Radical sophiology: Fr. Sergej Bulgakov and John Milbank on Augustine
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Radical sophiology: Fr. Sergej Bulgakov and John Milbank on Augustine David J. Dunn
Published online: 10 November 2012 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2012
Abstract Looking at John Milbank’s recent turn to Fr. Sergej Bulgakov, this paper argues that the theological and philosophical commitments they share are overshadowed by a deeper difference concerning the role each assigns the church in secular culture. It turns to Milbank’s roots in Augustine’s philosophy of history, which he argues could have allowed the church to overtake the pagan (which founds the secular) were it not for his distinction between the ‘‘visible’’ church and its deferred (eschatological) perfection. Bulgakov also criticizes Augustine’s doctrine of the church, or so he thinks. He actually misreads Augustine, accusing the bishop of holding a doctrine of the church that Milbank would have liked him to have held. This suggests that Bulgakov would not agree with Milbank’s view that the church should ‘‘enact’’ God’s judgment in history by opposing itself to the secular. Keywords Milbank, John Bulgakov, Sergej Augustine, St. of Hippo Ecclesiology Eschatology Radical Orthodoxy
The British theologian and proponent of a ‘‘school’’ of Christian theology known as ‘‘Radical Orthodoxy,’’ John Milbank, has recently named the Russian sophiological tradition, particularly the work of Fr. Sergej Bulgakov, as an intellectual ally that anticipates both Radical Orthodoxy’s postmodern, metacritical methodology as well as its objective to ‘‘out-narrate’’ the secular by showing how the Christian tradition corrects the nihilism present within the logic of modernity (2006, p. 331). One implication of this comparison may be that Bulgakov was radically orthodox before there was Radical Orthodoxy. While it is undeniable that Milbank and Bulgakov share certain opinions—a preference of Schelling over Kant, criticism of social D. J. Dunn (&) Franklin, TN, USA e-mail: [email protected]
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science, and comparisons of secularism to paganism—I argue that these are overshadowed by a more fundamental difference in the way each thinks about the role of the church in society and thus an approach to the logic of the secular at work in it (1979, pp. 51–59; 1999, p. 278; 2000, pp. 79ff, 186ff). Milbank takes a decidedly combative stance toward secular culture because he feels that the raison d’eˆtre of the church is to make theology the ‘‘queen of the sciences’’ by taking every thought captive to Christ (see 2 Cor. 10:15; Milbank 2006, p. 382). My opinion of Bulgakov is that his approach to secular culture is more collaborative, calling for something less like a debate and more like a creative dialogue; but to make a case for his differences with Milbank would take far more ink than I am allowed to spill in this essay.1 Thus my aim is more modest yet also more fundamental. Rather than compare their views point by point, I intend to show how John Milbank’s intention to ‘‘out-narrate’’ the secular requires that he appropriate Augustine’s ec
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