Matthew Rose writes a perceptive piece at First Things on the failure of Karl Barth’s project, in ways that echo concerns TCI has expressed on numerous occasions (e.g.) with modern theology’s “retreat to commitment”.
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Karl Barth’s Failure
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2 replies on “Karl Barth’s Failure”
I beg to disagree. Rose’s article is a shallow retelling of Barth’s theology, with little to no actual engagement with Barth’s work on God’s attributes (perfections), which is an appalling oversight. I wrote a review of Rose’s article on my blog, and David Congdon (from a different, modernist perspective) offers his own review.
Thanks for your comment. While recognizing that there’s a matter of deep debate over what Barth himself meant to teach on a number of subjects, it seems to me that on his approach to natural theology and revelation his positions are fairly clear: he denies revelation happens anywhere except in the immediate contact of the Word with the subject. And that seems to me to fairly put him in the “retreat to commitment” camp, conceding metaphysics and the reality of objective revelation to the criticisms of the moderns.