Autorität und Glaube. Edward Bouverie Pusey und Friedrich August Gottreu Tholuck im Briefwechsel, Teil 2, hg. v. Albrecht Geck

Abstract

The second part of this edition of the correspondence between August Tholuck and Edward Bouverie Pusey consists of Pusey’s “Report on the present state of the theological sciences in England” from 24.5.1830, which was published in German translation in Tholuck’s “Literarischer Anzeiger”. Pusey’s comprehensive survey sheds light on theological thought in England between the French Revolution and the rise of the Oxford-Movement. He sees Anglican theology as principally focused on the Theology of Evidences, which tried to defend the scientific plausibility of belief against the philosophical precepts of deism. Although he remains true to the idea of theology as an “animated science” drawn from mediating theology (Vermittlungstheorie), as elaborated in both his “Enquiries into German Theology” (1828/1830), Pusey also displays the first signs of doubt about theological liberalism. As Professor of Hebrew at Oxford University he openly professes himself to be a follower of the high-church party, and reading Pusey’s analysis of Henry Hart Milman’s “History of the Jews” (1829) it is possible to detect his fear that in the modern world neither feeling nor science would prove a firm basis for the Christian faith.