Word: barthians
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Fascinating facets of Earth's life and thought have been revived in the English edition of Letters 1961-1968 (Eerdmans; 382 pages; $18.95). Written late in his life, the 325 letters are full of typical Barthian barbs directed at the Allies' policy of rearming the West German "empire" and "the rabid mob of anti-Communists." Among the aging theologian's enthusiasms: Mozart (Barth proposed him for beatification), American Civil War battles, and the contemporary U.S., which he visited for the first and only time at age 75 ("a fantastic affair...
...Thinker's Grappling. Despite his acknowledged eminence, Barth's masterwork, Church Dogmatics, is one of the least-read great books of the century, and Barthian neo-orthodoxy now seems almost as old hat as the orthodoxy it displaced. Yet Barth wanted no disciples-except, he said, for his own sons Markus, a professor at Pittsburgh Theology Seminary, and Christoph, a Biblical scholar at the University of Mainz, Germany-and he often told students: "Don't repeat what I have said. Learn to think for yourselves." He tried firmly to shun theological fashion, and his constant goal...
...awareness that they are heavy going. He has "written more than any other contemporary theologian," and fears overdoing it: "I definitely don't wish to be another Adenauer." He is in good health, still full of sly wit and provocative opinions. A sampling of the latest Barthian views...
...Theologian Karl Earth. They talked, among other things, of Calvin, Mozart and Reinhold Niebuhr ("a great man. but if only he had an inner ear, through which he could hear what Mozart is saying, he wouldn't be so serious all the time"). Barth cheerfully remarked that a Barthian usually smokes a pipe; an orthodox theologian, cigars; and liberals, cigarettes. He offered Religion Editor Elson-a cigar...
...Does Barthian theology have anything to tell a world in which persistent doubt seems to be man's real condition? Because of its roots in an unchallengeable faith and its reliance upon the truth of a book that many men now regard as a volume of interesting poetry rather than a divine revelation, his theology has been described-by Reinhold Niebuhr-as "designed for the church of the catacombs." Barth himself believes his work contains "a missionary call." It provides no easy, immediate, specific answers to man's daily worries-but summons him to learn that all questions...