Reconsidering Resurrection, Incarnation and Nature in Schleiermacher's Glaubenslehre

Abstract

AbstractIn the Glaubenslehre, Friedrich Schleiermacher affirms the resurrection of Christ but dissociates it from redemption. Many interpreters have proposed that Schleiermacher's move to evacuate the resurrection of salvific content follows necessarily from his positions on the nature‐system and the unity of the divine creative decree. This article argues that Schleiermacher could have offered a more ramified place for the resurrection of Christ in the Glaubenslehre had he interpreted it as the consummation and extension of God's incarnation in Christ. In this light, it suggests three propositions that would both extend redemptive significance to the resurrection and preserve the integrity of the nature‐system, and defends those propositions against two likely and significant objections.