DOCSLIB.ORG

An Historical Consideration of F.C. Baur, His Life, Works, and Theological Thought, Especially in Regard to His Church History and Historical Theology

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
An Historical Consideration of F.C. Baur, His Life, Works, and Theological Thought, Especially in Regard to His Church History and Historical Theology Portland State University PDXScholar Dissertations and Theses Dissertations and Theses 1979 An historical consideration of F.C. Baur, his life, works, and theological thought, especially in regard to his church history and historical theology Steven Norman Goetz Portland State University Follow this and additional works at: https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/open_access_etds Part of the History of Religion Commons, and the Religious Thought, Theology and Philosophy of Religion Commons Let us know how access to this document benefits ou.y Recommended Citation Goetz, Steven Norman, "An historical consideration of F.C. Baur, his life, works, and theological thought, especially in regard to his church history and historical theology" (1979). Dissertations and Theses. Paper 2899. https://doi.org/10.15760/etd.2895 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations and Theses by an authorized administrator of PDXScholar. Please contact us if we can make this document more accessible: [email protected]. AN ABSTRACT OF THE THESIS OF Steven Norman Goetz for the Master of Arts in History presented July 27, 1979, Title: An Historical Consideration of F. c. Baur; His Life, Works, and Theological Thought, Especially in Regard to His Church History and Historical Theology. APPROVED BY MEMBERS OF THE COMMITTEE: - I This thesis examines and evaluates F. C. Baur's philosophical and theological ideas as they relate to the writing of Church history and historical theology. The study is undertaken within the context of the problem of the relation between faith and history, which can be stated in more rele'1'ant categories for Church historiography as the problem of the relation between subject (faith) and object (history), and proposes that Baur's thought on this problem can be useful for the modern faith/ history debate, and especially for the consideration of writing Church history. The overall methodological approach of the study is historical, and begins (Chapter II) with a general description of the cultural envi­ ronment in which Baur lived and worked. Here, four major cultural events are discussed which had an impact on his life, i. e. post-Kantian philo­ sophy, with its rejection of the noumenal/phenomenal bifurcation of know­ ledge; the French Revolution; the Romantic Revolt; and, the early Histor­ icist movement. Following this, in Chapter III, Baur's life, works, in­ tellectual development, and theological thought are surveyed, in order to show how he fits into the cultural milieu of his day. It is discovered that he is essentially a romantic theologian, greatly influenced by Schelling, Schleiermacher, and Hegel, yet he does not quite fit the des- ' cription of "romantic" due to his insistence on the objectivity, as well as the subjectivity, of reality. This is well illustrated, in Chapter IV by an analysis of his two works, The Epochs of Church Historiography, and Introduction to Lectures on the History of Christian Dogma, in which he asserts that both the objectivity (institutions and dogmas) and sub­ jectivity (theological thought) of Christianity must be preserved in dia­ lectical tension if the Church's true historical and ideal nature is to be understood. In evaluation and conclusion (Chapter V), it is maintained that Baur's greatest legacy to theology is his firm insistence on both object and subject as factors in the historical development of Christianity, rather than on just one or the other. Within this balance, Baur points the way toward a view of Christianity which is neither overly-historical nor overly-theological, and calls for a Church historiography which incorporates them both. AN HISTORICAL CONSIDERATION OF F. C. BAUR: HIS LIFE, WORKS, AND THEOLcx;ICAL THOUGHT, ESPECIALLY IN REGARD TO HIS CHURCH HISTORY AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY by STEVEN N. GOETZ A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS in HISTORY Portland State University 1979 TO THE OFFICE OF GRADUATE STUDIES AND RESEARCH: The members of the Committee approve the thesis of Steven Norman Goetz presented July 27, 1979. Michael Reardon, Chairman susanKarant-NUn APPROVED: nt of History and Research ii TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. INTRODUCTION • • • . 1 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM . ,7 JUSTIFICATION OF THE PROBLEM . 7 DELIMITATION • • • • • . 9 STATEMENT OF PROCEDURE . 10 II. GERMANY AND THE Roars OF ROMAN'fICISM . 12 THE INTELLECTUAL PREPARATION: FAITH AND HISTORY • • ." • • • • • • . 14 THE POLITICAL CATALYSTs THE FRENCH REVOLUI'ION • • • • • • . 23 THE CULTURAL RESPONSE: ROMANTICISM AND HISTORICISM • • • • • . 31 Romanticism . 32 Historicism • • • • • • • • • • . 42 SUMMARY . q,7 III • F. C. BAUR'' S LIFE, WORKS, INTELLECTUAL DEVELOP­ MENT, AND THEOLOGICAL POSITION • • • • 50 LIFE , . 50 WORKS . 59 INTELLECTUAL DEVELOPMENT • . 77 Schelling . 81 Scheiermacher . 87 Hegel . 95 Baur's Christology • • • . 100 iii CHAPI'ER PAGE IV. BAUR ON THE HISTORI(X;RAPHY OF CHRISTIAN DOGMA AND THE CHURCH •••••• •~• •••• 109 BAUR ON Tlm HISTORY OF D~MA • • ••• . 111 BAUR ON THE WRITING OF CHURCH HISTffiY 123 V. CONCLUSION AND EVALUATION 148 164 BIBLIOGRAPHY e I • e e • e e a a a I e e a . iv CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION One of the most important and consuming questions of theological investigation today is the problem of the relationship between faith and history.1 The problem of faith and history can actually be con- sidered as a particular theological form of a more general question 1The question of faith and history has been recognized as crucial for Christian theology since at least the early nineteenth century, yet the problems associated with this question, particularly the problem of the development of Christian doctrine, have recently caused both Catho­ lic and Protestant theologians to consider the question more seriously. On the Catholic side, the second Vatican council has created a more tolerant attitude toward open speculation on sensitive theological issues, and has thus opened the way for consideration of the place of history for faith and the matter of doctrinal development. The ecumen­ ical movement has also caused more concern over the question of faith and history because the division between Catholicism and Protestantism has been traced to a divergence over the question of doctrinal develop­ ment. John Courtney Murray has written: "I consider that the parting of the ways between the two Christian communities (Roman Catholicism and Protestantism) takes place on the issue of development of doctrine" (quoted in Jaroslav Pelikan,~evelopment of Christian Doctrine: Some Historical Prolegomena (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1969), p. 1.) If Murray is correct, then an adequate and acceptable solution to the problem of faith and history is vital to the life and success of the ecumenical movement. On the Protestant side there is also a new and burgeoning interest in the question of faith and history. One example of this new interest is the so-called "New Quest for the historical Jesus" led by many of Rudolph Bultmann's former disciples such as Ernst Fuchs, Gerhard Ebling, Ernst Kasema.nn, and Gunther Bornkamm. This new quest is based on the dissatisfaction with dialectical theology's concept of history, and hopes to recover at least some element of historical value in the life of Jesus. ·Other examples are provided by Wolfhart Pannenberg's work Revelation as History, and the new interest in nineteenth century liberal theological thought focusing on such persons as F. C. Baur and Ernst Troeltsch (for Baur see especially Peter c. Hodgson, "The Rediscovery of Ferdinand Christian Baur ••• ," Church History XX.XIII: 2 (June, 1964), pp. 206-214; for Troeltsch see Ernst Troeltsch and the Future of Theology, ed. John P. Clayton, London: Cambridge University Press, 1976). 2 concerning the relation between form and content in all reality which might be formulated historiographically as the relationship between ideas and history, or philosophically as the relationship between·abso~ lutes and particulars. The theological problem can be considered in various ways. For example, as applied to a believers• faith-response, the question of faith and history can be stated as: "To what extent is the truth and validity of the Christian faith dependent upon the occurrence of certain historical events?". In other words, is the truth of Christianity dependent upon the historical occurrence of such events as the birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus as portrayed in the Gospels? Stated this way, the problem of faith and history is more a problem of theology. There is, however, another way of putting the question which makes it as much a question of historiography as of theology. From this perspective the question can be formulated: "To what extent, if any, does the absoluteness of Christianity reside in the historical structure and theological expressions of the Church?''. In ·"other words, is it necessary that the phenomenal Church should embody absolutely, the ideality of Christianity for it to retain its dogmatic authority? It is with the latter formulation of the question of faith and history that this thesis is concerned, especially as it was addressed and answered by Ferdinand Christian Baur. How the question of faith and history is answered in general will determine how the history of the Church and theology is written, for it is upon one's conception of the relationship between faith and history (between idea and history) that one's concept of the Church and its history is formulated. Those who separate faith and history will tend to separate Christianity (the ideal) from the Church (the historical) 3 and consequently separate Church history from the history of theology. Those who identify faith and history as absolutely synonymous will be committed to one monolithic, absolute Church in history and will tend to see its dogrnatical pronouncements as unqualifiedly single, unchanging and transhistorical. Both of these positions have difficulties. In modern Protestant theology, the tendency has been to radically separate faith and history.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Is There a Judeo-Christian Tradition?
    Is there a Judeo-Christian Tradition? Perspectives on Jewish Texts and Contexts Edited by Vivian Liska Editorial Board Robert Alter, Steven E. Aschheim, Richard I. Cohen, Mark H. Gelber, Moshe Halbertal, Geoffrey Hartman, Moshe Idel, Samuel Moyn, Ada Rapoport-Albert, Alvin Rosenfeld, David Ruderman, Bernd Witte Volume 4 Is there a Judeo-Christian Tradition? A European Perspective Edited by Emmanuel Nathan Anya Topolski Volume inspired by the international workshop “Is there a Judeo-Christian tradition?” as part of the UCSIA/IJS Chair for Jewish-Christian Relations, organized by the Institute of Jewish Studies of the University of Antwerp and the University Centre Saint Ignatius Antwerp (UCSIA). An electronic version of this book is freely available, thanks to the support of libra- ries working with Knowledge Unlatched. KU is a collaborative initiative designed to make high quality books Open Access. More information about the initiative can be found at www.knowledgeunlatched.org This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 License. For details go to http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/. ISBN 978-3-11-041647-3 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-041659-6 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-041667-1 ISSN 2199-6962 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress. Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed
    [Show full text]
  • The Conceit of Norms in the Theology of Ernst Troeltsch
    THE CONCEIT OF NORMS IN THE THEOLOGY OF ERNST TROELTSCH A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Divinity to the Post-Braduate Faculty of Divinity of the University of Edinburgh by Louise S. Eby TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAP. I. Introductory The Place of Troeltsch as a Theological Thinker II. The Necessity for Norms in the Field of Theology III* Troeltsoh*s Determinatam of Norms in the General Field of History IV. The Relation of Historical Norms to Theological Norms V. The IfciEa&inatiori: of the Theological Norms VI. Troeltsch^s Construction of the Normative Essence of Christianity VII. The Normative Significance of Jesus VIII. The Application of the Theological Norms in the General Field of the Religions of the World The Finality of Christianity IX» Conclusion The Value of Troeltsch* s Concept of Norms in Theology CHAPTER I INTRODUCTORY THE PLACE OF TROELTSGH AS A THEOLOGICAL THINKER Brnst Troeltsch was born February 17, 1865, in Augsburg, German.. His father was a physicians hence the son had the opportunity to familiar ise himself with science in his parental home, and enjoyed the cultural advantages to which his family background made him heir. The classical culture became known to him in the Gymnasium, where he was prepared for the university. Following his own desire, he began the study of theo­ logy in 1885, and pursued his studies at Erlangen and Gottingen, where he sat at the feet of Frank, Ritschl, and Paul de Lagarde. All three of these great teachers contributed to the theological development of the youthful Troeltsch, as he later acknowledged repeqtedlyj but it was Ritschl who was most influential in the formation of Troeltsch* s own theology, even though the latter was largely a reaction from the 2 Ritschlian School.
    [Show full text]
  • The Opponents of Paul
    The Opponents of Paul Roy Bowen Ward It was Ferdinand Christian Baur who first decisively pointed to the importance of the opponents of Paul for the understanding of both Paul in particular and early Christianity in general.1 Even if Baur's reconstructions are open to criticism,2 he succeeded in making the question of the character of the opponents an inescapable one. Baur supposed that Paul developed his doctrine in opposition to the primi­ tive Christian community, especially in opposition to a Petrine party. Even if wrong in this particular supposition, Baur drew attention to the fact that there was variety in early Christianity and that Paul was by no means admired by all within the early church. It is not necessary to labor the point that modern New Testament studies are indebted to Baur nor to criticize again the specific theses of Baur. Nevertheless, one legacy from Baur is especially regret­ table. Baur treated the problem of Paul his opponents In a rather simplified way, viz., two parties divided over the judaizing question. Johannes Munck has noted the way in which the literary hypotheses of Baur were soon rejected, but the historical-theological reconstruc­ tion was able to linger on in current scholarship; that is, the leitmotiv in the history of early Christianity continues to be seen by many as the contrast between Gentile and Jewish Christianity.3 Hans Leitz- mann serves as a convenient example of this view. In his popular history of early Christianity Leitzmann speaks of Paul: Wherever he went, the "Judaizers" followed. These emis­ saries were in continual contact with Jerusalem, and they made it seem credible to the churches that James and the original Apostles stood behind them.
    [Show full text]
  • Heraclitus on Pythagoras
    Leonid Zhmud Heraclitus on Pythagoras By the time of Heraclitus, criticism of one’s predecessors and contemporaries had long been an established literary tradition. It had been successfully prac­ ticed since Hesiod by many poets and prose writers.1 No one, however, practiced criticism in the form of persistent and methodical attacks on both previous and current intellectual traditions as effectively as Heraclitus. Indeed, his biting criti­ cism was a part of his philosophical method and, on an even deeper level, of his self­appraisal and self­understanding, since he alone pretended to know the correct way to understand the underlying reality, unattainable even for the wisest men of Greece. Of all the celebrities figuring in Heraclitus’ fragments only Bias, one of the Seven Sages, is mentioned approvingly (DK 22 B 39), while another Sage, Thales, is the only one mentioned neutrally, as an astronomer (DK 22 B 38). All the others named by Heraclitus, which is to say the three most famous poets, Homer, Hesiod and Archilochus, the philosophical poet Xenophanes, Pythago­ ras, widely known for his manifold wisdom, and finally, the historian and geog­ rapher Hecataeus – are given their share of opprobrium.2 Despite all the intensity of Heraclitus’ attacks on these famous individuals, one cannot say that there was much personal in them. He was not engaged in ordi­ nary polemics with his contemporaries, as for example Xenophanes, Simonides or Pindar were.3 Xenophanes and Hecataeus, who were alive when his book was written, appear only once in his fragments, and even then only in the company of two more famous people, Hesiod and Pythagoras (DK 22 B 40).
    [Show full text]
  • Introduction
    Introduction This book was started with the average theology student in mind. In my fifteen years of teaching theology at undergraduate and postgraduate level, I have come to understand that, within most student quarters, the dominant image of Ferdinand Christian Baur is that of a theologian associated with a nontraditional perspective on the Bible—generally dubbed “liberal”—so his name is primarily connected with biblical studies. It has become evident to me that a significant number of students do not even realize that Baur was more than just a biblical theologian, let alone ask why he believed what he wrote in his numerous academic productions. His interest in philosophy and religion escapes most students interested in theology, so questions related to his understanding of these issues rarely surface during courses and seminars. Consequently, I began to write this book hoping that theology students would understand not only what lies beneath Baur’s “liberal” (in the sense of nontra- ditional, because he did precede German theological liberalism) perspective on the Bible, but also get a sense of how his perspective on theology was shaped by a couple of his famous predecessors, most notably Jakob Böhme and G.W.F. Hegel, to whom Baur is greatly indebted for his intellectual development. It should be said here that Böhme and Hegel are not the only figures who moulded Baur’s understanding of religion in general and of Christian theol- ogy in particular. Friedrich Schelling and Friedrich Schleiermacher were also mentioned alongside Böhme
    [Show full text]
  • Songs of the Last Philosopher: Early Nietzsche and the Spirit of Hölderlin
    Bard College Bard Digital Commons Senior Projects Spring 2013 Bard Undergraduate Senior Projects Spring 2013 Songs of the Last Philosopher: Early Nietzsche and the Spirit of Hölderlin Sylvia Mae Gorelick Bard College, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.bard.edu/senproj_s2013 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Recommended Citation Gorelick, Sylvia Mae, "Songs of the Last Philosopher: Early Nietzsche and the Spirit of Hölderlin" (2013). Senior Projects Spring 2013. 318. https://digitalcommons.bard.edu/senproj_s2013/318 This Open Access work is protected by copyright and/or related rights. It has been provided to you by Bard College's Stevenson Library with permission from the rights-holder(s). You are free to use this work in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights- holder(s) directly, unless additional rights are indicated by a Creative Commons license in the record and/or on the work itself. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Songs of the Last Philosopher: Early Nietzsche and the Spirit of Hölderlin Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College by Sylvia Mae Gorelick Annandale-on-Hudson, New York May 1, 2013 For Thomas Bartscherer, who agreed at a late moment to join in the struggle of this infinite project and who assisted me greatly, at times bringing me back to earth when I flew into the meteoric heights of Nietzsche and Hölderlin’s songs and at times allowing me to soar there.
    [Show full text]
  • David Friedrich Strauss
    DAVID FRIEDRICH STRAUSS. By GUSTAV KRtGER, Giessen. SOMEyears ago Eduard Zeller, who is spending the evening of a long life in learned leisure at Stuttgart, published a selection of the letters of his friend Strauss.' The personality of Strauss was already well known to us from his published books2 and from personal notices in his Literarische Denkwiirdigkeiten, as well as from what Zeller has told us in his friend's biography3 pub- lished shortly after the death of Strauss. We become still bet- ter acquainted with him through his letters, which exhibit his mental development and maturity, his struggles, conflicts, doubts, and recovered faith, and reveal him as a man of integrity, into whose clear, thoughtful eyes we can look with warmest sympathy. Even one who is not concerned with the scientific questions which naturally occupy a large place in these letters, especially one who is interested, if only a little, in philosophical, aesthetic, and theological problems, will find himself richly rewarded by read- ing them. One thing only we miss: instead of having only Strauss' side in learned or personal discussion, or in friendly Ausgewdhlte Briefe von David Friedrich Strauss. Herausgegeben und erlau- tert von EDUARD ZELLER. Mit einem Portrat in Lichtdruck. Bonn: Emil Strauss, 1895. 2Gesammelte Schriffen von David Friedrich Strauss. Nach des Verfassers letzt- willigen Verfiigungen zusammengestellt. Eingeleitet und mit erklarenden Nach- weisungen versehen von EDUARD ZELLER. Mit zwei Portraits des Verfassers in Stahlstich. 12 Bande. Bonn: Emil Strauss, 1876-8. (New editions of the sepa- rate works of Strauss are still being continually published.) 3David Friedrich Strauss, in seinem Leben und in seinen Schriften geschildert von EDUARD ZELLER.
    [Show full text]
  • Psychophysics and the Prehistory of the Marburg School
    The Sensation and the Stimulus: Psychophysics and the Prehistory of the Marburg School Marco Giovanelli Abstract This paper analyzes the role played by Fechner’s psychophysics—the new science meant to measure sensation as a function of the stimulus—in the development of Marburg Neo-Kantianism. It will show how Cohen, in the early 1870s, in order to make sense of Kant’s obscure principle of the Anticipations of Perception, resorted to psychophysics’ parlance of the relation between stimulus and sensation. By the end of the decade, Cohen’s remarks encouraged the early ‘Cohen circle’ (Stadler, Elsas, Müller) to pursue what were often sophisticated analyses of the problem of the measurability of sensation. This paper argues that in reaction to these contributions, Cohen shifted his interests towards the history of the infinitesimal calculus in his controversial 1883 monograph, Das Princip der Infinitesimal-Methode. This book, with its characteristic amalgam of transcendental philosophy and history of science, paved the way to what, around 1900, would become the ‘Marburg school’ (Natorp, Cassirer, Görland and others). However, it also interrupted a promising discussion in Marburg on the problem of measurability in science. Keywords: Neo-Kantianism, Marburg School, Hermann Cohen, Psychophysics, Gustav Theodor Fechner, History of Measurement Theory Introduction In 1912, Ernst Cassirer (1912) contributed to the special issue of the Kant-Studien that honored Hermann Cohen’s retirement—his mentor and teacher, and the recognized founding father of the so-called ‘Marburg school’ of Neo-Kantianism (Poma, [1989] 1997). In the context of an otherwise rather conventional presentation of Cohen’s interpretation of Kant, Cassirer made a remark that is initially surprising.
    [Show full text]
  • Book Reviews 283 Benjamin Lazier, God Interrupted
    book reviews 283 Benjamin Lazier, God Interrupted: Heresy and the European Imagination Between the World Wars (Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2008), pp. XIV, 254; ISBN: 978-0-691-13670-7 The first surprise amazing the reader of a book about three major figures among the Jewish intellectuals in Weimar Germany— including Gershom Scholem—is the author’s choice of the two other protagonists, Hans Jonas and Leo Strauss. One has become used to expect rather Walter Benjamin and Franz Rosenzweig and is therefore grateful for Lazier’s shifting of the focus. The book starts with three mottos by Augustine (his answer to “what is God”), Karl Barth (answering the question “what is the world?”) and Hans Jonas (stating that the world is “an unending revelation of matter”). Certainly Augustine and Barth are not considered to represent Scholem and Strauss (or vice versa), yet apparently both of them, the neo-Platonic genius from the fifth century and the dialectical theologian from the twentieth century, matched in some way the spiritual needs of the period between the World Wars; and indeed, the reader will meet them again throughout the book. The second, less perplexing surprise follows immediately: the Table of Contents, which lacks any hint of Maimonides (though he is of course present in the book), and guides the reader through the maze of heresies by means of the three markers Gnosticism, Pantheism, and Redemption through Sin, the last one referring to a famous essay published in Hebrew by Scholem in 1937. The author informs us in his preface that he primarily intended to call his own book by this very same title “as homage to Gershom Scholem” (p.
    [Show full text]
  • The Perspective of Mosheim and Neander
    Concordia Seminary - Saint Louis Scholarly Resources from Concordia Seminary Doctor of Theology Dissertation Concordia Seminary Scholarship 5-1-1994 Integrity and Integration in Ecclesiastical Historiography: The eP rspective of Mosheim and Neander Paulo Buss Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://scholar.csl.edu/thd Part of the Christian Denominations and Sects Commons, and the History of Christianity Commons Recommended Citation Buss, Paulo, "Integrity and Integration in Ecclesiastical Historiography: The eP rspective of Mosheim and Neander" (1994). Doctor of Theology Dissertation. 9. http://scholar.csl.edu/thd/9 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Concordia Seminary Scholarship at Scholarly Resources from Concordia Seminary. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctor of Theology Dissertation by an authorized administrator of Scholarly Resources from Concordia Seminary. For more information, please contact [email protected]. © Copyright 1994 by Paulo W. Buss CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND DEDICATION iii INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER I. THE BEGINNINGS OF LUTHERAN HISTORIOGRAPHY 11 Luther's view of History Knowledge of history History seen with human eyes God and History The church and its history Philosophy or theology of history? Uses of history Luther from the perspective of integrity and integration Luther's impact on historiography The Magdeburg Centuries Veit Ludwig von Seckendorff II. JOHANN LORENZ MOSHEIM 51 Life and works Writings and influence Mosheim's
    [Show full text]
  • 'The One and Only True and Salvational Faith'
    ANTTI HARMAINEN ‘The one and only true and salvational faith’ The synthesis of Kulturprotestantismus, German humanism and Western esotericism in Carl Robert Sederholm’s written work of the early 1880s n the 1880s, the religious life in Finland was in the writer1 (e.g. Nya Pressen 13.12.1883), which was midst of a turbulent period which, for some, pre- entitled Andens eller det rena förnuftets religion (‘The Isented a threat to traditional moral values and social Religion of a Spirit or of a Pure Reason’). According cohesion while for others it was the beginning of a new, to the advertisment in Nya Pressen magazine, the more liberal era. During this period, new ideas and book was representing critical views established by religious currents also stirred in the local milieu. For ‘free historical religious studies’, which made it an ex ample, modern Western esoteric currents played a inflammatory case in the highly charged religious- role in the process as well as many other ideological, nationalistic milieu of early 1880s Finland. scientific and religious phenomena. This article scru- After the book was released several public state- tinizes the period in question by focusing on a writing ments were made to proclaim that Andens eller det individual who entered the field of Finnish public debate rena förnuftets religion had made a significant con- somewhat suddenly. For him, the time was all about tribution to the ideological breakthrough which was creating the best possible religion from all the ingredi- seen to be spreading among the educated elite, as well ents that contemporary debate could offer.
    [Show full text]
  • CHRISTIANITY, DIASPORA JUDAISM, and ROMAN CRISIS* Robert M
    CHRISTIANITY, DIASPORA JUDAISM, AND ROMAN CRISIS* Robert M. Price Acts of the Apologists I fi rst came to the study of the Bible as a would-be theologian, which meant I wanted to take the great menagerie of texts and genres and feed them into a meat grinder that would give me neatly packaged sausages called “theology.”1 It was, as some Postmodernists like to say, “Logocentric,” at least an exercise in abstraction. I wanted to press Scripture into the service of so-called Systematic Theology. When I thought I had jumped the track and changed my focus to New Testament and Early Christianity as a descriptive discipline, little did I suspect I was still trying to play the same game. I was trying to construct an abstract template of “Christian Origins,” as church historians had always done, and then fi t all the data of the New Testament and the Church Fathers into that symmetrical systematic outline. I began with the traditional outline, accepted by Christian historians since Eusebius in the fourth century. According to this schema, Christianity began with Jesus Christ who taught true doctrine to his disciples, the apostles. The sum and substance of this faith was preserved in the Apostles’ Creed. The apostles in turn taught the true doctrine to their appointed successors, the bishops, who in turn trained their own successors, the next generation of bishops, and so on down the line. As the offi cial version had it, Satan waited until the last of the original apostles died and then began to train and send out heretics to corrupt the church with false doctrines.
    [Show full text]