Journal: Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society
Volume: JETS 18:3 (Summer 1975)
Article: Pacesetters For The Radical Theologians Of The 60s And 70s
Author: Vernon C. Grounds

Pacesetters For The Radical
Theologians Of The 60s And 70s*

Vernon C. Grounds*

Conservative Baptist Seminary, Denver, Colorado 80210

If contemporary theology is like a rushing, muddy river, as indeed it is, a pertinent question naturally arises: how did it ever become so turbulent and turbid? A related question also obtrudes itself: what were the tributaries somewhere upstream which poured themselves into this now swirling flood? An exhaustive answer to these questions would require a study that reached back into the remotest depths of human civilization and ransacked the vast resources of specialized scholarship. But we are at least entitled to say that in the more recent past the potent influences of four men have converged to swell this river. Our task, therefore, is to consider briefly the distinctive input which individually Rudolf Bultmann, Teilhard de Chardin, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Paul Tillich have made to the onflowing tide of present day theology.

I. Rudolf Bultman

Born on August 20, 1884, at Wiefeldstede in Oldenburg, Germany, Rudolf Bultmann has spent his entire career in the academic world. He taught at Marburg from 1912 to 1916; then he was assistant professor at Breslau until 1920; very briefly he held the rank of full professor at Giessen, returning to Marburg in 1921, where he remained until his retirement in 1951. Though not a political activist, he supported the Confessing Church during the Hitler era.

An encyclopedic scholar, he moves with competence and distinction, not to say critical creativity, in the fields of Judaism, Old Testament, Biblical Criticism, New Testament studies, classical culture, historical theology, modern science, contemporary theology, and world religions. Let Schubert M. Ogden give an appraisal of his importance.

Rudolf Bultmann is one of the most significant figures on the contemporary theological scene. By whatever criteria one judges such significance—whether quantitative or qualitative, whether with reference to specific areas of concern (i.e., “historical,” “systematic,” or “practical” theology) or to theological inquiry as a whole—his contribution is unchallengeably among the most important of our time. In the course of a long and productive scholarly career, which already spans half a century and still continues with unabated power, he has come to be one of the most decisive influences on the direction of Protestant theology in the

*From a forthcoming Moody Press book (1976) on Options in Contemporary Theology edited by S. Gundry and A. Johnson.

JETS 18:3 (Summer 1975) p. 152

twentieth century. The basic reason for this, undoubtedly, it that to an extent that seems to distinguish him among his contemporaries he has become a part of all that he has met theologically, and thus embodies in his own achievement virtually all of the important motives in the long tradition of German theology in which he stands. Of his work, as perhaps of no other, it can be said that it represents an integral and creative restatement of the cumulative wisdom of classical Protestant theology in its several decisive phases.1

1.

The Bultmann corpus is an impressive body of books and articles, much of it devoted to a highly technical exegesis of the New Testament. How best, then, can we understand this multifaceted contribution to present-day theology? Does it have a controlling purpose and, if so, what is that? Running the risk of oversimplification, we can say that Bultmann’s primary passion is to communicate the kerygma or the Christian message to the twentieth century world. In order to carry out this task, he engages, negatively, i...