Volume 60, Issue 2

This article offers an exposition of Karl Barth’s actualistic reorientation of the Augustinian notions of original sin and the bondage of the will in § 60 and § 65 of Church Dogmatics IV/1–2. Barth redefines human nature as a total determination of the human being ( Sein / Dasein ) “from above” by the covenantal history of reconciliation. Human nature as such remains totally intact in the historical state of sin. The human being, however, is also determined “from below” by the Adamic world-history of total corruption. With this dialectical construal of sin and human nature, Barth redefines original sin as the radically sinful activities and decisions that determine the confinement of human beings to the historical condition of fallenness. Barth also challenges the famous Augustinian account of the bondage of the will to which original sin gives rise, and uses the present active indicative to express his actualistic reorientation of the Augustinian notion of the bondage: “ non potest non peccare ”.

Among recent assessments of penal substitutionary accounts of atonement one significant critique is Mark Murphy’s “incoherence objection.” In this essay I express general agreement with Murphy’s critique of penal substitution, yet I suggest that there is a way to reconceive the doctrine of atonement such that it is conceptually coherent, is commensurate with scripture, and is a version of penal substitution. I call this view: The Penal-Consequence View of Atonement. This is a view of atonement that makes use of a distinction between what I call “penal consequences” and “mere consequences.” The view is defended with special reference to the topics of corporate moral responsibility and union with Christ.

Thomas Nagel has proposed a highly speculative metaphysical theory to account for the cosmological significance that he claims the human mind to have. Nagel argues that the mind cannot be fully explained by Darwinian evolutionary theory, nor should theological accounts be accepted. What he proposes instead is an explanation in terms of cosmological non-purposive teleological principles. Our universe awakens to itself in each and every individual consciousness. What comes to light in a pronounced manner when consciousness arises, are the mental aspects of the stuff that the universe is made of. These mental aspects are always concurrently present with the physical aspects of the basic elements that constitute the universe. This paper situates Nagel’s cosmology in the context of discussions of the relationship between modern science and Christian theology. It focuses on the history of modern science’s efforts to locate the origins of humanity. The aim of the paper is to present a qualified “Lutheran” reading of Nagel’s theory of the cosmological significance of the human mind. This will unearth strong reasons to think that Nagel’s cosmology is less secular than it claims to be.

This article outlines the possibility of phenomenology of religion as a strictly cognitive, non-theological and namely phenomenological discipline in the structure of the study of religion, based on the cognitive-value demarcation, for which the Russian variant of phenomenology of religion has been criticized. The irreducible difference between cognition and value is grounded in the specificity of thought and feeling; possible attempts to represent cognition and value as a mixture are rejected. Phenomenology of religion as recomprehended is characterized by a prevailing cognitive tendency and is thus separated as a discipline from theology, which features a prevailing orientation towards value (the theological part of the phenomenology of religion can clearly be included in theology itself). By specifying the phenomenological quality of phenomenology of religion, this article shows how religion can be represented in pure consciousness, reducing it to the effects of interactions within structures of consciousness. These disciplinary clarifications are founded on the general distinction between the study of religion and theology – cognitive and non-cognitive (valuable) and, thus, incomparable disciplines.

Zusammenfassung Dieser Beitrag widmet sich der letzten Auseinandersetzung um Theismus und Pantheismus, die in den 1870er Jahren zwischen Immanuel Hermann Fichte und Eduard von Hartmann stattfand. Diese Kontroverse, die die beiden Denker in ihren programmatischen Werken geführt haben, führt unmittelbar die Auseinandersetzungen Jacobis mit den deutschen Idealisten fort. Es wird aufgezeigt, dass es zwischen den zwei unterschiedlichen weltanschaulichen Doktrinen weit mehr Gemeinsamkeiten gibt, als weithin angenommen wird. Die Hauptschwierigkeit aber, die die theoretische Vermittlung und Versöhnung unmöglich macht, ist die unterschiedliche Beurteilung der Tragweite des menschlichen Erkenntnisvermögens.

Despite criticism, the thought of G. W. F. Hegel has been highly influential in theology. This article contributes to the debate on the heritage of Hegel from a historical perspective, by studying the theological movement of Vermittlungstheologie . It is demonstrated how Hegelianism provided these theologians with the tools to transform insights from confessional and “Schleiermacherian” theology into a comprehensive worldview. Special attention is paid to the construction of a system of theology with the incarnation at its heart.