Tuesday, November 28, 2006

Moltmann on Academic Theology

I started reading Jurgen Moltmann's Experiences in Theology. I agree with Frank it is fun and enjoyable to read and judging from the few pages I had read so far, the book's language is clear and simple but not simplistic. A characteristic very hard to find in a theology book. It is readable compare to Moltmann's early "contributions" to theology. For people like me whose first language is not English this is excellent.

I may response to this book while I go along by either posting quotes or making comments positively or otherwise. Meanwhile, here's an interesting quote:
Academic theology is nothing other than the scholarly penetration and illumination by mind and spirit of what Christian in the congregations think when they believe in God and live in the fellowship of Christ. By scholarly I mean that the theology is methodologically verifiable and comprehensible. Good scholarly theology is therefore basically simple, because it is clear. Only cloudy theology is complicated and difficult. Whether it be Athanasius or Augustine, Aquinas ot Calvin, Schleiermacher or Barth--the fundamental ideas of every good theological system can be presented in a single page. p. 13

3 comments:

One of Freedom said...

Glad you are enjoying it. I had forgotten how nice that one is until I stumbled upon it again in the library researching my last big paper. He recounts his testimony in "In the End - the Beginning" which I have on my shelf (thanks to Thom Chittom). Have you stumbled on the Moltmann Yahoo!Group yet? I have a link on my blog.

Joey said...

Yes, I'm already a "proud" member of Moltmann Yahoo!Group. In fact, one of the members helped had been very helpful in my prospectus last year.

For a theological list, I find it unusual that its membership is relatively big and still growing.

Thanks for the comments. I'm going to have a busy week...

tchittom said...

I'm so glad that you found participation in jm helpful, Joey. Did you continue going through _Experiences in Theology_? If so, why not share it on-board? We're glad to have you with us!