Zizek and Theology [Paperback]

Slavoj ??i??ek has been called an academic rock star. As public visibility of the Slovenian philosopher and psychoanalyst increases, so too does the depth of his engagement with Christian theology. ??i??ek's recent work includes extended treatments of key Christian thinkers from Paul, Pascal, and Kierkegaard to G. K. Chesterton and C. S. Lewis, while Christology and other theological themes have provided crucial points of reference. ??i??ek has even said that to become a true dialectical materialist, one should go through the Christian experience.
But ??i??ek's work on Christianity often overwhelms students of theology. To be sure, ??i??ek's style of argumentation is unusual and his concepts are complex. But the more basic problem is that his work on Christianity is a further development of a broader intellectual project established in many volumes produced in the course of the 1990s. This book will bring students of theology up to speed on this broader intellectual project, with an eye toward what brings ??i??ek to an explicit engagement with Christianity and how both his earlier and more recent works are relevant for theological reflection.

Introduction: A Materialist Theology?
The Approach of This Book
Hegel
Lacan
Marx

Chapter 1: Ideology Critique
Ideology in Practice
The Challenge of Cynicism
Ideology and the big Other
The Stumbling Block of the Real
Keeping Enjoyment at Bay
Liberal Democracy and Nationalism

Chapter 2: Subjectivity and Ethics
The Real as Sexual Difference
The Vanishing Mediator
Fantasy and the Big Other
Diagnosing Ethics
The Cure

Chapter 3: The Christian Experience
Prefiguring the Theological Turn
A Politics of Truth
The Reign of Perversion
Job and Judaism
Cross and Collective
Love Beyond the Law

Chapter 4: Dialectical Materialism, or The Philosophy of Freedom
What is Dialectical Materialism?
Self-Consciousness as Short Circuit
The Al#*