In this volume Robert Kysar chronicles the history of interpretation of the Fourth Gospel in the twentieth century. His study reveals four distinct critical approaches to understanding the Fourth Gospel―historical, theological, literary, and postmodernist readings. The use of these methods mirrors the history of biblical studies and influences the present state of scholarship.
Review
"... unfailingly insightful, honest, and compelling."―Adele Reinhartz, Dean, Graduate Studies and Research, Wilfrid Laurier University
"Read these chapters with great care. Not only will they offer you a comprehensive map of Johannine interpretation across the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. You also will delight in reading one of North America's foremost Johannine exegetes as he grapples with that Gospel's most critical issues, fortified by a lifetime of patient and disciplined study, a refreshing generosity of critical spirit, and the heart of a churchman."―C. Clifton Black, Otto A. Piper Professor of Biblical Theology, Chairman of the Department of Biblical Studies, Princeton Theological Seminary Book Editor, Theology Today
Review
Read these chapters with great care. Not only will they offer you a comprehensive map of Johannine interpretation across the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. You also will delight in reading one of North America’s foremost Johannine exegetes as he grapples with that Gospel’s most critical issues, fortified by a lifetime of patient and disciplined study, a refreshing generosity of critical spirit, and the heart of a churchman.
-- C. Clifton Black, Otto A. Piper Professor of Biblical Theology, Chairman of the Department of Biblical Studies, Princeton Theological Seminary Book Editor, Theology Today
About the Author
Robert D. Kysar is Bandy Professor of Preaching and New Testament, Emeritus, Emory University.
Acknowledgments..........................................................................ixCharting the Voyages: An Autobiographical Introduction...................................1Part I. Historical Criticism1 The Concept of Creation in John 1.....................................................112 The Eschatology of the Fourth Gospel..................................................193 Christology and Controversy in the Prologue of the Gospel of John.....................274 Pursuing the Paradoxes of Johannine Thought...........................................435 Literary Probe into the Gospel of John................................................536 Historical Puzzles in JohnPart II. Theological Criticism7 Seeing Johannine Theology through Temporal Lens.......................................1138 The Framework Johannine Theology......................................................119Part III. Literary Criticism9 Anti-Semitism and the Gospel of John..................................................14710 The Meaning and Function of Johannine Metaphor (John 10:1-18).........................16111 The Making of Metaphor (John 3:1-15)..................................................18312 The Dismantling of Decisional Faith (John 6:25-71)....................................199Part IV. Postmodern Criticism13 The Gospel of John in the Twenty-first Century........................................22114 The "Other" in Johannine Literature...................................................22715 The Expulsion from the Synagogue: The Tale of a Theory................................23716 The Sacraments and Johannine Ambiguity................................................247Conclusion: Looking Over One's Shoulder..................................................251Notes....................................................................................257Abbreviations............................................................................289Bibliography.............................................................................293Index of Scripture References............................................................327Index of Names...........................................................................333
Chapter One
The Concept of Creation in John 1
Heinrich Ott has written, "Understanding ... is a function of [humans] in the wholeness of [their] existence; it extends to the whole of the human situation" ("Language and Understanding" 132). Biblical interpretation has not always grasped and articulated with sufficient clarity the fact that exegetical understanding is a function of the exegete in the wholeness of her or his existence. Exegesis has too often been set in isolation from the larger framework of the exegete's self-understanding in general, or more specifically his or her theological and philosophical postures. This isolation resulted in what often has been shallowness in the discipline. It is to the credit of Rudolf Bultmann that he awakened the theological world as a whole and biblical interpretation in specific to the problem of preunderstanding and its function in the hermeneutical task (Bultmann, Existence 289-96).
The purpose of this paper is to attempt a simple demonstration of the manner in which an interpretation of a passage reflects and relies upon the larger realm of the understanding of the exegete. More specifically, this paper is an effort to illumine the manner in which Bultmann's theological motifs have shaped his interpretation of John 1:3-4. I will endeavor to penetrate what might be called the "logic" of Bultmann's exegetical method so as to see more clearly precisely how his theological understandings are operative in determining his interpretation. I suggest that one may see in Bultmann the influence of theological presuppositions upon biblical interpretation and therefore the inescapable unity of exegesis and theology. My procedure will be, first, to summarize briefly what Bultmann has to say about John 1:3-4 and in particular his interpretation of the concept of creation in those verses. Second, I will attempt an analysis of Bultmann's exegesis in the light of the theological motifs which have most obviously influenced his interpretation. Finally, the paper attempts to draw some general conclusions from this study of an exegete's method.
A Summary of Bultmann's Interpretation of the Concept of Creation in John 1:3-4
In his commentary on John, Bultmann argues that we should not understand the prologue to the gospel as theological or cosmological speculation. The concern of the prologue as a whole, he argues, is with the experience of revelation; it is a liturgical hymn, which articulates the experience of the Christian community with its Lord. It arises then not out of philosophical or even theological reflection but out of the self-understanding of the worshipping community.
Bultmann believes that the evangelist's use of egeneto ("came into being") in v. 3 is intended to exclude any speculation about the origin of the world. What the evangelist seeks to affirm, Bultmann says, is the self-understanding of the worshipper, which is the human's proper being. What is said of creation in 1:3-4 bears upon an individual's proper self-understanding; it has to do with the reader's proper sense of creatureliness. Hence, it is liturgical and confessional in nature rather than speculative.
Still, Bultmann asserts v. 3 affirms a concept of creatio ex nihilo (creation out of nothing), and he points out that this doctrine is also found in the Fourth Gospel at 17:24 in the expression kataboles zoe kosmou ("the foundation of the world"). In interpreting John 1:3 Bultmann emphasizes its liturgical and nonspeculative meaning and at the same time insists that the verse teaches creatio ex nihilo (Gospel 37-38).
Verse 3 affirms, moreover, that in the role of the logos in creation no separation of the logos and God is implied. Hence there is a unity here of creation and revelation: "The world is God's creation and as such God's revelation" ( Gospel 20; cf. Brown, Gospel According to John 1:25).
Bultmann thinks verse 4a is a statement of the continuous creative process under the power of the logos ho genonen en auto zoe en ("that which came into being was life"). "The life of the whole of creation has its origin in the logos." The punctuation of 3b-4a does not change the point of the passage: that which is created does not have its life from itself but has it bestowed. So the logos, Bultmann maintains, is zoe ("life") in that logos is the life-giving power and has life in the sense that he "makes alive" ( lebendig macht ). That this is the meaning of Christ as zoe ("life") is evident from the affirmation of the gospel as a whole, e.g. 5:21, 26; 6:33; 10:28 ( Gospel 21).
Since the logos is zoe ("life"), he/she can be phos ("light"). That the logos is Creator (making alive) allows that the logos be Revealer as well. Creation is preparation for redemption. Phos ("light") is that which makes clear and gives the possibility of seeing. However, "to see" is to understand oneself properly in the world. So the phos ("light") is
the brightness in which I can find myself and find my way about and in which I have no anxiety and am not at my "wit's end." The brightness therefore is not an external phenomenon, but it is the illumination of being ( Erhelltsein des Daseins ). ( Gospel 22)
If the logos is the light of humanity, one may supposed that there is the possibility of enlightened existence given in the very origin of life; that is, one is given the possibility of salvation. So creation is revelation, since that which is created has been given the possibility of knowing its Creator, and hence knowing itself. What is disclosed in the saving revelation is the human's proper self-understanding in the light of creation. Humanity's authenticity involves the knowledge of their creatureliness and the demands of the Creator. Still, Bultmann is careful to say that this content of revelation is neither a theory of creation nor a feeling of creatureliness ( a la Schleiermacher) but an existential self-understanding ( existentielles Selbstverstndnis ) ( Gospel 44). As a consequence of all of this, Bultmann can say that the coming of the logos as the light of the world means that Jesus gives the world the "realized possibility" latent within creation. "The saving revelation restores the lost possibility of the revelation in creation" ( Gospel 26).
Theological Motifs in Bultmann's Interpretation of John 1:3-4
The logic of Bultmann's interpretation of these verses is only evident after one has recognized the role played by four of his theological presuppositions: 1) the anthropocentric understanding of all Christian doctrine, 2) the theme of human dependence, 3) the unity of the concepts of creation and redemption in Christian thought, and 4) the character of natural revelation as self-understanding. I will attempt to demonstrate how each of these is operative in Bultmann's exegetical method.
Bultmann's theological method is notably characterized by its anthropocentric feature. He has affirmed that Christian theology is always to be understood in terms of what doctrine says about humans. His famous declaration of the anthropocentric nature of Christian theology is found in the "Preliminary Remarks" to his exposition of Pauline theology: "Every assertion about God is, simultaneously, an assertion about [humanity] and vice versa. For this reason and in this sense Paul's theology is, at the same time, anthropology" ( Theology 1:191). On this basis, he declares that one cannot speak of God except as one speaks of God's relation to humans ( Jesus 69). Therefore what we might know about God is primarily what we know about ourselves and our finitude ( Essays 98).
Pursuant of this anthropocentric method, Bultmann has undertaken to interpret the Christian doctrine of creation as a statement about humanity. The doctrine is not a theory about the past, he says, but speaks of humanity's present situation. "It grows out of the wonder at the riddle of the world that encompasses [humans] as the uncanny." Therefore, the purpose of the doctrine of creation is not to understand humanity in terms of the world about us, but to comprehend the world in terms of our fundamental concerns. "[F]aith in creation is the expression of a specific understanding of human existence" ( Existence 175-76; cf. Theology 1:227-28).
Still another theological motif betrayed in Bultmann's exegesis of John 1:3-4 is that of humanity's utter dependence upon God. If there is any one theme that finds continual expression in Bultmann's thought, it is the theme of our dependence upon God. The radical reliance upon God for human existence is explicated by Bultmann's use of the concept of "nothingness." "[W]e are suspended in nothing," he writes, and "to be God's creature means to be constantly encompassed and threatened by nothingness." The concept of creation is humanity's recognition that except for the creative will of God, we fall back into the nothingness from which God has created us ( Existence 175-76). Our existence is unconditionally derived from God's free creative will. For Bultmann that utter dependence is the very core of the Christian affirmation concerning creation.
The same theme of the utter dependence of humanity is very much evident in Bultmann's exposition of the doctrine of Christian redemption. Correlated with human dependence upon God in creation is the conviction that salvation means, above all else, our final and unreserved surrender to God. The end of humanity's ill-founded efforts to be independent and our acceptance of dependence upon the grace of God in Christ is, for Bultmann, the essence of Pauline soteriology ( Theology 1:134-46; Existence 80-83 and 149-57; cf. Theology 1:228-29).
It is, therefore, abundantly clear that a pervasive motif of human dependence upon the divine runs throughout Bultmann's theology. Along with the theme of anthropocentricity, that motif is very much evident in the Bultmannian interpretation of John 1:3-4. The references in the passage to creation are read essentially as references to humanity's self-understanding in the world (i.e., anthropocentrically), and those references are understood to mean humanity's primordial dependence upon God for existence. So it seems evident just how Bultmann's interpretation of this Johannine passage is premised upon his strongest theological commitments.
Bultmann's allegation that John 1:3 expresses a Johannine affirmation of creatio ex nihilo is a striking illustration of the further influence of his theology upon his exegesis. That Bultmann should find this traditional doctrine of creation in v. 3 at all is remarkable. No less remarkable is his assertion that creatio ex nihilo is the meaning of the expression kataboles kosmou ("the foundation of the world") at John 17:24 ( Gospel 38). On the surface, creation out of absolute nothingness would seem to be rather far removed from the meaning of either John 1:3 or 17:24. Moreover, creatio ex nihilo would seem to be speculation of the kind Bultmann would seek to avoid. How is it that he is able to claim that such a doctrine is referred to in John 1:3?
Bultmann's exegesis surely betrays again his theological predispositions. Actually, that he is able to find creatio ex nihilo in 1:3 and 17:24 is directly the result again of the two theological motifs mentioned above, namely, an anthropocentric interpretation of doctrine and an emphasis upon the theme of human dependence. Combined here with these two motifs is still another theological tendency in the Bultmannian system, namely, his inclination to emphasize the unity of the doctrines of creation and redemption. We must now consider how these three theological presuppositions combined to account for his interpretation of 1:3 and 17:24.
In the essay entitled, "Faith in God the Creator," Bultmann discusses the doctrine of creation from nothing as an existential appraisal of the human situation.
God's creation is a creation out of nothing; and to be God's creature means absolutely and in every present to have one's source in [God], in such a way that were [God] to withhold [the] creative will the creature would fall back into nothing.... We understand the world as God's creation only when we know about this nothingness that encompasses every created thing.... ( Existence 175)
Here creatio ex nihilo is not a speculative doctrine of the origin of the world but a statement of the total reliance of all humans upon God for their very being. In other words, the traditional doctrine is interpreted anthropocentrically and in terms of a radical understanding of human dependence. Bultmann's article then goes on to explore the relation of christology to faith in God as Creator. He suggests that creatio ex nihilo has its equivalent in Christian redemption.
To have faith in the cross of Christ means to be prepared to let God work as the Creator. God creates out of nothing, and whoever becomes nothing before [God] is made alive. Whenever the cross really leads me to the knowledge of my own nothingness and to the confession of my sin, I am open for God's rule as the Creator who forgives me my sin and takes from me nothingness, death. ( Existence 181; italics mine)
The link between creation and redemption is just at the point of humanity's utter dependence!
Here, then, are the ingredients which have led Bultmann to read creatio ex nihilo out of John 1:3 and kataboles kosmou ("the foundation of the world") in 17:24. He has given the traditional doctrine a new existential interpretation in terms of the central motifs of his own theological thought. He has read John 1:3 in terms of his concern for our radical dependence upon God. He was able, next, to assert that the doctrine which most vividly expresses that dependence in creation, namely, creatio ex nihilo , is present in the meaning of the text. Hence behind the simple flat assertion that the creation thought in John 1:3 is creatio ex nihilo lies a distinctive and complex method of interpretation.
Bultmann's explication of creatio ex nihilo has introduced still another feature of his theological thought which has had significant influence upon his exegesis of John 1:3-4. Bultmann's interpretation of these two verses of the prologue clearly affirms that creation and redemption are an inseparable unity in Christian thought. Moreover, his understanding of the words zoe ("life") and phos ("light") pivots around the unity of Christ's creative and redemptive work ( Gospel 38, 43-45). I contend that Bultmann's interpretation is seriously shaped by the radical significance he attaches to the continuity between creation and redemption.
This continuity is important to the whole theological system proposed by Bultmann. It appears that the Heideggerian concepts of authenticity and inauthenticity were instrumental in Bultmann's development of the doctrine of creation. If he were to adopt the concepts of authentic-inauthentic into the Christian framework, it meant that he had to stress anew a concept of creation which made possible both of these modes of existence (Heidegger, Being 312-13). Authentic and inauthentic existence logically imply an original intention or direction for existence, i.e., the essence of authentic life. In Christian thought that original intention is a part of the doctrine of creation. Bultmann's theological thought, therefore, necessitates a strong doctrine of creation which sets the stage for redemption, or to use Bultmannian language, makes authenticity possible. Redemption, then, makes actual what has been possible in creation.
It is understandable, therefore, that the German exegete should find in the prologue of John an affirmation of the radical unity of creation and redemption. A clear continuity must be affirmed, if Christian thought, as Bultmann conceives it, is to hold together in any cogent manner.
The suggestion that creation and redemption are a single revelation leads us to a final consideration of Bultmann's theological orientation. In his exposition of John 1:3-4 he stresses that in creation there is a revelation essential to our proper self-understanding. This statement is typical of his exegesis: "Creation is at the same time revelation, inasmuch as it was possible for the creature to know of [the] Creator, and thus to understand [her or] himself" ( Gospel 44). Furthermore, Bultmann's interpretation of the logos as zoe ("life") and phos ("light") takes for granted the revelation inherent in creation.
In this volume Robert Kysar chronicles the history of interpretation of the Fourth Gospel in the twentieth century. His study reveals four distinct critical approaches to understanding the Fourth Gospel―historical, theological, literary, and postmodernist readings. The use of these methods mirrors the history of biblical studies and influences the present state of scholarship.
Review
"... unfailingly insightful, honest, and compelling."―Adele Reinhartz, Dean, Graduate Studies and Research, Wilfrid Laurier University
"Read these chapters with great care. Not only will they offer you a comprehensive map of Johannine interpretation across the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. You also will delight in reading one of North America's foremost Johannine exegetes as he grapples with that Gospel's most critical issues, fortified by a lifetime of patient and disciplined study, a refreshing generosity of critical spirit, and the heart of a churchman."―C. Clifton Black, Otto A. Piper Professor of Biblical Theology, Chairman of the Department of Biblical Studies, Princeton Theological Seminary Book Editor, Theology Today
Review
Read these chapters with great care. Not only will they offer you a comprehensive map of Johannine interpretation across the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. You also will delight in reading one of North America’s foremost Johannine exegetes as he grapples with that Gospel’s most critical issues, fortified by a lifetime of patient and disciplined study, a refreshing generosity of critical spirit, and the heart of a churchman.
-- C. Clifton Black, Otto A. Piper Professor of Biblical Theology, Chairman of the Department of Biblical Studies, Princeton Theological Seminary Book Editor, Theology Today
About the Author
Robert D. Kysar is Bandy Professor of Preaching and New Testament, Emeritus, Emory University.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Voyages with John
Charting the Fourth Gospel By Robert Kysar
Baylor University Press
Copyright © 2005 Baylor University Press
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-932792-43-0
Contents
Acknowledgments..........................................................................ixCharting the Voyages: An Autobiographical Introduction...................................1Part I. Historical Criticism1 The Concept of Creation in John 1.....................................................112 The Eschatology of the Fourth Gospel..................................................193 Christology and Controversy in the Prologue of the Gospel of John.....................274 Pursuing the Paradoxes of Johannine Thought...........................................435 Literary Probe into the Gospel of John................................................536 Historical Puzzles in JohnPart II. Theological Criticism7 Seeing Johannine Theology through Temporal Lens.......................................1138 The Framework Johannine Theology......................................................119Part III. Literary Criticism9 Anti-Semitism and the Gospel of John..................................................14710 The Meaning and Function of Johannine Metaphor (John 10:1-18).........................16111 The Making of Metaphor (John 3:1-15)..................................................18312 The Dismantling of Decisional Faith (John 6:25-71)....................................199Part IV. Postmodern Criticism13 The Gospel of John in the Twenty-first Century........................................22114 The "Other" in Johannine Literature...................................................22715 The Expulsion from the Synagogue: The Tale of a Theory................................23716 The Sacraments and Johannine Ambiguity................................................247Conclusion: Looking Over One's Shoulder..................................................251Notes....................................................................................257Abbreviations............................................................................289Bibliography.............................................................................293Index of Scripture References............................................................327Index of Names...........................................................................333
Chapter One
The Concept of Creation in John 1
Heinrich Ott has written, "Understanding ... is a function of [humans] in the wholeness of [their] existence; it extends to the whole of the human situation" ("Language and Understanding" 132). Biblical interpretation has not always grasped and articulated with sufficient clarity the fact that exegetical understanding is a function of the exegete in the wholeness of her or his existence. Exegesis has too often been set in isolation from the larger framework of the exegete's self-understanding in general, or more specifically his or her theological and philosophical postures. This isolation resulted in what often has been shallowness in the discipline. It is to the credit of Rudolf Bultmann that he awakened the theological world as a whole and biblical interpretation in specific to the problem of preunderstanding and its function in the hermeneutical task (Bultmann, Existence 289-96).
The purpose of this paper is to attempt a simple demonstration of the manner in which an interpretation of a passage reflects and relies upon the larger realm of the understanding of the exegete. More specifically, this paper is an effort to illumine the manner in which Bultmann's theological motifs have shaped his interpretation of John 1:3-4. I will endeavor to penetrate what might be called the "logic" of Bultmann's exegetical method so as to see more clearly precisely how his theological understandings are operative in determining his interpretation. I suggest that one may see in Bultmann the influence of theological presuppositions upon biblical interpretation and therefore the inescapable unity of exegesis and theology. My procedure will be, first, to summarize briefly what Bultmann has to say about John 1:3-4 and in particular his interpretation of the concept of creation in those verses. Second, I will attempt an analysis of Bultmann's exegesis in the light of the theological motifs which have most obviously influenced his interpretation. Finally, the paper attempts to draw some general conclusions from this study of an exegete's method.
A Summary of Bultmann's Interpretation of the Concept of Creation in John 1:3-4
In his commentary on John, Bultmann argues that we should not understand the prologue to the gospel as theological or cosmological speculation. The concern of the prologue as a whole, he argues, is with the experience of revelation; it is a liturgical hymn, which articulates the experience of the Christian community with its Lord. It arises then not out of philosophical or even theological reflection but out of the self-understanding of the worshipping community.
Bultmann believes that the evangelist's use of egeneto ("came into being") in v. 3 is intended to exclude any speculation about the origin of the world. What the evangelist seeks to affirm, Bultmann says, is the self-understanding of the worshipper, which is the human's proper being. What is said of creation in 1:3-4 bears upon an individual's proper self-understanding; it has to do with the reader's proper sense of creatureliness. Hence, it is liturgical and confessional in nature rather than speculative.
Still, Bultmann asserts v. 3 affirms a concept of creatio ex nihilo (creation out of nothing), and he points out that this doctrine is also found in the Fourth Gospel at 17:24 in the expression kataboles zoe kosmou ("the foundation of the world"). In interpreting John 1:3 Bultmann emphasizes its liturgical and nonspeculative meaning and at the same time insists that the verse teaches creatio ex nihilo (Gospel 37-38).
Verse 3 affirms, moreover, that in the role of the logos in creation no separation of the logos and God is implied. Hence there is a unity here of creation and revelation: "The world is God's creation and as such God's revelation" ( Gospel 20; cf. Brown, Gospel According to John 1:25).
Bultmann thinks verse 4a is a statement of the continuous creative process under the power of the logos ho genonen en auto zoe en ("that which came into being was life"). "The life of the whole of creation has its origin in the logos." The punctuation of 3b-4a does not change the point of the passage: that which is created does not have its life from itself but has it bestowed. So the logos, Bultmann maintains, is zoe ("life") in that logos is the life-giving power and has life in the sense that he "makes alive" ( lebendig macht ). That this is the meaning of Christ as zoe ("life") is evident from the affirmation of the gospel as a whole, e.g. 5:21, 26; 6:33; 10:28 ( Gospel 21).
Since the logos is zoe ("life"), he/she can be phos ("light"). That the logos is Creator (making alive) allows that the logos be Revealer as well. Creation is preparation for redemption. Phos ("light") is that which makes clear and gives the possibility of seeing. However, "to see" is to understand oneself properly in the world. So the phos ("light") is
the brightness in which I can find myself and find my way about and in which I have no anxiety and am not at my "wit's end." The brightness therefore is not an external phenomenon, but it is the illumination of being ( Erhelltsein des Daseins ). ( Gospel 22)
If the logos is the light of humanity, one may supposed that there is the possibility of enlightened existence given in the very origin of life; that is, one is given the possibility of salvation. So creation is revelation, since that which is created has been given the possibility of knowing its Creator, and hence knowing itself. What is disclosed in the saving revelation is the human's proper self-understanding in the light of creation. Humanity's authenticity involves the knowledge of their creatureliness and the demands of the Creator. Still, Bultmann is careful to say that this content of revelation is neither a theory of creation nor a feeling of creatureliness ( a la Schleiermacher) but an existential self-understanding ( existentielles Selbstverstndnis ) ( Gospel 44). As a consequence of all of this, Bultmann can say that the coming of the logos as the light of the world means that Jesus gives the world the "realized possibility" latent within creation. "The saving revelation restores the lost possibility of the revelation in creation" ( Gospel 26).
Theological Motifs in Bultmann's Interpretation of John 1:3-4
The logic of Bultmann's interpretation of these verses is only evident after one has recognized the role played by four of his theological presuppositions: 1) the anthropocentric understanding of all Christian doctrine, 2) the theme of human dependence, 3) the unity of the concepts of creation and redemption in Christian thought, and 4) the character of natural revelation as self-understanding. I will attempt to demonstrate how each of these is operative in Bultmann's exegetical method.
Bultmann's theological method is notably characterized by its anthropocentric feature. He has affirmed that Christian theology is always to be understood in terms of what doctrine says about humans. His famous declaration of the anthropocentric nature of Christian theology is found in the "Preliminary Remarks" to his exposition of Pauline theology: "Every assertion about God is, simultaneously, an assertion about [humanity] and vice versa. For this reason and in this sense Paul's theology is, at the same time, anthropology" ( Theology 1:191). On this basis, he declares that one cannot speak of God except as one speaks of God's relation to humans ( Jesus 69). Therefore what we might know about God is primarily what we know about ourselves and our finitude ( Essays 98).
Pursuant of this anthropocentric method, Bultmann has undertaken to interpret the Christian doctrine of creation as a statement about humanity. The doctrine is not a theory about the past, he says, but speaks of humanity's present situation. "It grows out of the wonder at the riddle of the world that encompasses [humans] as the uncanny." Therefore, the purpose of the doctrine of creation is not to understand humanity in terms of the world about us, but to comprehend the world in terms of our fundamental concerns. "[F]aith in creation is the expression of a specific understanding of human existence" ( Existence 175-76; cf. Theology 1:227-28).
Still another theological motif betrayed in Bultmann's exegesis of John 1:3-4 is that of humanity's utter dependence upon God. If there is any one theme that finds continual expression in Bultmann's thought, it is the theme of our dependence upon God. The radical reliance upon God for human existence is explicated by Bultmann's use of the concept of "nothingness." "[W]e are suspended in nothing," he writes, and "to be God's creature means to be constantly encompassed and threatened by nothingness." The concept of creation is humanity's recognition that except for the creative will of God, we fall back into the nothingness from which God has created us ( Existence 175-76). Our existence is unconditionally derived from God's free creative will. For Bultmann that utter dependence is the very core of the Christian affirmation concerning creation.
The same theme of the utter dependence of humanity is very much evident in Bultmann's exposition of the doctrine of Christian redemption. Correlated with human dependence upon God in creation is the conviction that salvation means, above all else, our final and unreserved surrender to God. The end of humanity's ill-founded efforts to be independent and our acceptance of dependence upon the grace of God in Christ is, for Bultmann, the essence of Pauline soteriology ( Theology 1:134-46; Existence 80-83 and 149-57; cf. Theology 1:228-29).
It is, therefore, abundantly clear that a pervasive motif of human dependence upon the divine runs throughout Bultmann's theology. Along with the theme of anthropocentricity, that motif is very much evident in the Bultmannian interpretation of John 1:3-4. The references in the passage to creation are read essentially as references to humanity's self-understanding in the world (i.e., anthropocentrically), and those references are understood to mean humanity's primordial dependence upon God for existence. So it seems evident just how Bultmann's interpretation of this Johannine passage is premised upon his strongest theological commitments.
Bultmann's allegation that John 1:3 expresses a Johannine affirmation of creatio ex nihilo is a striking illustration of the further influence of his theology upon his exegesis. That Bultmann should find this traditional doctrine of creation in v. 3 at all is remarkable. No less remarkable is his assertion that creatio ex nihilo is the meaning of the expression kataboles kosmou ("the foundation of the world") at John 17:24 ( Gospel 38). On the surface, creation out of absolute nothingness would seem to be rather far removed from the meaning of either John 1:3 or 17:24. Moreover, creatio ex nihilo would seem to be speculation of the kind Bultmann would seek to avoid. How is it that he is able to claim that such a doctrine is referred to in John 1:3?
Bultmann's exegesis surely betrays again his theological predispositions. Actually, that he is able to find creatio ex nihilo in 1:3 and 17:24 is directly the result again of the two theological motifs mentioned above, namely, an anthropocentric interpretation of doctrine and an emphasis upon the theme of human dependence. Combined here with these two motifs is still another theological tendency in the Bultmannian system, namely, his inclination to emphasize the unity of the doctrines of creation and redemption. We must now consider how these three theological presuppositions combined to account for his interpretation of 1:3 and 17:24.
In the essay entitled, "Faith in God the Creator," Bultmann discusses the doctrine of creation from nothing as an existential appraisal of the human situation.
God's creation is a creation out of nothing; and to be God's creature means absolutely and in every present to have one's source in [God], in such a way that were [God] to withhold [the] creative will the creature would fall back into nothing.... We understand the world as God's creation only when we know about this nothingness that encompasses every created thing.... ( Existence 175)
Here creatio ex nihilo is not a speculative doctrine of the origin of the world but a statement of the total reliance of all humans upon God for their very being. In other words, the traditional doctrine is interpreted anthropocentrically and in terms of a radical understanding of human dependence. Bultmann's article then goes on to explore the relation of christology to faith in God as Creator. He suggests that creatio ex nihilo has its equivalent in Christian redemption.
To have faith in the cross of Christ means to be prepared to let God work as the Creator. God creates out of nothing, and whoever becomes nothing before [God] is made alive. Whenever the cross really leads me to the knowledge of my own nothingness and to the confession of my sin, I am open for God's rule as the Creator who forgives me my sin and takes from me nothingness, death. ( Existence 181; italics mine)
The link between creation and redemption is just at the point of humanity's utter dependence!
Here, then, are the ingredients which have led Bultmann to read creatio ex nihilo out of John 1:3 and kataboles kosmou ("the foundation of the world") in 17:24. He has given the traditional doctrine a new existential interpretation in terms of the central motifs of his own theological thought. He has read John 1:3 in terms of his concern for our radical dependence upon God. He was able, next, to assert that the doctrine which most vividly expresses that dependence in creation, namely, creatio ex nihilo , is present in the meaning of the text. Hence behind the simple flat assertion that the creation thought in John 1:3 is creatio ex nihilo lies a distinctive and complex method of interpretation.
Bultmann's explication of creatio ex nihilo has introduced still another feature of his theological thought which has had significant influence upon his exegesis of John 1:3-4. Bultmann's interpretation of these two verses of the prologue clearly affirms that creation and redemption are an inseparable unity in Christian thought. Moreover, his understanding of the words zoe ("life") and phos ("light") pivots around the unity of Christ's creative and redemptive work ( Gospel 38, 43-45). I contend that Bultmann's interpretation is seriously shaped by the radical significance he attaches to the continuity between creation and redemption.
This continuity is important to the whole theological system proposed by Bultmann. It appears that the Heideggerian concepts of authenticity and inauthenticity were instrumental in Bultmann's development of the doctrine of creation. If he were to adopt the concepts of authentic-inauthentic into the Christian framework, it meant that he had to stress anew a concept of creation which made possible both of these modes of existence (Heidegger, Being 312-13). Authentic and inauthentic existence logically imply an original intention or direction for existence, i.e., the essence of authentic life. In Christian thought that original intention is a part of the doctrine of creation. Bultmann's theological thought, therefore, necessitates a strong doctrine of creation which sets the stage for redemption, or to use Bultmannian language, makes authenticity possible. Redemption, then, makes actual what has been possible in creation.
It is understandable, therefore, that the German exegete should find in the prologue of John an affirmation of the radical unity of creation and redemption. A clear continuity must be affirmed, if Christian thought, as Bultmann conceives it, is to hold together in any cogent manner.
The suggestion that creation and redemption are a single revelation leads us to a final consideration of Bultmann's theological orientation. In his exposition of John 1:3-4 he stresses that in creation there is a revelation essential to our proper self-understanding. This statement is typical of his exegesis: "Creation is at the same time revelation, inasmuch as it was possible for the creature to know of [the] Creator, and thus to understand [her or] himself" ( Gospel 44). Furthermore, Bultmann's interpretation of the logos as zoe ("life") and phos ("light") takes for granted the revelation inherent in creation.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Voyages with Johnby Robert Kysar Copyright © 2005 by Baylor University Press. Excerpted by permission.
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