ABSTRACT

This is a groundbreaking, highly original work of postmodern feminist theology from one of the most important authors in the field. The Face of the Deep deconstructs the Christian doctrine of creation which claims that a transcendent Lord unilaterally created the universe out of nothing. Catherine Keller's impassioned, graceful meditation develops an alternative representation of the cosmic creative process, drawing upon Hebrew myths of creation, from chaos, and engaging with the political and the mystical, the literary and the scientific, the sexual and the racial.
As a landmark work of immense significance for Jewish and Christian theology, gender studies, literature, philosophy and ecology, The Face of the Deep takes our originary story to a new horizon, rewriting the starting point for Western spiritual discourse.

part I|40 pages

Creation Now and Then

chapter 1|22 pages

Mystery of the Missing Chaos

chapter 2|16 pages

“Floods of Truth”

Sex, love and loathing of the deep

part II|59 pages

Orthodoxies of Nothing

chapter 3|22 pages

“Tears of Achamoth”

The fathers' ex nihilo

chapter 4|19 pages

“Mother Most Dear”

Augustine's dark secrets

chapter 5|16 pages

“Sterile Waters”

Barth's nothingness that is

part III|54 pages

Monsters of Hermeneutics

chapter 6|21 pages

“Sea of Heteroglossia”

Return of the biblical chaos

chapter 8|14 pages

“Leviathanic Revelations”

Melville's hermenautical journey

part IV|84 pages

Creatio Ex Profundis

chapter 9|15 pages

Bottomless Surface

When beginning bereshit

chapter 10|11 pages

The Pluri-Singularity of Creation

Created God bara elohim

chapter 11|17 pages

Strange Attractions

Formless and void tohu vabohu

chapter 12|13 pages

Docta Ignorantia

Darkness on the face pne choshekh

chapter 13|16 pages

Ocean of Divinity

Deep tehom

chapter 14|10 pages

Pneumatic Foam

Spirit vibrating ruach elohim merahephet