DET

One of my publishers has asked that I help to publicize a couple of new – well, one brand new, and one new-ish – titles that they have put out on or in the neighborhood of Karl Barth. I also know the authors / editors of these volumes, so I’m happy to oblige. Those of you attending the AAR meeting at the end of the week should be sure to look them over in the book exhibition area and, dare I say, even consider purchasing them. Those of you know attending the AAR meeting should follow the links to the publisher’s website. I will be cut-and-pasting the book descriptions from their respective webpages. Christoph Friedrich Blumhardt, The Gospel of God’s Reign: Living for the Kingdom of God , Blumhardt Series (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2013). “No doubt, it is common to hear Christians today declaring their allegiance to God's kingdom. But what does this actually entail, and what difference does it make? In his characteristically provocative and daring way, Christoph Blumhardt articulates...

…or, Something to keep you busy over the weekend… …or, The Past Fortnight in the Theoblogosphere. Maybe we’re getting to the point where I need to change the template for these post from talking about “The Past Fortnight in the Theoblogosphere” to “The Past Month in the Theoblogosphere” . . . . In any case, it has been just shy of a month since the last link posts here at DET . As usual, we’ve got lots of interesting posts to link to, both from DET and elsewhere. We’re also staring down the barrel of this year’s national American Academy of Religion meeting, and I wanted to make sure that all of you – my gentle readers – had a chance to catch up on your reading in the meantime. So here’s what’s been happening at DET: Upcoming Interview with DET Founder & Editor, W. Travis McMaken - Well, not “upcoming” anymore, but the post contains links to the interview in case you missed it. Why the Niebuhrs Still Matter (Part 2) The “Social Creed” of the Methodist Episcopal Church, ...

Malachi 2.9–12 [9] “So I have caused you to be despised and humiliated before all the people, because you have not followed my ways but have shown partiality in matters of the law.” [10] Do we not all have one Father? Did not one God create us? Why do we profane the covenant of our ancestors by being unfaithful to one another? [11] Judah has been unfaithful. A detestable thing has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem: Judah has desecrated the sanctuary the LORD loves by marrying women who worship a foreign god. [12] If anyone does this, whoever he may be, may the LORD remove him from the tents of Jacob – event though he brings an offering to the LORD Almighty. ========================== COMMENTARY: Calvin picks up in this, his 175th lecture on the minor prophets, right where he left off in the previous lecture—i.e., with (at least) one eye firmly fixed on the Roman church and its failings. Here he anticipates ways that the Roman clergy might try to wriggle out of the censure...

Paradigm 2. Jesus is the bringer of the kingdom. Such dominant 20th century Protestant thinkers as Bultmann, Tillich and the early Barth (perhaps) embraced the ambiguities and tensions inherent in the firm distinction between Jesus and his message, on the one hand, and the faith of the church, on the other. This distinction -- or perhaps better put, aporia -- is often framed as a dilemma: The Christ of faith vs. the Jesus of history, or vice versa. These profound thinkers coped creatively with this tension -- in different ways, to be sure -- by shifting the locus of christology from the inner identity of Jesus' personal being, which preoccupied early christologians especially in the second through fifth centuries CE, to the moment of revelation or the birth of faith as noetic event. (I realize I'm oversimplifying here, but bear with me). After Weiss and Schweitzer dismantled a century of quests for a liberal Jesus, these theologians concluded that any bridges that sought to t...

David Fergusson published a new book earlier this year dealing with the doctrine of creation. It is somewhere between an introductory overview and a precis of several important foundational moves for a constructive doctrine of creation in the contemporary Western context. All of this makes it a nice little read, and I recommend it. I also wanted to share a piece here or there with you, gentle readers, to whet your appetites for more. The rather lengthy quote below comes after Fergusson provides a quick reading of the most important biblical discussions – both OT and NT – of the doctrine of creation. These four “important features,” then, represent the payoff of this reading. They also serve as the rough contours of the doctrine of creation as a whole. David Fergusson, Creation , Guides to Theology (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2014), 9. (I’ve thrown in some bold to help with navigating the paragraph, and to emphasize a couple of good lines.) Some important features of the doctrin...