Ground of Being

Thomas Jonathan Jackson Altizer was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts on May 28, 1927. During World War II, he enlisted in the Army, where he worked on radios for bombers. He received a bachelor's degree in 1948, a master's degree in theology in 1951, and a Ph.D. in history of religions in 1955 from the University of Chicago. He wanted to become an Episcopal priest but failed a psychiatric evaluation.

He taught at Wabash College, Emory University, and the State University of New York at Stony Brook. As a theologian, he believed in the God is dead movement. He wrote around 20 books including Radical Theology and the Death of God written with William Hamilton, The Gospel of Christian Atheism, and Living the Death of God. He died from complications of a stroke on November 28, 2018 at the age of 91.

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