Ancient Jewish and Christian scriptures: new developments in canon controversy

Abstract

contains a breadth of experience and expertise. Alberto de Mingo Kaminouchi is a Roman Catholic Redemptorist Brother and a professor in Spain and the United States. Although Catholic social ethics inform the first chapters of the book, its bedrock lies in the thinking of Aristotle. With a rejection of individualistic Enlightenment philosophy we are given, in modern dress, the Aristotelian concepts of Eudaimonia, Aretē, and Philia, which he calls happiness, virtue, and love. What gives this book its distinctiveness is that a breadth of ecumenical scholarship is unfolded with ease. This is facilitated by an excellent translation. The book is in two parts. The first deals with ethical thinking set alongside developments in Form Criticism, Christology, and what Kaminouchi calls ‘the grammar of ethics’. Stretching from Schweitzer to Bultmann, Kaminouchi concludes that what we read in the New Testament is the faith and questions of those who lived and wrote in the times after those who could remember Jesus had died. The second part of the book explores happiness in relation to the Trinity, virtue in relation to the Beatitudes and love expressed in the Summary of the Law. The author states his position early in a way which guides the reader through the chapters. We know where he stands, ‘. . . the cause of the crisis in the Western world is a cultural, economic and political system that has rejected, in the name of individual freedom, the project of a happiness shared with others’. Rejecting a ‘case study’method of doing ethics we are offered a new paradigm of discipleship lived in relation to others and in our local communities. In all later discussions he insists that the starting point is an existential one – echoing but not developing Bonhoeffer – how do I respond to the call of Jesus to live responsibly today? For this philosopher scholar and priest here is a choice for us all – a life of ‘utility’ looking after ourselves or a life of ‘happiness, virtue, and love’ which is only possible when we chose to live a life of discipleship in relation to others in community. He believes emphatically that in rural or urban church settings there is an imperative to work with others of any belief in ways which will develop local identity. This is particularly opportune in multi-congregation parish groupings. For the application of Christian ethics in the modern world Kaminouchi is wide ranging in his choice of sources but relies for a critique of modernity on the Scottish philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre. The book has no index but a useful short bibliography of each of the main writers discussed. Helpfully, the definition of the Christian life which gives Kaminouchi the most satisfaction is ‘faith seeking understanding’.