Karl Barth : a life in conflict

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Karl Barth : a life in conflict

Christiane Tietz ; translated by Victoria J. Barnett

Oxford University Press, 2021

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"This translation is based upon the corrected second German edition"--T.p. verso

Includes bibliographical references (p. [417]-431) and index

Description and Table of Contents

Description

From the beginning of his career, Swiss theologian Karl Barth (1886-1968) was often in conflict with the spirit of his times. While during the First World War German poets and philosophers became intoxicated by the experience of community and transcendence, Barth fought against all attempts to locate the divine in culture or individual sentiment. This freed him for a deep worldly engagement: he was known as "the red pastor," was the primary author of the founding document of the Confessing Church, the Barmen Theological Declaration, and after 1945 protested the rearmament of the Federal Republic of Germany. Christiane Tietz compellingly explores the interactions between Barth's personal and political biography and his theology. Numerous newly-available documents offer insight into the lesser-known sides of Barth such as his long-term three-way relationship with his wife Nelly and his colleague Charlotte von Kirschbaum. This is an evocative portrait of a theologian who described himself as "God's cheerful partisan," who was honored as a prophet and a genial spirit, was feared as a critic, and shaped the theology of an entire century as no other thinker.

Table of Contents

1: "I Belong To Basel": 1886-1904 Guildmaster, Pastors and Scholars: Barth's Ancestors A Strict Love for Truth and Christian Discipline: His Parents "A Great Great Joy": Childhood and Youth 2: "This Obscure Desire toward a Better Understanding": 1904-1909 The Decision to Study Theology Student in Bern Wearing the Colors and Noncombative: In the Zofingia Association "Very Diligent and Quite Capable": Student in Berlin Once More in Bern and Then Tubingen Finally in Marburg His Work for Die Christliche Welt 3: "Stumbling Up the Steps to Calvin's Pulpit": 1909-1911 Vicar in Geneva Quite Demanding: The First Confirmation Instruction Theologian in the Congregation "In Such a Dreadfully Pious Environment" A Daughter from a Good Home: The Engagement to Nelly Hoffmann Farewell to Geneva 4: "The Red Pastor": Safenwil, 1911-1921 "This System of Employment Must Fall": Workers and Socialists A Theological Friendship: Eduard Thurneysen "The WorldWithout Gods": The First World War "An Open House": Family Life 5: "A Book for Those Who Were Also Concerned": The First Epistle to the Romans, 1919 Human Religion and the Divine Word "Like a Bomb on the Playground of the Theologians" "Without Windows to the Kingdom of Heaven": The Tambach Lecture 6: "To Always Work Somewhat Faster": Goettingen 1921-1925 From Swiss Pastor to German Professor "Unavoidable Nonsense of the Academic Business" "Almost Like a Buddy": Barth with His Students "Lively Combat": Emanuel Hirsch and Other Colleagues "Stranger from a Neutral Place": Karl Barth and the Germans 7: "Not a Stone Left Standing": The Second Version of the Epistle to the Romans, 1922 A Critical Turn The new version of the Epistle to the Romans Critics and Admirers What is Dialectical Theology? Dialectical Traveling Companions: Brunner, Bultmann, Gogarten Fifteen Questions and Sixteen Answers: The Controversy with Harnack 8: "The Need for Thinking Further": Munster 1925-1930 A Call and a Momentous Encounter Received with Joy, Departing in Discord In the Tunnel of the Semester Return to Bern? "The Church, the Church, the Church": Encounters with Catholicism Riding, House Music and Travel 9: A Troubled 'Menage a Trois': Charlotte von Kirschbaum A Long-Guarded Secret "I Never Knew That There Could Be Something Like This" "A Certain Double Life" Three Under One Roof 10: "A Swissman in the Middle of Germany": Bonn 1930-1935 Working on Theology The Humanity of God First Conflicts with German Nationalists: the Case of Gunther Dehn Now's the Time for the Social Democrat Party: 1933 Warnings to the Church and a Letter to Hitler 1933 as a Year of Crisis in the Barth Household The Theological Dimension of Barth's Relationship to Charlotte von Kirschbaum Attacks on the Swissman Against the "German greeting" The Break with his Dialectical Travelling Companions The Barmen Theological Declaration Suspension, Ban on Public Speaking, Dismissal 11: "We Who Can Still Speak": Basel 1935-1945 Life Goes On: Professor in Basel International Honors and Lack of Appreciation Battle for the Confessing Church Anti-Appeasement: The Call to the Czechs to Resist The Political Responsibility of a Christian Church Struggle and Refugee Aid Ecumenical Silence at the Onset of the War Family Intrigues and Grief A Call for Military Resistance, and Swiss Censorship A Friend of the Germans, Nonetheless 12: "In Political Respects a Dubious Will-o'-the-Wisp": Basel 1945-1962 War's End and the Declaration of Guilt Back to Bonn and, Once Again, State and Church Issues "God's Beloved Eastern Zone": Against Anti-Communism A Pacifist after All? Protest against Rearmament and Nuclear Weapons Yes to Ecumenism, but without the Catholics The Master with the Crumpled Tie The Discovery of Optimism in Prison Courage, Tempo, Purity, Peace: Confession to Mozart Children, Grandchildren, and the Rejection of His Desired Successor 13: "The White Whale": Church Dogmatics "A Conceptual Helix": Barth's Monumental Work The Threefold Form of the Word of God God's Three Modes of Being "God is" means "God loves" Whom God Elects What God Commands Why God Wants the Creation Nothingness and the Shadow Sides of Creation The Threefold Office of Christ and the Three Forms of Sin The Light Shines Where It Wishes The Baptism of Water and of the Spirit 14: "All Things Considered, A Little Tired": The Final Years, Basel 1962-1968 "Fantastic": A Calvinist in the United States "Rules for Older people in Relation to Younger" "As If Deeply Veiled": Charlotte von Kirschbaum Must Move Out "Separated Brothers": In Conversation with Rome A Late Friendship with Carl Zuckmayer The Uncompleted Mammoth Work At the End of His Life Journey Epilogue Chronology Bibliography Index of Names Index of Subjects

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