John D. Caputo
Author of What Would Jesus Deconstruct?: The Good News of Postmodernism for the Church
About the Author
Academician John D. Caputo (b.1940) specializes in continental philosophy, described as the interaction among 20th century French and German philosophy and religion. He has written a number of scholarly books including The Mystical Element in Heidegger's Thought (1978), Heidegger and Aquinas show more (1982), Demythologizing Heidegger (1993), Against Ethics (1993), and The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida (1997). Caputo has been honored in Dublin and Toronto, where conferences have been organized around his work. Caputo is professor of philosophy at Villanova University in Pennsylvania, where he received his M.A. in 1964. Other degrees include a B.A. from LaSalle College (1962) and a Ph.D. from Bryn Mawr (1968). (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Image credit: Used by permission of Baker Publishing Group, copyright © 2008. All rights to this material are reserved. Materials are not to be distributed to other web locations for retrieval, published(see © info.)
Series
Works by John D. Caputo
The Folly of God: A Theology of the Unconditional (God and the Human Future) (2015) 19 copies, 1 review
Feminism, Sexuality, and the Return of Religion (Indiana Series in the Philosophy of Religion) (2011) — Editor — 18 copies
Cross and Cosmos: A Theology of Difficult Glory (Indiana Series in the Philosophy of Religion) (2019) 15 copies
Associated Works
The Sheed and Ward Anthology of Catholic Philosophy (A Sheed & Ward Classic) (2005) — Contributor — 29 copies
Apophatic Bodies: Negative Theology, Incarnation, and Relationality (2009) — Contributor — 20 copies
Religion With/Out Religion: The Prayers and Tears of John D. Caputo (2001) — Contributor — 12 copies
The Sleeping Giant Has Awoken: The New Politics of Religion in the United States (2008) — Introduction — 6 copies
Cross and Khora: Deconstruction and Christianity in the Work of John D. Caputo [Postmodern Ethics 1] (2010) — Contributor — 2 copies
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Canonical name
- Caputo, John D.
- Birthdate
- 1940-10-26
- Gender
- male
- Education
- LaSalle University (BA|1962)
Villanova University (MA|1964)
Bryn Mawr College (PhD|1968) - Occupations
- professor
- Organizations
- Syracuse University (Thomas J. Watson Professor of Religion and Humanities)
Members
Reviews
My first book-length foray into Caputo's work was challenging, enriching, and entertaining. He's an excellent stylist and presents a compelling argument for Derrida's contribution to a theology that is not defined or ever fixed. Caputo gave me a lot more hope and playfulness than I'm used to when reading theology and has laid rigorous and thoughtful groundwork for entering into way of conceiving religion without religion (thank God?).
Can Hope survive with the collapse of epistemology certainty? Is God necessarily existent for spiritual experience? Can the nihilism of our age open us up to the possibility of grace? Phenomenologist and deconstructionist John D. Caputo wrestles with these questions and more in his intellectual memoir, Hoping Against Hope (Confessions of a Postmodern Pilgrim). The book is a spiritual autobiography of sorts, but it only reveals the broad contours of Caputo's life, focusing on the development show more (or deconstruction?) of his thoughts on God, faith and certainty.
Caputo was raised in a devout Catholic family. He spent four years as a De LaSalle monk, before his illustrious career as a philosopher and theologians (thirty-six years as professor of Philosophy at Villanova University and professor of philosophy of religion at Syracuse University for seven years). In Hoping Against Hope he gives voice and personality to these various stages of his intellectual development. As a child Caputo was an altar boy in pre-Vatican II Catholicism who had memorized the Baltimore Catechism. Caputo refers to this younger self as "Jackie." "Brother Paul," is the monk Caputo who grew callouses on his knees in an attempt to learn prayer and had a love for the mystics. The professor, "John D.," is the the philosopher who's tongue was loosed by Jacques Derrida (the other Jackie) and the French Postmodernists.
Caputo writes:
With the Continental Philosophers, Heidigger, Derrida, Lacan, Lyotoard, Levinas, and others, Caputo thoroughly rejects the narrative of the Christian tradition and the official line of the Roman Catholic church. He dismantles dogma, expresses his antagonism toward the afterlife and a God that is either ' the Prime Punisher and the Royal Rewarder (64). He also regards the arguement between atheism and theism to be wrong-headed. With a Zen-Koan-like-air he proclaims, "God does not exist. God insists" (114). He gives fresh and unique interpretations of scripture and imagines the textual variants he wishes to one day uncover. Caputo's thoughts run far a field from classic Christian orthodoxy.
But his project isn't wholly negative. Caputo upholds active service to the poor and marginalized and the non-religious religion of love. He says his idea of nihilism is stolen from the mystics and he employs insights from Miester Eckhardt and Marguerite Porete (both mystics ran a foul from official church teaching). What Caputo proposes is a religion of the Rose--"The rose is without why; it blossoms because it blossoms; It cares not for itself, asks not if it's seen" (27). He brings this verse from Angelus Silesius into conversation wiht Lyotard's religion of the smile and posits a nihilism where all of life is received as a gift (with or without a giver), where all of life is received without condition (181).
As an intellectual memoir/spiritual autobiography I give this three stars and thought it was an interesting read. I especially loved the 'short nocturnal dialogue' where Caputo imagines a dialogue with himself at his different stages of faith and intellectual development. I appreciate how Caputo's postmodernity leads him to pluralism and relativism without the need to posit an underlying universal faith in God. However, I am unconvinced by Caputo's theological vision and see his radical (or weakness) theology as incompatible with the Christian gospel of grace. I was aware of Caputo before reading this book, so wasn't particularly surprised by what he says here. I have read him before and have seen him lecture. I find him fascinating. I also find it ironic that I received this book from Cross Focused reviews. If Caputo mentions the cross at all (and I don't remember that he does in this book), it is clearly not his focus. Anyway, I received this book in exchange for my honest review. ★★★
show less
Caputo was raised in a devout Catholic family. He spent four years as a De LaSalle monk, before his illustrious career as a philosopher and theologians (thirty-six years as professor of Philosophy at Villanova University and professor of philosophy of religion at Syracuse University for seven years). In Hoping Against Hope he gives voice and personality to these various stages of his intellectual development. As a child Caputo was an altar boy in pre-Vatican II Catholicism who had memorized the Baltimore Catechism. Caputo refers to this younger self as "Jackie." "Brother Paul," is the monk Caputo who grew callouses on his knees in an attempt to learn prayer and had a love for the mystics. The professor, "John D.," is the the philosopher who's tongue was loosed by Jacques Derrida (the other Jackie) and the French Postmodernists.
Caputo writes:
My life as a philosopher gas taken place in the distance between theology and philosophy. Like everyone else, however far forward I thought I moved, I was always circling around my origins. I soon found that the audacity of the philosophers who "dare to think" according to the Enlightenment motto, fails them when it comes to theology. There they panic, in fear of contamination. They treat the name of God like a terrible computer virus that will corrupt all their files, or like a real one, like the Ebola virus, where the odds of recovering are against you. So, mostly at the beginning of my professional life, when "John D." stepped forth and responded to the title "professor," while telling Jackie to stay at home, I was worried that they would say, "This is not philosophy, this is just his religion." But my religion is between me and Brother Paul and Jackie and several others. How can they know anything about that? (104-105).
With the Continental Philosophers, Heidigger, Derrida, Lacan, Lyotoard, Levinas, and others, Caputo thoroughly rejects the narrative of the Christian tradition and the official line of the Roman Catholic church. He dismantles dogma, expresses his antagonism toward the afterlife and a God that is either ' the Prime Punisher and the Royal Rewarder (64). He also regards the arguement between atheism and theism to be wrong-headed. With a Zen-Koan-like-air he proclaims, "God does not exist. God insists" (114). He gives fresh and unique interpretations of scripture and imagines the textual variants he wishes to one day uncover. Caputo's thoughts run far a field from classic Christian orthodoxy.
But his project isn't wholly negative. Caputo upholds active service to the poor and marginalized and the non-religious religion of love. He says his idea of nihilism is stolen from the mystics and he employs insights from Miester Eckhardt and Marguerite Porete (both mystics ran a foul from official church teaching). What Caputo proposes is a religion of the Rose--"The rose is without why; it blossoms because it blossoms; It cares not for itself, asks not if it's seen" (27). He brings this verse from Angelus Silesius into conversation wiht Lyotard's religion of the smile and posits a nihilism where all of life is received as a gift (with or without a giver), where all of life is received without condition (181).
As an intellectual memoir/spiritual autobiography I give this three stars and thought it was an interesting read. I especially loved the 'short nocturnal dialogue' where Caputo imagines a dialogue with himself at his different stages of faith and intellectual development. I appreciate how Caputo's postmodernity leads him to pluralism and relativism without the need to posit an underlying universal faith in God. However, I am unconvinced by Caputo's theological vision and see his radical (or weakness) theology as incompatible with the Christian gospel of grace. I was aware of Caputo before reading this book, so wasn't particularly surprised by what he says here. I have read him before and have seen him lecture. I find him fascinating. I also find it ironic that I received this book from Cross Focused reviews. If Caputo mentions the cross at all (and I don't remember that he does in this book), it is clearly not his focus. Anyway, I received this book in exchange for my honest review. ★★★
show less
Caputo's slim treatise is insight, erudite, and full of genuine wit and humor. Not coming from a philosophical background, I found it helpful that Caputo provided a philosophical and historical context for his ideas and the different conceptions of religion pre- and post-enlightenment. Admittedly I'm drawn to any theologian who advocates for truth (with a lowercase "t") and who is also still engaged and intent on being curious and in the throes of desire for life.
You don't often encounter a humble scholar, or even one who fakes it well, and that by itself is enough to recommend this book. But there's more.
I can't say I know yet what to make of this thing, but started out reading it for (amateur) scholarly reasons and ended up reading for pleasure, without pencil, highlighter, sticky-notes or notebook, and not wanting it to end like you don't want a good novel to end. Except this one I can read again. With a thorough background in Heidegger, show more Kierkegaard, Jewish and Christian Bibles, Husserl Nietzsche--not so much Derrida and I had never heard of Levinas--I came in pretty well armed but pretty soon just threw away everything I thought I knew and went along for the ride. It was a good ride. I have no idea if anything in it is true, I don't have any idea if there is a single verifiable assertion in it, but it's a trip you should take.
Without a pretty good knowledge of "strong theology" and Continental philosophy of the last hundred years or so this volume might make no sense at all and might not be any fun to read, be warned, but if you have a little of that background and like to see idols toppled (or windmills tilted at, I'm not sure which) pick this ont up. I've been swimming in that cold philosophical sea for decades even long after losing all hope I would find what I sought and this has made me dive in anew, and deeper and with the same sense of fun and coming good times I has as an undergraduate, decades ago. show less
I can't say I know yet what to make of this thing, but started out reading it for (amateur) scholarly reasons and ended up reading for pleasure, without pencil, highlighter, sticky-notes or notebook, and not wanting it to end like you don't want a good novel to end. Except this one I can read again. With a thorough background in Heidegger, show more Kierkegaard, Jewish and Christian Bibles, Husserl Nietzsche--not so much Derrida and I had never heard of Levinas--I came in pretty well armed but pretty soon just threw away everything I thought I knew and went along for the ride. It was a good ride. I have no idea if anything in it is true, I don't have any idea if there is a single verifiable assertion in it, but it's a trip you should take.
Without a pretty good knowledge of "strong theology" and Continental philosophy of the last hundred years or so this volume might make no sense at all and might not be any fun to read, be warned, but if you have a little of that background and like to see idols toppled (or windmills tilted at, I'm not sure which) pick this ont up. I've been swimming in that cold philosophical sea for decades even long after losing all hope I would find what I sought and this has made me dive in anew, and deeper and with the same sense of fun and coming good times I has as an undergraduate, decades ago. show less
Awards
You May Also Like
Associated Authors
Statistics
- Works
- 40
- Also by
- 19
- Members
- 2,187
- Popularity
- #11,727
- Rating
- 3.9
- Reviews
- 15
- ISBNs
- 122
- Languages
- 5