Karl Barth

Theory of the Theological Crisis

Karl Barth (1886-1968) in his Commentary on the Epistle of St. Paul to the Romans centers his attention on the question of the opposition between the finite and the infinite, which was the basic point of Kierkegaard's writings.

The problem Barth tries to solve is this: God is in heaven, and man is on earth. What is the relation between such a God and such a man, between such a man and such a God?

Barth observes that the infinite and the finite -- i.e., God and man -- are in perfect antithesis. There is a "line of death" dividing God from man, and any attempt to overcome this line is vain, as well as sacrilegious. Man lives in a world which is the opposite of that of God. The world of man, "flesh," is the world of nature, which is the framework for man's history, his culture, and his civilization -- all things that are completely under the domination of death. Man -- as an existent being, subject to death -- is conscious of his own nothingness and of the nothingness of his culture and civilization.

Even religion cannot help man to overcome this sentiment of nothingness, for any attempt to cross the line of death and to come close to God is destined to fail. But precisely because of this wreckage of culture and religion -- this general theological crisis -- faith arises in man. (Barth, like Kierkegaard, is a Christian Protestant.) Faith is due completely to God. It is the despotic domination of God over man.

Now, because of faith, the line dividing time from eternity and man from God, disappears. Under the absolute domination of God, the existence of man is transformed into an achievement of the eternal plan of God. (Predestination.) Time and man's sinful and imperfect activity in the world are absorbed in eternity. In short, the "no" of man corresponds to the "yes" of God.