Not to be confused with Religious studies.

This article is about theology as a science. For Sinéad O'Connor's album, see Theology (album). For the
academic journal, see Theology (journal).

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Theology is the study of religious belief from a religious perspective, with a focus on the nature of
divinity. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries.[1] It occupies itself
with the unique content of analyzing the supernatural, but also deals with religious epistemology, asks
and seeks to answer the question of revelation. Revelation pertains to the acceptance of God, gods, or
deities, as not only transcendent or above the natural world, but also willing and able to interact with
the natural world and to reveal themselves to humankind.

Theologians use various forms of analysis and argument (experiential, philosophical, ethnographic,
historical, and others) to help understand, explain, test, critique, defend or promote any myriad of
religious topics. As in philosophy of ethics and case law, arguments often assume the existence of
previously resolved questions, and develop by making analogies from them to draw new inferences in
new situations.
The study of theology may help a theologian more deeply understand their own religious tradition,[2]
another religious tradition,[3] or it may enable them to explore the nature of divinity without reference
to any specific tradition. Theology may be used to propagate,[4] reform,[5] or justify a religious tradition;
or it may be used to compare,[6] challenge (e.g. biblical criticism), or oppose (e.g. irreligion) a religious
tradition or worldview. Theology might also help a theologian address some present situation or need
through a religious tradition,[7] or to explore possible ways of interpreting the world.[8]

Etymology

Main article: History of theology

The term "theology" derives from the Greek theologia (θεολογία), a combination of theos (Θεός, 'god')
and logia (λογία, 'utterances, sayings, oracles')—the latter word relating to Greek logos (λόγος, 'word,
discourse, account, reasoning').[9][10] The term would pass on to Latin as theologia, then French as
théologie, eventually becoming the English theology.

Through several variants (e.g., theologie, teologye), the English theology had evolved into its current
form by 1362.[11] The sense that the word has in English depends in large part on the sense that the
Latin and Greek equivalents had acquired in patristic and medieval Christian usage although the English
term has now spread beyond Christian contexts.

Plato (left) and Aristotle in Raphael's 1509 fresco The School of Athens

Classical philosophy

Greek theologia (θεολογία) was used with the meaning 'discourse on God' around 380 BC by Plato in The
Republic.[12] Aristotle divided theoretical philosophy into mathematike, physike, and theologike, with
the latter corresponding roughly to metaphysics, which, for Aristotle, included discourse on the nature of
the divine.[13]

Drawing on Greek Stoic sources, the Latin writer Varro distinguished three forms of such discourse:[14]

mythical, concerning the myths of the Greek gods;

rational, philosophical analysis of the gods and of cosmology; and

civil, concerning the rites and duties of public religious observance.

Later usage
Some Latin Christian authors, such as Tertullian and Augustine, followed Varro's threefold usage.[14][15]
However, Augustine also defined theologia as "reasoning or discussion concerning the Deity".[16]

The Latin author Boethius, writing in the early 6th century, used theologia to denote a subdivision of
philosophy as a subject of academic study, dealing with the motionless, incorporeal reality; as opposed
to physica, which deals with corporeal, moving realities.[17] Boethius' definition influenced medieval
Latin usage.[18]

In patristic Greek Christian sources, theologia could refer narrowly to devout and/or inspired knowledge
of and teaching about the essential nature of God.[19]

In scholastic Latin sources, the term came to denote the rational study of the doctrines of the Christian
religion, or (more precisely) the academic discipline that investigated the coherence and implications of
the language and claims of the Bible and of the theological tradition (the latter often as represented in
Peter Lombard's Sentences, a book of extracts from the Church Fathers).[citation needed]

In the Renaissance, especially with Florentine Platonist apologists of Dante's poetics, the distinction
between 'poetic theology' (theologia poetica) and 'revealed' or Biblical theology serves as stepping stone
for a revival of philosophy as independent of theological authority.[citation needed]

It is in the last sense, theology as an academic discipline involving rational study of Christian teaching,
that the term passed into English in the 14th century,[20] although it could also be used in the narrower
sense found in Boethius and the Greek patristic authors, to mean rational study of the essential nature
of God, a discourse now sometimes called theology proper.[21]

From the 17th century onwards, the term theology began to be used to refer to the study of religious
ideas and teachings that are not specifically Christian or correlated with Christianity (e.g., in the term
natural theology, which denoted theology based on reasoning from natural facts independent of
specifically Christian revelation)[22] or that are specific to another religion (such as below).

Theology can also be used in a derived sense to mean "a system of theoretical principles; an (impractical
or rigid) ideology".[23][24]

In religion
The term theology has been deemed by some as only appropriate to the study of religions that worship
a supposed deity (a theos), i.e. more widely than monotheism; and presuppose a belief in the ability to
speak and reason about this deity (in logia). They suggest the term is less appropriate in religious
contexts that are organized differently (i.e., religions without a single deity, or that deny that such
subjects can be studied logically). Hierology has been proposed, by such people as Eugène Goblet
d'Alviella (1908), as an alternative, more generic term.[25]

Abrahamic religions

Christianity

Main articles: Christian theology and Neoplatonism

Further information: Diversity in early Christian theology, Great Apostasy, Nontrinitarianism, Son of God
(Christianity), and Trinity

Thomas Aquinas, an influential Roman Catholic theologian

As defined by Thomas Aquinas, theology is constituted by a triple aspect: what is taught by God, teaches
of God, and leads to God (Latin: Theologia a Deo docetur, Deum docet, et ad Deum ducit).[26] This
indicates the three distinct areas of God as theophanic revelation, the systematic study of the nature of
divine and, more generally, of religious belief, and the spiritual path. Christian theology as the study of
Christian belief and practice concentrates primarily upon the texts of the Old Testament and the New
Testament as well as on Christian tradition. Christian theologians use biblical exegesis, rational analysis
and argument. Theology might be undertaken to help the theologian better understand Christian tenets,
to make comparisons between Christianity and other traditions, to defend Christianity against objections
and criticism, to facilitate reforms in the Christian church, to assist in the propagation of Christianity, to
draw on the resources of the Christian tradition to address some present situation or need, or for a
variety of other reasons.

Islam

The famous Islamic scholar, jurist and theologian Malik Ibn Anas

Main article: Aqidah

Further information: Kalam, List of Muslim theologians, and Schools of Islamic theology

Islamic theological discussion that parallels Christian theological discussion is called Kalam; the Islamic
analogue of Christian theological discussion would more properly be the investigation and elaboration of
Sharia or Fiqh.[27]

Kalam...does not hold the leading place in Muslim thought that theology does in Christianity. To find
an equivalent for 'theology' in the Christian sense it is necessary to have recourse to several disciplines,
and to the usul al-fiqh as much as to kalam.
 — translated by L. Gardet

Some Universities in Germany established departments of islamic theology. (i.e.[28])

Judaism

Sculpture of the Jewish theologian Maimonides

Main article: Jewish theology

In Jewish theology, the historical absence of political authority has meant that most theological
reflection has happened within the context of the Jewish community and synagogue, including through
rabbinical discussion of Jewish law and Midrash (rabbinic biblical commentaries). Jewish theology is also
linked to ethics, as it is the case with theology in other religions, and therefore has implications for how
one behaves.[29][30]

Indian religions

Buddhism

Further information: Buddhist philosophy and Trikāya

Some academic inquiries within Buddhism, dedicated to the investigation of a Buddhist understanding of
the world, prefer the designation Buddhist philosophy to the term Buddhist theology, since Buddhism
lacks the same conception of a theos or a Creator God. Jose Ignacio Cabezon, who argues that the use of
theology is in fact appropriate, can only do so, he says, because "I take theology not to be restricted to
discourse on God.... I take 'theology' not to be restricted to its etymological meaning. In that latter sense,
Buddhism is of course atheological, rejecting as it does the notion of God."[31]

Whatever the case, there are various Buddhist theories and discussions on the nature of Buddhahood
and the ultimate reality / highest form of divinity, which has been termed "buddhology" by some
scholars like Louis de La Vallée-Poussin.[32] This is a different usage of the term than when it is taken to
mean the academic study of Buddhism, and here would refer to the study of the nature of what a
Buddha is. In Mahayana Buddhism, a central concept in its buddhology is the doctrine of the three
Buddha bodies (Sanskrit: Trikāya).[32] This doctrine is shared by all Mahayana Buddhist traditions.

Hinduism

See also: Vedanta, Vaishnavism, Shaivism, and Shaktism

Within Hindu philosophy, there are numerous traditions of philosophical speculation on the nature of
the universe, of God (termed Brahman, Paramatma, Ishvara, and/or Bhagavan in some schools of Hindu
thought) and of the ātman (soul). The Sanskrit word for the various schools of Hindu philosophy is
darśana ('view, viewpoint'), the most influential one in terms of modern Hindu religion is Vedanta and its
various sub-schools, each of which presents a different theory of Ishvara (the Supreme lord, God).

Vaishnava theology has been a subject of study for many devotees, philosophers and scholars in India for
centuries. A large part of its study lies in classifying and organizing the manifestations of thousands of
gods and their aspects. In recent decades the study of Hinduism has also been taken up by a number of
academic institutions in Europe, such as the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies and Bhaktivedanta College.
[33]

There are also other traditions of Hindu theology, including the various theologies of Shaivism (which
include dualistic and non-dualistic strands) as well as the theologies of the Goddess centered Shakta
traditions which posit a feminine deity as the ultimate.

Other religions

Shinto

In Japan, the term theology (神学, shingaku) has been ascribed to Shinto since the Edo period with the
publication of Mano Tokitsuna's Kokon shingaku ruihen (古今神学類編, 'categorized compilation of ancient
theology'). In modern times, other terms are used to denote studies in Shinto—as well as Buddhist—
belief, such as kyōgaku (教学, 'doctrinal studies') and shūgaku (宗学, 'denominational studies').

Modern Paganism

English academic Graham Harvey has commented that Pagans "rarely indulge in theology".[34]
Nevertheless, theology has been applied in some sectors across contemporary Pagan communities,
including Wicca, Heathenry, Druidry and Kemetism. As these religions have given precedence to
orthopraxy, theological views often vary among adherents. The term is used by Christine Kraemer in her
book Seeking The Mystery: An Introduction to Pagan Theologies and by Michael York in Pagan Theology:
Paganism as a World Religion.

Topics

Further information: Outline of theology

Richard Hooker defines theology as "the science of things divine".[35] The term can, however, be used
for a variety of disciplines or fields of study.[36] Theology considers whether the divine exists in some
form, such as in physical, supernatural, mental, or social realities, and what evidence for and about it
may be found via personal spiritual experiences or historical records of such experiences as documented
by others. The study of these assumptions is not part of theology proper, but is found in the philosophy
of religion, and increasingly through the psychology of religion and neurotheology. Theology's aim, then,
is to record, structure and understand these experiences and concepts; and to use them to derive
normative prescriptions for how to live our lives.

History of academic discipline

See also: Divinity (academic discipline)

This article focuses too much on specific examples. Please help improve this article by adding sources
that evaluate within a broader context. (October 2024)

The history of the study of theology in institutions of higher education is as old as the history of such
institutions themselves. For instance:

Taxila was an early centre of Vedic learning, possible from the 6th-century BC or earlier;[37][38]: 140–
142

the Platonic Academy founded in Athens in the 4th-century BC seems to have included theological
themes in its subject matter;[39]

the Chinese Taixue delivered Confucian teaching from the 2nd century BC;[40]

the School of Nisibis was a centre of Christian learning from the 4th century AD;[41][42]

Nalanda in India was a site of Buddhist higher learning from at least the 5th or 6th century AD;[38]:
149 and

the Moroccan University of Al-Karaouine was a centre of Islamic learning from the 10th century,[43] as
was Al-Azhar University in Cairo.[44]

The earliest universities were developed under the aegis of the Latin Church by papal bull as studia
generalia and perhaps from cathedral schools. It is possible, however, that the development of cathedral
schools into universities was quite rare, with the University of Paris being an exception.[45] Later they
were also founded by kings (University of Naples Federico II, Charles University in Prague, Jagiellonian
University in Kraków) or by municipal administrations (University of Cologne, University of Erfurt).

In the early medieval period, most new universities were founded from pre-existing schools, usually
when these schools were deemed to have become primarily sites of higher education. Many historians
state that universities and cathedral schools were a continuation of the interest in learning promoted by
monasteries.[46] Christian theological learning was, therefore, a component in these institutions, as was
the study of church or canon law: universities played an important role in training people for
ecclesiastical offices, in helping the church pursue the clarification and defence of its teaching, and in
supporting the legal rights of the church over against secular rulers.[47] At such universities, theological
study was initially closely tied to the life of faith and of the church: it fed, and was fed by, practices of
preaching, prayer and celebration of the Mass.[48]

During the High Middle Ages, theology was the ultimate subject at universities, being named "The
Queen of the Sciences". It served as the capstone to the Trivium and Quadrivium that young men were
expected to study. This meant that the other subjects (including philosophy) existed primarily to help
with theological thought.[49] In this context, medieval theology in the Christian West could subsume
fields of study which would later become more self-sufficient, such as metaphysics (Aristotle's "first
philosophy",[50][51] or ontology (the science of being).[52][53]

Christian theology's preeminent place in the university started to come under challenge during the
European Enlightenment, especially in Germany.[54] Other subjects gained in independence and
prestige, and questions were raised about the place of a discipline that seemed to involve a commitment
to the authority of particular religious traditions in institutions that were increasingly understood to be
devoted to independent reason.[55]

Since the early 19th century, various different approaches have emerged in the West to theology as an
academic discipline. Much of the debate concerning theology's place in the university or within a general
higher education curriculum centres on whether theology's methods are appropriately theoretical and
(broadly speaking) scientific or, on the other hand, whether theology requires a pre-commitment of faith
by its practitioners, and whether such a commitment conflicts with academic freedom.[54][56][57][58]

Ministerial training

In some contexts, theology has been held to belong in institutions of higher education primarily as a
form of professional training for Christian ministry. This was the basis on which Friedrich Schleiermacher,
a liberal theologian, argued for the inclusion of theology in the new University of Berlin in 1810.[59][54]:
ch. 14

For instance, in Germany, theological faculties at state universities are typically tied to particular
denominations, Protestant or Roman Catholic, and those faculties will offer denominationally-bound
(konfessionsgebunden) degrees, and have denominationally bound public posts amongst their faculty; as
well as contributing "to the development and growth of Christian knowledge" they "provide the
academic training for the future clergy and teachers of religious instruction at German schools."[60]
In the United States, several prominent colleges and universities were started in order to train Christian
ministers. Harvard,[61] Georgetown,[62] Boston University, Yale,[63] Duke University,[64] and
Princeton[65] all had the theological training of clergy as a primary purpose at their foundation.

Seminaries and bible colleges have continued this alliance between the academic study of theology and
training for Christian ministry. There are, for instance, numerous prominent examples in the United
States, including Phoenix Seminary, Catholic Theological Union in Chicago,[66] The Graduate Theological
Union in Berkeley,[67] Criswell College in Dallas,[68] The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in
Louisville,[69] Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois,[70] Dallas Theological Seminary,[71]
North Texas Collegiate Institute in Farmers Branch, Texas,[72] and the Assemblies of God Theological
Seminary in Springfield, Missouri. The only Judeo-Christian seminary for theology is the 'Idaho Messianic
Bible Seminary' which is part of the Jewish University of Colorado in Denver.[73]

As an academic discipline in its own right

In some contexts, scholars pursue theology as an academic discipline without formal affiliation to any
particular church (though members of staff may well have affiliations to churches), and without focussing
on ministerial training. This applies, for instance, to the Department of Theological Studies at Concordia
University in Canada, and to many university departments in the United Kingdom, including the Faculty
of Divinity at the University of Cambridge, the Department of Theology and Religion at the University of
Exeter, and the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at the University of Leeds.[74][75]
Traditional academic prizes, such as the University of Aberdeen's Lumsden and Sachs Fellowship, tend to
acknowledge performance in theology (or divinity as it is known at Aberdeen) and in religious studies.

Religious studies

In some contemporary contexts, a distinction is made between theology, which is seen as involving some
level of commitment to the claims of the religious tradition being studied, and religious studies, which by
contrast is normally seen as requiring that the question of the truth or falsehood of the religious
traditions studied be kept outside its field. Religious studies involves the study of historical or
contemporary practices or of those traditions' ideas using intellectual tools and frameworks that are not
themselves specifically tied to any religious tradition and that are normally understood to be neutral or
secular.[76] In contexts where 'religious studies' in this sense is the focus, the primary forms of study are
likely to include:

Anthropology of religion

Comparative religion

History of religions

Philosophy of religion
 Psychology of religion

Sociology of religion

Sometimes, theology and religious studies are seen as being in tension,[77] and at other times, they are
held to coexist without serious tension.[78] Occasionally it is denied that there is as clear a boundary
between them.[79]

Criticism

See also: Criticism of religion

Pre-20th century

Whether or not reasoned discussion about the divine is possible has long been a point of contention.
Protagoras, as early as the fifth century BC, who is reputed to have been exiled from Athens because of
his agnosticism about the existence of the gods, said that "Concerning the gods I cannot know either
that they exist or that they do not exist, or what form they might have, for there is much to prevent
one's knowing: the obscurity of the subject and the shortness of man's life."[80][81]

Baron d'Holbach

Since at least the eighteenth century, various authors have criticized the suitability of theology as an
academic discipline.[82] In 1772, Baron d'Holbach labeled theology "a continual insult to human reason"
in Le Bon sens.[82] Lord Bolingbroke, an English politician and political philosopher, wrote in Section IV
of his Essays on Human Knowledge, "Theology is in fault not religion. Theology is a science that may
justly be compared to the Box of Pandora. Many good things lie uppermost in it; but many evil lie under
them, and scatter plagues and desolation throughout the world."[83]

Thomas Paine, a Deistic American political theorist and pamphleteer, wrote in his three-part work The
Age of Reason (1794, 1795, 1807):[84]

The study of theology, as it stands in Christian churches, is the study of nothing; it is founded on
nothing; it rests on no principles; it proceeds by no authorities; it has no data; it can demonstrate
nothing; and it admits of no conclusion. Not anything can be studied as a science, without our being in
possession of the principles upon which it is founded; and as this is the case with Christian theology, it is
therefore the study of nothing.

The German atheist philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach sought to dissolve theology in his work Principles of
the Philosophy of the Future: "The task of the modern era was the realization and humanization of God –
the transformation and dissolution of theology into anthropology."[85] This mirrored his earlier work
The Essence of Christianity (1841), for which he was banned from teaching in Germany, in which he had
said that theology was a "web of contradictions and delusions".[86] The American satirist Mark Twain
remarked in his essay "The Lowest Animal", originally written in around 1896, but not published until
after Twain's death in 1910, that:[87][88]

[Man] is the only animal that loves his neighbor as himself and cuts his throat if his theology isn't
straight. He has made a graveyard of the globe in trying his honest best to smooth his brother's path to
happiness and heaven.... The higher animals have no religion. And we are told that they are going to be
left out in the Hereafter. I wonder why? It seems questionable taste.

20th and 21st centuries

A. J. Ayer, a British former logical-positivist, sought to show in his essay "Critique of Ethics and Theology"
that all statements about the divine are nonsensical and any divine-attribute is unprovable. He wrote: "It
is now generally admitted, at any rate by philosophers, that the existence of a being having the attributes
which define the god of any non-animistic religion cannot be demonstratively proved.... [A]ll utterances
about the nature of God are nonsensical."[89]

Jewish atheist philosopher Walter Kaufmann, in his essay "Against Theology", sought to differentiate
theology from religion in general:[90]

Theology, of course, is not religion; and a great deal of religion is emphatically anti-theological.... An
attack on theology, therefore, should not be taken as necessarily involving an attack on religion. Religion
can be, and often has been, untheological or even anti-theological.

However, Kaufmann found that "Christianity is inescapably a theological religion."[90]

English atheist Charles Bradlaugh believed theology prevented human beings from achieving liberty,[91]
although he also noted that many theologians of his time held that, because modern scientific research
sometimes contradicts sacred scriptures, the scriptures must therefore be wrong.[92] Robert G.
Ingersoll, an American agnostic lawyer, stated that, when theologians had power, the majority of people
lived in hovels, while a privileged few had palaces and cathedrals. In Ingersoll's opinion, it was science
that improved people's lives, not theology. Ingersoll further maintained that trained theologians reason
no better than a person who assumes the devil must exist because pictures resemble the devil so exactly.
[93]
The British evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins has been an outspoken critic of theology.[82][94] In
an article published in The Independent in 1993, he severely criticizes theology as entirely useless,[94]
declaring that it has completely and repeatedly failed to answer any questions about the nature of
reality or the human condition.[94] He states, "I have never heard any of them [i.e. theologians] ever say
anything of the smallest use, anything that was not either platitudinously obvious or downright
false."[94] He then states that, if all theology were completely eradicated from the earth, no one would
notice or even care. He concludes:[94]

The achievements of theologians don't do anything, don't affect anything, don't achieve anything,
don't even mean anything. What makes you think that 'theology' is a subject at all?

See also

Thealogy

References

"theology". [Link]. Archived from the original on 4 August 2012. Retrieved 11

November 2012.

See, e.g., Migliore, Daniel L. 2004. Faith Seeking Understanding: An Introduction to Christian Theology
(2nd ed.) Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.

See, e.g., Kogan, Michael S. 1995. "Toward a Jewish Theology of Christianity." Journal of Ecumenical
Studies 32(1):89–106. Archived from the online on 15 June 2006.

See, e.g., Dormor, Duncan, et al., eds. 2003. Anglicanism, the Answer to Modernity. London: Continuum.

See, e.g., Spong, John Shelby. 2001. Why Christianity Must Change or Die. New York: Harper Collins.

See, e.g., Burrell, David. 1994. Freedom and Creation in Three Traditions. Notre Dame: University of
Notre Dame Press.

See, e.g., Gorringe, Timothy. 2004. Crime, (Changing Society and the Churches Series). London: Society
for Promoting Christian Knowledge.

See e.g., Anne Hunt Overzee's gloss upon the view of Ricœur (1913–2005) as to the role and work of
'theologian': "Paul Ricœur speaks of the theologian as a hermeneut, whose task is to interpret the
multivalent, rich metaphors arising from the symbolic bases of tradition so that the symbols may 'speak'
once again to our existential situation." Overzee, Anne Hunt. 1992. The Body Divine: The Symbol of the
Body in the Works of Teilhard de Chardin and Ramanuja Archived 26 March 2023 at the Wayback
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The accusative plural of the neuter noun λόγιον; cf. Bauer, Walter, William F. Arndt, F. Wilbur Gingrich,
and Frederick W. Danker. 1979. A Greek–English Lexicon of the New Testament (2nd ed.). Chicago:
University of Chicago Press. p. 476. For examples of λόγια in the New Testament, cf. Acts 7:38; Romans
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Scouteris, Constantine B. [1972] 2016. Ἡ ἔννοια τῶν ὅρων 'Θεολογία', 'Θεολογεῖν', 'Θεολόγος', ἐν τῇ
διδασκαλίᾳ τῶν Ἑλλήνων Πατέρων καί Ἐκκλησιαστικῶν συγγραφέων μέχρι καί τῶν Καππαδοκῶν [The
Meaning of the Terms 'Theology', 'to Theologize' and 'Theologian' in the Teaching of the Greek Fathers
up to and Including the Cappadocians] (in Greek). Athens. pp. 187.

Langland, Piers Plowman A ix 136

Adam, James. 1902. The Republic of Plato 2.360C Archived 27 October 2020 at the Wayback Machine.
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Aristotle, Metaphysics, Book Epsilon. Archived 16 February 2008 at the Wayback Machine

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Augustine of Hippo. City of God Book VIII. i.. Archived 4 April 2008 at the Wayback Machine: "de
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McGukin, John. 2001. Saint Gregory of Nazianzus: An Intellectual Biography. Crestwood, NY: St.
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Christ the Word.)

"Theology." Oxford English Dictionary. note.

See, e.g., Hodge, Charles. 1871. Systematic Theology 1, part 1.

Oxford English Dictionary, sense 1

"Theology, 1(d)" and "Theological, A.3." Oxford English Dictionary. 1989.

Times Literary Supplement 329/4. 5 June 1959: "The 'theological' approach to Soviet Marxism...proves in
the long run unsatisfactory."

Jones, Alan H. 1983. Independence and Exegesis: The Study of Early Christianity in the Work of Alfred
Loisy (1857–1940), Charles Guignebert (1857 [i.e. 1867]–1939), and Maurice Goguel (1880–1955). Mohr
Siebeck. p. 194.

Kapic, Kelly M. Kapic (2012). A Little Book for New Theologians. Why and How to Study Theology.
Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press. p. 36. ISBN 978-0830866700.

Gardet, L. 1999. "Ilm al-kalam Archived 3 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine." The Encyclopedia of
Islam, edited by P. J. Bearman, et al. Leiden: Koninklijke Brill NV.

"Speech by State Secretary Dr Markus Kerber at the official opening ceremony for the Islamkolleg
Deutschland". DIK – Deutsche Islam Konferenz. Archived from the original on 31 January 2023. Retrieved
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Libenson, Dan and Lex Rofeberg, hosts. 5 October 2018. "God and Gender – Rachel Adler Archived 11
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unlike Christianity, Judaism is a tradition of deeds and maintains no strict theological tradition. Judaism's
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God), embedded and presupposed by that way of life as it is lived and learned."

Cabezon, Jose Ignacio. 1999. "Buddhist Theology in the Academy." pp. 25–52 in Buddhist Theology:
Critical Reflections by Contemporary Buddhist Scholars, edited by R. Jackson and J. J. Makransky. London:
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