Theology Beyond Metaphysics

“In his cutting-edge book, Theology Beyond Metaphysics, Anthony Bartlett reveals the radical way in which God has intervened to liberate and reconstitute human consciousness, transforming it from the inside out with language-signs of nonviolence. I am grateful for its hopeful vision: that the new beginning inaugurated by Jesus is in our day coming to full clarity, with an urgency that cannot fail to transform human reality.”


—James Warren, author of Compassion or Apocalypse: A Comprehensible Guide to the Thought of René Girard





“For anyone interested in the theological application of the thought of René Girard, Tony Bartlett has long been essential reading. Here he outdoes himself in the clarity with which he makes potentially complicated matters simple. He brings us to the heart of why and how Girard’s insight communicates an epochal shift in lived understanding of both the gospel and what it means to be human. Deep grazing, to which I will have to return to learn more.”


—James Alison, Catholic priest, theologian, and author





“Bartlett has an expansive vision with the sign at its center. Unfolding it evocatively through Girard, Heidegger, Marion, and the lesser known but no less rewarding semiotics of John Deely, he arrives at John’s Gospel, in the company of the Beloved Disciple, to discover Christ as the transformative sign that makes all things new.”


—Susannah Ticciati, Reader in Christian Theology, King’s College London





“In this important book, Anthony Bartlett draws on René Girard’s biblical anthropology in vital and telling ways. By engaging—and winningly explaining—advances in semiotics, he rewrites intellectual history. His analyses decouple theology from its unwieldy partnership with metaphysics, while mining key insights in philosophical tradition from Aquinas through Peirce, from Heidegger through Derrida, from Vico to Lévi-Strauss.”


—Andrew J. McKenna, Emeritus Professor of French, Loyola University Chicago





“In this paradigm-shifting work, Anthony Bartlett unfolds poetic language, potent descriptors, and powerful artifacts for dynamically revealing God as nonviolent. Though this is a deeply philosophical work, this book is an astonishing revelation that should be witnessed to around tables, from the pulpit, and even on our interwebs. Bartlett has given us an invaluable resource for telling a better story to the worlds we inhabit.”


—Dan White Jr., co-founder of The Praxis Gathering and author of Love Over Fear