Welcome back to Wednesdays With Barth! I hope you enjoyed some reading this week! I am really chewing on these portions of my reading this week (below). Help me out.
Expectation…
In our context there can be no question of more than a crosssectional indication of the state of matters in the Old Testament witness. There are three lines along which the unity of Old Testament with New Testament revelation in the relation of expectation to fulfilment appears to me to become recognisable… 1. The Old Testament like the New Testament is the witness to revelation, which is decidedly to be regarded as a free, utterly once-for-all, concrete action of God… 2. The Old Testament like the New Testament is the witness to the revelation in which God remains a hidden God, indeed declares Himself to be the hidden God by revealing Himself… 3. The Old Testament like the New Testament is the witness of the revelation in which God is present to man as the coming God. Present and coming are both to be stressed.
Recollection…
“In this theological explanation we shall also have to show to what extent the recollection attested in the New Testament really corresponds with the expectation attested in the Old Testament. Since Old Testament and New Testament mutually witness to each other, they jointly witness to the one Jesus Christ. We need not point out the fact but only the manner of this mutual witness. We must respect a mystery which claims to speak for itself. In the New Testament we have the witness of recollection, and it tells us itself that its object is identical with the object of expectation in the Old Testament. Therefore, now that we have tried to be clear how far expectation in the Old Testament is actually expectation in respect of this object, we can also try to see how far recollection in the New Testament can be related to the same object. Obviously what we need here is not an exhaustive exposition but merely an indication of the content in question. We have to understand how the three lines of Old Testament expectation which we sought to indicate are continued beyond the time fulfilled in Jesus Christ in New Testament recollection, in the complete change conditioned by the accomplished fulfilment, and yet also in that unity of recollection with expectation which is conditioned by the common medium… 1. The New Testament, like the Old Testament, is the witness to a togetherness of God and man, based on and consisting in a free self-relating of God to man. What in the Old Testament, in the expectation, was God’s covenant with man, is here, in the fulfilment, God’s becoming man… 2. The New Testament, like the Old Testament, is the witness to the revelation of the hidden God. The conclusive proof of this is the circumstance just touched upon, that it sees revelation, the revelation expected by the whole of the Old Testament, at the very point at which one might well have seen the contradiction and annihilation of it, in the rejection and crucifixion of the Son of God by His chosen people… 3. The New Testament, like the Old Testament, is the witness to the revelation in which God is present to man as the coming God.”
Some questions…
- What do you think of Barth’s lines of unity between the Old & New Testaments? It seems he sees 6 in total am I right?
- Is this “present and coming” theme that Barth speaks of similar to the already and not yet tension of Ladd’s Inaugurated eschatology?
- It seems John 5:24 supports the “present and coming” tension well enough so what OT scriptures come to mind in regards to “present and coming”.
- It seems that Barth is making a very strong case that the center of all of Scripture is Jesus Christ (revelation) as it (Scriptures witness) points us to the expectation, recollection and fulfillment of God revealing himself in Christ. What do you think about that am I far off (attention Barth Scholars)?
- If the center of all of Scripture is Jesus Christ (revelation) as it (Scriptures witness) points us to the expectation, recollection and fulfillment of God revealing himself in Christ how does that effect our “Biblical” preaching and “Biblical” theology?
Reading schedual for Church Dogmatics Book I.2 in 7 weeks.
Dates in bold represent posting/discussion days.
December 30, 2013 pp v–xiii, pp 1–25January 01, 2014 pp 26–69January 03, 2014 pp 70–106January 06, 2014 pp 107–146January 08, 2014 pp 147–198- January 10, 2014 pp 199–232
- January 13, 2014 pp 233–279
- January 15, 2014 pp 280–318
- January 17, 2014 pp 319–361
- January 20, 2014 pp 362–416
- January 22, 2014 pp 417–449
- January 24, 2014 pp 450–495
- January 27, 2014 pp 496–533
- January 29, 2014 pp 534–574
- January 31, 2014 pp 575–628
- February 03, 2014 pp 629–664
- February 05, 2014 pp 665–703
- February 07, 2014 pp 704–756
- February 10, 2014 pp 757–796
- February 12, 2014 pp 797–840
- February 14, 2014 pp 841–885, pp 895–905
Learn more about Karl Barth here.
Buy his Church Dogmatics in LOGOS here.
*Reading list generated by Logos Bible Software.