Transfiguring a Theologia Crucis Through James Cone 3161623606, 9783161623608

Table of contents :
Cover
Title
Foreword by Reggie L. Williams
Preface
Acknowledgements
Table of Contents
List of Abbreviations
Introduction
1. Methodology
2. Hermeneutics for the Theme of Theologia Crucis
2.1 Interpreting Martin Luther for a Contemporary Transfigured Theologia Crucis through James Cone
2.2 Finding Traces of Martin Luther’s Theology in a Contemporary Transfigured Theologia Crucis through James Cone
3. Outline of the Study, and Primary Sources Selected for Close Reading
4. Literature Review of Theologia Crucis
Part 1 Reading a Theologia Crucis in the Early Martin Luther
Chapter 1: The Heidelberg Disputation (1518)
1. Theologus Crucis vs. Theologus Gloriae
2. Luther’s Pauline Theology in the Heidelberg Disputation
3. The Epistemological Reversal of the Cross in Relation to Justification
4. Creative Divine Love for Unlovable Sinners
5. Theologia Crucis and Contemporary Suffering: A Constructive Development
6. Conclusion
Chapter 2: A Meditation on Christ’s Passion / A Sermon on Preparing to Die (1519)
1. A Meditation on Christ’s Passion
2. A Sermon on Preparing to Die
3. Connecting a Theologia Crucis with the Theme of Promise in Word and Sacraments: A Constructive Development
4. Conclusion
Chapter 3: Freedom of a Christian (1520)
1. Free Lord and Bound Servant: The Relationship Between Faith and Love
2. The Happy Exchange as Theologia Crucis in the Tradition of Bridal Mysticism
3. Luther’s Freedom of a Christian in View of Systemic Sin: A Constructive Development
4. Conclusion
Chapter 4: On Bound Choice (1525)
1. Jesus Christ as the Center of the Scriptures and Questions of Predestination
2. The Preached God in Contrast to God in God’s Majesty
3. On Bound Choice in Relation to Seelsorge in “Radical Lutheranism”
4. God’s Second Form of Hiddenness and the Eschatological lumen gloriae: A Constructive Development
5. Conclusion
Part 2 Reading a Theologia Crucis in Twentieth-Century Theologians
Chapter 5: Karl Barth’s Trinitarian Erwählungslehre
1. Election as the Triune God’s Free Decision
2. God’s Nature as Goodness in Relation to Election
3. The Yes and No in Barth’s Erwählungslehre as a Transformation of Thesis 28 of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation
4. Exploring a Theologia Crucis in the Early Luther as Seelsorge in Relation to a Transformed Happy Exchange through Barth’s Erwählungslehre
5. Questions Needing Answering about Predestination
6. “Ich lehre sie nicht, aber auch nicht nicht”: Barth’s Erwählungslehre and the Question of Universal Salvation through Jesus Christ: A Constructive Development
7. Conclusion
Chapter 6: Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Later Theology
1. Assessing Stellvertretung in Bonhoeffer’s Later Theology as a Transformed Happy Exchange through the Work of Reggie L. Williams
2. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in Bonhoeffer’s Lectures on Christology
3. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship
4. Christological Critique of the Two Kingdoms Doctrine in Bonhoeffer’s Ethics
5. Bonhoeffer’s Critique of Karl Barth and a Non-Religious Theologia Crucis
6. Turning a Theologia Crucis Toward the Suffering of God in the World through Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s July 18, 1944 Letter to Eberhard Bethge: A Constructive Development
7. Comparing Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth
8. Conclusion
Chapter 7: Jürgen Moltmann’s Trinitarian Eschatologia Crucis
1. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in Moltmann’s Autobiography
2. Moltmann’s Radicalization of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation
3. A Radicalized Happy Exchange and the Suffering Trinity on Golgotha
4. Moltmann’s Understanding of Sin in Relation to a Radicalized Theologia Crucis
5. Theology of Hope and the Resurrection of the Crucified Christ
6. The Unfinished Reformation for Victims and Perpetrators of Injustice
7. Jürgen Moltmann’s Universalist Eschatology as Hope in God’s Trinitarian Future for Victims and Perpetrators of Injustice: A Constructive Development
8. Comparing Jürgen Moltmann and Karl Barth
9. Conclusion
Part 3 Reading a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation
Chapter 8: A Transfigured Theologia Crucis in James Cone
1. Rationale for This Study’s Approach to James Cone
2. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Dialectical Incorporation of Black Theology and the Black Power Movement
3. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Theological Hermeneutics
4. James Cone’s Hermeneutics as a Transfiguration of Martin Luther
5. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Dialectical Incorporation of the Cross and the Lynching Tree
6. Conclusion
General Conclusion
1. Summarizing the Present Study’s Arguments
2. Limitations of the Present Study and Suggestions for Future Research
Bibliography
Index of Authors
Index of Subjects

Citation preview

Dogmatik in der Moderne Edited by

Christian Danz, Jörg Dierken, Hans-Peter Großhans, and Friederike Nüssel

48

Brach S. Jennings

Transfiguring a Theologia Crucis through James Cone

Mohr Siebeck

BRACH S. JENNINGS, born 1988; 2011 B.A. Music, B.A. History, Bradley University, Peoria, IL; 2015 M.Div., Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary, Berkeley, CA; 2017 M.Th. Systematic Theology, Luther Seminary, St. Paul, MN; 2019 Th.M., Systematic Theology, The Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago; 2022 Dr. theol., Systematic Theology, Eberhard Karls Universität, Tübingen; Vicar in the United Protestant Church in Baden.

The publication was supported by the Eric W. Gritsch Memorial Fund, the United Protestant Church in Baden, and the United Evangelical Lutheran Church in Germany (VELKD). ISBN 978-3-16-162360-8 / eISBN 978-3-16-162758-3 DOI 10.1628/978-3-16-162758-3 ISSN 1869-3962 / eISSN 2569-3913 (Dogmatik in der Moderne) The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliographie; detailed bibliographic data are available at https://dnb.de. © 2023 Mohr Siebeck Tübingen, Germany. www.mohrsiebeck.com This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, in any form (beyond that permitted by copyright law) without the publisher’s written permission. This applies particularly to reproductions, translations and storage and processing in electronic systems. The book was typeset by Martin Fischer in Tübingen using Minion typeface. It was printed on non-aging paper and bound by Laupp & Göbel in Gomaringen. Printed in Germany.

for Dr. Carol Ruth Jacobson (December 19, 1956–July 17, 2021) beloved teacher and mentor

Foreword by Reggie L. Williams In the over century and a half since Harriet Tubman described feeling propelled by her faith to return multiple times to Southern United States to lead over three hundred enslaved Black people from bondage to freedom, scholars have taken up the task of making sense of her faith tradition. When one looks at this tradition, one is not simply examining the faith of Christians who happen to be black, but of the faith of a people who had an embodied theological epistemology that challenged white supremacy in all its forms. Though Harriet Tubman is rarely named explicitly, the tradition to which she belonged has been the subject of scholarly inquiry through the disciplines of Black Church studies, Black Liberation theology, Black Social Gospel studies, or more commonly, Black theology. Such is the case with this study by Dr. Brach S. Jennings, which proposes a contemporary theologia crucis through the founder of Black Liberation theology, James H. Cone. The tradition of the Christian faith that is invoked in this study through referencing Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s encounter with the black Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem and culminating in James H. Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, explores a theologia crucis as a theological epistemology to challenge global white supremacy, and to thus propose a new hermeneutic at the intersection of academy, society, and church, in a tradition going back to Harriet Tubman. When it is done well, an interaction with black theology opens researcher and reader alike to an embodied epistemology that critiques the sacred/secular split that is so often seen in theologies related to the so-called Lutheran “Two Kingdoms” doctrine. As Jennings’s study argues, then, the soteriological claims of Christ encompass all areas of life because they must do so if Christ is risen to the glory of God the Creator in the all-encompassing power of the Holy Spirit. The healing work of the Gospel must then become embodied in this world where sin is social, political, and structural, in addition to giving hope for the world to come. Otherwise, the Gospel is merely a soporific aid for evil principalities and powers of this present darkness. There is no middle ground. Jennings’s study further addresses how the black church tradition that Bonhoeffer met in New York, and that reared James Cone in Bearden, Arkansas, connected Jesus Christ to the concrete personal and political suffering of black bodies. Not as a celebration of suffering, but in recognition that Christ was crucified in a way analogous to those who know oppression in a society structured

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by white supremacy. Therefore, while James Cone did not claim to have a seamless connection to the Protestant Reformation as a study on the theologia crucis might imply, Jennings carefully and critically explores how a theologia crucis can be transfigured through Cone’s theology, by beginning in Martin Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation, transforming the theme through Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre in 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics, further developing and critiquing Barth’s Erwählungslehre through Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s later theology and Jürgen Moltmann’s Crucified God, and concluding by reading James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis. Throughout the project, Jennings explores the thematic transformation and transfiguration of a theologia crucis as it takes shape in relationship to different twentieth-century theologies, and how hermeneutics and material dogmatics relate to an embodied, cruciform epistemology in a transfigured theologia crucis through Cone. Jennings thus shows how a contemporary, transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation is a scholarly argument for addressing God’s relationship to oppressed humanity worldwide, and the community of the body of Christ that is responsible for sharing the gospel with a hurting world, the Church. Luther’s distinction between the theologus crucis and theologus gloriae in the Heidelberg Disputation makes clear the kind of theological project that he thought meaningful for the proper knowledge of God in relation to the question of predestination. One was to look no further than the wounds of the crucified Christ to know experientially that one was justified in the sight of a gracious God. Jennings’s constructive transformation of a mystical theologia crucis from the early Martin Luther through Karl Barth, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Jürgen Moltmann, which then culminates in a constructive transfiguration through James Cone, shows how a theologia crucis morphs from the question of individual sin and guilt in the early Luther into political advocacy for and solidarity with the oppressed as the hermeneutical ground for a theologia crucis today through Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. Therefore, the notion of recognizing the hidden things of God through suffering and shame in Luther’s theologia crucis indebted to late medieval passion mysticism is “transfigured” through Cone to a moral imperative for Christians in the world. Bonhoeffer’s concept of Stellvertretung (vicarious representative action) is where this moral imperative begins to be found in this study, and where we see a concrete connection to Cone’s ethical and political concerns. This is also why Cone refers to Bonhoeffer often throughout his theology, culminating in The Cross and the Lynching Tree. Jennings’s study thus helps us to see how Reformation theology beginning with Martin Luther is transfigured by Cone’s black theological emphasis on embodied encounter as the departure point for determining moral faithfulness to the Triune God today. Jennings shows how Cone argues for an ethical interweaving of faith and politics by reference to what I call the “nefarious incongruity” of Christianity’s central symbol, the cross. Christ’s sacrificial death be-

Foreword by Reggie L. Williams

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came identified with the crucifixion of the negro, as illustrated by the burning cross of the Ku Klux Klan, or the Christian efforts to manufacture and maintain whites-only spaces. Not unlike the German efforts to secure Lebensraum, the Christian moral efforts to secure exclusively white Christian spaces include the practice of scapegoating the social and political “bio-contaminates,” black bodies. Practically, it meant that the actual symbol of white racist Christianity was not the savior Jesus on a cross for the sins of the world, but black people themselves on crosses, in ropes, and incarcerated, to secure idyllic white spaces free from the “sin” of racial bio-contamination. This history shows the need to recognize Christ in the suffering of those placed in harm’s way by oppressive political regimes. If God was with Christ on the cross, then God was and is with black people who suffer oppression and injustice from global white supremacy. The goal here, then, is not simply to acknowledge the suffering of God in the world, but to act in opposition to it. Thus, Christians are called to intervene for the oppressed. As Jesus says, “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me” (Matt. 25: 35–36, NRSV ). To engage the black Christian tradition represented by the theology of James Cone is to enter a space where the meaning of Bonhoeffer’s “Life Together” is derived from the practice of embodied reasoning about God and life today. Therefore, the starting point for theological knowledge is embodied human life with the Triune God and one another, in opposition to every injustice and oppression. This is where we must locate the research that Dr. Brach S. Jennings offers to us in Transfiguring a Theologia Crucis through James Cone. Reggie L. Williams, Ph.D. Professor of Christian Ethics McCormick Theological Seminary Chicago, Illinois USA

Preface “If you want to be a systematic theologian like myself and others, you better be reading Barth and Tillich and Bultmann!” His voice sounded just as I imagined it would from reading his theology for three years at that time, but that did not make his tone any less intense. I had just asked James Cone what he thought of me doing additional master’s level work in English literature on Stephen King before proceeding to a doctorate in systematic theology. After admonishing me to read the authors that are arguably Cone’s “big three” of twentieth-century dialectical theology, he told of his own love of literature, particularly Joyce Carol Oates and James Baldwin. But literature (Stephen King or otherwise) was not work I was to do at that moment; according to him, I was to be a systematic theologian and “stay on the path.” We then proceeded to the topic of Martin Luther. “Lutherans domesticate Luther! I read a lot of Luther in graduate school because of my teacher Philip Watson! Luther was so radical they wanted to kill him!” Cone’s admonishments in October 2016 set me on my way to working on a contemporary theologia crucis for the twenty-first century. They also compelled me, a white, Queer Lutheran, to avoid domesticating the radical potential of a Lutheran theologia crucis. My first published journal article was a constructive theologia crucis from Tillich, and my second a constructive theologia crucis from Bultmann’s demythologizing essay. This left only Barth untouched from Cone’s “big three,” a rather large gap which the present study attempts to address by exploring Barth’s Erwählungslehre in 2.2 from the Church Dogmatics as a transformation of a theologia crucis in texts from the early Luther on the way to a transfigured theologia crucis in Cone. My engagement with Barth in the present study is thus indebted to Cone for setting me on the way to a contemporary theologia crucis through Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, which has hopefully come to fruition in the present study.

Acknowledgements This study is a revised version of my doctoral dissertation in systematic theology, accepted by the Protestant Theology Faculty of the University of Tübingen in Summer 2022. I am grateful to Professor Dr. Christian Danz, Professor Dr. Jörg Dierken, Professor Dr. Hans-Peter Großhans, and Professor Dr. Friederike Nüssel for including my study in the Dogmatik in der Moderne series from Mohr Siebeck Publishers in Tübingen. Thanks also to my editor Tobias Stäbler, and to Dr. Katharina Gutekunst, who first considered this project for publication with Mohr Siebeck. This study could not have been written without the encouragement, guidance, and challenge of many people who supported me along the various stages of research and writing. Deep appreciation first goes to my doctoral advisors Professor Dr. Jürgen Moltmann, Professor Dr. Volker Leppin, and Professor Dr. Linda E. Thomas. I never dreamed I would write a doctoral dissertation under Jürgen Moltmann, and the experience of doing so is the honor of my life. He showed me not only the theological and pastoral riches of Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre, but also how to live the sapiential theologia crucis I have written about in this study. When I found myself struggling from the demands of doctoral research as well as life’s trials and tribulations in Spring 2021, Professor Moltmann pointed me to the resurrection of the crucified Christ. I then experienced a theology of hope rooted in a sapiential theologia crucis for the first time. Nearly every month during my doctoral studies, Professor Moltmann would also give me “just for fun” theological reading, which nourished me in both mind and spirit. Finally, due to Professor Moltmann’s influence, I have seen my theology expand toward an ecumenical Christian theology, while still being broadly situated within the Lutheranism I treasure. Ranging from debates early in the morning to late at night, Volker Leppin was my constant intellectual sparring partner and companion on the journey of writing this study. He never ceased giving me recommendations for excellent historical, theological, and philosophical literature that broadened my intellectual horizons beyond what is written in this study, and he led me to an appreciation for Wolfhart Pannenberg. This is in addition to the many resources he introduced me to for an historically sensitive constructive theological investigation and interpretation of Martin Luther’s theologia crucis. While we do not share an interest in Karl Barth, it is due to our many debates and exchanges over

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the last four years that I have written this study as a constructive contribution to fundamental theology. Finally, Professor Leppin is responsible for officially leading me to the United Protestant Church in Baden, which has given me a pastoral future in Germany. This is his greatest gift to me. Linda E. Thomas began as my mentor at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, upon the death of my first doctoral advisor Vítor Westhelle. She introduced me to Womanist theology, the relationship between theology and anthropology, and deepened my appreciation for James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. Professor Thomas was not only a wonderful academic resource, but also a true mentor in that she taught me as much about life as about academic research during my studies. Our frequent conversations together about James Cone, the Womanist tradition, theological anthropology, and current events, all in spiritual connection with Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth, have sharpened my work to always attempt to be attuned to concrete human suffering and liberation. Professor Thomas’s influence thus helped give me the confidence to shape this study around James Cone. My three doctoral mentors formed a network of support around me to help me become the best systematic theologian and future pastor possible, and for this I am immensely grateful. They are, in my estimation, the best doctoral committee one could have wished for, and I hope this study shows the influence of all three of my trinity of advisors. Thanks also to Professor Dr. Oswald Bayer, who graciously served as a “method consultant,” when I was struggling with the question of how to read Luther responsibly from an overall constructive lens. Professor Bayer opened his Tübingen apartment to me just before the COVID-19 pandemic began for an evening discussing Luther’s theology, twentieth-century systematic theology, and the music of Johann Sebastian Bach over red wine and Swabian pretzels. We later connected again at the Lutherakademie in Sondershausen in Fall 2021, where I was privileged to hear him lecture about his understanding of promise in Luther’s theology. While I have gone my own way in this study, I hope Professor Bayer’s influence on my interpretation of Luther’s own theology is apparent, even where it is not stated explicitly. A special note of thanks goes to Professor Dr. Gesche Linde, who very graciously stepped in with only five days’ notice to examine me in systematic theology for the doctoral Rigororsum in July 2022, and who has encouraged me toward future scholarly work in systematic theology. Professor Dr. Guillermo Hansen, Professor Dr. Lois Malcolm, and Professor Dr. Patrick Keifert from Luther Seminary are also to be warmly acknowledged, as the ideas about Luther’s theologia crucis in relation to consolation and justiceseeking I first articulated in my Master of Theology oral thesis defense in April 2017 have finally come to fruition in the present study.

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Deep thanks and appreciation go to Professor Dr. Heinz-Dieter Neef. Professor Neef gifted me almost all of Jürgen Moltmann’s books in German, as well as dozens of texts dealing with dialectical theology from his personal library, both in December 2021 and February 2022. Professor Neef ’s generosity strengthened this study’s use of German sources and has given me intellectual and spiritual nourishment for my ongoing theological and pastoral work. Further appreciation goes to Professor Dr. Reggie Williams, who graciously sent me a copy of his book Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus, enabling me to write the chapter on Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Professor Williams is also to be thanked for honoring me with a Foreword to this study. Finally, warm thanks and appreciation goes to Barry Hopkins and the JKM Library in Chicago, for graciously finding secondary sources for me that were difficult to obtain in Tübingen. Financially this study would have been impossible without the support of several organizations, both in Germany and the United States. The ClaussenSimon-Stiftung in Hamburg, Germany awarded me the Dissertation Plus Scholarship for three years, which granted me the financial resources to pursue doctoral research full time. Special thanks to Dr. Lukas Hoffmann and Tim Hoff for believing in my project from its inception. Professor Dr. Volker Drecoll and the Evangelisches Stift in Tübingen welcomed me originally as an exchange student from the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, and then as a doctoral student in Tübingen, providing a place to live for my first 2.5 years in Tübingen, and an ecumenical scholarship for my first year as a Tübingen doctoral student. I also had the opportunity to teach the theologies of James Cone and Eberhard Jüngel to undergraduate and master’s level students in the Stift, which was a true joy. The Eric W. Gritsch Memorial Fund awarded me the Fellowship for Reformation Studies in 2019, which originally enabled me to come to Tübingen to study with Jürgen Moltmann. One semester abroad turned in to me transferring from the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago to the University of Tübingen to complete my doctorate, and toward integration into Germany long-term. Therefore, I am deeply grateful for the Gritsch Fund’s initial support of my work. Finally, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America awarded me two grants during my studies at LSTC, and then one in Tübingen, which also supported me. For the printing costs of this monograph, I am grateful for the support of the Eric W. Gritsch Memorial Fund, the United Protestant Church in Baden, and the United Evangelical Lutheran Church in Germany (VELKD). Several friends from Germany and the United States further supported me as I embraced the long and often lonely journey of bringing this study to life whilst simultaneously restarting my life in Germany. The many conversations, exchanges, and debates with these friends from both sides of the Atlantic will remain with me long-term as I continue in pastoral work and academic theology. Angela Baggarley taught me about the differences and similarities between Ger-

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man theology and US seminary theology, as well as German and US culture overall, both during our time together in the Evangelisches Stift, Tübingen and after. She became my “methodology midwife,” and I would not have made it through the writing of the Introduction of this study without her. We also became flat mates outside of the Evangelisches Stift, and I am glad to have again shared a space with her, including yet another “unmotivated wall,” as we called it. Paul Wellingerhof became my constant companion for adventures in Tübingen and in his hometown of Marburg, both for study sessions and late-night movie nights having as little to do with theology as possible (which can be difficult when one is friends with me). He does not study theology, and I think every theologian needs a best friend who lives and operates outside of theology circles. This outlet was much needed, and so appreciated. If I might have piqued his interest in what I consider to be the endlessly fascinating world of systematic theology, this would be a bonus. David Schmalzhaf, my first friend in Germany, was not only an intellectual debate partner about systematic theology and church history for multiple-hour sessions, but also someone to recharge from academia with through watching The X-Files together and discussing art, music, literature, and life. Johannes Wilhelm helped me to pass my Hebrew, Greek, and Latin exams through several weekly study sessions, and introduced me to Swabian culture and tasty homemade Swabian cuisine. Simon Gottowik helped make life in the Evangelisches Stift, Tübingen fun and memorable. Even though we have both moved on from the Stift, he remains one of the reasons I will always think fondly of that community. Theodor Sinner confronted me with a theology both similar to and far away from my own, thus helping to sharpen my arguments in the present study. In addition, I shared many fun times with him over beer and wine. My friend and sparring partner Josia Sturm is responsible for causing me to admit I do ultimately have some form of metaphysics around the existence of God and the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ, even as I have been critical toward metaphysics in the present study. Further “Stiftlers” who accompanied me during the research and writing of this study are Benjamin Waldmann, Kilian Schrenk, Marco Elischer, Jonathan Krauter, Lorenz Walch, Aaron Albrecht, Nils Kassing, Danilo Panteleit, Miram Wien, Leander Köpnick, and JanChristoph Schowalter. Through meals, discussions, walks, and taking part in social gatherings, these friends helped me further realize that even when I felt lonely as a foreigner in Germany, I was not alone. Finally, the members of Volker Leppin’s Church History Doctoral Colloquium are to be thanked for many late nights of fun debate, and encouragement of my work, especially Dr. Jonathan Reinert, Anja Bork, Alex Gripentrog, and Alex Heindel. On the other side of the Atlantic, Dr. David Congdon became my academic “big brother” by challenging me to express my ideas clearly and thoroughly, as well as introducing me to many new publications about dialectical theology. I

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have learned so much from him and have found future directions for my theological work thanks to his gracious engagement with me. Stephen Morrison and I share many common intellectual and personal interests, and our conversations since Spring 2021 have been some of the richest theological exchanges I have had throughout my studies with a peer. He is a dedicated laborer in Karl Barth’s theology, and I am grateful for his companionship as I, too, labored in this theological world for this study. Ole Schenk and I conversed by Zoom almost weekly once the pandemic hit. His theological insights about Lutheranism, and particularly the theology of Vítor Westhelle, have been invaluable to my work, especially related to hermeneutics. I am grateful our friendship from the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago has continued long-term. River Cook Needham is a dear friend from LSTC, and she has been a continuous source of support since I came to LSTC in 2017. Our frequent, and now trans-Atlantic, conversations have been a source of delight on the good days, as well as consolation during the hard times involved with emigrating to a new country. Dr. Jeffrey Meyers is another friend from LSTC who came along with me virtually to Tübingen, and challenged me to relate my intellectual observations to the life of a teacher. Further, he graciously corrected several typographical errors in parts 2 and 3 of this study for me. Tracy Bradley and Dan and Amelia Collins are all to be thanked for their care of my two cats when it became clear I was not returning to the US, as well as for finding the cats new homes. These were not easy responsibilities to take on, and I am grateful to them for their willingness to see this through on my behalf. Dr. Christine Wenderoth, Dr. Tom Haverly, and Dr. Kadi Billman are also to be thanked for initial cat care at LSTC during my first semester as an LSTC exchange student in Tübingen. My now 16.5-years-and-counting conversation with Dr. Phil Jones continues to enrich me, even as it has become less frequent due to my relocation. From my first history professor in college at Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois, to now long-term mentor and friend, I remain deeply shaped by Phil, both academically and personally. Ryan Jerome is a friend from my Luther Seminary days who continues to enrich my life from afar by keeping me up to date with parish life in the US and engaging in a theological exchange that has now been going for over seven years. Peter Clark has also been a good friend since my time in St. Paul, Minnesota, and I am grateful for our continued discussions that have broadened beyond systematic theology. Returning to this side of the Atlantic, I was pleased to meet Thorben Hennig at Jürgen Moltmann’s 95th birthday symposium in October 2021, and we enjoyed several late-night conversations together over Zoom as I was finishing this study. Finally, Beate Fülle and I enjoyed many walks in the Tübingen hills, and many laughs, from Christmas 2021 until the end of my doctoral studies. She reminded me that I had a future beyond university, and was thus a source of encouragement on the days when I thought this study would not see an end.

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Perhaps no doctoral study would be complete without a significant setback, and mine came near the end of writing my doctoral dissertation in January 2022 when I accidentally spilled water on my laptop and short-circuited it. The generosity of the following people enabled me to buy a refurbished computer in excellent condition and to finish writing: Pamela Johnson Davis, Cora Rose, Stephen Morrison, Lisa Goodenough, Peter Clark, Dr. David Balch, Eric Clarkson, Phil and Donna Jones, Thorben Hennig, Christine Wenderoth, Morgan Gates, Gabriel Nicolae, Paul Wellingerhof, Beate Fülle, and Bonnie Ring. Thanks to Pastor Christina Jeremias-Hofias for providing opportunities to preach at the Dietrich Bonhoeffer Kirche in Tübingen, and for being a pastoral elder to converse with about pastoral work in Germany. Thanks also to Pastor Prof. Dr. Sibylle Rolf from the United Protestant Church in Baden, for welcoming me to the Baden Church, and being a source of encouragement along the way to beginning a Vikariat in Baden. Finally, thanks to Pastor Hans Gölz-Eisinger, who has gone the extra mile as my Lehrpfarrer to welcome me as a Lehrvikar in Pforzheim, not least through contextualizing the systematic theology we both love into wider German history and culture. Our frequent philosophizing together about God and the world has been a truly rich experience for me, as I begin to translate the research undertaken in this study for pastoral ministry. Lastly, special acknowledgement goes to Rev. Dr. Bonnie Ring, who has accompanied me spiritually and psychologically for 11 years, beginning during my Master of Divinity studies, and continuing throughout the doctorate. Bonnie has seen me through some of the best and worst times since March 2012 and has been the face of Jesus to me through it all. This study is dedicated, in loving memory, to my teacher and mentor, Dr. Carol Ruth Jacobson (1956–2021). Carol served as my advisor at Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary in Berkeley, California for my Master of Divinity degree, was the person who first introduced me to Jürgen Moltmann’s theology in Spring 2013, and was a tireless advocate for me to pursue a doctorate in systematic theology. She died tragically on July 17, 2021, just after her retirement from PLTS from an intense and short battle with stage 4 ovarian cancer. While I am deeply saddened Carol cannot read the results of this study, I am comforted by the hope that she has been resurrected into eternal life with Jesus Christ. I trust I shall see her again one day in the New Creation when the Lord Jesus will wipe away every tear from the eyes of all who grieve the loss of their loved ones (Cf. Rev. 21:4). Pforzheim, 13 May 2023

Brach S. Jennings

Table of Contents Foreword by Reggie L. Williams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . VII Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . XI Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . XIII List of Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . XXIII

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

1

1. Methodology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 2. Hermeneutics for the Theme of Theologia Crucis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 2.1 Interpreting Martin Luther for a Contemporary Transfigured Theologia Crucis through James Cone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 2.2 Finding Traces of Martin Luther’s Theology in a Contemporary Transfigured Theologia Crucis through James Cone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 3. Outline of the Study, and Primary Sources Selected for Close Reading . . 11 4. Literature Review of Theologia Crucis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

Part 1

Reading a Theologia Crucis in the Early Martin Luther Chapter 1: The Heidelberg Disputation (1518) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 1. Theologus Crucis vs. Theologus Gloriae . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2. Luther’s Pauline Theology in the Heidelberg Disputation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3. The Epistemological Reversal of the Cross in Relation to Justification . . . 4. Creative Divine Love for Unlovable Sinners . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5. Theologia Crucis and Contemporary Suffering: A Constructive Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

27 29 32 37 38 41

Chapter 2: A Meditation on Christ’s Passion / A Sermon on Preparing to Die (1519) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 1. A Meditation on Christ’s Passion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 2. A Sermon on Preparing to Die . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

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3. Connecting a Theologia Crucis with the Theme of Promise in Word and Sacraments: A Constructive Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 4. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Chapter 3: Freedom of a Christian (1520) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 1. Free Lord and Bound Servant: The Relationship Between Faith and Love . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2. The Happy Exchange as Theologia Crucis in the Tradition of Bridal Mysticism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3. Luther’s Freedom of a Christian in View of Systemic Sin: A Constructive Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

66 70 73 77

Chapter 4: On Bound Choice (1525) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81 1. Jesus Christ as the Center of the Scriptures and Questions of Predestination . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2. The Preached God in Contrast to God in God’s Majesty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3. On Bound Choice in Relation to Seelsorge in “Radical Lutheranism” . . . . 4. God’s Second Form of Hiddenness and the Eschatological lumen gloriae: A Constructive Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

81 84 87 94 98

Part 2

Reading a Theologia Crucis in Twentieth-Century Theologians Chapter 5: Karl Barth’s Trinitarian Erwählungslehre . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105 1. Election as the Triune God’s Free Decision . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107 2. God’s Nature as Goodness in Relation to Election . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111 3. The Yes and No in Barth’s Erwählungslehre as a Transformation of Thesis 28 of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114 4. Exploring a Theologia Crucis in the Early Luther as Seelsorge in Relation to a Transformed Happy Exchange through Barth’s Erwählungslehre . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 5. Questions Needing Answering about Predestination . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122 6. “Ich lehre sie nicht, aber auch nicht nicht”: Barth’s Erwählungslehre and the Question of Universal Salvation through Jesus Christ: A Constructive Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127 7. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130

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Chapter 6: Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Later Theology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133 1. Assessing Stellvertretung in Bonhoeffer’s Later Theology as a Transformed Happy Exchange through the Work of Reggie L. Williams 134 2. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in Bonhoeffer’s Lectures on Christology . . . . 140 3. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146 4. Christological Critique of the Two Kingdoms Doctrine in Bonhoeffer’s Ethics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150 5. Bonhoeffer’s Critique of Karl Barth and a Non-Religious Theologia Crucis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 6. Turning a Theologia Crucis Toward the Suffering of God in the World through Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s July 18, 1944 Letter to Eberhard Bethge: A Constructive Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157 7. Comparing Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161 8. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165

Chapter 7: Jürgen Moltmann’s Trinitarian Eschatologia Crucis . . . . . . 167 1. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in Moltmann’s Autobiography . . . . . . . . . . . . 169 2. Moltmann’s Radicalization of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation . . . . . . . . . . 172 3. A Radicalized Happy Exchange and the Suffering Trinity on Golgotha . . 175 4. Moltmann’s Understanding of Sin in Relation to a Radicalized Theologia Crucis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180 5. Theology of Hope and the Resurrection of the Crucified Christ . . . . . . . . . 182 6. The Unfinished Reformation for Victims and Perpetrators of Injustice . . 188 7. Jürgen Moltmann’s Universalist Eschatology as Hope in God’s Trinitarian Future for Victims and Perpetrators of Injustice: A Constructive Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191 8. Comparing Jürgen Moltmann and Karl Barth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195 9. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198

Part 3

Reading a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation Chapter 8: A Transfigured Theologia Crucis in James Cone . . . . . . . . . 203 1. Rationale for This Study’s Approach to James Cone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204 2. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Dialectical Incorporation of Black Theology and the Black Power Movement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205 3. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Theological Hermeneutics 220 4. James Cone’s Hermeneutics as a Transfiguration of Martin Luther . . . . . . 236

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5. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Dialectical Incorporation of the Cross and the Lynching Tree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245 6. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258

General Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261 1. Summarizing the Present Study’s Arguments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261 2. Limitations of the Present Study and Suggestions for Future Research . . . 266

Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269 Index of Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281 Index of Subjects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283

List of Abbreviations CD KD DBW DBWE CG GG LW WA NRSV

Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics Karl Barth, Kirchliche Dogmatik Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works, English Edition Jürgen Moltmann, The Crucified God Jürgen Moltmann, Der Gekreuzigte Gott Martin Luther’s Works, American Edition D. Martin Luthers Werke, Weimarer Ausgabe New Revised Standard Version of the Bible

Introduction 1. Methodology Research Question This study is a constructive investigation of the theme of theologia crucis, and attempts to answer the following research question: “how is the theme of theologia crucis in the early Martin Luther transfigured through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation?”1 This question is posed for reading a theologia crucis in texts originating from the early Luther as transformed through selected twentieth-century theologians (Karl Barth, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Jürgen Moltmann), in order to propose a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation.2 1

Selected texts from Luther will be examined with an emphasis on Luther’s pastoral application of the theme of theologia crucis. To ensure a manageable amount of material, the phrase “the early Martin Luther” is used principally to denote the years from the Heidelberg Disputation of 1518 to Freedom of a Christian in 1520, with the study additionally examining On Bound Choice of 1525 in relation to themes from the earlier texts. 2 The term “transformation” is used here to signify a change in the theme of theologia crucis through Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre, which is then developed and critiqued further through Bonhoeffer’s and Moltmann’s theologies. The term “transfiguration” is used to signify how a theologia crucis is further re-shaped by James Cone’s theology from a transformed theologia crucis through Barth, Bonhoeffer, and Moltmann. By exploring the transformation of a theologia crucis through Barth’s Erwählungslehre, the developments and critiques of Barth through Bonhoeffer and Moltmann, and Cone’s theology as a transfigured theologia crucis, the study explores where “traces” (see below, n. 6) of the theme of theologia crucis beginning with Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation can be found in the arguments for a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through Cone. The term “transformation” is indebted to Volker Leppin’s historical thesis about the relationship between the Middle Ages and the Reformation and is adapted for the present study. See Volker Leppin, Transformationen: Studien zu den Wandlungsprozessen in Theologie und Frömmigkeit zwischen Spätmittelalter und Reformation (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020), and Volker Leppin and Stefan Michels, eds., Reformation als Transformation? Interdisziplinäre Zugänge zum Transformationsparadigma als historiographischer Beschreibungskategorie (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2022). The term “transfiguration” is indebted to Vítor Westhelle and is explained below in the section addressing hermeneutics for the theme of theologia crucis. Finally, the term “constructive theology” and related synonyms is used throughout this study to denote an approach to fundamental theology at the intersection of hermeneutics, material dogmatics, historical theology, and ethics that is concerned with the contemporary construction and development of a theological theme.

2

Introduction

Method This study examines a chosen theme from within selected texts and authors to explore the chosen theme’s possible contemporary ethical and political relevance. The theorists drawn from for this study’s method are Roland Barthes, Jacques Derrida, and Linda Tuhiwai Smith, and all relate to deconstruction in literary studies.3 The present study has sought to remain broadly related to deconstruction for a method of textual analysis rather than only drawing from Jacques Derrida, in order that all three theorists named above can be incorporated for this study’s application of deconstruction. The present study applies textual deconstruction through a method of close reading to examine where the chosen theme being investigated for the present study can be found in primary texts, as well as how a text might be interpreted in ways different than an original author intended. Said close reading as a basis for textual interpretations that might be different from an author’s original intention corresponds to Roland Barthes’ work about texts and authors.4 Secondary sources are then drawn from to show how others have critically read and understood a primary text for insights both congruent to and different from the original author, with the realization that absolute authorial intent is elusive.5 This admission corresponds to Jacques Derrida’s concept of the “trace” in relation to the “erasure of concepts” in Of Grammatology. What I call the erasure of concepts ought to mark the places of that future mediation. For example, the value of the transcendental arche [archie] must make its necessity felt before letting itself be erased. The concept of arche-trace must comply with both that necessity and that erasure. It is in fact contradictory and not acceptable within the logic of identity. The trace is not only the disappearance of origin – within the discourse that we sustain and according to the path we follow it means that the origin did not even disappear, that it was never constituted except reciprocally by a nonorigin, the trace, which thus becomes the origin of the origin.6

Related to Derrida’s notion of the “trace,” written texts are emphasized in the present study, understanding an author’s intention for a text as one among numerous possible textual readings, per Derrida’s argument of “there is no outside text.”7 The arguments presented here are based on a close reading of primary 3 The overview of literary theory consulted for the present study is K. M. Martin, ed., Twentieth Century Literary Theory: A Reader, 2nd ed. (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997). 4 Roland Barthes, “The Death of the Author,” in Image, Music, Text, trans. Stephen Heath (New York: Hill & Yang, 1977), 142–48. 5 As well as Barthes, this understanding relates to Jacques Derrida’s notion of textual deconstruction. See Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology, trans. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1976). 6 Ibid., 61. 7 This phrase is also translated into English from French as “there is nothing outside of the text.” Ibid., 158.

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3

texts and a synthesis of secondary sources in order to propose how said primary texts might be understood in relation to the present study’s chosen theme, and how the chosen theme can then be interpreted for contemporary ethical and political concerns from a close reading of primary texts and synthesis of secondary sources. Derrida’s phrase “there is no outside text” is further incorporated here to explore how authors and contexts might contribute to textual analysis, in order to attempt to avoid arbitrary textual and thematic interpretations. These considerations then help show on the whole how textual authors’ intentions might correspond to or differ from an argument exploring contemporary ethical and political concerns, and how a thematic argument based on a close reading of written texts might be supported and/or challenged by various contexts. Finally, the research pursued in the present study explores how language (in this case, language surrounding a particular theme) functions in an imaginative and liberating capacity for marginalized persons in the struggle for justice. Linda Tuhiwai Smith articulates the importance of imaginative language in relation to critical research: Although in the literary sense the imagination is crucial to writing, the use of language is not highly regarded in academic discourses which claim to be scientific. The concept of imagination, when employed as a sociological tool, is often reduced to a way of seeing and understanding the world, or a way of understanding how people either construct the world or are constructed by the world. As Toni Morrison argues, however, the imagination can be a way of sharing the world. This means, according to Morrison, struggling to find the language to do this and then struggling to interpret and perform within that shared imagination.8

Imaginative language is connected to the possibility of envisioning a better world for marginalized persons, meaning language can become liberating when connected to struggles for social justice at the margins of society.9 Therefore, the research in this study explores how language surrounding the study’s chosen theme might relate to struggles for justice by marginalized persons.

2. Hermeneutics for the Theme of Theologia Crucis This study proposes a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation for three interdependent theological publics: academy, society, and church. Therefore, this study closely reads theological8 Linda Tuhiwai Smith, Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples, 2nd ed. (London: Zed, 2012), 39. 9 “Imagining a different world, or reimagining the world, is a way into theorizing the reasons why the world we experience is unjust, and posing alternatives to such a world from within our own world views” (Ibid., 204).

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academic texts, examines the possible ethical and political relevance of the main theme for society, and attempts to be grounded in critically reflected theological language originating in the church, all the while having its primary public as the academy.10 To achieve this study’s purpose of proposing a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, then, an overall hermeneutic is necessary for interpreting the theme of theologia crucis as it relates to Luther and Cone, as well as the transformation of Luther’s theologia crucis through Karl Barth and the further development and critique of Barth through Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Jürgen Moltmann. Two theologians have been chosen as hermeneutical guides for interpreting the theme of theologia crucis: Vítor Westhelle (1952–2018) and Oswald Bayer (b. 1939). Westhelle is chosen for his notion of Luther as a figura, in which the early Luther’s theologia crucis beginning in the Heidelberg Disputation can be transfigured for the twenty-first century in contexts far removed from sixteenthcentury Germany. Bayer’s hermeneutical work on Luther is chosen to show how a study incorporating Westhelle’s transfiguring hermeneutic might contain “traces,” in the Derridean sense of this term, of Luther’s own theology. Through incorporating Bayer as an additional hermeneutical guide to Westhelle, the present study attempts to avoid arbitrary interpretations of the early Luther’s theology, as well as to be aware of continuities and differences with Luther’s own theologia crucis in Barth, Bonhoeffer, Moltmann, and Cone.11

2.1 Interpreting Martin Luther for a Contemporary Transfigured Theologia Crucis through James Cone The present study’s concern with proposing a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone relates hermeneutically to the theme of theologia crucis when Martin Luther is seen as a figura, an historical figure whose ideas transcend their original context and find new expression and validity in global contexts. Vítor Westhelle uses this concept (indebted to literary scholar Erich Auerbach as well as postcolonial studies) to enliven Luther’s theology in the 2016 book Transfiguring Luther: The Planetary Promise of Luther’s Theology. Related to seeing Luther as a figura, Westhelle writes, 10 The concept of “three interdependent publics” for theological reflection is indebted to and developed from Jürgen Moltmann and David Tracy. See Jürgen Moltmann, “Die Zukunft der Theologie,” in Jürgen Moltmann, Christliche Erneuerungen in schwierigen Zeiten (Munich: Claudius, 2019), 106–24, and David Tracy, The Analogical Imagination: Christian Theology and the Culture of Pluralism (New York: Crossroad, 1985), 3–46. 11 For an explanation of the concept “trace,” see n. 6 above. Bayer has been chosen as a hermeneutical guide for interpreting texts from the early Luther as an attempt to apply Derrida’s notion of “there is no outside text” for an overall awareness of authorial intent and historical contexts in ongoing textual interpretations of Luther’s theologia crucis. See n. 7 above and n. 19 below.

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Luther as figura, as a figure, is something to be understood apart from, or before other specialized doctrinal aspects may be scrutinized and discerned. At least it needs to be acknowledged as a dimension of Luther research that in-depth textual and historic-critical analysis often overlooks or simply ignores, having unexplained its enduring significance and recurring effects. The figurae have Wirkungsgeschichte; they work. The more immersed Luther studies become in the profundity of the thought of the Reformer, the more obscure and neglected becomes his figural significance. The call for a closer reading of the text may arrest the inquiring gaze into historical and philological frames of a picture whose “aura” – to use Walter Benjamin’s helpful notion – has long taken flight.12

Westhelle argues Luther’s ideas need to be re-thought and revived for the twentyfirst century, as Lutheranism migrates out of its traditional homes in the North Atlantic (the United States, Germany, and Scandinavia) to the Planetary South.13 Understanding Luther as a figura thus allows for a transfigured theologia crucis in the twenty-first century, in diverse contexts removed from sixteenth-century Germany. Transfiguration tells the history of how the past comes alive, is metamorphosed into the present contexts. The malady of the archive does precisely the opposite – dissolves the present into a dead past. In Luther, Paul and Augustine were indeed transfigured, but he did not repeat them; he took upon himself their mantle, but on his own skin, in his own context, in order to preach Christ for the people of his time …. Luther’s example, his figure can be emulated insofar as he preached the precious good news, the words of novelty, even when some of his teachings given to his ‘dear German people’ are not for us, even as the example is useful.14

A theologia crucis (through Luther’s incisive Christological hermeneutic, Was Christum treibet) becomes the center from which Luther becomes a figura for the twenty-first century in Westhelle’s interpretation.15 Thus, the present study incorporates Westhelle’s figura hermeneutic for proposing a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone beginning in the early Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation.16 A difference between historical theology and constructive systematic theology related to Luther now needs to be clarified. This study understands historical 12 Vítor Westhelle, Transfiguring Luther: The Planetary Promise of Luther’s Theology (Eugene: Cascade, 2016), 7. 13 Ibid., 96–97; 178; 181–95; 241; 294. 14 Ibid., 190. Italic in original. 15 See LW 35: 396; WA DB 7, 384: 25–28, and Westhelle, Transfiguring Luther, 111–23; 190; 318–19. 16 Westhelle elaborates his hermeneutical approach to Luther’s theology, writing: “Luther’s texts, each distinct, with its own hue and shape, are all in movement not synchronically but each at its own pace toward what for Luther was the core – the knowledge of Christ or justice of Christ. To this end I have nudged some of Luther’s texts in their movement, taking care not to change their hue or shape but translating them for our times, all the while acknowledging that I might have been a traitor in the process, which I cannot but be.” Westhelle, Transfiguring Luther, xi–xiii.

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theologians to place Luther within his own context, and to not be concerned outright with a contemporary re-interpretation of Luther’s theology. The question of original authorial intent is then a primary concern in this way of approaching Luther’s theology.17 The present constructive theological study reading Luther for a transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone, on the other hand, inquires primarily about the contemporary ongoing relevance of a theologia crucis. Here, textual interpretations that might be independent of original authorial intent and historical context are proposed and developed.18 Thus, a constructive transfiguration of the theme of theologia crucis in the present study will expand beyond strictly historical theological readings of Luther, although it will still draw from them for textual argumentation and understanding to explore how a theologia crucis originating in texts from him is transfigured by Cone. Overall, then, the present study’s constructive orientation allows the theme of theologia crucis beginning in the early Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation to be transformed through twentieth-century theologians, with the purpose of proposing a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation.

2.2 Finding Traces of Martin Luther’s Theology in a Contemporary Transfigured Theologia Crucis through James Cone Although this study proposes textual interpretations that expand beyond historical theology, the study still uses an additional hermeneutical framework for attempting to interpret what the chosen theme for research meant originally in specific (con)texts (in so far as that can be known) before exploring transformations and transfigurations of said theme. This framework helps show how contemporary readings of historical theological texts might contain elements of the original author’s understanding, even as the original author’s (con)texts are transformed and transfigured in the present constructive theological study.19 17 Of numerous possible examples that could be cited, Heiko Oberman’s watershed Luther biography is particularly noteworthy for insisting on Luther’s historical difference from contemporary theology, and that it is thus important to emphasize Luther’s foreignness to modernity. See Heiko A. Oberman, Luther: Mensch zwischen Gott und Teufel (Berlin: Severin und Siedler, 1981). The present study is indebted to what can be called the “Oberman school” of historical theological research on Martin Luther, even while expanding beyond this school for this study’s constructive purposes. Further, Bayer’s hermeneutical work on Luther relates to the Oberman school of Luther research, even as this revisionist school critiques Bayer’s historical arguments about Luther’s “Reformation breakthrough.” 18 Therefore, the present study incorporates Westhelle’s Transfiguring Luther as a hermeneutical guide for the theme of theologia crucis related to a method of textual deconstruction in literary studies. 19 This consideration does not mean the present author is directly attempting an historicalgenetic reconstruction of Luther’s theology and/or biography, but rather that he is engaging in

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Therefore, related to texts dealing with the theme of theologia crucis in Luther himself, Oswald Bayer’s book Theology the Lutheran Way is incorporated as an additional hermeneutic to complement and strengthen Westhelle’s figura hermeneutic, which is carried throughout the study in terms of being aware of what from Luther’s theology is being transformed through the twentieth-century theologians drawn from, and then how James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation can be read for a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis.20 Bayer is noteworthy in systematic studies of Luther for admitting outright Martin Luther’s foreignness to today’s world in relation to contemporary theological questions, and for considering Luther’s own monastic context in the sixteenth century before engaging in contemporary systematic interpretations of Luther’s theology. His work is thus a helpful supplement to Westhelle’s interpretation of Luther as a figura, for seeing where “traces” of Luther’s own theology can be found in a contemporary theologia crucis through James Cone that Westhelle’s hermeneutic transfigures. Bayer’s reading of Luther’s theological hermeneutics centers in what he sees as Luther’s understanding of theology as sapientia (“wisdom,” which includes scientia, or “science”), where, for Bayer, Luther’s sapiential theology urges something onto the contemporary situation.21 Bayer writes: a constructive exploration of a principal theological theme by closely reading primary sources. Arguments from secondary sources are then consulted and evaluated that emphasize Luther is not a contemporary and/or postmodern person, including sources emphasizing historical context(s). Additionally, secondary sources related to the history of doctrine and ethical and political matters pertinent to James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation are drawn from throughout the present study. The overall purpose of secondary sources in this study is to show how the present study’s constructive arguments might be supported and/or challenged by various contexts. These premises attempt to again relate to Derrida’s notion of the “trace,” and argument that “there is no outside text” (see nn. 6 and 7 above). Therefore, the present study explores “traces” of Luther’s own theologia crucis beginning in the Heidelberg Disputation (in so far as this can be known) in the twentieth-century theologians studied here, culminating in the work of James H. Cone. Cf. Jacques Derrida, “Structure, Sign, and Play in Human Sciences,” in Richard Macsey and Eugenio Donato, eds., The Languages of Criticism and The Sciences of Man: The Structuralist Controversy, 40th Anniversary Edition (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007), 247–65. 20 While the present study is indebted to Bayer’s book on Lutheran theological hermeneutics, it differs from Bayer overall in its assessment of a transformation of Martin Luther through Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre, and by addressing the question if the theologia crucis can be considered an important hermeneutical theme throughout Luther’s theology. See Oswald Bayer, Theologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1994)/ET: Oswald Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, ed. and trans. Jeffrey G. Silcock and Mark C. Mattes (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008). The English translation is cited in this Introduction, but the German original should be consulted as well for Bayer’s comparison of Luther’s hermeneutics with other Reformation-era theologians, and for his account of Luther’s theology in relation to selected twentieth-century systematic theologians. This rich comparative work was left out of the English translation. 21 In his later study of Luther’s own theology for today’s world, Bayer argues: “When we contemporize Luther with a systematic intention – namely, posing the question about what is true – we discover that he speaks to our contemporary situation at the same time; we might say that he imposes himself upon us. This does not happen primarily because of his forceful

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Wisdom does not exclude science but includes it. Wisdom takes account of the connection between science and the pre-scientific life-world. Wisdom is a path that unites theory and practice and grounds both in a third thing, an experiential life (vita experimentalis), understood in the sense of a receptive life (vita passiva). Since Aristotle, science operates with necessary principles (principia) and ultimately a single principle (pricipium). According to the Aristotelian taxonomy of science, rational theology or theologic is the highest science. This theologic science is embedded in the philosophical concept of God. Wisdom, on the other hand, has to do with experience, understood in a non-Aristotelian sense. But experience is incomplete, without being vague and indefinite (vage). If wisdom (sapientia) encompasses science, science cannot become an end in itself, it cannot turn itself into a religion or make absolute claims for itself, but it must take its bearings from the pre-scientific life-world and be informed by it.22

Luther, then, would not divide academic theology and experiential theology, but integrates both into his approach to being a theologian. Especially important for the Reformer are the “three rules” for the study of theology, which Bayer argues is the key to understanding Luther’s approach to theology. Luther’s ‘three rules’ for the correct way to study theology: prayer, meditation, and spiritual attack (oratio, meditatio, tentatio) best show us why he defines theology as ‘wisdom,’ or, more precisely, as ‘experiential wisdom.’ This definition also shows that in Luther’s thinking, liturgical ‘monastic’ theology and academic ‘scholastic’ theology are inextricably connected. The former, however, is constitutive, in that it provides the content of theology, while the latter is purely regulative in that it orders, analyzes, and reflects on its subject matter, making the necessary distinctions and connections.23

Bayer’s interpretation of Luther’s “three rules” for the study of theology provide a framework for interpreting the theme of theologia crucis originating in texts from the early Luther that Westhelle’s figura hermeneutic transfigures through Cone as a re-shaping of the transformed theologia crucis from Barth, Bonhoeffer, and Moltmann. Overall, then, the present study will explore how James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation transfigures Luther’s emphasis on theology as “experiential wisdom” for a contemporary sapiential theologia crucis. We will be especially concerned with Luther’s notion of Anfechtung (spiritual attack) in relation to the hidden God and a mystical theologia crucis. A summary of the “three rules” based on Bayer’s reading of the Preface to the Complete Wittenberg Edition of Luther’s German Writings (1539) now follows.24 personality, but because of what his theology urges upon us.” Oswald Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation, trans. Thomas H. Trapp (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008), xix–xx. Italic in original. 22 Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, 28. 23 Ibid., 32. The understanding of Christian theology as sapientia is an ancient tradition, with Augustine of Hippo giving it particular prominence in the Western church. See Benjamin T. Quinn, Christ, the Way: Augustine’s Theology of Wisdom (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Academic, 2022). 24 Cf. LW 34, 283–89; WA 50, 657–61. For the historical context of the “three rules,” see Volker Leppin, “Wie legt sich nach Luther die Schrift selbst aus? Luthers pneumatische Hermeneutik,”

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Oratio addresses what can be called the “epistemology” of the Bible’s wisdom in contrast to other texts. Bayer understands Luther to be arguing for a wisdom that cannot be found in other knowledge, based on the Reformer’s statements in 1539. “Firstly, you should know that Holy Scripture is such a book as to make the wisdom of all other books foolishness, because it is the only book that teaches about eternal life.”25 Here the Bible as Word of God shows divine Wisdom and goodness, in contradistinction to human sin and foolishness, and, in Bayer’s words “turns practical godlessness into faith where faith knows and believes from experience that God is the creator and I am his creature.”26 Said knowledge is the beginning of true knowledge of God and confidence in God’s goodness, demonstrated particularly, according to Bayer, in the materiality of the Lord’s Supper.27 Meditatio is a reading aloud of the Scriptures in a worship service or individually. The external Word is emphasized, even as the Holy Spirit indwells in the Christian who recites the Word.28 Bayer argues that, for Luther, a distinction between public and private, as well as religion and theology, as has occurred since the eighteenth century is not possible.29 Conversely, Luther’s insistence on meditation means “the Holy Spirit has bound himself to a specific form of language.”30 “The decisive thing about [Luther’s] understanding of the Holy Spirit is that it excludes pure outwardness just as much as an exclusive inwardness. For this reason, he opposes Rome as well as the fanatics.”31 However, “anyone who meditates can expect to suffer,” and thus the final rule for Luther’s understanding of the study of theology is Tentatio.32 Here is the heart in Stefan Alkier, ed., Sola Scriptura 1517–2017. Rekonstruktionen – Kritiken – Transformationen – Performanzen (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2019), 83–102. 25 LW 34: 285; WA 50, 659: 5–7. Cf. Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, 43. 26 Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, 44. 27 Ibid, 45–46. 28 Bayer describes Luther’s understanding of “meditation” as related to the external Word more fully in his study on Luther’s theology in relation to today’s world: “Luther uses the word ‘meditation’ in an uncommon way when he specifically refers to meditation on the external Word. He does not just hasten to use some chance brainstorm. Instead, he harkens back to an insight of the ancient church and to its practice, which has faded away more and more as time has passed, if it has not indeed been relegated to what has been forgotten all together. This involves the practice of reading and praying out loud and, what is still more important, that such activities are practiced with regard to Scripture, particularly that one would have an especial acquaintance with the Psalter.” Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology, 35. 29 “We miss the point of Luther’s understanding of theology as meditation if we buy into the modern distinction between ‘private’ and ‘public,’ which first arose in the eighteenth century, and its related distinction between religion and theology, and use that as an interpretative lens to set up an antithesis between ‘private reflection on Scripture’ and the ‘public sermon and doctrine that are bound to the words of the gospel.’” Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, 54. 30 Ibid., 58. 31 Ibid., 55. 32 Ibid., 60. The theme of tentatio in Bayer’s constructive development of Luther’s theology is explored in depth in Joshua C. Miller, Hanging by a Promise: The Hidden God in the Theology of Oswald Bayer (Eugene: Cascade, 2015), and John T. Pless, Roland Ziegler, and Joshua C. Miller,

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of theology as an apocalyptic battle between God and Satan, in Bayer’s reading of Luther’s theological hermeneutics. “Nothing is left untouched by the great apocalyptic battle that rages through time and, simultaneously, deep in the heart of every individual, for this battle is universal.”33 The Latin tentatio is written in German as Anfechtung, and it is the “touchstone of God’s word, which demonstrates its credibility and power in times of spiritual attack and the fight against it.”34 Anfechtung means theology is an experiential endeavor, where the Christian learns the Word of God through spiritual attack. From this Anfechtung, the Bible is then seen as “life-giving words that stimulate our senses and emotions, our memory and imagination, our heart and desires.”35 There is one final aspect of Bayer’s interpretation of Luther’s theology that is of importance here: “Catechetical systematics.”36 This notion is Bayer’s term for how Luther kept cloister, pulpit, and classroom together as an integrated whole. Luther’s foreignness to much of contemporary academic theology since the eighteenth-century now becomes apparent, since the latter often neither begins nor ends in the church directly, but instead reflects about the question of God in pluralistic contexts.37 Conversely, Luther took up the catechetical tradition of the medieval church’s spirituality and combined it with the liturgical spirituality of monasticism, based on meditation, and its emphasis on the affects (which include the emotions, the senses, the desires, and the imagination) to produce a thoroughly pastoral theology.38

Realizing Luther’s difference from and foreignness to much of contemporary academic theology helps to clarify similarities and differences from Luther’s own theology in the twentieth-century theologians being incorporated into the present study, so that the present study can propose a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis through James Cone for the three interdependent theological publics of academy, society, and church today.39 eds., Promising Faith for a Ruptured Age: An English-Speaking Appreciation of Oswald Bayer (Eugene: Pickwick, 2019). 33 Bayer then continues, “This same universality that characterizes Luther’s understanding of meditation is also the mark of the third rule. The battle affects not only pastors in their special office but also every Christian. In fact, from the standpoint of the theology of creation and the doctrine of sin, we can say it affects everyone.” Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, 61. 34 Ibid., 63. Bayer’s emphasis on Anfechtung as an apocalyptic struggle between God and Satan in Luther’s theology is what connects his hermeneutical work most fully to Oberman. See Oberman, Luther, 223–40. 35 Ibid. 36 Ibid., 67. 37 See again n. 27 above, as well as Ibid., 83–84; 139–42. For a pertinent understanding of the difference between the church and the university in the context of secularization, see Harvey Cox, The Secular City: Secularization and Urbanization in Theological Perspective (London: SCM, 1965), 217–37. 38 Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, 67. 39 The present study does not begin or end in the church directly, but does understand the

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3. Outline of the Study, and Primary Sources Selected for Close Reading Having described the study’s methodology and shown how Vítor Westhelle and Oswald Bayer are hermeneutical guides for the theme of theologia crucis originating in texts from the early Martin Luther, we are now ready to proceed to the outline of the present study and primary sources chosen for close reading. The various chapters use a method of close reading to examine selected sources for traces of the theme of theologia crucis. Additionally, preliminary constructive developments of the study’s theme from within the selected primary sources are proposed at the end of the chapters leading up to James Cone as the present study’s apex. The sources selected are intended to provide a representative sampling of texts wherein a sapiential theologia crucis might be found, in relation to the present study’s research question of how the theme of theologia crucis originating in texts from the early Martin Luther is transfigured through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. Part 1: Reading a Theologia Crucis in the Early Martin Luther Since the study is a constructive exploration of the theme of theologia crucis, it is logical to begin with Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation (1518). The Heidelberg Disputation has become the locus classicus for studies on Luther’s theologia crucis since the work of Walther von Loewenich (1903–1992).40 However, the present study will critically evaluate von Loewenich’s view of the theologia crucis as a theology of revelation through a close reading of the Heidelberg Disputation itself in relation to Luther’s incorporation and development of late medieval passion mysticism. We will explore if Luther understands the theologia crucis as God being revealed where God is most hidden on Golgotha, if this understanding instead is von Loewenich’s own reading indebted to twentieth-century “dialectical theology” being super-imposed onto the text, or if a close reading of the source shows von Loewenich is partly right (epistemology), yet still overly indebted to church as one of three interdependent theological publics, this public being the one in which language about a sapiential theologia crucis originates. Academic theology in its systematic-constructive form then critically analyzes this language, in order to attempt to test the truth claims of a sapiential theologia crucis. Finally, the possible relevance of a sapiential theologia crucis for society in relation to ethical and political questions can be explored. In this constellation, the “three interdependent publics” for a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis through James Cone would be ordered as church, academy, and society. However, since the present study has the academy as its primary public, the order of the three interdependent publics is placed as academy, society, and church. See again n. 10 above. 40 Walther von Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, trans. Herbert J. A. Bouman (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1976).

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dialectical theology. Having evaluated von Loewenich’s reading of the source material, the study will attempt to be anchored in the kernel of Luther’s understanding of a theologia crucis as articulated in the Heidelberg Disputation. This reading will set up the remaining constructive investigations of Luther’s theology, before proceeding to a transformed theologia crucis through Karl Barth, and its further development and critique through Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Jürgen Moltmann. When the examination of the Heidelberg Disputation is complete, the study will explore three pastoral texts of Luther’s for traces of the theme of theologia crucis in relation to specific practical issues: Meditation on Christ’s Passion and Sermon on Preparing to Die (1519), and Freedom of a Christian (1520).41 The first two texts are examined as a unit since they come from the same year. They have been chosen to show how the cross is comforting in relation to sin and death, and to explore the doctrine of election in relation to Christ’s wounds. Freedom of a Christian is chosen in the present study for a reading of the cross in relation to neighbor love (thus, what can be thought of as a reading of justification in relation to sanctification). We will be especially concerned with the connection of the theme of “free Lord and bound servant” to the cross, the mystical theme of the “happy exchange,” and with how Luther’s text can be considered to be overly oriented toward perpetrators of sin at the expense of systemic sin.42 The Luther portion of this study ends with On Bound Choice (1525). There are three issues that will be explored: 1) God clothed in God’s word (the Preached God) in relation to God in God’s own majesty apart from the Word (the Unpreached God) 2) If this text should be thought of as pastoral care (as advocated by “Radical Lutheran” theologian Steven D. Paulson) or if it is better thought of in the genre of polemic (the dominant view of Luther scholars) 3) Developments in Luther’s understanding of the hidden God in comparison with the Heidelberg Disputation. Overarching developments in the texts from 1518–1525 chosen for close reading will be noted, along with continuities. Finally, the examination of On Bound Choice will end with a proposal for an eschatological transformation of Luther’s notion of the lumen gloriae from the standpoint of a theologia crucis indebted to Karl Barth’s theology. A question to consider to conclude the study’s textual readings from Luther is the following: Does Luther abandon the theme 41 Exploring Luther’s possible pastoral application of a theologia crucis is the guiding concern for these texts, due to Luther’s pastoral commitments that shaped his theology. Timothy Wengert observes that Luther was, “first and foremost, pastor and preacher to his Wittenberg flock.” See Timothy J. Wengert, ed., The Pastoral Luther: Essays On Martin Luther’s Practical Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009), 2. Wengert’s observation connects to Bayer’s interpretation of Luther’s theology as “experiential wisdom.” See again n. 23 above. 42 The German edition of Freedom of a Christian will be used, in the present author’s own translation, as it directly contains the phrase “happy exchange,” which is implied but cannot be directly found in the Latin edition. Also, the German edition was the more popular text in Luther’s own day, and was intended to present Luther’s theology to the broader public.

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of theologia crucis after Heidelberg, or can it reasonably be argued from the sources selected for this study that the theologia crucis remains a theme in the background, even if Luther no longer names it explicitly? Proposing a reasonable answer to this question intends to show how a transformed theologia crucis in part 2 of the present study might contain traces of Luther’s theology originating in the Heidelberg Disputation. Part 2: Reading a Theologia Crucis in Twentieth-Century Theologians Having concluded the close reading of selected texts from the early Luther, the study will explore a transformed theologia crucis through three theologians from the twentieth century before proceeding to James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis. Karl Barth (1886–1968), Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–1945), and Jürgen Moltmann (b. 1926) are the theologians chosen for this task, as all three theologians drew from and referenced Luther, all three can be shown to have traces of a sapiential theologia crucis, and all three were important for Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. Barth’s Erwählungslehre will be read in relation to the theme of theologia crucis explored in Luther’s early theology in the first portion of the study, to examine how Luther’s notion of the “happy exchange” can be thought of in terms of God’s election of the cross and tomb in 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics. An overall transformation of Luther’s theology through CD 2.2 will be explored, as the theme of theologia crucis becomes, in and through Barth’s Erwählungslehre, a consoling Trinitarian doctrine of election. The study continues with Dietrich Bonhoeffer, to explore a transformed sapiential theologia crucis that addresses the intertwining between dogmatic theology and ethical-political concerns. Barth’s Erwählungslehre is not explicitly political, although it is ethical, and investigating the political impact of a theologia crucis is necessary for reading James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis. Bonhoeffer, then, is a fruitful next step in exploring the theme of theologia crucis constructively through Cone’s theology. The texts for close reading will primarily be drawn from Bonhoeffer’s later pastoral and ethical texts connected to his time as director of the illegal preacher’s seminary in Finkenwalde, as well as his prison writings with their stress on the world come of age related to the suffering of God in the world in solidarity with the victims of sin. The reading will begin with an investigation of Reggie L. Williams’s argument that Bonhoeffer’s time at Union Seminary in New York radicalized his theological thinking about the cross and discipleship in relation to Christ as Stellvertretung, particularly as Bonhoeffer encountered the black Abyssinian Baptist Church. Williams’s argument was under emphasized, if not

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overlooked entirely, in Michael P. DeJonge’s study of Bonhoeffer’s reception of Luther.43 This section ends with Jürgen Moltmann, to read Moltmann’s expansion of the doctrine of justification from Luther’s emphasis on guilty sinners to victims and perpetrators of systemic sin in relation to Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis. This task will be accomplished by exploring themes from The Crucified God and relating these themes to excerpts from Moltmann’s Theology of Hope, his later Systematic Contributions to Theology, his 2006 autobiography, and selected theological essays for traces of a transformed and radicalized sapiential theologia crucis throughout Moltmann’s theology as the center of a Trinitarian eschatology of hope. Since Moltmann developed Barth and Bonhoeffer, radicalized Luther, and maintained a multi-decade friendship and mutual collegial exchange with James Cone, an exploration of his work is a logical conclusion to the study’s reading of selected twentieth-century theologians on the way to James Cone.44 When the transformation of a theologia crucis in texts from the early Luther through Barth’s Erwählungslehre, and the further development and critique of Barth’s theology through Bonhoeffer’s concept of Stellvertretung from his later pastoral-ethical texts and Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis centered in The Crucified God is complete, the study proceeds to explore James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis. Part 3: Reading a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation Selections from all of James Cone’s major constructive theological books will be closely read in the final part of this study. This is primarily because, to the knowledge of the present author, no study of Cone (1938–2018) in explicit relation to the theme of theologia crucis as proposed here has yet been attempted. Further, since the question of how Cone’s theology transfigures this theme originating in texts from the early Luther is the guiding inquiry of the present study, a close reading of samples from Cone’s main constructive works is necessary.45 43 The present study’s reading of Bonhoeffer will argue differently overall to Michael P. DeJonge’s recent work on Bonhoeffer’s reception of Martin Luther. While DeJonge attempted to demonstrate Bonhoeffer’s indebtedness to Luther’s theology, he did not offer any extensive analysis of a theologia crucis in Bonhoeffer in relation to Luther and/or Barth. Williams, however, argues for a theologia crucis in Bonhoeffer’s theology related to Stellvertretung, as well as Bonhoeffer’s critique of traditional Lutheran “Two Kingdoms” theology in his Ethics that the present study will argue is compatible with Barth’s pre-Erwählungslehre theology in the Barmen Declaration of 1934. Cf. Reggie L. Williams, Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus: Harlem Renaissance Theology and an Ethic of Resistance (Waco: Baylor University Press, 2014), and Michael P. DeJonge, Bonhoeffer’s Reception of Luther (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017). 44 For an account of Moltmann’s personal friendship with James H. Cone, see Jürgen Moltmann, “Personal Reflections of James H. Cone,” Theology Today 75, no. 2 (2018): 277–80. 45 Selections from several of Cone’s theological essays, doctoral dissertation on Karl Barth’s

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Black Theology and Black Power (1969), and A Black Theology of Liberation (1970) will be explored to ask how Cone understands the cross in relation to the black experience in his early theology. Particularly important is how he sees Christ’s presence manifested in black ghettos, God’s presence amid the suffering of oppressed black bodies, and Cone’s understanding of theological language. Next, the study will examine Cone’s hermeneutics from an essay coinciding with the publication of God of the Oppressed (1975). Here, as in God of the Oppressed, which will be consulted in relation to the aforementioned essay, the study will explore how Cone critiqued European theological methodologies, in order to construct a theology from the black experience as he understood it, in both continuity to and development of his early theology. We will emphasize Cone’s building of a creative, constructive theology from black music, the black church, and Cone’s personal experience, as well as investigate his incorporation and critique of Karl Barth, Paul Tillich, and Rudolf Bultmann. The chapter then will turn to an essay from 1994 where Cone references Martin Luther’s theologia crucis and Jürgen Moltmann’s Crucified God, in relation to the notion of the suffering of God in black theology. The final major text of Cone’s chosen in the present study for close reading is The Cross and the Lynching Tree (2011). Here, Cone’s understanding Christ’s crucifixion as a first century lynching will be explored in relation to his constructive theology on the whole, to complete the argument for reading Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis. General Conclusion: A Contemporary Transfigured Theologia Crucis through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation After the constructive exploration of the theme of theologia crucis in texts from Martin Luther, Karl Barth, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Jürgen Moltmann, and James Cone is complete, this study will attempt to answer the guiding research question, “how is the theme of theologia crucis in the early Martin Luther transfigured through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation?” The conclusion will summarize this study’s arguments and propose how Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation can be read for a contemporary transfigured sapiential theologia crucis for the three interdependent publics of academy, society, and church today.

theological anthropology, Spirituals and the Blues (1972), autobiographical texts and For my People (1984), and Martin and Malcolm and America (1991) will be referenced and drawn from where appropriate, in order to illumine the primary themes of Cone’s constructive theology.

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4. Literature Review of Theologia Crucis As demonstrated by the methodological and hermeneutical considerations, and primary texts chosen for close reading, the theologia crucis is the major theme of this study. Before proceeding to explore this theme constructively in the texts selected above, though, it is first appropriate to document a representative sampling of scholarly literature about the theologia crucis. The literature examined here comes from systematic theologians and Reformation historians, and comprises the most important secondary books and articles to be referenced, incorporated, and critiqued pertaining to Martin Luther in the present study.46 Although writing from different historical eras in the last century and accenting various aspects of the theologia crucis on the whole, many scholars have either constructed a contemporary theologia crucis related to, yet diverging from, Martin Luther’s own theology, examined this theme in relation to late medieval passion mysticism, and/or argued the theologia crucis is a central aspect of Luther’s theology. This last approach comprises a large sampling of scholarly literature, beginning with the work of Walther von Loewenich in the 1920s. Loewenich attempted to show the theologia crucis and the doctrine of justification are intertwined, and that this motif can be found in Luther’s theology from the first lectures on the Psalms through the Reformer’s mature Lectures on Genesis. The text is consciously related to the so-called “dialectical theology” of the twentieth century and sought to show Luther’s compatibility with this movement.47 H. Gaylon Barker notes the breakthrough in Luther research led by von Loewenich, Paul Althaus, and Gerhard Ebeling, which prioritized the theologia crucis as the key to the whole of Luther’s theology. “It was the wave of research in the 1920s and ’30s that Luther’s theologia crucis was identified as the foundation and core of Luther’s thought; it was a discovery that changed the picture of Luther that emerged.”48 Cited by von Loewenich with approval, Paul Althaus observed in “Die Bedeutung des Kreuzes im Denken Luthers,” the theologia crucis “belongs to what is most profound in Luther’s theology.”49 46 N. B. Bayer’s texts and Westhelle’s Transfiguring Luther are not referenced here, as they have already been referenced above in relation to hermeneutical considerations. 47 Walther von Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, trans. Herbert J. A. Bouman (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1976), esp. 10–14; 17–50. This English edition is a translation of the German 5th edition (Walther von Loewenich, Luther’s Theologia Crucis [Witten: Luther-Verlag, 1967]), and addresses von Loewenich’s changing relationship to mysticism from previous German editions (1st–3rd). Alastair McGrath observes rightly that the English translation suffers from several inaccuracies, meaning the German edition(s) should also be consulted. See Alastair McGrath, Luther’s Theology of the Cross: Martin Luther’s Theological Breakthrough (Oxford: Blackwell, 1984), 148, n. 1. 48 H. Gaylon Barker, The Cross of Reality: Luther’s Theologia Crucis and Bonhoeffer’s Christology (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2015), 77. 49 See Barker, The Cross of Reality, 77 and Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 20. It needs to be emphasized that Althaus welcomed Adolf Hitler’s rise to power in Germany in 1933.

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Gerhard Ebeling, through an overarching orientation to dialectical theology, wrote in his systematic survey of Luther’s theology, “Nevertheless, ‘theologia crucis’ was more than a momentary concern or a peculiarity of the young Luther. The keyword becomes a reference to what he had permanently understood as the basic orientation of theological thinking.”50 Erich Vogelsang examined the theme of Anfechtung in relation to the cross in Luther’s thought in a work that remains important today, despite his ties to the Nazi dictatorship in Germany during World War II.51 Similar to von Loewenich, and seeking to establish Luther’s theologia crucis as a path between Karl Barth and Rudolf Bultmann, Regin Prenter finds the theologia crucis not merely as one part of theology but as theology in its totality, that is, theology in so far as it is at all capable of understanding the unity underlying the antitheses in the divine works. God’s righteousness under his judgment, his grace under his anger, the life which he bestows even in the midst of death, his power to turn the present evil into a thing of good.52

Prenter is to be distinguished from von Loewenich in that, while he agrees with the theologia crucis as being the key to Luther’s theology, his essay is more critical of the dialectical theology of both Karl Barth and Rudolf Bultmann than von Loewenich’s text. Robert Kolb also remains convinced of the theologia crucis as a cornerstone to the entirety of Luther’s theology. While many scholars concentrate on the theologia crucis in Luther’s early Psalms lectures, Kolb argues this theme also occurs in Luther’s later work on the Psalms of Assent in 1532–1533. Further, Kolb analyzes Luther’s incorporation and development of late medieval passion mysticism.53 Dennis Ngien not only argues for the centrality of the theologia crucis to Luther’s overall theology, but that Luther himself believed God suffered in God’s divine nature on Golgotha. The latter thesis has proven to be controversial, as Althaus’s relationship to the Third Reich overall in the early 1930s is documented in Gotthard Jasper, Paul Althaus (1888–1966): Professor, Prediger, und Patriot in seiner Zeit (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2015), 193–241. I am grateful to Dr. Jonathan Reinert for this reference. 50 Translation mine. “Trotzdem kam mit ‘theologia crucis’ mehr zur Sprache als ein Augenblicksanliegen oder eine Eigentümlichkeit nur des jungen Luther. Das Stichwort wird zum Hinweis auf das, was ihm bleibend als die Grundorientierung theologischen Denkens aufgegangen war.” Gerhard Ebeling, Luther: Einführung in sein Denken (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1964), 260. 51 Erich Vogelsang, Der Angefochtene Christus bei Luther (Berlin and Leipzig: De Gruyter, 1932), esp. 1–79. Vogelsang’s relationship to the Nazi dictatorship is examined in Volker Leppin, “Luther Studies in Germany – The Presence and Absence of Theology,” Dialog 47, no. 2 (2008): 105–13; 105–6. 52 Regin Prenter, Luther’s Theology of the Cross (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1971), 2. 53 Robert Kolb, “Luther’s Theology of the Cross Fifteen Years After Heidelberg: Lectures on the Psalms of Assent,” Journal of Ecclesiastical History 61, no. 1 (2010): 69–85. The specific understanding of theologia crucis at Heidelberg is examined in Robert Kolb, Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 55–59.

18

Introduction

demonstrated in the revisionist work of David Luy, which argues for a greater continuity between the Christology of the ancient church, the late Middle Ages, and Luther’s Christology than Ngien.54 Alastair McGrath argues that the theologia crucis is both Luther’s indebtedness to, and transition point away from, the theology and piety of the late Middle Ages, showing, as von Loewenich did, the interrelationship between a theologia crucis and the doctrine of justification. With his concluding section of his study describing the relevance of the theologia crucis for the twentieth century, along with quoting a late preface from Luther, McGrath implies the Reformer never really abandoned his theological program at Heidelberg.55 In both an historical and systematic text, Bernhard Lohse places Luther’s theologia crucis within what constitutes the uniqueness of Luther’s theology.56 Critiquing what he found to be many misguided developments in contemporary theological thinking claiming to have roots in Luther’s own theologia crucis, Gerhard O. Forde analyzed Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation as the key to being theologians of the cross today, in a theological-pastoral commentary arguing for the theologia crucis as central to understanding Luther’s theology as a whole.57 Moving to the constructive incorporations and expansions of Luther’s own theologia crucis, Finnish theologian Tuomo Manermaa sees Luther’s theologia crucis as a demonstration of God’s Love. “What lies behind the distinction between the theology of glory and the theology of the cross is Luther’s concept of two kinds of love: the theology of glory is based on Human Love, whereas the theology of the cross is based on God’s Love.”58 Douglas John Hall draws from 54 See Dennis Ngien, The Suffering of God According to Martin Luther’s Theologia Crucis (Vancouver: Regent College Publishing, 1995), 19–55; 175–79, and David Luy, “Martin Luther and Late Medieval Christology: Continuity or Discontinuity?” in Christine Helmer, ed., The Medieval Luther (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020), 15–25. 55 Alastair McGrath, Luther’s Theology of the Cross: Martin Luther’s Theological Breakthrough (Oxford: Blackwell, 1990), 176–81. 56 Bernhard Lohse, Martin Luther’s Theology: Its Historical and Systematic Development, trans. and ed. Roy A. Harrisville (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006), 36–39. 57 Gerhard O. Forde, On Being a Theologian of the Cross: Reflections on Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997). Forde’s reading of Luther, including his concern that systematic theology be directly related to proclamation, known as “Radical Lutheranism,” is embodied and further developed by Steven D. Paulson, most notably in Paulson’s 3-volume trilogy addressing Predestination, the Hidden God, and Sacraments. See Steven D. Paulson, Luther’s Outlaw God, 3 vols. (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2018–2021). The movement of “Radical Lutheranism” began at Luther Seminary in the late twentieth century. See Gerhard O. Forde, “Radical Lutheranism,” Lutheran Quarterly 1 (1987): 1–16. 58 Tuomo Manermaa, Two Kinds of Love: Martin Luther’s Religious World, trans. Kirsi I. Stjerna (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2010), 27–45; 28. For summative essays surrounding the Finnish “breakthrough” in Luther research related to justification and theosis (with implications for understanding Luther’s theologia crucis apart from a neo-Kantian lens), see Carl E. Braaten and Robert W. Jenson, eds., Union with Christ: The New Finnish Interpretation of Luther (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998). Manermaa specifically connects the concept of theosis to Luther’s theologia crucis in Ibid., 25–41; 39.

Introduction

19

Luther’s theologia crucis to expand significantly beyond Luther’s own thinking for contemporary questions of suffering in the world. He argues the theologia crucis is a “theology of great refusal.”59 In a similar fashion, and perhaps the most well-known constructive radicalization of Luther’s theologia crucis in the twentieth century, Jürgen Moltmann argues for the theologia crucis as the “foundation and criticism” of Christian theology. Moltmann’s work is noteworthy for articulating a theologia crucis in relation to social, political, and economic justice in the modern world.60 Simultaneously close to, yet also far away from, Moltmann is Eberhard Jüngel’s interpretation of the theologia crucis, with connections to both Luther and Karl Barth, in addition to the Hegelian philosophical tradition, as an attempt to do theology as an alternative to both (metaphysical) theism and atheism in the modern world.61 Hans Urs von Balthasar expands the theologia crucis to a Theology of Holy Saturday in a stand-alone text originally published as part of a larger article for the dogmatic encyclopedia Mysterium Salutis.62 Here, then, is a development in the literature that remains related to Luther’s theology, but also moves in new directions.63 Written and completed while dying from cancer, Alan E. Lewis expanded the Pauline-Lutheran theologia crucis interpreted through a contemporary lens to a theology of Holy Saturday, to show theologically that God was present in the grave of Holy Saturday, and to propose that this event of the death of the living God be theology’s constructive task for the present. Although Lewis’s text has important connections and similarities to Hans Urs von Balthasar and Eberhard Jüngel, Lewis is unique in arguing that Holy Saturday should be at the center of contemporary constructive theology rooted in a theologia crucis.64 An argument drawing from von Loewenich’s proposal for Luther’s theology in relation to feminist concerns is found in Mary Solberg’s feminist epistemology.65 Indebted to Solberg, and presenting an overall feminist proposal for a crosscentered theology, Icelandic scholar Arnfridur Gudmundsdottir is attentive to 59 Douglas John Hall, The Cross in our Context: Jesus and the Suffering World (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003), 16. 60 Jürgen Moltmann, The Crucified God: The Cross of Christ as the Foundation and Criticism of Christian Theology, trans. R. A. Wilson and John Bowden (San Francisco: Harper & Row: 1972). 61 Eberhard Jüngel, Gott als Geheimnis der Welt, 10th ed. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010), esp. 409–544. 62 See Edward T. Oakes, review of Mysterium Paschale: On the Mystery of Easter by Hans Urs von Balthasar, The Journal of Religion 73, no. 1 (1993): 103–4. 63 Hans Urs von Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale: The Mystery of Easter, trans. Aidan Nichols, O. P. (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1990). 64 Alan E. Lewis, Between Cross and Resurrection: A Theology of Holy Saturday (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001), esp. 69–103. 65 Mary Solberg, Compelling Knowledge: A Feminist Proposal for an Epistemology of the Cross (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1997), 55–95.

20

Introduction

problematic aspects of Luther’s understanding of suffering from a feminist perspective.66 Continuing with the theme of theological epistemology, New Zealand scholar Rosaline Bradbury investigates both the classical theologia crucis beginning in the New Testament and proceeding through Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation, and then examines Karl Barth’s modernization of this theological tradition for constructive theology. Bradbury contributes to the scholarly conversation on the theologia crucis, and to scholarship on Martin Luther, but explicitly investigates this tradition for understanding Karl Barth, thus showing both continuity and discontinuity from the previous sources.67 Brazilian theologian Walter Altmann offers a contemporary reading of the theologia crucis in a creative and dialectical dialogue with Latin American liberation theology and postcolonial studies, calling the theologia crucis “so characteristic of Luther.”68 Fellow Brazilian Vítor Westhelle is similar to Altmann, and incorporates Luther’s theologia crucis at the center of a doctrine of God taking seriously the concerns of Latin American liberation theology, postcolonial studies, and postmodern philosophy and literary theory.69 In the latter half of the twentieth century, increasing attention began being paid to Luther’s relationship to late medieval passion mysticism, an aspect that was under-emphasized by von Loewenich, even in the later editions of his text where he is more sympathetic to Luther and mysticism. Although the notion of mysticism had been misused in Nazi Germany, particularly through the work of Erich Vogelsang, examining Luther’s relationship to mysticism revealed important spiritual aspects of Luther’s theology.70 As a result of increasing scholarly attention to Luther’s relationship to late medieval passion mysticism, the image of Luther shifted from the nineteenth-century monument in Wittenberg signifying his famous “Here I stand” protest against Roman Catholicism to a late medieval Catholic friar who was thoroughly shaped by the monastic piety of his own day, even as he re-formed this tradition in an evangelical manner. Thus, Luther’s foreignness to contemporary times began to be emphasized, to 66 Arnfridur Gudmundsdottir, Meeting God on the Cross: Christ, the Cross, and the Feminist Critique (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 74–78. 67 Rosalene Bradbury, Cross Theology: The Classical Theologia Crucis and Karl Barth’s Modern Theology of the Cross (Eugene: Pickwick, 2011). 68 Walter Altmann, Luther and Liberation: A Latin American Perspective, trans. Thia Cooper (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2016), 47–67; 58. 69 See, especially, Vítor Westhelle, The Scandalous God: The Use and Abuse of the Cross (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006), 16–33 and Vítor Westhelle, Liberating Luther: A Lutheran Theology from Latin America, trans. Robert A. Butterfield (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2021). 70 Volker Leppin writes, “Luther had lived as a monk for two decades and for more than one decade had been thoroughly integrated within a monastic-mystic environment with its unique conceptual patterns. Even his account of Anfechtung during this time rests on a mystical concept that Luther used his whole life to describe spiritual crises.” Volker Leppin, “Luther’s Roots in Monastic-Mystical Piety,” in Robert Kolb, Irene Dingel, and L’ubomír Batka, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Martin Luther’s Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 49–61; 50.

Introduction

21

avoid the mischaracterization that Luther himself was responsible for birthing modernity. Both images of “The Reformer” have been examined in a survey by Christine Helmer.71 The revisionist Luther research of Christine Helmer, Volker Leppin, Graham Tomlin, Franz Posset, Ronald Rittgers, and Berndt Hamm is especially important for understanding the mystical roots of Luther’s theologia crucis, which is underemphasized by the other scholars mentioned in this review, except for Hans Urs von Balthasar, and (indirectly) Alan E. Lewis. Luther’s incorporation and evangelical re-forming of late medieval passion mysticism has important consequences for a study explicitly concerned with the theme of theologia crucis, because it shows how Luther’s three rules (oratio/meditatio/tentatio) relate to Luther’s theologia crucis from the standpoint of theology as sapientia.72 Heiko Oberman is credited with initially pioneering a new interest of research into Luther’s relationship to mysticism, but it has now expanded beyond him.73 Graham S. Tomlin wrote an important article for both summarizing relevant research on this topic, as well as proposing the relationship between medieval passion piety and Luther’s theologia crucis. This article describes, in particular, the influence of Bernard of Clairvaux on Luther’s understanding of a theologia crucis, while also cautioning against an over-emphasis of the role of Bernard for Luther.74 Franz Posset explicitly connects Luther and Bernard of Clairvaux through a critical investigation of Melanchthon’s memoirs about Luther. Posset argues for the relationship between Bernard’s theology of grace and Luther’s emphasis on justification, including the former’s deep Christocentrism.75 Ronald Rittgers understands Luther’s theologia crucis as “one of the distinctive features of his evangelical theology,” which resulted from the indulgence controversy, rooted within the passion piety of his day.76 Berndt Hamm locates Luther’s theologia crucis in relation to a late medieval theology of piety, particularly addressing Luther’s understanding of Anfechtung, and provides an opportunity to explore

71 Christine Helmer, How Luther Became the Reformer (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2019). 72 See again the article by Volker Leppin referenced above in n. 24 that directly addresses the historical aspects of Luther’s “three rules” for the study of theology: Leppin, “Wie legt sich nach Luther die Schrift selbst aus?,” 83–102. 73 Heiko A. Oberman, “Simul genitus et raptus. Luther und die Mystik,” in Heiko A. Oberman, Die Reformation: Von Wittenberg nach Genf (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1986), 45– 89. Cf. Volker Leppin, “Mysticism and Justification,” in Christine Helmer, ed., The Medieval Luther, 182. 74 Graham S. Tomlin, “The Medieval Roots of Luther’s Theology of the Cross,” Archive for Reformation History 89 (1998): 22–39. 75 Franz Posset, The Real Luther: A Friar at Erfurt and Wittenberg (St Louis: Concordia, 2011). 76 Ronald K. Rittgers, The Reformation of Suffering: Pastoral Theology and Lay Piety in Late Medieval and Early Modern Germany (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 111–24; 111.

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Introduction

the relationship between “spirituality” and dogmatic theology.77 Finally, Volker Leppin argues both for the importance of the mystical theologia crucis to Luther’s overall theology, and the prominent place of von Loewenich’s research.78 The literature surveyed here points toward the theologia crucis as a central theme of Martin Luther’s theology, meaning von Loewenich’s basic thesis has been accepted by many scholars, either directly or indirectly, saying Luther was and remained a theologus crucis, even though the explicit term disappears from Luther’s writings after 1518. Areas where von Loewenich’s work has been supplemented, and often superseded, are in relation to mystical themes in Luther’s theology, the need for documenting explicitly the Reformer’s foreignness to present times, and the constructive work of thinking anew the theme of theologia crucis for today’s world. Finally, the above survey of relevant literature shows that no reading of the theme of theologia crucis has yet been attempted in the exact manner of the present study. Therefore, while the present study is situated in relation to the literature cited and reviewed here, it attempts to give a fresh reading of this theme to explore a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation.

77 Berndt Hamm, The Early Luther: Stages in a Reformation Re-Orientation (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2013), 57–58. The present study owes its classification of “The early Martin Luther” to this historical text. 78 Volker Leppin, “Luthers Kreuzestheologie als Fortentwicklung mittelalterlicher Mystik und Exegese,” Lateranum 84 (2018): 55. Two further articles by Leppin are illuminating regarding Luther’s theologia crucis and medieval passion mysticism: Volker Leppin, “Passionsmystik bei Luther,” Lutherjahrbuch 84 (2017): 51–81, and Volker Leppin, “Solus Christus: Zur Genese einer reformatorischen Exclusivpartikel aus der spätmittelalterlichen Passionsfrömmigkeit,” in Leppin, Transformationen, 279–301.

Part 1

Reading a Theologia Crucis in the Early Martin Luther

Chapter 1

The Heidelberg Disputation (1518) Martin Luther (1483–1546) uses the phrase “theologian of the cross” (theologus crucis) or “theology of the cross” (theologia crucis) explicitly only sparingly in his writings. It can thus be debated how much this theme serves as a fruitful hermeneutic for understanding Luther’s theological corpus.1 In any case, Luther proposed what it means to be a theologian of the cross over against a theologian of glory at the Heidelberg Disputation in 1518, with his thesis “a theologian of glory calls evil good and good evil. A theologian of the cross calls a thing as it actually is.”2 This motif of “calling a thing as it actually is” (dicit id quod res est) is for Luther in the Heidelberg Disputation the core of theological inquiry as related to trusting in the grace of God as known in the crucified Christ, rather than focusing on human works through the Law (argued in theses 1–7). Luther proposed a Pauline, paradoxical theology that centers in the cross of Christ as the God known/recognized as hidden in suffering.3 Finally, the theme of theologia 1 Scholarly arguments for the theology of the cross as a central motif in Luther’s theology are based on a tradition beginning with Walther von Loewenich in the 1920s. See Walther von Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross (Minneapolis: Augusburg, 1976), and the literature review in the Introduction of the present study. 2 Martin Luther, Heidelberg Disputation, 1518, in Luther’s Works 31: Career of the Reformer I (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1957), 40. English translations of Luther’s writings have been modified throughout the study for gender inclusive language where possible. Further, hereafter, excerpts from the Luther’s Works series throughout the present study will be cited as LW. Theologus gloriae dicit malum bonum, et bonum malum, Theologus crucis dicit id quod res est. WA 1, 354: 20–21. The historical circumstances of this disputation are described in Volker Leppin, Martin Luther, 3rd ed. (Darmstadt: Philipp von Zabern, 2017), 126–35. Noteworthy is Leppin’s description of the public nature of the event, and his argument that Luther himself seems to have represented his theses, instead of his companion and student Leonard Beyer. Cf. Ibid., 129: “Die Disputation fand am 25. oder 26. April 1518, dem Anlass und dem Kontext entsprechend, in den Räumlichkeiten der Artistenfakultät in Heidelberg statt. Studenten und Lehrende der Universität, auch Bürger der Stadt und Angehörige des Hofes hatten hier Gelegenheit, an dem Ereignis teilzunehmen. Und es wurde noch weit mehr zu einem Ereignis als ursprünglich geplant, denn statt dem eigentlich hierfür vorgestehenen Schüler und Begleiter Luthers, Leonard Beyer, scheint doch ganz überwiegend Luther selbst aufgetreten zu sein und seine Thesen vertreten zu haben.” 3 “Distrusting completely our own wisdom, according to that counsel of the Holy Spirit, ‘Do not rely on your own insight’ [Prov. 3:5], we humbly present to the judgment of all those who wish to be here these theological paradoxes, so that it may become clear whether they have been deduced well or poorly from St. Paul, the especially chosen vessel and instrument of Christ, and also from St. Augustine, his most trustworthy interpreter” LW 31: 39 Diffidentes nobis ipsis

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Part 1: Reading a Theologia Crucis in the Early Martin Luther

crucis as can be found in this text orients theology as sapientia (which includes scientia) to the cross of Christ, showing a continuity with and transformation of late medieval passion mysticism.4 While not addressing Luther’s relationship to late medieval passion mysticism, Walther von Loewenich defined a theologia crucis beginning in the Heidelberg Disputation in a way conducive to the present study’s concerns: The theology of the cross is not a chapter in theology but a specific kind of theology. The cross of Christ is significant here not only for the question concerning redemption and the certainty of salvation, but it is the center that provides perspective for all theological statements. Hence it belongs to the doctrine of God in the same way as it belongs to the doctrine of the work of Christ.5

If von Loewenich is correct, then Luther understands a theologian of the cross to be one for whom the cross of Christ is “the center that provides perspective for all theological statements.”6 Given that von Loewenich’s doctoral dissertation generated the storm of research and interest in Luther’s theologia crucis in the last century, this chapter will critically examine his claims in relation to a close reading of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation for traces of the theme of theologia crucis, in order to give a textual and thematic foundation for the present study’s constructive exploration of a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation.

prorsus iuxta illud spiritus consilium ‘ne innitaris prudentiae tuae’, humiliter offerimus omnium, qui adesse voluerint, iuditio haec Theologica paradoxa, ut vel sic appareat, bene an male elicita sint ex divo Paulo, vase et organo Christi electissimo, deinde et ex S. Augustino, interprete eiusdem fidelissimo (WA 1, 353: 10–14). 4 Regarding Luther’s understanding of theology as sapientia, see Oswald Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, ed. and trans. Jeffrey G. Silcock and Mark C. Mattes (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008), 28. Essays concerning Luther’s relationship to the Middle Ages, and particularly medieval Christology and philosophy are found in Christine Helmer, ed., The Medieval Luther (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020). See especially Part 1, 15–88. For the thesis that the Reformation should be considered a transformation of rather than a sudden break with late medieval theology and spirituality, which the present study follows based on the close reading of texts from the early Martin Luther selected for the first part of this study, see Volker Leppin, Transformationen: Studien zu den Wandlungsprozessen in Theologie und Frömmigkeit zwischen Spätmittelalter und Reformation (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020), and Volker Leppin and Stefan Michels, eds., Reformation als Transformation? Interdisziplinäre Zugänge zum Transformationsparadigma als historiographischer Beschreibungskategorie (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2022). 5 Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 18. Regin Prenter documented that the first explicit use of the term “theology of the cross” in Luther’s writings occurs in the Lectures on the Epistle to the Hebrews from 1517–1518. See Prenter, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 1–2. 6 Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 18.

Chapter 1: The Heidelberg Disputation

27

1. Theologus Crucis vs. Theologus Gloriae In the Heidelberg Disputation of 1518, Luther juxtaposes the mystery and majesty of the invisible God of the theologian of glory with the suffering of the cross. According to Luther, it is a mistake for a theologian to attempt to comprehend God’s hiddenness through perceptible events, or to probe into God’s majesty, power, and sovereignty. Such probing is the error of the theologian of glory. However, Luther writes in thesis 20, “that person deserves to be called a theologian … who comprehends (intelligit) the visible and manifest things of God (visibilia dei et posteriora) as seen (conspecta) through suffering and the cross.”7 In other words, God is seen and comprehended best in what is an affront to natural human reason – the crucified Christ. God as seen through suffering and the cross contrasts with worldly wisdom because worldly wisdom cannot comprehend the suffering and hanging God as seen in the crucified Christ. The theologian of the cross is one who thus lives in the paradox of God known in hiddenness and suffering and is another critique of a theologian of glory.8 Luther writes: This is clear: He who does not know Christ does not know God hidden in suffering. Therefore he prefers works to suffering, glory to the cross, strength to weakness, wisdom to folly, and, in general, good to evil. These are the people whom the apostle calls “enemies of the cross of Christ” [Phil. 3:18], for they hate the cross and suffering and love works and the glory of works. Thus they call the good of the cross evil and the evil of a deed good. God can be found only in suffering and the cross, as has already been said.9 7 LW 31: 40. Sed qui visibilia et posteriora Dei, per passiones et crucem conspecta intelligit (WA 1, 354: 19–20). Posteriora refers here to God’s back, and biblically to the Vulgate translation of Exodus 33:20, where God allowed Moses only to see God’s back. Tuomo Manermaa elaborates on God’s back in relation to Thesis 20, “When we take into account what the expression ‘God’s back’ means, we can understand what is characteristic of the theologians of the cross in their relationship with God. First, they observe what can be seen of God from God’s backside: God’s humanity, weakness, and folly. Second, they look at these attributes of God through their own sufferings and cross, that is, through their own humanity, weakness, and folly. The cross of Christ and the cross of the Christ-follower (Christian), thus belong organically together … Only those who are weak themselves can comprehend God’s empowering weakness on the cross. Here we are dealing again with Luther’s doctrine of two kinds of love: God is only where God’s creating love is, namely ‘down’ in the humanity, in the ‘nothingness,’ and in the ‘bad’ and the ‘evil.’” Tuomo Manermaa, Two Kinds of Love: Martin Luther’s Religious World, trans. Kirsi I. Stjerna (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2010), 31. 8 Cf. Paul Althaus, The Theology of Martin Luther (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1966), 27, and Burnell F. Eckardt, Jr., “Luther and Moltmann: The Theology of the Cross,” Concordia Theological Quarterly 49, no. 1 (1985): 19–28; 21. 9 Ibid., 53. Patet, quia dum ignorat Christum, ignorat Deum absconditum in passionibus. Ideo praefert opera passionibus, et gloriam cruci, potentiam infirmitati, sapientiam stulticiae, et universaliter bonum malo. Tales sunt quos Apostolus vocat Inimicos crucis Christi. Utique quia odiunt crucem et passiones, Amant vero opera et gloriam illorum, Ac sic bonum crucis dicunt malum et malum operis dicunt bonum. At Deum non inveniri nisi in passionibus et cruce, iam dictum est (WA 1, 362: 23–29).

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God is found “only in suffering and the cross,” and is known “hidden in suffering,” according to Luther.10 Theologians who trust in God’s work, and not their own, become “friends of the cross” (amici crucis).11 For Volker Leppin, Luther’s stress on finding God through suffering and the cross evokes imagery indebted to Bernard of Clairvaux. Bernard wrote: In my opinion that was the main reason for the invisible God, why he wanted to be seen in the flesh and at odds with human beings, namely that he would draw all the impulses of the fleshly, who would only love the fleshly, to the wholesome love of his flesh and so gradually advance to spiritual love.12

Franz Posset argues for the importance of Bernard’s Christocentrism for Luther’s doctrine of justification, saying controversially that Luther’s connection to Bernard needs to be explored before his Augustinianism. “Luther did not invent a new theology, but discovered the old Bernardine theology of justification by grace alone through faith alone. This was the matrix of all of Luther’s later theology and reform efforts of popular piety.”13 10 LW 31: 53; WA 1, 262: 29. For Luther’s indebtedness to Johannes von Staupitz in Theses 19–20, see Leppin, Martin Luther, 131–32. Emphasizing the connection to Staupitz further shows the mystical underpinnings of the Heidelberg Disputation, particularly related to Staupitz’s counseling of Luther to look to the wounds of Christ in times of spiritual distress (Anfechtung). See Chapter 2 of the present study for a fuller consideration of Staupitz’s counseling of Luther during the latter’s experiences of Anfechtung, particularly related to questions surrounding predestination. 11 “Therefore the friends of the cross say that the cross is good and works are evil, for through the cross works are destroyed and the old Adam, who is especially edified by works, is crucified. It is impossible for a person not to be puffed up by his good works unless he has first been deflated and destroyed by suffering and evil until he knows that he is worthless and that his works are not his but God’s.” LW 31: 53. Ideo amici crucis dicunt crucem esse bonam, et opera mala, quia per crucem destruuntur opera et crucifigitur Adam, qui per opera potius aedificatur. Impossibile est enim, ut non infletur operibus suis bonis, qui non prius exinanitus et destructus est passionibus et malis, donec sciat seipsum esse nihil, et opera non sua, sed Dei esse (WA 1, 362: 29–33). A question of epistemology can be found here, through Luther’s use of the Latin sciat (from “scire,” meaning “to know/understand”). 12 Translation mine. Hanc ego arbitror praecipuum invisibili Deo fuisse causam, quod voluit in carne videri et cum hominibus homo conversari, ut carnalium videlicet, qui nisi carnaliter amare non poterat, cunctas primo ad suae carnis salutarem amorem affectiones retraheret, atque ita gradatim ad amorem perduceret spiritualem. Bernhard von Clairvaux, Sämtliche Werke. Lateinisch/deutsch, ed., B. B. Winkler. Bd. 5 (Innsbruck: Tyrolia, 1994), 118, 21–26. Cf. Volker Leppin, “Luthers Kreuzestheologie als Fortentwicklung mittelalterlicher Mystik und Exegese,” Lateranum 84 (2018): 55–70 and Leppin, Transformationen, 300. Specifically related to Bernard of Clairvaux and Luther’s theologia crucis, Leppin writes, “Der Theologe des Kreuzes hingegen versteht das, was Gott von sich selbst sichtbar macht, durch das Leiden und Kreuz Christi. Hier wirkt jene Passionsfrömmigkeit nach, die Luther bei Staupitz lernen konnte, ja, man meint noch aus der Ferne Bernard von Clairvaux wiederzuerkennen …. Deutlich aber ist, dass in Heidelberg vor allem der Gegensatz von Mystik und Scholastik zur Debatte stand.” Volker Leppin, Die fremde Reformation: Luthers mystische Wurzeln (München: C. H. Beck, 2017), 78. 13 Franz Posset, The Real Luther: A Friar at Erfurt and Wittenberg (St. Louis: Concordia, 2011), 116–19; 116. Despite the intriguing possibilities for historical theological Luther research

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Arguing for this historical connection to Bernard provides evidence for Luther’s understanding of theology as sapientia and emphasizes Luther’s relatedness to and transformation of late medieval passion mysticism. Thus, while the Heidelberg Disputation can be read in relation to theological epistemology as von Loewenich did, it also shows Luther’s sapiential combination of theological knowledge and monastic-spiritual encounter, the latter aspect of which has been the concern of revisionist Luther research in recent decades. This revisionist historical research reveals previously overlooked or under-emphasized mystical themes in the early Luther and is incorporated into and documented throughout the first part of the present study.14

2. Luther’s Pauline Theology in the Heidelberg Disputation Luther’s theological framework incorporates Paul of Tarsus, who wrote, “For since, in the wisdom of God (σοφίᾳ τοῦ θεοῦ), the world did not know God through wisdom (σοφίας), God decided, through the foolishness of our proclamation (διὰ τῆς μωρίας τοῦ κηρύγματος), to save those who believe” (1 Cor. 1:21, NRSV ). For Luther, then, the crucified Christ is the source of true theology.15 God is recognized and known (two English definitions for the Latin through exploring the connections between Luther and Bernard of Clairvaux, Graham Tomlin critiques this position, writing, “The influence of Bernard on the early Luther’s theology has often been noticed, and has sometimes been overplayed.” Graham S. Tomlin, “The Medieval Roots of Luther’s Theology of the Cross,” Archive for Reformation History 89 (1998): 32. A mediating position between Posset and Tomlin can be proposed through incorporating the work of Heiko A. Oberman, who pioneered the revisionist research into Luther’s mystical-monastic theology in the latter half of the twentieth century. It can then be argued that Luther was an Augustinian monk with important spiritual influences from late medieval passion mysticism. See Heiko A. Oberman, Luther: Mensch zwischen Gott und Teufel (Berlin: Severin und Siedler, 1981), 58–87; 185–221. In the Heidelberg Disputation, Luther’s Augustinianism is revealed when he calls Augustine Paul of Tarsus’s “most trustworthy interpreter” (interprete eiusdem fidelissimo) (see n. 3 above). 14 Thus, the present study’s author finds the arguments of what can be called the “Oberman school” for revisionist historical theological research on the early Luther convincing on the whole, even as he expands beyond this historical research for exploring the possibility of a transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone and is not seeking to directly conduct an historical-genetic reconstruction of Luther’s early theology in the present study himself. (See nn. 17 and 19, and the literature review, in the Introduction to the present study above.) 15 Robert Kolb argues for the Pauline roots of Luther’s theologia crucis: “The cross of Christ permeated Luther’s proclamation of God’s Word and formed a framework for his hermeneutic of Scripture and life, for the human experience of reality. On the basis of 1 Corinthians 1–2, Luther insisted that both God’s modus operandi in the world and the Word that informs and enacts his will seem ‘weak and foolish’ to the world. In fact, attacking evil through Jesus’s death and resurrection and the proclamation of that divine action both exhibit and exercise God’s power. This became the biblical foundation of Luther’s hermeneutic, usually labeled ‘the theology of the cross,’ which is indeed a theology of the word from the cross.” Robert Kolb,

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word cognitio and the German word Erkenntnis) in an offensive way from the perspective of those who are wise by the world’s standards. Luther writes, Now it is not sufficient for anyone, and it does him no good to recognize God in his glory and majesty, unless he recognizes him in the humility and shame (ignomina) of the cross. Thus, God destroys the wisdom of the wise …. true theology and recognition of God are in the crucified Christ ….16

However, it is a matter of scholarly debate as to if Luther reads Paul correctly overall, or if he imposes his own questions onto Paul. This debate is represented theologically by briefly documenting Wolfhart Pannenberg’s understanding of the discontinuity between Paul and Luther, in relation to Ernst Käsemann’s understanding of Luther’s continuity with Paul.17 Pannenberg observes a contrast between what he sees as Paul’s own theology and Luther’s use of it in the Heidelberg Disputation: In Luther’s case the notion of theologia crucis was used against a self-righteous concept of justice as virtue, a concept which was considered an effect of the domination of scholasticism by the Aristotelian philosophy. In Paul’s case the cross of Christ was referred to as basis of Christian unity, because it is the only source of our salvation. Luther’s

Martin Luther and the Enduring Word of God: The Wittenberg School and its Scripture-Centered Proclamation (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017), 114. 16 LW 31: 52–53. Ita ut nulli iam satis sit ac prosit, qui cognoscit Deum in gloria et maiestate, nisi cognoscat eundem in humilitate et ignominia crucis. Sic perdit sapientiam sapientum …. Ergo in Christo crucifixo est vera Theologia et cognitio Dei (WA 1, 362: 11–13; 18–19). The Latin ignomina can also be translated into English as “disgrace” and “dishonor,” corresponding to the German word Schande. 17 Here, then, the scholarly debate about the so-called “New Perspective” on Paul is implied. See the now classic debate between Krister Stendahl and Ernst Käsemann, documented in Krister Stendahl, Paul Among Jews and Gentiles (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1976), 125–33. A Lutheran critique of the New Perspective, which also addresses the positive contributions of this movement (namely, overcoming supersessionist and anti-Jewish readings of Paul) is found in Erik M. Heen, “A Lutheran Response to the New Perspective on Paul,” Lutheran Quarterly 24 (2010): 263–91. Von Loewenich also believes that Paul’s theology corresponds to Luther’s. See Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 13. While the New Perspective on Paul is to be commended for exposing the anti-Judaism of many Lutheran New Testament exegetes during the Postwar period in Europe, as well as for being part of the impetus for exposing Martin Luther’s vile anti-Jewish rhetoric later in his life, from the standpoint of the present study’s concern with the theme of theologia crucis, the traditional “Lutheran” reading of Paul represented by Ernst Käsemann remains important. This is not, however, to accuse Pannenberg of being a modern theologus gloriae, nor to say the cross is unimportant for Pannenberg’s theological project. Rather, Käsemann explicitly emphasizes the scandal of the cross in Pauline theology, whereas for Pannenberg the scandal is implied, but not argued directly. Still, Pannenberg’s Grundzüge der Christologie can be read as a theologia crucis, due to Pannenberg’s proposal for a “Christology from below,” which is important for James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, as is Ernst Käsemann. To the knowledge of the present author, the argument that Pannenberg’s Grundzüge der Christologie can be read as a theologia crucis has not been proposed before in an academic study on the theme of theologia crucis. See Wolfhart Pannenberg, Grundzüge der Christologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1976), 251–91; 415–27, and Chapter 8, nn. 31, 73, and 85 below.

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theologia crucis was not primarily concerned for Christian unity over against divisions. Luther was haunted by the issue of personal righteousness by faith rather than works or virtue. Certainly Luther did not infer from his theology of the cross a weakness of theological knowledge.… But did not Paul himself insist on his doctrine, on the identity of the gospel he preached, in a not altogether dissimilar form?18

In contrast to Pannenberg, Ernst Käsemann argues for the continuity between Paul’s understanding of the cross and Luther’s theologia crucis. Käsemann’s thesis is convincing in relation to the biblical witness of the direct scandal of the cross in 1 Corinthians, as well as the death cry of Jesus in the Gospels of Mark and Matthew (Mk. 15:34; Matt. 27:46). The Reformation quite correctly based its understanding of evangelical theology as a theology of the cross upon Paul. Today, even among Protestants, this position is no longer generally accepted …. Nonetheless, it cannot be too strongly emphasized that Paul, historically and theologically, must be understood according to this insight of the Reformation.19

Similarly (yet overstated), Alan E. Lewis critiques Pannenberg regarding what he sees as Pannenberg’s lack of incorporation of the cross: [T]here is real doubt whether he [Pannenberg] takes the scandal of the cross seriously enough. He tends to see the resurrection as canceling out or redeeming the disaster which befell Jesus rather than analyzing, with Moltmann, what it means that precisely the Crucified One was raised, and that the Risen One remains the crucified Messiah.20

Käsemann and Lewis’s overall arguments are accurate if Paul himself can, in fact, be considered a theologian of the cross in Luther’s sense. In any case, Käsemann and Lewis offer interpretations in line with Luther’s Pauline theology in the Heidelberg Disputation, which Pannenberg also correctly identifies, even

18

Wolfhart Pannenberg, “A Theology of the Cross” Word and World 8, no. 2 (1988): 165. Ernst Käsemann, “The Pauline Theology of the Cross,” trans. James P. Martin, Interpretation 24, no. 2 (1970): 151–77; 151. See also Käsemann’s reference to Martin Kähler and the relationship between the cross and Christology in Ibid., 153. 20 Alan E. Lewis, Between Cross and Resurrection: A Theology of Holy Saturday (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001), 53–54, n. 16. Lewis’s arguments about the scandal of the cross are similar to Käsemann, who writes, “If the cross, which we value as a symbol of religiosity, was erected at a place where God was deemed absent, then the veneration and worship of the one who hung upon it would without question be the most frightful scandal.” Käsemann, “The Pauline Theology of the Cross,” 155. Lewis, however, does not take into consideration Pannenberg’s arguments for the centrality of the cross, which is validated in the Easter event, as the basis for “inclusive substitution,” nor Pannenberg’s arguments for doxology in relation to dogmatic theology. Lewis’s critique of Pannenberg is thus arguably overstated, even though Pannenberg does not argue for the direct scandal of the cross the way Lewis and Käsemann do. See Pannenberg, “A Theology of the Cross,” 167–69; 171–72, and Wolfhart Pannenberg, Systematische Theologie Gesamtausgabe, Band 1, ed., Gunther Wenz (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2015), 66. 19

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if perhaps over-emphasizing the differences between Paul’s understanding of the cross and Luther’s own theologia crucis.21

3. The Epistemological Reversal of the Cross in Relation to Justification Luther understands theologians of glory to have an entirely different view of God and God’s relationship to humanity than theologians of the cross.22 Human wisdom (sapientia) apart from Christ, the wisdom then of the theologus gloriae, that seeks the invisible things of God is “completely puffed up, blinded, and hardened” (thesis 22).23 Luther’s understanding of God, however, centered on the cross of Christ as the source for being called a true theologian (thesis 20). Luther reverses any claim for human righteousness through works of the Law in the Heidelberg Disputation, critiquing those who look “upon the invisible things of God as though they were clearly perceptible in those things which have actually happened.”24 He elaborates in the proof to thesis 19, This is apparent in the example of those who were ‘theologians’ and still were called fools by the Apostle in Rom. 1[:22]. Furthermore, the invisible things of God are virtue, godliness, wisdom, justice, goodness, and so forth. The recognition of all these things does not make one worthy or wise.25

21 For Käsemann, Paul’s theologia crucis also includes the resurrection: “For Paul the glory of Jesus consists in the fact that he makes his disciples on earth willing and capable to bear the cross after him, and the glory of the church and of Christian life consists in the fact that they have the honor of glorifying the crucified Christ as the wisdom and power of God, to seek salvation in him alone, and to let their lives become a service to God under the sign of Golgotha. The theology of the resurrection is at this point a chapter in the theology of the cross, not its supersession. Since the time of Paul all theological controversy proceeds ultimately from one center and is therefore decided only in terms of this center: Crux sola est nostra theologia.” Käsemann, “The Pauline Theology of the Cross,” 177. Käsemann’s overall arguments are important for the present study’s examination of James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. See Chapter 8, n. 89 below. 22 According to Robert Kolb, theologians of glory “presume something about God’s glory, and something about the glory of being human.” Robert Kolb, “Luther on the Theology of the Cross,” in Lutheran Quarterly 16 (2002): 443–66; 446. 23 LW 31: 40–41; WA 1, 354: 23–24. See also n. 31 below 24 LW 31: 52. Non ille digne Theologus dicitur, qui invisibilia Dei, per ea, quae facta sunt, intellecta conspicit (WA 1, 354: 17–18). Cf. Thesis 1. “The law of God, the most salutary doctrine of life, cannot advance a man on his way to righteousness, but rather hinders him.” LW 31: 39. Lex Dei, saluberrima vitae doctrina, non potest hominem ad iusticiam promovere, sed magis obest (WA 1, 353: 15–16). 25 Ibid. Patet per eos, qui tales fuerunt Et tamen ab Apostolo Roma. 1. stulti vocantur. Porro invisibilia Dei sunt, virtus, divinitas, sapientia, iusticia, bonitas etc. haec omnia cognita non faciunt dignum nec sapientem (WA 1, 361: 34–36). See Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 28–30.

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Luther thus proposes what can be read as an epistemological reversal, emphasizing the mystical recognition of God hidden in Christ’s cross.26 According to von Loewenich, speaking of the crucified and hidden God is what makes one a theologian of the cross: Who is a theologian of the cross? A theologian of the cross is one who speaks of the crucified and hidden God (cf. LW 31: 225). A theologian of glory is one who does not recognize, along with the Apostle [Paul], the crucified and hidden God alone (cf. ibid.). ‘Crucified and hidden alone’ makes thoroughly clear that the hidden God cannot be a hypostasis [person] in or behind God, but is the one living God who is manifest as he is concealed in the cross of Christ.27

Von Loewenich builds on Luther’s statement that the theologian of the cross is one who speaks of the “crucified and hidden God” from the Explanations of the 26 Luther’s often referenced phrase Crux sola est nostra theologia (from Opertiones in Psalmos, 1519–1521, WA 5, 176: 32 f.) should be understood in relation to Theses 19–21 of the Heidelberg Disputation. Theses 19–21 show an incorporation and transformation of late medieval passion mysticism, which will be examined and incorporated throughout the first part of this study. Bayer argues related to Luther’s phrase Crux sola est nostra theologia: “[T]his phrase is seldom understood in its context. The excursus is proximate to the Heidelberg Disputation, in which Luther, on the threshold of his Reformation theology speaks of the ‘theologian of the cross’ (Theologus crucis) and the ‘theologian of glory’ (Theologus gloriae) (Thesis 21; LW 31: 40; WA 1, 354: 21 f.).” Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, 23. Related to the epistemological reversal of God being recognized as hidden in Christ’s cross, Jürgen Moltmann’s emphasis on theological epistemology in his book The Crucified God is a radicalization of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation. Moltmann does not satisfactorily consider Luther’s incorporation and transformation of late medieval passion mysticism as it is being examined in the present study, but he does address Luther’s notion of every Christian being a theologian, which may have further mystical origins. See Jürgen Moltmann, The Crucified God: The Cross of Christ as the Foundation and Criticism of Christian Theology, 1st ed., trans. R. A. Wilson and John Bowden (New York: Harper and Row, 1972), 208; Jürgen Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott: Das Kreuz Christi als Grund und Kritik christlicher Theologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1972), 193, and Chapter 7, n. 13 below. Related to this passage in Moltmann’s Crucified God, Bayer elaborates on Luther’s understanding that “every person is a theologian” (Omnes dicimur Theologi, ut omnes Christiani, WA 41, 11: 9–13), and the distinction between academically trained theologians in relation to other Christians in Oswald Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation, trans. Thomas H. Trapp (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008), 15–20. 27 Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 30. It is important to emphasize that Luther’s understanding of God’s hiddenness in the Heidelberg Disputation means God as hidden in the cross of Christ. There is a second form of hiddenness, God hidden behind the Word of the cross, which Luther writes of in On Bound Choice (1525). See Chapter 4 below, pp. 98–102, for a comparison between The Heidelberg Disputation and On Bound Choice, as well as a critical evaluation of von Loewenich’s argument for the compatibility between the two kinds of hiddenness. Bayer argues for a third form of God’s hiddenness, in which God attacks God’s promise in the word through spiritual Anfechtung, in what is arguably his most original contribution to contemporary Lutheran theology, even as the present study does not follow him here. See Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, 207–9, and the (as of 2023) only English-language scholarly monograph about Bayer’s theology, Joshua C. Miller, Hanging by a Promise: The Hidden God in the Theology of Oswald Bayer (Eugene: Pickwick Publications, 2015), 257–302, and Chapter 4, pp. 84–87 below.

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Disputation Concerning Indulgences, written in 1518 after the Heidelberg Disputation, but showing a continuity with the Heidelberg theses: A theologian of glory does not recognize, along with the Apostle, the crucified and hidden God alone. He sees and speaks of God’s glorious manifestation among the heathen, how this invisible nature can be known from the things which are visible and how he is present and powerful in all things everywhere. The theologian of glory, however, learns from Aristotle that the object of the will is the good and the good is worthy to be loved, while the evil, on the other hand, is worthy of hate. He learns that God is the highest good and exceedingly lovable. Disagreeing with the theologian of the cross, he defines the treasury of Christ as the removing and remitting of punishments, things which are most evil and worthy of hate. In opposition to this the theologian of the cross defines the treasury of Christ as impositions and obligations of punishments, things which are best and most worthy of love.28

We see in this excerpt a continuation of the theme of divine reversal that is prominent in Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation.29 For Luther, the theologian of the cross sees God in the last place human reason would look for God, and apart from speculation about divine majesty, in the paradox of God as crucified and hidden. Luther then attempts to show how punishments and sufferings are intrinsic to the Christian life as the Christian becomes conformed to Christ’s cross.30 Thesis 22 of the Heidelberg Disputation further shows the contrast between divine and human wisdom. “That wisdom which sees the invisible things of God in works as perceived by humankind is completely puffed up, blinded, and 28 LW 31: 225. Theologus vero gloriae (id est qui non cum Apostolo solum crucifixum et absconditum deum novit, sed gloriosum cum gentibus, ex visibilibus invisibilia eius, ubique presentem omnia potentem videt et loquitur) discit ex Aristotele, quod obiectum voluntatis sit bonum et bonum amabile, malum vero odibile, ideo deum esse summum bonum et summe amabile. Et inde dissentiens Theologo crucis diffinit, thesaurum Christi esse relaxationes et solutiones poenarum tanquam rerum pessimarum et odibilissimarum, Contra Theologus crucis, thesaurum Christi esse impositiones et alligationes poenarum tanquam rerum optimarum et amabilissimarum (WA 1, 614: 17–24). Important to the argument that Luther’s theologia crucis can be understood as being situated within the overall question of theological epistemology is the Latin word novit, from noscere, meaning “become cognizant of/get to know/learn/find out.” Cf. Alastair McGrath, Luther’s Theology of the Cross: Martin Luther’s Theological Breakthrough (Oxford: Blackwell, 1984), 150–51. For Luther’s critique of Aristotelian philosophy in the Heidelberg Disputation, see Leppin, Martin Luther, 131–33. 29 See again Luther’s intention for the Heidelberg Disputation to be “theological paradoxes” (Theologica paradoxica). LW 31: 39; WA 1, 353: 11. 30 Related to the “crucified and hidden God,” Timothy J. Wengert observes, “[Luther] provided a brief definition of a theologian of the cross – a term he preferred to theology of the cross – as one who speaks of God crucified and hidden. Hiddenness for Luther is no Platonic dreamworld; it marks, instead, the very visibility of God in the last place reason would deign to look  – on the cross. Note, too, that such a theologian speaks. This theologus loquens exactly matches the Deus loquens and, in the sense of law and gospel, the viva vox evangelii.” Timothy J. Wengert, “Peace, Peace … Cross, Cross: Reflections on How Martin Luther Relates the Theology of the Cross to Suffering,” Theology Today 59, no. 2 (2002): 190–205; 201.

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hardened.”31 The desire for human wisdom needs to then be cured by the extinguishing of it, as Luther argues in the proof to this thesis.32 The gift that results from the cross leads to love of neighbor without any regard to merit, which is addressed in the Proof to thesis 25. For the righteousness of God is not acquired by means of acts frequently repeated, as Aristotle taught, but it is imparted by faith, for ‘He who through faith is righteous shall live’ (Rom. 1[:17]), and ‘One believes with his heart and so is justified’ (Rom. 10[:10]). Therefore I wish to have the words ‘without work’ understood in the following manner: Not that the righteous person does nothing, but that his works do not make him righteous, rather that his righteousness creates works. For grace and faith are infused without our works. After they have been imparted the works follow. Thus Rom. 3[:20] states, ‘No human being will be justified in his sight by works of the law,’ and, ‘For we hold that man is justified by faith apart from works of law’ (Rom. 3[:28]). In other words, works contribute nothing to justification. Therefore a human being knows that works which he does by such faith are not his but God’s. For this reason he does not seek to become justified or glorified through them, but seeks God. His justification by faith in Christ is sufficient to him. Christ is his wisdom, righteousness, etc., as 1 Cor. 1[:30] has it, that he himself may be Christ’s action and instrument.33

From this thesis proof, it is plausible that a mystical theologia crucis and justification are related to one another and should not ultimately be separated. Christ is the gift who infuses grace and faith without human works.34 This is a 31

LW 31: 40–41. Sapientia illa, quae invisibilia Dei ex operibus intellecta conspicit, omnio inflat, excaecat et indurat (WA 1, 354: 23–24). 32 “The remedy for curing desire does not lie in satisfying it, but in extinguishing it. In other words, the one who wishes to become wise does not seek wisdom by progressing toward it but becomes a fool by retrogressing into seeking folly. Likewise the one who wishes to have much power, honor, pleasure, satisfaction in all things must flee rather than seek power, honor, pleasure, and satisfaction in all things. This is the wisdom which is folly to the world.” LW 31: 54. Restat ergo remedium, ut non explendo curetur, sed extinguendo, id est, ut qui vult fieri sapiens non querat sapientiam procedendo, sed fiat stultus querendo stulticiam retrocedendo. Sic qui vult fieri potens, gloriosus, voluptuosus, satur omnium rerum, fugiat potius quam querat potentiam, gloriam, voluptatem omniumque rerum saturitatem. Haec sapientia illa est, quae mundo est stulticia (WA 1, 363: 9–14). 33 LW 31: 55–56. Quia iusticia Dei non acquiritur ex actibus frequenter iteratis, ut Aristoteles docuit, sed infunditur per fidem. Iustus enim ex fide vivit Roma. 1. et 10. Corde creditur ad iusticiam. Unde illud ‘sine opere’ sic volo intelligi, Non quod iustus nihil operetur, sed quod opera eius non faciunt eius iusticiam, sed potius iusticia eius facit opera. Sine enim opere nostro gratia et fides infunditur, qua infusa iam sequuntur opera. Sic Roma. 3. dicitur: Ex operibus Legis non iustificabitur omnis homo, Et Roma. 3. Arbitramur enim iustificari hominem per fidem sine operibus Legis, id est, ad iustificationem nihil faciunt opera. Deinde, quia opera, quae ex tali fide facit, non sua sed Dei esse novit, Ideo non se per illa iustificari aut glorificari querit, sed Deum querit: sua sibi sufficit iusticia ex fide Christi, id est, ut Christus sit eius sapientia, iusticia etc. ut 1 Corinth. 1. dicitur, ipse vero sit Christi operatio seu instrumentum (WA 1, 364: 4–16). 34 Luther’s understanding of justification can thus fruitfully be thought of as both forensic and effective. Cf. Mark Mattes, “Luther on Justification as Forensic and Effective,” in Robert Kolb, Irene Dingel, and L’ubomír Batka, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Martin Luther’s Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 264–74, and the Finnish breakthrough in Luther

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demonstration of Christus sacramentum. Then, works follow from this infused grace and faith, with the believer becoming “Christ’s actions and instrument.” That “works do not make him righteous, rather his righteousness creates works” has implications for Christ as gift and example, as argued for by Vítor Westhelle. Luther’s resolve to keep the irresolution that the cross entails is directed to the two dominant ‘solutions’ he inherited from the models of atonement developed in medieval theology. These are represented by Anselm’s ‘satisfaction’ model and by the ‘moral influence’ theory suggested by Abelard. Both options  – one emphasizing the objective dimension of the cross event as working out the redemptive work of Christ and the other the subjective affection of a radically loving gesture – worked out the contradiction into a resolution. One tends toward a sacramental emphasis, working ex opere operato, while the other emphasizes the cross as an exemplary token. Neither is to be excluded, exemplum et sacramentum, the favor and the gift. Luther’s retention of the paradox, his decisive avoidance of ‘closure,’ keeps the focus on a cross that we simultaneously behold and endure.35

Luther emphases the passive righteousness of the sinner, whom God justifies apart from any merit or worthiness on the guilty sinner’s part. Robert Kolb elaborates, “The Law, inadequate to produce life, can only evaluate human living, resulting in death and condemnation for all that is not in Christ (thesis 23). Luther left the law’s goodness and wisdom unchallenged but soberly assessed its ability to produce God-pleasing trust in him.”36 For Luther, then, no work or merit can earn God’s favor. In fact, seeking after such favor is part and parcel to being theologians of glory, and a misuse of the Law. 22. That wisdom which sees the invisible things of God in works as perceived by man is completely puffed up, blinded, and hardened. 23. The law brings the wrath of God, kills, reviles, accuses, judges, and condemns everything that is not in Christ [Rom. 4:15]. 24. Yet that wisdom is not of itself evil, nor is the law to be evaded; but without the theology of the cross [sine theologia crucis] a human being misuses the best in the worst manner. 25. That person is not righteous who does much, but he who, without work, believes much in Christ. 26. The law says, “do this,” and it is never done. Grace says, “believe in this,” and everything is already done.37

research summarized in Carl E. Braaten and Robert W. Jenson, eds., Union with Christ: The New Finnish Interpretation of Luther (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998), esp. 25–70. However, both studies do not adequately examine the presence and transformation of late medieval passion mysticism in Luther’s own understanding of the cross and suffering. 35 Vítor Westhelle, Transfiguring Luther: The Planetary Promise of Luther’s Theology (Eugene: Cascade, 2016), 66. 36 Robert Kolb, Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 56. 37 LW 31: 41. 22. Sapientia illa, quae invisibilia Dei ex operibus intellecta conspicit, omnino inflat, execat et indurat. 23. Et lex iram Dei operator, occidit, maledicit, reum facit, indicat, damnat, quicquid non est in Christo. 24. Non tamen sapientia illa mala nec lex fugienda, Sed homo sine Theologia crucis optimis pessime abutitur. 25. Non ille iustus est qui multum operatur, Sed qui

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The theologia crucis shows the proper theological understanding of the Law for Luther, to kill in order that God can make alive, and to stress the prominence of grace in Jesus Christ, extinguishing the desire for being theologians of glory. Especially important for these theses is the unconditionality of grace, through which belief accomplishes everything through pure receptivity of grace. The Law’s task then is to kill, accuse, and condemn “everything that which is not in Christ” (thesis 24), in order that Christ is trusted (thesis 25). Traces of the theme of the vita passiva from Luther’s later Lectures on Galatians (1535), and with connections to Johannes Tauler, can be found in theses 22–26, in which, according to Bayer, “The righteousness of Christ is set in complete opposition to the righteousness of works; it is passive. We can only receive it. We do nothing, but instead suffer its coming from another, who works in us: God.”38

4. Creative Divine Love for Unlovable Sinners Thesis 28: “The love of God does not find, but creates that which is pleasing to it.”39 Here there is a qualitative distinction between divine love and human love. In the proof of this thesis, Luther elaborates: The first part is clear because the love of God which lives in the human loves sinners, evil persons, fools, and weaklings in order to make them righteous, good, wise, and strong. Rather than seeking its own good, the love of God flows forth and bestows good. Therefore sinners are attractive because they are loved; they are not loved because they are attractive. For this reason the love of the human avoids sinners and evil persons. Thus Christ says: ‘For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners’ [Matt. 9:13]. This is the love of the cross, born of the cross, which turns in the direction where it does not find good which it may enjoy, but where it may confer good upon the bad and needy person.40

Emphasizing the “love of the cross, born of the cross” (amor crucis ex cruce natus) shows, for Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation, a divine reversal of the recognition of divine love. This love does not come through works of the Law (for this only hinders one on the way to righteousness, as Luther argued in Thesis 1), but through God’s cruciform love on the cross. Here, both a spirituality of the cross sine opere multum credit in Christum. 26. Lex dicit ‘ fac hoc’, et nunquam fit: gratia dicit, ‘Crede in hunc’, et iam facta sunt omnia (WA 1, 354: 23–32). 38 Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, 43. Cf. LW 26: 4–12; WA 40 (1), 41: 2–6. 39 LW 31: 41. Amor Dei non invenit sed creat suum diligibile, Amor hominis fit a suo diligibili (WA 1, 354: 35–36). 40 LW 31: 57. Prima pars patet, quia amor Dei in homine vivens diligit peccatores, malos, stultos, infirmos, ut faciat iustos, bonos, sapientes, robustos et sic effluit potius et bonum tribuit. Ideo enim peccatores sunt pulchri, quia diliguntur, non ideo diliguntur, quia sunt pulchri, Ideo amor hominis fugit peccatores, malos. Sic Christus: Non veni vocare iustos, sed peccatores. Et iste est amor crucis ex cruce natus, qui illuc sese transfert, non ubi invenit bonum quo fruatur, sed ubi bonum conferat malo et egeno (WA 1, 365: 8–15).

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indebted to and transforming late medieval passion mysticism, and the question of theological epistemology can again be found. There is also a connection to Luther’s understanding of justification. Eberhard Jüngel writes: But love cannot be earned. It occurs unconditionally – or it is not love. When it has mercy on sinners, God’s love does not turn to those worthy or deserving of love, but to those who have deformed themselves, those unworthy of love, those first made worthy of love through God’s love: ‘The love of God does not find, but creates, that which is pleasing to it.’ There is absolutely nothing ‘good in the sinner’ which can contribute to the event of justification. Even if we wish to, sinners cannot earn the love of God. That love occurs to us through grace alone.41

The theologian of the cross, the one who “calls a thing as it is” (dicit id quod res est) is one who recognizes this divine reversal in terms of divine love for sinners, a creative love springing apart from any merit in terms of the works of the Law.42

5. Theologia Crucis and Contemporary Suffering: A Constructive Development Luther’s argument in Theses 20–21 of the Heidelberg Disputation that God is found “only in suffering and the cross,” and is known “hidden in suffering,” leads to the question about the relationship between a theologia crucis and contemporary forms of suffering. This question is important to consider in light of feminist concerns about the glorification of suffering in relation to a theologia crucis. Icelandic feminist scholar Arnfríður Guðmundsdóttir documents this question well, incorporating the pioneering work on Lutheran feminist epistemology done by Mary Solberg. Luther’s writings on suffering have caused people to question if he has become guilty of turning theology of the cross into a glorification of suffering, by encouraging people to enjoy their suffering and accept it passively. In her book Compelling Knowledge, Mary 41 Eberhard Jüngel, “On the Doctrine of Justification,” trans. John Webster, International Journal of Systematic Theology 1, no. 1 (1999): 41. See the Heidelberg Disputation, Theses 25–27 and the corresponding proofs for further elaboration on the relationship between divine grace/ work and the folly of human attempts for Luther of earning divine grace through human works of the law, while yet still emphasizing the importance of good works that follow from justifying faith. Of particular interest is the proof to Thesis 25. See n. 33 above. 42 Douglas John Hall writes about the theme of love in relation to the cross: “The truth that the cross of Christ embodies about us is certainly that we are loved by God, but that we are loved as prodigals, as problematic creatures, as beings whose alienation from God, from one another, from ourselves, and from the inarticulate creation is so great that we will accept love only on our terms, when it corresponds with our desire to be affirmed without asking of us that we become authentic and without requiring of us any depth of commitment comparable to the love that is being shown us.” Douglas John Hall, The Cross in Our Context: Jesus and the Suffering World (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003), 102–3; 102.

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Solberg writes about Luther’s understanding of suffering, in which she stresses the importance that Luther’s ‘emphasis on suffering as the form of true Christian discipleship is descriptive, not prescriptive, legalistic, or moralistic.’ While Luther warned against self-chosen sufferings, usually related to suffering as good works, Luther saw suffering in terms of ‘conformation’ to Christ. According to Luther, suffering is an unavoidable part of life and as such a part of the reality theologians have to speak to.43

Guðmundsdóttir takes seriously the challenge feminist theologies pose to a theologia crucis as found in Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation. She shows how this text should not be abused to endorse the glorification of suffering, and thus how a theologia crucis centered in the crucified Christ should not be turned into a contemporary theologia gloriae. Further, the Heidelberg Disputation says nothing about seeking out suffering as a good work, or that suffering is evidence of a justified sinner’s special standing before God. Instead, this text implies a truth-telling principle of the divine reversal of common expectations related to God and God’s works, in which God is mystically known as hidden in the suffering of the crucified Christ.44 As Luther established in Theses 1–4, 1. The law of God, the most salutary doctrine of life, cannot advance the human on his way to righteousness, but rather hinders him. 2. Much less can human works, which are done over and over again with the aid of natural precepts, so to speak, lead to that end. 3. Al43 Arnfríður Guðmundsdóttir, Meeting God on the Cross: Christ, the Cross, and the Feminist Critique (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 77. Italic in original. Cf. Mary Solberg, Compelling Knowledge: A Feminist Proposal for an Epistemology of the Cross (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1997), 23–55. Arguments from feminist theologians are being considered here, and will be further considered in the constructive development in Chapter 3 (see pp. 73–76), due to the present study’s concerns with exploring transformations and transfigurations of the doctrine of justification from the individual guilty sinner before God in Luther’s early theology to victims and perpetrators of systemic injustice as found in the later theology of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and in the theologies of Jürgen Moltmann and James Cone. A transformation of Luther’s understanding of justification can also be found in Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre, wherein election/predestination becomes collective. Barth’s Erwählungslehre was received, developed, and critiqued by Moltmann in The Crucified God, which then was important for James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. See Chapter 5, pp. 111–13, Chapter 6, pp. 157–61, Chapter 7, pp. 188–91, and Chapter 8, n. 116 below. Finally, Lyndal Roper has written a biography of Luther from a feminist perspective that is arguably an updated version of Heiko Oberman’s watershed Luther biography from 1981. See Lyndal Roper, Martin Luther: Renegade and Prophet (New York: Random House, 2017). 44 Hall critiques intentional seeking after suffering, as has been practiced in certain pietistic circles of Lutheranism, as a contemporary theologia gloriae. “The church does not have to suffer, as if there were no other possibility – indeed, the fact that the historic church has so regularly and characteristically managed to avoid suffering ought to set to rest any insistence that Christians always and necessarily suffer. However, whenever the church has made good its claim to Christ’s discipleship, it has at least known the call to suffer. And again let me repeat (because it can never be said often enough): called to suffer not because suffering is good or beneficial or ultimately rewarding (I think Paul can actually be criticized a little for giving that impression in Romans 5), but called to suffer because there is suffering – that is, because God’s creatures, including human beings, are already suffering, because “the whole creation groans.” See Hall, “The Church and the Cross,” in The Cross in Our Context, 137–55; 152. Italics in original.

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though the works of humans always seem attractive and good, they are nevertheless likely to be mortal sins. 4. Although the works of God always seem unattractive and appear evil, they are nevertheless really eternal merits.45

If Luther were arguing for the glorification of suffering in The Heidelberg Disputation, he would have contradicted his premise of the inability of human works through the Law to advance one on the way to righteousness. It can thus be argued that Luther does not understand suffering as a good work or a matter of glorification, since the Heidelberg Disputation conversely stresses the inability of any works to justify before God. Suffering, then, can be understood as part of conformity to Christ. Timothy J. Wengert develops the understanding of suffering as conformity to Christ in relation to Luther’s description of God as crucified and hidden in the Explanations of the Disputation Concerning Indulgences: [T]he theologian of the cross does not make suffering holy but teaches that it is holy by virtue of Christ’s own suffering and by virtue of God willing these travails to be what they are not. God simply chooses to declare suffering to be what it can never be in and of itself. To be sure, God chooses because of Christ’s suffering and resurrection, because of the divine identification with suffering and its ultimate, proper goal – life. However, even more to the point, the triune God simply has mercy on the human predicament as it now stands and takes it into the very heart of God through the cross. By the word alone, God wills what is not – suffering, punishment, and death – into an existence enlivened by the Holy Spirit.46

Wengert’s description of the theologia crucis in relation to suffering is similar to Guðmundsdóttir’s. Instead of intentionally seeking after suffering, or turning suffering into a good work, the theologus crucis today understands Christ to be present in suffering, because of Christ’s suffering on the cross. While the argument for Christ’s presence in contemporary forms of suffering is a development of Luther’s theology, it is centered in Theses 19 and 20 of the Heidelberg Disputation and will be explored throughout this study for a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation.47

45 LW 31: 39. 1. Lex Dei saluberrima vitae doctrina, non potest hominem ad iusticiam promovere, sed magis obest. 2. Multo minus opera hominum, naturalis dictaminis auxilio frequenter, ut dicitur, iterata, possunt promovere. 3. Opera hominum ut semper sint speciosa, bonaque videantur, probabile tamen est ea esse peccata mortalia. 4. Opera Dei, ut semper sint deformia malaque videantur, vere tamen sunt merita immortalia (WA 1, 354: 15–22). 46 Wengert, “Peace, Peace … Cross, Cross,” 201–2. Italics in original. 47 A theologia crucis beginning in the Heidelberg Disputation should thus not be thought of as advocating suffering as a “good work,” but it remains an open question as to what Luther’s own understanding of the Law as the “killing” of the Old Adam means in relation to contemporary forms of suffering and victimization. This question is especially related to how sin can be reframed from a feminist perspective, rather than through masculine notions of “pride.” See Valerie Saiving-Goldstein, “The Human Situation: A Feminine View,” The Journal of Religion

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6. Conclusion The close reading of the Heidelberg Disputation for the theme of theologia crucis in the present chapter has attempted to explore Luther’s own claims about the cross to give a foundation for the transformation and transfiguration of this theme in the present study. This exploration has sought to show from the text that Luther’s understanding of a theologia crucis implies a theological epistemology providing a starting point for a staurocentric hermeneutic to being a theologian. With Pauline, paradoxical, and mystical roots (not to be confused with Paulinism), “Luther accentuated the power of the gospel to re-create sinners in God’s image. But on the basis of 1 Corinthians 1 and 2 he told hearers that God’s Word from the cross appears to sinners to be foolish and impotent.”48 True theology centers in recognizing the crucified Christ, not as a concept to be grasped through works, but stressing that God is found decisively in suffering and the cross (Theses 19 and 20). Luther’s theologia crucis as a theme has often been called a “theology of revelation,” particularly since von Loewenich’s work, which was written within the context of twentieth- century dialectical theology.49 If thought of in terms dialectical theology, this assessment cannot be found in the text of the Heidelberg Disputation. However, referencing von Loewenich but not using a framework indebted to dialectical theology herself, Guðmundsdóttir argues that the theme of theologia crucis in the Heidelberg Disputation is a theology of revelation a posteriori in relation to theological knowledge. Opposing the kind of theology that relies on speculation and theological conjecture, a theology of the cross is first and foremost a ‘theology of revelation.’ This implies a theological knowledge that is a posteriori, a reflection ‘after the fact about that which God has done.’ Hence, the theology of the cross ‘[does not] live out of ideas, but out of experiences.’50

Guðmundsdóttir’s position is a better description of a theologia crucis beginning in texts from the early Martin Luther as a theology of revelation than von Loewenich, because her position can still be ultimately situated within the Heidelberg Disputation’s assertion of the proper knowledge of God in God’s back (visibilia dei et posteriora) in Thesis 20, and thus, within the question of epis40, no. 2 (1960): 100–12, esp. 109, and “Luther’s Freedom of a Christian in View of Systemic Sin: A Constructive Development” in Chapter 3, pp. 73–76 below. 48 Kolb, Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith, 55. 49 Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 11–14. It needs to be kept in mind that von Loewenich’s text was originally released in 1929, and therefore could not have engaged with Barth’s Erwählungslehre from the Church Dogmatics, which was written in 1942. Von Loewenich’s various later editions of his doctoral dissertation also do not explore how Barth’s Erwählungslehre might relate to a theologia crucis. 50 Guðmundsdóttir, Meeting God on the Cross, 74–78; 78.

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temology as related to and transforming late medieval passion mysticism. She continues: In Luther’s cross-centered theology, the cross is the key not only to his understanding of God but also to his interpretation about the person and work of Jesus Christ. To know God a posteriori is to know God wrapped in human flesh (deus incarnatus), thus, the close connection between an incarnational theology and a theology of the cross. By acknowledging the cross of Christ as ‘the sole authentic locus’ of human knowledge of God, Luther exposes his understanding of Christ as ‘the perfect and visible manifestation of the nature of the invisible God.’51

Guðmundsdóttir helps to show how von Lowenich is correct overall in his emphasis on theological epistemology, even though the Heidelberg Disputation should be thought of only as within the question of proper knowledge of God. Von Loewenich thus remains indebted to the tradition of twentieth-century dialectical theology in his analysis of Luther’s theology, and this limitation in his work should be noted when it is consulted for Luther studies today.52 According to Luther in the Heidelberg Disputation, then, theological knowledge is impossible apart from the crucified Christ. The Heidelberg Disputation describes the theologus crucis as one who recognizes and comprehends God in the hiddenness and paradox of the crucified Christ, and passively does good works following this true knowledge of Christ (cf. the proof to thesis 25). It also shows Luther’s theology as sapientia, evidenced by the historical connection to Bernard of Clairvaux and late medieval passion mysticism. Kolb describes theologians of the cross well, according to the text of the Heidelberg Disputation: “So theologians of glory label evil good and good evil; theologians of the cross align their thinking with God’s view of reality and call things what they are.”53 With this chapter concerning the Heidelberg Disputation now complete, the present study proceeds to explore traces of a sapiential theologia crucis in select pastoraldevotional texts of the early Luther.

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Ibid. Alastair McGrath argues for the compatibility between Luther’s theologia crucis and twentieth-century dialectical theology, while also admitting the “serious anachronism” of describing Luther as a “theologian of the Word of God”: “The theologia crucis represents a programmatic critique of the analogical nature of theological language. The concept of absconditus sub contrario …. represents the most radical critique of the principle of analogy in theological discourse yet known, and, at least in this respect, parallels the origins of dialectical theology in the early twentieth century. While we would be guilty of a serious anachronism if we were to dub Luther a ‘theologian of the Word of God,’ given the twentieth-century connotations of this phrase, the fact remains that Luther insists that the word to which all theology must be related is the word of the cross. Crux probat omnia! All responsible discourse about God must be based upon the cross, and must be subject to criticism upon this basis.” Cf. McGrath, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 159. 53 Kolb, Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith, 57. 52

Chapter 2

A Meditation on Christ’s Passion / A Sermon on Preparing to Die (1519) Having closely read the Heidelberg Disputation in relation to the theme of theologia crucis, the study now proceeds to explore the cross theme in selected pastoral texts from the early Martin Luther. The first group to be presented are two sermons written in 1519 and are thus in close proximity to the Heidelberg Disputation. They both explicitly reference the crucified Christ in a devotional fashion, meaning they provide a good basis for testing Timothy J. Wengert’s observation that, “Martin Luther was, more than anything else, pastor and preacher to his Wittenberg flock,” at least as pertaining to Luther’s early years, as he made academic theology accessible for the broader public.1 The theme of theologia crucis as was found in the Heidelberg Disputation is in the background of the reading below, as we now examine the connections between Luther’s arguments pertaining to the cross theme in the Heidelberg theses and traces of this theme in texts of spiritual-pastoral devotion. The study will also keep Luther’s relationship to and transformation of late medieval passion mysticism in the background, in order to further show Luther’s understanding of theology as sapientia, and the spiritual application of the theme of theologia crucis in the chosen texts.2 These considerations are all related to what is rooted in Luther, and what is transformed through the twentieth century theologians selected for close reading, culminating in reading James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis. 1 Timothy J. Wengert, ed., The Pastoral Luther: Essays on Martin Luther’s Practical Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009), 1. 2 As argued in the Introduction and Chapter 1 of the present study, Luther’s theology does not have the sharp distinction between theory and praxis or sacred and secular that often characterizes academic theology since the eighteenth century. Theology was sapientia for Luther, but this stress on wisdom included scientia (science) rather than excluding it. See Oswald Bayer, Theologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1994), 49–55, and the section on Oswald Bayer’s reading of Luther’s hermeneutics in the Introduction of this study. Further, the present chapter’s concerns correspond to Walter Altmann’s observation about Luther’s understanding of God as incorporating both the academic and the practical: “When Luther spoke about God, it was not a theoretical question for him, but above all practical, insofar as he reflected from a concrete personal relationship between the believer and his God. This relation of human beings with their ‘god’ is fundamentally characterized by trust and the dedication of their lives.” Walter Altmann, Luther and Liberation: A Latin American Perspective, 2nd ed., trans. Thia Cooper (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2016), 31.

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1. A Meditation on Christ’s Passion This text begins with Luther’s descriptions of what constitutes for him the incorrect manner for meditating on Christ’s passion, showing therefore first what the Reformer considers in need of correction, in order that he might present an evangelical spiritual meditation on the passion of Christ.3 He begins with a critique of those “venting their anger on the Jews,” to redirect the focus from blame on others to centering on the passion of Christ. Luther writes, Some people meditate on Christ’s passion by venting their anger on the Jews. This singing and ranting about wretched Judas satisfies them, for they are in the habit of complaining about other people, of condemning and reproaching their adversaries. That might well be a meditation on the wickedness of Judas and the Jews, but not on the sufferings of Christ.4

While Luther’s critique of “The Jews” is certainly problematic from a contemporary perspective, it is noteworthy that this critique is offered only in relationship to the greater importance on the “sufferings of Christ” rather than “the wickedness of Judas and the Jews.”5 That the text begins with a re-direction from blame of others to the “sufferings of Christ” is a move that is shown to be consistent throughout the remainder of the meditation. In other words, Christ’s 3 The phrase “evangelical spiritual meditation” is used to show how Luther both incorporates and transforms a tradition of passion piety in a particular evangelical form. See Berndt Hamm, The Early Luther: Stages in a Reformation Reorientation (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017), ix–xv; 1–26; 190–233, Jonathan Reinert, Passionspredigt im 16. Jahrhundert: Das Leiden und Sterben Jesu Christi in den Postillen Martin Luthers, der Wittenberger Tradition und altgläubiger Prediger (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020), 34–63, and Volker Leppin, Transformationen: Studien zu den Wandlungsprozessen in Theologie und Frömmigkeit zwischen Spätmittelalter und Reformation (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020), 1–17; 279–303. Also of interest is Leppin’s question of what constitutes a properly “Lutheran” theology related to Luther’s own mysticism, in Volker Leppin, Die fremde Reformation: Luthers mystische Wurzeln (München: C. H. Beck, 2017), 206–7. 4 LW 42: 7. “Zcum ersten bedencken ettlich das leyden Christi alszo, das sie vber die Juden tzornig werden, singen vnd schelten vber den armen Judas vnd lassen es alszo gnug seynn, gleych wie sie gewont, andere leuth zu clagen vnd yhre widdersacher vordamen vnd vorsprechen. Das mocht wol mit Christus leyden, sondern Iudas vnd der Iuden boesheyt bedacht heyszen” (WA 2, 136: 1–10). 5 Ibid. Thus, the Meditation on Christ’s Passion corresponds to Luther’s 1523 text, That Jesus Christ was Born a Jew (LW 45: 195–229; WA 11 (307), 314–36), in terms of his less vile treatment of the Jewish faith to his later writings. Among the vast array of scholarly literature existing on this topic, an overview is provided by Hans-Martin Kirn, “Luther und die Juden,” in Albrecht Beutel, ed., Luther Handbuch (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005), 217–24. A recent historical monograph on this subject is Thomas Kaufmann, Luthers Juden (Stuttgart: Reclam, 2014). Hans-Martin Barth’s systematic overview of Luther’s theology offers both an historically sensitive treatment of Luther’s anti-Jewish rhetoric, particularly that of the late Luther, and the constructive theological possibilities arising out of Luther’s theology once these strong limitations have been addressed. Barth also addresses Luther’s anti-Islamic polemics, as well as his view of witches and demons under the section of his text dealing with the limitations of Luther’s theology from a contemporary perspective. See Hans-Martin Barth, The Theology of Martin Luther: A Critical Assessment (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2013), 29–77; 467–75.

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passion is to be the central point, rather than the various ways one might try to avoid it, as evidenced by the title of the text. Having established the incorrectness of blaming the Jews for the sufferings of Christ, Luther turns to critiquing a form of what he sees as works righteousness that seeks to avoid suffering. For him, carrying crosses, booklets, and pictures is thought to be a protection from suffering, which he sees as antithetical to a correct meditation on the passion.6 Luther critiques this seeking to avoid suffering through good works by noting a lack of suffering is contrary to Christ’s “being and nature.” “Christ’s suffering is thus used to effect in them a lack of suffering contrary to his being and nature.”7 Thirdly, Luther critiques those who “feel pity for Christ, lamenting and bewailing his existence.” He says those who do this are “like the women who followed Christ from Jerusalem and were chided and told by Christ that it would be better to weep for themselves and their children [Luke 23:27–28].”8 Luther then includes those who believe they have contemplated Christ correctly by hearing mass in his critique, stressing the passion in relation to how he understands the purpose of the mass. “Yet the mass was not instituted for its own worthiness, but to make us worthy and to remind us of the passion of Christ [des leydens Christi].”9 What Oswald Bayer would understand as the theme of promise can then be found when Luther writes, “Of what help is it to you that God is God, if he is not God to you?10,11 Emphasizing the promise of God “to  6

LW 42: 7; WA 2, 136: 10–20. Ibid. “vnd alszo Christus leyden eyn vnleyden yn yhn wircken sol widder seyn art vnd natur” (WA 2, 136: 19–20).  8 LW 42: 7–8. “Zcum dritten haben sie eyn mit leyden mit Christo, yhn zu clagen vnd zu beweynen alsz eynen vnschuldigen menschen gleych wie die weyber, die Christo von Jerusalem nach folgeten, vnd von yhm gestrafft wurden, sie solten sich selb beweynen vnd yhre kinder” (WA 2, 136: 21–24).  9 LW 42: 8. “so doch die messe nit vmb yhr selbs wirdickeyt, sondernn vnsz zuwirdigen ist eyn gesetzt, szonderlich vmb des leydens Christi willen zu bedencken” (WA 2, 137: 2–4). 10 Ibid. “dan was hillft dichs, das gott got ist, wan er dier nit eyn got ist?” (WA 2, 137: 6). 11 Here is evidence for what Bayer argues is Luther’s “reformational discovery” – the promise of the Gospel, which Bayer emphasizes belongs to the core of Luther’s theology. Bayer’s thesis has been challenged by recent historical scholarship on Luther, which seeks to situate Luther within the context of the late Middle Ages, and within an incorporation and transformation of passion mysticism in particular. Notwithstanding the developments in historical research about Luther’s theology since Bayer published his groundbreaking book Promissio, it should still be emphasized that the theme of promise is an important aspect of Luther’s theology, and that this theme corresponds to the theologia crucis, as well as Luther’s understanding of justification. Bayer writes, “Nachdem Luther der Messe selbst eine im Grunde belanglose Rolle zugesprochen hat, erstaunt es nicht, daß er das Hören des Wortes Gottes für nötiger hält als das Hören der Messe, die nach dem Willen Christi (1. Kor 11,25) und Pauli (1 Kor 11,26) gerade um der Verkündigung der Evangeliums willen zelebriert werden soll …. Luther geht es lediglich darum, daß keine Messe gehalten, ohne daß dabei gepredigt wird – und zwar nicht ‘humana et doctrinae iuris ac philosophorum’, sondern das ‘Euvangelium, id est (nach 1. Kor 11,25), memoria Christi’…. Das Wort ist dabei nicht als Proklamation, sondern als im Grunde zufälliges Mittel  7

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you” (German: dan was hilfft dichs das gott got ist wan er dier nit eyn got ist?) can reasonably be said to refer to the crucified Christ, in accordance with the passion mysticism common in Luther’s day.12 After these three critiques, Luther proceeds to show the correct way to contemplate Christ’s passion. “They contemplate Christ’s passion aright who view it with a terror-stricken heart and a despairing conscience.”13 That he begins this way shows a theological sequence of Law and Gospel, and thus how the Law kills in order that the Gospel might make alive in relation to the cross of Christ.14 Christ who is the “eternal wisdom of the Father” has suffered and died to appease the “stern wrath and unchanging earnestness with which God looks upon sin and sinners,” in reference to Isaiah 53.15 It must be an inexpressible and unbearable earnestness that forces such a great and infinite person to suffer and die to appease it. And if you seriously consider that it is God’s very own son, the eternal wisdom of the Father, who suffers, you will be terrified indeed. The more you think about it, the more intensely will you be frightened.16

The conscience of sinners is thus terror-stricken and despairing. At this point, Christ is not seen as consolation for sin, but rather a word of accusing Law to guilty sinners. Said terror-stricken and despairing conscience is related to Anfechtung (spiritual trial/agonizing struggle)17 that is part and parcel to the zur andächtigen Versenkung in das Bild das leidenden und sterbenden Christus verstanden.” Oswald Bayer, Promissio: Geschichte der Reformatorischen Wende in Luthers Theologie, 2nd ed. (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1989), 110–11. For an argument that takes seriously both the notion of a decisive evangelical development in Luther’s thinking, particularly regarding a critique of Aristotle, as well as his relationship to and incorporation of theology in the Middle Ages, see Alastair McGrath, Luther’s Theology of the Cross: Martin Luther’s Theological Breakthrough (Oxford: Blackwell, 1990), 136–47. 12 Leppin argues Luther was particularly influenced by Johannes von Paltz and Johannes von Staupitz, in terms of passion mysticism related to devotional literature. See Volker Leppin, “Passionsmystik bei Luther,” Lutherjahrbuch 84 (2017): 54–57. 13 LW 42: 8. “Zcum vierden. Die bedenckenn das leyden Christi recht, die yhn alszo ansehn, daz sie hertzlich darfur erschrecken vnd yhr gewissen gleych sincket yn eyn vorzagen” (WA 2, 137: 10–12). 14 Cf. Theses 1–7 of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation, LW 31: 39–40; WA 1, 353: 15–28. For Luther’s Law-Gospel sequence, see Oswald Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation, trans. Thomas H. Trapp (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007), 58–63. 15 LW 42: 9. “Das erschrecken sol da her kummen das du sihest den gestrengen zorn vnd vnwanckelbarn ernst gottis vber die sund vnd sundere, das er auch seynem eynigen allerliebsten sun hat nit wollen die sunder losz geben, er thette dan fur sie eynn solche schwere pusz, als er spricht durch Jsaiam 53” (WA 2, 137: 12–15). 16 Ibid. “Es musz eyn vnsprechlicher, vntreglicher ernst da sey, dem szo eyn grosze vnmeslich person entgegen geht vnd da fur leydet vnd stirbt, vnd wan du recht tieff bedenckst, das gottis sun, die ewige weyszheyt des vatters, selbst leydet, szo wirstu wol erschrecken, vnnd yhe mehr yhe tieffer” (WA 2, 137: 17–21). 17 The phrase “agonizing struggle” is how Thomas H. Trapp translated the word Anfechtung in the English edition of Bayer’s later study on Martin Luther’s theology. This translation takes seriously the existential dimension of Luther’s theology, and relates to how Luther saw theology

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Christian life for Luther, rooted again in mysticism, and which Staupitz taught Luther to see as a “cross and a grace.”18 Related to Luther’s own struggles with Anfechtungen, Hamm notes, “Even though Stauptiz could not really understand the spiritual anguish of Luther’s spiritual Anfechtungen, he helped him see them as necessary afflictions rooted in God’s merciful direction.”19 A Meditation on Christ’s Passion continues with an admonition to realize the reader’s own sins are what lead to Christ’s death. “You must get this thought through your head and not doubt that you are the one who is torturing Christ thus, for your sins have surely wrought this.”20 The spiritual accent of the sermon becomes apparent here, related to late medieval passion mysticism. The proper contemplation of Christ, then, does not involve the ways Luther critiqued above, but rather knowing one’s own sins are responsible for Christ’s death. “Therefore, when you see the nails piercing Christ’s hands, you can be certain that it is your work. When you behold his crown of thorns, you may rest assured that these are your evil thoughts, etc.”21 Luther emphasizes the humanity of Christ by accenting the nails that pierced Christ’s hands (cf. the Thomas story in John 20:24–2922), in relation to the nails that should have pierced the guilty sinner, with historical connections to Bernard of Clairvaux.23 “When Christ is tortured by nails penetrating his primarily as sapientia, wherein monastic and academic theology were intertwined, with monastic theology providing the content for academic theology. See Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology, xii-xiv. Vítor Westhelle argues the following about Anfechtung in relation to a theologia crucis: “Anfechtung means being in trial, probation, and tribulation, spiritual or otherwise. This is the ‘touchstone’ because you cannot do theology without experiencing cross and suffering and persecution. Prayer and meditation ought to lead to Anfechtung only so we may know that the Devil and his minions are indeed being confronted.” See Vítor Westhelle, “Luther’s Theologia Crucis,” in Robert Kolb, Irene Dingel, and L’ubomír Batka, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Martin Luther’s Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 165. 18 Hamm, The Early Luther, 44. 19 Ibid. 20 LW 42: 9. “Zcum funften, das du dir tieff eyn bildest vnd gar nicht zweyffelst, du seyest der der Christum alszo marteret, dan deyn sund habens gewiszlich than” (WA 2, 137: 22–23). 21 Ibid. “Drumb, wan du die negel Christi sihst durch seyn hend dringen, glaub sicher, das deynn werck seynd, sichstu seyn doerenn kron, glaub, es seyn deyn boesz gedancken etc.” (WA 2, 137: 27–29). 22 A theological-pastoral commentary on the Thomas story in relation to a theologia crucis is found in Robert H. Smith, Wounded Lord: Reading the Gospel of John Through the Eyes of Thomas – A Pastoral and Theological Commentary on the Fourth Gospel, ed., Donna Duensing (Eugene: Cascade, 2009). Smith argues both that the Gospel of John should be interpreted as a theologia crucis, and that Thomas should be called “faithful Thomas,” rather than “doubting Thomas,” as Thomas will have no other God than the “wounded Lord” of Golgotha. Karl Barth’s exegesis of the Thomas story in relation to the bodily resurrection of Jesus is arguably a predecessor to Smith’s arguments. See Karl Barth, CD 3.2, 330; KD 3.2, 397. 23 Emphasizing Christ’s humanity connects historically to late medieval passion mysticism, and to the spiritual writings of Bernard of Clairvaux, as Leppin has demonstrated: “Die Bernhardinische Mystik ist im wesentlichen eine christologisch zentrierte Leidens. und Liebensmystik: Das Leben Christi wird als Ganzes, seit der Inkarnation, als Leidensweg gedeutet,

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hands and feet, you should eternally suffer the pain they inflict and the pain of even more cruel nails, which will in truth be the lot of those who do not avail themselves of Christ’s passion.”24 It is further apparent that no consolation is to be found here, but only the terror of sin before the mirror of Christ, exemplified when Luther calls Christ the “this earnest mirror” (diszer ernster spiegel) at the end of point 6.25 However, emphasizing the terror of sin ultimately has an important spiritual purpose for Luther – the conformity to Christ, which he learned from Johannes von Staupitz.26 We must give ourselves wholly to this matter, for the main benefit of Christ’s passion is that one sees into his own true self and that he be terrified and crushed by this. Unless we seek that knowledge, we do not derive much benefit from Christ’s passion. The real and true work of Christ’s passion is to make the human being conformable to Christ, so that one’s conscience is tormented by his sins in like measure as Christ was pitiably tormented in body and soul by our sins. This does not call for many words but for profound reflection and a great awe of sins.27

For Luther, then, conformity to Christ is why one must first see Christ as an “earnest mirror,” being terrified at the remembrance of one’s sins, and being in aber als ein solcher, der nötig wurde, um den Menschen zur identifikatorischen Liebe einzuladen. Diese wiederum vollzieht sich als Erkenntnis der eigenen Sündigkeit, Nachfolge Christi und schließlich unio mit Christus.… Daß Bernhard für Luther hochattraktiv werden konnte, macht schon allein der bei Bernhard immer wieder betonte Begriff der ‘Demut’ deutlich, der auch für den jungen Luther eine entscheidende Kategorie darstellte. Auffällig aber und in der neueren Forschung wiederholt hervorgehoben ist, daß sich Luther zeit seines Lebens positiv auf Bernhard berief.” Volker Leppin, “Mystik,” in Beutel, ed., Luther Handbuch, 60. Luther specifically references Bernard regarding Christ’s being both the “earnest mirror” and the one who bears the guilty sinner’s sin in point 7 of the meditation. See LW 42: 9; WA 2, 137 (37)–38: 3. 24 LW 42: 9. “Wa Christo eyn hagell seynn hend adder fuesz durch martert, soltestu ewige solch vnd noch erger negell erleyden, alszo dan auch geschehn wirt denen, die Christus leyden an yhn laszen vorloren werden” (WA 2, 137: 32–34). 25 Ibid. “dan diszer ernster spiegel, Christus, wirt nit liegen noch schimpfen, Was er anzeygt, musz also seyn vberschwencklich” (WA 2, 137: 34–35). 26 For Luther’s spiritual-theological relation to Staupitz, see Volker Leppin, “Ich hab all mein ding von Doctor Staupitz: Johannes von Staupitz als geistlicher Begleiter in Luthers reformatorischer Entwicklung,” in Leppin, Transformationen, 241–61, esp. 246–54. Further, the notion of the conformitas Chrisi is related to Christ as Sacrament. So, Leppin: “An Christus erkennt der Glaubende sich selbst. Es reicht also nicht, compassio mit Christus zu empfinden, man muss vielmehr in den Wunden Christi die Wunden der eigenen Seele erkennen.” Leppin, “Passionsmystik bei Luther,” 67. 27 LW 42: 10. “Zcum achten, yn dieszem punct musz man sich gar wol vbenn, dan fast der nutz des leydens Christi gar daran gelegen ist, das der mensch zu seyns selb erkentnisz kumme vnd für yhm selbs erschrecke vnd zurschlagenn werde, Vnd wo der mensch nit da hyn kommet, ist yhm das leyden Christi noch nit recht nutz worden, dan das eygene naturlich werck des leydens Christi ist, daz es yhm den menschen gleych formig mache, das wie Christus am leyb vnnd seel jamerlich in vnsern sunden gemartert wirt, mussen wir auch ym nach alszo gemartert werden im gewissen von vnszernn sunden. Es geht auch hie nit zu mit vielen worten, sondern mit tieffen gedancken vnd grosz achtung der sonden” (WA 2, 138: 15–23).

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awe of what Christ accomplished on the cross for the guilty sinner.28 Conformity to Christ is still not to be thought of as a form of “works righteousness,” though. If this were the case, Luther’s above critiques of misdirected “works” in relation to the proper meditation of Christ’s passion would be only substituting one form of justification by works of the Law with another. Conversely, Luther is stressing conformity to the “earnest mirror” of Christ’s passion to then move to the spiritual consolation offered by the crucified Christ.29 Rather than a human work, then, conformity to Christ is accomplished by God’s own action (God’s “alien work”), in order that God might justify sinners through Jesus Christ (God’s “proper work”).30 In Luther’s words, “For it is inevitable, whether in this life or in hell, that you will have to become conformable to Christ’s image and suffering … Unless God inspires our heart, it is impossible for us of ourselves to meditate thoroughly on Christ’s passion.”31 Having stated the incorrect ways to contemplate Christ’s passion, as well as that the “real and true work of Christ’s passion is to make one conformable to Christ,” Luther proceeds to the benefits of contemplating Christ’s passion over and against what he considers to be incorrect contemplation of the passion in relation to good works. Contemplating Christ’s sufferings “changes a person’s being, and, almost like baptism, gives him a new birth.” Thus, Christ’s passion “performs its natural and noble work, strangling the old Adam and banishing all joy, delight, and confidence which [a human being] could derive from other creatures, even as Christ was forsaken by all, even by God.”32 Luther’s explicit reference here to Christ being “forsaken by all, even by God” is related again to late medieval passion mysticism, showing the spiritual application of the cross theme for Luther. It can further be reasonably argued that the theme of theologia crucis stands behind Luther’s understanding of conformity to Christ, his distinction between active 28 This topic, Christ taking the sin of the guilty sinner onto himself on the cross, will be examined in the following chapter when addressing Luther’s Freedom of a Christian related to the mystical theme of the “happy exchange.” 29 The spiritual consolation of the crucified Christ is related to Paltz’s notion of gazing on a crucifix for thinking on the wounds of Christ. “In seiner Anleitung hierzu empfahl Paltz, ‘ein Kruzifix anzusehen und mit dem gedanken in die heiligen funf wunden, sonderlich in die heiligen seiten’ zu fliehen.” Leppin, “Passionsmystik bei Luther,” 57. 30 Cf. Luther’s 1519 sermon, Two Kinds of Righteousness, LW 31: 293–306; WA 2, 145–52. A commentary on this sermon in relation to the late Middle Ages is found in Robert Kolb, Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 64–68. 31 LW 42: 10–11. “dan do wirt nit anders aus, dem Bild vnd leyden Christi mustu gleychformig werden, es geschehe yn dem leben adder yn der hellenn … dan es auch nit muglich ist, das Christus leyden bedencken, dan es auch nit muglich ist, das Christus leydenn von vnsz selber mueg bedacht werdenn gruntlich, gott senck es dan yn vnszer hertz” (WA 2, 138: 35–36; 139: 2–4). 32 LW 42: 11. “dann diszes bedencken wandelt den menschen weszentlich vnd gar nah wie die tauffe widderumb new gepiret. Hie wircket das leyden Christi seyn rechtes naturlich edels werck, erwurget den alten Adam, vortreybt alle lust, freud, vnd zuuorsicht, die man haben mag von creaturen, gleych wie Christus von allen, auch von got vorlaszen war” (WA 2, 139: 14–18).

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and passive righteousness, and his rejection of works righteousness in relation to contemplating Christ’s passion, as well as being seen in the light of spiritualdevotional passion literature.33 Luther then emphasizes what can be called the “divine reversal of justification” (in the words of Prenter) in relation to the strangling of the old Adam, which connects to a sapiential theologia crucis as found in Theses 19–21 of the Heidelberg Disputation.34 It may well be that he does not know that Christ’s passion, to which he gives no thought, is effecting this in him, even as the others who do think of Christ’s passion still do not gain this knowledge of self through it. For these the passion of Christ is hidden and genuine [heymlich und wahrhafftig], while for those it is only unreal and misleading. In that way God often reverses matters, so that those who do not meditate on Christ’s passion do meditate on it, and those who do not hear mass do hear it, and those who hear it do not hear it.35

It is noteworthy that for those who do not seek actively to contemplate Christ’s passion, the “passion of Christ is secret and genuine” (“secret” being a better translation of the German heymlich than “hidden”), while for those who attempt to “think of Christ’s passion” (in the sense of works righteousness, or what one might call today a “justification through intellectual works”), Christ’s passion is only “unreal and misleading.”36 33

Cf. Ronald R. Rittgers, The Reformation of Suffering: Pastoral Theology and Lay Piety in Late Medieval and Early Modern Germany (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 113. Rittgers notes that the Meditation on Christ’s Passion was one of Luther’s most popular devotional works. He also notes Luther was much more known for his popular devotional works than through his scholarly-academic work. “The radical emphasis on divine agency and human passivity in Luther’s theology of the cross is evident in the numerous devotional works that he published for the common folk in the late 1510s and early 1520s and especially in his comments on suffering contained in them. It is important to stress that it was through such vernacular works of devotion that the majority of Germans came to know Luther, not through his university lecture courses and scholarly debates. In the minds of his contemporaries, at least those who were sympathetic to him, Luther was first and foremost a pastor who was deeply committed to the care of souls.” 34 See Regin Prenter, Luther’s Theology of the Cross (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1971), and Chapter 1, pp. 27–29 of the present study. 35 LW 42: 11–12. “Vnd mag wol seyn das er nit weysz, das Christus leyden yn yhm solchs wirckt, daran er villeycht nit gedenckt, gleych wie die andernn fast an Christus leyden gedencken, vnd doch nit yhn yhr selbs erkentnis drausz kummen. Bey iyenen ist das leyden Christi heymlich vnd warhafftig, bey dieszen scheynbarlich vnd betrieglich, vnd der weysze nach gott offt das blat vmwend, das die nit das leyden bedencken, die es bedencken, vnd die messe hoeren, die sie nit hoeren, vnnd die nit hoeren die sie hoeren” (WA 2, 139: 24–31). 36 The phrase “justification through intellectual works” is indebted to Rudolf Bultmann’s program of Demythologizing, which is arguably his hermeneutic for a theologia crucis. Bultmann does not seek to provide a meditation on Christ’s passion per se, but even his famous “demythologizing essay” ends with the proclamation of the crucified Christ, risen eschatologically in the kerygma. If Luther’s understanding of justification is indeed the reverse side of a theologia crucis, the relationship of Bultmann’s demythologizing hermeneutic to the Pauline-Lutheran

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Having established the proper way to meditate on Christ’s passion, Luther now moves from Christ’s passion to Christ’s resurrection, and thus from Good Friday to Easter. “Until now we have sojourned in Passion Week and rightly celebrated Good Friday. Now we come to the resurrection of Christ, to the day of Easter.”37 The text moves from contemplating one’s sin, and the terrors of conscience that result from Christ as the “earnest mirror,” to Christ as consolation. The proper contemplation of Christ’s passion thus serves as the entry point to Christ’s resurrection, in which the terror of sin before Christ as the “earnest mirror” is the vehicle for conformity to the crucified Christ in the Gospel. Now the purpose for the strong emphasis on one’s sin has become clear – an even greater consolation in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is even greater than sin and the cross.38

understanding of justification can fruitfully be called a twentieth-century theologia crucis. In Bultmann’s words, “Indeed, de-mythologizing is a task parallel to that performed by Paul and Luther in their doctrine of justification by faith alone without the works of the law. More precisely, de-mythologizing is the radical application of the doctrine of justification by faith to the sphere of knowledge and thought. Like the doctrine of justification, de-mythologizing destroys every longing for security. There is no difference between security based on good works and security built on objectifying knowledge.” Rudolf Bultmann, Jesus Christ and Mythology (New York: Scribner’s, 1958), 83. Cf. Brach S. Jennings, “Rudolf Bultmann as Theologian of Radical Trust in the Gospel,” Currents in Theology and Mission 45, no. 4 (2018): 35–40. Bultmann relates further to Luther through the latter’s sacramentum und exemplum. Bultmann is important to reference here, because of James Cone’s explicit references to Bultmann in his Black Theology of Liberation. See Chapter 8 below. Regarding following Christ as an example, Leppin argues, “Dies führt nun aber nicht in eine Ausrichtung auf Aktivismus, sondern es bleibt jene früh angelegte mystische Grundierung, nach welcher Luther nun erklären kann, ‘Gott habe beschlossen, das wir nicht allein an den gecreuztzigten Christum glauben, sondern auch mit jm gecreutziget werden und leiden sollen.’” Leppin, “Passionsmystik bei Luther,” 77. Being crucified with Christ then also relates to Bultmann’s understanding of the cross: “[A]n das Kreuz glauben, heißt, das Kreuz Christi als das eigene übernehmen, heißt, sich mit Christus kreuzigen lassen.” Rudolf Bultmann, “Neues Testament und Mythologie,” in Kerygma und Mythos I: Ein Theologisches Gespräch, 4th ed. (Hamburg-Bergstedt: Herbert Reich Evangelische Verlag, 1960), 42. 37 LW 42: 12. “Zcum zwelfftenn, bisz her seyn wir yhn der marter wochen geweszen vnd den karfreytag recht begangen. Nu kummen wir zu dem Ostertag vnd aufferstehung Christi” (WA 2, 139: 32–34). 38 Cf. Rom. 5:20–21, NRSV. Rittgers’s observation about the purpose of meditating on Christ’s passion is helpful: “Meditation on the Passion serves the purpose that Luther attributed to the Law in the Heidelberg Disputation: to convict the conscience of sin and sin’s dire consequences.… Luther also compares meditation on Christ’s Passion to baptism, both of which provide new birth by ‘strangling the old Adam’ (erwurget den alten Adam). But this mortification of the conscience is not in the Christian’s power; as in the Heidelberg Disputation, it is a work of God. The Christian is like an infant baptized, utterly passive before God. Once the Christian becomes aware of his sins, Luther instructs him to cast them upon Christ, seeing in the Savior’s wounds and sufferings his own transgressions, which are overcome by Christ’s Resurrection …. Again, God is the primary agent in the life of salvation. God makes possible proper contemplation of Christ’s Passion and then grants the faith that permits the Christian to receive the fruits of such contemplation.” Rittgers, The Reformation of Suffering, 113–14.

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Luther is clear that one should not despair of one’s sin, but instead cast it on to Christ, in a form of what will later be called the “happy exchange” in Luther’s Freedom of a Christian.39 After one has thus become aware of his sin and is terrified in his heart, he must watch that sin does not remain in his conscience, for this would lead to sheer despair. Just as [our knowledge of ] sin flowed from Christ and was acknowledged by us, so we must pour this sin back on him and free our conscience of it.40

Luther is then further adamant that sinners should not “torture their hearts with their sins” and attempt to get rid of them through good works. Instead, sin is to be cast on to Christ, wherein it is swallowed up by Christ’s resurrection.41 “Sin cannot remain on Christ, since it is swallowed up by his resurrection … in his suffering, Christ makes our sin known and thus destroys it, but through his resurrection he justifies us and delivers us from all sin, if we believe this.”42 The meditation ends with a firm focus on Christ’s resurrection, so that Christians might see both Christ’s “friendly heart,” and the “divine and kind paternal heart” of God the Father. Here are some of Luther’s most consoling words in this text, and they show how the sermon belongs within the genre of consolation literature. First of all, you must no longer contemplate the suffering of Christ (for this has already done its work and terrified you), but pass beyond that and see his friendly heart and how this heart beats with such love for you that it impels him to bear with pain your conscience and your sin. Then your heart will be filled with love for him, and the confidence of your faith will be strengthened. Now continue and rise beyond Christ’s heart to God’s heart and you will see that Christ would not have shown this love for you if God in his eternal love had not wanted this, for Christ’s love for you is due to his obedience to God. Thus you will find the divine and kind paternal heart, and, as Christ says, you will be drawn to the Father through him. Then you will understand the words of Christ, ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, etc.’ [John 3:16]. We know God aright when we grasp him not in his might or wisdom (for then he proves terrifying), but in his kindness and 39

See Chapter 3 below. LW 42: 12. “Wan der mensch alszo seyner sund gewar worden vnd gantz erschreckt yhn yhm selbster ist, musz man acht haben, das die sunde nit alszo yhm gewissen bleyben, es wurde gewisz eyn lauter vorzweyffelnn drausz. Sundernn gleych wie sie ausz Christo geflossen vnd erkand worden seynd, szo musz man sie widder auff yhn schutten vnd das gewissen ledig machen” (WA 2, 139: 34–38). 41 Ibid. “Darumb sihe yhe zu, das du nit thuest, wie die vorkereten menschen, die sich mit yhren sunden ym hertzen beyssen vnd fressen, vnd streben darnach, das sie durch gutte werck adder gnugthuung hyn vnd her lauffen odder auch ablas sich erausz erbayten vnd der sund losz werden mougen, das vnmouglich ist. Vnd leyder weyt eyngerissen ist solche falsche zuvorsicht der gnugthuung vnd walfarten” (WA 2, 139 (38)–40: 5). 42 Ibid. “dan auff Christo mochten sie nit bleyben, sie seynd durch seyn aufferstehend vorschlungen … das ist, yn seynem leyden macht er vnszer sund bekannt und erwurget sie alszo, aber durch seyn aufferstehen macht er vnsz gerecht vnnd losz von allen sunden, szo wir anders dasselb gleubenn” (WA 2, 140: 20–21; 24–26). 40

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love. Then faith and confidence are able to exist, and then the human being is truly born anew in God.43

This excerpt is especially noteworthy for Luther’s stress on grasping God “in his kindness and love.” Traces of a theologia crucis are discernible here, in that God is not sought in God’s “might or wisdom,” but in God’s kindness and love, seen in that Christ bears the sin of the guilty sinner, and discloses the “kind and paternal heart” of God the Father. Christ as the “earnest mirror” of the theological use of the Law has now become a gift for guilty sinners, as emphasized by Luther’s reference to John 3:16. Christ as gift will now lead to Christ’s passion as example for the Christian life in the conclusion of Luther’s sermon.44 Having now become the gift for the removal of sin, Christ is then the example to follow. The vita passiva now becomes a cruciform vita activa. “After your heart has thus become firm in Christ, and love, not fear of pain, has made you a foe of sin, then Christ’s passion must from that day on become a pattern for your entire life. Henceforth you will have to see his passion differently. Until now we regarded it as a sacrament which is active in us while we are passive, but now we find that we too must be active, namely, in the following.”45 In the end of the sermon, then, we see the stress on Christ as sacramentum and exemplum. Christians passively receive the meditation on Christ’s passion, and then are urged to make Christ’s passion a form of life. Rittgers writes, [Luther] observes that throughout his sermon, Christ’s Passion has served as a ‘sacrament’ (sacrament) and now it must become an ‘example’ (exempel) for the Christian. This distinction goes back to Augustine and does not appear in medieval Passion literature; Luther’s use of it in this context is unique and stems directly from his new soteriology …. Christians must first receive Christ’s Passion as a means of grace before they can regard 43 LW 42: 13. “Zum ersten, nit das leyden Christi mehr an zusehen (dan das hatt nu seyn werck gethan vnd dich erschreckt), Sundern duch hyn dringen vnd ansehen seyn fruntlich hertz, wie voller lieb das gegen dir ist, die yhn da zu zwingt, das er deyn gewissen vnd deyn sund szo schwerlich tregt. Alszo wirt dir das hertz gegen yhm sussze vnd die zuvorsicht des glaubens gstercket. Darnach weyter steyg durch Christus hertz zu gottis hertz vnd sehe, das Christus die liebe dir mit hette mocht erzeigen, wan es gott nit hett gewolt yn ewiger lieben haben, dem Christus mit seyner lieb gegen dir gehorsam ist. Da wirstu finden das gotlich gutt vatter hertz vnnd, wie Christus sagt, also durch Christum tzum vatter gezogen, da wirstu dan vorsteen den spruch Christi: Also hat got die welt geliebt, das er seynen eynigen sun vbir geben hat etc. Das heist dann got recht erkennet, wan man yhn nit bey der gewalt ader weysheit (die erschrecklich seynd), sundernn bey der gute vnd liebe ergreifft, da kann der glaub vnd zuvorsicht dan besteen vnd ist der mensch alszo warhafftig new ynn got geporen” (WA 2, 140 (30)–41: 7). 44 There are also theological connections here to Barth’s Trinitarian Erwählungslehre, in terms of Barth’s Johannine theologia crucis and his emphasis on the love of God in Christ as God’s grace. See Barth, CD 2.2, 9; KD 2.2, 8, and Chapter 5 below. 45 LW 42:13. “Zum funfzehenden. Wan alszo deyn hertz in Christo bestetiget ist vnnd nu den sunden feynd worden bist auszt liebe, nit ausz furcht der peyn, szo soll hynfurter das leyden Christi auch eyn exempel seyn deynes gantzen lebens, vnd nu auff eyn anderweysz dasselb bedencken. Dan bisz her haben wir es bedacht als eyn sacrament, das yn vnsz wirckt, vnd wir leyden, Nu bedencken wyr es, das wir auch wircken. Nemlich alszo” (WA 2, 141: 8–13).

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it as a model to imitate. Christians cannot suffer with Christ before they have embraced the full benefits of Christ’s suffering for them; they cannot act like Christ until Christ has acted upon (and in) them. Luther still urges imitation of Christ and participation in his sufferings, but he thinks that the ability to do so depends on the indwelling Christ himself; there is no thought of human merit here, as in late medieval Passion piety.46

Provided Rittgers is correct in his observations about this sermon, it is reasonable to conclude Luther’s incorporation and transformation of late medieval passion literature in relation to a theologia crucis is a key element to his “new soteriology,” which is in place by 1519.47 Luther’s text shows how the cross functions in relation to Law and Gospel, terror and consolation, and to the justification of guilty sinners. Having examined Luther’s A Meditation on Christ’s Passion in relation to the theme of theologia crucis, we are now ready to proceed to the next piece of pastoral-devotional literature from 1519, A Sermon on Preparing to Die.

2. A Sermon on Preparing to Die This text does not begin with descriptions on incorrect preparations for death, nor with the consolation of the Gospel in light of death’s terrors, but rather with practical suggestions for how one is to put one’s affairs in order before death, in order that there not be “squabbles, quarrels, or other misunderstanding among his surviving friends.”48 Luther emphasizes immediately the spiritual world over material possessions, with biblical connections to Jesus’s emphasis on “treasures in heaven” (Matt. 6:19–21). Therefore, even though beginning with a practical recommendation for preparing for death, a theology of trust in God can be found.49 Luther then proceeds to admonish his reader(s) to “cheerfully and sincerely forgive, for God’s sake, all persons who have offended us,” as well as to ask God for forgiveness for those the reader has wronged, corresponding to the Lord’s Prayer (Matt. 6:9–13; Luke 11:2–4) and Jesus’s command to love one’s neighbor as one’s self (Matt. 22:35–40; Mark 12:28–34; Luke 10:27a).50 46

Rittgers, The Reformation of Suffering, 115. Rittgers argues for the theologia crucis rooted within late medieval passion piety as “one of the distinctive features of his [Luther’s] evangelical theology,” which resulted from the indulgence controversy. Rittgers then cites von Loewenich and McGrath’s books on Luther’s theologia crucis as evidence for his claim. Ibid., 111. 48 LW 42: 99. “Zum ersten. Die weyl der todt eyn abschid ist von diszer welt vnd allen yhrer hendellen, ist not, das der mennsch seyn zceytlich gut ordenlich vorschaffe, wie es soll oder er gedenckt zu ordenen, das nit bleybe nach seynem tod, vrsach, zanck, haddersz oder sonst eyns yrthumbs, vnter seynen nachgelaszen freunden, vnd disz ist eyn leyplicher oder euszerlicher abschied von diszer welt, vnd wirt vrlaub vnd letze geben dem gut” (WA 2, 685: 4–12). 49 Said theme of trust in God will be seen throughout this sermon, but particularly in the section wherein one is to look to the cross of Christ for all questions related to predestination. 50 “Zum Andern, Das man auch geystlich eyn abschied nheme, das ist, man vorgebe freuntlich, lauterlich vmb gottis willen, allen menschen, we sie vnsz beleydigt haben, widderumb, auch 47

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Having established that one should not cling to one’s material possessions, and that one’s temporal affairs should be put in order, and emphasizing the benefit of “cheerfully and sincerely” forgiving those whom have wronged the dying person, along with the dying person’s own plea for forgiveness, Luther proceeds to direct consolation in the face of death.51 The dying are to “turn our eyes to God, to whom the path of death leads and directs us.” There is found “the beginning of the narrow gate and the straight path to life.”52 We now can see direct theological content in the sermon, in that the eyes of the dying are to turn to God, in order that the “narrow gate of death” might be experienced as a “new birth” (ein new gepurt) as it is with the “death of the dear saints” (der lieben heyligen). The anguish of death is matched with knowing “that a large mansion will follow” (ein grosser raum vnd freud seyn wirt).53 Trust in God turns toward the comfort of confession, the Sacrament of the Altar, and of unction, all of which should be received with “great confidence” (grosser zuuorsicht) if they are available. If not available, “longing and yearning for them should nevertheless be a comfort and we should not be dismayed by this circumstance.”54 The word “comfort” (trostlich) is noteworthy in relation to Luther’s understanding of the sacraments here. Neil R. Leroux provides context for Luther’s comments about the Sacrament of the Altar, and of the (soon to disappear) reference to unction. Here, in first mentioning the sacraments (Article 4), Luther says readiness for dying can be had through confession, the holy Christian sacrament of the holy and true body of Christ, and with the unction …. The unction, however, virtually disappears from consideration, for Luther speaks only of the sacrament of the altar, mentioning unction only once more …. As he begins to explain how the sacraments help us in the dying process, Luther argues that they can overshadow our sins. A proper understanding of our virtues includes truly receiving what the sacraments signify and all that God declares and indicates in them (WA 2:686:25).55 begere vorgebung lautterlich vmb gottis willen von allen menschenn, deren wyr vill anzweyffel beleydiget haben, zum wenigsten mit poszen exempel, odder zu wenig wolthaten, wie wyr schuldig geweszen nach dem depot bruderlicher, christlicher liebe, auff das die seel nit bleyb behafft mit yrgen eynem handell auff erden” (WA 2, 685: 13–19). 51 Said advices relate to the mystical notion of Gelassenheit. Contemporary homiletical incorporations of this concept in mysticism are found in Volker Leppin, Rechtfertigung und Gelassenheit: Predigten (Stuttgart: Radius, 2020). 52 LW 42: 99. “Zum Dritten, Wan szo ydermann yrlaub auff erden geben, Soll man sich dan alleyn zu gott richten, da der weg des sterbens sich auch hin keret, vnd vnsz furet. Vnd hie hebt an, die enge pforte, der schmale steyg zum leben, des musz sich eyn yglicher froelich erwegen, dann er ist woll fast enge, er ist aber nit langk” (WA 2, 685: 20–24). Given Luther’s comments later in the sermon about directing all questions about predestination to the wounds of Jesus Christ, it is plausible Luther understands the crucified Christ to be “the beginning of the narrow gate and of the straight path to life.” 53 LW 42: 99; WA 2, 685(27)–86: 3. 54 LW 42: 100; WA 2, 686: 9–18. 55 Neil R. Leroux, Martin Luther as Comforter: Writings on Death (Leiden: Brill, 2007), 61–62.

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Later on in the sermon (articles 7–14), Luther “develops their [namely, the Sacraments’] function as signs and their function of signifying positively, in opposition to the negative signification of ‘death, sin, hell.’” This function is also seen in article 5, where Luther sees the sacraments as comfort in the face of death, and can be reasonably supposed to relate to the comfort of clinging to the cross of Christ when questions pertaining to predestination arise.56 The virtues (tugent) of the Sacraments contend with the evils/vices (die vntugent) of death, sin, and the “unbearable and unavoidable image” (das vntreglich vnd vnormeydliche bild) of hell and eternal damnation.57 The devil now enters the sermon for the first time as the one who “presses the human being to look closely at the gruesome mien and image of death to add to his worry, timidity, and despair.”58 He “fills our foolish human nature with the dread of death while cultivating a love and concern for life, so that burdened with such thoughts one forgets God, flees and abhors death, and thus, in the end, is and remains disobedient to God.”59 There is an implied struggle with the devil in this paragraph, because of Luther’s notion that the Sacraments contend with the evils and vices of death, sin, and hell. Presumably then, the devil is involved in and/or causing the vices with which the sacraments are contending.60 In the seventh section of the sermon, Luther moves from death to sin. Here we see the theme of the terrified conscience, which was also found in the Meditation on Christ’s Passion. This time a fearful conscience is linked to the devil, who “reminds us of all who have sinned and of the many who were damned for lesser sins than ours so as to make us despair or die reluctantly, thus forgetting God and being found disobedient in the hour of death.”61 Luther’s description of the “many who were damned for lesser sins than ours” gives evidence for fearfulness of sin being linked to the question of salvation or damnation, and thus to 56 Ibid., 65. Luther writes in article 5, “Fifth, one should earnestly, diligently, and highly esteem the holy sacraments, hold them in honor, freely and cheerfully rely on them, and so balance them against sin, death, and hell that they will outweigh these by far.” LW 42: 100. “Zum Funfften, Soll man yhe zu sehen mit allem ernst und vleysz, das man die heyligen sacrament grosz acht, sie yn ehren habe, sich frey vnd froelich darauff vorlasse vnd sie gegen die sund, todt vnd hell, alszo wege, das sie weyt vbir ausz schlahen” (WA 2, 686: 19–22). 57 LW 42: 101; WA 2, 686: 31–35. 58 LW 42: 101; “da zu steuret nu der teuffel, auff das der mensch das greszlich gesperd vnd bild des todts tieff betrachte, da durch bekummert, weych vnd zaghafft werd” (WA 2, 687: 2–4). 59 LW 42: 101. “Damit er die blode natur zur furcht des todts vnd zur lieb vnd sorgen des lebens treybe, da durch der mensch zuvil beladen mit solchen gedancken gottis vorgesse, den todt flige vnd hasse, vnd alszo gott am letzten end vngehorsam erfunden werde vnd bleybe” (WA 2, 687: 7–10). 60 For Luther’s overall struggle with Satan, see Heiko A. Oberman, Luther: Mensch zwischen Gott und Teufel (Berlin: Severin und Siedler, 1981), 223–40. 61 LW 42: 102. “Da hatt der teuffell dan eyn bad funden, das er gesucht, da treybt er, da macht er die sund szo vill, vnd grosz, da soll er alle die fuorhalten, die gesundet haben, vnd wie vil mit wenigern sunden vordampt seyn” (WA 2, 687: 20–23).

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the question of predestination. The devil does a different form of reversal to that of the divine reversal of justification, in that the devil frightens the dying person who is near to death. In other words, there is Anfechtung here, wherein one does not see the grace of God in the cross of Christ, but rather the frightful images coming from the devil, causing the one who is dying to fear damnation. “But in the hour of death when our eyes should see only life, grace, and salvation, he at once opens our eyes and frightens us with these untimely images so that we shall not see the true ones.”62 The final vice/evil to contend with is hell, which Luther addresses in part 8 of this sermon. Undue focus on hell is made worse by being unsure of one’s election before God. The devil (described now by Luther as the “evil spirit”) relates to the vice/evil of hell, in that he “prods the soul so that it burdens itself with all kinds of useless presumptions, especially with the most dangerous undertaking of delving into the mystery of God’s will to ascertain whether one is ‘chosen’ or not.”63 We see, then, that the devil is directly related toward doubt over one’s election. Luther makes this clear by writing that the devil “sets a human being above God, insofar as one seeks signs of God’s will and becomes impatient because he is not supposed to know whether he is among the elect.”64 It is notable that, this “ultimate, greatest, and most cunning art and power” of the devil – causing the human being to set oneself above God over questions of election – is in no way focused on the cross of Christ.65 Luther then relates hell to being unsure about the state of one’s election, and thus the devil’s assailing to Anfechtung.66 “When one is assailed by thoughts regarding his election, he is being assailed by hell, as the psalms lament so much. The one who surmounts this temptation has vanquished sin, hell, and death all in one.”67 Having named the chief vices/evil of death, sin, and hell that torment the dying person, Luther provides pastoral advice on how to best prevent them 62 LW 42: 102. “Am todt da wir solten nur das leben, gnad vnd selickeit voraugen haben, thut er vnsz dan aller erst die augen auff vnd engstet vnsz mit den vnzeitigen bilden, daz wir der rechten bilden nit sehen sollen” (WA 2, 687: 34–36). 63 LW 42: 102. “da hin der bosze geyst die seel treybet, das sie sich mit vbringen vnnutzen furwitz, Ja mit dem aller ferlichsten furnhemen beladet vnd forschen sol gotlichs radts heymlickeit, ob sie vorsehn sey odder nit” (WA 2, 688: 3–6). 64 LW 42: 102–3. “Hie ubet der teuffell seyn letzte, groste, listigiste kunst vnd vormugen. Dan da mit furet er den menschen (szo er es vorsiht) vbir gott, das er sucht zeychen gottlichs willen vnd vngedultig werd, das er nit wissen soll, ob er vorsehen sey” (WA 2, 688: 6–9). 65 LW 42: 102; WA 2, 688: 6. 66 Here is evidence for Jürgen Moltmann’s claim that Luther understood hell primarily as an existential experience, rather than a physical place. See Jürgen Moltmann, The Coming of God: Christian Eschatology (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996), 252; Jürgen Moltmann, Das Kommen Gottes: Christliche Eschatologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1995), 281, and Chapter 7, n. 75 below. 67 LW 42: 103. “Das heyst mit der helle angefochten, wan der mensch mit gedancken seyner vorsehung wirt angefochtenn, daruber ym psalter gar vill clagen ist. Wer hie gewinnet, der hat die hel, sund, todt auff einem hauffen vbirwunden” (WA 2, 688: 19–22).

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from gaining control over the one who is facing death. The principal strategy is to “exercise all diligence not to open our homes to any of these images and not to paint the devil over the door.”68 Luther is arguing that one should not provide hospitality to the devil, since the devil wishes to torment the person facing death with questions pertaining to election. As the devil provided a hellish reversal above, through causing doubt over a person’s election, Luther now recommends focusing on God’s divine reversal, meaning that the dying person “must look at death while you are alive and see sin in the light of grace and hell in the light of heaven, permitting nothing to divert you from that view.”69 This reversal is to be focused on exclusively, “even if all angels, all creatures, yes, even your own thoughts, depict God in a different light.”70 In the struggle with the devil in the hour of death, one is to adhere to divine grace. Luther then moves to Christ and the saints, as those who have overcome death, and therefore as an admonition not to ponder death nor those who were “killed by God’s wrath and overcome by death.”71 “Christ is nothing other than sheer life, as are his saints.”72 Here is textual evidence for the thesis that Luther’s evangelical theology emerges gradually rather than through a sudden dramatic break with the late medieval tradition he has inherited.73 Whereas the devil tormented the dying person with questions about election, Jesus Christ becomes the consolation to this question, and the one to whom the dying person should look. It is particularly to Christ’s death one’s gaze is to be directed toward, related again to the theme of theologia crucis as found in the Heidelberg Disputation, 68 LW 42: 103. “Zum Neunden, Nun musz man yn diszem handell allen vleysz ankeren, das man dyszer dreyer bild, keyns zu hausz lade, noch den teuffell vbir die thur male” (WA 2, 688: 23–25). 69 LW 42: 103. “Du must den tod yn dem leben, die sund yn der gnadenn, die hell ym hymell ansehen, vnd dich von dem ansehen odder blick nit lassen treyben” (WA 2, 688: 35–37). 70 LW 42: 103–4. “wan dirs gleych alle Engell, alle Creatur, ya wens auch dich dunckt, gott selbs anders furlegen, das sie doch nit thun, aber, der boesz geyst macht eyn solchen scheyn” (WA 2, 688(37)–89: 2). Cf. Gal. 1: 8–12, NRSV. 71 LW 42: 103. “Zum Zehenden, Du must den todt nit yn yhm selbs, noch yn dir odder deyner natur, noch yn denen, die durch gottis zorn getodtet seyn, die der todt vbir wunden hatt, ansehen odder betrachten, du bist anders vorloren vnd wirst mit yhn vbir wunden” (WA 2, 689: 3–6). 72 LW 42: 103. “Dan Christus ist nichts dan eytell leben, seyn heyligen auch” (WA 2, 689: 11–12). 73 See the literature review of the present study for an overview of the discussion around understanding Luther in relation to late medieval passion mysticism, rather than as the person responsible for birthing modernity, the latter of which was common in the 19th century. Leppin observes the following about the presence of the saints and passion mysticism in Johannes von Paltz: “Konkurrenz zu der Präsenz der Heiligen in der Frömmigkeitswelt – diese Gegenüberstellung wird erst durch die Gestalt des reformatorischen Solus Christus geprägt. Aber sie stellt in den Mittelpunkt des Glaubenslebens eine identifikatorische und zugleich kontraidentifikatorische Christusbeziehung: Der glaubende Mensch erfährt sich in seiner Sündigkeit als Ursache des Leidens Christi, sieht in diesem zugleich den Weg zu seiner Erlösung und wird damit in das Leiden hineingenommen und mit dem identifiziert, dem er zunächst so fern stand.” Leppin, “Passionsmystik bei Luther,” 61.

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in that God is known where God is most hidden in the crucified Christ (cf. the Proof to Heidelberg Thesis 20).74 Thus you must concern yourself solely with the death of Christ and then you will find life. But if you look at death in any other way, it will kill you with great anxiety and anguish. This is why Christ says, ‘In the world – that is, in yourselves – you have unrest, but in me you will find peace’ [John 16:33].75

Concerning oneself “solely with the death of Christ” is the antidote to the fear and anguish of sin, death, and hell, which are brought on by the devil. All questions of election are to be directed to Christ on the cross, through the so-called “happy exchange,” wherein Christ carries the sin of the guilty sinner, and bestows the guilty sinners with his righteousness, in another connection to Staupitz.76 Until this point, Luther has dealt with practical matters toward how one should prepare for temporal death, the spiritual anguish that accompanies dying, and how the sacraments are means of comfort in this anguish. He now turns to Christ on the cross as the chief comfort regarding the question of election, to which the sacraments are related.77

74 Gazing on Christ’s death also relates to the overall genre Luther is writing in for A Sermon on Preparing to Die, namely the ars moriendi. See Berndt Hamm, “Luther’s Instructions for a Blessed Death, Viewed against the Background of the Late Medieval Ars Moriendi,” in Berndt Hamm, The Early Luther: Stages in a Reformation Reorientation, trans. Martin J. Lohrmann (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017), 110–54. Hamm writes, “In the end, everything hung on the fact that the fear of punishment before God’s righteousness retreated before the loving trust in God’s boundless compassion and the assuring prayer for God’s mercy. The Ars Moriendi hoped to give dying people the serenity to stop worrying about their own sinfulness or holiness, to stop worrying about all earthly things, and to surrender themselves entirely to God’s saving compassion with a confident hope.” Ibid., 121. 75 LW 42: 104. “Alszo mustu dich mit dem todt Christi alleyn bekummern, szo wirstu das leben finden, vnd wo du den todt anderszwo ansihest, szo toedt er dich mit grosser vnruge vnnd peyn. Drumb sagt Christus: In der welt (daz ist auch yn vnszselb) werdet yhr vnruge haben, In mir aber den friden” (WA 2, 689: 20–23). 76 Oberman makes explicit Staupitz’s role for Luther’s emphasis on the crucified Christ in relation to questions of election, based on Staupitz’s own counsel of Luther: “Saupitz hat also nicht mit einem spontan dahingesprochenen Beichtrat dem verängstigten Mönch geholfen, er hat vielmehr aus dem Vollen geschöpft. Anfechtungstheologie was seine Spezialität. Mit seinem Rat hat Staupitz den Ordensbruder aus tiefer Anfechtung befreit – Luther war der Verzweiflung nahe: Bin ich zum Himmel erwählt? Stehe ich geschrieben im Buch der Lebenden? Wäre ihm Staupitz nicht zu Hilfe gekommen, so bekennt er später, dann wäre er entweder in völliger Verzweiflung untergegangen oder hätte sich in überheblicher Gleichgültigkeit aller Gottesfurcht verschlossen.” Oberman, Luther, 193. Leppin also addresses Staupitz’s overall relationship to Luther. See Leppin, Transformationen, 241–61, esp. 246–54, and n. 26 above. 77 Luther’s emphasis on the cross of Christ as the answer to questions of election is particularly important for this study’s reading of Barth’s Erwählungslehre as a transformed sapiential theologia crucis. While it would be anachronistic to say Luther has a doctrine of election in the vein of Barth, this study is nevertheless arguing that Luther’s pastoral theology can be read as a theological predecessor to Barth, as will be explored in Chapter 5.

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To focus on Christ means not to focus on one’s own sin, or the sin of others who are damned. Instead, one is to “look at sin only within the picture of grace” that is found in Christ on the cross and his saints. “The picture of grace is nothing else but that of Christ on the cross and of all his dear saints.”78 The picture of grace of Christ and the saints then relates to the so-called “happy exchange.”79 Grace and mercy are there where Christ on the cross takes your sin from you, bears it for you, and destroys it. To believe this firmly, to keep it before your eyes and not to doubt it, means to view the picture of Christ and to engrave it in yourself …. In this way you may view your sins in safety without tormenting your conscience. Here sins are never sins, for here they are overcome and swallowed up in Christ. He takes your death upon himself and strangles it so that it may not harm you, if you believe that he does it for you and see your death in him and not in yourself. Likewise, he also takes your sins upon himself and overcomes them with his righteousness out of sheer mercy, and if you believe that, your sins will never work you harm. In that way Christ, the picture of life and of grace over against the picture of death and sin, is our consolation. Paul states that in 1 Corinthians 15 [:57], ‘Thanks and praise be to God, who through Christ gives us the victory over sin and death.’80

What at first was sin and torment from the devil becomes “our consolation” through Christ on the cross. That Luther specifically mentions Christ “on the 78 LW 42: 104. “Der gnaden bild ist nit anders, dan Christus am Creutz vnd alle seyne lieben heyligen” (WA 2, 689: 28–29). Again the reference to the saints shows Luther is both indebted to and transforming a wider tradition of medieval passion mysticism. 79 Robert W. Bertram notes the “unfairness” of the happy exchange for God, in addition to a new interpretation of this phrase in American English for contemporary Lutheran theology: “Unfairly enough, at least to God, this authority does not give people what they have coming to them, namely, exile and death – at least not ultimately. That, quite shockingly, is assigned to God instead. And what God has coming to him – love and life – goes instead to the world. Call it the “Happy Exchange” or – as Luther might have called it had he spoken American – the ‘Sweet Swap.’” A footnote then explains the phrase “Sweet Swap” was coined by an anonymous seminary student during the time of the Seminex controvery in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. Robert W. Bertram, A Time for Confessing, ed., Michael Hoy (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017), 135. Bertram’s description has commonalities with Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre, wherein election is sure and certain salvation for humankind, but a sure and certain risk for God. Cf. Barth, CD 2.2, 162–63; KD 2.2, 177. I am indebted to my late teacher and mentor Dr. Carol Ruth Jacobson (1956–2021), to whom the present study is dedicated, for introducing me to this pithy phrase for understanding the theme of happy exchange in the early Martin Luther. 80 LW 42: 105. “daz ist gnade vnd barmhertzickeit, das Christus am Creutz deyne sund von dir nymmet, tregt sie fur dich vnd erwurget sie, vnd dasselb festiglich glauben vnd vor augen haben, nit drann zweyfellnn, das heyst das gnaden bild ansehen vnd ynn sich bilden.… Sich, szo magstu deyn sund sicher ansehen auszer deynem gewiszen, sich, da seynd sund nymer sund, da seynd sie vberwunden vnd yn Christo vorschlunden: dan gleych wie er deynen tod auff sich nympt vnd yhn erwurgt, das er dir nit schaden mag, szo du anders gleubst, das er dyr das thut, vnd dynen todt yn yhm, nit yn dyr ansihest, alszo nympt er auch deyn sund auff sich vnd yn seyner gerechickeit ausz lauter gnaden dir vbir windt: szo du das glaubist, szo thun sie dyr nymmer schaden. Alszo ist Christus, des lebens vnd gnaden bild widder des tods vnd sund bildt, vnszer trost, das sagt Paulus. 1. Corin: 15. Gott sey lob vnd danck, das er vnsz yn Christo geben hatt vbirwindung der sund vnd des todts” (WA 2, 689: 30–33; 37–38; 690: 1–9).

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cross” is textual evidence for this sermon having traces of a theologia crucis (cf. the Proofs to Heidelberg Theses 20–21).81 This becomes especially apparent where Luther emphasizes Christ’s descent into hell for the overcoming of one’s own fears about hell and eternal damnation through the crucified Christ, and thus Christ forsaken on the cross by God as one eternally damned is the picture for guaranteeing the surety of one’s election. So then, gaze at the heavenly picture of Christ, who descended into hell [1 Pet. 3:19] for your sake and was forsaken by God as one eternally damned when he spoke the words on the cross, ‘Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani!’ – ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ [Matt. 27:46]. In that picture your hell is defeated and your uncertain election is made sure. If you concern yourself solely with that and believe that it was done for you, you will surely be preserved in this same faith. Never, therefore, let this be erased from your vision. Seek yourself only in Christ and not in yourself and you will find yourself in him eternally.82

Christ who was “forsaken by God as one eternally damned” on the cross is the source for hell being defeated and an uncertain election to be made sure. Thus, traces of a theologia crucis as the answer to questions pertaining to election can be found here. Christ who descended to hell and who was the godforsaken one on the cross is then the source for sin, death, and hell to flee away.

3. Connecting a Theologia Crucis with the Theme of Promise in Word and Sacraments: A Constructive Development In A Sermon on Preparing to Die, referencing Judges 7:16–22, Luther writes that sin, death, and hell “will flee with all their might if in the night we but keep our eyes on the glowing picture of Christ and his saints and abide in the faith, which does not see and does not want to see the false pictures.”83 Christ on the cross is again the true image to be gazed on to vanish the three chief vices/evils brought out by the devil, as a “threefold picture for us, to be held before the eyes of our 81 For Regin Prenter, a theologia crucis indebted to Luther centering in the crucified Christ is “theology in its totality, that is, theology in so far as it is at all capable of understanding the unity underlying the antitheses in the divine works: God’s righteousness under his judgment, his grace under his anger, the life which he bestows even in the midst of death, his power to turn the present evil into a thing of good.” Prenter, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 2. 82 LW 42: 106. “Drumb sich das hymelisch bild Christum an, der vmb deynen willen gen hell gefaren vnd von gott ist vorlassen geweszen, alz eyner der vordampt sey ewiglich, da er sprach am Creutz: Eli, eli, lama asabthani, O meyn gott, o meyn gott, warumb hastu mich vorlassen? Sich yn dem bild ist vbirwunden deyn helle vnd deyn vngewisz vorsehung gewisz gemacht, dan szo du da mit alleyn dich bekummerst vnd das glaubst fur dich geschehn, szo wirstu yn dem selben glauben behalten gewiszlich. Drumb las dirs nur nit ausz den augen nhemen vnd suche dich nur in Christo vnd nit yn dir, szo wirstu dich ewiglich yn yhm finden” (WA 2, 690: 17–25). 83 LW 42: 106. “Alszo fleugt tod, sund vnd hell mit allen yhren crefften, szo wir nur Christi vnd seyner heyligen leuchtende bild yn vns vben yn der nacht, das ist ym glauben, der die boeszen bild nit sihet noch sehen mag ….” (WA 2, 690 (36)–691: 2).

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faith against the three evil pictures with which the evil spirit and our nature would assail us to rob us of this faith.”84 Said threefold image of Christ on the cross is the “living and immortal image against death,” the “image of the grace of God against sin,” which he assumed and overcame through the happy exchange, and the “heavenly image …. who was forsaken by God as damned, yet he conquered hell through his omnipotent love, thereby proving that he is the dearest Son, who gives this to us all if we but believe.”85 Luther then returns to the sacraments, showing how the sacraments are concrete signs of God’s promises, and how right reception of them is related to trust in God.86 Through receiving the sacraments, one “has received a sign and a promise from God with which he can exercise and strengthen his belief that he has been called into Christ’s image and to his benefits.”87 The sacraments are related to trust in God, in that “we must know that even though the works of God surpass human understanding, God yet effects all of this through such insignificant signs as the sacraments to teach us what a great thing a true faith in God really is.”88 Trust in God means to personally appropriate Christ on the cross for oneself in the hour of death, along with the sacraments that are given and promised for the struggle against sin, death, and hell. In the present sermon, Luther writes that sacraments and the Word are “signs and promises of God.” They are the guarantee that “whatever the true God promises and effects must be something big.”89 Bayer argues the following about the theme of promise in relation to the Word and Sacraments in Luther’s theology overall: [Promises are] the concrete way and manner in which Christ is present: definite and clear – clearly freeing one and giving one assurance. One cannot remember achieving such 84 LW 42: 106. “Wen hatt er das gethan? Am Creuz, dan doselb hatt er vnsz sich selbs bereyt eyn dreyfeltig bild, vnszerm glauben furzuhalten widder die drey bild, da der boesze geyst vnd vnszer natur vnsz mit anficht ausz dem glauben zu reyszen” (WA 2, 691: 12–15). 85 LW 42: 107. “Er ist das lebendig vnd vnsterblich bild widder den tod, den er erlitten, vnd doch mit seyner vfferstand von todtenn vbirwunden vn seynem leben. Er ist das bild der gnaden gottis widder die sund, die er auff sich genommen vnd durch seynen vnubirwindlichen gehorsam vbirwunden. Er ist daz hymelisch bild, der vorlassen von gott, alsz eyn vordampter, vnd durch seyn aller mechtigist liebe die hell vbirwunden, bezeugt, daz er der liebst sun sey vnd vnsz allen dasselb zu eygen geben, szo wir alszo glauben” (WA 2, 691: 15–21). 86 For an overview of Luther’s understanding of promise in relation to the Sacrament of the Altar during the period of the Sermon on Preparing to Die, see Bayer, Promissio, 226–54. 87 LW 42: 110. “Zum Sibentzehenden, Sich eyn solch vorteyll hatt, der die sacrament erlangt, das er eyn zeychen gottis erlangt vnd zusag, daran er seynen glauben vben vnd stercken mag, er sey yn Christus bild vnd guter berufft, An wilche zeychen die andern alleyn ym glauben arbeyten vnd sie mit dem begirde des hertzen erlangen, wie woll sie auch erhalten werden, szo sie yn dem selben glauben besteen” (WA 2, 694: 17–22). 88 LW 42: 113. “darumb soll man wissen, das gottis werck seyn, die groszer seyn dan jemand dencken mag, vnd sie doch wircket ynn solchem cleynen tzeichen der Sacrament, das er vnsz lere, wie grosz dinck sey eyn rechter glaub tzu Gott” (WA 2, 696: 16–19). 89 LW 42: 109. “Es musz grosz seyn, was der rechte gott zusagt vnd wirckt” (WA 2, 693: 32–33).

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freedom and assurance in one own private, inner monologue. It guarantees and constitutes itself only by the use of the medium of the promise made by another human being – not only when stated by the priest or preacher who holds the office but when spoken by anyone who speaks it to me in the name of Jesus. I cannot say it to myself. It has to be spoken to me … In contrast to every metaphysical set of statements that teach about the deity, this assertion [that promises are the concrete way and manner in which Christ is present] declares that God’s truth and will are not abstract entities, but are directed verbally and publicly as a concrete promise to a particular hearer in a specific situation. ‘God’ is apprehended as the one who makes a promise to a human being in such a way that the person who hears it can have full confidence in it.90

Trusting the promise spoken by another in the name of Jesus is akin to being absolved by Christ himself. In Luther’s words, “You must trust in the priest’s absolution as firmly as though God had sent a special angel or apostle to you, yes, as though Christ himself were absolving you.”91 Bayer’s research on the theme of promise in Luther’s theology can be connected to the theme of theologia crucis, and vice versa. Said promise means God is trustworthy in struggles with Satan in Anfechtung, especially over the question of predestination. Therefore, it can be argued that Christ’s descent into hell and godforsakenness on the cross shows God’s love and faithfulness amid experiences of Anfechtung and hell. The gift of Christ, who as the “image of life, of grace, and of salvation” takes the sin and Anfechtung of the guilty sinner onto himself, and the gift of the sacraments have been given by God in order that death might not be feared, but accepted willingly and overcome.92 Thus, absolution through the Word, receiving the Sacrament of the Altar for struggling against the three vices/evils imposed on a dying person (through which the devil tempts a dying person to abandon trust in the true God), and a mystical theologia crucis centering in Christ’s descent into hell and godforsakenness on the cross arguably all relate to the promise and consolation of the Gospel. As Luther writes concerning Christ’s consolation of dying persons in the hour of death, “From this you can see that he is a true God and that he performs great, right, and divine works for you.”93

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Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology, 53. LW 42: 110. “Dan du solt eben szo fest trawen auff das priesters absolution, als wan dir gott eynen besondern engel odder Apostell sendet, Ja als ob dich Christus selbs absolviret” (WA 2, 694: 14–16). 92 Cf. LW 42: 114; WA 2, 697: 14–25. 93 LW 42: 114. “Drumb sihstu, das er eyn warer gott ist, vnd rechte grosze gottliche werck mit dyr wirckt” (WA 2, 697: 26–27). 91

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4. Conclusion This chapter read two sermons of Luther’s from 1519 to explore where and how traces of a sapiential theologia crucis related to and transforming late medieval passion mysticism can be found in relation to Luther’s pastoral theology. We have attempted to reasonably show where a theologia crucis is present, as well as specifically how a theologia crucis is meant to be a form of spiritual consolation. While A Meditation on Christ’s Passion emphasized particularly the terrified conscience in relation to Christ as the “earnest mirror,” the sermon ended with Christ’s “friendly heart” wherein Christ’s bears the sin of the guilty sinner, as well as the “friendly heart” of God the Father who gave Christ for the world. A Sermon on Preparing to Die does not focus on Christ as this “earnest mirror,” but instead on Christ on the cross as the consolation amid the torments and fears of sin, death, and hell brought on by the devil, and Christ as the one who bestows righteousness on the guilty sinner through the “happy exchange.” Luther also emphasizes the Sacrament of the Altar here in relation to God’s promises, which was not present in A Meditation on Christ’s Passion, even though traces of the promise theme were found there. With the emphasis on promise, the present study argued for a constructive interconnectedness through Oswald Bayer’s research between a mystical theologia crucis as anchored in Christ’s descent into hell and godforsakenness on the cross and Luther’s understanding of promise in Word and Sacraments. In A Sermon on Preparing to Die, then, Luther has moved from the terror of death to the promise of election through Christ on the cross. Luther’s text shows the crucified Christ was meant to be pastorally consoling to persons facing death and the question of election. A theologia crucis, with an emphasis on God as mystically known a posteriori where God is most hidden in suffering and the cross, can then be said to be related to the question of election, and anchored in the promise of Word and Sacraments, in order that Anfechtung related to the devil’s torments might be overcome. With these explorations complete, the study proceeds to a close reading of Luther’s Freedom of a Christian (1520) to examine the theme of theologia crucis as related to neighbor love through the mystical “happy exchange.”

Chapter 3

Freedom of a Christian (1520) The last chapter closely read two pastoral texts of Luther’s in close chronological proximity to the Heidelberg Disputation. The present chapter addresses one of Luther’s most popular pastoral texts from the year 1520, Freedom of a Christian (Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen).1 The previous chapter explored the cross theme in relation to the meditation of Christ’s passion and the question of divine election. Here, the study will be concerned with how justification through faith alone is related to sanctification (neighbor love), as well as how the mystical 1 This chapter will analyze the German edition of Luther’s text, in the present author’s own translation, as it was the most widely read in Luther’s own day and was intended to present Luther’s understanding of evangelical theology beyond university or church authorities. This intention is explained by Luther in his dedication of the German edition to Hermann Mühlpfort (WA 7, 20: 19–22; LW 31: 333). Further, the German edition has been chosen here over the Latin for the former’s explicit use of the phrase “happy exchange” (der fröhliche Wechsel), in order to explore where traces of a mystical theologia crucis might be found. Hamm writes about Luther’s dedication to Mühlpfort, “With these words, Luther was saying that with his tract on freedom (which he described as a small tract or sermon) he has laid out before everyone, in complete openness, the cause, that is, the legitimation, for his teaching and his writing about the papacy – an explanation that, as he hopes, is not unproven, that is, one, based as it is on arguments from Holy Scripture, that cannot be proven false. Thus, Luther hopes those who read in The Freedom of a Christian about how Christian freedom is grounded in the theology of justification understand why he rightly attacked the bases of a papal understanding of the church.” Berndt Hamm, The Early Luther: Stages in a Reformation Reorientation, trans. Martin J. Lohrmann (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017), 176. Hamm’s argument is based on his historical interest in Freedom of a Christian together with the Letter to Pope Leo X, which Luther wrote as a preface to his tract on Freedom. Hamm argues the two documents should be understood as a “double pamphlet” (Ibid., 187) to show how Luther’s tract on freedom is “an ecclesiastical manifesto against the power of the Roman papacy and against every form of bureaucratic lordship” (Ibid., 183). Hamm also argues that it is possible to read Freedom of a Christian through other lenses, as well as arguing overall for a mystical reading. What he does not propose directly and/or specifically is to read the text as a mystical sermon in relation to the theme of theologia crucis. The present study will take this latter position. However, Hamm’s analysis is helpful for connecting the question of freedom with the ecclesiastical struggles of Luther’s own day. “Although the tract on freedom could be understood and translated into concrete situations in varying ways, it would – to say the least – be enormously reductive of its wide perspective to omit consideration of the thematic roots and emphases that came from the ecclesiastical conflicts of 1520. As a result of such a consideration, however, this means that The Freedom of a Christian is not a purely theological work. Instead, it belongs to sixteenth-century discourse about lordship, power, and authority. It has thus not been a matter of simple misunderstanding that many readers have read it as a tract against an illegitimate lordship that had rejected God’s law” (Ibid., 189).

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theme of the “happy exchange” (der fröhliche Wechsel) is connected to the cross. We will then address limitations of Luther’s text in relation to questions of systemic sin from the standpoint of Valerie Saving-Goldstein’s feminist concerns, William H. Lazareth’s Lutheran social ethics, and James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. Finally, we will be concerned throughout this chapter to examine where traces of the theme of theologia crucis can be found in Freedom of a Christian with roots in late medieval passion mysticism.

1. Free Lord and Bound Servant: The Relationship Between Faith and Love Luther begins his theological argument with the following: “A Christian person is a free Lord over all things and subject to no one. A Christian person is a subservient slave [dienstbar knecht] of all things und subject to everyone.”2 Luther’s argument is Pauline (1 Cor. 9, Rom. 13, and Gal. 4), with the person’s spiritual nature corresponding to freedom (freyheit), and the person’s bodily nature corresponding to servitude (dienstparkeit).3 Freedom and servitude are to be distinguished, but not separated in a dualistic fashion.4 How does it help the soul that the body is unbound, fresh, and healthy, that it eats, drinks, and lives as it wants? Conversely, what harm does it to the soul that the body is bound, sick, and weak, that it starves, thirsts, and suffers in a way that it does not want to? None of this is enough to free the soul or to bind it, to make it right or bad.5

The emphasis on Freedom and servitude corresponds to faith and good works. The relationship between faith and good works, and thus faith and love, flows throughout this text. A question for Luther is if good works should be done at all, since faith alone justifies the sinner before God. Related to justification by faith alone, and the good works that result from justification, Luther writes, 2 WA 7, 21: 1–4. “Eyn Christen mensch ist eyn freyer herr ueber alle ding vnd niemandt vnterthan. Eyn Christen mensch ist eyn dienstpar knecht aller ding vnd yderman vnterthan.” 3 WA 7, 21: 13–17. “Nach der seelen wirt er eyn geystlich, new, ynnerlich mensch genennet, nach dem fleysch vnd blut wirt er eyn leyplich, allt vnd euszerlich mensch genennet. Vnd vmb diszes vnterschiedisz willen werden von yhm gesagt yn der schrifft, die do stracks widdernander seyn, wie ich itzt gesagt, von der freyheyt vnd dienstparkeit.” 4 For the contrary position that Luther’s Freedom of a Christian contains a duality that is a core tenant of Lutheran theological identity, see Torleiv Austad, “Lutherische Identität: Eine systematische Stellungnahme,” in Rainer Rausch and Tobias Jammerthal, eds., Lutherische Identität: Protestantische Positionen und Perskpektiven: Herbsttagung der Luther-Akademie 2013 (Hannover: Lutherisches Verlagshaus, 2016), 119–43; 139. 5 WA 7, 21: 23–27. “Was hilffts die seelen, das der leyp vngefangen, frisch vnd gesund ist, ysszet, trinckt, lebt, wie er will? Widderumb was schadet das der seelen, das der leyp gefangen, krang vnd matt ist, hungert, duerstet vnd leydet, wie er nit gerne wolt? Diszer ding reychtet keynisz bisz an die seelen, sie zu befreyhen oder fahen, frum oder boesze zu machen.”

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Since works do not justify anyone and a human being has to be just before he works, it is evident that only faith out of pure grace through Christ and his Word makes the person completely just and saved. And it is obvious that no work, no commandment is necessary for a Christian to be saved. Rather, he is free from all commandments and out of pure freedom does everything he does for free; and he does nothing with which he seeks his benefit or his happiness – for he is already satisfied and happy through his faith and God’s grace – but only does everything to please God in it.6

The notion of good works to please God is not meant to imply works are required for salvation, since Luther believes “faith from pure grace through Christ and the Word makes the person completely just and saved.” Rather, good works flow from faith for God’s pleasure, since the free Christian person is the servant of all, per Luther’s beginning theses. Thus, the good works Luther is addressing are free flowing from faith and please God, arguably showing an interconnectedness between faith and love.7 The Christian is freed from sin in Christ, and lives toward the neighbor in love. Good works thus flow from faith, not to earn justification, but in free response to God’s justifying grace. The sermon can then be said to be oriented toward Christian living related to sanctification in light of justification.8 Luther compares the good works done by a Christian person to the works of Adam and Eve done in paradise before the fall. In other words, there is what can be termed a 6

WA 7, 32: 27–34. “So dann die werck niemant frum machen, vnd der mensch zuvor musz frum sein, ehe er wirckt, so ists offenbar, das allein der glaub ausz lauttern gnaden, durch Christum vnd seyn wort, die person gnugsam frum vnd selig machet. Vnd das keyn werck, keyn gepott eynem Christen nott sey zur seligkeit, sondern er frey ist von allen gepotten, vnd ausz lauterer freyheit vmb sonst thut alls, was er thut, nichts damit gesucht seynesz nutzs oder selickeyt, Denn er schon satt vnd selig ist durch seynenn glaubenn vnd gottis gnaden, sondernn nur gott darynnen gefallen.” 7 Regarding the relationship between faith and love throughout Freedom of a Christian, Oswald Bayer writes, “Das Verhältnis von Glaube und Liebe faßt seine Schrift ‘Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen’ in die Doppelthese: ‘Ein Christenmensch ist ein freier Herr über alle Dinge und niemandem untertan. Ein Christenmensch ist ein dienstbarer Knecht aller Dinge und jedermann untertan.’ Der Christenmensch ist keine Spezies eines Menschen oder eines religiösen Menschen, sondern Mensch, der befreite Mensch. Im Glauben lebt er außerhalb seiner selbst, in Gott – befreit davon, seine Identität zu suchen und sich selbst verwirklichen zu müssen. Deshalb kann er es sich leisten, nun der Knecht aller, nicht nur aller Menschen, sondern aller Dinge zu sein und auf diese Weise zu sorgen, ‘als wäre kein Gott da.’ Mit der gesamten Schrift über die Freiheit will Luther nichts anderes als einen einzigen Satz des Paulus auslegen: ‘Weil ich frei bin von allem, deshalb habe ich mich zum Knecht aller gemacht’ (1 Korinther 9, 19). Nicht: obwohl ich frei bin, sondern weil ich frei bin.” Oswald Bayer, Aus Glauben Leben: Über Rechtfertigung und Heiligung, 2nd ed. (Stuttgart: Calwer, 1990), 47. 8 For sanctification in Luther, see Jane E. Strohl, “The Framework for Christian Living: Luther on the Christian’s Callings,” in Robert Kolb, Irene Dingel, and L’ubomír Batka, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Martin Luther’s Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 365–69; Robert Kolb, Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 172–97; William H. Lazareth, Christians in Society: Luther, the Bible, and Social Ethics (Minneapolis:, 2001), 198–235, esp. 224–34; Bayer, Aus Glauben Leben, 43–50.

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“free spontaneity” to the good works done by a Christian, not undertaken in any attempt to earn righteousness or good favor to God, but out of pure receptivity to God’s grace, in order that God might be pleased (gott zu gefallen]. Related to the works done by Adam and Eve in paradise in relation to the works of the free Christian person who is the bound servant to the neighbor, Luther writes, These would have been nothing but free works, done for the sake of no other thing than to please God and not to obtain righteousness, which he already had before and which would naturally have been innate in all of us. Likewise, the work of a believing person, who through his faith transferred to paradise anew and was created anew, does not need any works in order to be just: rather, so that he does not go idle, but work on and preserve his body, that is why such free works are commanded to him only to please God.9

According to Robert Kolb, Luther’s statements about good works in relation to justification are related to his 1519 sermon Two Kinds of Righteousness. Kolb notes, Without using the term ‘two kinds of righteousness,’ the work [Freedom of a Christian] unfolds its argument along lines set by this distinction as it defines God’s justifying action towards sinners as, first, liberation from sin – thus restoration to the dignity and activity of human creatures as God designed them – and, second, liberation for living in trust toward God and service or love toward others.10

The relationship between faith and love is related to being conformed to Christ based on Luther’s reading of Romans 7, in that “All persons, who belong to Christ, crucify their flesh with its evil lusts.”11 This crucifying of evil lusts again corresponds to sanctification, and thus “faith active in love,” as stated by Paul in Galatians 5. Still, the crucifying of the flesh is not a good work, but related to living in free love for the neighbor. And yet works are not the true good by which he becomes right and just before God, but he should do them out of free love free of charge to please God. And nothing else should be sought or viewed in it than that this action pleases God, whose will faith wants to fulfill with pleasure and in the best possible way.12

 9 WA 7, 31: 25–32. “Wilchs weren eytell frey werck geweszen, vmb keynsz dings willen gethan, denn allein gott zu gefallen, vnd nit vmb frumkeyt zu erlangen, die er zuvor hett, wilch vns auch allen naturlich were angeborn geweszenn. Alszo auch eynis glaubigen menschen werck, wilcher durch seynen glauben ist widderumb ynsz paradisz gesetzt vnd von newen geschaffen, darff keyner werck frum zu werden, sondern das er nit muessig gahe vnd seynen leyb erbeytt vnd beware, seyn yhm solche freye werck zu thun alleyn gott zu gefallenn befolhen.” 10 Robert Kolb, Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 78. 11 WA 7, 30: 30. “Alle, die Christum angehoeren, creutzigen yhr fleysch mit seynen boeszen luesten.” 12 WA 7, 31: 4–8. “vnd doch die werck nit das rechte gutt seyn, davon er frum vnd gerecht sey fur gott, szondern thue sie ausz freyer lieb vmbsonst, got zu gefallen, nichts darynn anders gesucht noch angesehen, denn das es gott also gefellet, wilchs willen er gerne thet auffs allerbeste.”

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It is now important to emphasize that the relationship between faith and love does not mean a neglecting of preaching of the Law to sinners. In the eighth point of the sermon, Luther writes, “Namely it is valid to know that the whole of Holy Scripture is divided into two kinds of words: command or Law of God and promise or assurance.”13 The Law shows what is to be done, although there is no ability within humans to do this work (cf. Heidelberg Theses 1–7).14 When the Law has properly humbled the sinner through showing the sinner her inability to achieve the righteousness of the Law through works, the consolation of the Gospel follows. Whereas the humiliation of the sinner corresponds chiefly to the Old Testament for Luther, so now consolation in Jesus Christ corresponds to the New Testament. Here there is also a connection to the Meditation on Christ’s Passion, in that the sinner is to have angst before one’s sins in light of the Law, in order to be prepared to receive the grace of Christ.15,16 From receiving the grace of Christ, the Christian is then free to live in Christ and the neighbor. Luther writes at the end of this sermon, “All of this leads to the conclusion, that a Christian lives not in himself, but in Christ and in his neighbor. He lives in Christ through faith, in his neighbor through love. By faith he is caught up beyond himself into God. By love he descends again beneath himself through love and remains in God and in divine love.”17 The Christian’s being “caught up beyond himself into God” and then descending “again beneath himself through love” contains mystical imagery, which will now be explored in relation to medieval bridal mysticism and traces of a theologia crucis. 13 WA 7, 23: 29–30. “Vnd ist zu wissen, das die ganze heylige schrifft wirt yn zweyerley wort geteyllet, wilche seyn Gebot oder gesetz gottis vnd vorheyschen oder zusagunge.” 14 WA 7, 23: 31–33 “Die gebott leren vnd schreyben vns fur mancherley gutte werck, aber damit seyn sie noch nit geschehen. Sie weyszen wol, sie helffen aber nit, lehren was man thun soll, geben aber keyn sterck dartzu.” 15 See Chapter 2 of the present study. 16 Luther’s theology of humility in general is indebted to Staupitz, and thus has connections to late medieval passion mysticism. On the theology of humility in Luther, see Ronald K. Rittgers, The Reformation of Suffering: Pastoral Theology and Lay Piety in Late Medieval and Early Modern Germany (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 81, 97, 115–16. According to Rittgers, Luther’s understanding of humility theology undergoes a change from the Romans lectures to the Heidelberg Disputation and subsequent works. In the latter, a humility theology is a divine work rather than a human merit. Rittgers writes about humility in Luther’s Operationes in Psalmos, written in 1519, and thus near to both the Heidelberg Disputation and Freedom of a Christian, “Luther now views humility as a divine rather than a human work; there is no association of merit with humility in the Operationes. God himself prepares human beings for the gift of faith through the gift of humility, and God accomplishes this alien work through the Word and suffering, something that applies to both the beginning of justification and its ongoing process.” Ibid., 116. It is this latter understanding, then, of humility theology that is present in Freedom of a Christian. 17 WA 7, 38: 6–10. “Czum xxx. Ausz dem allenn folget der beschlusz, das eyn Christen mensch lebt nit ynn yhm selb, sondern ynn Christo ynd seynem nehstenn, ynn Christo durch den glauben, ym nehsten durch die liebe: durch den glauben feret er vber sich yn gott, ausz gott feret er widder vnter sich durch die liebe, vnd bleybt doch ymmer ynn gott vnd gottlicher liebe.”

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2. The Happy Exchange as Theologia Crucis in the Tradition of Bridal Mysticism The “happy exchange” (der fröhliche Wechsel) is crucial for Luther’s understanding of justification, and the theme (though not the exact phrase) appears as early as the Romans Lectures of 1515–1516.18 Through the happy exchange, Christ bears the sin of the guilty sinner, and bestows the guilty sinner with Christ’s righteousness. Thus, guilty sinners are declared just because of Christ, who has taken on their sin through his death on the cross. Luther describes the happy exchange in The Freedom of a Christian in the following manner: For what Christ has is the believer’s own; what the soul has becomes Christ’s own. So Christ has all goods and bliss that are peculiar to the soul. So the soul has on it all vice and sin, which become Christ’s own. This is where the happy exchange and strife [der froelich wechszel vnd streytt] begins: Since Christ is God and human, who has never sinned and whose righteousness is insurmountable, eternal, and omnipotent – when he makes the sin of the believing soul his own through its bridal ring, faith, and when he does not behave differently than as if he had done them, then sins must be swallowed up and drowned in him, for his invincible righteousness is too strong for all sins. In this way the soul is released and free from all its sins through its dowry alone, i. e. for the sake of faith, and is bestowed with the eternal righteousness of its bridegroom Christ.19

There is then a joyful wedding [ein froeliche wirtschafft], between Christ and his bride, the soul of the sinner, whose sins are being cast on to Christ. Sins now cannot damn the soul of Christ’s bride, because Christ has devoured them.20 Here is an example of the mystical event of justification by faith through Christ – the sinner (the bride) is released from guilt, since sins have been borne by Christ the bridegroom. The imagery invoked by Luther is steeped in the bridal mysticism of Johannes von Staupitz and Bernard of Clairvaux.21 Thus, we see again that 18

WA 56, 204: 17–25; WA 25: 188. Cf. Hamm, The Early Luther, 240–41. WA 7, 25 (30)–26: 4. “das was Christus hatt, das ist eygen der glaubigen seele, was die seele hatt, wirt eygen Christi. So hatt Christus alle guetter vnd seligkeit, die seyn der seelen eygen. So hatt die seel alle vntugent vnd sund auff yhr, die werden Christi eygen. Hie hebt sich nu der froelich wechszel vnd streytt. Die weyl Christus ist gott vnd mensch, wilcher noch nie gesundigt hatt, vnd seyne frumkeyt vnuebirwindlich, ewig vnd almechtig ist, szo er denn der glaubigen seelen sund durch yhren braudtring, das ist der glaub, ym selbs eygen macht vnd nit anders thut, denn als hett er sie gethan, szo mussen die sund ynn yhm vorschlundenn vnd erseufft werden, Denn sein vnuebirwindlich gerechtigkeyt ist allenn sunden zustarck, also wirt die seele von allen yhren sunden, lauterlich durch yhren malschatzts, das ist des glaubens halben, ledig vnd frey, vnd begabt mit der ewigen gerechtickeit yhrs breuedgamsz Christi.” 20 WA 7, 26: 4–10. “Ist nu das nit ein froeliche wirtschafft, da der reyche, edle, frummer breuedgam Christus das arm voracte boeszes huerlein zur ehe nympt, vnd sie entledigt von allem uebell, zieret mit allen guetern? So ists nit muglich, das die sund sie vordampne, denn sie liegen nu auff Christo, vnd sein ynn yhm vorschlunden, so hat sie szo ein reyche gerechtickeyt ynn yhrem breuetgam, das sie abermals wider alle sund bestahn mag, ob sie schon auff yhr legen.” 21 Volker Leppin traces Luther’s use of bridal imagery in this passage to Staupitz. “Notably, Luther used the imagery for exactly the same purpose as Staupitz did: to show how Christ frees 19

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Luther relates to late medieval passion mysticism and incorporates and transforms this tradition for his understanding of justification in the present sermon.22 The soul is the bride, and Christ is the bridegroom. The wedding ring of faith unites bride and bridegroom, in that all the bridegroom has is given to the bride, and vice versa. Thus, the soul of the guilty sinner is given Christ’s righteousness through no merit of one’s own, and Christ bears the sin of the soul of the guilty sinner. Faith is not a merit and/or price one pays in this mystical marriage, but a passive trust in God given through grace related to Baptism, as Luther emphasizes in point 7 of the sermon.23 Traces of the theologia crucis can be found here if the mystical influences of Staupitz and Bernard on Luther’s thought are taken seriously. Here it is important to remember how Staupitz counseled Luther to look to the wounds of

sinner from their sins!” See Volker Leppin, “Mysticism and Justification,” in Christine Helmer, ed., The Medieval Luther (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020), 192. Else Marie Wiberg Pedersen describes how the bridal imagery in relation to the happy exchange in Freedom of a Christian, as well as in Luther’s theology in general, connects to Bernard. “As I read Luther, he – again like Bernard, understands the happy exchange in a slightly asymmetrical way, as he also does in his exposition of Hosea 2: Whereas the bridegroom is the fullness of all good and gives all good things to his bride out of grace and mercy, his spouse has it only partially and must progress in imitation of Christ’s unselfish love. As Luther states [in the Sermo de duplici justitia, 1519], the external justice ‘is not totally infused at one time, it begins, proceeds and is perfected through death’ – in an echo of Bernard’s Of Loving God. Inwardly, for the inner human being, this external justification is enough. However, humans live in a social setting, and therefore something more is required. Yet, there is also symmetry in the exchange. Luther, who always operates dialectically, uses his dialectics of the inner and outer human, of spirit and flesh, of gift and example, of the alien justice and own justice, and of the coram Deo and the coram hominibus to explicate life’s two dimensions: the God-human relation and the inner-human relation. Whereas Christ is gift (donum) in the first justice, he is example (exemplum) in the second justice, in which humans become Christ-formed by doing works of love.” Else Marie Wiberg Pedersen, “You are Mine and I am Yours: The Nuptial Motif in Luther’s Theology,” in Ibid., 175–76. From these arguments, as well as Franz Posset and Leppin’s work showing the connection between Luther’s theology and Bernard of Clairvaux (see Chapter 1, pp. 27–29 of the present study), it is reasonable to conclude Luther’s theological-spiritual sources for the “happy exchange” are both Johannes von Staupitz and Bernard of Clairvaux. This judgment is in line with Hamm, who argues for the connection to both Staupitz and Bernard for the theme of “happy exchange” (see below). 22 Referring to Freedom of a Christian as a sermon is warranted when one is reading the German edition of the text, as Luther refers to it as a “little tract and sermon” (disz tractatell vnnd Sermon) in his dedication letter to Hieronymus Mülphordt. See WA 7, 20: 1–23, esp. 18–22. 23 WA 7, 23: 14–23. “Darumb ists gar ein vberschwenklich reychtumb, ein rechter glaub yn Christo, denn er mit sich bringt alle seligkeit, vnd abnympt alle vnseligkeyt. Wie Mar. vlt. ‘Wer do glaubt vnd taufft ist, der wirt selig. Wer nit glaubt, der wirt vordampt.’ Darumb der prophet Isa. x. Den reychtumb des selben glaubens ansach vnd sprach: ‘Gott wirt eyn kurtz summa machen auff erden, vnd die kurtz summa wirt, wie ein syndflut, eynfliessen die gerechtigkeit’, das ist, der glaub, darynn kurtzlich aller gebot erfullung steht, wirt vberflussig rechtfertigen alle die yhn haben, das sie nichts mehr bedurffen, das sie gerecht vnd frum seyn. Also sagt S. Pauel Ro. x. ‘Das man von hertzen glaubt, das macht eynen gerecht vnd frum.’”

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Christ when he was distressed over the question of election.24 Further, Luther’s own connection to Bernard of Clairvaux is apparent when it is emphasized that Luther relates to and transforms a tradition of passion mysticism stressing Christ’s entering into human misery. Hamm clarifies this argument. With this new mysticism, Luther did not merely cut himself off from medieval mysticism but, in his own way, inherited, continued, and intensified it. This is seen most impressively in the example of Johannes von Staupitz. Together with Staupitz, Luther stands in a mystical tradition that, especially since the time of Bernard of Clairvaux, found its central perspective in God’s coming down to human misery. For this kind of mysticism, the union of the soul with Christ always meant being placed into Christ’s unio with human flesh and blood, participating in his incarnation and being marked by his cross. The image of the soul that finds a refuge and home in Christ’s wounds is characteristic of this context.25

While Luther does not specifically speak of Christ’s wounds and/or the cross in relation to the happy exchange in the passage referenced above, it is reasonable to argue the crucified Christ is the source of the happy exchange, if Freedom of a Christian can be said to be in a similar spiritual vein to Theses 19–21 of the Heidelberg Disputation, wherein Luther argues for God to be found in suffering and the cross, and that true knowledge of God is in the crucified Christ (a tradition with further connections to Bernardian mysticism). Provided this judgment is correct, it would mean Freedom of a Christian is not only about the dialectical relationship between freedom in Christ and servitude to neighbors, and thus about the dialectic between faith and love and justification and sanctification, but concerns a mystical theologia crucis as the spiritual source for Luther’s arguments about the happy exchange. Here then would be an example that shows Luther’s passion mysticism is deeply related to his theologia crucis (and perhaps even the spiritual source of it), and vice versa.26

24

Hamm writes, “As his pastor, Staupitz advised Luther when in Anfechtung about predestination to meditate on the wounds of the crucified Christ and to seek comfort nowhere else.” Hamm, The Early Luther, 223, n. 126. 25 Hamm, The Early Luther, 223. 26 This argument agrees with Hamm, who writes, “The brokenness of the theology of the cross in Luther’s mysticism and its characteristic structure of God’s saving presence sub contrario (under the form of opposites) are thus rooted in a late medieval spirituality that – rather than making a speculative ascent to the heights – invites the soul searching for God into an intimate familiarity with the pitiful, incarnate, martyred Christ. Luther extended this passion mysticism of humanity from the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries into his theology of the cross, shaping his mysticism of word and sacrament.” Hamm, The Early Luther, 224.

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3. Luther’s Freedom of a Christian in View of Systemic Sin: A Constructive Development As has been argued in Chapter 1 of the present study, a theologia crucis with roots in Luther’s early theology does not sanction suffering or attempt to turn it into a good work for earning favor and/or holiness before God. This is important to consider, particularly given the concerns of feminist theologians.27 However, a contemporary, constructive critique can now be given to Luther’s Freedom of a Christian in terms of the happy exchange in relation to guilty sinners precisely in light of the concern to avoid a contemporary theologia gloriae: In this sermon, Christ bears the sins of the soul of the guilty sinner and bestows Christ’s own righteousness on the guilty sinner. This Bernardian bridal mysticism (also found in Staupitz, as explored above) was undoubtedly deeply consoling for Luther personally in light of his own struggles with Anfechtung.28 Nevertheless, the guilty sinner remains the primary concern of the happy exchange. There is nothing offered here in relation to what liberation theologians would understand as structural sin and injustice.29 In Luther’s text, the notion of the guilty sinner bride who is bestowed the bridegroom Christ’s righteousness through the happy exchange is rooted in the notion of sin as incurvatus in se, in the sense that human arrogance before God has caused the sinner to turn away from God and God’s goodness. The sinner remains simul iustus et peccator, but sin is ultimately unrelated to any kind of structural injustice.30 While it needs to be admitted that Luther himself was not a liberation theologian in the twentieth-century sense of that term, and cannot directly address contemporary theological questions given his own historical distance to the present, systematic theologians have nevertheless transformed

27

See “Theologia Crucis and Contemporary Suffering: A Constructive Development” in Chapter 1, pp. 38–40 of the present study, wherein Arnfríður Guðmundsdóttir’s feminist reading of Luther’s theologia crucis is considered. 28 For Anfechtung in relation to faith (including its mystical dimensions), see Reinhard Schwarz, Martin Luther: Lehrer der christlichen Religion (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2016) 361– 80. 29 The phrase “liberation theologians” is used to acknowledge the plurality of theological reflections on liberation movements that emerged in the 1960s, rather than restricting to Latin American liberation theology alone. Also, it is important for the present study’s concerns to note that James Cone’s Black Theology and Black Power was published before Gustavo Gutiérrez’s now classic Latin American liberation theology. See Diana L. Hayes, “James Cone’s Hermeneutic of Language and Black Theology,” Theological Studies 61 (2000): 611, n. 4, James Cone, Black Theology and Black Power (New York: Seabury, 1969), and Gustavo Gutiérrez, A Theology of Liberation, 15th anniversary ed. (New York: Orbis Books, 1988). 30 In Luther, the phrase simul iustus et peccator can be found as early as the Romans Lectures of 1515–1516. See LW 25: 260; WA 56, 272: 17–19, and Hamm, The Early Luther, 163.

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Luther’s own theology, and particularly the theme of theologia crucis, in relation to contemporary structural injustice.31 In Freedom of a Christian, Luther’s notion of what can be termed the “guilty sinner” is what feminist theologian Valerie Saiving-Goldstein would view as a typically “masculine” definition of sin, rooted in an Augustinian understanding of “original sin” related to pride and undisciplined sexual desire. This masculine understanding of sin can be found even despite the feminine bridal imagery in Luther’s sermon. However, Saiving-Goldstein’s article, “The Human Situation: A Feminine View” (1960) offers a corrective to what she sees as the traditional, masculine definition of sin, particularly related to sexual desire, through a feminist reading of sin. For her, women are more likely to fall into triviality, distractibility, and diffuseness; lack of an organizing center or focus; dependence on others for one’s own self-definition; tolerance at the expense of standards of excellence; inability to respect the boundaries of privacy; sentimentality, gossipy sociability, and mistrust of reason – in short, under-development or negation of the self than unbridled, masculine, lustful desire for sex.32

Saiving-Goldstein’s argument is one way sin can be reframed in relation to structural injustice, and it is important to consider, particularly given Luther’s incorporation of feminine imagery related to Bernardian bridal mysticism, and since Luther himself does not argue for suffering as something that should be sought out. For him, as the present study has repeatedly sought to show, suffering relates to being conformed to Christ. From a contemporary perspective, then, it is important to ask what conformity to Christ might mean in relation to structural injustice, and thus to systemic sin. One answer is proposed by SaivingGoldstein, in her reframing of sin from a traditional, Augustinian understanding of pride to feminist concerns for the unjust suffering of women in masculinedominated societies.33 Saiving-Goldstein’s reframing of sin to better address the 31 See Vítor Westhelle, “The Divergence between Lutheran Theology and Liberation Theology,” in Vítor Westhelle, Liberating Luther: A Lutheran Theology from Latin America, trans. Robert A. Butterfield (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2021), 193–217, Walter Altmann, Luther and Liberation: A Latin American Perspective (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2016), 67–93; 367–403, and the literature review in the Introduction of the present study. I am grateful to Ole Schenk for alerting me to Westhelle’s essay referenced here. 32 Valerie Saiving-Goldstein, “The Human Situation: A Feminine View,” The Journal of Religion 40, no. 2 (1960): 109. 33 “What is usually called the ‘modern era’ in Western civilization, stretching roughly from the Renaissance and Reformation up to very recent times and reaching the peak of its expression in the rise of capitalism, the industrial revolution, imperialism, the triumphs of science and technology, and other well-known phenomena of the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries – this modern era can be called the ‘masculine age par excellence,’ in the sense that it emphasized, encouraged, and set free precisely those aspects of human nature which are peculiarly significant to men.” Ibid., 107. I have proposed a constructive theologia crucis related to Saiving-Goldstein’s reframing of the Augustinian tradition’s understanding of sin as pride in Brach S. Jennings, “St. Augustine and Malcolm X as Theological Figures in Relation to a Con-

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concerns of women is helpful for questions of systemic sin because it relates to a concern for the victims of oppression. Understanding sin systemically then provides an impetus for reconsidering Luther’s arguments about faith and love in Freedom of a Christian, and thus the relationship between theology and ethics. Luther’s emphasis on the dialectical relationship between faith and love is arguably not what in later Lutheran dogmatics is called a “third use of the Law” (tertius usus legis), but a matter of the Gospel as lived out for the sake of the neighbor. While it is important to emphasize that Luther is not dogmatic about the relationship between Law and Gospel in Freedom of a Christian, his statements about the relationship between faith and love still arguably accord better with what William H. Lazareth calls a “second” and/or “parenetic” use of the Gospel than with a “third use of the Law.” Lazareth writes, [Luther] turns from Christ’s justifying work for us to the Holy Spirit’s sanctifying work in and through us, as the evangelical basis for the theological ethics of Christian renewal. It is the actual love of God that the Holy Spirit pours into our hearts (Rom 5:6). Hence, ‘If you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law’ (tertius usus legis), but through what we have earlier proposed to call the second or parenetic use of the gospel, that is, justifying faith active in sanctifying love and justice, that the Holy Spirit calls and empowers us with new gifts to fulfill our new obedience to God’s primal command of love (mandatum). Therefore the mature Luther faithfully taught this Christ-normed law of love (lex spiritus, caritatis Christi) dialectically generates God’s twofold rule of humankind through interacting expressions of the law and gospel within the world’s two kingdoms.34

Luther’s own ethics, both in this sermon and overall, can then be critiqued for not being attentive to social injustice as a second and/or parenetic use of the Gospel. From a constructive perspective, Luther was simply wrong to not have read the Bible and/or history from the standpoint of the victims of oppression, a position argued for by James Cone. We cannot say that Luther, Calvin, Wesley, and other prominent representatives of the Church’s tradition were limited by their time, as if their ethical judgments on oppression did not affect the essential truth of their theologies. They were wrong ethically, because they were wrong theologically. They were wrong theologically because they failed to listen to the Bible – with sufficient openness and through the eyes of the victims of political oppression. How ironic it is that he who proclaimed sola scriptura as one of the guiding lights of his reformation did not really hear the true meaning of that proclamation. For to hear the message of Scripture is to hear and see the truth of God’s liberating presence temporary Theologia Crucis in Solidarity with the #BlackLivesMatter Movement,” Currents in Theology and Mission 49, no. 1 (2022): 64–70. 34 Lazareth, Christians in Society, 244. While Lazareth is explicitly concerned in this excerpt with the “mature Luther,” his arguments also correspond well to Luther’s Freedom of a Christian, even as Lazareth himself did not offer an extensive analysis of this text. Lazareth briefly addresses Freedom of a Christian in relation to neighbor love and the universal priesthood of Baptized Christians in Ibid., 221.

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in history for those who are oppressed by unjust social structures. Luther could not hear God’s liberating Word for the oppressed because he was not a victim. He could only see God’s liberation in terms of the individual, ‘religious’ oppression of sin and guilt. Any time God is not derived from the biblical theme of liberation of the oppressed, it is to be expected that Christian ethics will be at best indifferent toward the oppressed struggle for freedom.35

Cone is concerned that Luther not be excused for his failure to engage with history’s victims in light of Luther’s own historical circumstances. Cone argues that to attempt to excuse Luther’s neglect of reading the Bible from the standpoint of the oppressed due to living in the sixteenth century is to bypass a larger question of the proper relationship between theology and ethics.36 However, Cone’s emphasis on the interrelationship between theology and ethics from the standpoint of his Black Theology of Liberation is not entirely different from Luther’s own emphasis on both faith and love, and thus justification and sanctification, as has been examined in the present chapter in relation to Freedom of a Christian. Thus, arguing for a transfigured theologia crucis originating in texts such as Freedom of a Christian in Cone’s thinking shows how traditional notions of sin can be expanded in relation to liberationist concerns.37 Sin thus becomes reframed from a primary concern with an individual’s relationship to God (and, as Saiving-Goldstein would argue, a masculine understanding of sin as pride), to a systemic reality concerned with injustices faced by the victims of oppression. While the two understandings of sin do not necessarily need to be opposed to one another, expanding Luther’s arguments in this way shows one way how Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation transfigures Luther’s theology, while still containing traces of Luther’s original insights, particularly related to the theme of theologia crucis and a radicalized understanding of the happy exchange. These arguments will be developed further as the study progresses.38

35

James H. Cone, God of the Oppressed, Revised ed. (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1997), 183–84. For Cone’s understanding of the interdependence of theology and ethics, see Ibid., 180–89. As will become clearer in the second and third parts of the present study, there is a connection between Cone’s intersecting of theology and ethics with Karl Barth’s claims about the relationship between Dogmatics and Ethics in the Barmen Declaration and 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics. 37 See the section “James Cone’s Hermeneutics as a Transfiguration of Martin Luther,” pp. 236–44, in Chapter 8 below for arguments as to how Cone’s theology transfigures a theologia crucis originating in texts from the early Martin Luther related to Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. 38 See especially Chapters 5–7 below for explorations of how the happy exchange is transformed from Luther’s theology through Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre and developed and critiqued further by Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Jürgen Moltmann on the way to James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. 36

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4. Conclusion This chapter read Luther’s 1520 text Freedom of a Christian (Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen) to explore the relationship between faith and love for Luther, and what is arguably the central mystical theme of this sermon, the happy exchange (der fröhliche Wechsel). For the Reformer, a Christian is a free person in Christ who is then bound to serve the neighbor. Said freedom is anchored in justification by grace through faith in Christ, wherein no good works earn merit and/or righteousness before God.39 Love of neighbors results from said freedom in Christ, wherein the Christian is bound to the neighbor in servitude.40 Faith and love are connected throughout the sermon, although the sermon is anchored overall in Luther’s concern for justification, related to Luther’s Pauline theological orientation throughout the text. Having examined the relationship between faith and love, the study then proceeded to explore the happy exchange in Luther’s text with roots in the bridal mysticism of Bernard of Clairvaux and Johannes von Staupitz. Based on the close reading undertaken here, is reasonable to suppose that the happy exchange is intimately related to a theologia crucis, given the mystical roots of both themes in the Reformer’s theology. This judgment is in line with Berndt Hamm.41 Finding the theme of theologia crucis in the happy exchange (and vice versa) then invites ongoing possibilities for the research into Luther’s theology for both historical theology and constructive systematic theology. Related to the so-called “revisionist historical scholarship” on Martin Luther’s life and theology, wherein Luther is seen as a late medieval Catholic friar rather than the person responsible for the birth of modernity, Luther’s theological connections to Staupitz and Bernard of Clairvaux show both that Luther’s theologia crucis is deeply mystical, and that this scholarship on Luther (arguably originating with Heiko Oberman in the 1960s) is advancing the historical theological study of the Reformer’s own theologia crucis, even if the scholars working on the late medieval roots of Luther’s thought do not always use this term.42 When arguing 39 Thus, Luther ends his sermon with the following description: “Sihe das ist die rechte, geystliche, Christliche freyheyt, die das hertz frey macht von allen sundenn, gesetzen vnd gepotten, wilch alle andere freyheyt vbirtrifft, wie der hymell die erdenn, Wilch geb vns gott recht zuvorstehen vnd behaltenn, AMEN.” WA 7, 38: 12–15. 40 “Nach der seelen wirt er eyn geystlich, new, ynnerlich mensch genennet, nach dem fleysch vnd blut wirt er eyn leyplich allt vnd euszerlich mensch genennet. Vnd vmb diszes vnterschiedisz willen werden von yhm gesagt yn der schrifft, die do stracks widdernander seyn, we ich itzt gesagt, von der freyheyt vnd dienstparkeit.” WA 7, 21: 13–17. 41 See Hamm, The Early Luther, 224, and n. 26 above. 42 In addition to the secondary literature cited in the present chapter, see the literature review in the Introduction of the present study for an overview of the “revisionist” scholarship on Luther’s theology that emphasizes his relationship to the Middle Ages, and especially to late medieval passion mysticism. The work of Leppin, Rittgers, and Hamm is especially important

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for Luther’s theology in relation to passion mysticism, one can thus claim with reasonable accuracy that Luther is a theologian of the cross because he inherits and transforms the spiritual tradition of passion mysticism in his own day and before. Further, if Luther’s own theologia crucis is deeply mystical, and deeply Catholic, it is then reasonable to say the theme of theologia crucis in his writings (and particularly in his pastoral pamphleteering) is not the only source for a contemporary constructive theologia crucis. Therefore, the theologia crucis becomes a broad spiritual-sapiential tradition, which can be investigated and re-interpreted by constructive systematic theology. While these are possibilities that can only be preliminarily considered in the present study due to space limitations, it is still important to emphasize that Luther’s connection to Bernard of Clairvaux and Johannes von Staupitz (and not forgetting Johannes von Paltz!) provides grounding for an ecumenical conversation around the theologia crucis.43 Finally, the present study proposed a constructive development and critique of Luther’s “happy exchange” in relation to systemic sin, drawing from Valerie Saiving-Goldstein’s feminist theology, William H. Lazareth’s Lutheran social ethics, and James Cone. Said development and critique relates to the aim of this within this revisionist tradition, as these scholars emphasize how Luther’s mystical theology is related to a theologia crucis. 43 See Volker Leppin, “Passionsmystik bei Luther,” Lutherjahrbuch 84 (2017): 51–81; 56–61. One possibility for a re-interpreted sapiential theologia crucis for contemporary concerns from Catholic theology could be a critical investigation of Karl Rahner’s mystical-spiritual theology. In particular, said investigation could be a study of selected essays from Rahner’s Theological Investigations and select devotional works for traces of a theologia crucis. See, for example, the essays on Christology, dogmatics and exegesis, salvation history, faith, and the commandment of love in Karl Rahner, S. J., Theological Investigations, Volume 5: Later Writings, trans. Karl-H. Kruger (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966). A collection of Rahner’s devotional writings in English is found in Karl Rahner, S. J., The Mystical Way in Everyday Life, trans. and ed., Annemarie S. Kidder (Maryknoll: Orbis, 2010). For an argument that Rahner’s theology is a theologia crucis, taking seriously both his devotional and academic theology and centering in a reading of Rahner’s meditations on the spiritual exercises of Ignatius of Loyola, see Lois Malcolm, “Rahner’s Theology of the Cross,” in Paul G. Crowley, S. J., ed., Rahner Beyond Rahner: A Great Theologian Encounters the Pacific Rim (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2005), 115–31. This article responds to Hans Urs von Balthasar’s critique that Rahner did not have a sufficient theologia crucis, references Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation and Freedom of a Christian in relation to Rahner, and addresses the feminist concerns of Rita Nakashima Brock and Rebecca Ann Parker around a theologia crucis and sin. After acknowledging the “vast differences” between Luther and Rahner, Malcolm argues for important theological connections between Rahner and Luther in several points, including an understanding of sin related to idolatry (Malcom sees a critique of idolatry in Luther’s distinction between a theologian of glory and a theologian of the cross in the Heidelberg Disputation), the hiddenness of God in the cross (for Rahner the “incomprehensible God”), and the happy exchange, which Malcolm argues for both Rahner and Luther means the letting go of the need for “idolatrous sources of security” so that neighbors might be loved “in ways that are truly genuine and liberating.” Ibid., 125–26. The proposal for a future examination of Rahner’s mystical-spiritual theology for traces of a theologia crucis could thus build on Malcolm’s work and the research undertaken in the present study around a sapiential theologia crucis.

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study to explore a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, and argued that Luther’s Pauline stress on “faith active in love” (Gal. 5) is best understood through what William H. Lazareth calls the second/paranetic Use of the Gospel, rather than what later Lutheran dogmatics would term a Third Use of the Law, even though Luther himself uses none of these dogmatic terms. If this designation is correct, then Bayer’s stress on the passive justification of faith, which is followed by a new obedience, would also be accurate overall to Luther’s theology in this text, showing again the connection between faith and love, and justification and sanctification.44 What was outlined as an introductory development and critique will become clearer as the study progresses. With these remarks complete, the study now proceeds to the final text of Luther’s for close reading, On Bound Choice (1525).

44

See Bayer, Aus Glauben Leben, 29–50.

Chapter 4

On Bound Choice (1525) Martin Luther’s On Bound Choice (De servo arbitrio) addresses the complete inability of human beings to merit salvation in relation to God, and the problem of the (un)free will. It does not belong to the early period of Luther’s theological writings, but it has been chosen nonetheless to end the close reading of texts from Luther in the present study to examine if traces of a sapiential theologia crucis indebted to the early Luther’s theology might be found here in ways perhaps not previously considered. After clarifying the place of Jesus Christ for questions of Scriptural interpretation and the free will debate for Luther, we will closely read excerpts from On Bound Choice in order to address three principal topics in relation to a sapiential theologia crucis: 1) God clothed in God’s Word (the Preached God) in relation to God in God’s own majesty apart from the Word (the Unpreached God) 2) If this text should be thought of as pastoral care (as advocated by “Radical Lutheran” theologian Steven D. Paulson) or if it is better thought of in the genre of polemic (the dominant view of Luther scholars) 3) Developments in Luther’s understanding of the hidden God in comparison with the Heidelberg Disputation. Overall, we will examine how this text stands in continuity to and difference from the theme of theologia crucis found in the Heidelberg Disputation and the pastoral texts from the same period, and how Luther’s understanding of divine hiddenness behind the cross On Bound Choice related the question of predestination can be transformed through an eschatologia crucis.1

1. Jesus Christ as the Center of the Scriptures and Questions of Predestination As examined in Chapter 1 above, Luther argues in the Heidelberg Disputation (1518) that God is known and recognized in the crucified Christ, with connections to and transformations of late medieval passion mysticism. Therefore, Luther can define a theologian of the cross as one who speaks of the crucified and 1 Shifts and continuities in Luther’s thinking about the cross in general after 1518 have been examined recently in Athina Lexutt and Elisabeth Neumeister, OSB, Alles hängt am Kreuz: Eine Annäherung in Wort und Bild (Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2018), 172–83.

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hidden God in the Explanations of the 95 Theses, also from 1518.2 While there is a striking development and change in how Luther understands divine hiddenness in On Bound Choice, this later text also contains similar Christological accents to Luther’s earlier texts, namely that theology should emphasize God incarnate when addressing questions of predestination. In On Bound Choice, Luther writes, What is better than Christ and the gospel? Yet what is more execrated by the world? Consequently, how things can be good in God’s sight which are evil to us only God knows, and those who see with God’s eyes, that is, who have the Spirit. But there is no need to argue such a subtle point as that just yet. The preceding answer is enough for the present.3

In general, it can be argued that Luther interprets Jesus Christ as the center of the Scriptures. Without encountering Jesus Christ crucified and risen through the written Word, then, the Scriptures have little use for theology and the life of faith.4 As the Reformer remarks in the Preface to St. James (1522), the Scriptures “bear forth” Jesus Christ.5 On Bound Choice is in continuity with this preface, when Luther asks emphatically, “Take Christ out of the Scriptures, and what will you find left in them?”6 The Scriptures for Luther, then, offer nothing for theology and faith if Christ is not in the center of scriptural interpretation, for it is to Christ that questions of the (un)free will related to predestination should be directed. Conversely, Luther believes Erasmus’s position about free choice cancels out Christ and the entire Scripture. “Hence, inasmuch as you maintain free choice, you cancel out Christ and ruin the entire Scripture.”7 Luther thus believes the public has the right to know how the Scriptures show Christ, so that Jesus Christ as the incarnate God may be emphasized in opposition to free will in questions pertaining to predestination. This concern is

2

LW 31: 225; WA 1, 614: 17–27. LW 33: 175. Quid Christo et Evangelio melius? at quid mundo execratius? Igitur quomodo sint bona coram Deo, quae nobis mala sunt, solus Deus novit et ii qui oculis Dei vident, id est, qui spiritum habent, Sed tam acuta disputatione nondum opus est. Sufficit interim illa prior responsio (WA 18, 708 (39)–9: 4). 4 Cf. Eric W. Gritsch, Martin – God’s Court Jester: Luther in Retrospect (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1984), 164–68. 5 While this text calls the theological authenticity of the Book of James into question for Luther, we are most concerned here with how this text provides a basis for arguing that Luther interpreted the Bible Christologically. “All the genuine sacred books agree in this, that all of them preach and inculcate [treyben] Christ. And that is the true test by which to judge all books, when we see whether or not they inculcate Christ.” LW 35: 396. “Und daryn stymmen alle rechtschaffene heylige bucher uber eyns, das sie alle sampt Christum predigen und treyben. Auch ist das der rechte prufesteyn alle bucher zu taddelln, wenn man sihet, ob sie Christum treyben, odder nit, Syntemal alle schrifft Christum zeyget” (WA DB 7, 384: 25–28). 6 LW 33: 26. Tolle Christum e scripturis, quid amplius in illis invenies? (WA 18, 606: 29). 7 LW 33: 282. ac sic, dum liberum arbitrium statuis, Christum evacuas et totam scripturam pessundas (WA 18, 779: 31–32). 3

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in contrast to what Luther sees as Erasmus’s refusal to point to Christ for scriptural interpretation and questions about predestination.8 Luther writes: Let it [theology related to questions of (un)free will and predestination] occupy itself instead with God incarnate, or as Paul puts it, with Jesus crucified, in whom are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, though in a hidden manner [Col. 2:3]; for through him it is furnished abundantly with what it ought to know and ought not to know. It is God incarnate, moreover, who is speaking here: ‘I would, you would not’ – God incarnate, I say, who has been sent into the world for the very purpose of willing, speaking, doing, suffering, and offering to all people everything necessary for salvation.9

The incarnate God present in the external Word “in whom are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” is then the supreme consolation of Christians in adversities, in order that God is shown to be trustworthy. “For this is the one supreme consolation of Christians in all adversities, to know that God does not lie, but does all things immutably, and that his will can neither be resisted nor changed nor hindered.”10 Traces of a sapiential theologia crucis can be found here, which then relate to the silencing of the protests of the human (un)free will in light of God’s justifying Word, for the sake of trusting the preached God.11

 8 Luther’s emphasis on the public’s right to know about the (un)free will is evidence for Vítor Westhelle’s claim that Luther was especially well known as a pamphleteer during the 16th century Reformation. See Vítor Westhelle, Transfiguring Luther: The Planetary Promise of Luther’s Theology (Eugene: Cascade, 2016), 1–5. A synthesis of the importance of Luther’s publishing activity, drawing largely from previous scholarship in the late twentieth century, is found in Andrew Pettegree, Brand Luther: How an Unheralded Monk Turned His Small Town into a Center of Publishing, Made Himself the Most Famous Man in Europe – and Started the Protestant Reformation (New York: Penguin, 2015).  9 LW 33: 145. Occupet vero sese cum Deo incarnato seu (ut Paulus loquitur) cum Ihesu crucifixo, in quo sunt omnes thesauri sapientiae et scientiae, sed absconditi; per hunc enim abunde habet, quid scire et non scire debeat. Deus igitur incarnatus hic loquitur: Volui et tu noluisti, Deus, inquam, incarnatus in hoc missus est, ut velit, loquatur, faciat, patiatur, offerat omnibus omnia, quae sunt ad salutem necessaria (WA 18, 689: 22–28). 10 LW 33: 43. Christianorum enim haec una et summa consolatio est in omnibus adversitatibus, nosse, quod Deus non mentitur, sed immutabiliter omnia facit et voluntati eius neque resisti neque eam mutari aut impediri posse (WA 18, 619: 19–21). It is important to emphasize regarding Christ’s consolation amid adversities that Luther nowhere in this text says God suffers in God’s divine nature with the victims of adversities. This interpretation of Luther’s theology is a twentieth-century transformation of his thinking, seen particularly in theologies influenced by Karl Barth, and is arguably indebted to Hegelian philosophy. See Chapters 5–7 of the present study, and Eberhard Jüngel, Gott als Geheimnis der Welt, 10th ed. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010), 83–132. Jüngel shows how a theologia crucis and the corresponding speech about the death of God was primarily philosophical in the modern age, seen in G. W. F. Hegel’s notion of a “speculative Good Friday” in the Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion, until returning “home” to theology in Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Letters and Papers from Prison (see Ibid., 74–83). 11 See Robert Kolb, Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 102–3 and Reinhard Schwarz, Martin Luther: Lehrer der christlichen Religion (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2016), 223–25. On the concept of the Gospel as God’s forgiveness of sins in Luther’s overall theology, see Schwarz, Martin Luther, 237–62.

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2. The Preached God in Contrast to God in God’s Majesty For Luther, the heart of the matter for the question of the (un)free will is the relationship between God as preached and God as hidden in God’s majesty (God as unpreached). God preached means God as clothed in God’s Word in the cross. God unpreached is God behind the Word, and thus behind the cross. The latter corresponds to God in God’s majesty, whereas the former corresponds to God incarnate who “weeps, wails, and groans” for the perdition of the ungodly.12 Luther elaborates on the difference between God in God’s majesty (unpreached), and God as clothed in God’s Word (preached): God must therefore be left to himself in his own majesty, for in this regard we have nothing to do with him, nor has he willed that we should have anything to do with him. But we have something to do with him insofar as he is clothed and set forth in his Word, through which he offers himself to us and which is the beauty and glory with which the psalmist celebrates him as being clothed. In this regard we say, the good God does not deplore the death of his people which he works in them, but he deplores the death which he finds in his people and desires to remove from them. For it is this that God as he is preached is concerned with, namely, that sin and death should be taken away and we should be saved. For ‘he sent his word and healed them’ [Ps. 107:20]. But God hidden in his majesty neither deplores nor takes away death, but works life, death, and all in all. For there he has not bound himself by his word, but has kept himself free over all things.13

Here, then, God is hidden in God’s majesty outside the Word when unpreached, and it might seem as if traces of a sapiential theologia crucis beginning in the Heidelberg Disputation can no longer be found. However, despite a rather dramatic change from the way God’s hiddenness is understood in the Heidelberg Disputation, Luther ultimately emphasizes the preached God, as shown in the beginning of this excerpt, wherein God is to be “left to himself in his own majesty” when unpreached. Thus, the unpreached God to be fled from is God behind God’s Word in the cross, wherein God works through God’s inscrutable will, which humans are to leave alone. God does many things that he does not disclose to us in his word; he also wills many things which he does not disclose himself as willing in his word. Thus he does not will the 12

LW 33: 146; WA 18, 689 (32)–90: 2. LW 33: 139–40. Relinquendus est igitur Deus in maiestate et natura sua, sic enim nihil nos cum illo habemus agere, nec sic voluit a nobis agi cum eo, Sed quatenus indutus et proditus est verbo suo, quo nobis sese obtulit, cum eo agimus, quod est decor et gloria eius, quo Psalmista eum celebrat indutum. Sic dicimus: Deus pius non deplorat mortem populi quam operatur in illo, Sed deplorat mortem quam invenit in populo et amovere studet. Hoc enim agit Deus praedicatus, ut ablato peccato et morte salvi simus. Misit enim verbum suum et sanavit eos. Caeterum Deus absconditus in maiestate, neque deplorat neque tollit mortem, sed operatur vitam, mortem et omnia in omnibus. Neque enim tum verbo suo definivit sese, sed liberum sese reservavit super omnia (WA 18, 685: 14–24). 13

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death of a sinner, according to his word; but he wills it according to that inscrutable will of his. It is our business, however, to pay attention to the word and leave that inscrutable will alone, for we must be guided by the word and not by that inscrutable will. After all, who can direct himself by a will completely inscrutable and unknowable? It is enough to know simply that there is a certain inscrutable will in God, and as to what, why, and how far it wills, that is something we have no right whatever to inquire into, hanker after, care about, or meddle with, but only to fear and adore.14

For Luther, without a preacher to assure of the Gospel’s justification of guilty sinners, said guilty sinners are lost and damned. With a preacher, Jesus Christ with his wounds can be trusted, and there one’s salvation is certain.15 The unpreached God in God’s inscrutable will is simply to be adored.16 Thus, without denying the reality for Luther of God hidden behind God’s Word, the chief theological emphasis for questions of the (un)free will related to predestination should remain the preached God in the cross of Jesus Christ. In On Bound Choice, the encounter with the preached God is not a matter of personal choice for Luther, but a work of God when the Christian is forced to endure the hidden God behind the cross, in confidence that the preached God will come to the forefront. Luther then has no desire for free choice because he does not believe free choice can lead to salvation. For my own part, I frankly confess that even if it were possible, I should not wish to have free choice given to me, or to have anything left in my own hands by which I might strive toward salvation. For, on the one hand, I should be unable to stand firm and keep hold of it amid so many adversities and perils and so many assaults of demons, seeing that even one demon is mightier, than all humans, and no human being at all could be saved; and on the other hand, even if there were no perils or adversities or demons, I should nevertheless have to labor under perpetual uncertainty and to fight as one beating the air, since even if I lived and worked to eternity, my conscience would never be assured and certain how much it ought to do to satisfy God.17 14 LW 33: 140. Nunc autem nobis spectandum est verbum relinquendaque illa voluntas imperscrutabilis. Verbo enim nos dirigi, non voluntate illa inscrutabili oportet. Atque adeo quis sese dirigere queat ad voluntatem prorsus imperscrutabilem et incognoscibilem? Satis est, nosse tantum, quod sit quaedam in Deo voluntas imperscrutabilis, Quid vero, Cur et quatenus illa velit, hoc prorsus non licet quaerere, optare, curare aut tangere, sed tantum timere et adorare (WA 18, 685 (29)–86: 3). 15 Cf. n. 21 below, and Steven D. Paulson, Luther’s Outlaw God, Volume 2: Hidden in the Cross (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2019), 37–39. 16 Related to the hidden God in this manner, von Loewenich observes accurately to Luther’s text, “The hidden God does not want to be known by us. He is not only a hidden God, but a God who has concealed himself.” Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 35. Westhelle argues the adoration of the unpreached God is a kind of mysterium termendum in the vein of Rudolf Otto, but does not develop its consequences, seeming to prefer ultimately the early Luther’s theologia crucis in the Heidelberg Disputation. See Westhelle, Transfiguring Luther, 118–21. 17 LW 33: 288–89. Ego sane de me confiteor, Si qua fieri posset, nollem mihi dari liberum arbitrium, aut quippiam in manu mea relinqui, quo ad salutem conari possem, non solum ideo, quod in tot adversitatibus et periculis, Deinde tot impugnantibus daemonibus, subsistere et retinere

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Luther thus objects to free choice, because he believes free choice denies the God encountered as preached. Steven D. Paulson describes Luther’s emphasis on the preached God, as well as Luther’s need to critique Erasmus in a biting polemical style: Luther was convinced by Scripture and reason that the Holy Spirit worked by means of preachers who proclaimed salvation in Christ apart from the law by faith alone. This meant that early on in Luther’s best book [De servo arbitrio] Erasmus simply became irrelevant – except as a honing wheel for Luther’s own sharp theological sword. Erasmus became merely the occasion for a volcanic explosion by a theologian who had, by most other accounts, already written his best works.18

The preached God in the cross of Christ relates to Luther’s stress on the “kind paternal heart” of God the Father in his Meditation on Christ’s Passion (1519).19 It can thus be argued that when focusing on the preached God, one sees Jesus Christ, who is the human face of God.20 Luther’s insistence of fleeing the unpreached God for God as clothed in God’s Word, and Luther’s emphasis on the incarnate God, also corresponds to his Sermon on Preparing to Die (1519), wherein questions of election and predestination are to be directed to Christ’s wounds.21 However, the Deus absconditus encountered when God is not preached is to be fled from at all costs. Hence, Luther’s reminder, “It is our business, however, to pay attention to the word and leave that inscrutable will alone, for we must be guided by the word and not by that inscrutable will.”22 Directing questions about the (un)free will related to predestination to Jesus Christ means the preached God is a source of spiritual consolation containing traces of a sapiential theologia crucis.23 Still, Luther says one is to “stand in awe” of the unpreached God in light of those who perish. illud non valerem, cum unus daemon potentior sit omnibus hominibus neque ullus hominum salvaretur, Sed, quod etiam si nulla pericula, nullae adversitates, nulli daemones essent, cogerer tamen perpetuo in incertum laborare et aerem pugnis verberare; neque enim conscientia mea, si in aeternum viverem et operarer, unquam certa et secura fieret, quantum facere deberet, quo satis Deo fieret (WA 18, 783: 17–26). 18 Steven D. Paulson, Foreword, in Gerhard O. Forde, The Captivation of the Will: Luther and Erasmus on Freedom and Bondage, ed. Steven D. Paulson (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017), ix–x. 19 LW 42: 13; WA 2, 140–41. 20 Cf. Kolb, Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith, 101–2. 21 See LW 42: 105–6; WA 2, 690: 17–25. Volker Leppin clarifies Luther’s relating questions of election to Christ’s wounds as originating with Johannes von Staupitz. See Volker Leppin, “Deus absconditus und Deus revelatus. Transformationen mittelalterlicher Theologie in der Gotteslehre von ‘De servo arbitrio,’” in Volker Leppin, Transformationen: Studien zu den Wandlungsprozessen in Theologie und Frömmigkeit zwischen Spätmittelalter und Reformation (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2015), 443–58, and Chapter 2 above. 22 LW 33: 140. Nunc autem nobis spectandum est verbum, relinquendaque illa voluntas imperscrutabilis, Verbo enim nos dirigi, non voluntate illa inscrutabili oportet (WA 18, 685: 29–31). 23 See n. 10 above, in relation to consolation for Christians amid aversities.

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It is likewise the part of this incarnate God to weep, wail, and groan over the perdition of the ungodly, when the will of the Divine Majesty purposely abandons and reprobates some to perish. And it is not for us to ask why he does so, but to stand in awe of God who both can do and wills to do such things.24

The unpreached God thus offers no consolation to guilty sinners asking the question about predestination. However, the preached God works in an altogether opposite manner – as a God who consoles sinners anxious about predestination. The possibility of On Bound Choice as a text for pastoral consolation (Seelsorge) will now be examined further, as related to the theological movement known as “Radical Lutheranism.”

3. On Bound Choice in Relation to Seelsorge in “Radical Lutheranism” The present study’s exploration of the theme of theologia crucis in the early Luther has emphasized select pastoral writings to examine pastoral applications of the theologia crucis. At first, then, it may seem an odd choice to conclude the study’s close reading of texts from Luther with On Bound Choice, given this text is commonly thought of in the genre of polemic by most Luther scholars, and that the pastoral texts examined in this study have had little-to-no polemical flavor. However, Steven D. Paulson, a “Radical Lutheran” with roots in the Fordian tradition of Lutheranism which began in the late twentieth century at Luther Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota, argues for On Bound Choice as an example of Luther’s stress on Seelsorge.25 In Paulson’s reading, Luther intends to function as Erasmus’s pastor, making On Bound Choice a text for pastoral care. Given Paul24 LW 33: 146. Huius itidem Dei incarnati est flere, deplorare, gemere super perditione impiorum, cum voluntas maiestatis ex proposito aliquos relinquat et reprobet, ut pereant. Nec nobis quaerendum, cur ita faciat, sed reverendus Deus, qui talia et possit et velit (WA 18, 689 (32)–90: 2). 25 Forde defined so-called “Radical Lutheranism” in a theological polemic for the first issue of the Lutheran Quarterly Journal in 1987. “My thesis is that Lutherans, to be true to their identity, yes, even to reclaim their identity, or rather be reclaimed by it, should become even more radical proponents of the tradition that gave them birth and has brought them thus far. The crisis in identity indicates the necessity for staking out some turf on the ecclesiastical map. What shall we be? Let us be radicals: not conservatives or liberals, fundagelicals or charismatics (or whatever other brand of something-less-than gospel entices), but radicals: radical preachers and practitioners of the gospel by justification by faith without the deeds of the law. We should pursue it to the radical depths already plumbed by St. Paul, especially in Romans and Galatians, when he saw that justification by faith without the deeds of the law really involves and announces the death of the old being and the calling forth of the new in hope. We stand at a crossroads. Either we must become more radical about the gospel, or we would be better off to forget it altogether.” Gerhard O. Forde, “Radical Lutheranism,” Lutheran Quarterly, vol. 1 (1987): 1–16; 5.

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son’s unusual approach to On Bound Choice as a pastoral text, it is warranted to test his understanding from within the text itself in a study explicitly examining a selection of Luther’s pastoral texts for the theme of theologia crucis. Paulson writes, But what Luther really wanted was not a debating victory, but to be a pastor to Erasmus, who had bared his troubled conscience to the world. Who else would dare to tell the poor Dutchman he was an emperor with no clothes? So Luther’s writing is actually a pastoral care clinic, quite personal, especially in his sarcasm (a primary tool for pastors), in which Luther recognized that Erasmus’s morality was an idol that had to be toppled – perhaps the highest and best of all idols ever worshipped.26

Luther’s text mentions nothing about intending to act as Erasmus’s pastor, despite Paulson’s view of On Bound Choice being Luther’s “pastoral care clinic.”27 Luther has many other texts that fit more easily into the genre of pastoral literature, such as the texts examined in Chapters 2 and 3 of the present study.28 Nevertheless, Paulson emphasizes the theological portions of the book, particularly where Luther writes of the necessity of a Christocentric hermeneutic for Scripture, the Law-Gospel sequence as the key to sound Christocentric scriptural exegesis, and the preached God versus the unpreached God, in order to argue for On Bound Choice being a pastoral text directed to Erasmus. Paulson purposefully reads the direct theological content found in the last part of the book as the impetus for seeing On Bound Choice as a text of pastoral care and devotion.29 Through this approach, concerned particularly with the doctrine of justification, Paulson sees Luther as an ironic kind of “father confessor” to Erasmus, absolving the latter’s sin of not being able to properly distinguish Law and Gospel, and thus absolving him for not emphasizing the God who justifies without and apart from the works of the Law in Jesus Christ. Therefore, Paulson’s reading interprets On Bound Choice as a lengthy exposition of Luther’s understanding of the necessity of preaching for the sake of showing the crucified Christ’s relationship to the (un)free human will in matters of salvation, and thus emphasizing God’s justification of sinners apart from the Law.30 Crucial to Paulson’s argument is Luther’s stress on the complete inability of human beings to choose salvation due to original sin. Human existence is then a continual fight between God and the Devil, the will being ridden by one or 26

Paulson, Luther’s Outlaw God, Volume 2, 31–32. Ibid. 28 Cf. Timothy J. Wengert, ed.,  The Pastoral Luther: Essays On Martin Luther’s Practical Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009), 1–20. 29 See LW 33: 246–95; WA 18, 756–87. The present study is also ultimately privileging the theological portions of the book, as the basis for testing Paulson’s assertion of Luther intending to be Erasmus’s pastor. 30 Paulson, Luther’s Outlaw God, Volume 1, 6–16; Paulson, Luther’s Outlaw God, Volume 2, 1–29. 27

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the other, and there is no way out of this apocalyptic struggle between God and Satan.31 However, the struggle between God and Satan is arguably not a matter of pastoral care in On Bound Choice, but rather a matter of Luther’s apocalyptic style related to the polemical nature of his writing against Erasmus. Volker Leppin clarifies Luther’s intentions from an historical perspective: God or the Devil: the judgment of humankind was completely given from the outside. This was the deepest conclusion from the message of justification, which Luther increasingly perceived as the central message not only from the Apostle Paul, but the entire Holy Scripture. If it was correct that the human will had nothing to contribute to salvation, but that everything depended on God, then, as a consequence, belief in humankind’s disposition over itself in terms of salvation was misguided. According to Luther, the greatness of God’s grace demanded exactly that human will be minimized. Any claim that there is a free human will was for [Luther] a human meddling in salvation, and thus upon God’s determination for God’s self.32

Theologically, if the human will is bound, then God is free to be the God of sinners, and thus to be the God of justifying grace despite human sin and repeated shortcomings. Luther thus attempts to put Erasmus to right about the unfree will with the characteristic sarcasm and irony of his other theological polemics. Whatever the merit of Paulson’s claims that sarcasm and irony are “a primary tool for pastors,” Luther does not say he wishes to be Erasmus’s sarcastic pastor in the text.33 Instead, Luther seeks to force Erasmus to admit the human will is utterly powerless in terms of salvation, being left to the apocalyptic struggle between God and Satan.34 According to Luther, Erasmus’s chief problem is his inability to grasp the power of the preached God in relation to the (un)free will. Erasmus is thus in need of correcting for his errors, and Martin Luther serves as Erasmus’s sarcastic, ironic, and biting truth teller. He spared no expense in calling Erasmus out in the latter’s theological apostasy.35 31

LW 33: 65–66; WA 18, 635: 2–22. Translation mine. “Gott oder Teufel: die Richtung des Menschen wurde ganz und gar von außen vorgegeben. Das war die steilste Folgerung aus der Rechtfertigungsbotschaft, die Luther zunehmend als die zentrale Botschaft nicht nur des Apostels Paulus, sondern der gesamten Heiligen Schrift wahrnahm. Wenn es richtig war, dass der Mensch selbst zu seinem Heil nichts beizutragen hatte, sondern alles von Gott abhing, dann war in der Konsequenz jeder Glaube an eine Verfügung des Menschen über sich selbst in Fragen des Heils fehlgeleitet. Die Größe der göttlichen Gnade verlangte nach Luther geradezu danach, den menschlichen Willen zu minimieren. Jeder Anspruch, dass einen freien menschlichen Willen gebe, war für ihn ein Anspruch auf menschliches Mittun an seinem Heil, damit auf seine Bestimmung über sich selbst.” Volker Leppin, Martin Luther, 3rd ed. (Darmstadt: Philipp von Zabern, 2017), 252. 33 See n. 26 above. 34 See n. 31 above. 35 Here it is important to note that Erasmus was not able to respond to Luther’s biting criticisms of him directly when the criticisms were written. Luther proclaimed the Gospel as he understood it without any kind of dialogical method of Seelsorge that twenty-first century 32

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I absolve your heart so long as you display it no further. See that you fear the Spirit of God, who tries the minds and hearts [Ps. 7:9; Jer. 11:20] and is not deceived by cleverly devised phrases. For I have said all this so that you may henceforward cease from charging me with obstinacy and willfulness in this matter. By such tactics you only succeed in showing that you foster in your heart a Lucian, or some other pig from Epicurus’ sty who, having no belief in God himself, secretly ridicules all who have a belief and confess it.36

This excerpt shows another shortcoming of Paulson’s argument for reading On Bound Choice as a text for pastoral care: Paulson does not address the original Latin of the above quotation. The English translation is incorrect with its choice of “absolve” for the Latin verb excusare in Cor tuum interim excuso. Instead, the verb is better translated as “acquit.” Speaking of “acquitting” Erasmus’s heart provides textual evidence for Luther’s theological assertions seeking to be the final word on the matter of the unfree will, rather than a matter of him consoling Erasmus pastorally in an ironic fashion. For Luther, if the human will has free choice in terms of salvation, there would be no need for Jesus Christ. Indeed, Christ would have died for nothing, and the Scriptures would bear false testimony to Christ if free choice were the correct theological response to questions of the free versus enslaved will. “For Christ has opened our minds so that we may understand the Scriptures [Luke 24:45], and the gospel is preached to the whole creation [Mark 16:15]; ‘Their voice has gone out to all the earth’ [Rom. 10:18], and ‘Whatever was written was written for our instruction’ [Rom. 15:4].”37 Further, Luther judges Erasmus as unable to distinguish between Law and Gospel, and thus between a false justification by works and true justification by faith. Therefore, Luther believes Erasmus is not a true theologian.38 persons expect. Luther’s boisterous style did not win him favors with Erasmus, or others who followed the renowned philologist. Related to the reception of Luther following De servo arbitrio by Erasmus and others, Leppin writes, “Luther hatte sich in den Augen des Erasmus und vieler anderer als einer entlarvt, der viel zu lange im Fahrwasser des Humanismus mitgezogen worden war und der nun sein tatsächliches Antlitz zeigte: nicht bereit oder vielleicht nicht fähig zur Diskussion, sondern ein Verkündiger und Polterer, der dekretierte statt zu diskutieren.” Leppin, Martin Luther, 256. 36 LW 33: 24. Sed ut dixi, Verba eant. Cor tuum interim excuso, modo tu non prodas latius, ac metue spiritum Dei, qui scrutatur renes et corda, nec fallitur compositis verbis. Dixi enim haec ideo, ut deinceps desinas nostram causam arguere pertinaciae et pervicatiae. Nam hoc consilio aliud nihil facis, quam quod significas te in corde, Lucianum aut alium quendam de grege Epicuri porcum alere, qui cum ipse nihil credat esse Deum, rideat occulte omnes qui credunt et confitentur (WA 18, 605: 24–30). 37 LW 33: 26. Christus enim aperuit nobis sensum, ut intelligamus scripturas. Et Euangelion predicatum est omni creaturae. In omnem terram exivit sonus eorum. Et omnia quae scripta sunt, ad nostram doctrinam scripta sunt (WA 18, 607: 4–6). 38 Regarding Luther’s understanding of Erasmus as a theologian, Martin Brecht observes, “From the very beginning, in his masterful way Luther left no doubt that he considered Erasmus theologically unqualified.” Martin Brecht, Martin Luther: Shaping and Defining the Reformation, 1521–1532, trans. James L. Schaaf (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1994), 226.

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If, therefore, Abraham is not righteous because of any works, and if both he himself and all his works remain in a state of ungodliness unless he is clothed with another righteousness, namely, that of faith, then it is plain that no human being is brought any nearer to righteousness by his works; and what is more, that no works and no aspirations or endeavors of free choice count for anything in the sight of God, but are all adjudged to be ungodly, unrighteous, and evil. For if the human being is not righteous, neither are his works or endeavors righteous; and if they are not righteous, they are damnable and deserving of wrath.39

For Luther, then, since Erasmus does not properly distinguish between faith and works and Law and Gospel, he does not understand the promise of the Gospel. For this also must be observed, that just as the voice of the law is not raised except over those who do not feel or acknowledge their sin, as Paul says in Romans 3[:20]: ‘Through the law comes knowledge of sin,’ so the word of grace does not come except to those who feel their sin and are troubled and tempted to despair. Thus in all expressions of the law you see that sin is revealed, inasmuch as we are shown what we ought to do, just as you see in all the words of promise, on the other hand, that the evil is indicated under which sinners, or those who are to be lifted up, are laboring.40

No one is exempted from the condemnation of attempted justification by works of the Law. However, condemning works for the sake of earning merit before God leads to new life through the righteousness of faith because of God’s grace.41 Erasmus’s emphasis on free choice contradicts Luther’s concern with the righteousness of faith. Thus, Luther believes Erasmus should exit the theological theater immediately.

39 LW 33: 270. Si igitur Abraham nullis operibus iustus est, sed nisi alia iustitia, puta fidei, induatur, tam ipse, quam opera sua cuncta sub impietate relinquuntur, Palam est, nullum hominem quicquam promovere ad iustitiam suis operibus, Deinde nulla opera, nulla studia, nullos conatus liberi arbitrii coram Deo quicquam valere, Sed omnia impia, iniusta et mala iudicari. Si enim ipse iustus non est, nec opera aut studia eius iusta sunt (WA 18, 772: 4–10). 40 LW 33: 137. Sicut vox legis non fertur nisi super eos, qui peccatum non sentiunt nec agnoscunt, sicut Paulus dicit Romano. 3: Per legem cognitio peccati, Ita verbum gratiae non venit nisi ad eos, qui peccatum sentientes affliguntur et tentantur desperatione. Ideo in omnibus verbis legis vides indicari peccatum, dum ostenditur, quid debeamus. Sicut contra in omnibus verbis promissionis vides malum significari, quo laborant peccatores vel ii, qui erigendi sunt, ut hic: Nolo mortem peccatoris, clare mortem et peccatorem nominat, tam ipsum malum, quod sentitur, quam ipsum hominem, qui senit (WA 18, 684: 4–11). 41 “For if the human being himself is not righteous, neither are his works or endeavors righteous; and if they are not righteous, they are damnable and deserving of wrath. The other kind of righteousness is the righteousness of faith, which does not depend on any works, but on God’s favorable regard and his ‘reckoning’ on the basis of grace.” LW 33: 270–71. Si enim ipse iustus non est, nec opera aut studia eius iusta sunt. Si justa non sunt, damnabilia et ira digna sunt. Altera est fidei justitia, quae constat non operibus ullis, sed favente et reputante Deo per gratiam (WA 18, 772: 9–12). Here there is a connection to Thesis 25 and the corresponding proof of the Heidelberg Disputation. See LW 31: 55–56; WA 1, 364: 4–16, and Chapter 1, pp. 35–37 above.

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What am I to say here, Erasmus? You reek of nothing but Lucian, and you breathe out on me the vast drunken folly of Epicurus. If you consider this subject unnecessary for Christians, then please quit the field; you and I have nothing in common, for I consider it vital.42

The proper distinction of faith and works, and thus of Law and Gospel, which Luther accuses Erasmus of being totally ignorant, is used by Luther for the purpose of directing questions of the (un)free will related to predestination to the preached God known in Jesus Christ. First, the Law brings knowledge of sin, then grace consoles through the Gospel of justification. “Therefore, the law is necessary to make sin known so that when its gravity and magnitude are recognized, the human being in his pride who imagines himself well may be humbled and may sigh and gasp for the grace that is offered in Christ.”43 Paulson’s reading of On Bound Choice as Luther himself functioning as Erasmus’s pastor still cannot be sustained from within the text itself. Rather, the text should be thought of as a theological polemic, intended to prove Luther’s theological prowess over and against Erasmus. This is evidenced further in the text where Luther uses the Latin term harena (theater/arena) in the context of their theological debate.44 Luther was thus functioning as a theological judge to Erasmus here and does not have the language of pastoral devotion and contextual concern that is found in his other writings, and particularly those examined in Chapters 2 and 3 of the present study as pastoral applications of a sapiential theologia crucis. On Bound Choice is thus best understood within the genre of theological polemic, which is a more widely accepted conclusion among Luther scholars.45 However, while not written in the genre of pastoral writings, in On 42 LW 33: 29. The English translation of the Latin word harena is too mild in the LW edition and is better rendered as “theater” or “arena,” thereby preserving the polemical nature of this treatise. Quid hic dicam Erasme? Totus Lucianum spiras, et inhalas mihi grandem Epicuri crapulam. Si tu hanc caussam non necessariam ducis Christianis, cede quaeso ex harena, nihil tibi et nobis. Nos necessariam ducimus (WA 18, 609: 21–24). 43 LW 33: 262. Ideo necessaria est lex, quae notificet peccatum, ut nequicia et magnitudine eius cognita, humiliatur superbus et sanus sibi visus homo et gratiam suspiret et anhelet in Christo propositam (WA 18, 767: 6–8). Cf. Rom. 3:20–26, NRSV. Forde observes the following about Justification of sinners by grace through faith in Jesus Christ in relation to Luther’s understanding of simul iustus et peccator: “Above all, the simul iustus et peccator brings with it an understanding of sin that undermines all ordinary ideas of progress according to moral or legal schemes. The iustitia exists simultaneously with the peccatum. The unconditional act of justification exposes; by declaring us to be just, it reveals us as sinners. In the light of the totality of justification, sin is confessed simultaneously as a total state. The justifying deed therefore does not remove sin in the sense one might accord a moral or legal scheme; it exposes it. As if the more light you get, the more dirt you see! And the miracle is that God nevertheless does business with sinners – in just that way!” Gerhard O. Forde, Justification by Faith: A Matter of Death to Life (Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 1990), 43. 44 See n. 42 above. 45 This designation also relates to Gritsch’s description of Luther as a “court jester.” See Gritsch, Martin – God’s Court Jester, 80–85. A summary of Luther as a polemicist is found in Anna Vind, “Luther’s Thought Assumed Form in Polemics,” in Robert Kolb, Irene Dingel, and

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Bound Choice, Luther’s theological sequence of Law and Gospel in relation to the preached and unpreached God is Luther’s understanding of the necessity of the bound human will for the proper proclamation of the Gospel centered in justification by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Thus, this text still arguably contains traces of a pastoral theologia crucis, although it is overall a polemic about God’s freedom to be God at the expense of the bondage of the human will in matters of predestination.46 Paulson’s argument for the centrality of promise in relation to Luther’s understanding of the preached vs. unpreached God is also accurate to the text, as has been examined above.47 This theme can then be mined from the perspective of contemporary pastoral concerns, but when this is done it needs to be stated from the outset that one is aware that Luther himself did not intend this text to be used as a text for Seelsorge, nor did he intend to function as Erasmus’s pastor. Instead, one would be applying a constructive hermeneutic from the outside onto the text, as Paulson does by saying Luther functioned as Erasmus’s pastor. The primary problem with Paulson’s interpretation of On Bound Choice, then, is not ultimately his attempt to read On Bound Choice constructively in a pastoral fashion, but rather his lack of methodological and hermeneutical clarity as to how he proceeds with his textual reading, interpretation, and constructive theological argumentation.48

L’ubomír Batka, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Martin Luther’s Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 471–81. 46 So, the Introduction to the English translation of On Bound Choice in Luther’s Works, Volume 33: “Luther is concerned for God’s freedom, because to deny it is to undermine the gospel and grace; indeed, it is to deny God himself. For God’s freedom is precisely the freedom of grace, that is, of the divine love revealed in Christ, which startlingly ignores the calculated schemes of merit and reward which prevail among humans.” LW 33: 10. Forde sees Luther’s emphasis on God’s freedom in On Bound Choice in a positive light: “The Bondage of the Will should not be seen primarily as a negative work or merely one more theological debate, but as a desperate call to get the Gospel preached. It is intended to be a summons, not a dirge. It is the attraction of the argument that is all important. It is full of humor and theological gusto!” While it may be doubted if On Bound Choice is full of “humor and theological gusto,” Forde’s observation of Luther’s stress on the preached Gospel is warranted. Forde, The Captivation of the Will, xvii. 47 Oswald Bayer is most closely associated for discovering the theme of promise as undergirding the early Luther’s Reformation discovery, which was documented in Chapter 2 of the present study. See Oswald Bayer, Promissio: Geschichte der reformatorischen Wende in Luthers Theologie, 2nd ed. (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1989), 339–53, and Oswald Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation, trans. Thomas H. Trapp (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008), 50–58. Paulson incorporates the theme of promise in his work with Luther’s On Bound Choice specifically related to Luther’s emphasis on the importance of private absolution, although he does not always acknowledge Bayer as the undergirding source for his own academic-homiletical views. 48 In the Introduction to Volume 1 of Luther’s Outlaw God, Paulson states his book “interprets Luther’s way of dealing with the hidden God,” but he gives no further methodological or

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The theme of theologia crucis, and corresponding pastoral elements, on the other hand, can be found from inside the text of On Bound Choice in Luther’s stress on the incarnate God, as has been shown above.49 Therefore, we will now explore an eschatological transformation of a theologia crucis through Luther’s notion of the lumen gloriae at the end of On Bound Choice.

4. God’s Second Form of Hiddenness and the Eschatological lumen gloriae: A Constructive Development The present reading has sought to emphasize Luther’s differentiation of God’s hiddenness when preached vs. unpreached, and thus God as hidden in the cross vs. hidden behind the cross. The first form of hiddenness (God preached, and thus hidden in the cross) corresponds to the Heidelberg Disputation. This aspect of Luther’s understanding of God’s hiddenness has been explored by many theologians in the last century, beginning with and based on the work of von Loewenich.50 However, Luther’s stress on God’s second hiddenness in On Bound Choice (God as unpreached/behind the cross), can be seen as particularly problematic from a contemporary perspective, especially when considered in relation to social-political catastrophes, injustices, and innocent victimization.51 Therefore, it is appropriate to now explore what can be termed an “eschatological solution” to the problem of God hidden behind the cross as it has been examined in this chapter. Said “eschatological solution” can be found in the section of On Bound Choice dealing with the “three lights” (nature, grace, and glory). If Luther’s understanding of the “light of glory” (lumen gloriae) is viewed eschatologically from the standpoint of a Pauline theologia crucis, a surprising conclusion to an otherwise bleak picture of God’s hiddenness behind Christ’s cross can be found. Let us take it that there are three lights – the light of nature, the light of grace, and the light of glory, to use the common and valid distinction. By the light of nature it is an insoluble problem how it can be just that a good person should suffer and a bad person prosper; but this problem is solved by the light of grace. By the light of grace it is an insoluble problem how God can damn one who is unable by any power of his own to do anything but sin hermeneutical clarifications as to how he reads Luther’s text(s). Paulson, Luther’s Outlaw God, Volume 1, ix. 49 See n. 9 above. 50 See the literature review in the Introduction of the present study. 51 Conversely, Joshua C. Miller understands Luther’s notion of God hidden behind the cross in De servo arbitrio (as analyzed and interpreted by Oswald Bayer) to provide fruitful possibilities for a contemporary theology of lament in relation to catastrophes and injustices. See Joshua C. Miller, “With Those Who Weep: Towards a Theology of Solidarity in Lament,” in John T. Pless, Roland Ziegler, and Joshua C. Miller, eds., Promising Faith for a Ruptured Age: An English-Speaking Appreciation of Oswald Bayer (Eugene: Pickwick, 2019), 136–55.

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and be guilty. Here both the light of nature and the light of grace tell us that it is not the fault of the unhappy person, but of an unjust God; for they cannot judge otherwise of a God who crowns one ungodly person freely and apart from merits, yet damns another who may well be less, or at least not more, ungodly. But the light of glory tells us differently, and it will show us hereafter that the God whose judgment here is one of incomprehensible righteousness is a God of most perfect and manifest righteousness. In the meantime, we can only believe this, being admonished and confirmed by the example of the light of grace, which performs a similar miracle in relation to the light of nature.52

What is unsolvable in terms of human reason related to predestination will be made clear by God in the lumen gloriae. There is an implication, then, that God’s second form of hiddenness (unpreached/behind the cross) will cease at the Last Day, wherein God will be “all in all” (1 Cor. 15:28) if the basis for the lumen gloriae is a Pauline theologia crucis.53 If traces of a sapiential theologia crucis can reasonably be found in places in De servo arbitrio, and this theme is an essential element to Luther’s theology on the whole, it is then reasonable to read Luther’s argument for the lumen gloriae eschatologically from the standpoint of a theologia crucis. God mystically known as hidden in suffering and the cross (as argued in theses 19–21 of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputaiton) would then be revealed in “manifest righteousness” (esse iustissimae et manifestissimae justitiae) at the Last Day. Therefore, even though Luther himself does not advocate any kind of explicit universal salvation through Christ, there is room within Luther’s text surrounding the lumen gloriae for the hope of universal salvation through Christ at the Last Day as rooted in a eschatological, Pauline theologia crucis. This hope should not be turned into dogmatism, for to do so would advance a rigidity like that of “double predestination,” which is also not present within Luther’s text.54 52 LW 33: 292. Tria mihi lumina pone, lumen naturae, lumen gratiae, lumen gloriae, ut habet vulgata et bona distinctio. In lumine naturae est insolubile, hoc esse iustum, quod bonus affligatur et malus bene habeat. At hoc dissolvit lumen gratiae. In lumine gratiae est insolubile, quomodo Deus damnet eum, qui non potest ullis suis viribus aliud facere quam peccare et reus esse, Hic tam lumen naturae quam lumen gratiae dictant, culpam esse non miseri hominis sed iniqui Dei, nec enim aliud iudicare possunt de Deo, qui hominem impium gratis sine meritis coronat et alium non coronat sed damnat forte minus vel saltem non magis impium. At lumen gloriae aliud dictat, et Deum, cuius modo est iudicum incomprehensibilis iustitiae, tunc ostendet esse iustissimae et manifestissimae iustitiae, tantum ut interim id credamus, moniti et confirmati exemplo luminis gratiae, quod simile miraculum in naturali lumine implet (WA 18, 785: 26–38). 53 Bayer remarks helpfully that universal salvation is not a dogma, but a hope and prayer. “The hope for the deliverance of all is not a statement that is appropriate as teaching in the sense of a proposition, but rather is appropriate to prayer.” Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology, 327. Italics in original. 54 In general, the notion of a dogmatic “double predestination” would be foreign to a theologia crucis with roots in Luther’s Pauline theology. Therefore, since this position is also not found in De servo arbitrio in any developed form, the proposal for an eschatological theologia crucis is being pursued here. To avoid a theological contradiction, it must then be said from the outset that the hope of universal salvation in Jesus Christ from the perspective of the lumen gloriae

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Instead, hope in the possibility of universal salvation through Christ relates to Luther’s statement that “if not all, some and indeed many are saved” due to God’s mercy in Jesus Christ and the lack of free choice in matters related to salvation.55 So it comes about that, if not all, some and indeed many are saved, whereas by the power of free choice none at all would be saved, but all would perish together. Moreover, we are also certain and sure that we please God, not by the merit of our own working, but by the favor of his mercy promised to us, and that if we do less than we should or do it badly, he does not hold this against us, but in a fatherly way pardons and corrects us. Hence the glorying of all the saints in their God.56

An eschatological hope for the salvation of the world in Christ would thus transform Luther’s notion of the lumen gloriae in line with the turn to eschatology in twentieth-century Protestant systematic theology, beginning with Karl Barth.57 must not be made into a rigid dogma, either, especially since the present study is attempting to show how a theologia crucis is not an abstract principle, but rather a hermeneutic for the concrete event of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. 55 See nn. 5–7 above for Luther’s Christological accents in On Bound Choice and an argument for Luther’s Christological interpretation of the Bible overall, given that the section in On Bound Choice about the lumen gloriae does not explicitly mention Jesus Christ or his wounds. For the hope of universal salvation in Jesus Christ from the perspective of Lutheran dogmatic theology, see Hans Schwarz, “The Content of Christian Hope,” in Carl E. Braaten and Robert W. Jenson, eds., Christian Dogmatics, Volume 2 (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1984), 555–89. 56 LW 33: 289. Ita fit, ut si non omnes, tamen aliqui et multi salventur, cum per vim liberi arbitrii nullus prorsus servaretur, sed in unum omnes perderemur. Tum etiam certi sumus et securi, nos Deo placere, non merito operis nostri, sed favore misericordiae suae nobis promissae, atque si minus aut male egerimus, quod nobis non imputet, sed paterne ignoscat et emendet. Haec est gloriatio omnium sanctorum in Deo suo (WA 18, 783: 34–39). 57 See Karl Barth, Der Römerbrief: Unveränderter Nachdruck der ersten Auflage von 1919 (Zürich: EVZ, 1963). One finds there an argumentation for eschatological hope in the coming Christ, with connections to the Württemberg Lutheran Pietism of Christoph Blumhardt. This text is arguably more important for the eschatological theology of hope developed by Jürgen Moltmann than Barth’s more well-known second edition Romans commentary of 1922 with its Kirkegaardian existentialism and overall Kantian epistemology. For Barth’s understanding and appreciation of Christoph Blumhardt, see Karl Barth, “Vergangenheit und Zukunft: Friedrich Naumann und Christoph Blumhardt,” in Jürgen Moltmann, ed., Anfänge der dialektischen Theologie, Teil 1: Karl Barth, Heinrich Barth, Emil Brunner (Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1961), 37–49, and Karl Barth, Die Protestantische Theologie im 19. Jahrhundert: Ihr Vorgeschichte und ihre Geschichte (Zollikon-Zürich: Evangelischer Verlag A. G., 1952), 588–98. Moltmann writes of his own appreciation for Barth’s 1919 Romans commentary and of its connections to Blumhardt in Jürgen Moltmann, Weiter Raum: Eine Lebensgeschichte (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 2006), 114–15. Finally, for the present study’s concerns with Barth’s Erwählungslehre from 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics in Chapter 5 below, Bruce McCormack’s thesis that Barth’s theology should be considered to be dialectical overall, with various stages of development and emphasis, rather than undergoing a change to analogy following Barth’s 1931 book on Anselm of Canterbury as argued by Hans Urs von Balthasar, is important to note. See Bruce L. McCormack, Theologische Dialektik und kritischer Realismus: Entstehung und Entwicklung von Karl Barths Theologie 1909–1936, trans. Matthias Gockel (Zürich: Theologischer Verlag, 2006), 27–48. McCormack describes the theology of Barth’s 1919 Romans commentary in Ibid., 132–71, and Barth’s encounter with Blumhardt in Ibid., 121–23.

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By so doing, one would argue for a theological solution to the question of predestination Luther himself did not advocate, yet which can be transformed from his emphasis on the lumen gloriae seen through an eschatological Pauline theologia crucis, and even from the places where a sapiential theologia crucis is a “thin tradition” in On Bound Choice overall.58 Doing so would both admit Luther’s own notion of a form of God’s hiddenness behind the cross, while ultimately stressing the form of hiddenness corresponding directly to a theologia crucis as found in the Heidelberg Disputation, in order to emphasize cosmic justification as an eschatological solution to Luther’s second form of hiddenness in this text.59 Justification can then be reframed eschatologically as an encounter with the living God and a praxis for living in the world, while still being seen as the reverse side of a theologia crucis. This connects also with the sacramentum and exemplum, which is possible to find in the Proof to Thesis 25 of the Heidelberg Disputation.60 Regarding Justification as a praxis, Vítor Westhelle writes, Justification is not a doctrine among others. It is not even a doctrine. It is not a teaching that we engage in our theological endeavors, either in construing systems to ground the church or in devising policies to legislate and administer it. It is the habit of learning, of receiving what has already been given; it is an event grounded in sheer conviction and trust (fiducia). But this sheer conviction, its event that is received by us with the unconditional features that correspond to receiving death, takes place in the midst of life itself. The end and the beginning are in the midst of our existence, in the playground we are inducted into. This existence is at the same time the joyful display or expression of this conviction as much as it is also its evasion.61

Luther himself did not argue for justification as a playground or as the seedbed for the universal future of creation in Jesus Christ. Instead, as has been shown above, he argued God hidden in God’s majesty should be fled from, and to instead embrace God as clothed in God’s Word. Salvation was a matter of the highest mystery, and one did well from Luther’s perspective by not speculating on ques-

58 The phrase “thin tradition” is Douglas John Hall’s description of a theologia crucis. See Douglas John Hall, The Cross in Our Context: Jesus and the Suffering World (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003), 6. 59 An argument for retaining Luther’s notion of God’s second hiddenness while also emphasizing cosmic justification is found in Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology, 326–30. 60 LW 31: 55–56; WA 1, 364: 1–10. 61 Vítor Westhelle, “Justification as Death and Gift,” Lutheran Quarterly 24 (2010): 260. Westhelle’s article has explicit connections to Jacques Derrida. Cf. Jacques Derrida, The Gift of Death, trans. David Willis (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995), and Jacques Derrida, Given Time: I. Counterfeit Money trans. Peggy Kamuf (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994). Isolde Andrews finds commonalities between Derrida’s understanding of Gift and Barth’s Christological hermeneutic in the Church Dogmatics, providing constructive possibilities for interpreting Barth not only in relation to Derrida, but also to so-called “Postmodern philosophy” in general. See Isolde Andrews, Deconstructing Barth: A Study of the Complementary Methods in Karl Barth and Jacques Derrida (Frankfurt: Lang, 1996).

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tions of predestination, but instead by trusting Christ, who is God incarnate.62 The eschatological, cruciform reading proposed here based on Luther’s notion of the lumen gloriae at the end of On Bound Choice thus emphasizes Luther’s stress on Christ as God incarnate, and the necessity of the preached Word, while then transforming Luther’s arguments about the lumen gloriae through an eschatological hermeneutic. It is precisely this transformation which will be explored in the next section of this study through reading a theologia crucis in the theologies of Karl Barth, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Jürgen Moltmann.

5. Conclusion When reading the theme of theologia crucis in texts from the early Luther of the Heidelberg Disputation until 1525, it is helpful to focus on the relationship between a theologia crucis and divine hiddenness. This approach means admitting there is a sharp distinction between Luther’s theologia crucis in the Heidelberg Disputation and the pastoral texts related to it, and the polemic of On Bound Choice in terms of the hiddenness of God. This contrast is necessary to note for explaining both Luther’s understanding of divine hiddenness in the Heidelberg Disputation (the locus classicus for Luther’s own theologia crucis), and how Luther’s understanding of divine hiddenness has developed by 1525 in On Bound Choice. Simply stated, Luther understands God’s hiddenness differently in the latter text, which corresponds to the different circumstances he is addressing in 1525.63 In the Heidelberg Disputation, God is hidden in the cross of Christ. Luther then writes of the “crucified and hidden God” in the Explanations of the 95 Theses, also from 1518. God as hidden in the cross of the crucified Christ is connected to the divine reversal of justification, and indeed should be understood as part and parcel to the doctrine of justification, as is argued by Regin Prenter.64 God known where God is most hidden – the cross of the crucified Christ – is then why Luther’s theologia crucis has so often been referred to as a “theology of revelation,” beginning with von Loewenich.65 As shown in Chapter 1, though, this term is appropriate when understood in a mystical, a posteriori fashion, but not

62 See again Luther’s remarks about theology occupying itself with God incarnate in n. 9 above. 63 See Thomas Kaufmann, Luther und Erasmus, in Albrecht Beutel, ed., Luther Handbuch, 2nd ed. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010), 142–52; Steven Paulson, “Luther’s Doctrine of God,” in Kolb, Dingel, and Batka, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Martin Luther’s Theology, 187–201. 64 Regin Prenter, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1971), 4. 65 Walther von Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, trans. Herbert J. A. Bouman (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1976), 12–14; 17–21.

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when understood as if Luther himself should be thought of as a “dialectical theologian,” in the twentieth-century sense of that term.66 In On Bound Choice, Luther addresses a second form of God’s hiddenness – God hidden behind the cross, in God’s majesty, and thus apart from the preached Word. At least in On Bound Choice, then, there is a strong contrast between the preached and unpreached God, corresponding to two different forms of hiddenness. The hiddenness of God preached has continuities with the form of hiddenness described in the Heidelberg Disputation, wherein the hidden God of the cross is revealed in the proclaimed Word. Therefore, the preached God is the God revealed on Golgotha. This God is a God of consolation, mercy, forgiveness, grace, love, and goodness. It is the God of the verbum externum, who addresses sinners with the Word of absolution. The hiddenness of God unpreached, God in God’s majesty, corresponds to an entirely different form of hiddenness, in which God “works all in all,” including acts that humans find abhorrent, especially in the contemporary world. While Luther insists that one should flee from the unpreached God and not to inquire into God’s inscrutable will, and even offers tantalizingly what can be seen as an eschatological solution to this problem through his notion of the lumen gloriae, his text ultimately embraces a form of divine hiddenness apart from Christ’s cross. In On Bound Choice, then, Luther admits not only that there is still something left to ultimate mystery in terms of God’s works in the world, but that God functions differently when preached versus not preached. This form of God’s hiddenness should not be harmonized with Luther’s observations in the Heidelberg Disputation if one wants to understand Luther’s own view of divine hiddenness in On Bound Choice, in contrast to von Loewenich’s once-held view. It is precisely because of the revealed God that faith knows about the hidden God. Revelation addresses itself to faith, not to sight, not to reflective reason. Reason can only establish a dualism. Faith presses through the revealed God to the hidden God, and yet does not meet a second God behind or beside the former. But this is something only faith can achieve.… It is precisely for the sake of faith that Luther must here undertake the apparently rigid metaphysical separation between the hidden God and the revealed God. The difference between the two lines may be summarized in this way: In the former the idea of the hidden God means that revelation in principle is possible only in concealment; in the latter it means that also in the revealed God secrets remain. Both lines intersect in the concept of faith.67 66 Barth cites von Loewenich with approval in relation to Barth’s own description of dogmatics as a theologia crucis in CD 1.1, 167; KD 1.1, 173. 67 Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 37–38. He later amended this harmonization, in an afterward to the fourth edition of his text. See Ibid., 221, and Jonathan Reinert, “Luthers theologia crucis: Eine ökumenische Herausforderung,” in Stefan Kopp and Joachim Werz, eds., Gebaute Ökumene: Botschaft und Auftrag für das 21. Jahrhundert? (Freiburg: Herder, 2018), 453–71; 459. The critiques of von Loewenich presented here are thus only related to the body of von Loewenich’s book as it stands.

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Von Loewenich overly harmonized Luther’s own distinction between God preached (Deus predicatus) and God unpreached (God hidden in God’s majesty – Deus absconditus in maiestate). As Joshua C. Miller correctly observes, von Loewenich’s reading of On Bound Choice in his book on Luther’s theologia crucis “collapses the hiddenness of the unpreached God in God’s self by mistakenly identifying it with God’s hiddenness in revelation.”68 While a sapiential theologia crucis can be found in portions of On Bound Choice and then transformed eschatologically in relation to contemporary questions in the vein of the twentieth-century theologians examined in the next part of the present study, this theme is admittedly not the primary focus of Luther’s theological polemic against Erasmus. Instead, the (un)free will in relation to the preached God and the unpreached God is much more prevalent. Thus, when constructive theology retrieves the theme of theologia crucis from texts in the early Luther in general, it is wise to remember one specific theme is being retrieved and transformed, rather than thinking that this theme is the only way one can understand Luther. Emphasizing that the theologia crucis is an important aspect of the Reformer’s theology overall but not the only one then helps show how a contemporary constructive theologia crucis through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation transfigures Luther’s own thinking. Thus, a constructive transfiguration of a sapiential theologia crucis through James Cone beginning in Luther’s texts means one form of Luther’s own understanding of divine hiddenness is being retrieved, anchored chiefly in Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation.69 If one then wishes to retrieve Luther’s understanding of hiddenness from On Bound Choice in its entirety, one has then departed from the Heidelberg Disputation strictly speaking.70 It may now appear that Luther has abandoned the theologia crucis as found in the Heidelberg Disputation, given the different form of divine hiddenness that is present in On Bound Choice. However, the present study has attempted to show 68

Joshua C. Miller, Hanging by a Promise: The Hidden God in the Theology of Oswald Bayer (Eugene: Pickwick, 2015), 71. 69 Luther’s Law-Gospel sequence in the Heidelberg Disputation is also questionable, as is shown in Karl Barth’s reversal to Gospel-Law in his own Trinitarian theologia crucis, followed as well by Eberhard Jüngel and Jürgen Moltmann. Cf. Jüngel, Gott als Geheimnis der Welt, 472–74; 514–43, and Jürgen Moltmann, Theologie der Hoffnung: Untersuchungen zur Begründung und zu den Konsequenzen einer christlichen Eschatologie (Münich: Chr. Kaiser, 1964), 108–12. However, the present study has attempted to argue, especially in Chapter 3, that Luther himself is not dogmatic in the sequence of Law and Gospel. See “Luther’s Freedom of a Christian in View of Systemic Sin: A Constructive Development,” pp. 73–76 above. 70 Paulson critiques most modern Protestant systematic theology for understanding itself to be in line with Luther in terms of a theologia crucis, while not addressing Luther’s understanding of hiddenness from On Bound Choice. He argues Luther’s understanding of God preached vs. unpreached is explicitly needed today to avoid becoming negative theologians of glory, of which he believes Barth and Jüngel fall prey to. See Steven D. Paulson, Luther’s Outlaw God, Volume 3: Sacraments and God’s Attack on the Promise (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2021), 129–36.

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where On Bound Choice might still have traces of the theme of theologia crucis, in addition to showing where this text diverges from the Heidelberg Disputation, particularly in terms of understanding God’s hiddenness behind the preached Word of the cross. Although Luther understands God’s hiddenness differently here than in the Heidelberg Disputation, von Loewenich is not necessarily wrong about the prominence of the theologia crucis throughout Luther’s theology.71 It is therefore appropriate to argue that a sapiential theologia crucis is one important theme in Luther’s own theology, but not the only theme. On Bound Choice shows that the hiddenness of God behind the cross, the Law-Gospel sequence, and the distinction between the preached God and God hidden in God’s majesty are other important themes. In addition to these themes, we could also list others from Luther’s later texts, such as his theology of the Three Estates, which fall beyond the scope of the present study.72 The present study is concerned chiefly with reading the theme of theologia crucis in the early Martin Luther as transformed through Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre and critiqued and developed further through Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s later theology and Jürgen Moltmann’s Crucified God in order to explore a transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. Therefore, the theme of theologia crucis read in the Heidelberg Disputation and the pastoral texts examined up to On Bound Choice is being retrieved, while critiquing Luther’s understanding of God’s hiddenness behind the Word in the text just examined, in both continuity with a portion of Luther (that which can be said to reasonably contain the theme of theologia crucis) and in opposition to Luther’s understanding of God’s hiddenness in On Bound Choice if and in so far as this is seen apart from an eschatological, Pauline theologia crucis.73 Thus, a dissonance 71 Von Loewenich refers to the theologia crucis as a “heuristic” for analyzing Luther’s theology. See Loewenich, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, 138. Wengert observes the following about the theologia crucis in relation to On Bound Choice: “After using the term ‘theology of the cross’ and ringing the changes on this theological paradox, it might seem at first glance that after 1525 and his refutation of Erasmus Luther abandoned this approach to theology all together. Indeed, Luther did tend to talk more ‘baby talk’ and less paradox in his later sermons and in other writings intended for his flock. However, the concept itself – God revealed in the last place one would reasonably look (revelatio Dei sub contrario specie) – runs throughout his career.” Wengert, ed., The Pastoral Luther, 15–16. 72 For analyses and synopses of Luther’s understanding of oeconomia, politia, and ecclesia, see Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology, 120–54. 73 The remainder of the study will still incorporate Bayer’s work as a hermeneutic for interpreting Luther’s own theology but differ from him by showing a transformation of Luther’s theology around questions pertaining to God’s hiddenness in the twentieth-century Protestant theologians selected for the next section of this study. Therefore, this study is following Karl Barth, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Jürgen Moltmann explicitly, Eberhard Jüngel and Wolfhart Pannenberg implicitly, as well as von Loewenich overall, while understanding that von Loewenich originally over-harmonized Luther’s own theology of God’s hiddenness in On Bound Choice. In terms of twentieth-century Catholic theology, which is unfortunately unable to be adequately addressed due to space limitations, this study implicitly relates to Hans Urs von Balthasar’s con-

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with Luther’s understanding of God’s second form of hiddenness in On Bound Choice is being embraced for the remainder of the study, while still retrieving and transforming Luther’s notion of the lumen gloriae through an eschatological, Pauline theologia crucis. Said retrieval and transformation of Luther’s lumen gloriae through a Pauline eschatologia crucis then allows for the possibility of exploring a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone, in order to argue for God’s solidarity with and liberation of the victims of suffering and oppression, and God’s putting to right the perpetrators of oppression. To begin the exploration of an eschatological, transformed theologia crucis in selected twentieth-century theologians, the study proceeds to read the theme of theologia crucis in Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre from Volume 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics.

cern with a theology of Holy Saturday, and implicitly follows Karl Rahner’s well-known axiom about the relationship between the economic and immanent Trinity, “The ‘economic’ Trinity is the ‘immanent’ Trinity, and vice versa.” Karl Rahner, S. J., The Trinity, trans. Joseph Donceel (New York: Continuum, 2001), 21–24. “Rahner’s Rule” as related to his overall concern with the Triune God’s self-communication in the historical missions of Christ and the Spirit means for him there is no deus absconditus behind the deus revelatus as communicated in Jesus Christ through the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit. For a helpful and critical analysis of Rahner’s Trinitarian theology, as well as clarifications of possible mis-understandings of “Rahner’s Rule” and suggestions for further development, see Catherine Mowry LaCugna, God for Us: The Trinity and Christian Life (New York: HarperCollins, 1993), 209–41. The present study’s following of these twentieth-century theologians seeks not to become a contemporary negative theologia gloriae, since a contemporary theologia crucis should acknowledge the impossibility of knowing the completeness of the Triune God’s majesty and mystery prior to the Last Day, but rather to take seriously a transformation of the Lutheran understanding of justification through Barth’s Trinitarian Erwählungslehre in terms of innocent victimhood, seen principally in Moltmann’s theology, implied in Bonhoeffer’s prison writings (although it is unknown whether Bonhoeffer was able to read CD 2.2), and transfigured through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. Said acknowledgement of the impossibility of knowing the completeness of God’s mystery and majesty then relates to Derrida’s premise that ultimate textual meaning is deferred, as well as contemporary Catholic theologies influenced by Rahner that acknowledge an apophatic “unknowing” is necessary for Christian theology and spirituality around the question of evil and suffering. See Karen Kilby, God, Evil and the Limits of Theology (London: T & T Clark, 2020). It also takes seriously Cone’s statement about the human character of theological language. Cone writes: “Because Christian theology is human speech about God, it is always related to historical situations, and thus all of its assertions are culturally limited …. Although God, the subject of theology, is eternal, theology itself is, like those who articulate it, limited by history and time.” James H. Cone, God of the Oppressed, Revised ed. (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1997), 36. These proposals are against Paulson, who argues that modern theologies of the cross that address suffering within the being of God are negative theologies of glory. See Paulson, Luther’s Outlaw God, Volume 2, 248–51; Paulson, Luther’s Outlaw God, Volume 3, 58, 85. Critical commentaries on Jüngel, Moltmann, and Pannenberg’s developments of Luther’s own theologia crucis, in terms of collapsing God’s hiddenness into hiddenness as revealed on the cross, are found in Mark C. Mattes, The Role of Justification in Contemporary Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007), 23–117, and Miller, Hanging by a Promise, 101–14. However, it is significant for the present study’s concerns that neither Mattes nor Paulson engage with James Cone.

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Chapter 5

Karl Barth’s Trinitarian Erwählungslehre Karl Barth’s (1886–1968) Doctrine of Election in Volume 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics emphasizes the Triune God’s goodness, freedom, overflowing glory, grace, and love for God’s people in Jesus Christ, who is the electing God and elected human being.1 Barth emphasizes God’s freedom, because God has freely chosen to be the electing God (Jesus Christ) and to elect human beings through the elected human being, the crucified Jesus, who is the image of the invisible God.2 This decision for, in, and through Jesus Christ is a “gracious decision,” showing God’s lovingkindness for all human beings.3 These themes in Barth’s Trinitarian doctrine of election can be read as a transformed sapiential theologia crucis.4 Therefore, this chapter explores traces of a theologia crucis in Barth’s 1 This chapter explores a Trinitarian, cruciform reading of Barth’s Erwählungslehre as a transformation of a sapiential theologia crucis found in the texts from the early Martin Luther in part 1 of this study. Barth addresses the Doctrine of the Trinity in Volume 1.1 of the Church Dogmatics as part of his Prolegomena, emphasizing that it is the Triune God who reveals God’s self in Jesus Christ as the subject of revelation, giving Barth’s understanding of the Trinity overall a Johannine accent, particularly in the prologue to John 1 (CD 1.1, 137; KD 1.1, 141 / CD 1.1, 293–304; KD 1.1, 309–20). The Triune God reveals God’s self in three “ways of being,” (Seinsweisen, CD 1.1, 355; KD 1.1, 374), which for Barth is the basis for “Christian monotheism” (Ibid). The use of the term Seinsweisen was Barth’s preferred term instead of Trinitarian “persons,” in order that the Trinitarian relationships not be confused with the modern notion of “personalities” (CD 1.1, 355–68; KD 1.1, 378–88). From the One God, then, Barth understands the three “ways of being” of God as Father, Son, and Spirit. In other words, the Trinity of God is seen in God’s unity (CD 1.1, 368; KD 1.1, 388). “Thus to the same God who in unimpaired unity is the Revealer, the Revelation, and the Revealedness, there is also ascribed in unimpaired differentiation within Himself this threefold mode of being” (CD 1.1, 299). “Also: Demselben Gott, der in unzerstörter Einheit der Offenbarer, die Offenbarung und das Offenbarsein ist, wird auch in unzerstörter Verschiedenheit in sich selber gerade diese dreifache Weise von Sein zugeschreiben” (KD 1.1, 315). Barth’s description and (re)forming of Trinitarian theology in CD 1.1 has implications for his Erwählungslehre in CD 2.2, because the Triune God is the basis for Barth’s Erwählungslehre, wherein a concretized sapiential theologia crucis can be read corresponding to his re-framing of Christology and traditional questions of election. N. B. Throughout this chapter, the English translation of the Church Dogmatics has been modified slightly, related to capitalizations for pronouns for God and the use of gender inclusive language where possible. 2 Barth, CD 2.2, 123; KD 2.2, 132. See also n. 30 below. 3 Barth, CD 2.2, 10; KD 2.2, 9. 4 In Volume 1.1 of the Church Dogmatics, Barth writes that dogmatic theology should be done only as a theologia crucis: “Dogmatics is possible only as theologia crucis, in the act of obedience which is certain in faith, but which for this very reason is humble, always being thrown back to the beginning and having to make a fresh start. It is not possible as an effort-

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Trinitarian Erwählungslehre in relation to the theme of theologia crucis found in the close reading of texts from Martin Luther from the first section of the present study.5 It will draw especially from Barth’s understanding of God’s overflowing glory that emphasizes God’s nature as goodness, seen in God’s grace and love in Jesus Christ, and then argue for a transformation of Luther’s mystical “happy exchange” through Barth’s Erwählungslehre. Finally, the chapter will propose a constructive development of Barth’s Erwählungslehre in relation to the question of universal salvation through Christ from a Pauline hermeneutic, intended to complement what can be understood as Barth’s Johannine theologia crucis, and related to the eschatologia crucis proposed at the end of Chapter 4.6 This proposal for a Pauline eschatologia crucis in relation to the question of universal salvation through Jesus Christ will set up the remaining transformations of the theologia crucis through Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Jürgen Moltmann on the way to reading James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis.

less triumph or an intermittent labor. It always takes place on the narrow way which leads from the enacted revelation to the promised revelation” (Barth, CD 1.1, 14). “Dogmatik gibt es nur als theologia crucis: im Akt des im Glauben gewissen, aber gerade darum demütigen, immer wieder auf den Anfang zurückgeworfen, immer neu sich aufschließenden Gehorsams: nicht als arbeitslos triumphierenden Zugriff und auch nicht als eine je und dann zu erledigende und erledigte Arbeit. Sie ist immer auf dem schmalen Wege von der geschehenen Offenbarung her zu der verheißenen Offenbarung hin” (KD 1.1, 13). Since Barth’s Erwählungslehre is arguably the center of his Church Dogmatics, it is the task of the present chapter to explore how Barth’s Erwählungslehre can be read as a transformed theologia crucis, even though Barth does not explicitly reference this theme in CD 2.2. 5 This chapter reads a theologia crucis in CD 2.2 in relation to Martin Luther’s theology differently than Oswald Bayer. Whereas Bayer contrasted Barth sharply with Luther, particularly in relation to the Lutheran understandings of sacraments and in charging Barth with a theologia crucis naturalis from German idealism, the present chapter seeks to read Barth’s Trinitarian Erwählungslehre as a theologia crucis to explore Barth’s Erwählungslehre as a transformation of Luther. This chapter therefore draws from Oswald Bayer’s work on Luther but does not engage his critiques of Barth’s theology. For Bayer’s comparison of Barth and Luther, and his critique of the former with the latter’s theology, see Oswald Bayer, Theologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1994), 310–88, esp. 344–47 and 379–88. For Barth’s relationship to the German idealist tradition of Kant, Hegel, and Fichte, and an argument for Barth’s overall methodological indebtedness, with notable differences in content, to Friedrich Schleiermacher, see Hans Urs von Balthasar, The Theology of Karl Barth (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1992), 199–219. Barth’s relationship to Schleiermacher is also discussed in detail in Matthias Gockel and Martin Leiner, eds., Karl Barth und Friedrich Schleiermacher: Zur Neubestimmuing ihres Verhältnisses (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2015). See especially the essays by Bruce McCormack contained therein, pp. 45–89; 303–17. 6 See “God’s Second Form of Hiddenness and the Eschatological lumen gloriae: A Constructive Development,” pp. 94–98, in Chapter 4 above. An important work for showing Barth’s relationship to the tradition of Luther’s theologia crucis is Rosalene Bradbury, Cross Theology: The Classical Theologia Crucis and Karl Barth’s Modern Theology of the Cross (Eugene: Pickwick, 2011). Bradbury’s book is a constructive exploration of Barth’s theology in relation to the theologia crucis in general, though, and thus does not restrict specifically to Martin Luther or to 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics.

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1. Election as the Triune God’s Free Decision Election is the heart of the Gospel for Karl Barth in the Church Dogmatics. Paragraph 32 of the CD begins: “The doctrine of election is the sum of the Gospel because of all words that can be said or heard it is the best: that God elects humankind; that God is for humankind too the One who loves in freedom.”7 Barth stresses God’s free love is the source of God’s electing, predestinating grace, centering in the Triune God’s concrete revelation in the person of Jesus Christ.8 Through Barth’s Erwählungslehre, election is a testimony to God’s faithfulness. “What takes place in this election is always that God is for us; for us, and therefore for the world which was created by him, which is distinct from him, but which is yet maintained by him.”9 This free decision is a decision for 7 Barth, CD 2.2, 3. “Die Erwählungslehre ist die Summe des Evangeliums, weil dies das Beste ist, was je gesagt und gehört werden kann: daß Gott den Menschen wählt und also auch für ihn der in Freiheit Liebende ist” (KD 2.2, 1). Cf. Balthasar, The Theology of Karl Barth, 174. 8 Cf. Barth, CD 2.2, 4; KD 2.2, 2. Concerning the present study’s exploration of a transformed theologia crucis through Barth’s Trinitarian Erwählungslehre, George Hunsinger’s reading of Karl Barth’s reception of Martin Luther is helpful when understood in relation to Barth’s dictum that dogmatics is possible only as a theologia crucis in CD 1.1, as documented above in note 4. See George Hunsinger, “What Karl Barth Learned from Martin Luther,” Lutheran Quarterly 13 (1999): 125–55. However, if Karl Barth is indeed indebted to Schleiermacher overall in the Church Dogmatics, and CD 2.2 in particular, then Bruce McCormack’s arguments for the relationship between Election and Trinity in Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre are to be preferred to Hunsinger’s positions put forth in George Hunsinger, “Election and the Trinity: Twenty-Five Theses on the Theology of Karl Barth,” Modern Theology 24, no. 2 (2008): 179–98. One could then still argue fruitfully for Barth’s indebtedness to Luther a la Hunsinger’s article just referenced, but that Barth’s theologia crucis is developed, changed, and concretized from CD 1.1 in CD 2.2, and further developed in CD 4.1 and 4.2, the latter volumes falling outside this chapter’s explicit concerns, drawing from McCormack, and especially McCormack’s constructive work with a “post-Barthian” theologia crucis, found in Bruce L. McCormack, The Humility of the Eternal Son: Reformed Kenoticism and the Repair of Chalcedon (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021). Finally, Schleiermacher’s concern for non-speculative theology also can be found in the concreteness of Barth’s Erwählungslehre related to Barth’s emphasis on the concrete person of Jesus Christ as the Subject and Object of election. See Bruce L. McCormack, “What Has Basel to Do with Berlin? Continuities in the Theologies of Barth and Schleiermacher,” Princeton Seminary Review 23, no. 2 (2002): 146–73, Bruce L. McCormack, “Election and the Trinity: Theses in Response to George Hunsinger,” Scottish Journal of Theology 63, no. 2 (2010): 203–24, and Bruce L. McCormack, “Grace and Being: The Role of God’s Gracious Election in Karl Barth’s Theological Ontology,” in John Webster, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Karl Barth (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 92–111. McCormack’s positions related to CD 2.2 seem more favorable overall, also when considering Barth’s use of the term Seinsweisen instead of “persons” for the Trinity in CD 1.1, showing a connection to Schleiermacher’s charitable, non-modalistic reading of Sabellius in Schleiermacher’s 1822 work, translated into English as An Essay on the Trinity. N. B. I am grateful to Stephen Morrison for being the first person to alert me to the (often overlooked and/or unexamined) theological commonalities between Barth and Schleiermacher. See Stephen D. Morrison, Schleiermacher in Plain English (Columbus: Beloved Publishing, 2019), 41–48. 9 Barth, CD 2.2, 26. “Was in dieser Wahl geschieht, das ist unter allen Umständen dies, daß Gott für uns ist. Für uns und damit für die von ihm geschaffene, von ihm verschiedene, aber

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Christ, and shows God’s concrete love for humankind in that Jesus Christ is both the electing God and the elected human being for the world.10 For Barth, then, predestination should not be a terrifying doctrine about God’s absolute will predestinating some people to heaven and others to hell, but instead a testament to God’s promises for humankind in Christ. Predestination thus no longer warrants John Milton’s famous protest, “I may go to hell, but such a God will never command my respect.”11 Barth’s Erwählungslehre shows God’s election of God’s self and humankind as an election of deepest love through Christ, and that, for Barth, one need look no farther than God’s election in and through Jesus Christ to find God’s grace. “This love of God is his grace.”12 Barth shares an important commonality with the early Luther at this point. Luther believed one’s election is certain when questions of election are directed to Jesus Christ. Luther writes in A Sermon on Preparing to Die (1519): So then, gaze at the heavenly picture of Christ, who descended into hell [1 Pet. 3:19] for your sake and was forsaken by God as one eternally damned when he spoke the words on the cross, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani!” – “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” [Matt. 27:46]. In that picture your hell is defeated and your uncertain election is made sure. If you concern yourself solely with that and believe that it was done for you, you will surely be preserved in this same faith. Never, therefore, let this be erased from your vision. Seek yourself only in Christ and not in yourself and you will find yourself in him eternally.13

By emphasizing Jesus Christ as the electing God and elected human being, Barth shows how the doctrine of election becomes concrete and embodied, rather than a speculative principle in abstracto. This concrete Christocentrism is then a key aspect to reading Barth’s Trinitarian Erwählungslehre as a transformed sapiential theologia crucis.14 durch ihn im Dasein erhaltene Welt” (KD 2.2, 26). Emphasis added. Cf. McCormack, “Grace and Being,” 98. 10 Thus, McCormack: “What Barth accomplished with his doctrine of election was to establish a hermeneutical rule which would allow the church to speak authoritatively about what God was doing – and, indeed, who and what God was/is – ‘before the foundation of the world’, without engaging in speculation.” McCormack, “Grace and Being,” 92. 11 Barth, CD 2.2, 13; KD 2.2, 12. As quoted by Jürgen Moltmann, “The Election of Grace: Barth on the Doctrine of Predestination,” in Reading the Gospels with Karl Barth, ed., Daniel L. Migliore (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017), 2. 12 Barth, CD 2.2, 9. “Diese Liebe Gottes ist seine Gnade” (KD 2.2, 8). 13 Martin Luther, A Sermon on Preparing to Die (1519), LW 42: 105–6. “Drumb sich das hymelisch bild Christum an, der vmb deynen willen gen hell gefaren vnd von gott ist vorlassen geweszen, alz eyner der vordampt sey ewiglich, da er sprach am Creutz: Eli, eli, lama asabthani, O meyn gott, o meyn gott, warumb hastu mich vorlassen? Sich yn dem bild ist vbirwunden deyn helle vnd deyn vngewisz vorsehung gewisz gemacht, dan szo du da mit alleyn dich bekummerst vnd das glaubst fur dich geschehn, szo wirstu yn dem selben glauben behalten gewiszlich. Drumb las dirs nur nit ausz den augen nhemen vnd suche dich nur in Christo vnd nit yn dir, szo wirstu dich ewiglich yn yhm finden” (WA 2, 690: 17–25). 14 For Barth, the Trinity in general is not a principle in abstracto, as shown in his understanding of the inter-relationality of the triune persons for the sake of God’s freedom in election.

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Further, Barth accentuates God’s free choice to elect humankind through the elected human being Jesus Christ as a matter of God’s Selbstbestimmung (selfautonomy).15 While at first, God’s free decision as author of the covenant could seem to be problematic (an example is the question of “could God have chosen otherwise?”), when viewed from the perspective of Barth’s Erwählungslehre, God’s Selbstbestimmung is arguably related to the consolation of the Gospel. It can then be argued that Barth stresses God’s freedom in order to emphasize God’s goodness, with a commonality to and transformation of Luther’s De servo This emphasis on God’s trinitarian relationality corresponds to Barth’s understanding of the doctrine of election as being integral to the doctrine of God. “One spoke of the three persons, of their inter-relationship, of their common work ad extra, without making clear what it means that this triune being does not exist and cannot be known as a being which rests or moves purely within itself. God is not in abstracto Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the triune God. He is so with a definite purpose and reference; in virtue of the love and freedom in which in the bosom of his triune being he has foreordained himself from and to all eternity.” Translation modified. Cf. Barth, CD 2.2, 79–81; 79. “Man redete dort von den drei Personen, von ihrem Verhältnis untereinander, von ihrem gemeinsamen Werk nach außen, ohne sich klar zu machen, was es bedeutet, daß dieses dreieinige Wesen als rein in sich ruhendes oder bewegtes doch weder existiert noch erkennbar, daß Gott doch nicht in abstracto der Vater, der Sohn und der Heilige Geist und als dieser Dreieinige der Eine ist, sondern das Alles in bestimmter Beziehung und Entschließung: kraft der Liebe und Freiheit, in der er im Schoße seines dreieinigen Wesens von Ewigkeit her und in die Ewigkeit hinein über sich selbst verfügt hat” (KD 2.2, 85–87; 85). Emphasizing the person of Jesus Christ as the center of his Trinitarian Erwählungslehre arguably further shows that Barth’s understanding of election should be thought of primarily as concrete rather than as abstract and speculative, as he is concerned with the incarnation of the Word in flesh, following John 1.14. Cf. CD 2.1, 141: “Now, we have already heard what it means concretely that Jesus Christ is human. It means that the only begotten Son of God and therefore God himself, who is knowable to himself from eternity to eternity, has come in our flesh, has taken our flesh, has become the bearer of our flesh, and does not exist as God’s Son from eternity to eternity except in our flesh. Our flesh is therefore present when he knows God as the Son the Father, when God knows himself. In our flesh God knows himself. Therefore in him it is a fact that our flesh knows God himself.” “Nun, wir hörten schon, was das konkret bedeutet, daß Jesus Christus der Mensch ist: es bedeutet, daß der eingeborene Sohn Gottes und also Gott selbst, der sich selber erkennbar ist von Ewigkeit zu Ewigkeit, in unser Fleisch gekommen ist, unser Fleisch angenommen hat, der Träger unseres Fleisches geworden ist, als Gottes Sohn nicht anders als eben in unserem Fleische existiert von Ewigkeit zu Ewigkeit. Unser Fleisch ist also dabei, wenn er Gott erkennt, als der Sohn den Vater, wenn Gott sich selber erkennt. In unserem Fleische erkennt Gott sich selber. In ihm geschieht es also, daß unser Fleisch Gott selber erkennt” (KD 2.1, 169). Cf. n. 10 above and n. 45 below. 15 Cf. CD 2.2, 161–62; KD 2.2, 175–76. McCormack offers an apt summary of Selbstbestimmung related to Barth’s Erwählungslehre: “The eternal act of establishing a covenant of grace is an act of Self-determination by means of which God determines to be God, from everlasting to everlasting, in a covenantal relationship with human beings and to be God in no other way. This is not a decision for mere role-play; it is a decision which has ontological significance. What Barth is suggesting is that election is the event in God’s life in which he assigns to himself the being he will have for all eternity. It is an act of Self-determination by means of which God chooses in Jesus Christ love and mercy for the human race and judgment (reprobation) for himself.” McCormack, “Grace and Being,” 98. Further elaboration on Selbstbestimmung is found in Michael Beintker, ed., Barth Handbuch (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2016), 324–26.

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arbitrio.16 According to Luther in De servo arbitrio, to ask if God could have chosen otherwise would be to probe into the hiddenness of God, where no consolation is to be found, because one would then be seeking the unpreached God rather than clinging to the preached God revealed in God’s Word.17 Barth, then, stresses the Triune God’s self-revelation for humankind in Jesus Christ, meaning election is not to be feared, but rather to be entrusted to Christ as a matter of the God who loves in freedom. [God] constitutes himself the Lord of the covenant. He is, therefore, its free author. He gives it its content and determines its order. He maintains it. He directs it to its goal. He governs it in every respect. It is his decision that there is a covenant-partner. It is also his decision who this partner is, and what must befall that partner. It is only as he wills it that the covenant arises at all. The covenant-member is the one whom he ordains …. It is a question of grace, and that means the love of God. It is a question of freedom, and that means the election of God.18

16 In relation to God’s workings in history as God’s free decision in Jesus Christ, von Balthasar observes, “God is secretly at work everywhere, while visibly so where he rewards the meaning and goal of history …. God is triune love and life (KD 3.2, 260f ), which means God can bestow genuine mutuality and authentic freedom. It is only the obsessive abstraction of philosophical speculation that gives theology an anxiety complex here (KD 3.3, 166), with its simulations that God’s infinite freedom is some kind of threat to our finite freedom and not rather much more the only possible way that freedom can be rooted and assured.” Balthasar, Theology of Karl Barth, 134. The excerpts from Barth’s Kirchliche Dogmatik referenced here are numbered by the present author according to the German published edition, rather than adopting von Balthasar’s numbering system from 1951. 17 So Luther, in On Bound Choice (1525) regarding the relationship between God preached and God unpreached: “God does many things that he does not disclose to us in his word; he also wills many things which he does not disclose himself as willing in his word. Thus he does not will the death of a sinner, according to his word; but he wills it according to that inscrutable will of his. It is our business, however, to pay attention to the word and leave that inscrutable will alone, for we must be guided by the word and not by that inscrutable will. After all, who can direct himself by a will completely inscrutable and unknowable? It is enough to know simply that there is a certain inscrutable will in God, and as to what, why, and how far it wills, that is something we have no right whatever to inquire into, hanker after, care about, or meddle with, but only to fear and adore” (LW 33: 140). Nunc autem nobis spectandum est verbum relinquendaque illa voluntas imperscrutabilis. Verbo enim nos dirigi, non voluntate illa inscrutabili oportet. Atque adeo quis sese dirigere queat ad voluntatem prorsus imperscrutabilem et incognoscibilem? Satis est, nosse tantum, quod sit quaedam in Deo voluntas imperscrutabilis, Quid vero, Cur et quatenus illa velit, hoc prorsus non licet quaerere, optare, curare aut tangere, sed tantum timere et adorare (WA 18, 685 (29)–86: 3). 18 Barth, CD 2.2, 9. “Er setzt sich selbst zum Herrn dieses Bundes. Er ist also sein freier Begründer. Er gibt ihm seinen Inhalt, er bestimmt seine Ordnung. Er erhält ihn aufrecht. Er führt ihn zu seinem Ziel, er regiert ihn in jeder Hinsicht. Auf seiner Entscheidung beruht es, daß es einen Partner gibt, mit dem er diesen Bund eingeht und wieder auf seiner Entscheidung, wer dieser Partner ist und wieder auf seiner Entscheidung, was diesem Partner im Bunde mit ihm widerfahren soll. Indem er es will, kommt es zu diesem Bunde. Wen er dazu bestimmt, der ist dieses Bundes Genosse. Und was er will, das geschieht in diesem Bunde … Es geht um Gnade and also um die Liebe Gottes. Und es geht um Wahl und also um die Freiheit Gottes” (KD 2.2, 8).

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Divine election is thus solely a matter of God’s freedom and is a testimony to God’s goodness. God’s decision in Jesus Christ is a gracious decision. In making it, God stoops down from above. In it, he does something which he has no need to do, which he is not constrained to do. He does something which he alone can constrain himself, and has in fact constrained himself, to do. In entering into this covenant, he freely makes himself both benefactor and benefit.19

This action is superfluous on God’s part (God remains the free creator, redeemer, and sustainer of humanity and the world), but it is superfluity belonging to God’s nature as goodness.20

2. God’s Nature as Goodness in Relation to Election God’s nature as goodness is witnessed to by biblical texts, and particularly by 2 Tim. 2:13 (NRSV ): “If we are faithless, he remains faithful, for he cannot deny himself.”21 God’s trustworthiness, faithfulness, and dependability relate to Barth’s Erwählungslehre, since God demonstrates God’s goodness in the Gospel through Jesus Christ as the elected human being, and the free election of humankind because of Jesus Christ. In the Hebrew Scriptures, Jeremiah 31 proclaims God’s nature as goodness as well: “They shall come and sing aloud on the height of Zion, and they shall be radiant over the goodness of the LORD, over the grain, the wine, and the oil, and over the young of the flock and the 19 Ibid., 10. “Gottes Entscheidung in Jesus Christus ist eine gnädige Entscheidung. Gott steigt herunter aus einer Höhe, indem er sie vollzieht. Er tut mit ihr ein Solches, dessen er nicht bedarf, wozu er nicht verbunden ist, wozu er sich nur selbst verbinden kann, wozu er sich aber tatsächlich verbunden hat. Er macht sich selbst in Freiheit zum Wohltäter und zur Wohltat, indem er jenen Bund eingeht” (KD 2.2, 9). 20 Von Balthasar is helpful on this point related to the Triune God’s freedom and election. Predestination is related to God’s freedom as an expression of God’s ultimate love. In his Mysterium Paschale, von Balthasar writes, “God is not, in the first place, ‘absolute power’, but ‘absolute love’, and his sovereignty manifests itself not in holding on to what is its own but in its abandonment – all this in such a way that this sovereignty displays itself in transcending the opposition, known to us from the world, between power and impotence. The exteriorization of God (in the Incarnation) has its ontic condition of possibility in the external exteriorization of God – that is, in his tripersonal self-gift.” See Hans Urs von Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale: The Mystery of Easter, trans. Aidan Nichols, O. P. (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1990), 28. Although this text is not strictly an examination of Barth’s Erwählungslehre, it arguably shares many commonalities with Barth’s overall theological project in CD 2.2, while being explicitly concerned with a theology of Holy Saturday. For both an appreciation and critique of von Balthasar’s Christological efforts, particularly related to Chalcedon and the question of Kenosis, see McCormack, The Humility of the Eternal Son, 155–58. 21 Essential for the present argument in relation to Barth’s Erwählungslehre is the Greek word πιστός meaning “trustworthy, faithful, dependable, inspiring trust/faith.” Further, the Greek word ἀρνήσασθαι (ἀρνέομαι) means “to refuse consent to”/“to deny.”

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herd; their life shall become like a watered garden, and they shall never languish again” (Jer. 31:12, NRSV ).22 The centrality of God’s nature as goodness is shown in God’s love for the world in the gift of Jesus Christ (John 3:16). Emphasizing God’s nature as goodness does not mandate God to be loving (then the Gospel would be turned into Law in the negative sense), but rather relates to Barth’s concrete Christological understanding of election – Jesus Christ as the electing God and elected human being.23 If God is for the world in Jesus Christ as the Gospel of John proclaims, then this pro mundis means God would not have chosen otherwise than to give God’s self for the world by becoming one with human beings in Jesus Christ. God remains the free author and executor of God’s covenant, but God’s freedom is a freedom for the world in grace and love. God’s love reveals God’s glory as the One who loves humankind in free, divine movement. Barth writes: All that we have to say concerning this aspect of the divine movement may be summed up in the concept which is the title of this chapter: that of the election in the sense of the election of divine grace, the choice which God makes in his grace, thus making this movement, and instituting, maintaining and directing this covenant. In accordance with the theological tradition of the Reformed Churches (and especially the Germanspeaking), what we have in mind is the election of grace (in translation of ἐκλογὴ χάριτος, Rom. 11:5); and it may be noted how the term reflects the being of God as we have hitherto sought to understand and explain it. It is a question of grace, and that means the love of God. It is a question of election, and that means the freedom of God.24

The decision for election belongs to the Triune God alone, giving God the appropriate glory due to God. Emphasizing God’s free self-decision also shows 22 The Hebrew word ‫ טוּב‬means “goodness,” when used in relation to proper names. Thus, Jeremiah attests to YHWH’s goodness as a promise to the people of Israel for restoration, wholeness, and life. 23 McCormack argues Barth critiques Calvin’s understanding of predestination, in order emphasize Jesus Christ being the subject of election as the event showing God’s love and mercy for humanity. “Calvin’s mistake was not simply that he understood predestination to entail a pre-temporal division of the human race into two camps. That is only his most conspicuous error. But the root of the difference between Calvin and Barth lies at a much deeper level – at the level of divine ontology. The electing God, Barth argues, is not an unknown ‘x’. He is a God whose very being – already in eternity – is determined, defined, by what he reveals himself to be in Jesus Christ; viz. a God of love and mercy towards the whole human race. That is what Barth means for us to understand when he says that Jesus Christ is the Subject of election.” McCormack, “Grace and Being,” 97–98. 24 Barth, CD 2.2, 9. “Wir fassen Alles, was von der göttlichen Zuwendung in dieser Hinsicht zu sagen ist, zusammen in den Begriff, der als Titel an der Spitze dieses Kapitels steht: in den Begriff, der Gnadenwahl, d. h. der Wahl der göttlichen Gnade, der Wahl, die Gott in seiner Gnade vollzieht und eben so jene Zuwendung vollzieht, jenen Bund stiftet, erhält und regiert. Man bemerke, wie sich in diesem Begriff, den wir als Übersetzung von ἐκλογὴ χάριτος (Röm. 11, 5) zunächst der theologischen Tradition speziell der deutschsprachigen reformierten Kirche entnehmen, das Wesen Gottes, wie wir es auf unserem bisherigen Weg verstanden und erklärt haben, widerspiegelt: Es geht um Gnade und also um die Liebe Gottes. Und es geht um Wahl und also um die Freiheit Gottes” (KD 2.2, 8).

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Barth’s understanding of the relationship between God’s being and act in his Erwählungslehre.25 Barth writes, “According to the Christian perception the true God is what he is only in this movement, in the movement toward this human being [Jesus Christ], and in him and through him toward other human beings in their unity as his people.”26 A theological epistemology is present in Barth’s understanding of election when the question of God’s freedom is considered in relation to election. For God to decide otherwise than for God’s self in Jesus Christ and for humankind through the elected human being Jesus Christ would go against the revealed, concrete God that Barth emphasizes throughout the Erwählungslehre. God would then become the terrifying deus absconditus Luther admonishes should be fled from in De servo arbitrio, rather than God as clothed in God’s Word on the cross.27 There is, however, a distinct difference between the hiddenness of God in Barth’s Erwählungslehre and Luther’s notion of God’s hiddenness behind the cross in De servo arbitrio. For Barth, God’s hiddenness is primarily God’s hiddenness on Golgotha. This corresponds to one aspect of hiddenness in Luther’s theology, the form of hiddenness found in The Heidelberg Disputation. Barth, however, distances himself from Luther’s second form of hiddenness found in De servo arbitrio. Thus, there is no hiddenness of God behind the cross for Barth, and this rejection of God’s hiddenness behind the cross is an important difference with and transformation of Luther’s theology. Nevertheless, Barth emphasizes God’s overflowing grace and love in glory in God’s election of humankind in Jesus Christ, showing God is steadfast and faithful, and “cannot deny himself ” (2 Tim 2:13).28 25 Regarding the relationship of the being and act of God in Barth’s Erwählungslehre, Eberhard Jüngel writes, “Die Erwählung Jesu Christi impliziert eine göttliche Entscheidung über Gottes Sein, deren explizite Konsequenz für uns als das ‘Leiden Gottes’ thematisch wird. Sowohl in der Erwählung Jesu Christi als auch im Leiden Gottes geht es aber um ‘Gottes Sein in der Tat.’” Eberhard Jüngel, Gottes Sein ist im Werden: Verantwortliche Rede vom Sein Gottes bei Karl Barth, 2nd ed. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1966), 75. Cf. McCormack, “Election and Trinity,” 207–10. McCormack proposes a correction of the Doctrine of the Trinity from Barth’s Erwählungslehre in CD 2.2 and Jüngel’s arguments found in Gottes Sein ist im Werden in “Grace and Being,” 101–4. See n. 8 above for arguments as to why McCormack’s reading of the Trinity and Election in Karl Barth seems to be preferable to George Hunsinger’s overall, even as Hunsinger’s arguments for Barth’s reception of Luther are helpful in relation to the present study. 26 Barth, CD 2.2, 7. “Eben der wirkliche Gott ist nach christlicher Erkenntnis, was er ist, nur in dieser Zuwendung. In der Zuwendung zu diesem Menschen und in ihm und durch ihn zu den als sein Volk vereinigten anderen Menschen!” (KD 2.2, 6). Cf. Jüngel, Gottes Sein ist im Werden, 80. 27 Paraphrasing Luther, On Bound Choice. See n. 17 above. A study demonstrating Barth’s distancing from Luther on this point is found in Rustin E. Brian, Covering Up Luther: How Barth’s Christology Challenged the Deus Absconditus that Haunts Modernity (Eugene: Cascade), 2013. Barth also distances himself in his Erwählungslehre from the classical Reformed extra calvinisticum, and thus from an abstract, metaphysical Logos asarkos seen apart from the Logos ensarkos in Christ. See McCormack, “Grace and Being,” 95–101. 28 The question of divine hiddenness in Luther’s theology in relation to Barth’s Erwäh-

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3. The Yes and No in Barth’s Erwählungslehre as a Transformation of Thesis 28 of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation For Barth, God’s Yes in Jesus Christ and the election present for humankind in him is juxtaposed with God’s No to temptation, death, and Satan, which are contrary to God as goodness, love, grace, and wholeness incarnate in Christ. Barth writes: When confronted by Satan and his kingdom, the human being in himself and as such has in his creaturely freedom no power to reject that which in God’s divine freedom God rejects. Face to face with temptation he cannot maintain the goodness of his creation in the divine image and foreordination to the divine likeness. This is done by the elected human being Jesus (Mt. 4:1–11). In himself and as such a human being will always do as Adam did in Gen. 3. And for this reason, according to the will and counsel of God, a human being in himself and as such incurs the rejection which rests upon his temptation and corruption. He stands under the wrath which is God’s only answer to the creature which abuses and dishonors its creatureliness. Exposed to the power of the divine negation, he is guilty of death. But it is this very human being in himself and as such who in and with the election of the human being Jesus is loved of God from all eternity and elected to fellowship with him: he who was powerless against the insinuations of the tempter and seducer; he who in his actual temptation and seduction became the enemy of God; he who incurred rejection and became guilty of death. In this one human being Jesus, God puts at the head and in the place of all other human beings the One who has the same power as himself to reject Satan and to maintain and not surrender the goodness of humankind’s divine creation and destiny; the One who according to Mt. 4 actually does this, and does it for all who are elected in him, for the human being in himself and as such who does not and cannot do it of himself.29 lungslehre corresponds also to the question of Luther’s understanding of Anfechtung. Luther’s theology arguably emphasizes a struggle between God and Satan, and is related to his experiences of Anfechtung, whereas Barth’s theology overall centers on the resurrection of the crucified Christ, and a Johannine realized eschatology. Chapter 4 of the present study argued for a constructive eschatological solution to Luther’s understanding of divine hiddenness behind the cross, which also can imply an eschatological end to Anfechtung as Luther understood it. This proposal corresponds to Barth’s Erwählungslehre and the constructive development through a Pauline eschatologia crucis at the end of the present chapter. In any case, there is arguably a transformation of Luther’s overall understanding of Anfechtung and divine hiddenness in Barth’s Erwählungslehre. For Anfechtung in Luther, see Bayer, Theologie, 96–105, Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology, 20–21; 35–37, and Heiko A. Oberman, Luther: Mensch zwischen Gott und Teufel (Berlin: Severin und Siedler, 1981), 223–40. 29 Barth, CD 2.2, 122–23. “Der Mensch an sich und als solcher, konfrontiert mit dem Satan und seinem Reich, hat nun einmal in seiner geschöpflichen Freiheit die Macht nicht, seinerseits zu verwerfen, was Gott in seiner göttlichen Freiheit verwirft und also der Versuchung gegenüber die Güte seiner Schöpfung und seiner Bestimmung zum Bilde Gottes zu behaupten. Der erwählte Mensch Jesus tut es (Matth. 4, 1–11). Der Mensch an sich und als solcher aber wird immer tun, was nach Gen. 3 Adam tat. Und darum ist der Mensch an sich und als solcher nach Gottes Ratschluß und Willen derselben Verwerfung verfallen, die auf seinem Versuchen und Verführen liegt. Er steht unter dem Zorn, mit dem Gott dem seine Geschöpflichkeit schmähen-

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God’s No is overcome on Golgotha when Christ takes the sin of the world onto himself. As Barth states, “the crucified Jesus is the image of the invisible God.”30 Both Yes and No need to be heard, in order that the decisive and final Yes of the Gospel retains its decisiveness. “The Yes cannot be heard unless the No is also heard. But the No is said for the sake of the Yes and not for its own sake. In substance, therefore, the first and last word is Yes and not No.”31 Election, for Barth, thus attests to God’s goodness, grace, freedom, glory, and love in Jesus Christ through God’s actions alone, not through any merit on the part of elected sinners.32 The Yes and No of Barth’s Erwählungslehre can be read as a transformation of Thesis 28 from the early Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation (1518), wherein those thought to be unworthy or unloved are declared worthy and loved because of Christ on the cross. Luther writes, The love of God which lives in human beings loves sinners, evil persons, fools, and weaklings in order to make them righteous, good, wise, and strong. Rather than seeking its own good, the love of God flows forth and bestows good. Therefore sinners are attractive because they are loved; they are not loved because they are attractive.33 den und schändenden Geschöpf allein antworten kann. Er ist, der Kraft der göttlichen Negation ausgesetzt, des Todes schuldig. Aber eben diesen Menschen an sich und als solchen hat Gott ja in und mit der Erwählung des Menschen Jesus von Ewigkeit her geliebt und zum Bunde mit sich selber erwählt! Ihn, den der Einflüsterung des Versuchers und Verführers gegenüber Ohnmächtigen, ihn, der als wirklich Versuchter und Verführter zu seinem Feind geworden und also der Verwerfung verfallen, des Todes schuldig geworden ist! In dem einen Menschen Jesus stellt er ja den an die Spitze und zugleich an die Stelle aller Anderen, der wie Gott selber mächtig ist, den Satan zu verwerfen und also die Güte der göttlichen Schöpfung und Bestimmung des Menschen nicht preiszugeben, sondern zu verteidigen und der das nach Matth. 4 auch wirklich tut u. zw. tut für Alle, die Gott erwählt, für den Menschen an sich und als solchen, der das von sich aus nicht tut und nicht tun kann” (KD 2.2, 131–32). 30 Barth, CD 2.2, 123. “Darum ist der  gekreuzigte  Jesus das ‘Ebenbild des unsichtbaren Gottes’” (KD 2.2, 132). Emphasis added. 31 Barth, CD 2.2, 13. “Ihr Ja könnte nicht gehört werden, wo nicht auch ihr Nein gehört wird. Sie sagt also in ihrer Substanz, in ihrem ersten und letzten Wort Ja und nicht nein” (KD 2.2, 12). Cf. 2 Cor. 1:18–22, NRSV. Barth’s Yes and No in his Erwählungslehre arguably corresponds to his Second Romans Commentary from 1922, wherein eschatology and Christology are connected as related to justification. See Bruce McCormack, “An Anti-Metaphysical Manifesto: Karl Barth’s Romans Commentary in its Second Edition,” in Christophe Chalamet, Andreas Dettwiler, and Sarah Stewart-Kroeker, eds., Karl Barth’s Epistle to the Romans: Retrospect and Prospect (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2022), 109–20; 116–17. I am grateful to Stephen Morrison for alerting me to this essay. 32 Here there may also be a connection to and transformation of what Bayer calls the vita passiva for Luther’s theology. See especially Oswald Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation, trans. Thomas H. Trapp (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008), 42–43. “Faith is not knowledge and not action, neither metaphysical nor moral, neither vita activa nor vita contemplativa, but vita passiva” (43). Italics in original. 33 Martin Luther, Heidelberg Disputation (1518), LW 31: 57. amor Dei in homine vivens diligit peccatores, malos, stultos, infirmos, ut faciat iustos, bonos, sapientes, robustos et sic effluit potius et bonum tribuit. Ideo enim peccatores sunt pulchri, quia diliguntur, non ideo diliguntur, quia sunt

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Through Barth’s Erwählungslehre, all protests of the unworthiness of oneself or others before God are put to an end by God’s revelatory Yes in the hiddenness of the crucified Jesus as the image of the invisible God on Golgotha. Emphasizing the creative divine love that loves “sinners, evil persons, fools, and weaklings” demonstrated in God’s election of humankind in Jesus Christ then begins to show overall how Barth’s Erwählungslehre can be read as transforming a sapiential theologia crucis beginning in texts from the early Luther.

4. Exploring a Theologia Crucis in the Early Luther as Seelsorge in Relation to a Transformed Happy Exchange through Barth’s Erwählungslehre34 For the early Luther in the Heidelberg Disputation (1518), a sapiential theologia crucis can be found in that God is recognized in the humility and shame of the pulchri (WA 1, 365: 9–12). See Chapter 1, n. 41 above for Jüngel’s explanation of this thesis, which also corresponds to Karl Barth. 34 The present reading of Barth’s Erwählungslehre intends to emphasize the consoling potential of Barth’s doctrine of election, corresponding to a transformation of Luther’s texts examined in the first part of this study. It is thus now appropriate to examine Luther’s theologia crucis briefly as Seelsorge in relation to Barth’s Erwählungslehre, wherein a transformation of the happy exchange can be found, even though Barth does not use this exact term. In Luther’s Freedom of a Christian, the mystical happy exchange involves Christ the bridegroom bearing the sin of the guilty sinner bride and bestowing on the guilty sinner his righteousness (see Chapter 3 above). Through Barth’s Erwählungslehre, the happy exchange arguably becomes collective, in that Christ takes the sin of humankind onto himself and bestows his righteousness on humankind. However, Barth himself should be thought of as situated overall within the Reformed tradition rather than the Lutheran, even as he creatively re-interprets and diverges from Reformed theology in his Erwählungslehre. Thus, while this chapter attempts a “Trinitarian, cruciform reading” of Barth as a transformation of Luther’s sapiential theologia crucis (see n. 1 above), we have also referenced in the footnotes places where Barth relates to and diverges from Schleiermacher and Calvin in CD 2.2, found especially in the work of Bruce McCormack. By so doing, the present study seeks to be aware of how the reading offered here might differ from Barth’s own intentions, related to this study’s methodology and hermeneutics (cf. the Introduction of the present study). For a helpful summary of Barth’s relation to and divergence from John Calvin and Reformed theology in CD 2.2, see Christiane Tietz, Karl Barth: Ein Leben in Widerspruch (Munich: C. H. Beck, 2018), 378–81. Further, Parts 2 and 3 of this study attempt to take seriously the overall ecumenical potential of a contemporary sapiential theologia crucis beyond Luther’s theology, even as this study’s argument begins in texts from the early Luther, and is only able to explore contemporary Catholic theologies in a cursory fashion as related to the primary theologians incorporated here. Cf. Chapter 3, pp. 77–79 above. Finally, the possible presence of a Trinitarian theologia crucis in Orthodox theologies has unfortunately not been able to be addressed apart from a brief exploration of the doctrine of perichoresis in Jürgen Moltmann (see Chapter 7, pp. 196–97 below). There may, however, be fruitful connections between a Trinitarian theologia crucis as found in Barth’s Erwählungslehre, Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s later theology and Jürgen Moltmann’s Crucified God, and Dumitru Staniloae that could be addressed in future research related to James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. See Dumitru Staniloae,

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crucified Christ.35 The theme of theologia crucis also relates to what is called Seelsorge in modern German (the care of souls), which is important when thinking of the pastoral orientation of Luther’s theology. Consolation for the terrified conscience because of humankind’s justification by grace alone through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone is then arguably the center of the early Luther’s pastoral theology, as related to the mystical happy exchange. A key text for the consolation offered by justification by faith alone through the happy exchange is found in Luther’s 1520 sermon, Freedom of a Christian.36 Related specifically to the consolation of justification by faith alone, Luther writes, To preach Christ means to feed the soul, make it righteous, set it free, and save it, provided it believes the preaching. Faith alone is the saving and efficacious use of the Word of God, according to Rom. 10[:9]: ‘If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.’ Furthermore, ‘Christ is the end of the law, that every one who has faith may be justified’ [Rom. 10:4]. Again, in Rom. 1[:17], ‘He who through faith is righteous shall live.’ The Word of God cannot be received and cherished by any works whatever but only by faith. Therefore it is clear that, as the soul needs only the Word of God for its life and righteousness, so it is justified by faith alone and not any works; for if it could be justified by anything else, it would not need the Word, and consequently it would not need faith.37

For Luther, the principal pastoral use of the Gospel was as consolation for the terrified conscience. The terrified conscience is anxiety over sin and wrongdoing, and therefore anxiety over one’s acceptance by God, especially as pertaining to predestination. Luther’s understanding of the consolation of the Gospel for the The Experience of God, Orthodox Dogmatic Theology, Vol. 1: Revelation and Knowledge of the Triune God, trans. and ed., Ioan Ionita and Robert Barringer (Brookline, MA: Holy Cross Orthodox Press, 1994). These clarifications and suggestions for further research attempt to relate to an overall understanding of theology as sapientia. 35 See the explanation to Thesis 20 of the Heidelberg Disputation: “Now it is not sufficient for anyone, and it does him no good to recognize God in his glory and majesty, unless he recognizes him in the humility and shame of the cross. Thus God destroys the wisdom of the wise … true theology and recognition of God are in the crucified Christ ….” (LW 31: 52–53). Ita ut nulli iam satis sit ac prosit, qui cognoscit Deum in gloria et maiestate, nisi cognoscat eundem in humilitate et ignominia crucis. Sic perdit sapientiam sapientum …. Ergo in Christo crucifixo est vera Theologia et cognitio Dei (WA 1, 362: 11–13; 18–19). 36 The exact phrase “happy exchange” (der fröhliche Wechsel) is found only in the German edition of this text (WA 7, 20–38), which is why the present study used this version for close reading in Chapter 3. However, the theme of happy exchange can also be found in the Latin edition (WA 7, 49–73), and an excerpt from this latter edition is cited below. 37 Martin Luther, Freedom of a Christian (1520), LW 31: 346. Predicasse enim Christum, hoc est, animam pavisse, iustificasse, liberasse et salvam fecisse, si crediderit praedicationi. Fides enim sola est salutaris et efficax usus verbi dei, Ro. 10. ‘Si confitearis ore tuo, Ihesum esse dominum, et corde tuo credideris, quod deus illum suscitavit a mortuis, salvus eris’. Et iterum, ‘Finis legis Christus ad iustitiam omni credenti’. Et Ro. 1. ‘Iustus ex fide sua vivet’. Neque enim verbum dei operibus ullis, sed sola fide suscipi et coli potest. Ideo clarum est, ut solo verbo anima opus habet ad vitam et iustitiam, ita sola fide et nullis operibus iustificatur. Si enim alio quopiam iustificari posset, verbo non haberet opus, ac per hoc nec fide (WA 7, 51: 15–24).

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terrified conscience says that those who are tormented by sin find relief and solace through Word and Sacrament.38 In Luther’s understanding, the cross of Christ shows who God is, demonstrates who a sinner is in relationship to God, and consoles the guilty sinner for Christ’s sake alone. This consolation is seen especially in the ending of Luther’s A Meditation on Christ’s Passion: First of all, you must no longer contemplate the suffering of Christ (for this has already done its work and terrified you), but pass beyond that and see his friendly heart and how this heart beats with such love for you that it impels him to bear with pain your conscience and your sin. Then your heart will be filled with love for him, and the confidence of your faith will be strengthened. Now continue and rise beyond Christ’s heart to God’s heart and you will see that Christ would not have shown this love for you if God in his eternal love had not wanted this, for Christ’s love for you is due to his obedience to God. Thus you will find the divine and kind paternal heart, and, as Christ says, you will be drawn to the Father through him. Then you will understand the words of Christ, ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, etc.’ [John 3:16]. We know God aright when we grasp him not in his might or wisdom (for then he proves terrifying), but in his kindness and love. Then faith and confidence are able to exist, and then the human is truly born anew in God.39

The crucified Christ, at first a terror to the guilty sinner, becomes the source of greatest consolation through the happy exchange.40 God’s goodness and kind38 See Robert Kolb, Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 84, 96; Ronald K. Rittgers, “How Luther’s Engagement in Pastoral Care Shaped his Theology,” in Robert Kolb, Irene Dinger, and L’ubomír Batka, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Martin Luther’s Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 462–70; Neil R. Leroux, Martin Luther as Comforter: Writings on Death (Leiden: Brill, 2007), xxvi; Timothy J. Wengert, ed., The Pastoral Luther: Essays on Martin Luther’s Practical Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009), 1–32. 39 Martin Luther, Meditation on Christ’s Passion (1519), LW 42: 13. “Zum ersten, nit das leyden Christi mehr an zusehen (dan das hatt nu seyn werck gethan vnd dich erschreckt), Sundern duch hyn dringen vnd ansehen seyn fruntlich hertz, wie voller lieb das gegen dir ist, die yhn da zu zwingt, das er deyn gewissen vnd deyn sund szo schwerlich tregt. Alszo wirt dir das hertz gegen yhm sussze vnd die zuvorsicht des glaubens gstercket. Darnach weyter steyg durch Christus hertz zu gottis hertz vnd sehe, das Christus die liebe dir mit hette mocht erzeigen, wan es gott nit hett gewolt yn ewiger lieben haben, dem Christus mit seyner lieb gegen dir gehorsam ist. Da wirstu finden das gotlich gutt vatter hertz vnnd, wie Christus sagt, also durch Christum tzum vatter gezogen, da wirstu dan vorsteen den spruch Christi: Also hat got die welt geliebt, das er seynen eynigen sun vbir geben hat etc. Das heist dann got recht erkennet, wan man yhn nit bey der gewalt ader weysheit (die erschrecklich seynd), sundernn bey der gute vnd liebe ergreifft, da kann der glaub vnd zuvorsicht dan besteen vnd ist der mensch alszo warhafftig new ynn got geporen” (WA 2, 140 (30)–41: 7). 40 An early example of Luther’s understanding of the happy exchange is found in a letter he wrote to George Spenlein in 1516, an Augustinian friar who was transferred from Wittenberg to Memmingen. Luther writes, “Therefore, my dear Friar, learn Christ and him crucified. Learn to praise him and, despairing of yourself, say, ‘Lord Jesus, you are my righteousness, just as I am your sin. You have taken upon yourself what is mine and have given to me what is yours. You have taken upon yourself what you were not and have given to me what I was not.’ Beware of aspiring to such purity that you will not wish to be looked upon as a sinner, or to be one. For

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ness are seen in the paradoxical event of shame and humiliation of the cross. When one learns not to trust in one’s own works in any way in relation to salvation, one then begins to discover the meaning of new birth through the life of faith. Luther is clear, though, that one must not backslide into trusting in one’s own works or achievements to earn God’s favor. Learning to passively trust one’s acceptance by God as revealed a posteriori in the crucified Christ is part and parcel to the doctrine of justification by grace through faith alone.41 Arguing for the transformation of Luther’s pastoral use of the Gospel and Sacraments through Barth’s Erwählungslehre means then emphasizing how Barth’s understanding of election is rooted in the consolation of the Gospel of the crucified Christ of Golgotha. A particular passage from CD 2.2 is of importance:

Christ dwells only in sinners. On this account he descended from heaven, where he dwelt among the righteous, to dwell among sinners. Meditate on this love of his and you will see his sweet consolation. For why was it necessary for him to die if we can obtain a good conscience by our works and afflictions? Accordingly you will find peace only in him and only when you despair of yourself and your own works. Besides, you will learn from him that just as he has received you, so he has made your sins his own and has made his righteousness yours” (Martin Luther, To George Spenlein, Wittenberg, April 8, 1516, LW 48: 12). Igitur, mi dulcis Frater, disce Christum et hunc crucifixum, disce ei cantare et de te ipso desperans dicere ei: tu, Domine Ihesu, es iustitia mea, ego autem sum peccatum tuum; tu assumpsisti meum, et dedisti mihi tuum; assumpsisti, quod non eras, et dedisti mihi, quod non eram. Cave, ne aliquando ad tantam puritatem aspires, ut peccator tibi videri nolis, imo esse. Christus enim non nisi in peccatoribus habitat. Ideo enim descendit de coelo, ubi habitabat in iustis, ut etiam habitaret in peccatoribus. Istam charitatem eius rumina, et videbis dulcissimam consolationem eius. Si enim nostris laboribus et afflictionibus ad conscientiae quietem pervenire oportet, ut quid ille mortuus est? Igitur non nisi in illo, per fiducialem desperationem tui et operum tuorum, pacem invenies; disces insuper ex ipso, ut, sicut ipse suscepit te et peccata tua fecit sua, et suam iustitiam fecit tuam (WA Br 1, 35: 24–36). 41 For the argument that a sapiential theologia crucis as found in Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation is a mystical theology of revelation a posteriori in the crucified Christ, see Chapter 1, pp. 41–42 above. This revelation a posteriori in Christ is then the critique of justification by works. For Luther, the old Adam who delights in works in terms of earning salvation before God must be daily drowned through remembrance of Holy Baptism, but, when this is accomplished, there is sheer consolation and joy, because sinners are justified and “truly born anew in God.” In the Small Catechism (1529), Luther explains the relation of Baptism to the drowning of the old Adam: “Fourth What then is the significance of such a baptism with water? Answer: It signifies that the old creature in us with all sins and evil desires is to be drowned and die through daily contrition and repentance, and on the other hand that daily a new person is to come forth and rise up to live before God in righteousness and purity forever” (Martin Luther, The Small Catechism (1529), in Robert Kolb and Timothy J. Wengert, eds., The Book of Concord: The Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2000), 360. “Zum vierden. Was bedeut denn solch wasser teuffen? Antwort. Es bedeut, das der alte Adam ynn vns durch tegliche rew vnd busse sol erseufft werden vnd sterben mit allen suenden vnd boesen luesten, Vnd widderumb teglich eraus kommen vnd aufferstehen Ein newer mensch, der ynn gerechtigkeit vnnd reinigkeit fuer Gott ewiglich lebe” (WA 30 (1), 312: 11–21). A commentary on this new life in Baptism and the good works that follow from it is found in Gerhard O. Forde, Justification by Faith: A Matter of Death to Life (Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 1990), 39–61. Oswald Bayer also describes this process in Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology, 282–89.

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He elected our suffering (what we as sinners must suffer towards him and before him and from him). He elected it as his own suffering. This is the extent to which his election is an election of grace, an election of love, an election to give himself, an election to empty and abase himself for the sake of the elect. Judas who betrays him he elects as an apostle. The sentence of Pilate he elects as a revelation of his judgment on the world. He elects the cross of Golgotha as his kingly throne. He elects the tomb in the garden as the scene of his being as the living God. That is how God loved the world. That is how from all eternity his love was so selfless and genuine.42

A transformation of the happy exchange can be found here in that what for Luther was based on the soul’s mystical relationship to Christ becomes in Barth Christ’s relationship to humankind and vice versa. Thus, what for Luther was the seedbed of justification becomes through Barth’s Erwählungslehre a transformed happy exchange, revealed in the crucified Christ of Golgotha. Both theologians stress God’s goodness, Luther with the language of the “kind, paternal heart of God” and Barth with the language of God’s “selfless and genuine” eternal love through the cross of Golgotha and the tomb in the garden of Joseph of Arimathea.43 Barth then uses the word Tausch to in relation to Golgotha: The exchange [Tausch] which took place on Golgotha, when God chose as his throne the malefactor’s cross, when the Son of God bore what the son of man ought to have borne, took place once and for all in fulfilment of God’s eternal will, and it [dieser Tausch] can never be reversed. There is no condemnation – literally none – for those that are in Christ Jesus.44

Barth’s use of the word Tausch is both evidence for the happy exchange in his Erwählungslehre, and is implicitly mystical, at least when read in relation to Luther’s own mystical happy exchange. Barth’s use of this term can then be emphasized to further explore how his Erwählungslehre transforms the pastoral texts of Luther’s examined in Chapters 2 and 3 of the present study. 42 Karl Barth, CD 2.2, 164–65. “Er wählte unser Leiden: (das, was wir als Sünder an ihm und vor ihm von ihm her leiden mußten) zu seinem eigenen Leiden. So sehr ist seine Wahl Gnadenwahl, Liebeswahl, Wahl sich selbst hinzugeben, sich seiner selbst zugunsten des von ihm Gewählten zu entäußern und zu erniedrigen. Er wählt Judas, der ihn verriet, zu seinem Apostel. Er wählt das Urteil des Pilatus zur Offenbarung seines Gerichtes über die Welt. Er wählt das Kreuz von Golgotha zu seinem Königsthron. Er wählt das Grab in Josephs Garten zur Stätte seines Seins als der lebendige Gott. Also, in der Weise, hat Gott die Welt geliebt! Also, in der Weise war seine Liebe von Ewigkeit her selbstlose und gerade so wirkliche Liebe” (KD 2.2, 179–80). 43 Barth also writes of Jesus Christ as the “declaration of the heart of God” (die Kundgebung des Herzens Gottes) in CD 2.2, 422; KD 2.2, 467. 44 CD 2.2 167. “Es ist der Tausch, der auf Golgatha geschehen ist, wo Gott das Verbrecherkreuz zu seinem Thron erwählte, wo der Gottessohn erlitt, was der Menschensohn erleiden sollte, darum ein für allemal geschehen, weil das die Ausführung des von Ewigkeit gefaßten göttlichen Entschlusses, weil das Geschehen des ewigen göttlichen Willens war. Weil er aber ein für allemal geschehen ist in Vollstreckung des ewigen göttlichen Willens, darum ist dieser Tausch nicht mehr rückgängig zu machen, darum ist nichts – wirklich nichts – Verdammliches an denen, die in Christus Jesus sind (Röm 8,1)” (KD 2.2, 182).

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Given the excerpts from CD 2.2 just referenced, it is reasonable to suppose Barth’s Erwählungslehre is grounded in the last words of the crucified Johannine Jesus on the cross in John 19:30, “It is finished” (τετέλεσται, which means more precisely “to bring to an end, finish, complete”). This is evidenced by Barth emphasizing the garden tomb, which is described in the most detail in the Gospel of John, as well as the reference to John 3:16 above. Therefore, if Barth’s Erwählungslehre is read through the τετέλεσται of John 19:30, the fullness of Jesus Christ as the elected God and the elected human being is seen in his wounds on the cross, which would then be why, for Barth, “the crucified Jesus is the image of the invisible God.”45 George Hunsinger describes Barth’s understanding of the cross as the revelation of God’s suffering love in a way that relates to a transformed happy exchange through Barth’s Erwählungslehre as has just been argued. The cross, Barth constantly stressed, was the deepest revelation of God’s being, not its contradiction. Moreover, the cross bore its saving significance not in the placating of divine wrath, but in the divine judgment which in mercy assumed the whole burden of the world’s sin and removed it through suffering love.46

Thus Barth writes that Jesus Christ is rejected, in order that sinners are not rejected, and is the “Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.”47 In the event of Christ’s passion, death, and resurrection, Barth argues, “the kingdom of God is here set up as the consummation towards which all God’s ways and works are moving.”48 Arguing for a transformed happy exchange through Barth’s

45 See n. 30 above. The present study is arguing that, at least beginning with the Erwählungslehre, Barth’s Church Dogmatics can be read fruitfully in relation to a transformed sapiential theologia crucis. Prior to CD 2.2, Barth likely attempted to rationalize a theologia crucis, meaning the crucified Christ’s revelation in scripture, preaching, and personal faith became primarily a principle for investigation. Conversely, at least by the Erwählungslehre, and perhaps beginning in CD 2.1 (see n. 14 above), Barth’s theology becomes increasingly concrete, Christocentric, and then a theology of saga by CD 3.1 and onward, all of which relates to an understanding of theology as sapientia. 46 Hunsinger, “What Karl Barth Learned from Martin Luther,” 135. 47 Cf. CD 2.2, 167. “The self-giving of God consists, the giving and sending of his Son is fulfilled, in the fact that he is rejected in order that we might not be rejected. Predestination means that from all eternity God has determined upon humankind’s acquittal at his own cost. It means that God has ordained that in the place of the one acquitted he himself should be perishing and abandoned and rejected – the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” “Darin besteht doch Gottes Selbsthingabe, darin vollzogen, daß er seinen Sohn gab und sandte: daß dieser verworfen wurde, damit wir nicht verworfen würden. Praedestination heißt: der von Gott von Ewigkeit her beschlossene Freispruch des Menschen von der Verwerfung zu Gottes eigenen Ungunsten, der Freispruch des Menschen, in welchem Gott sich selbst zum Verlierenden, zum Verlassenen, zum Verworfenen an Stelle des Freigesprochenen bestimmt: von Anbeginn der Welt her zu jenem Lamm, das geschlachtet wird” (KD 2.2, 182–83). 48 Barth, CD 2.2, 126. “darin besteht die Aufrichtung des Reiches Gottes als der Vollendung, der alle Wege und Werke Gottes entgegenführen” (KD 2.2, 135).

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Erwählungslehre thus means emphasizing Christ taking the sin of the world onto himself and bestowing his righteousness on humankind.

5. Questions Needing Answering about Predestination To understand Barth’s Trinitarian Erwâhlungslehre thoroughly, it is important to answer the question, “does God elect God’s self, or Jesus Christ?” Barth answers by emphasizing Jesus Christ as both the electing God and elected human being for the sake of humanity. Carolyn E. L. Tan describes the importance of this formation for Barth: Of critical significance to Barth’s doctrine of election is that Jesus Christ is both the electing God and the elected human, in one person (CD 2.2, 3). This is vitally important because Barth asserts that the Son, as Elector with the Father and the Spirit, not only elects himself to be the Elect, but also, as Elector, elects with himself, his people. Thus it is not individuals who are elected, or damned, or even groups of people labeled ‘elect’ and ‘reprobate,’ but humanity as a whole who are united to Christ in his election.49

The Triune God elects Jesus Christ, and by so doing elects both God’s self and humankind through Jesus Christ as the electing God and elected human being.50 Barth’s framing of election corresponds to his interpretation of the Chalcedonian formula of Jesus Christ as one person in two natures.51 Since Jesus Christ is fully human and fully divine, election within the Triune Godhead and election of humankind becomes possible through the Logos becoming flesh in the elected human being from Nazareth. But the concept of election has a double reference – to the elector and to the elected …. Thus the simplest form of the dogma may be divided at once into the two assertions that Jesus Christ is the electing God, and that he is also elected human being.52 49 Carolyn E. L. Tan, The Spirit at the Cross: Exploring a Cruciform Pneumatology (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2019), 226. Italics in original. See also von Balthasar, Theology of Karl Barth, 175: “In [Christ], God chooses himself, but in the form of a creature. On him, the gracious Mediator and Redeemer, all creation is founded ‘from before the foundation of the world.’ He alone is the primal object of the Father’s election. It is in him that the family of [humanity] is summoned to election.” 50 See Tan, The Spirit at the Cross, 227. McCormack’s observation about Jesus Christ and election is also pertinent: “Jesus Christ is both the Subject of election and its Object, the electing God and the elect human. That is the fundamental thesis which shapes the whole of Barth’s doctrine of election.” McCormack, “Grace and Being,” 93. 51 See McCormack’s chapter, “Karl Barth’s Historicized Christology: Just How ‘Chalcedonian’ is It?” in Bruce L. McCormack, Orthodox and Modern: Studies in the Theology of Karl Barth (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008), 201–35 for arguments that Barth develops his own Christology differently to that of Chalcedon after the Erwählungslehre of CD 2.2, while still retaining the “two natures” language. 52 Barth, CD 2.2, 103. “Der Begriff der Erwählung redet aber von einem Doppelten: von einem Erwählenden und von einem Erwählten. Und so schließt ja auch der Name Jesus Christus

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Jesus Christ reveals God’s goodness. In the Triune God’s self-autonomy, then, God elects God’s self in Jesus Christ and elects humankind through Jesus Christ. An excerpt from Paragraph 33 of CD 2.2 is helpful here: The election of Jesus Christ is the eternal choice and decision of God. And our first assertion tells us that Jesus Christ is the electing God. We must not ask concerning any other but him. In no depth of the Godhead shall we encounter any other but him. There is no such thing as Godhead in itself. Godhead is always the Godhead of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. But the Father is the Father of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Father and the Spirit of Jesus Christ. There is no such thing as a decretum absolutum. There is no such thing as a will of God apart from the will of Jesus Christ. Thus Jesus Christ is not only the manifestatio and speculum nostrae praedestinationis …. Jesus Christ is elected human being. In making this second assertion we are again at one with the traditional teaching. But the Christological assertion of tradition tells us no more than that in his humanity Jesus Christ was one of the elect. It was in virtue of his divinity that he was ordained and appointed Lord and Head of all others, the organ and instrument of the whole election of God and the revelation and reflection of the election of those who were elected with him.53

In this example, Barth re-emphasizes his outline at the beginning of Paragraph 33: The election of grace is the eternal beginning of all the ways and works of God in Jesus Christ. In Jesus Christ God in his free grace determines himself for sinful humankind and sinful humankind for himself. He therefore takes upon himself the rejection of humankind with all its consequences and elects humankind to participation in his own glory.54

Thus, through the Triune God’s election of God’s self in Jesus Christ, and the election of humankind through Jesus Christ as the elected human being, preein Doppeltes in sich: daß der, der so heißt, wahrer Gott und daß er zugleich wahrer Mensch ist. Danach gliedert sich jene einfachste Form des Praedestinationsdogmas zunächst in zwei Sätze, die dahin lauten, daß Jesus Christus  der erwählende Gott, und: daß er  der erwählte Mensch ist” (KD 2.2, 110). 53 Barth, CD 2.2, 115. “Die Erwählung Jesu Christi ist  die  ewige Wahl und Entscheidung Gottes. Und nun sagt unser erster Satz: Jesus Christus ist der erwählende Gott. Wir haben nach keinem anderen als nach ihm zu fragen. Wir werden in keiner Tiefe der Gottheit einem anderen als ihm begegnen. Es gibt keine Gottheit an sich. Sie ist die Gottheit des Vaters, des Sohnes und des Heiligen Geistes. Der Vater ist aber der Vater Jesu Christi und der Heilige Geist ist der Geist dieses Vaters und der Geist Jesu Christi. Es gibt kein decretum absolutum. Es gibt keinen vom Willen Jesu Christi verschiedenen Willen Gottes. Jesus Christus ist also nicht nur manifestatio und speculum nostrae praedestinationis …. Jesus Christus ist der erwählte Mensch. In diesem zweiten Satz treffen wir mit der traditionellen Praedestinationslehre wieder zusammen. Aber ihr christologischer Satz lautet doch nur dahin, daß Jesus Christus nach seiner Menschheit ein Erwählter sei: vermöge seiner Gottheit zum Herrn und Haupt aller anderen bestimmt und eingesetzt, das Organ und Instrument alles göttlichen Erwählens, die Offenbarung und den Spiegel der Erwählung für alle anderen Erwählten” (KD 2.2, 123–24). 54 Barth, CD 2.2, 94. “Die Gnadenwahl ist der ewige Anfang aller Wege und Werke Gottes in Jesus Christus, in welchem Gott in freier Gnade sich selbst für den sündigen Menschen und den sündigen Menschen für sich bestimmt und also die Verwerfung des Menschen mit allen ihren Folgen auf sich selber nimmt und den Menschen erwählt zur Teilnahme an seiner eigenen Herrlichkeit” (KD 2.2, 101).

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destination loses its terror and God’s nature as goodness is demonstrated. As von Balthasar argues in his Barth study, Christ “has been chosen for the sake of those not chosen, and he vicariously bears their fate in his destiny. In this way, those not chosen become in truth the elect, while the one elected is rejected for the sake of the others.”55 The next question about predestination is the problem of single or double predestination. The answer is paradoxical. There is a double predestination for Jesus Christ, and a single predestination for humankind.56 Crucially, Barth rejects the dualism of some elected and some condemned from before eternity. “In the sharpest contrast to this view our thesis that the eternal will of God is the election of Jesus Christ means that we deny the existence of any such twofold mystery.”57 Instead, Jesus Christ as the electing God and elected human being means human beings are elected into fellowship with God because of Christ, who stands in their stead and takes their sin onto himself. Where humankind stands only to gain, God stands only to lose. And because the eternal divine predestination is identical with the election of Jesus Christ, its twofold content is that God wills to lose in order that humanity may gain. There is a sure and certain salvation for humankind, and a sure and certain risk for God.58

Election as related to the Christ event is thus not a speculative principle in abstracto but a concrete reality on which Barth’s understanding of this doctrine depends. [Jesus Christ] is the Lamb slain, and the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. For this reason, the crucified Jesus is the ‘image of the invisible God.’ If, then, there is an election of others on the basis of the election of this human being Jesus, we can see that that election is to be understood only as free grace, and we can also see why this is so.59 55

Balthasar, The Theology of Karl Barth, 178. Ibid., 177. 57 Barth, CD 2.2, 146. “Unsere These vom ewigen Willen Gottes in der Erwählung Jesu Christi bedeutet in scharfem Gegensatz dazu, daß wir die Existenz dieses doppelten Dunkels in Abrede stellen” (KD 2.2, 158). 58 Barth, CD 2.2, 162–63. “Gott will verlieren, damit der Mensch gewinne. Sicheres Heil für den Menschen, sichere Gefahr für Gott selber!” (KD 2.2, 177). Here, then, is an argument in Barth’s Erwählungslehre for McCormack’s claim that the Logos asarkos should not be thought of without the Logos ensarkos, and thus that God’s covenant of grace is “the act in which God gives Himself His own being and, therefore, structures Himself as triune for the sake of establishing a redemptive relationship with the human race. There is nothing behind this event, no ‘moment’ in God in which God existed in another and different way from what God does in the event itself.” Bruce L. McCormack, “Let’s Speak Plainly: A Response to Paul Molnar,” Theology Today 67 (2010): 57–65; 59–60. Emphases in original. Cf. n. 8 above. 59 Barth, CD 2.2, 123. “Darum ist er ‘das geschlachtete Lamm’ u. zw. von Anbeginn der Welt her. Darum ist der gekreuzigte Jesus das ‘Ebenbild des unsichtbaren Gottes’. – Gibt es ein Erwähltsein anderer Menschen auf Grund der Erwählung dieses Menschen Jesus, so sehen wir nun auf einer zweiten Linie, daß und warum dies nur als freie Gnade zu verstehen ist” (KD 2.2, 132). Emphasis added. 56

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Thus, it is from the concreteness of the Christ event that there is no hiddenness of God behind Jesus Christ for Barth. We also see again Barth’s overall Johannine Christological commitments. Related to single or double predestination is the question of whether Barth’s theology is supralapsarian or infralapsarian. It can be argued that Barth proposes a modified understanding of supralapsarianism, with a Christological critique of the seventeenth-century supralapsarian position.60 Understanding Barth’s Erwählungslehre as a modified form of supralapsarianism is important when reading Barth’s Erwählungslehre as a transformed theologia crucis, because God’s free decision in being for humankind and creation, to the extent of electing sinners in the Golgotha event, can be emphasized.61 Barth writes: In the beginning, before time and space as we know them, before creation, before there was any reality distinct from God which could be the object of the love of God or the setting for his acts of freedom, God anticipated and determined within himself (in the power of his love and freedom, of his knowing and willing) that the goal and meaning of all his dealings with the as yet non-existent universe should be the fact that in his Son he would be gracious towards humankind, uniting himself with humankind. In the beginning it was the choice of the Father himself to establish this covenant with humankind by giving up his Son for them, that he himself might become human in the fulfilment of his grace. In the beginning it was the choice of the Son to be obedient to grace, and therefore to offer up himself and to become human in order that this covenant might be made a reality. In the beginning it was the resolve of the Holy Spirit that the unity of God, of Father and Son should not be disturbed or rent by this covenant with humankind, but that it should be made the more glorious, the deity of God, the divinity of his love and freedom, being confirmed and demonstrated by this offering of the Father and this self-offering of the Son.62 60 Tan observes the following about Barth’s theology as a modified form of supralapsarianism: “Barth shares with the supralapsarian approach its Calvinistic concern for the primary freedom and supremacy of God, its refusal to separate the divine act of creation from the divine act of redemption, and its determination to see all history, including creation and fall, in the light of God’s eschatological goal – God’s glory. He is less convinced by the infralapsarian approach because, in his view, while it portrays a kinder God, it undermines those very concepts that he acknowledges and applauds in supralapsarianism (CD 2.2, 133–39, 143). Nonetheless, Barth rejects the classical supralapsarian portrayal of a God who, for the sole purpose of selfglorification, predestines from eternity one group of humans for salvation and another group for damnation, and for this very purpose, creates a world in which evil rules, so that humans will fall and need redemption (CD 2.2, 140); in crude vernacular – the idea that God wants to be a hero, like a firefighter who sets fires in order to be commended for putting them out and rescuing people. In Barth’s more refined terminology, the classical supralapsarian approach is ‘most dangerous’ (CD 2.2, 140).” Tan, Spirit at the Cross, 225. 61 For an argument that Karl Barth uses an infralapsarian theological hermeneutic, see Shao Kai Tseng, Karl Barth’s Infralapsarian Theology: Origins and Development 1920–1953 (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2016), 213–41. 62 Barth, CD 2.2, 101–2. “Im Anfang, vor dieser unserer Zeit und vor diesem unserem Raum, vor der Schöpfung und also bevor eine von Gott verschiedene Wirklichkeit Gegenstand seiner Liebe, bevor sie der Schauplatz der Taten seiner Freiheit sein konnte, hat Gott in sich selber (in der Kraft seiner Liebe und Freiheit, seines Wissens und Wollens) dies vorweggenommen, dies schon bestimmt als das Ziel und den Sinn seines ganzen Handelns mit der Welt, die noch nicht

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Barth believes God was not forced to create the world, as if there was an external mandate directing God with instructions on how to appropriately be and act as the Triune creator, redeemer, and sustainer of the world. Instead, God created the world, and elected humankind through the election of Jesus Christ, out of God’s goodness. The climax of God’s election of Christ and of humankind is the resurrection of Jesus from the tomb. This action shows the Triune God is the electing God of life, as demonstrated through God taking death into the center of God’s being because of the cross of Golgotha and the garden tomb of Joseph of Arimathea.63 Barth’s Erwählungslehre thus arguably transforms and expands Luther’s stress of God’s justification of sinners through Jesus Christ by emphasizing the Triune God’s eternal decision to be the redeeming God of sinners in the Christ event. The fact that election and faith belong together, or in Luther’s phrase are jumbled together, in the same way as calling and faith, or justification and faith, or sanctification and faith, or God and faith, is made clear only when we understand the election originally and decisively as the election of Jesus Christ.64

war: daß er in seinem Sohn dem Menschen gnädig sein, daß er sich ihm verbinden wolle. Es war im Anfang die Wahl des Vaters, diesen Bund mit dem Menschen darin wahr zu machen, daß er seinen Sohn für ihn dahingab, um selbst Mensch zu werden zum Vollzug seiner Gnade. Es war im Anfang die Wahl des Sohnes, der Gnade gehorsam zu sein und also sich selbst hinzugeben und Mensch zu werden, damit darin jener Bund seine Wirklichkeit habe. Es war im Anfang der Beschluß des Heiligen Geistes, daß die Einheit Gottes, die Einheit des Vaters und des Sohnes durch diesen Bund mit dem Menschen nicht gestört, geschweige denn zerrissen, vielmehr um so herrlicher werde, daß die Gottheit Gottes, die Göttlichkeit seiner Freiheit und seiner Liebe eben in diesem Hingeben des Vaters und in seinem Sichhingeben des Sohnes sich bestätigen und bewähren solle” (KD 2.2, 108–9). Cf. Balthasar, Theology of Karl Barth, 176. 63 The notion of God “taking death into the center of God’s being because of Golgotha and the garden tomb of Joseph of Arimathea” is rooted in Barth’s statements about God’s election of the cross as God’s “kingly throne” and the “garden tomb as the scene of his being as the living God.” See n. 42 above, and Alan Lewis’s constructive development through a theology of Holy Saturday in Alan E. Lewis, Between Cross and Resurrection: A Theology of Holy Saturday (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001), 244. The present study’s overall argument for a contemporary transfigured sapiential theologia crucis through James Cone can be understood as related to a Trinitarian theology of Holy Saturday. However, space limitations have prevented a direct investigation of a theology of Holy Saturday in relation to Cone, even as Cone’s final book with its theme of hope beyond the tragedy of lynching amid continuing contemporary forms of lynching in the United States and worldwide might be fruitfully interpreted as part of a Trinitarian theology of Holy Saturday. Cf. James H. Cone, The Cross and the Lynching Tree (Maryknoll: Orbis, 2011), esp. 152–67. 64 Barth, CD 2.2, 161. “Daß Erwählung und Glaube in derselben Ordnung zusammengehören wie Berufung und Glaube, wie Rechtfertigung und Glaube, wie Heiligung und Glaube, wie Gott und der Glaube nach Luthers Wort ‘zuhaufe’ gehören, das wird dann, das wird aber auch erst dann klar, wenn wir sie ursprünglich und entscheidend als die Erwählung Jesu Christi verstehen” (KD 2.2, 175). Here evidence can again be gathered for Barth’s revision of the Reformed tradition, wherein Jesus Christ is the Subject and Object of divine election. See McCormack, “Grace and Being,” 93–95.

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Election in eternity is a free decision made in the abundance of the Triune life of God, maintaining the distinction between creator and creature, while showing the creator’s ultimate overflowing glory-as-goodness, the full extent of which is shown in Christ’s three-day journey from death to resurrection. “The insight is this: that in the predestination of the human being Jesus we see what predestination is always and everywhere – the acceptance and reception of humankind only by the free grace of God.”65

6. “Ich lehre sie nicht, aber auch nicht nicht”66: Barth’s Erwählungslehre and the Question of Universal Salvation through Jesus Christ: A Constructive Development Barth consistently rejected universal salvation as an abstract concept, or as something God was bound to do through Christ.67 Although Barth does not explicitly argue for universal salvation through Jesus Christ, this position remains a reasonable consequence of his Erwählungslehre. Barth writes: 65 Barth, CD 2.2, 118. “Wir erkennen in der Praedestination des Menschen Jesus, was Praedestination immer und überall ist: An– und Aufnahme des Menschen durch Gottes freie Gnade allein” (KD 2.2, 126). 66 Eberhard Jüngel writes that he heard Barth say this orally. Jüngel elaborates on Barth’s refusal to openly proclaim universal salvation through Christ: “Die universalistische Konzeption der Prädestinationslehre führt zur Vorordnung der Erwählungslehre der Gemeinde vor der des Einzelnen. Die Gefahr, implizit die apokastastasis panton zu lehren – ‘ich lehre sie nicht, aber auch nicht nicht’ –, wird der als größer empfundenen Gefahr, den souveränen Heilswillen und die Macht des Evangeliums einzuschränken, untergeordnet. Die christologische Grundorientierung wirkt sich auch auf die Ethik der Gotteslehre aus, die Jesus Christus  – parallel zur Dialektik zwischen erwählendem Gott und erwähltem Menschen – als heiligenden Gott und geheiligten Menschen darstellt.” Eberhard Jüngel, Barth Studien (Zürich-Köln and Gütersloh: Benzinger and Gütersloher Gerd Mohn, 1982), 51. Cf. Tietz, Karl Barth, 380–81. 67 Barth emphasized his rejection of “universal salvation” as an abstract theological term but re-iterated his stress on Christ as the universal savior of humankind in a conversation with Methodist preachers on May 16, 1961. To the specific question of “Are all people going to be saved?” Barth answered, “We cannot place ourselves alongside the salvation of Christ, of whom Scripture says: ‘In Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself ’ (2 Cor. 5:19), and then look about and ask, Will all be saved? Like someone observing a building under construction, and asking – How will this come out? Let this be the word to us that we should proclaim: Christ is the Saviour of the World! With that we shall have our hands full. With that alone we are also given a tremendous version of the future. Surely it will be a huge affair so that we will open our eyes and ears wide indeed! But ‘universal salvation’ – such a curious term! In Colossians chapter 1:20 we do hear about something like this; nevertheless, I am not fond of the concept. I was good friends with Inspector Imberg in Gümlingen. He was such a preacher of universal salvation. I said to him once: ‘I do not believe in universal salvation, but I do believe in Jesus Christ the universal Saviour.’ Yes, indeed, I believe in Christ, the soter tou kosmou (John 4:42; 1 John 4:14), the Saviour of the world. I cannot even say about myself whether I am saved. That will be God’s free grace.” Eberhard Busch, ed., Karl Barth in Conversation Volume 1: 1959 to 1962 (Philadelphia: Westminster John Knox Press, 2017), 129–30.

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If the teachers of predestination were right when they spoke always of a duality, of election and reprobation, of predestination to salvation or perdition, to life or death, then we may say already that in the election of Jesus Christ which is the eternal will of God, God has ascribed to humankind the former, election, salvation and life; and to himself he has ascribed the latter, reprobation, perdition and death.68

A transformed happy exchange can be found again, wherein Christ takes on “reprobation, damnation, and death” so that humankind might receive “election, salvation, and life.” Related to and moving beyond Barth’s avoidance of explicitly endorsing universal salvation through Jesus Christ, it needs to be asked what “election, salvation, and life” might mean for humanity in terms of the eschatological raising of Jesus from the dead. Since Barth described Jesus Christ as the electing God and the elected human being, Christ as the “enfleshed Word”69 is able to overcome death once for all by his resurrection from the dead, when seen in relation to the testimony about Christ’s resurrection in Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians. There is both a particularity and a universality to this event, as described at the end of 1. Cor. 15: But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have died. For since death came through a human being, the resurrection of the dead has also come through a human being; for as all die in Adam, so all will be made alive in Christ. But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father, after he has destroyed every ruler and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For ‘God has put all things in subjection under his feet.’ But when it says, ‘All things are put in subjection,’ it is plain that this does not include the one who put all things in subjection under him. When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to the one who put all things in subjection under him, so that God may be all in all. (1 Cor. 15:20–28, NRSV ).70 68 Barth, CD 2.2, 163. “Wenn es recht ist, daß man in der Praedestinationslehre immer von einem Doppelten, immer von Erwählung und Verwerfung, von Vorherbestimmung zur Seligkeit und zur Verdammnis, zum Leben und zum Tode geredet hat, dann können wir also jetzt schon sagen: in der Erwählung Jesu Christi, die der ewige Wille Gottes ist, hat Gott dem Menschen das Erste, die Erwählung, die Seligkeit und das Leben, sich selber aber das Zweite, die Verwerfung, die Verdammnis und den Tod zugedacht” (KD 2.2, 177). 69 The phrase “enfleshed Word” is meant to relate to Barth’s stress on Jesus Christ as the Incarnate Logos, and thus to Barth’s stress on Jesus Christ as True God and True Human Being. See CD 1.2, 132–71 (KD 1.2, 145–87). 70 In the original Greek: Νυνὶ δὲ Χριστὸς ἐγήγερται ἐκ νεκρῶν ἀπαρχὴ τῶν κεκοιμημένων. ἐπειδὴ γὰρ δι’ ἀνθρώπου θάνατος, καὶ δι’ ἀνθρώπου ἀνάστασις νεκρῶν. ὥσπερ γὰρ ἐν τῷ Ἀδὰμ πάντες ἀποθνῄσκουσιν, οὕτως καὶ ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ πάντες ζῳοποιηθήσονται. Ἕκαστος δὲ ἐν τῷ ἰδίῳ τάγματι· ἀπαρχὴ Χριστός, ἔπειτα οἱ τοῦ Χριστοῦ ἐν τῇ παρουσίᾳ αὐτοῦ, εἶτα τὸ τέλος, ὅταν παραδιδῷ τὴν βασιλείαν τῷ θεῷ καὶ πατρί, ὅταν καταργήσῃ πᾶσαν ἀρχὴν καὶ πᾶσαν ἐξουσίαν καὶ δύναμιν. δεῖ γὰρ αὐτὸν βασιλεύειν ἄχρι οὗ θῇ πάντας τοὺς ἐχθροὺς ὑπὸ τοὺς πόδας αὐτοῦ. ἔσχατος ἐχθρὸς καταργεῖται ὁ θάνατος· πάντα γὰρ ὑπέταξεν ὑπὸ τοὺς πόδας αὐτοῦ. ὅταν δὲ εἴπῃ ὅτι πάντα ὑποτέτακται, δῆλον ὅτι ἐκτὸς τοῦ ὑποτάξαντος αὐτῷ τὰ πάντα.

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The concreteness and particularity is the resurrection of Jesus Christ.71 The universal aspect is the Law that “all die in Adam” and the promise that “all will be made alive in Christ” (1 Cor. 15:22) when God will be “all in all” at the eschatological Last Day when the Son “hands over the kingdom to God the Father, after he has destroyed every ruler and every authority and power” (1 Cor. 15:24).72 Barth refused to speculate the final outcome of the eschatological promise of the Triune God’s victory over death and all enemies, yet his Erwählungslehre emphasizes the historical particularity of the Christ event on Golgotha as the basis for the election of humanity through the human being Jesus of Nazareth.73 Barth writes: That we know God and have God only in Jesus Christ means that we can know him and have him only with the human being Jesus of Nazareth and with the people which he represents. Apart from this human being and apart from this people God would be a different, an alien God.74

Expressing the hope of universal salvation through a Pauline hermeneutic that goes beyond Barth’s Erwählungslehre can then be rooted in Barth’s statements about God electing the cross and the garden tomb, since the crucified and entombed God is resurrected.75 Therefore, it is congruent with Barth to express the hope of universal salvation decisively through prayerful reflection on the life, ὅταν δὲ ὑποταγῇ αὐτῷ τὰ πάντα, τότε [καὶ] αὐτὸς ὁ υἱὸς ὑποταγήσεται τῷ ὑποτάξαντι αὐτῷ τὰ πάντα, ἵνα ᾖ ὁ θεὸς [τὰ] πάντα ἐν πᾶσιν. 71 Von Balthasar says all of Barth’s theology proceeds from the particularity of the Word of God, and thus God’s revelation in Christ, to the general. See Balthasar, The Theology of Karl Barth, 193–98. For arguments about universalism and particularity in Christ’s resurrection related to 1 Cor. 15: 20–28 and CD 2.2, see Jürgen Moltmann, Kirche in der Kraft des Geistes: Ein Beitrag zur Messianischen Ekklesiologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1975), 111. 72 The Greek word καταργήσῃ (καταργέω), which the NRSV translates with the word “destroyed,” means more precisely “to cause something to come to an end or to no longer be in existence” or “to abolish, wipe out, set aside.” 73 David Congdon describes the relationship of Barth’s Erwählungelehre and the historical particularity of Golgotha: “First, Barth’s doctrine of election is not an abstract decretum absolutum willed by God. It is a conceptual explication of what occurred in the reconciling history of Jesus Christ’s life, death and resurrection. Election is a historical event. Insofar as Barth understands it as a decision in pretemporal eternity, it is a decision made by God strictly in anticipation of the event that took place at Golgotha. In other words, what God elects in eternity is precisely this history. Second, what occurred in this history, according to Barth, is not merely the possibility of reconciliation but its actuality. There is no act, divine or human, needed to consummate the redemptive work accomplished already in Christ – neither an ecclesial act of sacramental mediation nor an individual act of faithful acknowledgement.” David W. Congdon, “Apokatastasis and Apostolicity: A Response to Oliver Crisp on the Question of Barth’s Universalism,” Scottish Journal of Theology 67, no. 4 (2014): 467. 74 Barth, CD 2.2, 7. “Daß wir Gott nur in Jesus Christus erkennen und haben, das bedeutet auch dies: daß wir ihn nur zusammen mit dem Menschen Jesus von Nazareth und mit dem in ihm vertretenen Menschenvolk erkennen und haben können. Gott ohne diesen Menschen und ohne dieses Volk wäre ein anderer, ein fremder Gott” (KD 2.2, 6). 75 See again n. 42 above.

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death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, even though Barth himself did not explicitly advocate universal salvation.76 Interpreted Christologically, the hope of universal salvation uniquely through Jesus Christ, and it is still hope until the Last Day when God will be “all in all” (1. Cor. 15:28), is in line with Barth’s re-interpretation of the doctrine of election and is anchored in a Gospel-centered theologia crucis, but with a Pauline hermeneutic added to Barth’s Johannine hermeneutic.77 Election of humanity because of Jesus Christ as electing God and elected human being is cause for the hope of the universal new creation through Jesus Christ. Interpreted eschatologically, Christ promises life, healing, and wholeness as the “Wounded Lord” of Golgotha who holds creation in his care and providence.78 Karl Barth did not address this eschatological hope in a bold fashion, instead maintaining his “reverent agnosticism” about the question.79 Seen in light of 1 Cor. 15:20–28, as well as Barth’s observations about God’s election of the cross and tomb, universal salvation through Christ is not an abstraction, but a “particularly universal” and “universally concrete” hope. Because Christ’s resurrection from the dead is the beginning of these things to come, as proclaimed by Paul in 1 Cor. 15:20–28, it can then be argued that the universal new creation of all things in Jesus Christ as articulated by Jürgen Moltmann is the consequence of Barth’s Erwählungslehre, which will be explored below in Chapter 7.

7. Conclusion This chapter read Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre in 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics in relation to a sapiential theologia crucis as read in the early Martin Luther’s theology in the first part of the present study. We explored Barth’s transfor76 For elaboration on Barth’s basic position related to rejecting universalism as a doctrine but expressing the hope that all might be redeemed through Christ, see Balthasar, Theology of Karl Barth, 172, and Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, 16. 77 See n. 42 above, and George Hunsinger, How to Read Karl Barth: The Shape of his Theology (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 130. 78 The present study is thus attempting to show that it is possible to emphasize the hope of universal salvation through Christ by going beyond Barth through an eschatological, Pauline hermeneutic for developing Barth’s Erwählungslehre. This constructive development of Barth relies on a Gospel-centered understanding of God’s freedom, and thus on a relationship between Christology and soteriology because of the theologia crucis. An argument for the relationship between Christology and soteriology in Barth’s theology, and how Barth’s thought on these matters is related to Martin Luther is found in Amy E. Marga, “Jesus Christ and the Modern Sinner: Karl Barth’s Retrieval of Luther’s Substantive Christology,” Currents in Theology and Mission 34, no. 4 (2007): 260–70. For the phrase “Wounded Lord,” see Robert H. Smith, Wounded Lord: Reading the Gospel of John Through the Eyes of Thomas – A Pastoral and Theological Commentary on the Fourth Gospel, ed., Donna Duensing (Eugene: Cascade Books, 2009), and Chapter 2, n. 22 above. 79 For the phrase “reverent agnosticism,” see Hunsinger, How to Read Karl Barth, 134.

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mation of Luther and sought to show how the theme of theologia crucis is expanded by Barth’s Trinitarian Erwählungslehre. Pertinent here was how Barth’s Erwählungslehre connects to and transforms Luther’s understanding of divine hiddenness in The Heidelberg Disputation yet rejects Luther’s emphasis of divine hiddenness behind the cross in De servo arbitrio. While there is arguably a connection to Luther’s early theology in Barth’s Erwählungslehre, there is also an important transformation of Luther in that, for Barth, there is no hiddenness of God behind the hidden God who is revealed on the cross. Said transformation of Luther relates to this study’s constructive development from an eschatological, Pauline theologia crucis in Chapter 4 of Luther’s understanding of the “three lights” at the end of De servo arbitrio. We also addressed relevant questions about Barth’s Erwählungslehre related to predestination and proposed a constructive development of Barth’s Erwählungslehre through an eschatological, Pauline theologia crucis in relation to Barth’s reluctance to address explicitly the hope of universal salvation through Jesus Christ. It was then proposed here that an eschatological, Pauline theologia crucis complements Barth’s own Johannine theology in CD 2.2 and is a basis for further expanding Barth’s Erwählungslehre. This expansion is seen in Jürgen Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis, which will be examined in Chapter 7. An especially important consequence from the present reading of Barth’s Erwählungslehre is the argument for a transformation of the happy exchange through Barth’s Erwählungslehre. Since the study argued in Chapter 3 that the happy exchange is part and parcel to a theologia crucis for the early Luther and has documented Barth’s dictum that dogmatic theology is only possible as a theologia crucis from CD 1.1, it is plausible that the argument for a transformation of the theme of happy exchange through CD 2.2 is related to Barth’s understanding of a Trinitarian Erwählungslehre, and thus to a sapiential theologia crucis. Although the happy exchange found in Barth’s Erwählungslehre is not explicitly related to late medieval passion mysticism, there may be further connections to Luther’s own mystical notion of the happy exchange through Barth’s use of the word Tausch in relation to the Christ event on Golgotha (CD 2.2, 167; KD 2.2, 182). Thus, an implicit mystical undercurrent to Barth’s Erwählungslehre in CD 2.2 can be found, when it is read in relation to the happy exchange in the early Luther. Finally, the present chapter has explored how Barth’s Erwählungslehre is Johannine, relating to what Wolfhart Pannenberg describes as a “Christology from above.”80 This assessment then corresponds to Barth’s beginning the Church Dogmatics with a new construction of the Trinitarian dogma in relation to a theologia crucis (CD 1.1, 14; KD 1.1, 13). From this Johannine hermeneutic, one 80 See Wolfhart Pannenberg, Grundzüge der Christologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1976), 26–44.

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can further argue Barth grounds his Trinitarian Erwählungslehre in the Johannine Jesus’s words, “It is finished” (τετέλεσται, John 19:30). With the Trinitarian, cruciform reading of Barth’s Erwählungslehre as a transformation of Martin Luther’s sapiential theologia crucis completed, the study continues by reading a transformed theologia crucis in Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s later theology.

Chapter 6

Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Later Theology Having read a transformed sapiential theologia crucis in Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre in 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics, this study now proceeds to read a transformed sapiential theologia crucis in Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s (1906–1945) later theology through Bonhoeffer’s concept of Stellvertretung.1 The chapter begins with an exploration of African American Bonhoeffer scholar Reggie L. Williams’s text, Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus: Harlem Renaissance Theology and an Ethic of Resistance, in order to examine Williams’s argument that Bonhoeffer’s time in Harlem during post-doctoral studies at Union Seminary in New York from 1930–1931 was an important catalyst for the radicalizing of his theologia crucis, particularly related to the notion of Christ as Stellvertretung (vicarious representative action).2 The chapter turns next to Bonhoeffer’s Lectures on Christology from 1933 to examine Bonhoeffer’s notion of Jesus Christ’s personal, bodily presence in the churchcommunity and in human history. The remainder of the chapter focuses on selections from Bonhoeffer’s later texts, emphasizing his pastoral-ethical writings to explore a connection to Karl Barth’s theology, and how Bonhoeffer’s critiques and developments of Barth’s pre-Erwählungslehre theology move a transformed sapiential theologia crucis to new territory through Bonhoeffer’s notion of “religionless Christianity” in his Letters and Papers from Prison. The chapter will 1 Due to space limitations, the present chapter will not directly engage Bonhoeffer’s two dissertations, Sanctorum Communio and Act and Being, but instead focus on his theology written specifically with the church and the world in mind, in relation to a transformed sapiential theologia crucis. For an argument that Act and Being should be understood as a theologia crucis, and particularly in distinction to Karl Barth, see Josh de Keijzer, Bonhoeffer’s Theology of the Cross: The Influence of Luther in Act and Being (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2019). 2 This chapter thus begins somewhat differently from the other chapters of the present study, which have proceeded directly to close reading of primary sources. However, it is warranted to begin the present chapter by exploring Williams’s study of Dietrich Bonhoeffer related to Bonhoeffer’s notion of Christ as Stellvertretung (an important concept in Bonhoeffer’s Ethics), as Williams shows how a theologia crucis indebted to Bonhoeffer relates to ethical-political matters, and the role of the black church in Bonhoeffer’s intellectual-personal development. Both aspects are important for reading James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis. Finally, the recent examination of Bonhoeffer’s reception of Martin Luther’s theology by Michael P. DeJonge did not adequately assess Williams’s arguments about the black church in relation to Stellvertretung, nor the possible importance of the theme of theologia crucis in Bonhoeffer’s theology overall. See Michael P. DeJonge, Bonhoeffer’s Reception of Luther (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 225.

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then address commonalities and divergences between the theologies of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth. Overall, this chapter explores how a sapiential theologia crucis turns toward the suffering of God in the world and toward the victims of sin through Bonhoeffer’s later theology, a thematic turn which is important for James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation.

1. Assessing Stellvertretung in Bonhoeffer’s Later Theology as a Transformed Happy Exchange through the Work of Reggie L. Williams Reggie L. Williams’s Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus: Harlem Renaissance Theology and an Ethic of Resistance frames Bonhoeffer’s intellectual growth during 1930–1931 in relation to broader cultural trends within the Harlem Renaissance to show Bonhoeffer’s development as a scholar with an exceptional racial-political consciousness for a white, German, male theologian. This book is a unique contribution to Bonhoeffer scholarship, which was inadequately assessed recently in Michael P. DeJonge’s 2017 study analyzing the reception of Martin Luther in Bonhoeffer’s thought. Due to DeJonge’s lack of sufficient engagement with Williams’s text and the theologia crucis in general while still laboriously seeking to demonstrate how Bonhoeffer related positively to Luther, the present chapter begins by exploring how Williams’s work can provide a hermeneutical basis for reading the theme of theologia crucis as a transformed “happy exchange” through Stellvertretung in Bonhoeffer’s later texts. Williams’s book combines historical-cultural study of black religion with constructive engagement of Bonhoeffer’s theologia crucis in relation to oppressed and exploited black bodies. Williams, then, understands Bonhoeffer to reflect on race as a theological matter, and argues this viewpoint was unique and noteworthy for a white, male German theologian to hold.3 Williams writes, In Harlem Bonhoeffer saw black Christians connecting with Christ as an unconditional obligation not in power and privilege but in suffering humanity. In Harlem Bonhoeffer began learning to embrace Christ hidden in suffering as resistance to oppression. His new awareness of racism gave him unique insight into nationalism as the racialized mixture of God and country embodied in idealized Aryan humanity. That reality included Christian identity synthesized into an untenable way of being in the world and of viewing self and others in it. Harlem provided what he needed to see the world differently and to imagine a different way of being Christian within it.4

3 DeJonge explicitly disagrees with Williams here. See DeJonge, Bonhoeffer’s Reception of Luther, 225. 4 Reggie L. Williams, Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus: Harlem Renaissance Theology and an Ethic of Resistance (Waco: Baylor University Press, 2014), 139.

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In other words, Williams sees Bonhoeffer’s time in Harlem from 1930–1931 as the catalyst for Bonhoeffer’s understanding of a theologia crucis as an experiential reality, and thus the impetus for “passionate articulation of his faith rather than a demonstration of his intellect.”5 Prior to experiencing Harlem, Bonhoeffer was a brilliant, highly-accomplished, and conceited German intellectual who doubted studying at Union would benefit him academically.6 Williams writes, [Bonhoeffer] held a proud interpretation of the place that the German academy held within the larger academic world, and he was certain that his community of modern liberal American students and faculty at Union was incapable of even comprehending theology from the German academy.7

To the contrary, what Bonhoeffer found through interacting with three friends at Union and participating as a lay leader at the black Abyssinian Baptist church was an understanding of Christ’s decisive presence hidden in suffering, which relates to Luther’s definition of a theologian of the cross in the Heidelberg Disputation.8 A key concept for Williams’s argument is Bonhoeffer’s understanding of Stellvertretung in relation to Christ. This concept is important in Bonhoeffer’s late text Ethics and can be directly found in a section titled “The Structure of Responsible Life,” especially regarding how the life of Christ corresponds to how humans are to live responsibly with and for others. Bonhoeffer relates vicarious representative action to “relationships in which a person is literally required to act on behalf of others.” Responsibility is based on vicarious representative action [Stellvertretung]. This is most evident in those relationships in which a person is literally required to act on behalf of others, for example, as a father, as a statesman, or as the instructor of an apprentice. A father acts on behalf of his children by working, providing, intervening, struggling, and suffering for them. In so doing, he really stands in their place. He is not an isolated individual, but incorporates the selves of several people in his own self. Every attempt to live as if he were alone is a denial of the fact that he is actually responsible. He cannot escape the responsibility, which is his because he is a father.9

5

Ibid., 109. Ibid., 35. 7 Ibid., 117. 8 Ibid., 128–29. Cf. Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation, Theses 19–21, and Chapter 1 of the present study. 9 DBWE 6: 257–58. “Daß Verantwortung auf Stellvertretung beruht, geht am deutlichsten aus jenen Verhältnissen hervor, in denen der Mensch unmittelbar genötigt ist, an der Stelle anderer Menschen zu handeln, also etwa als Vater, als Staatsmann, als Lehrmeister. Der Vater handelt an der Stelle der Kinder, indem er für sie arbeitet, für sie sorgt, eintritt, kämpft, leidet. Er tritt damit real an ihre Stelle. Er ist nicht ein isolierter Einzelner, sondern er vereinigt in sich das Ich mehrerer Menschen. Jeder Versuch zu leben als wäre er allein, ist eine Leugnung der Tatsächlichkeit seiner Verantwortlichkeit. Entgehen kann er der durch seine Vaterschaft gegebenen Verantwortlichkeit nicht” (DBW 6: 256–57). 6

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The human pattern of relationships wherein, in Bonhoeffer’s example, a father “acts on behalf of his children” and “literally stands in their place” is modeled on how Bonhoeffer understands the Christ story. Especially noteworthy in the above example is Bonhoeffer’s notion of how a father “incorporates the selves of several people into his own self.” When related to Jesus Christ, traces of the “happy exchange” can then be found. Jesus  – the life, our life  – the Son of God who became human, lived as our vicarious representative. Through him, therefore, all human life is in its essence vicarious representation. Jesus was not the individual who sought to achieve some personal perfection, but only lived as the one who in himself has taken on and bears the selves of all human beings. His entire living, acting, and suffering was vicarious representative action [Stellvertretung]. All that human beings were supposed to live, do, and suffer was fulfilled in him. In this real vicarious representative action, in which his human existence consists, he is the responsible human being par excellence. Since he is life, all of life through him is destined to be vicarious representative action. Even if a life resists this intrinsic character, it nevertheless remains vicariously representative, be it with regard to life or with regard to death, just as a father remains a father for good or for ill.10

As a father bears responsibility for, and acts on behalf of, his children, so Christ “takes on and bears the selves of all human beings.” The Johannine imagery in the above passage (Christ as “life” and “our life” corresponding to John 1:4), as well as Bonhoeffer’s emphasis on Christ as the “Son of God who became human” and how Christ “bears the selves” of human beings contains further traces of the theme of happy exchange. It is thus possible to argue Bonhoeffer’s understanding of Stellvertretung is a transformation of the happy exchange found in texts from the early Luther. In Luther’s understanding of this theme (seen directly in the German edition of Freedom of a Christian), Christ bears the sins of the soul in a mystical exchange with the guilty sinner, bestowing Christ’s righteousness on the sinner, and taking the sins of the guilty sinner onto himself. Luther writes, For what Christ has is the believer’s own; what the soul has becomes Christ’s own. So Christ has all goods and bliss that are peculiar to the soul. So the soul has on it all vice and sin, which become Christ’s own. This is where the happy exchange and strife [der froelich wechszel vnd streytt] begins.11 10

DBWE 6: 258–59. “Weil Jesus, – das Leben, unser Leben, – als der Menschgewordene Sohn Gottes stellvertretend für uns gelebt hat, darum ist alles menschliche Leben durch ihn wesentlich stellvertretendes Leben. Jesus war nicht der Einzelne, der zu einer eigenen Vollkommenheit gelangen wollte, sondern er lebte nur als der, der in sich das Ich aller Menschen aufgenommen hat und trägt. Sein gesamtes Leben, Handeln und Leiden war Stellvertretung. Was die Menschen leben, handeln und leiden sollten, erfüllte sich an ihm. In dieser realen Stellvertretung, die eine menschliche Existenz ausgemacht, ist er der Verantwortliche schlechthin. Weil er das Leben ist, ist durch ihn alles Leben zur Stellvertretung bestimmt. Ob es sich auch dagegen wehrt, so bleibt es doch stellvertretend, zum Leben oder zum Tode, wie der Vater Vater bleibt, zum Guten oder zum Bösen” (DBW 6: 257–58). 11 Translation mine. Luther, WA 7, 25: 30–34. “das was Christus hatt, das ist eygen der glau-

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Bonhoeffer’s later theology can thus be read as transforming this theme originating in the early Martin Luther through Stellvertretung. Returning to Williams’s analysis of Bonhoeffer’s theology, Williams argues that Bonhoeffer developed his understanding of Christ as Stellvertretung in relation to suffering and exploited African Americans in Harlem.12 Williams finds the emphasis on vicarious representative action to have theological roots in Karl Barth, Karl Holl, Adolf von Harnack, and Reinhold Seeburg.13 He then shows how the concept of Stellvertretung relates to all of humanity, rooted in Christ as becoming Kollektivperson through his “standing in” for humanity. Williams writes: For Bonhoeffer, Christ is present in the world as the church, in the communion of saints, in the community of believers. Christ existing as the church is empathic, vicarious representative action, or Jesus as Stellvertretung, who became Kollektivperson, or humanity combined in one, by standing in for all of humanity in the sin and shame that makes us hide and isolate ourselves from God and one another. Bonhoeffer’s interpretation of Christ as vicarious representative action is not only who Jesus is; Stellvertretung as vicarious representative action is an ethical mandate for followers of Jesus.14

Williams argues that Bonhoeffer the German academic discovered during his time in New York “[p]articipation in the will of God as demonstrated in Christ is defined by vicarious and empathic solidarity with the oppressed.”15 Williams bigen seele, was die seele hatt, wirt eygen Christi. So hatt Christus alle guetter vnd seligkeit, die seyn der seelen eygen. So hatt die seel alle vntugent vnd sund auff yhr, die werden Christi eygen. Hie hebt sich nu der froelich wechszel vnd streytt.” 12 The theological-ethical concept itself occurs as early as Bonhoeffer’s first doctoral dissertation, Sanctorum Communio. See DBWE 1: 155–56; DBW 1: 99–100. Therefore, Williams’s argument is that what was at first an academic concept for Bonhoeffer became embodied during his time in Harlem. 13 Williams, Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus, 9. Of the three liberal theologians in Berlin that Bonhoeffer studied with and learned from, H. Gaylon Barker argues it is Karl Holl’s interpretation of Luther that had the most important influence on Bonhoeffer’s own reception of Luther. For Bonhoeffer’s relationship to and critique of Karl Holl and the “Luther Renaissance,” see H. Gaylon Barker, The Cross of Reality: Luther’s Theologia Crucis and Bonhoeffer’s Christology (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2015), 33–122. Barker argues that while Bonhoeffer gained many insights from Holl’s reading of Luther, particularly around justification, Bonhoeffer’s own reading of Luther is what separates him both from Holl’s emphasis on a religion of conscience and the “dialectical theology” of Karl Barth. So, Barker: “But at the core of this independence of all theological ‘schools’ is the one constant – the influence of and commitment to the theology of Martin Luther. It is that constant that gives him a unique voice. By and large, Luther is the only theologian of whom Bonhoeffer is not critical; Luther is always quoted in a favorable light. By means of his reading of Luther, Bonhoeffer is able to steer a middle path between his teachers and Barth.” Ibid., 40. Barker documents that Bonhoeffer’s criticisms of Holl around Christology appear as early as 1928. Ibid., 71. For Bonhoeffer’s studies in Berlin with Harnack, Seeberg, and Holl, and the appearance of Karl Barth’s dialectical theology represented in his second Romans commentary from 1922 and the collection of essays Das Wort Gottes und die Theologie from 1929, see Eberhard Bethge, Dietrich Bonhoeffer: Eine Biographie, 3rd ed. (Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1970), 93–107. 14 Williams, Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus, 9–10. 15 Ibid., 72.

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believes this discovery was crucial to Bonhoeffer’s ongoing activity as a pastor and resister of Hitler in his native Germany, and his emphasis on Jesus Christ’s presence hidden in suffering became decisive for political action in the world for oppressed bodies, exemplified in Germany by the persecuted Jews. Williams’s study emphasizes the black church’s role in shaping Bonhoeffer’s mature understanding of Christ as Stellvertretung, an aspect that was overlooked entirely by DeJonge’s study on Bonhoeffer and Luther.16 Thus, Williams argues Bonhoeffer’s immersion in the black church in Harlem showed the German theologian the importance of stressing Jesus’s empathic suffering with oppressed bodies. Although Bonhoeffer’s theology had previously focused on empathy and he had an empathic personality, Williams argues that Harlem showed Bonhoeffer the practical consequences of seeing Jesus as the Stellvertreter.17 Jesus “stands in” for humanity before God, and humanity is called to “stand in” for vulnerable, suffering neighbors due to Christ’s ongoing presence in the church-community. Bonhoeffer writes in Ethics: “The Christian community stands in the place in which the whole world should stand. In this respect it serves the world as vicarious representative; it is there for the world’s sake.”18 If there is a connection from Bonhoeffer’s time in Harlem to his mature understanding of Stellvertretung in Ethics, it can then be argued that Bonhoeffer’s exposure to the black church in Harlem is a crucial part of how Bonhoeffer understands Stellvertretung in a concrete fashion in Ethics, and in his later pastoral-ethical texts in general. Also, this excerpt from Ethics is another possibility for reading Bonhoeffer’s Stellvertretung as a transformation of Luther’s happy exchange from Freedom of a Christian. In Williams’s words, “as the vicarious representative for humanity, Jesus is both the source and the guide for Christian community and the mandate for empathic social interaction with those who suffer.”19 Textual evidence for Williams’s argument of the black church’s influence on Bonhoeffer’s thinking can be found in Bonhoeffer’s praising of the black church as the seedbed for beloved spiritual songs and revivalist preaching of the Gospel in his essay Protestantism Without Reformation.20 Bonhoeffer writes, Every white American knows, loves, and sings these songs. It is difficult to understand how famous Negro singers can sing these songs in the overcrowded concert halls of white people and receive resounding applause, while at the same time the same men and women find no acceptance in the communities of the whites because of social discrimination. We should further point out that nowhere else is revivalist preaching still so alive and wide16 DeJonge also does not address the possible connection between Stellvertretung and a theologia crucis in general. See DeJonge, Bonhoeffer’s Reception of Luther, 244–48. 17 Williams, Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus, 3. 18 DBWE 6: 404. “Die christliche Gemeinde steht an der Stelle, an der die ganze Welt stehen sollte; insofern dient sie stellvertretend der Welt, ist sie um der Welt willen da” (DBW 6: 408). 19 Williams, Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus, 125. 20 DBWE 15: 438–62; 456–57; DBW 15: 432–60; 453–54.

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spread as it is for Negroes; here the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Savior of sinners, is truly preached and received with great welcome and visible emotion. The issue of the Negro is one of the most decisive future tasks for the white churches.21

If it is reasonable to argue that Bonhoeffer’s mature understanding of Christ as Stellvertretung was shaped by his experiences with African American Christians in Harlem, Bonhoeffer’s praise of the black church and African American Spirituals from Protestantism without Reformation would then be intricately related to Bonhoeffer’s observation of Jesus Christ being “truly preached and received with great welcome and visible emotion” in the black church. Bonhoeffer’s emphasis on Christ as Stellvertretung then becomes apparent in his praise of the black Christians he met in Harlem.22 Reggie Williams’s Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus thus presents Bonhoeffer as a concrete human being with both flaws and growth experiences rather than someone with only a disembodied intellectual theology to be studied.23 Bonhoeffer’s turn to the Bible and subsequent writing from the standpoint of faith rather than primarily as an academic meant he was able to embody Stellvertretung as a praxis in ways which it was previously primarily a theory.24 Prior to his time in Harlem, Bonhoeffer was the product of the European theological academy that focused on the white European male body as the seedbed for idealized humanity.25 However, “Harlem was calling [Bonhoeffer] to a new interpretation of himself as Christian, one that would contradict the blending of national identity and

21 DBWE 15: 458. “Jeder weiße Amerikaner kennt, singt und liebt diese Lieder. Est ist schwer begreiflich, daß große Negersänger vor überfüllen Konzertsälen der Weißen diese Lieder singen und beispiellosen Beifall finden können, und daß gleichzeitig denselben Männern und Frauen durch soziale Diskriminierung der Zugang zu der Gemeinschaft der Weißen verschlossen bleibt. Man wird außerdem sagen dürfen, daß nirgends die Erweckungspredigt noch so lebendig und verbreitet ist wie bei den Negern, daß hier wirklich das Evangelium von Jesus Christus, dem Heiland der Sünder, gepredigt und mit großer Empfänglichkeit und spürbarer Bewegung aufgenommen wird. Das Negerproblem ist eine der entscheidenden Zukunftsaufgaben der weißen Kirchen” (DBW 15: 454). 22 Hans Pfeifer argues that Bonhoeffer’s commitment to pacifism also formed during his experiences at Union Theological Seminary. See Hans Pfeifer, “Learning Faith and Ethical Commitment in the Context of Spiritual Training Groups: Consequences of Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Post Doctoral Year in New York City 1930/1931,” Dietrich Bonhoeffer Jahrbuch 3 (2007/2008): 277, and DBWE 14: 134; DBW 14: 112–14. 23 Williams, Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus, 135. 24 Ibid., 8–9. This shift becomes explicit in Bonhoeffer’s Creation and Fall (Schöpfung und Sünde. Theologische Auslegung von Genesis 1–3), wherein Bonhoeffer states in the beginning of the lectures that theological education understands and interprets the Bible as a book of the church. See DBWE 4: 22; DBW 4: 22. Also, the English introduction to the critical edition of Creation and the Fall describes Bonhoeffer’s theological shift from writing primarily for the academy to writing for the Church. See “A Turning Point in Bonhoeffer’s Theological Development,” in DBWE 4: 5–12. 25 Williams, Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus, 47.

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Christianity with Jesus at the center of biblical concreteness and take years of struggle for him to grasp.”26 Williams’s presentation of Bonhoeffer is in line with a theologia crucis that proposes a cross-centered path for faithful living in Christ for oppressed bodies rather than primarily a doctrine to be learned.27 Williams argues convincingly that Bonhoeffer’s time in Harlem allowed Bonhoeffer to build on his understanding of Christ as Stellvertretung from his academic work by experiencing Christ as Stellvertretung embodied in the black church.28 Williams’s work on Bonhoeffer, then, can provide a fruitful hermeneutical basis for a transformed theologia crucis that takes seriously the ethical-political dimensions of this theme, showing how Bonhoeffer allowed his concrete experiences in Harlem to shape his theology focused on the concrete presence of Christ in the church-community and in history. It is to this concrete presence of Christ that we now turn toward by closely reading selections from Bonhoeffer’s 1933 Lectures on Christology.

2. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in Bonhoeffer’s Lectures on Christology The student-assembled notes forming Bonhoeffer’s Lectures on Christology provide a Christological orientation for understanding the later pastoral-ethical writings that are the primary subject matter of the present chapter.29 Grasping Bonhoeffer’s understanding of Christ as person in these lectures will help show Bonhoeffer’s emphasis on encountering Christ in the other, as well as how a transformed theologia crucis through his later theology remains concrete.30 26

Ibid., 110. See Vítor Westhelle, The Scandalous God: The Use and Abuse of the Cross (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006), 119–24. 28 However, Bonhoeffer still maintained critiques of the American churches, which can be found in Protestantism Without Reformation. Bonhoeffer ultimately favors the churches of the Reformation from a theological standpoint but appreciates the American churches’ stress on constitutions and practical realities. He then praises H. R. Niebuhr, Francis Miller, and Wilhelm Pauck as theologians rooted in the Reformation, but says those theologians are rarities. See DBWE 15: 461; DBW 15: 459. 29 Regarding the assemblage of said student notes, see DBWE 12:279. For a theological analysis of the Christology lectures with overall sympathies to both Barth and Bonhoeffer, see Wolf Krötke, “Der begegnende Gott und der Glaube: Zum theologischen Schwerpunkt der Christologievorlesung Dietrich Bonhoeffers,” in Wolf Krötke, Barmen – Barth – Bonhoeffer: Beiträge zu einer zeitgemäßen christozentrischen Theologie (Bielefeld: Luther-Verlag, 2009), 315–33. 30 The concreteness of a transformed theologia crucis through Bonhoeffer is related to how he understands the concept of Christ as pro-me. See DBWE 12: 314–15: “All theology and all Christology condemn themselves if they do not say right from the beginning that God and Christ can only be Christ pro-me. Where this pro-me has been assumed, there the specific work begins. But here theology has deserted its God. It has either carried on with Scholastic substance and 27

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Bonhoeffer’s phrase, “God is bound up in the human being” is helpful for understanding the concept of Stellvertretung related to a transformed happy exchange.31 For Bonhoeffer, Christ “stands in” for humanity bearing humanity’s sin. He is there for his brothers [and sisters] in that he stands in their stead. Christ stands for his new humanity before God, that is, he takes their place and stands in their stead before God. If this is so, then he is the new humanity. There where the new humanity should stand, he himself stands, by virtue of his pro-me structure. That means he is the churchcommunity. He is no longer acting for it, on its behalf, but rather as it, in his going to the cross, dying, and taking the sins of the church-community upon himself. Thus in him the new humanity is crucified and dies.32

condemned being-there-for-you to simply being-there, or else it looks only at Christ’s actions, his effects. And yet what is decisive about the pro-me structure is that, with it, both the being and the works of Christ are maintained. Being-there-for-you comes together with being-there for you. The presence of Christ as the pro-me is his real being-for-me.” “Jede Theologie und jede Christologie verurteilt sich selbst, die nicht am Anfang den Satz stehen läßt, daß Gott und Christus nur Christus pro me ist. Wo diese Voraussetzung des Pro-me ist, setzt die spezifische Arbeit ein. Hier aber ist die Theologie abtrünnig geworden. Sie hat entweder scholastische Substanz weiterbetrieben und das Dir-Dasein zu einem Dasein verfluchtet, oder sie blickt nur auf die Akte, die Wirkungen Christi. Und doch ist das Entscheidende bei der Pro-me-Struktur, daß dadurch das Sein wie der Akt Christi aufrechterhalten werden. Das Dir-Da-sein und das Dir-da-sein kommt zusammen. Die Gegenwart Christi als das Pro me ist sein wirkliches Fürmich-Sein” (DBW 12: 296). 31 See n. 43 below for full quotation, and cf. DBWE 12: 356–57: “This is the true image of the human sarx. His sarx is our sarx. What is essential about our sarx is our vulnerability to temptation, our self-will. Christ took on all the mortifying aspects of being human; otherwise he could not help us in our sarx. Then how was he different from us? The first answer is, not at all. He is a human like us and is tempted as we are, even more than we are. In his sarx too there was a law, which was opposed to the will of God. It was a constant struggle for him. He also did things that appeared to be sins. He gave a hard answer to his mother in the temple; he evaded his opponents’ questions; he called for resistance against the ruling castes of the pious and of people. In people’s eyes, he must have looked like a sinner. So he entered in, to the extent of being unrecognizable.” “Dies ist das wirkliche Ebenbild der menschlichen sarx. Seine sarx ist unsere sarx. Das für unsere sarx Wesentliche ist unsere Versuchlichkeit und der Eigenwille. Christus hat alle Verlegenheiten des Menschen mit angenommen, sonst könnte er ja dieser sarx nicht helfen. Inwiefern unterscheidet er sich dann von uns? Zunächst gar nicht. Er ist Mensch wie wir und wird versucht wie wir, ja noch mehr wie wir. Auch in seiner sarx war ein Gesetz, das dem Willen Gottes zuwider war. Er stand allezeit im Kampf. Er tat auch, was wie Sünde aussah. Er war hart zu seiner Mutter im Tempel, er wich seinen Gegnern aus, er rief zum Widerstand gegen die herrschende Kaste der Frommen und Menschen. Er mußte in den Augen der Menschen ein Sünder sein. So trat er hinein bis zu Unkenntlichkeit” (DBW 12: 344). 32 DBWE 12: 315. “Er ist für seine Brüder, indem er an ihrer Stelle steht. Christus steht für seine neue Menschheit vor Gott, d. h. er steht an ihrer Stelle, stellvertretend für sie vor Gott. Ist das so, dann ist er die neue Menschheit. Dort, wo die neue Menschheit stehen sollte, steht kraft seiner Pro-me-Struktur er selbst. D. h. er ist die Gemeinde. Er handelt nicht mehr für sie, sondern als sie, indem er an das Kreuz steht stirbt und ihre Sünde trägt. Darum ist in ihm die neue Menschheit gekreuzigt und gestorben” (DBW 12: 296). Cf. Williams, Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus, 125.

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This understanding of Stellvertretung shows Bonhoeffer’s continuity with the Chalcedonian tradition and how Christ as Stellvertretung can be seen as a transformed happy exchange. Stressing how Stellvertretung is the kernel of Bonhoeffer’s Christology then becomes the impetus for connecting dogma and ethics, faith and love, and thus justification and sanctification, and for further exploring how Bonhoeffer’s later theology incorporates and transforms theological themes from Luther.33 Through his use of the phrase “God is bound up in the human being,” Bonhoeffer critiques the ancient heresies of Docetism (along with all its modern variants, including, according to him, liberal theology),34 Ebionism (i. e. adoptionism),35 monophysitism, and Nestorianism.36 Bonhoeffer believes the concept of heresy is foreign to modern Christians because they no longer have ecumenical councils to discern doctrine communally. For us the concept of heresy no longer exists, because there is no longer a doctrinal authority vested in councils. Our ecumenical councils of today are anything but councils, because the word heresy has been struck from our vocabulary. And yet the concept of heresy is a necessary, nonnegotiable factor for the confessing church. Doctrine must always be set over against false doctrine; otherwise one does not know what doctrine means. However, care must be taken that the concept of heresy be one that is used by the church out of love, not out of lack of love. For if I do not speak the truth to my brethren, I am considering them as heathens; if I do speak the truth to them, I am doing it out of love.37

However, each of the ancient heresies (and their contemporary counterparts) Bonhoeffer critiques in these lectures are appropriately named heresies because they all misinterpret the mystery of Jesus Christ as the God-human.38 Bonhoeffer 33 Bonhoeffer specifically references Luther’s understanding of Christ as the peccator pessimus. See DBWE 12: 357: “For our sake [God] made him to be sin. Christ is the very peccator pessimus. Luther even said that Christ was a robber, murderer, and adulterer like ourselves, because he carries our sins. But he is at the same time the One who is without sin, the Holy One, the Eternal, the Lord, the Son of the Father.” “Er ist für uns zur Sünde gemacht. Er ist selbst der peccator pessimus. Luther sagt, er ist selbst Räuber, Mörder, Ehebrecher wie wir, weil er unsere Sünde trägt. Aber zugleich ist Er der Sündlose, der Heilige, der Ewige, der Herr, der Sohn seines Vaters” (DBW 12: 344). 34 DBWE 12: 333, 338; DBW 12: 317, 323. 35 DBWE 12: 338–40; DBW 12: 323–25. 36 DBWE 12: 340–42; DBW 12: 325–28. 37 DBWE 12: 332. “Für uns gibt es den Begriff der Häresie nicht mehr, weil es eine Lehrautorität des Konzils nicht mehr gibt. Unseren heutigen ökumenischen Konzilen sind alles andere als Konzilen, denn man streicht das Wort Häresie aus dem Vokabular. Und doch ist der Begriff der Häresie ein notwendiger, unaufgebbarer Faktor für die bekennende Kirche. Der Lehre gegenüber muß die Irrlehre stehen, sonst weiß man nicht, was Lehre ist. Dabei ist zu beachten, daß der Begriff der Häresie ein solcher ist, der aus der Liebe und nicht aus der Lieblosigkeit der Kirche hervorgeht. Denn sage ich dem Bruder nicht die Wahrheit, dann betrachte ich ihn als Heiden; sage ich ihm die Wahrheit, dann geschieht das aus Liebe” (DBW 12: 316). 38 According to three of the student notes, Bonhoeffer follows the practice in the Augsburg Confession of docent (they teach) over against damnant (they condemn). See DBWE 12: 332, n. 82.

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thus seeks to confess “doctrine” over against “false doctrine,” which he sees as essential in order to confess Jesus Christ today, and believes heresy should be critiqued in love for the sake of the truth.39 Ultimately the phrase “God is bound up in the human being” is formed from expressing the mystery of Chalcedon40 through the Lutheran Christology first expounded dogmatically in the Formula of Concord, Articles 7 and 8, and based on Luther’s Confession Concerning Christ’s Supper of 1528.41 Bonhoeffer rehabilitates the three classic Lutheran genera in order to emphasize Christ’s full humanity and full divinity, meaning a transformed theologia crucis through Bonhoeffer’s later theology can be termed an Incarnational theology.42 “God is no longer other than the one who has become human. God is bound up in the human being. The result of this indissoluble bond between Logos and flesh is the unio naturalis, the union of divinity and humanity.”43 For Bonhoeffer, the proper way to speak of God is as “the one who has become human” in Jesus Christ, and thus of God in God’s weakness. “If we speak of Jesus Christ as we speak of God, we should not speak of him as representing an idea of God, that is, in his attributes as all-knowing and all-powerful, but rather speak of his weakness and manger.”44 Jesus Christ then shows how “God glorifies himself 39

DBWE 12: 332; DBW 12: 316. See DBWE 12: 342: “Thus, the matter itself is left as a mystery, for we cannot enter into it within the parameters of positive thinking. We can only enter in faith. All forms of thought are outside the realm of possibility. This means that from the Council of Chalcedon onward, it is no longer permissible to talk about the human and divine natures of Jesus Christ as about things or facts.” “Damit ist die Sache selbst als Mysterium zurückgelassen. Denn es ist nicht möglich, mit positive Denkbestimmungen hinzuzutreten. Nur Zutritt im Glauben ist möglich. Alle Denkformen sind unmöglich. D. h. vom Chalcedonense an soll es nicht mehr erlaubt sein, über die menschliche und göttliche Natur in Jesus Christus als über dingliche Gegebenheiten zu reden” (DBW 12: 327). 41 Cf. LW 37: 151–372; WA 26, 241–509. 42 DBWE 12: 344–45; DBW 12: 330–31. Bonhoeffer’s retrieval of the three genera from the Lutheran Formula of Concord is evidence for Michael P. DeJonge’s arguments that Bonhoeffer should be understood as related dogmatically to Lutheranism. However, DeJonge still does not explore the possibility of a theologia crucis for Bonhoeffer’s theology in general or examine theological commonalities between Bonhoeffer and Barth related to a theologia crucis. For the genera in relation to a contrast between the Lutheran communicatio idiomatum and Barth’s rejection of it, see DeJonge, Bonhoeffer’s Reception of Luther, 54–76. For the argument that Barth himself understands the communicatio idiomatum in line with Luther in 4.2 of the Church Dogmatics, even though Barth does not use that term, see Johann Anselm Steiger, “The communicatio idiomatum as the Axle and Motor of Luther’s Theology,” Lutheran Quarterly 14 (2000): 125–58; 155, n. 7. 43 DBWE 12: 344. “Gott ist nicht mehr anders als der Menschgewordene. Er ist in den Menschen hineingebunden. Aus diesem unlöslichen Zusammenhang von Logos und Fleisch folgt die unio naturalis, Vereinigung von Gottheit und Menschheit” (DBW 12: 329). Emphasis added. 44 DBWE 12: 354. “Soll von dem Menschen Jesus Christus als von Gott geredet werden, so darf man nicht von ihm als dem Repräsentanten einer Gottesidee reden, d. h. in seiner Eigenschaft als Allwissenheit, Allmacht, sondern von seiner Schwachheit und Krippe” (DBW 12: 341). This statement is reminiscent of Theses 19–21 of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation and 40

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in the human” and this is the “ultimate mystery of the Trinity,”45 but Jesus Christ does not visibly glorify God, “because God who became human is the Crucified One.”46 The “Crucified One” as the human God is a scandal to what reason would commonly expect (1 Cor. 1:26–28). Thus, what seems to be failure and ultimate weakness in the Christ event is actually the decisive revelation of God. The God-human who is humiliated is the stumbling block to the pious human being and to the human being, period. What is scandalous is the lack of historical clarity of this Godhuman. The most incomprehensible thing for the pious is this human being’s claim to be not only a believer in God but the Son of God.47

Bonhoeffer emphasizes God became human rather than God becoming human. Christ is thus a concrete person in human history and in the church-community rather than “the realization of some human principle” as a critique of Docetism.48 provides further material for reading Bonhoeffer’s later theology as a transformed sapiential theologia crucis. 45 DBWE 12: 355. “Gott verherrlicht sich im Menschen. Das ist das letzte Geheimnis der Trinität” (DBW 12: 342). 46 Ibid. “Warum klingt uns das so unwahrscheinlich und fremd? Weil die Menschwerdung Gottes in Jesus Christus nicht die sichtbare Verherrlichung Gottes ist, weil der Menschgewordene der Gekreuzigte ist” (DBW 12: 355). 47 DBWE 12: 358. “Der erniedrigte Gott-Mensch ist das Ärgernis des frommen Menschen und des Menschen überhaupt. Die Ärgerlichkeit ist seine geschichtliche Undeutlichkeit. Das Unbegreiflichste für den Frommen ist der Anspruch, den dieser Mensch erhebt, er sei nicht nur ein Frommer, sondern Gottes Sohn” (DBW 12: 345). 48 DBWE 12: 338. “Denn der Idealismus hebt mit dieser Unterscheidung den ersten Satz aller Theologie auf, daß Gott aus freier Gnade wirklich Mensch geworden sei und nicht aus Notwendigkeit ein menschliches Prinzip verwirklicht habe. Der Riß an jedem Doketismus ist seine Nähe zum Rationalismus” (DBW 12: 322). Bonhoeffer’s emphasis on Christ as a human person in human history and in the church-community in his Christology lectures has implications for goodness of humanity because of Christ’s incarnation and can serve as a basis for a contemporary theological critique of Docetism. Docetism is not just found in those theologies that deny Christ’s human body; it is also found wherever the bodily goodness of humankind is denied in light of the bodily incarnation of the Word. Therefore, the docetic heresy should not only be critiqued from a Christological standpoint (as it is in Bonhoeffer’s Christology lectures being examined here) but expanded to anthropological and ethical dimensions. Proposing an anthropological-ethical expansion of Christological dogma relates to reading Bonhoeffer’s concept of Stellvertretung as a transformed happy exchange. Theologically, then, one can say God’s declares the human body good because God became human in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ stands in for humankind before God, and humans should, in turn, stand in for and with vulnerable neighbors. This proposal corresponds to the present study’s concern with James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. Further, James Cone’s arguments for Christ’s non-docetic resurrection connects to Bonhoeffer’s critique of Docetism and stress on Christ’s concrete presence in the church-community and in human history. Cone writes: “The resurrection means that God’s identity with the poor in Jesus is not limited to the particularity of his Jewishness but is applicable to all who fight on behalf of the liberation of humanity in this world. And the Risen Lord’s identification with the suffering poor today is just as real as was his presence with the outcasts in first-century Palestine. His presence with the poor today is not docetic; but like yesterday, today also he takes the pain of the poor upon himself and bears it for them.” James H. Cone, God of the Oppressed, Revised ed. (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1997), 124.

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Emphasizing Christ’s concrete humanity then relates to living for others through Bonhoeffer’s re-working of the Chalcedonian formula.49 Jesus Christ, who is fully human and fully divine, following Chalcedon, is the humiliated and exalted One. Further, in keeping with an overall emphasis on concrete theology, Bonhoeffer argues for the historical resurrection of Christ: “The historical truth of Jesus Christ can therefore neither be denied nor affirmed with absolute certainty,”50 and yet the “historical fact of the empty grave” is “one of the most decisive elements of Christology.”51 Christ’s resurrection is the “impossible possibility,”52 which can be said to be the basis for Christ’s concrete presence in the church-

49 Arguing for a connection between Stellvertretung and Bonhoeffer’s phrase “God is bound up in the human being” thus attempts to show the interconnectedness between doctrinal reflection in light of ethics, and Christocentric, worldly ethics in light of traditional Chalcedonian doctrine, related to the present study’s arguments around justification and sanctification and a mystical happy exchange in Luther’s Freedom of a Christian in Chapter 3 above. Further, this proposal not only relates to Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship, but also to Barth’s Evangelium und Gesetz essay from 1935, and Barth’s intertwining of dogmatics and ethics in 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics from 1942. See Karl Barth, “Evangelium und Gesetz,” in Ernst Kinder and Klaus Haendler, eds., Gesetz und Evangelium: Beiträge zur gegenwärtigen theologischen Diskussion, 2nd ed. (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgeselschaft, 1986), 1–30 and CD 2.2, 509; KD 2.2, 564. Arguing for an interconnection between dogmatics and ethics is important overall for James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, and particularly given Cone’s critique of Wolfhart Pannenberg’s lack of attention to Christ’s presence in contemporary liberation movements of oppressed peoples, even as Cone largely agrees with Pannenberg’s arguments for the historical Jesus in Pannenberg’s Grundzüge der Christologie and can be thought of as situated within what Pannenberg would characterize as a Christology from below. See Chapter 8, n. 73 below. Cone’s critiques are pertinent in relation to Pannenberg’s Systematic Theology as well, wherein Pannenberg explicitly argues for a separation of dogmatics and ethics. Pannenberg writes, “Dogmatik als Darstellung der christlichen Lehre muß also systematische Theologie sein, nämlich systematische Lehre von Gott und sonst nichts.” Wolfhart Pannenberg, Systematische Theologie Gesamtausgabe, Band 1, ed., Gunther Wenz (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2015), 70. Pannenberg then clarifies his arguments about the difference between dogmatics and ethics, defining the respective tasks of both subjects: “Die Ethik spricht den Menschen als Subjekt seines Handelns an, während die Dogmatik auf Gott und sein Handeln blickt, auch wenn von der Schöpfung oder von der Kirche die Rede ist.” Ibid., 70. The present study ultimately agrees with James Cone’s critique, and thus follows Barth, Bonhoeffer, and Jürgen Moltmann on this point, differing from Pannenberg’s arguments about the separation of dogmatics and ethics in Volume 1 of his Systematic Theology, even though still following him implicitly overall in his rejection of Luther’s “second form” of divine hiddenness in De servo arbitrio, as documented in Chapter 4, n. 73 above. 50 DBWE 12: 330. “Die Historizität Jesu ist also weder mit absoluter Sicherheit zu leugnen noch zu bejahen” (DBW 12: 313). 51 DBWE 12: 359. “Zwischen Erniedrigung und Erhöhung liegt nun das historische Faktum des leeren Grabes. Das ist einer der entscheidenden christologischen Momente” (DBW 12: 347). 52 See DBWE 12: 360: “This is the final stumbling block, which we have to accept as believers in Christ. Either way, there is a stumbling block. The impossible possibility that the grave was empty is the stumbling block of faith. The affirmation of the empty grave is also a stumbling block.” “Das ist das letzte Ärgernis, das wir hinnehmen müssen als die an Christus Glaubenden. Es bleibt Ärgernis auf beiden Seiten. Die unmögliche Möglichkeit, daß das Grab leer gewesen ist, ist Ärgernis des Glaubens. Auch die Bejahung des leeren Grabes ist Ärgernis” (DBW 12: 347).

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community and in history. Bonhoeffer argues for the concreteness of Christ’s presence at the beginning of the lecture. As the Crucified and Risen One, Jesus is at the same time the Christ who is present now. This is the first statement: that Christ is the Christ who is present in history. He is to be understood as present in time and space. Nunc et hic, the two flow together in the concept of the church. Christ in his person is indeed present in the church as person. Thus the presence of Christ is there in the church. Only because Christ is the Christ who is present are we still able to inquire of him. Only because proclamation and the sacraments are carried out in the church can we inquire about Christ.53

Bonhoeffer’s description of Christ’s concrete presence further relates to a transformed theologia crucis, and the presence of Christ as related to proclamation and the Sacraments corresponds to themes that can be found in Luther’s Sermon on Preparing to Die (1519).54 This concrete presence of Christ in the church-community and in history has ethical implications for Bonhoeffer, which he addresses in his Discipleship text from 1937.

3. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship Having explored Bonhoeffer’s Lectures on Christology for the presence of a theologia crucis related to the theme of Stellvertretung as a transformed happy exchange, we are now ready to proceed to selections from Bonhoeffer’s later pastoral-ethical texts for examination, beginning with Discipleship (Nachfolge). This text specifically shows how Bonhoeffer understands the cross to be ethically relevant, and thus as the basis for concrete praxis.55 Discipleship addresses how Bonhoeffer believes the church has strayed from Luther’s teaching about justification. Bonhoeffer seeks to prevent the doctrine of justification from becoming an abstract principle, devoid of Christ’s person, because grace as a principle would be cheap grace, that is, grace devoid of the concrete event of the incarnation of the Word of God. Cheap grace means grace as doctrine, as principle, as system. It means forgiveness of sins as a general truth; it means God’s love as merely a Christian idea of God. Those

53 DBWE 12: 310. “Jesus ist als der Gekreuzigte und Auferstandene zugleich der gegenwärtige Christus. Das ist die erste Aussage: Christus als der gegenwärtige geschichtliche Christus. Seine Gegenwart ist zeitlich und räumlich zu verstehen. Nunc et hic, beides läuft zusammen im Begriff der Kirche. Christus ist in seiner Person gegenwärtig in der Kirche, und zwar als Person. Die Gegenwart Christi ist also in der Kirche. Nur weil Christus der gegenwärtige Christus ist, können wir ihn noch befragen. Nur weil sich in der Kirche die Verkündigung und das Sakrament vollzieht, darum kann nach Christus gefragt werden” (DBW 12: 291–92). 54 See Chapter 2 above. 55 This section only examines excerpts from Discipleship cited by Karl Barth in 4.2 of the Church Dogmatics for the purpose of comparing Barth’s and Bonhoeffer’s theologies below.

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who affirm it have already had their sins forgiven. The church that teaches this doctrine of grace thereby confers such grace upon itself. The world finds in this church a cheap cover-up for its sins, for which it shows no remorse and from which it has even less desire to be set free. Cheap grace is, thus, denial of God’s living word, denial of the incarnation of the word of God.56

Bonhoeffer’s emphasis on the who of Jesus Christ rather than the what of doctrine devoid of the personal encounter with Christ is his corrective to the problem of cheap grace. He argues that Luther taught costly grace, while Luther’s spiritual heirs have resorted to cheap grace. “Luther’s deed cannot be misunderstood more grievously than by thinking that through discovering the gospel of pure grace, Luther proclaimed a dispensation from obeying Jesus’ commandments in the world.”57 For Bonhoeffer, cheap grace is grace without discipleship. “Without discipleship, costly grace would become cheap grace.”58 Cheap grace for him would also be theological doctrines without the corresponding following of Jesus Christ. Only those who in following Christ leave everything they have can stand and say that they are justified solely by grace. They recognize the call to discipleship itself as grace and grace as that call. But those who want to use this grace to excuse themselves from discipleship are deceiving themselves.59

He argues for the critique of cheap grace through Luther, saying that “Luther always included as a matter of course: discipleship.”60 Yet Jesus’s commandments are not received as legalism by people of faith, but as the Law of the Lord that is

56

DBWE 4: 43. “Billige Gnade heißt Gnade als Lehre, als Prinzip, als System; heißt Sündenvergebung als allgemeine Wahrheit, heißt Liebe Gottes als christliche Gottesidee. Wer sie bejaht, der hat schon Vergebung seiner Sünden. Die Kirche dieser Gnadenlehre ist durch sie schon der Gnade teilhaftig. In dieser Kirche findet die Welt billige Bedeckung ihrer Sünden, die sie nicht bereut und von denen frei zu werden sie erst recht nicht wünscht. Billige Gnade ist darum Leugnung des lebendigen Wortes Gottes, Leugnung der Menschwerdung des Wortes Gottes” (DBW 4: 29). 57 DBWE 4: 49. “Man kann die Tat Luthers nicht verhängnisvoller mißverstehen als mit der Meinung, Luther habe mit der Entdeckung des Evangeliums der reinen Gnade einen Dispens für den Gehorsam gegen das Gebot Jesu in der Welt proklamiert” (DBW 4: 35). 58 DBWE 4: 50. “Aus der teuren Gnade wurde die billige Gnade ohne Nachfolge” (DBW 4: 36). 59 DBWE 4: 51. “Nur wer in der Nachfolge Jesu im Verzicht auf alles, was er hatte, steht, darf sagen, daß er allein aus Gnaden gerecht werde. Er erkennt den Ruf in die Nachfolge selbst als Gnade und die Gnade als diesen Ruf. Wer sich aber mit dieser Gnade von der Nachfolge dispensieren will, betrügt sich selbst” (DBW 4: 38). 60 DBWE 4: 50. “Daß die Gnade allein es tut, hatte Luther gesagt, und wörtlich so wiederholten es seine Schüler, mit dem einzigen Unterschied, daß sie sehr bald das ausließen und nicht mitdachten und sagten, was Luther immer selbstverständlich mitgedacht hatte, nämlich die Nachfolge, ja, was er nicht mehr zu sagen brauchte, weil er ja immer selbst als einer redete, den die Gnade in die schwerste Nachfolge Jesu geführt hatte” (DBW 4: 36).

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joyfully responded to through Christ, and for Christ’s sake.61 Obeying the Law of the Lord means to follow Christ and for Christ to be the source of the existence and sustainability of the church-community. For those who have been reborn through Baptism into Jesus Christ, obeying Christ’s commands become a joyous occasion rather than one of dread. Good works flow from faith and Christians freely admit to being justified sinners following the way of the crucified One.62 Bonhoeffer understands following Jesus Christ to entail life under the cross. No one can avoid the cross and suffering, “the law of suffering from its Lord” (das Gesetz des Leidens durch ihren Herrn) when one follows Jesus.63 So Jesus has to make it clear and unmistakable to his disciples that the need to suffer now applies to them, too. Just as Christ is only Christ as one who suffers and is rejected, so a disciple is a disciple only in suffering and being rejected, thereby participating in crucifixion. Discipleship as allegiance to the person of Jesus Christ places the follower under the law of Christ, that is, under the cross.64

However, Satan often attempts to divert the church from its following of the crucified Jesus, meaning “Satan tries to pull the church away from the cross of its Lord.”65 Bonhoeffer then states that the Christian life involves suffering, because the Christian life is the life of the cross. “The cross is suffering with Christ. Indeed, it is Christ-suffering. Only one who is bound to Christ as this occurs in discipleship stands in seriousness under the cross.”66 Still, those who trust in Christ follow his call that both uproots and restores. Thus, Bonhoeffer’s formation, “only the believers obey, and only the obedient believe.”67 These sections of 61 Although written after Bonhoeffer’s Nachfolge, Paragraph 37 of CD 2.2 of Barth’s Church Dogmatics connects to this claim. See CD 2.2, 552–631; KD 2.2, 612–701. 62 Cf. Bonhoeffer’s re-working of Luther’s pecca fortiter in DBWE 4: 51–53. “Grace as a principle, pecca fortiter as a principle, cheap grace – all these are finally only a new law, which neither helps nor liberates. Grace as a living word, pecca fortiter as comfort in a time of despair and a call to discipleship, costly grace alone is pure grace, which really forgives sins and liberates the sinner” (Ibid., 53). “Gnade als Prinzip, pecca fortiter als Prinzip, billige Gnade ist zuletzt nur ein neues Gesetz, das nicht hilft und nicht befreit. Gnade als lebendiges Wort, pecca fortiter als Trost in der Anfechtung und Ruf in die Nachfolge, teure Gnade ist allein reine Gnade, die wirklich Sünden vergibt und den Sünder befreit” (DBW 4: 40). 63 DBWE 4: 85; DBW 4: 78. 64 DBWE 4: 85. “So ist für Jesus die Notwendigkeit gegeben, das Muß des Leidens nun auch klar und eindeutig auf seine Jünger zu beziehen. Wie Christus nur Christus ist als er leidende und verworfene, so ist der Jünger nur Jünger als der leidende und verworfene, als der mitgekreuzigte. Die Nachfolge als die Bedingung an die Person Jesu Christi stellt den Nachfolgenden unter das Gesetz Christi, d. h. unter das Kreuz” (DBW 4: 78). 65 Ibid. “Er [Satan] will sie [die Kirche] vom Kreuz ihres Herrn losreißen” (DBW 4: 78). 66 DBWE 4: 87. “Kreuz ist mitleiden mit Christus, Christusleiden. Allein die Bindung zu Christus, wie sie in der Nachfolge geschieht, steht ernstlich unter dem Kreuz” (DBW 4: 80). 67 DBWE 4: 63. “Nur der Glaubende ist gehorsam, und nur der Gehorsame glaubt” (DBW 4: 52). Emphases in original. Here it is again possible to find connections to Luther’s Freedom of a Christian and Luther’s own possible interconnecting of justification and sanctification as argued by the present study, even though Bonhoeffer himself does not explicitly cite this text.

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Discipleship can reasonably be read as theologically in line with Luther’s Freedom of a Christian, if the latter text does indeed include the relationship of faith and love, and thus justification and sanctification, as has been argued in Chapter 3 of the present study. Ten years after Bonhoeffer’s execution in 1945, Karl Barth observed the following about Bonhoeffer’s book in relation to Barth’s own understanding of discipleship in CD 4.2: Easily the best that has been written on this subject is to be found in Discipleship, by Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1937). We do not refer to all the parts, which were obviously compiled from different sources, but to the opening sections, ‘The Call to Discipleship,’ ‘Simple Obedience’ and ‘Discipleship and the Individual.’ In these the matter is handled with such depth and precision that I am almost tempted simply to reproduce them in an extended quotation. For I cannot hope to say anything better on the subject than what is said here by a man who, having written on discipleship, was ready to achieve it in his own life, and did in his own way achieve it even to the point of death. In following my own course, I am happy that on this occasion I can lean as heavily as I do upon another.68

Barth’s approval of Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship in CD 4.2 gives evidence for the compatibility between Barth’s and Bonhoeffer’s theologies around ethics. If both Barth’s and Bonhoeffer’s understanding of ethical living can then be said to be rooted in a cruciform following of Jesus Christ rather than a “new Law,” it can be reasonably argued that Luther’s Freedom of a Christian relates theologically to these twentieth-century theologians, even though Luther’s own mystical understanding of the happy exchange is not found directly.69 Having now examined sections of Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship, and proposed an overall compatibility between Barth’s and Bonhoeffer’s theologies concerning ethics as possibly Luther writes, “A Christian person is a free Lord over all things and subject to no one. A Christian person is a subservient slave [dienstpar knecht] of all things and subject to everyone.” See WA 7, 21: 1–4, and Chapter 3 above. 68 CD 4.2, 533–34. “Mit Abstand das Beste, was dazu geschrieben ist, scheint mir in dem Buch ‘Nachfolge’ von Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1937) vorzuliegen: nicht in allen von dessen, offenbar aus verschiedenen Vorlagen zusammengesetzten Teilen, wohl aber in den gleich am Anfang erscheinenden Abschnitten: ‘Der Ruf in die Nachfolge,’ ‘Der einfältige Gehorsam,’ und ‘Die Nachfolge und der Einzelne,’ in denen die Sache so tief angefaßt und so präzis behandelt ist, daß ich wohl versucht sein könnte, sie hier einfach als großes Zitat einzurücken, weil ich wirklich nicht der Meinung bin, etwas Besseres dazu sagen zu können, als da gesagt ist: von einem Mann, der die Nachfolge, nachdem er über sie geschrieben, auch persönlich und mit der Tat bis zum Ende wahr machen wollte und in seiner Weise wahr gemacht hat. Indem ich nun doch meinem eigenen Duktus folge, bin ich froh, mich einmal so stark, wie das in diesem Fall geschrieben darf, an einen Anderen anlehnen zu dürfen” (KD 4.2, 604). 69 Bonhoeffer’s own appreciation of monasticism, particularly during his Finkenwalde period, should now be mentioned. There may, in fact, be implicit mystical themes in Life Together (Gemeinsames Leben), a text contemporaneous to Discipleship, that deserve further investigation, particularly related to the happy exchange. Cf. DBWE 5 and DBW 5. See also Chapter 5, n. 44 for the present study’s examination of Barth’s use of the word Tausch as evidence for the possibility of an implicitly mystical transformed happy exchange in Barth’s Erwählungslehre.

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related to Luther’s Freedom of a Christian, we now proceed to examine Bonhoeffer’s indebtedness to, and further development of, Barth’s theology in his critique of the “two kingdoms” doctrine in his Ethics.

4. Christological Critique of the Two Kingdoms Doctrine in Bonhoeffer’s Ethics In Bonhoeffer’s drafts of his Ethics manuscript, written during his time in prison, he proposes a Christological critique of the so-called “two kingdoms” doctrine.70 Through this Christological critique, Bonhoeffer appears to show an indebtedness to, yet development of, Karl Barth’s theology. For Bonhoeffer, the two kingdoms are to be seen through Christ; thus, the right-hand kingdom and lefthand kingdom are not separated. There is, therefore, nothing that is ultimately apart from Jesus Christ. Bonhoeffer writes: In Christ we are invited to participate in the reality of God and the reality of the world at the same time, the one not without the other. The reality of God is disclosed only as it places me completely into the reality of the world. But I find the reality of the world always already borne, accepted, and reconciled in the reality of God. That is the mystery of the revelation of God in the human being Jesus Christ. The Christian ethic asks, then, how this reality of God and of the world that is given in Christ becomes real in our world …. the question is how the reality in Christ – which has long embraced us and our world within itself – works here and now, or, in other words, how life is to be lived in it. What matters is participating in the reality of God and the world in Jesus Christ today, and doing so in such a way that I never experience the reality of God without the reality of the world, nor the reality of the world without the reality of God.71 70 While the present study argues that Bonhoeffer critiques the Lutheran dogmatic understanding of “two kingdoms,” it is important to emphasize that Luther himself was not especially systematic about the way he understood this concept. Also, contemporary Lutheran scholars have attempted to show how Luther’s two kingdoms thinking has under-explored and/or ignored themes of liberation. See James Kenneth Echols, “The Two Kingdoms: A Black American Lutheran Perspective,” in Albert Pero, ed., Theology and the Black Experience (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2009), 110–32, Guillermo C. Hansen, “Money, Religion, and Tyranny: God and the Demonic in Luther’s Antifragile Theology,” in Wanda Deifelt, ed., Market and Margins: Lutheran Perspectives (Minneapolis: Lutheran Publishing House, 2014), 31–68, William H. Lazareth, Luther, The Bible, and Social Ethics (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001), 110–40, and Vítor Westhelle, Transfiguring Luther: The Planetary Promise of Luther’s Theology (Eugene: Cascade, 2016), 262–304. A historical-systematic summary of Luther’s Two Kingdoms is found in Oswald Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation, trans. Thomas H. Trapp (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2008), 309–26. Importantly, Westhelle’s Transfiguring Luther (p. 264) notes that the description of a “two kingdoms doctrine” in relationship to Luther’s theology does not appear until 1933, one year before the Barmen Declaration, in an essay by Franz Lau. 71 DBWE 6: 55. “In Christus begegnet uns das Angebot, an der Gotteswirklichkeit und an der Weltwirklichkeit zugleich teil zu bekommen, eines nicht ohne das andere. Die Wirklichkeit Gottes erschließt sich nicht anders als indem sie mich ganz in die Weltwirklichkeit hineinstellt, die Weltwirklichkeit aber finde ich immer schon getragen, angenommen, versöhnt in der

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The reality of the world and the reality of God united in Jesus Christ shows Bonhoeffer does not think in two realms, but rather in a similar fashion to Karl Barth’s emphasis on Jesus Christ as the “one Word of God which we have to hear and which we have to trust and obey in life and in death” in Thesis 1 of the Barmen Declaration from May 1934.72 Evidence for the complementarity between Barmen Declaration Thesis 1 and Bonhoeffer’s Ethics is found again when Bonhoeffer describes the problems for interpreting reality when thinking in two realms: As long as Christ and the world are conceived as two realms [Räume] bumping against and repelling each other, we are left with only the following options. Giving up on reality as a whole, either we place ourselves in one of the two realms, wanting Christ without the world or the world without Christ – and in both cases we deceive ourselves. Or we try to stand in the two realms at the same time, thereby becoming people in eternal conflict, shaped by the post-Reformation era, who ever and again present ourselves as the only form of Christian existence that is in accord with reality.73

Wirklichkeit Gottes vor. Das ist das Geheimnis der Offenbarung Gottes in dem Menschen Jesus Christus. Die christliche Ethik fragt nun nach dem Wirklichwerden dieser Gottes-und Weltwirklichkeit, die in Christus gegeben ist, in unserer Welt …. Es wird vielmehr danach gefragt, wie die – auch uns und unsere Welt längst in sich beschlossen haltende – Wirklichkeit in Christus als jetzt gegenwärtige wirke beziehungsweise wie in ihr zu leben sei. Es geht also darum, an der Wirklichkeit Gottes und der Welt in Jesus Christus heute teilzuhaben und das so, daß ich die Wirklichkeit Gottes nie ohne die Wirklichkeit der Welt und die Wirklichkeit der Welt nie ohne die Wirklichkeit Gottes erfahre” (DBW 6: 40–41). Emphases in original. 72 “Jesus Christus, wie er uns in der Heiligen Schrift bezeugt wird, ist das eine Wort Gottes, das wir zu hören, dem wir im Leben und im Sterben zu vertrauen und zu gehorchen haben.” Die Barmer Theologische Erklärung, These 1, in Hansjörg Sick, ed., Bekenntnisschriften der Evangelischen Landeskirche in Baden, 8th ed. (Karlsruhe: Evangelischer Pressverband für Baden, 1988), 128. See also Wolf Krötke, Bonhoeffer – Barth – Barmen, 1–65. For Barth’s own commentary on the Barmen Declaration overall, and with a specific emphasis on Thesis 1, see CD 2.1, 172–78; KD 2.1, 194–200. Given Barth’s commentary on the Barmen Declaration in CD 2.1, it is reasonable to suppose the Church Dogmatics overall is a theological interpretation of Thesis 1 of the Barmen Declaration, as has been argued by Oswald Bayer. However, the argument proposed by the present study about the relationship between the Barmen Declaration and the Church Dogmatics differs from Bayer, in that the present study is not seeking to critique either Bonhoeffer or Barth from Luther’s theology, but to explore a transformation of Luther’s theologia crucis through Barth, Bonhoeffer, and Moltmann. For Bayer’s critique of the Barmen Declaration in relation to Barth’s Church Dogmatics, see Oswald Bayer, “Barths KD als Auslegung von Barmen  – im kritischen Vergleich mit Luther,” in Oswald Bayer, Theologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1994), 341–51. 73 DBWE 6: 57–58. “Solange Christus und die Welt als zwei aneinanderstoßende, und einander abstoßende Räume gedacht werden, bleiben dem Menschen nur folgende Möglichkeiten: unter dem Verzicht auf das Wirklichkeitsganze stellt er sich in einen der beiden Räume, er will Christus ohne die Welt oder die Welt ohne Christus. In beiden Fällen betrügt er sich selbst. Oder aber der Mensch will in beiden Räumen zugleich stehen und wird damit der Mensch des ewigen Konflikts, wie ihn die nachreformatorische Zeit hervorgebracht hat und wie er sich selbst immer wieder als die einzige der Wirklichkeit gemäße Gestalt christlicher Existenz ausgegeben hat” (DBW 6: 43). Italic in original.

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Bonhoeffer’s solution to the traditional position of Lutheran two kingdoms thinking is to posit Jesus Christ as the revelation of God present in all reality.74 The world has no reality of its own independent of God’s revelation in Christ. It is a denial of God’s revelation in Jesus Christ to wish to be ‘Christian’ without being ‘worldly,’ or to wish to be worldly without seeing and recognizing the world in Christ. Hence there are not two realms, but only the one realm of the Christ-reality [Christuswirklichkeit], in which the reality of God and the reality of the world are united. Because this is so, the theme of two realms, which has dominated the history of the church again and again, is foreign to the New Testament.75

Here is further evidence for Bonhoeffer to be in basic agreement with Karl Barth, in that Bonhoeffer is not positing a natural theology outside of Jesus Christ, which was a position rejected both by the Barmen Declaration, and by Barth in CD 2.1 in relation to historical circumstances of the German Christians during the Nazi era.76 Rather, Christ is the center of reality that allows for Christians to be worldly by perceiving the world in Christ, as has been shown above.77 If this reading of Bonhoeffer’s critique of the Lutheran two kingdoms can be supported from the text, it would mean his thinking in his Ethics has not radically departed from Discipleship, in terms of the relationship between faith and obedience, and thus justification and sanctification. However, there is an accent on being “worldly” in Bonhoeffer’s Ethics that was not emphasized in Discipleship. In Discipleship, the emphasis was on a cruciform following of Jesus Christ as a critique of cheap grace. Now, in Ethics, Bonhoeffer posits Christ as the center of reality, in order that the world might not be divided into sacred and secular (or a right-hand and left-hand kingdom, as was being done by many Lutherans in Bonhoeffer’s time), but that the world and Christ might be seen together. Regarding Bonhoeffer’s understanding of the relationship between God and the world, H. Gaylon Barker writes, 74 The reading proposed here argues again differently from DeJonge, who posits that Bonhoeffer maintained a Lutheran two kingdoms thinking in his Ethics, rather than proposing a Christological critique as argued by the present study. DeJonge’s arguments also implicitly critique the Barmen Declaration. See DeJonge, Bonhoeffer’s Reception of Luther, 130–41. 75 DBWE 6: 58. “Es ist eine Verleugnung der Offenbarung Gottes in Jesus Christus, ‘christlich’ sein zu wollen, ohne ‘weltlich’ zu sein, oder weltlich sein [zu] wollen, ohne die Welt in Christus zu sehen und zu erkennen. Es gibt daher nicht zwei Räume, sondern nur den einen Raum der Christuswirklichkeit, in dem Gottes-und Weltwirklichkeit miteinander vereinigt sind. So ist das Thema der zwei Räume, das die Geschichte der Kirche immer wieder beherrscht hat, dem Neuen Testament fremd” (DBW 6: 43–44). Emphasis in original. 76 Cf. CD 2.1, 179–254; KD 2.1, 200–87. Barth’s own form of “natural theology,” or at least a notion of Christ’s presence outside of direct encounter with the revealed Word in the church, is found in CD 4.3 (1), 38–165; KD 4.3 (1), 40–188. Cf. Jürgen Moltmann, “Natürliche Theologie?” in Jürgen Moltmann, Gott in der Schöpfung: Ökologische Schöpfungslehre (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1985), 70–73; 71, n. 11, and Christiane Tietz, Karl Barth: Ein Leben in Widerspruch (Munich: C. H. Beck, 2018), 388–89. 77 See again n. 75 above.

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It is such a definition of the relationship between God and the world that leads Bonhoeffer to reject what he calls ‘thinking in two realms,’ a manner of defining reality that had characterized traditional Christian thought, including the ‘pseudo-Lutheranism’s’ [sic] proclamation of the ‘autonomy of the orders of this world’…. This approach was problematic because it was able to carve out a small piece of the world reserved for God, with the result that any claim on the part of God is only partial, but never complete, ‘a provincial affair within the whole of reality.’ It assumes that there are ‘realities outside the reality of Christ,’ thereby reducing God to a ‘partial reality amid alongside others.’78

If it is accurate to argue that Bonhoeffer is proposing a Christological critique of the Lutheran two kingdoms related to Karl Barth’s Christology as represented in the Barmen Declaration, it is then further possible to see how a transformed theologia crucis through Bonhoeffer’s later theology is directly related to political discipleship. This argument is in sharp contrast with DeJonge’s view that Bonhoeffer retrieves a Lutheran understanding of the two kingdoms. DeJonge also critiques several American scholars who argue in a similar vein to what the present study is proposing, including Stanley Hauerwas, John Howard Yoder, and Reggie Williams. However, DeJonge fails to consider the influence both Luther’s theologia crucis and Karl Barth’s grounding of dogmatic-ethical questions in Christology might have had on Bonhoeffer overall.79 Further, the argument proposed here is also in contrast to Barker, who posits that Bonhoeffer still retained a Lutheran two kingdoms ethic. Barker is right to emphasize that Bonhoeffer’s critique of the “pseudo-Lutheran” two kingdoms doctrine is a logical consequence of Bonhoeffer’s understanding of the communicatio idiomatum, and that it results from Bonhoeffer’s study and retrieval of the Lutheran Formula of Concord. Like DeJonge, though, Barker arguably over accentuates the contrasts between Bonhoeffer and Barth, and does not accurately assess the Christological basis from which Bonhoeffer critiques “traditional” Lutheran dogmatic two kingdoms thinking, particularly as this critique can be found in the Barmen Declaration.80 Having now argued for continuities between the Barmen Declaration and Bonhoeffer’s Christological critique of the two kingdoms, the present study proceeds to examine Bonhoeffer’s critique of Barth in relation to a non-religious theologia crucis, and then to Bonhoeffer’s developments of Barth’s theology in his Prison letters related to the suffering of God in the world.

78

Barker, The Cross of Reality, 370–71. See DeJonge, Bonhoeffer’s Reception of Luther, 102–42. 80 See Barker, Cross of Reality, 371, n. 24. 79

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5. Bonhoeffer’s Critique of Karl Barth and a Non-Religious Theologia Crucis It is now appropriate to consider what is most frequently critiqued in Barth by Bonhoeffer scholars related to the Prison letters, wherein Bonhoeffer charges Barth with Offenbarungspositivismus (a positivism of revelation).81 Bonhoeffer’s own statements in the Letters and Papers from Prison seem to posit a sharp distancing between himself and Karl Barth. The most important critique of Barth comes from a letter Bonhoeffer wrote to Eberhard Bethge, dated June 8, 1944.82 There Bonhoeffer describes what he believes to be both the strength and weakness of Barth’s theology. He praises Barth for critiquing the various shortcomings of the liberal theologies of his day but finds Barth to be lacking in terms of a nonreligious interpretation of Christianity. Bonhoeffer writes to Bethge: Barth was the first one to recognize the error of all these attempts (which were basically all still sailing in the wake of liberal theology, without intending to do so) in that they all aim to save some room for religion in the world or over against the world. He led the God of Jesus Christ forward to battle against religion, pneuma against sarx. This remains his greatest merit (the second edition of The Epistle to the Romans, despite all the neo-Kantian eggshells!). Through his later Dogmatics he has put the church in a position to carry this distinction in principle all the way through. It was not in his ethics that he eventually failed, as is often said – his ethical observations, so far as they exist, are as important as his dogmatic ones – but in the nonreligious interpretation of theological concepts he gave no concrete guidance, either in dogmatics or ethics. Here he reaches his limit, and that is why his theology of revelation has become positivist, a ‘positivism of revelation,’ as I call it.83 81 For an examination and contestation of this critique, see D. Paul La Montagne, Barth and Rationality: Critical Realism in Theology (Eugene: Cascade, 2012), 152–66, and Robert T. Osburn, “Positivism and Promise in the Theology of Karl Barth,” Interpretation 25, no. 3 (1971): 283–302. 82 The date of this letter is important to note, as Barth’s Erwählungslehre was published in 1942. The previous chapter of the present study attempted to examine how Barth’s Erwählungslehre in 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics is concrete, rather than abstract, and is related to theology as sapientia. See Chapter 5, n. 45 above. However, there is no evidence that Bonhoeffer was able to read this volume. In a letter to Bethge from December 18–19, 1943, Bonhoeffer requested Bethge to send him an unbound copy of sections of CD 2.2 that Bonhoeffer obtained during a trip to Switzerland, but Bonhoeffer does not mention reading Barth’s Erwählungslehre while in prison, or that he had had time to read it before being arrested in April 1943. See DBWE 8: 232; DBW 8: 249. 83 DBWE 8: 428–29. “Barth erkannte als erster den Fehler aller dieser Versuche (die im Grunde alle noch im Fahrwasser der liberalen Theologie segelten, ohne es zu wollen) darin, daß sie alle darauf ausgehen, einen Raum für Religion in der Welt oder gegen die Welt auszusparen. Er führte den Gott Jesu Christi gegen die Religion ins Feld, pneuma gegen sarx. Das bleibt sein größtes Verdienst (Römerbrief 2. Auflage trotz aller neukantianischen Eierschalen!). Durch seine spätere Dogmatik hat er die Kirche instandgesetzt, diese Unterscheidung prinzipiell auf der ganzen Linie durchzuführen. Nicht in der Ethik, wie man häufig sagt, hat er dann versagt, – seine ethischen Ausführungen, soweit sie existieren, sind ebenso bedeutsam wie seine dogmatischen –, aber in der nicht-religiösen Interpretation der theologischen Begriffe hat er

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However, instead of a sharp difference between Barth and Bonhoeffer, it is possible to argue instead that Bonhoeffer is critiquing and developing Barth’s dogmatic-ethical propositions in relation to a world living without positive and/ or direct acknowledgement of God. In other words, Bonhoeffer himself is beginning to think through what Barth’s theology is suggesting, but has not, at least according to Bonhoeffer, been thought through to the end.84 This “thinking through” of Barth’s theology to the end relates to Bonhoeffer’s “nonreligious interpretation” of Christianity. Bonhoeffer sees human living in the world as if being without God. Thus, God is with human beings as the God who has forsaken them, corresponding to Christ’s death cry from the cross in Mark 15:34. And we cannot be honest unless we recognize that we have to live in the world – ‘etsi deus non daretur.’ And this is precisely what we do recognize – before God! God himself compels us to recognize it. Thus our coming of age leads us to a truer recognition of our situation before God. God would have us know that we must live as those who manage their lives without God. The same God who is with us is the God who forsakes us (Mark 15:34!). The same God who makes us to live in the world without the working hypothesis of God is the God before whom we stand continually. Before God, and with God, we live without God.85 keine konkrete Wegweisung gegeben, weder in der Dogmatik noch in der Ethik. Hier liegt seine Grenze, und darum wird seine Offenbarungstheologie positivistisch, ‘Offenbarungspositivismus,’ wie ich mich ausdrückte” (DBW 8: 480–81). 84 It should also be noted that Barth himself was perplexed by Bonhoeffer’s charge of Offenbarungspositivismus. After defining Bonhoeffer as an “impulsive and visionary thinker,” Barth describes the “enigmatic utterances” of Bonhoeffer’s Prison letters in relation to Barth’s supposed “positivism of revelation.” “But I am somewhat embarrassed by the thought that so sensible and well-meaning a man as Bonhoeffer somehow remembered my books (which he certainly did not have with him in his prison cell) in terms of this enigmatic expression. The hope remains that in heaven at least he has not reported about me to all the angels (including the church fathers, etc.) with just this expression. But perhaps I have indeed on occasion behaved and expressed myself ‘positivistically,’ and if this is so then Bonhoeffer’s recollections have brought it to light. Without being able to ask him personally, we shall have to make do with remaining behind, somewhat confused.” Karl Barth, “From a Letter of Karl Barth to Landessuperintendent P. W. Herrenbrück, 21 December 1952,” in Ronald Gregor Smith, ed., World Come of Age: A Symposium on Dietrich Bonhoeffer (London: Collins, 1967), 89–90. Italic in original. See also Christiane Tietz, “Barth und Bonhoeffer,” in Michael Beintker, ed., Barth Handbuch (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2016), 113–16. Despite Barth’s letter, Regin Prenter advanced the thesis of Barth’s Offenbarungspositivismus in Gregor Smith, ed., World Come of Age, 93–131. This line of thinking sets up a sharp distinction concerning revelation in Barth and Bonhoeffer, and has been recently argued in Josh DeKeijzer, Bonhoeffer’s Theology of the Cross, 31–71. While Bonhoeffer’s critique is likely accurate for the early volumes of the CD (as pointed out by DeKeijzer), the critique is arguably overstated if Barth, indeed, turns increasingly toward theology as sapientia beginning at least in CD 2.2, as the present study has argued. See Chapter 5, n. 45 above. 85 DBWE 8: 478–79. “Und wir können nicht Redlich sein, ohne zu erkennen, daß wir in der Welt leben müssen – ‘etsi deus non daretur’. Und eben dies erkennen wir – vor Gott! Gott selbst zwingt uns zu dieser Erkenntnis. So führt uns unser Mündigwerden zu einer wahrhaftigeren

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A nonreligious Christianity is arguably a transformed theologia crucis, because “God would have us know that we must live as those who manage without God.” God is with humankind as the God who has forsaken humankind. Here, it is implied that human beings living in the world face a godforsakenness like that of Christ on the cross. Bonhoeffer’s argument, “Before God and with God, we live without God,” then implies a hiddenness of God that corresponds to and transforms Luther’s notion of God’s hiddenness in cross and suffering from the Heidelberg Disputation. Still, it is precisely the suffering and hidden God who is helper and accompanier of humanity. God consents to be pushed out of the world and onto the cross; God is weak and powerless in the world and in precisely this way, and only so, is at our side and helps us. Matt. 8:17 makes it quite clear that Christ helps us not by virtue of his omnipotence but rather by virtue of his weakness and suffering! This is the crucial distinction between Christianity and all religions. Human religiosity directs people in need to the power of God in the world, God as deus ex machina. The Bible directs people toward the powerlessness and the suffering of God; only the suffering God can help. To this extent, one may say that the previously described development toward the world’s coming of age, which has cleared the way by eliminating a false notion of God, frees us to see the God of the Bible, who gains ground and power in the world by being powerless. This will probably be the starting point for our ‘worldly interpretation.’86

A non-religious theologia crucis is the beginning of a “worldly interpretation” for a transformed sapiential theologia crucis, wherein the “God of the Bible …. gains ground and power in the world by being powerless.”87 That God is no longer thought of as a metaphysical deus ex machina means human beings are directed “toward the powerlessness and suffering of God”88 We thus see BonErkenntnis unsere Lage vor Gott. Gott gibt uns zu wissen, daß wir leben müssen als solche, die mit dem Leben ohne Gott fertig werden. Der Gott, der mit uns ist, ist der Gott, der uns verläßt (Markus 15:34!) Der Gott, der uns in der Welt leben läßt ohne die Arbeitshypothese Gott, ist der Gott, vor dem wir dauernd stehen. Vor und mit Gott leben wir ohne Gott” (DBW 8: 533–34). 86 DBWE 8: 479–80. “Gott läßt sich aus der Welt herausdrängen ans Kreuz. Gott ist ohnmächtig und schwach in der Welt und gerade und nur so ist er bei uns und hilft uns. Es ist Matthäus 8,17 ganz deutlich, daß Christus nicht hilft kraft seiner Allmacht, sondern kraft seiner Schwachheit, seines Leidens! Hier liegt der entscheidende Unterschied zu allen Religionen. Die Religiosität des Menschen weist ihn in seiner Not an die Macht Gottes in der Welt, Gott ist der deus ex machina. Die Bibel weist den Menschen an die Ohnmacht und das Leiden Gottes; nur der leidende Gott kann helfen. Insofern kann man sagen, daß die beschriebene Entwicklung zur Mündigkeit der Welt, durch die mit einer falschen Gottesvorstellung aufgeräumt wird, den Blick frei macht für den Gott der Bibel, der durch seine Ohnmacht in der Welt Macht und Raum gewinnt. Hier wird wohl die ‘weltliche Interpretation’ einzusetzen haben” (DBW 8: 534–35). 87 Ibid. 88 See Eberhard Bethge’s description of religion in Bonhoeffer’s Letters and Papers from Prison, wherein he describes the relationship between religion and metaphysics. “Secondly, religion is metaphysics. Its transcendence provides the completion which is felt necessary for this world. God or the divine is the superstructure for being. Thus it secures the escape the religious desire wants to have. Religion inescapably leads to thinking in two realms: reality must be completed by the supranatural. It emphasizes Christianity as the religion of salvation.” Eberhard

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hoeffer is not attempting to defend Christianity’s status as a religion, nor God in relation to metaphysics indebted to Greek philosophy, but rather to show the God of the Bible is the God “pushed out of the world and onto the cross.”89 Bonhoeffer’s later theology can then be seen overall as post-metaphysical, and thus carving new territory between (metaphysical) theism and atheism, as argued by Eberhard Jüngel.90

6. Turning a Theologia Crucis Toward the Suffering of God in the World through Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s July 18, 1944 Letter to Eberhard Bethge: A Constructive Development Bonhoeffer’s understanding of God as weak and powerless and pushed out of the world onto the cross to propose an alternative to God as the metaphysical deus ex machina, is further articulated regarding what it means to be human amid the world come of age in a letter to Eberhard Bethge from July 18, 1944. In this letter, Bonhoeffer writes that humans are to share in God’s suffering in the world. This directive has traces of his understanding of Christ as Stellvertretung, regarding “sharing in God’s suffering in a worldly life,” even though Bonhoeffer does not use the word Stellvertretung in his reflections to Bethge. The human being is called upon to share in God’s suffering at the hands of a godless world. Thus we must really live in that godless world and not try to cover up or transfigure its godlessness somehow with religion. Our lives must be ‘worldly,’ so that we can share precisely so in God’s suffering; our lives are allowed to be ‘worldly,’ that is, we are delivered Bethge, “The Challenge of Bonhoeffer’s Life and Theology,” in Gregor Smith, ed., World Come of Age, 78–82; 79. Italic in original. 89 The “powerless and suffering of God” shows Bonhoeffer understands God to be passible, in distinction to the Greek metaphysical notion of God as apathetic. Thus, it can be argued Bonhoeffer’s thought is related to debates in Anglican theology about the passibility of God since 1850, represented in early twentieth-century studies by J. K. Mozley and Bertrand R. Brasnett. See J. K. Mozley, The Impassibility of God: A Survey of Christian Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1926), and Bertrand R. Brasnett, The Suffering of the Impassible God (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1928). Jürgen Moltmann responded to Mozley’s study on divine impassibility (particularly Mozley’s “six necessary questions”), and ultimately argued for God’s passibility in the vein of Bonhoeffer. Moltmann concluded with two questions of his own: “If God is immutable and cannot be moved, why do we pray? If God is impassible, how can God feel compassion and show mercy?” Jürgen Moltmann, “The Passibility or Impassibility of God: Answers to J. K. Mozley’s “Six Necessary Questions,” in Jürgen Moltmann, The Spirit of Hope: Theology for a World in Peril, trans. Margaret Kohl and Brian McNeil (Philadelphia: Westminster John Knox 2019), 159–71; 171. For Moltmann’s understanding of the Triune God’s divine pathos in his books The Crucified God and Trinity and the Kingdom, see Chapter 7 below. 90 See Eberhard Jüngel, Gott als Geheimnis der Welt, 10th ed. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010), 74–83. This observation, however, need not imply that all metaphysical reflection is antithetical to dogmatic theology. Cf. Pannenberg, Systematische Theologie Gesamtausgabe, Band 1, 73–83.

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from false religious obligations and inhibitions. Being a Christian does not mean being religious in a certain way, making oneself into something or other (a sinner, penitent, or saint) according to some method or other. Instead it means being human, not a certain type of human being, but the human being Christ creates in us. It is not a religious act that makes someone a Christian, but rather sharing in God’s suffering in the worldly life.91

Bonhoeffer’s notion of “worldly” (weltlich) here is in continuity with the excerpts from his Ethics quoted above, and again in contrast with his emphasis on cruciform obedience to Christ as the critique of cheap grace in Discipleship.92 Noteworthy in the present text is Bonhoeffer’s observation that being a Christian means being “the human being Christ creates in us.” And one is a human being “not by a religious act,” but by “sharing in God’s suffering in the worldly life.” Here, then, it can be argued that the concept of Stellvertretung stands behind Bonhoeffer’s comments about being a human being and sharing in the suffering of God in the world.93 Said sharing in God’s suffering is Bonhoeffer’s understanding of metanoia in this letter, meaning “not thinking first of one’s own needs, questions, sins, and fears but allowing oneself to be pulled into walking the path Jesus walks, into the messianic event, in which Isa. 53 is now being fulfilled!”94 Bonhoeffer now

91 DBWE 8: 480. “Der Mensch wird aufgerufen, das Leiden Gottes an der gottlosen Welt mitzuleiden. Er muß also wirklich in der gottlosen Welt leben und darf nicht den Versuch machen, ihre Gottlosigkeit irgendwie religiös zu verdecken, zu verklären; er muß ‘weltlich’ leben und nimmt eben darin an den Leiden Gottes teil; er darf ‘weltlich’ leben, d. h. er ist befreit von den falschen religiösen Bindungen und Hemmungen. Christsein heißt nicht in einer bestimmten Weise religiös sein, auf Grund irgendeiner Methodik etwas aus sich machen (einen Sünder, Büßer oder einen Heiligen), sondern es heißt Menschsein, nicht einen Menschtypus, sondern den Menschen schafft Christus in uns. Nicht der religiöse Akt macht den Christen, sondern das Teilnehmen am Leiden Gottes im weltlichen Leben” (DBW 8: 535). 92 Here it is helpful to consider Bethge’s argument for stages in Bonhoeffer’s development, and particularly for a change in Bonhoeffer’s thinking from Discipleship to Ethics and Letters and Papers from Prison. It also then needs to be stated again that while the shift is apparent, particularly around the notion of being “worldly,” there is a consistency in Bonhoeffer’s thinking, which the present study has argued is to be found in Bonhoeffer’s understanding of Stellvertretung. Related to the third and final period of Bonhoeffer’s thinking, which Bethge defines as “Liberation,” Bethge argues the following about Bonhoeffer’s Christology: “Bonhoeffer wants to re-check the doctrinal shape of the churches in order to prove that Christ is precisely not all that religion says he is. He is the man for others against individualistic inwardness. He is lonely and forsaken without transcendent escape. He worships not in provinciality but in the midst of real life. He, though longing for him, does not experience the deus ex machina. Thus the time for religion might be gone, but not the time for Jesus, or if you like, for the theologia crucis.” Eberhard Bethge, “The Challenge of Bonhoeffer’s Life and Theology,” in Gregor Smith, ed., World Come of Age, 22–89; 80–81. 93 Sharing in the suffering of God in the world also relates to Bonhoeffer’s description of Jesus as the “human being for others” (der Mensch für andere) as the “Crucified One” (der Gekreuzigte). See the notes for Chapter 2, Section B of Bonhoeffer’s “Outline for a Book,” in DBWE 8: 501; DBW 8: 559. 94 DBWE 8: 480. Das ist die ‘metanoia’, nicht zuerst an die eigenen Nöte, Fragen, Sünden,

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understands discipleship as Christians being called to share in God’s suffering in a world come of age. Therefore, Christians are called to be in the world as the human beings Christ has created them to be, and to follow Christ by sharing in the suffering of God in the world.95 Bonhoeffer then explains how the New Testament understands human beings being “pulled along [Hineingerissenwerden] into the – messianic – suffering,”96 through referencing several stories from the synoptic gospels, including Christ’s calling of the disciples, Christ’s eating with sinners (Matt. 9:11), the conversion of Zacchaeus (Luke 19:1–8), the sinful woman’s anointing of Jesus with her tears and with oil (Luke 7:37–38; 44–46),97 the healing of the sick according to Matt. 8:17,98 and Christ’s inviting children to come to him (Mark 10:14–16; Matt. 19:14). Bonhoeffer then notes how the shepherds (Luke 2: 15–16) and wise men (Matt. 2:1–12) from the East stand at the manger of Christ “just as they are,” and not as “converted sinners.”99 This observation is related to the centurion at Capernaum who Jesus says is an example of faith, even without the centurion’s confession of sin (Matt. 8:5–13; Luke 7:1–10).100 Bonhoeffer concludes his examples from the New Testament with Jesus’s loving of the rich young man (Mark 10:21), the Ethiopian Eunuch (Acts 8: 26–40), the story of Cornelius (Acts 10), Nathaniel (John 1:47),101 Joseph of Arimathea (Mark 15:42–46; Matt. 27:57–60; Luke 23:50–53; John 19:38), and the women keeping the Shabbat at the tomb of Jesus (Matt. 27:61; Mark 15:47; 16:1; Luke 23:55–56).102 For Bonhoeffer, the common-

Ängste denken, sondern sich in den Weg Jesu mithineinreißen lassen, in das messianische Ereignis, daß Jes 53 nun erfüllt wird!” (DBW 8: 535–36).  95 See again n. 91 above.  96 DBWE 8: 481; DBW 8: 536.  97 Bonhoeffer observes here that the woman did not confess her sins to Jesus.  98 This example can be read in relation to the happy exchange, due to the quotation from Isaiah wherein Matthew interprets Christ as taking on human infirmities and bearing human diseases.  99 DBWE 8: 481; DBW 8: 536–37. 100 Bonhoeffer then gives a cursory reference to Jairus (Matt. 9:18–19, 23–26; Mark 5:22–24, 35–43; Luke 8:41–42, 49–56). Presumably Jairus is included due to his coming to Jesus in suffering from his daughter’s death, whom Jesus then revives. The Markan account of this story emphasizes how Jairus “begged [Jesus] repeatedly” (Mk. 5:23) to heal his dying daughter, and the Lukan account says Jairus “begged him to come to his house” to heal his daughter who was dying (Luke 8:41–42). The Matthean account lacks any expression of Jairus’s grief at his daughter’s plight (who has already died in this telling) and says Jairus “came in and knelt before [Jesus]” (Matt. 9:18). This latter account appears to emphasize Jairus’s confidence that his daughter will live because of Jesus. “My daughter has just died; but come and lay your hand on her, and she will live” (Ibid.). Given the emphasis on suffering in this letter, it is more likely Bonhoeffer had either the Markan or the Lukan account of the Jairus story in mind, rather than the Matthean. See DBWE 8: 481; DBW 8: 537. 101 The reference to Nathaniel is the only example Bonhoeffer gives here that is found exclusively in the Gospel of John. 102 The Scripture passages cited in this paragraph are taken from the notes in DBWE 8:

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ality of these stories is that all the people contained therein share in the suffering of God in Christ. “That is their ‘faith.’ There is nothing about a religious method; the ‘religious act’ is always something partial, whereas ‘faith’ is something whole and involves one’s whole life.”103 Bonhoeffer gives lengthy examples to Bethge from the Bible, stressing that Jesus calls human beings to life rather than a new religion. Nonreligious speech about God for a world come of age is then presumably how Bonhoeffer understands Jesus’s call to life. Therefore, Bonhoeffer is not thinking in terms of religion, but of being human in Jesus Christ in the world, and participating in God’s suffering in the world. Jesus calls not to a new religion but to life. But what is this life like? this life of participating in God’s powerlessness in the world? I’ll write about this next time, I hope. For today I’ll just say this: if one wants to speak of God ‘nonreligiously,’ then one must speak in such a way that the godlessness of the world is not covered up in any way, but rather precisely to uncover it and surprise the world by letting light shine on it. The world come of age is more god-less and perhaps just because of that closer to God than the world not yet come of age.104

Here is a paradox that contains traces of a transformed theologia crucis: In being godless (in the sense of the lack of a metaphysical God as the deus ex machina), the world come of age is close to God. This paradox relates to, and can be read as an expansion of, Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation, wherein God is mystically revealed a posteriori as hidden in suffering and the cross.105 The fragmentary nature of Bonhoeffer’s arguments becomes clear in his closing of this letter: “Forgive me, this is all still put terribly clumsily and badly; I’m very aware of this. But perhaps you are just the one to help me again to clarify and simplify it, if only by my being able to tell you about it, and to hear you, as it

481–82, and were not directly supplied by Bonhoeffer himself, except for Luke 7, Matt. 8:17, Acts 8, Acts 10, and John 1:47. 103 DBWE 8: 482. “Das einzige, ihnen allen Gemeinsame, ist das Teilhaben am Leiden Gottes in Christus. Das ist ihr ‘Glaube’. Nichts von religiöser Methodik, der ‘religiöse Akt’ ist immer etwas Partielles, der ‘Glaube’ ist etwas Ganzes, ein Lebensakt” (DBW 8: 537). 104 Ibid. “Jesus ruft nicht zu einer neuen Religion auf, sondern zum Leben. Wie sieht nun aber dieses Leben aus? dieses Leben der Teilnahme an der Ohnmacht Gottes in der Welt? Davon schreibe ich das nächste Mal, hoffentlich. Heute nur noch dies: Wenn man von Gott ‘nichtreligiös’ sprechen will, dann muß man so von ihm sprechen, daß die Gottlosigkeit der Welt dadurch nicht irgendwie verdeckt, sondern vielmehr gerade aufgedeckt wird und gerade so ein überraschendes Licht auf die Welt fällt. Die mündige Welt ist Gott-loser und darum vielleicht gerade Gott-näher als die unmündige Welt” (DBW 8: 537). 105 See Chapter 1 above, especially for the argument that a theologia crucis in Luther’s own sense should be thought of as a mystical theology of revelation a posteriori, and not as a “theology of revelation” in the sense of twentieth-century dialectical theology. It is also important to emphasize that Bonhoeffer, like Karl Barth, is not positing a hiddenness of God behind the cross as Luther does in De servo arbitrio. See Chapter 4 of the present study.

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were, keep asking and answering me!”106 Nevertheless, Bonhoeffer’s insistence on Christians being called to “share in God’s sufferings at the hands of a godless world” shows he understands God as capable of suffering, as demonstrated in the crucified Christ. Bonhoeffer’s arguments for a non-religious Christianity thus transform Luther’s theologia crucis where God’s suffering was implied, but not explicit, as well as critique and develop Barth’s theology, which according to Bonhoeffer had not been thought through to the end regarding a non-religious interpretation of Christianity.107 Further, Christians suffering with God in the world can be understood as connecting back to Bonhoeffer’s notion of Stellvertretung, as this concept (and transformation of the happy exchange that can be found therein) has been argued for throughout the present chapter. Thus, Bonhoeffer’s later theology shows how a transformed theologia crucis now begins to move toward the victims of sin. Having explored a constructive development of a transformed theologia crucis toward the suffering of God in the world for the victims of sin in Bonhoeffer’s July 18, 1944 letter to Bethge, we now turn to the final section of the present chapter – a comparison of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth.

7. Comparing Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth When examining Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s theology in his later pastoral-ethical texts for traces of a theologia crucis, it is helpful to compare Bonhoeffer’s and Karl Barth’s theologies, as the two theologians are often thought to be in sharp distinction from one another given Bonhoeffer’s critiques of Barth in the Letters and Papers from Prison. The position argued for in the present study is that Bonhoeffer is compatible overall with Karl Barth in the later texts examined here, yet he critiques and develops Barth’s theology to the next level, that of a nonreligious interpretation of Christianity, specifically related to a non-religious theologia crucis and the suffering of God in the world.108 This position has been 106 DBWE 8: 482. “Verzeih, es ist alles noch furchtbar schwerfällig und schlecht gesagt, ich spüre das deutlich. Aber vielleicht hilfst gerade Du mir wieder zur Klärung und Vereinfachung und sei es nur dadurch, daß ich zu Dir darüber sprechen kann und Dich gleichsam immer fragen und antworten höre!” (DBW 8: 537). 107 See above, n. 83. 108 Another connection between Barth and Bonhoeffer is found in both theologians’ reception of Christoph Blumhardt. Jürgen Moltmann is one of the few theologians to recognize Blumhardt’s influence on Bonhoeffer. See Jürgen Moltmann, Sein Name ist Gerechtigkeit: Neue Beiträge zur christlichen Gotteslehre (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 2008), 76–79, and Jürgen Moltmann, Hoffen und Denken: Beiträge zur Zukunft der Theologie (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Theologie, 2016), 195–227. For Barth’s own understanding and appreciation of Christoph Blumhardt, see Karl Barth, “Vergangenheit und Zukunft: Friedrich Naumann und Christoph Blumhardt,” in Jürgen Moltmann, ed., Anfänge der dialektischen Theologie, Teil 1: Karl Barth, Heinrich Barth, Emil Brunner (Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1961), 37–49, and Karl Barth, Die Protes-

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criticized by H. Gaylon Barker. Barker’s analysis notes Bonhoeffer’s admission that he did not want to be considered to be a Barthian, and Barker therefore critiques scholars who seek to emphasize similarities between Bonhoeffer and Barth at the expense of issues Barker sees as distinctly dividing the two theologians.109 Barker writes, “While he was quick to recognize the strength of Barth’s position over against that of liberal theologians, he did not hesitate to criticize Barth at those points where he detected Barth’s weaknesses.”110 It is precisely because of the theological differences between Bonhoeffer and Barth that the present study posits Bonhoeffer’s later theology is a critique and development of Barth’s pre-Erwählungslehre theology, but that there are not sharp overall differences between the two theologians. Evidence for this argument is found in Bonhoeffer’s notion of the “world come of age” in relation to Jesus Christ. In seeking to confess Jesus Christ for “a world come of age,” Bonhoeffer is arguably positing a theologia crucis without Christian religion (etsi deus non daretur). However, the seeds of this proposal were already present in Barth’s second edition of his Romans commentary (as seen in Bonhoeffer’s initial praising of Barth’s theological strengths) and in Volume 1.2, Paragraph 17 of the Church Dogmatics, which Bonhoeffer would have known of at the time of writing this letter.111 The difference is Bonhoeffer is trying to move beyond traditional religious language and concepts to describe the Christ event. If this is the case, then, rather than seeing Barth and Bonhoeffer in sharp distinction (as scholars such as DeKeijzer, DeJonge, and Godsey do), one can see Bonhoeffer’s later pastoral-ethical texts as a critique and development of Barth’s positions in the second edition of the Romans commentary and 1.2 of the Church Dogmatics, yet without constricting Bonhoeffer’s theology to the category of “Barthian.”112 tantische Theologie im 19. Jahrhundert: Ihr Vorgeschichte und ihre Geschichte (Zollikon-Zürich: Evangelischer Verlag, 1952), 588–98. See Chapter 4, n. 57 above for the connections to Blumhardt in Barth’s first Romans commentary of 1919, and the argument for this commentary’s influence on Moltmann’s Theology of Hope. 109 See Barker, The Cross of Reality, 6. 110 Ibid., 10. Barker also notes Bonhoeffer’s desire to distance himself from his liberal Berlin teachers. See n. 13 above. 111 CD. 1.2, 280–362; KD 1.2, 304–97. 112 Thus, the present study is attempting to carefully consider Barker’s analysis around Bonhoeffer’s indebtedness to and critique of Karl Holl and the “Luther Renaissance,” and Karl Barth. Barker’s research is important overall for understanding the historical context of Bonhoeffer’s reading of Luther, which the present study has not examined directly, concentrating instead on the historical-cultural arguments presented by Reggie L. Williams for the black church’s role in shaping Bonhoeffer’s concrete embodiment of Stellvertretung in his later theology, as this argument was under emphasized, if not overlooked entirely, in DeJonge’s study of Bonhoeffer’s reception of Luther and it is directly pertinent to reading James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis. See again n. 13 above. However, the decision not to concentrate explicitly on Bonhoeffer’s relationship to the Luther Renaissance may, in fact, be an overall limitation in the present study’s reading of Bonhoeffer, particularly in light of Bethge’s observation about Bonhoeffer’s reception of Karl Barth, which might be in

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This proposal is admittedly not commonly argued113, as demonstrated by John Godsey’s assertion: “Barth’s theology tends toward a theologia gloriae in order to ensure the graciousness of God’s action in Christ. In contrast, Bonhoeffer’s theology is a theologia crucis in order to ensure the costliness of God’s grace in Christ.”114 Charging Barth with a theologia gloriae in Luther’s sense from the Heidelberg Disputation is arguably inaccurate to Barth’s project in the Church Dogmatics. As was proposed in the last chapter, Barth’s Erwählungslehre can be fruitfully read as a transformed sapiential theologia crucis, although it is unknown if Bonhoeffer was able to read CD 2.2.115 If Barth’s theology is interpreted as a transformed sapiential theologia crucis from his Erwählungslehre in CD 2.2, it is then possible to argue both Barth and Bonhoeffer are theologians of the cross and transform Luther, even though the later Bonhoeffer critiques and develops Barth’s pre-Erwählungslehre theology to the next level, particularly in his Letters and Papers from Prison in relation to a nonreligious theologia crucis.116 A final compatibiltension with Barker’s analysis: “But there is no doubt that as far as this independent and creative mind opened itself to contemporary influence, Bonhoeffer sided with none more readily than with Karl Barth.” Bethge, “Bonhoeffer’s Life and Theology,” in Gregor Smith, ed., World Come of Age, 31–32. Thus, there is arguably further research on Bonhoeffer’s later theology needed, wherein Bonhoeffer’s historical relatedness to the Luther Renaissance, the influence of the black Abyssinian Baptist church in Harlem on Bonhoeffer’s concept of Stellvertretung in his Ethics, and his reception of Karl Barth are all taken into consideration, which the present study has not conducted due to space limitations. 113 An exception is found in Rosaline Bradbury’s exploration of Barth’s theologia crucis. Bradbury takes seriously Barth’s dictum in CD 1.1 that dogmatic theology should only be done as a theologia crucis and argues in the conclusion of her book: “Barth locates the truth of God and true creaturely glory where these may reasonably be found. That is, not in ancient analogy drawn from the creature to God, not in the self-sanctification forwarded by the western ordo salutis, and certainly not in the anthropocentric spirit of the age. Rather divine truth and true human glory are available in the man-God Jesus Christ, and him crucified. He is the noetic and ontic Word from the cross, and the Content of the Word so proclaimed. Thence the opening to Barth’s mature theology already noted: dogmatics, the formal explication of Christian faith, is only possible as a theologia crucis.” Rosalene Bradbury, Cross Theology: The Classical Theologia Crucis and Karl Barth’s Modern Theology of the Cross (Eugene: Pickwick, 2011), 296. 114 John D. Godsey, “Barth and Bonhoeffer: The Basic Difference,” Quarterly Review 7, no. 1 (1987): 9. 115 See Chapter 5 of the present study, and CD 1.1, 14; KD 1.1, 13. 116 Regarding a non-religious theologia crucis in Bonhoeffer’s Letters and Papers from Prison, Jüngel writes, “Wir sagten, Bonhoeffer fordere, Gott nicht ohne die Welt zu denken, die ihrerseits ohne Gott zu denken ist. Und wir nannten das eine scheinbar zutiefst paradoxe Forderung. Jetzt löst sich das Paradox, insofern ‘Gott nicht ohne die Welt denken’ bedeutet: Gott als den sich aus der Welt herausdrängen Lassenden und gerade so sich auf die Welt Beziehenden denken. Sich-herausdrängen-Lassen, Abschied, Weggehen ist etwas anders als Beziehungslosigkeit. Es kann vielmehr intensivste Beziehung bedeuten. Die mit dem Weggang gesetzte Beziehung muß auch nicht notwendig negativ worden. Sie kann vielmehr sogar eine Steigerung implizieren. So ermöglicht z. B. der Weggang des johanneischen Christus in gewisser Weise erst den rechten Zugang zu ihm …. Bonhoeffer hat mit seinen fragmentarischen Gedanken nicht weniger geleistet, als daß er die ‘etsi deus non daretur’ existierende Welt coram deo zu denken lehrte,

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ity with Barth’s theology is then found when Bonhoeffer’s notion of Stellvertretung is understood, in the words of Reggie Williams, as an “ethical mandate for followers of Jesus,” corresponding to Paragraphs 36–39 of 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics, wherein Barth argues for the inter-connectedness between dogmatics and ethics.117 This ethical mandate also corresponds to the connection between faith and neighbor love (justification and sanctification) in Luther’s Freedom of a Christian as argued in Chapter 3 of this study.118 There are two specific differences between Barth and Bonhoeffer that need to be addressed in relation to the present study. First, Barth’s Johannine Christology in the Church Dogmatics is in distinction to Bonhoeffer’s own seeming preference for Paul and the Synoptic Gospels in the later texts examined here, with the themes of Christ as the crucified, humiliated One, and the stress of following after Jesus Christ. Thus, while Christology is the center of Bonhoeffer’s theology, and while he emphasizes God’s revelation in Jesus Christ, as well as Christ as “life” and “our life” (with commonalities to Barth’s Johannine Christology), Bonhoeffer seems to accord better with what Wolfhart Pannenberg describes as a “Christology from below” rather than Barth’s own “Christology from above” in the Church Dogmatics.119 Second, Karl Barth did not seek to understand the Christ event in explicitly non-religious terms. While God’s revelation through the outpouring of the Holy Spirit is the critique of religion in Paragraph 17 of CD 1.2, God’s grace in Jesus Christ in the outpouring of the Holy Spirit and the existence of the church and the children of God are still evidences for a “true religion” bearing witness to the name of Jesus Christ.120 In contrast, Bonhoeffer is seeking to describe the Christ event in relation to the world etsi deus non daretur.

indem er den in Christo crucifixo existierenden Gott als den deus coram mundo zu begreifen lehrte. Gott existiert coram mundo, indem er am Kreuz die Welt als die ihn nicht ertragende erträgt. Das ist das Evangelium, das der Welt im Horizont des Gesetzes ihrer Wirklichkeit zu existieren erlaubt, ‘etsi deus non daretur.’” Jüngel, Gott als Geheimnis der Welt, 80–81. Emphases in original. 117 See CD 2.2, 509; KD 2.2, 564, and Williams, Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus, 9–10. 118 The present study’s use of Reggie Williams’s phrase “ethical mandate” for Bonhoeffer’s understanding of Stellvertretung is not meant to imply a Lutheran dogmatic “third use” of the Law, but rather to take seriously Barth’s preferred sequence of Gospel-Law, seen in his Evangelium und Gesetz essay, and Luther’s notion of neighbor love in Freedom of a Christian, from the standpoint of a Pauline eschatologia crucis indebted to Jürgen Moltmann. See n. 49 of the present chapter, “God’s Second Form of Hiddenness and the Eschatological lumen gloriae: A Constructive Development” (pp. 94–98 in Chapter 4), and “‘Ich lehre sie nicht, aber auch nicht nicht’: Barth’s Erwählungslehre and the Question of Universal Salvation through Jesus Christ: A Constructive Development” (pp. 127–30 in Chapter 5) above, and Chapter 7 below. 119 See Wolfhart Pannenberg, Grundzüge der Christologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1976), 26–44. 120 See CD 1.2, 344–61; KD 1.2, 377–97.

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8. Conclusion Bonhoeffer’s later pastoral-ethical texts show how a theologia crucis is expanded for concrete, cruciform discipleship in the world, particularly in relation to Bonhoeffer’s notion of Stellvertretung, argued here as a transformation of Luther’s happy exchange. This chapter began by engaging Reggie Williams’s Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus, which argues Bonhoeffer saw Christ as Stellvertretung embodied in Harlem, and that his experiences with the African American Christians at the black Abyssinian Baptist church radicalized his theologia crucis. As this point was under-emphasized, if not overlooked entirely, in DeJonge’s work on Bonhoeffer’s reception of Luther, it was important to explore it here when reading Bonhoeffer’s later theology as a transformed theologia crucis on the way to James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis. Further, Bonhoeffer’s understanding of Stellvertretung shows an overall interconnectedness of ethical and political matters for Bonhoeffer’s theology, which, at least implicitly, addresses some of the limitations in a theologia crucis as found in Martin Luther’s early pastoral theology. The chapter then turned to Bonhoeffer’s Christology lectures, to explore Christ’s concrete presence in the church-community and in human history. Next, the study explored the ethical implications of Stellvertretung as a transformed happy exchange through Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship. Continuing with an ethical-political transformed theologia crucis, the study examined Bonhoeffer’s Christological critique of the Lutheran two kingdoms doctrine in his Ethics. Here, a connection between said Christological critique and the Barmen Declaration was found. Given the connection between Bonhoeffer’s Ethics and the Barmen Declaration, the present study explored Bonhoeffer’s critique of Barth in the Letters and Papers from Prison, in relation to a transformed non-religious theologia crucis. The study argued that Bonhoeffer critiques and develops Barth’s theology, but that the two theologians are not ultimately in sharp distinction with one another. Thus, the present study understands their relationship differently than Godsey, DeKeijzer, and DeJonge. Then, the study turned to a constructive development of a transformed non-religious theologia crucis in relation to the suffering of God in the world through Bonhoeffer’s July 18, 1944 letter to Eberhard Bethge, in order to explore how Jesus calls human beings to life, rather than a new religion, through nonreligious speech about God. A world come of age seemingly without God is paradoxically closer to God as revealed a posteriori in hiddenness through a transformed non-religious theologia crucis. Finally, the study ended with a comparison of Bonhoeffer’s and Barth’s respective theologies of the cross, in light of Bonhoeffer’s critiques of Barth in the Prison letters. The study argued both Barth and Bonhoeffer can be considered theologians of the cross, with

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Barth’s Erwählungslehre corresponding to a Christology from above, and Bonhoeffer’s later theology corresponding to a Christology from below. Overall, then, Bonhoeffer’s notion of Jesus Christ as Stellvertretung seen as a transformed happy exchange shows how a sapiential theologia crucis moves to the suffering world. The happy exchange is thus reframed through Bonhoeffer’s theology from Luther’s focus on the individual guilty sinner (although this accent is still present) to Christ’s “standing in” for humanity, wherein humanity is called to follow Christ and “stand in” for one another. Bonhoeffer’s later theology therefore serves as an impetus for turning a theologia crucis toward the victims of sin. Having explored a transformed theologia crucis in Bonhoeffer’s later pastoralethical texts through Stellvertretung, we turn next the theology of Jürgen Moltmann to read Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis centered in The Crucified God in relation to victims and perpetrators of systemic sin and injustice.

Chapter 7

Jürgen Moltmann’s Trinitarian Eschatologia Crucis In his book The Crucified God, Jürgen Moltmann (b. 1926) describes the cross of Christ as the very “foundation and criticism” of Christian theology.1 His eschatological framing of a Trinitarian theologia crucis addresses social-political suffering in the contemporary world and the question of what it means to be the church under the cross of the risen Christ today.2 Moltmann views Jesus as 1 Jürgen Moltmann, The Crucified God: The Cross of Christ as the Foundation and Criticism of Christian Theology, 1st ed., trans. A. Wilson and John Bowden (New York: Harper & Row, 1974), 3; Jürgen Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott: Das Kreuz Christi als Grund und Kritik christlicher Theologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1972), 3. 2 As with Karl Barth, Jürgen Moltmann can be interpreted as a Trinitarian theologian of the cross. This interpretation is justifiable when considered in relation to Moltmann’s Crucified God. This text shows Moltmann’s transformation of Luther’s theologia crucis through the explicit connection of Christ’s death on the cross to the Trinity and radicalizes Karl Barth’s Erwälungslehre from 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics. Moltmann argues CD 2.2 is Barth’s theologia crucis and that Barth developed his theologia crucis further in CD 4.1–4.4. However, Moltmann finds Barth to speak too theologically about God in relation to a theologia crucis, and not enough about the Trinitarian relationality of God. (CG, 204; GG, 188). Moltmann thus emphasizes the Trinitarian relationality of God centering in the cross of Jesus, rather than beginning with the unity of God in three Seinsweisen as Karl Barth does in 1.1 of the Church Dogmatics (CG, 207; GG, 192). Moltmann’s Trinitarian theologia crucis in The Crucified God is developed further through his interpretation and radicalization of the doctrine of perichoresis in Jürgen Moltmann, Trinity and the Kingdom: The Doctrine of God, trans. Margaret S. Kohl (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993), 25–30; Jürgen Moltmann, Trinität und Reich Gottes: Zur Gotteslehre (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1980), 40–45. Because Moltmann understands Golgotha to be an event affecting the entire Trinity, he argues for death in God, rather than the death of God (CG 207; GG, 192). This death in God is neither theopaschism nor patripasssionism, but what Moltmann calls “patricompassionism” (CG, 243; GG, 230, and n. 20 below). The Triune God, then, is a God of love who through the Holy Spirit “justifies the godless, fills the forsaken with love, and even brings the dead alive,” because of the cross event. “In the cross, Father and Son are most deeply separated in forsakenness and at the same time are most inwardly one in their surrender. What proceeds from this event between Father and Son is the Spirit which justifies the godless, fills the forsaken with love and even brings the dead alive, since even the fact that they are dead cannot exclude them from this event of the cross; the death in God includes them” (CG, 244). “Im Kreuz sind Vater und Sohn in der Verlassenheit aufs tiefste getrennt und zugleich in der Hingabe aufs innigste eins. Was aus diesem Geschehen zwischen Vater und Sohn hervorgeht, ist der Geist, der Gottlose rechtfertigt, Verlassene mit Liebe erfüllt und selbst die Toten lebendig machen wird, da auch ihr Trostsein sie nicht von jenem Geschehen des Kreuzes ausschließen kann, sondern der Tod in Gott auch sie einschließt“ (GG, 231). Moltmann is also concerned with the political relevance of a Trinitarian theologia crucis beyond the dispute between theism and atheism, in which God is “the event

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the divine Brother in human suffering and the divine Liberator who leads all who suffer to new life in the Triune God’s eschatological future. Moltmann’s The Crucified God thus radicalizes Martin Luther’s stress on consolation for the terrified conscience amid personal sin and anxiety over one’s election in Christ, as well as the transformed happy exchange the present study found in Barth’s Erwählungslehre, to argue for the crucified Christ’s solidarity in contemporary suffering and catastrophes. Moltmann’s concern with Christ’s solidarity amid suffering and catastrophes also shows how his Crucified God develops Bonhoeffer’s later theology. Therefore, the present reading of Moltmann’s theology centers in themes from The Crucified God, and explores excerpts from his Theology of Hope, his later Systematic Contributions to Theology, his 2006 autobiography, and select recent theological essays for traces of a radicalized sapiential theologia crucis throughout his theology as related to a Trinitarian eschatology of hope. As with the previous chapter on Dietrich Bonhoeffer, we will then compare the theologies of Jürgen Moltmann and Karl Barth at the end of this chapter. Overall, this chapter explores Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis as a transformation of Luther’s stress on justification for guilty sinners into solidarity with innocent victims and the putting to right of perpetrators in light of God’s Trinitarian future.3

of suffering, liberating love” (CG, 252; GG, 239). This politicized Trinitarian theologia crucis is explicitly a theology after Auschwitz, in which Auschwitz is taken up into the Triune God (CG, 278; GG, 266–67), and arguably a radicalization of the transformed happy change the present study found in CD 2.2 (see Chapter 5, pp. 116–22 above). Finally, Moltmann’s stress on the trinitarian relationality of the Godhead, in contrast to Barth’s emphasis on the unity of God, is to show how the cross is at the center of the Trinity, and how the Triune God can be thought of as “love” because of the Golgotha event, so that humankind might live in flourishing life (CG, 274–78; GG, 263–67). These emphases should be kept in mind throughout the present reading of Moltmann’s theology. 3 This transformation is important for James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, since Cone references Moltmann’s Crucified God as a stimulus to black theologians’ theological imagination in an essay written later in Cone’s career. See James H. Cone, “An African American Perspective on the Cross and Suffering,” in Yacob Tesfai, ed., The Scandal of a Crucified World: Perspectives on the Cross and Suffering (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1994), 48–60; 58, and the section “James Cone’s Hermeneutics as a Transfiguration of Martin Luther,” pp. 236–44 in Chapter 8 below. For the present chapter, then, an exhaustive exploration of Moltmann’s writings is by no means attempted, but rather a representative sampling of texts from throughout his theological corpus for the purpose of exploring his Trinitarian eschatologia crucis centering in a radicalized theologia crucis found in The Crucified God. The English translations have been modified slightly where necessary for gender inclusive language. Critiques and challenges to Moltmann’s thinking are considered in the footnotes, as well as similarities and differences to Luther, Barth, and Bonhoeffer.

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1. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in Moltmann’s Autobiography In understanding Moltmann’s The Crucified God, it can be helpful to briefly explore how Moltmann describes his theology as a direct result of the experiences he endured as a member of the German army and then as a prisoner of war during the Second World War.4 He recounts these experiences and the way they shaped his subsequent theology in his autobiography, A Broad Place (German: Weiter Raum) published in 2006 in celebration of his eightieth birthday. Moltmann tells how he was a secular humanist prior to the war, and his time in the German army and as a prisoner of war ignited a deep seeking for God that would ultimately lead to him to become a systematic theologian. The experience during the Second World War that affected Moltmann the most was the death of 4 Moltmann states openly in several places that his personal narrative shapes his theological questions, beginning at least in The Crucified God (see n. 11 below). Collin Miller Smith offers a brief account of Moltmann’s autobiography in relation to a theologia crucis found in his Crucified God. See Collin Miller Smith, “Cult Books Revisited: Jürgen Moltmann’s The Crucified God,” Theology Today 121, no. 5 (2018): 357–63; 357–58. Smith writes, “Moltmann is distinct among German academic theologians in that he purposefully and publicly allows his biographical experience to shape his theology. Thus, it is necessary to draw a brief biological sketch of Moltmann in order to develop a proper contextual understanding of his work” (357). This approach of exploring how Moltmann’s personal narrative shapes his theology has also been examined recently in Carolyn E. Tan’s work Spirit at the Cross: Exploring a Cruciform Pneumatology. However, Tan did not specifically explore Moltmann’s theologia crucis as a radicalization of a theme beginning in texts from the early Martin Luther, and instead focused primarily on pneumatology. See Carolyn E. L. Tan, The Spirit at the Cross: Exploring a Cruciform Pneumatology (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2019), 58–61. Showing the connection between Moltmann’s theologia crucis and his personal narrative might also help demonstrate how his theological reflections regarding contemporary catastrophes in society are embodied in relation to his personal narrative of suffering. If this is the case, then Moltmann’s theology should not be termed a theologia crucis naturalis, in which “integral narratives of particular, embodied humans” are downplayed. Cf. Neal Anthony, Cross Narratives: Martin Luther’s Christology and the Location of Redemption (Eugene: Pickwick, 2010), 43. Anthony does not charge Moltmann with a theologia crucis naturalis per se, as Moltmann’s theology is not a concern of his study. Anthony does, however, claim that two theologians who are quite near to Moltmann theologically fall within this error: Douglas John Hall and Alan E. Lewis. For a further description of a theologia crucis naturalis, where Moltmann is directly charged with advancing this position originating with G. W. F. Hegel, see Oswald Bayer, “Passion und Wissen: Kreuzestheologie und Universitätswissenschaft,” Kerygma und Dogma 39 (1993): 114–16. Finally, it is perhaps a limitation of the present chapter to begin exploring traces of a theologia crucis throughout Moltmann’s theological corpus with a close reading of excerpts from Moltmann’s autobiography, as it is an open question whether a later (con)textual source can be drawn from to interpret earlier sources. From a systematic perspective, this approach can be helpful, since traces of a theologia crucis can be found in Moltmann’s autobiography that might also illumine earlier themes present in The Crucified God, even though this approach would be avoided in an historical-genetic study of Moltmann’s theology. This chapter’s exploration of Moltmann’s autobiography may be further limited, in that space limitations have prevented an independent investigation of the events Moltmann describes. In any case, an exploration of excerpts from Moltmann’s autobiography is pertinent to the argument that his theology overall should not be thought of as a theologia crucis naturalis.

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his friend Gerhard Schopper during a bombing in Hamburg. Schopper had his head blown off while Moltmann watched, crouched down next to him in shock. Moltmann recounts the effect of this event: I was as if dead, and ever after received life every day as a new gift. My question was not, ‘why does God allow this to happen?’ but, ‘My God, where are you?’ And there was the other question, the answer to which I am still looking for today: Why am I alive and not dead, too, like the friend at my side? I felt the guilt of survival and searched for the meaning of continued life. I knew that there had to be some reason why I was still alive. During that night I became a seeker after God.5

Moltmann’s existential question of “My God, where are you?” is arguably the starting point of his theologia crucis, because he relates it to Christ’s death cry from the cross, “my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” in the Gospels of Mark and Matthew (Mk. 15:34, Mt. 27:46, NRSV ). For Moltmann, this death cry of Christ from the cross is the ultimate expression of yearning for God amid godlessness, which Moltmann remembers experiencing as his friend was killed. In addition to the Gospel of Mark, Moltmann also read Psalm 39, and found in Jesus a divine Brother who understood and was present in Moltmann’s profound suffering. Christ’s death cry from the cross thus became central to Moltmann’s understanding of God’s relationship to suffering through the theologia crucis. In his autobiography, he relates the theologia crucis to his personal history of suffering in the following manner: When I began to take the history of Jesus’ crucifixion seriously in a personal sense, I had to read Golgotha in the darkness of Good Friday, and Jesus’ dark night of the soul together with my own annihilating experience, and in this way, I was able to find myself again in Jesus’ history. Where was God that night? Was God present in the inferno of those burning nights I remembered, or was God untouched by them, in the heaven of a complacent blessedness? Where is God? That was my existential question, the question which took me to the theology of the cross.6 5

Jürgen Moltmann, A Broad Place: An Autobiography, trans. Margaret S. Kohl (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2008), 17. “Ich war wie tot und empfing danach das Leben jeden Tag als ein neues Geschenk. Meine Frage war nicht: Warum lässt Gott das zu?, sondern: Mein Gott, wo bist du? Und die andere Frage, auf die ich bis heute Antwort suche: Warum bin ich am Leben und nicht auch tot wie der Freund neben mir? Ich fühlte die ‘Schuld’ des Überlebens und suchte nach dem Sinn des Weiterlebens. Ich wusste, dass es einen solchen Sinn für mein Weiterleben geben musste. In der Nacht wurde ich zum Gottsucher.” Jürgen Moltmann, Weiter Raum: Eine Lebensgeschichte (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 2006), 29. 6 Moltmann, A Broad Place, 190. “Als ich begann, die Geschichte der Kreuzigung Jesu persönlich ernst zu nehmen, musste ich Golgatha, die Finsternis des Karfreitags und die dunkle Nacht der Seele Jesu mit diesen meinen vernichtenden Erfahrungen lesen. Ich konnte mich darum in seiner Geschichte wiederfinden. Wo war Gott in jener Nacht? War Gott gegenwärtig im Inferno jener brennenden Nächte meiner Erinnerungen, oder war er unberührt davon im Himmel einer selbstzufriedenen Seligkeit? Wo ist Gott? Das war meine existenzielle Frage, mit der ich an die Theologie des Kreuzes ging.” Moltmann, Weiter Raum, 185–86. Emphasis in original. Moltmann arguably relates to what David Tracy calls a “neo-orthodox model” for

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According to Moltmann’s personal recollections, his primary existential question was not about the existence of God in relation to a secularized age, or the possibility of speaking about God in the scientific world dominated by an Enlightenment epistemology.7 His question also was not about metaphysical problems of theodicy.8 Instead, he sought relief from the agonies of the Second World War, and the experiences he endured therein, from the Jesus story. Moltmann came to understand Jesus as the divine Brother in suffering amid profound Anfechtungen, due to his personal understanding of a theologia crucis forming from his Bible reading while a “prisoner of war behind barbed wire.”9

modern Protestant theology (represented by Karl Barth, Emil Brunner, Rudolf Bultmann, H. Richard and Reinhold Niebuhr, and Paul Tillich), wherein existential questions are placed in a dialectical relationship to theological insights, even as Moltmann critiques and expands upon this theological model in his eschatology of the future. The present study uses the term “dialectical theology” for a theological model relating to Barth, Tillich, and Bultmann instead of Tracy’s term “neo-orthodoxy,” due to taking seriously Bruce McCormack’s historical-genetic work on Karl Barth, which was written after Tracy’s fundamental theology was first published in 1975. See David Tracy, Blessed Rage for Order: The New Pluralism in Theology (New York: Harper & Row, 1988), 27–31, and Bruce L. McCormack, Theologische Dialektik und kritischer Realismus: Entstehung und Entwicklung von Karl Barths Theologie 1909–1936, trans. Matthias Gockel (Zürich: Theologischer Verlag, 2006), 27–48. 7 Here there is a considerable difference between Jürgen Moltmann and Rudolf Bultmann. The latter sought to make the Gospel relevant to modernity steeped in a worldview dominated by the natural sciences, emphasizing the realized eschatological presence of Christ in Christian proclamation, but not directly in relation to social-political suffering or the future for a suffering world. See Rudolf Bultmann, “Neues Testament und Mythologie: Das Problem der Entmythologisieruhg der neutestamentlichen Verkündigung,” in Hans-Werner Barrsch, ed., Kerygma und Mythos: Ein theologisches Gespräch (Hamburg: Herbert Reich, 1960), 15–49. 8 Moltmann, A Broad Place, 1980; Moltmann, Weiter Raum, 186. 9 Moltmann, Crucified God, 1; Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 7. Moltmann’s emphasis on Jesus as the divine Brother in solidarity in suffering became especially important in San Salvador in 1989, when six Jesuit fathers, their housekeeper, and their housekeeper’s daughter, were murdered, and the Spanish edition of his text was found soaked in blood. Moltmann reflects on this event in the Preface to the British 40th Anniversary Edition of The Crucified God. “In 1990, I received a letter from Robert McAfee Brown. He had just returned from San Salvador, and told the following: ‘On the night of 16 November 1989, government soldiers murdered six Jesuit fathers in the Jesuit university UCA, together with their housekeeper and her daughter, the intention being to silence Ignacio Ellacuria’s critical voice. As chance would have it, Jon Sobrino was not in the country at the time. When the murderers dragged some of the bodies back into the building, they took the dead Ramon Moreno into Jon Sobrino’s room. They knocked down a bookcase, and a book fell on the floor and was soaked in the martyr’s blood. When it was picked up the following morning, it was found to be your book El Dios Crucificado.’ Martin Maier, a German Jesuit who was in El Salvador at the time, wrote similarly and enclosed photographs. Two years later, I then made my own pilgrimage to the grave of the martyrs in San Salvador. There I found my blood-stained book in a glass case, exhibited as a symbol of what really took place at that time during that murderous night. The text of my book had found its Latin American context.” Jürgen Moltmann, The Crucified God, 40th Anniversary Edition (London: SCM, 2015), xii.

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2. Moltmann’s Radicalization of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation Moltmann also argues for his personal indebtedness to the theologia crucis in the Introduction to The Crucified God.10 Since I first studied theology, I have been concerned with the theology of the cross. This may not have been so clear to those who liked Theology of Hope, which I published in 1964, as it was to its critics; yet I believe that it has been the guiding light of my theological thought. This no doubt goes back to the period of my first concern with question of Christian faith and theology in actual life, as a prisoner of war behind barbed wire. I certainly owe it to the unforgettable lectures on Reformation theology which I heard from Hans Joachim Iwand, Ernst Wolf, and Otto Weber in 1948/49 in Göttingen. Shattered and broken, the survivors of my generation were then returning from camps and hospitals to the lecture room. A theology which did not speak of God in the sight of the one who was abandoned and crucified would have nothing to say to us then.11

The above excerpt from The Crucified God is another pertinent example of how Moltmann understands his personal narrative to shape his theological inquiry, and how his experiences during the Second World War were arguably a personal foundation for his radicalized theologia crucis. Also, after being a prisoner of war for three years, Moltmann studied theology in Göttingen under Hans-Joachim 10

This chapter’s reading of Moltmann centers on a radicalized theologia crucis as found in The Crucified God as an overall hermeneutic for exploring traces of a theologia crucis throughout Moltmann’s theology, which is why we did not begin with Theology of Hope, even though this text was written eight years before The Crucified God, and arguably contains traces of a theologia crucis. See n. 40 below. While the present study’s approach might be critiqued from an historical-genetic perspective, the decision to center explicitly in themes from The Crucified God rather than beginning with Theology of Hope also allows for an overall exploration of Moltmann’s possible connection to and radicalization of Barth’s dictum in CD 1.1 that all theology should be done as a theologia crucis. Cf. Barth, CD 1.1, 14; KD 1.1, 13. 11 Moltmann, Crucified God, 1. “Seit den Anfängen meines Theologiestudiums beschäftigt mich die Kreuzestheologie. Wenn auch Freunde der ‘Theologie der Hoffnung’ die ich 1964 veröffentlichte, sie nicht immer so deutlich bemerkt haben wie ihre Kritiker, so glaube ich doch, daß sie der rote Faden meines theologischen Denkens ist. Das geht wohl zurück auf die Zeit meiner ersten Beschäftigung mit den Fragen ees christlichen Glaubens und der Theologie in der Existenz eines Kriegsgefangenen hinter Stacheldraht. Das verdanke ich sicher den unvergeßlichen Vorlesungen meiner Lehrer Hans Joachim Iwand, Ernst Wolf, und Otto Weber 1948/49 in Göttingen über reformatorische Theologie. Erschüttert und zerschlagen kamen damals die Überlebenden meiner Generation aus den Lagern und Lazaretten in die Hörsäle. Eine Theologie, die nicht im Angesicht des gottverlassen Gekreuzigten von gott gesprochen hätte, hätte uns damals nicht erreicht.” Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 7. On this point, see Miller Smith, “Cult Books Revisited,” 357. “The heart of Moltmann’s work is his adaptation of Luther’s ‘theology of the cross’, which informs his unique methodology: that the cross-dead Christ is the criterion by which all Christian theology is to face criticism. Moltmann argues that Christian theology has traditionally allowed existing assumptions about God inherited from philosophy to interpret the crucifixion event instead of making the ‘crucified God’ the sole standard by which any and all talk about God is judged.”

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Iwand, Ernst Wolf, and Otto Weber. His three teachers studied Karl Barth’s Church Dogmatics and Luther’s theology, and Moltmann even affectionately described Hans Iwand as being like the young Luther himself. According to Moltmann, Iwand especially proclaimed a theologia crucis, which rang true to Moltmann and his classmates as they coped with the horrors they had seen in the second world war.12 His time studying in Göttingen under Iwand, Wolf, and Weber thus likely served as an additional foundation for his eventual radicalizing of Luther’s and Barth’s theologies to stress God’s presence in suffering through Jesus Christ in The Crucified God. As has been argued in the first chapter of this study, a sapiential theologia crucis in Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation centers in the true recognition and knowledge of God through showing God’s deep heart and love for human sinners because of the cross of Christ.13 This theology is consoling for those whose consciences are tormented by the question of a gracious God or by past misdeeds, and then leads to neighbor love because of the “happy exchange.” We become Christ’s, and Christ becomes ours, in order that we may be little Christs to our neighbor(s) in need.14 Moltmann says he was steeped in these aspects of Luther’s theology as a student in Göttingen.15 However, Moltmann was not satisfied with an almost exclusive focus on forgiveness of sins and the Lutheran Law-Gospel motif 16, and 12

Moltmann, A Broad Place, 41; Moltmann, Weiter Raum, 51. Moltmann argues that Luther “understands the cross in a quite unmystical way,” [ganz unmystisch] and that the Heidelberg Disputation is Luther’s presentation of a “new principle of theological epistemology [ein neues theologisches Erkenntnisprinzip] by means of an exegesis of Psalm 22.” Moltmann, Crucified God, 208; Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 193. Conversely, the present study has argued Luther’s theologia crucis in the Heidelberg Disputation is an incorporation and evangelical development of late medieval passion mysticism and should only be situated within the question of theological epistemology, rather than a new revelatory theological epistemology unrelated to mysticism. Thus, Moltmann’s reading of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation in The Crucified God arguably has similar limitations to Walther von Loewenich, in that Moltmann remains overly indebted to twentieth-century dialectical theology in his reading of Luther in relation to mysticism. See Chapter 1, pp. 41–42 above, and the literature review in the Introduction of the present study. 14 See the exploration of Luther’s Freedom of a Christian (1520) in Chapter 3 of the present thesis, for examining the relationship between the happy exchange and neighbor love for Luther, as well as Oswald Bayer, Aus Glauben Leben: Über Rechtfertigung und Heiligung (Stuttgart: Calwer, 1990). 15 Moltmann, A Broad Place, 41–42; Moltmann, Weiter Raum, 50–52. 16 Moltmann, like Barth, reverses the traditional Lutheran sequence of Law-Gospel, preferring instead the Reformed sequence of Gospel-Law. For Moltmann, this reversal is done from an eschatological standpoint (arguably having commonalities with Barth’s 1919 Romans commentary) to show how ethics and dogmatics are related, avoiding a possible Lutheran dualism in God (the God of the Law vs. the God of the Promise), and allowing for sensitive inter-faith dialogue between Christians and Jews, in which the Torah is thought of as promise. See Karl Barth, “Evangelium und Gesetz,” in Ernst Kinder and Klaus Haendler, eds., Gesetz und Evangelium: Beiträge zur gegenwärtigen theologischen Diskussion, 2nd ed. (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgeselschaft, 1986), 1–30, Chapter 4, n. 37 above, and nn. 44 and 80 below. For an appreciation of Karl Barth’s emphasis on Gospel-Law for the relationship of dogmatics and ethics 13

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radicalized Luther’s and Barth’s theologies by arguing for the crucified Christ as the source of hope in suffering and the One who suffers with the victims of unjust circumstances.17 Through Moltmann’s Crucified God, then, the theme of theologia crucis becomes the central hermeneutic for Christian theology. The death of Jesus on the cross is the centre of all Christian theology. It is not the only theme of theology, but it is in effect the entry to its problems and answers on earth. All Christian statements about God, about creation, about sin and death have their focal point in the crucified Christ. All Christian statements about history, about the church, about faith and sanctification, about the future and about hope stem from the crucified Christ.18

Thus, the theme of theologia crucis as found in Moltmann’s Crucified God is arguably radicalized from Luther and Barth, and contains Christological commonalities with the later Bonhoeffer, because the crucifixion of Jesus on Golgotha is an event affecting the entire Trinity, rather than restricted to the suffering of the Son in his divine nature. The crucifixion of Jesus then relates to a radicalized happy exchange and the suffering Trinity on Golgotha. that is also sympathetic to Luther’s theology, see Eberhard Jüngel, Barth Studien (Zürich-Köln and Gütersloh: Benzinger and Gütersloher Gerd Mohn, 1982), 180–210. 17 Matthias Gockel argues that two features of Moltmann’s theologia crucis relate to Luther in The Crucified God: “As a whole, the book can be read as an extended meditation on the gospel of the crucified Christ, ‘foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God’ (1 Cor 1:18). It is indebted to at least two features of Luther’s theology: (1) the combination of the theology of the cross with the theme of God’s hiddenness, which explains that God is hidden in sufferings or, literally, ‘passions’; and (2) the emphasis on the ‘communication of attributes’ as an attempt to overcome the abstract separation between the two ‘natures’ of Christ. Perhaps the most important contribution of the book lies in the extension of the traditional idea of God’s redemptive suffering beyond the personal to the socio-political realm.” Matthias Gockel, “Constructive Theology, The Cross of Christ, and the Praxis of Liberation,” Dialog 56, no. 3 (2017): 228–32; 229–30. 18 Moltmann, Crucified God, 204. “Der Tod Jesu am Kreuz ist das Zentrum der ganzen christlichen Theologie. Er ist nicht das einzige Thema der Theologie, wohl aber so etwas wie die Eingangstür zu ihren Problemen und Antworten auf der Erde. Alle christlichen Aussagen über Gott, über die Schöpfung, über Sünde und Tod weisen auf den Gekreuzigten hin. Alle christlichen Aussagen über die Geschichte, die Kirche, den Glauben und die Heiligung, die Zukunft und die Hoffnung kommen von dem Gekreuzigten her.” Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 189. Emphasis in original. While this excerpt supports the present study’s concerns for finding traces of a theologia crucis throughout Moltmann’s theology, a careful historical-genetic study of Moltmann’s thinking is also needed which examines if Moltmann held to this crucicentric principle cited here throughout his constructive theology overall. For instance, future historical-genetic research on Moltmann’s theology might reveal that he turned away from a theologia crucis as a principal theme in his later work, beginning at least with his Systematic Contributions to Theology in 1980, Moltmann’s personal autobiographical reflections and various prefaces to The Crucified God notwithstanding. This historical-genetic research will not be undertaken in the present study, as more historical distance is arguably needed for such an investigation to be fruitful than is possible for the present study’s author. Thus, the present author admits to possibly having another limitation in his overall approach to Moltmann in this study (in addition to n. 4 above) that might yield different results from future historicalgenetical studies of Moltmann: he has been shaped academically, pastorally, and personally by this theologian as Moltmann’s last doctoral student.

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3. A Radicalized Happy Exchange and the Suffering Trinity on Golgotha As with Barth and Bonhoeffer, the theme of happy exchange can be found in and transformed through Moltmann’s theology, originating in the early Luther, wherein Christ took on sin on the cross at Golgotha, but now radicalized through Moltmann’s Crucified God to the status of an event within the heart of the Trinity. This transformed happy exchange is controversial and related to the question of whether the entire Trinity suffered on Golgotha. While many theologians, including Karl Rahner,19 criticized Moltmann’s thinking on God’s suffering, Moltmann emphatically stressed that God suffered in God’s very being in the crucifixion of Christ.20 Through Moltmann’s Crucified God, then, the kenosis of 19 Moltmann, A Broad Place, 197; Moltmann, Weiter Raum, 192. For an argument that Karl Rahner’s theology should be considered a theologia crucis, responding to the critiques of both Hans Urs von Balthasar and feminist theologians Rita Nakashima Brock and Rebecca Ann Parker, see Lois Malcolm, “Rahner’s Theology of the Cross,” in Paul G. Crowley, S. J., ed., Rahner Beyond Rahner: A Great Theologian Encounters the Pacific Rim (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2005), 115–31. Cf. Chapter 3, n. 43 of the present study above. Moltmann responded to Rahner’s critiques in Jürgen Moltmann, In der Geschichte des dreieinigen Gottes: Beiträge zur trinitarischen Theologie (Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1991), 156–72; Jürgen Moltmann, History and the Triune God, trans. John Bowden (New York: Crossroad, 1991), 110–24. 20 William P. Loewe summarizes Moltmann’s position about the passibility of God well, in an article written around the time of the publication of The Crucified God: “Hence Moltmann would open anew the theopaschite question which Nicaea prematurely closed. Starting from Christ’s horrified death-cry, he focuses on what happened between the Father and the Son on Calvary. The Pauline witness establishes that the Father sent and delivered up his Son to die for godless men, and also that the Son entered into this voluntarily, delivering himself up for sinners. The Son then suffers death, a death in which he is rejected, abandoned, and sacrificed by his Father. But, Moltmann insists, the Father suffers as well. He does not suffer in the same way as Christ, but he suffers in grief at the loss of his Son. And finally, from this union of wills even in their moment of profoundest separation, there comes forth from the suffering of Father and Son the Spirit of their love which justifies the godless. God thus constitutes his existence as love in the event of the cross, and in that event the Trinity is set in motion as an eschatological process of liberation.” William P. Loewe, “Two Theologians of the Cross: Karl Barth and Jürgen Moltmann,” The Thomist 41, no. 4 (1977): 530. It is important to emphasize, though, that Moltmann himself uses neither the term theopaschism nor the classical Christian heresy of patripassionism to describe the relationship between the suffering of the Son and the Father on Golgotha, preferring patricompassionism instead. See Moltmann, Crucified God, 243; Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 230; Jürgen Moltmann, The Future of Creation: Collected Essays, trans. Margaret S. Kohl (London: SCM, 1979), 73. Dennis Ngien describes Moltmann’s position well, writing, “Moltmann coins this new term ‘patricompassionism’ to indicate the theological position which advocates a trinitarian understanding of the suffering of God, according to which ‘the Son suffers dying, the Father suffers the death of the Son.’” Dennis Ngien, the Suffering of God According to Martin Luther’s Theologia Crucis (Vancouver: Regent College Publishing, 1995, 2005), 245, n. 77. Miller Smith notes, “In this model [patricompassionism], Jesus – as the eternal Son – experiences the abandonment of the Father, as well as dying as a condemned criminal, while God the Father experiences the mournful loss of the Son to death. In other words, God knows what it is like to be on both sides of death, as both the one who dies

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the suffering Son on the cross becomes an event within the Trinity and is not restricted to the Son alone, in an incorporation of Eastern theology, a critique of the doctrine of the two natures of Christ, and a radicalization of Luther’s communicatio idiomatum. The ‘mystical theology of the Eastern church’, unrestricted by the doctrine of the two natures by which God and humanity are distinguished, could go further here and say: ‘The kenosis ….(and) the work of the incarnate Son (is) the work of the entire most holy Trinity [der ganzen heiligsten Dreifaltigkeit], from which Christ cannot be separated.’…. What happens on the cross manifests the relationships of Jesus, the Son, to the Father, and vice versa. The cross stands at the heart of the trinitarian being of God; it divides and conjoins the persons in their relationships to each other and portrays them in a specific way. For as we said, the theological dimension of the death of Jesus on the cross is what happens between Jesus and his Father in the spirit of abandonment and surrender. In these relationships the person of Jesus comes to the fore in its totality as the Son, and the relationship of the Godhead and the humanity in his person fall into the background. Anyone who talks of the Trinity talks of the cross of Jesus, and does not speculate in heavenly riddles.21 and, in the case of the Father suffering the death of the Son, the one who mourns a death within oneself. For Moltmann, this is the meaning of the crucifixion within the Trinitarian life. In this way, while it is proper to say ‘death of God’, it is better put as ‘death in God’.” Miller Smith, “Cult Books Revisited,” 360. 21 Moltmann, Crucified God, 206–7. “Die ‘mystische Theologie der morgenländischen Kirche’ konnte hier ungehemmt durch die Lehre von dem zwei Naturen, mit der Gott und Mensch unterschieden werden, weiter gehen und sagen: ‘Die Kenosis.…(und) das Werk des menschgewordenen Sohnes (ist) das Werk der ganzen heiligsten Dreifältigkeit, von der man Christus nicht trennen kann.’…. Im Kreuzesgeschehen werden die Beziehungen Jesu, des Sohnes, zum Vater und umgekehrt offenbar. Aus dem Kreuzesgeschehen und seiner befreienden Wirkung wird der Ausgang des Geistes vom Vater uns offenbar. Das Kreuz steht mitten im trinitarischen Sein Gottes, trennt und verbindet die Personen in ihren Beziehungen zueinander und zeigt sie konkret. Denn die theologische Dimension des Kreuzestodes Jesu, sagten wir, ist das Geschehen zwischen Jesus und seinem Vater im Geist der Verlassenheit und Hingabe. In diesen Beziehungen tritt die Person Jesu in ihrer Ganzheit als Son hervor und tritt das Verhältnis von Gottheit und Menschheit in seiner Person zurück. Wer wirklich Trinität sagt, der spricht von Kreuz Jesu und spekuliert nicht in himmlischen Rätseln.” Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 191–92. For reflections on the doctrine of communicatio idiomatum, see n. 28 below. Regarding the doctrine of the two natures of Christ, Moltmann appears to again be developing Karl Barth from CD 2.2 (cf. Chapter 5, n. 51 above). Whereas Barth retained the language of two natures from the Council of Chalcedon, but arguably in a post-metaphysical way, Moltmann wishes to move beyond two natures language, and to instead stress the rich relationality of the trinitarian persons centered in the cross of Jesus following the Eastern church. These positions in The Crucified God arguably correspond to his social doctrine of the Trinity in his Systematic Contributions to Theology and the constructive reception of the Eastern doctrine of perichoresis contained therein. See the section “Comparing Jürgen Moltmann and Karl Barth,” pp. 195–98 below. Finally, the present study’s findings may at this point intersect with Bruce McCormack’s constructive, “post-Barthian” theologia crucis, as he is specifically concerned with the question of Kenosis and the Council of Chalcedon in Volume 1 of his project. However, since McCormack was not able to engage directly with Moltmann’s Crucified God in his first volume, it remains to be seen if the present study might relate to the future volumes of McCormack’s project. See Bruce L. McCormack, The Humility of the Eternal Son: Reformed Kenoticism and the Repair of Chalcedon (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021), 21.

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A radicalized happy exchange through The Crucified God thus emphasizes the pain and suffering of the kenosis of the Son as an event within the Triune God which took place in human history on the cross to show how God is present in the pain and suffering of humans and creation today, as well as God’s presence in life, happiness, and joy.22 There is no suffering which in this history of God is not God’s suffering; no death which has not been God’s death in the history on Golgotha. Therefore there is no life, no fortune and no joy which have not been integrated by his history into eternal life, the eternal joy of God.23

For Moltmann, then, since Jesus cried, “my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” on Golgotha, and suffered the ultimate hell of God forsakenness on the cross, Jesus knows and understands all human suffering.24 The Triune God, known decisively in the cross of Jesus on Golgotha, is for him a God of love and solidarity with humankind, in order that humankind might participate fully in God. “The human being is taken up, without limitations and conditions, into the life and suffering, the death and resurrection of God, and in faith participates corporeally in the fullness of God.”25

22 I have explored the relationship between Moltmann’s theologia crucis, Niels Heinrik Gregersen’s “Deep Incarnation,” and the suffering of creation, as well as some constructive possibilities for these themes, in Brach S. Jennings, “Interpreting Martin Luther’s Theologia Crucis Eschatologically as Deep Incarnation for Ecological Justice,” Communio Viatorum 62, no. 3 (2020): 266–79. Moltmann’s emphasis of “history in God” due to Golgotha rather than “God in history” relates also to Moltmann’s emphasis on the resurrection as an eschatological event awaiting verification at the Last Day, when victims are vindicated, and perpetrators are put to right for their crimes. See the section “The Unfinished Reformation for Victims and Perpetrators of Injustice,” pp. 188–91 below. 23 Moltmann, Crucified God, 246. “Es gibt kein Leiden, das in dieser Geschichte Gottes nicht Gottes Leiden, es gibt keinen Tod, der nicht in der Geschichte auf Golgotha Gottes Tod geworden wäre. Darum gibt es auch kein Leben, kein Glück und keine Freude, die nicht durch seine Geschichte in das ewige Leben, die ewige Freude Gottes integriert werden.” Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 233. 24 In 1990, Moltmann reflected on his radicalization of Luther’s theologia crucis in an English preface for The Crucified God: “I began with an interpretation of the theologia crucis of the young Luther. I saw that when God reveals himself to us godless mean and women, who turn ourselves into proud and unhappy gods, he does not do so through power and glory. He reveals himself through suffering and cross, so he repudiates in us the arrogant man or woman, and accepts the sinner in us. But then I turned the question round, and instead of asking just what God means for us human beings in the cross of Christ, asked too what this human cross of Christ means for God. I found the answer in the idea of God’s passion, which reveals itself in the passion of Christ. What is manifested in the cross is God’s suffering of a passionate love for his lost creatures, a suffering prepared for sacrifice.” Jürgen Moltmann, “1990 Preface to the Crucified God (1972),” 3. Cited from Jürgen Moltmann’s personal copy. Emphases in original. 25 Moltmann, Crucified God, 277. “Ohne Grenzen und Bedingungen wird der Mensch in das Leben und Leiden, in den Tod und die Auferstehung Gottes hineingenommen und nimmt im Glauben leibhaftig an der Fülle Gottes teil.” Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 265.

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Moltmann’s stress on God’s suffering within God’s self in the Christ event on Golgotha can be read as a transformed happy exchange related to the kenosis of the Son based on a radicalization of Luther and Paul of Tarsus to emphasize both God’s suffering love in Christ and God’s faithfulness and solidarity in human suffering. An excerpt from Moltmann’s later Pneumatology, The Spirit of Life: A Universal Affirmation, shows both his indebtedness to Luther and Paul of Tarsus, and how his theology overall can be read as radicalizing their central Christological insights around traces of a theologia crucis for a world beset with suffering and injustice. What did Christ suffer on the cross that can be described as atonement? Not the sins of body and mind, for he shares these with the many crucified and murdered people in world history. What he suffered is his special divine pain: the unheard prayer in Gethsemane, and the God-forsakenness he experienced on the cross. By suffering forsakenness by God – the God whose nearness he had so incomparably experienced that he knew himself to be the messianic child, God’s Son – he experiences the pain of the divine love for sinners and takes it on himself. Christ’s suffering on the cross is human sin transmuted into the atoning suffering of God. That is why this experience of Christ’s on the cross – his experience of being forsaken by God – cannot be qualified or played down in any way at all. It is the experience of hell, as the young Luther so emphatically stressed in his theology of the cross. Paul interpreted the God-forsakenness of Christ on the cross in the same way: ‘For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin’ (II Cor. 5:21). Christ ‘became a curse for us’ (Gal 3:13). On the cross hangs the Son of God, forsaken, cursed, and damned. He hangs there ‘for us’, so that we might have peace: through his wounds we are healed. There is more in this than Christ’s solidarity with ‘the accursed of the earth’. In this is the divine atonement for sin, for injustice, and violence on earth. This divine atonement reveals God’s pain. But God’s pain reveals God’s faithfulness to those he has created, and his indestructible love, which endures in a world in opposition to him, and overcomes it. God reconciles this world-in-contradiction by enduring the contradiction, not by contradicting that contradiction – not, that is to say, through judgment. He molds and alchemizes the pain of his love into atonement for the sinner. In this way God becomes the God of sinners. He does not desire their death, and so that they turn back he turns to them; so that they may live, he endures their death.26 26 Jürgen Moltmann, The Spirit of Life: A Universal Affirmation, trans. Margaret S. Kohl (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1992), 136. “Was hat Christus am Kreuz erlitten, das ‘Sühne’ genannt werden kann? Es sind nicht die leiblichen und seelischen Schmerzen. Diese teilt er vielmehr mit den vielen Gekreuzigten und Ermordeten in der Weltgeschichte. Es sind aber seine besonderen Gottesschmerzen: das nichterhörte Gebet in Gethsemane und die erfahrene Gottverlassenheit am Kreuz. Indem er, der die Nähe Gottes als ‘Abba’ so unvergleichlich erfahren hatte, daß er sich als das messianische Kind, den Sohn Gottes, wußte, die Verlassenheit Gottes erleidet, erfährt er den Schmerz der göttlichen Liebe zu den Sündern und nimmt ihn an. Das Leiden Christi am Kreuz ist die ins sühnende Gottesleiden verwandelte Sünde der Menschen. Darum ist diese Erfahrung der Gottverlassenheit Christi am Kreuz durch nichts einzuschränken. Es ist die Erfahrung der Hölle, wie der junge Luther in seiner Kreuzestheologie so nachdrücklich betonte. Auch Paulus hat die Gottverlassenheit Christi am Kreuz so aufgefaßt: ‘Er hat den, der von keiner Sünde wußte, für uns zur Sünde gemacht’ (2 Kor 5,21). Christus wurde zum ‘Fluch für uns’ (Gal 3, 13). Am Kreuz hängt der verlassene, verfluchte und verdammte Sohn Gottes. Er

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The above excerpt shows how traditional theological themes such as sin, suffering, cross, judgment, and death are radicalized to address the question of God’s presence amid profound suffering, injustice, and victimization. Moltmann interprets these themes in relation to the Triune God’s divine pain and solidarity in Jesus Christ, showing a cruciform shape to his theology, even as he creatively re-works traditional dogmatic theology in relation to contemporary social-political suffering.27 In relation to suffering and innocent victimhood, the cross is reframed as Jesus’s solidarity with humankind and creation, demonstrating Christ’s unconditional love and grace. A transformed theologia crucis centered in Moltmann’s Crucified God thus develops and radicalizes a transformed happy exchange as found in Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre, wherein the Triune God now takes on the pain, suffering, and sin of the entire creation onto Godself because of the cross at Golgotha.28 hängt dort ‘für uns’, auf daß wir Frieden hätten: durch seine Wunden sind wir geheilt. Darin liegt mehr als Christi Solidarität mit den ‘Verdammten dieser Erde’. Darin liegt die göttliche Sühne für die Sünde, für Unrecht und Gewalttat auf Erden. In dieser göttlichen Sühne wird der Schmerz Gottes offenbar. Im Schmerz Gottes aber wird Gottes Treue zu seinen Geschöpfen und seine unzerstörbare Liebe offenbar, die eine Welt in Widerspruch erträgt und überwindet. Gott versöhnt diese Welt im Widerspruch durch sein Erleiden des Widerspruchs, nicht durch den Widerspruch des Widerspruchs, d. h. durch das Gericht. Er verarbeitet den Schmerz seiner Liebe zur Sühne für den Sünder. So wird Gott zum Gott der Sünder. Er will nicht ihren Tod, sondern damit sie umkehren, kehrt er sich zu ihnen; damit sie leben, erleidet er ihren Tod.” Jürgen Moltmann, Der Geist des Lebens: Eine ganzheitliche Pneumatologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1991), 149–50. Italics in original. 27 Joshua C. Miller’s description of Moltmann’s theologia crucis as using Luther’s original ideas as “a theological basis for leftist political activism” is overstated. Indeed, Moltmann’s politics can be considered “leftist,” for lack of a better term, and Miller is correct that Moltmann, like Karl Barth, rejects Luther’s understanding of God’s hiddenness behind the cross in On Bound Choice (1525). Said rejection is to be expected of theologians influenced by Karl Barth, such as Moltmann’s teachers, the early Walther von Loewenich, and Moltmann himself, because for said theologians, the hidden God is the revealed God, and the revealed God is the God hidden on the cross at Golgotha. In any case, an exploration of Moltmann’s construction of a Trinitarian theologia crucis should not be reduced to ethical-political matters. While he was a major proponent of so-called “political theology,” Moltmann’s work is best considered a Trinitarian eschatologia crucis for social-political suffering and the abuse of creation, rather than only for leftist activism. If the latter were accurate, it is unlikely Moltmann would so thoroughly consider Golgotha as the center of his Trinitarian theology in The Crucified God. See Joshua C. Miller, Hanging by a Promise: The Hidden God in the Theology of Oswald Bayer (Eugene: Pickwick, 2015), 105–7. A similar critique to Miller of Moltmann’s work is found in Mark C. Mattes, The Role of Justification in Contemporary Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007), 109–13. 28 Moltmann writes of “indestructible election and divine life” as related to the question of salvation, wherein all “disaster, forsakenness by God, absolute death, the infinite curse of damnation and sinking into nothingness” are taken into the Triune God in the cross of Christ, thus arguing for the Triune God’s divine suffering on the cross. See Moltmann, Crucified God, 246; Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 233. Dennis Ngien understands Luther himself to argue for the suffering of God in God’s divine nature from the theologia crucis. “By descending to the

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4. Moltmann’s Understanding of Sin in Relation to a Radicalized Theologia Crucis A radicalized theologia crucis through Moltmann’s Crucified God argues that all sin, as well as suffering, shame, death, abandonment, and hell, is taken into the being of the Triune God because of Golgotha.29 God is, then, not impassible to the experience of the crucified Jesus. Instead, God is full of pathos, that is, divine, suffering love for God’s creation, and the cross is central for understanding the suffering heart of the Trinity.30 In his later book The Way of Jesus Christ: Chrisworld in the human suffering form of Jesus, God is revealed as the one who loves and suffers. More specifically, the God who hides in the suffering of the cross means for Luther that God suffers. This declaration does not arise from speculation, but rather as a conclusion derived from God’s revelation in Christ.” Ngien’s study lacks methodological clarity as to how he arrives at the conclusion that Luther’s own theology should be read in such a similar fashion to Moltmann’s radicalization of it. It is more textually accurate to Luther to argue Luther’s Christology implies a suffering within the Triune God, due to the God-human, Jesus Christ, who dies on the cross, because of Luther’s interpretation of the communicatio idiomatum. This suffering of the Triune God is then made explicit through Moltmann’s Crucified God, particularly around the kenosis of the Son on the cross. Cf. Ngien, The Suffering of God According to Martin Luther’s Theologia Crucis, 67, and George Hunsinger, “What Karl Barth Learned from Martin Luther,” 132–34. Particularly important for Luther’s understanding of the communicatio idiomatum is the Eucharistic controversy between Luther and Zwingli, which reached its apex at the Marburg Colloquy of 1529. See LW 38: 3–89; WA 30 (3), 92–159. For Luther’s view of the communicatio idiomatum, see Johann Anselm Steiger, “The communicatio idiomatum as the Axle and Motor of Luther’s Theology,” Lutheran Quarterly 14 (2000): 125–58, and Richard Cross, “Luther’s Christology and the Communicatio Idiomatum,” in Christine Helmer, ed., The Medieval Luther (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020), 27–47. Steiger also notes Barth’s polemicizing against the communicatio idiomatum in CD 4.2 but believes said polemicizing to be “strange for the simple reason that Barth himself de facto applies it constantly, at least in its content; even his talk of the humble Christ in exaltation cannot be conceived apart from it.” See Steiger, 155, n. 7. Moltmann addresses a radicalized communicatio idiomatum indebted to Luther in relation to God’s suffering in God’s self on Golgotha in Crucified God, 232–35; 234; Der gekreuzigte Gott, 219–22; 221–22. Theologically, the communicatio idiomatum and the happy exchange are connected, in that Jesus Christ bares the sins of individual guilty sinners (Luther), suffers with, and bears the sin of humankind writ large (Barth and Bonhoeffer), and stands in solidarity with the entirety of the victimized creation (Moltmann). 29 Alan Lewis believes Moltmann does not satisfactorily address the role of human sin in Christ’s execution. He suggests Karl Barth and Eberhard Jüngel are needed additions to Moltmann’s proposal of sin in relation to social-political suffering. See Alan E. Lewis, Between Cross and Resurrection: A Theology of Holy Saturday (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001), 84–85, n. 17. 30 See Moltmann, Trinity and the Kingdom, 25–30; Moltmann, Trinität und Reich Gottes, 40–45, for a discussion of the Triune God’s pathos. Moltmann emphasizes here the difference between the apathetic God of Greek philosophy and the passionate God of the biblical narrative. Miller Smith comments on the pathos of God in Moltmann’s view: “[Moltmann] insists that the God of Christianity is not Aristotle’s apathetic unmoved Mover, but reminds us of the shekinah of the involved YHWH in the Hebrew Bible, the emotive Christ of the New Testament evangelists, and the Holy Spirit present in the sufferings of the Church.” Miller Smith, “Cult Books Revisited,” 360. Moltmann’s arguments for the passionate God of the biblical narrative also relate to his concern in The Crucified God with “God in Auschwitz and Auschwitz in the

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tology in Messianic Dimensions, Moltmann writes, “In Christian faith the cross is always at the centre of the Trinity, for the cross reveals the heart of the triune God, which beats for God’s whole creation.”31 A transformation of Luther’s language of the cross showing the “kind heart” of God the Father (from A Meditation on Christ’s Passion32) can then be found in Moltmann’s emphasis on the cross revealing the heart of the Trinity.33 Confessional Lutheran theologians might criticize the present reading of Moltmann’s theology as a way to remain in suffering and victimization when tragedies occur.34 However, because Moltmann understands Christ to be truly present in human suffering and the suffering of creation, he then understands the crucified and risen Christ to act as the liberator for all who suffer, which includes being the liberator for those who suffer from the effects of structural sin. Moltmann expresses this point at the beginning of The Crucified God: The cross is not and cannot be loved. Yet only the crucified Christ can bring the freedom which changes the world because it is no longer afraid of death. In his time the crucified Christ was regarded as a scandal and as foolishness. Today, too, it is considered old fashioned to put him in the centre of Christian faith and theology. Yet only when people are reminded of him, however untimely this may be, can they be set free from the power of the facts of the present time, and from the laws and compulsions of history, and be offered a future which will never grow dark again. Today the church and theology must turn to the crucified Christ in order to show the world the freedom he offers. This is essential if they wish to become what they assert they are: the church of Christ, and Christian theology.35 crucified God” (CG, 278; GG, 267), in that God is not impassible to the horrors of history, but rather takes the horrors of history into God’s self in the crucified Christ. 31 Jürgen Moltmann, The Way of Jesus Christ: Christology in Messianic Dimensions, trans. Margaret S. Kohl (New York: Harper Collins, 1990), 173. “Im Zentrum der Trinität steht christlich immer das Kreuz, denn das Kreuz offenbart das Herz des dreieinigen Gottes, das für seine ganze Schöpfung schlägt.” Jürgen Moltmann, Der Weg Jesu Christi: Christologie in messianischen Dimensionen (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1989), 195. 32 LW 42: 13; WA 2, 140 (30)–141: 7. 33 A connection to, and development of, Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre can also be found here, where Barth wrote of Christ as the “declaration of the heart of God.” See CD 2.2, 422; KD 2.2, 467, and Chapter 5, nn. 42–43 above. 34 See, for example, Gerhard Forde, On Being a Theologian of the Cross: Reflections on Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation, 1518 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997), viii. Forde was concerned that Luther’s stress on the consequences of original sin would not be lost in platitudes about God’s presence with human beings in suffering. However, Forde does not address the notion of structural sin and innocent victimization, restricting himself to Luther’s own theology. Conversely, Moltmann consciously radicalizes Luther’s own theology. For Moltmann, then, God does not become more attractive through identifying with the suffering world; rather, God is truly seen as creator, lover, and liberator of the world through God’s suffering love-in-solidarity in the divine Shekinah of the Hebrew Scriptures, Jesus’s anguish before the Father in the garden of Gethsemane, and in Christ’s death cry from the cross on Golgotha. See Moltmann, Crucified God, 200–90; Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 184–267. 35 Moltmann, Crucified God, 1. “Das Kreuz wird nicht geliebt und kann nicht geliebt werden. Und doch verschafft nur der Gekreuzigte jene Freiheit, die die Welt verändert, weil sie den Tod nicht mehr fürchtet. Der Gekreuzigte galt in seiner Zeit als Ärgernis und Torheit. Es ist auch

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Thus, through Moltmann’s Crucified God, the crucified Christ is the source of Christian hope in a world beset with catastrophes and hopelessness.36 Christ is God’s decisive revelation in godlessness and godforsakenness, and the crucified One, who is also the risen One, leads to new life amid lifelessness and catastrophes. With regards to new life amid lifelessness, we now proceed to the resurrection of the crucified Christ, whereas we have up until now been concerned with the crucifixion of the risen Christ. Thus, we move from a radicalized theologia crucis in The Crucified God to Moltmann’s Theology of Hope, for which he has been internationally acclaimed, and of which his Crucified God is arguably a concrete expression.37

5. Theology of Hope and the Resurrection of the Crucified Christ Moltmann’s first major theological work is Theology of Hope: On the Ground and Implications of a Christian Eschatology, and shows Moltmann’s understanding of eschatology as it relates to social-political engagement. He believes the affirmation of new life despite death comes solely because the dead Christ on Golgotha has been raised, and that the resurrection of the crucified Christ is the basis for ethical-political action in the world.38 Moltmann thus emphasizes Christ’s resurrection as the resurrection of the crucified Christ, and Theology of Hope is arguably rooted in his understanding and radicalization of Luther’s theologia crucis, which became fully apparent in The Crucified God.39 This semantic aspect of Moltmann’s thought, that it is specifically the crucified Christ who has been raised by the power of the Holy Spirit, is important to emphasize, because Moltmann seeks to keep the tension between the cross and resurrection together rather than separating them. Therefore, it can be argued that the cross and the resurrection, and thus an eschatology of the heute unzeitgemäß, ihn in den Mittelpunkt des christlichen Glaubens und der Theologie zu stellen. Und doch befreit nur die unzeitgemäße Erinnerung an ihn Menschen von der Macht gegenwärtiger Fakten und den Gesetzen und Zwängen der Geschichte und öffnet sie für eine Zukunft, die nicht wieder dunkel wird. Es kommt heute darauf an, daß sich Kirche und Theologie auf den gekreuzigten Christus besinnen, um der Welt seine Freiheit zu zeigen, wenn anders sie werden wollen, was sie zu sein behaupten: nämlich die Kirche Christi und christliche Theologie.” Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 7. 36 See Moltmann’s explanations to the return and development of the theologia crucis in the Introduction to The Crucified God (CG, 3–6; GG, 9–11). 37 Cf. CG, 5; GG, 10. 38 Jürgen Moltmann, Theology of Hope: On the Ground and the Implications of a Christian Eschatology, trans. James W. Leitch (New York: Harper & Row, 1967), 165–72; Jürgen Moltmann, Theologie der Hoffnung: Untersuchungen zur Begründung und zu den Konsequenzen einer christlichen Eschatologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1964), 150–55. 39 Moltmann explicitly addresses Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation in CG 207–14; GG, 193–99.

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future and a theologia crucis, are interwoven throughout Moltmann’s theology, beginning in Theology of Hope. Moltmann writes: Faith does not come to its own in becoming radically unworldly, but by hopeful outgoing into the world it becomes a benefit to the world. By accepting the cross, the suffering and the death of Christ, by taking upon it the trials and struggles of obedience in the body and surrendering itself to the pain of love, it proclaims in the everyday world the future of the resurrection, of life and the righteousness of God. The future of the resurrection comes to it as it takes upon itself the cross. Thus the eschatology of the future and the theology of the cross are interwoven.40

This excerpt shows how a theology of hope and a theology of the cross complement each other in the life of faith, and this complementarity is arguably why traces of a theologia crucis can be found throughout Moltmann’s constructive theology beginning with Theology of Hope and proceeding through recent theological essays, and why Moltmann’s understanding of a theologia crucis can overall be termed a Trinitarian eschatologia crucis. Christ’s incarnation, which culminates in the resurrection of the crucified Christ, shows the full extent of God’s involvement with the material, good, and bodily creation. Jesus lives and dies in this world. He is resurrected into God’s future, and the Christ event shows that God’s future and the world’s future are united. This means Moltmann’s eschatologia crucis leads to a theology of life as a never-ending feast in the joy of the Triune God’s eternal presence.41 Moltmann, then, understands the crucified Christ’s resurrection as the beginning of the new creation, and hope-centered eschatology as the basis for Christian faith.42 A 40 Moltmann, Theology of Hope, 163. “Nicht in radikaler Entweltlichung gewinnt sich der Glaube, sondern durch hoffnungsvolle Entäußerung in die Welt hinein wird er zu einem Gewinn für die Welt hinein wird er zu einem Gewinn für die Welt. Indem er das Kreuz, das Leiden und Sterben mit Christus, indem er die Anfechtung und den Kampf um leiblichen Gehorsam annimmt und sich in den Schmerz der Liebe hineingibt, verkündet er die Zukunft der Auferstehung, des Lebens und der Gerechtigkeit Gottes im Alltag der Welt. Die Zukunft der Auferstehung kommt zu ihm, indem er das Kreuz auf sich nimmt. So greifen futurische Eschatologie und Kreuzestheologie ineinander.“ Moltmann, Theologie der Hoffnung, 148. Italics added for emphasis. For the emphasis on the cross of the risen Christ, see CG, 204; GG, 189. Space limitations have unfortunately prevented the present study from examining Moltmann’s reception of Ernst Bloch in his Theology of Hope as related to a theologia crucis. However, for a critique of Moltmann’s reception of Bloch related to the question of hope beyond the promise of Christ, see Thomas R. Gaulke, An Unpromising Hope: Finding Hope Outside of Promise for an Agnostic Church and for Those of Us Who Find It Hard to Believe (Eugene: Pickwick, 2021), xiii-37. 41 Cf. Jürgen Moltmann, Die lebendige Gott und die Fülle des Lebens: Auch ein Beitrag zu Atheismusdebatte unserer Zeit (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 2014), 192–99. 42 Moltmann’s understanding of Christ’s resurrection as the foundation of new creation contrasts with Wolfhart Pannenberg’s Grundzüge der Christologie, which Moltmann critiques for not emphasizing the resurrection of the crucified Christ strongly enough (CG, 176–77; GG, 163–64). Alan Lewis describes the contrast between Moltmann’s view of the resurrection with Wolfhart Pannenberg’s in the Grundzüge, noting a preference for Moltmann’s understanding of resurrection over Pannenberg’s, while still critiquing Moltmann for too strong an emphasis

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helpful summary of Moltmann’s eschatological outlook for the Christian faith is found early in Theology of Hope. From first to last, and not merely in the epilogue, Christianity is eschatology, is hope, forward looking and forward moving, and therefore also revolutionizing and transforming the present. The eschatological is not one element of Christianity, but it is the medium of the Christian faith as such, the key to which everything in it is set, the glow that suffuses everything here in the dawn of an expected new day. For Christian faith lives from the raising of the crucified Christ, and strains after the promises of the universal future of Christ. Eschatology is the passionate suffering and passionate longing kindled by the Messiah. Hence eschatology cannot really be only a part of Christian doctrine. Rather, the eschatological outlook is characteristic of all Christian proclamation, of every Christian existence, and of the whole Church.43

Christ’s resurrection is God’s vindication of Jesus, God’s ultimate rejection of all forms of domination and oppression, and God’s promise of a future of justice, beginning with the promise to Abraham.44 Jesus has been raised by the power of the Holy Spirit, and he lives in the eternity of God.45 Christ’s resurrection is on the future, at the expense of a present, realized eschatology. See Lewis, Between Cross and Resurrection, 65–66, n. 33. For the present study’s argument that Pannenberg’s Grundzüge der Christologie can be considered as his theologia crucis, see Chapter 1, nn. 17–21 above. Moltmann’s critiques notwithstanding, Pannenberg’s Grundzüge der Christologie remains important for the present study overall because of James Cone’s reception and critique of this book, in terms of arguing for the dialectical incorporation of both a Christology from above and a Christology from below related to Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, even as Cone is likely situated overall within a Christology from below. See especially Chapter 8, nn. 31 and 73 below. 43 Moltmann, Theology of Hope, 16. “Das Christentum ist ganz und gar und nicht nur im Anfang Eschatologie, ist Hoffnung, Aussicht und Ausrichtung nach vorne, darum auch Aufbruch und Wandlung der Gegenwart. Das Eschatologie ist nicht etwas am Christentum, sondern es ist schlechterdings das Medium des christlichen Glaubens, der Ton, auf den in ihm alles gestimmt ist, die Farbe der Morgenröte eines erwarteten neuen Tages, in die hier alles getaucht ist. Denn der christliche Glaube lebt von der Auferweckung des gekreuzigten Christus und streckt sich aus nach den Verheißungen der universalen Zukunft Christi. Eschatologie ist das Leiden und die Leidenschaft, die am Messias entstehen. Darum kann die Eschatologie eigentlich kein Teilstück christlicher Lehre sein. Eschatologisch ausgerichtet ist vielmehr der Charakter aller christlichen Verkündigung, jeder christlichen Existenz und der ganzen Kirche.” Moltmann, Theologie der Hoffnung, 12. 44 Moltmann, Theology of Hope, 148–54, 203–8; Moltmann, Theologie der Hoffnung, 134–40, 185–89. 45 Moltmann emphasizes the “cosmic presence of the Spirit” in relation to panentheism in his later Systematic Contributions to Theology, but not the “third mode” of Christ’s presence as can be found in Luther’s sacramental theology in the Confession Concerning Christ’s Supper (1528, LW 37: 161–372; WA 26, 261–509). See Jürgen Moltmann, God in Creation: A New Theology of Creation and the Spirit of God, trans. Margaret S. Kohl (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1989), 98–104; Jürgen Moltmann, Gott in der Schöpfung: Ökologische Schöpfungslehre (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1985), 110–16. Further, compare Moltmann’s understanding of the cosmic Spirit with Luther’s assertion against Huldrych Zwingli that Christ can be present in the Lord’s Supper in his full humanity because “the right hand of God is everywhere,” from the Marburg Colloquy of 1529 (LW 38: 3–89; WA 30 (3), 92–159). The present chapter can be understood as concerned in part with exploring how Luther’s “third mode” of Christ’s presence in the Lord’s Supper might be

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then the first fruits of the resurrection of the dead, and is the springboard of the New Creation with which humankind is freed from the terrors of death and destruction to address and combat injustice in all its forms. Further, hope for new life and a future lived in God when one knows, has known, or will know deep despair is possible because Christ is the divine Brother of outcasts and those who suffer.46 However, the hope expressed in Christ’s presence amid suffering is only possible because the One who was crucified is risen.47 The resurrection serves as consolation to all who suffer, because not only does Christ stand in solidarity with all those who suffer, but he also works through all people and things that combat injustice, domination, and oppression. Therefore, Moltmann argues for the divine promise of the risen Christ and resurrection hope as the “enemy of death and of a world that puts up with death”: The raising of Christ is not merely a consolation to him in a life that is full of distress and doomed to die, but it is also God’s contradiction to suffering and death, of humiliation and offense, and of the wickedness of evil. Hope finds in Christ not only a consolation in suffering, but also the protest of the divine promise against suffering. If Paul calls death the ‘last enemy’ (1 Cor. 15.26), then the opposite is also true: that the risen Christ, and with him the resurrection hope, must be declared to be the enemy of death and of a world that puts up with death.48 combined with Moltmann’s emphasis on panentheism for a sapiential theologia crucis related to “Deep Incarnation” as “Christocentric, Trinitarian Panentheism.” Said Christocentric, Trinitarian Panentheism arguably corresponds to a Christological critique of the two kingdoms as found in Bonhoeffer’s Ethics and in the Barmen Declaration and is a possible hermeneutical framework related to a Trinitarian theology of Holy Saturday for political-ethical action in the world as argued for in Cone. Cf. Jennings, “Interpreting Luther’s Theologia Crucis Eschatologically as Deep Incarnation,” 273, and n. 22 above. 46 See Moltmann, The Way of Jesus Christ, 149; Moltmann, Der Weg Jesu Christi, 169. By emphasizing Jesus’s brotherhood with outcasts and those who suffer, Moltmann notes a difference between himself and Karl Barth in 4.2, Paragraph 64.3, of the Church Dogmatics. Barth understands Jesus as the “royal person” (königlichen Menschen), but Moltmann sees this description of Jesus applying only to his exultation and completed only in his parousia. Moltmann thinks Barth’s understanding of the earthly Jesus as the “royal person” leads to a christologia gloriae. See Moltmann, Way of Jesus Christ, 149, n. 116; Moltmann, Weg Jesu Christi, 169, n. 116. However, perhaps this charge against Barth is too strong, and the difference here between Barth and Moltmann is a difference in emphasis, corresponding to Barth’s overall preference for the Gospel of John and Moltmann’s overall preference for the Gospel of Mark. A theologia crucis can be found in both Gospels, with John containing a Christology from above, and Mark a Christology from below. 47 Moltmann, Theology of Hope, 165–72; Moltmann, Theologie der Hoffnung, 150–56. 48 Moltmann, Theology of Hope, 21. “Die Auferweckung Christi ist ihr nicht nur ein Trost in einem angefochtenen und zum Sterben verurteilten Leben, sondern auch der Widerspruch Gottes gegen das Leiden und Sterben, gegen die Erniedrigung und Beleidigung, gegen die Bosheit des Bösen. Christus ist der Hoffnung nicht nur Trost im Leiden, sondern auch der Protest der Verheißung Gottes gegen das Leiden. Wird von Paulus der Tod der ‘letzte Feind’ genannt (1 Kor.15, 26), so muß umgekehrt der auferstandene Christus und mit ihm die Auferstehungshoffnung zum Feind des Todes und einer Welt, die sich mit ihm einrichtet, erklärt werden.“ Moltmann, Theologie der Hoffnung, 17.

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This God of promise is a God of promise for humans and creation in this world as well as the next.49 Moltmann’s eschatology of hope causes Christian faith and theology to become world-focused, and argues for how Christians can stand in solidarity with contemporary justice movements of society. Thus, Christians protest suffering through an eschatology of hope, because Christ is “the divine promise against suffering.”50 Finally, Moltmann’s eschatology of hope is grounded on the decisively bodily resurrection of the crucified Jesus Christ as the basis for the hope of the new creation, which becomes clear in his later Christology, The Way of Jesus Christ.51 Moltmann writes: Raising means being raised bodily, or it is not raising at all. The early Christian faith in the risen Christ means the whole Christ in person, body and soul: Christ’s resurrection is bodily resurrection, or it is not a resurrection at all. The Christian faith cannot be spiritualized either, without its being destroyed. Christ’s resurrection means that the whole bodily Christ ‘lives.’ It is not merely his spirit which continues to be efficacious and his cause which goes on. For it is only in the presence of ‘the living Christ’ that his spirit is efficacious and that his cause goes on. Christ’s ‘appearances’ were bodily appearances. If they were not, no one could have identified him from the marks of the nails, and he could not have broken bread with his friends. He would have appeared to the women and to the disciples only as a ghost. Finally, Christians expect that at the universal parousia of Christ their mortal bodies will be made ‘alive for evermore.’ The expectation of parousia is a bodily, earthly, ‘natural’ or material expectation. Unless it is this it can provide no foundation for the hope of the new creation.52 49

Cf. Moltmann, Theology of Hope, 143–48; Moltmann, Theologie der Hoffnung, 129–34. See above, n. 48. 51 This point is emphasized to show another difference between Jürgen Moltmann and Rudolf Bultmann. For Bultmann, Christ was risen into the kerygma, but this understanding of resurrection did not necessarily involve a decisively bodily resurrection, in which an empty grave is implied. See Brach S. Jennings, “Rudolf Bultmann as Theologian of Radical Trust in the Gospel,” Currents in Theology and Mission 45, no. 4 (2018): 35–40; 37–39. There is, then, an important commonality between Jürgen Moltmann and Wolfhart Pannenberg regarding the bodily resurrection of Christ, despite Moltmann’s criticism of Pannenberg for not emphasizing the resurrection of the crucified Christ strongly enough. See n. 42 above. These arguments are important to consider regarding James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, wherein Cone argues in God of the Oppressed that Jesus is present with the poor, bearing their pain upon himself in a decisively non-docetic way, using Christological language reminiscent of Bonhoeffer’s Christology lectures. See James H. Cone, God of the Oppressed, Revised ed. (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1997), 124, and Chapter 6, n. 48 above. 52 Moltmann, The Way of Jesus Christ: Christology in Messianic Dimensions, trans. Margaret S. Kohl (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993), 256–57. “Auferweckung ist leibliche Auferweckung oder sie ist keine Auferweckung. Der urchristliche Glaube an den auferstandenen Christus meint den ganzen Christus in Person nach Leib und Seele: Christi Auferstehung ist leibliche Auferstehung oder sie ist keine Auferstehung. Auch der christliche Glaube läßt sich nicht vergeistigen, ohne daß er zerstört wird. Die Auferstehung Christi heißt, daß der ganze, leibhaftige Christus ‘lebt’ und nicht etwa nur sein Geist weiterwirkt und seine Sache weitergeht. Nur in der Gegenwart des ‘lebendigen’ Christus wirkt sein Geist und geht seine Sache weiter. Die ‘Erscheinungen’ Christi waren leibliche Erscheinungen, sonst hätte niemand ihn an seinen Nägelmalen identifizieren 50

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By emphasizing the bodily resurrection of Christ as the “foundation for the hope of the new creation,” Moltmann shows how his theology is concrete and oriented toward the world, while also remaining rooted in what he argues is the biblical view of Christ’s resurrection.53 That Christ’s resurrection is not only spiritual, but also bodily, also means Moltmann understands bodies and materiality to be important and beloved by God.54 The resurrection of Christ, however, remains eschatological promise for Moltmann, who does not believe the resurrection can be proven, due to the violence and suffering still present in the world. The Christian belief in the resurrection remains dependent on its verification through the eschatological raising of all the dead. As along as this has not been manifested, the belief is still only hope. But in this eschatological context the raising of Jesus speaks for itself. It speaks its own language of promise and well-founded hope, but it is not yet the language of accomplished fact. As long as the facts that determine this world are the facts of violence and suffering, the world is not able to furnish proof of the resurrection of life and the annihilation of death. In this ‘unredeemed world’ the resurrection of Christ is still dependent on its eschatological verification through the new creation of the world.55

For Moltmann, then, the kingdom of God has been revealed in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ is still to come in fullness in the future when all the dead are raised at the Last Day, and creation is made whole through the complete indwelling of God where God will be “all in all” (1 Cor. 15:28, NRSV ). An eschatological expectation between “already” and “not yet” can be read in Moltmann’s understanding of the bodily resurrection of the crucified Christ, an expectation related to his radicalization of Luther’s understanding of justification, wherein this doctrine is transformed to justification for victims and perpetrators of injustice.56 und er hätte nicht das Brot mit ihnen brechen können. Er wäre den Frauen und Jüngern nur als ein ‘Gespenst’ erschienen. Endlich erwarten Christen von der universalen Parusie Christi die ewige Lebendigmachung ihrer sterblichen Leiber. Die Parusieerwartung ist eine leibliche, irdische und natürliche Erwartung, sonst kann sie nicht die Hoffnung auf die neue Schöpfung begründen.” Jürgen Moltmann, Der Weg Jesu Christi: Christologie in messianischen Dimensionen (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1989), 279–80. 53 Ibid. 54 The emphasis of bodies and materiality being important to God is related to Moltmann’s radicalization of the doctrine of justification for victims and perpetrators, which will be explored below. 55 Moltmann, The Way of Jesus Christ, 223. “Der christliche Auferstehungsglaube bleibt auf seine Verifikation durch die eschatologische Auferweckung aller Toten angewiesen. Solange diese noch nicht in Erscheinung getreten ist, so lange bleibt er Hoffnung. In diesem eschatologischen Kontext aber spricht die Auferweckung Jesu ihre eigene Sprache. Sie ist die Sprache der Verheißung und der begründeten Hoffnung, aber sie ist noch nicht die Sprache der vollendeten Tatsachen. Solange diese Welt von den Tatsachen der Gewalt und des Leidens bestimmt wird, ist sie für die Auferstehung des Lebens und für die Vernichtung des Todes nicht beweisfähig. In dieser ‘unerlösten Welt’ bleibt die Auferstehung Christi auf die eschatologische Verifikation durch die Neuschöpfung der Welt angewiesen.” Moltmann, Der Weg Jesu Christi, 245. 56 Moltmann’s eschatology as examined in this section could admittedly be critiqued for

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6. The Unfinished Reformation for Victims and Perpetrators of Injustice The texts closely read in relation to the theme of theologia crucis throughout the present study have thus far attempted to show how Martin Luther’s theologia crucis relates to justification for guilty sinners, Karl Barth’s theologia crucis offers a consoling doctrine of election from a Trinitarian, Christocentric standpoint, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s theologia crucis turns a theologia crucis toward the suffering of God in the world. Incorporating and expanding upon these themes, a transformed theologia crucis through Moltmann’s Crucified God argues for the Triune God’s solidarity amid suffering, catastrophe, and destruction, in order that God may then be the power that vindicates the victims of history and puts to right the evil actions of perpetrators of injustice. Moltmann’s essay, “The Unfinished Reformation,” states what he found missing in Luther’s understanding of justification in terms of the victims of sin.57 There is something missing in the centre of Reformation theology, which is the doctrine of justification …. up to now, we know in the church and in the public sphere how we ought to deal with perpetrators, but the misery of the victims leaves us perplexed. In the case of the perpetrators, we ask how they came to perform their disgusting actions; but in the case of the victims, we do not look for ways that would allow them to emerge from their shame and disgrace. In the church and in the public sphere, we are oriented to the perpetrators and we forget the victims.58

being too one-sidedly oriented toward the future, at the expense of a more realized eschatology (see Alan Lewis’s critique, referenced in n. 42 above). Hans Urs von Balthasar sharply critiqued Moltmann for this futurist eschatology, even accusing Moltmann of being too Jewish in his Theology of Hope and related early writings, and argued instead for a Johannine, realized eschatology. See Hans Urs von Balthasar, Theodramatik IV: Das Endspiel (Einsiedeln: Johannes, 1983), 148–59. Von Balthasar’s arguably overstated critiques notwithstanding, Moltmann has recently expanded his eschatology to include a more realized dimension, in light of his wife Elisabeth Moltmann-Wendel’s death in 2016. See Jürgen Moltmann, Auferstanden in das ewige Leben: Über das Sterben und Erwachen einer lebendigen Seele (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 2020). It is due to Moltmann’s recent turn to a more realized eschatology that the present study has used the phrase “eschatological expectation between the ‘already’ and ‘not yet’” in relation to the crucified Christ’s bodily resurrection. 57 Jürgen Moltmann, “The Unfinished Reformation: Ecumenical Answers to Unresolved Problems,” in Jürgen Moltmann, Spirit of Hope: Theology for a World in Peril, trans. Margaret Kohl and Brian McNeil (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2019), 123–38. The original German essay, “Die unvollendete Reformation: Ungelöste Probleme – ökumenische Antworten” is found in Jürgen Moltmann, Christliche Erneuerungen in schwierigen Zeiten (München: Claudius, 2019), 12–39. 58 Moltmann, Spirit of Hope, 130–31. “Im Zentrum der reformatorischen Theologie, der Rechtfertigungslehre, fehlt etwas.… Bis heute wissen wir in Kirche und Öffentlichkeit, wie wir mit den Tätern umgehen sollen, aber vor dem Elend der Opfer sind wir ratlos. Bei den Tätern fragen wir, wie sie zu ihren abscheulichen Täten kamen, bei den Opfern suchen wir nicht nach Wegen, wie sie aus ihrer Scham und Schande herauskommen. In Kirche und Öffentlichkeit sind

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Luther thought primarily in terms of (perpetrator-oriented) sin and grace, Law and Gospel, and did not address the vindication of innocent victims of catastrophe(s) and the repentance of perpetrators who act unjustly against their victims. By expanding justification to include innocent victimhood, Moltmann shows the Triune God is a God of solidarity with the victims of systemic sin who puts to right the actions of perpetrators of injustice.59 In an essay from 1991 about justification for victims and perpetrators, Moltmann similarly emphasizes that Christ suffers with those who are exploited by systemic sin, and is the liberator of the victimized, showing how God is at work in the world bringing righteousness, wholeness, and peace to the victims and perpetrators of an unjust world. God is righteous because he executes justice for men and women without rights and puts the unjust right. He executes justice for those who suffer violence and he saves through his righteousness. Through this righteousness God creates that shared peace which at the same time means his true life: Shalom60

Returning to his “Unfinished Reformation” essay, Moltmann understands justification for victims as vindication before God. Victims tell their truth, and expose the injustices done to them. This process involves three steps: telling the truth, in which victims “need a free space where their suffering is acknowledged, in order that they can scream their pains out,” “lifting their heads to God” who is the source for a “conversion from self-pity and self-hatred,” and forgiveness,

wir taterorientiert und opfervergessen.” Moltmann, Christliche Erneuerungen, 25. Emphases in original. 59 A pertinent exposition of Moltmann’s understanding of justification as a radicalization of Luther’s Freedom of a Christian in relation to victims and perpetrators of injustice can be found in an untranslated essay from 2018. See Jürgen Moltmann, “Luthers ‘Die Freiheit Eines Christenmenschen’  – Damals und Heute  – Für Täter und Opfer der Sünde,” Communio Viatorum 60, no. 2 (2018): 126–38. See especially the following excerpts: “Luther hatte vom ‘fröhlichen Wechsel’ zwischen den Sünden der Seele und der Gerechtigkeit Christi gesprochen. Christi Passion ist aber zuerst eine tröstliche Solidarität mit den Opfern der Sünde” (135). “Er richtet die Täter im Angesicht ihrer Opfer, die bei ihm sind. Das ist die tröstliche Solidaritätschristologie, die unsere christlichen Traditionen lange Zeit übersehen haben. Wollte man Luthers Sprache übernehmen, so könnte man sagen: Durch den Glauben vereinigt sich die verletze, erniedrigte, verlassene Seele mit dem verletzten, erniedrigten und verlassenen Christus und Christus nimmt die gequälte Seele in seine Arme und nimmt auf sich ihren Schmerz und ihre Traurigkeit, um sie hineinzunehmen in seine Auferstehung und sie in der Fülle des Lebens selig zu machen” (136). 60 Moltmann, “Justification for Victims and Perpetrators,” in History and the Triune God, 44– 56; 56. “Gott ist gerecht, weil er rechtlosen Menschen Recht schafft und ungerechte Menschen zurechtbringt. Er schafft Recht denen, die Gewalt leiden, und er rettet durch seine Gerechtigkeit. Durch diese Gerechtigkeit schafft Gott jenen gemeinsamen Frieden, der zugleich das wahre Leben bedeutet: Schalom.” Moltmann, “Gerechtigkeit für Opfer und Täter,” in In der Geschichte des dreieinigen Gottes, 88.

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which is the releasing of feelings of vengeance.61 “When we forgive our debtors, we do good not only to them, but also to our own selves: we overcome the evil that has made its way into us. Forgiveness is also an act whereby victims heal themselves.”62 Perpetrators are tormented in their consciences, or at least have a restless and unfulfilled life that comes with the brutality of their crimes. The promise of the resurrection says Jesus Christ’s future means the perpetrators will be restored to their full humanity and will turn away from their inhumane practices.63 God’s grace in Christ is still paramount here, but seen through God’s wounded love.64 Moltmann’s expansion of justification for both victims and perpetrators shows that God loves both victims and perpetrators. The Holy Spirit thus puts to right what the perpetrators of injustice have done, through a three-step process corresponding to the three-step process for the justification for victims: 1) Perpetrators’ confession of wrongdoing against their victims, 2) A metanoia from their evil actions toward their victims, and 3) A reparation “only when they do everything possible to remove the damage they have done.” Said reparation does not remove the damage done to the victims, but is “the beginning of a new community between perpetrators and victims.”65 Finally, whereas Gerhard Forde believed the theologia crucis and justification by faith presuppose Christ’s resurrection, Moltmann gives explicit attention to Christ’s bodily resurrection in his understanding of justification for victims and perpetrators.66 For Moltmann, Christ’s raising from the dead through the Holy Spirit to the glory of God the Father is the basis for Christians protesting against death and suffering in all its forms.67 Since the resurrected Christ is also the crucified Christ, God’s solidarity and liberation of the victims of history is shown in Christ’s bodily resurrection into the coming glory of God with marks from 61 Moltmann, Spirit of Hope, 133. “Sie brauchen einen Freiraum der Anerkennung ihres Leidens, damit sie ihre Schmerzen herausschreien können.” Moltmann, Christliche Erneuerungen, 30. 62 Moltmann, Spirit of Hope, 133–34; 134. “Wann wir unseren Schuldigern vergeben, nun wir nicht nur ihnen, sondern auch uns selbst etwas Gutes: Wir überwinden das Böse, das in uns eingedrungen ist. Vergebung ist auch ein Akt der Selbstheilung der Opfer.” Moltmann, Christliche Erneuerungen, 29–31: 31. 63 Cf. Moltmann, The Spirit of Life, 132–38; Moltmann, Der Geist des Lebens, 145–52. 64 The notion of God’s “wounded love” relates to Moltmann’s work with the suffering of the divine Shechina in the Hebrew scriptures. See Moltmann, Crucified God, 270–73 / Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 259–63; Moltmann, Trinity and the Kingdom, 20–25 / Moltmann, Trinität und Reich Gottes, 40–45; Jürgen Moltmann, The Coming of God: Christian Eschatology, trans. Margaret S. Kohl (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996), 317–21 / Jürgen Moltmann, Das Kommen Gottes: Christliche Eschatologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1995), 348–51. 65 Moltmann, Spirit of Hope, 132–33; Moltmann, Christliche Erneuerung, 27–29. Moltmann lists the South African Truth Commission as an example of this process working out concretely. 66 See Forde, On Being a Theologian of the Cross, 1–23. 67 Moltmann, Theology of Hope, 329–39; Moltmann, Theologie der Hoffnung, 304–13.

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the nails in his hands and the spear in his side.68 Therefore, the wounded Lord is the One who takes the pain of the “crucified people of history” into himself, and who provides a future for those who have been victimized.69 Christ is their justification, because he is profound consolation amid suffering and catastrophe, and the hope for the future since he has been raised bodily from the dead.70

7. Jürgen Moltmann’s Universalist Eschatology as Hope in God’s Trinitarian Future for Victims and Perpetrators of Injustice: A Constructive Development71 Remembering that the cross and resurrection of Christ are intertwined throughout Moltmann’s theology, we can see how a theologia crucis becomes future oriented for victims and perpetrators of injustice, when we consider The Crucified God in relation to Moltmann’s later eschatology, The Coming of God: Chris68

Moltmann, The Way of Jesus Christ, 256–57; Moltmann, Der Weg Jesu Christi, 279–80. The phrase “crucified people of history” comes from Ignacio Ellacuria. See Tesfai, ed., The Scandal of a Crucified World, 10–12; 10. 70 Thus, Moltmann’s theology is compatible with liberation theologies, which is important to emphasize in relation to the present study’s concern with a transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. Miller Smith argues for Moltmann’s compatibility with liberation theologies: “The incarnation is realized completely by the Son, who takes on himself the full judgement for the guilt of humanity, at the moment of abandonment and death of Christ. It is in this moment of godforsaken-ness and mortality that the Son is in full solidarity with humanity and that ‘at-one-ment’ between God and humankind is achieved. Likewise, Jesus proves himself to be at one with the Father in the Garden of Gethsemane, which brings us to the point of Moltmann’s Christology that has been widely appropriated by liberation theologians worldwide: it is precisely where God seems to be most absent that God is most present. As Elie Wiesel contended that God himself hung on the gallows of Auschwitz, so Moltmann avers that God himself hangs on the cross outside Jerusalem: the crucified God is in solidarity with God’s crucified people.” Miller Smith, “Cult Books Revisited,” 361. Regarding Latin American liberation theology, Moltmann’s positions in The Crucified God were especially important to Jon Sobrino in his early work, as well as Leonardo Boff. See Jon Sobrino, Christology at the Crossroads (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1978), and Leonardo Boff, Trinity and Society (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1988). 71 Nigel G. Wright argues that theological universalism is a theme throughout Moltmann’s theology. While Wright’s argument could be questioned through a study on Moltmann’s theology in relation to the theme of universal salvation in general, and particularly as Moltmann’s theology relates to Christoph Blumhardt, the present study is instead concerned with the theme of Trinitarian, Christocentric universalism as it relates to Moltmann’s eschatologia crucis in the penultimate volume of his Systematic Contributions to Theology, Moltmann, The Coming of God  / Moltmann, Das Kommen Gottes, as well as Moltmann’s Crucified God. So, Wright: “Universal salvation is implicit in all Moltmann’s theology from the beginning even if it does not always surface. It becomes most explicit however in his final ‘systematic contribution to theology’ entitled The Coming of God: Christian Eschatology. Here he devotes twenty pages (235–255) to the theme under the heading, ‘The Restoration of All Things’.” Nigel G. Wright, “Universalism in the Theology of Jürgen Moltmann,” Evangelical Quarterly 84, no. 1 (2012): 33–39. 69

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tian Eschatology. The future is comprised of God’s faithfulness, despite human sin and rebelliousness, because of the new creation beginning in the crucified Christ’s resurrection (2 Cor. 5:19). God’s gift of new life in the resurrection of the crucified Christ is an eschatological act done in the grace of God for both victim and perpetrator, unrighteous and self-righteous. If God raised this dishonoured man in his coming righteousness, it follows that in this crucified figure he manifests his true righteousness, the right of the unconditional grace which makes righteous the unrighteous and those without rights …. It shows the cross of Christ as the unique and once-for-all anticipation of the great world judgment in the favour of those who otherwise could not survive it. Thus resurrection is no longer the ontic presupposition of the accomplishment of the final judgment on the dead and the living, but is already itself the new creation. So the Pauline resurrection kerygma contains within itself the proclamation of the new creation. In that case righteousness no longer means the rewarding of the righteous with eternal life and the punishing of the unrighteous with eternal condemnation, but the law of grace for the unrighteous and self-righteous alike.72

Moltmann also emphasizes the hope of universal salvation, coming from the particularity of the crucified Christ’s resurrection. Moltmann writes in The Coming of God: “The true Christian foundation for the hope of universal salvation is the theology of the cross, and the realistic consequence of the theology of the cross can only be the restoration of all things.”73 Moltmann’s emphasis on the particularity of the crucified Christ’s resurrection as the beginning of a universal new creation builds off of Paul in 1 Cor. 15: 21–28 and develops Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre, showing that the scandal of the cross is the basis for a universal hope.74 Because Christ suffered the full extent of sin, death, the devil, and hell on 72 Moltmann, Crucified God, 176. “Hat Gott diesen Entrechteten in seine kommende Gerechtigkeit auferweckt, so bedeutet das umgekehrt, daß er durch diesen Gekreuzigten seine wahre Gerechtigkeit offenbar macht, nämlich das Recht der unbedingten Gnade, die Ungerechte und Rechtlose gerecht macht …. Sie läßt das Kreuz Christi als einmalige und ein für allemal gültige Vorwegnahme des großen Weltgerihtes sehen zugunsten derer, die in ihm anders nicht bestehen können. Auferstehung ist darum nicht mehr die ontische Voraussetzung für den Vollzug des Endgerichtes an Toten und Lebendigen, sondern ist schon selbst die neue Schöpfung. Das paulinische Auferstehungskerygma enthält darum die Verkündigung der neuen Schöpfung in sich. Gerechtigkeit heißt dann nicht mehr Belohnung der Gerechten mit ewigem Leben und Bestrafung der Ungerechten mit ewiger Verdammnis, sondern Recht der Gnade für Ungerechte und Selbstgerechte.” Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott, 163. 73 Moltmann, Coming of God, 251. “Die wahre christliche Begründung der Hoffnung auf Allversöhnung ist die Kreuzestheologie, und die einzig realistische Konsequenz aus der Kreuzestheologie ist die Wiederbringung aller Dinge.” Moltmann, Das Kommen Gottes, 279. Italics in original. This excerpt is further evidence for the presence of traces of a theologia crucis throughout Moltmann’s theology, given that Coming of God was his final book written as an active faculty member at the University of Tübingen in 1994. 74 See “‘Ich lehre sie nicht, aber auch nicht nicht’: Barth’s Erwählungslehre and the Question of Universal Salvation,” in Chapter 5, pp. 127–30 of the present study for Barth’s “reverent agnosticism” about the question of universal salvation in relation to the Pauline theology of 1 Cor. 15:21–28, and the argument that Moltmann’s theology is a realistic consequence of a transformed theologia crucis from CD 2.2. Evidence for this claim is found in Moltmann’s reception

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the cross, he who is the risen Lord is the bringer of new life and hope amid all injustices. Thus, it becomes possible to argue that both Barth’s Erwählungslehre and Luther’s A Sermon on Preparing to Die are radicalized through Moltmann’s Pauline eschatologia crucis in The Coming of God: Luther did not believe that hell was ‘a special place.’ It was not a place anywhere in the world, not even in the underworld. It was an existential experience, the experience of God’s anger and curse on sin and godless being. Christ suffered this hell on the cross in order to reconcile this world, damned as it is, with God. Here Luther is following Paul, for whom Christ ‘was made sin’ (2 Cor. 5:21) for our reconciliation, and according to Gal. 3:13 even ‘became a curse for us’. Those are the real ‘pangs of death’ (Acts 2:24) which God ‘loosed’ through the raising of Christ from the dead.75

For Moltmann, then, Christian hope rooted in a Trinitarian eschatologia crucis confesses that God in Christ will ultimately have the last word in relation to systemic sin.76 Christ gave himself up for lost in order to save all who are lost, and to bring them home. He suffered the torments of hell, in order to throw hell open, so that these torments are no longer without hope of an end. Because he suffered hell, he gave hope where otherwise ‘all hope must be abandoned’, as Dante said. Because Christ was brought out of hell, the gates of hell are open, and its walls broken down. Through his sufferings Christ has destroyed hell. Since his resurrection from his hellish death on the cross there is no longer any such thing as being ‘damned for all eternity’.77

and critique of Barth’s Erwählungslehre in The Crucified God. See especially n. 2 above and n. 82 below. 75 Moltmann, The Coming of God, 252. “Luther glaubte nicht, daß die Hölle ‘ein sonderlicher Ort’ sei. Sie sei kein Weltort, auch nicht in der Unterwelt, sondern eine Existenzerfahrung, die Erfahrung des Zornes und des Fluches Gottes über Sünde und gottloses Wesen. Diese ‘Hölle’ hat Christus am Kreuz erlitten, um diese verdammte Welt mit Gott zu versöhnen. Er folgt damit Paulus, für den 2 Kor 5,21 Christus um unserer Versöhnung willen ‘zur Sünde gemacht wurde’ und nach Gal 3,13 sogar zum ‘Fluch für uns’ wurde. Das sind die wirklichen ‘Schmerzen des Todes’ (Apg 2,24), die Gott durch die Auferweckung Christi von den Toten aufgelöst hat.” Moltmann, Das Kommen Gottes, 281. Cf. Chapter 2, n. 66 above. 76 Wright summaries aptly Moltmann’s description of the history of the church’s rejection of universal salvation: “Moltmann is clear that mainline theology has consistently rejected Origen’s doctrine of apokatastasis, the hope for the final reconciliation of all things, including of the devil, and has tended to side with Augustine’s view that out of the mass of sinful humanity only a limited number would be redeemed. He argues that when universalism re-emerged in the 16th and 17th centuries it did so from a surprising source, not out of Anabaptism or liberalism or humanism as might be assumed but out of Pietism. Specifically he cites the biblicism of Johann Albrecht Bengel (1687–1752) and his pupil F. C. Oetinger (1702–1782) as key articulators of this hope …. This tradition within Pietism was carried forward significantly by the revivalists Johann Christoph Blumhardt (1805–1880) and his son Christoph Friedrich Blumhardt (1842–1919) in their confession of universal hope, and by means of them was passed on to a number of twentieth century theologians and in particular to Karl Barth.” Wright, “Universalism in the Theology of Jürgen Moltmann,” 34. 77 Moltmann, Coming of God, 253–54. “Christus gab sich selbst verloren, um alle Verlorenen zu suchen und heimzubringen. Er elitt die Qualen der Hölle, um die Hölle zu öffnen, damit diese

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God demonstrates the costliest pain, love, and grace in the death of Jesus, and pledges to be the divine liberator of all who are victimized, because Christ was an innocent victim as well. Moltmann thus argues for God’s solidarity with the victims of injustice, and for God’s restoration to full humanity of the perpetrators of injustice, through the bodily resurrection of the crucified Christ.78 Overall, Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis argues that God’s grace in Jesus Christ is grace and all-reconciling love for everyone or God cannot be said to be the God of grace who will be all in all at the last day (1 Cor. 15:28). To make Christ’s death on the cross the foundation for universal salvation and ‘the restoration of all things’ is to surmount the old dispute between the universal theology of grace and the particularist theology of faith. The all-reconciling love is not what Bonhoeffer called ‘cheap grace.’ It is grace through and through, and grace is always and only free and for nothing. But it is born out of the profound suffering of God and is the costliest thing that God can give: himself in his Son, who has become our Brother, and who draws us through our hells. It is costliest grace.79

By arguing for God’s cost to God’s self in the Christ event, Moltmann seeks to avoid accusations of what Bonhoeffer called “cheap grace” (and, one might say from a Lutheran theological perspective, accusations of antinomianism).80 His Qualen nicht mehr aussichtslos sind. Weil er die Hölle durchlitten hat, gibt er dort Hoffnung, wo man sonst ‘alle Hoffnung fahren lassen’ muß (Dante). Weil Christus aus der Hölle herausgeführt worden ist, sind die Tore der Hölle offen und ihre Mauern zerbrochen. Durch seine Leiden hat Christus die Hölle zerstört. Seit seiner Auferweckung von seinem höllischen Tod am Kreuz gibt es kein ‘Verdammt-in-alle-Ewigkeit’ mehr.” Moltmann, Das Kommen Gottes, 282. 78 This notion of the death of Christ as the “costliest grace” of God can be read as a theological development of Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre in relation to Christ bearing humankind’s sin. See Barth, CD 2.2, 749; KD 2.2, 837. Loewe argues for Moltmann’s theologia crucis in general as a development of Barth’s theologia crucis, providing a helpful summary of both theologians, although ultimately remaining critical toward their respective theological conclusions and charging both theologians with “mystification” as regards methodology. See Loewe, “Two Theologians of the Cross,” 510–39. 79 Moltmann, Coming of God, 254. “Mit der Begründung der Allversöhnung und der Wiederbringung aller Dinge im Kreuzestod Christi ist der alte Streit zwischen universaler Gnadentheologie und partikularer Glaubenstheologie überwunden. Die allversöhnende Liebe ist keine ‘billige Gnade’ (D. Bonhoeffer). Sie ist ganz und gar Gnade, und Gnade gibt es immer nur ‘umsonst’ gratis. Sie ist aber aus dem tiefen Leiden Gottes geboren und ist das Teuerste, das Gott geben kann: sich selbst in seinem Sohn, der unser Bruder geworden ist und uns durch unsere Höllen reißt. Sie ist teuerste Gnade.” Moltmann, Das Kommen Gottes, 283. 80 Oswald Bayer’s critique of so-called “modern antinomianism” in relation to Luther’s theology is important to note: “According to Luther, what makes a theologian a theologian is being able to correctly distinguish law and gospel. The issue addressed by this statement is not recognized with utter seriousness today or is even related ‘to the time-bound form of the Reformation and its theology’ [citing Wolfhart Pannenberg]. But it continues to raise a ruckus in the midst of the problematic relationship between reason and faith, faith and politics, in the assessment of evil and its power – including the question about whether there is a chance that evil can be overcome – as well as in the question about the future of humanity. As in the past, and in the present as well, the issue deals with foundational questions of anthropology, ethics, and eschatology. What raises a ruckus needs to be clarified. The following thesis seeks to give

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stress on the universal restoration of all things and the hope of the new creation is tied to the particularity of God’s self-giving costly grace in Jesus Christ.81 From the particularity of the Christ event comes the universal hope for new creation and the restoration of all things. Particularity and universality are then connected in the bodily resurrection of the crucified Christ from the dead, in relation to expanding the doctrine of justification for victims and perpetrators of injustice. Thus, through Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis centered in The Crucified God, a sapiential theologia crucis is now transformed to stress the Triune God’s eschatological future for victims and perpetrators of injustice.

8. Comparing Jürgen Moltmann and Karl Barth It is now appropriate to consider theological comparisons between Jürgen Moltmann and Karl Barth, given that Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis centered in The Crucified God is arguably a development, critique, and radicalization of Barth’s Erwählungslehre.82 Barth’s Christological re-framing of the support to such clarification: In its universalizing of the gospel, the modern age is antinomian, but at the same time it is increasingly nomistic.” Oswald Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation, trans. Thomas H. Trapp (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008), 65. Italics in original. However, Moltmann’s theology is arguably neither antinomian nor nomistic, but is instead an eschatological development of Karl Barth’s reversal of the Lutheran Law-Gospel sequence to Gospel-Law. See n. 16 above. 81 Moltmann rejects “double predestination” in the sense of some people being predestined to salvation and others to damnation. Here we can see a connection to Barth’s Erwählungslehre, as well as a radicalizing of it for victims and perpetrators. This rejection of “double predestination” in both Moltmann and Barth relates to the two theologians emphasizing God’s hiddenness only as found in the cross, in a continuity with Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation, said hiddenness of which is also found in Bonhoeffer’s later theology, but not God’s hiddenness behind the cross as found in Luther’s De servo arbitrio. See “God’s Second Form of Hiddenness and the Eschatological lumen gloriae: A Constructive Development,” pp. 94–98 in Chapter 4 of the present study, and Wright, “Universalism in the Theology of Jürgen Moltmann,” 36–37. Particularity and universality around the Christ event for victims and perpetrators of injustice is also important for understanding James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, as will be explored in Chapter 8 below. 82 Evidence for this claim is found in Moltmann’s reception of Barth’s phrase, “the crucified Jesus is the image of the invisible God” (CD 2.2, 123; KD 2.2, 132), which the present study has argued is central for understanding Barth’s Erwählungslehre as a Johannine theologia crucis, corresponding to a Christology from above (cf. Chapter 5 above). Moltmann can be said to be radicalizing Barth’s Erwählungslehre, and thus Barth’s theologia crucis, in that he emphasizes the humiliation, self-surrender, and helplessness of the crucified Jesus. In this way, Moltmann advances the theme of theologia crucis in relation to a Christology from below. Moltmann writes, “When the crucified Jesus is called the ‘image of the invisible God,’ the meaning is that this is God, and God is like this. God is not greater than he is in this humiliation. God is not more glorious than he is in his self-surrender. God is not more powerful than he is in his helplessness. God is not more divine than he is in his humanity” (CG, 205). “Wird der gekreuzigte Jesus das ‘Ebenbild des unsichtbaren Gottes’ genannt, so heißt das: das ist Gott und so ist Gott. Gott ist

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doctrine of election argues predestination is not something to be feared, but should be seen as humankind’s passive trust in the active, electing Triune God. This means, for Barth, that there is one primary form of God’s hiddenness where God is revealed – the cross of Christ on Golgotha – showing that Barth connects theologically with Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation, but not with Luther’s notion of God’s hiddenness behind the cross in On Bound Choice.83 Also, Barth understands God to undertake a “sure and certain risk” in electing humankind to God’s self through Jesus Christ as the elected human being, but he does not have an explicit solidarity Christology in relation to the victims and perpetrators of injustice in society.84 Finally, Barth does not openly address the question of universal salvation through Jesus Christ, preferring instead “reverent agnosticism” about this question.85 Moltmann connects with Barth in terms of retaining only the hiddenness of God as found in Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation rather than the second form of hiddenness found in On Bound Choice, a deep appreciation of Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre from CD 2.2, and a concern with Trinitarian constructive theology.86 However, while there are similarities between Barth’s Erwählungslehre and Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis and both theologians can be read in relation to an understanding of theology as sapientia, the two theologians also have theological differences with one another that need to be noted. In relation to the Doctrine of the Trinity, Barth begins with God’s unity, and then proceeds to the Trinitarian persons. Barth’s phrase for this approach to the Trinity is “One God in three modes/ways of being” (Seinsweisen).87 Barth understood this notion to be an appropriate reframing of the concept of Trinitarian persons.88 Instead, Moltmann emphasizes the inter-trinitarian relationships of the three divine persons who are one God, in order to critique and correct what he sees as Barth’s Trinitarian Monarchianism.89 Moltmann incorporates the docnicht größer als in dieser Erniedrigung. Gott ist nicht herrlicher als in dieser Hingabe. Gott ist nicht mächtiger als in dieser Ohnmacht. Gott ist nicht göttlicher als in dieser Menschlichkeit” (GG, 190). Emphases in original. 83 Related to Barth’s understanding of God’s hiddenness, Hunsinger writes, “in a way that was foreign to Luther, [Barth] integrated the hidden God with the revealed God, making them two different aspects of the one God taken as a whole.” Hunsinger, “What Karl Barth Learned from Martin Luther,” 147. This integration is also found in Moltmann, but now with explicit eschatological intentions. See Chapter 5, pp. 111–13 above for the divergence with Luther. 84 CD 2.2, 162–63; KD 2.2, 177. 85 George Hunsinger, How to Read Karl Barth: The Shape of his Theology (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 134. 86 Moltmann writes of his appreciation for CD 2.2 in Jürgen Moltmann, Hoffen und Denken: Beiträge zur Zukunft der Theologie (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Theologie, 2016), 241. 87 Barth, CD 1.1, 355; KD 1.1, 374. 88 For Barth’s arguments for the appropriateness of the term Seinsweisen, see CD 1.1, 355–68; KD 1.1, 378–88. 89 Moltmann understood Barth’s emphasis on the One God in three modes of being as

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trine of perichoresis from the Cappadocian Church Fathers, with Scriptural basis in John 17:21, which he then transforms for political freedom in the Triune God in Trinity and the Kingdom of God.90 The question of tritheism can be posed for Moltmann’s framing of the Trinity through perichoresis.91 However, Moltmann’s thought should not be expressed in terms of tritheism, because he instead emphasizes the rich relationships of the trinitarian persons, rather than three separate gods. Moltmann’s Trinitarian theology is then related to a theologia crucis as found in The Crucified God, because he stresses the biblical pathos of God (indebted to Abraham Heschel’s text The Prophets), rather than what he observes as the apathy of God in Greek philosophy.92 Regarding the theme of theologia crucis originating with Martin Luther, Barth and Moltmann have further differences. Barth’s Trinitarian theologia crucis is Johannine overall, emphasizing the Word made flesh from John 1.93 The present study has argued that Barth’s Erwählungslehre transforms Luther’s mystical happy exchange from this Johannine hermeneutic, where, for Barth, God “elects having the possibility of reviving the old heresy of modalism, through an overarching Trinitarian Monarchianism. Moltmann sees his own approach of emphasizing the three persons of the Trinity as one God as the corrective to Barth’s Trinitarian Monarchianism and possibility of modalism, which Moltmann understands to have connections in modern theology to Schleiermacher. See Moltmann, Trinity and the Kingdom, 139–44; Moltmann, Trinität und Reich Gottes, 154–61. See Chapter 5, nn. 5 and 8 above for arguments related to commonalities between Schleiermacher and Barth. While Moltmann’s critiques of Barth in CD 1.1 show how his own Trinitarian theology relates to sapientia, said critiques of Barth in relation to modalism and Trinitarian Monarchianism might be overstated on the whole if one takes Eberhard Jüngel’s arguments about Barth’s Trinitarian theology seriously, and if Barth’s theology is increasingly sapiential at least beginning in CD 2.2 as the present study has argued in Chapter 5. See Eberhard Jüngel, Gottes Sein ist im Werden: Verantwortliche Rede vom Sein Gottes bei Karl Barth, 2nd ed. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1966), esp. 27–37 and 74–82, and Chapter 5, n. 45 above. For Moltmann’s understanding of sapientia, see Jürgen Moltmann, Erfahrungen theologischen Denkens: Wege und Formen Christlicher Theologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1999), 33–37; 291–98, and Jürgen Moltmann, Wissenschaft und Weisheit: Zum Gespräch zwischen Naturwissenschaften und Theologie (Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser/Gütersloher, 2002), 172–90. 90 Moltmann, Trinity and the Kingdom, 212–23; Moltmann, Trinität und Reich Gottes, 230–41. 91 Cameron D. Coombe notes this charge has been leveled against Moltmann by several critics, including Wolfhart Pannenberg, Klaus Rosenthal, and George Hunsinger. To the knowledge of the present author, Coombe’s doctoral thesis is the most thorough exploration of the place of Scripture throughout Moltmann’s theology to date. See Cameron D. Coombe, “The Role of Scripture in the Theology of Jürgen Moltmann,” ThD diss., (University of Otago, 2019), 251. 92 Moltmann, Trinity and the Kingdom, 25–30; Moltmann, Trinität und Reich Gottes, 40–45; Moltmann, Crucified God, 270–72 / Moltmann, Gekreuzigte Gott, 259–61. See again the debates in Anglican theology since 1850 about the passibility of God, represented in the early twentiethcentury studies by J. K. Mozley and Bertrand R. Brasnett. J. K. Mozley, The Impassibility of God: A Survey of Christian Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1926), and Bertrand R. Brasnett, The Suffering of the Impassible God (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1928). 93 Cf. CD 2.1, 141; KD 2.1, 169

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the cross of Golgotha as his kingly throne” and “the tomb in the garden as the scene of his being as the living God.”94 Moltmann, in contrast, grounds his own Trinitarian theologia crucis in the Markan Jesus’s death-cry from the cross, “My God, My God, Why have you forsaken me?” (Mk. 15:34; Mt. 27:46), which has connections to Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Letters and Papers from Prison and Christology lectures. Barth’s theologia crucis is thus compatible with the Johannine “Christology from above,” while Moltmann’s theologia crucis is compatible with the synoptic “Christology from below.”95 Finally, Barth’s theological connection to Luther’s theologia crucis beginning in the Heidelberg Disputation is implicit (he does not state specifically that he wishes to develop the Heidelberg Disputation in CD 2.296), whereas Moltmann’s connection to and radicalization of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation in The Crucified God is explicit.

9. Conclusion The reading of Jürgen Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis proposed in this chapter develops Barth’s Erwählungslehre, as well as Bonhoeffer’s later theology emphasizing the suffering of God in the world, for justification for victims and perpetrators of injustice. Through Moltmann’s theology, centered in The Crucified God, a sapiential theologia crucis moves away from primarily focusing on personal guilt and sin in relation to one’s standing before God to a theological hermeneutic for critiquing social and political injustice at all levels. Moltmann’s argument for the Triune God’s passionate and personal suffering on Golgotha and consequent identification with the victims of suffering throughout history, is then related to his theology of hope that centers in God’s eschatological future through the bodily raising of the crucified Christ. Finally, hope in the risen Christ becomes the impetus for boldly engaging in political action in the world to combat injustice. By expanding Barth’s Trinitarian Erwählungslehre through Moltmann’s notion of justification for victims and perpetrators from the standpoint of a Trinitarian 94 CD 2.2, 164–65; KD 2.2, 179–80. As argued above in Chapter 5, it is reasonable then to suppose Barth grounds his theologia crucis in the last words of the crucified Johannine Christ on the cross, “It is finished” (John 19:30). 95 Bonhoeffer’s Christology is also compatible with a Christology from below, as argued above in Chapter 6. This observation is not meant to imply that Barth is docetic or that Moltmann and Bonhoeffer are adoptionistic. Rather, it is a matter of emphasis for how the respective theologians construct their Christologies, which is arguably synthesized through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. See Pannenberg, Grundzüge der Christologie, 26–44, and Chapter 8, n. 73 below. 96 However, see Hunsinger, “What Karl Barth learned from Martin Luther,” for a persuasive argument that Luther remained an overall influence on Barth’s theology, even often over and against John Calvin.

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eschatologia crucis, we discover how to relate the theme of theologia crucis and a transformed happy exchange to contemporary theological and social-political concerns. We also see how Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s notion of “cheap grace” vs. “costly grace” in Discipleship is resolved from the standpoint of eschatological hope in God’s costliest gift of Jesus Christ, while still turning a theologia crucis toward the suffering of God in the world for the victims of sin. Thus, Karl Barth, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Jürgen Moltmann all offer fertile material for transforming a sapiential theologia crucis on the way to James Cone. With this chapter on Jürgen Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis complete, we are ready to proceed to the final part of the present study: reading James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis.

Part 3

Reading a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation

Chapter 8

A Transfigured Theologia Crucis in James Cone The first two parts of the present study have read the theme of theologia crucis in texts from Martin Luther, Karl Barth, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Jürgen Moltmann. The study has argued for the interrelationship between a theologia crucis and the doctrine of justification, and the importance of the “happy exchange” in relation to a theologia crucis. We have further explored how the principal theme being investigated has transformed from justification for guilty sinners in a mystical happy exchange in Martin Luther, to the Triune God’s gracious election of humankind in Jesus Christ through Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre, and developed toward an ethical-political realization of the theologia crucis as God’s suffering solidarity with the victims of sin through Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and then to the relationship between a theologia crucis and justification for victims and perpetrators of systemic sin through the theology of Jürgen Moltmann. The final chapter of the present study reads James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis, arguing for a re-shaping of the transformed theologia crucis from the twentieth-century theologians examined in the previous section. This chapter thus examines selections from the whole of Cone’s theology for traces of a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis, ranging from Cone’s first book Black Theology and Black Power to his final book The Cross and the Lynching Tree, while also giving attention to selected theological essays from Cone that illumine important constructive and hermeneutical themes of his theology.1

1 Here it is important to note Frederick L. Ware’s study of black theology, wherein he places James Cone in the black hermeneutical school for theological methodology. Ware defines three tasks of the black hermeneutical school of black theology as the following: “In the Black Hermeneutical School, the tasks of black theology – with varying degrees of emphasis – are description, analysis, evaluation, explanation, and revision …. The task of revision is construed primarily as a correction of the omissions made by ‘white theology’ and reconceptualization of cardinal beliefs in Christianity, such as beliefs about God, humanity, Christ, church, and eschatology.” Frederick L. Ware, Methodologies of Black Theology (Cleveland: The Pilgrim Press, 2002), 31–34; 31–32.

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1. Rationale for This Study’s Approach to James Cone To the knowledge of the present author, James H. Cone (1938–2018) does not directly describe his Black Theology of Liberation as a theologia crucis in his theological writings. He also did not come from a theological-ecclesial background related to Martin Luther, but was raised in Macedonia African Methodist Episcopal Church in Bearden, Arkansas. Cone’s early upbringing in Macedonia AME Church exposed him to the personal presence of God in prayer, song, and sermon. “Through prayer, song, and sermon, God made frequent visits to the community in Bearden and reassured the people of God’s concern for their well-being and the divine will to bring them safely home.”2 Therefore, the existential-experiential roots of Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation are not found in Luther, Barth, Bonhoeffer, or Moltmann, but in the black church tradition of the United States. Also, while Cone identified himself as a Protestant, his faith was shaped “more by the faith of the African slaves of nineteenthcentury America than by the sixteenth-century Protestant Reformation.”3 Finally, if Cone has a direct personal connection to the Protestant Reformation broadly understood, it is his appreciation for and radicalization of John Wesley’s understanding of sanctification, seen in Cone’s contrasting of Black Methodism with White Methodism in the United States, rather than a personally acknowledged indebtedness to a theologia crucis.4 When reading James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis, then, it needs to be made clear from the outset one is reading Cone in a way other than what Cone defines in his theological texts directly.5 2

James H. Cone, God of The Oppressed, Revised ed. (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1997), 1. James H. Cone, “A Theological Challenge to the American Catholic Church,” in James H. Cone Speaking the Truth: Ecumenism, Liberation, and Black Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1986), 50. 4 See Cone, Speaking the Truth, 29–34. 5 However, Cone’s doctoral dissertation advisor at Garrett Evangelical Theological Seminary was Philip S. Watson, a noteworthy British-American Luther scholar during the midtwentieth century. Cone would have encountered an interpretation of Luther’s theologia crucis during his graduate studies, particularly in Watson’s 1947 Fernley-Hartley lecture published as Let God be God, which is cited in Cone’s doctoral dissertation. See Philip S. Watson, Let God Be God: An Interpretation of the Theology of Martin Luther (Philadelphia: Mühlenberg, 1948). For Cone’s personal recollections of his relationship to Philip S. Watson, see Cone’s second autobiographical reflection, published posthumously, James H. Cone, Said I Wasn’t Gonna Tell Nobody: The Making of a Black Theologian (Maryknoll: Orbis, 2018), 4–6, 28, 56–57, 82–84, 108. It should also be remembered that none of the authors examined throughout the present study have directly defined themselves as theologians of the cross or, with the possible exception of Karl Barth, that their theologies should be considered explicitly as theologies of the cross, even when, as with Jürgen Moltmann in the previous chapter, the importance of this theme is apparent in relationship to an author’s personal narrative and in a particular text by an author. Regarding Karl Barth, although one might argue that he directly claimed his theology was a theologia crucis due to his dictum of dogmatics only being possible as a theologia 3

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However, although Cone does not describe his theology explicitly as a theologia crucis, it can still be argued that Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation on the whole can be read as a transfigured theologia crucis.6 In order to make this argument, it is necessary to closely read representative samples from the whole of Cone’s theological corpus for traces of the theme of theologia crucis.7

2. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Dialectical Incorporation of Black Theology and the Black Power Movement We begin exploring James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis with a close reading of excerpts from his Black Theology and crucis in Volume 1 of the Church Dogmatics (CD 1.1, 14; KD 1.1, 13), this theme is not explicitly named in his Erwählungslehre. Regarding Jürgen Moltmann, it could be argued both that it is methodologically questionable to read his Theology of Hope as a theologia crucis, and that he turned away from an explicit theologia crucis found in The Crucified God at least after he began his Systematic Contributions to Theology in 1980, his comments in the preface(s) to The Crucified God, his autobiographical reflections, and his understanding of theology as sapientia notwithstanding. See Chapter 7, nn. 4, 10, 18, 40, and 89 above. While seeking to avoid arbitrary textual interpretations through an overall awareness of authorial intent and historical context(s), all the texts and authors incorporated in this study have been examined in relation to the theme of theologia crucis, culminating in the investigation of Cone’s theology as a transfigured theologia crucis in the present chapter. Therefore, the present study has emphasized Jacques Derrida’s concept of the “trace” and notion “there is no outside text” in relation to a method of close reading (cf. the Introduction of the present study). 6 By reading Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a “transfigured theologia crucis” we are referring to the overall methodology for the present study, as well as the study’s hermeneutics incorporating Vítor Westhelle and Oswald Bayer. See again the Introduction of the present study. 7 Selections from the following books will be examined, referenced, and drawn from in this chapter: James H. Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 1st ed. (New York: Seabury, 1969), James H. Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation, 40th Anniversary Edition (Maryknoll: Orbis, 2010), James H. Cone, God of the Oppressed, Revised ed. (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1997), James H. Cone, Speaking the Truth: Ecumenism, Liberation, and Black Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1986), and James H. Cone, The Cross and the Lynching Tree (Maryknoll: Orbis, 2011). Cone’s Martin and Malcolm and America will only be explored in a cursory fashion, as this book is not primarily about constructive theology, but rather an historical analysis of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X. Therefore, Cone’s arguments from this text will only be consulted in relation to his constructive arguments addressing the dialectical relationship between King and Malcolm X. James H. Cone, Martin and Malcolm and America: A Dream or a Nightmare? (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1991). Cone’s Spirituals and the Blues will primarily be drawn from to illumine Cone’s hermeneutics, wherein Cone considers black music as an essential source for constructing theology. James H. Cone, The Spirituals and the Blues: An Interpretation (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1972). Cone’s doctoral dissertation on Karl Barth’s theological anthropology will also be referenced, to explore how Cone’s theology re-shapes and critiques Barth. Finally, select theological essays will be closely read for Cone’s hermeneutics, and for themes that complement his constructive theological books.

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Black Power to see how traces of the theme of theologia crucis can be found in his theology from the beginning of his constructive work. The present study will devote significant space to exploring this book to show how the whole of Cone’s theology can be read as a transfigured theologia crucis. The intention in this section, then, is to investigate where traces of a theologia crucis can be found in Cone’s prophetic theologizing from the black experience in relation to the Black Power Movement and in his Christology. In Black Theology and Black Power (1969), Cone presented a strong critique of white theology’s failure to engage racism as a theological issue. As the title suggests, the book was written in the context of the Black Power movement as it emerged out of the Civil Rights Movement, and Cone intended it to be a prophetic indictment on white theology (and the corresponding white churches) in the tradition of the biblical prophets.8 This book, as well as Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation overall, sought to bring together the Christian theological identity of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the radical black consciousness of Malcolm X dialectically.9 What has so far not been explored in Cone’s first con8

For details on the origins of black theology amidst the Black Power movement of the 1960s, see Gayraud S. Wilmore and James H. Cone, eds., Black Theology: A Documentary History, 1966–1979 (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1979) 15–21. Cone notes that it is unclear who first used the term black theology, but that he was the first person to use the term in relation to a new theology. “My Black Theology and Black Power (April 1969) was the first publication that used the term ‘black theology’ in an attempt to develop a constructive theology.” James H. Cone, For My People: Black Theology and the Black Church (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1984, 19. For Cone’s analysis of the intellectual development of black theology in relation to the Civil Rights and Black Power movements, see Ibid., 6–24. 9 In the Preface to Cone’s collection of essays published as Risks of Faith, Cone notes the distinctiveness of his incorporation of King and Malcolm X, in relation to redefining Christianity without the need of approval from Cone’s white professors in graduate school. From King, Cone learned a uniquely Christian identity. From Malcolm X, Cone incorporated a revolutionary black consciousness into his Christian theology. It is therefore plausible that from the beginning of Cone’s theological work, he was concerned with drawing from both King and Malcolm X in a dialectical fashion. “The distinctiveness of black theology is the bringing together of Martin and Malcolm – their ideas about Christianity and justice and blackness and self. Neither Martin nor Malcolm sought to do that. The cultural identity of Christianity was not important to Martin because he understood it in the ‘universal’ categories he was taught in graduate school. His main concern was to link the identity of Christianity with social justice, oriented in love and defined by hope. The Christian identity of the black self was not important to Malcolm X. For him, Christianity was the white man’s religion and thus had to be rejected. Black people, Malcolm contended, needed a black religion, on that would bestow self-respect upon them for being black. Malcolm was not interested in remaking Christianity into a black religion. I disagreed with both Martin and Malcolm and insisted on the importance of bringing blackness and Christianity together. While Martin and Malcolm were prevented from coming together during their lifetime, I was determined to put them together in black liberation theology. Using their cultural and political insights, I discovered a way of articulating what I wanted to say about theology and race that not only rejected the need for my professors’ approval, but challenged them to excise the racism in their theologies.” James H. Cone, “Introduction: Looking Back, Going Forward,” in James H. Cone, Risks of Faith: The Emergence of a Black Theology of Lib-

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structive book, though, is the possibility of a theologia crucis therein. However, it can be argued that Cone’s creative combination of a new, prophetic black theology in relation to the Black Power movement contains traces of the theme of theologia crucis. Making this argument means showing the relationship between Cone’s prophetic intention in his text and the theme of theologia crucis. Black Theology and Black Power is not a text written in an attempt at scholarly neutrality. Instead, it is a passionate proclamation of the relationship between the Christian message and the Black Power movement, as well as what can fruitfully be termed a “manifesto” that addresses the need for theology to be public, prophetic, and political.10 While the previous twentieth-century theologians examined in the present study have all addressed the relationship between theology and ethics, Cone’s work moves beyond the ethical to the directly political, in ways related to Bonhoeffer and Moltmann but radicalized in terms of arguing for the necessity of theology to call systemic white racism in the United States to account and empower oppressed black people in their struggle for justice.11 Cone recognizes in the beginning of his book that his constructive work lacks the typical neutrality required in academic theology. “This work, then, is written with a definite attitude, the attitude of an angry black man, disgusted with the oppression of black people in America and with the scholarly demand to be ‘objective’ about it.”12 Cone believes theology must become prophetic if it eration, 1968–1998 (Boston: Beacon, 1998), xxi. Cf. James H. Cone, “Calling Oppressors to Account for Four Centuries of Terror,” Currents in Theology and Mission 31, no. 3 (2004): 179–86. 10 The Collins English Dictionary defines the term “manifesto” in American English as “a public declaration of motives and intentions by a government or by a person or group regarded as having some public importance.” Cf. Collins Online-Wörterbuch Englisch, s. v. “manifesto (n.),” accessed February 15, 2022, https://www.collinsdictionary.com/de/worterbuch/englisch/manifesto. 11 The prophetic and political task of theology as Cone understands it can be read as transfiguring Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation, wherein the theologian of the cross is the one who “calls a thing as it is” (dicit id quod res est) in contrast to the theologian of glory who “calls evil good and good evil” (dicit malum bonum, et bonum malum). Cf. LW 31: 40; WA 1, 354: 20–21. In Cone’s Black Theology and Black Power, then, a theologian who does not take the suffering of black people as a worthy theme of theological reflection is analogous to a theologian of glory. Conversely, a theologian who does take the suffering of oppressed blacks in the United States as a valid starting point for theological reflection is analogous to a theologian of the cross. This analogy relates to Cone’s sharp distinction between black theologians and white theologians. See the section “James Cone’s Hermeneutics as a Transfiguration of Martin Luther,” pp. 236–44 below for both a reference to Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation in Cone, and arguments for why his Black Theology of Liberation can be thought of as a transfigured theologia crucis for oppressed black people in the United States particularly, and oppressed peoples worldwide in general, in relation to Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation. We will address Cone’s symbolic understanding of “blackness” and “whiteness” at the end of the present section. 12 Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 2. Throughout this chapter, Cone’s early texts have been modified related to gender-inclusive language. This decision was made in relation to Cone’s own insistence of the need to confront sexism as a black male theologian, and of his decision to change the exclusive language of the 1970 edition of A Black Theology of Liberation

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is to remain faithful to Jesus Christ in relation to oppressed black people in the United States. Therefore, Cone’s angry and prophetic tone has a biblical and Christological basis, and his first book is written as a challenge to the church to combat racism. “If the Church is to remain faithful to its Lord, it must make a decisive break with the structure of this society by launching a vehement attack on the evils of racism in all forms. It must become prophetic, demanding radical change in the interlocking structures of this society.”13 Cone urges the church and theology to become prophetic, because he sees the Black Power movement as “Christ’s central message to twentieth-century America.”14 Given the systemic oppression of blacks in the United States by white racism, Cone believes theologians need to become emotionally involved with the struggle for racial justice distinctively as theologians. “It seems that one weakness of most theological works is their ‘coolness’ in the investigation of an idea. Is it not time for theologians to get upset?”15 Cone’s writing here has an unmistakable existential urging to it, which further shows why this early book lacks so-called scholarly “neutrality.”16 Theologians being “upset” at the condition of oppressed blacks in the United States allows them to critique white oppressors, for the sake of the existence of the oppressed. “This is a word to the oppressor, a word to Whitey, not in hope that he will listen (after King’s death who can hope?) but in the expectation that my own existence will be clarified,” says Cone.17 to gender inclusive language in the 1986 edition. See Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation, xx. In relation to the excerpt from Black Theology and Black Power cited here, Cone’s tone is reminiscent of Malcolm X, who Cone also relates to the role of angry biblical prophet. “Malcolm was committed to telling the truth as he felt it and with the simplicity, clarity, and passion of an angry biblical prophet. He frequently quoted Jesus’s saying, ‘You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.’ No one believed that saying more than Malcolm. ‘We don’t care who likes this or not, as long as we know it’s the truth,’ he told his audiences. ‘If you are afraid to tell the truth, why you don’t deserve freedom. Just tell the truth.’” Cone, Martin and Malcolm and America, 95. 13 Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 2. Italic in original. 14 Ibid., 1. Cf. Wilmore and Cone, Black Theology: A Documentary History, 1966–1979, 15–23. 15 Ibid., 3. 16 Cf. Cone’s definition of Truth in Ibid., 9: “Truth is that which places a human being in touch with the real; and once a person finds it, he is prepared to give all for it.” Cone’s existential understanding of Truth connects to Paul Tillich’s notion of “ultimate concern” in relation to the theologian’s task. Tillich writes, “The basic attitude of the theologian is commitment to the content that he expounds. Detachment would be a denial of the very nature of this content. The attitude of the theologian is ‘existential.’ He is involved – with the whole of his existence, with his finitude and his anxiety, with his self-contradictions and his despair, with the healing forces in him and in his social situation. Every theological statement derives its seriousness from these elements of existence. The theologian, in short, is determined by his faith.” Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, Volume 1: Being and the Question of God (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1951), 23. 17 Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 3. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated on April 4, 1968, in Memphis, Tennessee while participating in a garbage workers strike. See Jürgen Moltmann, “Schwarze Theologie für Weiße,” in Jürgen Moltmann, Erfahrungen theo-

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Cone thus seeks to call white oppressors to account for the systemic injustice of racism, from the standpoint of a prophetic and angry black theologian. The goal of Cone’s project becomes clear at the end of the Introduction to Black Theology and Black Power: he accents his own particularity as writing from “the attitude of an angry black man” for the sake of the United States, as a black American who wishes both for the destruction of white America’s oppression of black people and that some white persons might be moved by his strong critique. I am critical of white America, because this is my country; and what is mine must not be spared my emotional and intellectual scrutiny. Although my motive for writing was not – did not want to be – dependent upon the response of white people, I do not rule out the possibility of creative changes, even in the lives of oppressors. It is illegitimate to sit in judgment on another human being, deciding how he will or must respond. That is another form of oppression.18

Therefore, even though Cone writes in an angry tone reminiscent of a biblical prophet, his anger is directed toward a country he is a part of and is demanding full recognition from as someone with the right to protest for full human dignity in light of innocent black victimhood.19 Cone’s protest is done Christologically logischen Denkens: Wege und Formen christlicher Theologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1999), 171–94; 186–88. Cone reflects theologically about King’s “journey to Memphis” in ways reminiscent of Jesus’s traveling to Jerusalem in Cross and the Lynching Tree, which gives evidence for Cone understanding King as a theologian of the cross: “Just as Jesus knew he could be executed when he went to Jerusalem, King knew that threats against his life could be realized in Memphis. Like Jesus’ disciples who rejected the idea that his mission entailed his suffering and death (Mk. 8:31.32), nearly everyone in King’s organization opposed his journey to Memphis, not only because of the dangers but because of the need to focus on the coming Poor People’s Campaign in Washington. But King, like Jesus, felt he had no choice: he had to go to Memphis and aid the garbage workers in their struggle for dignity, better wages, and a safer work place. He had to go because his faith demanded it.” Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 90. Cone describes the centrality of the cross for King in his Martin and Malcolm and America, writing, “The centrality of the cross for King’s faith was what separated him from liberal theology and placed him solidly in the heart of the black religious tradition. Not even Martin Luther of the sixteenth century or any of his modern-day interpreters explored the power of the cross in the freedom struggle of the poor as passionately and profoundly as did Martin Luther King, Jr …. For King, the cross was God’s way of saying no to segregation and yes to integration, no to the alienation between blacks and whites and yes to their reconciliation.” Cone, Martin and Malcolm and America, 127. 18 Ibid., 4. Cone shares another important commonality with Malcolm X in relation to the possibility of change in white oppressors. Malcolm X observed to Alex Haley near the end of his life, “I have learned that not all white people are racists. I am speaking against and my fight is against the white racists. I firmly believe that Negroes have the right to fight against these racists, by any means that are necessary.” Alex Haley, The Autobiography of Malcolm X as Told to Alex Haley (New York: Ballantine, 1964, 2015), 422. 19 In 2017, Cone lectured at Yale Divinity School about the rise of his Black Theology of Liberation in relation to the Black Power movement and his rage about the silence of white theologians concerning the black blood shed by systemic white racism. In this lecture, he specifically relates the cross of Jesus on Golgotha to the blood of black bodies, citing this black blood as a reason for his writing Black Theology and Black Power. “The heart of the Christian faith is focused on the cross of Jesus, the one who shed his blood as a crucified victim in

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in his first book, as Cone dialectically incorporates the Black Power movement with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Cone defines the task of theology as being “to show what the changeless gospel means in each new situation,” and describes how “contemporary theology from Karl Barth to Jürgen Moltmann” is engaged in this task.20 What Cone finds missing in so-called “contemporary theology,” though, is a revolutionary theology written from the standpoint of oppressed black people in the United States who are seeking freedom from white oppression. Therefore, Cone understands systemic racism in the United States as the cultural situation for which the changeless Gospel must be translated. He relates his understanding of theology with his constructive definition of Black Power, which he outlines at the beginning of his book. Black Power means black freedom, black self-determination, wherein black people no longer view themselves as without human dignity but as persons, human beings with the ability to carve out their own destiny. In short, as Stokely Carmichael would say, Black Power means T. C. B., Take Care of Business – black folks taking care of black folks’ business, not on the terms of the oppressor, but on terms of the oppressed.21 Jerusalem. No one can understand the Jesus of Golgotha and the saving power of his blood without seeing him through the experiences of the crucified peoples today. No people can understand the transforming power of Jesus, except those in complete solidarity with the poor and the wretched of this land. When that biblical truth became clear to me, my theological transformation from a negro theologian to a black theologian began to develop and soon was complete. The blood of blacks in America’s cities (Watts, Detroit, and Newark) were crying out to God and to white America, crying out for their humanity to be recognized. ‘We declare our rights on this earth,’ Malcolm X said, ‘to be a human being, to be respected as a human being, which we intend to bring into existence by any means necessary.’ In the midst of burning cities, I knew what I had to say, but I did not know whether I had the talent and the courage to say it effectively, with the word power that would get the attention of both the black community and the white theological world. But I had to try, because I heard the cry of black blood, and like the prophet Jeremiah, within me there was something like a burning fire shut up in my bones. I was weary of holding it in, and I could not. I became obsessed with the cries of black blood, and angry about the silence of white theologians and their churches. They study [sic] Kant and Hegel and Heidegger, and a host of other Europeans who regarded blacks as inferior and unimportant as a source of philosophical and theological reflection. And as a result they render [sic] spilled black blood insignificant. That was why I began writing about a Black Theology of Liberation with a focus on a critique of white theology and its churches, and the need to do theology with a black signature on it … like a wounded boxer I came out swingin’ at white theology and its churches, determined to speak and write the truth I felt burning inside me.” Yale Divinity School, “The Cry of Black Blood: The Rise of Black Liberation Theology,” YouTube Video, 1:12:45, April 19, 2017, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=kyP7BrmII9U&t=340s. Transcription mine. In this lecture, Cone also describes his first two books as theological manifestos (see n. 10 above). 20 Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 31. 21 Ibid., 6. The need for translating the Gospel message to contemporary times, and in Cone’s case, for translating the Gospel message in relation to the liberation of oppressed black people, is consonant with Rudolf Bultmann and Paul Tillich’s hermeneutical projects concerning the dialectical relationship between Gospel and culture. See Rudolf Bultmann, Jesus Christ and

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Black Power means black people in the United States viewing themselves as “human beings with an ability to carve out their own destiny.” Theology in relation to Black Power for Cone is done from the experience of oppressed black people in relation to the liberating Gospel of Jesus Christ, which bestows human dignity to the oppressed. Thus, Cone’s theology is concerned with an explicitly named particularity from the outset, which is arguably part of Cone’s hermeneutics for interpreting the Gospel – oppressed black people struggling for freedom from systemic white racism in the United States.22 From this particularity, Cone identifies a “desperate need” for black theology, which he defines solely as theology that applies “the freeing power of the gospel to black people under white oppression.”23 White oppression is exemplified by the exploitation white racists practice toward blacks, from which blacks seek survival. “Black identity is survival; white racism is exploitation.”24 The particularity of the experience of oppressed black people in the United States is related dialectically to the particularity of Jesus Christ. This dialectical relationship of Christology and liberation for oppressed black people in the United States belongs to the core of Cone’s arguments throughout Black Theology and Black Power, demonstrated by Cone’s understanding of Christianity finding its beginning and end in Jesus Christ. Christianity begins and ends with the human being Jesus – his life, death, and resurrection. He is the Revelation, the special disclosure of God to human beings, revealing who God is and what his purpose for humankind is. In short, Christ is the essence of Christianity. Schleiermacher was not far wrong when he said that ‘Christianity is essentially distinguished from other faiths by the fact that everything in it is related to the redemption

Mythology (New York: Scribner’s, 1958) and Rudolf Bultmann, “Neues Testament und Mythologie,” in Kerygma und Mythos I: Ein Theologisches Gespräch, 4th ed. (Hamburg-Bergstedt: Herbert Reich, 1960), 15–48. See pp. 229–31 below for Cone’s creative incorporation of Tillich and Bultmann, as well as arguments for Cone’s connection to Tillich’s “method of correlation.” 22 See Cone’s description of Black Power, which he defines as “complete emancipation of black people from white oppression by whatever means black people deem necessary.” Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 6. This description again has commonalities with Malcolm X. See n. 18 above. 23 Ibid. 24 Ibid., 19. Cone provides an expanded definition of black identity in relation to black consciousness in an article written one year after Black Theology and Black Power, writing: “Black consciousness is the black person’s self-awareness. To know blackness is to know self, and to know self is to be cognizant of other selves in relation to self. It is knowing the criterion of acceptance and rejection in human encounters. To be conscious of his[/her/their] color means that the black person knows that his[/her/their] blackness is the reason for his [/her/ their] oppression, for there is no way to account for the white racist brutality against the black community except by focusing on the color of the victim.” James H. Cone, “Black Consciousness and the Black Church: A Historical-Theological Interpretation,” The Annals 387, no. 1 (1970): 49–55; 50.

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accomplished by Jesus of Nazareth.’ In contrast to many religions, Christianity revolves around a Person, without whom its existence ceases to be.25

Defining Jesus Christ as the “special disclosure of God to human beings,” is reminiscent of Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre as has been examined in the present study. Given Cone wrote his doctoral dissertation on Karl Barth’s anthropology and read deeply throughout Barth’s Church Dogmatics for his dissertation, arguing for a connection to CD 2.2 in Cone’s first full book of constructive theology is warranted.26 There is a change from Barth, however, in that Cone describes Christ as the “special disclosure of God” in particular to black people being oppressed by white racism in the United States. 25

Ibid., 34. Cone observes the following in the Introduction to Risks of Faith about writing a doctoral dissertation on Barth: “While writing a dissertation on Karl Barth’s anthropology, I thought I had enough knowledge of the Christian faith to communicate it to persons anywhere in the world. Who wouldn’t feel adequately endowed after plowing through twelve volumes of Barth’s Church Dogmatics?” Cone, Risks of Faith, 14. The bibliography for Cone’s doctoral dissertation cites the CD from 1.1–4.3.2. Presumably, then, Cone was familiar with the entirety of the CD. The only volumes not included in his dissertation’s bibliography are 3.3 and 4.1. Further, Volume 4.4 was not published in German until 1967. Cone also wrote a Master’s thesis on Karl Barth titled “The Idea of Satan in the New Testament and in the Theology of Karl Barth.” Both theses remain unpublished, with Cone’s Master’s thesis cited as unpublished material in the doctoral dissertation. Although Cone does not directly engage CD 2.2 in his dissertation, he does appear to argue for a connection between Barth’s Erwählungslehre and Barth’s theological anthropology. Evidence for this claim is found in Cone’s understanding of election (related to CD 3.2) in his dissertation. “Humankind’s existence rests upon God’s election! This is his [Barth’s] first point. In this One human being all people have been elected by God. The starting point must be with God’s election of this human being [Jesus Christ], and it will be shown that through this human being’s election all people are elected. By election Barth means ‘a special decision with a special intention in relation to a special object.’ When it is said that God has elected Jesus, it is not meant that Jesus’ existence and meaning of his existence are dependent upon his choice to the extent that he too is a creature. It is true that Jesus himself makes his own choice when he gives himself to God in fellowship. To say that God has elected this human being means that Jesus did not elect himself for the fellowship with God even though as a human being he made the choice. He is elected by God in that ‘in all this there is revealed in time an eternal counsel of God, in the created world the will of the Creator, in the self-ordination of this human being his divine foreordination.’ Predestination, which is God’s electing grace, ‘is the basis of the fact that Creator and creature, God and humanity, are united at this point and the Kingdom of God comes.’” James Hal Cone, “The Doctrine of Man in the Theology of Karl Barth,” PhD diss., (Northwestern University, 1965), 66. In contrast with the present study, Cone’s dissertation on Barth posits a sharp distinction between Barth and Schleiermacher based on Barth’s second Romans commentary of 1922 and selections from the Church Dogmatics. See Cone, “The Doctrine of Man in the Theology of Karl Barth,” 1, 13, 26, 29, 32. However, see Chapter 5 of the present study for arguments related to the connection between the theologies of Barth and Schleiermacher and a sampling of literature concerning this question, showing the change in scholarly opinion about the relationship between Barth and Schleiermacher since Cone wrote his doctoral dissertation. Finally, Cone’s argument from Black Theology and Black Power cited above (n. 25) suggests he no longer saw a great chasm between Barth and Schleiermacher as argued in his doctoral dissertation, at least regarding both theologians’ orientation around Jesus. 26

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It can further be argued that Cone’s Christology in Black Theology and Black Power is a creative synthesis in content of Barth, Bonhoeffer, and Moltmann that aligns overall with Pannenberg’s description of a “Christology from below,” as Cone incorporates all these theologians into his own Christology. Concerning Barth, Cone agrees with Barth in the Church Dogmatics that theological language should proceed from a Christological center, in order for theology not to become “idle, abstract words which have no relation to the Christian experience of revelation.”27 For Cone, then, despite an implicit disagreement with Barth’s strong critique of natural theology found in his polemic Nein! addressed to Emil Brunner, Barth’s approach ensures that Christian theology remains “Christianly Christian.”28 Cone also describes Jesus being the “human being for others” in a way that is reminiscent of Bonhoeffer’s understanding of Stellvertretung, as explored in Chapter 6: “According to the New Testament, Jesus is the human being for others who views his existence as inextricably tied to other human beings to the degree that his own Person is inexplicable apart from others.”29 From Moltmann, Cone incorporates a “political hermeneutics of the gospel.” “When black people begin to hear Jesus’ message as contemporaneous with their life situation, they will quickly recognize what Jürgen Moltmann calls the ‘political hermeneutics of the gospel.’”30 Pannenberg’s Christology from below is likely the Christological methodology holding these theologians together, given Cone’s explicit reference to Pannenberg’s Grundzüge der Christologie. Cone cites from Pannenberg: “It is precisely Christology that discusses and establishes the justification and appropriate form of theological reference to Jesus in a methodological way.”31 The present study has argued that all these theo27

Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 34. Ibid. Cf. Cone’s reading of the Barth-Brunner debate over natural theology in Cone, “Doctrine of Man in the Theology of Karl Barth,” 8–22; 143–45. 29 Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 35. See Chapter 6, n. 93 above for the argument that Bonhoeffer’s description of Jesus Christ as the “human being for others” relates to a transformed theologia crucis sharing in the suffering of God in the world. Cone’s connection to Bonhoeffer becomes explicit when Cone cites Bonhoeffer’s letter from July 1944 where Bonhoeffer says Christians are called to stand by God in God’s suffering. See Ibid., 66. 30 Ibid., 37. 31 Ibid. Cf. Wolfhart Pannenberg, Grundzüge der Christologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1976), 9. It is Cone’s explicit citation of this Pannenberg’s Grundzüge, as well as his reliance on the Lukan Jesus’s proclamation of liberation to the captives (Lk. 4:18–19) that is behind the present study’s claim that Cone can be seen to be situated overall within what Pannenberg would term a “Christology from below.” Cone’s student Dwight Hopkins clarifies Cone’s Christology, writing: “In order to fight white theology, Cone brings together both the Jesus of history and the Christ of faith to complement the liberation theme; we cannot have one without the other. He does argue that we know what and where Jesus is today based on what Jesus did while on earth. But at the same time, Cone creates a new political meaning in the crucifixion and resurrection around the theme of liberation. Calvary (i. e., the crucifixion) and the empty tomb (i. e., the resurrection) prove key in Cone’s christology.” Dwight N. Hopkins, Introducing Black Theology of Liberation (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1999), 58. 28

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logians have traces of a theologia crucis, providing evidence for traces of this theme in Cone’s Black Theology and Black Power. Another connection to the theme of theologia crucis as it has been explored constructively throughout the present study is Cone’s description of Christ taking on the suffering and despair of the poor and oppressed. Cone writes: “In Christ, God enters human affairs and takes sides with the oppressed. Their suffering becomes his; their despair, divine despair. Through Christ the poor human being is offered freedom now to rebel against that which makes him other than human.”32 This excerpt can fruitfully be termed a transfigured “happy exchange,” because in Cone’s text Jesus Christ is described as standing in solidarity with the oppressed in ways similar to Bonhoeffer’s understanding of Stellvertretung (containing traces of Barth and Moltmann as well), which the present study has argued is a transformed happy exchange. The re-shaping through Cone’s theology from the transformed happy exchange argued for in Part 2 of this study, then, is the explicit reference to political rebellion from Christ’s entering into human affairs. From Christ’s entering into human affairs and siding with the oppressed, a divine reversal of poor and rich occurs. The poor person may expect everything from God, while the rich person may expect nothing because he refuses to free himself from his own pride. It is not that poverty is a pre-condition for entrance into the Kingdom. But those who recognize their utter dependance on God and wait on him despite the miserable uncertainty of life are typically the poor, according to Jesus.33 32 Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 36. Cone’s language here corresponds to his first published theological essay, “Christianity and Black Power” from 1968, where he describes the message of Christ to the situation of the oppressed in theological language reminiscent of the transformed “happy exchange” through Barth, Bonhoeffer, and Moltmann in Part 2 of this study. “[Jesus Christ] is God Himself coming into the very depths of human existence for the sole purpose of destroying all human tentacles of slavery, thereby freeing human beings from ungodly principalities and powers that hinder his relationship with God.… In Christ, God enters human affairs and takes sides with the oppressed. Their suffering becomes his; their despair, divine despair. Through Christ the poor are offered freedom now to rebel against that which makes them other than human.” Cone, “Christianity and Black Power,” in Ibid., Risks of Faith, 7–88. Also, Cone used explicit words from Dietrich Bonhoeffer in this essay, when he defined Jesus as the “human being for others,” which corresponds as well to Cone’s reading of Volume 3.2 of Karl Barth’s Church Dogmatics in his doctoral dissertation. See Ibid., 7, and Cone, “Doctrine of Man in the Theology of Karl Barth,” 88. 33 Ibid., 36–37. Here it is pertinent to note Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation developed independently of Latin American liberation theology. Cone’s first published essay also appeared three years before the Spanish edition of Gustavo Gutiérrez’s A Theology of Liberation. Although both Cone and Gutiérrez stress the dialectical relationship between Jesus Christ and oppressed persons, Cone’s particular emphasis remains on oppressed black people in the United States. The two theologians also differ on the place of Marxism in their respective methodologies, even as Cone himself embraced Marxist class critique as his own theological reflections evolved. For the overall relationship between Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation and Gutiérrez’s Latin American Liberation Theology, see James H. Cone, For My People: Black Theology and the

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While Cone’s argument here could seem to be shifting away from the particularity of systemic white racism in the United States, Cone is connecting poverty and racism as evils against which Christ is fighting and from which Christ is offering freedom. And the Kingdom which the poor enter is not merely an eschatological longing for escape to a transcendent reality, nor is it an inward serenity which eases unbearable suffering. Rather, it is God encountering humanity in the very depths of his being-in-the-world and releasing humanity from all human evils, like racism, which hold him captive. The repentant person knows that though God’s ultimate Kingdom be in the future, yet even now it breaks through like a ray of light upon the darkness of the oppressed.34

Cone’s eschatological observations here are concrete, corresponding to the concreteness of Jesus Christ’s Incarnation, exemplified in Cone’s phrase “God encountering humanity in the very depths of his being-in-the-world.” This phrase is reminiscent of Bonhoeffer’s Christology lectures, wherein Bonhoeffer writes, “God is bound up with the human being.”35 There is also a connection to Moltmann’s theology, wherein an eschatology coming from the future breaks into the present for struggles for justice for the oppressed in society, providing the opportunity for realizing Moltmann’s “political hermeneutics of the gospel.”36 Proposing these Christological arguments in relation to the Black Power movement means Cone defines Black Power as “the message of Christ himself.”37 He notes this is “both politically and religiously dangerous,” given Barth’s early theology maintaining the sharp distinction between God and humanity, and Christ never promising political security.38 However, he finds this message appropriate, given Luther’s emphasis on neighbor love. But if Luther’s statement, ‘We are Christ to the neighbor,’ is to be taken seriously, and if we believe the New Testament witness which proclaims Jesus as resurrected and thus active even now, then he must be alive in those very persons who are struggling in the midst of humility and humiliation.39 Black Church (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1984), 72–74, James H. Cone, My Soul Looks Back (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1986), 93–113, and Wilmore and Cone, eds., Black Theology: A Documentary History, 1966–1979, 445–63. 34 Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 37. 35 See Chapter 6, n. 43 above. 36 Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 37. See Chapter 7, pp. 188–90 of the present study above for Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis in relation to his political expansion of justification for victims and perpetrators of injustice. 37 Ibid., 37. 38 Ibid., 37–38. See again Cone’s outlining of Barth’s critique of natural theology, and Barth’s polemic against Brunner on this topic, in Cone, “The Doctrine of Man in the Theology of Karl Barth,” 1–22. However, Cone did not engage Barth’s theology of the “three lights” in his dissertation and appears not to have done so in Black Theology and Black Power, either. See CD 4.3 (1), 38–165; KD 4.3 (1), 40–188. 39 Ibid., 38. Cone may be alluding to Luther’s Freedom of a Christian, which the present study has argued contains a theologia crucis through the mystical “happy exchange,” as well as an

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This reference to Luther is further material for finding traces of a theologia crucis in Black Theology and Black Power. What is arguably Cone’s transfiguration of Luther’s stress on neighbor love then transfigures Thesis 28 of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation when Cone writes later in the book: “God’s agape to human beings is spontaneous and creative, the starting point for the godhuman relationship. It is spontaneous in that there is no worth in a human being from God’s perspective which accounts for God’s love. The sole reason for God’s love is found in God’s loving character.”40 In Cone’s understanding of the Gospel, if Jesus Christ is not present in the ghetto the Gospel is a lie. Cone continues: If the gospel is a gospel of liberation for the oppressed, then Jesus is where the oppressed are and continues his work of liberation there. Jesus is not safely confined in the first century. He is our contemporary, proclaiming release to the captives and rebelling against all who silently accept the structures of injustice. If he is not in the ghetto, if he is not where human beings are living at the brink of existence, but is, rather, in the easy life of the suburbs, then the gospel is a lie. The opposite, however, is the case. Christianity is not alien to Black power; it is Black Power.41

Cone’s Lukan Christological commitments are seen, containing traces of a theologia crucis, given the theologians Cone draws from to make his arguments. Cone’s theology here transfigures the theme of theologia crucis, given Cone’s explicit privileging of oppressed black people in the United States as the starting point for theological reflection. Further, while Cone’s theology is concerned with the particularity of Jesus, and corresponds to a “Christology from below,” he is explicitly concerned with Christ’s contemporary presence with the oppressed.

interconnectedness between justification and sanctification. See Chapter 3 above, and Luther, Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen, in WA 7, 20–38. 40 Ibid, 50. While Cone is explicitly referencing the New Testament and the Lutheran theologian Anders Nygren in this excerpt, Cone’s language is similar to the proof for Thesis 28 of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation. So, Luther: “The first part is clear because the love of God which lives in the human loves sinners, evil persons, fools, and weaklings in order to make them righteous, good, wise, and strong. Rather than seeking its own good, the love of God flows forth and bestows good. Therefore sinners are attractive because they are loved; they are not loved because they are attractive. For this reason the love of the human avoids sinners and evil persons. Thus Christ says: ‘For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners’ [Matt. 9:13]. This is the love of the cross, born of the cross, which turns in the direction where it does not find good which it may enjoy, but where it may confer good upon the bad and needy person” (LW 31: 57). Prima pars patet, quia amor Dei in homine vivens diligit peccatores, malos, stultos, infirmos, ut faciat iustos, bonos, sapientes, robustos et sic effluit potius et bonum tribuit. Ideo enim peccatores sunt pulchri, quia diliguntur, non ideo diliguntur, quia sunt pulchri, Ideo amor hominis fugit peccatores, malos. Sic Christus: Non veni vocare iustos, sed peccatores. Et iste est amor crucis ex cruce natus, qui illuc sese transfert, non ubi invenit bonum quo fruatur, sed ubi bonum conferat malo et egeno (WA 1, 365: 8–15). Cf. Chapter 1, nn. 39–42 above for a close reading of this thesis proof. 41 Ibid., 38.

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Therefore, Cone emphasizes Christ’s contemporary presence with oppressed people so that black people can love God, themselves, and the neighbor. For the black person to respond to God’s love in faith means that he accepts as truth the new image of himself revealed in Jesus Christ. He now knows that the definition of himself defined by white society is inconsistent with the newly found image disclosed in Christ. In a world which has taught blacks to hate themselves, the new black person does not transcend blackness, but accepts it as a gift of the Creator. For he knows until he accepts himself as a being of God in all his physical blackness, he can love neither God nor neighbor.42

For Cone, then, accepting blackness as a gift of God is akin to Paul’s statement about New Creation in 2 Cor. 5:17. As a “new creature” in Christ, a black person can glorify in blackness as a gift from God as a creature of God.43 For Cone, blackness, love of God, and love of neighbor are all interconnected in Jesus Christ, in order for oppressed black people to find freedom and flourishing through the Christian message in a society permeated by white racism. Cone emphasizes that Christ was not only incarnate in the first century of the Common Era but is present in the contemporary United States as well, “proclaiming release to the captives and rebelling against all who silently accept the structures of injustice.”44 Christ’s proclamation of release to the captivates relates both to Cone’s understanding of neighbor love and Christ and to the church being found in the ghetto. Neighbor love means “joining God in his activity on behalf of the oppressed”45 in a “radical identification with the neighbor” in order that God’s grace not be cheapened.46 For Cone, this means the white church is called to find Christ in the ghetto. Citing Bonhoeffer’s July 18, 1944 letter to Eberhard Bethge about Christians being called to stand by God in God’s suffering, Cone writes, “Christ is to be found, as always, where human beings are enslaved and trampled under foot; Christ is in the ghetto – there also is his church.”47 42 Ibid., 53. Cone’s theological understanding of blackness as a gift of God corresponds to his understanding of black consciousness and the Black Power movement: “Black consciousness is Black Power, the power of the oppressed black human being to liberate himself from white enslavement by making blackness the primary datum of his humanity. It is the power to be black in spite of whiteness, the courage to affirm being in the midst of non-being.” Cone, “Black Consciousness and the Black Church,” 50. Here there is also a connection to Paul Tillich’s notion of the “courage to be.” See Paul Tillich, The Courage to Be (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1952), 188. 43 Cone explains: “When St. Paul speaks of being ‘a new creature’ in Christ, the redeemed black person takes that literally. He glorifies blackness, not as a means of glorifying self in the egotistical sense, but merely as an acceptance of the black self as a creature of God.” Ibid., 53. 44 Ibid. 45 Ibid., 51. 46 Ibid., 52. Cone cites Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship here. See Chapter 6, pp. 146–50 above for arguments that Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship can be read as a theologia crucis, as well as an intertwining of justification and sanctification that is consonant with Luther’s Freedom of a Christian. 47 Ibid., 66. See Chapter 6, pp. 157–61 above for the argument that Bonhoeffer’s July 18, 1944 letter to Eberhard Bethge turns a theologia crucis to the suffering of the victims of sin in the world.

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Finally, Cone believes the Christian message as a rebuke of white racism in the United States means denying whiteness and affirming blackness. Yet this is not explicitly related to physical skin color, but rather an attitude of the heart. “To be black means that your heart, your soul, your mind, and your body are where the dispossessed are.”48 Therefore, Cone’s understanding of the terms “blackness” and “whiteness” is symbolic. Still, this symbolic description of blackness is related to Cone’s understanding of reconciliation, wherein “white people are prepared to deny themselves (whiteness), take up the cross (blackness), and follow Christ (black ghetto).”49 Cone thus associates whiteness (and the corresponding systemic oppression of white racism) with a denial of the cross, blackness explicitly with Christ’s cross, and Christian discipleship with following Christ in the ghetto. One year after the publication of Black Theology and Black Power, Cone published A Black Theology of Liberation (1970), in which he explained how black theology understands theological language as symbolic language, related methodologically to Paul Tillich. Cone’s more precise arguments about theological language in his second book are helpful to note, as they illumine Cone’s positions in Black Theology and Black Power, including the angry prophetic tone which Cone used in his first book. [B]lack theology takes seriously Paul Tillich’s description of the symbolic nature of all theological speech. We cannot describe God directly; we must use symbols that point to dimensions of reality that cannot be spoken of literally. Therefore to speak of black theology is to speak with the Tillichian understanding of symbol in mind. The focus on blackness does not mean that only blacks suffer as victims in a racist society, but that blackness is an ontological symbol and a visible reality which best describes what oppression means in America.50

In Black Theology and Black Power, then, Cone is not arguing for a literal change of skin color on the part of whites, but that whites should stand with oppressed blacks, and by so doing follow Jesus Christ who is symbolically present in the ghetto.51 This symbolic-ontological understanding of blackness is behind Cone’s argument that God is black. The blackness of God means that God has made the oppressed condition God’s own condition. This is the essence of the biblical revelation. By electing Israelite slaves as the people 48

Ibid., 151. Ibid., 150. 50 Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation, 7–8. 51 Cone’s symbolic-ontological understanding of blackness corresponds to his understanding of theological language as passionate language in A Black Theology of Liberation. “I am concerned with concrete humanity, particularly with oppressed humanity. In America that means black humanity. This is the point of departure of black theology, because it believes that oppressed humanity is the point of departure of Christ himself. It is this concern that makes theological language a language of passion.” Ibid., 20. 49

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of God and by becoming the Oppressed One in Jesus Christ, the human race is made to understand that God is known where human beings experience humiliation and suffering. It is not that God feels sorry and takes pity on them (the condescending attitude of those racists who need their guilt assuaged for getting fat on the starvation of others); quite the contrary. God’s election of Israel and incarnation in Christ reveal that the liberation of the oppressed is a part of the innermost nature of God. Liberation is not an afterthought, but the essence of divine activity.52

Again we see that for Cone the symbol of God’s blackness is an ontological orientation toward those who are oppressed, with the particularity in Cone’s theology being oppressed black people in the United States.53 His emphasis on “making the oppressed condition God’s own condition” relates to a transformed happy exchange as argued for in part 2 of the present study, which is then transfigured through his argument that liberation is “the essence of divine activity.” This transfiguration is significant: for the first time in the texts and authors examined in the present study, we are seeing an argument for liberation as the essence of God’s actions. Regarding the resurrection of Jesus, Cone’s understanding of theological language shows again Cone’s incorporation of Jürgen Moltmann’s political hermeneutics of the gospel. In A Black Theology of Liberation, Cone defines Jesus’s resurrection as the “universal note in the gospel message of Jesus,” and defines the resurrection as “hope which focuses on the future in order to make

52 Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation, 67. Italic in original. Cone’s understanding of the blackness of God has implications for a contemporary constructive understanding the Trinity. Using Cone’s symbolic understanding of language as a basis, one could then say the Black Trinity suffers with all people who are oppressed, and particularly with oppressed black people in the United States, and is the source of their liberation, as well as the impetus for putting to right the systemic sins of the perpetrators of racism and global white supremacy. Cone’s understanding of God as Black could then correspond to a Trinitarian theology of Holy Saturday as a new theology of hope for the twenty-first century, which would find its concrete basis in a transfigured theologia crucis through Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. This new theology of hope would center on liberation of oppressed black bodies, as well as liberation to repentance and true humanity for oppressors. For a recent constructive proposal around the theme of liberation for oppressors (although without direct engagement of James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation), see Patrick Oden, Hope for the Oppressor: Discovering Freedom through Transformative Community (Lanham, Maryland: Lexington/Fortress Academic, 2019), 1–20. 53 Stephen Morrison argues constructively from Cone’s understanding of the blackness of God that God’s participation in the history of the oppressed in the Exodus narrative, and the universal expansion of the Exodus in the Christ story, means God stands in solidarity with oppressed peoples worldwide: “God actively participates in the history of the oppressed. In Christ, that history was expanded from its exclusive focus on the Jewish people to include all the marginalized and poor throughout the world. That means God identifies with the black struggle for liberation. That is true for black bodies brutalized by the streets and prisons of America and black societies throughout the third-world exploited by the white first-world. God is black means that God is on the side of the oppressed everywhere.” Stephen D. Morrison, James Cone in Plain English (Columbus: Beloved Publishing, 2020), 19–32; 23.

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us refuse to tolerate present inequities.”54 Connecting with his incorporation of Moltmann’s “political hermeneutics of the gospel” in Black Theology and Black Power, Cone now argues the future of God revealed in the resurrection of Jesus is “the contradiction of any earthly injustice with existence in Jesus Christ.”55 He then describes theological language in relation to Christian theology’s task of analyzing the meaning of hope in God, in order that oppressed peoples can take an existential risk for freedom. The task of Christian theology, then, is to analyze the meaning of hope in God in such a way that the oppressed community of a given society will risk all for earthly freedom, a freedom made possible in the resurrection of Jesus. The language of theology challenges structural societies because it is inseparable from the suffering community.56

Cone’s understanding of Christian theology means theological language is not neutral for him, but rather what he calls “passionate language” in relation to black theology being survival theology. “Black theology is survival theology because it seeks to provide the theological dimensions of the struggle for black identity. It seeks to reorder religious language, to show that all forces supporting white oppression are anti-Christian in their essence.”57 Cone’s incorporation of Tillich’s understanding of theology as symbolic language is thus to argue for theology as a liberating language of hope for the oppressed, done from the standpoint of the oppressed themselves, in order to “provide the theological dimensions of the struggle for black identity.” These arguments also relate to Black Theology and Black Power, wherein Cone identifies Black Power as “the message of Christ himself.”58 Having closely read excerpts from Black Theology and Black Power and clarified Cone’s understanding of theological language in his A Black Theology of Liberation, the present study now proceeds to examine Cone’s theological hermeneutics for traces of a theologia crucis.

3. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Theological Hermeneutics In order to connect Cone’s prophetic critiques from Black Theology and Black Power with his mature theology in Cross in the Lynching Tree, an examination of his theological hermeneutics is necessary. By so doing, the argument can be made for reading the whole of Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis, and thus not primarily restricted to The Cross and the 54

Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation, 3–4. Ibid., 4. See also n. 25 above. 56 Ibid. 57 Ibid., 14. 58 See n. 37 above. 55

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Lynching Tree.59 Further, since this later text is the more obvious choice for exploring traces of a theologia crucis in Cone, attempting to connect it with theology from his early-to-middle years allows for potentially discovering aspects to a transfigured theologia crucis through Cone that would be missed by only, or even primarily, examining Cross and the Lynching Tree. When considering Cone’s theological hermeneutics overall, it is important to mention the shift in Cone’s thinking that becomes fully apparent in God of the Oppressed.60 Whereas in Black Theology and Black Power and A Black Theology of Liberation, Cone remained indebted overall to Karl Barth, Paul Tillich, and Rudolf Bultmann for methodological starting points, by the time of God of the Oppressed, Cone has turned to a constructive theology derived apart from first consulting European methodologies, and as a critique of Karl Barth in particular. Cone writes: What could Karl Barth possibly mean for black students who had come from the cotton fields of Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi, seeking to change the structure of their lives that had defined black as nonbeing? What is the significance of Nicaea and Chalcedon for those who knew Jesus not as a thought in their heads to be analyzed in relation to a similar thought called God? They knew Jesus as a Savior and a friend, as the ‘lily of the valley and the bright and morning star.’61

Cone argues here for a theology that is concrete and rooted in the black experience as its starting point independent of a theological methodology beginning with Barth. The concreteness of black experience is then seen in relation to the concreteness of Jesus rather than as an object for abstract analysis. Therefore, while Cone’s theology was based in the dialectical relationship between Gospel and the black experience from the beginning, Cone reverses the order to the dialectical relationship of the black experience and the Gospel with God of the Oppressed.62 This shift is demonstrated when Cone reflects on the impact his black students had on his theology. 59

Thus, the present study is taking a different approach than Dominik Gautier, who has identified Cone’s theologia crucis primarily in The Cross and the Lynching Tree. See Dominik Gautier, “The Cross and the Lynching Tree: Die Kreuzestheologie James H. Cones,” Ökumenische Rundschau 64, no. 2 (2015): 198–206. 60 This shift may, in fact, begin to be seen in Cone’s Spirituals and the Blues. However, in this text, Cone is not writing a constructive theology of black music per se but is rather interpreting the spirituals and the blues theologically. Cone writes: “Black music is also theological. That is, it tells us about the divine Spirit that moves the people toward unity and self-determination. It is not possible to be black and encounter the Spirit of black emotion and not be moved. My purpose is to uncover the theological propositions of black music as reflected in the spirituals and the blues, asking: What do they tell us about black people’s deepest aspiration and devotion? I will ask questions about God, Jesus Christ, life after death, and suffering; and I will seek to investigate these questions in light of black people’s historical strivings for freedom.” Cone, Spirituals and the Blues, 6. 61 Cone, God of the Oppressed, 5. Italics in original. 62 As Cone reflected on his early books, he realized he had failed to consider the importance

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Those black students drove me back to the primary art forms of the black religious experience by refusing to accept a prefabricated theology from the lips of James Cone. I began once more to listen to the heartbeat of black life as reflected in the song and speech of black people. As I did so, I asked myself, What is theology? What is the significance of this ‘reasoning about God’ that the Church has undertaken for nearly twenty centuries? And I knew that Calvin and Bultmann could not answer the question for me. Indeed the heart of the problem was the relation of the black religious experience to my knowledge of classical theology.63

This shift in Cone’s theology from beginning with European methodologies indebted to Barth, Tillich, and/or Bultmann toward a constructive theology beginning first with the black experience means blackness is in a dialectical relationship with the Gospel of Jesus Christ now, rather than the Gospel of Jesus Christ being the anchoring for a theology of blackness. The hermeneutical shift does not mean a dramatic break with Cone’s earliest theology, as will be shown throughout the rest of the chapter. Rather it means that Cone allowed the black experience to shape his use of “classical theology” from the beginning, instead of as a secondary act. Therefore, even though there is a change in Cone’s thinking about constructive theological methodology by the time of God of the Oppressed, this change does not necessarily mean Cone has departed from his arguments in Black Theology and Black Power or A Black Theology of Liberation. Instead, evidence for a consistency in Cone’s thinking, even as his theology shifts to beginning with the black experience without first consulting the methodologies of European theologians, can be found in an essay Cone wrote on theological hermeneutics in 1975, the same year the first edition of God of the Oppressed was published. The of his home church on his theological consciousness. This realization was arguably a cause for him to reverse the hermeneutical order from his early books of Gospel-black experience to black experience-Gospel. “Reflecting on those books I realized that something important was missing. They did not show clearly enough the significance of Macedonia A. M. E. Church and the imprint of that community upon my theological consciousness. After all, I was insisting that theology has to arise out of an oppressed community as they seek to understand their place in the history of salvation. Therefore I had to inquire about the theological significance of the black experience as reflected in sermon, song, and story.” Cone, God of the Oppressed, 6. 63 Ibid, 5. Compare with Cone’s definition of black theology from 1970, which shows a consistency in his thinking, even as his emphasis on beginning theological reflection with the black experience becomes more prevalent in God of the Oppressed: “What is Black Theology? Black Theology is that theology which arises out of the need to articulate the significance of black presence in a hostile white world. It is black people reflecting religiously on the black experience, attempting to redefine the relevance of the Christian Gospel for their lives. It is a mood, a feeling that grips the soul of a people when they realize that the world is not as they wish it to be. White people are cruel, disorderly, and violent against black people. To study theology from the perspective of Black Theology means casting one’s mental and emotional faculties with the lot of the oppressed so that they may learn the cause and the cure of their humiliation. More specifically, Black Theology is the theological explication of the blackness of black people.” Cone, “Black Consciousness and the Black Church,” 53.

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essay is called “Christian Theology and Scripture as the Expression of God’s Liberating Activity for the Poor” and is found in Cone’s book Speaking the Truth: Ecumenism, Liberation, and Black Theology.64 This book, first published in 1986, is compiled of essays from the years 1975–1985 in which Cone wrote about his own development as a black theologian, the primary sources involved in constructing his Black Theology of Liberation, and academic theology’s relationship to the church. Since this essay was published in final form in a book appearing at roughly the mid-point of Cone’s theological career, and originally in the same year as the first edition of God of the Oppressed, it can connect Cone’s early theology on the dialectical relationship of Black Theology and Black Power to his mature theology about the dialectical relationship between the cross and the lynching tree. Therefore, “Christian Theology and Scripture as the Expression of God’s Liberating Activity for the Poor” shows how Cone’s hermeneutics can transfigure the theme of theologia crucis. From this essay, we will be concerned with Cone’s understanding of theology, Scripture, the black experience, and the relationship between theory and praxis, noting where this essay corresponds with Cone’s constructive theology prior to The Cross and the Lynching Tree. In this essay, Cone defines Christian theology as liberating language for oppressed persons in the world. “Christian theology is language about God’s liberating activity in the world on behalf of the freedom of the oppressed.”65 In Cone’s understanding, then, Christian theological language is explicitly political and interrelated to praxis. “For the word ‘Christian’ connects theology inseparably to God’s will to set the captives free.”66 Cone admits his understanding of theology is not in line with the dominant Western theological tradition, writing, “truth ought not to be defined by the majority or by the dominant intellec-

64 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 4–17. To the knowledge of the present author, this book is currently under-represented in studies about Cone’s theology, and was out of print until its re-issue in May 2023 by Orbis. However, the essay “Christian Theology and Scripture as the Expression of God’s Liberating Activity for the Poor” is a detailed explanation of Cone’s hermeneutics related to Cone’s early theology and God of the Oppressed. This essay can thus be a source through which his early and mature constructive theological works can be interpreted. The first edition of Speaking the Truth is cited in this study. 65 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 4. Cone’s argument corresponds to Ware’s description of the content of black theology for the so-called Black Hermeneutical School: “For the Black Hermeneutical School, liberation is the content of black theology. This theme of liberation is understood primarily within the context of the biblical tradition.” Ware, Methodologies of Black Theology, 34–35. 66 Ibid. Cone connects here again to the Lukan Jesus’s saying, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free” (Luke 4:18, NRSV ). The word πτωχός, which the NRSV translates as “poor,” specifically refers to those who are being thrust onto divine resources because of their poverty. Thus, in the Lukan account, poverty is not spiritual (as in Matt. 5:3), but material. Cone’s understanding of the liberative nature of theological language for the oppressed is therefore in line with the Lukan view of poverty.

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tual interest of university academicians.”67 There is a prophetic undercurrent to Cone’s statement here, in which he critiques the dominant interests of the academy for the sake of those who are oppressed.68 Cone’s understanding of theology is political, practical, and prophetic, because Cone understands himself to be anchoring his theological speech in Scripture. My contention that Christian theology is language about God’s liberating activity for the poor is based upon the assumption that Scripture is the primary source of theological speech. To use Scripture as the starting point of theology does not rule out other sources, such as philosophy, tradition, and our contemporary context. It simply means that Scripture will define how these sources will function in theology.69

Cone admits others would also claim to anchor theological speech in Scripture. Therefore, he defines his hermeneutics of Scripture to make his argumentation clear about how he understands scriptural interpretation to be related to God’s solidarity with and liberation of the poor.70 Cone’s biblical hermeneutics center on YHWH’s liberation of the Hebrew slaves in Egypt, and the universalizing of this liberating hermeneutic in Jesus Christ. The Exodus is the central narrative of the Hebrew scriptures for Cone, wherein “God’s salvation is revealed in the liberation of slaves from social-political bondage.”71 Thus, Cone’s understanding of the Hebrew Bible revolves around “the central theme of divine liberation.”72 The importance of the Exodus story for Cone is seen especially in his observation that, “To fail to see this point is to misunderstand the Old Testament and thus to distort its message.”73 67

Ibid. This prophetic undercurrent results from Cone’s understanding of the Christ event, and corresponds to Cone’s Black Theology and Black Power, as well as Cone’s first published essay from 1968. See again n. 32 above. 69 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 4. 70 Ibid. “Since others, with different perspectives, would say the same thing, I can only explain the essential structure of my hermeneutical perspective.” Here, Cone’s consistency with his earlier A Black Theology of Liberation is important: “Black theology is biblical theology. That is, it is theology which takes seriously the importance of scripture in theological discourse. There can be no theology of the Christian gospel which does not take into account the biblical witness. It is true that the Bible is not the revelation of God; only Jesus is. But it is an indispensable witness to God’s revelation and is thus a primary source for Christian thinking about God.” Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation, 32. 71 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 5. 72 Ibid. 73 Ibid. Cone’s description of biblical hermeneutics here seems to still accord with Karl Barth overall, wherein the Bible is primarily read from the standpoint of theological exegesis. Evidence for this claim is seen in that Cone does not question whether the Exodus is an historical event, but instead sees it as a narrative foundation for God’s liberating activity in history. For Barth’s own hermeneutics of Scriptural interpretation, see Richard E. Burnett, Karl Barth’s Theological Exegesis: Hermeneutical Principals of the Römerbrief Period (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2001), and Daniel L. Migliore, ed., Reading the Gospels with Karl Barth (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017). Related to Cone’s understanding of the black church’s compatibility with Barth’s inter68

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The New Testament is then the universalizing of the message of divine liberation found in the Hebrew Bible (and especially the Exodus story) through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Here Cone’s biblical hermeneutics contain traces of a theologia crucis re-shaped from the transformed theologia crucis through the twentieth-century theologians examined in the previous section of the present study. God became a poor Jew in Jesus and thus identified with the helpless in Israel. The cross of Jesus is nothing but God’s will to be with and like the poor. The resurrection means that God achieved victory over oppression, so that the poor no longer have to be determined by their poverty. This is true not only for the ‘house of Israel’ but for all the wretched of the land. The Incarnation, then, is simply God taking upon the divine self human suffering and humiliation. The resurrection is the divine victory over suffering, the bestowal of freedom to all who are weak and helpless. This and nothing else is the central meaning of the biblical story.74

A transfigured happy exchange from the transformation of this theme through Karl Barth, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Jürgen Moltmann can also be found in this excerpt, wherein the Christ event is defined as “God taking upon the divine self human suffering and humiliation,” in order that in Christ’s resurrection freedom is bestowed to “all who are weak and helpless.”75 God’s liberating presence in the pretation of Scripture, Cone writes, “Also like Barth, the black church regards the Bible as the primary source for knowledge about Jesus and God. It was usually the first book that black slaves learned to read and the one which every black Christian had in his or her home. The Bible is the ‘good Book,’ God’s true Word to which the people turn for knowledge of God and for guidance on how to live. No preacher would dare preach without a text from the Bible and frequent references to the gospel truth found in it. No Christian can describe the meaning of the ‘good life’ without references to ethics arising out the Bible. Whatever we say about the black religion, it is a religion of the ‘good Book,’ and that alone makes it partly compatible with Barth’s theology.” Cone, My Soul Looks Back, 81. Cone incorporates the historical-critical biblical method dialectically into his understanding of Christology, though, when he cites Pannenberg’s Grundzüge der Christologie with approval. Cone agrees with Pannenberg’s emphasis on a socalled “Christology from below” overall, but critiques Pannenberg for a one-sided stress on the historical Jesus as the basis for Christology at the expense of Christ’s presence in contemporary existence related to liberation of oppressed black people. He argues further that theology needs both a “Christology from above” and a “Christology from below” in dialectical tension with each other. See Cone, God of the Oppressed, 106–12, and Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 34–35. For the present study’s argument that Pannenberg’s Grundzüge der Christologie can be considered his theologia crucis, see Chapter 1, nn. 17–21 above. 74 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 5–6. Cone’s student and first-generation Womanist theologian Jacqueline Grant argues similarly about the cross and resurrection to Cone overall: “The condition of Black people today reflects the cross of Jesus. Yet the resurrection brings the hope that liberation from oppression is immanent. The resurrected Black Christ signifies this hope.” Jacqueline Grant, White Women’s Christ and Black Women’s Jesus (Atlanta: Scholars, 1989), 216. 75 This observation corresponds to Cone’s arguments about the cross and resurrection in God of the Oppressed. Cone writes, “The cross of Jesus reveals the extent of God’s involvement in the suffering of the weak. God is not merely sympathetic with the social pain of the poor but becomes totally identified with them in their agony and pain. The pain of the oppressed is God’s pain, for God takes their suffering as God’s own, thereby freeing them from its ultimate

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Exodus and the Christ events is then what makes Christian theological language liberative for Cone, in contrast to an ideological distortion of the Gospel.76 Cone’s observations here about theological language relate to his understanding of language and theological method in A Black Theology of Liberation, even though this former text is still indebted to European theological methodologies as a starting point in a way the later text is not. In the earlier text, Cone defines Christian theology in general as liberation theology. “Christian theology is a theology of liberation. It is a rational study of the being of God in the world in light of the existential situation of an oppressed community, relating the forces of liberation to the essence of the gospel, which is Jesus Christ.”77 The dialectical relationship of liberation and the gospel of Jesus Christ is immediately apparent, so that oppressed communities understand that liberation “is the gospel of Jesus Christ.”78 Cone’s argument for the dialectical incorporation of liberation and the gospel of Jesus Christ in his A Black Theology of Liberation is posed due to his interpretation of the Exodus story and the Lukan Jesus’s announcement of liberation for the oppressed (cf. Lk. 4:18–19), corresponding to the essay examined from Speaking the Truth.79 Since Cone understands liberation as essential to the Bible, Cone argues in A Black Theology of Liberation that the oppressed Christian community joins Jesus in the liberation struggle for oppressed humanity. In view of the biblical emphasis on liberation, it seems not only appropriate but necessary to define the Christian community as the community of the oppressed which joins Jesus Christ in his fight for the liberation of humankind. The task of theology, then, is to explicate the meaning of God’s liberating activity so that those who labor under enslaving powers will see that the forces of liberation are the very activity of God. Christian theology is never just a rational study of the being of God. Rather it is a study of God’s liberating activity in the world, God’s activity [o]n behalf of the oppressed.80

Significant for Cone’s definition in A Black Theology of Liberation is his understanding of Jesus’s mission as that of political liberation rather than merely a spiritual one. It is from this political understanding of Jesus’s mission that control of their lives. The oppressed do not have to worry about suffering because its power over their lives was defeated by God. God in Christ became the Suffering Servant and thus took the humiliation and suffering of the oppressed into God’s own history. This divine event that happened on the cross liberated the oppressed to fight against suffering while not being determined by it. The resurrection ignites joy and excitement because it is the sign of God’s victory over suffering on the cross. The oppressed are set free to struggle politically against the imposed injustice of rulers. The Suffering Servant was raised from the dead, and this means that God is now present not only with Israel but with all who fight for the realization of humanity.” Cone, God of the Oppressed, 161–62. 76 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 6. 77 Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation, 1. Italics in original. 78 Ibid., 1. Italic in original. 79 Ibid., 2–3. 80 Ibid., 3. Cf. n. 87 below.

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Cone finds the Christian community as an oppressed community which “joins Jesus Christ in his fight for liberation of humankind,” corresponding again to Cone’s hermeneutical essay from Speaking the Truth.81 Cone believes Jesus has a “thoroughly Hebrew view of human nature,” meaning he connects Jesus’s mission with the Exodus story through Jesus’s message of liberation from Satanic powers.82 Returning to the essay found in Speaking the Truth, Cone moves from his understanding of the Bible and language to the relationship of Christology to theological language in general, and the Bible in particular. Here Cone shows an indebtedness to, yet critique of Karl Barth.83 Because Christian theology begins and ends with the biblical story of God’s liberation of the weak, it is also christological language. On this point Karl Barth was right. Unfortunately, Barth did not explicate his christological point with sufficient clarity, because his theology was determined too much by the theological tradition of Augustine and Calvin and too little by Scripture. While Barth’s christological starting point enabled him to move closer to the biblical message than most of his contemporaries, his understanding of theology was not derived from the biblical view of Jesus Christ as the liberator of the oppressed. Because Jesus the Liberator is not central in Barth’s Christology, his view of theology is also defective at this point.84

Chapter 5 of the present study has attempted to argue how Barth’s Erwählungslehre in 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics is concrete, rather than abstract. However, Cone is nevertheless critiquing Barth’s Christology for lacking a hermeneutic corresponding to the political-prophetic concerns of liberation theologies, as well as an over indebtedness to Augustine and Calvin to make his Christological claims. There is also an implicit critique here of Barth’s Johannine Christology, and an implicit privileging of Lukan Christology.85 81

Ibid. Cone writes: “The conflict with Satan and the powers of this world, the condemnation of the rich, the insistence that the kingdom of God is for the poor, and the locating of his ministry among the poor – these and other features of the career of Jesus show that his work was directed to the oppressed for the purpose of their liberation.” Ibid. 83 There is also a possible connection to and radicalization of Martin Luther’s Christological hermeneutics, with Cone’s description of Christian theology as Christological language. Cf. Chapter 4 above, as well Luther’s Preface to the Book of James in LW 35: 396; WA DB 7, 384: 25–28, and his rhetorical question against Erasmus, “Take Christ out of the Scriptures, and what will you find left in them?” (Tolle Christum e scripturis, quid amplius in illis invenies?) in LW 33: 26; WA 18, 606: 29. 84 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 6. 85 See n. 31 above. If it is accurate that Cone’s Christology is Lukan overall, then this excerpt helps further show why it is likely that Cone’s Christology fits overall within what Pannenberg characterizes as a “Christology from below.” See Pannenberg, Grundzüge der Christologie, 26–44. Notwithstanding Cone’s Christological compatibility with Wolfhart Pannenberg, Cone’s Christology is still concerned with oppressed persons in a way Pannenberg’s is not. See Cone, God of the Oppressed, 31: “There is no truth in Jesus Christ independent of the oppressed of the land – their history and culture. And in America, the oppressed are the people of color – black, 82

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As a critique and implicit radicalization of Barth’s own Christology (Cone finds Barth to be correct that Christian theology is Christological language), Cone believes theology begins with Scripture and Christ. “Because theology begins with Scripture, it must also begin with Christ.”86 Cone’s understanding of the necessity of a Christological starting point in relation to oppressed persons shows his relation to and transfiguration of the previous texts and authors closely read in the present study: Christian theology is language about the crucified Christ who grants freedom to all who are falsely condemned in an oppressive society. What else can the crucifixion mean except that God, the Holy One of Israel, became identified with the victims of oppression? What else can the resurrection mean except that God’s victory in Christ is the poor person’s victory over poverty? If theology does not take this seriously, how can it be worthy of the name Christian? If the church, the community out of which theology arises, does not make God’s liberation of the oppressed central in its mission and proclamation, how can it rest easy with a condemned criminal as the dominant symbol of its message?87

Cone argues theological language has its origin in the church.88 However, Cone’s critique of theology beginning in the church is that it needs to make the theme of God’s liberation of the oppressed seen in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ “central to its mission and proclamation.” In so doing, then, the church gives witness to Christ as a “condemned criminal” as the “dominant symbol of its message.”89

yellow, red, and brown. Indeed it can be said that to know Jesus to know him as revealed in the struggle of the oppressed for freedom.” 86 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 6. 87 Ibid. Cf. n. 80 above. 88 Cf. Barth’s explanation of dogmatics as a theological discipline that is a function of the church in KD 1.1, 1; CD 1.1, 3. 89 Ibid. Cone’s use of the phrase “condemned criminal” to describe Jesus Christ has connections to Ernst Käsemann. See Ernst Käsemann, Der Ruf der Freiheit, 5th ed. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1972). Cone expressed his appreciation to Käsemann in an email to editor Ry O. Siggelkow that serves as the Foreword to a new English collection of Käsemann’s writings. “Käsemann was a very distinguished scholar. I have read extensively in his work and appreciate him very much. His book Jesus Means Freedom was one of the first books that excited me about him, even though I knew and read his work about the ‘new quest for the historical Jesus,’ challenging some of the assumptions of his teacher Rudolf Bultmann. As I look back, I can see how his challenge to Bultmann led directly to his affirmation of liberation theology and my work …. Among all the German theologians, or Europeans for that matter, whom I came to know when I began writing, Käsemann was the only one who understood me. He was a man of my own mind and heart and wrote concretely about what I was trying to express in my own situation.” Ernst Käsemann, Church Conflicts: The Cross, Apocalyptic, and Political Resistance, ed., Ry O. Siggelkow (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2021), vii. Chapter 1 of the present study argued briefly for the validity of Käsemann’s reading of a Pauline theologia crucis in relation to Martin Luther, providing further evidence that Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation can be fruitfully read as a transfigured theologia crucis. Finally, Cone quotes Käsemann in relation to a Pauline theologia crucis in Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 26. I am grateful to Stephen

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Having described the strengths and shortcomings of Karl Barth’s approach to theology, Cone moves to the relationship between the Christian message as translated for contemporary contexts and particular cultures. Here, Cone shows an incorporation and critique of Paul Tillich and Rudolf Bultmann. “The meaning of Scripture is not self-evident in every situation. Therefore, it is theology’s task to relate the message of the Bible to every situation.”90 Said situational translation of the message of the Bible means the Bible is interpreted dialectically in relation to contemporary cultural questions. On this point, Cone moves beyond Karl Barth and to Bultmann and Tillich, while still critiquing what he sees as theological shortcomings in the latter two theologians. Because theology must relate the message to the situation of the church’s involvement in the world, theology must use other sources in addition to Scripture. On this point, Bultmann and Tillich are more useful than Barth, although they misrepresent the function of culture in theology.91

Cone agrees with Bultmann and Tillich that theology uses sources outside of Scripture to interpret the Gospel for the contemporary world.92 This means Morrison for alerting me to the new English collection of Käsemann essays containing the Foreword by Cone. 90 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 7. 91 Ibid. 92 Cone’s hermeneutics examined here connect with Paul Tillich’s method of correlation. In the Introduction to his Systematic Theology, Tillich defines a method of correlation in the following way: “The method of correlation explains the contents of the Christian faith through existential questions and theological answers in mutual interdependence.” Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, Volume 1, 60. For Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, the question would be how oppressed black people in the United States particularly, and oppressed persons worldwide in general, can find freedom from systemic racism through the symbolic language of the Christian faith. The Christian faith, as (re)defined by Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, is then the answer to the question of black survival and existence. Thus, Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation can be fruitfully interpreted as a radicalization of Tillich’s method, in that liberation of the oppressed and the Gospel of Jesus Christ are the intertwining that prevents the separation of question and answer. Tillich elaborates the question-answer paradigm not as a specific point in time, but as a part of the essential being of humanity which is estranged through existence: “Symbolically speaking, God answers humankind’s questions, and under the impact of God’s answers humanity asks them. Theology formulates the questions implied in human existence, and theology formulates the answers implied in divine self-manifestation under the guidance of the questions implied in human existence. This is a circle which drives a human being to a point where question and answer are not separated.” Ibid., 61. Masculine language altered for gender inclusivity. Tillich’s theological circle of question-answer is another way in which Cone’s theology can be seen to be consistent overall, even given his turn away from Barth, Tillich, and Bultmann as explicit methodological starting points in his later theology, because the Gospel and the black experience are interconnected for Cone similarly to how existential questions and theological answers are interconnected for Tillich. Importantly, and perhaps controversially, Bruce McCormack argues both Karl Barth and Paul Tillich have a method of correlation, with Tillich’s method relating to the traditional Lutheran Law-Gospel sequence, and Barth’s the Reformed Gospel-Law. McCormack argues that a careful study of both theologians is needed in relation to this question, which, to the knowledge of the present study’s author, has

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he disagrees with the pre-Erwählungslehre Barth about the question of natural theology. “Karl Barth notwithstanding, the natural theology issue is dead, at least to the extent that our language is never simply about God and nothing else however much we might wish it otherwise. This means that theology cannot avoid philosophy, sociology, and other perspectives on the world.”93 Human culture, as well as academic disciplines outside of theology proper, aid the translation of the biblical message of liberation to contemporary cultural situations. Cone’s critiques of Tillich and Bultmann arise ultimately in that, like Barth, the liberation of the oppressed is not taken into direct hermeneutical consideration in their theologies.94 For Cone, then, theology considers the contemporary not yet been attempted. Such a study would be pertinent to understanding James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, because it could help show how Cone relates to, critiques, and radicalizes both Tillich and Barth. Also, and perhaps ironically given Cone’s academic training as a Barth scholar, Cone’s constructive theology overall may correspond more fully with Tillich’s method of correlation and thus the Lutheran Law-Gospel sequence rather than Barth’s Reformed Gospel-Law (cf. nn. 50–51 above). Unfortunately, McCormack does not consider whether or not Bultmann has a method of correlation, but comparing Bultmann’s “Demythologizing essay” and Johanneskommentar (both from 1941) with Tillich’s Systematic Theology could also be fruitful for a fuller understanding of Cone’s constructive theology. See Bruce L. McCormack, Theologische Dialektik und kritischer Realismus: Entstehung und Entwicklung von Karl Barths Theologie 1909–1936, trans. Matthias Gockel (Zürich: Theologischer Verlag, 2006), 46–47, n. 57. Bultmann’s Johanneskommentar is arguably his theological application of his demythologizing hermeneutic, seen in the beginning of the commentary in his observations about the existential importance of the mythological language of the Word made flesh. See Rudolf Bultmann, Das Evangelium des Johannes (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1941), 1–77. 93 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 7. It is still unclear overall if Cone considered Karl Barth’s theology of the three lights in CD 4.3 in relation to the question of a possible form of natural theology in the mature Barth. Cf. CD 4.3 (1), 38–165; KD 4.3 (1), 40–188, and Jürgen Moltmann, “Natürliche Theologie?” in Jürgen Moltmann, Gott in der Schöpfung: Ökologische Schöpfungslehre (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1985), 70–73; 71, n. 11. 94 However, in a sermon called The Riddle of Inequality, Tillich addresses divine participation in the human condition in light of Christ on the cross. “It is the greatness and heart of the Christian message that God, as manifest in the Christ on the Cross, totally participates in the dying of a child, in the condemnation of the criminal, in the disintegration of a mind, in starvation and famine, and even in the human rejection of Himself. There is no human condition into which the divine power does not penetrate. This is what the Cross, the most extreme of all human conditions, tells us.” Paul Tillich, “The Riddle of Inequality,” in Paul Tillich, The Eternal Now (New York: Scribner’s, 1963), 46. Due to this sermon, Tillich’s You are Accepted sermon, the concluding chapter of his The Courage to Be, sections from his Theology and Culture, and the method and Christology of his Systematic Theology, I have argued Tillich should be considered a theologian of the cross in the tradition of Martin Luther, as well as proposing constructive possibilities for contemporary theological reflection from Tillich’s thinking. See Brach S. Jennings, “The Courage to Be: Paul Tillich’s Existentialist Theology of the Cross in Relation to Martin Luther” in Dialog 57, no. 3 (2018): 211–18. Cone also draws from Tillich’s understanding of theological language as symbolic language, which is important for his understanding of whiteness and of God’s blackness, as was shown above. Regarding Bultmann, it needs to be kept in mind that Bultmann’s controversial demythologizing essay was written to the Confessing Church, and that Bultmann was a member of this group. See Brach S. Jennings, “Rudolf Bultmann as Theologian of Radical Trust in the Gospel” in Currents in Theology and Mission 45, no. 4

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political and social situation from which it must respond to, but it is not wholly determined by that situation. This hermeneutical decision is made in order that dominant interests of white culture are not allowed to obscure and/or suppress the hermeneutical necessity of privileging the experiences of oppressed persons of color for a theological starting point, as related to Cone’s understanding of the Bible. “I believe that by focusing on Scripture, theology is granted the freedom to take seriously its social and political situation without being determined by it. Thus the question is not whether we take seriously our social existence but how and in what way we take it seriously.”95 Cone emphasizes the particularity of political and social situations to “represent the political interest of the One about whom Christianity speaks.”96 Therefore, the dialectical relationship between theology and culture is still oriented toward Jesus Christ as the liberator of the oppressed.97 In terms of Cone’s constructive theology, Cone’s description of the dialectical relationship between theology and culture shows a creative incorporation and critique of Barth, Tillich, and Bultmann in his thinking. Cone draws from Barth in relation to Barth’s emphasis on theology as Christological language. From Tillich and Bultmann, Cone takes seriously the need for theology to draw from other academic disciplines, in order that the theological task is not reduced to the (theological) exegesis of Scripture alone, and that the message of Scripture can be translated for contemporary cultural situations. Still, Cone’s agreement with Tillich and Bultmann about the necessity of drawing from other disciplines outside of theology is balanced with his insistence that the social interest of the oppressed be the starting point in relation to Christ. “The presence of the crucified and risen Christ as witnessed in Scripture determines whose social interest we must represent if we are to be faithful to him.”98 Cone defines his hermeneutical task as doing theology for oppressed black humanity in the United States, which then relates to oppressed peoples world(2018): 35–40, and David W. Congdon, The Mission of Demythologizing: Rudolf Bultmann’s Dialectical Theology (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2015), 176–82, esp. 181, n. 357. For the argument that Bultmann’s demythologizing hermeneutic should be seen as political, rather than apolitical as argued by Dorothee Sölle, see Congdon, Mission of Demythologizing, 587–91. Both Tillich and Bultmann thus have undertones that are consonant with Cone’s own concerns. For Cone, then, the problem with Bultmann and Tillich is likely that they both fail to consider the specific embodied oppressions of peoples of color as a source and starting place for hermeneutics. 95 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 7. Italics in original. 96 Ibid. 97 While explicit references to Moltmann’s “political hermeneutics of the gospel” are not present here, Cone’s arguments are nevertheless still consonant with Moltmann’s political concerns that are part and parcel to his Trinitarian eschatologia crucis, as explored in chapter 7 above. Cf. Cone, God of the Oppressed, 117–19, where Cone defines his understanding of hope in comparison to and contrast with “hope” theology represented by Metz, Moltmann, and Pannenberg, but still in apparent appreciation of Moltmann’s concern for concrete oppressed communities.  98 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 8.

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wide. This task corresponds to the contemporary witness to Jesus Christ crucified and risen, which Cone defines as black theology. In an attempt to do theology in the light of this scriptural witness to the crucified and risen Christ as found in our contemporary situation, I have spoken of Christian theology as black theology.… There is not one Christian theology, but many Christian theologies which are valid expressions of the gospel of Jesus. But it is not possible to do Christian theology as if the poor do not exist. Indeed, there can be no Christian speech about God which does not represent the interest of the victims in our society. If we can just make that point an embodiment of our Christian identity, then we will have moved a long way since the days of Constantine.99

The implied failure of theologies which do not take the existence of the poor and oppressed into account as a hermeneutical source for Christian theology corresponds to missing the mark concerning the incarnate, crucified, and risen Jesus Christ. Since God “became a poor Jew in Jesus and thus identified with the helpless in Israel,” Christian theology should be connected to oppressed peoples and communities.100 Christian theological language should then correspond to the language of oppressed peoples fighting for freedom. “If Christian theology is language about the crucified and risen One, the One who has elected all for freedom, what else can it be than the language of those who are fighting for freedom?”101 Cone then returns to his previous emphasis on the relationship between theory and praxis, giving the basis for his critique of contemporary white, Western theology. For him, the problem with white, Western theology is not only its failure to think about God from the vantage point of oppressed peoples, but also in its separation of theory from praxis, which in turn does not allow for analyzing the relationship between the gospel and liberation of oppressed peoples. From Augustine to Schleiermacher, it is hard to find a theologian in the Western church who defines the gospel in terms of God’s liberation of the oppressed. The same is true in much of the contemporary speech about God. It can be seen in the separation of theology from ethics and the absence of liberation in both. The chief mistake of contemporary white theology is not simply found in what it says about God, though that is not excluded. It is found in its separation of theory from praxis, and the absence of liberation in its analysis of the gospel.102

 99 Ibid. Cone’s critique of post-Constantinian theology is similar to Douglas John Hall, who critiques the Constantinian theology of empire from the standpoint of a contemporary theologia crucis. See Douglas John Hall, The Cross in Our Context: Jesus and the Suffering World (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003), 157–81. 100 See again n. 74 above. 101 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 9. This argument relates to Cone’s understanding of Jesus’s mission as political rather than merely spiritual in A Black Theology of Liberation. See nn. 80–81 above. 102 Ibid., 10.

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Even though he creatively incorporates the theologies of Karl Barth, Paul Tillich, and Rudolf Bultmann, Cone argues now for his primary starting point to be the black experience, as oppressed black humanity, and oppressed peoples in general, struggle for freedom.103 Making the struggles of the oppressed (seen particularly in the black experience in the United States and worldwide where oppressed persons of color are struggling for liberation) his explicit starting point for theological language relates to Cone’s attempt to identify the difference between truth and heresy. For him, heresy entails any theology that does not take liberation of the oppressed as the basis of its hermeneutics, as related to scriptural liberation.104 Cone’s hermeneutical privileging of Jesus Christ as the liberator of poor and oppressed black people then entails a redefining of appropriate sources for systematic theology. Therefore, Cone turns to the spirituals and the blues as sources depicting the black experience in his constructive theology and derives a new understanding of the cross theme in comparison with the other primary texts closely read throughout the present study.105 Theology derived from the moans and shouts of oppressed black people defines a different set of problems than those found in the white theological textbooks. Instead of asking whether the Bible is infallible, black people want to know whether it is real – that is, whether the God to which is bears witness is present in their struggle. Black theology seeks to investigate the meaning of black people’s confidence in the biblical claim that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. Black theology is the consciousness of the people analyzing the meaning of their faith when they have to live in an extreme situation of suffering.106 103 It is important to emphasize that Cone does not claim all theological language originating from oppressed peoples is right solely because it originates from said oppressed peoples. Rather, Cone maintains the dialectical relationship between oppressed communities’ embodied experiences and Christian theological language as witnessed to in Scripture, giving further evidence for a particularity and universality in Cone’s thinking. Therefore, he argues that Christian theological language begins with the experiences of particular oppressed communities, in order to witness to God in Christ’s liberation of all oppressed peoples worldwide: “My limitation of Christian theology to the oppressed community does not mean everything the oppressed say about God is right because they are weak and helpless. To do that would be to equate the word of the oppressed with God’s word. There is nothing in Scripture that grants this possibility …. When I limit Christian theology to the oppressed community, I intend to say nothing other than what I believe to be the central message of Scripture: God has chosen to disclose divine righteousness in the liberation of the poor …. It is because Scripture is so decisively clear on this issue that I insist that theology cannot separate itself from the cultural history of the oppressed if it intends to be faithful to the One who makes Christian language possible.” Cone, Speaking the Truth, 9. 104 Ibid., 9–10. 105 This redefining of appropriate sources for systematic theology also relates to Cone’s constructive theological turn away from European methodologies as the starting point of his Black Theology of Liberation, as seen in Cone, God of the Oppressed, 15–36. 106 Ibid., 11–12. See also Cone’s argument for theology derived from the moans and shouts of black religion in Cone, God of the Oppressed, 21: “Truth is found in shout, hum, and moan as these expressions move the people closer to the source of their being. The moan, the shout, and

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The theme of suffering then relates to black theology’s Christological focus, particularly regarding Christ’s presence in the suffering of oppressed black people. This emphasis is consonant with Cone’s stress on the cross and resurrection as both Christ’s presence amid the suffering of victims, and Christ’s victory over suffering. In other words, the theme of suffering is not reduced to what Christ underwent on the cross but is dialectically incorporated with ongoing suffering in contemporary black life. “The presence of Jesus as the starting point for black theology does not mean it can overlook the experience of suffering in black life.”107 Cone then turns to a brief analysis of the spiritual “Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen” to elaborate on his point of black theology’s relationship to suffering, focusing on how the refrain of the spiritual ends with “Glory, Hallelujah.” The ‘Glory, Hallelujah’ at the end of that spiritual was not a denial of trouble but a faith affirmation that trouble does not have the last word in black existence. It means that evil and suffering, while still unquestionably present, cannot count decisively against black people’s faith that Jesus is also present with them, fighting against trouble …. No matter how difficult the pains of life might become, they cannot destroy the people’s confidence that victory over suffering has already been won in Jesus’ resurrection.108

Spirituals such as “Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen” are important sources for Cone’s constructive theology, in that they tell the story of black suffering in relation to the suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Jesus is a fighter against black people’s suffering, the One who is present with them in their suffering, and the victor over suffering, all of which accounts for the “Glory, Hallelujah” in this spiritual.109 Cone then admits that black faith does not claim to be objective or scientific, but centers in the scandal of the Christ event, quoting Paul from 1 Cor. 1:24 with language containing traces of a theologia crucis. Black faith is particularly a scandal to theological knowledge rooted in European standards of science as has dominated academic theology since the eighteenth century.110 the rhythmic bodily responses to prayer, song, and sermon are artistic projections of the pain and joy experienced in the struggle for freedom. It is the ability of black people to express the tragic side of social existence but also their refusal to be imprisoned by its limitations.” 107 Ibid., 12. 108 Ibid., 13. Cf. Cone, Spirituals and the Blues, 57–58. 109 This description corresponds to Cone’s argument regarding the spirituals that black saves understood Jesus as God’s eschatological liberation breaking into their history. “For black slaves, Jesus is God breaking into their historical present and transforming it according to divine expectations. Because of the revelation of Christ, there is no need to worry about the reality of liberation. It is already at hand in Jesus’ own person and work, and it will be fully consummated in God’s own ordained future.” Cone, Spirituals and the Blues, 52. 110 Here we can see a transfiguring through Cone’s theology of what Oswald Bayer calls “Catechetical Systematics” in Luther’s theological hermeneutics. See Oswald Bayer, Theologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1994), 106–15, and the Introduction of the present study which describes “Catechetical Systematics” in relation to hermeneutics for the theme of theologia crucis.

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For black faith claims that Jesus is the only evidence one needs to have in order to be assured that God has not left the little ones alone in bondage. For those who stand outside of this faith, such a claim is a scandal – that is, foolishness to those whose wisdom is derived from European intellectual history. ‘But to those who are called …. Christ [is] the power of God, and the wisdom of God’ (1 Cor. 1:24). In black religion, Christ is the Alpha and Omega, the One who has come to make the first last and the last first. The knowledge of this truth is not found in philosophy, sociology, or psychology. It is found in the immediate presence of Jesus with the people.111

While it is important to note that Cone is addressing black faith here, and not his own Black Theology of Liberation, it should also be remembered that Cone understands theological language to be derived principally from Scripture and the black experience (and/or the experience of oppressed peoples worldwide) and originates in the church. His Black Theology deriving from black faith can thus be read as containing traces of what Oswald Bayer calls sapientia for Luther’s theology. Bayer’s observation for Luther’s theology would then also be true for Cone’s theology in a transfigured fashion: Wisdom does not exclude science but includes it. Wisdom takes account of the connection between science and the pre-scientific life-world. Wisdom is a path that unites theory and practice and grounds both in a third thing, an experiential life (vita experimentalis), understood in the sense of a receptive life (vita passiva).112

A form of Anfechtung can also be found in Cone’s understanding of the black experience, given the prominent place suffering and its overcoming holds in his understanding of black reality. The transfiguration of sapientia related to a theologia crucis in the early Luther through Cone is that the vita experimentalis in Cone is the experience both of suffering (Anfechtung) in black life, and of Jesus as victor over suffering. While there may also be traces of the vita passiva in Cone’s theology (for example, in Cone’s argument for black people’s trust in “the immediate presence of Jesus with the people,”) the vita experimentalis would here be the assurance of the power of Christ’s victorious defeat of suffering. In any case, understanding Cone’s theology as a transfiguration of what Bayer calls sapientia for Luther’s theology helps make sense of Cone’s claim that black faith assertions are not rooted in rational arguments. Cone writes: But black faith assertions were never intended to be answers for the intellectual problems arising out of the European experience. They are black reflections on life and were intended as testimonies for the oppressed so that they would not give up in despair. They are not rational arguments.113

111

Cone, Speaking the Truth, 14. Oswald Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, ed. and trans. Jeffrey G. Silcock and Mark C. Mattes (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008), 28. 113 Cone, Speaking the Truth, 14. Italic in original. 112

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Reading Cone’s theology as a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis accounts both for Cone’s attempts to ground his Christian theological language in Scripture and in the black experience, as well as insistence that theology must engage human culture to translate the gospel message for the contemporary situation of oppressed black people. Through Cone’s hermeneutics, then, Jesus Christ becomes the impetus for oppressed people fighting for liberation and full humanity. “Because trouble does not have the last word, we can fight now in order to realize in our present what we know to be coming in God’s future.”114 Thus, while Cone does not reject contemporary forms of what can be termed scientia, he draws from them primarily in relation to what can be seen as a contemporary form of sapientia: theological language originating in the black church and confessing Jesus Christ as the liberator of the oppressed.115 As was argued in Chapter 1 of the present study, the theme of theologia crucis as read in Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation is an example of theology as sapientia. Cone’s theology can then be read as a transfigured form of sapientia, although without direct elements of late medieval passion mysticism found in Luther. If this description is consonant with Cone, it would mean that through Cone, a transfigured theologia crucis as sapientia does not reject intellectual analysis or rigorous inquiry into dogmatic propositions from a particular hermeneutical standpoint. Rather, theological language originates in the church as it provides a public space for hearing and living out the biblical story, which academic theology organizes and analyzes, particularly for Cone through the disciplines of philosophy and sociology, for the liberation of the oppressed in society. Arguing for reading Cone’s theology as sapientia then warrants further investigation into Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfiguration of a theologia crucis reshaped from the transformed theologia crucis in Part 2 of the present study, and originating in texts from the early Luther.

4. James Cone’s Hermeneutics as a Transfiguration of Martin Luther Having argued how Cone’s hermeneutics can be read as a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis, the present study will now closely read an essay from 1994 where Cone references Luther’s theologia crucis, and in a way corresponding explicitly to the present study’s investigations of this theme. In this essay, Cone describes 114

Ibid., 16. Italics in original. Cf. Cone’s essay presented to the World Council of Churches in 1973 during a conference addressing black theology and Latin American liberation theology in James H. Cone, “The Social Context of Theology: Freedom, History, and Hope,” The Journal of the Interdenominational Theological Center 1, no. 1 (1973): 55–65; 55–57. 115 See Cone’s essays about the black church and black worship in Ibid., 111–42 for further descriptions of Cone’s understanding of the origin of theological language in the church.

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black theologians being stimulated by Moltmann’s “Crucified God,” and by Luther’s distinction between the “theology of glory” and the “theology of the cross.” This essay also contains traces of a transformed theologia crucis as the present study has argued for through Barth and Bonhoeffer. Although this essay was written later in Cone’s theological career, it provides material for attempting to show how Cone’s theology on the whole serves as the culmination of the constructive exploration of the theme of theologia crucis in the present study, from which one can then see more clearly how Cone’s theological hermeneutics can be read as a transfigured theologia crucis. Cone writes: As black theologians have reread the Bible in the light of the struggles of the oppressed, the idea of the ‘suffering God’ has become important in our theological perspective. Our theological imagination has been stirred by Jürgen Moltmann’s writings about ‘the Crucified God,’ as well as Luther’s distinction between the ‘theology of glory’ and the ‘theology of the cross.’ But it has been the actual suffering of the oppressed in black and other Third World communities that has been decisive in our reflections on the cross of Jesus Christ. As Gustavo Gutiérrez has said: ‘We cannot speak of the death of Jesus until we speak of the death of real people.’ For in the deaths of the poor of the world is found the suffering and even the death of God.116

Three things are important to note in this excerpt: 1) Cone’s theology is rooted in the concrete experiences of suffering peoples in “black and other Third World communities.” Therefore, Cone is advancing neither a speculative theologia gloriae apart from the cross of Christ, nor what Oswald Bayer would call a theologia crucis naturalis, the latter of which would involve theological speculation apart from lived, embodied human narratives.117 2) Cone privileges 116

James H. Cone, “An African American Perspective on the Cross and Suffering,” in Yacob Tesfai, ed., The Scandal of a Crucified World: Perspectives on the Cross and Suffering (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1994), 58. See also Cone’s comments about Moltmann, Luther, and the “Crucified God” in his first autobiographical reflection My Soul Looks Back, published the same year as the essays comprising Speaking the Truth: “Although Jürgen Moltmann’s writings about the ‘Crucified God’ have been provocative for our theological imagination, as has Luther’s distinction between the ‘theology of glory’ and the ‘theology of the Cross,’ it has been the actual sufferings of the oppressed in Africa, Asia, and Latin and North America that have been the most decisive in our reflections on the cross of Jesus Christ.” Cone, My Soul Looks Back, 105. 117 See Neal Anthony, Cross Narratives: Martin Luther’s Christology and the Location of Redemption (Eugene: Pickwick, 2010), 43, and Oswald Bayer, “Passion und Wissen: Kreuzestheologie und Universitätswissenschaft,” Kerygma und Dogma 39 (1993): 112–22; 114–16. Arguing that Cone’s theology is not a theologia crucis naturalis is important because of Joshua C. Miller’s observation about and interest in the compatibility between James Cone and Oswald Bayer’s Lutheran systematic theology. To date, Miller remains one of the few self-defined “confessional Lutheran” scholars explicitly interested in the relationship between confessional Lutheran theology and James Cone. However, the connection Miller draws is based on Bayer’s understanding of divine hiddenness rooted in and expanding upon Martin Luther in On Bound Choice, rather than a theologia crucis originating in Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation and transfigured through James Cone’s theology. See Joshua C. Miller, Hanging by a Promise: The Hidden God in the Theology of Oswald Bayer (Eugene: Pickwick, 2015), 323, 326.

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Moltmann’s radicalization of Luther’s own theologia crucis in his description, referencing Moltmann’s use of the phrase “Crucified God,” but not how this phrase is found in Luther himself. Therefore, it can be argued Cone’s own understanding of the theologia crucis relates to Moltmann’s radicalization of this theme, and the doctrine of justification contained therein, for victims and perpetrators of sin. This argument is warranted given Cone’s direct connection of the death of the poor of the world to the death of God.118 3) The references to the theme of theologia crucis in this essay are related to the importance of the “suffering God” for black theologians. It is thus reasonable to conclude Moltmann’s Crucified God and Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation are transfigured through Cone’s understanding of the cross, as both texts address the revelation of God a posteriori on the cross, and the suffering of God either implied (Luther) or contained directly therein (Moltmann).119 Cone then critiques Luther’s theology in relation to the poor of the world: The political implications of Martin Luther’s insight on this point [Luther’s distinction between a ‘theology of glory’ and a ‘theology of the cross’] seemed to have been greatly distorted with his unfortunate emphasis on the two kingdoms. Many modern-day Lutheran scholars are often even worse, because they turn the cross of Jesus into a theological idea completely unrelated to the concrete historical struggles of the oppressed for freedom. For many Lutheran scholars, the theology of the cross is a theological concept to be contrasted with philosophical and metaphysical speculations. It is a way of making a distinction between faith and reason, justification by faith through grace and justification by the works of reason.120

Cone again shows his concern for theology to be concrete, and explicitly related to the embodied experiences of oppression and suffering of “black and other Third World communities.”121 Given Cone’s connecting the embodied experiences of suffering of persons of color with Christ’s cross, it is reasonable to argue Cone is not positing a reality outside of Jesus Christ. Cone’s rejection of the “two kingdoms,” then, is reminiscent of Karl Barth’s theology in the Barmen Dec118 See again n. 116 above. See also Chapter 7, pp. 188–91 above for Moltmann’s understanding of the doctrine of justification for victims and perpetrators in relation to a transformed theologia crucis. 119 Therefore, the present study’s claim that Cone’s theology transfigures a theologia crucis originating in Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation is warranted, due to Cone referencing Luther’s juxtaposition of the theologus gloriae and the theologus crucis in the present essay being closely read, as well as Cone’s remarks in his first autobiographical reflection (see above n. 116). This distinction is found in theses 19–21 of the Heidelberg Disputation and is the locus classicus for finding a theologia crucis in Martin Luther, particularly since the work of Walther von Loewenich. See Chapter 1 above, as well as the literature review of the present study. 120 Cone, “An African American Perspective on the Cross and Suffering,” 58. Cone’s critique of the “Two Kingdoms” shown here relates to his critiques of Luther in relation to the Peasants’ Revolt of 1525 in God of the Oppressed. There, he charges Luther with advocating an “ethic of the status quo.” See Cone, God of the Oppressed, 182. 121 See n. 116 above.

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laration of 1934, and of Bonhoeffer’s Christological critique of the two kingdoms in his Ethics.122 Cone critiques Luther’s two kingdoms as allowing many Lutheran scholars to view the theologia crucis in an incorrect, abstract way. This strays from Cone’s belief in the essential importance of concrete, embodied theology. Cone’s critique is also related to his understanding of the political and liberating task of theological speech, wherein academic theology corresponds to praxis.123 While Cone is explicitly critiquing Lutheran scholars who use Luther’s theology as a theological abstraction unrelated to concrete struggles of oppressed people of color, his assessment accords with his earlier critique of Luther’s two kingdoms in A Black Theology of Liberation. Cone writes: Luther’s identification with the oppressors in society enabled him to speak of the state as the servant of God at the same time that the oppressed were being tortured by the state. It is impossible for the oppressed who are seeking liberation to think of the state as God’s servant. In most cases, the state is responsible for human enslavement and is thus the enemy of all who strive for human freedom. Luther’s concern for ‘law and order’ in the midst of human oppression is seriously questioned by Black Theology. Although it may be doubtful whether his doctrine of the relationship between church and state prepared the way for Hitler’s massacre of the Jews, it did little to prevent it. In fact, his condemnation of the Peasants’ Revolt sounds very much like white churchmen’s condemnation of ghetto rebellions.124 122

See Chapter 6 above. In an essay from 1974, Cone writes explicitly about Christ’s interdependence with the black experience. Given Cone’s emphasis on the interdependence of Jesus Christ and the black experience, wherein Christ is “the ground of human existence without whom nothing is,” it is understandable Cone would critique theologies emphasizing the two kingdoms in language reminiscent of Karl Barth in the Barmen Declaration, and of Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Christological critique of the Lutheran two kingdoms in Bonhoeffer’s Ethics. Cone writes of Jesus Christ: “He is the eternal event of liberation in the divine person who makes freedom a constituent of human existence. There is no existence apart from him, because he is the ground of existence without whom nothing is. Therefore, where human beings struggle for freedom and refuse to be defined by unauthorized human authorities, there Jesus Christ is present among them. His presence is the sustaining and liberating event in the lives of the oppressed that makes possible the continued struggle for freedom. From the context of the eternal presence of Christ the liberator emerges the interdependence of Jesus and the black experience as expressed in the lives of many black people. This interdependence is expressed so forcibly and concretely that to speak truly of the black experience is to speak of Jesus. He is the Word in their lives, and thus to speak of their experience as it is manifested in the joys and sorrows of black life is to speak of the One they say is the Comforter in time of trouble, ‘the lily of the valley,’ and ‘the bright and morning star.’” James H. Cone, “The Dialectic of Theology and Life,” Union Seminary Quarterly Review 24, no. 2 (1974): 75–89; 87, and Cone, God of the Oppressed, 33. 123 See nn. 65–68 above. 124 Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation, 35. In the footnote following these observations, Cone recognizes Luther’s own historical limitations, while still arguing for the necessity of the theological critique of the Lutheran two kingdoms, and the notion of “law and order” Cone sees contained therein, in relation to his own Black Theology of Liberation. “Black Theology can appreciate Luther’s speaking out against the evils of princes (typical of many theologians), but, and this is the problem with Luther, he was for ‘law and order,’ even at the expense of the poor …. It

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Returning to the essay from 1994, Cone believes the problem with many Lutheran scholars is their failure reflect on the cross from the standpoint of the global poor. Cone then proposes how said reflection from the vantage point of the poor moves the cross from a “theological idea” to God’s “suffering solidarity” with the victims of the world. But when the poor of North America and the Third World read the passion story of the cross, they do not view it as a theological idea but as God’s suffering solidarity with the victims of the world. Jesus’ cross is God’s solidarity with the poor, experiencing their pain and suffering.125

Cone cites a spiritual to emphasize his point: They nail my Jesus down, They put him on the crown of thorns, O see my Jesus hangin’ high! He look so pale an’ bleed so free: O don’t you think it was a shame, He hung three hours in dreadful pain?126 could be that we can excuse Luther (after all, he lived in the sixteenth century!), but certainly not white religionists who use him as the guide for their thinking on the black revolution in America.” Ibid., n. 10 (pp. 157–58). In the end, then, Cone does not see the Lutheran two kingdoms ethic being able to be retrieved for contemporary theology. However, see Chapter 6, n. 70 above, for examples of Lutheran scholars attempting to retrieve the two kingdoms for contemporary social-political ethics, as well as admitting that Luther himself was not systematic about these matters. Further, it can be questioned if Cone is primarily critiquing Luther’s theology in its historical context around the question of the two kingdoms, or if Cone’s critique is principally directed toward white religionists who used Luther’s theology to continue oppressing black people in the United States. 125 Cone, “An African American Perspective on the Cross and Suffering,” 58. 126 Ibid., 59. Cf. Cone, “Social Context of Theology,” 58, and Cone, Spirituals and the Blues, 48–50. African Americans showed their identification with Jesus’s suffering and death in the spirituals. Howard Thurman observes, “In the spirituals the death of Jesus took on a deep and personal poignancy. It was not merely the death of a man or a God, but there was in it a quality of identification in experience that continues to burn its way deep into the heart of even the most unemotional. The suffering of Jesus was something more. He suffered, He died, but not alone – they were with Him. They knew what He suffered; it was a cry of the heart that found a response and an echo in their own woes. They entered into the fellowship of His suffering.” Howard Thurman, Deep River and The Negro Spiritual Speaks of Life and Death (Richmond, IN: Friends United, 1975), 26. Moltmann relates African slaves’ identification with the crucified Jesus in the spirituals to a theologia crucis and James Cone, writing: “‘Were you there, when they crucified my Lord?’ begins one of their songs. And the answer is: ‘We, the black slaves, were there with him in his agony’.… By his suffering and death, Jesus identified himself with those who were enslaved, and took their pain upon himself. And if he was not alone in his suffering, nor were they abandoned in the pains of their slavery. Jesus was with them. And there too lay their hope of freedom, by virtue of his resurrection into the freedom of God. Jesus was their identity with God in a world which had taken all hope from them and destroyed their human dignity until it was unrecognizable.” Jürgen Moltmann, The Crucified God: The Cross of Christ as the Foundation and Criticism of Christian Theology, trans. R. A. Wilson and John Bowden (New York: Harper and Row, 1974), 48. “‘Were you there, when they crucified my Lord?’ beginnt

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The “dreadful pain” Jesus experienced on the cross, as described by the unnamed spiritual Cone references, shows Jesus’s solidarity with poor and oppressed peoples of color. Allowing the experiences of oppression and suffering of poor people of color to interpret the cross story means Cone seeks to avoid theological abstraction, while showing the privileged place the cross holds in his theology. As has been argued in the first part of the present study, Luther cannot address contemporary questions directly, due to his historical distance from the present-day. However, given Cone’s observations and critiques referenced here, a contemporary sapiential theologia crucis originating in Luther’s early pastoral theology as transfigured through Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation needs to question the contemporary applicability of the so-called “two kingdoms,” even as it is admitted that Luther himself did not think in a particularly systematic manner about this theme. In any case, Cone’s critiques show the shortcomings of this “traditional Lutheran” doctrine, in that oppressed peoples are prevented from full liberation.127 Cone’s essay then connects the sufferings of oppressed poor persons of color to his own understanding of “God as Black” and “Jesus as the Oppressed One.” “Modern-day black theologians make a similar point [to the spiritual referenced above] when they say that ‘God is Black’ and ‘Jesus is the Oppressed One.’”128 These latter two themes originate in Cone’s early constructive theology.129 Therefore, since Cone uses the two phrases “God is Black” and “Jesus is the Oppressed One” in an essay explicitly referencing Moltmann’s and Luther’s theologies of the cross, it is further possible to read Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation overall as a transfigured theologia crucis. Finally, Cone references 1 Cor. 1: 27–28 in relation to his rejection of European metaphysics, containing further traces of a theologia crucis.130 eines ihrer Lieder. Und die Antwort lautet: Wir, die schwarzen Sklaven, waren dort bei ihm in seiner Agonie …. Durch sein Leiden und Sterben identifizierte sich Jesus mit den Versklavten und nahm ihre Qual auf sich. Und wenn er nicht allein war in seinem Leiden, so waren sie selbst auch nicht verlassen in den Quallen ihrer Sklaverei. Jesus war bei ihnen. Darin lag dann auch ihre Hoffnung auf Befreiung kraft seiner Auferweckung in die Freiheit Gottes. Jesus war ihre Identität bei Gott in einer Welt, die ihnen jede Hoffnung genommen und ihre menschliche Identität bis zur Unkenntlichkeit zerstört hatte.” Jürgen Moltmann, Der gekreuzigte Gott: Das Kreuz Christi als Grund und Kritik christlicher Theologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher, 1972), 50. 127 Cone’s critiques are compatible with Moltmann’s critiques in his study on the relationship between political theology and ethics. See Jürgen Moltmann, Politische Theologie – Politische Ethik (Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1984), 124–37. In this book, Moltmann makes explicit his indebtedness to, and further development of, the Barmen Declaration. 128 Ibid. 129 If Cone’s themes “God is Black” and Jesus Christ as “The Oppressed One” do, in fact, relate to a theologia crucis as Cone is implying in the present essay being closely read, then these themes are further ways in which Cone’s theology transfigures the theme of theologia crucis as it has been explored constructively throughout the present study. 130 See Chapter 1, pp.  29–32 above for arguments related to Luther’s incorporation of a Pauline theologia crucis in the Heidelberg Disputation.

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Our rejection of European metaphysical speculations and our acceptance of an apparently crude anthropomorphic way of speaking of God are black theologians’ way of concretizing Paul’s saying that ‘God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are’ (1 Cor. 1: 27–28).131

In Cone’s understanding, then, God is not a metaphysical Deus ex machina, but the biblical God revealed in the suffering Christ, through which God “chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise.” Cone’s observations transfigure Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation, which sought to be Pauline theological paradoxes, and emphasized revelation in the cross a posteriori.132 There is thus an important change from Luther that needs to be noted: what for Luther was meant to be Pauline theological paradoxes is now in Cone a rejection of European abstract metaphysical speculation, the de-emphasis of the Western theological tradition, and the affirmation of black history and culture for Cone’s own contemporary constructive theology concerned with freedom for oppressed peoples throughout the world in general, and oppressed black people in the United States specifically, in relation to Jesus Christ.133 Cone’s rejection of metaphysical abstraction, his de-emphasizing the Western theological tradition, and his affirmation of black history and culture shows again his emphasis on the dialectical relationship of the suffering of God and the suffering of the oppressed. “If the suffering of God is revealed in the suffering of the oppressed, it follows that theology cannot achieve its Christian identity apart from a systematic and critical reflection upon the history and culture of

131

Cone, “An African American Perspective on the Cross and Suffering,” 59. It is, however, an open question as to if Cone finds any and all metaphysical speculation inappropriate to the theological task as he understands it, or if he rather critiques European white theologies that elevate metaphysics over and above the biblical narrative and concrete history of Jesus of Nazareth in relation to oppressed communities of color. The latter of these two options seems to be the more likely, given Cone’s incorporation of Paul Tillich’s ontological understanding of symbol in relation to his own understanding of theological language. See again nn. 50–51 above. Tillich’s understanding of theological language as symbolic language is described concisely in Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, Volume 2: Existence and the Christ (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1957), 9–10. 132 See LW 31: 39; WA 1, 353: 10–14, and Chapter 1 above. 133 From the perspective of theological anthropology in Cone’s theology, Dwight Hopkins observes, “Cone persistently emphasizes, among other realities, the decisive roles of liberation and freedom. In this regard, he interweaves the themes of God, Christology, and humanity. Human liberation becomes God’s salvific work through Jesus Christ; therefore, Jesus Christ’s humanity and divinity act as the initiation point for an analytical investigation of liberation. Oppressed humanity, especially oppressed black humanity, perceives its historical fight against exploitation ground in Jesus Christ who is the gift of freedom for the oppressed …. In the initial act of creating human beings, God offered the right to struggle for freedom as a paramount gift, especially for those heavily laden with burdens of violence and injustice.” Dwight N. Hopkins, Being Human: Race Culture and Religion (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 2005), 35–39; 35–36.

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the victims of oppression.”134 For Cone, the “victims of oppression” are suffering black people in the United States particularly, and oppressed persons of color throughout the world in general. Oppressed peoples should then do theological reflection for themselves without relying on the white, Western theological tradition for authority, corresponding to Cone’s concerns in God of the Oppressed.135 “We now know that the people responsible for or indifferent to the oppression of blacks are not likely to provide the theological resources for our liberation. If oppressed peoples are to be liberated, they must themselves create the means for it to happen.”136 For Cone, centering on the experiences of oppressed peoples of color “has led to an emphasis upon praxis as the context out of which Christian theology develops.”137 Emphasizing praxis is a further example of how Cone’s understanding of the cross is concrete rather than abstract. “To know the truth is to do the truth, that is, to make happen in history what is confessed in the church.”138 Said doing of the truth involves taking sides with the poor over and against those who are responsible for their poverty. “[T]o do black liberation theology, one must make 134

Cone, “An African American Perspective on the Cross and Suffering,” 59. See Cone, God of the Oppressed, 15–36. 136 Ibid. Here, then, Dominik Gautier’s recent examination of the relationship between the theologies of James Cone and Jürgen Moltmann should be noted. Gautier examines Cone’s use of Moltmann’s theology, particularly in Cone’s early works, in relation to what historian Evelyn Brooks Higgenbotham calls the “Politics of Respectability.” According to Gautier, then, Moltmann’s theology gave Cone’s black theology an authority among white audiences it would otherwise not have had, were Moltmann not to have been quoted. Gautier observes, “Cone’s later theology comes without these strategic references and draws primarily on the Black religious, political, and literary tradition in the United States.” Dominik Gautier, “Black Theology and the Question of Hope: A Transnational Dialogue Between James H. Cone and Jürgen Moltmann,” Kirchliche Zeitgeschichte. Internationale Zeitschrift für Theologie und Geschichtswissenschaft 1 (2020): 112–19; 113–15. Gautier then references Cone’s statement, “The feeling that Moltmann’s theology supported the liberation of the poor accounted for why he was quoted so liberally in my work; he provided ‘respectable’ theological support for my claims regarding God’s solidarity with the poor” (Cone, For My People, 68). Gautier notes correctly the overlap between Moltmann’s and Cone’s theologies, and even argues charitably that Moltmann was genuinely concerned with the betterment of oppressed persons of color, but still seems nevertheless to believe Moltmann’s theology gave Cone’s early theological works an authority it would have otherwise lacked. However, what Gautier appears to have overlooked is the explicit reference to Moltmann’s “Crucified God” in the essay under examination here. This essay fits into what can be considered Cone’s “later theology,” and explicitly addresses the theme of theologia crucis in both Luther and Moltmann in a way Cone’s other writings do not. Also, in the footnote in For My People addressing the role Moltmann’s theology played in Cone’s earliest theology, he writes, “The influence of Moltmann’s Theology of Hope and later his Religion, Revolution, and the Future (New York: Scribner’s, 1969) was great. I read and then reread them” (Cone, For My People, 68, n. 31). While Gautier notes this reference in Cone, he does not consider that perhaps, more than the “politics of respectability,” Moltmann’s presence in Cone’s theology in general is because both theologians can be considered to be theologians of the cross. 137 Cone, “An African American Perspective on the Cross and Suffering,” 59. 138 Ibid. 135

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a commitment, and option for the poor and against those who are responsible for their poverty.”139 Deciding to take sides with the poor of the world is then demonstrated concretely by employing social analysis as a methodological tool to analyze racism, classism, and sexism.140 “Social analysis is a tool that helps us to know why the social, economic, and political orders are arranged as they are. It enables us to know not only who benefits from the present status quo, but what must be done to change it.”141 The methodological tool of social analysis thus corresponds to Cone’s concern with praxis and is an example of a concrete doing of the truth in relation to the cross of Jesus Christ and oppressed persons of color. Finally, Cone’s emphasis on social analysis relates to his hermeneutics that incorporate the theologies of Paul Tillich and Rudolf Bultmann and their concerns to translate the gospel message in dialectical relationship to contemporary culture(s). As seen above, though, Cone’s incorporating other disciplines outside of theology for his constructive task is ultimately related to and centered in Jesus Christ and the black church. While the essay examined here references Luther’s distinction between the theologus gloriae and the theologus crucis as well as Moltmann’s “Crucified God,” there is a decisive transfiguration of the theme of theologia crucis through Cone’s theology: Unique to the other texts and authors closely read in the present study, Cone’s understanding of the cross corresponds explicitly to the embodied experiences of suffering poor persons of color struggling for freedom.142 The embodied experiences of oppressed poor blacks in the United States, and then oppressed persons of color worldwide, in dialectical relationship to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, is thus essential to reading Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis. Having now examined traces of a theologia crucis in Cone’s early constructive theology and his theological hermeneutics overall, the present study proceeds to a close reading of selections from Cone’s The Cross and the Lynching Tree in relation to a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis, to complete the present study’s investigation for traces of a theologia crucis throughout Cone’s constructive theology.

139

Ibid. Italics in original. Although the explicit commitment to the methodological tool of social analysis is a development that is not found in Cone’s earliest two constructive theological books, said development does not mean traces of a theologia crucis cannot be found throughout Cone’s theology. 141 Cone, “An African American Perspective on the Cross and Suffering,” 60. 142 Cf. Cone, “Social Context of Theology,” 58: “To see the freedom of God in the man hanging on a tree means that God’s liberation is for those who are falsely condemned and executed in the name of law and order. Black slaves recognized this fact when they focused on the crucified One and saw in Jesus’ face their faces, his condition as their condition, his shame as their shame.” 140

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5. Traces of a Theologia Crucis in James Cone’s Dialectical Incorporation of the Cross and the Lynching Tree James Cone began his constructive theological work arguing for the dialectical incorporation of black theology in relation to the Black Power movement of the 1960s. His final theological book addresses another dialectical relationship: the cross and the lynching tree. Cone considered this text to be a “continuation and culmination” of his life’s work, the most difficult book for him to write, as well as his favorite of the books he had written.143 In this text, Cone argues that the cross is the central symbol of Christian faith, and that the lynching tree is the central symbol for what black bodies endured during slavery, particularly during what Cone calls the “lynching era” (1880–1940), wherein nearly five thousand black people were lynched.144 While Cone’s final theological book contains his mature theological positions, it also differs from his other texts closely read in this chapter, because it is not primarily a work of constructive theology like his three main books (Black Theology and Black Power, A Black Theology of Liberation, and God of the Oppressed). Instead, this book is a meditative historical survey of the lynching of African Americans in the Southern United States, an investigation into the theologies of Reinhold Niebuhr, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Cone’s Womanist critics, and a survey of the presence of the cross in black literary imagination.145 Therefore, while the book is written with the overarching thesis of the cross and the lynching tree dialectically interpreting each other, Cone’s own constructive theology is found only indirectly as he tells the significance of lynching for understanding the cross in the twenty-first century United States.146 143

Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, xv–xvi; Cone, Said I Wasn’t Gonna Tell Nobody, 126. Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 3. Cone also notes that not only blacks were victims of lynching. “Lynching has a complicated and dynamic meaning in American history. Since the publication of Jacquelyn Dowd Hall’s Revolt Against Chivalry (1979), many historians have been investigating lynching, and have even discovered most of the names of the nearly five thousand African American victims. Initially, lynching was not directed primarily against blacks nor did it always mean death to the victim. Mexicans, Indians, Chinese, and whites were lynched – a term that could apply to whipping, stabbing, as well as hanging. Lynching was an extra-legal punishment sanctioned by the community.” 145 See Gautier, “Kreuzestheologie bei James Cone,” and Dominik Gautier, “Theologie als Blues: Zum Tod von James H. Cone,” Ökumenische Rundschau 67, no. 3 (2018): 426–29. 146 Dominik Gautier observes the following about The Cross and the Lynching Tree: “In The Cross and the Lynching Tree (2011) entwickelt er [Cone] im Rückgriff auf die schwarze religiöse und literarische Tradition, in der Auseinandersetzung mit den Kreuzestheologien Reinhold Niebuhrs und Martin Luther Kings sowie im Gespräch mit den Entwürfen schwarzer Frauen seine eigene Theologie des Kreuzes. Cone versteht das Kreuz vor dem Hintergrund der historischen Lynchmorde an Schwarzen und im Hinblick auf den nicht überwundenen Rassismus in den USA als Herausforderung. Das Kreuz und die Geschichte des Lynching verweisen darauf, dass rassistische Gewalt gesehen und angegangen werden muss. Erst so kann es zur Versöhnung zwischen Schwarzen und Weißen kommen. Diese Perspektive kann dann 144

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The present study’s close reading of selections from this text explores how Cone’s constructive arguments about the dialectical relationship of the cross and the lynching tree contain traces of a theologia crucis as has been explored throughout this chapter. We are thus only indirectly concerned with Cone’s narrative arguments and are instead explicitly concerned with how Cone argues about the cross as related to his own constructive theology. By so doing, the intent is to complete the central investigation of this chapter of how Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation overall can be read as a transfigured theologia crucis. In The Cross and the Lynching Tree, Cone argues that Christ’s crucifixion should be understood as a first-century lynching, and that the cross is a paradoxical symbol of hope coming through defeat.147 He sees the symbol of the cross, wherein Jesus of Nazareth was crucified by the Roman Empire, as inverting the world’s values.148 “The cross is a paradoxical religious symbol because it inverts the world’s value system with the news that hope comes by way of defeat, that suffering and death do not have the last word, that the last shall be first and the first last.”149 Thus, Cone understands the symbol of the cross as representing hope for oppressed black people who endured lynching.150 Cone then relates the paradox of the cross to black slaves, arguing this symbol was “profoundly real in the souls of black folk.”

eingenommen werden, wenn der Gekreuzigte in den gelynchten schwarzen Menschen erkannt wird.” Gautier, “The Cross and the Lynching Tree,” 198. The present study thus differs from Gautier by exploring the possibility of reading Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation overall as a transfigured theologia crucis. 147 For Cone’s description of the cross as a first-century lynching, see Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 30–31. 148 Mark R. Glanville writes about Cone’s theologia crucis in relation to the lynching tree: “Cone challenges theologizing on the cross of Christ that takes place in the Western church and Academy, on the basis that an understanding of the cross has been divorced from the modern realities of systemic suffering and oppression that are germane to the cross itself. Thousands of books have been written on the cross in the past hundred years, without so much as a mention of lynching. And yet, the association of the cross with the lynching tree is as visceral as it is theological. A stark visual resemblance exists between the torturous death of blacks in the South – black bodies hanging from trees – with the cross of Christ. And yet, the similarity goes beyond visual appearance. In both Roman crucifixion and the lynching of black people in the United States, an innocent victim was executed by the will of the state, at the frenzied cry of a mob, in a public display that is carefully curated and advertised in order to strike fear in the hearts of the subordinate population.” Mark R. Glanville, “The birth of the blues and the birth of biblical law in parallel: A dialogue with James Cone’s theology of the cross,” Review and Expositor 117, no. 1 (2020): 114–27; 115. 149 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 2. Italic in original. Traces of a theologia crucis and Cone’s Lukan Christology from his early-to-middle period constructive theology can be found here, in that the cross is seen as a political event with a significance markedly different to what would be expected from a symbol representing defeat. 150 Ibid., 165–66.

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That God could ‘make a way out of no way’ in Jesus’ cross was truly absurd to the intellect, yet profoundly real in the souls of black folk. Enslaved blacks who first heard the gospel message seized on the power of the cross. Christ crucified manifested God’s loving and liberating presence in the contradictions of black life – that transcendent presence in the lives of black Christians that empowered them to believe that ultimately, in God’s eschatological future, they would not be defeated by the ‘troubles of this world,’ no matter how great and painful the suffering.151

Continuities with Cone’s hermeneutics as examined above can be found here, again showing the presence of the crucified Christ in the suffering of oppressed blacks, and that Christ crucified was a source of hope in the time of suffering. Cone’s specific description that Christ crucified “manifested God’s loving and liberating presence in the contradictions of black life” also relates to the essay examined above where Cone wrote about black theology’s learning from both Moltmann and Luther about the theme of the “suffering God.”152 Here, Cone argues how the cross was also a demonstration of God’s “powerless love,” rather than “white power” related to systemic racism and oppression of blacks.153 “There was no place for the proud and mighty, for people who think God called them to rule over others. The cross was God’s critique of power – white power – with powerless love, snatching victory of defeat.”154 151

Ibid., 2. Italics in original. See n. 116 above. 153 Powerless love corresponds to the theme of power as revealed in weakness in Paul’s theology (Cf. 2 Cor. 12:19), which is arguably related to Paul’s arguments about the scandal of the cross in 1 Cor. 1:18–31, esp. vv. 27–29. However, Joshua Heavin argues that a Pauline theologia crucis indebted to Martin Luther’s epistemological questions and found in Moltmann and Cone over-emphasizes the weakness of God, and Heavin describes this development as “power dissolved in weakness.” He therefore offers a close reading of 2 Corinthians 13: 3–4 to reclaim the notion of divine power in relation to the vulnerable in society. Heavin writes, “The significance I am drawing attention to here is that theological interpretation of Paul’s theology of the cross in the last century, at least in examples such as Moltmann and Cone, sought to address questions of theodicy and liberation not only by locating weakness in the divine economy, nor merely using theologia crucis in an epistemic and critical turn, but by proposing that some notion of ‘powerlessness’ is constitutive of God’s inner life in solidarity with the oppressed and suffering. But is that programmatic christological move – one [John D.] Caputo takes to its limits – a necessary christological move? Notably, 2 Cor 13:3–4 remained unmentioned in these projects that make frequent reference to Paul and his theologia crucis, and I contend that the christological concerns driving interpreters such as Cyril [of Alexandria] are not incompatible with the hermeneutical, missional, or justice-oriented concerns of Moltmann and Cone.” Joshua Heavin, “Power Made Perfect in Weakness: Theologia Crucis in 2 Corinthians 13:3–4,” Journal of Theological Interpretation, Vol. 13, no. 2 (2019): 251–79; 273. While it might be contested that Cone or Moltmann would see God’s power dissolved into weakness because of the cross, Heavin’s arguments provide further possibilities for considering the question of God’s power in relation to a Pauline theologia crucis for the twenty-first century. 154 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 2. Although Cone does not specifically mention Black Power here, his arguments about the cross as God’s critique of white power with “powerless love, snatching victory out of defeat” correspond to his earlier theology, wherein Black Power was related to empowerment of the poor over and against the rich for the sake of the Kingdom 152

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By arguing for Christ’s crucifixion as a first-century lynching, Cone is seeking to critique white domestication of the cross. He describes this domestication of the cross in the beginning of Cross and the Lynching Tree, and references Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship. The cross has been transformed into a harmless, non-offensive ornament that Christians wear around their necks. Rather than reminding us of the ‘cost of discipleship,’ it has become a form of ‘cheap grace,’ an easy way to salvation that doesn’t force us to confront the power of Christ’s message and mission. Until we can see the cross and the lynching tree together, until we can identify Christ with a ‘recrucified’ black body hanging from a lynching tree, there can be no genuine understanding of Christian identity in America, and no deliverance from the brutal slavery and white supremacy.155

For Cone, then, “genuine Christian identity in America” means seeing the cross and the lynching tree together for cruciform discipleship on behalf of the oppressed, wherein Christ’s message and mission shows divine power through God’s “snatching victory out of defeat.”156 The symbol of the lynching tree represents how black people struggled to maintain hope amid systemic white supremacy, a struggle which was particularly visible from 1880 to 1940. At no time was the struggle to keep such hope alive more difficult than during the lynching era (1880–1940). The lynching tree is the most potent symbol of the trouble nobody knows that blacks have seen but do not talk about because the pain of remembering – visions of black bodies dangling from southern trees, surrounded by jeering white mobs – is almost too excruciating to recall.157

Cone’s dialectical relation of the symbol of the lynching tree and the symbol of Jesus’s crucifixion is thus rooted in the collective memory of the lynching of black of God. Cone’s later arguments in Cross and the Lynching Tree can thus illumine his Black Theology and Black Power, in that seeing Black Power from a Christian constructive theological perspective means empowerment of the weak, suffering, and oppressed through the Gospel, in order that systemic white racism be critiqued in the name of the Gospel. See nn. 33–34 above. 155 Ibid., xiv–xv. 156 See again n. 154. 157 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 3. This excerpt refers to Billie Holiday’s song “Strange Fruit,” which Cone draws from both to explain the horrors of lynching in the South as an historical event and for his dialectical incorporation of the lynching tree with the cross. It is also related to Cone’s concern with the “Recrucified Christ in black literary imagination” in this text (Ibid., 93–120). Cone writes about “Strange Fruit”: “With vivid and horrific imagery, deep and disturbing emotions, Billie Holiday’s rendition of ‘Strange Fruit’ forced white listeners to wrestle with the violent truth of white supremacy. No white person could listen to Billie’s ‘Strange Fruit’ without feeling indicted and exposed by the sound of truth and contempt in her voice. She made whites look at the brutality they wanted to forget. That was why ‘Strange Fruit’ was often banned from many radio stations and several clubs would not let Billie sing it, especially when whites walked out, claiming it was not entertainment. Those who stayed to listen were eerily quiet as Billie told the story of lynching in the South. Billie’s record company, Columbia, refused to record it, fearing that the South would boycott them.” Ibid., 136.

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people. It is also evidence both of Cone’s concrete understanding of the cross and of his beginning his Black Theology of Liberation with reflections on the black experience as he understood it rather than European theological methodologies, as has been the case at least since his God of the Oppressed.158 Cone’s language is passionate and engaged, as he describes how black people in the South were tortured by lynching.159 By the 1890s, lynching fever gripped the South, spreading like cholera, as white communities made blacks their primary target, and torture their focus. Burning the black victim slowly for hours was the chief method of torture. Lynching became a white media spectacle, in which prominent newspapers, like the Atlanta Constitution, announced to the public the place, date, and time of the expected hanging and burning of black victims.160

According to Cone, black people turned to black music and religion as sources of comfort to deal with the horrors of lynching, and the underlying white supremacy supporting it. At the juke joints on Friday and Saturday nights and at churches on Sunday mornings and evening week nights blacks affirmed their humanity and fought back against dehumanization. Both black religion and the blues offered sources of hope that there was more to life than what one encountered daily in the white man’s world.161

Especially during the era of lynching, then, black music was a source of hope. “Black people found hope in the music itself  – a collective self-transcendent meaning in the singing, dancing, loving, and laughing. They found hope in the stoic determination not to be defeated by the suffering in their lives.”162 Black music was thus a source of hope in times of despair, and a means to cope with lynching, “the most horrifying symbol of white supremacy in black life.”163 Religion, particularly the story of the crucified Jesus Christ, also offered hope for black people during the lynching era. African Americans embraced the story of Jesus, the crucified Christ, whose death they claimed paradoxically gave them life, just as God resurrected him in the life of the earliest Christian community. While the lynching tree symbolized white power and ‘black death,’ 158

See nn. 60–63 above. See above, n. 51, for Cone’s description of theological language as “passionate language” in A Black Theology of Liberation. 160 Ibid., 9. 161 Ibid., 12. Compare with Cone’s observations about black music as “unity music” in Cone, Spirituals and the Blues, 5. 162 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 13. We see connections here overall to Cone’s insistence that black music is an appropriate source for systematic theology beginning with the black experience. Cf. Cone’s argument that the blues and the spirituals should be interpreted together as witnesses to the black experience in the United States, rather than pitted against each other, in Cone, Spirituals and the Blues, 129–30. 163 Ibid., 15. Cone credits the blues especially as a source of existential joy amid black suffering due to lynching: “The blues expressed a feeling, an existential affirmation of joy in the midst of extreme suffering, especially the ever-present threat of death by lynching.” Ibid., 17. 159

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the cross symbolized divine power and ‘black life’ – God overcoming the power of sin and death.164

Paradoxical hope in the crucified Christ resurrected by God relates to Cone’s description of the cross as God’s “snatching victory out of defeat.”165 Cone then connects his intellectual observations about the role of the cross for black people amid the lynching era to his own childhood at A. M. E. Macedonia Church in Bearden, Arkansas. During my childhood, I heard a lot about the cross at Macedonia A. M. E. Church, where faith in Jesus was defined and celebrated. We sang about ‘Calvary,’ and asked, ‘Were you there?’, ‘down at the cross,’ ‘when they crucified my Lord.’ ‘Oh! Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble.’ The spirituals, gospel songs, and hymns focused on how Jesus achieved salvation for the least through his solidarity with them even unto death. There were more songs, sermons, prayers, and testimonies about the cross than any other theme. The cross was the foundation on which their faith was built.166

Cone’s memories of Macedonia A. M. E. Church in Bearden demonstrate how Christ’s cross is at the center of black faith,167 and how black spirituals witness to the crucified Christ’s solidarity with oppressed black people in the United States.168 164

Ibid., 18. See again n. 154 above. 166 Ibid., 21. Italic in original. In addition to hearing about the cross during his childhood, Cone also tells of almost witnessing a lynching. His reflection thus shows how writing on the dialectical relationship between the cross and the lynching tree was a matter of personal importance, and it relates to the “passionate language” that can be found throughout the whole of Cone’s theology (cf. n. 51 above). “When I was about six, I saw a black man nearly lynched in Bearden, in the presence of his wife and son, after a white woman ran a stop light and crashed into him. In any altercation with whites, no matter the circumstances, blacks were always wrong, especially when a white woman was involved. While in college during the 1950s, I nearly started a riot when I sat down near a white woman on a newly integrated Little Rock city bus. I was only seventeen, about 130 pounds at the time. A burly looking white man bolted from his seat, grabbed me from behind and lifted me up as if he was going to kill me. Fortunately, a black man of similar size came to my defense and said, ‘Put him down! Pick on somebody your own size.’ The white man was caught off guard and obeyed. When I got off the bus and told a policeman what happened he replied, ‘I agree with the white man who attacked you. Complain to the Attorney General.’ It was much later while researching the white male mind on lynching that I realized how close I came to starting a riot.” Ibid., 183, n. 24. 167 In the essay version of Cross and the Lynching Tree, Cone writes that the cross holds a prominent place in black preaching: “Most black sermons take their climax on Calvary and the people often wait patiently for the preacher to take them there. When preachers think they may be losing their audience, they retell the story of Jesus’ crucifixion, emphasizing how he died to make people free so we might live with God eternally. Paradoxically, the cross can resurrect dead sermons and enable ill-prepared preachers to enliven a bored congregation.” James H. Cone, “Strange Fruit: The Cross and the Lynching Tree,” Journal of Theology for Southern Africa 148 (2014): 11. 168 Jürgen Moltmann relates his own solidarity Christology to Cone’s Cross and the Lynching Tree, showing further the long-term connection between Moltmann and Cone, and how both 165

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According to Cone, then, the cross was a source of “spiritual power” for oppressed black people. “The more black people struggled against white supremacy, the more they found in the cross the spiritual power to resist the violence they so often suffered.”169 Another paradox is seen at this point, in that the violent death of Jesus of Nazareth on the cross was a source of resistance against the violence black people suffered during lynching. The symbol of the cross thus offered paradoxical consolation and redemption. “Because of their experience of arbitrary violence, the cross was and is a redeeming and comforting image for many black Christians.”170 Cone then connects the victims of lynching to the theologians can be fruitfully considered to be theologians of the cross: “Das Evangelium des gekreuzigten Christus für die Opfer der Sünde ist relativ neu. In der kirchlichen Tradition des Bußsakraments und der lutherischen Rechtfertigungslehre geht es einseitig um die Täter der Sünde. Aber Jesus wurde zuerst ein Opfer menschlicher Sünde und Gewalttat, um bei den Opfern zu sein und in ihnen. In Amerika wurde er zum ‘black Jesus’, ich habe das ‘Solidaritätschristologie’ genannt. Durch seine Passion zeigt Jesus, dass Gott solidarisch wird mit den Opfern menschlicher Gottlosigkeit. Auf der anderen Seite wird der gekreuzigte Jesus zum Erlöser der Täter von ihrer Schuld, wenn sie in das Licht der Wahrheit treten.” Jürgen Moltmann, Vorwort, in James H. Cone, Kreuz und Lynchbaum, trans. Ursula Sieg (Strufenhütten: Mutual Blessing Edition, 2019), 8. 169 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 22. The present author was unable to find the specific phrase “white supremacy” in Cone’s early-to-middle period constructive texts, which is why the phrase “systemic white racism” has been used throughout this chapter until this section. In any case, Cone begins to speak of “white supremacy” by 2004. See James H. Cone, “Theology’s Great Sin: Silence in the Face of White Supremacy,” Black Theology: An International Journal 2, no. 2 (2004): 139–52. 170 Ibid., 23. Here it is now important to address the relationship between a theologia crucis and redemptive suffering, considering Cone’s response in Cross and the Lynching Tree to Womanist theologian Delores Williams’s critique of redemptive suffering related to Western atonement theories and black women’s experience of surrogacy. Due to this surrogacy experience, Williams does not think the cross can have a healthy meaning-making function for black women. Williams therefore critiques Calvin and other Protestants in relation to the payment model of atonement, although she does not reference Luther or the theme of “happy exchange,” the latter of which need not necessarily be thought of as “redemptive suffering.” See Delores S. Williams, Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1993), 161–67. In response to Williams’s critiques, Cone writes, “I accept Delores Williams’s rejection of theories of atonement as found in the Western theological tradition and in the uncritical proclamation of the cross in many black churches. I find nothing redemptive about suffering in itself. The gospel of Jesus is not a rational concept to be explained in a theory of salvation, but a story about God’s presence in Jesus’ solidarity with the oppressed, which led to his death on the cross. What is redemptive is the faith that God snatched victory out of defeat, life out of death, and hope out of despair, as revealed in the biblical and black proclamation of Jesus’ resurrection.” Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 150. While Cone explicitly says he finds “nothing redemptive about suffering in itself,” he admits to agreeing more with Womanist theologian Shawn Copeland, and his Womanist students JoAnne Marie Terrell and Jacqueline Grant, “who view the cross as central to the Christian faith, especially in African American communities.” Ibid. Another Womanist with whom Cone shares commonalities is his student Kelly Brown Douglas, particularly in her book Stand Your Ground: Black Bodies and the Justice of God, where she connects the execution of Trayvon Martin to the execution of Jesus of Nazareth. This book is arguably Douglas’s own theologia crucis and she draws from Cone’s Cross

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“crucified peoples of history,” an expression originating with Ignatio Ellacuria, showing Cone’s connection to global liberation theologies.171 “If the God of Jesus’ cross is found among the least, the crucified people of the world, then God is also found among those lynched in American history.”172 Lynched black bodies in the United States are thus the particular “crucified people” to whom and the Lynching Tree in her chapter “Jesus and Trayvon: The Justice of God.” See Kelly Brown Douglas, Stand Your Ground: Black Bodies and the Justice of God (Maryknoll: Orbis, 2015), 171–204; 172–74, 199. Regarding the violence of the world (demonstrated in the cross) in relation to the crucified Jesus’s nonviolent resurrection from the dead, Douglas writes, “God responds to the violence of the world not in an eye-for-an-eye manner. Instead, God responds in a way that negates and denounces the violence that perverts and demeans the integrity of human creation. Thus, through the resurrection, God responds to the violence of the cross – the violence of the world – in a nonviolent but forceful manner …. The forces of nonviolence actually reveal the impotence of violent power. Ironically, the nonviolent power of God is revealed through the violence of the cross. But this is essential. That God could defeat the unmitigated violence of the cross reveals the consummate power of the nonviolent, life-giving force that is God.” Ibid., 184. Cone’s response to Delores Williams and the theological connections between Cone and Womanist theologians who place the cross at the center of their theological reflections notwithstanding, Cone’s student and theological ethicist Marvin E. Wickware, Jr. believes Cone did not satisfactorily address Williams’s critiques or the critiques of Womanist theologians in general, and argues constructively for a convergence between Cone and Williams through the place of love in their respective Christologies. Wickware’s arguments are also important for his description of Cone as a theologian of love. “Divine love is the driving force for both Blackness and liberation in Cone’s theology. Cone recognizes the will of God at work in the history of the Black struggle for liberation from White supremacy and the forces with which it is aligned. As such, the character of God’s love is reflected in God’s participation in that struggle. Insofar as that is a struggle against White enemies, ‘God cannot be both for us and for our White oppressors at the same time.’ In this light, Cone understands the cross to be ‘the most empowering symbol of God’s loving solidarity with ‘the least of these,’ the unwanted in society who suffer daily from great injustice,’ and argues that it condemns those who make peace with a White supremacist society.” Marvin E. Wickware, Jr. “The Labour of Black Love: James Cone, Womanism, and the Future of Black Men’s Theologies,” Black Theology 19, no. 1 (2021): 3–17; 5. While Wickware does not directly explore a theologia crucis in Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, for the present study’s purposes, Tuomo Manermaa’s book on Luther’s own theologia crucis in relation to the juxtaposition between divine and human love should be recalled, as well as the arguments for Cone transfiguring Thesis 28 of Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation above. See Tuomo Manermaa, Two Kinds of Love: Martin Luther’s Religious World, trans. Kirsi I. Stjerna (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2010), 27–45; 28, and n. 40 above. 171 See Tesfai, ed., The Scandal of a Crucified World, 10–12; 10. 172 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 23. The cross was also arguably a sign of hope amid political protest. “The blues sent people traveling, roaming, looking for a woman or man to sooth one’s aching human heart. But it was Jesus’ cross that sent people protesting in the streets, seeking to change the social structures of racial oppression.” Ibid., 28. Cone’s observation about the cross and protests corresponds to his understanding of the place of the cross in the theology of Martin Luther King, Jr. “The cross of Jesus is the key to King’s willingness to sacrifice his life, not only for the freedom of black people.… but also for the souls of whites and the redemption of America.… With the cross at the center of his faith, he could even love the people he knew were trying to kill him, following Jesus’ example on the cross, ‘Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do’ (Lk. 23:34).” Ibid., 82–83. For King’s understanding of the cross in relation to Cone’s theological reflections on King’s “journey to Memphis,” see n. 17 above.

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Cone has turned, showing both consistency with and development of his previous theology.173 Therefore, it is Cone’s concern with lynched black bodies as “crucified people” that leads him to theologize about the dialectical relationship between the cross and the lynching tree, wherein he interprets Jesus’s crucifixion as a “first-century lynching.”174 In his chapter on Reinhold Niebuhr, Cone argues for the similarities between the cross and the lynching tree.175 Both the cross and the lynching tree were symbols of terror, instruments of torture and execution, reserved primarily for slaves, criminals, and insurrectionists – the lowest of the low in society. Both Jesus and blacks were publicly humiliated, subjected to the utmost indignity and cruelty. They were stripped, in order to be deprived of dignity, then paraded, mocked and whipped, pierced, derided and spat upon, tortured for hours in the presence of jeering crowds for popular entertainment. In both cases, the purpose was to strike terror in the subject community. It was to let people know that the same thing would happen to them if they did not stay in their place.176

Cone is thus connecting two means of terror – the cross and the lynching tree. Cone compares Christ’s mocking, whipping, and stripping before his crucifixion to what black victims of lynching endured. The principal comparison, though, is

173 The consistency is arguably that embodied experiences of oppressed persons of color are the starting point for Cone’s constructive reflections about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The development is in Cone’s naming the victims of lynching specifically as “crucified people.” 174 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 30. 175 Here it is important to reference Cone’s critique of Reinhold Niebuhr regarding race, given Niebuhr’s theologia crucis. An important text for reading a theologia crucis in Niebuhr is Reinhold Niebuhr, Beyond Tragedy (New York: Scribner’s, 1937), esp. 171–215. Cone writes about Niebuhr: “My biggest problem with Niebuhr on race was not merely that he failed to associate himself with black organizations fighting for racial justice but, more importantly, what Niebuhr wrote about America’s greatest moral issue was at best moderate in a time when he was radical on other issues that were dear to him. Most Niebuhr interpreters either ignore what he said about race, as if it was not important for his ethics and theology, or they tend to overvalue his work in that area. While it is true that ‘Niebuhr worked in the struggle for the rights of black Americans throughout his ministry’ (R. Stone), that work was not radical in any sense. Niebuhr’s interpreters on race are not much different from him, which shows how distant they are from the truly radical movements of the black community. Contrary to [John] Bennett’s view, Niebuhr did not have a ‘deep commitment to racial justice,’ at least not in his writings or in his life.” Ibid., 177. Italics in original. Despite Cone’s critique of Niebuhr around race, Cone claims his own understanding of the cross is “deeply influenced” by Niebuhr (Ibid., 60), and calls Niebuhr a “Christian theologian of the cross” (Ibid.,63). However, Cone then critiques Niebuhr writing, “His theology and ethics needed to be informed from critical reading and dialogue with radical black perspectives” (Ibid., 60). Cone’s critique of Niebuhr is similar to the shortcomings he finds in Barth, Tillich, and Bultmann. None of these theologians related to the tradition of so-called “dialectical theology” either engage with radical black intellectual-social movements directly or make the liberation of the oppressed a hermeneutical starting point for their respective theologies. Space limitations have unfortunately prevented a fuller investigation into Cone’s reception and critique of Niebuhr. 176 Ibid., 31.

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where Cone sees lynched bodies being hanged as a re-crucifixion of Jesus, with an explicit reference to Christ’s death cry from the cross (Mk. 15:34; Matt. 27:46). The crowd’s shout ‘Crucify him!’ (Mk. 15:14) anticipated the white mob’s shout ‘Lynch him!’ Jesus’ agonizing final cry of abandonment from the cross, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ (Mk. 15:34), was similar to the lynched victim Sam Hose’s awful scream as he drew his last breath, ‘Oh, my God! Oh, Jesus.’ In each case, it was a cruel, agonizing, and contemptable death.177

Cone’s arguments can be read as transfiguring Luther’s “third rule” for the study of theology, tentatio (Anfechtung), in that black faith “emerged out of black people’s wrestling with suffering, the struggle to make sense out of their senseless situation, as they related their own predicament to similar stories in the Bible.”178 Said transfiguration of Anfechtung is the wrestling with apparent divine abandonment (Mk. 15:34) due to black suffering from lynching, a suffering which Cone relates to Jacob’s wrestling with the angel in Genesis 32.179 However, lynching, and the black suffering resulting from it, does not have the final word for Cone when viewed from the perspective of Christ’s cross. “The final word about black life is not death on a lynching tree but redemption in the cross – a miraculously transformed life found in the God of the gallows.”180 Therefore, a transfigured form of Anfechtung can be found in that, for Cone, the “God of the gallows” is in solidarity with lynched black bodies, making “redemption in the cross” the “final word about black life.” Thus, Cone writes, “although Jacob was left with a limp, he won his struggle with God.”181 Whereas for Luther, individual torments and anxieties about predestination were overcome by looking to the wounds of the crucified Christ on the cross, in Cone, Christ’s cross shows how the Anfechtung of the lynching tree is overcome through God’s “loving solidarity,” wherein the ugliness of the cross and the lynching tree is transformed into the beauty of God’s “liberating presence.”182 177

Ibid., 161. Ibid., 124. 179 See Ibid., 23–25, and Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, 59–65. For the classic study on Anfechtung in Luther, see Erich Vogelsang, Der Angefochtene Christus bei Luther (Berlin and Leipzig: De Gruyter, 1932), esp. 52–79. Joshua C. Miller argues Cone’s referencing of the Jacob story in comparison with lynching has connections to Bayer’s understanding of lament in terms of God’s “third hiddenness,” wherein God attacks the promise God has made in God’s word. See Miller, Hanging by a Promise, 326. From the present study’s perspective, though, Cone’s theology does not primarily relate to the hiddenness of God behind the cross of Christ. Rather, Cone’s theology can be fruitfully read as a transfigured theologia crucis related to the suffering of God as argued for in the transformed theologia crucis through Barth, Bonhoeffer, and Moltmann in Part 2 of the present study, and originating in the constructive eschatological transformation proposed from the lumen gloriae at the end of Luther’s De servo arbitrio in Chapter 4. See “God’s Second Form of Hiddenness and the Eschatological lumen gloriae: A Constructive Development,” pp. 94–98 in Chapter 4 of the present study, and n. 150 above. 180 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 23. 181 Ibid., 24. 182 Ibid., 162. “God’s loving solidarity can transform ugliness – whether Jesus on the cross 178

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Cone thus interprets the cross and the lynching tree dialectically and writes of the “scandal” of the cross and lynching tree. In a way not present in his prior constructive theology, Cone now understands the dialectical relationship between the cross and the lynching tree to be the measure of genuine theology and genuine preaching. The cross and the lynching tree interpret each other. Both were spectacles, shameful events, instruments of punishment reserved for the most despised people in society. Any genuine theology and any genuine preaching of the Christian gospel must be measured against the test of the scandal of the cross and the lynching tree.183

Cone admits that “[o]ne has to be a little mad, kind of crazy, to find salvation in the cross, victory in defeat, and life in death.”184 Nevertheless, Cone believes “the lynching tree reveals the true religious meaning of the cross for American Christians today.”185 While The Cross and the Lynching Tree examines the “lynching era” (1880– 1940), Cone interpets the lynching tree overall as a “metaphor for America’s crucifixion of black people,” and one that is still ongoing due to the US criminal justice system’s disproportionate targeting of black bodies through the death penalty and the “war against drugs.”186 Legal theorist Michelle Alexander understands this disproportionate targeting of black bodies in the US criminal justice system as a “New Jim Crow.”187 Cone draws from Alexander and argues for this “New Jim Crow” as a contemporary form of lynching, writing, “One can lynch a person without a rope or a tree.”188

or a lynched black victim – into beauty, into God’s liberating presence. Through the powerful imagination of faith, we can discover the ‘terrible beauty’ of the cross and the ‘tragic beauty’ of the lynching tree.” See Chapter 2, n. 83 above for Luther’s admonishment from A Sermon on Preparing to Die that one’s hell is defeated, and one’s uncertain election is made sure, through gazing on Christ who descended into hell (LW 42: 106; WA 2, 690: 17–25). 183 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 161. 184 Ibid., 25. 185 Ibid., 161. Cone insists on Americans not forgetting the history of lynching in a similar fashion to how Germans must never forget the Holocaust. “Just as Germans should never forget the Holocaust, Americans should never forget slavery, segregation, and the lynching tree.” Ibid., 165. Cone’s remarks correspond to Moltmann’s “solidarity Christology” in relation to the question of God in Auschwitz, and Elie Wiesel’s remark that God is found hanging on the gallows. See n. 168 above. 186 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 163. 187 See Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness (New York: The New Press, 2010, 2012), 7–9, 98–102, 178–221, and Brach S. Jennings, “St. Augustine and Malcolm X as Theological Figures in Relation to a Contemporary Theologia Crucis in Solidarity with the #BlackLivesMatter Movement,” Currents in Theology and Mission 49, no. 1 (2022): 64–70. 188 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 163. Cone then relates lynching to the U. S. military’s invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, showing he understands the lynching tree to be a symbol with global relevance. Ibid., 164.

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Cone’s arguments for interpreting the cross and the lynching tree dialectically are also the basis for a newly articulated understanding of the black-white relationship in the contemporary United States, which can be read as a transfigured theologia crucis for victims and perpetrators that is both consonant with and in distinction to Jürgen Moltmann’s eschatologia crucis examined in the previous chapter.189 Cone calls white Americans to account for historical and contemporary forms of lynching, in order to then argue for why the lynching of black bodies matters for both black people (victims) and their white oppressors (perpetrators). “Blacks and whites are bound together in Christ by their brutal and beautiful encounter in this land.”190 A change in Cone’s understanding of the black-white relationship in comparison with Black Theology and Black Power is now discernable. While Cone’s first book was written as an angry, prophetic “word to Whitey”191 in order that white people would “deny themselves (whiteness), take up the cross (blackness), and follow Christ (black ghetto),”192 his final book has a word of hope for black-white relations due to the dialectical relationship of the cross and the lynching tree. No two people are in America have had more violent and loving encounters than black and white people. We were made brothers and sisters by the blood of the lynching tree, the blood of sexual union, and the blood of the cross of Jesus. No gulf between blacks and whites is too great to overcome, for our beauty is more enduring than our brutality. What God has bound together, no one can tear apart.193

For Cone, black victims and white perpetrators are bonded together through common human blood. Cone’s stress on the beauty of blacks and whites being “more enduring than our brutality,” further shows his ultimately hopeful outlook for black-white relations in the United States. This hope relates to Cone’s understanding of God’s transformation of the tragedy of the cross and the lynching tree into the “triumphant beauty of the divine.”194 Therefore, while Cone’s theology in The Cross and the Lynching Tree is primarily a theology for the victims of white supremacy, he ends this text with what can be termed a “cruciform word of hope” for the perpetrators, in language reminiscent of Martin Luther King, Jr., which contrasts with his first book’s tone that was more akin to Malcolm X.195 “God took the evil of the cross and 189 See especially the section “The Unfinished Reformation for Victims and Perpetrators of Injustice,” pp. 188–91 in Chapter 7 of the present study. 190 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 165. 191 See Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 3, and n. 17 above. 192 See Ibid., 150, and n. 49 above. 193 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 166. 194 Ibid. 195 Cone also thinks differently about so-called “reconciliation” between blacks and whites in Cross and the Lynching Tree from his concluding arguments in God of the Oppressed. There, Cone ends his text in language similar to Malcolm X as well: “Black theologians are not called

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the lynching tree and transformed them both into the triumphant beauty of the divine. If America has the courage to confront the great sin and ongoing legacy of white supremacy with repentance and reparation there is hope ‘beyond tragedy.’”196 In sum, The Cross and the Lynching Tree is important to the present study’s concern with a contemporary transfigured sapiential theologia crucis through James Cone in the following ways: 1) As an admonishment to white Americans of the dehumanizing crimes of lynching done to blacks in the Southern United States during the years 1880–1940, and of contemporary forms of lynching today through the US criminal justice system. This exemplifies how a transfigured theologia crucis through Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation centers in the embodied experiences of oppressed black people in the United States in particular, and oppressed peoples of color worldwide, in general.197 2) As an argument for Jesus’s crucifixion to be interpreted as a first-century lynching, in order to critique white Christian domestication of the cross.198 3) As an argument that the cross and the lynching tree should be interpreted dialectically, in order that Americans understand the meaning of the crucifixion for the contemporary United States.199 4) As an argument showing how the cross is a paradoxical sign of hope, wherein “victory is snatched out of defeat.”200 5) As an argument for the crucified Christ’s liberating solidarity with the victims of suffering.201 6) As an argument showing how the lynching of black bodies has significance for understanding the cross for both black and white Americans, exemplified in Cone’s statement of God’s transformation of the ugliness of the cross and the lynching tree into the “triumphant beauty of the divine.”202 While this text only indirectly contains Cone’s constructive theology, it still arguably corresponds to his other works as explored in the present chapter, due to Cone’s examination of the Christ event in relation to suffering black bodies and his argument for the crucified Christ’s presence in suffering. Further, while Cone’s tone has calmed somewhat in comparison with his earliest constructive books, his language remains passionate and engaged in his analysis of the symbol of the cross in comparison with the symbol of the lynching tree.203 Overall, then, Cone’s final book shows how the symbols of the cross and the lynching tree to interpret the gospel in a form acceptable to white oppressors …. We must let white oppressors know that we are on the ‘battlefield of the Lord’ and are determined through God’s grace to fight until we die.” Cone, God of the Oppressed, 225. 196 Cone, Cross and the Lynching Tree, 165. 197 See nn. 144, 187, 188 above. 198 See n. 155 above. 199 See n. 185 above. 200 See n. 154 above. 201 See n. 151 above. 202 See n. 196 above. 203 See n. 51 above for Cone’s description of black theology as “passionate language.”

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witness to God’s loving and liberating solidarity with the victims of lynching, as well as how these symbols offer paradoxical hope for both the victims and perpetrators of lynching.

6. Conclusion The final chapter of this study explored James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis. This study closely read selections from the whole of Cone’s theology, ranging from his first book Black Theology and Black Power (1969) to his final book The Cross and the Lynching Tree (2011), for traces of the theme of theologia crucis related to and re-shaped from the transformed sapiential theologia crucis from Part 2 of this study and originating in texts from the early Martin Luther. The study also drew from selected theological essays, Cone’s autobiographical texts, Spirituals and the Blues, For my People, Martin and Malcolm and America, and Cone’s doctoral dissertation where appropriate. We have especially attempted to show how Cone’s Christology and hermeneutics can be read as a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis. A concluding note about the present study’s overall hermeneutical approach for a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone is now appropriate. With Vítor Westhelle’s figura hermeneutic for a contemporary theologia crucis and Oswald Bayer’s hermeneutics for Luther’s own theology in the background, the present study’s close reading of texts from James Cone’s theology sought to show how a sapiential theologia crucis beginning in texts from the early Luther finds new validity for the twenty-first century as transfigured through Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation.204 Westhelle’s interpretation of Luther as a figura allows for the possibility of a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis in diverse contexts far removed from sixteenth-century Germany. Bayer’s hermeneutics for Martin Luther’s own theology allow for exploring how Cone’s theology re-shapes a sapiential theologia crucis originating in texts from the early Luther as transformed through Barth, Bonhoeffer, and Moltmann. These hermeneutical considerations are not meant to imply that James Cone was a Lutheran theologian. Rather, these hermeneutics have been incorporated to propose how Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation can disrupt what sources are commonly considered for a theologia crucis beginning in texts from the early Luther to move a theologia crucis to new territory for the twentyfirst century.

204 See Bayer, Theology the Lutheran Way, Vítor Westhelle, Transfiguring Luther: The Planetary Promise of Luther’s Theology (Eugene: Cascade, 2016), and this study’s Introduction.

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Through Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, then, a sapiential theologia crucis is transfigured to God’s suffering solidarity with oppressed black people in the United States in particular, and oppressed persons of color worldwide in general to show how the crucified Christ is the liberator of the oppressed. Cone’s theology thus shows how the theme of theologia crucis can have ongoing relevance in relation to situations of global oppression. Therefore, when this theme originating in texts from the early Luther is transformed through Karl Barth’s Erwählungslehre, and then further developed and critiqued through the theologies of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Jürgen Moltmann, it can then be transfigured by Cone’s theology through Cone’s particular emphasis on oppressed black people in the United States, and oppressed people of color worldwide in general, for a contemporary theologia crucis that connects sapiential theology with political-prophetic theology.

General Conclusion 1. Summarizing the Present Study’s Arguments This study proposed a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. In the first part, the study argued for the presence and importance of the theme of theologia crucis in Martin Luther’s early pastoral theology and its indebtedness to late medieval passion mysticism, shown particularly in Luther’s incorporation of the mystical “happy exchange” and the interrelatedness of the cross theme with the doctrine of justification. Thus, in Luther’s early theology, one can reasonably claim that the theme of theologia crucis centers on the mystical revelation of God a posteriori in the crucified Christ and corresponds to the justification of the individual guilty sinner before God. The study also argued that a theologia crucis in Martin Luther can be fruitfully understood through the phrase “pastoral application,” thus seeking to demonstrate Oswald Bayer’s assertion that theology for Luther is sapientia, which, while not excluding scientific and/or academic theology, does not begin with this latter theological form, but instead in the church, and particularly for Luther, in monasticism. We began the first part with a close reading of the Heidelberg Disputation (1518), in order to explore Luther’s claim of God known decisively in suffering and the cross in relation to contemporary forms of suffering, as well as to ask if Luther’s own sapiential theologia crucis should be thought of as a theology of revelation in the sense of twentieth-century “dialectical theology.” We then proceeded to examine traces of specific so-called “pastoral applications” of the theme of theologia crucis, found in A Meditation on Christ’s Passion and A Sermon on Preparing to Die (both from 1519), and Freedom of a Christian (1520). These texts helped demonstrate this study’s claim that a theologia crucis in Luther’s own theology can be understood as pastoral theology, related to theology as sapientia. Important findings in the first set of pastoral texts included the relationship of a theologia crucis to the question of predestination, and what can be seen as the interconnectedness between a theologia crucis and the importance of promise in Luther’s evangelical theology, the latter of which is associated principally in the last century with Bayer’s work. In Freedom of a Christian, the present study not only examined the mystical “happy exchange” for traces of a theologia crucis, but also argued for the interconnectedness of justification and sanctification

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in Luther’s text. The study then explored how Luther’s text can be thought to be overly oriented to the perpetrators of systemic sin, while forgetting the victims. This argument introduced James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, through an initial excursion into Valerie Saiving-Goldstein’s feminist theology and William H. Lazareth’s Lutheran social ethics. Finally, we argued for the importance of the so-called “revisionist” historical scholarship about Martin Luther for finding a mystical theologia crucis in his early theology, as well as that this historical research is important for a constructive theological investigation related to a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through Cone beginning in texts from the early Luther. The first part of the present study ended with a close reading of Luther’s De servo arbitrio (1525). While neither being specifically from what can be characterized as theology from the “early” Martin Luther, nor specifically within the genre of pastoral literature, this text nevertheless was important for the present study’s concerns surrounding a transfigured theologia crucis through Cone. First, we addressed sections of De servo arbitrio wherein traces of a theologia crucis might reasonably be found. Doing so helped show how the theme of theologia crucis was important for Luther beyond the Heidelberg Disputation, even though the specific phrase theologia crucis or theologus crucis can no longer be found. We also addressed whether De servo arbitrio should be thought of as a text for pastoral care, given Steven D. Paulson’s claims in his Luther’s Outlaw God trilogy. We ultimately concluded it is best to consider De servo arbitrio as within the genre of polemic, as argued by the majority of Luther scholars. The reason for this conclusion is Luther’s text says nothing specifically about Luther attempting to function as Erasmus’s pastor, and the text contains Latin terms associated with public debate rather than pastoral consolation. However, while the present study argued differently to and against Paulson at many points, the study did seek to show Paulson was accurate in his understanding of the importance of promise in Luther’s theology, with connections to Bayer. These connections correspond to the present study’s arguments in Chapter 2 that a mystical theologia crucis in the early Luther and Bayer’s work on promise can be seen as connected. To the knowledge of the present author, this claim has not been proposed before. The Luther portion of the study ended with a proposal for a constructive development of the lumen gloriae, found in the last section of Luther’s De servo arbitrio. At least when interpreted through a Pauline eschatologia crucis, there is hope that God’s “second hiddenness” (God behind the cross) will cease at the last day, wherein God will be “all in all” (1 Cor. 15:28). The study thus argued for a transformation of the theme of theologia crucis in line with the turn to eschatology in twentieth-century Protestant systematic theology, beginning with Karl Barth. This proposal for an eschatologia crucis then set up the investigations of a transformed theologia crucis in the second part of this study.

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Having examined texts from Luther for traces of the theme of theologia crucis and proposed preliminary constructive developments, the study proceeded to texts from three theologians from the twentieth century as transformations of a theologia crucis from Luther’s early theology on the way to James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation: Karl Barth, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Jürgen Moltmann. In this section, the present study became explicitly concerned with ethicalpolitical matters. The first text for close reading in this section was Barth’s Erwählungslehre from 2.2 of the Church Dogmatics. Barth was chosen due to his importance for Cone’s theology, and due to the constructive proposal for transforming Luther’s notion of the lumen gloriae eschatologically in On Bound Choice. Given Barth’s dictum in CD 1.1 that dogmatic theology should be done as a theologia crucis, we sought to show how CD 2.2 can be read as a sapiential theologia crucis, even though he does not directly reference this theme in his Erwählungslehre. An important transformation in the theme of theologia crucis from Luther to Barth was then found: What for Luther was justification for the guilty sinner in a mystical exchange with the crucified Christ becomes, through Barth, God’s gracious election of humankind in the crucified Jesus, who is the image of the invisible God. Therefore, the individual soul-bridegroom’s mystical exchange with Christ the bride in Luther’s “happy exchange” is transformed into a collective exchange between Christ and humanity through Barth, wherein, for Barth, there is no divine hiddenness behind the hidden God as revealed in the crucified Jesus on Golgotha. The present study also argued, perhaps controversially, that Barth’s Erwählungslehre still might contain a mystical undercurrent, due to his use of the word Tausch in relation to the Golgotha event. At least when read in relation to the early Luther, mystical undercurrents in CD 2.2 can be discerned related to a sapiential theologia crucis. Finally, the study argued for a constructive development of Barth’s Erwählungslehre through a Pauline eschatologia crucis, intended to complement Barth’s Johannine theologia crucis in CD 2.2. Therefore, we argued hope in the universal reconciliation and restoration of all creation as found in Jürgen Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis is a reasonable consequence of Barth’s Erwählungslehre, even though Barth himself did not advance this position directly. Overall, we attempted to show how a sapiential theologia crucis originating in texts from the early Luther is transformed into a consoling, Trinitarian doctrine of election through Barth’s Erwählungslehre. The study turned next to Dietrich Bonhoeffer to argue for the interweaving of ethical and political concerns in a transformed theologia crucis. This interconnection between a theologia crucis and ethical and political matters is important for Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation, and, at least implicitly, addresses some of the limitations in a theologia crucis as found in Luther’s early pastoral theology. Therefore, this study read a theologia crucis in Bonhoeffer’s later pastoral-ethical writings through the lens of Bonhoeffer’s ethical concept of Stell-

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vertretung. We began with an investigation of Reggie L. Williams’s book Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus: Harlem Renaissance Theology and an Ethic of Resistance to establish a hermeneutical framework for understanding Stellvertretung, due to Williams’s argument for the black church’s role in shaping Bonhoeffer’s concrete application of an ethical theme dating back to Bonhoeffer’s first academic dissertations, as well as the relationship between this ethical theme and a theologia crucis. Further, Williams’s argument was not adequately considered in Michael P. DeJonge’s study on Bonhoeffer’s reception of Martin Luther, providing an opportunity for the present study to correct this oversight. Having established this hermeneutical framework, the present study proceeded to examine Bonhoeffer’s Christology lectures from 1933, in an attempt to show how Bonhoeffer argues for Jesus Christ’s concrete presence in the churchcommunity and in human history. We then proceeded to Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship from 1937, in order to examine how Bonhoeffer understands the relationship between faith and obedience, and thus justification and sanctification. Here the study argued for Bonhoeffer’s compatibility with both Barth and Luther, if the latter’s texts do, indeed, present justification and sanctification as two sides of the same coin centered in the cross. The last two major texts of Bonhoeffer’s closely read were sections from his Ethics and Letters and Papers from Prison. In the section about Ethics, we examined Bonhoeffer’s Christological critique of the so-called “traditional Lutheran” doctrine of the “two kingdoms,” as well as Bonhoeffer’s compatibility with Barth’s theology in the Barmen Declaration of 1934. We also argued for the connection between Discipleship and Ethics related to Stellvertretung, even though Ethics has an emphasis on being “worldly” that is lacking in Discipleship. Finally, selections from Letters and Papers from Prison were closely read to show how Bonhoeffer’s theology critiques and develops the pre-Erwählungslehre Barth to the next level, that of a non-religious theologia crucis, as well as how, through Bonhoeffer, a theologia crucis turns toward the suffering of God in the world. Here there was a decisive development in the theme of theologia crucis, wherein the crucified Christ is now seen in solidarity with the victims of sin. Overall, Bonhoeffer’s later pastoral-ethical texts show how a theologia crucis is transformed for concrete, cruciform discipleship in the world, particularly in relation to Bonhoeffer’s notion of Stellvertretung, which the present study argued can be read as a development of Luther’s own notion of the “happy exchange” that also has commonalities with Barth’s Erwählungslehre in CD 2.2 as a transformed sapiential theologia crucis. The second part of this study concluded with an examination of Jürgen Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis centered in The Crucified God to explore a radicalization of Luther’s emphasis on justification of guilty sinners to justification for victims and perpetrators of systemic sin. We thus explored how Moltmann’s radicalization of Luther’s theologia crucis and Barth’s Erwählungslehre is a key part of his eschatological theology of hope. We then examined how

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a transformed theologia crucis both consonant with and in distinction to Luther, Barth, and Bonhoeffer might be found throughout Moltmann’s theology from Theology of Hope to his autobiography and selected theological essays. Given both Moltmann’s personal friendship with Cone, and Cone’s reception of Moltmann’s theology in his own Black Theology of Liberation, Moltmann’s Trinitarian eschatologia crucis as centered in his book The Crucified God was a logical conclusion to the second section. Through Moltmann’s Crucified God, then, a theologia crucis becomes a theological hermeneutic for critiquing social and political injustice. Moltmann’s argument of the Triune God’s passionate suffering on Golgotha (in contrast to what he understands as an apathetic God rooted in Greek metaphysics), and consequent identification with the victims of suffering throughout history, corresponds to his Theology of Hope that proclaims God’s eschatological future for all people and all creation through the bodily raising of the crucified, godforsaken Christ of Golgotha. Moltmann’s eschatologia crucis is also a critique and development of Barth, wherein Barth’s Erwählungslehre corresponded to a Johannine Christology from above, and Moltmann’s theology represents a Christology from below for concrete suffering in the world, corresponding to Bonhoeffer’s later theology. Overall, then, a transformed sapiential theologia crucis through Moltmann’s theology becomes the impetus for boldly engaging in political action in the world to combat injustice. The present study reached its apex in the third section, wherein we argued for reading James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation as a transfigured theologia crucis. To the knowledge of the present author, this approach to Cone’s theology has not yet been explored in the exact manner as was done here. While Cone does not define his theology directly by way of this theme, the present study has attempted to show how the approach taken here was both reasonable and fruitful when seen in relation to Vítor Westhelle and Oswald Bayer’s hermeneutics and undertaken through the study’s chosen method of close reading. Therefore, the study closely read selections from Cone’s major constructive theological books, ranging from Cone’s Black Theology and Black Power to The Cross and the Lynching Tree, his doctoral dissertation, and selected theological essays, in order to explore where traces of a theologia crucis might be found throughout Cone’s theology. We particularly emphasized reading Cone’s Christology and hermeneutics as a transfigured theologia crucis, and also closely read an essay where Cone references Luther’s distinction between the theologus gloriae and theologus crucis and Moltmann’s Crucified God. The present study claimed that a transfigured theologia crucis through Cone re-shapes the transformed theologia crucis from the second part of the study in relation to oppressed black bodies. Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation thus transfigures a theologia crucis beginning in the early Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation in that the cross is now a symbol for God’s suffering solidarity with op-

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pressed black humanity in the United States particularly, and oppressed people of color worldwide in general. This transfigured theologia crucis illustrates how theological reflection can be seen as a contemporary form of what Bayer calls sapientia in Luther’s theology, in that Cone’s theological language originates in the black church in relation to the black experience as he understood it in wider society. Thus, while rigorous academic reflection is an essential part of the constructive theological task, a transfigured theologia crucis through Cone shows that the content of academic investigations for a contemporary constructive theologia crucis is found in the dialectical relationship between the cross and oppressed peoples of color worldwide in general, and oppressed black people in the United States in particular. Overall, Cone’s stress on Jesus Christ’s solidarity with oppressed people of color from the black experience as he understood it transfigures a theologia crucis for the twenty-first century to be attuned to concrete situations of global oppression, in order that a cruciform word of hope can be given. Through Cone’s theology, it can be fruitfully said that sapiential theology is political-prophetic, and political-prophetic theology is sapiential. This connecting of the political-prophetic and the sapiential in a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through Cone then provides an impetus for fundamental theology to further reflect about the mutual interdependence of academy, society, and church in hermeneutics and material dogmatics from the standpoint of theology as sapientia.

2. Limitations of the Present Study and Suggestions for Future Research The present study has explored how a sapiential theologia crucis beginning in the early Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation is transfigured through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation. Unfortunately, however, the doctrine of the Trinity was not directly addressed in relation to Cone. While Barth and Moltmann are explicitly Trinitarian theologians, and Bonhoeffer connected Christology to the mystery of the Trinity in his Christology lectures, the present study stopped short of offering a fully articulated contemporary constructive Trinitarian theologia crucis through Cone. This was due to space limitations, the vastness of the constructive and historical literature surrounding the Trinity in Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox theology that has been published in recent decades, and the sparseness of direct references to the doctrine of the Trinity in Cone’s texts. However, future studies on Cone might yield fruitful results from exploring how Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation might contribute to a contemporary ecumenical constructive doctrine of the Trinity, particularly around Cone’s notion of God as Black in his early theology, for a Trinitarian theology of Holy Saturday as a new twenty-first century theology of hope. The present study is related to these con-

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cerns, but an explicit study of Cone in relation to a Trinitarian theology of Holy Saturday is a task for further research. A more detailed examination of Luther’s understanding of Christ’s descent into hell might also contribute to this proposed Trinitarian theology of Holy Saturday through Cone’s theology, in that one could explore if Luther’s theology can be thought of as an evangelical incorporation and development of late medieval passion mysticism that connects the Trinity, Christology, and soteriology. Fragmentary steps toward this possibility for future research can be found in Chapter 2 of this study. Space limitations also prevented examining the full ecumenical potential of a contemporary transfigured theologia crucis through Cone. Particularly the theologies of Hans Urs von Balthasar, Karl Rahner, and Dumitru Staniloae could be explored as theologies of Wisdom related to Cone’s prophetic critiques in his Black Theology of Liberation, which might yield fruitful results for an ecumenical theologia crucis beyond the present study. Another limitation is the study’s failure to propose a doctrine of sacraments in relation to a transfigured theologia crucis through Cone. A re-interpretation of Luther’s understanding of Baptism as dying to the Old Adam in relation to global white supremacy is something constructive systematic theology could thus explore in the future related to Cone’s theology. Also, and this an area where Lutheran theology would bring something unique to the ongoing scholarly engagement with Cone’s theology, the present study did not engage in a contemporary re-interpretation of Luther’s eucharistic theology in relation to James Cone. Particularly the “third mode” of Christ’s presence in Luther’s Confession Concerning Christ’s Supper, and the Christology in Articles 7 and 8 of the Lutheran Formula of Concord, are eucharistic accents that could be examined in relation to oppressed people of color worldwide. Initial steps toward a constructive doctrine of sacraments can be found in Chapter 2, and in the footnotes of the chapters on Barth, Bonhoeffer, and Moltmann, but the liberating potential of Lutheran sacramental theology in relation to Cone remains unexplored. Space limitations unfortunately prevented a fuller investigation of Bonhoeffer’s relationship to the Luther Renaissance, and particularly to his three Berlin teachers Karl Holl, Adolf von Harnack, and Reinhold Seeburg. A fuller investigation of Bonhoeffer’s reception and critique of liberal theology may give further insight both into how he understood Luther’s theology, and into how Bonhoeffer’s understanding of Stellvertretung was radicalized during his time in Harlem. This suggestion for further research might also be pertinent to understanding Cone’s theology, given Cone’s own reception of Bonhoeffer’s theology throughout his theological career. Space limitations further prevented a fuller investigation of the possible presence of mysticism in dialectical theology, and an in-depth investigation of Paul Tillich, Rudolf Bultmann, and Emil Brunner. Future research on dialectical theology could investigate Cone’s theology in relationship to Tillich and Bult-

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mann more fully, particularly given Cone’s incorporation and critique of these thinkers in his hermeneutics. Cone’s arguments about Brunner in his doctoral dissertation (often as a critique of Barth) could also provide the basis for a study on Cone’s reception of Brunner, which the present study was unable to engage. This study also did not address Reinhold Niebuhr beyond a reference to him from Cone’s The Cross and the Lynching Tree. This is because the intention for this study was to show a transformation of Luther’s own theologia crucis through Barth, the critique, development, and radicalization of Barth through Bonhoeffer and Moltmann, and Cone’s theology as a transfigured sapiential theologia crucis as reshaped from these three twentieth-century theologians with the theme originating in Luther. Also, Barth, Tillich, and Bultmann were more important to Cone’s hermeneutics prior to The Cross and the Lynching Tree. Nevertheless, Niebuhr was a highly important dialectical theologian coming from the United States in the twentieth century, and it is particularly unfortunate that the present study was not able to give him adequate space. Future work on Cone’s theology could thus investigate Cone’s theological relationship to Niebuhr from constructive as well as historical perspectives. Further, the present study did not explicitly address the reception of Cone’s theology by Womanist theologians. In particular, Shawn Copeland, as well as Cone’s students Kelly Brown Douglas, Jacqueline Grant, and JoAnne Marie Terrell all have connections to Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation in their Christologies, which warrant further study. Cone’s debate with Delores Williams about the place of the cross in theological reflection also deserves further consideration, given Marvin Wickware’s insights about the place of love in the Christologies of Cone and Williams. Perhaps a further solution indebted to and developing Wickware’s can be found by seeing Williams’s and Cone’s Christological accents as complementary rather than exclusionary, with Williams concerned more with the life of Jesus and Cone with a twentieth-century radicalization of the Christus Victor atonement theory. Finally, while the present study sought to avoid arbitrary textual interpretations through an overall awareness of authorial intent and historical context(s) related to deconstruction in literary studies, future research might further strengthen and/or critique the interpretations presented throughout this study through incorporating both literary critical and historical methods of textual analysis. Notwithstanding the above-named limitations (as well as any other shortcomings subsequent readers of this study might find that are presently unknown to the study’s author), and the suggestions for further research proposed, this study’s author hopes an overall coherent and consistent argument was made for transfiguring a theologia crucis through James Cone’s Black Theology of Liberation for the academy, society, and church today.

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Index of Authors Balthasar, Hans Urs von 19, 21, 78n.43, 96n.57, 101n.73, 106n.5, 107n.7, 110n.16, 111n.20, 122n.49, 124, 125n.62, 129n.71, 130n.76, 175n.19, 187n.56, 267 Barth, Karl viii, xi, xiii, xvii, 1, 4, 7n.20, 8, 12–15, 17, 19–20, 39n.43, 41n.49, 47n.22, 53n.44, 59n.77, 60n.79, 76nn.36;38, 83n.10, 96, 97n.61, 98, 99n.66, 100nn.69;70, 101–2, 105–32, 133–34, 137, 140n.29, 143n.42, 145n.49, 146n.55, 148n.61, 149–57, 160n.105, 161–66, 167n.2, 168, 170n.6, 172n.10, 173–75, 176n.21, 179, 180n.29, 181n.33, 185n.46, 188, 192–93, 194n.78, 195– 99, 203–4, 205n.7, 210, 212–14, 221– 22, 225, 227–29, 237–38, 239n.122, 253n.175, 254n.179, 258–59, 262–68 Barthes, Roland 2 Bernard of Clairvaux 21, 28–29, 42, 47, 70–74, 77–78 Bonhoeffer, Dietrich vii–ix, xv, xviii, 1, 4, 8, 12–15, 16n.48, 39n.43, 76n.38, 83n.10, 98, 101–2, 106, 116n.34, 132, 133–66, 168, 174–75, 179n.28, 184n.45, 186n.51, 188, 194, 195n.81, 198–99, 203–4, 207, 213–15, 217, 225, 237, 239, 248, 254n.179, 258–59, 263–68 Bultmann, Rudolf xi, 15, 17, 50n.36, 170n.6, 171n.7, 186n.51, 210n.21, 221– 22, 228n.89, 229–31, 233, 244, 253n.175, 267–68 Cone, James H. vii–ix, xi, xiv–xv, 1, 3–15, 22, 26, 29n.14, 30n.17, 32n.21, 39n.43, 40, 43, 50n.36, 66, 73n.29, 75–76, 78–79, 100–2, 106, 116n.34, 126n.63, 133n.2, 134, 144n.48, 145n.49, 162n.112, 165, 168n.3, 183n.42, 184n.45, 186n.51,

191n.70, 195n.81, 198n.95, 199, 201–59, 261–68 Coombe, Cameron D. 197 DeJonge, Michael P. 14, 133n.2, 134, 138, 143n.42, 152n.74, 153, 162, 165, 264 Derrida, Jacques 2–3, 4n.11, 6n.19, 97n.61, 101n.73, 204n.5 Douglas, Kelly Brown 251n.170, 268 Forde, Gerhard O. 18, 86n.18, 87n.25, 92n.43, 93n.46, 119n.41, 181n.34, 190 Grant, Jacqueline 225n.74, 251n.170, 268 Gudmundsdottir, Arnfridur 19–20, 38– 42, 73n.27 Gutiérrez, Gustavo 73n.29, 214n.33, 237 Hall, Douglas John 18–19, 38n.42, 39n.44, 97n.58, 169n.4, 232n.99 Hamm, Berndt 21, 22n.77, 44n.3, 47, 59n.74, 65n.1, 70n.18, 70n.21, 72, 73n.30, 77 Hayes, Diana L. 73n.29 Hopkins, Dwight 213n.31, 242n.133 Hunsinger, George 107n.8, 113n.25, 121, 130nn.77;79, 179n.28, 196nn.83;85, 197n.91, 198n.96 Jüngel, Eberhard xv, 19, 38, 83n.10, 100nn.69;70, 101n.73, 113nn.25;26, 115n.33, 127n.66, 157, 163n.116, 173n.16, 180n.29, 196n.89 Käsemann, Ernst 30f, 32n.21, 228n.89 Kilby, Karen 101n.73 King, Martin Luther 205n.7, 206, 208, 245, 252n.172, 256

282

Index of Authors

Kolb, Robert 17, 20n.70, 29n.15, 32n.22, 35n.34, 36, 41n.48, 42, 46n.17, 49n.30, 67n.8, 68, 83n.11, 86n.20, 92n.45, 98n.63, 118n.38, 119n.41

250n.168, 254n.179, 255n.185, 256, 258–59, 263–66, 268 Morrison, Stephen D. xvii, xviii, 107n.8, 115n.31, 219n.53, 228n.89

LaCugna, Catherine Mowry 101n.73 Leppin, Volker xiii–xiv, xvi, 1n.2, 8n.24, 17n.51, 20n.70, 21–22, 25n.2, 26n.4, 28, 34n.28, 44n.3, 46n.12, 47n.23, 48n.26, 49n.29, 50n.36, 55n.51, 58n.73, 59n.76, 70n.21, 77n.42, 78n.43, 86n.21, 89 Lewis, Alan E. 19, 21, 31, 126n.63, 169n.4, 180n.29, 183n.42, 187n.56 Loewenich, Walther von 11–12, 16–22, 25n.1, 26, 29, 30n.17, 32–34, 41–42, 54n.47, 85n.16, 94, 98–102, 173n.13, 179n.27, 238n.119 Luther, Martin vii–ix, xi, xiii–xiv, 1–102, 105n.1, 106, 107n.8, 108–10, 114–20, 126, 130–32, 133nn.1;2, 134–38, 142–43, 145n.49 146–47, 148nn.62;67, 149–50, 151n.72, 152– 53, 156, 160–61, 162n.112, 163–64, 165–66, 167n.2, 168, 169n.4, 172– 76, 177n.22, 181–82, 184n.45, 187, 188–89, 193, 194n.80, 195n.81, 196– 98, 203, 204–5, 207n.11, 208n.17, 215–16, 217n.46, 227n.83, 228n.89, 230n.94, 234n.110, 235, 236–44, 247, 251n.170, 254, 258, 261–68

Oberman, Heiko A. 6n.17, 10n.34, 21, 28n.13, 29n.14, 39n.43, 56n.60, 59n.76, 77, 113n.28

Malcolm, Lois xiv, 78n.43, 175n.19 McCormack, Bruce L. 96n.57, 106n.5, 107nn.8;9, 108n.10, 109n.15, 111n.20, 112n.23, 113nn.25;27, 115n.31, 116n.34, 122nn.50;51, 124n.58, 126n.64, 170n.6, 176n.21, 229n.92 Moltmann, Jürgen viii, xiv–xv, xvii– xviii, xxiii, 1, 4, 8, 12–15, 19, 27n.8, 31, 33n.26, 39n.43, 57n.66, 76n.38, 96n.57, 98, 100n.69, 101–2, 106, 108n.11, 116n.34, 129n.71, 130–31, 145n.49, 151n.72, 152n.76, 157n.89, 161n.108, 164n.118, 166, 167–99, 203–4n.5, 207, 208n.17, 210, 213–15, 219–20, 225, 230n.93, 231n.97, 237– 38, 240n.126, 241, 243n.136, 244, 247,

Pannenberg, Wolfhart xiii, 30f, 101n.73, 131, 145n.49, 157n.90, 164, 183n.42, 186n.51, 194n.80, 197n.91, 198n.95, 213, 224n.73, 227n.85, 231n.97 Paulson, Steven D. 12, 18n.57, 81, 85n.15, 86, 87–94, 98n.63, 100n.70, 101n.73, 262 Rahner, Karl 78n.43, 101n.73, 175, 267 Rittgers, Ronald K. 21, 30n.33, 51n.38, 53–54, 69n.16, 77n.42, 118n.38 Schleiermacher, Friedrich 106n.5, 107n.8, 116n.34, 196n.89, 211, 212n.26, 232 Smith, Linda Tuhiwai 2–3 Staniloae, Dumitru 116n.34, 267 Staupitz, Johannes von 28nn.10;12, 46n.12, 47–48, 59, 69n.16, 70–73, 77– 78, 86n.21 Tillich, Paul xi, 15, 170n.6, 208n.16, 210n.21, 217n.42, 218, 220–22, 229–31, 233, 242n.131, 244, 253n.175, 267, 268 Tracy, David 4n.10, 170n.6 Truth, Sojourner xiv Tubman, Harriet vii, xiv Wengert, Timothy J. 12n.41, 34n.30, 40, 43, 88n.28, 101n.71, 118n.38, 119n.41 Westhelle, Vítor xiv, xvii, 1, 4–8, 11, 16, 20, 36, 46n.17, 74n.31, 83n.8, 85n.16, 97, 140n.27, 150n.70, 205n.6, 258, 265 Wickware, Marvin E. 251n.170, 268 Williams, Delores S. 251n.170, 268 Williams, Reggie vii–ix, xv, 13, 14n.43, 133–40, 141n.32, 164n.117, 165, 264 X, Malcolm 74n.33, 205n.7, 206, 207n.12, 209nn.18;19, 211n.22, 255n.187, 256

Index of Subjects Anfechtung xiii, 8–10, 17, 20n.70, 21, 28n.10, 33n.27, 46–47, 57, 59n.76, 63– 64, 72n.24, 73, 113n.28, 148n.62, 171, 183n.40, 235, 254 Baptism 49, 51n.38, 59, 61–64, 71, 119n.41, 148, 267 Black Church vii–ix, 15, 133n.2, 138–40, 162n.112, 204, 206n.8, 211n.24, 214n.33, 217n.42, 222n.63, 224n.73, 236, 244, 251n.170, 264, 266 Black Theology of Liberation vii– ix, xiv, 1, 3, 4, 6–8, 11, 13–15, 22, 26, 30n.17, 32n.21, 39n.43, 40, 43, 50n.36, 66, 73n.29, 75–76, 79, 100–1, 106, 116n.34, 133n.2, 134, 144n.48, 145n.49, 162n.112, 165, 168n.3, 183n.42, 186n.51, 191n.70, 195n.81, 198n.95, 199, 201–59, 261–68 Christology 16n.48, 18, 26n.4, 30n.17, 31n.19, 78n.43, 105n.1, 113n.27, 115n.31, 122n.51, 130n.78, 131, 133, 137n.13, 140–46, 153, 158n.92, 164–66, 169n.4, 179n.28, 181n.31, 183n.42, 185n.46, 186–87, 191n.70, 195n.82, 196, 198, 206, 211, 213, 215–16, 224n.73, 227–28, 230n.94, 237n.117, 242n.133, 246n.149, 250n.168, 255n.185, 258, 264–67 communicatio idiomatum 143n.42, 153, 176, 179n.28 Dialectical Theology xi, xiii, xv–xvi, 11–12, 16–17, 41–42, 96n.57, 137n.13, 160n.105, 170n.6, 173n.13, 230n.94, 253n.175, 261, 267–68

Election (s. also Predestination) vii, xi, xiii, 1n.2, 7n.20, 12–14, 39n.43, 41n.49, 53n.44, 57–59, 60n.79, 61, 64–65, 72, 76n.38, 86, 88, 96n.57, 101–2, 105–33, 149n.69, 154n.82, 162–63, 164n.118, 166, 168, 179, 181n.33, 188, 192–93, 194n.78, 195–98, 203, 204n.5, 212, 219, 227, 230, 254n.182, 259, 263–65 Eschatology 12, 14, 50n.36, 57n.66, 81, 94–102, 106, 113n.28, 115n.31, 125n.60, 127–32, 164n.118, 166–99, 215, 234n.109, 203n.1, 215, 247, 254n.179, 262–65 Feminist Theology 19–20, 38–42, 66, 73– 76, 78, 175n.19, 262 Happy Exchange 12–13, 49n.28, 52, 59– 60, 62, 64, 65n.1, 66, 70–79, 106, 116– 22, 128, 131, 134–42, 144n.48, 145n.49, 146, 149, 159n.98, 161, 165–66, 168, 173–79,197, 199, 203, 214, 215n.39, 219, 225, 251n.170, 261, 263–64 Hermeneutics vii–viii, xvii, 1n.2, 3–11, 15–16, 25, 29n.15, 41, 43n.2, 50n.56, 73n.29, 76n.37, 88, 93, 95n.54, 97n.61, 98, 101n.73, 106, 108n.10, 116n.34, 125n.61, 129–31, 134–40, 168n.3, 172n.10, 174, 184n.45, 197–98, 203, 205nn.6–7, 207n.11, 210n.21, 211, 213, 215, 219–44, 247, 253n.175, 258, 264– 66, 268 Hiddenness of God viii, 8, 11–12, 18n.57, 25, 27–28, 33–34, 38–40, 42, 50, 59, 64, 78n.43, 81–85, 94–102, 106n.6, 110, 113, 116, 125, 131, 134– 35, 138, 145n.49, 156, 160, 164n.118, 165, 174n.17, 179n.27, 195n.81, 196, 237n.117, 254n.179, 262–63

284

Index of Subjects

Justification 12, 14, 16, 18, 21, 28, 32–38, 39n.43, 45n.11, 49–50, 54, 57, 65–68, 69n.16, 70–72, 76–77, 79, 85, 87n.25, 88–93, 97–98, 101n.73, 115n.31, 117, 119–20, 126, 137n.13, 142, 145n.49, 146, 148n.67, 149, 152, 164, 168, 187– 91, 195, 198, 203, 215nn.36;39, 217n.46, 238, 261, 263–64 Law and Gospel 34n.30, 46, 54, 75, 88, 90–93, 100n.69, 101, 164n.118, 173, 189, 194n.80, 229n.92 Lord’s Supper 9, 55, 59, 61–64, 184n.45 Metaphysics xvi, 19, 63, 99, 113n.27, 115nn.31–32, 156n.88, 156–57, 160, 171, 176n.21, 238, 241, 242, 265 Mysticism viii, 8, 11–12, 16–22, 26, 28– 29, 33, 35, 38–39, 41–43, 44n.3, 45n.11, 46–47, 49n.28, 55n.51, 58n.73, 60n.78, 61–66, 69–74, 77–78, 81, 95, 98, 106, 116n.34, 117, 119n.41, 120, 131, 136, 145n.49, 149, 160, 173n.13, 176, 197, 203, 215n.39, 236, 261–63, 267 Predestination (s. also Election) viii, 18n.57, 28n.10, 39n.43, 54n.49, 55n.52, 56–57, 63, 72n.24, 81–83, 85–87, 92–93, 95, 97–98, 108, 111n.20, 112n.23, 117, 121n.47, 122–28, 131, 195n.81, 196, 212n.26, 254, 261 Promise xiv, 4, 8n.32, 33n.27, 45, 61–64, 69, 91, 93, 96, 105n.4, 108, 112n.22,

129–30, 173n.16, 183n.40, 184–87, 190, 254n.179, 261–62 Revisionist Historical Scholarship on Martin Luther 6n.17, 18, 20–22, 29, 77, 262 sapientia xiii, 7–8, 10, 11, 13–15, 21, 26– 29, 32–37, 42–43, 46n.17, 50, 59n.77, 64, 78, 81, 83–84, 86, 92, 95, 97, 100–1, 105, 108, 116, 119n.41, 121n.45, 126n.63, 130–34, 143n.44, 154n.82, 155n.84, 156, 163, 166, 168, 173, 185n.45, 195–96, 198–99, 203, 204n.5, 235–36, 241, 244, 257–259, 261, 263–66, 268 Seelsorge xiv, 10, 12, 21n.76, 43–64, 81, 83, 86–94, 109–10, 116–22, 168, 185, 191, 251, 262 Third Use of the Law 75, 79, 164n.118, Three Publics for Theology 3–4, 10, 15, 266, 268 Trinity viii–ix, 13–14, 40, 53n.44, 100n.69, 101n.73, 105–13, 116n.34, 122–23, 126, 129, 131–32 144, 157n.89, 166, 168, 174–83, 184n.45, 188–89, 190n.64, 191–99, 203, 219n.52, 265–67 Womanist Theology xiv, 73n.29, 225n.74, 245, 251n.170, 268 Two Kingdoms vii, 14n.43, 75, 150–53, 165, 184n.45, 238–41, 264