1138.The Resurrection

SCANNED PDF

The other point where I see an important difference from Marxsen is that, as free as he tries to make faith even from metaphysics, he fails to make it free enough from empirical history! When he says, for example, "what is always at stake is the faith brought by the historical Jesus" (150), or when he speaks of "the offer of Jesus, to accept God as Father, to go through life with him, freed from the sins of the past, also freed from the powers oppressing us in this world" (145), he is evidently referring to the empirical-historical, as distinct from the existential-historical, Jesus. At any rate, he nowhere makes clear that he is not doing this, by pointing out, e.g., that the Jesus who is, indeed, the only thing that isn't interchangeable is the Jesus who summons one to faith (150). This, in turn, is connected with the fact that he talks about the obedience of Jesus himself (148) and implies that the risk of accepting Jesus' offer is the risk of one's own way's eventually ending as his did, on the cross (145). As over against his claim that "the cause of Jesus" is "what Jesus was [sic!] concerned with" (150), _he is evidently referring to the _empirical-historical, as distinct from the existential-historical, Jesus. At any rate, he nowhere makes clear that he is not doing this, by pointing out, e.g., that the Jesus who is, indeed, the only thing that isn't interchangeable is the Jesus who summons one to faith (150). This, in turn, is connected with the fact that he talks about the obedience of Jesus himself (148) and implies that the risk of accepting Jesus' offer is the risk of one's own way's eventually ending as his did, on the cross (145). As over against his claim that "the cause of Jesus" is "what Jesus was [sic!] concerned with" (150), I should want to stress that what faith means by "Jesus" is the one through whom God decisively calls one to open oneself to God's love, etc. Whatever Jesus may have been concerned with, the only Jesus with whom Christian faith is concerned is the Jesus who decisively represens the gift and demand of ~slove, and hence is the explicit primal source authorizing trust in love and loyalty to it as authentic human existence. Thus, when one asks to whom one has really opened oneself when one accepts the call made in a Christian sermon, the answer, as Marxsen says, is indeed Jesus (see 145). But this is not because or insofar as certain empiricalhistorical claims concerning Jesus are true; _it is because, regardless of the truth or falsity of any such claims, what is meant by "Jesus" in any appropriate ChrIstian sermon IS the one to which every such sermon summons its hearers._