Orthodox and Modern

Forty years after his death, Karl Barth remains one of the most influential theologians of the last century. Of late, much has been written attempting to reassess his philosophical assumptions and theology from the perspectives of Anglo-American postmodernism and postliberalism. In this intriguing volume, Bruce McCormack presents critical chapters that challenge the prevailing revisionist trends and focus on Barth as a modern yet orthodox figure.

As he notes in his introduction, McCormack self-consciously reads Barth from a Continental perspective, and his essays will likely be controversial in their challenge to contemporary American perspectives. The first two sections of his study provide context for reading Barth in relation to nineteenth-century German theology and engage recent postmodern and postliberal views. The third section focuses more particularly on an aspect that McCormack believes is critically important in the contemporary setting--Barth's theological ontology. The final section gathers together occasional writings that survey several issues of continuing concern.

This collection will be of great interest to those who already have some knowledge of Karl Barth's theology, but it will also provide serious readers with an approachable and thoughtful account of several areas of critical concern for contemporary theology.

"This distinguished collection of studies presents Barth's theology as an attempt to discern what it means to be orthodox under the conditions of modernity, most of all, after the dissolution of the long-standing pact between Christian theology and classical metaphysics and epistemology. Each essay is a model of lucidity as well as wide learning and discriminating intelligence. McCormack moves with consummate ease and authority through the development of modern theology and the substance of Christian dogmatics. This is a book of rare historical and theological penetration from a commanding figure in Barth scholarship."--John Webster, chair of systematic theology, King's College, University of Aberdeen

"This collection of essays represents another major contribution from Bruce McCormack to our understanding of Barth. Typically rigorous, imaginative, and forceful, it provides frequent insight into Barth's massive theological output. McCormack shows how Barth's work continues to assail those in the church and the academy who search for a strong theology that remains alert to the ongoing problems and challenges of modernity. This volume will quickly become a standard point of reference for subsequent work in the field."--David Fergusson, professor of divinity, University of Edinburgh

Bruce McCormack (PhD, Prinecton Theological Seminary; Dr theol hc, Friederich Schiller University) is the Weyerhaeuser Professor of Systematic Theology at Princeton Theological Seminary in Princeton, New Jersey. He is world renowned Barth scholar.