A first-of-its-kind critical overview of how art leads to moral action in the field of theological ethics
One question that remains insufficiently addressed in theological ethics is the question of how art leads to moral action. While many modernist theories consider art to be a morally irrelevant activity, others think that the arts, and the emotions they elicit, are integral to moral formation and justice. Challenging both kinds of theories, Art and Moral Change proposes that art is essential because it is an inevitable source of moral disagreement.
Drawing on the work of Jonathan Edwards and many others in theology, philosophy, and literary studies, Art and Moral Change argues that the arts are the cultural mediums through which we can better understand what is morally possible in the midst of difference. The arts, in other words, can serve as snapshots of a particular community's perspectives on the good life, offering glimpses not only of competing moral visions within society but also of the extent to which these contested moral views are reconcilable. Thus, the arts reveal the limits of moral reasoning, confirm the contextuality of moral discernment, and necessitate moral thinking that is dialogical and dialectical.
Art and Moral Change provides a first-of-its-kind critical overview of how the field of theological ethics approaches and should utilize aesthetics. The core premise—that paying attention to art encourages us to appreciate the ethical importance of disagreement, difference, and conflict—will foster greater understanding of aesthetics and ethics for students and scholars of theological, social, and virtue ethics.
Reviews
"Much contemporary moral philosophy and theology assumes some relation between aesthetics and ethics without carefully explicating what it is. Choi has remedied any such deficiency by carefully and judiciously assessing how art does and does not transform moral agents. Examining contemporary thinkers, Aquinas, Jonathan Edwards, and others, he develops a complex relationship between the dispositions of an audience, aesthetic works, and moral agency. Art and Moral Change is a beautiful work enhancing our understanding of goodness."—D. Stephen Long, Cary M. Maguire University Professor of Ethics, Southern Methodist University
"Dr. Choi scrutinizes the intersection of art and ethics, challenging claims that have become commonplace and, in the end, bringing deeper meaning to them. With precision and care, he conducts a methodological study of art, affections, and transformation and creates a text that actually illuminates the art of change itself."—Ellen Ott Marshall, professor, Candler School of Theology, Emory University
"In Art and Moral Change, Ki Joo Choi offers an incisive examination of existing conversations about the relationship between theological ethics and aesthetics. In a direct and compelling voice, he offers persuasive answers to questions with which scholars working in this area have grappled for decades. One finishes this book with a clear sense of the stakes of this relationship, and the necessity of thinking well about it for the future of ethics. This book is required reading for students of theological ethics and aesthetics in the 21st century."—Nichole M. Flores, associate professor of religious studies, University of Virginia
"This deeply interdisciplinary work gives us the best sustained account of the place of the arts in contemporary Christian ethics. Moving beyond claims that art is morally transformative (or not), it constructively problematizes the revived ethical interest in aesthetics by exploring how the contested experience of art is related both to social practices and prior visions of the good life."—Eric Gregory, professor of religion, Princeton University
About the Author
Ki Joo Choi teaches Asian American theology and Christian ethics at Princeton Theological Seminary. His publications include Disciplined by Race: Theological Ethics and the Problem of Asian American Identity (2019). He is the coeditor of the Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics.
