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The Joy of Being Dogmatic

Karl Barth

(1886 1968)

Theology

withoutCompromise

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Science orDogma?

What does it mean to be

scientific?

What does it mean to be

dogmatic?

Are they compatible?

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Science orDogma?

As a theological discipline, dogmatics is the

scientific test to which the Christian Church puts

herself regarding the language about God which is

peculiar to her.

. . . if theology allows itself to be called a science, it

cannot at the same time take over the obligation to submit

to measurement by the canons valid for the other sciences.

Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics

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Science orDogma?

For medieval theologian, Thomas Aquinas, Christian

Theology

flows from founts recognized in the light of a higher

science, namely Gods very own which he shares with theblessed. Hence, as harmony credits its principles which are

taken from arithmetic, so Christian theology takes on faith

its principles revealed by God.

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Real Science

Barth rejects the idea that modern

science and rationality is value-free and

objective. In fact it conceals an anti-Christian ideology.

The true science of dogmatics must rest

on principles which are God-given and

secure.

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Text

Why does Barth think that theology

deserves the name of science?

Why does he think most of what we callscience is heathen?

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Enlightenment Themes (1)

Descartes: we start with the certainty ofour own existence and build knowledge onthat

Kant: we need to recognise that weactively shape the world, we are the oneswho make it knowable.

Scientific Method: knowledge is based onpublicly available empirical evidence,backed up by experimentation.

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Enlightenment Themes (2)

Consequences:

Dualism: dividing the world between facts

and values; matter and spirit; knowledgeand faith

Suspicion: questioning traditional

authorities and superstition

Optimism: Human rationality can fuel

progress towards a better world

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Liberal Protestantism

Accepts historical method, questions

traditional doctrines

Accepts validity of modern science Belief in gradual evolution of religious

awareness

Church part of wider brotherhood of man Historical figure of Jesus more important

than doctrines about him

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World WarOne

3 Oct. 1914 93 German intellectuals, among whom were

almost all of Barths university theological teachers, to the

scandalised Barth, signed a manifesto of support for Kaiser

Wilhelm IIs German expansionism. The manifestodeclared:

we believe that for European culture on the whole

Salvation rests on the victory which German militarism,

namely manly discipline, the faithfulness, the courage to

sacrifice, of the united and free German nation will

achieve.

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Dialectical Theology

If I have a system, it is limited to a recognition of what

Kierkegaard called the infinite qualitative distinction

between time and eternity, and to my regarding this as

possessing negative as well as positive significance: Godis in heaven and thou art on earth.

The Gospel is not a religious message to inform mankind of

their divinity or to tell them how they may become divine.

The Gospel proclaims a God utterly distinct from men.

Karl Barth, The Epistle to the Romans

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Problems?

If God is wholly other to human beings,how can human beings speak of God?

If we need a special revelation from Godto speak of God, doesnt this underminethe doctrine of creation that we arealready made in Gods image?

If revelation is historical, how can it avoidthe relativising effects of historicalcriticism?

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The German Christians

We see in race, folk, and nation, orders of existence

granted and entrusted to us by God. God's law for us is that

we look to the preservation of these orders. Consequently,

miscegenation is to be opposed. ... faith in Christ does notdestroy one's race but deepens and sanctifies it.

In the person of the Fuhrer we behold the One sent from

God who places Germany in the presence of the Lord of

History.

German Christian statements

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The Cross and the Swastika

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Text

On what basis does the Barmen

declaration reject Nazi ideology?

What role is played by the ideas ofobedience, lordship and authority in this

rejection?

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Barmen (1)

The church in opposition to the world

The Christian church is the community ofbrethren in which, in Word and sacrament,

through the Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ acts in thepresent as Lord. With both its faith and itsobedience, with both its message and its order,it has to testify in the midst of the sinful world, asthe church of pardoned sinners, that it belongsto him alone and lives and may live by hiscomfort and under his direction alone, inexpectation of his appearing.

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Barmen (2)

We reject the false doctrine that the

church could have permission to hand

over the form of its message and of its

order to whatever it itself might wish or to

the vicissitudes of the prevailing

ideological and political convictions of the

day.

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Religion is Unbelief

All human religion is an attempt to grasp

God on the basis of our distorted and

sinful ideas and wills.

Therefore all human religion is idolatry and

unbelief (including Christianity, where it is

not true to revelation).

Can dialogue between religions be

possible on this basis?

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Religion is Unbelief 2

Revelation is Gods self-offering and self

manifestation. Revelation encounters man

on the presupposition and in confirmation ofthe fact that mans attempts to know God

from his own standpoint are wholly and

entirely futile.Church Dogmatics1/2, p. 301

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Religion is Unbelief 3

In religion man bolts and bars himself

against revelation by providing a substitute,

by taking away in advance the very thingwhich was to be given by God . . .

Revelation does not link up with human

religion which is already present and

practised. It contradicts it . . . .

Church Dogmatics1/2, p. 303

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The Fall

Barths alternative to the liberalism and

nationalism he rejected depends on a

strong doctrine of the Fall, ie, that all

human striving after God apart from Gods

revelation is bound to be sinful and

destructive.

Is this credible or justified? Whatobjections could be raised to it?

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Text

What do you think the role of experience, historyand culture is in theology? Does Barth take themseriously enough?

Do we need Barths stress on the Fall and Godsinitiative to cure us of false optimism, and theway we turn God into a projection of ourselves?

How might Barths criticism of liberalism and

religion be countered? How fair is it to associateliberalism with violence and war? Or otherreligions with idolatry and rebellion?

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Barth and Fundamentalism

It is easy to caricature Barth as a fundamentalist.

Do not forget:

For Barth revelation is an event, a transformingencounter, not a static body of knowledge

Barths theology is always worked out in conversationwith the thinkers and trends of his time

Barths later work emphasises Gods (freely chosen)solidarity with humankind in Christ.

Dogmatics is Church Dogmatics. For Barth, theology isalways done in the context of the Church the Biblecannot be interpreted apart from that context.

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Church as Event

The church is when it takes place that God lets certain

people live as his servants, friends and children, the

witnesses of the reconciliation of the world with himself as it

has taken place in Jesus Christ, the preachers of thevictory which has been won in him over sin and suffering

and death, the heralds of his future revelation in which the

glory of the Creator will be declared to all creation as that of

his love and faithfulness and mercy.

Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics

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Church nothing in itself

This something which claims to be the church, and is

before us all in these manifestations, may well be only the

semblance of a church, in which human will and work,

although they allege that they are occasioned andfashioned by God, are striving to express only themselves.

What is visible in all this is only a religious society.

It will always be in the revelation of God that the truechurch is visible.

Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics

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Questions

Is Barths theology just for insiders for believers whoare already part of the Church? Why should anyoneoutside the Church take it seriously?

If the Church is as flawed as Barth says, why is it given

such a central role in his theology? Note the contemporary trend (Stanley Hauerwas,

Radical Orthodoxy) to pit the Church against secularliberal society, and make it the necessary setting forChristian truth and practice. Is this a welcome return to

an assertive theology or a defensive retreat inwards inthe face of an indifferent world?

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The Word of God (1)

y The Word comes from God , not from us.We cant read it off our experience, orreason our way to it. It is not the same as

the Bible, though the Bible contains andbears witness to it

y The Word of God as directed to us is first

ofallsuch a word as we do not speak toourselves, as under no circumstances wecould ever speak to ourselves.

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The Word of God (2)

y The Word is life and world changing.It speaks to us, here now, in theconcrete situation we are in. Its notjust abstract information about God.

y the Word of God is, secondly, theWord which aims at and touches us inour existence.

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The Word of God (3)

y The Word restores our connection withGod. Christ takes upon himself ourrejection of God, and overcomes it.

y the Word of God is in the thirdplace theWord which has become and doesbecome necessary for the renewal of the

original relationship between us and Him.

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The Word of God (4)

y The Word reveals Gods own natureand self. It is personal. Christ is at theheart of the Trinity, the essence of

Gods being. Hes not just a go-between!

y

the Word of God is fourthlyandfinally the Word by which Godannounces himself to man

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The Humanity of God

Without retracting his earlier stress on Gods

otherness and transcendence, Barth did

later wish to correct its imbalance. The

divinity of God must beheld together with

Gods decision to be together with humanity,

to make humanity, through Christ, his

covenant partner: It is the divinity which as

such has also the character of humanity.

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Concluding Thoughts

Barth wrote of a revelation wholly unsullied by

human ideology. But his own theology was

shaped by the context and ideological conflicts

of his day. For Barth, the Word of God is utterly sovereign.

And yet it is most fully expressed in the historical

human life of Jesus.

Are these contradictions? Or creative tensions?

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Barth in a Week

http://faith-

theology.blogspot.com/2005/11/church-

dogmatics-in-week.html

Selected readings and analysis compiled

by Benjamin Myers

Do not plagiarise this!

Do not plagiarise this!