Abundantly More – The Theological Promise of the Arts in a Reductionist World

"A remarkable achievement that breaks new ground". In a culture that so often seems to shrink and flatten our vision, reducing the world to mere atoms and us to mere things, the arts can break our imaginations open. In conversation with multiple art forms, theologian Jeremy Begbie helps us see this world and ourselves as infinitely richer than we could ever imagine: as created and redeemed by the inexhaustible love of God. "As only Jeremy Begbie can do, this book weaves theology and music, philosophy and poetry, science and Scripture to explore and celebrate the uncontainability of the triune God and the irreducible complexity of creation. Beginning with an astute analysis of our modern tendency to reduce, flatten, and de-complexify the beautiful, swirling kaleidoscope of divine and created reality, Begbie articulates a creative, constructive pneumatology that deepens our understanding of the resonance between theology and the arts. A remarkable achievement that breaks new ground. "-James K. A. Smith. , Calvin University; editor in chief, Image. "Abundantly More. is not simply a justification of the literary, visual, and musical arts. Begbie insists that the arts do far more than give us delight. They also undermine the idea that human reason alone is capable of understanding our universe and invite us to encounter and engage the inexhaustible beauty and incomprehensible mystery of what cannot be defined. "-Robin Jensen. , University of Notre Dame"Over against modernity's reductionistic impulses-to view human life as 'nothing more than, ' human work as 'nothing but, ' and human relations as mere power struggles and 'nothing besides'-Jeremy Begbie shows how Christ's resurrection, as the uncontainable 'moreness' of God's love-in-action par excellence, serves to rupture this pathologically miserly vision of life and how the arts can function as graced partners in the ongoing 'opening up and out' work of the triune God. This book is a must-read for theologians and church leaders. "-W. David O. Taylor. , Fuller Theological Seminary"In this book, Jeremy Begbie achieves a remarkable double feat: a quietly devastating critique of the engrained reductionist tendencies in Western modernity and, in dialogue with his profoundly humane theological insight, an inspiring manifesto for the fundamental value of the arts as part of what makes us human. "-Bettina Varwig. , University of Cambridge