One of the reasons why I changed tack was that I didn’t want this to become just a two way exchange. So far as Moltmann and Weisel’s pain is concerned my less than perfect theology really doesn’t matter.
I’m going to step back for a few days. My brother lost his wife in shocking circumstances a month ago and he’s coming to stay with us for three days. So I’m stopping posting at least until Wednesday and concentrating on him. Meanwhile we’ll both see whether anyone else is interested in looking at this issue. Grief, loss, and love are very much on my mind for someone I care about a lot.
Can I ask how and why the 'classic' understanding is 'wanting' in terms of God's reaching out to fallen humanity in his infinite love and care and its presentation of Christ's sufferings and Passion?
What 'need' there is for novelty and innovation in our understanding of it?
What doesn't the 'classic' position cover that Heschel and Moltmann have to 'put right'?
What has been deficient in the Church's general consensus and understanding of these issues for the last 2000 years?
How does their understanding make it more likely that we'd 'let our legs do the praying' at Selma than someone like Archbishop Iakavos who did the same from a different theological standpoint?
What is 'wrong' with the classic position that it has to be rectified?
I’m going to step back for a few days. My brother lost his wife in shocking circumstances a month ago and he’s coming to stay with us for three days. So I’m stopping posting at least until Wednesday and concentrating on him. Meanwhile we’ll both see whether anyone else is interested in looking at this issue. Grief, loss, and love are very much on my mind for someone I care about a lot.
One of the reasons why I changed tack was that I didn’t want this to become just a two way exchange. So far as Moltmann and Weisel’s pain is concerned my less than perfect theology really doesn’t matter.
I’m going to step back for a few days. My brother lost his wife in shocking circumstances a month ago and he’s coming to stay with us for three days. So I’m stopping posting at least until Wednesday and concentrating on him. Meanwhile we’ll both see whether anyone else is interested in looking at this issue. Grief, loss, and love are very much on my mind for someone I care about a lot.
Prayers for your brother, his wife (RIP), and you all. 😢🕯❤️
I've got no interest in arguing over theology from an academic point of view right now--whether this or that ought to be rectified. I don't fit well among the academic theologians, and I freely confess that my personal theology is informed by my life experiences. About the only thing that would override those would be the Scripture for me (naturally, since I'm a Lutheran).
Case in point: I came up against the question of God's emotions in a very personal way as the result of child abuse (and ongoing abuse through adulthood until three years ago). The particular nature of this abuse led to me seeking help and comfort in God (particularly, in Christ); but it also meant that a lot of my ... understanding? of God was severely lacking, particularly with regard to God the Father, and also in terms of God's emotions. This is a thing he set out to heal after my major abuser died, and there was time and space for me to get better without being continually ripped apart again.
I think I've mentioned elsewhere that my basic, unexamined assumption for my whole life up till last year was that while I had normal emotions (that is, they were a part of me, a response to my environment), God did not. I had always assumed that God knew my emotions, etc. toward him, examined them, and then logically chose a response and, well, ladled it out to me--without ever being personally affected himself. Without being affected the way human beings are affected and then generate emotions.
He, uh, chose to make it clear to me that I had it the wrong way around. That his emotions were not non-existent--as if they were weaker than ours--but that in fact, they were incredibly greater than ours--to a degree that is entirely suitable to his deity, but overwhelming to a created being like me. In particular, love-- I did not realize that love, his love, could be such a strong force it could be terrifying. ... I was afraid it would shake me apart. Up till then I think I had only experienced the shallows of his love--not the depths. But this was like a tsunami, like Niagara Falls, like a star going supernova. And I'm not claiming that I saw the whole of it. In fact, I'm pretty sure what I saw, felt, experienced, was just a bit deeper than I was used to already, enough to wipe me out, but not in fact the whole truth of it, which is probably something only the Trinity can know or comprehend.
Obviously nobody has to credit anything I've just said--the experience was personal, and nobody witnessed it but me. But wow. And since then, I've never been able to credit the idea that God has no emotions (and no, I'm not wanting to fight about the correct formulation of that idea, OR whether those who hold it are authorities of any kind, or what have you). I'm just speaking to the question of whether personal experiences inform theology. Maybe for some people they don't, but in my case they do--when they don't contradict Scripture.
And it's had this benefit, that never again have I been able to doubt that God in fact truly wants and loves me (or anybody else, it's clearly for all of us). It put that horrible doubt to rest forever.
Apologies to @Barnabas62 as I cross-posted with him when he told us of the pain and grief he is currently going through.
Lord have mercy!
Prayers ascending.
I don’t want this to become a two-way debate and welcome contributions from all posters.
Neither do I wish to diminish or undermine people's personal experiences. The very nature of those things is that they will be very particular and specific to each of us. They will also shape our approach to things.
For some of us the idea of divine immutability and 'impassibility' could be a source of comfort - it gives a sense of stability and consistency in terms of God's dealings with us.
For others that might not scratch where they itch as it were and feel that the idea of God suffering with them - or with suffering humanity as a whole - offers a deeper sense of God's grace and compassion.
The 'classic' view I'd suggest doesn't obviate the idea of God's complete solidarity with suffering humanity - the Passion of Christ is the ultimate expression of that.
Equally, I'd posit that the Palamite distinction between God's essence and energies - which integrates with the 'classic' view and augments/'completes' it as it were in Orthodox theology offers further promise in holding out the potential of theosis - of our sharing and participation in God's eternal and uncreated 'energies'.
That's why I'm banging a particular drum 🥁 on that issue in the same sort of way as @Lamb Chopped emphasises her Lutheran emphasis on scripture.
I'd argue of course that the 'classic' position is commensurate with scripture of course, all within the interpretive framework of Holy Tradition.
Whatever view we take on it and however much a part our own sufferings and personal experiences play into our theology and practice, it's pretty clear that people on both sides of this debate - or who aren't particularly engaged with it either way - 'pray with their legs'.
I would of course suggest that God 'truly wants and loves' every one whether we 'feel' or experience that to be the case or not - which doesn't mean that feelings or emotional responses can't or don't help us to appreciate or apprehend that more fully.
I'm not playing down the 'affective' element. That's there in the 'classic' understanding also.
I’ve got about 5 minutes. Read @Lamb Chopped’s moving post.
Worth adding that Heschel’s work is a critique of impassibility as it is understood in Traditional Judaism and Moltmann’s critique may well be more related to impassibility as understood in Protestantism.
The German Confessing Church group of which he was a member, was formed from churches protesting against Nazification in churches. Haven’t got full details but it’s likely to have been predominantly Lutheran.
In neither case is the criticism directly and obviously targeted at Catholicism or Orthodoxy. The implication is that if the cap fits wear it. If the cap doesn’t fit, then good.
The German Confessing Church group of which he was a member, was formed from churches protesting against Nazification in churches. Haven’t got full details but it’s likely to have been predominantly Lutheran.
Lutheran and Reformed. Remember that in many parts of Germany, including the former Prussia, Lutherans and the Reformed were in union churches.
Reformed theologian Karl Barth was part of the Confessing Church, and was the primary author of The Theological Declaration of Barmen (1934), which has confessional status in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).
I’ve got about 5 minutes. Read @Lamb Chopped’s moving post.
Worth adding that Heschel’s work is a critique of impassibility as it is understood in Traditional Judaism and Moltmann’s critique may well be more related to impassibility as understood in Protestantism.
The German Confessing Church group of which he was a member, was formed from churches protesting against Nazification in churches. Haven’t got full details but it’s likely to have been predominantly Lutheran.
In neither case is the criticism directly and obviously targeted at Catholicism or Orthodoxy. The implication is that if the cap fits wear it. If the cap doesn’t fit, then good.
Ok. Yes, I'd read @Lamb Chopped's moving post. Very good. It's very evident that God is 'on her case' if we can put it that way.
You raise an interesting point. I don't know enough about the way these matters are understood or addressed within Judaism.
I'd assume the Reformers and the RCs were pretty much on the same page on this one - which doesn't mean that contemporary Lutherans, Reformed Christians and RCs retain 16th century Western understandings of this issue.
They share a common Patristic heritage of course but, from an Orthodox perspective, some later post-Schism Scholastic accretions and twiddly bits.
Moltmann does seem to have been very au faith with Orthodox theology and called for churches to go back to the original Nicene creedal formularies without the addition of the 'filioque clause.'
He gets Orthodox 'top marks' for that. He also, so far as I understand, emphasised the communal aspects perichoreisis. Again, full marks.
I have no idea whether he took Orthodox understandings of 'divine impassibility' into account but he did challenge the 'Monarchical' view of the Trinity as he believed that this could encourage the development of authoritarian political systems.
I've seen a passing Orthodox comment online to the effect that whilst he shared common ground with us on many issues his theology left little room for theosis - which would earn him no marks from an Orthodox perspective.
I'm not the examiner so have no idea if that's the case or not.
Thanks @Lamb Chopped. I did know about that Declaration and that
Karl Barth wrote it. You can get The Prophets and The Crucified God on Kindle but if you’ve got a lot of other reading to do I’d give them a miss until you’ve got more head space. Maybe I should say a lot more headspace!?!
I got a copy of The Crucified God. Haven’t read too much of it but Moltmann does a critique of Martin Luther and also Karl Barth. It does look as though his primary focus was Protestant understanding.
And now I must go! We’ve got the spare bedroom ready for my brother and he’s arriving at 9.30am tomorrow. A bit more preparation required!
Thanks for the Maimonides link. I've heard of him but didn't know much about him.
Skimming through the Wikipedia article I noticed that he's seen as having an influence on both Aquinas and Duns Scotus.
I could do the standard Orthodox side-step here and say, 'Aha! That's Western theology, that's the delinquent and nefarious Medieval Scholastics. It doesn't apply to us at all! Nur-nah-na-na-nah!'
But then notice Maimonides was big on apophatic or 'negative' expressions about the nature of God rather than cataphatic or 'positive' statements about God's attributes.
That's very much an Eastern approach. We need a both/and one of course - both apophatic and cataphatic statements whilst appreciating that anything we say about God is going to be inadequate.
I've not read the Summa nor have I quite got my head around why the Christian East has an issue with Duns Scotus, even though I've read some articles about it all from both Orthodox and RC perspectives.
There's very much an Orthodox thing about the West getting more wonky or out of synch from around 1215 onwards with the First Lateran Council and then some developments in later Franciscan thought and some (but not all) aspects of Aquinas.
We'd see all that flowing into the Reformation Churches to a greater or lesser extent too. Hence the view that Moltmann is fine on some things but skewiff on others.
But I've not read enough of the source documents or arguments on both sides to get my head around it all.
Life's too short. God in his time or out of time will correct this, to nick a quote from RS Thomas.
I've got no interest in arguing over theology from an academic point of view right now--whether this or that ought to be rectified. I don't fit well among the academic theologians, and I freely confess that my personal theology is informed by my life experiences. About the only thing that would override those would be the Scripture for me (naturally, since I'm a Lutheran).
Case in point: I came up against the question of God's emotions in a very personal way as the result of child abuse (and ongoing abuse through adulthood until three years ago). The particular nature of this abuse led to me seeking help and comfort in God (particularly, in Christ); but it also meant that a lot of my ... understanding? of God was severely lacking, particularly with regard to God the Father, and also in terms of God's emotions. This is a thing he set out to heal after my major abuser died, and there was time and space for me to get better without being continually ripped apart again.
I think I've mentioned elsewhere that my basic, unexamined assumption for my whole life up till last year was that while I had normal emotions (that is, they were a part of me, a response to my environment), God did not. I had always assumed that God knew my emotions, etc. toward him, examined them, and then logically chose a response and, well, ladled it out to me--without ever being personally affected himself. Without being affected the way human beings are affected and then generate emotions.
He, uh, chose to make it clear to me that I had it the wrong way around. That his emotions were not non-existent--as if they were weaker than ours--but that in fact, they were incredibly greater than ours--to a degree that is entirely suitable to his deity, but overwhelming to a created being like me. In particular, love-- I did not realize that love, his love, could be such a strong force it could be terrifying. ... I was afraid it would shake me apart. Up till then I think I had only experienced the shallows of his love--not the depths. But this was like a tsunami, like Niagara Falls, like a star going supernova. And I'm not claiming that I saw the whole of it. In fact, I'm pretty sure what I saw, felt, experienced, was just a bit deeper than I was used to already, enough to wipe me out, but not in fact the whole truth of it, which is probably something only the Trinity can know or comprehend.
Obviously nobody has to credit anything I've just said--the experience was personal, and nobody witnessed it but me. But wow. And since then, I've never been able to credit the idea that God has no emotions (and no, I'm not wanting to fight about the correct formulation of that idea, OR whether those who hold it are authorities of any kind, or what have you). I'm just speaking to the question of whether personal experiences inform theology. Maybe for some people they don't, but in my case they do--when they don't contradict Scripture.
And it's had this benefit, that never again have I been able to doubt that God in fact truly wants and loves me (or anybody else, it's clearly for all of us). It put that horrible doubt to rest forever.
We might be in less disagreement than it sounds like. I do believe that whatever is in us (apart from sin, of course) is a reflection/image in some way of God, but infinitely smaller. What we call and experience as “emotion” being part of that. I still do not believe God changes at all, but a way of looking at it might be to imagine Him functioning, from our point of view, not in a static/frozen way, but at infinite speed, with love at infinite intensity.
Whatever our theology and whether we want to approach these things 'academically' or in a more 'affective' way or a mixture of the two - these things are never mutually exclusive - I think it's inevitable that we are going to 'interpret' these things according to our particular theological tradition.
So, for instance, reading @Lamb Chopped's moving account of her experiences I 'can't help' but 'interpret' them in a way that accords with an Orthodox understanding of these things. The accounts don't 'contradict' what I understand of the Orthodox approach and the Palamite distinction between God's 'essence' and 'energies.'
That would be entirely presumptous of me of course as they aren't 'my' experiences. Lamb Chopped is also perfectly entitled to approach these things as she sees fit and from her particular theological paradigm.
Again, whatever 'differences' there may or may not be these could be complementary rather than contradictory. I think all of us here who operate within a Christian faith position of whatever stripe would celebrate with Lamb Chopped and say, 'This is the Lord's doing and marvellous in our eyes!'
Obviously atheists and agnostics would see things differently.
'Some said it thundered.'
@ChastMastr the Palamite thing about the 'divine energies' is all about those 'uncreated and eternal' attributes acting in a dynamic and far from static way - which is how we are able to apprehend and experience them i in the here and now and in the midst of the vagaries and mutability of our earthly existence.
It's one of the reasons why I find the 'essence/energies' idea attractive as a way of making sense of all this - although it took me a good while to get my head around it and it's still - inevitably - work in progress.
It's how I can 'handle' the idea of God not changing and being immutable, ineffable and way beyond our ken yet also able to be 'known' and experienced at the same time. It's also why concepts like the 'Unmoved Mover' don't come into my frame of reference as that's not how these things are understood within my particular theological paradigm.
That's not to say there aren't Aristotelian and other Hellenistic and 'classical' philosophies in the mix. Of course there are.
I'd like to think the Orthodox view combines Hebraic and Hellenistic features and factors in a holistic and balanced 'both/and' kind of way but others may think differently.
It's not that I am 'opposed' to Heschel or Moltmann - or anyone else for that matter - it's simply that I'd need to know more about the particular paradigms they were challenging. Where I can make some kind of 'judgement' is to the extent to which their views overlap or clash with the particular theological position I operate within.
Which is fair enough, I think, as long as I'm not rude about them or dismissive in any way.
I've got no interest in arguing over theology from an academic point of view right now--whether this or that ought to be rectified. I don't fit well among the academic theologians, and I freely confess that my personal theology is informed by my life experiences. About the only thing that would override those would be the Scripture for me (naturally, since I'm a Lutheran).
Case in point: I came up against the question of God's emotions in a very personal way as the result of child abuse (and ongoing abuse through adulthood until three years ago). The particular nature of this abuse led to me seeking help and comfort in God (particularly, in Christ); but it also meant that a lot of my ... understanding? of God was severely lacking, particularly with regard to God the Father, and also in terms of God's emotions. This is a thing he set out to heal after my major abuser died, and there was time and space for me to get better without being continually ripped apart again.
I think I've mentioned elsewhere that my basic, unexamined assumption for my whole life up till last year was that while I had normal emotions (that is, they were a part of me, a response to my environment), God did not. I had always assumed that God knew my emotions, etc. toward him, examined them, and then logically chose a response and, well, ladled it out to me--without ever being personally affected himself. Without being affected the way human beings are affected and then generate emotions.
He, uh, chose to make it clear to me that I had it the wrong way around. That his emotions were not non-existent--as if they were weaker than ours--but that in fact, they were incredibly greater than ours--to a degree that is entirely suitable to his deity, but overwhelming to a created being like me. In particular, love-- I did not realize that love, his love, could be such a strong force it could be terrifying. ... I was afraid it would shake me apart. Up till then I think I had only experienced the shallows of his love--not the depths. But this was like a tsunami, like Niagara Falls, like a star going supernova. And I'm not claiming that I saw the whole of it. In fact, I'm pretty sure what I saw, felt, experienced, was just a bit deeper than I was used to already, enough to wipe me out, but not in fact the whole truth of it, which is probably something only the Trinity can know or comprehend.
Obviously nobody has to credit anything I've just said--the experience was personal, and nobody witnessed it but me. But wow. And since then, I've never been able to credit the idea that God has no emotions (and no, I'm not wanting to fight about the correct formulation of that idea, OR whether those who hold it are authorities of any kind, or what have you). I'm just speaking to the question of whether personal experiences inform theology. Maybe for some people they don't, but in my case they do--when they don't contradict Scripture.
And it's had this benefit, that never again have I been able to doubt that God in fact truly wants and loves me (or anybody else, it's clearly for all of us). It put that horrible doubt to rest forever.
We might be in less disagreement than it sounds like. I do believe that whatever is in us (apart from sin, of course) is a reflection/image in some way of God, but infinitely smaller. What we call and experience as “emotion” being part of that. I still do not believe God changes at all, but a way of looking at it might be to imagine Him functioning, from our point of view, not in a static/frozen way, but at infinite speed, with love at infinite intensity.
I think that might be a very good way of describing it. Thank you.
I'm not at all convinced that possessing emotions means that one changes. Nor do I think that for God to give his creation permission to affect him (if I can put it that way) is in any way improper to deity. We've already seen him choose to humble himself to the Incarnation and then to death, even death on a cross. A God who would do that, it seems to me, is a God who would have no problem at all with allowing his creation to "act upon him" or affect him via emotion.
I suspect the problem lies in the way we conceptualizer emotion. If we think of it as a series of moods that flit past, filling a single mental screen and then giving way to the next, that does suggest change. But that's not how I'm seeing God's emotions. He doesn't love for a while and then love gives way to (say) sorrow. It seems to me that he is always loving at full blast, at the same time as he's always sorrowing / joyful/ angry (appropriately) etc. I don't think he turns these emotions off. I think he's capable of feeling them all at full strength all the time.
If I can express it this way, the variation we experience comes from us moving from zone to zone of emotion, not from him turning off one emotion and turning on another. Our actions make the difference to how we experience him. Behave in one way and experience his joy in that "zone", behave in a different way and move to experiencing his anger (at what you're doing to harm yourself or others). Repent and you're back to joy or gentleness. But it's us that change. In that sense, maybe, it could be said that he does not change in spite of having real, infinitely strong emotions, and allowing us to act on him. We aren't changing him, maybe, so much as we're changing how we experience him. And yet his emotions are real.
We aren't changing him, maybe, so much as we're changing how we experience him. And yet his emotions are real.
I think that's pretty much what the patristic and medieval advocates of the idea were saying. It's not that they thought that God had nothing we would call emotions; it's that they thought God's emotions are constant attitudes to creation (and between the persons of the Trinity).
I wonder, from @Barnabas62's description, whether Herschel and Maimonides aren't talking past each other. Not that I've read either, so this is rather tentative. But I don't know that the medieval scholastics would reject an account of infinite concern. It's just that they'd want to pair it with the thought that God is outside time; and also that when God changes his mind it can't be because something God didn't know has come to God's attention, nor is it because God has calmed down and thought better of God's initial reaction. As far as I'm can think of the Bible, God doesn't change God's mind unless the situation has changed.
I'd say this of course wouldn't I, but how you've both articulated those observations seems - to me at least - as close to or commensurate with the Patristic understanding.
Here's that lovely line from Hopkins again which both asserts God's immutability with his active engagement with this present world: 'He fathers forth, whose beauty is past change.'
The essence/energies distinction 'allows' us to interact with God's eternal and uncreated 'energies' without altering his immutable 'essence' - as it were.
The Incarnation, life, death and glorious Resurrection has always been part of God's 'eternal plan' - the 'Lamb slain from before the foundation of the earth.'
It's not as if Father, Son and Holy Spirit had an emergency confab when things started to go wrong.
"OK you guys, look what's happened now. How are we going to fix this one?'
God is outside time so our temporal struggles can't 'affect' him in any sense of 'directional' or attitudinal change, but through the uncreated and eternal divine energies we can apprehend and experience them as love, sorrow, approval or disapproval etc.
All analogies are imperfect but the energies have been enlikened to an electric current. The electricity is always there but we only experience or 'utilise' its power when there's a circuit and connection to direct the current.
That analogy is inadequate of course as God isn't an impersonal 'faith force". God's love, mercy and grace aren't external and created properties or attributes but 'expressions' of his nature. God isn't just loving, he is Love. He isn't just gracious, he is Love ... and so on.
Back briefly. My brother has just left (his excellent son in law is driving him back to their home). He said it had been a therapeutic time for him. It felt that was to us too.
I’ll probably have a nap this afternoon. But I have been reading a chapter or two of Jurgen Moltmann’s “The Crucified God”. Sufficient to know that his thoughts have something to say of value re this thread. More later. Probably tomorrow. It’s been a very good but tiring time.
I've got no interest in arguing over theology from an academic point of view right now--whether this or that ought to be rectified. I don't fit well among the academic theologians, and I freely confess that my personal theology is informed by my life experiences. About the only thing that would override those would be the Scripture for me (naturally, since I'm a Lutheran).
Case in point: I came up against the question of God's emotions in a very personal way as the result of child abuse (and ongoing abuse through adulthood until three years ago). The particular nature of this abuse led to me seeking help and comfort in God (particularly, in Christ); but it also meant that a lot of my ... understanding? of God was severely lacking, particularly with regard to God the Father, and also in terms of God's emotions. This is a thing he set out to heal after my major abuser died, and there was time and space for me to get better without being continually ripped apart again.
I think I've mentioned elsewhere that my basic, unexamined assumption for my whole life up till last year was that while I had normal emotions (that is, they were a part of me, a response to my environment), God did not. I had always assumed that God knew my emotions, etc. toward him, examined them, and then logically chose a response and, well, ladled it out to me--without ever being personally affected himself. Without being affected the way human beings are affected and then generate emotions.
He, uh, chose to make it clear to me that I had it the wrong way around. That his emotions were not non-existent--as if they were weaker than ours--but that in fact, they were incredibly greater than ours--to a degree that is entirely suitable to his deity, but overwhelming to a created being like me. In particular, love-- I did not realize that love, his love, could be such a strong force it could be terrifying. ... I was afraid it would shake me apart. Up till then I think I had only experienced the shallows of his love--not the depths. But this was like a tsunami, like Niagara Falls, like a star going supernova. And I'm not claiming that I saw the whole of it. In fact, I'm pretty sure what I saw, felt, experienced, was just a bit deeper than I was used to already, enough to wipe me out, but not in fact the whole truth of it, which is probably something only the Trinity can know or comprehend.
Obviously nobody has to credit anything I've just said--the experience was personal, and nobody witnessed it but me. But wow. And since then, I've never been able to credit the idea that God has no emotions (and no, I'm not wanting to fight about the correct formulation of that idea, OR whether those who hold it are authorities of any kind, or what have you). I'm just speaking to the question of whether personal experiences inform theology. Maybe for some people they don't, but in my case they do--when they don't contradict Scripture.
And it's had this benefit, that never again have I been able to doubt that God in fact truly wants and loves me (or anybody else, it's clearly for all of us). It put that horrible doubt to rest forever.
We might be in less disagreement than it sounds like. I do believe that whatever is in us (apart from sin, of course) is a reflection/image in some way of God, but infinitely smaller. What we call and experience as “emotion” being part of that. I still do not believe God changes at all, but a way of looking at it might be to imagine Him functioning, from our point of view, not in a static/frozen way, but at infinite speed, with love at infinite intensity.
I think that might be a very good way of describing it. Thank you.
I'm not at all convinced that possessing emotions means that one changes. Nor do I think that for God to give his creation permission to affect him (if I can put it that way) is in any way improper to deity. We've already seen him choose to humble himself to the Incarnation and then to death, even death on a cross. A God who would do that, it seems to me, is a God who would have no problem at all with allowing his creation to "act upon him" or affect him via emotion.
I suspect the problem lies in the way we conceptualizer emotion. If we think of it as a series of moods that flit past, filling a single mental screen and then giving way to the next, that does suggest change. But that's not how I'm seeing God's emotions. He doesn't love for a while and then love gives way to (say) sorrow. It seems to me that he is always loving at full blast, at the same time as he's always sorrowing / joyful/ angry (appropriately) etc. I don't think he turns these emotions off. I think he's capable of feeling them all at full strength all the time.
If I can express it this way, the variation we experience comes from us moving from zone to zone of emotion, not from him turning off one emotion and turning on another. Our actions make the difference to how we experience him. Behave in one way and experience his joy in that "zone", behave in a different way and move to experiencing his anger (at what you're doing to harm yourself or others). Repent and you're back to joy or gentleness. But it's us that change. In that sense, maybe, it could be said that he does not change in spite of having real, infinitely strong emotions, and allowing us to act on him. We aren't changing him, maybe, so much as we're changing how we experience him. And yet his emotions are real.
If I understand you right, I think we may be on the same page, then.
I’m not going to even attempt a summary analysis of what Jurgen Moltmann was trying to say. To start with, I didn’t find him at all easy to read. Lots of long Germanic sentences translated in English into lots of long complex and often puzzlingly obscure sentences. Then I suddenly “got him”. Not sure how or why, but the lights switched on.
Anyway. I’m not going to try comprehensive. But maybe just a few impressions.
I think one of the most important things he says is this.
In antiquity, the divine being was not a problem. Its existence was rarely doubted. It was man in his relationship to God which was the problem.
But he understands very clearly that the way thought has moved on, God is a problem. Is He or is He not there? If He is there is He really good. Have we imagined Him as some kind of Cosmic Sadist and how can that fit in with Him being asserted as good?
This is exemplified by the excerpt from E Wiesel’s “Night” which I mentioned before.
“Where is God now?”
Is He really hanging from the gallows? Does He in some way appreciate our pain but remain unaffected by it? Or is He just not there?
So far as hanging from the gallows is concerned there is this poignant quote from Moltmann.
Any other answer would be blasphemy. There cannot be any other answer to the question of this torment. To speak of a God who could not suffer would make God a demon. To speak here of an absolute God would make God an annihilating nothingness. To speak here of an indifferent God would condemn men to indifference.
.
Moving? Blasphemous? A misunderstanding? Or opening the door on how does divine impassibility speak to people today?
It reminded me of something I read years ago.
Up to and including the 19th century, the issue for faith was the problem of human sinfulness. In the 20th century following the unspeakable mass horrors of the two World Wars it became the problem of pain.
Given Moltmann’s early experiences, his deep depression and his experience of Christ finding him when he was in a very dark place, I can understand why he relatesd strongly to Abraham Heschel’s understanding of Divine Pathos, why it spoke to him. As he quotes and says in the book.
I think the problems of pain and sin are inextricably intertwined . Collectively we are not just sinners. Nor are we just victims. The summary of Forde’s book is absolutely right about that.
Unhurt people hurt people. Hurt people hurt people. And the natural disasters of the world hurt people.
I’m still digesting “The Crucified God”. It’s not an easy read but I think it’s a profound one. I’m not surprised by its good reviews and significant influence.
At the risk of being simplistic it could be said that the Fathers, expanded on by the Palamite essence/energies offer a 'solution' to the problems Moltmann poses and have done so for hundreds of years.
Not that everything is 'done and dusted' of course.
I don't believe we do a disservice to the uniquely horrific horrors of the 20th century - the Holocaust, the Stalinist purges, the 'Rape of Nanking', Pol Pot's genocide, US and Russian interference in conflicts worldwide - by suggesting that previous generations saw plague, genocide (Genghiz Khan, the colonial conquests of the Americas etc) and horrors also.
I don’t wish to be dismissive or take a 'tick box' Patristic/Palamite position in a casual kind of way but I'm not sure what Moltmann 'adds' that isn't already available within that Tradition.
That doesn't clear everything up in terms of theodicy but Moltmann appears to be asking questions that have already been 'addressed', if I can put it that way.
Does Moltmann address the essence/energies distinction in The Crucified God, @Barnabas62?
I'm sure he must have been aware of it given that he was well versed in Orthodox theology and respected in Orthodox circles.
Yes, he rejected the 'Monarchical' view of the Trinity but he also pressed for World Council of Churches members to drop the filioque clause. He also put a great deal of emphasis on perichoreisis, the relationship between the Persons of the Holy and Undivided Trinity in terms that gained Orthodox approval from what I can gather.
And we're a contentious bunch and difficult to please. 😉
Close but no cigar? 😉
Joking aside, it sounds churlish to challenge Moltmann given what he went through and it could sound as though we are down-playing the Holocaust in doing so - which certainly wouldn't be the intention of any right thinking person.
But I still don't understand the 'problem' when, to my mind at least, the 'classic' understanding and the Palamite distinction between divine essence and energies offer a way to understand these difficulties. Not by brushing them under the carpet but by putting things in an 'eternal' perspective.
Perhaps it’s a solution that people find very difficult to hear or understand today? Maybe pain and doubts about God drown it out? Faith sharing needs to understand the people we are sharing faith with?
For the rest, I’ll get back to you. My impression is as I said before that his primary critique is pointed at an aspect of Protestant understanding. Hardly surprising given his membership of the Confessing Church. And his profound understanding of the damage caused by Nazification. Like Heschel, his experiences of pain were different to ours.
Sure. And just because he seems to be coming at this from a different direction to how we'd approach these things in my own circles doesn't mean that we can't read Moltmann without profit.
In a similar way to how I was both impressed and moved by Zurbaran's religious art in the National Gallery yesterday even though I don't share the same Thomist and Counter-Reformation perspective he was operating within.
Allegorical images of the Immaculate Conception of Mary, for instance, although I appreciated depictions of Joachim and Anna, the 'ancestors of God' (Christ's Gran and Grandad) who are commemorated in the Liturgy each week.
I'm not sure why 'pain and doubts' should 'drown out' the 'classical' understanding any more now than at other times. The Black Death for instance? Although arguably that did lead to more depictions of the sufferings of Christ - and indeed paved the way for some features that fed into the Reformation.
I'd be interested to know whether Moltmann engaged with the 'classic' understanding in its Eastern Christian form, with its important Palamite distinction and rejected it because he felt it was inadequate.
Or whether he felt it wasn't pertinent to his Western Christian perspective. Which would seem odd as he was fully engaged in discussions with Orthodox theologians and would undoubtedly have come across it.
Equally, I'd submit that the 'classic' understanding and the Palamite distinction between God's essence and energies does enable us to deal with pain and doubts - although we can't 'do away' with those completely of course - nor should we.
Moltmann was very well and widely read. On ancient and modern philosophies and early church understandings, and Reformation understandings. the evidence is very clear from his references. I can’t word search his text but I’ve looked at his index of names. St Gregory Palamas doesn’t feature. And from memory neither does the hesychastic controversy. I’d be very surprised if he didn’t know.
And as you say. from both his later writings and his dialogues with Catholicism and Orthodoxy he seems to have placed a strong value on working towards ecumenical theologies. Which given the divisions which gave rise to the Confessing Church is maybe surprising. But certainly hopeful!
So far as impassibility is concerned I should think his view of Divine Pathos was deep within him, central to who he was personally as a believer. It seems very unlikely that ever changed, but I suppose in his journey it might have had some of the corners knocked off.
Sure. I don’t know a great deal about Moltmann but can well imagine how and why The Crucified God remained embedded in his spiritual DNA.
I'm not saying he should have abandoned it but did wonder whether he'd taken the Palamite distinction into account when developing his views on this issue.
Sure, which is one of the reasons (I think) why I started a thread on that topic. A vast one.
There'll be parallels/overlaps between Luther's views on that and Orthodox understandings of course. Some aspects very much in synch, as indeed with Luther's views on 'mystic union' with God and the Christian East's views on theosis.
As indeed there are with Gustav Aulen's Christus Victor approach to the atonement and Orthodox understandings. See @Gramps49's new atonement thread.
There will be plenty of common ground on other issues besides.
The Eastern take on these things tends to be less juridical and 'forensic'. I'm not quite sure how that plays into Moltmann's understanding - nor indeed how 'juridical' Luther was in his approach or whether these aspects are a later development within Lutheranism.
Given that the Reformers derived a great deal from late medieval Western Scholastic theology I wouldn't be surprised if more Aristotelian Thomist elements were retained - even if in a modified way - by both Luther and Calvin. Moltmann appears to have drawn from both the Lutheran and Reformed traditions as far as I can make out.
The 'Unmoved Mover' emphasis was very much a Thomist one and as has been noted several times, Luther was very much in the Augustinian tradition in a way that was less apparent in the Christian East.
As far as Luther's theology of the Cross goes, if I understand it correctly - and it's a hu-uu-ge topic - then God revealing himself through suffering is very much in line with Eastern Christian approaches, whatever differences there might be otherwise.
Comments
I’m going to step back for a few days. My brother lost his wife in shocking circumstances a month ago and he’s coming to stay with us for three days. So I’m stopping posting at least until Wednesday and concentrating on him. Meanwhile we’ll both see whether anyone else is interested in looking at this issue. Grief, loss, and love are very much on my mind for someone I care about a lot.
What 'need' there is for novelty and innovation in our understanding of it?
What doesn't the 'classic' position cover that Heschel and Moltmann have to 'put right'?
What has been deficient in the Church's general consensus and understanding of these issues for the last 2000 years?
How does their understanding make it more likely that we'd 'let our legs do the praying' at Selma than someone like Archbishop Iakavos who did the same from a different theological standpoint?
What is 'wrong' with the classic position that it has to be rectified?
Oh dear, I'm so sorry. Praying for you all.
Prayers for your brother, his wife (RIP), and you all. 😢🕯❤️
Case in point: I came up against the question of God's emotions in a very personal way as the result of child abuse (and ongoing abuse through adulthood until three years ago). The particular nature of this abuse led to me seeking help and comfort in God (particularly, in Christ); but it also meant that a lot of my ... understanding? of God was severely lacking, particularly with regard to God the Father, and also in terms of God's emotions. This is a thing he set out to heal after my major abuser died, and there was time and space for me to get better without being continually ripped apart again.
I think I've mentioned elsewhere that my basic, unexamined assumption for my whole life up till last year was that while I had normal emotions (that is, they were a part of me, a response to my environment), God did not. I had always assumed that God knew my emotions, etc. toward him, examined them, and then logically chose a response and, well, ladled it out to me--without ever being personally affected himself. Without being affected the way human beings are affected and then generate emotions.
He, uh, chose to make it clear to me that I had it the wrong way around. That his emotions were not non-existent--as if they were weaker than ours--but that in fact, they were incredibly greater than ours--to a degree that is entirely suitable to his deity, but overwhelming to a created being like me. In particular, love-- I did not realize that love, his love, could be such a strong force it could be terrifying. ... I was afraid it would shake me apart. Up till then I think I had only experienced the shallows of his love--not the depths. But this was like a tsunami, like Niagara Falls, like a star going supernova. And I'm not claiming that I saw the whole of it. In fact, I'm pretty sure what I saw, felt, experienced, was just a bit deeper than I was used to already, enough to wipe me out, but not in fact the whole truth of it, which is probably something only the Trinity can know or comprehend.
Obviously nobody has to credit anything I've just said--the experience was personal, and nobody witnessed it but me. But wow. And since then, I've never been able to credit the idea that God has no emotions (and no, I'm not wanting to fight about the correct formulation of that idea, OR whether those who hold it are authorities of any kind, or what have you). I'm just speaking to the question of whether personal experiences inform theology. Maybe for some people they don't, but in my case they do--when they don't contradict Scripture.
And it's had this benefit, that never again have I been able to doubt that God in fact truly wants and loves me (or anybody else, it's clearly for all of us). It put that horrible doubt to rest forever.
Lord have mercy!
Prayers ascending.
I don’t want this to become a two-way debate and welcome contributions from all posters.
Neither do I wish to diminish or undermine people's personal experiences. The very nature of those things is that they will be very particular and specific to each of us. They will also shape our approach to things.
For some of us the idea of divine immutability and 'impassibility' could be a source of comfort - it gives a sense of stability and consistency in terms of God's dealings with us.
For others that might not scratch where they itch as it were and feel that the idea of God suffering with them - or with suffering humanity as a whole - offers a deeper sense of God's grace and compassion.
The 'classic' view I'd suggest doesn't obviate the idea of God's complete solidarity with suffering humanity - the Passion of Christ is the ultimate expression of that.
Equally, I'd posit that the Palamite distinction between God's essence and energies - which integrates with the 'classic' view and augments/'completes' it as it were in Orthodox theology offers further promise in holding out the potential of theosis - of our sharing and participation in God's eternal and uncreated 'energies'.
That's why I'm banging a particular drum 🥁 on that issue in the same sort of way as @Lamb Chopped emphasises her Lutheran emphasis on scripture.
I'd argue of course that the 'classic' position is commensurate with scripture of course, all within the interpretive framework of Holy Tradition.
Whatever view we take on it and however much a part our own sufferings and personal experiences play into our theology and practice, it's pretty clear that people on both sides of this debate - or who aren't particularly engaged with it either way - 'pray with their legs'.
And we should glorify God for that.
I'm not playing down the 'affective' element. That's there in the 'classic' understanding also.
"Yet none of the disciples dared ask Him, 'Who are you?' - knowing it was the Lord."
John 21:12b
Worth adding that Heschel’s work is a critique of impassibility as it is understood in Traditional Judaism and Moltmann’s critique may well be more related to impassibility as understood in Protestantism.
The German Confessing Church group of which he was a member, was formed from churches protesting against Nazification in churches. Haven’t got full details but it’s likely to have been predominantly Lutheran.
In neither case is the criticism directly and obviously targeted at Catholicism or Orthodoxy. The implication is that if the cap fits wear it. If the cap doesn’t fit, then good.
Reformed theologian Karl Barth was part of the Confessing Church, and was the primary author of The Theological Declaration of Barmen (1934), which has confessional status in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).
Ok. Yes, I'd read @Lamb Chopped's moving post. Very good. It's very evident that God is 'on her case' if we can put it that way.
You raise an interesting point. I don't know enough about the way these matters are understood or addressed within Judaism.
I'd assume the Reformers and the RCs were pretty much on the same page on this one - which doesn't mean that contemporary Lutherans, Reformed Christians and RCs retain 16th century Western understandings of this issue.
They share a common Patristic heritage of course but, from an Orthodox perspective, some later post-Schism Scholastic accretions and twiddly bits.
Moltmann does seem to have been very au faith with Orthodox theology and called for churches to go back to the original Nicene creedal formularies without the addition of the 'filioque clause.'
He gets Orthodox 'top marks' for that. He also, so far as I understand, emphasised the communal aspects perichoreisis. Again, full marks.
I have no idea whether he took Orthodox understandings of 'divine impassibility' into account but he did challenge the 'Monarchical' view of the Trinity as he believed that this could encourage the development of authoritarian political systems.
I've seen a passing Orthodox comment online to the effect that whilst he shared common ground with us on many issues his theology left little room for theosis - which would earn him no marks from an Orthodox perspective.
I'm not the examiner so have no idea if that's the case or not.
Karl Barth wrote it. You can get The Prophets and The Crucified God on Kindle but if you’ve got a lot of other reading to do I’d give them a miss until you’ve got more head space. Maybe I should say a lot more headspace!?!
I got a copy of The Crucified God. Haven’t read too much of it but Moltmann does a critique of Martin Luther and also Karl Barth. It does look as though his primary focus was Protestant understanding.
And now I must go! We’ve got the spare bedroom ready for my brother and he’s arriving at 9.30am tomorrow. A bit more preparation required!
Re Maimonides
If you’ve got the time …..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Guide_for_the_Perplexed
It was @Nick Tamen not @Lamb Chopped who provided the link to Barth's 'Declaration'.
Thanks for the Maimonides link. I've heard of him but didn't know much about him.
Skimming through the Wikipedia article I noticed that he's seen as having an influence on both Aquinas and Duns Scotus.
I could do the standard Orthodox side-step here and say, 'Aha! That's Western theology, that's the delinquent and nefarious Medieval Scholastics. It doesn't apply to us at all! Nur-nah-na-na-nah!'
But then notice Maimonides was big on apophatic or 'negative' expressions about the nature of God rather than cataphatic or 'positive' statements about God's attributes.
That's very much an Eastern approach. We need a both/and one of course - both apophatic and cataphatic statements whilst appreciating that anything we say about God is going to be inadequate.
I've not read the Summa nor have I quite got my head around why the Christian East has an issue with Duns Scotus, even though I've read some articles about it all from both Orthodox and RC perspectives.
There's very much an Orthodox thing about the West getting more wonky or out of synch from around 1215 onwards with the First Lateran Council and then some developments in later Franciscan thought and some (but not all) aspects of Aquinas.
We'd see all that flowing into the Reformation Churches to a greater or lesser extent too. Hence the view that Moltmann is fine on some things but skewiff on others.
But I've not read enough of the source documents or arguments on both sides to get my head around it all.
Life's too short. God in his time or out of time will correct this, to nick a quote from RS Thomas.
We might be in less disagreement than it sounds like. I do believe that whatever is in us (apart from sin, of course) is a reflection/image in some way of God, but infinitely smaller. What we call and experience as “emotion” being part of that. I still do not believe God changes at all, but a way of looking at it might be to imagine Him functioning, from our point of view, not in a static/frozen way, but at infinite speed, with love at infinite intensity.
So, for instance, reading @Lamb Chopped's moving account of her experiences I 'can't help' but 'interpret' them in a way that accords with an Orthodox understanding of these things. The accounts don't 'contradict' what I understand of the Orthodox approach and the Palamite distinction between God's 'essence' and 'energies.'
That would be entirely presumptous of me of course as they aren't 'my' experiences. Lamb Chopped is also perfectly entitled to approach these things as she sees fit and from her particular theological paradigm.
Again, whatever 'differences' there may or may not be these could be complementary rather than contradictory. I think all of us here who operate within a Christian faith position of whatever stripe would celebrate with Lamb Chopped and say, 'This is the Lord's doing and marvellous in our eyes!'
Obviously atheists and agnostics would see things differently.
'Some said it thundered.'
@ChastMastr the Palamite thing about the 'divine energies' is all about those 'uncreated and eternal' attributes acting in a dynamic and far from static way - which is how we are able to apprehend and experience them i in the here and now and in the midst of the vagaries and mutability of our earthly existence.
It's one of the reasons why I find the 'essence/energies' idea attractive as a way of making sense of all this - although it took me a good while to get my head around it and it's still - inevitably - work in progress.
It's how I can 'handle' the idea of God not changing and being immutable, ineffable and way beyond our ken yet also able to be 'known' and experienced at the same time. It's also why concepts like the 'Unmoved Mover' don't come into my frame of reference as that's not how these things are understood within my particular theological paradigm.
That's not to say there aren't Aristotelian and other Hellenistic and 'classical' philosophies in the mix. Of course there are.
I'd like to think the Orthodox view combines Hebraic and Hellenistic features and factors in a holistic and balanced 'both/and' kind of way but others may think differently.
It's not that I am 'opposed' to Heschel or Moltmann - or anyone else for that matter - it's simply that I'd need to know more about the particular paradigms they were challenging. Where I can make some kind of 'judgement' is to the extent to which their views overlap or clash with the particular theological position I operate within.
Which is fair enough, I think, as long as I'm not rude about them or dismissive in any way.
I think that might be a very good way of describing it. Thank you.
I'm not at all convinced that possessing emotions means that one changes. Nor do I think that for God to give his creation permission to affect him (if I can put it that way) is in any way improper to deity. We've already seen him choose to humble himself to the Incarnation and then to death, even death on a cross. A God who would do that, it seems to me, is a God who would have no problem at all with allowing his creation to "act upon him" or affect him via emotion.
I suspect the problem lies in the way we conceptualizer emotion. If we think of it as a series of moods that flit past, filling a single mental screen and then giving way to the next, that does suggest change. But that's not how I'm seeing God's emotions. He doesn't love for a while and then love gives way to (say) sorrow. It seems to me that he is always loving at full blast, at the same time as he's always sorrowing / joyful/ angry (appropriately) etc. I don't think he turns these emotions off. I think he's capable of feeling them all at full strength all the time.
If I can express it this way, the variation we experience comes from us moving from zone to zone of emotion, not from him turning off one emotion and turning on another. Our actions make the difference to how we experience him. Behave in one way and experience his joy in that "zone", behave in a different way and move to experiencing his anger (at what you're doing to harm yourself or others). Repent and you're back to joy or gentleness. But it's us that change. In that sense, maybe, it could be said that he does not change in spite of having real, infinitely strong emotions, and allowing us to act on him. We aren't changing him, maybe, so much as we're changing how we experience him. And yet his emotions are real.
I wonder, from @Barnabas62's description, whether Herschel and Maimonides aren't talking past each other. Not that I've read either, so this is rather tentative. But I don't know that the medieval scholastics would reject an account of infinite concern. It's just that they'd want to pair it with the thought that God is outside time; and also that when God changes his mind it can't be because something God didn't know has come to God's attention, nor is it because God has calmed down and thought better of God's initial reaction. As far as I'm can think of the Bible, God doesn't change God's mind unless the situation has changed.
I'd say this of course wouldn't I, but how you've both articulated those observations seems - to me at least - as close to or commensurate with the Patristic understanding.
Here's that lovely line from Hopkins again which both asserts God's immutability with his active engagement with this present world: 'He fathers forth, whose beauty is past change.'
The essence/energies distinction 'allows' us to interact with God's eternal and uncreated 'energies' without altering his immutable 'essence' - as it were.
The Incarnation, life, death and glorious Resurrection has always been part of God's 'eternal plan' - the 'Lamb slain from before the foundation of the earth.'
It's not as if Father, Son and Holy Spirit had an emergency confab when things started to go wrong.
"OK you guys, look what's happened now. How are we going to fix this one?'
God is outside time so our temporal struggles can't 'affect' him in any sense of 'directional' or attitudinal change, but through the uncreated and eternal divine energies we can apprehend and experience them as love, sorrow, approval or disapproval etc.
All analogies are imperfect but the energies have been enlikened to an electric current. The electricity is always there but we only experience or 'utilise' its power when there's a circuit and connection to direct the current.
That analogy is inadequate of course as God isn't an impersonal 'faith force". God's love, mercy and grace aren't external and created properties or attributes but 'expressions' of his nature. God isn't just loving, he is Love. He isn't just gracious, he is Love ... and so on.
I’ll probably have a nap this afternoon. But I have been reading a chapter or two of Jurgen Moltmann’s “The Crucified God”. Sufficient to know that his thoughts have something to say of value re this thread. More later. Probably tomorrow. It’s been a very good but tiring time.
If I understand you right, I think we may be on the same page, then.
I’m not going to even attempt a summary analysis of what Jurgen Moltmann was trying to say. To start with, I didn’t find him at all easy to read. Lots of long Germanic sentences translated in English into lots of long complex and often puzzlingly obscure sentences. Then I suddenly “got him”. Not sure how or why, but the lights switched on.
Anyway. I’m not going to try comprehensive. But maybe just a few impressions.
I think one of the most important things he says is this.
But he understands very clearly that the way thought has moved on, God is a problem. Is He or is He not there? If He is there is He really good. Have we imagined Him as some kind of Cosmic Sadist and how can that fit in with Him being asserted as good?
This is exemplified by the excerpt from E Wiesel’s “Night” which I mentioned before.
“Where is God now?”
Is He really hanging from the gallows? Does He in some way appreciate our pain but remain unaffected by it? Or is He just not there?
So far as hanging from the gallows is concerned there is this poignant quote from Moltmann.
.
Moving? Blasphemous? A misunderstanding? Or opening the door on how does divine impassibility speak to people today?
It reminded me of something I read years ago.
Given Moltmann’s early experiences, his deep depression and his experience of Christ finding him when he was in a very dark place, I can understand why he relatesd strongly to Abraham Heschel’s understanding of Divine Pathos, why it spoke to him. As he quotes and says in the book.
I think the problems of pain and sin are inextricably intertwined . Collectively we are not just sinners. Nor are we just victims. The summary of Forde’s book is absolutely right about that.
Unhurt people hurt people. Hurt people hurt people. And the natural disasters of the world hurt people.
I’m still digesting “The Crucified God”. It’s not an easy read but I think it’s a profound one. I’m not surprised by its good reviews and significant influence.
Not that everything is 'done and dusted' of course.
I don't believe we do a disservice to the uniquely horrific horrors of the 20th century - the Holocaust, the Stalinist purges, the 'Rape of Nanking', Pol Pot's genocide, US and Russian interference in conflicts worldwide - by suggesting that previous generations saw plague, genocide (Genghiz Khan, the colonial conquests of the Americas etc) and horrors also.
I don’t wish to be dismissive or take a 'tick box' Patristic/Palamite position in a casual kind of way but I'm not sure what Moltmann 'adds' that isn't already available within that Tradition.
That doesn't clear everything up in terms of theodicy but Moltmann appears to be asking questions that have already been 'addressed', if I can put it that way.
I'm sure he must have been aware of it given that he was well versed in Orthodox theology and respected in Orthodox circles.
Yes, he rejected the 'Monarchical' view of the Trinity but he also pressed for World Council of Churches members to drop the filioque clause. He also put a great deal of emphasis on perichoreisis, the relationship between the Persons of the Holy and Undivided Trinity in terms that gained Orthodox approval from what I can gather.
And we're a contentious bunch and difficult to please. 😉
Close but no cigar? 😉
Joking aside, it sounds churlish to challenge Moltmann given what he went through and it could sound as though we are down-playing the Holocaust in doing so - which certainly wouldn't be the intention of any right thinking person.
But I still don't understand the 'problem' when, to my mind at least, the 'classic' understanding and the Palamite distinction between divine essence and energies offer a way to understand these difficulties. Not by brushing them under the carpet but by putting things in an 'eternal' perspective.
For the rest, I’ll get back to you. My impression is as I said before that his primary critique is pointed at an aspect of Protestant understanding. Hardly surprising given his membership of the Confessing Church. And his profound understanding of the damage caused by Nazification. Like Heschel, his experiences of pain were different to ours.
In a similar way to how I was both impressed and moved by Zurbaran's religious art in the National Gallery yesterday even though I don't share the same Thomist and Counter-Reformation perspective he was operating within.
Allegorical images of the Immaculate Conception of Mary, for instance, although I appreciated depictions of Joachim and Anna, the 'ancestors of God' (Christ's Gran and Grandad) who are commemorated in the Liturgy each week.
I'm not sure why 'pain and doubts' should 'drown out' the 'classical' understanding any more now than at other times. The Black Death for instance? Although arguably that did lead to more depictions of the sufferings of Christ - and indeed paved the way for some features that fed into the Reformation.
I'd be interested to know whether Moltmann engaged with the 'classic' understanding in its Eastern Christian form, with its important Palamite distinction and rejected it because he felt it was inadequate.
Or whether he felt it wasn't pertinent to his Western Christian perspective. Which would seem odd as he was fully engaged in discussions with Orthodox theologians and would undoubtedly have come across it.
Equally, I'd submit that the 'classic' understanding and the Palamite distinction between God's essence and energies does enable us to deal with pain and doubts - although we can't 'do away' with those completely of course - nor should we.
Pain and doubt is part of the process.
Moltmann was very well and widely read. On ancient and modern philosophies and early church understandings, and Reformation understandings. the evidence is very clear from his references. I can’t word search his text but I’ve looked at his index of names. St Gregory Palamas doesn’t feature. And from memory neither does the hesychastic controversy. I’d be very surprised if he didn’t know.
And as you say. from both his later writings and his dialogues with Catholicism and Orthodoxy he seems to have placed a strong value on working towards ecumenical theologies. Which given the divisions which gave rise to the Confessing Church is maybe surprising. But certainly hopeful!
So far as impassibility is concerned I should think his view of Divine Pathos was deep within him, central to who he was personally as a believer. It seems very unlikely that ever changed, but I suppose in his journey it might have had some of the corners knocked off.
I'm not saying he should have abandoned it but did wonder whether he'd taken the Palamite distinction into account when developing his views on this issue.
It could be he only came across it later.
There'll be parallels/overlaps between Luther's views on that and Orthodox understandings of course. Some aspects very much in synch, as indeed with Luther's views on 'mystic union' with God and the Christian East's views on theosis.
As indeed there are with Gustav Aulen's Christus Victor approach to the atonement and Orthodox understandings. See @Gramps49's new atonement thread.
There will be plenty of common ground on other issues besides.
The Eastern take on these things tends to be less juridical and 'forensic'. I'm not quite sure how that plays into Moltmann's understanding - nor indeed how 'juridical' Luther was in his approach or whether these aspects are a later development within Lutheranism.
Given that the Reformers derived a great deal from late medieval Western Scholastic theology I wouldn't be surprised if more Aristotelian Thomist elements were retained - even if in a modified way - by both Luther and Calvin. Moltmann appears to have drawn from both the Lutheran and Reformed traditions as far as I can make out.
The 'Unmoved Mover' emphasis was very much a Thomist one and as has been noted several times, Luther was very much in the Augustinian tradition in a way that was less apparent in the Christian East.
As far as Luther's theology of the Cross goes, if I understand it correctly - and it's a hu-uu-ge topic - then God revealing himself through suffering is very much in line with Eastern Christian approaches, whatever differences there might be otherwise.
So I can understand Moltmann appealing to that.