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All Shall Be Well: Christian and Marxist Hope

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 April 2024

Nicholas Lash
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Most people would agree that there are differences between Christian hope and Marxist hope. But where do these differences lie, and how are they to be specified? According to one widely accepted account, Marxists entertain high hopes for the future of the world, convinced that nothing can stand in the way of their realization. Christians, on the other hand, entertain no such hopes. They are prepared to tolerate, or endure, the state of the world as it is, hoping only for a future ‘beyond’ all futures, an eternity that will redress the tragedy of time.

Type
Research Article
Information
New Blackfriars , Volume 63 , Issue 748 , October 1982 , pp. 404 - 415
Copyright
Copyright © 1982 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers

References

1 A paper read to the British‐Irish Theological Seminar, Cambridge, September 1982.

2 Quoted by Bentley, James, Between Christ und Mum (London, 1982). p 109Google Scholar.

3 Marx, Karl, ‘A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right. Introduction’Early Wrings (London, Penguin Books, 1975), p 251Google Scholar.

4 Cf. Bentley, op. cit. p 110.

5 Cf. Barth, Karl, Church Dogmatics, LII/2, edited by Bromiley, G.W. and Torrance, T.F. (Edinburgh, 1960), pp 383–390Google Scholar.

6 Barth. op. cit. p 386.

7 Cf. ibid. p387.

8 Ibid. p 388.

9 Ibid. p 389.

10 Ibid. pp 389–90.

11 Ibid. p390.

12 Cf. esp. Ch. 18, ‘Optimism, Eschatology and the Form of the Future’, A Mutter of Hope (London, 1981). pp 250–280Google Scholar.

13 Steiner, George, The Death of Tragedy (2London, 1963). p 4Google Scholar.

14 Ibid. p 342.

15 Julian of Norwich, Revelations of Divine Love (London, Penguin Books, 1966), p 103Google Scholar. I have preferred not to take the ‘motif’ statement from this modem translation, where it appears, in the form taken up by the author of Jesus Christ, Superstar, as: It is all going to be all right; it is all going to be all right; everything is going to be all right(loc. cit.).

16 Cf. Marx, Karl, ‘Critique of the Gotha Programme’, Political Writings, HI. The First International and After (London, Penguin Books, 1974), p 213Google Scholar.

17 Cf. Lash, A Matter of Hope. p271.

18 At least, I think that this h what Barth asked! Bentley gives it as the assertion that ‘In the materialism of Marxism some part of the resurrection of the flesh lies hidden’ (op. cit. p 68). He took it from F.W. Marquardt, Theologie und Sozialismus. Dos Beispiel Kurl Barths (2Munich, 1972), p 15. Marquardt took it from W. D. Mush, “Cerechtigkeit im Tal des Todes”. Christlicha Glaube und Politiache Vernunft im Denkens Karl Barths’, Thedogie Zwischen Gestern und Mogen, Interpretationen und Anfragen zum Werk Karl Barths, edited by W. Dantineand K. Lüthi (Munich, 1968), p 181. Marsh took it from Karl Burth. ‘Der Gotze Wackelt’: Zeitkritische Aufsätze. Reden und Briefe von 1930 bis 1960, ed.K. Kupisch (Berlin, 1961), pp 120–121, where it appcars as: ‘Hat die Kirche eingesehen, daas im Mate‐rialismus des Marxismus etwas steckt von der Botschaft von da Aufentehung des Fleiaches?’. Kupisch was reprinting an interview which fist appeared in 1947 in a German evangelical periodical entitled Unterwegs, which is to be found m four libraries in Germany and none in Britain.