Description
This title was first published in 2000. Hope in Barth's Eschatology presents a critical investigation and survey of Karl Barth's writings, particularly his Church Dogmatics IV.3, in order to locate the character and nature of 'hope' within Barth's eschatology. Arguing that Barth, with his form of hope that refuses to shy away from the dark themes of the 'tragic vision', could be seen to undermine certain tragic sensibilities necessary for a healthy account of hope, John McDowell locates Barth within the context of larger traditions of theological thinking, and influential accounts of Christian hope, examining the work of Steiner, MacKinnon, Pannenberg, Rahner, Moltmanm and others. Addressing the relative neglect that Barth commentators have paid to eschatological themes, McDowell maintains that to miss what Barth is doing in his eschatology, is to seriously misunderstand Barth's broader theological sense. This book offers a significant contribution to the ongoing task of understanding Barth's theology whilst developing a way of reading hope and eschatology that, ultimately, places some critical questions at Barth's door.
Table of Contents
Contents: Introduction; Silenus’ wisdom and the ’crime of being’: George Steiner on the untragic nature of Christian hope; Escaping contingency: Barth’s eschatological actuality; Barth’s developing eschatology (1909-1924); Barth’s Christological hermaneutic of eschatological assertions (GD-CD, I); Contriving creation eschatology under Christological control: the doctrine of election (CD, II-III); Being placed in hope: Christ’s prophetic work (CD, IV.3, IV.4); Hope’s performance in anticipating the coming dawn (CD, IV.3, IV.4, CL); Conclusion: faintly detecting Edgar’s voice in Barth; Select bibliography, Index of names.
