Information on the thesis

Thesis  for  the  Candidate  Degree  in  Philology,  Specialty  10.02.04  –  Germanic
Languages. – Lviv Ivan Franko National University. – Lviv, 2016.
The thesis is devoted to the study of lexical and semantic, linguistic and pragmatic
peculiarities of German Christian theological terminology.
For the first time, the German terms of professional theological language at the
level  of  vocabulary  and  text  have  been  analyzed.    The  properties  of  German  Christian
theological terminology according to the systematic aspect and the aspect of definitiveness
have  been  studied.  While  studying  the  German  Christian  theological  terms  a  content-
conceptual classification was created. The grouping of words was performed according to
the  conceptual  and  logical  principle  co-thematically  taking  into  account  the  hyper-
hyponymic relations of terminological units in the studied terminology. According to this
classification the German Christian theological terms form the following thematic groups:
1) terms denoting historical theology: patristic and church history; 2) terms of Dogmatic
theology  3)  terms  of  the  field  of  practical  theology  denoting  the  notions  of  pastoral
theology,  catechetics,  moral  theology,  canon  law,  liturgy,  including:  feasts,  worship,
church utensils and prayer; 4) biblical theology and biblical studies.

Structural  and  semantic  features  which  formed  the  new  German  Christian
theological  terminology  units  have  been  recorded.    Professional  communication  in
theology takes place within the discourse of theology, which is interwoven with religious
discourse.  Elements  of  theological  discourse  are  professional  theological  texts  and
extralinguistic factors. The theological discourse contains instructions for the spiritual and
moral  life  based  on  the  Holy  Scriptures,  Divine  Revelation  and  the  Tradition  of  the
Church.  There  are  oral  and  written  forms  which  occur  within  specific  channels  of
communication. The discourse of theology is regulated by specific strategies: profession of
faith (tactics: belief in one God, the dogmas of the Church, the truth of faith); prayer (the
tactics of praise, confession, thanksgiving, request); Sacraments (tactics: the life in God
through  the  Sacraments);  Decalogue  (tactics:  observance of  the  Ten  Commandments of
God, the perfection of moral and theological virtues).
At the level of professional  theological  text cohesion, coherence, the theme and
rheme division of the text,  the means of content, formal and logic coherence have been
observed, their peculiarities  discovered. Quantitative analysis of the use of terminological
units  under  the  terminological  aspect  of  their  saturation  and  frequency  has  been
performed.  The author determined structural and morphological characteristics of prayer
texts.

Keywords:  Christian  theological  terminology,  theological  term,  professional
theological  language,  structural  model,  derivational  feature,  semantic  feature,  the
discourse of theology, professional text.