Announcing a Mini-Series on Pannenberg

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Wolfhardt Pannenberg has been appearing as part of the conversation throughout the theo-blogosphere lately. There have been a number of posts devoted entirely to his thought. Kevin has asked some good questions about how Pannenberg deals with theodicy. Alex, to whom I awarded the ‘Thinking Blogger Award’ not too long ago, has a series going on the first volume of Pannenberg’s Systematic Theology (post 1 / post 2 / post 3 / post 4). Pannenberg also pops up more or less randomly from time to time in various discussions, like this one about what it means to be ‘biblical’.

It is beyond doubt in my mind that Pannenberg deserves and rewards serious attention, and I intend to give him some here at DET. So, I will publish a mini-series (to be indexed as usual) of four excurses into Pannenberg, to be posted on Monday mornings for the next four weeks. I do hope that you will follow along and interact with me as I interact with this significant thinker.

Lest you need more encouragement, I leave you with this quotation from John Webster, “Systematic Theology after Barth: Jüngel, Jenson, and Gunton” in The Modern Theologians: An Introduction to Christian Theology since 1918 (Edited by David F. Ford and Rachel Muers; Blackwell, 2005), 249-50:
“[T]he momentous character of Barth’s achievement has meant that doing systematic theology is his wake has not proved an easy business. The discipline, of course, continues unabated in German Protestantism…the years since Barth’s death have seen the publication of at least two dozen high-level comprehensive systematic theologies…But Barth staked out the field with such distinctiveness and expounded his views so authoritatively that those who follow him have had to discover ways of emerging from his shadow…[F]or those who have retained Barth’s kind of dogmatics, it has been necessary to work with a very different configuration of sources and norms and of doctrinal content: this…possibility is exemplified in Pannenberg’s Systematic Theology, surely the most consequential Protestant account since Barth.”

Comments

Jon said…
Looking forwards to this!

PS I've moved to www.jonmackenzie.wordpress.com
October 26, 2007 6:40 PM
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