The present project proposes the eschatological nature of Christian hope as a bridge to cross the ugly ditch dividing contemporary conceptions of theology and ethics. This is accomplished through a synthetic examination of eschatological hope by means of a critically-reformulated conception of virtue theory. This project is synthetic in that it draws upon specific insights from diverse dialogue partners, including: Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin, Stanley Hauerwas, James McClendon, Jurgen Moltmann, and Paul Ricoeur. This project is critical in that it sifts the respective contributions of the dialogue partners through an evangelically-charged canonical-linguistic hermeneutic. The desire is to overcome the contemporary bifurcation of theology and ethics by developing constructive theological and ethical links through a conception of spesiential virtue.;The ultimate intent of the project is, therefore, threefold: (1) to afford some conceptual biblical-theological clarity with regard to the role and content of eschatological hope in theological methodology and prolegomena; (2) to examine the potential for the theological virtue of hope to fund and to govern a distinctively Christian virtue theory; (3) constructively to propose the concept of hope as a means of bridging the contemporary divide between theology and ethics, and thus serve to critically engage contemporary hucksters of hope through a thoroughgoing redemptive-historical, eschatologically oriented Christian worldview.;After locating this modern bifurcation, the next two chapters consist of an examination of eschatological hope. Specifically, chapter 2 observes hope in the context of theological and philosophical articulation, particularly the "eschatological turn" of the twentieth century. Alternatively, chapter 3 considers eschatological hope from a biblical-theological framework, examining the content, locus, and form of eschatological hope. Chapter 4 investigates hope with reference to the virtue tradition. Initially exploring its current function as a discrete theological virtue, the chapter assesses the prospect of hope for reinterpreting the substructure of a Christian virtue theory. Several constructive proposals are offered to re-envision a habitus of Christian hope within a theodramatic perspective. Finally, chapter 5 turns to bridge the dogma/praxis divide by employing spesiential virtue in several preliminary case-studies by suggestively considering the implications of this proposal in a variety of practical laboratories.
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