Word: brunner
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Calvinist Theologian Emil Brunner of Switzerland knows that "Christianity and Civilization" is a big subject. He does not even believe that there has ever been such a thing as a Christian civilization. "What is usually called by that name," he says, "is a compromise between Christian and non-Christian forces." But he chose to tackle the subject because he feels that no civilization can rightly be called "human" that is not based upon Christianity...
...Harry Brunner lived in a circle of fear. He feared life and, when war came, feared death. He trembled before the burdens of love and dreaded the void left by its absence. Watching himself as if he were a diseased stranger, relishing his troubles as if they were sweet delicacies, he could never act simply or spontaneously. Even after he had seen action as a naval flyer in the Pacific, he knew that his real war had to be fought within himself...
Andersen was the kind of man "who always chose that another might die so that he might live." When the Japs came, he cooperated; when Brunner came, he was kind to him. In him, Brunner came to see what he too might become if he stayed on. Andersen had a daughter; she was very beautiful and the next 15 pages are very predictable. When an American advance party hit the island to prepare for an invasion, Brunner joined the troops...
...Baillie, professor of systematic theology at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland, has written only two books in his 60 years. But when he has something to say, he knows how to say it. Swiss Professor Emil Brunner, one of Europe's leading theologians, paid it a rare tribute: "It is rather exceptional that a book of dogmatic theology makes fascinating reading . . ." Union Theological Seminary's President Emeritus Henry Sloane Coffin gave it an equally rare garland: "First-rate . . . We have little really tiptop theology today, and this is tiptop...
Into Battle. Theologian Brunner lost no time in challenging this position. In an open letter to Earth in the same publication he said that he was unable to understand why Earth, one of the first and most uncompromising opponents of Naziism, has not taken a similar stand against Communism-and long since. Is not Communism totalitarianism? Brunner asked. And is not totalitarianism "in principle" unrighteous and inhuman? Must not Christians join in this battle? To remain silent is to deny a fundamental Christian principle, which Christians must never...