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Essence, Existence, and the Fall: Paul Tillich's Analysis Of Existence

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 June 2011

Donald F. Dreisbach
Donald F. Dreisbach
Affiliation:
Northern Michigan University, Marquette, MI 49855
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Extract

Paul Tillich's theology is largely an attempt to interpret or at least illuminate Christian concepts by using ontological or philosophical concepts. An important part of Tillich's system is his treatment of sin and the fall, a treatment that is in effect an analysis of existence. But this analysis is beset with ambiguities and difficulties. It is my purpose here to clarify and to defend Tillich's existential analysis.

Type
Articles
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 73 , Issue 3-4 , October 1980 , pp. 521 - 538
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1980

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References

1 Tillich, Paul, Systematic Theology (3 vols.; Chicago: University of Chicago, 1951–1963) cited in text as ST.Google Scholar

2 Thatcher, Adrian, The Ontology of Paul Tillich (Oxford: Oxford University, 1978) 102.Google Scholar

3 Ibid., 96.

4 In his Introduction to his translation of Tillich's The Construction of the History of Religion in Schelling's Positive Philosophy (Lewisburg: Bucknell University, 1974) 18.Google Scholar

5 Ibid., 23.

6 Tillich, , “The Problem of Theological Method,” JR 27 (1947) 23.Google Scholar

7 Tillich, , “Is a Science of Human Values Possible?” New Knowledge in Human Values, ed. Maslow, A. H. (New York: Harper & Bros., 1959) 193.Google Scholar

8 Thatcher, Ontology of Paul Tillich, 109.

9 This is hardly a new idea, being at least as old as Aristotle. The best contemporary development and defense of the claim that values are based on knowledge of what a man is is Veatch, Henry B., Rational Man (Bloomington: Indiana University, 1966).Google Scholar

10 Tillich, , My Search for Absolutes (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1967) 73–75. Tillich argues that the essence of the individual, which “shines through the temporal manifestations of a human being,” is the object of “the artists who create essential images of individuals in paint or stone, in drama or novel, in poetry or biography” (p. 75).Google Scholar

11 Tillich, , “Existential Analysis and Religious Symbols,” Contemporary Problems in Religion, ed. Basilius, H. A. (Detroit: Wayne University, 1956) 46.Google Scholar

12 Tillich, , Perspectives on 19th and 20th Century Protestant Theology (New York: Harper & Row, 1967) 151. Although he is here discussing Schelling, it is clear that Tillich approves of this position.Google Scholar

13 Thatcher (Ontology of Paul Tillich, 49–51) argues that Tillich's use of mē on is not the same as Plato's. However, this neither weakens nor makes incomprehensible Tillich's position.

14 Thatcher, Ontology of Paul Tillich, 116; also Osborne, Kenan B., New Being (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1969) 110, 194.Google Scholar

15 Track, Joachim, Der theologische Ansatz Paul Tillichs (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1975) 399.Google Scholar

16 Schepers, Gerhard, Schöpfung und allgemeine Sündigkeit: Die Auffassung Paul Tillichs im Kontext der heutigen Diskussion (Essen: Ludgerus, 1974) 117–18.Google Scholar

17 Niebuhr, Reinhold, “Biblical Thought and Ontological Speculation in Tillich's Theology,” The Theology of Paul Tillich, ed. Kegley, Charles W. and Bretail, Robert W. (New York: Macmillan, 1961) 225.Google Scholar

18 Smith, Joel R., “Creation, Fall and Theodicy in Paul Tillich's Systematic Theology,” Kairos and Logos, ed. Carey, John J. (Cambridge: The North American Paul Tillich Society, 1978) 163.Google Scholar

19 Tillich, “Reply to Interpretation and Criticism,” in Kegley and Bretail, Theology of Paul Tillich, 342–43.

20 Ibid., 343.

21 Smith, “Creation, Fall and Theodicy,” 165.

22 Ibid., 166.

23 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, Part XI.

24 The problem is discussed at length by R. Jolivet, “Evil,” NCE 5. 699.

25 David E. Roberts, “Tillich's Doctrine of Man,” Kegley and Bretall, Theology of Paul Tillich, 126.

26 Winter, Gerhard, “Paul Tillichs Frage nach dem Sinn des Lebens und die Kreise des bürgerlichen Geschichtsbewusstseins,” Deutsche Zeitschrift für Philosophic 16 (1968) 312ff.Google Scholar