Quick viewing(Text Mode)

(James 4:8) the Development of Karl Rahner's Theological Thinking in Its F

(James 4:8) the Development of Karl Rahner's Theological Thinking in Its F

Louvain Studies 29 (2004) 28-48

“Draw nigh to God and He will draw nigh to you” (James 4:8) The Development of Karl Rahner’s Theological Thinking in Its First Period Roman A. Siebenrock

Abstract. — This article proposes a new point of departure for evaluating the work of Karl Rahner and in particular for exploring the controversial issue of the influence of Ignatian spirituality on his thought. The proposed new approach considers Rahner’s various sources, and suggests that his entire corpus is the unfold- ing of an original intuition. This original intuition is encapsulated in the fol- lowing phrase: God touches us in our innermost being, and in the sacrament of the , so that we can touch God. God’s descent into the world and the ek- stasis or transcendence of human beings and the world in God are two aspects of one God and humanity. The key to Rahner’s of grace is his emphasis on uncreated grace. He developed his theology of grace as a reaction to neo-scholastic theology, and this gave his work its definitive shape. In , God’s universal saving will is effected in the world and in all people historically, victoriously and irrevo- cably.

The development of 20th-century is mirrored in the work of Karl Rahner. Rahner’s writings exemplify not only the pur- suit of Christian and ecclesial life forms before, during and after the Sec- ond Vatican Council, but also how this search continues in a new epoch of Church history. It is therefore strange that interpretation of his work which began after the continues to run along old lines.1

1. Roman A. Siebenrock, “Einleitung,” Karl Rahner in der Diskussion: Erstes und zweites Innsbrucker Karl-Rahner-Symposion: Themen – Referate – Ergebnisse. Mit einem Vorwort von Karl H. Neufeld, ed. R. A. Siebenrock, Innsbrucker Theologische Studien, 56 (/Wien: Tyrolia, 2001) 9-32. RAHNER’S THEOLOGICAL THINKING IN ITS FIRST PERIOD 29

The continuing discussion concerning the relationship between Ignatian spirituality and ; Christian-mystical experience and modern thought; the apparent contradiction between the transcen- dental and the historical, all proceed, in the characterisations of his theology as ‘transcendental’ or ‘anthropologically oriented’, from the presupposition that Rahner’s work can be understood as something sta- tic and without any significant developments. This is due to the fact that Rahner’s work is essentially identified with the somewhat problematic nature of his Foundations of Christian . Texts from this period usually form the basis of current research. As a result, two essential aspects of Rahner’s work are entirely over- looked: his critical engagement with, yet dependence upon scholastic theology, and development and change inspired by his pastoral engage- ment. In addition, it is hardly ever acknowledged that Rahner’s work cannot be reduced to one method and one source. Neither has it a sin- gle purpose and quest.2 Nor is there any agreement regarding Rahner’s lasting contribution. On the one hand, he is heralded as the foremost theologian of the 20th century; on the other, he is decried as a heretic. The project of interpreting Rahner has its own history and presuppo- sitions, and these have not yet been critically considered. Therefore, the work of the generation of scholars after Rahner is timely3 as this gen- eration did not know him as a teacher, had no need to step out of his shadow, and was therefore free to pursue its own theological enquiry. A certain scholarly distance from Rahner facilitates evaluation of the complexity of his work without falling prey either to blind enthusiasm or to enmity. There is nothing methodologically new in the approach presented here: it is that of classical hermeneutics. It examines the entire text

2. A possible reason for this neglect of neo-scholastic theology may lie in Rahner’s move from Innsbruck to , where he had to teach in the philosophy faculty. 3. This present article is my summary of a recent research project in German, in which mutual agreement was the cornerstone of our work. It is published as: Der Denkweg Karl Rahners: Quellen – Entwicklungen – Perspektiven, ed. Andreas R. Batlogg SJ, Paul Rulands, Walter Schmolly, Roman A. Siebenrock, Günter Wassilowsky, Arno Zahlauer (Mainz: Grünewald, 2003, 2004). We provide a systematic-genetic interpretation of Rah- ner’s earlier writings (1925-1949). Each interpretation had to be agreed upon by all involved. We strove to identify leading ideas or images (Urintention), each of which we termed a ‘Leitmotiv’. We were not interested in harmonizing the work, but attempted to determine the developing energies, presumptions, spiritual motives, systematic options and problems in Rahner’s life and work. 30 ROMAN A. SIEBENROCK in its double context: in itself, and in its historical situatedness. There- fore, developments in Rahner’s personal faith life and in his thinking are linked with the adoption of certain systematic approaches and his focus on key questions. Such a methodology is in no way exceptional, but has only come to be applied to Rahner research in the most recent past.

I. Form and Sources

Rahner’s work is presented in several essays. These record both his pastoral concern and the fact that he was anchored in a particular his- torical context in which he felt obliged to respond to particular theo- logical problems and questions. One can describe his work as ‘acciden- tal theology’. Theology, as he understood it, had to deal with the proclamation of the and with faith today. Rahner’s theology has therefore to be regarded as doubly oriented. On the one hand the actual coming to completion of life and faith, emerging from the free call of God, which cannot be fully understood by means of reason. His think- ing (Denken) proceeds continuously from insights, practice, and life expe- riences which he does not always explicitly describe, but upon which he is constantly reflecting (nach-denkt). On the other hand, thinking does not capture Rahner’s life and its foundational experiences entirely. All talk about God, which begins from and takes place in the context of lived discipleship, flows into silent adoration before the Holy Mystery. Given its pastoral rootedness, Rahner’s theology is to be read as an accom- paniment to the Church at a time of transition, and as providing a the- ological basis for Christian discipleship. This paper will explore Rahner’s early work and its development, beginning with a presentation of the normative sources or ‘loci’. Then, based upon these normative sources, we will identify Rahner’s guiding principle (Urintention) by means of an integrating overview of the main systematic themes with an eye to their further development. The essay is making the case throughout for a new point of departure in Rahner interpretation, on the basis of a ‘genetic-systematic’ (genetisch- systematischen) methodology. The necessary sources will only become available with the publication of Rahner’s collected works (Sämtliche Werke).4

4. For this reason I have given the Sämtliche Werke (abv. SW) in my references. The following volumes have already appeared: Sämtliche Werke, edited by the Karl-Rahner- Stiftung under the direction of , , Karl-Heinz Neufeld, RAHNER’S THEOLOGICAL THINKING IN ITS FIRST PERIOD 31

1. Sources and References of the Work: Rahner’s ‘loci’ Rahner’s own principal theological sources are as manifold as they are heterogenous. In this, they reflect the complexity of Catholic theol- ogy, which is not to be aligned with any particular historical epoch or one particular authority. We can identify different starting points: 1. Rahner’s first consideration of his Ignatian roots is found in “The Ignatian of Joy in the World” (TI III, 277-293).5 The redis- covery of the mystical Ignatius in the context of the Jesuit way of life ori- entates spiritual contemplation of scripture towards a life choice which is personal, and in which God deals directly (unmittelbar) with his creature. 2. Rahner addresses the question which modernism raised con- cerning the faith-subject and the meaning of experience, by referring back to the tradition of the spiritual senses rooted in the Fathers. Later these preliminary reflections, published as “Experience of Grace” (TI, III, 86-91), bore fruit in his work on mystagogy and the direct nature of experience of God (TI XI, 149-165). 3. Rahner’s theology of sacramental practice and piety reflects his theology of grace and . We note here an emphasis on the his- toricality of grace, and in fact this early sacramental theology also repre- sents Rahner’s first excursus into a theology of history. His theology of

Albert Raffelt and Herbert Vorgrimler (Freiburg/Basel/Wien/Solothurn/Düsseldorf: Herder/Benzinger, 1995ff; from 2002: Freiburg/Basel/Wien: Herder). Already published: SW 2: Geist in Welt: Philosophische Schriften, ed. Albert Raffelt, 1995; SW 3: Spiritua- lität und Theologie der Kirchenväter, ed. Andreas R. Batlogg, Eduard Farrugia and Karl- Heinz Neufeld (“E Latere Christi,” 1-84; “Aszese und Mystik in der Väterzeit,” 129- 427), 1999; SW 4: Hörer des Wortes: Schriften zur Religionsphilosophie und zur Grundlegung der Theologie, ed. Albert Raffelt, 1997; SW 8: Der Mensch in der Schöpfung, ed. Karl-Heinz Neufeld, 1998; SW 10: Kirche in den Herausforderungen der Zeit: Studien zur Ekklesiologie und zur kirchlichen Existenz, ed. Josef Heislbetz and Albert Raffelt, 2003; SW 15: Verantwortung der Theologie: Im Dialog mit Naturwissenschaften und Gesellschafts- theorie, ed. Hans-Dieter Mutschler, 2002; SW 17: Enzyklopädische Theologie: Die Lexikonbeiträge der Jahre 1956-1973; “Teilband 1;” “Teilband 2,” ed. Herbert Vorgrim- ler, 2002; SW 18: Leiblichkeit der Gnade: Schriften zur Sakramententheologie, ed. Wen- delin Knoch and Tobias Trappe, 2003; SW 19: Selbstvollzug der Kirche: Ekklesiologische Grundlegung praktischer Theologie, ed. Karl-Heinz Neufeld, 1995; SW 26: Grundkurs des Glaubens: Studien zum Begriff des Christentums, ed. Nikolaus Schwerdtfeger and Albert Raffelt, 1999; SW 27: Einheit in Vielfalt: Schriften zur ökumenischen Theologie, ed. Karl Kardinal Lehmann and Albert Raffelt, 2003. 5. “ Speaks to a Modern Jesuit,” Ignatius of Loyola, ed. Paul Imhof (London: Collins, 1979) 11-38; Karl H. Neufeld, Die Brüder Rahner: Eine Biogra- phie (Freiburg/Basel/Wien: Herder, 22004); Klaus P. Fischer, Der Mensch als Geheimnis: Die Anthropologie Karl Rahners: Mit einem Brief von Karl Rahner (Freiburg/Basel/Wien: Herder, 1974); Philip Endean, Karl Rahner and Ignatian Spirituality (Oxford: University Press, 2001); Arno Zahlauer, Karl Rahner und sein “produktives Vorbild” Ignatius von Loyola, Innsbrucker Theologische Studien, 47 (Innsbruck/Wien: Tyrolia, 1996). 32 ROMAN A. SIEBENROCK grace is developed in contrast to the preoccupation with the self of of religion, and is conceived of as a Christological- ecclesiological mediation of , as first considered in “The Mean- ing of Frequent Confession of Devotion” (TI III, 177-189). 4. The question concerning the possibility of metaphysics for a knowledge continually dependent upon the senses or indeed upon the world (SW 3: Geist in Welt, Spirit in the World), and the foundation of a philosophy of religion grounded on revelation as fundamental theological anthropology (SW 4: Hörer des Wortes, Hearer of the Word), together with a critical engagement with modern philosophy from Kant to Heidegger, is daringly explored in a systematic new interpretation of the thought of . Aquinas was regarded as the measuring stick for philos- ophy and theology, in its response to the errors of modernism since Leo XIII (, 1879). Despite this particular reading of Aquinas, Rahner is still able to draw upon him to structure his thinking in response to the challenges of present-day philosophy. For Rahner, Aquinas is a bridge to the questions of the day, which are also the questions of modern philosophy. 5. His theology of grace and repentance is the context for his engagement with the scholastic debates of post-tridentine systematics. He considers these themes in their own right but also considers them in the light of contemporary concerns. At no point does he commit him- self to any one particular school, even that of his own order, . Rahner’s lectures on De Gratia Christi represent the first course he taught in theology.6 The first article which Rahner published on this topic constitutes a remarkable development away from post-Tridentine teaching. In contrast to the schools, the primary meaning of grace for Rahner is not gratia creata but gratia increata: God’s universal will of sal- vation and his revelation in Christ.7 From this starting point he will develop his concept of the self-communication of God as grace, and rev- elation in and through Christ as divinisation of the whole creation. 6. His reception of the church fathers in his work on the history of spirituality and dogma, in co-operation with his brother Hugo Rah- ner SJ (1900-1968), stands within the then current rediscovery of patris- tic theology. It is important therefore to note that Rahner is familiar with

6. The contents of these lectures were published for the private use of his stu- dents: De Gratia Christi: Summa Praelectionum in usum privatum auditorum ordinata (Oeniponte 1937-38, republished or reprinted in 1950-51, 1955 and 1959, the second edition is still outstanding). Rahner’s publication of this material is noteworthy, as Lercher’s dogmatic handbook, Institutiones Theologiae Dogmaticae, remained in use in Innsbruck until Vatican II. 7. “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” TI III, 319-346. RAHNER’S THEOLOGICAL THINKING IN ITS FIRST PERIOD 33 the origin of the individual themes and theological options presented in the supposed theologia perennis of neoscholasticism and of western the- ology (SW 3). 7. The creative tensions in his work are owed to his pastoral sensi- tivity and his awareness of the rapidly changing faith situation. Rahner is above all concerned with the crisis of faith and with the reality that ref- erence to the authority of scripture and/or church tradition alone is no longer intellectually credible. As his theology of sacramental practice devel- ops, so also his work becomes more pastorally anchored, especially while working with Prälat Rudolf in Cardinal Innitzer’s pastoral office in (1940-44). Thus, Rahner’s theology can be understood first and foremost as theological accompaniment to a church in radical transformation.

2. Guiding Principle: The Basic Idea of the ‘Dual-Single’ (‘doppelt-einen’) Movement of Creator and His Creation The guiding principle that underpins the various sources and points of departure of Rahner’s thought can be encapsulated in a single concept that integrates the various perspectives. This guiding principle is illus- trated by a quotation from the Letter of James, which has been used as the title of this essay: “Draw nigh to God and he will draw nigh to you” (James 4:8). In this quotation the ‘dual-single’ movement, thematised in the Spiritual Exercises, coalesces with the fundamental orientation of Karl Rahner’s theology. The movement of God towards humankind is tradi- tionally referred to by the concepts , descensus Dei or katabasis. This is the descent of God into the world, which in scholastic theology is considered as grace. God’s descent into the world enables a movement of creation and in particular of human beings to God. Rahner under- stands this as an ek-stasis or transcendence of people into the infinity and incomprehensibility of God. Since the movement of God towards humankind logically and temporally precedes the movement of humankind towards God, it can consequently be described as ‘transcen- dental’, i.e. as a condition of the possibility of transcendence in humankind. Inasmuch as this God-enabled movement into grace reaches God’s self, this ‘transcendental moment’ can be interpreted as transcen- dence in the sense of ek-stasis in God.8 In later works the different aspects of the meaning of the term ‘transcendental’ merge indivisibly into one

8. As well as these two meanings, Knoepffler recognizes also the classical aspect of the transcendental: see Nikolaus Knoepffler, Der Begriff ‘transcendental’ bei Karl Rahner: Zur Frage seiner Kantischen Herkunft, Innsbrucker Theologische Studien, 39 (Innsbruck/ Wien: Tyrolia, 1993). 34 ROMAN A. SIEBENROCK another, particularly in Foundations of Christian Faith, and are a source of continuing confusion. These movements are central to the Exercises of Ignatius. God engages directly within each person (Spiritual Exercises, 15). Erhard Kunz discerns a dual movement within the Exercises: “God’s movement to the person, and the person’s movement to God. Neither movement happens apart from the other; rather, each occurs in the other; God moves to the person, and in that movement, the person is then able to move to God.”9 This dual movement, of God to the human – kenosis, descent – and of the human to God – ek-stasis or transcendence – also marks the basic dynamic of Karl Rahner’s theology. The key moment, in which both movements come together, is, in this early period of Rahner’s work, expressed by means of the concept attingere (“touching”).

II. The Genesis and Systematic Structure of Rahner’s Early Work

Rahner’s theological essays present fragments of Christian thought concerning fundamental aspects of faith, in a context in which there are no longer certainties. They can be properly referred to as systematic because, even though they are individual essays which often do not make any reference to each other, nonetheless taken together, these disparate essays address almost every aspect of Christian faith. The coherent nature of Rahner’s work emerges only subsequently. Only then can we identify certain fundamental options and how they correlate to and correct one another. The development of his work takes places in the most wide- ranging dynamic possible between a theological analysis of the present, dogmatic principles in the light of concrete pastoral challenges, and scientific enquiry. In the first phase (1934-49), we detect a systematic foundation of enduring significance.

The Various Starting Points and Their Systematic Significance “The church finds itself in a new era” (SW 4, 497). Rahner’s aware- ness of the challenges facing Christian faith emerges for the first time dur- ing his pastoral work in Vienna. By this time, a fundamental theologi- cal intuition had developed, which can be encapsulated as follows: God

9. Erhard Kunz, “‘Bewegt von Gottes Liebe’: Theologische Aspekte der ignatia- nischen Exerzitien und Merkmale jesuitischer Vorgehensweise,” Ignatianisch: Eigenart und Methode der Gesellschaft Jesu, ed. Michael Sievernich and Gunter Switek (Freiburg/Basel/Wien: Herder, 1990) 75-95, p. 95. RAHNER’S THEOLOGICAL THINKING IN ITS FIRST PERIOD 35 touches us in our innermost being and in the sacrament of the church so that we can touch God. This dual-single movement, which evolves as a key insight, finds application and expression in the most diverse man- ner in his various essays. We find it developed, amended, deepened and then corrected in the light of church doctrine. Different points of depar- ture may be discerned in his early work. a. The Mystical In an article dealing with the spiritual senses that draws upon ’s mystical theology, Rahner explores the possibility of direct experience of God in the context of appropriating the Ignatian mysticism of election.10 Assuming that Bonaventure’s account is reliable, he asks, “How can this direct experience of God be made comprehensible?” (TI XVI, 123). Already he is postulating an ‘organ’ attuned to religious experience, in which one is touched by God. Even prior to the exercise of knowing and of freedom, God transforms into love the ek-stasis of human existence which resides in the apex affectus (‘the soul’s highest point’). Following the classical distinction between will and intellect, Rah- ner says that God touches (attingit) human beings more deeply than at an intellectual or volitive level, because the apex affectus is the deepest and inmost ground of the soul. He summarizes: Naturally the soul experiences God directly in the ground of its being only as the motive power of ecstatic love which leaves all knowledge behind it, and in consequence the experience remains obscure until the intellect as well is flooded, without being blinded by the dazzling brilliance of God in the . But at any rate God is here as the dark fire of love (TI XVI, 125). Therefore, already in Rahner’s earliest writings, love is presented as the definining form of divine encounter. Encounter with God is inter- preted as an event of freedom that transforms us into love in our inner- most being. So our encounter with God is located in the innermost cen- tre of our existence. This mystical point of departure later develops, in accordance with the principles of Rahner’s theology of grace, into that form of transcendental theology that is often discussed, but not recog- nised clearly enough as having its origin in that same theology of grace and in the spiritual senses.

10. “The Doctrine of the ‘Spiritual Senses’ in the Middle Ages,” TI XVI, 104-134 (first published 1934). 36 ROMAN A. SIEBENROCK b. Sacramental Theology The second point of departure which shapes his thought is to be found in a sacramental theology that stresses the historical character of revelation. In an analysis of frequent confession of devotion (Andachts- beichte), a form of piety that had reached a critical low point, Rahner asks how the necessity for receiving the sacrament can be theologically justi- fied given that forgiveness of sins is also possible outside this sacrament. What significance can the sacrament have, when the salvific grace attrib- uted to it may also be received without it? This question is decisive for Rahner’s work. It is also the first time that the unity of theology and anthropology becomes apparent: … the more genuine and the deeper one’s spiritual life is, the more (and the more directly) it will grow out of the ultimate, basic fact of our being, and the more exclusively the religious activity of the per- son will centre round the truly decisive conditions of our life (TI III, 178). He continues: But these conditions undoubtedly include the fact that we are sin- ners, and that, precisely as a sinner, man is called by Christian redemption before the countenance of Christ, who was crucified for our sins. Christianity knows of no other God besides the God of the one who died for our sins (TI III, 178). According to Rahner’s theology, God makes a choice in history. God chooses not to be found at all times and everywhere but rather in the con- crete history of salvation; at one time in Galilee; today in the confes- sional. Therefore, the sacrament, in its concrete, ecclesial form, is the place in which, in freedom, we respond to the freedom of God. The sacrament is in essence the historically realised form of the drama of human and divine freedom. In this interaction, in freedom, of God and the faithful, we can find moments both of critical reflection and of surrender: Every confession in its turning to the historically visible is a protest against every hidden of a humanitarian spiritual piety; it is an acknowledgement that ultimately our sins are remitted by God’s act alone and that ultimately he, the free God of Grace, can be found only in his historical revelation, in his visible church and his visible sacraments (TI III, 186). This understanding of revelation and of God’s gracious and merci- ful activity in history faces two problems. Firstly, how can an earlier event in human history become present for a later generation? Rahner tackles this question in “E Latere Christi,” where he calls for an adequate RAHNER’S THEOLOGICAL THINKING IN ITS FIRST PERIOD 37 understanding of symbolic reality (SW 3, 81-84). Secondly, Rahner has to develop an answer to the problem of double . This ques- tion is dealt with in his treatise on Grace. c. Fides quaerens intellectum: Faith Gives Pause for Thought In this, the third perspective, Rahner confronts the intellectual chal- lenge of the present. Rahner’s theology takes its particular character from his legitimisation of Christian faith, which he accomplishes not merely by asserting faith’s claims, but also by seeking to demonstrate them in contemporary language and concepts. All this is argued in a philo- sophically rigorous manner. Philosophical thinking serves to bridge and to mediate between the interior and the exterior, between the immediacy of the God of Rahner’s personal background, and an era in which God seems remote (TI 1, 94). The philosophical research project Geist in Welt (Spirit in World, SW 2) deals with two questions. Kant delimited human understanding (Erkennt- nis) to phenomena in time and space. Rahner addresses this by reference to the dynamism of understanding and the affirmative synthesis in the work of Joseph Maréchal SJ (SW 2, 373-406). This approach is called into question by Heidegger’s emphasis on finiteness (Finitismus), as analysed by SJ (SW 2, 449-451). For Heidegger, ‘ex-istence’ is understood as the dynamic of radical finiteness towards nothingness. Human know- ing, according to Rahner’s point of departure, is not a limited act, but instead is carried by a dynamic into the unlimited expanse of all reality. Life-orienting knowing (Erkenntnis), which demands the freedom of the individual, springs from an affirmation of the original unity of under- standing of the knower (Erkennende) and that which is known (Erkann- te), a unity that precedes all questions and doubts. Such an act is not solitary, but rather integrates in an ‘affirmative synthesis’ all human capac- ities (sense experience, understanding, reason, and imagination). The metaphysics of knowing becomes anthropology. We step beyond the horizon of all finitude, without, however, being capable of achieving this abstraction (ek-stasis as excess, anticipation) again by our- selves. We are creatures of the borderlands, between death and life, between time and eternity, between heaven and earth – but in all things are referred to the world. God is co-known as Principle, not as Object. We find ourselves being referred to something above and beyond the world, before a God who remains silent. For this reason, those who are in conversio are called back from all idealistic temptations into the world, into their own historicality and personal story. If at all, then only in 38 ROMAN A. SIEBENROCK history, can we encounter a word of eternity. Rahner’s metaphysics of understanding is to be explored as ‘metaphysics of conversion’ and all metaphysics ends in the recognition of its own futility: So in itself all metaphysics would have to conclude in an eternally watchful readiness of man to keep his ear cocked for the perhaps pos- sible possibility of a revelation. But will man be able to endure this ecstasy of his being, this remaining on the look-out, to see whether perhaps God will come? (TI III, 284). There is always a risk that human readiness to God can be inflated, that we answer our own prayers, and that our search for God concludes in the erection of human idols. Rahner underscored this in 1937, when speaking of race and religion in his confrontation with Nazi ideology (SW 4, 104f, 454-461; SW 2, 451-454).11 We are therefore in the situation of having to listen for a revela- tion of God which is to be encountered in history. To be human is to be a “Hearer of the Word” (SW 4). We humans have the capacity to enquire after Being. To that extent is Being illumined. The goal of knowledge and ontology correlate one another. Following the Augus- tinian-Platonic tradition, Rahner defines Being as the unity of under- standing and being. Understanding, therefore, is participation in the divine logos.12 Schwerdtfeger is correct when he speaks of an incarna- tional metaphysics.13 He highlights in particular the following: “Being in general is disclosed to man only in appearance.”14 And: “It is in appearance that man finds being in general opened up to him.”15 The logos-theology in the background is expressed in his thesis of the unity of being and knowing: The ultimate presupposition for God in his divinity, communicating to men through speech, that is, through the Word, is the ultimate unity of being and knowing. Only if the being of that which is, is “logos” from the very start, can the incarnate Logos utter in words

11. This part, which shows the political awareness of Rahner’s work, was omitted out in the second edition by Johann Baptist Metz. Therefore the passage could not have any influence in the understanding Karl Rahner in English speaking countries. 12. Karsten Kreutzer, Transzendentales versus hermeneutisches Denken: Zur Genese des religionsphilosophischen Ansatzes bei Karl Rahner und seiner Rezeption durch Johann Baptist Metz, Ratio fidei, 10 (Regensburg: Pustet, 2002). 13. Nikolaus Schwerdtfeger, Gnade und Welt: Zum Grundgefüge von Karl Rahners Theorie des ‘anonymen Christen’, Freiburger Theologische Studien, 123 (Freiburg/ Basel/Wien: Herder, 1982) 119. 14. Hearers of the Word (London: Sheed and Ward, 1969) 145 (SW 4, 220). 15. Ibid., 147 (see SW 4, 224). RAHNER’S THEOLOGICAL THINKING IN ITS FIRST PERIOD 39

what lies hidden in the depths of God. Only if these depths are not a dark urge and chaotic primal cause, not blind caprice, but eternal light (even if inaccessible to man in his own strength), can the Word be the bearer of all grace and truth.16 Rahner puts together epistemologically a theology of the Logos which is oriented towards the transcendental. Being discloses itself to the extent that we are capable of enquiring after it (Fragbarkeit), but at the same time it remains hidden, so much so that that same enquiry remains questionable (Fraglichkeit). In the last analysis, however, Being is with- drawn. Thus, he encounters in his search another’s freedom which can disclose itself to him, or remain silent. The ordering, of absolute freedom and finite freedom, within the capacity for remaining silent and the obligation to listen, represents the furthest boundary of a philosophical foundation for revelation. Such a foundation can do no more than designate the place in which sovereign freedom of the will of the Other expresses itself: as Word in history. The anthropologically-oriented metaphysics, as an “ontology of the poten- tia obedientialis,” becomes a fundamental theological anthropology, and demands from itself an explication of its preconditions and consequences in the theology of Grace. d. De Gratia Christi: The Centre and Form of Rahner’s Theology In 1937, Rahner found himself having to teach a course in Scholas- ticism, and thereby he discovered his lifelong theme, that which became the theological centre of his thought: the Grace of Christ.17 This is the fourth point of departure for Rahner’s thought. Rahner revolutionised the Catholic theology of grace while sometimes still using the actual, literal words of his teachers. What he has to say is permeated by a fundamen- tal Trinitarian structure: God desires the salvation of all (1 Tim 2, Eph 1-2); this universal will for salvation touches us in Christ and in the

16. Ibid., 51f (SW 4, 80). The conclusion of his philosophical dissertation Spirit in the World is conversion to Jesus; see: Spirit in the World (London: Sheed and Ward, 1968) 408 (SW 2, 300). 17. De Gratia Christi. Summa Praelectionum (see n. 6); Roman A. Siebenrock, “Gnade als Herz der Welt: Der Beitrag Karl Rahners zu einer zeitgemäßen Gnaden- theologie,” Theologie aus Erfahrung der Gnade: Annäherungen an Karl Rahner, ed. Mariano Delgado and Matthias Lutz-Bachmann (Berlin: Morus, 1994) 34-71; Paul Rulands, Menschsein unter dem An-spruch der Gnade: Das übernatürliche Existential und der Begriff der natura pura bei Karl Rahner, Innsbrucker Theologische Studien, 55 (Inns- bruck-Wien: Tyrolia, 2000). 40 ROMAN A. SIEBENROCK church.18 Grace is first of all uncreated grace, the person of Jesus Christ himself. Through the Holy Spirit, this grace touches the whole of humankind in Jesus Christ who is the head of redeemed humanity, and wishes to transform it by redemption into the life of God. Therefore the world is so that Christ can be. The is the aim (finis) of creation. Because in Christ, as the new Adam, this goal of creation has been realised in history, the completion of the life and love of Christ becomes the distinguishing sign of (‘supernatural’) salvation: “Our super- natural life is the prolongation and explication of the life of Christ” (De Gratia Christi, 22). The goal of God’s saving action is the whole of humanity. The church, in Christ, is the sign of this among people. It is in Christ the unum magnum sacramentum. Rahner’s concept of church is thus, from its very beginnings, analogous.19 The theology of grace is what formulates the dynamic which gives his work its decisive character: God’s universal will for salvation desires to extend from the head of renewed humanity to all its members. In this finality of grace humankind and all reality is aligned to the immediacy of God. This horizon (‘super- natural formal object’) is where humanity stands. Thus, grace is co- experienced in the most diverse experiences. The traditional nature-grace dichotomy is overcome. The entire enterprise needs to be perceived as the dynamic of God’s universal salvific will in Christ, which Rahner understands as God’s self- communication. Rahner interprets this self-communication as universal offer of grace and event of revelation. Traditional themes such as mar- tyrdom (baptism by blood), the desire (votum) for the church, the Jesuit Ripalda’s thesis that a moral act is a saving act, and the distinction between the visible and invisible church, are further developed in the light of Pius XII’s Mystici Corporis (1943). This results in the proposal of various levels of church membership as well as in the concept of ‘objec- tive redemption’ (SW 10, 3-81, 657-666). As the work develops, Rahner’s theology of grace becomes fused with an analysis of the structures of the human spirit, transcendentally opened up. But as we are directed to God in an ecstatic form of existence, we do not find our way to perfection through abandoning the world, but solely by means of a conversio ad historiam, ultimately in the following of Christ in love of neighbour.

18. The first Chapter of De Gratia Christi is dedicated to Gods universal will of salvation. This opening is the leading perspective of the whole tract. 19. Walter Schmolly, Eschatologische Hoffnung in Geschichte: Karl Rahners dogma- tisches Grundverständnis der Kirche als theologische Begleitung von deren Selbstvollzug, Inns- brucker Theologische Studien, 57 (Innsbruck/Wien: Tyrolia, 2001). RAHNER’S THEOLOGICAL THINKING IN ITS FIRST PERIOD 41

Acknowledging the most diverse forms of discipleship, the accep- tance of the offer of grace by humankind always points either to a fuga saeculi or an acceptance of death.20 The reason for this is that human nature must, according to Rahner, be broken open and indeed broken to pieces, by the life and death of Christ.21 All acts of salvation are there- fore not only in relation to Christ, but explain an aspect of his historical and eternal life. Rahner states: “our supernatural life is the prolongation and unfolding of the life of Christ.”22 Redemption is hence only possi- ble in a relationship with Christ and his historical realisation as church. The dual single movement already identified is evident here as well. Walter Schmolly has researched this two-levelled fundamental axiomatic which it is not possible to bring together in a higher synthesis. From God’s perspective the movement has to be seen as irrevocable and victo- rious (, ), because of the divine universal will to salvation. However, from the human perspective, it must always be seen as under threat because of guilt and sin. Thus, the unconditional and earnest salvific will of God, who shows the same determination with regard to the plan of salvation as is mani- fest in the glory of creation, is, as far as humans are concerned, open, because God unconditionally wills and respects human freedom. It is only possible to respond, in love and friendship to God’s prevenient love, out of the fragility of human freedom. For this reason, salvation history is a dramatic encounter between God and humankind, which Rahner outlines in his article “Theos in the New Testament” as follows: God’s activity in the course of saving history is not a kind of mono- logue which God conducts by himself; it is a long, dramatic dialogue between God and his creature, in which God confers on man the power to make a genuine answer to his Word, and so makes his own further Word dependent upon the way in which man does in fact freely answer. God’s free action never ceases to take new fire in the

20. Andreas A. Batlogg, Die Mysterien des Lebens Jesu bei Karl Rahner: Zugang zum Christusglauben, Innsbrucker Theologische Studien, 58 (Innsbruck/Wien: Tyrolia, 22003) 131-143, 161-196. 21. See De Gratia Christi, 108. This was correctly noted to be unusual in Catholic teaching on grace by Ulrich Kühn, Natur und Gnade: Untersuchungen zur deutschen katholischen Theologie der Gegenwart (Berlin: Lutherisches Verlagshaus, 21962) 24f. 22. “Nostra vita supernaturalis est prolongatio et explicatio vitae Christi” (De Gra- tia Christi, 22). This is the most important root of his later concept of the ‘’. See Eamonn Conway, The Anonymous Christian – A Relativised Christianity? An Evaluation of ’s Criticisms of Karl Rahner’s Theory of the Anony- mous Christian, European University Studies, XXIII: Theology, 485 (Frankfurt: Lang, 1993). 42 ROMAN A. SIEBENROCK

activity of man…; the creature is a real co-performer in this humano- divine drama of history (TI I, 111). In view of these statements and the sacramental-historical founda- tions of his doctrine of grace and revelation, there can be no question of there being any forgetfulness of history by Rahner. The transcendental form of thinking does not skip clean over history, but analyses its mean- ing, and is at the service of proclamation because it asks how the word of the Gospel can truly draw close to people today. To this extent, the theology of proclamation necessarily demands a transcendental mode of thinking. e. Pastoral Responsibility: Theological Relevance in a Post-Christian Age The pastoral rootedness of Rahner’s work were already clearly demonstrated in his essays on personal and sacramental piety. In addi- tion, the examination of his own vocation as a priest is of great impor- tance for the systematic interpretation of his work, because Rahner always seeks to clarify pastoral questions by means of a formal dogmatic foun- dation.23 His pastoral focus became an indispensable and core part of his theology from the time of his parish work in Vienna. At that time he recognised the radical change which meant that a new era for the Church and for faith had dawned. We find him warning against any illusory return to the merely apparent security of ‘pre-modern’ times, and ever more emphatically calling for a root and branch reform. The catchphrase he uses to describe this situation is: a minority in a worldwide diaspora situation, radical pluralism, and the fact that sociological and social supports for religions are growing weaker or dis- appearing entirely. This led Rahner to place increasingly more emphasis on the necessity for personal education or formation, as well as personal experience (‘mystagogy’). The shift is inevitable from an inherited Christianity (Nachwuchs- christentum) to a Christianity that is freely and decisively embraced (Entscheidungschristentum) (SW 10, 251-273). In this context, “the courage to take risk” (TI VII, 81) is necessary. Rahner emphasises the significance of the individual. He encourages openness in the Church and welcomes experimentation. He insists on respecting principles and imperatives and discourages any arbitrariness in reform. He distinguishes between ‘essential theology’ (Essenztheologie) and

23. For example: “Priestly Existence,” TI III, 239-262; “The and Suf- fering,” TI III, 161-170. RAHNER’S THEOLOGICAL THINKING IN ITS FIRST PERIOD 43

‘existential theology’ (Existenztheologie) (SW 10), and warns against crypto-heresies (SW 10, 520-556). At the time of the Council, Rahner’s insights into the Zeitgeist become more focused, since he characterises modernity as “self-manipu- lation of the person,” reaching into commonly held psychic, ideological, and biological assumptions (SW 19, 265f). The experiment of moder- nity is seriously endangered, because the possibility of a backward evo- lution of humans into resourceful and ingenious animals, in which they seek to avoid the pain of transcendence, cannot be excluded (SW 15). The absence of God distinguishes our situation most from that of previous eras, for example, the New Testament. Already in Vienna (1942- 43) Rahner says, The first thing that strikes us when we try to find out how the men of the new Testament thought about God is the unquestioning assur- ance which characterised their consciousness of him. It never occurred to these men to raise the question of his existence as such. The New Testament knew nothing of all those characteristic features of our consciousness of God today: an anxious sense that question- ing must come first, a sense that it is first necessary slowly and reflec- tively to lay a firm foundation before any form of intimation, devel- oped feeling or recognition of God can be admitted; a feeling that God never fails to withdraw himself from the grip of man’s question; a fear that after all God may be nothing but a monstrous projection of man’s subjective needs and yearnings; a suffering in religious doubt (TI I, 94). From this quotation the role of philosophical thinking in Rahner’s work becomes apparent. It is the bridge between his own deep experi- ence of God in the tradition of the Ignatian Exercises, an experience which is similar to that of New Testament times, and the contemporary situa- tion, in which the true God might be lost or confused with human pro- jections. Rahner’s early work is very concerned with the elaboration of criteria to help distinguish God from mere idols.

III. Aspects of Rahner’s Early Work and Its Development

This analysis of the structure of the early work, which also has a bearing on later developments, needs further clarification. To this end we will now offer some limited systematic and methodological observations. What is important is to discern Rahner’s broad weaving together and inter-relating of various sources, dogmatic-systematic fundamental options and methodological approaches. Rahner’s work is at its most 44 ROMAN A. SIEBENROCK interesting precisely where it is not very well rounded, and seems to “struggle with itself,” either by rejecting or abandoning certain points of departure. It is precisely in these places that we can see the same problems with which we also must struggle.

1. The Significance of Scholastic Theology The reason why post-tridentine scholastic philosophy and theology was significant for the work of Karl Rahner is clear to anyone who knows the context in which he was working in Innsbruck. However, much Rahner interpretation takes its starting point from his time at the Philosophy Department in Munich, with the result that the influence of is fatefully and disastrously undervalued.24 Rahner is not only the one who overturns neo-scholasticism but eventually will also become its custodian in the future. So an understanding of Rahner’s work is impossible with- out an understanding of scholastic theses, methods and controversies. Rahner’s work reveals its scholastic origins and context in diverse ways. He is obliged to work his way through theological ideas and top- ics from a whole spectrum of theses, positions and arguments presented to him by tradition. This was the particular significance of a standard manual. Theological options and fundamental ideas had to hold their ground against traditional doctrine. Thus, for example, one should con- sider the treatise on grace of 1937-38, with its point of departure in God’s universal will for salvation and the option for uncreated grace, as a theology in the making; the work is not carried through in all respects. Rahner had to show familiarity with sources from every epoch of the tradition both in terms of teaching and of the Christian faith: scripture, the Fathers, the Middle Ages, modern times. The manuals he produced himself provide a rich testament to this. Rahner brings out the systematic significance of tradition in the final section of a thesis in which he presents the ratio theologica.Herewesee Rahner’s particular interest in bringing tradition into fruitful dialogue with present-day concerns. Without doubt, his fundamental acknowl- edgement of the church’s teaching office belongs to the scholastic tradi- tion. Scholastic theology presented and commented exhaustively on the normative tradition of the church. Karl Rahner occasionally criticised the magisterium and the papacy. But such criticism was rooted in and founded upon a life-long acknowledgment and defence of their significance.

24. See Karl Lehmann, Art. “Rahner, Karl SJ,” Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche VIII (31999) 805-808, c. 808. RAHNER’S THEOLOGICAL THINKING IN ITS FIRST PERIOD 45

2. Existence and World in God through Christ: Rahner’s Transcendental Theological Proposal of a Logos Theology The dual-single movement is to be construed as a Christologically ‘deep grammar’ (Tiefengrammatik) in his work. It mediates between uni- versal and historical-existential Christology, between the devout con- templation of the life of Jesus and the universal offer of salvation in Christ. The basic question here is as old as Christianity itself: how can the particular, individual life of Jesus of Nazareth be proven to be sig- nificant for all people, indeed for the whole world? Rahner’s answer inte- grates transcendental thinking, as explication and foundation of the sig- nificance of Christ, into a universal horizon. This horizon, radicalised by evolution and the modern natural sciences, orientates every single indi- vidual towards the mystery of Christ as the sacrament of the mystery of God in history. In the tradition of Greek patrology that informs his Trini- tarian doctrine of God (“Theos in the New Testament,” TI I, 79-148; SW 4, 346-403) Christ (‘hypostatic union’) is understood in a Scotist manner as the inner goal of creation. This Christological grammar also implies a correlation of theology with anthropology, the first instance of which was established by the itself. In Rahner’s work, understanding of this relationship is deepened in his writings on Mariology and popular piety.

3. Transcendental Thinking and Pastoral Responsibility Rahner’s transcendental thinking, which develops in the context of a faith crisis, is motivated by fundamental theology. Awareness of the self- manipulation of the human being brings matters into even sharper focus. Because the human being has succumbed to this self-manipulation, Rahner develops his basis for faith in this very reality of human self-alienation. Individuals are confronted with themselves and their history in a radical manner. At the core of human freedom, individuals enquire after that which cannot be manipulated, disposed of or dispensed by them; the mystery, the Other. Rahner’s first ontology of having to hear (SW 4) develops into a the- ology of the inaccessible or holy mystery from an analysis of human free- dom in an age of radical self-manipulation. Inasmuch as the presence of Christ can come to expression in existential experience, and inasmuch as this presence already represents a form of the history of salvation, Rahner speaks of a transcendental revelation and a transcendental Christology which has its centre in the theology of the experience of Easter.25

25. See Schmolly, Eschatologische Hoffnung, 258-305. 46 ROMAN A. SIEBENROCK

4. Theology of a Pilgrim on His Journey Rahner’s work develops in a creative-tense unity of analysis of the current socio-cultural context, basic theological options and practical pro- posals for the church, all of which are orientated toward spiritual renewal, and are underpinned by deep religious devotion. The ethos of his theol- ogy can be expressed by these words which he himself used to describe the aims of : What Clement intends is easily recognised, and the genuineness of his Christian intention is beyond question. He did not seek to change any Christian dogma by means of philosophy; his only concern was to represent the received truth of Christianity in language which he considered the scientific one for his age (SW 3, 182). If Catholic theology is to be developed not against the modern age, but in, for, and only for this reason also against it, then Rahner remains faithful to this orientation, not just because he offers a theological gram- mar, but because he took up the whole tradition in all its heterogene- ity for this purpose, and made it bear fruit for faith both today and in the future. Because he conceived of theology as testimony of the aver- age Christian, there is in his writing not just reflection on faith, but above all encouragement for faith and a provocation towards faith. Therefore, Rahner’s theology can be understood as the theology of a pilgrim on his way, as a theological accompaniment of a church in rad- ical change.

5. What is Christianity? The development of Rahner’s thinking in this first phase can be most clearly demonstrated in those texts, in which he offers a summary of Christianity. In his first systematic article on the significance of fre- quent confession of devotion (TI III, 183-187), Rahner treats of divine revelation for the first time. Here, Rahner emphasises that grace and rev- elation in the history of salvation happen here and there but not overall, because Christianity is historical in nature, and therefore free and irre- ducible. The concept ‘supernatural’ attempts to show this. At another level, in his article on Ignatian mysticism of joy in the world (TI III, 283-287) Rahner understands Christianity as a super- abundance: “The living personal God has spoken to man in Christian- ity, that is in Jesus Christ” (TI III, 283). Despite the ek-stasis of human being, humans are nonetheless at the mercy of the silent God, if God does not come to meet them. Humanity is always tempted to create idols, which establish God as anima mundi. RAHNER’S THEOLOGICAL THINKING IN ITS FIRST PERIOD 47

But God is more than that. And as this more-than-the-world, he has broken in upon man’s existence and has shattered the world, that which theology calls ‘nature’. He has revealed himself in Jesus Christ. This revelation has taken place in the dual unity of a communica- tion of supernatural being and of the word. And the ultimate mean- ing of this revelation is a calling of man out of this world into the life of God, who leads his personal life as the Being exalted above the whole world, as the tri-personal God in inaccessible light. God is thereby bringing himself immediately face to face with man with a demand and a call which flings man out of the course pre-established by nature, which he would have followed within the horizons of the world. This gives rise to a transcendence of man’s mission and desti- nation… (TI III, 285). God’s call breaks open the World. That is why it belongs to the basic make-up of finite spirits to have to reckon with a free act of reve- lation from a God who is personal. There exists, then, the existential obligation, if we do not wish to fail ourselves, of listening to what the Word of God is possibly saying to us. At the third level, in his article on priestly existence (TI III, 239- 262) we can recognize the influence of his theology of grace, specifically, the grace of Christ. Therefore, Christ and his grace have influenced all reality and history. That is why he can speak of a “supernatural existen- tial sphere of man” (TI III, 252), in which Christ is a reality overall. Because the presence of Christ means grace, and grace in history means Church, he can say that the preacher does not proclaim a word in a world deserted by grace. In the actually existing order, “Christ and therefore ‘Church’ is a reality in the concrete existence of every man” (TI III, 252). At the ultimate level we can identify a radical form of Christian universality. This last quotation marks the status quaestionis at end of his early work, because at the next stage Rahner must interpret this univer- sality against the background of tradition, the new reality of , and a radical plurality of religions. It is worth citing this passage on the destination of the parish priest in full: Christianity is first and last Christ himself. It is not, ultimately, a col- lection of doctrines and laws, dogmas and regulations, but a reality which is there, and which is present in our lives ever anew: Christ and his grace, the reality of God which, in Christ, becomes our own reality … For Christ is God’s will for our salvation made historical, made flesh; God’s personal, loving will does not encounter man in some unattainable, intangible ‘inner realm’; since Christ, since the One who became man, all grace is Christ’s grace with a body, grace dependent on the historical event that at one particular space-time point in our human history the Word became man and was cruci- fied and rose again … But an essential constituent of this visibility 48 ROMAN A. SIEBENROCK

of Christ’s grace is the word … Further, the saving reality of Christ is the consecration, in principle, of the whole creation. If anything was not assumed, neither was it redeemed; … But everything has been assumed, for Christ is true man, true son of Adam, truly lived a human life in all its breadth and height and depth, has truly become a star of this in which everything depends on everything else, a flower of this earth which we love. And hence everything, without confusion and without separation, is to enter into eternal life; there is to be not only a new heaven but a new earth. Nothing, unless it be eternally damned, can remain outside the blessing, the protection, the transfiguration of this of the world which, begin- ning in Christ, aims at drawing everything that exists into the life of God himself, precisely in order that it may thus have eternal validity conferred upon it. This is the reality of Christ, with constitutes Chris- tianity; the incarnate life of God in our place and our time. A real- ity to which belongs the word; a reality in which all human reality is called to God and blessed.26

26. This early summary of Christianity and of his Christology is part of an essay on the mission of the parish-priest, Mission and Grace: Essays in Pastoral Theology, Vol. 2 (London/New York: Sheed and Ward, 1964) 39-42; originally it was written in Vienna about 1943-44).

Top View