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Systematic Theology #2
Systematic Theology
Widely regarded as the foremost theologian in the world today, Wolfhart Pannenberg here unfolds his long-awaited systematic theology, for which his many previous (primarily methodological) writings have laid the groundwork.
Volume 2 of Pannenberg's magnum opus moves beyond the highly touted discussion of systematic prolegomena and theology proper in Volume 1 to commanding, comprehensive statements concerning creation, the nature of man, Christology, and salvation. Throughout, Pannenberg brings to bear the vast command of historical and exegetical knowledge and philosophical argumentation for which he is well known.
Volume 2 of Pannenberg's magnum opus moves beyond the highly touted discussion of systematic prolegomena and theology proper in Volume 1 to commanding, comprehensive statements concerning creation, the nature of man, Christology, and salvation. Throughout, Pannenberg brings to bear the vast command of historical and exegetical knowledge and philosophical argumentation for which he is well known.
515 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1988
8 people are currently reading
132 people want to read
About the author
Wolfhart Pannenberg
151 books41 followersWolfhart Pannenberg, born in Stettin, Germany (now Szczecin, Poland), was a German Christian theologian. His emphasis on history as revelation, centred on the Resurrection of Christ, has proved important in stimulating debate in both Protestant and Catholic theology, as well as with non-Christian thinkers.
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November 4, 2018
His name is pronounced “Volf-hart,” not “Wolf-Heart.” He is not a character in a Twilight fan fiction).
What would a Christology from below look like if it were written by someone who also affirms the eternal pre-existence of the Logos? Pannenberg gives us an idea. This volume covers the standard loci one would find in volume 2 of a three volume dogmatics (anthropology, sin, possibly Christology).
His methodology is most obvious in how he approaches the doctrine of Christ. He doesn’t begin with Chalcedonian formulations and then from those deductions, also affirm particularities like the resurrection. Rather, he begins, as with the apostles, “with what our hands have handled and eyes have seen, the Word of Life.” The apologetic value of such a move is enormous.
This book is quite difficult and is not intended for anything under grad school level readings. You are in the presence of a master who has read almost everything on everything. This is the type of theological reflection you did not find in North America until quite recently.
Pannenberg pushes back on the axiom that all outward acts of the Trinity are indivisible. He says it is a postulate from an extreme view of divine simplicity. The problem is that “the scriptures speak quite freely and expressly of a variety of divine acts….These can be summed up in a collective plural” (Pannenberg 8).
Refiguring Hegel
Hegel erred in seeing the Son as the emergence of finitude from the Absolute. This made creation logically necessary, since the Infinite must produce the Finite. WP argues that if we see the life of the Trinity in terms of mutual relations we can avoid this problem. Self-distinction for the persons is a condition of their fellowship in the divine life (29).
We see the idea of the world’s contingency in the Father’s preservation of it in providence. He has a disappointing take on evolution, since he agrees with it. But aside from that, he raises an obvious point that Darwin missed: Darwin operated under the strange assumption that creation meant God created every instance of variety all at once. WP shows there is no reason to believe that, as creation manifests a sequence of forms.
The Spirit of God
Spirit is Life-Giving breath of God (Ezek. 37.9, p. 78).
Spirit as Field and Force
“Classical dynamics tried to trace the concept of force back to that of the body and impulses that move it, and in this way to base all physics on the body and the relations between bodies” (79).
We are now able to move away from inertial views of force and closer to something like the Bible’s view. Per Leibniz, force (or its manifestation) is not linked to bodies but to spatial points. Per Faraday, bodies themselves are forms of forces.
Drawing upon his insights in ST 1, WP argues that our view of God-as-Spirit shouldn’t be read in a Middle Platonic nous, but the Spirit of God as a dynamic field that is structured in “Trinitarian fashion, so that the person of the Holy Spirit is one of the personal concretions of the essence of God as Spirit in distinction from the Father and Son….The Person of the Holy Spirit is not himself to be understood as the field but as a unique manifestation (singularity) of the field of divine essentiality” (83).
Personal Unity of Body and Soul
WP urges that we are psychosomatic unities, rather than two juxtaposed essences. So he rejects substance dualism, which is a problem, but he also refuses to reduce the soul to the body, unlike tendencies of some at Calvin College.
He argues that the soul is deeply rooted in the body (182). I agree. In older language we would say the body “traduces” the soul. He begins with Genesis 2:7. We are ensouled bodies, a nephesh hayya.
What is a Spirit
WP is very clear that spirit/Spirit means vital creative force, not merely intellect (185). Whenever we have ruach, we are alive. If God were to withhold his ruach (Job 34:14ff), we would die. Further, a ruach or a pneuma is not the independent creaturely station. While Paul does speak of human beings as spirit, soul, body, he makes several moves which prove difficult for seeing spirit as soul.
The Image of God
WP gives a thorough survey of “image-theology” in post-Reformation history. His unique insight is that a theology of the image of God must be linked to human destiny. This avoids certain conceptual pitfalls in both the Patristics and Post-Reformation thinkers. It also has a Christological thrust to it.
The Method of Christology
WP gives a rough outline of his “Christology from below.”
The historical Jesus is the starting point for all Christological statements about his person (279-280).
Any such historical presentation would also have a systemic character (283). This assumes an inner relation between Jesus himself and the apostolic proclamation of Jesus.
Any talk of resurrection must be about the historicity of the resurrection, and not nonsense about the “faith-dimension” of it.
While this is a Christology from below, the “material primacy belongs to the eternal Son” (289).
The Economy of Christ
The particularity of Jesus is the origin of a new human image, per 1 Cor. 15:49ff (Pannenberg 295). The link lies in the eschatological event of the death of Christ.
The Deity of Jesus
WP notes that the church’s rejoicing over Jerusalem’s destruction (as perhaps in modern preterism) forgets Jesus’s own weeping over it, as well as Paul’s ministry. It also the future restoration (342).
The Case for the Resurrection
The starting point for the work of Christ must be the in-breaking of God’s kingdom (329).
Those who believe in them have this future already.
It is much more difficult methodologically to begin with Jesus’s own understood authority for his message, for then we are faced with the problem of why he kept it a secret for most of the time (338).
The Resurrection of Jesus forms the starting point of the apostolic message (343ff). The Easter-event determines the pre-Easter message.
Metaphorical language was necessary because this was a unique event.
The Resurrection is a Jewish concept.
WP starts with the biblical material relating to the Lord’s appearance to Saul (354), as it is the earliest testimony. Saul’s testimony also links the resurrection and ascension. The disciples also accepted Saul’s testimony, which means they saw it as similar to their own experiences.
The earliest critics of the Resurrection acknowledged the empty tomb. The debated question was what it meant.
If there were no empty tomb, the Christian message couldn’t have spread (modus tollens).
The Christological Development of the Identity of Jesus with God
WP wants to link the pre-existence statements to those of exaltation
Thesis: “The relation of the Son to the Father is characterized in eternity by the subordination to the Father by the self-distinction from the majesty of the Father, which took historical form in the human relation of Jesus to God” (377). Jesus’s participation in the attributes is “mediated by the self-distinction of Jesus from the Father in the course of his earthly history” (387).
What would a Christology from below look like if it were written by someone who also affirms the eternal pre-existence of the Logos? Pannenberg gives us an idea. This volume covers the standard loci one would find in volume 2 of a three volume dogmatics (anthropology, sin, possibly Christology).
His methodology is most obvious in how he approaches the doctrine of Christ. He doesn’t begin with Chalcedonian formulations and then from those deductions, also affirm particularities like the resurrection. Rather, he begins, as with the apostles, “with what our hands have handled and eyes have seen, the Word of Life.” The apologetic value of such a move is enormous.
This book is quite difficult and is not intended for anything under grad school level readings. You are in the presence of a master who has read almost everything on everything. This is the type of theological reflection you did not find in North America until quite recently.
Pannenberg pushes back on the axiom that all outward acts of the Trinity are indivisible. He says it is a postulate from an extreme view of divine simplicity. The problem is that “the scriptures speak quite freely and expressly of a variety of divine acts….These can be summed up in a collective plural” (Pannenberg 8).
Refiguring Hegel
Hegel erred in seeing the Son as the emergence of finitude from the Absolute. This made creation logically necessary, since the Infinite must produce the Finite. WP argues that if we see the life of the Trinity in terms of mutual relations we can avoid this problem. Self-distinction for the persons is a condition of their fellowship in the divine life (29).
We see the idea of the world’s contingency in the Father’s preservation of it in providence. He has a disappointing take on evolution, since he agrees with it. But aside from that, he raises an obvious point that Darwin missed: Darwin operated under the strange assumption that creation meant God created every instance of variety all at once. WP shows there is no reason to believe that, as creation manifests a sequence of forms.
The Spirit of God
Spirit is Life-Giving breath of God (Ezek. 37.9, p. 78).
Spirit as Field and Force
“Classical dynamics tried to trace the concept of force back to that of the body and impulses that move it, and in this way to base all physics on the body and the relations between bodies” (79).
We are now able to move away from inertial views of force and closer to something like the Bible’s view. Per Leibniz, force (or its manifestation) is not linked to bodies but to spatial points. Per Faraday, bodies themselves are forms of forces.
Drawing upon his insights in ST 1, WP argues that our view of God-as-Spirit shouldn’t be read in a Middle Platonic nous, but the Spirit of God as a dynamic field that is structured in “Trinitarian fashion, so that the person of the Holy Spirit is one of the personal concretions of the essence of God as Spirit in distinction from the Father and Son….The Person of the Holy Spirit is not himself to be understood as the field but as a unique manifestation (singularity) of the field of divine essentiality” (83).
Personal Unity of Body and Soul
WP urges that we are psychosomatic unities, rather than two juxtaposed essences. So he rejects substance dualism, which is a problem, but he also refuses to reduce the soul to the body, unlike tendencies of some at Calvin College.
He argues that the soul is deeply rooted in the body (182). I agree. In older language we would say the body “traduces” the soul. He begins with Genesis 2:7. We are ensouled bodies, a nephesh hayya.
What is a Spirit
WP is very clear that spirit/Spirit means vital creative force, not merely intellect (185). Whenever we have ruach, we are alive. If God were to withhold his ruach (Job 34:14ff), we would die. Further, a ruach or a pneuma is not the independent creaturely station. While Paul does speak of human beings as spirit, soul, body, he makes several moves which prove difficult for seeing spirit as soul.
The Image of God
WP gives a thorough survey of “image-theology” in post-Reformation history. His unique insight is that a theology of the image of God must be linked to human destiny. This avoids certain conceptual pitfalls in both the Patristics and Post-Reformation thinkers. It also has a Christological thrust to it.
The Method of Christology
WP gives a rough outline of his “Christology from below.”
The historical Jesus is the starting point for all Christological statements about his person (279-280).
Any such historical presentation would also have a systemic character (283). This assumes an inner relation between Jesus himself and the apostolic proclamation of Jesus.
Any talk of resurrection must be about the historicity of the resurrection, and not nonsense about the “faith-dimension” of it.
While this is a Christology from below, the “material primacy belongs to the eternal Son” (289).
The Economy of Christ
The particularity of Jesus is the origin of a new human image, per 1 Cor. 15:49ff (Pannenberg 295). The link lies in the eschatological event of the death of Christ.
The Deity of Jesus
WP notes that the church’s rejoicing over Jerusalem’s destruction (as perhaps in modern preterism) forgets Jesus’s own weeping over it, as well as Paul’s ministry. It also the future restoration (342).
The Case for the Resurrection
The starting point for the work of Christ must be the in-breaking of God’s kingdom (329).
Those who believe in them have this future already.
It is much more difficult methodologically to begin with Jesus’s own understood authority for his message, for then we are faced with the problem of why he kept it a secret for most of the time (338).
The Resurrection of Jesus forms the starting point of the apostolic message (343ff). The Easter-event determines the pre-Easter message.
Metaphorical language was necessary because this was a unique event.
The Resurrection is a Jewish concept.
WP starts with the biblical material relating to the Lord’s appearance to Saul (354), as it is the earliest testimony. Saul’s testimony also links the resurrection and ascension. The disciples also accepted Saul’s testimony, which means they saw it as similar to their own experiences.
The earliest critics of the Resurrection acknowledged the empty tomb. The debated question was what it meant.
If there were no empty tomb, the Christian message couldn’t have spread (modus tollens).
The Christological Development of the Identity of Jesus with God
WP wants to link the pre-existence statements to those of exaltation
Thesis: “The relation of the Son to the Father is characterized in eternity by the subordination to the Father by the self-distinction from the majesty of the Father, which took historical form in the human relation of Jesus to God” (377). Jesus’s participation in the attributes is “mediated by the self-distinction of Jesus from the Father in the course of his earthly history” (387).
July 15, 2025
I love Pannenberg because he isn’t just trying to be clever. He really wants to think clearly. But he’s also really, really clever.
Read
April 18, 2012It is a little bit difficult to understand how it is even possible to do research on this scholarly level and to do it consistently over so many areas of theology. After having read this volume I'm kind of pressed to agree that if someone says, particularly on a historical point, Pannenberg says, well then it is correct. Or, I would have a very difficult time to prove it wrong anyway. Then when it comes to some theological issues, I might disagree, but this is such an impressive achievement that it is worth reading simply for that reason. Although, it simply takes a very long time and it should be said that it is dry stuff, but still German theology at its best as well. His thoughts of the Bible that it is to the extent that it witness to the Gospel that it is authoritative over the Church is very interesting, sort of tautologous, but interesting and I hope he develops it in the third volume. But that is for a little later. Now I must read something slightly lighter for a while (like Kant, Hegel or Wittgenstein!).
May 16, 2025
In Volume 2 of his systematic Theology, Pannenberg has even outdone the incredible high standard of the first volume. A work of pure genius. Only a remarkably gifted theologian studying for half a century could have produced such a work. (When he was working, he reported reading 500+ pages a day.) It stands with Summa Theological and Calvin’s Institutes at the pinnacle of theology.
Furthermore, this insightful and brilliant work is written with a careful logic, making even the most abstract philosophical and theological arguments easy to follow. One must again commend the original as well as the excellent English translation.
Only 50 years of distilling these ideas could lead to such clarity and ease with the material. He weaves in the historical development of the theological ideas from the OT to NT through church fathers, medieval thinkers, Scholastics, reformers, and moderns. Almost without exception, when someone attempts this, it becomes a jumbled series of quotes, and the thread is lost in the jungle of ideas and names. Not here. Pannenberg weaves a tapestry that lays bare the evolution of these theological ideas. Truly remarkable and a delight to read.
He interacts with Schleiermacher a lot in this volume, as in Volume 1, and also Ritschl. More interaction with Barth and Moltmann as well as Augustine and Aquinas and a number of lesser-known theologians. His primary philosophical interlocutors are Hegel and Kant.
Particularly insightful in this volume is his discussion on sin, which he places in the chapter on human misery. He also tackles the work of God in creation, anthropology, and Christology with profound and detailed analysis. He always connects the theological themes with the trinitarian aspect, which, in his theology, is key. Only in a trinitarian model can one understand creation, what is man, and of course, Christology.
The greatest work of systematic theology in the last 300 years.
Brilliant
Furthermore, this insightful and brilliant work is written with a careful logic, making even the most abstract philosophical and theological arguments easy to follow. One must again commend the original as well as the excellent English translation.
Only 50 years of distilling these ideas could lead to such clarity and ease with the material. He weaves in the historical development of the theological ideas from the OT to NT through church fathers, medieval thinkers, Scholastics, reformers, and moderns. Almost without exception, when someone attempts this, it becomes a jumbled series of quotes, and the thread is lost in the jungle of ideas and names. Not here. Pannenberg weaves a tapestry that lays bare the evolution of these theological ideas. Truly remarkable and a delight to read.
He interacts with Schleiermacher a lot in this volume, as in Volume 1, and also Ritschl. More interaction with Barth and Moltmann as well as Augustine and Aquinas and a number of lesser-known theologians. His primary philosophical interlocutors are Hegel and Kant.
Particularly insightful in this volume is his discussion on sin, which he places in the chapter on human misery. He also tackles the work of God in creation, anthropology, and Christology with profound and detailed analysis. He always connects the theological themes with the trinitarian aspect, which, in his theology, is key. Only in a trinitarian model can one understand creation, what is man, and of course, Christology.
The greatest work of systematic theology in the last 300 years.
Brilliant
August 6, 2014
I may be a bit harsh in giving this 4 stars. I want to give it more, but not sure I understand in well enough to give it 5 stars. I certainly haven't lived it enough for that yet.
In this volume, Pannenberg gives his perspective on Creation, Anthropology, and Christology. As the reader comes to expect by now, he interacts with an extensive list of figures. Since he has written full scale monographs on Theological Anthropology and Christology already, either because of this or because I have been influenced by people that have been quite influenced by those works, this volume reads much easier to me than Vol. 1.
Back when I first read his An Introduction to Systematic Theology, I was confused about his connection between Spirit (in theological language) and Field (in the language of Physics) – something he also spoke of in Vol. 1. I assumed that it would become clearer what he meant when he got to his loci on Creation. But I remain confused. Does he mean Classical fields like Maxwell? Or does he mean Quantum Mechanical fields like Feynman’s QED and field theories since then? What he says almost makes sense with Classical fields, but with Quantum Mechanical fields and their exchange particles, does this really transcend the materialism of the Stoic concepts behind Fields? Pannenberg has been so active in the discussion between Theology and the Sciences that I am sure that the confusion is mine and that someone who understands the Physics side of things would have called him on this by now. But if I, with a Physics minor behind me, am confused, how useful is this connection?
His comments on Theological Anthropology in the light of both Creation and the new Adam of Christ are good – and worth going over again. I very much might read his Anthropology in Theological Perspective some day for more of it.
It was in the area of Christology where Pannenberg made much of his early theological reputation. And his comments on this show it. They are still a powerful meditation on viewing Jesus’ work and identity in the light of his end – namely, Easter. This perspective has been useful for so many Christians, that any treatment of Christology today should almost certainly interact with him.
And yet this is the section I wish he interacted more with classical Christology. After seeing his extensive interaction with these sources in the Doctrine of God in volume one, I was expecting similar interaction with the great Christological councils, and more discussion about the post-Reformation debates. Instead, there were only a few comments about Alexandrian and Antiochian tendencies and about some theology since Hegel speaking more about God suffering than the Formula of Concord does. In reading him, have grown to expect more.
He ends with a discussion of what the Gospel is and means. Some good stuff here, but it needs to be expanded for clarity.
All in all, a very good read, even if not the easiest one. It gives me much to think about. Systematically it makes more sense to me than Vol. 1, but I am not sure about all the details. But it enables me to think more and grow.
In this volume, Pannenberg gives his perspective on Creation, Anthropology, and Christology. As the reader comes to expect by now, he interacts with an extensive list of figures. Since he has written full scale monographs on Theological Anthropology and Christology already, either because of this or because I have been influenced by people that have been quite influenced by those works, this volume reads much easier to me than Vol. 1.
Back when I first read his An Introduction to Systematic Theology, I was confused about his connection between Spirit (in theological language) and Field (in the language of Physics) – something he also spoke of in Vol. 1. I assumed that it would become clearer what he meant when he got to his loci on Creation. But I remain confused. Does he mean Classical fields like Maxwell? Or does he mean Quantum Mechanical fields like Feynman’s QED and field theories since then? What he says almost makes sense with Classical fields, but with Quantum Mechanical fields and their exchange particles, does this really transcend the materialism of the Stoic concepts behind Fields? Pannenberg has been so active in the discussion between Theology and the Sciences that I am sure that the confusion is mine and that someone who understands the Physics side of things would have called him on this by now. But if I, with a Physics minor behind me, am confused, how useful is this connection?
His comments on Theological Anthropology in the light of both Creation and the new Adam of Christ are good – and worth going over again. I very much might read his Anthropology in Theological Perspective some day for more of it.
It was in the area of Christology where Pannenberg made much of his early theological reputation. And his comments on this show it. They are still a powerful meditation on viewing Jesus’ work and identity in the light of his end – namely, Easter. This perspective has been useful for so many Christians, that any treatment of Christology today should almost certainly interact with him.
And yet this is the section I wish he interacted more with classical Christology. After seeing his extensive interaction with these sources in the Doctrine of God in volume one, I was expecting similar interaction with the great Christological councils, and more discussion about the post-Reformation debates. Instead, there were only a few comments about Alexandrian and Antiochian tendencies and about some theology since Hegel speaking more about God suffering than the Formula of Concord does. In reading him, have grown to expect more.
He ends with a discussion of what the Gospel is and means. Some good stuff here, but it needs to be expanded for clarity.
All in all, a very good read, even if not the easiest one. It gives me much to think about. Systematically it makes more sense to me than Vol. 1, but I am not sure about all the details. But it enables me to think more and grow.
March 28, 2020
Probably one of the best volumes of Systematic Theology in Modern Christian Thought. Unlike most systematic theologies, Pannenberg addresses the Christian Gospel from the perspective of scientific, academic, philosophical and anthropological disciplines first instead of simply making blanket assumptions about the Bible.
This volume addresses items like creation, science, evolution, the problem of evil, free will, original sin, the activity of God in the world, the varying meanings of Jesus' death and resurrection for Christianity, the reconciliation of humanity, the role of Scripture for the Church, the mission of the Church and the hope of the future, to name a few.
If you're into theologically dense stuff, and you're not satisfied with the standard "because the Bible told me so" fundamentalist cliches, this will be paradise for you. Caution: sometimes it gets so dense you'll feel like you're wading through conceptual molasses but it's well worth it at the end. :)
This volume addresses items like creation, science, evolution, the problem of evil, free will, original sin, the activity of God in the world, the varying meanings of Jesus' death and resurrection for Christianity, the reconciliation of humanity, the role of Scripture for the Church, the mission of the Church and the hope of the future, to name a few.
If you're into theologically dense stuff, and you're not satisfied with the standard "because the Bible told me so" fundamentalist cliches, this will be paradise for you. Caution: sometimes it gets so dense you'll feel like you're wading through conceptual molasses but it's well worth it at the end. :)
July 20, 2016
Throughout, Pannenberg brings to bear his impressive command of historical and exegetical knowledge and philosophical argumentation for which he is well known. Widely regarded as the foremost theologian in the world today, Wolfhart Pannenberg unfolds his systematic theology, for which his many previous (primarily methodological) writings have laid the groundwork. Volume 2 of Pannenberg's magnum opus moves beyond the highly touted discussion of systematic prolegomena and theology proper in Volume 1 to commanding, comprehensive statements concerning creation, the nature of man, Christology, and salvation.
October 7, 2016
A very stimulating read, thought-provoking. I find modern theology like Pannenberg's is best read after reading the basics of traditional theology. Read classic Lutheran theology then read Pannenberg. You'll get a lot more out of him.
April 4, 2015
this book was really good for the essay that I was writing for my degree. Rather insightful
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews