Paul Tillich The Eternal Now Sparknotes

In The Eternal Now, Paul Tillich intent is to answer a variety of questions that are concomitant with Ontology and Theology. It is written in a direct style that is free from the characteristic rhetorical frills of many religious works. Make no mistake Tillich is a sincerely religious man who frames his philosophical thinking in the weltanschauung of Christianity. Nonetheless, in Tillich’s mode of existentialist manifestation, ideation of "being" saturates the mundane milieu of religion.

Throughout the pages, Tillich provides an alternative ontological examination of the necessity in a belief of the Ultimate. The emblematic apologetic approach, as articulated in the works of St. Anselm, William of Ockham, and Duns Scotus, is destabilized by Tillich’s radical exposition that: If God is being – viz., the highest being-in-itself – then God cannot be the “Creator”. Consequently, God must be

understood as the ground of Being-Itself. This analysis should not be considered all that radical. Many historical theologians expressed analogous views of God is the agennetos [non-original ground] of all being (Cf. J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, p. 128).
What this text presents is a culmination of Tillich’s sermons [lectures] delivered to answer explicit questions relating to biblical passages.

As an example, Chapter Three, The Riddle of Inequality – incidentally, my favorite chapter – starts with the following verse from Mark 4:25:

“For to him who has will more be given; and from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away”

What Tillich then attempts to explicate, is the historical significance of this passage apropos to the expression of meaning. Through a cursory trace of self-reflection, Tillich layers the historical meaning onto modernity by exclaiming, “There are many things that we seemed to have, but that we really did not have, and that were therefore taken away from us”. As an example, Tillich uses the widespread belief in childhood innocence as something that cannot be used or increased. “The growth of our lives is made possible only by the sacrifice of the original gift of ignorance”. Hence, there are many things we had [have] that are constantly being taken away because of “taking them too much for

granted”.
The real inequalities, according to Tillich, are:
“[T]he inequality of talents in body and mind; the inequality created by freedom and destiny, and the inequality of justice deriving from the fact that all generations before the time of such equality would by nature be excluded from its blessing”
Therefore, Tillich argument is that we must not confound the imbroglio of inequality with the understanding that each person is a “unique and incomparable self. We should be defending the uniqueness and individuality of humanity and at the same time understand that this is not the solution to inequality (Hence, maxims like “The Golden Rule,” and Kant’s Categorical Imperative have their place, but it is not to help solve the riddle of inequality).
Ultimately, I appreciate Tillich’s style of writing and his exposition of some problems inherent to humanity. Although I must admit, I would prefer to highlight a great portion of the text with a black highlighter, his thoughts are intriguing. As a path forward, I would like to research the connection between Tillich and Heidegger, concentrating on the ways in which their ideas are similar, but find different inspiration and results.