Thomas F. Torrance and the problem of universalism

2015 ◽  
Vol 68 (2) ◽  
pp. 164-186 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul D. Molnar
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Karl Barth ◽  
Objective Knowledge ◽  
Salvation History ◽  
Knowledge Of God ◽  
Universal Salvation ◽  
Existential Knowledge ◽  
Free Grace ◽  
The Voice ◽  
The Trinity

AbstractWhile Karl Barth and Thomas F. Torrance both believed in the possibility of universal salvation, they also rejected the idea that we could make a final determination about this possibility prior to the second coming of Jesus Christ. Hence, both theologians rejected what may be called a doctrine of universal salvation in the interest of respecting God's freedom to determine the outcome of salvation history in accordance with the love which was revealed in and through the death and resurrection of Jesus himself. This article explores Torrance's reasons for holding that ‘the voice of the Catholic Church . . . throughout all ages has consistently judged universalism a heresy for faith and a menace to the Gospel’. Torrance expressly believed in the ‘universality of Christ's saving work’ but rejected ‘universalism’ and any idea of ‘limited atonement’. He considered both of these views to be rationalistic approaches which ignore the need for eschatological reserve when thinking about what happens at the end when Christ comes again and consequently tend to read back logical necessities into the gospel of free grace. Whenever this happens, Torrance held that the true meaning of election as the basis for Christian hope is lost and some version of limited atonement or determinism invariably follows. The ultimate problem with universalism then, from Torrance's perspective, can be traced to a form of Nestorian thinking with respect to christology and to a theoretical and practical separation of the person of Christ from his atoning work for us. What I hope to show in this article is that those who advance a ‘doctrine of universalism’ as opposed to its possibility also have an inadequate understanding of the Trinity. Interestingly, Torrance objected to the thinking of John A. T. Robinson and Rudolf Bultmann because both theologians, in their own way, separated knowledge of God for us from knowledge of who God is ‘in himself’. Any such thinking transfers our knowledge of God and of salvation from the objective knowledge of God given in revelation to a type of symbolic, mythological or existential knowledge projected from one's experience of faith and this once again opens the door to both limited atonement and to universalism. Against this Torrance insisted that we cannot speak objectively about what God is doing for us unless we can speak analogically about who God is in himself.

‘Thy word is truth’: the role of faith in reading scripture theologically with Karl Barth

2009 ◽  
Vol 63 (1) ◽  
pp. 70-92
Author(s):  
Paul D. Molnar
Keyword(s):  
Jesus Christ ◽  
General Trend ◽  
Karl Barth ◽  
Paul Tillich ◽  
Knowledge Of God ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Justification By Faith ◽  
Doctrine Of The Trinity ◽  
The Trinity

AbstractFollowing the thinking of Karl Barth, this article demonstrates how and why reading the Bible in faith is necessary in order to understand the truth which is and remains identical with God himself speaking to us in his Word and Spirit. After developing how faith, grace, revelation and truth are connected in Barth's theology by being determined by who God is in Jesus Christ, this article explains why Barth was essentially correct in claiming that we cannot know God truly through a study of religious experience but only through Christ himself and thus through the Spirit. I illustrate that for Barth the truth of religion simply cannot be found in the study of religion itself but only through revelation. That is why he applied the doctrine of justification by faith both to knowledge of God and to reading scripture. In light of what is then established, I conclude by briefly exploring exactly why the thinking of Paul Tillich, and three theologians who follow the general trend of Tillich's thinking (John Haught, John A. T. Robinson and S. Mark Heim), exemplify the correctness of Barth's analysis of the relation between religion and revelation, since each theologian is led to an understanding of who God is, how we reach God and how the doctrine of the Trinity should be understood that actually undermines Barth's emphasis on the fact that all knowledge of God and all doctrine should be dictated solely by who God is in Jesus Christ.

The obedience of the Son in the theology of Karl Barth and of Thomas F. Torrance

2014 ◽  
Vol 67 (1) ◽  
pp. 50-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul D. Molnar
Keyword(s):  
Karl Barth ◽  
Important Distinction ◽  
God's Love ◽  
Free Grace ◽  
The Trinity

AbstractBoth Thomas F. Torrance and Karl Barth speak of the obedience of the Son as a condescension of the Son to become incarnate for our sakes. Thus there is wide agreement between them with regard to both the doctrines of atonement and the Trinity. Yet, despite the fact that Barth never wavered in his rejection of subordinationism and modalism and always affirmed the freedom of God's love, he also claimed that there ‘is in God Himself an above and a below, apriusand aposterius, a superiority and a subordination’,1while Torrance unequivocally refused to read elements of the economy, such as the ideas of super and subordination and a before or after, back into the immanent Trinity. By comparing the thinking of Barth and Torrance on this issue, I hope to show why I think Barth illegitimately read back elements of the economy into the immanent Trinity, thus creating confusion where clarity would help us see that what God does for us in the economy is and remains an act of free grace which becomes obscured when any sort of hierarchy is introduced into the Trinity.Both theologians thoroughly agree that what God is towards us in the economy, he is eternally in himself and what he is eternally in himself, he is towards us in the economy. But, there is a difference between them over how to interpret this insight, since Barth thinks super and subordination should be ascribed to the immanent Trinity. While Torrance, like Barth, will argue that the incarnation and Christ's mediatorial activity fall ‘within the life of God’, he also insists that the incarnation cannot in any way be confused with the generation of the Son from the Father in eternity. Barth would agree; yet this important distinction becomes fuzzy when he ascribes subordination and obedience to the eternal Son as a basis for his actionsad extra.This article will develop in four sections. First, I will discuss the obedience of the Son as condescension for Torrance and Barth. Second, I will consider the implications of theExtra Calvinisticumfor each theologian's view of the obedience of the Son and of the Trinity. Third, I will explore how each theologian attempts to avoid subordinationism and modalism indicating the problems which arise in Barth's thinking in connection with these views. Fourth, I will compare Torrance and Barth, showing that Torrance more consistently maintains God's freedom and love by not reading back elements of the economy into the life of the immanent Trinity.

scholarly journals Dramatic Theology of K. Barth, H.U. von Balthasar and R. Schwager

2014 ◽  
pp. 104-111
Author(s):  
O. Shepetyak
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Theological Reflection ◽  
Karl Barth ◽  
Second Vatican Council ◽  
Liberal Theology ◽  
Vatican Council ◽  
The Catholic Church

In the article of Oleh Shepetyak «Dramatic Theology of K. Barth, H.U. von Balthasar and R. Schwager» the analysis of one of the theological concepts of XX - the beginning of XXI century was performed which was developed by Karl Barth, Gustav Aulén, Gans Urs von Balthasar and got the name «dramatic theology». This way of theological reflection appeared as antithesis to liberal theology developed in the dialogue with the Enlightment philosophy. The contribution of main creators of dramatic theology into the development of this study, its role and meaning in Theological discussions of the Catholic Church after the Second Vatican Council are highlighted in the investigation

Medieval Theology IV

2018 ◽  
pp. 320-331
Author(s):  
Thomas Nail
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Internal Motion ◽  
Medieval Theology ◽  
The West ◽  
Doctrine Of The Trinity ◽  
Nicene Creed ◽  
The Trinity

In this chapter, we turn to an analysis of the coexistence of relational, external, and internal motion in the doctrine of the Trinity. The theological doctrine of the Trinity was by far one of the most important, dominant, and novel descriptions of being during the medieval and early modern periods, beginning around the middle of the fourth century. From the beginning of the Nicene Creed (381 CE), which established an official doctrine of the Trinity, until the emergence of the European Enlightenment in the mid-eighteenth century, Trinitarianism remained the single most pervasive and powerful ontotheological framework in the West—influencing all the natural theologies of force of the previous chapters. To this day it remains the official doctrine of the Catholic Church. This chapter lays out the patterns of tensional motion at work in this important theory.

The Doctrine of Appropriation as an Interpretative Framework for Karl Barth's Pneumatology of the Church Dogmatics

2007 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
pp. 278-290
Author(s):  
Adam McIntosh
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Karl Barth ◽  
Trinitarian Theology ◽  
Church Dogmatics ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Doctrine Of The Trinity ◽  
The Church ◽  
The Trinity ◽  
Interpretative Framework

Although Karl Barth is widely recognised as the initiator of the renewal of trinitarian theology in the twentieth century, his theology of the Church Dogmatics has been strongly criticised for its inadequate account of the work of the Holy Spirit. This author argues that the putative weakness of Barth's pneumatology should be reconsidered in light of his doctrine of appropriation. Barth employs the doctrine of appropriation as a hermeneutical procedure, within his doctrine of the Trinity, for bringing to speech the persons of the Trinity in their inseparable distinctiveness. It is argued that the doctrine of appropriation provides a sound interpretative framework for his pneumatology of the Church Dogmatics.

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