현대 과정 종교철학의 흐름과 화이트헤드 철학의 전망

Abstract

As far as a Whiteheadian philosophy of religion regards creativity as ultimate reality, it is faced with two challenges at least. A challenge is from the traditional philosophy of religion in the West that construes God to be an ultimate reality. The other challenge is from a contemporary philosophy of religion in the East that construes nothingness or emptiness to be an ultimate. Although these challenges are so phenomenal as to be threatening to Whitehead's philosophical system, I believe that a Whiteheadian philosophy of religion has a framework in which while it can incorporate these ultimates into its system of thought, it does not have to result in any damage to its own metaphysical system. The purpose of this paper is to show how an aesthetic interpretation of Whitehead's philosophy can be successful in incorporating God and Emptiness into its own metaphysical system, without losing the peculiar doctrine of ultimate reality in which creativity is regarded as the ultimate reality. My thesis is that although it goes without saying that creativity is the only ultimate reality in Whitehead's philosophy, it does not do away with the possibility of interpretation in which both God and Emptiness can be construed as an ultimate. I believe such an interpretation is to be made possible when we rely on Whitehead's theory of civilization where the production of Beauty is said to be the teleology of our universe. My argument is that Beauty is to be regarded as an axiological ultimate toward which the teleology of the Universe is oriented. Furthermore, while both God and Emptiness are considered to be an ultimate in Whitehead's system, Creativity is still the only explanatory item by means of which all the entities of the Universe, including God and Emptiness can be explained.