Pannenberg's Theology Research Articles

Body politics, alterities, and perception: A theological hesitation after the pandemic

AbstractBy demanding collective strategies and agreeing individuals, the pandemic has not only exposed multiple kinds of otherness around us and between us, but even within us. In this article, I propose to theologically reflect on this situation by means of a perceptive hesitation. I do this with reference to Wolfhart Pannenberg's theology, and Alia Al‐Sagi's critical phenomenology, both of whom draw on Henri Bergsson's descriptions of human temporality, and share the consideration of human independence as being integral to perceiving alterity. In the end, I identify where Al‐Sagi and Pannneberg differ, and I go with Al‐Sagi, and consider hesitation as a term for the temporal dimension and difference of faith as related to hope and the necessary condition for a loving body politics.

Recognition and Mutuality: Pannenberg's Theology of Law

Wolfhart Pannenberg is considered by many to be one of the preeminent living Protestant theologians. Now retired, Pannenberg's active career spanned almost five decades. From 1968 to 1994 he was Professor of Systematic Theology at the University of Munich; previously he taught in Mainz and Wuppertal in Germany. Pannenberg has published prolifically, culminating with his three-volumeSystematic Theology. Even in retirement, Pannenberg has continued to publish extensively, producing several volumes over the past decade. He has lectured in the U.S. on numerous occasions, and many of his books and articles have appeared in English translation. In this country, Pannenberg is generally associated with the theology of hope, a now-dated movement that was characterized by an emphasis on eschatology and the proleptic anticipation of the future through the events of history. But that association reflects only a limited aspect of Pannenberg's lengthy career, one since eclipsed by the further development of his thinking and concerns.The breadth of Pannenberg's interests is vast. In addition to his concentration on the classical themes of theology, he has explored other subjects from a theological perspective, among them sociology, science, nature, anthropology, politics and ethics. Over the course of his career, Pannenberg has repeatedly addressed questions of law and jurisprudence, beginning with essays in the early 1960s and continuing up to a publication that appeared in 2004. For the most part, these writings consist of thematic essays, a form Pannenberg has used extensively for a wide variety of subjects. In addition to these essays, portions of Pannenberg's larger works treat law and jurisprudential themes, though as subsidiary topics. His continuing concern with law reflects his view that law is strongly tied to ethics, an area to which he has devoted more attention after he completed hisSystematic Theology. Taken together, Pannenberg's writings on law constitute a coherent and reasonably well-articulated theory of law, though one that has unfortunately received limited attention, and no sustained exposition in English. Nonetheless, because of Pannenberg's prominence, and because of his incisive analysis, his work on law deserves attention in this country as well.

Wolfhart Pannenbergs Vorlesung "Theologie der Vernunft"

Pannenberg's Theology of Reason Greive's contribution gives an outline of Pannenberg's lecture course on the theology of reason, which is the backbone of his whole theology. He developed the theology of reason during the 60ies of the last century. The introduction of the lecture course highlights two problems: faith and reason and reason and authority. Pannenberg emphasizes that only a sophisticated understanding of reason brings a relevant perspective for theology. In the mainpart he first distinguishes five types of reason in the history of philosophy: 1. receptive reason, 2. creative reason (a priori reason), 3. openess of reason, 4. reflective reason, 5. the historical openess of reason (here Dilthey is the key!). Second - on the basis of the historicity of reason - he clarifies reason in its relationship to: language, logic, metaphysics, faith and science. In Pannenberg's systematic reflection upon the infinite presupposition of reason he indicates the importance of Hegel and Heidegger. Addressing the issue of reality and its definition he treats the problem of verification in metaphysics and in theology. The focus of the lecture course is the anticipation of truth in reason and faith in view of the tension between them.

Ambiguity, the Trinity, and Naturalism: From the Methodology of Pannenberg to the Phenomenology of Merleau-Ponty

Through an interpretation of Wolfhart Pannenberg's trinitarian methodology, this article presents the argument that theology and naturalism are ambiguously intertwined and that we once again have to determine how to methodologically address the relationship between theology and science. This study contends that Pannenberg's theology is important for our conception of the dialog between theology and science. However, I wish to offer a fundamentally new interpretation of Pannenberg which locates the ambiguous character of his methodology primarily in the substantive issue with which it deals. This redirects the dialogue between theology and science through Pannenberg's hermeneutic of history towards the contemporary phenomenology of the body and ultimately to the suggestion of a trinitarian-phenomenological approach beyond the methodology of Pannenberg.

Futural Ousia or Eschatological Disclosure?

Abstract This study aims at scrutinizing the belief that Pannenberg's theology of God is immanentist in logic by, first, presenting a method for analyzing Pannenberg's theological thinking that is shaped by Pannenberg's own hermeneutic of retrospection (i.e. viewing truth from the end), which he applies to his understanding of God's reality per se. It then applies the suggested method to Pannenberg's theology of the Trinity in {! Systematic Theology}, volume one, chapter five. From his trinitarian view in that chapter, this paper, third, argues that Pannenberg's understanding of the Trinity belies any substantial similarity between his theology and the immanent logic of some trinitarian theologies that renders God's essence as the function of his historical relationality. Understanding Pannenberg's thinking about God from his last systematic analysis back to his earliest claims reveals his rejection of any collapse of God's eternal being into God's historical actions.

How to be a trinitarian theologian: a critique of Wolfhart Pannenberg's systematic theology

This article is a critical assessment of Pannenberg's trinitarian approach in his Systematic Theology. In particular it raises the questions of how far Pannenberg's emphasis on the Trinity affects the practice of theology and of how the theologian should understand his or her task in the light of the being and work of the triune God. It argues that there is an uneasy tension between Pannenberg's commitment to thoroughgoing trinitarianism on the one hand and his commitment to a rational theology that takes account of the modern age. This tension can be seen most clearly in Pannenberg's treatment of christology, faith and theological method. It is at these points, where modern thinking has often been so critical with traditional theology, that Pannenberg's trinitarian commitments are not deployed as consistently or penetratingly as elsewhere.

The Ecological Significance of God-Language

Against the tendency to reduce trinitarian language only to Father-Son categories, an ecological theology requires the retrieval of the tradition that understands the Trinity in categories of Wisdom and Logos. These concepts have always been linked to creation theology and are open to ecological theology. New Testament hymns, several Church Fathers, and Wolfhart Pannenberg provide resources for such a theology. Pannenberg's theology of the Word as the divine principle of creaturely self-distinction can be understood in light of Bonaventure's concept of divine Wisdom as self-expressive for a contemporary theology of creation.

Where Do We Go from Here?

Beginning with the End represents an excellent collection of articles devoted to the thought of Wolfhart Pannenberg. This volume includes many of the most important thinkers in the science‐religion dialogue and shows as well the importance and impact of Pannenberg's theology. This response addresses themes that surface in several of the articles: What is religion? What is science? What is theology? What is God? On some of these themes there is agreement, on others sharp disagreement. The conclusion also considers what this volume suggests about the future of Pannenberg's theology.

From Eschatology to Trinity: Pannenberg's Doctrine of God

This article comprises three parts. The first part establishes some important landmarks in Pannenberg's theology as it has developed over a number of decades. In the second part Pannenberg's identification of God with the future is noted, with particular reference to an early essay. The final part shows how this theme is taken up into the explicitly trinitarian theology which is the hallmark of Pannenberg's theological magnum opus.

Some Problems with Pannenberg's Solution to Barth's ‘Faith Subjectivism’

Among recent reconstructions, Wolfhart Pannenberg's systematic theology is one of the most influential attempts to overcome authoritarianism and subjectivism. Without presenting a thorough development of Pannenberg's theology here, I shall discuss the relationship between philosophy and theology by analyzing Pannenberg's critique of Barth's ‘subjectivism’ and ‘authoritarianism’. I argue that by grounding theological knowledge in a version of Heidegger's concept of anticipation, Pannenberg has not escaped his own religious subjectivism. Thus theological meaning inevitably results from a philosophy of existence grounded in an anticipatory grasp (Vorgriff) of the totality of reality which is presumed to refer to the reality of God.

Faith at the Frontiers: Pannenberg's Theology of Faith

Faith at the Frontiers: Pannenberg's Theology of Faith

Wolfhart Pannenberg's Doctrine of the Trinity

In the past some of Wolfhart Pannenberg's interpreters have suggested that a major weakness of his revision of the doctrine of God is a neglect of the doctrine of the Trinity. In 1975 Herbert Burhenn criticised Pannenberg for exercising considerable reservation with regard to the three-in-oneness of God and for reducing the trinitarian distinctions of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit to temporal distinctions. He also stated that ‘The Trinity cannot function for Pannenberg, as it does for Barth, as a structural principle of theology.’ About a decade later Elizabeth Johnson very cogently noted the need for a well-developed concept of the Trinity in Pannenberg's theology:

On the way to God: an exploration into the theology of Wolfhart Pannenberg

Wolfhart Pannenberg's understanding of God as the all-determining power of the future is the governing focus of this intensive study which examines the whole structure of Pannenberg's theology from that vantage point. It serves both as a careful exposition of his thought and as a richly nuanced critique of a number of key themes in his theological program. Recognizing that Pannenberg's theology draws from the revelation of God but is also concerned to answer adequately the questions raised by our quest for knowledge, concern for meaning, and boundless 'world-openness, ' the explorations delve into his conceptual prolegomena concerning philosophical truth, historical meaning, and anthropological understanding, and then track in subsequent chapters his view of revelation as that is discernible in the Old Testament, in the tradition of Jewish apocalyptic, and, finally and most importantly, in the life, message, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. The guiding principle of this theological exploration is to judge the sufficiency of Pannenberg's theological insights directly on their own merit, without introducing alternative presuppositional perspectives

CONTINGENCY IN PHYSICS AND COSMOLOGY: A CRITIQUE OF THE THEOLOGY OF WOLFHART PANNENBERG

Abstract. The concept of contingency serves to bridge the doctrine of creation and natural science in Wolfhart Pannenberg's theology. My paper first analyzes the relation of creatio ex nihilo and creatio continua. Next I suggest three categories of contingency: global, local, and nomological. Under each category I assess Pannenberg's use of physics, cosmology, and philosophy of science. Although I agree with Pannenberg's emphasis on continuous creation and on the role of science in renewing the doctrine of creation, I argue for a shift in the discussion from Pannenberg's topics to others, such as the anthropic principle, quantum physics, and thermodynamics.

The God of History and the Presence of the FutureGrundfragen systematischer Theologie: Gesammelte Aufsätze, Band 2. Wolfhart Pannenberg

Previous articleNext article No AccessReview ArticlesThe God of History and the Presence of the Future Grundfragen systematischer Theologie: Gesammelte Aufsätze, Band 2 . Wolfhart Pannenberg Philip ClaytonPhilip Clayton Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The Journal of Religion Volume 65, Number 1Jan., 1985 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/487184 Views: 3Total views on this site Citations: 1Citations are reported from Crossref Copyright 1985 The University of ChicagoPDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Philip Clayton Natural Law and Divine Action: The Search for an Expanded Theory of Causation, Zygon(r) 39, no.33 (Sep 2004): 615–636.https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9744.2004.t01-1-00605.x

A critique of Pannenberg's Theology and the Philosophy of Science

A critique of Pannenberg's Theology and the Philosophy of Science

PANNENBERGS POLANYIANISM: A RESPONSE TO JOHN V. APCZYNSKI

Abstract. John V. Apczynski, while presenting a helpful analysis of Wolfhart Pannenberg and Michael Polanyi, does not succeed in showing that Pannenberg's theology is incoherent. Contrary to Apczynski, I hold that Pannenberg's concern for theoretic assertions is not extrinsic but intrinsic and central to his program. Moreover, this concern does not rest directly upon the cultural dominance of impersonal knowing but is a countering of the theological overreaction against it. Polanyi has pioneered the critique of impersonal knowledge, but in Pannenberg's judgment much theology tends to espouse too cheaply the Polanyian elevation of faith as ground of knowing. Pannenberg, while appreciating the relative justification of Polanyi's work, is attempting to thematize afresh—in interesting contrast to Polanyi and, for instance, Paul Tillich—the public, rational structure of faith.

Pannenberg on the Resurrection and Historical Method

Even the most casual observer of the contemporary theological scene knows that Wolfhart Pannenberg's theology relies heavily on the resurrection of Jesus as a genuinely historical event. The peculiarity of this is that a theologian who has accurately been called a ‘rationalist’ should so forthrightly embrace a claim that the entire thrust of post-Enlightenment theology has seemingly undermined. But Pannenberg himself contends that his reliance on the resurrection is not legitimated by the subterfuge of an existential ‘moment’ or ‘leap of faith’; instead, he argues for the acceptance of the resurrection on purely historical grounds. This argument implicitly rests on Pannenberg's conviction that ‘the truth is one’ and that the theologian's worst mistake is to cut the ties between theology and secular disciplines and modes of inquiry, a conviction that has recently received its most forceful statement in Pannenberg's Theology and the Philosophy of Science. This means that, insofar as belief in the resurrection of Jesus entails a claim about a past event, the standard methods by which we normally adjudicate claims about the past must be brought into play. Accordingly, the resurrection of Jesus is for Pannenberg not a ‘faith claim’, for ‘faith cannot ascertain anything certain about events of the past that would perhaps be inaccessible to the historian’. Instead, the resurrection of Jesus must be understood as the best historical explanation accounting for the New Testament witness and the rise of Christianity.

Pannenberg on God and Freedom

No problem has been more difficult for Christian theology than the relation between divine power and human freedom. Many theologians have sacrificed the latter for the former, and a few have been willing to sacrifice divine power for human freedom. But it has often been maintained that God is omnipotent and that human beings are free in the sense required to render them morally responsible and to give them a sense of dignity. The problem is immediately obvious. If omnipotent is defined, as it sometimes is, in such a way that the power of God is thought to determine all historical events, including human decisions, then the latter would seem to be functions of the divine will or, in other words, necessitated. And, of course, if they are necessitated, it would seem to be logically impossible to maintain that they are free in the crucial sense. Stated succinctly, the problem is this: How can human beings be morally responsible and have a sense of personal dignity if their acts are necessitated by the power of an omnipotent God? With characteristic candor as well as courage, Wolfhart Pannenberg has addressed this issue in many of his writings, most directly in his book, The Idea of God and Human Freedom. Everyone senses that Pannenberg's theology is still in the making and that he has yet to say his final word on this or any other major topic. Nonetheless, he has made some very provocative suggestions regard-

Pannenberg's Philosophical Foundations

Prolepsis became a technical term in Pannenberg's theology in the first edition of Offenbarung als Geschichte (1961). In this series of essays, he used the term to describe the salient characteristic of the Christ-event, namely, Jesus' resurrection as the preappearance of the end of history in his life and fate.' Though the term was a new one for Pannenberg. the idea had already been enunciated in an earlier essay, Heilsgeschehen und Geschichte, where he referred to Jesus as the anticipated end and not the middle of history.2 It was, however, only in 1962 that Pannenberg made his real intentions clearhe proposed to demonstrate that the whole of reality has a proleptic structure.3 This article investigates the philosophical underpinnings of the proleptic nature of reality in Pannenberg's theology. By way of introductory statement, it might be pointed out that the noun prolepsis, the corresponding adjective proleptic, and the adverb proleptically, are technical terms in Pannenberg's theology. Prolepsis refers to the anticipatory nature of reality and should be understood ontologically and noetically. Pannenberg not only asserts that man noetically anticipates the future through his plans, hopes, and expectations, but that the whole of reality is anticipatorily structured in its very being; that is, its very substance is anticipation of the yet outstanding future end of history. The following discussion will begin with his idea of truth, which operates, in Pannenberg's conceptual universe, as presupposition for his understanding of reality. Then it will proceed to a description of the interrelationships of future and finite reality, and of being and knowing in a proleptic perspective. Finally, two fundamental structures of Pannenberg's proleptic reality-the principles of retroaction and negative mediation-need to be and will be uncovered.