822. When Bultmann speaks of "the 'nevertheless' ...

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When Bultmann speaks of "the 'nevertheless' that essentially belongs to faith," or says that "[t]his 'nevertheless' is inseparable from faith" (188, 198 [102, 113]), is he not, in his own way, insisting on the main point of "Anselm's discovery," which is to say, that the whole question of God is unique and is not to be compared with questions about anyone or anything else, being essentially a matter of faith or self-understanding, as distinct from a matter of fact?

In any case, his insistence that "God eludes the objectifying view and can be believed in only against appearances -- just as the justification of the sinner can be believed in only against the accusing conscience" (207 [122]) -- seems to me to be clearly convergent with Hartshorne's insistence that ''for the believer, the laws of nature 'declare the glory of God and the framework of things showeth his handiwork'; but they do not prove and could not disprove, the validity of this belief. They illustrate its validity, but only for or to the believer, and hence cannot be used either to justify or to discredit [her or] his faith" ("Criteria for Ideas of God": 86). In a closely parallel passage, Hartshorne adds, "[O]nly faith can relate us to God. . . . Observed facts and even laws of nature are neutral to the topic" (A Natural Theology for Our Time: 88).

The convergence is particularly striking in this statement of Hartshorne's: "There are no empirical arguments either against or for the divine existence. . . . The divine existence is a topic falling wholly within 'logic' in that broad sense which includes metaphysics. . . . It is not a topic within empirical science (including history as a science), for this is entirely incompetent to legislate concerning it. So is mere common sense acting as amateur scientist or historian. Only the logician-metaphysician, whether expert or amateur, has anything relevant to say, from a rational point of view, concerning the existence and essential or eternal nature of God. (God's contingent non-eternal relations to the world and man are different. With reference to them, empirical evidences, historical events, may be relevant.) Aside from metaphysics, there is only sheer faith or sheer unfaith. Empirical facts, or contingent objects of experience, may lead some to faith, some to unfaith. But in neither case is the connection a rational one. The rational ground of faith cannot be contingent or empirical, and neither can the ground of unfaith -- if indeed this has a ground" ("A New Look at the Problem of Evil": 212).

5 May 1997