John Caird 1820 – 1898
John Caird was a Scottish theologian, philosopher of religion, and Church of Scotland minister, elder brother of Edward Caird, and from 1873 principal of the University of Glasgow. After a celebrated parish ministry, he produced the most sustained nineteenth-century British defense of Hegelian philosophy of religion in his Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion of 1880 and his posthumously published Gifford Lectures on the Fundamental Ideas of Christianity. His careful argument that the infinite reveals itself only through the finite shaped much subsequent British and American philosophical theology.
Key facts
- Nationality
- Scottish
- Era
- Modern
- Movements
- Continental, Christian
Selected quotes
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Attributed to John Caird:
“The infinite reveals itself only through the finite.”
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Attributed to John Caird:
“Religion is the activity of spirit recognizing itself in God.”
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Attributed to John Caird:
“True theology is reasoned theology.”
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Attributed to John Caird:
“Faith without philosophy is poor; philosophy without faith is hollow.”
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Attributed to John Caird:
“The deepest knowledge is also the deepest love.”