Religion & Philosophy Faculty Publications
Scholarly Publications
Books
Faber, Hustwit, and Phelps (eds.) Beyond Superlatives: Regenerating Whitehead’s Philosophy of Experience (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014).
This collection of essays, drawn from the latest generation of Whitehead scholars, explores how, in the deconstruction of certain concepts, an unceasing invitation of possibility and change is released, both in relation to ongoing philosophical conversations, and as applied to lived experience. This volume applies Whitehead’s philosophy to superlatives-those valued concepts that limit and define our categories amid the flux of experience. The first half of this book probes the superlatives that have historically defined philosophical method in the West. The essays in the second half of the book reflect on the influx, fragility, and impossibility of superlatives like care, tragedy, love, and loss in human experience, generating new matters of philosophical discourse.
Hustwit, J. R. Interreligious Hermeneutics and the Pursuit of Truth (Lexington Books, 2014)
In terms of interreligious dialogue, Hustwit’s hermeneutical approach treats religious truth claims as tentative hypotheses, but hypotheses that are frequently commensurable and rationally contestable. Interreligious dialogue goes beyond facilitating bonhomie or negotiating tolerance; dialogue can and should be a disciplined space for rationally adjudicating claims about what lies beyond the limits of human understanding.
Potts, Michael; Byrne, Paul A.; Nilges, Richard G. (eds.) Beyond Brain Death: The Case against Brain Based Criteria for Human Death (Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000).
Beyond Brain Death offers a provocative challenge to one of the most widely accepted conclusions of contemporary bioethics: the position that brain death marks the death of the human person. Eleven chapters by physicians, philosophers, and theologians present the case against brain-based criteria for human death. Each author believes that this position calls into question the moral acceptability of the transplantation of unpaired vital organs from brain-dead patients who have continuing function of the circulatory system.
Walsh, Richard G. Finding St. Paul in Film (T&T Clark International, 2005).
Walsh finds a Paul who is a stranger to our questions and ideologies. As Paul does not appear often in film, the films that the book brings into dialogue with Paul have only metaphorical connections with the Paul of Christian and academic discourse. The films relate to Paul only as Walsh’s interpretations of the films and of Paul render Paul the films’ precursor. Walsh’s book works more abstractly. It has four major topics distributed in an equal number of chapters: (1) Paul’s concept of grace (the inclusion of the Gentiles); (2) Paul’s apocalyptic visions and worldview; (3) Paul’s struggles with theodicy and community formation; and (4) Paul’s “apostolic” or “canonical” status. He examines movies such as Tender Mercies, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Places in the Heart, Donnie Darko, Witness, The Truman Show, Strange Days, Being John Malkovich, Fargo, Crimes and Misdemeanors, and The Apostle.
Walsh, Richard G. Reading the Bible: An Introduction (Cross Cultural Publications, 1998).
Excellent background information on all the books of the Bible. Indispensable for the understanding of the Scriptures, prepared by a most respected scholar and teacher. Full of helpful charts and literary parallels.
Walsh, Richard G. Reading the Gospels in the Dark: Portrayals of Jesus in Film (Trinity Press International, 2003).
From The Greatest Story Ever Told to Jesus of Montreal to Shane, the figure of Jesus has made repeated—and varied—appearances in American cinema. In Reading the Gospels in the Dark, Richard Walsh brings “Jesus-films,” the canonical gospels, and American culture into conversation. The discourse begins in the theater with the lights down low and the Jesus-films on the big screen. Walsh’s commentary starts with the films themselves and the American Jesus(es) portrayed therein. Ironically, while we do not expect Jesus-films to “get Jesus or the gospels right,” they do cast light on interesting literary and mythical features of the gospels—and on American culture.
Walsh, Richard G., and George Aichele (eds). Screening Scripture: Intertextual Connections Between Scripture and Film (Trinity Press International, 2002).
The book proposes that there is no natural connection between scripture and film—even for those movies that seem to have an obvious relationship to religious text. It is only the viewer that makes this connection. From this perspective, Screening Scripture opens up new possibilities for viewing these movies and reading these texts with each other. The contributors to this volume serve as creative viewers who make these connections for some of today’s most popular and provocative films. The scriptures discussed include not only the Bible, but apocryphal, heretical, and non-Western scriptures.
Walsh, Richard G., and George Aichele (eds). Those Outside: Noncanonical Readings of Canonical Gospels. (T&T Clark, 2005).
Readings of the canonical gospels have a particular place in this history. Indeed, the gospels are the pride and joy of the church(es), as they are of an academy that scarcely separates itself from the church. The following essays, however, all share a desire to read Herme(s)tically, in heterodox or even heretical directions. In this volume, and against the traditional readings and their keepers, the contributors practice interpretative thefts or, put differently, they pursue “lines of flight” (Deleuze and Guattari 1987), not movements of escape but rather creative ways of contesting prevailing ideologies.
Walsh, Richard G. Three Versions of Judas (Equinox Publishing, 2010).
Three Versions of Judas explores the mythic work transpiring in the Judases of the gospels and of subsequent scholarly and artistic interpretation from the perspective of Jorge Luis Borges’ “Three Versions of Judas”.
Recent Articles and Chapters
Hustwit, J. R. “Models, Idols, and the Great White Whale: Toward a Christian Faith of Nonattachment,” in Models of God and of Other Ultimate Realities, ed. Jeanine Diller and Asa Kasher. (Forthcoming, Springer Publishing, 2012).
_____. “The Imaginal Solvent: Whitehead and Coleridge on Novel Forms” in Beyond Superlatives: Regenerating Whitehead’s Philosophy of Experience, eds. Roland Faber, J.R. Hustwit, and Hollis Phelps (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014).
_____. “Is Paul Ricoeur a Process Philosopher? Interpretation and Becoming,” Process Studies 37, no. 1 (2008).
_____. “Can Models of God Compete?” Philosophia 35, no. 3-4 (Fall 2007), 433-439. Revised and republished in Models of God and of Other Ultimate Realities, ed. Jeanine Diller and Asa Kasher. (Forthcoming, Springer Publishing, 2012).
_____. “Process Philosophy,” The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, hosted by the University of Tennessee at Martin, available at http://www.iep.utm.edu/p/processp.htm.
_____. “Open Interpretation: Whitehead and Schleiermacher on Hermeneutics,” in Whitehead and Schleiermacher: Open Systems in Dialogue, ed. Christine Helmer et al. (New York: De Gruyter, 2004), 185-213.
_____. “Self-Determination, Evil, and Process Theology,” New Perspectives 16:1 (Winter 2004), 20-21.
Potts, Michael; Verheijde, Joseph L; Rady, Mohamad Y.; Evans, David W. “The Ethics of Limiting Informed Debate: Censorship of Select Medical Publications in the Interest of Organ Transplantation.” Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 38 (December 2013):625-638.
_____ and Devanno, Amy. “Tertullian’s Theory of the Soul and Contemporary Psychical Research.” Journal of the Society for Psychical Research 77 (October 2013): 209-219.
_____ and Verheijde, Joseph L; Rady, Mohamad Y. (2012). “When a Nudge Becomes a Shove.” The American Journal of Bioethics 12:2 (February):40-42.
_____ and Rady, Mohamad Y.; Verheijde Joseph L.; Potts, Michael. “Quality Palliative Care or Physician-Assisted Death: A Comment on the French Perspective of End-of-life Care in Neurological Disorders.” Journal of Clinical Research and Bioethics (2011) 2:102e
_____ and Verheijde, Joseph L.; Rady, Mohamad Y.; Evans, David W. “Normative Consent and Presumed Consent for Organ Donation: A Critique.” Journal of Medical Ethics 36 (2010):498-499.
_____ and Verheijde, Joseph L.; (2010). Commentary on the Concept of Brain Death within the Catholic Bioethical Framework. Christian Bioethics 16:3 (December 2010):246-256.
_____ and Byrne, Paul A.; Evans, David W. (2010). “Infant Heart Transplantation after Cardiac Death: Ethical and Legal Problems.” Journal of Clinical Ethics 21:3 (Fall 2010):224-228.
_____. “Risk Management, Chaos Theory, and the Corporate Board of Directors.” In Corporate Boards: Managers of Risk, Sources of Risk, ed. Robert W. Kolb and David Schwartz (Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010), pp. 55-69.
_____ and Byrne, Paul A. (2009). “Is it Morally Right to Kill Patients that Good may Come?” The Internet Journal of Law, Healthcare, and Ethics 6:1 (2009)
_____ and Evans, David W. (2008). “Is Solid Organ Donation by Living Kidney Donors Ethical?” The Case of Kidney Donation. In Organ Transplantation: Ethical, Legal, and Psychosocial Aspects, ed. W. Weimar, M. A. Bos, and J. J. Busschlach (Lengerich: Pabst Science Publishers), pp. 377-381.
_____. (2008). “Pharmaceutical Mergers and Genetic Technology: A Problematic Combination.” In The Ethics of Genetic Commerce, ed. Robert Kolb (Malden, MA: Blackwell), pp. 177-189.
Walsh, Richard. “(Carrying the Fire on) No Road for Old Horses: Cormac McCarthy’s Untold Biblical Stories,” The Journal of Religion and Popular Culture (forthcoming,Fall 2012).
_____. “Crimes and Misdemeanors,” in Adele Reinhartz, ed. Bible and Cinema: Fifty Key Films (London: Routledge, forthcoming).
_____. “Monty Python’s Life of Brian,” in Adele Reinhartz, ed. Bible and Cinema: Fifty Key Films (London: Routledge, forthcoming).
_____. “Jesus and the Zealots: A Leitmotif in Bible Films.” Forthcoming in a Collection of the Papers of the Religion und Gewalt im Bibelfilm Internationales Symposium.
_____. “Epic, Film,” in The Encyclopedia of the Bible and Its Reception (Walter DeGruyter).
_____. “Metamorphosis, Transfiguration, and the Body.” With George Aichele. Biblical Interpretation 19.3 (2011): 253-75.
_____. “The Christians Kill Jesus Again: Spectacle, Drama, and Politics at Oberammergau.” The Bible and Critical Theory 7.1 (2011): 42-50.
_____. “The Horror, the Horror: What Kind of (Horror) Movie is the Apocalypse?” The Journal of Religion and Popular Culture 22.3 (Fall 2010).
_____. “Sanctifying Empire: Or the (Hopeful?) Paradox of Apocalysia.” In John Walliss and Lee Quinby, eds., Reel Revelations: Apocalypse and Film, Apocalypse and Popular Culture Series 1 (Sheffield Phoenix, 2010).
_____. “Imagine There’s No Heaven Canon.” The Bible and Critical Theory. 6.3 (2010) (Monash University EPress).
_____. “The Hollywood Gospel and its Scholars: Lessons from Stigmata.” Postscripts: The Journal of Sacred Texts and Contemporary Worlds 4.1 (2008, published 2010): 93-109.
_____. “Passover Plots: From Modern Fictions to Mark and Back Again.” Postscripts: The Journal of Sacred Texts and Contemporary Worlds 3.2-3 (August-November2007; published Feb. 2010): 201-22.
_____. “‘Realizing’ Paul’s Visions: The New Testament, Caravaggio, and Paxton’s Frailty.” Biblical Interpretation 18.1 (2010):28-51.
_____. “Bible Movies.” In William L. Blizek, ed. The Continuum Companion to Religion and Film (London/New York: Continuum, 2009). Reprinted as The Bloomsbury Companion to Religion and Film (2013).
_____. “An Elephant in the Room: Historical, Critical, and Postmodern Interpretations of the Bible.” With George Aichele and Peter Miscall. The Journal of Biblical Literature 128.2 (Summer 2009): 399-419.
_____. “The Passion as Horror Show: St. Mel of the Cross,” The Journal of Religion and Popular Culture 20 (Fall 2008).
_____. “Barabbas: The Cross that Damns.” In David Shepherd, ed. Images of the Word: Hollywood’s Bible and Beyond. Semeia Studies 54 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature,2008), pp. 113-29.
Other Publications
Fiction
Potts, Michael. End of Summer (Tullahoma, TN: WordCrafts Press, 2011).
_____. “Death Rattle.” Belle Rêve Literary Journal 14:3 (Summer 2014):40-48.
_____. “Earnest Expectations.” In: We are Dust and Shadow, edited by James Ward Kirk (Lexington, KY: James Ward Kirk Fiction, 2014), 98-103.
Screenplays
Potts, Michael. “Obedience.” Finalist, Peachtree Village International Film Festival, Atlanta, GA, August 2013; Official Selection, Fright Night Film Festival, Louisville, KY, July 2013.
_____. “Business Meeting” Semi-Finalist, Screamfest, 2013.
Poetry
Potts, Michael. “Butterscotch.” In: The Southern Poetry Anthology, Volume 6: Tennessee, edited by Jesse Graves, Paul Ruffin, and William Wright (Huntsville, TX: Texas Review Press, 2013).
_____. From Field to Thicket. (North Carolina Writers’ Network, 2006). Winner, 2006 Mary Belle Campbell Poetry Book Award, North Carolina Writers’ Network