Tillich's Thought Of Ultimate Concern

Paul Tillich is a great thinker who made great contributions in both philosophy and theology. His ultimate concern thought is an important component of his cultural theology system, and it's also his culture theology system's foothold and the home to return. In his ultimate concern thought, the content is rich, the opinion is profound, and the theory is of great value, so the thought arouses people's great interest. There are many materials dealing with its ultimate concern thought, but some of these research materials are from the angle of the philosophy ultimate concern ,others are from the angle of the religious ultimate concern. Therefore they can't be concrete to somebody or some school of thought and the angle of view is too big. While on the other hand, Some research materials deal with the ultimate concern thought from 1-2 aspects, such as only from"the ultimate concern and the existence"or"the ultimate concern and the belief". Thus they can't be very comprehensive and systematic. In view of this, this article attempts to give a systematic and comprehensive explanation of the ultimate concern thought, including the background in which the thought came into being, the thought connotation, the relationship with philosophy ,the relationship with religion, its thought's evaluation and so on, hoping to rise to a new altitude in understanding Tilichi's ultimate concern thought.This article consists of five parts:In the first part, the social environment where the ultimate concern thought was proposed is analyzed. The thought"arises at the historic moment"when western cultural crisis arises. The author has analyzed the Western cultural crisis's performance and the essence. Generally speaking, the 20th century Western cultural crisis was dual crises: first, the rationalism crisis caused by the vanishing of the technology ration; second, people's belief crisis resulted from Christianity's declining gradually. Crisis's essence is the forfeit of people's significance and value world.In the second part, is the explanation of the ultimate concern. First the author introduced briefly the thought origin of the ultimate concern thought, then elaborated the connotation of ultimate concern. The ultimate concern can be seen as the humanity's unconditionally, extremely devotionally yearningly and warmly pursuing from beginning to end for the thing that is infinite, eternal and free. The author elaborates the relationship between ultimate concern and the idolatry, and the key characters of ultimate concern, such as the infinity, the integrity, the absolute quality and survivability and so on. Ultimate concern'objects include God, new existence and religion.The third part elaborates the existentialism philosophy foundation of ultimate concern. The paper has analyzed the relationship between the ultimate concern and existence from two angles. Humanity's existence is the ultimate concern's ontology premise. Tillich explained"the existence"by comparing"existence"with"non-existence", utilizing mutual association method. Thus, the author draws out the finiteness of existence, humanity's finiteness, the humanity's difficult position. To solve anxious difficult position, the author then elaborated the existence courage, absolute belief. Absolute belief in fact is the ultimate concern. From another angle, the ultimate concern makes the humanity has the strength to exist and believe. Here, the author believes that this kind of ultimate concern is the new existence actually, it is renewed based on the old stock.The fourth part mainly elaborates"the religion is the ultimate concern for humanity". The paper elaborates from three aspects: 1st, the religion is the ultimate concern for humanity .The author first expounds the religious true connotation and the function, then elaborates"the validity"of religion existence , attempting to explain that the religion is still indispensable in the heart of contemporary people; the religion is still the mind homeland which the humanity yearn. 2nd, God is the existence itself. Tillich believed that only by relating God with humanity's existence, with humanity's activity, and regarding God as the creative existence, can we find God's ultimate concern for humanity is meaningful. About this matter, the author elaborates from two aspects. One is"God is existence itself"and the other,"the relationship between God and humanity". 3rd, the belief is the existence condition which is seized by the ultimate concern. It is elaborated from two angles. First, it deals with Tillich's understanding of belief. Then the author elaborates that absolute belief is materially the ultimate concern for humanity.The last part is the evaluation of Tillich's ultimate concern thought. The paper is elaborated from four aspects. First, from the theory stratification, with the existentialism viewpoint, Tillich's ultimate concern thought is a brand-new explanation of the religion. The second, from the realistic angle, the ultimate concern thought was a theology critique of the 20th century West culture crisis. The third, from the religious dialog angle, Tillich's ultimate concern thought may provide a versatile academic platform for the contemporary religion dialog theory. Because his ultimate concern thought is already a brand-new religious view, and he has achieved more in understanding religion than any westerner. The fourth part elaborates the ultimate concern in modern circumstances from its development aspect."The ultimate concern"realized the transformation from the theory world to the experience world, and the transformation from"understanding"the ultimate concern to"using"the ultimate concern.