While looking at my
brother-in-law's blog site today I somehow or another came across a rather silly test on
quizfarm.com regarding theology. (Please note the emphasis on the word silly.) Being a glutton for punishment I took the exam and found out my 'theology' most closely resembles Anselm's and Friedrich Schleiermacher's.
Not recalling much about Anselm (college was quite a long time ago and medieval theology didn't exactly excite me then) I did some quick googling/wikiing and discovered Anselm is considered by many to be the first scholarly philosopher of Christian theology. Hmm; interesting. Anselm was the Archbishop of Canterbury from 1093-1109 A.D. (duh) and had quite an ongoing spat with Kings William II and Henry I regarding the practice of investiture. (Nobles granting privilege by way of awarding church offices.) More notably, Anselm was responsible for ushering in reason as a critical element of Christian faith and established the ontological proof -- that God's existence can be proven by intuition and reason alone. (Anselm's my man.) Perhaps the most important aspect of his proof isn't the proof itself but the arguments it spawned via Hume and Descartes.
Friedrich Schleiermacher, who arrived 650 or so years later, was a philosopher and theologian (and all around academic who taught more than a dozen disciplines). Schleiermacher is noted for many things, including his works
Reden (places religion at the pinnacle of divine mysteries within human nature) and
Christliche Glaube (argues religious feeling, the sense of absolute dependence on God as communicated by
Jesus through the church, and not the creeds or the letter of Scripture or the rationalistic understanding, is the source and law of dogmatic theology). Hmm; interesting. This religious feeling has been characterized as both the consciousness of the universe and the consciousness of being in relation with God. (Astounding.)
Not to be outdone, another quiz on the site told me I was most like Huldrych Zwingli (somewhat sandwiched between the others in a timeline sense), the leader of the Swiss Reformation. (Zwingli and Luther were contemporaries.) Zwingli, the lesser known of the two reformers, believed faith and works were necessary for salvation and also held fast that the physical body of Christ was not present in the Eucharist but, instead, the ceremony existed for purely symbolic means. (Zwingli is also known for his non-instrumental approach so worship band members can stop reading now.)
Now, for those of you who know me, you know how silly these tests must be. . .
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