On Human Being: Christian Anthropology in Conflicts of Present

by Jürgen Moltmann

"This series of sketches provides a basis for Moltmann's view of man and woman as socially and politically responsible beings. Moving quickly through biological, cultural, religious, and Christian anthropology, he locates the contemporary problems of humanism in a technological (and inhuman) society...While the future remains central, its features are somewhat sobered in the emphasis on suffering love."

-- Anne Carr , University of Chicago

Genres: Anthropology

149 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1971

About the author

Jürgen Moltmann is a German Reformed theologian. He is the 2000 recipient of the Louisville Grawemeyer Award in Religion.

Moltmann's Theology of Hope is a theological perspective with an eschatological foundation and focuses on the hope that the resurrection brings. Through faith we are bound to Christ, and as such have the hope of the resurrected Christ ("Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead" (1 Peter 1:3, NIV)), and knowledge of his return. For Moltmann, the hope of the Christian faith is hope in the resurrection of Christ crucified. Hope and faith depend on each other to remain true and substantial; and only with both may one find "not only a consolation in suffering, but also the protest of the divine promise against suffering."

However, because of this hope we hold, we may never exist harmoniously in a society such as ours which is based on sin. When following the Theology of Hope, a Christian should find hope in the future but also experience much discontentment with the way the world is now, corrupt and full of sin. Sin bases itself in hopelessness, which can take on two forms: presumption and despair. "Presumption is a premature, selfwilled anticipation of the fulfillment of what we hope for from God. Despair is the premature, arbitrary anticipation of the non-fulfillment of what we hope for from God."

In Moltmann's opinion, all should be seen from an eschatological perspective, looking toward the days when Christ will make all things new. "A proper theology would therefore have to be constructed in the light of its future goal. Eschatology should not be its end, but its beginning." This does not, as many fear, 'remove happiness from the present' by focusing all ones attention toward the hope for Christ's return. Moltmann addresses this concern as such: "Does this hope cheat man of the happiness of the present? How could it do so! For it is itself the happiness of the present." The importance of the current times is necessary for the Theology of Hope because it brings the future events to the here and now. This theological perspective of eschatology makes the hope of the future, the hope of today.

Hope strengthens faith and aids a believer into living a life of love, and directing them toward a new creation of all things. It creates in a believer a "passion for the possible" "For our knowledge and comprehension of reality, and our reflections on it, that means at least this: that in the medium of hope our theological concepts become not judgments which nail reality down to what it is, but anticipations which show reality its prospects and its future possibilities." This passion is one that is centered around the hope of the resurrected and the returning Christ, creating a change within a believer and drives the change that a believer seeks make on the world.

For Moltmann, creation and eschatology depend on one another. There exists an ongoing process of creation, continuing creation, alongside creation ex nihilo and the consummation of creation. The consummation of creation will consist of the eschatological transformation of this creation into the new creation. The apocalypse will include the purging of sin from our finite world so that a transformed humanity can participate in the new creation.

Reviews

[Emil Henriksen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book by Jürgen Moltmann who manages to balance on a knifes edge when exploring who man is and what different political projects of salvation for man entails. By examining both the project of salvation from the right and the left, Moltmann concludes that although both of these projects definitely contain traces of the gospel, both also lack in serious ways. Ways that can only be mended by the project of salvation from God to man.
Moltmann writes this in 1976, and is thus in a time where the right wing projects of the 30s, 40s and 50s are still fresh in memory whilst the left wing projects of the 60s and 70s are unfolding. The experiences are clear in his writing and leaves us with a phenomenal burden of insight and a challenge to bring the truth of Christ into the world seeped in politics, to acknowledge the truths in both wings and to stand against the lies in both wings. To go the radical third way, which is not necessarily the middle.

Highly recommend although the wording is quite academic

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this in the way I like all Moltmann's writings, but it wasn't quite what I was hoping for, and I don't think there's anything here that Moltmann hasn't said better elsewhere.

[Robert Terrell · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was worth reading if only for the last chapter. Hard to believe it was written over 40 years ago. So much of what Dr. Moltmann says is still on target for today.

[Wyatt Houtz · Rating 4 out of 5]

A critic of anthropologies rather than a complete statement. Lots on Marx. Non-technical.