Everyone interested in Arabic and Persian literature, in Islam and in comparative religion, regrets the death of Arthur J. Arberry, Sir Thomas Adams's Professor of Arabic in the University of Cambridge. Arberry combined rare human qualities and exceptional professional attainment, and this enabled him to make a unique contribution both to learning and to mutual understanding between East and West. He had a deep sense of vocation, which he brought to his unremitting labours as a skilled editor of texts, especially in the field of Islamic mysticism, and as an imaginative translator of these texts of the Koran and of Arabic and Persian poetry, and as a sympathetic interpreter of Sūfism.

Professor MacKinnon, in an essay on Philosophy and Christology, remarks that Christology confronts theology with difficult but ‘inescapable problems’ because logically ‘it is unique; and yet it overlaps here, there and everywhere’. The complexity of the task, however, does not excuse the theologian from the need to determine the logical nature of the concept of ‘incarnation’ if he wishes to use it in his work—and, as I hope to show, any theology which attempts to describe the actual nature of God probably cannot avoid using this concept in some form or other. Only by appreciating the logic of this concept can the theologian be confident that he understands its proper content and implications and that he offers appropriate justification for his claims about it. In this paper I want to suggest one possible way of viewing the logic of incarnational talk in theology which is based upon the attempt to treat such talk in terms of the notion of ‘revelation’.

Three basic attitudes toward human destiny have precipitated out of the modern theological mentality: double predestination, Arminianism, and universalism. Of the three, Arminianism and double predestination have been unacceptable to a large segment of modern protestantism. The result is that universalism, in one form or another, has assumed wide popularity in recent years. The doctrine has become what might be called an article in the popular creed. But since the influence of universalism has come about largely through default, its explicit formulation has remained incommensurate with its popularity and importance.

Sometimes the scholar can safely take hints for the direction of his scholarship from popular concerns. They may be deeper than they appear. As Erik H. Erikson has remarked in reference to the yearnings of young Americans for the teaching of the Eastern mystics: ‘The need to search for total and final values can often be met only under the condition that these values be foreign to everything one has been taught’.

When Christians worship God, their cultic activities display, in widely varying combinations, attitudes of fear, respect, love, trust, awe, deference and obedience. They worship the Lord with all their heart, soul and strength, confessing their own insignificance in comparison to God, yet expressing confidence in the divine mercy which they believe will assist them through the trials of this life, toward a joyful existence beyond the grave. In the liturgical churches, the dominating mood varies according to the tables of feasts and fasts: Christmas and Easter are times for joyful song, brightly coloured vestments and festive activities. Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are days of penitence, sorrow and sombre hymnody. (‘Remember, Oh Man, that dust thou art…’) Throughout the year, the houses of worship are places of bowed heads and lowered voices, of respect and sobriety, and sometimes of veneration for icons and the objects used in worship. The inventory of revered objects varies considerably, as do the activities thought to be appropriate in this connection, ranging from the Low Protestant's respectful handling of the Bible to the High Churchman's prostration before the Monstrance, in the Benediction of the Holy Sacrament. But it is clear that divine worship normally involves reverence and awe and that it usually involves some form of self-abasement (bending the knee before).

The knockdown argument, the logically impregnable position are rarities in philosophy. Indeed, there are some who might argue (guardedly of course) that no philosophical argument or position is immune from damaging criticism: what seems utterly convincing to one generation of philosophers is 1iable to be held up as a classic blunder by the next. Nevertheless, Hume's presentation of the problem of evil and his allied criticisms of a Christian-type theism (in the Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, esp. Parts X and XI) have seemed conclusive to an impressive array of nineteenth- and twentieth-century philosophers, and both his efforts, consequently, might be regarded as likely exceptions to the principle of philosophical fallibility. But now, in a fairly recent article, Professor Nelson Pike has seen fit to challenge even these supposedly reliable cornerstones of our philosophical heritage. More recently still, Pike has included this article, unchanged, in an anthology which he has edited, and he has backed it up with an introductory note which reaffirms his challenge to Hume on evil.