Abstract
This article concerns the methodological issues confronted by pastoral theology students in their writing of a master’s thesis or doctoral dissertation. I introduce H. Richard Niebuhr’s (1951) identification of five models (rejection, accommodation, synthesis, dualism, and conversionist) for relating the theological and psychological resources used in their writing. Then, by means of Rudolf Arnheim’s art theory (1986, 1988, 1996), I identify three additional models (convergence, juxtaposition, and structural uniformity) and note their affinities with and complications of three of Niebuhr’s models (synthesis, dualism, and accommodation). I argue that these complications can play a positive role in the writing of a thesis or dissertation as they promote a fuller engagement with the empirical reality that is the focus of study. I also note David W. Galenson’s (2006) view that his typology of artists as conceptualists and experimentalists is applicable to scholars and suggest that awareness of which type is most characteristic of oneself may enable one to minimize the frustrations that one is likely to experience in writing a thesis or dissertation. I conclude with a brief discussion of Erik H. Erikson’s consideration of Martin Luther’s redefinition of work in Young Man Luther (chapter 5) and suggest that it makes the case for understanding thesis and dissertation writing as an exercise in liberated craftsmanship.
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Notes
I am aware that doctoral programs in the field have various titles and that “pastoral theology” is merely one of them. However, it is convenient for me to use this title because it is the title of the doctoral program at the institution I have been associated with since 1981. Also, for simplicity’s sake, I will generally refer to the student’s dissertation, but thesis is also implied.
By “theological resources” I intend to include the whole range of resources that the term implies (i.e., systematic, historical, philosophical, biblical, cultural, and practical, as well as theological ethics, theologies that focus on specific reference groups or emphasize specific topics and themes—hope, liberation, peace, environment, etc.—and theologies identified with specific denominations, movements, and theologians). By “psychological resources” I support the historical tendency of pastoral theology to privilege the psychological disciplines, but I do not mean to exclude other disciplines (sociology, anthropology, economics, literary theory, philosophy, etc.). Also, I would note that pastoral theology is defined not only by the resources that it employs but also by the phenomena that it chooses for study. In this regard, pastoral theology has tended to privilege the individual (as reflected in its emphasis on case studies and autobiographical writings), but not the individual in isolation from his or her social, institutional, and cultural contexts and frameworks. Although I personally support its emphasis on local contexts (see Capps & Fowler 2010, pp. 155–161), I believe that pastoral theology also needs to be attentive to cosmopolitan and global contexts, especially to the ways in which these contexts impinge upon and are reflected in local contexts.
It might be argued that this methodological elasticity is itself a method and, if so, a method that is not among the methods suggested by Niebuhr’s five models. If so, I believe that students are well-advised to adopt one of the five methods for the purposes of a thesis or dissertation if for no other reason than that this will facilitate the writing and completion of the thesis or dissertation. Pastoral theologians are typically identified as “practical theologians,” and the completion of a thesis or dissertation is certainly a practical matter. The dictionary suggests that practical is “concerned with the application of knowledge to useful ends” and that it “stresses effectiveness as tested by actual experience or as measured by a completely realistic approach to life or the particular circumstances involved” (Agnes 2001, pp. 1129).
The foregoing associations between Arnheim’s and Niebuhr’s models leave out Niebuhr’s rejection and conversionist models. One way to address this omission would be to formulate two additional art historical models and the paintings that illustrate them. In my view, this formulation would be especially valuable in the case of Niebuhr’s conversionist model, as I have questions about the viability of a dissertation in pastoral theology that would propose the outright rejection of psychological resources. (One could focus on the theme as opposed to the technique of Titian’s Christ Crowned with Thorns and suggest that it is illustrative of the rejectionist model, but I suspect that identifying psychological resources with Christ and theological resources with the soldiers would be considered rather hyperbolic, if not perverse.). As Niebuhr’s conversionist model views Christ as the “transformer” of culture, it is likely that a painting illustrative of this model would involve action, but action that has a positive effect on its object.
My primary source for the theology of work was The Theology of Work: An Exploration by Marie-Dominique Chenu (1963), a French Roman Catholic theologian. More recent texts on the theology of work include Miroslav Volf’s (2001) Work in the Spirit: Toward a Theology of Work, David H. Jensen’s (2006) Responsive Labor: A Theology of Work, and Carrell Cosden’s (2006) A Theology of Work: Work and the New Creation. Also, Josè Luis Illane’s (2003) The Sanctification of Work was originally published in English 1967 under the title On the Theology of Work. The Psychology of Work by Donald Scott (1970) was published shortly after my dissertation was completed.
In the preface to Young Man Luther Erikson mentions that Joan Erikson’s work in transforming the Austen Riggs Center’s occupational therapy program into a meaningful “activities program” helped him “to understand the curative as well as the creative role of work which . . . is so prominent in young Luther’s life” (p. 8; see Erikson et al. 1976).
While I have restricted my discussion of Erikson’s Young Man Luther to the issue of work, I would also like to mention that chapter 2—“The Fit in the Choir”—is an excellent resource with regard to the methodological issues discussed in this article. I would suggest that it reveals Erikson’s endorsement of the synthesis model. Here Erikson focuses on Luther’s “fit” in the choir loft of the monastery where he was in the process of becoming a monk (in which Luther was said to have shouted out “It’s not me” when the story of the demon-possessed boy in Mark 9:14–29 was being read). He discusses four interpreters of this episode (a Lutheran professor, a Dominican priest, a Danish psychiatrist, and an American professor who is acquainted with Freud’s thought) and goes on to indicate that what he will be attempting to do in the book is to view Luther from a more integrative perspective than is reflected in the works of these four writers. The first two authors treat the episode as a theological matter, while the other two treat it as a psychological matter. His approach involves both. But, even more importantly, he views the four of them as united on one point, namely, they all agree that “dynamic psychology must be kept away from the data of Luther’s life” (p. 30). The implication, of course, is that this is what Erikson will bring to the study of Luther’s life and that this will affect not only the psychological but also the theological understanding of Luther. One could perhaps argue that although his method reflects his endorsement of the synthesis model, there are also intimations of the conversionist model. In an unpublished lecture at a conference on psychohistory, Erikson (1972) noted that he wrote his books on Luther and Gandhi (Erikson 1958, 1969) because “I wanted to get closer to what religious genius is.” He added that he used the tool that God had given Freud—that of psychoanalysis—to experience their presence. This would suggest that through the very synthesis of theology and psychology both may undergo a certain transformation. It also raises the possibility that the writing of a thesis or dissertation may be a religious experience for the author.
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Capps, D. Method, Models, and Scholarly Types: Reflections on Thesis and Dissertation Writing in Pastoral Theology. Pastoral Psychol 63, 551–560 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11089-014-0594-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11089-014-0594-4