Systematic and Philosophical Theology by Distance Learning MA/PGDip

This module is particularly intended for those who are entering the programme from disciplines other than theology and/or philosophy. It may be a requirement of your admission that you take this module.

You will be introduced to the language and method of systematic theology and philosophical theology through a study of key themes and texts.

These will include portions of:

• Plato’s ‘Republic’
• Aristotle’s ‘Metaphysics’
• St. Thomas Aquinas on theological language
• Karl Barth on revelation and the Trinity.

This module is worth 20 credits.

This module introduces the skills and resources you will need for academic work at postgraduate level, and introduces you to methodological and theoretical issues which arise in religious history.

Topics to be covered include:

• the critical use of sources
• academic presentation
• essay writing
• research methods approaches.

The assignment will require you to discuss developments in Systematic and Philosophical Theology  over the last 30 years.

This module is worth 20 credits.

The module will be a close reading of four second-century Christian documents of various lengths in their entirety.

The concerns of each text will be given priority rather than viewing them as sources for other thematic concerns. This will lead to an examination of how these documents bring before us some of central questions of Christian theology.

There will be close attention throughout the module on how these texts have been used in theology in the past and how that can be used in theological understanding today.

This is an optional module that can be taken for 20, 30 or 40 credits.

This module will examine the factors in early Christianity which led to certain documents, such as the texts that go to make up the Hebrew Bible, being given special status within the community’s worship, memory, and theological perception.

It will look at how this collection of documents expanded and evolved in theological significance until it became generally accepted to be a body of 'sacred scripture' - and how that concept was adopted from Judaism and modified within Christianity.

The module will also explore the impact of the emergence of a Christian canon of theology, and its significance for Christianity as another 'lawful religion' within the Roman empire. 

This module is worth 20 or 40 credits.

Christian theology naturally focuses on the person and work of Christ, otherwise known as Christology. You will study the development of the doctrine of Christ in the first six centuries of Christianity in some detail.

This will involve reading a number of primary texts in translation, studying the ways in which Christian theologians developed a language which enabled Christians speak more clearly and coherently about Christ.

You will then examine medieval, Reformation and modern understandings of Christ.

This module is worth 20 or 40 credits.

This module will examine a range of primary texts, in translation, that extend in time from Anselm (c.1033-1109) to William of Ockham (c.1285-1347). Moreover, the texts will also vary in genre from formal academic works to liturgical texts composed in the period.

Through a close reading of these texts students will come to understand how:

• Anselm’s theological method marked a break with the past
• the rise of the university affected theology
• the recovery of Aristotle and reception of Islamic thought affected theology
• we look at some texts exhibiting the characteristics of ‘scholasticism.’

This is an optional module worth 20 or 40 credits.

You'll study the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas (c.1225-1274) and the associated theological and philosophical school known as Thomism.

Through a close reading of a range of primary texts, we will examine some key themes in Aquinas's work including:

• the relationship between theology and philosophy
• the doctrine of creation
• theological ethics
• the Trinity.

This will lead to an examination of the most significant moments in the history of the interpretation of Aquinas, from Suárez (1548-1617) to the present day.

This module is worth 20 or 40 credits.

La Nouvelle Theologie ("The New Theology") is a pejorative term invented by the French Dominican theologian Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange. It is used to describe a new wave of twentieth century Catholic theology which offered a fresh interpretation of Aquinas and called for a return to the Church’s patristic and high medieval resources.

This movement, which was a reaction against nineteenth century neo-scholasticism, is also known as ‘resourcement’ theology – a theology which looks to the depths of the Church’s traditional theological resources to meet the intellectual and cultural challenges of late modernity.

You will study the New Theologians’ understanding of the Church, scriptural exegesis and the key issue in the debate concerning resourcement theology: relationship between nature and grace.

This module is worth 20 or 40 credits.

Together with an appropriate supervisor you will:

• agree and follow a plan of guided reading
• write an essay on agreed topic(s).

You will also submit a list of the works read as part of the Directed Reading programme. The area must normally be different from any of those covered by other Distance Learning MA modules, and also distinct from the area of the student's dissertation.

This module is worth 20 or 40 credits.

You will study the historical development of the Marian cult in Eastern and Western Christian traditions, with emphasis on its spiritual, doctrinal, and liturgical importance. You will discover how Christian interest in the Virgin Mary increased in the course of the first five centuries of the Church, especially with regard to three main aspects:

• her central role in the incarnation of Christ
• her status as a model of virginal asceticism
• her capacity to act as protector or intercessor for Christians.

One of the aims of the module is for you to develop core skills in historical and systematic theology.

This is module is worth 20 or 40 credits.

You will undertake a close reading of four or six documents from the early followers of Jesus. These documents are of various lengths and you will read them in their entirety.

The emphasis of the reading is on the concerns of each text in the period when 'Judaism' and 'Christianity' are becoming distinct religions rather than viewing them as sources for other thematic concerns. This will lead to an examination of how these documents bring before us the history of some early communities, and exhibit both their theological concerns and styles of theology.

There will be close attention throughout the module to how these texts have been used in theology in the past and how they can be used in theological understanding today. 

This module is worth 20 or 40 credits.

This module provides an opportunity to engage with key questions about the relationship between faith and reason in the modern world.

Led by the department's specialists in systematic and philosophical theology the module is split into a series of units. Each unit addresses the issue of faith and reason in a very different way. For example:

• phenomenology
• the thought of Aquinas
• understanding of philosophy as a spiritual exercise.

This module is worth 20 or 40 credits.

The module explores the Christian doctrine of eschatology, the study of last things, in its historical, developmental, doctrinal and philosophical context.

The module will focus on traditional themes within Christian eschatology such as:

• the Kingdom of God
• messianism
• providence
• apocalypticism
• death
• resurrection
• The Last Judgement
• the new heavens and the new earth.

It will also consider the development of these topics in relation to their systematic, philosophical and historical context.

Attention will be given to both ecumenical and confessional distinctives within eschatology so that issues such as purgatory, various approaches to hell and deification from across the confessional spectrum will be considered.

The module will, by the end, focus on recent contemporary approaches to eschatology and its deep renewal and focus in 20th and 21st century theology and philosophy.

This is an optional module that can be taken for 20 or 40 credits.