The precariousness of Christian truth

I am beginning to realize that my initial attraction to the thought of Rudolf Bultmann was almost exclusively spurred on by my radical skepticism about the historical reliability of the Bible. Bultmann’s insistence on the existential contemporaneity of Christ made real in the proclamation of the gospel is, I think, a tempting way out of dealing with the historical precariousness of the gospel accounts.

No matter how attractive it is to turn Christianity into a system of belief independent of historical events, I have come to believe that this is a profoundly problematic route to go in. Indeed it is far safer to seek a way to “ground” Christian truth independently of contingent and empirical propositions. However, the truth of the Christian faith is unavoidably tied up with the historical actuality of certain contingent, empirical events. And so, it makes perfect sense why conservative biblical scholars exist and why people like Bart Ehrman scare so many Christians. Frankly, I think most of conservative biblical scholarship is both remarkably fearful and usually rather delusional. But one can at least understand that what motivates these scholars, in part, is the conviction that history actually matters and has some bearing on the truth of the Christian faith. On this point, I think they are quite right. It is much safer for us to maintain the image of an eternal changeless God and avoid the reality that the truth of Christian convictions is dependent on certain historical events that, as Donald MacKinnon once put it, “could have been otherwise.”

The Most Misunderstood Theologian?

In my opinion, Rudolf Bultmann is perhaps the most misunderstood theologian. I’ve heard him referred to as a “liberal Protestant,” an “existentialist,” and a “neo-orthodox.” His relationship to liberal theology, Barth, Heidegger, not to mention his demythologizing project, are among the many topics that are constantly misrepresented or just plain misunderstood.

In your opinion, who is the most misunderstood theologian?

Resurrection as Eschatology: In Defense of Bultmann

Over the past two hundred years or so Christian scripture has been under intense and unprecedented historical scrutiny. Free from ecclesial constraint scholars have unleashed the tools and methods of modern science onto the church’s sacred scriptures. Although one will find much disagreement among scholars, and indeed many of the issues raised are still left unresolved, the relatively new field of “biblical studies” continues to pose a formidable challenge to traditional Christian belief. Much of biblical scholarship has radically called into question the historicity of many if not most of the events witnessed to by scripture. This, among other related challenges, has left theologians grasping for something on which to build. One of the most deleterious effects of biblical criticism is most deeply felt when peering into the newly developed chasm between “biblical studies” and “theology.” To be sure, in recent years much headway has been made towards reconciling Christian theology with the challenges set forth by modern biblical criticism. Indeed, in the wake of harsh challenges, we have witnessed the rise of a variety of new and creative approaches to the interpretation of scripture as well as a veritable attempt to recover older approaches which had been effectively displaced by historical criticism.

One of the most important and controversial responses to the challenge of modern biblical criticism was Rudolf Bultmann’s demythologizing project. Bultmann’s work takes for granted that modern biblical scholarship and modern science have effectively dismantled the biblical worldview. For modern man, according to Bultmann, belief in a three-level universe, demons, angels, the miraculous, and resurrected bodies, is akin to belief in a flat earth, leprechauns, and unicorns. Contrary to popular belief, this did not in fact lead Bultmann to reject the reality of the resurrection of Jesus. For Bultmann the resurrection cannot be considered an historical event as such precisely because of its eschatological character. Indeed, the resurrection of Jesus marks the end of history, it is the eschatological event par excellence.

By claiming that the resurrection is not an event of past history, Bultmann actually attempts to protect the eschatological character of the event. In his view, it was simply self-evident that historical criticism could not establish the historicity of such an event -and therefore, it was not an historical event in any ordinary sense of the word. Bultmann asserts, “All that historical criticism can establish is the fact that the first disciples came to believe in the resurrection.” By maintaining that the resurrection is purely an eschatological event, Bultmann attempts to secure or section off the core of the Christian faith from historical critical research.

It is highly important to note that Bultmann’s work is thoroughly dominated by apologetic interests. He rather uncritically presupposes the claims of modernity precisely because he believes that there is no other option. For Bultmann, the only way forward, the only way to make the gospel credible to the scientific age, is to point out the existential truths that underly all the talk about angels, demons, and resurrected bodies. Thus, the actual historicity of the biblical accounts, including the witness to the bodily resurrection of Jesus, makes little difference to Bultmann. Of course, Bultmann certainly wants to maintain that Jesus was an historical figure and that God’s act in him was an event “wrought out in space and time.”nFor Bultmann, to speak of “God acting” and “eschatology,” is not properly mythological and so is appropriate language that fits within his schema.

Contrary to Bultmann, the Anglican Bishop of Durham and biblical scholar N.T. Wright argues that there is a great deal of evidence for the historicity of the biblical witnesses in general and the accounts of the resurrection of Jesus in particular. In fact, much of his massive work, The Resurrection of the Son of God, is devoted to making such a case. Although he stops short of claiming that one can actually prove the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus on the basis of historical critical research, he is highly optimistic about the capabilities of historical criticism to provide us with rational ground on which to base our faith. On the one hand, Wright’s project opposes the deeply pessimistic position held by Bultmann and his followers, which regarded historical criticism as an empty tool in accounting for the resurrection event. After all, because the resurrection of Jesus is the eschatological event par excellence it cannot be held under the historical critical microscope. On the other hand, Wright’s view of the limits of historical criticism appears to be much closer to Bultmann’s than what initially meets the eye. After making the case for the authenticity of the gospel accounts, Wright plainly asserts, “These [resurrection] stories too, of course, provide evidence not directly for what happened but for what several different people thought had happened.” Thus for Wright, as for Bultmann, the historical critical method can only get you so far.

The work of Bultmann and Wright represent attempts to respond to the challenges of modern biblical criticism. Although differing in opinion on many fundamental issues, both thinkers embrace and utilize the various methods of modern historical criticism. For Bultmann the resurrection is not an event of past history, but an eschatological event; it is therefore an event that lies outside the scope of historical criticism. For Wright, the resurrection is an event of past history, but he also concludes that we cannot prove that it happened on the basis of historical research. Nonetheless, Wright does devote over 800 pages to making a case for the historical reliability and authenticity of the gospel accounts. In Wright’s view, there is compelling textual evidence that the New Testament authors did not just imagine the resurrection event. In general, Bultmann seems less confident in the historical reliability of the witnesses to the resurrection of Jesus, taking it simply for granted that resurrections do not happen. As we have argued, this does not lead Bultmann to reject the resurrection; instead it becomes the catalyst for his affirmation that the resurrection is the non-mythological eschatological reality that confronts hearers even today.

Much to my surprise (and delight) after reading Bultmann again (after many years) I find myself quite sympathetic to his project. Although not uncritical of elements of his work, I think there are good theological reasons for speaking of the resurrection as an eschatological event not subject to the whims of historical scholarship. It seems to me that Bultmann’s insistence that the resurrection can only be understood eschatologically, and therefore, only by the eyes of faith, does not necessarily lift the resurrection out of the space and time universe. Can we say, contrary to Bultmann, that the resurrection is the most historical and human event precisely because of its eschatological character?All of creation finally finds its rest, its telos, in participation in the resurrected life of the triune God.

The Legacy of Rudolf Bultmann

Although the work of Rudolf Bultmann had a nearly unprecedented impact on biblical studies and theology in the twentieth century, he has certainly left a mixed legacy. Perhaps more than any other modern theologian Bultmann is attacked from virtually all perspectives of the theological spectrum. Whereas biblical fundamentalists write him off upon hearing the word “demythologizing,” liberal Protestants think Bultmann did not carry his demythologizing project far enough. Even in Barthian circles (perhaps especially) he is almost always held with a deep sense of distrust. Indeed, it is not very difficult to quickly understand why he is read with a bit of hostility. There is no question that Bultmann’s form criticism of the New Testament radically calls into question the historical reliability of the gospel. His biblical criticsm certainly seems to enlarge the already deep division between the so-called Jesus of history and the Christ of faith. Further, his hermeneutical and theological lens is even more controversial -between Bultmann’s demythologizing project and his heavy reliance on Heideggerian existentialism- one inevitably is left thinking that there must be something wrong here. However, I do sometimes wonder how much of Bultmann’s negative reception among many systematic theologians is due to a passing on of caricatures of his thought. There is indeed much to be learned from such a brilliant theological mind.

Bultmann played a pivotal role in my own theological development, helping me find some hope amidst radical historical criticism. In recent years I have grown far away from him, but it was an absolute joy reading Jesus Christ and Mythology again today for class. I found him to be surprisingly more orthodox than I remembered (or at least less theologically liberal) and I began to see his project in a new light. I still think he presents us with a deeper gulf between the “ancient” mythological mind and the “modern” scientific mind than actually exists. The ancient mythological mind is certainly not as simplistic as he seems to think and God knows the modern mind is not as enlightened!

Bultmann, of course, is commonly accused of making the assumptions of modernity the criteria for interpretation of the Christian gospel. Indeed, Bultmann admits this is in fact what the demythologizing project does, but he asserts that this is not done in order to raise the modern worldview above others; rather it is the attempt to call into question all worldviews as fundamental. In other words, Bultmann wants to free the gospel from the constraints of any particular cultural worldview to create more universal space in which the gospel can be heard. I find myself quite sympathetic to the concerns behind what Bultmann wants to do. After all, the Word of God is for the whole world, every race, tongue, and culture. However, in attempting to transcend the constraints of culture as such, I think Bultmann inevitably offers us a disembodied and dehistoricized gospel [hence his attraction to existentialism] which is in fact simply a reorientation of the gospel to fit the very particular constraints of the “modern mind.”