Page History

...

"This single adjustment in the New Testament view is defined as superficial rather than serious to distinguish the idea of 'interim' as here used from that of Albert Schweitzer. According to his conception the whole ethic and religion of Jesus is based upon his illusion of his proximate return. The absolute character of this ethic is due, in the opinion of Schweitzer, to the belief that the 'time is short.' The real fact is that the absolute character of the ethic of Jesus confirms conforms to the actual constitution of man and history, that is, to the transcendent freedom of man over the contingencies of nature and the necessities of time, so that only a final harmony of life with life in love can be the ultimate norm of his existence. Yet man's actual history is subject to contingency and necessity and is corrupted by his sinful efforts to escape and to deny his dependence and his involvement in finiteness. The idea that the time is short expresses Christianity's understanding that these limitations and corruptions of history are not finally normative for man.

...