Vattimo and Theology by Thomas G. Guarino (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 514 argument would have been strengthened from the inside out, however, and even kept from more than occasional dualistic miscues, if Nichols had shown greater awareness of the more integrated (postliberal) approaches to theology mentioned above. In short, in spite of Nichols’s rather traditional conclusions, he is still doing theology in a modern (i.e., Enlightenment) key. RODNEY HOWSARE DeSales University Center Valley, Pennsylvania Vattimo and Theology. By THOMAS G. GUARINO. London and New York: T & T Clark Press, 2009. Pp. 183. $ 29.95 (paper) ISBN: 978-0-567-03233-1. Gianni Vattimo is one ofthe leading proponents of contemporary postmodern philosophy. Heavily influenced by Nietzsche and Heidegger (and, to a lesser degree, Hans-Georg Gadamer), Vattimo has become famous for what he calls “weak thought,” that is, a decidedly antimetaphysical thought that does not oppose itself to Christianity but interprets itself as the fulfillment, or consummation, of the Christian understanding of reality. He argues,forexample, that we need to be more nihilistic in order to be more Christian. “Kenosis” and “caritas” have thus become key concepts of his radical hermeneutics. Postmodernism, he consequently maintains, makes it possible for Christianity (understood along the lines of his own interpretation of it) to play a new role. In the “age of interpretation” Christianity is, as he points out, no longer dependent on alien standards of rationality (nor excluded from any public or theoretical significance), but can rediscover its own (proper) claims. Thomas Guarino summarizes nicely Vattimo’s position vis-à-vis Christianity as follows: “To be a Christian, indeed, to be a religious person, is to recognize that all thinking is ‘weak,’ that all knowing is interpretative, that ‘metaphysics,’ with all its assertion of absolutes, must always be diluted into tolerant charity” (17). If postmodernism needs to be taken seriously (as the kind of challenge that it clearly is), it also needs to be taken seriously in the shape that it has found in Vattimo’s thought. Vattimo’s constant dialogue with the Christian theological and philosophical tradition explains, more specifically, why his philosophy deserves close attention and criticism both from a Christian philosophical and from a theological perspective. Vattimo and Theology provides such a criticism of Vattimo’s thought. It offers in its first two chapters a very accurate and accessible account of Vattimo’s thought and discusses key themes such as his understanding of modernity and its end, truth, Being, interpretation, history, and the kenotic dimension of Christianity. Anyone merely looking for a short, yet concise introduction to Vattimo’s thought will clearly benefit from reading BOOK REVIEWS 515 Guarino’s book. Guarino, however, does not limit himself to such an introduction. His interest is to host a critical dialogue between the Christian tradition and Vattimo (he considers himself “hardly an apologist for Vattimian thought” [3]). Before he goes on to examine Vattimo’s thought critically, however, he discusses from a historical (but also a systematic) point of view the question as to whether or not a Nietzschean can speak to Christian theology. The third chapter of his book shows—very convincingly—that thinkers such as Nietzsche and his followers may have something important to offer to Christian thought and that a Christian thinker must not be afraid to engage in a dialogue with Nietzschean thought. This may well be the case with Vattimo’s postmodernism, too. In the following two chapters, Guarino takes up the challenge of a theological dialogue with Vattimo. The first of these two critical chapters deals with postmodernity and theology; the second one with truth and interpretation. Both chapters provide a convincing critique of Vattimo’s thought that is interesting not only for theologians. Philosophers, too, will benefit from Guarino’s critical remarks about the Italian philosopher and value the balanced nature of his reading of Vattimo’s works. Guarino is without any doubt right in appreciating Vattimo’s desire for God and for Christ; he is also right in pointing out that there are many important parallels between Vattimo’s thought and the Christian tradition (particularly the mystical tradition) and that his emphasis upon practice needs to be taken very seriously. Guarino does not, however, overlook the limits of Vattimo’s hermeneutical nihilism...