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The North American Paul Tillich SocietyN ewsletter

Volume XXVIII, Number 3 Summer 2002Religious Studies Department Santa Clara University336 Bannan Hall Santa Clara, CA 95053

Editor: Frederick J. Parrella, Secretary-Treasurer, NAPTS408-554-4714 [email protected]

www.NAPTS.org ____________________________________________________________________________________________________

In this issue:o News about the Annual Meeting of the Society in Torontoo New Publications on Tillich or by Members of the Societyo Report on the Ninth International Tillich Symposium in Frankfurto “In Search of a God for Evolution: Paul Tillich and Teilhard de Chardin”

by John F. Haughto “Religion, Science, and Evolution: Tillich’s Fourth Way” by Richard Griggo “The New Being in Christ: Tillich’s Universal Concept of Revelation as a Contribution to

Inter-religious Encounter in the Pluralistic Situation of Post-modernity”by Jörg Eickhoff

o “Salvation as Cosmic Healing in Tillich” by Karin Grau

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NEWS ABOUT THE ANNUAL MEETING OF THESOCIETY IN TORONTO

The Annual meeting of the North American PaulTillich Society will take place on November 22 and23, 2002, in Toronto, Ontario. As always, the meet-ing will take place in conjunction with the AmericanAcademy of Religion and Society of Biblical Lit-erature’s annual meeting from November 23 throughNovember 26, 2002.

Registration for the meeting and housing reser-vations are currently available. “Super-Saver” regis-tration rates are in effect until Sept. 15. You must beregistered for the meeting to secure housing. YourAAR/SBL dues must be paid up to date by August 1,2002.

To make reservations for the meeting and forhousing (one method only):ON LINE:

www.aarweb.org OR www.sbl-site.orgFAX: (available 24 hours a day)

330.963.0319 (meeting registration and housingforms)

MAIL:Annual Meeting of the AAR/SBL Registration

and Housingc/o Conference Registration and Housing Bu-reau2450 Edison Blvd, Suite 2Twinsburg, OH 44087

QUESTIONS:800.575.7185 (U.S. and Canada)330.425.9330 (outside U.S. and Canada)

Please note that the hotel prices quoted in theAAR/SBL Annual Meetings Bulletin are quoted inCanadian dollars. Thus, a room that costs $150 CDNis the equivalent to $94 USD.

The annual program book will be mailed in earlySeptember (allow a few weeks for delivery). Theprogram for the North American Paul Tillich Societysessions on Friday afternoon and Saturday morning,along with the new AAR Group on Tillich, will beprinted in the October Newsletter. The banquet asusual will be held on Friday evening. This year’sbanquet speaker will be Peter John. Both GertHummel, President of the DPTG, and Marc Boss,President of the APTF, will be present at the meet-ing this year.

North American Paul Tillich Society Newsletter Vol. 28, number 3 Summer 2002 2

NEW PUBLICATIONS ON or ABOUT TILLICHOR BY MEMBERS OF THE SOCIETY

Thomas F. O’Meara, Erich Przywara, S.J.: His The-ology and His World. Notre Dame, IN: Univer-sity of Notre Dame Press, 2002.

From the Spring Newsletter:John J. Carey. Paulus, Then and Now: A Study of

Paul Tillich’s Theological World and the Con-tinuing Relevance of His Work. Macon, GA:Mercer University Press, 2002.

The Paul Tillich Society of Brazil (Sociedade PaulTillich do Brasil) is pleased to announce thattheir journal is now online:www.metodista.br/Noticias/correlatio

REPORT ON THE INTERNATIONAL PAULTILLICH SYMPOSIUM

The Ninth International Paul Tillich Sympo-sium, under the sponsorship of the Deutsche-Paul-Tillich-Gesellschaft, was held in Frankfurt/ Mainfrom 31 May to 2 June 2002. The theme of thisyear’s symposium was “Trinity and/or Quarternity:Paul Tillich’s Reopening of the Trinitarian Prob-lem.” As always, Bishop Prof. Dr. Gert Hummelwas the organizer and gracious host of the Sympo-sium. He was ably and amiably assisted by DorisLax, Secretary of the DPTG. Accommodations at thePhilipp-Jakob-Spener-Haus and Kolping-Haus werevery pleasant and greatly enhanced the enjoyment ofthe meeting.

Bishop Hummel opened the meeting on Fridayafternoon with an introduction to the theme of theninth symposium and a warm welcome to the par-ticipants from fifteen different countries in Europeand North and South America.

In order to accommodate the number of papers,parallel working session were held throughout mostof the conference. The topics for each session are asfollows:• Session I, Marc Boss, Chair

Approaching the Issue• Session II, Holger Strutwolf, Chair

Experience as a Staring Point• Session III, Théo Junker, Chair

Biblical and Historical-Theological Approaches

• Session IV, Erdmann Sturm, ChairSystematic-Theological Approaches

• Session V, Werner Schübler, ChairSymbolic Understanding as a Solution?

Sessions VI, Ilona Nord, ChairBeyond Trinity

Section VII, Wolf R. Wrege, ChairChances for an Interreligious Dialogue?

Section VIII, Theodor Mahlmann, ChairEthical and Practical(-Theological ) Aspects

Section IX, Wessel Stoker, ChairControversial PerspectivesThe topic of Tillich and the Trinity evoked inter-

esting and controversial papers and stimulating dis-cussion and questions. Through the years, the Frank-furt Symposia on Paul Tillich have produced excel-lent papers and outstanding scholarship in the vol-umes published by Walter de Gruyter of Berlin andLit Verlag of Münster. In addition, one of the specialmoments is the surprise that our host, Gert Hummel,prepares for the Saturday evening banquet. Not eventhe DPTG’s Secretary, Doris Lax, knows of the des-tination. The evening was thoughtfully planned andperfectly executed, with an elegant table, splendidwine, and much good colleagueship, friendship, andGemütlichheit..

This year’s banquet was held at the Hofgut Dip-pelshof, outside of Darmstadt. The private banquetroom was as elegant as the menu. As each memberentered the room, they were greeted with a glass ofchampagne. The menu consisted of: OdernwälderLachsforellentatar mit Spargelsalat; Schaunsuppevon rotem Tai-Curry; Rind.–und Kalbsmedaillonsunter der Kräuterkruste auf Portweinjus/ Jahrszeitli-ches Gemüse und Kartoffel-Roulade; Dessertvaria-tions “Dippelshof.” Splendid wines added to the su-perb food. During the banquet, Robison James pre-sented Gert Hummel with a contribution to theChurch in Georgia and his apostolic work there.

The Symposium concluded on Sunday morningwith a worship service conducted by Bishop Hum-mel at the inactive Dominican church across thestreet from the Spener–Haus. After the final two pa-pers on Sunday morning in plenary session, BishopHummel concluded with words of gratitude to allpresent. He plans to convene a tenth symposium in2004.

In addition to the members of the Deutsche-Paul-Tillich-Gesellschaft, members of other TillichSocieties—the Brazilian, the Dutch, the French-


speaking, and the North American—were presentand presented papers. Members of the North Ameri-can Paul Tillich Society in attendance includedYoung-Ho Chun, Donald Dreisbach, Robison James,Russell Manning, Jean Richard, Terence O’Keefe,Robert Scharlemann, Mary Ann Stenger, and Fre-derick J. Parrella.

This year’s proceedings will be edited by GertHummel and Doris Lax, and will be published byLIT Verlag of Münster, Hamburg, and London as avolume in the Tillich-Studien Series. All of theSymposia are the products of the vision, the effi-ciency, the generosity, and the gracious hospitalityof Gert Hummel. The members of the North Ameri-can Paul Tillich Society are very grateful to BishopHummel for his contributions to Tillich scholarship.

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EDITOR’S NOTE:

The editor invites comments, preferably by Email,on any of the papers published in this issue or inprevious issues of the Newsletter. Letters will bepublished in subsequent Newsletters.

IN SEARCH OF A GOD FOR EVOLUTION: PAULTILLICH AND TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

John F. Haught

The world’s religions, at least during the periodof their emergence, knew nothing about Big Bangcosmology, deep time, or biological evolution. Gen-erally speaking, they have still not caught up withthese ideas. Even in the scientific West the findingsof evolutionary biology and cosmology continue tolurk only at the fringes of contemporary theologicalawareness. The sensibilities of most believers inGod, including theologians, have been fashioned inan imaginative context defined either by ancientcosmographies or, if philosophically tutored, byequally timeworn ontologies that are static and hier-archical. Our religious understandings of ultimatereality, our thoughts about the meaning of humanexistence and destiny, our intuitions about what isultimately good and what the good life is, and ourideas of what is evil or unethical—all of these atleast originally took up residence in a human aware-ness still innocent of the implications of deep cosmictime, and largely unaware of the prospect that the

universe may still be only at the dawn of its journeythrough time.

How, then, are we to think about God, if at all,in a manner proportionate to the new scientific un-derstanding of biological evolution and cosmic proc-ess? Probably the majority of scientists have givenup on such a project, settling into their impressionsthat the immense universe of contemporary naturalscience has by now vastly outgrown what astrono-mer Harlow Shapely once referred to as the anthro-pomorphic one-planet deity of our terrestrial relig-ions. Theology, meanwhile, is just beginning to re-consider the idea of God in a way that would renderit consonant with evolution.

The famous Jesuit geologist and paleontologist,Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955), was far ahead ofprofessional theologians in perceiving evolution’sdemand for a revitalized understanding of God. Ournew awareness of nature’s immensities—in the do-mains of space, time, and organized physical com-plexity—provides us, he thought, with the excitingopportunity to enlarge our sense of God far beyondthat of any previous age. Moreover, as Teilhard alsoemphasized, the new scientific picture of the uni-verse has not only amplified our sense of cosmicimmensity; it has also altered our whole under-standing of the sort of thing the universe is. Sciencehas now shown quite clearly that the cosmos is astory. Nature is narrative to the core. As physicistKarl Friedrich von Weizsäcker argues in The Historyof Nature, the greatest scientific discovery of theTwentieth Century was that the universe is historical(Weizsäcker; see also Toulmin and Goodfield; Pan-nenberg, 86-98). And Teilhard was one of the firstscientists in the last century to have fully realizedthis fact. The cosmos, he often repeated, is not afixed body of things, but a genesis—a still unfoldingdrama rather than merely a frozen agglomeration ofspatially related objects. The world is still cominginto being (1999).

It is now of utmost importance, therefore, forreligious thought to reshape its ideas of nature, hu-man existence, and reality as such in a manner pro-portionate to the idea of a cosmos still emerging inthe remarkable ways that science is recording.Above all, evolution requires a revolution in ourthoughts about God. But “who,” Teilhard asked,“will at last give evolution its own God?” (1969,240)

Although Teilhard himself was a profoundly re-ligious thinker, he was not a professional theologian,and so his own efforts to construe a “God for evolu-


tion” stopped short of the systematic developmenthis intuitions demanded. The project of shaping the-ology in a manner fully apprised of evolution stillremains to be done. It may be instructive, therefore,to look into a great theological system such as thatof Paul Tillich as a possible resource for a contem-porary theology of evolution. After giving a briefsketch of Teilhard’s central ideas immediately be-low, therefore, I will scan several facets of Tillich’stheology to see if it may prove capable of giving us“a God for evolution.”

Teilhard’s Essential Ideas

For Teilhard, the whole universe is in evolutionand there is a clear direction to the cosmic story. Heconsciously extended the term “evolution” beyondits biological meaning and applied it to the cosmicprocess. In spite of the obvious meandering or“branching” character of biological evolution, heobserved, the universe as a whole has clearly movedin the direction of increasing organized complexity.The cosmic process has gone through the pre-atomic, atomic, molecular, unicellular, multicellular,vertebrate, primate, and human phases of evolution.During this journey, the universe has manifested ameasurable growth in instances of organized com-plexity.

What gives significance to this story is that dur-ing the course of cosmic evolution there has been agradual increase in what Teilhard called “conscious-ness”—in direct proportion to the increase in orga-nized physical complexity. In obedience to the “lawof complexity-consciousness,” as matter has becomemore complex in its organization, consciousness andeventually (in humans at least) self-awareness haveemerged. The “inside” of things has become moreand more intensified, more centered and more liber-ated from habitual physical routine. And there is noreason to suspect that the cosmic journey towardcomplexity, having reached the level of human con-sciousness, will now inevitably be suspended. In-deed our own hominized planet is now developing a“noosphere,” (a new geological stratum consisting oftightening webs of mind, culture, economics, poli-tics, science, information, and technology), thusmoving evolution in the direction of a new level ofcomplexity-consciousness. Apparently, and in spiteof the protests of many biologists to the contrary, acosmological perspective shows that there is a netoverall advance or “progress” in evolution after all.

Teilhard abstractly refers to the ultimate goal of thisadvance as “Omega” (1999, 191-94).

Omega is “God.” Nothing less than a transcen-dent force, radically distinct from but also intimatelyincarnate in matter, could ultimately explain evolu-tionary emergence. For Teilhard, it is the attractionof God–Omega that finally accounts for the world’srestless tendency to move beyond any specific levelof development toward ontologically richer modesof being. In the world’s religions, the universe’s“search for a center” finally becomes conscious. At adeep level of explanation—deeper than science itselfcan reach—evolution can be said to occur because asGod draws near to the world, the world explodes“upwards into God” (1964, 83). If we read beneaththe surface of the world that science has discovered,we may understand both humanity’s long religiousjourney and the whole epic of evolution prior to it asone long cosmic search for an integrating and re-newing Center. This quest recurrently gathers thepast into a new present and carries the whole streamof creation toward the God who creates the worldfrom “up ahead” (1964, 272-81).

Teilhard also thought in cosmic terms about theChrist of his own creed, deliberately following thecosmic Christology of St. Paul and some laterChristian writers. As a Christian thinker, he picturedthe whole vast universe as converging on and com-ing to a head in the Christ of the Parousia, the onewho is to come. Redemption, for Teilhard as for St.Paul, coincides with the new creation of the wholeuniverse in Christ (1975, 92-100; 203-08).

As his thought matured, Teilhard increasinglycomplained that traditional theology, insofar as it isfocused on esse (the idea of being) is unable as suchto contextualize the dramatic new sense of a worldstill in the process of becoming. Moreover, theologyhas conceived of God too much in terms of Aris-totle’s notion of a Prime Mover impelling thingsfrom the past (a retro). Evolution demands that wethink of God as drawing the world from up ahead(ab ante), pulling it forward into the future. Creationis a process of gathering the multiple strands ofcosmic evolution into an ultimate unity located notso much up above as up ahead: creatio est uniri. ForTeilhard, as for the author of Revelation, God is bothAlpha and Omega. But after Darwin and the newcosmology, we must say that God is less Alpha thanOmega: “Only a God who is functionally and totally‘Omega’ can satisfy us,” Teilhard exclaims. But hepersists with his question and now ours as well:“where shall we find such a God?” (1969, 240).


Tillich and Teilhard

Half a century after Teilhard’s death we have yetto answer this question. For the most part theologi-ans still think and write almost as though Darwin,Einstein, and Hubble never existed. Their attentionis fixed almost exclusively on questions about themeaning of human existence, human history, socialjustice, hermeneutics, gender issues, or the individ-ual’s spiritual journey. These are all worthy of at-tention, of course, but except for a smattering ofecologically interested theologies the natural worldremains distant from dominant theological interest.In the Christian churches, redemption and eschatol-ogy are still typically thought of in terms of a har-vesting of human souls rather than the coming tofulfillment of an entire universe. Furthermore, thedivorce of theology from the cosmos persists no lessglaringly in what has come to be called “postmoderntheology,” most of which ironically seems unable tomove beyond modernity’s sense of the fundamentalestrangement of both God and ourselves from thenon–human natural world.1

In view of the general failure of theology to re-spond adequately to evolution we may ask herewhether the impressive theological work of PaulTillich is perhaps of sufficient depth and breadth tobring out systematically the religious meaning of thenew evolutionary picture of the universe that so en-ergized Teilhard’s own life and thought. In greatmeasure, the contemporary value of Tillich’sthought may be assessed in terms of its adequacy tothis task. Toward the end of his life Tillich had be-come acquainted at least vaguely with some of Teil-hard’s ideas, and although he considered Teilhard’svision of the universe too “progressivistic” for hisown tastes, he nevertheless felt “near” to the modestJesuit in “so many respects” (Tillich, 1966, 90-91).Tillich did not say exactly what attracted him toTeilhard, so we can only guess. I suspect, though,that he found in Teilhard a deeply Christian thinkerwho mirrored many of Tillich’s own religious andtheological intuitions.

For example, Tillich and Teilhard both sought areformulation of Christian spirituality in which wedo not have to turn our backs on the universe or theearth in order to approach the Kingdom of God. Ad-ditionally, they agreed that life in a finite universe isinevitably, and not just accidentally, riddled withambiguity, and that the estrangement of the universefrom its essential being somehow coincides with thevery fact of its existence. They both wrestled in

creative ways with how to balance the vertical (tran-scendent) and horizontal (immanent) dimensions ofhuman aspiration. They both looked for a way inwhich the human person could experience religiousmeaning without heteronomy (Tillich’s term for ourbeing subjected to a law alien to our authentic beingand freedom). That is, they longed for a kind ofcommunion with God, with other humans, and withthe universe that differentiates rather than obliteratespersonality and freedom. They held in common anintuition that love is the key to all unity, but thatagape should never be separated from eros. Not in-significantly they also shared an appreciation of thedimension of the inorganic which had been largelyoverlooked, and is still seldom noticed, by theology.(See Drummy.) Similarly they both recognized thatthe materialist metaphysical foundation of modernscience is, in Tillich’s words, nothing less than an“ontology of death.” (1963, Vol. III, 19), yet theyboth sought to address this baleful modern perspec-tive without reverting to vitalism. Above all, theyeach placed special emphasis on the need for relig-ious thought to open itself to the category of theNew.

Both Tillich and Teilhard were also extremelysensitive to the ways in which dualism and “supra-naturalism” had sickened Christianity. AlthoughTeilhard was not directly influenced as much byNietzsche as was Tillich, he was sensitive toNietzsche’s accusations that Christian piety oftenfosters a hatred of the earth that saps human exis-tence of a wholesome “zest for living” (1970, 231-43). He also agreed with modern secularistic cri-tiques that Platonic influences in Christian thoughthad robbed the world’s “becoming” of any real sig-nificance, of the capacity to bring about anythingtruly new. Indeed, there are passages in Teilhard’sbooks, as well as in his letters, that sound hauntinglyNietzschean in tone.

In the end, however, Teilhard no less than Til-lich found the Nietzschean outlook suffocating. Anyvision of things that ultimately closes off the worldto new being, however friendly to becoming it mayinitially seem to be, is no domicile for the humanspirit or for the religious adventure. Both the meta-physics of eternity, in which everything importanthas already happened, and the modern materialistideology that explains everything “new” as simplythe outcome of a past sequence of deterministiccauses, have the effect of stifling hope and depletinghuman energy. Only a universe in which the truly


new can occur will ever be a suitable setting for re-ligious faith and hope in the future.

Another point of comparison is that of originalsin. Aware that the traditional explanation of a his-torical “Fall” of actual humans from an earthly para-dise could no longer be taken literally as the expla-nation of our estrangement from the essential, Tillichand Teilhard both sought new ways to account forthe ambiguities of life and the presence of evil. Theywrote at a time when biblical scholarship and agrowing awareness of evolution had already exposedthe questionable nature of a plain reading of Gene-sis; and they received harsh criticism as they soughtdeeper meanings in the story of the so-called “Fall.”In fact, they are still demonized by biblical or dog-matic literalists and anti-evolutionists.

On the question of original sin, what continuesto require theological discussion is the role of humanfreedom and responsibility in accounting for evil.Both Tillich and Teilhard moved decisively in thedirection of interpreting sin, evil, suffering and deathas tragic, or as “somehow” inevitable. Their inten-tion in doing so was in each case to widen the sweepof our sense of the redemption of the world by God.They shared the belief that a one-sidedly anthropo-centric interpretation of evil always risks diminish-ing the compass of divine love. But by pointing tothe tragic “inevitability” of evil, they raised trou-bling questions about how much responsibility forevil can then be attributed to individual human per-sons.

In one of several early notes not intended forpublication (reflections that may have led at leastindirectly to his being virtually exiled to China byhis religious superiors) Teilhard wrote that originalsin, taken in its widest sense, is not a malady spe-cific to the earth, nor is it bound up with human gen-eration. It simply symbolizes the inevitable chanceof evil (Necesse est ut eveniant scandala) which ac-companies the existence of all participated being.Wherever being in fieri [in process of becoming] isproduced, suffering and wrong immediately appearas its shadow: not only as a result of the tendencytowards inaction and selfishness found in creatures,but also (which is more disturbing) as an inevitableconsequence of their effort to progress. Original sinis the essential reaction of the finite to the creativeact. Inevitably it insinuates itself into existencethrough the medium of all creation. It is the reverseside of all creation (1969, 40).

For Teilhard, the most noteworthy theologicalconsequence of this universalizing of evil is that it

considerably enlarges the scope and import of theredemption in Christ:

If we are to retain the Christian view of Christ-the-Redeemer it is evident that we must also re-tain an original sin as vast as the world: other-wise Christ would have saved only a part of theworld and would not truly be the center of all.Further, scientific research has shown that, inspace and duration, the world is vast beyondanything conceived by the apostles and the firstgenerations of Christianity (1969, 54).

It follows that by failing to expand our minds in away that represents the temporal and spatial immen-sities given to us by the new scientific epic of evo-lution, we will also inevitably fail to do justice to thenotions of Christ and divine redemption: “How,then, can we contrive still to make first original sin,and then the figure of Christ, cover the enormousand daily expanding panorama of the universe? Howare we to maintain the possibility of a fault as cos-mic as the Redemption?” (1969, 54) Teilhard’s an-swer: “The only way in which we can do so is byspreading the Fall throughout the whole of universalhistory…” (1969, 54). And in this respect, he com-ments: “The spirit of the Bible and the Church isperfectly clear: the whole world has been corruptedby the Fall and the whole of everything has been re-deemed. Christ’s glory, beauty, and irresistible at-traction radiate, in short, from his universal king-ship. If his dominance is restricted to the sublunaryregions, then he is eclipsed, he is abjectly extin-guished by the universe” (1969, 39).

Paul Tillich would surely sympathize with Teil-hard’s attempt to widen the scope of redemption. Infact, for Tillich the redemption extends not only intothe whole of the physical universe and its history,but into the very heart of being as such. (See Part IIof his five-part Systematic Theology, vol. I, 163-210.) However, for Tillich no less than for Teilhard,the question remains as to whether, by universalizingthe primordial fault and correspondingly the com-pass of redemption, he has unduly lessened the roleof human responsibility in accounting for evil. Manytheologians have resisted a broad extension of thescheme of redemption precisely because such expan-sionism seems to dilute and even nullify the role ofhuman freedom in accounting for the most horren-dous evils in our world. (See, for example, Niebuhr,219.)

Although Teilhard does not pretend to removethe mystery of evil, he rightly claims that the realityof evil has a cosmic dimension; and evil appears to


be not quite the same thing when viewed in the con-text of evolution as when interpreted in terms of astatic universe, although too few theologians havebothered to notice the difference. We may askwhether even as significant a theologian as Paul Til-lich has taken evolution and the idea of an unfin-ished universe sufficiently into account in his ownunderstanding of God and the theology of redemp-tion.

Cosmic and biological evolution instruct us asnever before that we live in a universe that is in greatmeasure not yet created. The incompleteness of thecosmic project logically implies, therefore, that theuniverse and human existence have never, under anycircumstances, been situated in a condition of idealfullness and perfection. In an evolving cosmos cre-ated being as such has not yet achieved the state ofintegrity. Moreover, this is nobody’s fault, includingthe Creator’s, because the only kind of universe aloving and caring God could create in the first placeis an unfinished one. For God’s love of creation tobe actualized, after all, the beloved world must betruly “other” than God. And an instantaneously fin-ished universe, one from which our present condi-tion of historical becoming and existential ambiguitycould be envisaged as a subsequent estrangement,would in principle have been only an emanation orappendage of deity and not something truly otherthan God and hence able to be the recipient of divinelove. It could never have established any independ-ent existence vis-a-vis its creator. The idea of aworld perfectly constituted ab initio would, in otherwords, be logically incompatible with any idea of adivine creation emerging from the depths of selflesslove.

Moreover, the pre-scientific sense of a non-evolving universe has tended too easily to sponsorscapegoating quests for the “culprit” or “culprits”that allegedly befouled the primordial purity of be-ing. If creation had been originally a fully accom-plished affair, after all, we would understandablywant to identify whoever or whatever it was thatmessed things up so badly for us. The assumption ofan original perfection of creation has in fact led re-ligious speculation to imagine that the source of theenormous evil and suffering in the world would beeither an extramundane principle of evil—an ideaunacceptable to biblical theism according to whichthe principle of all being is inherently good—or elsesome intraworldly being or event. That such a sup-position has led to the demonizing of various events,persons, animals, genders, aliens, etc. requires no

new documentation here. It is enough for us simplyto wonder what would happen if religious thoughtwere now to take the reality of evolution with com-plete seriousness.

In 1933 Teilhard reflected, in words that apply tomuch Christian thought even today:

In spite of the subtle distinctions of the theologi-ans, it is a matter of fact that Christianity has de-veloped under the over-riding impression that allthe evil round us was born from an initial trans-gression. So far as dogma is concerned we arestill living in the atmosphere of a universe inwhich what matters most is reparation and ex-piation. The vital problem, both for Christ andourselves, is to get rid of a stain (1969, 81).

As long as we had assumed that creation was in-stantaneous, and the cosmos fully formed in an ini-tial creative act, the only way we could make senseof present evil and suffering was to posit a secon-dary distortion. But this assumption opened up thepossibility of interpreting suffering essentially aspunishment and fostered an ethic tolerant of retribu-tion. Such a view, one that still informs both relig-ious and social life, can only render expiation an in-terminable affair, thereby robbing suffering of thepossibility of being interpreted as part of the processof ongoing creation itself. “A primary disorder,”Teilhard goes on, “cannot be justified in a worldwhich is created fully formed: a culprit has to befound. But in a world which emerges gradually frommatter there is no longer any need to assume a pri-mordial mishap in order to explain the appearance ofthe multiple and its inevitable satellite, evil.” (1969,83-84)

Evolution, to repeat our theme, means that theworld is unfinished. But if it is unfinished then wecannot justifiably expect it yet to be perfect. It in-evitably has a dark side. Redemption, therefore, if itmeans anything at all, must mean—perhaps aboveeverything else—the healing of the tragedy (and notjust the consequences of human sin) that accompa-nies a universe in via. Especially in view of Dar-win’s ragged portrait of the life story, one throughwhich we can now survey previously unknown ep-ochs of life’s suffering and struggle preceding ourown emergence, it would be callous indeed on thepart of theologians to perpetuate the one-sidedlyanthropocentric and retributive notions of pain andredemption that used to fit so comfortably into pre-evolutionary pictures of the world.

Imagine, once again, that the created universe inillo tempore had possessed the birthmarks of an


original perfection. Then the evil that we experiencehere and now would have to be attributed to a con-tingent occurrence or perhaps a “culprit” that some-how spoiled the primordial creation, causing it tolose its original integrity. This, of course, is how eviland suffering have often been accounted for by re-ligions, including by Christianity. Accordingly, any“history of salvation” will then consist essentially ofa drama of “restoring” the original state of affairs.And although the re-storation may be garnished atits margins with epicycles of novelty, it will be es-sentially a re-establishment of the assumed fullnessthat once was and now has dissolved.

The central biblical intuition, of course, is thatsalvation is actually much more than the restorationof a primordial fullness of being. But the influenceon soteriology by Western philosophy has causedtheologians to subordinate the expectation of noveltyand surprise in the fulfillment of God’s promises tothat of the recovery of a primal perfection of being.This is why evolution is potentially such good newsfor theology. Paying close attention to evolution nolonger allows us even to imagine that the universewas at one time—in a remote historical or mythicpast—an integrally constituted state of being. As welook back into the universe’s distant evolutionarypast with Teilhard we see only multiplicity fadinginto nothingness, accompanied at its birth by an al-most imperceptible straining toward a future unitythat still remains to be fully accomplished. For thisreason, a scientifically informed soteriology may nolonger plausibly make themes of restoration or re-covery dominant. The remote cosmic past, after all,consists of the multiple, that is, fragmentary monadsnot yet brought into relationship or unity. The notionof an unfinished universe still coming into being, onthe other hand, opens up the horizon of a new or un-precedented future and promises an end to expiation.After the emergence of evolutionary biology andcosmology, the whole notion of the future begs asnever before to be brought more integrally into ourontologies as well as our cosmologies. Any notion ofesse as the consummation of the vast cosmos mustbe qualified by the theme of being’s essential futu-rity. Being must in some way mean the still-to-come. Esse est advenire.

Is Tillich’s Theology Adequate to Evolution?

How well then does Tillich’s theology functionas a context for understanding and appreciating the

reality of evolution broadly speaking? Unfortu-nately, even Tillich, in spite of his awareness of thebiblical theme of new creation, embeds his cosmicsoteriology and eschatology in a conceptuality andterminology of “re-storation” that benumbs thepower of his notion of New Being with suggestionsof repetition. Certainly Tillich goes far beyond clas-sical theology in taking us toward the metaphysicsof the future that the logic of evolution requires. Hisinterpretation of redemption as the coming of theNew Being is philosophically rich, and it takes us inthe direction of a theology that can at last take evo-lution seriously. But does it take us far enough?Open to New Being though his system of theologyis, has it fully absorbed the impact of Darwin andothers who have introduced us to evolution?1 Tillich,as I mentioned earlier, was suspicious of Teilhard’sapparently progressivist optimism. But beneath ofthis complaint lies a much deeper disagreement, onethat places in question whether Tillich’s thought can,after all, give us our “God for evolution,” andwhether his thought can move us forcefully beyondromantic nostalgia to the fullness of a hope propor-tionate to evolution.

Tillich distinguishes the actual state of estrangedexistence from what he refers to as “essential” being.Essential being is an idealized unity of all beingswith God, the “Ground” of their being. But the Tilli-chian location of the essential in terms of a meta-physics of esse is in tension with Teilhard’s sense ofthe inadequacy to evolution of any theological sys-tem that thinks of the divine in terms only of a phi-losophical notion of “being.” Both Tillich and Teil-hard interpret our ambiguous existence in terms ofan existential estrangement from the “essential.” Butwhere the comparison between them becomes mostimportant—at least as far as the question of God andevolution is concerned—is in their respective waysof understanding just how and where the “essential”is to be located with respect to the actual or existen-tial state of finite beings. It is on this point that I be-lieve we can begin to notice some divergence of onereligious thinker from the other.

For Tillich, existence erupts as the separationfrom a primordial wholeness of being, from an un-differentiated “dreaming innocence” (SystematicTheology, vol. II, 33-36). Implied here are images ofloss that can only be redressed by the idea of re-union with the primordial Ground of being. Tillich’sontological way of putting things is likely, in spite ofhis attempts to highlight the newness of being in re-demption, to subordinate the novelty of creation and


evolution in the actual world to the motif of restora-tion. For even though his thought tries to introduceus to New Being, it is still in terms of the notion of“being” that he articulates the idea of newness. TheNew Being, after all, is defined as “essential beingunder the conditions of existence” (Systematic The-ology, vol. II, 118). This way of putting things isunable to prevent us from thinking and imaginingessential being in pre-evolutionary terms as an eter-nal sameness that resides somewhere other than inthe dimension of the unprecedented, still-not-yetfuture toward which a sense of cosmic process nowturns our expectations. In Tillich’s thought, as in theclassical metaphysics of pre-evolutionary theology,the futurity of being is still subordinated to the ideaof an eternal presence of being. For Teilhard, on theother hand, such a Platonic view of things impliesthat nothing truly new can ever get accomplished inthe world’s own historical unfolding, since the full-ness of being is portrayed as already realized in aneternal present. Such a picture of things, as Teilhardmight put it, would only “clip the wings of hope.”

For Teilhard, the fullness of being is what awaitsat the end of a cosmic journey, not something thatlurks either in an eternal present or in some mistyUrzeit. In a sense, we can say that the universe is notyet, or that it not yet is. Its being awaits it. The foun-dation of things is not so much a “Ground” of beingsustaining from beneath—although this idea is par-tially illuminating—as it is a power of attraction to-ward what lies up ahead. “The universe,” Teilhardsays, “is organically resting on…the future as itssole support…” (1970, 239). This suggestive way oflocating ultimate reality arouses a religious imageryquite different from Tillich’s notion of God asGround of being or as the Eternal Now. The gravi-tational undertow of Tillich’s powerful metaphor of“ground”—together with his other earthy images of“depth” and “abyss”—tends to pull our theologicalreflections toward a soteriology of return to whatalready is. Tillich’s metaphors of God as ground,depth, and abyss do respond to Teilhard’s concernthat theology no longer locate the divine exclusivelyin the arena of the “up above,” but the same imagesmay also fail sufficiently to open up for religiousthought the horizon of the future as the appropriatedomain of redemption and the fullness of being.

In a world not yet fully completed, it is impor-tant for theology still to acknowledge with Tillichthat the actual condition of finite existents is indeedthat of estrangement from their true being. But thebeing from which they are “estranged” must be, at

least in the light of evolution, in some sensenot–yet–being, being which arrives ab ante, and notonly a ground to which estranged beings eventuallyreturn. Perhaps Tillich would agree with much ofwhat Teilhard is haltingly attempting to say aboutthe future as the world’s foundation, but his ontol-ogy places excessively rigid constraints on what wecan affirm and hope for the world’s future. Thereremains in Tillich’s thought a spirit of tragic resig-nation that is hard to locate in terms either of evolu-tion or biblical eschatology. The New Being, an oth-erwise felicitous idea, is still portrayed as a future-less plenitude of being, one that graciously entersvertically into the context of our estrangement andreconciles us to itself. But consoling as such a con-ception may be, it still bears the weight of meta-physical traditions innocent of evolution and at leastto some extent resistant to the biblical motif ofpromise.

Tillich’s presentation of Christ as the New Beingdoes indeed give an enormous breadth to redemp-tion, and in this respect his theology goes a long waytoward meeting the requirements of a theology ofevolution. However, although Teilhard would beappreciative of Tillich’s broadening of the scheme ofredemption, he would still wonder whether the phi-losophical notion of “being,” even when qualified bythe adjective “new” is itself adequate to the reality ofevolution. To Teilhard, it is less the concept of essethan those of fieri (becoming) and uniri (beingbrought into unity in the future) that a theology at-tuned to a post-Darwinian world require (1969, 51).Even his earliest reflections on God and evolutionadumbrated Teilhard’s life–long disillusionmentwith the Thomistic metaphysics of being, beginningat a time when it was extremely audacious for aCatholic thinker to express such disenchantment.But the young Teilhard already realized that evolu-tion requires nothing less than a revolution in meta-physics. It seems that evolution still awaits such ametaphysics, and it is doubtful that Tillich’s theo-logical system is revolutionary enough to accommo-date this requirement.

For Teilhard, as I have noted, the “essential”from which the universe, including humans as partof it, is separated is the Future, the Up Ahead, theGod-Omega who creates the world ab ante ratherthan a retro, the God who saves the world not somuch by returning it to an Eternal Now, but by beingthe world’s Future. The essential, therefore, is notfor Teilhard an original fullness of being from whichthe universe has become estranged, but instead a yet


unrealized ideal (God’s vision or God’s dream, per-haps?) toward which the multiple is forever beingsummoned. In this eschatological setting—one thatrenders Teilhard’s thought more biblical than Til-lich’s—the universe can be thought of as essentiallymore of a promise than a sacrament. Correspond-ingly, nature may be seen as anticipative rather thansimply revelatory of the ultimate Future on which itleans. If we still view the cosmos as participativebeing, then what it participates in is not a past orpresent plenitude, but a future pleroma. And its pre-sent ambiguity is of the sort that we might associatewith a promise still unfulfilled, rather than the se-ductive traces of a primordial wholeness that hasnow vanished into the past. Evolutionary cosmol-ogy, in other words, invites us to complete the bibli-cal vision of a life based on hope for surprise ratherthan allowing us to wax nostalgic for what weimagine once was, or for what we have taken to bean eternal presence hovering either above or in thedepths.

In keeping with Teilhard’s futurist location ofthe foundation of the world’s being, our own exis-tence and action can now also be thought of as pos-sessing an intrinsic meaning and an effectuality thatalternative metaphysical conceptions of the universe,including Tillich’s, do not permit. Now, much moreclearly than we ever realized before we learned thatthe cosmos is a genesis, we may envisage humanaction as contributing to the creation of somethingthat never was. Teilhard was especially concerned todevelop a vision of the world in which young andold alike could feel genuinely that their lives andactions truly matter, that their existence is not just“killing time” but potentially contributing to thecreation of a cosmos. Evolutionary science, there-fore, is both a disturbance and a stimulus to theologybecause it logically requires that we think of para-dise (or the “essential”) as something more than acondition to be restored or returned to after ourhaving been exiled from it. Instead of nostalgia for alost innocence, evolution allows a posture of genuinehope that justifies action in the world. Our existencehere is more than a waiting for an alleged reunionwith Being-Itself. The true “courage to be” is nottherefore simply a Tillichian taking nonbeing intoourselves, but an orienting of our lives toward theFuture Unity which is the world’s true foundation.Concretely this would mean “building the earth” in aresponsible manner as our small part of the ongoingcreation of the cosmos. After Darwin, the power ofbeing is the power of the future, and we affirm our-

selves courageously by orienting ourselves towardthis future in spite of the pull of the multiple thatdefines the past.

From the perspective of a theology of evolution,once the universe arrives at conscious self-awarenessit hopefully anticipates arriving at the being fromwhich it is deprived, rather than merely longing for areunion with it. In this setting, what Tillich refers toas our “existential anxiety” is not simply the aware-ness of our possible nonbeing, an awareness thatturns us toward courageous participation in the“Power of Being” (Tillich, 1952, 32-57). Even more,it is the disequilibrium that inevitably accompaniesour being part of a universe still–in–the–making, andwhose inevitable ambiguity turns us toward what wemight call the Power of the Future (see Peters).Pathological forms of anxiety, which Tillich distin-guishes from normal or existential anxiety, couldthen be understood as unrealistically prematureflights from the hopeful and enlivening disequilib-rium of living in an unfinished universe into nostal-gic illusions of paradisal perfection cleansed of tem-poral process.

Sin and evil, moreover, would be understoodhere as the consequence of our free submission tothe pull of the multiple, to the fragmentary past of auniverse whose perfected state of ultimate unity inGod–Omega has yet to be realized. In an unfinisheduniverse, we humans remain accomplices of evil, ofcourse, even horrendous forms of evil. But our com-plicity in evil may now be interpreted less in termsof a hypothesized break from primordial innocencethan as our systematic refusal to participate in theongoing creation of the world. The creative processis one in which the multiple, the originally dispersedelements of an emerging cosmos, are now beingdrawn toward unity. Our own sin, then, is at least insome measure that of spurning the invitation to par-ticipate in the holy adventure of the God–Omega)upon which it leans as its foundation. Here sinmeans our acquiescence in and fascination with thelure of the multiple. It is our resistance to the calltoward “being more,” our deliberate turning awayfrom participation in what is still coming into being.

Thus, there is ample room in this scheme for usto respect the traditional emphasis on our own per-sonal responsibility for evil. But we can affirm ourguilt in a way that no longer requires expiation orretribution so much as renewed hope to energize ourethical aspirations. Moreover, in an evolutionarycontext we might wish go beyond Teilhard and sug-gest that “original” sin is not simply the reverse side


of an unfinished universe in process of being cre-ated. It is also the aggregation in human history andculture of all of the effects of our habitual refusal toassume an appropriate place in the ongoing creationof the universe. It is this kind of corruption—and notthe defilement of an allegedly original cosmic per-fection—by which each of us is “stained.” The lureof the “multiple” is inevitable in an unfinished uni-verse, but there is also the cumulative history of ourown species’ “Fall” backward toward disunity. Andyet past evolutionary achievement also provides areason for trusting that the forces of unity canemerge victorious in the future. Even if the universeeventually succumbs to entropy, as Teilhard pre-dicted it would, there is something of great signifi-cance—he called it the realm of spirit—that is nowcoming to birth in evolution and that can escape ab-solute loss by being taken permanently into the lifeof God.

Bibliography

Drummy, Michael. 2000. Being and Earth: PaulTillich’s Theology of Nature. Lanham, MD: Univer-sity Press of America.

Niebuhr, Reinhold. “Biblical Thought and Ontologi-cal Speculation in Tillich’s Theology,” in The The-ology of Paul Tillich, edited by Charles W. Kegleyand Robert W. Bretall. New York, Macmillan, 1952,216-29.

Pannenberg, Wolfhart. 1993. Toward a Theology ofNature, edited by Ted Peters. Louisville: Westmin-ster/John Knox Press.

Toulmin, Stephen and Goodfield. June, 1965. TheDiscovery of Time. London: Hutchinson.

Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre. 1964. The Future ofMan , trans. Norman Denny. New York: HarperColophon Books.

Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre. 1969. Christianity andEvolution, trans. Rene Hague. New York: HarcourtBrace & Co.

Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre. 1970. Activation of En-ergy, trans. Rene Hague New York: Harcourt BraceJovanovich.

Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre, 1975. Toward the Fu-ture, trans. Rene Hague. New York: Harcourt BraceJovanovich.

Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre. 1999. The Human Phe-nomenon, trans. Sarah Appleton-Weber. Portland,Oregon: Sussex Academic Press.

Tillich, Paul. The Shaking of the Foundations. 1948.New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons.

Tillich, Paul. The Courage to Be. 1952. New Haven:Yale University Press.

Tillich, Paul. Systematic Theology, three Volumes.1951, 57, 63. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Tillich, Paul. 1966. The Future of Religions, editedby Jerald C. Brauer. New York: Harper & Row.

Weizsäcker, Carl Friedrich von. 1949. The Historyof Nature. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

1 In some of his sermons the sense of the future seems

sometimes more alive than in the Systematic Theology.Tillich talks about being religiously grasped by the“coming order”: “The coming order is always coming,shaking this order, fighting with it, conquering it and con-quered by it. The coming order is always at hand. But onecan never say: ‘It is here! It is there!’ One can never graspit. But one can be grasped by it.” Shaking of the Founda-tions (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1948), 27.


RELIGION, SCIENCE, AND EVOLUTION:TILLICH’S FOURTH WAY

Richard Grigg

Those who embrace the Christian faith have everwanted to speak about their God as a God who acts.The Christian God acts, primordially, in the creationof the universe. And rather than subsequently aban-doning creation, as the Deist’s God was wont to do,the Christian God continues to act within and uponcreation. God’s continuous action includes preserva-tion, providential guidance, and perhaps also discreteand spectacular acts of intervention. It is the secondof these, God’s providential guidance of God’s crea-tion, that shall concern us here, since it is that di-mension of divine action that connects most readilywith our focus, the evolution of living things on theearth. In the pages that follow, John Haught’s GodAfter Darwin: A Theology of Evolution is my start-ing point (Haught, 2000). But while Haught’s pro-vocative reflections serve as something of a center ofgravity for my own reflections in this essay, I ulti-mately suggest that a particular reading of Paul Til-lich’s theology—an admittedly rather radicalone—will serve us better in confronting some of thedifficult, technical problems that face us in talkingabout divine action vis-a-vis biological evolution. The moment that we begin to consider claims ofdivine action in the world, including divine guidanceof evolution, we face a particularly stern scientificchallenge: all talk of God acting within the physicaluniverse appears to run afoul of the law of the con-servation of mass–energy (the “law of the conserva-tion of energy,” for short). That law tells us that, in aclosed system, energy can change form, but it cannever be created or destroyed; if one inventories theenergy in such a system on Monday, one must comeup with the very same amount of energy when onechecks the system again on Friday.

If so, then how can God ever act within God’screation? Any such action should register as an illicitaddition of energy from outside the closed system ofthe universe. The Christian thinker will no doubt betempted here to fall back upon the venerable Tho-mistic notion of primary and secondary causality.God acts through the natural causal channels of theworld that he has created. But, unfortunately, thiswon’t do as a response to the challenge of the con-servation law. If the assertion that God acts throughsecondary causes is to be more than merely a poetic

flourish, if it is meant to suggest that there really is aGod and that that God makes things happen in thephysical universe that would not have happenedwithout divine action, then God must add somethingto or change the direction of the natural or “secon-dary” causal processes of the world. But this takes usright back to our problem: any such addition or tam-pering will violate the law of the conservation ofenergy. What, then, should the Christian thinker do whenconfronted with the Darwinian evolution of all livingthings upon the earth and with his or her desire tosee some role for God in that process? JohnHaught’s categories are certainly helpful here.1

Some theologians will choose the way of opposi-tion—creationist thinkers fit here, for example—butsimple opposition to the scientific notion of evolu-tion is hopelessly benighted. As Pope John Paul IIhas reminded his flock, evolution is more than just ahypothesis; the evidence to support it is over-whelming. Those who have not bothered to followthe very latest efforts of anti-Darwinian Christians tomake their case are to be congratulated for theirgood judgment. Just to put everything on the table,however, let it be stated that those efforts aresummed up in what is being called “Intelligent De-sign” theory, which has been with us only sincearound 1990. Its proponents do attempt some newmaneuvers, such as attacking evolutionary theory onthe molecular level and drawing on information the-ory. But careful thinkers who have taken the time toreply have had no difficulty in showing the tangle ofconfusions that characterizes so-called “ID” thinking(e.g., Edis 2001; Pennock 2001; Roche 2001). It re-mains the case, then, that to take up residence in theoppositionist camp is simply to remove oneself fromall serious discussion of the nature of our world. What of the separatist camp? That is surely amore respectable option. After all, both scientistStephen Jay Gould and the Tillich of Dynamics ofFaith appear to fit there (Gould 1999). Tillich tellsus in his book that “scientific truth and the truth offaith do not belong to the same dimension of mean-ing. Science has no right and no power to interferewith faith and faith has no power to interfere withscience. One dimension of meaning is not able tointerfere with another dimension” (Tillich 1957, 81). But the separatist position rests upon a confusion.Suppose that, when I am in a state of despair, I prayto God and then find my mindset transformed. Des-peration is replaced by optimism and torpor by re-newed vigor. The separatist will most likely describe


what happens in this case by saying that God hasacted to give me strength, but that only the eyes offaith can see that it was in fact the work of God. Sci-ence will find nothing unusual in this transforma-tion, because science by its very nature is confinedto a dimension of reality wholly separate from thetranscendent reality of God and God’s action. Hereis the confusion, however: while one may claim thatonly faith is privy to the fact that it was God whoacted, the result of that action is publicly observable,at least in principle, even when we are talking aboutsomething as apparently private as a change in mymental state. For my mood to change, my brainchemistry must change: dopamine will flow, or se-rotonin levels will rise, or electrical activity will in-crease—whatever the details, the change will bemore than evident to scientific scrutiny. And anysuch change will entail expenditure of energy. If thisenergy is introduced by God (however far back insome perhaps exceedingly long causal chain), if it isnot simply part of a series of events that was goingto occur in any case, with or without a God, then theconservation law is violated. In short, the separatiststance does not succeed in removing all elements ofa theological claim from scientific investigation, andthe crucial fact of the matter is that the elements ofthe claim left in plain view are sufficient for the sci-entist to detect a violation of the conservation of en-ergy. This takes us to Professor Haught’s third way, away that appears much more promising, not to men-tion more interesting, than either the way of opposi-tion or the way of separation. His third way is theway of engagement: theology is not wholly separatefrom science, but neither does it connect with sci-ence simply by rejecting scientific claims. Rather,theological claims can constructively mesh with, andthus do real work with, scientific facts and theories. But let us not forget the specific problem in view,viz., how to speak meaningfully of divine action inthe world without violating the law of the conserva-tion of energy. How does the way of engagementmake claims of divine action without needing tosmuggle extra energy into a physical system? Pro-fessor Haught, along with a number of the othermost eminent commentators on science and theol-ogy, turns to the notion of non-energetic informa-tion. Let us think of pool balls to see how this mightwork. Suppose that I wrack up the fifteen pool ballsat one end of the table, thus arranging them in thefamiliar triangular pattern. Taking aim with my cuefrom the other end of the table, I fire the cue ball

into that triangular grouping, sending the fifteenballs careening off on many different paths. The cueball and the fifteen other balls are interacting withone another via mechanical causality, via what, fromthe time of Aristotle, has been called efficient cau-sality. The kinetic energy that I have imparted to thecue ball expends itself in such as way as to move theother balls (as well as to generate a negligibleamount of heat). All of the energy that is used herecan be fully accounted for, and is thoroughly expli-cable, by looking back to the motion of the cue ball,and from there back to the motion of my cue, and soon.

But we ought to notice something else about thisscenario. The original triangular pattern of the poolballs must surely have had an effect upon the inter-action of those balls. That initial pattern helped de-termine the trajectories that the fifteen balls followedafter having been set in motion by the cue ball.Yet—and this is a crucial fact—the causal efficacyof this initial pattern surely cannot be reduced to thekinetic activity of the cue ball, nor to the individualcharacteristics of the fifteen balls that constitute thepattern, nor to the causal interactions among thoseballs, nor to any combination of these factors. Thepattern appears to have a causal efficacy of its own;it cannot be reduced to the efficient causality oper-ating among the individual pool balls. It thus appearsthat this causal efficacy is not a function of expend-ing energy. It is instead, simply a function of the in-formation represented by the arrangement of thepool balls. It certainly seems, then, as if we havecome upon causal efficacy without expenditure ofenergy, and this is important news for the theolo-gian. For this opens the possibility that God can ex-ercise causal efficacy in the world, that God can actwithin the world, by imparting information ratherthan energy to the world. Divine action can thus besquared with the law of the conservation of energy,and we can find a meaningful way to talk about Godguiding the evolutionary process. John Haught’sparticular way of tapping in here is to claim that Godcan act by luring events into the future. God is ever aGod of the novel, of what can be, and God actswithin the evolutionary process by introducinggenuinely new possibilities that make evolution inthe fullest sense possible. But, alas, there is a serious problem here that Ihave glossed over hitherto, and it is, I am afraid, ashow-stopper. The problem becomes evident whenwe return to our pool ball example: while the initialpattern of the pool balls on the table exercises causal


efficacy without expending energy, there is a verydefinite expenditure of energy in the act of pattern-ing the balls. I expended energy in wracking up theballs in that particular pattern. In other words, whileno energy-use is detectable when we look at thepattern as a static, atemporal entity, that approach isan abstractive, artificial view of the phenomenon. Bycontrast, when we rewind the tape and then “pushplay,” as it were, and view the phenomenon in itsactual, temporal reality, it is quite evident that thecausal efficacy of the initial, triangular pattern of theballs necessarily draws upon my expenditure of en-ergy in the act of patterning. In the end, the mannerin which pattern-as-information exercises causalpower does not provide a way for God to act in theworld without violating the law of the conservationof energy. Even Arthur Peacocke, probably the best knownadvocate of the non-energetic, information-as-causality approach, a form of “top down causality,”seems to admit to this problem: “…in the world weobserve through the sciences, we know of no trans-fer of information without some exchange of matterand/or energy, however minimal. So to speak of Godas ‘informing’ the world-as-a-whole without suchinputs of matter/energy…is but to accept the ulti-mate, ontological gap between the nature of God’sown being and that of the created world….” (Pea-cocke 1995, 286) Translation: transfer of informa-tion does, in fact, always involve expenditure of en-ergy. Hence, the information-as-causality model ofGod’s action in the world does not really help us toescape violation of the conservation law at all. Hence the need for a fourth way to think aboutthe relationship between science and theology, a waydistinguishable from the way of opposition, the wayof separation, as well as the way of engagement. Itis, I suggest, to Paul Tillich that we can turn in orderto find this fourth way. For Tillich’s mature systemsuggests the possibility of meshing science and the-ology not, as in Professor Haught’s way of engage-ment, by linking the tenets of technical or scientificreason with metaphysics (or with Tillich’s own“ontological reason,” which has cognitive and aes-thetic, theoretical and practical dimensions) butrather by linking scientific reason with ecstatic rea-son. “Ecstatic reason” is, explains Tillich, “reasongrasped by an ultimate concern.” (Tillich 1951-63,vol. 1:53) With Tillich’s theology, Darwinian evo-lution can be taken up into our ultimate concern, butnot in the form of a theory about how the God whois the object of Christian ultimate concern causally

influences the evolutionary process. Indeed, Tillichcannot talk at all about God having a causal relationto evolution, however subtle, for Tillich, good Kan-tian that he is (at least at some points in his thought)designates causality as one of the categories of finitebeing and thinking (Tillich 1951-63, vol. 1:192-8).And as a category of finite being and thinking, cau-sality cannot apply to God as being-itself or to God’srelation to the world. How exactly, then, does Tillich’s theologicalsystem, or at least a constructive rereading of it,connect God and biological evolution? In its briefestform, my thesis is this: God is not relevant at all tobiological evolution taken just in and of itself. Butevolution and God come into substantive contact viaour own human quest for redemption. Now MichaelDrummy, in his insightful study on Tillich and ecol-ogy, Being and Earth , continually reminds us of thedangers of the old Protestant anthropocentrism ofgrace, which so focuses upon the individual soul’sdirect relation to God, its absolute relation to the ab-solute, that it thoroughly disregards the world ofnature (Drummy 2001). I want to be clear at the out-set that my proposal here does involve a form ofanthropocentrism, but given Drummy’s well-placedwarning, I must begin with a brief apologetic foranthropocentrism, the upshot of which will be thatthere are better and worse anthropocentrisms. Anytheological position operates from some perspective.Furthermore, perspective is necessarily a function ofconsciousness. Pre-sentient nature, by definition,does not possess consciousness. Thus, there is nosuch thing as the perspective of the larger world ofnature. We are stuck simply with choices amongdifferent anthropocentric perspectives on nature.Granted, there may be a divine perspective on non-human nature and its value. But we have no directaccess to any divine perspective. Even an allegedrevelation must be both received and interpretedfrom a particular human perspective. And it shouldbe added here that, if the God we have in mind isTillich’s “transpersonal” God, then it is not clear thateven God has a perspective. It is an anthropocentricperspective on nature, then, or none at all. But there is nonetheless an important distinctionto be made: there are fecund and magnanimous an-thropocentric perspectives, on the one hand, andpetty and destructive ones, on the other hand. I takeDrummy’s warnings about traditional anthropocen-trisms of grace to be about the latter kind, the kind,specifically, that devalue and cut us off from theworld of nature. Needless to say, when I assert that


God is to be connected to evolution only through ourown quest for redemption, I am aiming for a mag-nanimous anthropocentrism. I must prepare the ground for my case by verybriefly reviewing some of the most basic elements ofTillich’s theology. Human being, as finite being, isconstantly threatened by nonbeing—finite being issimply being that is limited by nonbeing—a threatgiven to consciousness in the form of anxiety. Thus,the religious quest is the quest for an ultimate con-cern that can enable the self-affirmation of being inspite of the threat of nonbeing. The only legitimateobject of such a quest is God as being-itself, thedepth of the structure of finite being. Readers of thethree volumes of Tillich’s Systematic Theology willrecall that the religious quest and the dynamics ofultimate concern are complicated by distinguishingamong “essential,” “existential,” and “ambiguous”being. For the sake of brevity, I shall not spell outthese technical distinctions here. It is sufficient forour purposes to know that all three forms of beingrequire the self-affirmation of being in spite of thethreat of nonbeing. The one particular form of beingthat we shall in fact have occasion to consider in abit more detail later on is the one that Tillich equateswith “fallenness,” namely, “existential” being.2

Because Tillich, clearly influenced by Heideg-ger, proceeds phenomenologically when describingthe whole structure of finite being, not just thestructure of human being, it is unsurprising that hefinds the basic polarity of self and world in all in-stances of finite being, even if only analogically.Says Tillich, even “selfhood or self-centerednessmust be attributed in some measure to all living be-ings and, in terms of analogy, to all individualGestalten even in the inorganic realm.” (Tillich1951-63, vol. 1:169) The whole natural world par-ticipates, then, in the being of man–woman. This is aformal deliverance of Tillich’s phenomenologicalderivation of the structure of being. But the reverseis also true: human beings participate in the world ofnature. And here we look not to formal considera-tions derived from Tillich’s chosen ontologicalmethod, but from material considerations. Specifi-cally, we should look to Darwinian evolution. Fornothing shows us so powerfully that we are part ofthe larger physical world of nature than the facts ofthe evolution of the species and the dynamics ofnatural selection. These facts of Darwinian evolutiontell us who we are: we are one permutation of thelaws and energetic interactions that make up the uni-verse. Thus, we can speak of a reciprocal participa-

tion of nature in man and woman and of man andwoman in nature: nature participates formally andanalogically in man–woman insofar as our point ofentry into the being of nature can only be throughhuman being as that being for whom its own being isan issue; human beings participate materially in na-ture, insofar as we are the product of thoroughlynatural forces. To be precise, then, we can speakhere of asymmetric reciprocal participation. Now the fashion in which Darwin—along withlater physics, biology, chemistry, and cosmol-ogy—powerfully spells out for us the fact that weare inextricably bound up to the whole of the naturalworld, ought to affect our sense of the religiousquest, ought to shape that quest more directly thanTillich explicitly allowed in his own writings. Welook, says Tillich, to God as the depth of being, asthat which allows us to affirm our being in spite ofthe threat of nonbeing. As already mentioned, thethreat of nonbeing, in turn, is given to human con-sciousness in the form of anxiety, and a bold con-frontation with the facts of Darwinian evolution willhave an impact, for example, on our experience ofwhat Tillich names the relative form of ontic anxi-ety, that is, the anxiety of fate (see Tillich, 1952).Evolution is a wholly contingent, absolutely non-teleological process. To think through the facts ofevolution leads one to grasp what we might welldesignate, not the “thrownness” of the individual,but rather the “thrownness” of the human species.And to face head-on the fact that we ourselves arethus a mere accident of nature—albeit a “gloriousaccident” in Stephen Jay Gould’s felicitousphrase—is to encounter a most powerful form of theanxiety of fate. The religious quest as informed by a grasp of thescience of evolution, then, is the quest for a sourceof courage that allows me meaningfully to affirm mybeing in spite of the pure non-teleological contin-gency of my origin (one might note here, by theway, how ontic anxiety, i.e., the anxiety of fate,fuses with what Tillich calls spiritual anxiety, theanxiety of emptiness and meaninglessness). Tillich’sGod, however, is up to the task at hand; his God canprovide the courage that I require. For while I canfind no meaningful linear telos that will rescue myevolutionary origin from pure contingency and ap-parent meaninglessness, I can find instead what Iwould call a vertical or depth teleology. For it is bythinking my groundedness in God as the eternaldepth of being, the “negation of the negation of be-ing,” that I can affirm my being in spite of the radi-


cal contingency of my evolutionary origin. What ismore, to the extent that nature participates analogi-cally in human being, this courageous self-affirmation of being, this redemption from the threatof nonbeing, is a redemption in which the process ofbiological evolution participates. What, more exactly, might be involved in mythinking my groundedness in God as the eternaldepth of being?3 Two brief examples will need tosuffice here. To recognize that my existence isgiven, that it is “let be,” by being-itself, despite theconstant threat of nonbeing, is to be struck by relig-ious wonder at the fact that, in the famous Leibnitz-ian formula, there is anything at all, rather than sim-ply nothing.4 This self-conscious wonder and relig-ious gratefulness for the sheer fact of beingness is, ofcourse, firmly tied up with the wonder and grateful-ness at my own particular chance to participate inbeing, and I am now fully cognizant of how all-the-more gratuitous is the fact of my existence given theincredible contingency and tenuousness of the proc-ess of evolution that has produced me. By gratefullyrecognizing my being as supported or grounded inGod as the depth of being, as the negation of the ne-gation of being, I am able powerfully to affirm mybeing in spite of the threat of nonbeing, to live in away that Tillich would identify with courage andwith faith (see Tillich, 1952). And given the tie be-tween my own being and the evolutionary process,this faith, is, on an analogical level, a courageousaffirmation too of the process of evolution, a faith inits redemption, as it were. Consider a second example. Tillich’s phenome-nological derivation of the structure of human beinguncovers the basic polar structure of freedom anddestiny, individuation and participation, and dy-namics and form. He intends this polar structure tobe understood in such a way that, for example, themore fully realized is the destiny pole, so is the poleof freedom more fully realized. The poles, in otherwords, are in the most creative, the healthiest, of ten-sions. In our fallen condition, however, the polestend to come apart, so that freedom degenerates intomere arbitrariness, for example, and destiny intomechanical necessity. But the particularly Christianform of thinking myself in relation to God, of “ori-enting” my sense of self by God, if you will, opensup the possibility of New Being in the Christ, thatparticular Christ given to us in what Tillich calls thebiblical picture of Jesus as the Christ. The biblicalpicture of Jesus as the Christ offers the possibility ofreestablishing the proper polar tension between the

elements of our being. Consider how the idea ofDarwinian evolution might actually provide concreteresources in this redemptive process effectedthrough faith in the Christ. Rather than finding myfreedom degenerating into mere arbitrariness, I canunderstand it as situated within the larger boundary-setting destiny of evolutionary history; my indi-viduation finds its proper context in my solidaritywith the whole history of evolution and its manyspecies, of which I am a part; and the danger of be-ing stuck in unchanging, ultimately lifeless form isovercome by the fact of evolutionary change, towhich I am inextricably bound via the history of myspecies. Both my own being and the Darwinian no-tion of evolution are “redeemed” here, once again,not by engaging in some metaphysical argumentabout how evolution can be understood in relation todivine causality and teleology within history, butrather with how evolution is taken up into my ownredemptive quest, in how I understand myself in re-lation to God as Being-itself, in this case Being-itselfas manifested in the New Being in Jesus as theChrist.

The argument that it is depth-teleology ratherthan any sort of linear teleology that ought to be atissue when thinking about evolution can be rein-forced, not only by recalling that biologists refuseeven the vaguest hint of teleology in the evolution-ary process, but also by recalling what Tillich has tosay about history. For the temporal unfolding that ishistory and the temporal unfolding that is evolutionare surely related, even though, in the technicalsense given it by Tillich, “history,” properly speak-ing, arises only in those dimensions of being where“spirit” is present. But those who have read the thirdvolume of Tillich’s Systematic Theology will recallthat, according to Tillich, the end of history, in thesense of the meaning that both fulfills and judges it,is not some Omega Point, not some temporal end,but rather what Tillich terms “eternal life.” That is,we again must look to a depth teleology, an eternalnow.

The distinction between approaching Darwinianevolution via a Tillichian depth teleology and viaany variety of historical, linear teleology is signifi-cant, I think. Professor Haught’s desire to find someform of linear teleology, however highly modified,means that, unfortunately, his theology cannot passmuster with genuine Darwinian theory. And this isso whether or not one reads Darwin through the lensof a thoroughly materialistic metaphysic: whatevermetaphysic one attempts to link to Darwinian sci-


ence, Darwin refuses all teleology. Frederick Crews,whose critical intelligence has done so much to op-pose Freudian theory, turns his considerable abilitiesto a defense of Darwin. Crews calls ProfessorHaught’s position into question with this observa-tion: Haught, he says,

relocates God in the future and depicts him notas a planner but as ‘a transcendent force of at-traction.’ But it doesn’t occur to Haught thatsuch teleology is just what Darwin managed tosubtract from science. Whether pushing us orpulling us toward his desired end, the ChristianGod is utterly extraneous to evolution as Darwinand his modern successors have understood it.Evolution is an undirected, reactive proc-ess—the exact opposite of Haught’s con-strual—or nothing at all.” (Crews 2001, 52)

The Tillichian approach that I have suggested heredoes in fact embrace the truth that the Christian Godis utterly extraneous to evolution, that is, to evolu-tion in and of itself, evolution as a physical process.It is the meaning and value of evolution and its con-nection to our religious projects that gets connectedwith the Tillichian God. Depth teleology means thatthe larger reality of nature and its struggles, what-ever the accidental ends of those struggles withinhistory, become meaningful by being juxtaposed toTillich’s version of the Christian vision of themeaning and purpose of human existence, humanexistence as it essentially ought to be, that is, as it isgrounded in God. All of physical nature participates,as we have seen, analogically in this depth goal ofhuman being. And, in turn, the human quest for re-demption is enriched and much more adequatelyunderstood when located within its physical, in-cluding evolutionary, environment. By way of conclusion, it is perhaps my duty tomake sure that the theological books are balanced.Just as there is a law of conservation of energy thatdictates that, in the physical universe, one cannot getsomething for nothing, so there is a kind of law ofconservation of theological value that applies to anytheological proposal. While the Tillichian approachthat I am proposing here does offer, at least in myopinion, a genuinely workable combination of sci-ence and religion, one that avoids any violation ofscientific principles and yet meaningfully enrichesour notion of ultimate concern, we of course losesomething when it comes to our notion of the divine.Tillich’s God can provide a depth teleology that cre-ates no interference with the law of conservation ofenergy or with biology’s total rejection of linear

teleology just insofar as his God is essentially irrele-vant to the actual physical workings of that universe,however much that God may have significant impli-cations for how we think the value of the universeand its relation to our own religious quest. By con-trast, Professor Haught’s proposal, while it has whatI have argued are some not insignificant technicaldifficulties, has the laudable characteristic of pro-posing—and proposing in elegant fashion—a Godwho, through how he introduces novelty into theuniverse and lures the universe, still has a vital rela-tion to that universe and actually affects its physicalunfolding. At the end of the day, then, in both myTillichian proposal about science and religion and inProfessor Haught’s approach, there is always atradeoff; something is gained and something is lost.In theologizing, as in much of life, one must payone’s money and take one’s choice.

1 Some readers are already familiar with Ian Bar-

bour’s four categories, conflict, independence, dialogue,and integration (Barbour 1990). When Haught analyzestheological responses to evolution in particular, he finds itconvenient to group the responses into three categories:opposition, separatism, and engagement.

2 Even though the notion of “redemption” applies,most technically, only to this fallen or “existential” stateof being, I take the liberty of using the term redemption atvarious points in this essay in a more general sense as anyprocess in which being is rescued from the threat of non-being.

3 One item that must surely be noted here is that mythinking my existence as grounded in being-itself has thesingular advantage of avoiding any violation of the law ofconservation of energy. That is, this is not a matter of Godacting from without the closed system of nature. Rather,as long as it is simply my own thinking that is at is-sue—even if that thinking is about God and perhaps evenentails my being grasped by an ultimate concern and istherefore “ecstatic” thinking or reason—that thinking isstill purely natural and can be explained in terms of theenergy that is already part of the biological system ofwhich my thinking is a part (assuming, as I am, thatthinking is simply a particular dynamic of electrical andchemical processes in brain tissue).

4 See Tillich’s discussion of the “ontological shock”in Systematic Theology 1: 113 and 163.


Works Cited

Barbour, Ian. 1990. Religion in an Age of Science: TheGifford Lectures 1989-1991, Volume 1. San Fran-cisco: Harper and Row.

Crews, Frederick. 2001. “Saving Us from Darwin, PartII.” The New York Review of Books XLVIII (October18): 51-55.

Edis, Taner. 2001. “Darwin in Mind: ‘Intelligent Design’Meets Artificial Intelligence.” Skeptical Inquirer 25(March/April): 35-39.

Gould, Stephen Jay. 1999. Rocks of Ages: Science andReligion in the Fullness of Life. New York: Bal-lantine.

Haught, John F. 2000. God After Darwin: A Theology ofEvolution. Boulder, CO: Westview.

Peacocke, Arthur R. 1995. “God’s Interaction with theWorld: The Implications of Deterministic ‘Chaos’and of Interconnected and Interdependent Complex-ity.” In Chaos and Complexity: Scientific Perspec-tives on Divine Action, ed. Robert John Russell,Nancey Murphy, and Arthur R. Peacocke. Vatican

City State: Vatican Observatory Publications, andBerkeley, CA: The Center for Theology and theNatural Sciences, 263-287.

Pennnock, Robert T. 2001. Tower of Babel: The EvidenceAgainst the New Creationism. Cambridge: MITPress.

Roche, David. 2001. “A Bit Confused: Creationism andInformation Theory.” Skeptical Inquirer 25(March/April): 40-42.

Tillich, Paul. 1951-1963. Systematic Theology. 3 vols.Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

____________. 1952. The Courage to Be. New Haven:Yale University Press.

____________. 1957. Dynamics of Faith. New York:Harper and Row.

THE NEW BEING IN CHRIST:TILLICH’S UNIVERSAL CONCEPT OF

REVELATION AS A CONTRIBUTION TO INTER-RELIGIOUS ENCOUNTER IN THE PLURALISTIC

SITUATION OF POST-MODERNITY

Jörg Eickhoff

1. The Pluralistic Situation of Post-modernity

The situation of life, especially in WesternEurope and North America, is that of a pluralist so-ciety. Crucial signs for this pluralism are that values,norms, life-concepts, and beliefs are deprived of aframework that was once binding. Religion, espe-cially Christian faith, no longer has a normative andexclusive function of integrating life in a social way.The foregone matter of introducing people to theChristian faith and to the social reality of this faith,the church, has been lost. And moreover, religionseems to be seen as generally declining, according to

the overall assumption concerning the conception ofreality in respect to secularity.

This depiction, however, is not undisputed andalternative views concerning the relatedness of re-ligion and post-modern pluralist society have been

developed. Hence, their relationship is no longerdefined as something that is negative, but rather asambivalent; that is, it creates dangers, as well aschances. The plurality is not just viewed as a motorfor increasing religious indifference, but also as amean in respect of forcing the own personal deci-sion.

2. From Paradigm of Secularization to Pluralism

The concept of secularization has manifoldmanifestations. The most common one is the diag-nosis that the relationship of religion and modernityhas to be understood as a denigration of religion. Itis evident that the religious substance of the individ-ual and society as a whole seems to decrease and thepossibility of passing on inherited religious tradi-


tions to following generations is less and less suc-cessful. Termination of religion seems to belong tothe idea of a culminating modernity.

As much as, on the one hand, some authors orgroups in society wish for this end to come, thereare, on the other hand, groups, especially thechurches, which try to be skeptical with respect tomodernity and want to keep a religious sense of un-derstanding. Through theory as well as through ex-perience, an understanding is hatched that tries tomake the relationship of religion and modernityplausible through employing terms such as disconti-nuity and antagonism. It is evident that in this spe-cific context of thought, theology of religion cannotmove any further. It has to save what there is tosave—in the context of a threatening situation. Atthis point, I would like to refer to Paul Tillich’s un-derstanding of Kulturprotestantismus although I willnot be able to develop this any further way.

At the end of the 20th century a stronger self-enlightenment amongst the social sciences devel-oped in respect to the way in which their theorieswere constructed. It is now questioned whether thediscussion concerning the so-called end of religiondid not actually prove to be a myth, which has be-come a victim of the reflection on modernity, andalso post-modernity.1

One cannot fail to recognize to that it is moredifficult today to mediate Christian traditions.Breaks in tradition, and even erosions of Christianconsciousness are discussed beginning with the de-crease of participation in anything which is Chris-tian, to the public plausibility of Christian convic-tions. Decrease, however, cannot be simply equatedwith disintegration, which is a more linear process. Ithas to be recognized that within Christendom, po-tentials for innovation are effective. Religion, Chris-tian religion, is present in a pluralist society in mani-fold ways. The need for religion, it seems, does notcome to an end.

3. The Way Theology of Religion is Challengedby Pluralism

Christianity is an example that for a very longperiod a religion could build upon socialization anddevelopment theories that believed the introductionto the religious-cultural heritage to be a transporta-tion into the growing up society. This transportationshould change those who are growing up, while theform of this heritage was accepted to remain as thesame. The features of Christian identity are defined

in its large extent and should be at the same timeimplanted into the human beings, so that they mightbe bearers of this good. The equating concept ofculture was very much determined by this thought ofuniformity, although uniformity was at this stagealready long gone.

It becomes more and more problematic, in re-spect to culture or religion, to establish a certaincondition, a certain way of thinking or a certain con-sciousness as an outlasting manifestation, since theway in which a culture or a religion is differentiatedis completely lost. Moreover, the basic role of re-cipient subjects is not recognized, namely that theynot only adapt and reproduce, but also interact andconstruct reality. Thinking in concepts of uniform-ity, unity, and so on seems to be incompatible withour reality. It is more and more in conflict with theheterogeneity, difference, and pluriformity with re-spect to daily life.

This means that in Western society, one experi-ences a diminishing of quasi-normative religiousmonopoly; religions are increasingly a fellow rivalin the market where world-views are also offered.Although individual religious convictions are stilldetermined by aspects of tradition which are affectedby institutions, this does not mean that they coincidewith them. We have to acknowledge that post-modernity is polymorphic and ambivalent.

To become a Christian, so it seems nowadays, isnot something which human beings become becauseof a tradition or because of convictions and attitudesinfluenced by the church or religion which are re-ceived in an unquestioned way. It seems to be moreand more the individual subject who decides on theplausibility of a particular religious conviction. Tobecome a Christian is more frequently to be the re-sult of a choice. This is no unique process, but anongoing act of balancing one’s own identity. Relig-ious identity occurs when proving and evaluating ofdifferent positions, and not in the process of accept-ing unquestioned established creeds.

Hence, a theology of religion has to search forways how, in midst of this plurality, religious iden-tity can be found and cultivated. For it is hardly pos-sible to desire the cultural pluralism of society, onthe one hand, but, on the other, to reject the religiousand ethical one. Of current religious convictions, it isknown that they tend more and more to adopt theform of a self-invented pattern. One is talking aboutreligious bricolage or religious syncretism. Analyti-cally speaking, this can be seen as an adaptation tothe demands the rest of existence has. Society, being


functionally differentiated, demands the individualto be in all areas and in nearly respects to erect inde-pendently connections between diverging areas oflife. The dimension of world-concept is included inthis process. Thus, modern biographies presentthemselves as a movement through various worlds,social, cultural, and religious. They seem not only toallow a gradual realization of different identities, butmoreover, to be a parallel composition of manifoldidentities.2

Religious identity implies, as identity in generaldoes, a drawing of boundaries between elementsbelonging to it and elements that do not. Although ithas to be stated that neither the boundaries are de-termined, nor is the definition of the content of iden-tity established. What it means to be Christian re-quires an ongoing hermeneutical process of under-standing and relativising of tradition and situation.

4. On the Function of Theological Normativity

The aim is not to deprive Christian dogmatics ofits normativity. However, it is to show under whichconditions Christian traditions can re-establish theirplausibility in postmodernity.

This is not only true with respect to the relation-ship analyzed above between a pluralist theology ofreligion and the cultural plurality of the post-modernin general, but also with regards to the specific rela-tionship between the religions in particular. Thefollowing account shall consider this particular as-pect.

Dialogue is the normative value of a pluralisttheology of religion. It is concerned with an authen-tic, productive exchange, and with change and im-provement of the dialogical competence of the en-gaged dialogue partner. It is by no means true thatall religions are equal or confess the same thing inrespect to the nature of their being a religion and intheir present condition. However, as participants inthis dialogue they all have to have the same rights inorder to be in true dialogue. At the end it might verywell happen and will happen that one religion willbe able to give a better answer to a specific questionthan the rest. This is nothing but a quasi-eschatological result of this dialogue and not a kindof knowledge that is already established before dia-logue happens. Truth and reality are created in a dis-cursive way through a dialogical speech-act. Bothtraditional apologetic models of religious discoursehave lost their significance. This is of importance forthe horizontal model of exclusivism which is dis-

carding anything that is outside the realm of Christi-anity, being determined by an exclusively dualisticdistinction according to this schema: true and untrue,right and wrong, light and dark; as well as the modelof positive inclusivism with respect to a basic, uni-versal level according to the schema: plan and com-pletion, preparation and development, promise andfulfillment.3

5. Paul Tillich’s Universal Concept of Revelation

What should follow this detailed account of ourstarting-point is Paul Tillich himself. My aim is totry to explain what his ontological principle of theNew Being in Christ can contribute to the dialoguetheology of religion has in post-modernity. Paul Til-lich refers to this specific mode of dialogue with theterm of correlation. He understands this correlationto be rooted in questions concerning human experi-ence and the answer the Gospel gives to these ques-tions. In his religious-theological point of departure,he is unmistakably following the line religious sci-ence and philosophy are taking, which are broughtinto connection with names like Schleiermacher,Troeltsch, and Otto. In doing so, he also gives roomto concerns which are of a Christocentric dimensionand are critical of religion such as dialectical theol-ogy—and integrates these concepts in his depictionof the relation existing between Christianity and thereligions.

The absolute nature of Christianity is a lesshappy expression for the binding validity of theChristian message. Tillich rather prefers to use theterm universality and tries to show in what respect“die christliche Botschaft universal und für alleKulturen bindend gültig ist, so dass der Christus daswerden muss, was er potentiell von Anfang an ist:die Mitte der Geschichte für alle geschichtlichenEntwicklungen”4. Reinhold Bernhardt elucidates adouble foundation to the Tillichian concept of uni-versality when employing Rudolf Otto; it rests on“der Voraussetzung eines universalen Heiligen undseiner universalen Offenbarung einerseits, auf derAnnahme einer universalen, in allen Menschen an-gelegten Ausrichtung auf diese Sinnerschließungandererseits”5.

When Tillich writes that “the divine being em-bodies itself in different forms”6 in the various re-ligions, it becomes evident that incarnation does notrepresent a specific or genuine Christian concept.This means that a concept of incarnation that is lim-ited in plurality is highlighting the universality of the


understanding of what revelation is. The correlatingside of this understanding Tillich describes in hisSystematic Theology: “Revelation is the manifesta-tion of what concerns us ultimately.”7 This meansthat there is an ontological depth of dimensionwhich discloses the incarnation of the New Being,and which is encountered as a general human phe-nomenon of all religions: “The quest for the NewBeing is universal…the quest for the New Beingappears in all religions.”8 This universal structure isopposed to the unique character the incarnation ofChrist in Jesus of Nazareth inherently has. Jesusdoes not demand absolutism, neither for Himself,nor for His person. He does not identify Himselfwith the unconditional. He refers to God’s kingdom.His cross is the point where the particular is blendedinto the universal, from Jesus to Christ. Highest par-ticularity and highest universality are united in thisevent. Thus, Jesus is turned into “an absolute figureof world-encompassing importance.”9 If Christianityis now making a universal claim, then it demandslikewise that in all the various manifestations inwhich this longing for the New Being has ap-peared—meaning, the manifold forms of religionthat exist—it has been fulfilled in Jesus as Christ. Itis in this unique way that the New Being has beenrevealed. This message bears a meaning for all na-tions, cultures and religions.

This final revelation of God in Jesus as the onebringing the salvific New Being becomes the normfor all revelation which happens in nature and his-tory, among groups and individuals—and from nowon is only appreciated as a preparatory revelation.Hence, Jesus’ revelation lifts the story of revelationout of the period of preparation into acceptance. TheChrist-event becomes the centre of history. Thesespecific phases of preparation and acceptance are,however, not just temporally separated from eachother; preparation also happens apart from or inChristianity itself. Moreover, this acceptance doesnot happen in a supernatural way but is communi-cated through history and through human awareness.The break-through to faith occurs on an individuallevel, and hence, does not happen in all places at thesame time. In other terminology, Tillich speaks ofthe great and central kairos as the break-through ofthe event of revelation in the Christ-Event in historyand the small kairoi that is correlated to it. In theseparticular kairoi, there is no new revelation or spe-cial revelation that make the Christ-event unneces-sary, however it leads up to a more and more novel,more and more existential recapitulation of Christ’s

revelation. This particular revelation restitutes theoriginal character of the final meaning of the onto-logical relationship between God and the human.10

The concept of religion in Tillich is not opposedto his concept of revelation, as it is in dialectic the-ology. Revelation needs religion if revelation wantsto penetrate space where human life exists. Religionis humanity’s answer to God’s revelation. Hence,Tillich does not refer to any empirical religion in itshistorical manifestation with respect to his conceptof religion. He is dealing with a theological cate-gory: “Religion is the experience of ultimate con-cern. It is the state of being grasped by somethingabsolute, holy, total.”11 Tillich refers to empiricalreligions as a phenomenon of culture. As suchChristianity is a religion amongst religions, an ex-pression of the New Being. All these expressions areconfronted—and therefore, Christianity aswell—with the message of Jesus as the Christ. He isan answer to their questions, as well as judgement.For religion can be, on the one hand, the honest hu-man search for meaning and for God, as well as amongrel self-creation with the purpose of erectingmeaning which lets the conditional be unconditional,the temporal eternal, and thus, denies God’s infinity.True religion is “in welcher Gott sich gibt undfalsche die, in welcher er vergeblich gesuchtwird.”12. The message of Jesus as the Christ, hence,becomes for Tillich the uniting centre “in dem alleReligionen geeint werden könnten, wenn sie dasKriterium des Neuen Seins, das im Christus erschie-nen ist, anerkannt haben.”13

Should Tillich’s religious-theological constructbe categorized , then the term of conditional exclu-siveness seems to be appropriate.14 The eternal alonecan be in the position of exclusive absolutism. Eve-rything finite—and, thus, every religion, includingChristianity—cannot claim absolutism. The univer-sally absolute is confronted with that which condi-tions all that is particular only as being conditioned.The relationship Christianity as an empirical phe-nomenon has with other religions cannot and shouldnot be a simple rejection, since the universally ab-solute can be manifest and is manifest in all otherreligions. Therefore, Christianity is not the fulfill-ment of all religions, but rather is enriched throughthis encounter with revelation of the New Being inthe various religions.

Hence, dialogue becomes a model for inter-religious treatment. This dialogue, however, derivesits norms from the criteria of the New Being. Thus,it becomes possible to accept each other’s truths, as


well as to criticize and to be able to endure criticismin dialogue. The aim of this dialogue is to overcomeparticular and provincial self-glorification and to beopen for the universal reality of God.

6. The Post-modern End of the Meta-narrative asan Inquiry into Tillich

Much has been discussed so far: plurality, for in-stance—and consequently a pluralist theology ofreligion. This is the signature and the call for battlein post-modernity. Unfortunately, “post-modern”has become a term with which one can do almostanything. The retrograde intersection against thepost-modern is always the much quoted inclinationand obligation to be arbitrary. The famous sloganfor this is “anything goes,” which of course, whenPaul Feyerabend employ it, means something com-pletely different.15 Plurality is obviously misinter-preted when referring to this arbitrary propaganda:one is only analyzing one side of the manifold ex-pression existing, and does not take in to account theother which is the precision of the multiple possi-bilities. Let me explain what I mean by this.

Our concept of reality and our expectations inrespect of recognition and act are determined byspecificity, difference, and multi-dimensionality.Plurality is our present paradigm. Overall, the post-modern pluralization is not affected only by the su-perstructure or the surface of society, as some criticsmight claim. It has moreover permeated the basisand elementary definitions of society. Jean-FrancoisLyotard’s16 determination of Post-modernity by theprofessing the end of the meta-narrative endows thisrejection unity. To phrase it differently: it brings theunconditional acceptance of plurality—and its radi-calization—to the point. This shall serve as a back-ground for evaluating Tillich’s construction of the-ology of religion.

In my opinion, often the post-modern interces-sion for difference and plurality is confused with theconventional and rather flat pluralism. I am referringto the understanding that primary values should al-ways agree and on this unquestionable basis colorfulsuperficialities can be tolerated. Typical for this con-cept, for which modernity has to be held account-able, is the assumption of a great design having amethod and an aim. This concept promises salvationavailable for all and on the whole.

Post-modern thinkers, however, share the as-sumption that plurality permeates the basis, so thateven the roots will be affected. Thus, plurality is un-

derstood to be incisive and radical. The post-modernbreak-down, that is, the loss of any total vision, isnot mourned or regretted, but rather interpreted andconsidered a gain. The right question is not whetherthe motif of plurality is new as such. It is more im-portant that it is now at the centre of attention and is,therefore, grasped in a radical way. Therefore, any-one defining plurality in the classic style of moder-nity, that is, seeing it in respect of unity will haveextreme difficulties in recognizing this description.He or she has to discard it and to shut themselves offfrom a sober awareness of the multiplicity of realityand the realities.

The constructivist notion of the post-modern,which allows truth and reality to emerge in a discur-sive way from a dialogical speech-act, thus, empha-sizes the open correlational process. Furthermore,Tillich’s primary correlation concerning the questionof the human and the answer given by the Gospel isremembered. This specific understanding of correla-tion is based on the preconception of a universalNew Being.

Are we, however, not being confronted with an-other meta-narrative? I do not think so. According tomy reading, Tillich resists the temptation to absolu-tize the universal, ontological, and theonomic prin-ciples in an empirical category. Tillich himself callsthis relationship a theological paradox: “The abso-lute standpoint must, therefore, notwithstanding itsabsoluteness, descend to the relative and elevate therelative standpoint to itself. Intuition must go intothe sphere of reflection, of singularity, of contradic-tion, in order to lead reflection through itself beyonditself.”17

In the context of postmodernism, one has tocontinue further questioning through employing hismodel of religious theology. What do we want toachieve with this dialogue? What is the telos? Toconclude and to close, I will offer you four points:

1. Religious pluralism begins where all religionsrecognize each other as equal discussion partners.Everything else belongs to the prolegomena of thedialogue. A religion, which is not willing to com-municate with other religions on the same level, isstill in its pre-pluralist stage.

2. No religion has the fullness of truth at its dis-posal. Religions are characterized by their belief inpromise and not in their claim to a possession. Thereis no religion, not a single one, whose cultural tradi-tion as such is untouchable in a holy way, reachingfrom general and super-temporal obligation. Such alimitation is a demonization of religious forms, as


Paul Tillich has clearly shown. Only when one ac-knowledges this, that is, when one ac-knowledgesthat all religious forms are grown from culture andhence de-demonizes culture is the path open tohonor cultural traditions in a relaxed manner.

3. One’s own religious identity is significant andworth-while persevering, that is, an equalization ofreligions will be and has to be avoided in dialogue. Itis important to be responsible for, acknowledge, andemphasize one’s own religious situation. The plural-ity of the various manifestations—even from a re-ligious situation from within—should not be gradedin a pre-mature manner. The own individual profilehas to be clear and should remain so. However, it isimportant that every religious human being is awarethat concretizing one’s own relation to God in doc-trines of faith and custom, with all their ritual forms,are precious as possible forms; however, they arenot necessary as the only possible way. This attitudelets the human being be more tolerant, as well asreligious, which can foster multi-cultural living to-gether. For individualization in dialogue does notnecessarily lead to isolation.

4. Religious experience is striving for communi-cation. It is an encounter—in a symbolic manifesta-tion—with the one who is of unconditional concern.Apart from the pure aspect of content, the aspect ofrelationship between the dialogue partners is an is-sue. The attention of this dialogue is directed to-wards the discharge and the procedure of true com-munication. Such a procedural pluralism (cf. JürgenHabermas18) acknowledges the impossibility of de-ceiving post-modern heterogeneity (cf. Jean-Francois Lyotard19). Hence, the dialogue itself be-comes the telos and encounters an eschatologicaldynamics—that is, fragment and anticipation,theonomic (cf. Paul Tillich 20) realization and com-munity.

1 Cf. Thomas Luckmann, Invisible Religion. The

Problem of Religion in Modern Society. New York:Macmillan, 1967.

2 Cf. Peter L. Berger, Der Zwang zur Häresie. Re-ligion in der pluralistischen Gesellschaft. Frankfurt 1980.Cf. John Milbank, Theology and Social Theory. Oxford:Blackwell, 1994.

3 Cf. Robison B. James, “La rencontre interrelieused’après Tillich,” in LTP 58/1 (2002) 43-64. 42f. Cf. R. B.James, “Tillich on the Absoluteness of Christianity,” inPapers from the Annual Meeting of the NAPTS, Philadel-phia, P.A. November 1995, ed. Robert P. Scharlemann

(Charlotteville, VA, August 1997) 35-50. Cf. Marc Boss,“Religious Diversity: From Tillich to Lindbeck and Back.In Religion in the New Millenium, ed. Raymond F. Bul-man and Frederick J. Parrella, 177-195. Macon, GA:Mercer University Press 2001.

4 Paul Tillich, GW VIII, 280-281. Cf. “Missions inWorld History,” in The Theology of the Christian Mis-sion.

5 Reinhold Bernhardt, Der Absolutheitsanspruch desChristentums—Von der Aufklärung bis zur pluralistischenReligionstheologie, Gütersloh: 1994, 119.

6 Paul Tillich, GW V, 220; cf. Theology of Culture63.

7 Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, 3 vols. (Chicago:University of Chicago Press, 1951, 57, 63), I: 110.

8 Paul Tillich, ST II, 86.9 Paul Tillich, GW VIII, 280, cf. “Missions in World

History,” in: The Theology of the Christian Mission.10 Cf. Jörg Eickhoff, Theodizee, Die theologische

Antwort Paul Tillichs im Kontext der philosophischenFragestellung, Frankfurt a.M. 1997, 209-225.

11 Paul Tillich, GW IX, 86, cf. “Religion and Cul-ture” in The Protestant Era, Chicago: University of Chi-cago Press, 1957.

12 Paul Tillich, GW I, 382, cf. “The Conquest of theConcept of Religion in the Philosophy of Religion,” inWhat is Religion?, New York: Harper and Row, 1968.

13 Paul Tillich, GW VIII, 279, cf. “Missions in WorldHistory,” in The Theology of the Christian Mission.

14 Cf. Paul Tillich, Christianity and the Encounter ofthe World Religions (1963), in Main Works 5, 302.

15 Cf. Paul Feyerabend, “Anything Goes” in Erk-enntnis für freie Menschen. Frankfurt, 1979: 83-85.

16 Cf. Wolfgang Welsch “Einleitung,” in Wege ausder Moderne. Schlüsseltexte der Postmoderne-Diskussion,ed. Wolfgang Welsch. Berlin,1994, 1-43.

17 Paul Tillich, Systematische Theologie, 1913, para-graph 22, Uwe Scharf transl., slightly revised.

18 Cf. Jürgen Habermas, “Modernity versus Postmod-ernity,” in New German Critique 22 (1981) 3-14. Cf.“The French Path to Postmodernity: Battle between Eroti-cism and General Economics,” in New German Critique33 (1984). 79-102.

19 Cf. Jean-Francois Lyotard , The Postmodern Con-dition: A Report on Knowledge. Minneapolis, 1984.

20 Cf. Paul Tillich, Theonomie (1931), in: MainWorks 4, 252. Cf. ST III (Deutsche Ausgabe, 282-314,Kapitel: Die Gegenwart des göttlichen Geistes und dieZweideutigkeiten der Kultur).


SALVATION AS COSMIC HEALING IN TILLICH

Karin Grau

“A religion without healing or saving power isirrelevant.”1 This remarkable comment by the 74-year-old Paul Tillich may serve as the starting pointfor the following reflections. Tillich’s theology canbe described as a continuous struggle against thepossibility that Christian faith might be irrele-vant—as an indefatigable effort to discover and con-firm healing and saving powers hidden in the Chris-tian message. We see this concern realized in hisearliest sermons, in his “Kirchliche Apologetik,” inthe first sketches of a Systematic Theology and inthe lectures of the 1925 Marburger Dogmatik.2 Andthis same concern of Tillich’s is only intensified by anew love that he finds in the New World after emi-gration, the love for “salvation,” both the word andwhat it means.

In the mid-1940s, more then a decade afterleaving the Old World, and while waiting for the endof World War II and the impending collapse ofGermany, Tillich recalls with astonishing enthusi-asm the Christian hope for “salvation.” Obviously,he has found his own meaning for this traditionalword. Learning English as he did at the age of 47,the term appears to him as a fresh, unused word, freefrom traditional connotations, and free also from thesharp contrast in German between Heil and Heilung.Going back to the root of the word, Tillich nevertires of recalling the deep longing for being “whole,not yet split, not disrupted, not disintegrated, andtherefore healthy and sane”3 that is connoted in “sal-vation.” He never tires of opposing the disastrousreduction in meaning that restricted this universalevent to the individual soul and its eternal destiny.4In colorful images from the history of religions, hedepicts “salvation” as a cosmic event that embracessociety and nature.

This love for “salvation” as cosmic healing re-flects Tillich’s contact even with Whitehead’s cos-mological philosophy,5 as well as his contact withpsychoanalysis, with Jung’s doctrine of the arche-types, and with the “faith healing” offered by Pente-costal groups and by Christian Science. Tillich’slove for “salvation” will accompany him for the restof his life. We come across the term within the threevolumes of his Systematic Theology as one aspect ofrevelation,6 as the work of the Savior,7 and as thehealing power of the Spiritual Presence.8 We en-counter “salvation” also as a central concern in Til-

lich’s reflections on “Pastoral Care”9 and in the latersermons,10 especially in the sermons that paint thepicture of Jesus as the healing Savior.11 The word“salvation” appears as the essence of the religiousanswer given to the cultural analysis of estrangedexistence,12 and as the fundamental experiential ba-sis of any religion,13 especially of Christian faith, thefaith that sees universal healing power “embodied inthe Christ.”14 And, finally, we find passages in Til-lich—hermeneutically very interesting pas-sages—that reveal “salvation,” with its healing andcosmic connotations, as a key both to Tillich’s ideaof the New Being15 and to his model of the multidi-mensional unity of life.16

Nevertheless, Tillich’s concept of “salvation”gets its most powerful expression in the mid-1940swhen he emphasizes in an unexpected way the par-ticipation of nature in this cosmic healing event:“salvation,” says Tillich, “presupposes the healing ofdisintegrated nature generally. Salvation includes thepeace in nature and the peace between man and na-ture.”17 Or, as the title of his 1945 sermon puts it:“Nature Also Mourns for a Lost Good.”18 In Til-lich’s descriptions, which are much more than his-torical illustrations, we perceive nature as anautonomous subject. We perceive animals, plants,and landscapes suffering from sicknesses, feelingpain, hoping for healing.19 We hear the hidden voiceof nature, the harmony of the “heavenly bodies,” the“song of transitoriness” in autumn, the sighing andthrobbing of the entire creation20—voices of nature’shidden melancholy. Connecting the interpretation ofRomans 8: 19-22 with Schelling’s nature philoso-phy, Tillich describes nature as a living being, rootedin the same Ground as mankind, participating in sinand in separation from that Ground, but also partici-pating in “salvation.” “Bread and wine, water andlight, and all the great elements of nature become thebearers of spiritual meaning and saving power.”21

“Salvation” is represented as a cosmic drama withinwhich nature plays a part of its own. Nature appearsas a living, suffering, hoping Gestalt. In short, wewitness an intensified perception of nature that canbe described as a “Gestalt-perception.”

In places where Tillich is discussing salvation,we find only two small remarks in which he pointsout his affinity with the theories of “Gestalt.” Tohim “the theory of Gestalt…has deprived the quan-titative-mechanistic definition of nature of its seem-ingly uncontested victory.”22 To him, “Gestalt-psychology and Gestalt-medicine have introducedthe concept of wholeness as the ultimate therapeutic


principle.”23 (Both these remarks are from 1946.)But, considering Tillich’s contacts with leading rep-resentatives of Gestalt-theory in his Frankfurt time,especially with Kurt Goldstein,24 and also consider-ing his ideas about the Mächtigkeit”25 [power] ofnature and “Die Gestalt der Gnade”26 [the structureof grace] in the 1930s, it becomes obvious that theeschatological and religious-historical discovery ofcosmic “salvation” is deeply connected with the dis-covery of a new way of perception, namely, Gestalt-perception. Tillich’s 1959 laudatio concerning “TheSignificance of Kurt Goldstein for Philosophy ofReligion” and his reflections upon organic and psy-chic “Gestalten” within the multidimensional unityof life 27 confirm the following thesis: In these textswe learn that The Courage to Be and the fourth Partof the Systematic Theology are directly influencedby Goldstein. In these texts, it becomes evident thatTillich owes the term “self-actualization,” which isthe telos of all life-processes in Tillich’s philosophyof life, to his old friend from Frankfurt. And it alsobecomes evident that all considerations about theinorganic, the organic, and the psychic realm areinspired by the dialogue with Kurt Goldstein’s“Ganzheitsbiologie” [holistic biology]. In what hesays in these places, Tillich is on the way towardestablishing an embracing Gestalt-theology, a Ge-stalt-theology in which the term “Gestalt” is re-placed by the term “centeredness.”28

Notwithstanding all this—notwithstanding Til-lich’s fascinating work with the holistic notion ofGestalt—I see more that is relevant to my concernwith salvation in the salvation-papers of the mid-1940s. In those places the inspiration of a newfoundway of perceiving things is still fresh, and is not re-fracted in the intricate details of Tillich’s SystematicTheology, Part IV. Further—and perhaps most im-portantly—in those papers of the mid-1940s Tillichhas found a new approach to a subject that had beenimportant to him since his works on the demonic,namely, the subject of forces, energies, and powers.

Declaring it his aim to set free the “originalpower”29 of the early Christian eschatological mes-sage, and looking at the rich material of religioushistory, Tillich now deals with “cosmic forces,”30

with “demonic forces,”31 and with the “healingpower”32 of the Savior. As the “Son of man,” theSavior is “the concentration of all cosmic powers,the macrocosmos condensed in a microcosmos,”33

conquering the “cosmic power” of Death, bringing“Eternal Life which is equally an objective power.”34

In this perspective,” destructive forces” are seen as a

“cosmic reality” that “appears as the negative powerin history, man, and nature.”35

This small selection of passages mentioningforces and powers in the context of salvation, re-demption, and reconciliation may show the follow-ing: Nature appears as a tragic Gestalt drawn into adrama of forces and energies that is nothing less thanthe drama of fall and salvation itself.36 Nature is in-volved in cosmic sickness and so, in Tillich’s ownwords, the “cosmic disease is cosmic guilt.”37 TheFall, guilt, and disease are overcome by salvation,but in both, “in fall and in salvation, the turningpower is in man.”38

Today, there is ample knowledge of nature, itsdiseases, the way it is being destroyed, and the waysin which diseases might be treated and nature res-cued. But only a new way of human perception willbring the needed “turning power”—only a new per-ception of energies, of forces, of powers, and of na-ture itself as a powerful cosmic Gestalt. Only as weare able through our bodily senses to hear, see, andfeel these energies will we be able to arrive at a sac-ramental communion with nature.39 Only the factthat we hear, see, and feel nature’s “greatness andpower”40 through our bodily senses can tear us awayfrom the scheme of subject and object, a scheme thathas destroyed the awareness of the fundamental in-terdependence between man and nature—a schemethat started not only with Descartes’ “res cogitans,”but earlier with the Platonic construction of an innerworld.41

There can be no doubt here about two things.First, there can be no dispute that these new ways ofperception, including Gestalt-perception, are not tobe confused with revelation. We are still speakinghere of perception, even if it is “perception” in anextended sense. It belongs to the realm of the sub-jective, to the side of existential questions. It belongsto the realm of natural theology with its own pre-rogatives and limits. 42 On the other hand, Tillichnever tires of emphasizing the side of salvation thatis a “divine act”43 and a “universal event,”44 the sidethat is the creation of a New Heaven, a New Earth, aNew Being45—which is then followed by the subjec-tive side of salvation, that is, by the creatures’ par-ticipation in and their individual reception of salva-tion.

But there also can be no doubt about a secondfact, namely, that we, as well as nature, need a turn-around. And in order for us to be grasped by thenecessary turning power, we have to hear, to see, tofeel nature as a living, suffering, hoping Gestalt. I


am sure that perception in this extended sense willbe followed by r e ception in an extendedsense—reception of the familiar theological answers,for example, by a deeper reception of the embodi-ment of the Spirit, or of the real and powerful “LeibChristi” [body of Christ] that embraces humankindand nature. Spirit has become body; bread and wine,water and light, and all the great elements of naturehave become the bearers of spiritual meaning andsaving power. The turning power to realize this em-bodiment on earth and to confirm its fundamentalrelevance for the world is in the human race.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1909. Frühe Predigten (1909-1918), EGW 7, ed. byErdmann Sturm, Berlin/New York, 1994, 76-78.

1925. Dogmatik. Marburger Vorlesungen von 1925,ed. by Werner Schüßler, Düsseldorf, 1986.

1930a. Natur und Sakrament, in: MW 6, 151-171.

1930b. Protestantische Gestaltung, in Der Protestan-tismus. Prinzip und Wirklichkeit, Stuttgart, 1950,255-271.

1930c. Christologie und Geschichtsdeutung, in MainWorks, 6, 189-212. Henceforth, MW.

1946a. The Relation of Religion and Health. His-torical Considerations and Theoretical Questions, inMW 2, 209-238.

1946b. Redemption in Cosmic and Social History, inMW 6, 273-283.

1948. The Shaking of the Foundations , New York.

1951. Systematic Theology. Vol. 1, Chicago.

1955a. The New Being, New York.

1955b. “Psychoanalysis, Existentialism and Theol-ogy,” in The Meaning of Health. Essays in Existen-tialism, Psychoanalysis, and Religion, ed. by PerryLeFevre, Chicago, 1984, 131-139.

1956” Existential Analysis and Religious Symbols,”in MW 6, 385-399.

1957. Systematic Theology. Vol. 2, Chicago.

1959. “The Significance of Kurt Goldstein for Phi-losophy of Religion,” in LeFevre, 140-143.

1960a. “The Impact of Psychotherapy on Theologi-cal Thought,” in MW 2, 309-316.

1960b. “Philosophical Background of my Theol-ogy,” in MW 1, 411-420.

1960c Dimensionen, Schichten und die Einheit desSeins, in MW 6, 413-416.

1961. The Meaning of Health, in MW 2, 345-352.

1963a. Systematic Theology. Vol. 3, Chicago.

1963b. The Eternal Now, New York.

1966. “The Significance of the History of Religionsfor the Systematic Theologian,” in MW 6, 431-446.

Albrecht, Renate and Schüßler, Werner (1993):Paul Tillich. Sein Leben, Frankfurt/M.

Drummy, Michael F. (2000): Being and Earth.Paul Tillich’s Theology of Nature, University Pressof America.

Schmitz, Hermann (1992): Leib und Gefühl. Mate-rialien zu einer philosophischen Therapeutik, Pader-born.

(1998): Der Leib, der Raum und die Gefühle, Stutt-gart.

Sturm, Erdmann (1994): “Sein oder Werden? PaulTillich und die Prozessphilosophie,” in Gert Hum-mel, ed., Natural Theology versus Theology of Na-ture, Berlin/New York, 184-211.

Appendix concerning Kurt Goldstein

In the 1920s Kurt Goldstein had a neurologicalinstitute in Frankfurt where he studied soldiers ofWorld War I with brain injuries. He came to theconclusion that even organic brain processes followGestalt-regulations. After a short time in Berlin andhis arrest by the Nazis, he went to Amsterdam, andlater to New York, where he became professor ofpsychiatry at Columbia University. In his main work(The Organism [New York, 1939], 16) he describesone instinct, one driving force in each organism,


namely, the drive for “self-actualization.” This in-cludes a certain “centeredness” of the organism, orthe ability of “self-regulation,” which means thedrive to keep a homoeostatic balance by integratingimpacts from outside.Source: Christiane Ludwig-Körner, Der Selbst-Begriff in Psychologie und Psychotherapie (Wies-baden, 1992), 73; Hans-Jürgen Walter, AngewandteGestalttheorie in Psychotherapie und Psychohygiene(Opladen, 1996), 91.Lore and Fritz Perls, the originators of “Gestaltther-apy,” had chosen this name because of their associa-tion with Goldstein, in whose institute they workedin the 1920s.

1 1960a: 315.2 Especially those who describe the breaking in of

“Heilskräfte” und “Heilkräfte”; 1925: 242-247.3 1946a: 211.4 1946a: 210; 1946b: 277.5 Sturm (1994): 184-211. The cosmic element is not

really new in Tillich’s thought. It is prepared—as is al-most every topic in his work—in earlier writings. It isrooted, of course, in the nature philosophy of Schelling,and is connected with the attempt to interpret Jesus theChrist as an event that is significant for the whole uni-verse, as Tillich works this out in 1930c.

6 1951: 144-1477 1957: 164-1708 1963a: 277-282.9 1955b: 88; 1960a: 313-315; 1961: 351.10 1948: 76-86; 1955a: 34-41. 175-179; 1963b: 58-

65. 112-121.11 1955a: 42-45; 1963b: 62-65.12 1956: 395.13 1966: 433.14 1960b: 419. The notion of “salvation” in the con-

text of the “Philosophical Background” of his Theology isremarkable. There Tillich declares: “Salvation is in itsvery nature healing. .. And this power of healing is forChristian thinking embodied in the Christ.”

15 1957: 166.16 1960c: 414.17 1946b: 277.18 1948: 76.19 1946a: 210-213; 1946b: 277f.20 1948: 78-81.21 1948: 86.22 1946a: 225f.23 1946b: 276.

24 Albrecht/Schüßler (1993): 76f. 80.25 1930a: 154-163.26 1930b.27 1963a: 17-21.28 1963a: 32-34. See the Appendix concerning Kurt

Goldstein.29 1946a: 210; 1946b: 274.30 1946b: 278.31 1946a: 213; 1946b: 277.32 1946a: 212; 1946b: 276; 1948: 86.33 1946a: 214.34 1946b: 279.35 1946b: 279.36 1948: 77. 176.37 1946a: 212.38 1946b: 278.39 Drummy (2000).40 1948: 79f.41 In this point I follow the Kiel philosopher

Hermann Schmitz (1992; 1998). Continuing Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology of perception as well as elementsof gestalttheory, Schmitz develops a broad phenomenol-ogy of body within which “atmospheres” appear as en-countering Gestalten.

42 1951: 118-120.43 1946a: 215.44 1946b: 281.45 1946b: 281.


The Officers of the NorthAmerican Paul Tillich Society

Robison James, University of RichmondPresident

Michael F. DrummyVice President

Frederick J. Parrella, Santa Clara UniversitySecretary Treasurer

Young-Ho Chun, St. Paul School of Theology,Past President, Chair, Nominating Committee

Board of Directors

Term Expiring 2002

Mel Vulgamore, Albion CollegeDan Peterson, Graduate StudentDoris Lax, Secretary, DPTG

Term Expiring 2003

Paul Carr, University of Massachusetts, LowellDon Arther, Ballwin MissouriMary Ann Cooney, New York City

Term Expiring 2004

Duane OlsenMary Ann StengerLon Weaver

Coming in the Fall Newsletter: The NAPTS Meeting Schedule and banquet reservation. Papersfrom other sources, including student papers, will be published.

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