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Wiki Markup1. Clearly, Bultmann is open in principle to the _Sachkritik_ of all Christian witness at _all_ levels \ -\- the task of (New Testament) theology, in his view, being precisely "to inquire back behind the different formulations \ [_sc_. of the kerygma\] in order to construct, so to speak, an ideal type of the kerygma" ("_Theologie als Wissenschaft_": 16 \ [_NTM_: 60\]).unmigrated-wiki-markup

2. Thus he insists that the direction of New Testament research can only be thoroughgoingly critical in the sense that "it measures the theological formulations of the New Testament by their own subject matter, i.e., by asking to what extent the eschatological occurrence of which faith knows by participating in it finds legitimate expression in them. Thus arises the peculiar paradox that research can acquire its understanding of the subject matter, of the eschatological occurrence, only from the witness of the New Testament and yet at the same time is critical of these same witnesses. It is bound to the witnesses and yet also free from them, being freed from them precisely through them themselves" (16 \ [60 f.\]).unmigrated-wiki-markup

3. In Bultmann's view, "the kerygma today acquires its legitimation from the Christ event of the past," and because this is so "present preaching and systematic theology along with it has need of a critical control that secures its identity with the apostolic preaching \ -\- namely, New Testament theology" (17 f. \ [62\]). (Elsewhere, in speaking about what is meant by "appropriateness to scripture," Bultmann asserts that "the only thing at stake is identity in subject matter \ [_die Identität in der Sache_\]." \ [_NTM_: 63\]).

4. What Bultmann calls" an ideal type of the kerygma" is evidently closely analogous to what I speak of as "the constitutive christological assertion."

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