Introduction

The introduction provides an overview of the main argument pursued in this book, namely, the application of Henri Bergson’s (1859–1941) philosophy to the classical problem of human freedom and divine foreknowledge in the philosophy of religion. The introduction proceeds in three steps. The first section situates the project of this book within the wider framework of recent approaches to Bergson’s philosophy. The second section offers a very short historical overview of Bergson, analytic philosophy, Thomism, and interactions between them. The final section offers a series of methodological caveats, presuppositions, and hypotheses that the argument pursued in the rest of this book relies on but that will not be independently defended here. Finally, the introduction closes with a brief summary of the individual chapters.