In our first article in this issue, Mike Ashfield begins by noting and accepting a distinction introduced by of Ingolf Dalferth (1984) between the ontology of sin and the criteria of sinful acts. Ashfield focuses on the criteriological issue. He catalogues various suggestions regarding what sinful acts should be included in the extension of sin. While there are differences here, he notes that there is a “moral consensus” that moral fault is necessary or sufficient for an act to count as sinful. Ashfield claims that this consensus is problematic. In this wake, Ashfield introduces and evaluates two unexplored solutions to the problems entailed in the moral consensus. Finding problems in them as well, he concludes that Christian thinkers may need to consider a more radical separation of sin and moral fault.

We go next from an interest in what counts as a sinful act to the question of what counts as a meritorious act. As Steven Smith notes, many religious traditions adopt a merit scheme according to which reward and punishment are deserved because they are earned on the basis of good or evil deeds. This raises a question of the possibility of merit transfer, the bestowing of merit on those who have not earned it. Yet Buddhism and Roman Catholicism, banking on the harmony of interdependence, are able to make a place for this transfer of merit to those who have not earned it. This is because these traditions follow a communal love scheme that permits the transfer of merit to the undeserving. This scheme allows the transfer of merit that does not violate the logic of a merit scheme since this transfer is itself meritorious.

In our next article, Wookby Park reminds us that even though Emmanuel Levinas doubts the ethical value of artistic beauty, his exploration of the possibility of spiritual-ethical teaching in literature can be compared to Kant’s reflections on the sublime quality of beauty. This comparison can shed light on Levinas’s religious concept of the sublime. Wookby argues that it is a mistake to assume that Levinas is antipathetic to art itself. Rather, he seems to want to utilize art’s features to enlighten our ethical and religious commitments.

In our final essay, Sabastian Gab begins by noting that mystical experiences are fundamentally similar, at least if we look below the surface. Here we see that even though all mystical experiences are intrinsically shaped by the mystics’ pre-existing religious concepts, this does not preclude a non-conceptual core. This core is the universal common element in all mystical experiences. He calls this the raw material of mystical experiences. This common core thesis doesn’t claim that our background beliefs and concepts are irrelevant for our experiences – they surely are. It’s just that they alone don’t constitute these experiences.