Religion 34 (2004) 229–230

www.elsevier.com/locate/religion

Tribute to John Powell Clayton (1943–2003)

A friend of John Clayton once said that he had the ability to charm an audience in threecountries: Britain, Germany and the USA. The friend was referring not just to the intellectualquality of what John said but to his style, sense of humour, and subtle irony, which many personswill remember with pleasure.John Powell Clayton was born in Sherman, Texas, in 1943, and was educated at Hardin-

Simmons and Baylor universities, and at Southern Baptist Seminary, Louisville. He decided topursue doctoral studies in Britain, and came to Emmanuel College, Cambridge, in October 1968 towork on Paul Tillich’s theology of culture, initially under Professor Dennis Nineham and thenunder Professor Dorothy Emmet. (This change of supervisors reflected John’s increased interest inphilosophy during his time in Cambridge.) The work earned him a Ph.D. in 1976, and a book basedon it, The Concept of Correlation: Paul Tillich and the Possibility of a Mediating Theology (Berlin,De Gruyter, 1980) was soon published, dedicated to Dorothy Emmet on her 75th birthday. It wasone of the earliest substantial studies of Tillich’s theology of culture and is still a leader in its field.While hewas a research student in Cambridge, John succeeded in being appointed to a lectureship

in the Religious Studies Department at Lancaster University, which had been set up by NinianSmart in 1967, three years after the university’s foundation. This department sought to get awayfrom the conventional British theology syllabus, not only by studying all themajor religions but alsoby refusing to concentrate on doctrinal and textual questions at the expense of ignoring the social,ethical, experiential and liturgical dimensions of religions. John was to spend a quarter of a centuryin this department, gaining a Personal Chair in 1991 and serving as Head of Department in 1993–1996. It was in Lancaster, too, that a daughter, Emma, was born to him and his wife, June, in 1981.John was initially appointed to teach courses on modern Protestant thought, and in his research

he concentrated on the work of Tillich and Troeltsch. Together with three colleagues in Lancaster,Ninian Smart, Steven Katz and me, he edited the three volumes of Nineteenth-Century ReligiousThought in the West (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1985). But as time went on, hisphilosophical interests came to play a greater role in his work, in Lancaster as in Cambridge. Hetook over much of Ninian Smart’s teaching in the philosophy of religion. In his research he cameto take an interest in the traditional arguments for God’s existence, focusing not so much on theapologetical role of such arguments, which all too often have been extracted from their originalreligious homes, as on their contexts and purposes within religions. Here he drew not only onChristian sources but also on medieval debates in Judaism and Islam, and, still more widely, ondiscussions within Indian religions. He paid research visits to the Institute of Indology at theUniversity of Vienna in 1989 and 1992.

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The first fruits of this interest in comparative philosophy of religion were seen in a substantialarticle on the theistic arguments, ‘Gottesbeweise’, in the Theologische Realenzyclopadie. A littlelater, he developed his ideas in the Stanton Lectures in the Philosophy of Religion, delivered inCambridge in 1991–92. These lectures, entitled ‘Religions, Reasons, and Gods’, were, alas, neverpublished, though articles related to them appeared in Religious Studies and elsewhere at the time,and John continued to publish articles in this and related fields up until the end e.g., ‘TheOtherness of Anselm’, Neue Zeitschrift fur Systematische Theologie und Religionsphilosophie, 37(1995), 125–43. During his last illness he was working on an article comparing parts of Hume’sDialogues on Natural Religion with earlier debates in Indian religion. His essays were marked byconceptual clarity, wit and elegant style.During his time at Lancaster John undertook many administrative responsibilities, outside his

department as well as in it. He served a term as Principal of Cartmel College in the early 1980s,and sat on many university committees in the 1990s, at a time when a too speedy expansion of theinstitution had resulted in serious financial problems. John’s clarity of mind, wisdom and tactwere much appreciated by his colleagues throughout the University.John also spent two periods of sabbatical leave at the University of Marburg, where he was

Humboldt Research Fellow. He worked especially with Professor Karl Heinz Ratschow, botha leading philosopher of religion and a Lutheran theologian, and was appointed co-editor of theNeue Zeitschrift fur Systematische Theologie und Religionsphilosophie.Having performed with great distinction many roles at Lancaster, John surprised his colleagues

in 1997 by announcing that he was returning to the USA—though to Boston, not his belovedTexas. (He was always very proud of his Texan roots. I recall a visit to the Alamo with him, andlearning of its history and of the brief period in the 1840s when Texas was a separate republic.)At Boston University, John served as Professor of Religion, Chairman of the Department of

Religion, and Director of the Graduate Division of Religious and Theological Studies. There heembarked on the task of building up a large department, using resources of money and personnelthat were not available to him in Lancaster. Alas, he did not have as much time for this effort ashe desired. After surviving one serious illness, he was faced by another early in 2003, and died inBoston on 21 September 2003.John’s career was cut short by illness, and many people will feel frustrated that he did not have

the opportunity to write the great work of comparative philosophy of religion towards which hislater articles were pointing. Yet they will have vivid memories of him: as teacher and scholar, ashelper and wise advisor, and as a warm, kind and witty friend, whose company was a delight.

Patrick SherryProfessor Emeritus, Department of Religious Studies

Lancaster University, Lancaster LA1 4YG, UKE-mail address: p.sherry@lancaster.ac.uk

15 December 2003