Philosophy of Religion: An Old Topic or A New One?

"Anyone going to a major university library and searching for books on "philosophy of religion" would think that this area of philosophy was quite new. By all appearances, it would seem that the philosophy of religion emerged sometime in the middle of the twentieth century and then blossomed rapidly over the period between then and now. Yet this appearance would be deceiving. Philosophical reflection on religious themes has been a central part of philosophy from the time of its origin to the present. In the Western philosophical tradition, this is due at least in part to the fact that most philosophers in the West either have been theists themselves or have written in intellectual climates dominated by theistic presuppositions. Yet while philosophy of religion is not itself new, what is new is the attempt to tease out some of the questions that philosophers raise when discussing religion and to treat them together under a single heading" (Michael J. Murray and Michael Rea, 'An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion,' Preface).

Murray and Rea make a good point I think, viz., the near perennial treatment of religious questions in connection with Western philosophy, at least up until fairly recently (relative to the scope of Western philosophy as a whole). But I don't know if I agree with them on the last point they raise concerning the grouping together of all of the common themes associated with religious questions and treating these questions as a systematic whole. For, arguably, certain theistic traditions were doing this long before the advent of the twentieth century, under the broad label of 'theology.' Though, of course, the degree of philosophical attention that theologians typically gave to religious topics would vary from one period to another, depending on the intellectual inclinations and interests of the theologians in question.

Then again, this potential disagreement is not, I think, all that substantive -- just something of a quibble of mine. And if there is a serious dispute concerning nomenclature, what irks me is not the name per se, but the perhaps implicit suggestion, provided by the name, that philosophy is somehow only incidental to theology. That is, as if theologians could, in fact, do serious theology without the proper philosophical tools in place. (In this case, the name 'philosophical theology' fares hardly much better.) It might be true that philosophy is only the handmaiden, but, as one recent philosophical theologian quipped, the Queen herself historically did not even get out of bed without the handmaiden's assistance.