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A Straussian Question to ‘New Testament Theology’

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

Robert C. Morgan
Robert C. Morgan
Affiliation:
Lancaster, England
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Extract

David Friedrich Strauss died on 8 February 1874. His Leben Jesu of 1835 was said by Albert Schweitzer to be ‘no mere destroyer of untenable solutions, but also the prophet of a coming advance in knowledge’, namely eschatology. The claims that it ‘has a different significance for modern theology from that which it had for his contemporaries’ and that it ‘marked out the ground which is now occupied by modern critical study’ appear even more true in the light of subsequent history of religions and form-critical research than Schweitzer himself realized. But as well as marking an epoch in the historical critical study of the New Testament, this book, and with it the fate of its author, remains a symbol of something else: the tension between historical research and the formation of a systematic or doctrinal theological position. Ecclesiastical authorities have in the meantime learned to live with theological pluralism and become more tolerant, but the problem itself has not disappeared. The investigation and development of Strauss' generally unappreciated contribution is perhaps an appropriate centenary celebration.

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Articles
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New Testament Studies , Volume 23 , Issue 3 , April 1977 , pp. 243 - 265
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1977

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References

page 243 note 1 Von Reimarus zu Wrede (1906)Google Scholar, E.T. by Montgomery, W., The Quest of the Historical Jesus (1910), p. 95.Google Scholar

page 243 note 2 Ibid.

page 243 note 3 p. 84.

page 243 note 4 A shortened form of this paper was read at the twenty-ninth general meeting of the S.N.T.S. in Sigtuna on 13 August 1974.

page 243 note 5 So Baur, F. C., Kirchengeschichte des neunzehnten, Jahrhunderts (rp. Stuttgart, 1970)Google Scholar, pp. 379 f.; Kritische Untersuchungen über die kanonischen Evangelien (1847), p. 47.Google Scholar Also Schweitzer, , op. cit. p. 84.Google Scholar

page 243 note 6 On the limitations of the principle of analogy, see Pannenberg, W., Basic Questions in Theology I (E.T. London, 1970), pp. 40–57.Google Scholar

page 243 note 7 Harvey, Van A., ‘D. F. Strauss’ Life of Jesus Revisited’, Church History XXX (1961), 191–211Google Scholar, writes of ‘a common operational assumption of almost all modern critical historiography’ (p. 198). Harvey's discussion of Strauss' historical methodology is not mentioned in the treatment by Harris, Horton, David Friedrich Strauss and his Theology (Cambridge, 1973).Google Scholar

page 244 note 1 The terminology is that of Troeltsch, but it reflects Strauss' position, and the classical formulation of the problem by Hume.

page 244 note 2 The first German edition was reprinted for the Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt, 1969. George Eliot's 1846 translation of the fourth (1840) edition was republished by the Scholarly Press, Michigan, , 1970, and edited by Hodgson, Peter C. for the Fortress Press, Philadelphia, and SCM Press, London, Lives of Jesus Series, 1972–3.Google Scholar References are to the SCM edition: The Life of Jesus Critically Examined.

page 245 note 1 According to his original plan, outlined to Märklin on 6 February 1832 (reproduced by Sand-berger, , David Friedrich Strauss als theologischer Hegelianen (1972), pp. 192–9)Google Scholar what is now almost the whole work was to constitute the second (negative critical) part and what has here shrunk to a brief sketch the third, constructive part of his ‘larger dogmatic plans’ (p. 195).

page 245 note 2 ‘das kritisch Vernichtete dogmatisch weiderherzustellen’ (II, 686. Cf. E.T. p. 757).

page 245 note 3 For discussion of this cf. my ‘Expansion and Criticism in the Christian Tradition’ in Pye, M. and Morgan, R. (eds.), The Cardinal Meaning. Essays in Comparative Hermeneutics: Buddhism and Christianity (The Hague, 1973), especially pp. 92–101.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 245 note 4 This is even clearer in Die Christliche Glaubenslehre (1840–1841)Google Scholar, which has no positive section at all, and where destructive analysis proves that ‘Die wahre Kritik des Dogma ist seine Geschichte’ (rp. Darmstadt, , 1973, I, 71).Google Scholar

page 245 note 5 The thesis is not uncommon. On I January 1916 Barth wrote to Thurneysen,‘…ich habe schon unter dem Einfluß Herrmanns die Kritik immer nur als ein Mittel zur Freiheit gegenüber der Tradition aufgefaßt, nicht aber als konstituierenden Faktor einer neuen liberalen Tradition…’ ( Barth, Karl, Gesamtausgabe v, I (Zürich, 1973), p. 121).Google Scholar

page 246 note 1 In a letter to Märklin (22 June 1846) he admitted to being ‘kein Historiker’ and ‘vom dogmatischen (resp. antidogmatischen) Interesse ausgegangen’. ( Zeller, E. (ed.), Ausgewählte Briefe (1895), p. 183.)Google Scholar Similarly to Georgii, L. (2 July 1841)Google Scholar ‘Denn von dem rein historischen Interesse… habe ich keinen Blutstropfen in mir’ and (1 November 1844), ‘Du bist Historiker, ich nicht’. ( Maier, H. (ed.), ‘Briefe von David Friedrich Strauss an L. Georgii’, Universität Tübingen Doktoren-Verzeichnis der philosophischen Fakultät 1905 (1912), pp. 37, 46.)Google Scholar

page 246 note 2 Correctly emphasized by Baur, F. C., Kanonische Evangelien, pp. 40–76Google Scholar, especially 71 f.; Kirchengeschichte, pp. 394–9.Google Scholar

page 246 note 3 Most of the furore was caused by Strauss' critical judgements. But Strauss was soon to be vindicated on this, and not even the loss of his (temporary) position as Repetent in the Stift at Tübingen after the publication of the first half of the work was particularly serious. See Geisser, ‘David Fried-rich Strauss als verhinderte (Zürcher) Dogmatiker’, Z.M.K. LXIX (1972), 217Google Scholar, n. 6. More indicatively of his future chances of becoming a professor of theology, Credner proposed him for a post at Giessen after the appearance of the first volume but changed his mind when he saw the second. Cf. Barnikol, E. ‘Der Briefwechsel zwischen Strauss und Baur’, Z.K.G. LXXIII (1962), 81Google Scholar, n. 5.

page 246 note 4 p. 780.

page 246 note 5 p. 779.

page 246 note 6 It is instructive to note how hard Baur struggles to give ‘the founder’ of Christianity a constitutive role in his account, and thus to remain orthodox, even though the historical Jesus is scarcely necessary for his Hegelian interpretation of classical Christian dogma.

page 247 note 1 See Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone (1793): E.T. Harper (1960), p. 39 n.Google Scholar

page 247 note 2 Origen was prepared to abandon the literal meaning where necessary for the sake of ‘a meaning worthy of God’. De Prin. IV.Google Scholar 2.9. Harper, E.T. (1966), p. 287.Google Scholar Strauss obscures the issue by comparing his own historical procedure in applying the category of myth to the Gospels, with the allegorizers' theological interpretation of his material (pp. 39–92). The true parallel to the allegorizers' theological interpretation is of course Strauss' own theological interpretation in the concluding dissertation. The historian's ‘mythical mode of interpretation’ merely sets the stage for this by proposing a classification of the material which makes possible its subsequent assimilation to the Hegelian Vorstellung-Begriff scheme. The confusion arises from the ambiguity of the word ‘interpretation’ which may refer either to the historian's general task of making the past intelligible to the present or to the theologian's special interest in making it intelligible in such a way that contemporary Christians recognize it to be a more or less adequate expression of the faith which they hold.

page 247 note 3 p. 773.

page 247 note 4 Baur's early criticism of Schleiermacher was published in 1827 while Strauss was still his student. See Liebing, H., ‘Ferdinand Christian Baurs Kritik an Schleiermachers Glaubenslehre’, Z.Th.K. LIV (1957), 225–43.Google Scholar

page 247 note 5 p. 773.

page 247 note 6 p. 780.

page 248 note 1 The difficulty has become more acute since historical study has shown that the New Testament is not a doctrinal unity. If a ‘canon’ were required for judging interpretations it would have to be defined more narrowly- a ‘canon within the canon’. But in fact a whole variety of criteria is employed in judging an interpretation's fidelity to the tradition. The inadequacy of any one criterion does not mean that the enterprise is hopeless.

page 248 note 2 The distinction between ‘meaning’ and ‘significance’ is rightly emphasized by Hirsch, E. D., Validity in Interpretation (Yale U.P. 1967).Google Scholar Hirsch presents a form of separation model in which the interpretative ‘guess what the author meant’ is followed by ‘a logic of validation’ analogous to the negative function of history in Strauss: ‘While there is not and cannot be any method or model of correct interpretation there can be a ruthless critical process of validation to which many skills and many hands may contribute. Just as any individual act of interpretation comprises both a hypothetical and a critical function, so the discipline of interpretation also comprises of having ideas and testing them. At the level of the discipline these two ‘moments’ or ‘episodes’ can be separated…' (p. 206).

page 248 note 3 See p. 247, n. 1. David Pailin threatens to follow a similar path: ‘Authenticity in the Interpretation of Christianity’, The Cardinal Meaning, op. cit. pp. 127–59.Google Scholar

page 248 note 4 This is Barth's main objection to the Enlightenment thinkers. Bultmann provides a theoretical framework in which the interpreter's prior understanding may be corrected through encounter with the text. Whether this happens in his own practice remains a question.

page 249 note 1 Strauss' position (ironically!) recalls that of Nietzsche, who in The Use and Abuse of History (1874)Google Scholar considered how history could serve and how destroy life. Both appreciated the pruning function of the ‘critical use of history’, but considered history one to be negative and destructive of life. The question is whether historical work alone can adequately perform theology's (or art's) task of interpreting human existence.

page 249 note 2 William Wrede gave classic expression to this view: über Aufgabe and Methode der sogenannten neutestamentlichen Theologie (1897), E.T. SCM Press (London, 1973).Google Scholar

page 249 note 3 Cf. Käsemann, E. (ed.), Das Neue Testament als Kanon (Göttingen, 1970).Google Scholar

page 249 note 4 The disagreement between Barth and Bultmann on this issue is reflected in the subsequent de-bate. Cf. Käsemann, E., ‘Konsequente Traditionsgeschichte?’ Z.Th.K. LXII (1965), 137–52.Google Scholar

page 249 note 5 Those who, like Bultmann and Käsemann, stress the theological interpretation, achieve greater coherence than those who, while remaining theologians, emphasize the historical character of the enterprise. Kümmels account of the unity of the NT, which houses his own theology, sits uncomfortably upon an admirable historical presentation. See p. 259, n. 2. Conzelmann's formula for combining the two sides ‘by regarding theology not only in general terms, as the interpretation of (the) faith made at a particular time, but in a more special sense as an exegesis of the original texts of the faith, the oldest formulations of the creed’ seems inappropriate to most of the New Testament material. An Outline of the Theology of the New Testament (E.T. London, 1969), p. xv.Google Scholar

page 249 note 6 Käsemann, E., New Testament Questions of Today (E.T. London, 1969), p. 7Google Scholar, where such ‘thoroughly misplaced modesty’ is attacked.

page 250 note 1 Op. cit. E.T. p. 116.Google Scholar

page 250 note 2 Cf. above p. 246, nn. I 2.

page 250 note 3 Like Nietzsche, he turned to philosophy and art for this.

page 251 note 1 Krister Stendahl has argued convincingly that biblical studies will have to be more self-consciously theological if it is to justify its separate existence in departments of religion. See Ramsey, P. and Wilson, J. F. (eds.), The Study of Religion in Colleges and Universities (Princeton, 1970), pp. 23–39, especially p. 28.Google Scholar

page 251 note 2 Cf. Gabler, J. P., Oratio de iusto discrimine theologiae biblicae et dogmaticae regundisque rette utriusque finibus (1787).Google Scholar A German translation is available in Merk, O., Biblische Theologie des Neuen Testaments in ihrer Anfangszeit (Marburg, 1972)Google Scholar and Strecker, G. (ed.), Das Problem der Theologie des Neuen Testaments (Darmstadt, 1975).Google Scholar

page 251 note 3 Cf. my argument in ‘The New Testament in Religious Studies’, Religious Studies X (1974), 385–406.Google Scholar

page 251 note 4 Cf. especially Ebeling, G., ‘What is “Biblical Theology”?’, Word and Faith (London, 1963), pp, 79–97Google Scholar, Kraus, H. J., Die Biblische Theologie. Ihre Geschichte und Problematik (Neukirchen, 1970)Google Scholar and Merk, O., op. cit.Google Scholar

page 251 note 5 Critical scholars' sarcasm about conservative work in this field for its inadequate treatment of the history sometimes fails to appreciate its theological aims. Beyschlag, for example, was aware of questions for which Wrede had no ear. See my Nature of New Testament Theology, op. cit.Google Scholar pp. 58 f.

page 252 note 1 See especially ‘Das Problem einer theologischen Exegese des neuen Testaments’ (1925), re-printed in Moltmannn, J. (ed.), Anfänge der dialektischen Theologie II (Munich, 1967 page 243 note 2), 47–72.Google Scholar

page 252 note 2 The century from 1831 ( Baur, F. C., ‘Die Christuspartei in Korinth…’) to 1930Google Scholar may be claimed as the period in which historical criticism made its most decisive contribution to Christian theology.

page 253 note 1 Quoted by D. M. MacKinnon in a preface to the Fontana reprint of Creed, J. M., The Divinity of Jesus Christ (1964)Google Scholar, pp. 10 f.

page 254 note 1 The phrase itself was adumbrated by Strauss in his critique of Schleiermacher's Life of Jesus: Der Christus des Glaubens und der Jesus der Geschichte (1865).Google Scholar

page 254 note 2 In his letter of 6 February 1832 to Märklin he wrote ‘Nun ginge aber erst der Tanz los im zweiten, kritischen Teile’. Sandberger, , op. cit. p. 195.Google Scholar (See p. 245, n. 1.)

page 255 note 1 Bultmann praised Baur for this ( The Theology of the New Testament, II (E.T. London, 1955) p. 244.).Google Scholar Of Baur's interpretation of Pauline theology he wrote: ‘diese Interpretation ist getragen von dem Wiflen darum, dass den theologischen Begriffen des Paulus, die es zu interpretieren gilt, eine bestimmte Auffaßung vom Sein des Menschen zugrunde liegt’ (‘Zur Geschichte der Paulus-Forschung’, Th.R. N.F. 1 (1929), 26–59.Google Scholar See p. 32).

page 255 note 2 E.g. Bultmann, R., History and Eschatology (Edinburgh, 1957).Google Scholar

page 255 note 3 Barth gave sharp expression to this view in his debate with Harnack (Answer 14, Anfänge 1, 329Google Scholar). Its (temporary) attraction for Bultmann is evident in his 1924 essay on liberal and dialectical theology, E.T. Faith and Understanding (London, 1969), p. 31.Google Scholar

page 255 note 4 See p. 246, n. 2.

page 255 note 5 As early as 1824, in his first major work, he was strongly influenced by Schelling, and wrote, ‘Ohne Philosophie bleibt mir die Geschichte ewig todt and stumm’ ( Symbolik and Mythologie, 1, xiGoogle Scholar).

page 256 note 1 In a letter to Heyd, dated 10 February 1836, he agrees that ‘from the time of the Reformation, as you rightly remark, one has set Scripture in too high a place…’ (translated by Harris, H., op. cit. p. 88).Google Scholar

page 256 note 2 1864, rp. Darmstadt, , 1973.Google Scholar

page 256 note 3 ‘Auch Baur verband ja später die historische Kritik mit der Hegelschen Philosophie, aber eben nicht mit der Unterscheidung von Vorstellung and Begriff, sondern mit dem dialektischen Geschichtsbegriff’, Sandberger, , op. cit. p. 152.Google Scholar

page 256 note 4 No doubt the patterning of history which sharpened Baur's eye for contrasts and antitheses also led him to exaggerate and oversimplify them. But his dialectical framework was itself based upon historical analysis of the sources and so too was his positioning of each document within his over-simple framework.

page 256 note 5 Points of detail may be disputed, ‘but this is not the way to dispose of a comprehensive historical theory. Such a theory appeals to its broad general truth… ’. Paul, the Apostle of Jesus Christ, E.T. (1876), p. 4.Google Scholar

page 256 note 6 The finest exponent of this view is undoubtedly Troeltsch, whose work was suppressed rather than critically evaluated by the rise of ‘dialectical theology’.

page 257 note 1 Even before the new sceptical turn within New Testament scholarship at the beginning of the century, Martin Kähler could in 1892 use historical scepticism as an instrument of theological criticism against the ‘life of Jesus’ theology.

page 257 note 2 Faith and Understanding (E.T., London, 1969), p. 132.Google Scholar The essay ‘Zur Frage der Christologie’ was first published in 1927.

page 257 note 3 It rests on some rather precarious hypotheses about the history of the tradition, especially that used by the fourth evangelist. But the lack of evidence makes these far more difficult to falsify than Baur's vulnerable reconstruction.

page 257 note 4 This has been done most persistently by Käsemann, who has made it very clear that his historical criticisms of Bultmann's exegesis of Paul in particular, and also of Bultmann's position on the question of the historical Jesus, carry a theological criticism of existentialist theology's suppression of the primacy of Christology.

page 258 note 1 ‘No New Testament writing was born with the predicate “canonical” attached…’, op. cit. E.T. pp. 70 f.

page 258 note 2 His brief comment in Anfdnge II, 71Google Scholar that the idea of the canon should preserve the contingency of revelation is hardly sufficient. On p. 67 he even allows the theoretical possibility of interpreting Augustine, Luther, Schleiermacher (or the Bhagavadgita) in the same way.

page 258 note 3 Barth was caustic about Niebergall's ‘practical’ interpretation of scripture. The Epistle to the Romans (E.T., Oxford 1933), p. 9.Google Scholar See Faith and Understanding, p. 158Google Scholar for Bultmann's view.

page 259 note 1 Bultmann uses the same word Sachkritik in both contexts, claiming that it is practised by historians but also recalling Luther's theological criticism of the canon. N. A. Dahl questions the legitimacy of Bultmann's procedure in his important review article, Th.R. N.F. XXIII (1955), 21–49.Google Scholar The concept is also discussed in The Nature of New Testament Theology, pp. 42–51.Google Scholar

page 259 note 2 Anfänge IIGoogle Scholar, 53 f. In The Theology of the New Testament (E.T. 1974)Google Scholar Kümmel offers a pragmatic solution: ‘We can expect to encounter this witness in its purest version in those forms of primitive Christian proclamation which stand closest in point of time to the historical Christ event’ where he finds ‘in spite of all the differences, a common message which can be labelled as foundational and by which the message of the rest of the New Testament can be measured’ (p. 324). But why should he draw a line at Paul? And does he find all pre-Pauline theologies equally acceptable? It is better frankly to involve one's own understanding of Christianity in making a theological judgement, as implied by Luther's criterion of ‘what preaches Christ’ and continued in Bultmann's and Käsemann's theological interpretation and criticism.

page 260 note 1 In his preface to the English edition (1933) of The Epistle to the Romans Barth wrote about ‘the problem, “What is exegesis?” No one can, of course, bring out the meaning of a text (auslegen) with-out at the same time adding something to it (einlegen). Moreover, no interpreter is rid of the danger of in fact adding more than he extracts. I neither was nor am free from this danger. And yet I should be altogether misunderstood if my readers refused to credit me with the honesty of, at any rate, intending to explain the text. I must assure them that, in writing this book, I felt myself bound to the actual words of the text, and did not in any way propose to engage myself in free theologizing. It goes without saying that my interpretation is open to criticism… ’ (p. ix). The continuation of this pas-sage shows that Barth is thinking of criticism according to historical criteria which could falsify his interpretation. He is therefore a good example of the Straussian model. And in his clearest account of interpretation which illuminates the subject-matter of the text, the preface to the second edition, he asks ‘why parallels drawn from the ancient world - and with such parallels modern commentators are chiefly concerned - should be of more value for an understanding of the Epistle than the situation in which we ourselves actually are, and to which we can therefore bear witness’ (p. 11). He attacks an (imaginary) commentary in which ‘a maze of contemporary parallels did duty for an explanation’ of what modern interpreters find difficult, and asks whether ‘such a commentary could really be called an interpretation’ (p. 12).

page 260 note 2 This concern has been most persistently emphasized by W. Pannenberg.

page 260 note 3 A useful account of this is contained in Ladd, G. E., ‘The Search for Perspective’, Interpretation, XXV (1971), 41–62.Google Scholar This conservative movement is of course not to be confused with the far more sophisticated search for ‘biblical theology’ associated with Von Rad, Kraus, Gese, Stuhlmacher and others.

page 261 note 1 E.g. Wilson, Bryan R. (ed.), Rationality (Oxford, 1970)Google Scholar; Phillips, D. Z. (ed.), Religion and Under-standing (Oxford, 1967)Google Scholar; Horton, Robin and Finnegan, Ruth (eds.), Modes of Thought. Essays on Thinking in Western and Non-Western Societies (London, 1973).Google Scholar

page 261 note 2 Bultmann rightly insists that ‘Neither exists, of course, without the other, and they stand constantly in a reciprocal relation to each other’ ( Theology of the New Testament, E.T. (1955), p. 251).Google Scholar But for him ‘interpretation of the New Testament writings’ stands ‘under the presupposition that they have something to say to the present’. The historical task is formulated here in a way that makes room for the theological interest. But it is equally possible to acknowledge the two sides to historical work, interpretation of the evidence and reconstruction of that to which it refers, without making this presupposition.

page 262 note 1 As Bultmann indicated: Anfänge der dialektischen Theologie, II, 68.Google Scholar

page 264 note 1 Some scrutiny of what is brought into theological interpretation for its compatibility with the tradition remains a necessary control. It was faced by those who allowed but controlled the use of allegorical interpretation, e.g. Aquinas, , S.T.I. I. 10.Google Scholar

page 265 note 1 See p. 257, n. 2. In the preceding sentence Bultmann speaks of his ‘conservative New Testament colleagues…perpetually engaged in salvage operations’.