1

Emily Rowell

Hart

RELC362

12 Mar. 2009

The Christologies of Paul Tillich and Karl Barth and Eternal Life

as a Present Reality

A proper understanding of Christ’s person and Christ’s

significance for human history proves essential in the

theological reflection of Paul Tillich and Karl Barth: for both

thinkers, Jesus Christ serves as the hinge on which the remainder

of their thought rests. Tillich conceives of Jesus Christ as the

definitive answer to human questions of existence, while Barth

understands Christ to be the event of God’s gracious love and

God’s very self-revelation to humankind. Their approaches to the

theologian’s task fundamentally differ, and their pictures of

Christ seem to be utterly irreconcilable: Tillich employs a

method of correlation, while Barth firmly insists upon non-

correlation; Tillich’s Christology is extremely low and Barth’s

high; Tillich’s Christ is a symbol and Barth’s a concrete event.

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Tillich’s and Barth’s conceptions of Christ intersect, however,

at the theologians’ considerations of eternal life, for each

thinker understands Christ’s primary significance to lie in the

present age. The possibility of dialogue between Tillich and

Barth emerges when one examines how their respective

Christologies shape their shared belief that Christ makes eternal

life available to humankind in the here and now.

Paul Tillich seeks to engage in a dialogue with the world

and to correlate the questions of modern society with the

appropriate answers by using the language of philosophy, which

describes the nature of being, in his theological reflection,

which supplies the meaning of being. Tillich asserts, “The

method of correlation explains the contents of the Christian

faith through existential questions and theological answers in

mutual interdependence.”1 Tillich identifies humanity’s ultimate

concern as that of nonbeing, for he believes that human beings

most fear non-existence and recognize that who they are

essentially does not coincide with who they are existentially.

1 Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, 2nd ed., Vol. 1 (Chicago: University Press, 1976) 60.

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Humans desire to overcome their existential estrangement and to

be reunited to the ground of their being.

As a theologian, Tillich interprets the answers already

found in revelation and expresses the truth of Christ. Since the

person of Jesus is so particular, the theologian must make

revelation intelligible and coherent to the modern world.

Tillich believes that the new being humanity seeks, or the answer

to the current problem of existence, lies in Jesus Christ: He is

the final revelation “because he stands the double test of

finality: uninterrupted unity with the ground of his being and

continuous sacrifice of himself as Jesus to himself as the

Christ.”2 Christ, who overcame his existential estrangement and

sacrificed all that he could have gained from his unity of

essence and existence, makes available a new existence for

humanity.

God reveals Godself as a mystery in the life and death of

Jesus Christ. God’s love thus is manifested in Christ: Christ is

the original revelation who shows a new conception of the human

relationship with God and makes possible the overcoming of

2 Ibid. 137.

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existential estrangement. The final revelation, found in Jesus

Christ, overpowers the dualities and ambiguities the world

presents. Tillich strongly upholds God’s transcendence and

power: God will never be fully realized or comprehended by

humankind. Because God never fully reveals Godself, humans can

never fully participate in the relationship evidenced by Christ’s

life or completely transcend the alienation from their being.

Tillich works within the Lutheran tradition and therefore

utilizes scripture and Martin Luther’s doctrine of the bondage of

the will as sources for Christological reflection. While Tillich

draws upon traditional understandings of human justification, he

also reworks these modes of conceptualizing Christ’s significance

for sinful humanity by recoding into philosophical terminology

what he perceives to be the biblical message: Christ becomes the

“New Being,” or the alternative to the problem of alienation from

one’s being, sin is simply existential estrangement, and God

expresses the ultimate concern of humankind, or the symbol for

that which is unconditioned.

The contrast between humankind’s states in Adam and in

Christ articulates the significance of the New Being which Christ

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brings: whereas Adam brought sin and death into the world, Christ

releases humankind from its sinful state through his obedience on

the cross. Through belief in Christ, humans may pass from the

state of existential estrangement “in Adam” to one of a new

existence by assuming the new being made available “in Christ.”

Tillich subscribes to Luther’s teaching that although humans

become fully justified in the eyes of God through Christ, they

simultaneously exist in sin as well: in their natural state,

humans still experience partial alienation from their being and

encounter ambiguities even when they participate in Christ’s New

Being, for only Christ’s existence and essence completely

coincided.

Tillich’s Christology is heavily tied to his doctrine of

soteriology, and salvation may be understood as humankind’s

participation in Christ. For Tillich, the message relayed in

Romans 5 explains that without the Christ symbol, all humans are

alienated from themselves, anxious about the uncertainties of who

they will become, the future, and ever-impending death. Humans

must turn from the old being to the New Being in order truly to

be wholly at one with their being and thus be saved. Tillich

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believes that the New Being, and only the New Being, allows

humanity to experience healing and to overcome the otherwise

insurmountable rift in its being.

Tillich considers and rejects all methods human beings

employ in attempt to transcend their existential estrangement and

asserts that it is “revelation overcomes the conflict between

autonomy and heteronomy by re-establishing their essential

unity.”3 Efforts which do not look outside of autonomy always

fail, for salvation necessarily involves both autonomy and

heteronomy, both self-recognition of one’s problem of existence

and acceptance of help outside of the self. Only the Christ

symbol successfully combines the crucial elements of autonomy and

heteronomy and establishes theonomy: Christ as the final

revelation correlates the autonomy of human reason with the

heteronomy of the authority of the Bible. Salvation through

Christ may thus be understood as a symbol for humankind’s return

to the ground and abyss of its being, wherein the individual is

regenerated (healed and given the power of the New Being),

3 Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, 2nd ed., Vol. 1 (Chicago: University Press, 1976) 147.

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justified (accepts the New Being) and sanctified (transformed by

participation in the New Being).

Tillich greatly emphasizes the philosophical implications of

the Christ symbol but finds the relation of Jesus Christ’s

divinity and humanity to be of little importance, for Tillich is

concerned with meaning of Christ’s being, i.e., that because

Jesus made himself entirely available to the ground and abyss of

his being (God), his essence perfectly corresponded to his

existence. By having God at the center of his life, Jesus

overcame his estrangement. Tillich, heavily drawing upon the

synoptic gospels and stressing Jesus’ earthly life, asserts an

extremely low Christology: the finite, conditioned human being of

Jesus, because he is completely one with his being, ascends

toward God as Christ. Jesus’ words and preaching urged humankind

to change and allowed humans to see a new kind of being; Jesus’

deeds pointed beyond himself and enabled humanity to recognize

the eternal significance of Christ and the new being; and the

suffering and death of Jesus of Nazareth demonstrated the extent

of Jesus’ obedience to God and therefore surmounted all

existential alienation. Rejecting theories of Christ’s divine

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and human natures, Tillich holds that Christ was simply a human

being and that his significance lies in his earthly existence

during which he was wholly at one with his being.

Furthermore, Tillich sees no need to know whether or not the

man Jesus of Nazareth ever genuinely existed because another

human being could have been called the Christ. What is important

is merely that the Christ symbol has in fact been attached to

someone who has lived and that humankind now may participate in

it. In other words, “In Jesus of Nazareth the New Being has

appeared…It has two sides which are mutually interdependent: the

fact which is Jesus of Nazareth and its reception as the New

Being.”4 The reality of essential realization under the finite

conditions of existence and recognition of that reality enable

the Christ symbol to become real and alive. Although Tillich

accepts historical criticism, he dismisses attempts to

reconstruct the historical Jesus. The realization that Jesus

possesses eternally significant implications for humankind will

not be found in minute biographical details but in the

4 John Norton Williams, “Christology of Paul Tillich” Encounter Aug. 1960: 430.

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recognition that Christ ushers in and makes possible the age of

New Being.

Tillich does not hold a literal understanding of the

incarnation or resurrection of Jesus Christ, for he recognizes

that it would be not only incredible but pagan for today’s world

to believe that God became man. Christ’s “resurrection” occurs

in the minds of Jesus’ followers when they interpret and affirm

the cross event, recognizing Jesus as the Messiah, or the New

Being. Tillich states, “Resurrection means the victory of the

New state of things, the New Being born out of the death of the

Old. Resurrection is not an event that might happen in some

remote future, but it is the power of the New Being to create

life out of death, here and now, today and tomorrow.”5 Through

the resurrection, humans experience the internal psychological

event of being forgiven and overcoming their existential

estrangement; in their acceptance of and participation of the New

Being, humans become transformed.

Thus, for Tillich, humankind may find both salvation and

eternal life in this world upon return to the ground and abyss of

5 Paul Tillich, The Eternal Now, 1955 ch. 2.

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its being, for “where there is revelation there is salvation…

[and] where there is salvation there is revelation…By speaking of

universal revelation, we have spoken implicitly of universal

salvation.”6 The revelation of Christ to all humankind provides

humans with the hope of passing from the old being to the New

Being, a New Being which allows authentic living without fear of

nonexistence. Transcendence indicates the new life which becomes

possible in this world upon one’s acceptance of the Christ

symbol. The kingdom of God, then, happens when humans recognize

God as their king rather than continuing to live in a secular

world defined by existential alienation; it points toward the

eternal life of humankind’s New Being. Tillich understands

eternal life in light of the reality of the establishment of

God’s kingdom: “Since Eternal Life is identical with the Kingdom

of God and its fulfillment, it is the non-fragmentary, total, and

complete conquest of the ambiguities of life.”7 The kingdom of

God possesses a universal claim and promises the transformation

of all dimensions of human life.

6 Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, 2nd ed., Vol. 3 (Chicago: University Press, 1976) 400.7 Ibid. 401.

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Tillich provides a theology for this life and believes that

eternal life is a present reality; “it is our estrangement and

guilt which are the impediments which keep us from reaching

eternal life in the here and now.”8 God’s kingdom lays claim

over the political and social aspects of this world and demands

consequences for the individual’s personal existence and

universal ramifications for the whole of humanity. For Tillich,

salvation is necessarily oriented towards this world because of

his rejection of both bodily and spiritual resurrection.

Humanity becomes whole again by accepting the Christ symbol, but

humans may never fully participate in the eternal life, for

humans cannot escape all of life’s ambiguities. Tillich

subscribes to the understanding of an inaugurated eschatology:

eternal life has already begun but will not be fully realized in

this world. Eternity, or unconditioned, absolute being, may only

be fully experienced at one’s death. In death, an individual

becomes completely one with his or her being and no longer faces

the ambiguities presented by life’s numerous potentialities.

8 Paul Tillich, The Eternal Now, 1955 ch. 10

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Karl Barth’s approach to doing theology entirely contrasts

with that of Paul Tillich: rather than formulating questions

which relay modern concerns and correlating Christian revelation

with such existential questions, Barth seeks to proclaim the

Christian message. The theologian cannot, for Barth, engage in

dialogue with the world as Tillich does or attempt to present an

apologetic account of Christianity, for theology depends upon

God’s three-fold self-revelation through the incarnation of Jesus

Christ, scripture, and preaching of scripture. Barth thus

entirely rejects Tillich’s method for doing theology: to begin

with philosophy is to begin with a human device when the sole

true starting point necessarily must be the personal God. The

relationship between God and humanity may be only rightly

understood in light of Christ incarnate, for in him God freely

chooses to go in search of and to redeem humankind. Barth

asserts that the “basic rule of all Church dogmatics” entails

that “no single item of Christian doctrine is legitimately

grounded, or rightly developed or expounded, unless it can of

itself be understood and explained as a part of the

responsibility laid upon the hearing and teaching Church towards

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the self-revelation of God attested in Holy Scripture.”9 Because

God can only be known by God but refuses to remain completely

unknown, graciously revealing Godself to humanity, the theologian

always shuttles between the three poles of the analogy of faith.

Although the Christ event, the witness of scripture, and

preaching of the Word provide indirect knowledge of God, God

still should never become confined to these human devices. God

remains hidden—but not incomprehensible—to humanity because of

the nature of God’s self-revelation. Like Tillich, Barth upholds

God’s hiddenness but conceives of divine mystery in terms of

God’s knowability. The revelation God mercifully offers allows

humankind to turn away from human concepts and instead turn

toward God on God’s terms. God speaks through the incarnate

Jesus of Nazareth, and humanity encounters Christ as an act of

creation, a radically free event of God’s choosing, “who, even as

he reveals himself…makes us see how truly he is the hidden God,

the great personal mystery that we are unable to discern.”10

Since sinful humankind cannot bear or comprehend the

9 Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, I/2 The Digital Karl Barth Library 35.10 Louis Bouyer, The Word, Church, and Sacraments: In Protestantism and Catholicism (NY: Desclee, 1961) 18.

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transcendence of God, God both reveals Godself in Christ and also

graciously reveils Godself in limiting what humans can know about

God.

Barth’s theology begins with the concrete, particular

attestations of scripture rather than abstract understandings,

for Barth understands the Bible as providing witness to the

Christ event. Like Tillich, Barth acknowledges and accepts

historical criticism as a useful method for scholarship and

chooses instead to look beyond its discoveries. While Tillich

remains uninterested in the historical Jesus because he claims

that the Christ symbol remains valid since humanity’s

participation in the Christ symbol guarantees that the New Being

has conquered the old being under conditions of finite existence.

Barth discounts the historical-critical method for use in

proclamation, believing that it fails to appreciate the Bible as

a lively event which reveals God’s loving decision to redeem

humankind.11

11 Paul Dafydd Jones, The Humanity of Christ: Christology in Karl Barth’s Church Dogmatics (UK: Continuum, 2008) 356.

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The incarnate Christ, for Barth, is God’s primary form of

self-revelation, “the revelation of God…which precedes

proclamation and Holy Scripture.”12 All theological reflection

must therefore attend to Christ, for Christ is prior to all other

forms of revelation. Barth argues, “The existence of Jesus

Christ as true God, as true man, and the unity of both (God-man)

is only understood in the completed act of the reconciliation of

man with God in history.”13 Because every Christian doctrine

hinges upon Christology, a proper understanding of Christ proves

essential for understanding soteriology and eschatology.

While Tillich primarily considers the philosophical

implications of Christ’s existence and largely ignores the

relation of Christ’s divinity and humanity, Barth avoids the

language of philosophy whenever possible and engages in

proclamation. Affirming the Chalcedonian Definition, Barth

understands Christ’s divine and human natures to be eternally

united: Jesus Christ never exists as independent of the divine

reality. Jesus Christ possesses Jewish flesh, exists in history,

12 Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, I/2 The Digital Karl Barth Library 457.13 Barth, IV/2 10.

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and fully identifies with sinful humanity. The incarnation

reveals the Son’s completely solidarity with humankind and his

willingness to condescend and experience God’s rejection of sin.

However, the Son remains coequal with the Father even as he

renders obedience. God’s decision to determine Godself to be the

concrete person of Christ and Christ’s obedience demonstrate

God’s extreme love and concern for humankind. Thus, for Barth

the works and actions of Jesus’ life must never be isolated from

Christ’s vital being and become the sole focus for theological

thinking as though a particular system of ethics could achieve

reconciliation between God and humanity. Tillich similarly finds

Christ’s action and being necessarily entangled and sees Jesus’

work as the means by which the theologian comprehends the New

Being; it is “the being out of which his actions come [which]

makes him the Christ.”14 Jesus’ ability to make himself

transparent to the ground of his being in his life and his

refusal to exploit what he gained in his ability to be at one

with his being, manifested in his actions, has salvific impact.

14 Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, 2nd ed., Vol 2 (Chicago, University Press, 1976) 123.

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Barth strongly disagrees with Tillich’s assertion that Jesus

Christ existed as merely a human being and instead insists that

Christ’s divinity and humanity together effect salvation for

humankind. “Reconciliation entails the agency of Christ’s divine

and human essences…uni- lateral divine action never happens in

Christ’s divine life.”15 In an act of extreme commitment and

love, God as Jesus Christ chooses to take on the sinful condition

of humanity. Like Tillich, who comprehends Christ as the saving

mediator who represents what man essentially is and should be to

those who live under the conditions of existence. Barth also

sees Christ as humanity’s loving helper: “In the primal act of

free love God… chooses for Himself fellowship with man and

therefore the endurance of judgment, but for man fellowship with

Himself and therefore the glory of His mercy.”16 God, seeking

to change humanity from within, becomes involved with the human

predicament in the person of Christ.

Christ alone possesses the power to achieve reconciliation

between God and humankind, the passage from being in Adam to

15 Paul Dafydd Jones. The Humanity of Christ (UK: Continuum, 2008) 327.16 Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, II/2 The Digital Karl Barth Library 197.

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being in Christ. Barth, like Tillich, explains humankind’s

release from its old sinful existence to a new existence in terms

of Christ’s obedience to God. Tillich and Barth both assert that

Jesus exclusively enacts salvation, but Barth intensely

emphasizes Christ’s uniqueness as the true human, the one who

undergoes humiliation (Lord as Servant) and exaltation (Servant

as Lord), the only one in whom there is an exaltation of being

human. For Barth, Tillich’s conception of Christ as the one who

experiences who lives essentially under the conditions of finite

existence fails to appreciate or convey Christ’s exceptionality.

For Barth, God wills Christ to be both the “electing God”

and the “elected man,” both to choose humankind for eternal life

and to take on the reprobation of humanity in suffering and

death.17 In his radical redefinition of the doctrine of election,

Barth claims that God’s eternal decree is forever to identify

Godself with Christ because God has revealed Godself to humankind

as eternally one with Christ. God’s decision to be forever for

human beings and willingly to commit one mode of God’s own being

to the person of Christ has universal implications for human

17 Ibid. 162.

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existence; human essence is “determined wholly and utterly, from

the very outset and in every part, by the electing grace of

God.”18 For Tillich and Barth, Christ holds promise for all

humankind and changes what it means to be human: Tillich believes

that Christ gives humans a “new being” and Barth argues that

God’s free, loving action toward humankind in Christ defines

humanity’s essence.

For Barth, the reality of Christ’s life and death therefore

has consequences for the present world, providing “a new history

for every man”19. As a result of God’s gracious action, human

nature becomes transformed, and all humans at their very core

exist in right relation with God. Tillich, however, understands

the transformation of human nature to occur when humans put on

the “new being”; thus, inauguration of the new humanity requires

both the Christ symbol and recognition of the Christ symbol.

Even after recognizing and accepting the Christ symbol, humans,

18 Ibid. 88.19Barth, IV/2 228. George M. Schurr, “Brunner and Barth on Life after Death” Journal of Religious Thought 1968: 108.

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according to Tillich, remain partially estranged from their

essence. In intense disagreement with Tillich, Barth believes

that the individual becomes his or her truest self when

conforming to Christ the true human, God’s example of what human

existence is. Barth views life after Christ in terms of humanity

realizing its essence; Tillich understands existence to precede

essence, so eternal life happens when human beings create their

essences throughout their lives, becoming increasingly more

themselves under the conditions of existence.

Tillich’s and Barth’s strong assertions of Christ’s

universal transformative ability thus require an already-present

eternal life. Their doctrines of Christology, soteriology, and

eschatology prove inextricably tied: salvation ceases to exist

outside of Christ, and eschatology may not be comprehended apart

from Christ’s saving power. Concerns about life outside of this

world serve only to distract humankind from the atonement and

eternal life made possible in this life through Christ.

Therefore Barth, like Tillich, rejects the notion of a bodily or

spiritual resurrection and eternity as an otherworldly, atemporal

limitless existence. “Barth believes that eschatology is limited

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by [humanity’s] own historicity.”20 Life outside of earthly

existence ceases to exist for humanity; rather, resurrection

encompasses the extent to which an individual accepts God in the

present life, which determines how God remembers that individual.

Barth and Tillich are hesitant to speculate about life outside of

20

Works ConsultedBarth, Karl. Church Dogmatics. 1932-68. The Digital Karl Barth Library. Eds. Peter, Niklaus,

Hans-Anton Drewes, and Clifford B. Anderson. 11 Mar 2009 <http://www.http://

solomon.dkbl.alexanderstreet.com>.Bouyer, Louis. The Word, Church, and Sacraments: In Protestantism and Catholicism. NY:

Desclee, Co., 1961.Jones, Paul Dafydd. The Humanity of Christ: Christology in Karl Barth’s Church Dogmatics.

UK: Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd., 2008.Schurr, George M. “Brunner and Barth on Life after Death.” Journal of Religious Thought

1968: 95-110. ATLA. EBSCOhost. University of Virginia Library, Charlottesville, VA.

11 Mar. 2009 <http://web.ebscohost.com>.Tillich, Paul. The Eternal Now. 1955. Religion Online. Eds. Tedand Winnie Brock. 11 Mar.

2009 <http://www.religion-online.org>.- - -. Systematic Theology. 2nd ed. 3 vols. Chicago: University Press, 1976.

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the concrete, earthly world of today, fearing that such

speculation would only lead to incredulous, pagan, or idolatrous

claims (Tillich) or would look outside of God’s three-fold self-

revelation (Barth). Thus, both theologians offer a theology

oriented towards this life: Christ proves determinative for the

present reality and shapes how humankind must respond to God

today.

Endnotes

Williams, John Norton. “Christology of Paul Tillich.” Encounter Aug. 1960: 423-48. ATLA.

EBSCOhost. University of Virginia Library, Charlottesville,VA. 11 Mar. 2009 <http://

web.ebscohost.com>.