Tuesday 2 May 2006

Chris Tilling’s Church Dogmatics!

Folks, it is a great day. My friend from Tübingen, Chris Tilling, has just received a full set of the German study edition of Karl Barth’s Church Dogmatics—and all due to the legendary generosity of Jim West!

Within Barth’s own lifetime, his old friend Rudolf Bultmann used to boast that he never read any of the Church Dogmatics. So could it be a sign that God’s eschatological kingdom is breaking into our midst when even New Testament scholars are now beginning to read Barth’s Dogmatics?

In any case, it is a great day for Chris. To celebrate the occasion, I have written a short poem entitled “Ode to Church Dogmatics.” I once tried to summarise the whole Church Dogmatics in a single sentence; and this time I’ve tried to summarise the whole work in the form of an ode.

I’ll post the poem tomorrow; in the mean time, here’s a picture of Barth’s favourite painting, Grünewald’s “Christ on the Cross.” This is the picture that hung over Barth’s desk throughout all the decades in which he was writing his great Dogmatics.

1 Comment:

Anonymous said...

Yes, it was right up there.

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