Abstract

ABSTRACTThe paper discusses Paul Tillich’s changing conception of a “prophetic critique” of contemporary culture and society through the notion of a “kairos”, the moment of fullfilled time. It shows how Tillich refers both to a specific notion of prophecy (developed in Max Weber’s reflections on charisma) and to a concept of eschatological time (developed in Karl Barth’s dialectical theology). In different texts from the 1920ies and the 1950ies, Tillich uses the idea of “kairos” for a critique of the “idols” of bourgeois culture that is both radical and urgent. However, read in their historic sequence, these texts also reveal the difficulty of upholding the urgency of such a critique over time – as a result, Tillich’s notion of “kairos” becomes more and more reflexive and self critical as the possibility of prophetic critique is concerned.

Highlights

  • In 1922, the young protestant theologian Paul Tillich published an essay entitled “Kairos” in the Journal Die Tat (The Action)

  • The notion of kairos or the “fulfilled time” is crucial for Tillich and the discourse of the Weimar Republic in general.[2]. It inspired the Kairos Circle, a small group of Christian intellectuals including Günther Dehn, Car Mennicke, Adolf Löwe, and Alexander Rüstow, who advocated for religious socialism in the early 1920s

  • Tillich himself wrote no fewer than three different texts entitled “Kairos.” Besides the 1922 essay, he published another essay four years later in a collection that emerged from the Kairos Circle, and a third text in 1958

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Summary

Introduction

In 1922, the young protestant theologian Paul Tillich published an essay entitled “Kairos” in the Journal Die Tat (The Action).

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