Central Themes in Barth’s Theology
Many scholars debate the presence of methodological phases in Barth’s work. There are, however, prominent themes from the first edition of Romans to the end of his career. Chief among these consistencies is his dialectical approach (in the sense of “yes” and “no”). Where Hunsinger distills Barth to motifs based on content, this theme is mainly a formal observation but, an informative one nonetheless. (Hunsinger 1991 identifies six motifs in Barth, actualism, particularism, objectivism, personalism, realism, and rationalism and develops these at length. For a brief review of Hunsinger’s argument, see Molnar.) Owing to his disillusion with the liberal theology of his youth, Barth sought to balance the two sides of God and the human. This “balancing act” is seen most clearly by contrasting his early emphasis on God, that is, God’s wholly-otherness and distance from humanity as well as the created world with his later emphasis on the humanity of God. It is important to notice, however, that this apparent change over time is one of emphasis only.
Beginning with his Romans Barth placed strong emphasis on the otherness of God. In contrast to the liberal theology he was taught by Harnack and Hermann, Barth saw that, “the Gospel proclaims a God utterly distinct from men. Salvation comes to them from him [God], and because they are, as men, incapable of knowing him, they have no right to claim anything from him” (Barth 1968, 28; Cf. Church Dogmatics I/1). This dualism between God and the world had several prominent consequences for Barth’s understanding of doctrine including, in particular, revelation and interpretation of scripture (See McGrath 1997, 306-8 on Barth’s move to start his Church Dogmatics with the Trinity, reversing the order of Schleiermacher’s Glaubenslehre). It is important to note that, as Torrance points out, the dualism at work in Barth does not imply the absence of an “active relation between God and the world” (Torrance 1995, 85). Rather, “Barth’s position rests upon an immense stress on the concrete activity of God in space and time, in creation as in redemption, and upon his refusal to accept that God’s power is limited by the weakness of human capacity or that the so-called natural reason can set any limits to God’s self-revelation to mankind” (Torrance 1995, 86).
In keeping with his distaste for natural theology Barth held theology to be, in contrast to the liberal theologians of his day (and today), a “science of the Church” (Barth 1995, 21-22; Church Dogmatics I/1, 1). Theology’s object of study is therefore the Word of God revealed in Jesus Christ, scripture, and the proclamation of the Church. Jesus Christ, as the inspiration for scripture and the Church, is the ground of the witness to God’s Word. Scripture and the Church’s proclamation are however human creations and activities and as such become the Word of God only by grace and through the power of the Holy Spirit. There is nothing special therefore about the language used in the Bible (per se) nor the skill of the preacher, for the Word of God comes to humanity from God alone by grace (Church Dogmatics I/1, 191-4).
Despite the recognition of scripture as a human book, it is through the grace of God and by the Holy Spirit also the revealed Word of God and therefore exegesis and interpretation of scripture are critical for Barth’s dogmatics. He discusses these at length in his Church Dogmatics (I/1; I/2). As a “science of the Church” dogmatics presupposes not the “objective” exegesis of the Romans but rather a completely interested “theological exegesis,” that is informed by the history of the Church’s hearing of God’s Word in scripture and hopes, through faith, to hear God’s Word themselves for their own time. This “interested exegesis” is further developed in Church Dogmatics I/2 under the title of “Freedom under the Word of God” (695-740). Principally, Barth calls for the recognition of humanity’s relative standing with respect to God’s Word. Human beings, while not forbidden to bring to bear their tools of philosophy and critical exegesis, are always required to subordinate the text and the meanings found there to God’s self, who is always “other than” the words we humans use to express God’s will (Livingston 2000, 105-6). Barth’s formulation of exegesis and hermeneutics has lead to broad criticism but is perhaps as far as one can go while maintaining the wholly-other character of God and the reality of revelation from such a God.
As early as the second edition of Romans the reader can find traces of the profound connection between God and humanity fully elaborated only later (37-8, for example, speaks of God’s “no” being the ground of the “yes” of salvation). By 1956 Barth explicitly recognized that his early emphasis on God’s distinctiveness as wholly other had been (and remained) necessary to counter the immanence of nineteenth-century liberal theology but that it was incomplete. In his lecture, entitled “The Humanity of God” Barth acknowledged a correction that had developed in his Church Dogmatics to the radical otherness of Romans (Barth 1960, 37-65). This shift in thought is often called Barth’s “Christological concentration” and involves the notion that God cannot be understood without Christ and, of course, Christ cannot be understood without humanity and vice versa. After 1935, all of Barth’s theology is focused on Christ. His doctrines of God, creation, election, anthropology, and reconciliation are all Christological (Livingston 2000, 107; Church Dogmatics passim). True to his dialectical pattern, Barth saw all of theology as concerned with the work of God in Jesus Christ. As the ground, or source, and the goal of all creation, Christ is the model for humanity. Not only is Christ the revelation of God but he is also the source of human nature. Through Christ we learn our relationship to God and we receive the grace which God planned for us from the beginning (Barth 1960, 46-65; Church Dogmatics, I/2, 347; II/1, 319f; II/2, 4f, 94f; III/2, 160f; III/3, 186; IV/1, 3, 17f, 161-3). Moreover, since “Christ is the ground and goal of humanity,” evil and sin are not the final necessary fate of humanity (Livingston 2000, 107). Rather, although a human being may withdraw from relationship with God and therefore sin (idolatry), one is powerless to undo what Christ has done. As the author of creation and salvation, Christ restores covenant with God, so all of creation lies in essentially positive relation to God. “That is the first and the last word of God” (Livingston 2000, 107). Barth therefore calls sin and evil an ontological impossibility (Church Dogmatics II/1, 503f; II/2, 165f; III/3, 353f). Evil and sin, though real, exist only relatively and transitorily for nothing can prevent God from receiving humanity with the divine “yes!” (Livingston 2000, 108).
Barth reconceived the Protestant doctrine of election. For him, God elected God’s self for suffering and death in Christ and elected humanity for eternal life, simultaneously condemning Christ and raising up humanity. Barth stops short, however, of proclaiming universal salvation. Rather, God has extended unlimited love to all and it is up to human beings to accept this through faith. Those who believe are saved and those who do not are damned. The saved have only one appropriate response to the charis of God and this is eucharista or thanksgiving (Barth 1993; Livingston 2000, 109; Church Dogmatics IV/2, 733-51; IV/3, 99-103).
As has been seen in this brief overview of important aspects of Barth’s dogmatics, his dialectical, yes/no, approach informs every aspect of his thought. It is therefore, perhaps, unfair to cast Barth as a theologian of judgment without also recognizing the important place given to grace and election. For Barth humanity is both radically not God and (even more) radically called to covenant with God.
Criticism and Influence
Barth’s theology has been widely criticized by many theologians. Beside the liberal Protestant reaction, his neo-orthodoxy has been criticized for not being open enough to non-Christians, ignoring culture, employing Biblicism, for the density of his writing, and the sheer size of his Church Dogmatics. It should be noted in regards to the first criticism that Barth is, on at least one occasion, just as critical of Christian religion (as opposed to faith) as he is of other religions (Church Dogmatics I/1, 280-300). Overall, however, the fundamental criticism of Barth’s theology boils down to a questioning of his (albeit somewhat qualified) dualism.
In terms of revelation, he is accused of denying any significant role for humanity in the reception of God’s Word (Bultmann, Brunner, Pannenberg). Criticism is this area would seem to ignore statements such as, “In Him the fact is once for all established that God does not exist without man” (Barth 1960, 50). Regarding history, he is said to have no place for the historical and supra-historical event of Jesus Christ to happen. In other words, salvation history happens for Barth neither entirely with God nor entirely (or perhaps at all in some respects) with humanity. Concerning the relationship between the world and God, many have been critical of Barth because his dualism ignores the actions of humans and that he does not adequately account for the connection linking God and the world between revelatory events. Although these criticisms are not without merit, there is a strong tendency to take isolated statements of Barth’s and to extend them logically to a level of abstraction that he himself avoided while ignoring (due, perhaps, to the immensity of his work) the “balancing” statements he makes.
Barth’s positive influence can be felt in the current work of the so-called postliberal theologians. Among these are Hans Frei, George Lindbeck, Stanley Hauerwas, Ronald Theiman, William Placher, Kathryn Tanner, and Charles Ward. Barth’s continues to provide a negative influence for the work of theologians of correlation such as Paul Tillich, David Tracy, Hans Küng, Rosemary Ruether, and Schubert Ogden.
Barth’s theology reacted to the profound challenges of the twentieth-century. In light of the mass destruction of the World Wars, the Holocaust(s), and countless other tragedies, Barth’s call to know our collective place under heaven while not denying that we do in fact have a significant relationship to engage in with God seems to have been a crucial one. Moreover, as Robert McAfee Brown says in his foreword to Credo, “The reader has the privilege of disagreeing with Barth. He no longer has the privilege of ignoring him” (Barth 1962, xi).
Bibliography
Primary
Barth, Karl. 1936-1975. Church Dogmatics. [ET Kirchliche Dogmatik] Translated by T.H.L. Parker, W.B. Johnston, Harold Knight, and J.L.M. Haire. Edited by G.W. Bromiley and G.T. Thomson. Edinburgh: T & T Clark.
Barth, Karl. 1949 [1947]. Dogmatics in Outline. Translated by G.T. Thomson. New York: Philosophical Library.
Barth, Karl. 1960 [1956]. “The Humanity of God,” in The Humanity of God, 37-65. Trans. John Newman Thomas. Atlanta: John Knox Press.
Barth, Karl. 1962 [1935]. Credo. With a foreword by Robert McAfee Brown. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons.
Barth, Karl. 1968 [1933]. The Epistle to the Romans. Translated from the 6th German edition [Römerbrief] by Edwyn C. Hoskyns. London; Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press.
Barth, Karl. 1993. The Holy Spirit and the Christian Life: The Theological Basis of Ethics. Translated by R. Birch Hoyle with a foreword by Robin W. Lovin. [1st English edition London: F. Muller, 1938] Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press.
Barth, Karl. 1995. “Theology” from God in Action [1936]. In The Christian Theology Reader, ed. Alister McGrath, 21-22. Oxford; Cambridge, MA: Blackwell.