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Document Details : Title: ‘De akelig brede kloof...’ Subtitle: De betekenis van de hernieuwde vraag naar de ‘historische Jezus’ voor de hedendaagse dogmatiek Author(s): ESSEN, Georg Journal: Tijdschrift voor Theologie Volume: 48 Issue: 4 Date: 2008 Pages: 376-388 DOI: 10.2143/TVT.48.4.3203507 Abstract : This article puts Joseph Ratzinger, Benedict XVI’s criticism of historical-critical exegesis in his book on Jesus into a more general context of the history of theology, from Albert Schweitzer and Adolf von Harnack to Ernst Troeltsch. Because of the traditionally intricate relation between dogmatic theology and exegesis, the author outlines a concept of dogmatic theology as a hermeneutics of Christian faith that is beholden to the truth. On the one hand, it is the task of dogmatic theology to consider philosophy in the interest of an inclusive appropriation of the truth of Christian faith, and from the position of autonomous reason, to justify faith. On the other, however, dogmatic theology has the task to explain and justify the foundation of faith in the historical source it describes as revelation. The fact that Christian faith finds its truth in a historical event, the life and fate of Jesus, points dogmatic theology towards a dialogue with exegesis. In his exchange with Ratzinger’s conception of exegesis, the author proposes, on the one hand, that any pronouncements on historical events within theological hermeneutics can only be made by means of the historical critical method. On the other, however, he insists that Jesus’ history also prevails over the traditions of the church, because the church’s confession of Jesus Christ is first and foremost founded in the Christ-event. In view of these insights, the author proposes that the methodical initiatives of E. Schillebeeckx, Hans Küng, Wolfhart Pannenberg and others in the 1960s and 70s, of a ‘Christology from below’ gain new currency, as far as this is tasked with the reconstruction of the origins of the faith in Jesus and the Christological pronouncements about him in a way that demonstrates that this historical context of discovery is in fact the founding context of this confession. |
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