Analytic Theology and the Academic Study of Religion aims to explain analytic theology to other theologians, and to scholars of religion, and to explain those other fields to analytic theologians. The book defends analytic theology from some common criticisms, but also argues that analytic theologians have much to learn from other forms of inquiry. Analytic theology is a legitimate form of theology, and a legitimate form of academic inquiry, and it can be a valuable conversation partner within the wider religious studies academy. I aim to articulate an attractive vision of analytic theology, foster a more fruitful inter-disciplinary conversation, and enable scholars across the religious studies academy to understand one another better. Analytic theology can flourish in the secular academy, and flourish as authentically Christian theology.

My objective is to explore a possible contribution of Afro-Brazilian religions to a pluralist philosophy of religious diversity. I will especially explore the syncretic wisdom of these religious traditions, showing how it can help us better understand interreligious dynamics. To do this, I begin by exposing some challenges of pluralist theses, highlighting two problems: homogenization and isolationism. Following that, I briefly introduce some characteristics of Afro-Brazilian religiosity, emphasizing its syncretic aspects, and then argue in favour of syncretism as a kind of wisdom intrinsic to Afro-Brazilian religiosity. This wisdom encompasses both practical and conceptual aspects. I conclude by demonstrating how this Afro-Brazilian wisdom can contribute with philosophical studies on religious diversity.

This article examines whether artificial intelligence (AI)-driven harm can be classified as moral or natural evil, or whether a new category – artificial evil – is needed. Should AI’s harm be seen as a product of human design, thus maintaining moral responsibility for its creators, or whether AI’s autonomous actions resemble natural evil, where harm arises unintentionally? The concept of artificial evil, combining elements of both moral and natural evil, is presented to better address this dilemma. Just as AI is still a form of intelligence (albeit non-biological), artificial evil would still be evil in the sense that it results in real harm or suffering – it is just that this harm is produced by AI systems rather than by nature or human moral agents directly. The discussion further extends into the realm of defence or theodicy, drawing parallels with the Free Will Defence, questioning if AI autonomy may be justified even if it results in harm, much like human free will. Ultimately, the article calls for a re-evaluation of our ethical frameworks and glossary of terms to address the emerging challenges of AI autonomy and its moral implications.

William Wood argues that analytic theology can be included as a part of the academic study of religion. He describes two types of benefits to this inclusion: benefits accruing to the study of religion on the one hand, and benefits accruing to analytic theology on the other. I find the first type of benefit that he describes to be real, but think that within the overall compass of the interests of the academic study of religion in Christian traditions it is quite small in scope, even in a context in which doctrines are a topic of particular interest. The second type of benefit, that accruing to analytic theology, is more of a puzzle. On the one hand, I find that one species of benefit that Wood describes with some clarity is unpromising, as it seems to amount to an opportunity for yet more defensive apologetics. But on the other hand, some of what Wood says is compatible with the idea that analytic theology stands to be improved in ways that are not yet clear by engagement with the academic study of religion. I conclude with a critical glance at Wood's attempt to defend analytic theology as a method of inquiry from the charge of historical shallowness.

This article examines the philosophical and theological implications of artificial intelligence (AI) and the technological singularity for core religious concepts. The predictive capacities of AI challenge traditional accounts of divine omniscience, raising critical questions about the distinction between algorithmic foreknowledge and theological models of perfect knowledge. The increasing determinacy of human behaviour through data-driven systems complicates classical formulations of human freedom and moral responsibility. Additionally, the potential for artificial suffering demands an expansion of theodicy and a reassessment of the creator-creature relationship in light of human technological agency. Finally, emerging technological eschatologies, promising digital immortality and transcendence, confront religious soteriology with novel anthropocentric models of salvation.

This study argues that the philosophy of religion must critically rearticulate its categories of knowledge, suffering, and eschatological hope to remain conceptually viable in a world mediated by intelligent systems.

This article contributes to ongoing discussions on the place of theology in secular research universities by examining the relationship between analytic theology and science-engaged theology. Writing in response to William Wood's Analytic Theology and the Academic Study of Religion, I consider if and how one might demarcate these two recent movements in academic theology given that both sociological and substantive definitions result in significant overlap. To show the extent of this overlap, I argue that both analytic theology and science-engaged theology are forms of faith seeking understanding, which use the tools and methods from other disciplines in order to make incremental progress on specific theological questions. I then offer two critiques of Wood's argument (made by analogy with the natural sciences) that the doctrine of creation provides theological warrant for the extension of common human reason seen in analytic philosophy and theology. My own attempt at a demarcation suggests that whereas analytic theology is best understood as an intellectual tradition, science-engaged theology is an intellectual disposition. This means that although science-engaged theology may not always be analytic, analytic theologians (and theologians more widely) should always be science-engaged.

The article takes as point of departure the influential book An Interpretation of Religion by John Hick both to understand an Afro-Brazilian religion called Candomblé and to suggest a way to define this human activity as a whole. After a description of Hick’s proposal, his ideas will be applied to Candomblé to see what kind of religion it is. From the problems raised in this classification, the article puts forward two formal refinements in Hick’s proposal, which can increase its internal coherence as well. In addition, in view of a salient feature of Candomblé, it is argued that the concept of religion should include the experience of evil as an essential element. The resulting definition is justified by its explanatory power, amplitude and fruitfulness.

An overarching question in William Wood's Analytic Theology and the Academic Study of Religion concerns the conditions under which theology belongs in the public university. On this question, many or most academics today are methodological naturalists, and they would not accept explanations that appeal to supernatural entities. Wood devotes a chapter to arguing against that position. Nevertheless, Wood is not a ‘sectarian’ who argues that Christian theology should only answer to its own, tradition-specific norms, and so it is important to see how close his proposal and methodological naturalism (MN) actually are. In this response, I seek to clarify both MN and Wood's proposal regarding the proper norms for academic inquiry. Key to my argument is a distinction between a MN based on strict or scientific naturalism and a MN based on liberal or expansive naturalism. Analytic theologians and expansive naturalists can agree both that a theology that operates according to proper norms for academic inquiry belongs in the public university and that strict naturalism is not the norm that we want.

Skeptical theism attempts to address the problem of evil by appealing to human cognitive limitations. The causal structure of the world is opaque to us. We cannot tell, and should not expect to be able to tell, if there is gratuitous evil, that is, evil which isn’t necessary for achieving some greater good or for precluding some greater evil. At first, it seems tempting to think that the rapid development of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies might change this fact. Our cognitive limitations may no longer be a fixed point in responding to the problem of evil. But I argue that this won’t ultimately matter. The workings of any AI capable of rendering the problem of evil tractable will likely be just as opaque to us as the causal structure of the world God created. Interestingly, then, both God and a sufficiently advanced AI are alien intelligences to us. This reveals what is truly difficult, and perhaps intractable, about the problem of evil. For the evils to be defeated, we would need a relational understanding of why God permitted them. Yet such an understanding of an inscrutable God seems forever beyond our, and even our post-human descendants, ken.

In this article, I explore the mythic narratives of the Yoruba-derived tradition of Candomblé Nagô to discern the attributes of its Supreme Being. I introduce Candomblé, offering an overview of its central beliefs and practices, and then present theological perspectives on the Supreme Being in African Traditional Religion as a basis for comparison with the myths I will examine. I consider the primary creation myths of Candomblé, emphasizing references to the tradition's Supreme Being and, analysing these myths, I argue that Candomblé's Supreme Being, as depicted in these narratives, amounts to a limited god. This portrayal accounts for the absence of a problem of evil within the tradition. It suggests the moral ambivalence of Candomblé's Supreme Being and other high deities, as well as the world itself. This exploration sheds light on a lesser-explored tradition and its unique approach to philosophical dilemmas, distinct from the predominantly theistic framework of most philosophy of religion, and evinces that philosophizing through immersion in myths should involve appreciating the complexities and richness inherent in these forms of life, free from the imposition of external assumptions or biases.

Based on fieldwork with two related Afro-Brazilian religions, Umbanda and Quimbanda, this article explores the value of Donald Davidson’s semantic theory for making sense of ethnographic fieldwork. Specifically, we look at the role of scriptedness in communication, including religious ritual. We first clarify the role of social externalities in Davidson’s view of communicative interpretation, which is broader than his initial framework of radical interpretation. We then offer an account of what constitutes communicative and interpretational success, by drawing on Davidson’s account of prior and passing theory. Prior theories are interpreters’ initial hypothetical frameworks, ranging from general (e.g., the rational, intentional nature of self and other, and a shared perceivable world) to local (e.g., assumptions about cultural, social, and institutional contexts). Passing theories are tactical, on-the-fly modifications that we hypothesize in order to get mutual understanding back on track. We introduce the concept of ‘semantic reduction’ to operationalize the view that specific, local social externalities provide clues that help keep interpretation on track. In the case of religious ethnography, these include ritual, doctrinal, narrative, symbolic, material, temporal, and spatial frames that constrain the generation of passing theories. Examples from fieldwork illustrate the potential value of our appeal to Davidson’s ideas.

In Analytic Theology and the Academic Study of Religion William Wood argues that the discipline of analytic theology (AT) can make a distinctively valuable contribution to the mainstream academic study of religion. He deftly navigates the intellectual public relations work required to secure mutual appreciation across these domains of scholarly discourse. In evaluating the characteristic goods of AT, Wood also seeks to recognize and address what Laruen Winner calls ‘characteristic damage’ or deformation in the practice of AT, which he identifies with its apparent inadequacies in addressing ‘history, mystery, and practice’ in the study of religion and theology. I argue that Wood's diagnosis fails to recognize how AT's characteristic damage emerges from its monomaniacal fixation on the epistemic value of theological theorizing to the exclusion of disciplined attention to other kinds of value. While at one point he engages a previously published version of this critique (as an explanation for AT's neglect of liberation theology), he mischaracterizes my argument in that paper in ways that lead him to miss its relevance to the objections from history, mystery, and practice. These objections can be met, I suggest, but only by significant reform to AT as currently practised.

I respond to challenges posed by Andrew Dole, Joanna Leidenhag, Kevin Schilbrack, and Sameer Yadav. Key topics include: whether the engagement between analytic theology and the academic study of religion really is mutually beneficial, distinguishing analytic theology from science-engaged theology, restrictive methodological naturalism, and whether I misconstrue analytic theology’s ‘characteristic damage’.