Barth

JM said:

Why read Barth?

It seems those who love Barth claim those who don't have misunderstood him. Why should we read him if he is so commonly misunderstood?

Yours in the Lord,

jm

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Good point. Why bother with people who muck up the gospel and make it confusing.

With regard to reading Barth, a required standard in my Romanist seminary days, my standard answer is:

1. Read The Doctrine of God: The Election of God; The Command of God first (Volume II, Part 2)

2. Next read all of Volume IV Chronologically
Volume IV Part 1: The Doctrine of Reconciliation
Volume IV Part 2: Doctrine of Reconciliation: Jesus Christ the Servant As Lord
Volume IV Part 3, 1st and 2nd halves: Doctrine of Reconciliation: Jesus Christ the True Witness
Volume IV Part 4: Doctrine of Reconciliation: The Foundation of the Christian Life (Baptism) (was never finished and can be skipped as it is not one of his finest efforts)

By the time you finish with the above, you will be smart enough about the man to decide where you want to go next. My favorite would be to read Volume II Part 1: The Doctrine of God: The Knowledge of God; The Reality of God.

But, having said all of that, I recommend you find Webster's Barth (see here) for a starter read to get the lay of the land.

A few of my favorite Barthisms:

“In the Church of Jesus Christ there can and should be no non-theologians”

“Jesus does not give recipes that show the way to God as other teachers of religion do. He is himself the way.”

“Faith is never identical with piety.”

“Grace must find expression in life, otherwise it is not grace.”

“Man can certainly keep on lying... but he cannot make truth falsehood. He can certainly rebel... but he can accomplish nothing which abolishes the choice of God.”

“All sin has its being and origin in the fact that man wants to be his own judge. And in wanting to be that, and thinking and acting accordingly, he and his whole world is in conflict with God. It is an unreconciled world, and therefore a suffering world, a world given up to destruction.”

“He {God} is not deaf, he listens; more than that, he acts. He does not act in the same way whether we pray or not. Prayer exerts an influence upon God's action, even upon his existence. That is what the word 'answer' means. ... The fact that God yields to man's petitions, changing his intentions in response to man's prayer, is not a sign of weakness. He himself, in the glory of his majesty and power, has so willed it.”

Barth is an acquired taste for the mature Christian interested in philosophical theology (my specialty) who is able to separate the wheat from the chaff.

BryanW92 said:

Good point. Why bother with people who muck up the gospel and make it confusing.

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Well, if we never read those that oppose us we will never really understand their arguments and be able to meet them where they stand therein.

Consider open theism, one of my hobby horses of heresy. If I have not read Pinnock, Boyd, Sanders, and even Olson who flirts with openism, how can I engage the open theist on the same ground? I often find those steeped in heresy or unorthodoxy have not availed themselves of the literature rooting their error. Once this is pointed out to them, they are often given pause or at least they know I am simply not parroting the usual canards one finds on the internet.

Scripture teaches us to take every word captive for the glory of God. We should not be caricatures of the "Just Me and My Bible" types. Note I am not implying in my response that anyone here fits that modality.

Of course, the above is conditioned on the caveat that one should be well-grounded in their walk of faith by not neglecting daily Scripture study, rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer (Romans 12:12), fellowship with others, stewardship of the secular and spiritual gifts God has given you, and regular assembly with others to worship God (see also here, and Genesis 15:1-6; Prov. 3:5-8; Romans 5:1-11; Eph. 6, 1 Cor. 9:24-27; Hebrews 10:19-25, 35-39; Hebrews 11:1,6).

AMR said:

Well, if we never read those that oppose us we will never really understand their arguments and be able to meet them where they stand therein.

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Until recently, I was a United Methodist and an Arminian. I read all the stuff that Arminians read and listened to all the people that Arminians listen to. Along the way they taught me what Calvinism is: the religion of robots and their puppet-master God.

Then, I started reading what people who understand Reformed Theology really understand, instead of the Arminian version of it. I began to read about Reformed Theology because the borderline Universalism of the UMC just seemed wrong. Their patient and motherly God who built the world as our playground so we could decide if we believed in him (her?) didn't feel right anymore.

So, I've read both sides and decided that God is sovereign and in control. I don't need to read Barth anymore. Of course, as a new member of the PCA, it is unlikely that I will ever lead, teach, or fill a pulpit ever again, so I don't really need to study theology as much as I did when I was Methodist. That's kind of a relief.

Michael Wittmer has a good, brief analysis of Barth's theology related to universalism in his book Christ Alone: An Evangelical Response to Rob Bell's Love Wins. I'll share this part:

"Barth's emphasis on the centrality of Christ and the freedom of God led him to
the brink of universalism, but he refused to step over the edge. He would not say for sure that God would save everyone, for he feared that committing God to universal salvation would compromise God's sovereignty. How could God be genuinely free if a human being knew what God must do? So Barth said that God was free enough to veto our human rebellion, but also free enough to permit it to stand. He suspected that God would do the former, but he would not guarantee it."

JM said:

AMR, are you saying Barth is in fact "opposed to us?"

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JM said:

The philosophical bent of Barth has to be an unbelieving liberalism...is it not?

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There is plenty of Barth's views that would be beyond the bounds of orthodox Reformed doctrine. That said, and as I have intimated, reading the man by the mature believer can be edifying. If we confine ourselves to reading Biblical extant materials only that which we have full agreement with, we will find ourselves quite impoverished as we are all unprofitable servants.

JM said:

Why read Barth?

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Barth can make a worthwhile contribution to one's thinking. I greatly appreciate his thoughts here:

"According to Barth, there can be no approach to God whatsoever via human reason. Apart from God's revelation in Christ, human reason comprehends absolutely nothing about God ... But God has revealed Himself to man in Jesus Christ, indeed, Christ is the revelation of the Word of God (See John 1:1-4 'In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind') ...

Barth continues: .... Lost in sin, man cannot even began to move in the direction of faith, so that even a leap of faith is impossible for him. No, it must be God who breaks into man's indolent sinfulness to confront him with the Word of God (Christ). As Barth writes, 'Knowledge of God is a knowledge completely effected and determined from the side of its object, from the side of God.' Or again, 'the fact that he [ie the believing man] did come to this decision, that he really believed, and that he actually had freedom to enter this new life of obedience and hope --- all this was not the work of his spirit but the work of the Holy Spirit."
__Source: William Lane Craig, Reasonable Faith, pg. 36