. The latter is the dominant, or majority, report, which Dr Hick called ‘Augustinian’, since Augustine's formulation of it became deeply and profoundly influential in subsequent Christian thought. The differences are not absolute, but the contrasts are clear: ‘Instead of the Augustinian view of life's trials as a divine punishment for Adam's sin, Irenaeus sees our world of mingled good and evil as a divinely appointed environment for man's development towards the perfection that represents the fulfillment of God's good purpose for him.’2

Karl Barth is the foremost modern exponent of the view that Jesus Christ is the decisive, unrepeatable and unsurpassable ‘locus’ of divine revelation, and that consequently it is only by following the way of Christ that we can possibly hope for the ultimate salvation of mankind. This view of Barth's finds expression in the following passage:

Most contemporary general studies on Hinduism affirm the view that this tradition proposes several distinct and independent ways (mārgas) for the attainment of ultimate spiritual freedom (moksha). The methods most often mentioned are karmayoga (the way of detached selfless work), bhaktiyoga (the way of love and worship towards a personal God), and jñānayoga (the way of reason). These studies, however, make little or no attempt to critically assess the assumptions of this thesis or to demonstrate in any convincing detail the relationship between the particularities of a specific method and the attainment of moksha. In spite of the way in which this claim has entered into modern writings on Hinduism, discussion still tends, on the whole, to be vague and generalized.

This brief introduction outlines the main themes and arguments of Roman Faith and Christian Faith.

During June, 1836 Soren Kierkegaard attended a soiree in Copenhagen where the wine flowed, witty conversation bubbled from every corner, and he himself was at the centre of merriment – sparkling, acerbic, enormously witty. After the party he returned home and penned the following lines in his journal:

I have just now come from a party where I was its life and soul; witticisms streamed from my lips, everyone laughed and admired me, but I went away – yes, the dash would be as long as the radius of the earth's orbit…and wanted to shoot myself.

I present an argument for God's existence based on the idea that the possibility of God requires the existence of God as a ground. After setting this argument out, I compare it to other arguments for God, concentrating on an argument from Descartes's Third Meditation. I then address various objections and conclude by setting out a non-theistic version of the argument.