The Spiritual Dimension Religion,

Philosophy and Human Value

Cambridge University Press, 2005
ISBN 0-521-60497-4 (PB); ISBN 0-521-84377-4 (HB)

The Spiritual Dimension offers a new model for

the philosophy of religion, bringing together
emotional and intellectual aspects of our human
experience, and embracing practical as well as
theoretical concerns. It shows how a religious
worldview is best understood not as an isolated
set of doctrines, but as intimately related to
spiritual praxis and to the search for self-
understanding and moral growth. It argues that
the religious quest requires a certain emotional
openness, but can be pursued without
sacrificing our philosophical integrity. Touching
on many important debates in contemporary
philosophy and theology, but accessible to
general readers, The Spiritual Dimension
covers a range of central topics in the
philosophy of religion, including scientific
cosmology and the problem of evil; ethical
theory and the objectivity of goodness;
psychoanalytic thought, self-discovery and
virtue; the multi-layered nature of religious
discourse; and the relation between faith and
evidence

“John Cottingham has followed up his excellent On the Meaning of Life with
an equally fine book. I strongly recommend anyone interested in religion to
read this humane, wide-ranging, judicious and highly suggestive book.”
Leslie Stephenson, Philosophical Quarterly.

“Beautifully written . . . Cottingham articulates, in this fine book, a deeply

attractive . . . account of what it is to be a religious person.”
Fergus Kerr, The Tablet

“Compellingly articulates matters of the first importance.”

Christopher Howse, Daily Telegraph

“There is something of the road to Damascus about this book … It appears to

be the product of [an] awakening, which adds much to its appeal…
Cottingham knows the complaints brought against religion by those who
assume they can see right through it, and is able to address them from the
other side.”
Janet Martin Soskice, Times Literary Supplement
“His book will engage anyone who thinks spirituality is worth talking about -
theist, atheist or agnostic. Clearly and humanely, he lays out the ground upon
which any truly interesting philosophy of religion must be done.”
The Philosophers' Magazine

“Professor Cottingham has pulled off an unusually difficult combination of

lucidity, comprehensiveness both of reference and of issue, common sense
and profundity. There is evident throughout the book a generosity of mind
and a clarity of vision which are quite exemplary.”
Denys Turner, Professor of Religion, Yale University, and former Norris-
Hulse Professor of Divinity, University of Cambridge

“[A] wonderful book … Cottingham not only avoids the traps of superficiality
…but offers ways out of those traps for the rest of us.”
Tim Chappell, Mind. '

As efforts to re-contextualise spirituality within technology and religion are

increasing, Cottingham's scholarly and aptly titled work makes a most useful
contribution to these endeavours … Beautifully written … remarkably clear,
this is an indispensable and timely study … A particular attraction of this
study is the way in which Cottingham appeals to reason to justify his concern
with spirituality … A broadly conceived book, it has much to recommend. It is
rich, laden with insight, and bears careful study.'
Journal of Contemporary Religion '

… this is an original and stimulating work, which will profit specialist and
general readers alike. It is highly recommended.'
Philosophical Investigations

CONTENTS

1 Religion and spirituality: from praxis to belief

1 From analysis to exercise
2 Why praxis must come first
3 The heart has its reasons
4 Trust and the corrections of reason

2 Religion and science: theodicy in an imperfect universe

1 Religion and the standards of inference
2 Are religious claims explanatory hypotheses?
3 The problem of evil and the nature of matter
4 The dust of the earth
5 Detachment, intervention, participation
6 Proof, consistency and faith
3 Religion and value: the problem of heteronomy
1 Submission to God: an obsolete ideal?
2 Autonomy and dependency
3 The metaphysics of value
4 God as source of morality
5 Objectivity and its basis

4 Religion and self-discovery: the interior journey

1 A triangle of tension
2 Psychoanalysis and philosophy
3 Psychoanalytic critiques of religion
4 Two responses to Freud
5 Moral improvement, psychoanalytic reflection,
and the religious quest

5 Religion and language: emotion, symbol and fact

1 Modes of discourse
2 Emotion and layers of meaning
3 The emotional dynamic
4 The importance of layering
5 Meaning and justification

6 Religion and the Enlightenment: modernist

and postmodernist obstacles
1 The stigma of metaphysics
2 The supposed legacy of the Enlightenment
3 Naturalism and contemporary philosophical orthodoxy
4 The religious counter: an unpromising postmodernist repl4
5 Enlightenment and faith

7 Religion and the good life: the epistemic

and moral resources of spirituality
1 What it means to believe
2 Faith and evidence
3 Traces of the transcendent
4 Horizons of knowledge and intimations of the beyond
5 Moral psychology and the cultivation of virtue
6 Dimensions of askesis
7 From psychotherapy to spirituality

8 Religion and pluralism: which spirituality?

1 Recapitulation
2 Which path?
3 Mysticism and the apophatic tradition
4 From mystery to liturgy
5 Distinctive culture and common humanity
6 Images of integration

Bibliography
Index