Peter Ochs

As theologian, Ochs adopts C. S. Peirce's notions of “thirdness” to find an alternative to the dichotomies particular/universal, traditional/modern, individual/community that plague modern thought and theology. In the difficult attempt to walk this fine line between the dichotomies of contemporary thought, Ochs often finds himself misunderstood by the two camps on either side of him. Thus, we see that Batnitzky accuses him of being too universalistic and Lamberth of being too particularistic. Ochs's reply to his critics on both the modernist or traditionalist sides is that both are wrong because they employ the same dichotomist logic. Each is a mirror image of the other. Ochs argues that operative in scripture is a “logic of thirdness,” which provides the key both to the repair of modern theology and the repair of the world

Dichotomy · Epistemology · Theology · Computer Science · Karl Barth and Christian Theology · Philosophy · Religion and Society Interactions · Religion, Ecology, and Ethics