In-visibility: Reflections upon Visibility and Transcendence in Theology, Philosophy and the Arts 9783647550718, 364755071X

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Anna Vind / Iben Damgaard / Kirsten Busch Nielsen / Sven Rune Havsteen (eds.)

In-visibility Reflections upon Visibility and Transcendence in Theology, Philosophy and the Arts Academic Studies

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Refo500 Academic Studies Edited by Herman J. Selderhuis In co-operation with Christopher B. Brown (Boston), Günter Frank (Bretten), Bruce Gordon (New Haven), Barbara Mahlmann-Bauer (Bern), Tarald Rasmussen (Oslo), Violet Soen (Leuven), Zsombor Tóth (Budapest), Günther Wassilowsky (Frankfurt), Siegrid Westphal (Osnabrück)

Volume 18

 

Anna Vind/Iben Damgaard/Kirsten Busch Nielsen/ Sven Rune Havsteen (eds.)

In-visibility Reflections upon Visibility and Transcendence in Theology, Philosophy and the Arts

Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht

 

The interdisciplinary research project In-visibilis. Visibility and Transcendence in Religion, Art and Ethics was funded by The Danish Council for Independent Research and by The Carlsberg Foundation.

Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek: The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data available online: https://dnb.de. © 2020, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Theaterstraße 13, D-37073 Göttingen All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without prior written permission from the publisher. Typesetting: SchwabScantechnik, Göttingen Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Verlage | www.vandenhoeck-ruprecht-verlage.com ISSN 2197-0165 ISBN 978-3-647-55071-8

 

Contents

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Phenomenology of In-visibility Arne Grøn Phenomenology of In-visibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Jonna Bornemark Visibility and Invisibility in a Phenomenological Trisection of Experience . 33 Gavin Flood Becoming Invisible and the Formal Indication of the Religious Life . . . . . . . . 49

Language as a Mode of Revealing and Hiding George Pattison Language and the Revelation of Silence. Reflections on Mystical Theology .65 Iben Damgaard “Look, there he stands – the god. Where? There. Can you not see him?” Poetic Refigurations of Christ in Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky . . . . . . . . . . . . 85 Therese B. Solten Hymn and Ending. The Scope of the Eyes of Faith in Grundtvig’s Hymn “Velkommen igien Guds engle smaa” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105 Christine Helmer To Refer or Not to Refer, That is the Question . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121

 

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Human Existence between Visibility and Invisibility Antti Raunio Inner and Outer Man in Luther’s Thought . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141 Anna Vind Hoc est, tua iusticia non est visibilis, non est sensibilis. Glaube und christliches Leben bei Luther – mit einem kurzen Ausblick auf die lutherische Tradition in Dänemark . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159 Pierre Bühler Homo absconditus und homo revelatus. Un-sichtbarkeit als Herausforderung für die theologische Anthropologie . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177 Claudia Welz Imago Dei – A Self-Concealing Image . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193

The Manifestation of a ‘Beyond’ in the Arts: Images Olivier Boulnois Beyond Image: Reading, Meditating, Venerating – Three Uses of Image. Luther and the Middle Ages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225 Johann Anselm Steiger Christus, Mensch, Bilder. Zur intermedialen Hermeneutik des Bildes bei Martin Luther und seinen barocken Erben . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245 Dietrich Korsch Verborgenheit macht sichtbar. Ein Gedanke zur Ikonologie im Anschluss an Martin Luther . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281 Svein Aage Christoffersen Homo invisibilis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297

The Manifestation of a ‘Beyond’ in the Arts: Music, Liturgical Inventory and Architecture Sven Rune Havsteen Moments of an Aesthetics of the Invisible: The sermo humilis . . . . . . . . . . . . 319

 

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Nils Holger Petersen The Notion of an Imaginary Space in Music: Interpreting Mozart’s Requiem in Liturgical, Denominational, and Secular Contexts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339 Konrad Küster Wann spielt die Orgel im Gottesdienst? Liturgische Beobachtungen zwischen Spätmittelalter und Früher Neuzeit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 361 Martin Wangsgaard Jürgensen The Properties of Style. Allusions to the Invisible in 19th-Century Church Art and Architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385

Visible Community and Invisible Transcendence Heinrich Assel „Im innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit … erblickt so der Mensch nichts andres als ein Antlitz gleich dem eigenen“ (Franz Rosenzweig). Gottes Angesicht sehen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 411 Carl Axel Aurelius We See, While We Are Hearing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 435 Hans-Peter Großhans The Divine Mystery Becoming Visible in Human Communities . . . . . . . . . . . 445 Harald Hegstad Invisible Church? An Ecclesiological Idea Reconsidered . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 459 Karina Juhl Kande Die unsichtbare Kirche. Eine Hauptspur in der Ekklesiologie Dietrich Bonhoeffers? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 473 Kirsten Busch Nielsen Last but not least – Church, Community and tà éschata. Reconsidering the Relation between Ecclesiology and Eschatology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 487 Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 503

 

 

Introduction

The relationship between visibility and transcendence in a thematically broad field, embracing more than five centuries and a plurality of methods drawn from theology, philosophy, and history and theory of art, is reconsidered here. The book is divided into five sub-topics: In the first and more fundamental part, “The phenomenology of in-visibility”, questions underlying the other four themes are broached, defined or narrowed down. Here the modes of appearing/revealing or hiding of phenomena are reflected. In the second section of the book dealing with “Language as a mode of revealing and hiding” the specific role of verbal expression in a very broad sense is at the core: What is the fundamental understanding and use of language, when speaking of the indescribable? The third section on “Human existence between visibility and invisibility” focuses on the features and norms of theological anthropology. The ambiguity of anthropological categories such as faith, rationality, imagination, memory and emotion play a prominent role here. The fourth section concerning “The manifestation of a ‘beyond’ in the arts” investigates transcendence in the arts. What are the theological discourses behind the religious customs of different artistic media (i.e. images, music, liturgical inventory, architecture)? Finally, contributions on the idea of ‘vicarious representation’ can be found in the fifth section, “Visible community and invisible transcendence”. This œuvre is the result of an interdisciplinary research project entitled In-visibilis. Visibility and Transcendence in Religion, Art and Ethics, funded by The Danish Council for Independent Research and The Carlsberg Foundation. The project was carried out by a core group of eight scholars at the Faculty of Theology of the University of Copenhagen, in cooperation with a broad group of international researchers. The aim of the project was to study theological and philosophical thoughts on the relation between what can be seen and what cannot be not seen in religion, art and ethics from the time of the Reformation until the present day. The focus was on the dialectic reflection upon visibility and invisibility found in reformatory theology, and the observation of its influence on texts and religious practice throughout history. The importance of the themes in the five sections, as described

 

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above, was central: Phenomenology, anthropology, language, art/architecture and church. The project aimed at establishing a historically based answer to contemporary interests in seeing and being seen, disregarding and hiding. The project was designed as a comment on ongoing research within literature, language philosophy and phenomenology, and a contribution to theological research into the relationship between faith and reason, faith and love, iconoclasm and representation, church and society.

 

Phenomenology of In-visibility

 

 

Arne Grøn

Phenomenology of In-visibility

1.

Between ‘invisibles’

“Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and reverence, the more often and more steadily one reflects on them: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me. I do not need to search for them and merely conjecture them as though they were veiled in obscurity or in the transcendent region beyond my horizon; I see them before me and connect them immediately with the consciousness of my existence. The first begins from the place I occupy in the external world of sense and extends the connection in which I stand into an unbounded magnitude with worlds upon worlds and systems of systems, and moreover into the unbounded times of their periodic motion, their beginning and their duration. The second begins from my invisible self, my personality, and presents me in a world which has true infinity but which can be discovered only by the understanding” (Kant: 2006, 269). The passage from the end of Kant’s Critique of Practical Reason places us as human beings between two forms of ‘invisibles’. Both concern the visible world, albeit in radically different ways. The first begins from the place I occupy and follows the movement of the eye beyond what I see. This movement is unbounded as the horizon is open, and with the help of tools (such as telescopes and microscopes) we are able to see more than we can see with the naked eye. The visible world is not to be captured in vision. Rather, there is a peculiar kind of invisibility to the visible world. We can only see what we see now in that there is something beyond – something which in turn may be seen, but this would take time and require that we move beyond what we have seen. The connection in which I stand “extends into an unbounded magnitude with worlds upon worlds”. Is this something ‘invisible’? The movement of the eye ‘within’ an open horizon means that the visible world cannot be seen. We may only imagine seeing the visible world in which we live. This indicates that vision is not closed upon itself. The second movement is explicitly about something invisible. It begins “from my invisible self ”. We may be tempted to divide the world into the external, vis-

 

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ible world and the inner, invisible. In fact, this seems to be the obvious reading of Kant’s text. Yet as the first movement begins from the place I occupy and let my vision move beyond itself, the second concerns me as the one seeing, moving in the visible world. When read along this line, Kant’s words situate us between ‘invisibles’, and, remarkably, they situate us as the subject of vision. It may seem strange to speak of being situated between ‘invisibles’. The point, however, is that we are situated between ‘invisibles’ in this world – as the one seeing. In Kant’s text, note the remark: “I see them before me”. What is implied in this “before me”? In the first movement what is before me is indeed visible, but I can be lost in seeing what is before me and cannot see ‘the’ visible. In the second movement I only ‘see’ what is before me, the moral law, because I am the addressee. It is about how I should see myself situated in a moral universe. I am brought before myself as the one seeing and acting. What I see before me determines myself: as the subject seeing. Following this line of thought, the invisible concerns seeing and the visible. If we seek to comprehend the invisible by the division of the world into external and inner worlds, we cannot account for how we are situated ourselves. When we ask about the relation of the visible and the invisible, what is in between? In a critical sense we are – as the one seeing. If we operate with the visible and the invisible as two worlds, we move between them – and we do so in this world.

2. Visibility Speaking of the visible and the invisible, what is in question appears to be the invisible. As the invisible it is defined against the visible, but does it make sense to speak of ‘the invisible’? How does the invisible show itself? If we are looking for that which shows itself, is the visible not all there is? Let us begin with what appears in need of no justification, the visible. Obviously, the visible is defined through what we actually see or have seen. Yet it is not only what we remember having seen (memoria) and what we now see (contuitus), but also what there is – still – to be seen. The possibility indicated in the visible is primarily to see what is still to come. But there is more to it: the visible is also what – already now – could be seen if we saw differently. This means that we cannot account for the visible without taking what is not seen (and not only: not yet seen) into account. The invisible, then, is not something beyond, added to the visible. Rather, the visible is itself turned into a question of seeing. This is the suggestion I want to probe in this chapter, developing the notion of the in-visible. Yet does it not go without saying that the visible is a matter of seeing? Maybe we should even claim that what is visible depends not only on what we see but also on what we make visible. Apparently we live in a culture of visibility. The world we

 

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more or less share is not only mediated through images of the world. How we deal with visibility seems to have changed. To put it most briefly: visibility is turned into a matter of making visible, and what is to be made visible is not so much what has been ignored or overlooked, e. g. past wrongs or present minorities, but ourselves. Making oneself visible has become a condition of communication, that is, of being someone. If you are not seen, you are out, and whether you are seen or not is a matter of making yourself visible (Grøn 1995). My aim here is not to offer a diagnosis of the age but to point to the question of visibility. The question is twofold: first, even when we seek to turn visibility into a matter of making visible, it remains an open question to us, and second, the question of what is visible brings us – the one seeing – into question. This twofold question of visibility and vision will guide us in the following, through a fourfold motif. Visibility is a condition that escapes us no matter how much we seek to turn it into a matter of making visible. Thus we do not just appear as we project. Rather, we also appear as the one projecting, seeking to make ourselves visible. Implied in this first motif – visibility escaping us even in seeking to make ourselves visible – is a second one, indicated in the question: what do we see in what is to be seen? In these two connected motifs – the condition of visibility and the question of seeing – lies a third one, complicating the first two: it is possible for us to see without seeing. This goes especially for seeing the other. We may ignore her, but ignoring is still a form of seeing: it is to see the other so as not to see her. We do not just do this: see without seeing. It requires us to do something to ourselves in seeing the other. Thus we may explain our ways of seeing the other so that we can almost let it appear as nothing that we do ourselves. A forceful way of explaining ourselves is to claim that we see her as she is. In doing so we can make ourselves blind to what we do to the other in seeing her. It is possible for us to make her invisible to us. This short outline may lead us to both a phenomenology and an ethics of in-visibility (Grøn: 2015). If the visible is also what we – already now – could see if we saw differently, what we actually see bears witness to us. If we can see the other and yet not see her, what is visible is a question to us that questions us. This is reflected in the fact that we may try to explain ourselves and even come to question ourselves as the one seeing. But are we not here introducing the ethical into the visible world? Is phenomenology not about the visible as the visible? Phenomenology is a logos about that which shows itself. Why is such an inquiry needed? It concerns that which shows itself as it shows itself. Why this redoubling? ‘The visible as the visible’ does not indicate a world of phenomena available to us, just to be observed, but, rather, the question of seeing implies: how do we see what we see? The question opens for a figure of ‘repetition’: to see what we see. The possibility of repetition indicates the temporality of seeing. Thus, the third complicating motif – the possibility of seeing and yet not seeing – opens a fourth motif: time and vision. What I aim at here is to hold the three motifs mentioned

 

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above – visibility as a condition escaping us in seeing, the question of seeing, the possibility of seeing and yet not seeing (negativity) – together in the question of repetition (time and vision): coming to see (understand) what we see. The visible is that which can be seen, but what is implied in ‘can’? Is the visible already a matter of a culture defining what can be seen? If it is, the question still remains, how do we see what can be seen? Is that which can be seen in fact seen? Defining what can be seen requires us to see. Our vision is not only what is supposed to be determined in visuality (as cultural limits to the visible). It also harbours the question of what is visible. We only come to understand what ‘can’ be seen in that we see (for) ourselves. Seeing is not just observing what is there to be seen. It is also recognizing, thereby affirming what one sees. This opens the question: what do we see in the visible? Does this bring invisibility into the picture? If it does, it is a critical reminder, especially when identity appears to be at stake in seeing as recognition. Are we as we are seen? Do we actually see the other we see? A culture of visibility easily loses the sense of the invisible – as a question of visibility. However, if visibility is a question to us, if it is up to us to see what is there to be seen, the weight seems to be placed on the one seeing. When seeing is put into the foreground, vision is divided between the seen and the seer. If the visible is not simply there but a matter of us seeing, the one seeing, the seer, appears to be at a distance from what is seen. The one seeing seems to be behind her seeing. In The Visible and the Invisible Merleau-Ponty seeks, as a countermove to this division, to capture the visibility of the one seeing, describing the world as “universal flesh” (Merleau-Ponty 1968, 137). If we take vision seriously we will come to a notion of the intertwining of the visible and the seer, “Visibility” as “flesh”, as an “‘element’ of Being” (139). When we see others seeing, the “lacuna where our eyes, our back, lie is filled”. We are, through other eyes, “for ourselves fully visible” (ibid., 143). Focusing on the double question of visibility and vision, my argument moves in a different direction. It seeks to capture both the becoming visible of the one seeing and the distance, even asymmetry, between the one and the other – in seeing and being seen. Ignoring that we ourselves become visible in seeing is ethical in nature. If we let vision define what is visible, we overlook that there is a peculiar visibility to vision. Others can see us ‘in the eyes’. We can see others seeing us. How we see others manifests itself in how we act. Moreover, we can seek to give words to how we see others and the world. Thus seeing is itself a matter of becoming visible. Yet seeing is not an act in the way that speaking is. We can give words to how we see, but we cannot see as we choose. The visible is neither something given just to be observed nor to be defined in terms of vision that gives significance to what is seen. Ironically, both conceptions share the notion of visibility as something given – either to be observed or to be

 

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given significance to. In contrast, what I urge is a double claim: that visibility is a condition that escapes us in seeing, and it is a question of seeing in the sense that seeing itself comes into question. If we let the visible world between us be a matter of what is made visible, we still take our point of departure in the visible world. No matter how much we seek to turn it into what we make out of it, the question remains open: what comes out of what we make out of the visible world? Visibility is the field of vision in which the one seeing is situated and moves. It lies not only before us but is defined by a horizon which moves with us. What is seen depends on the eyes that see – but do the eyes decide what is to be seen? Visibility as a condition that escapes us in seeing turns our seeing into a question: what we see in what we see, and how we see what we see. In an important and critical sense it is possible not to see what there is to be seen. Humans can be struck by blindness – in seeing. That is in a sense what tragedy is about. This indicates that what we should see is not a matter of choice. Rather, what is visible puts a demand on us that is not of our making. The visible is that which can be seen. This ‘can’ cannot be taken back into what we do in seeing or making visible. Rather, the limits of seeing implied in visibility are not simply the limits within which we see the world. What we do not see may testify to us seeing. It does not simply fall outside of view but may even be a way of seeing. There are forms of seeing that consist in not-seeing, such as ignoring. Arrogance, for example, is to deprive the other of significance in order to tell her how she is to see herself – as inferior to oneself. It only works if she does. This shows that limits of seeing may be limits we draw – in seeing. The question is not only what we see and make visible but also what we, in seeing and making visible, make invisible. Beginning with the question of visibility we were led to ask, how does invisibility enter the picture? I have suggested that the notion of the invisible can remind us that seeing is also a matter of what we do not see. But do we need a notion of the invisible in order to deal with the question of what we do not see – in seeing? Before going deeper into the question of the in-visible, let me add a further note on visibility and vision. What I have in mind is not to advocate seeing over, e. g., listening, but to insist on the problems inherent in seeing. These are complex and not to be accounted for without presupposing the interplay of senses, in particular seeing, listening and touching. Senses, remarkably, have metaphorical status in terms of the world of experience. What you see is a matter of ‘seeing’: what you see in that which you see. What do you think in seeing? Senses interplay in a metaphorical ‘seeing’ the world. Thus a glance can caress what is seen – as if it were touching the face or the figure it sees. A look can seek to ‘catch’ the other. This leads us back to the condition of visibility. What I have in mind is visibility as the opening of the world of experience. It is a world of sounds, light, colours, forms, smells, and all things tangible. The world of visibility is not just defined by

 

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sight – rather vision is formed through what we touch, smell and hear. The body we see can be touched. The face we see speaks (Levinas 1969, 66) – to the point of questioning us seeing it. The face speaks before we see it – so to speak. When metaphysics seeks to capture the world in terms of vision – to the point of dividing the world into two, the visible and the invisible – this apparent privileging carries along an undercurrent moving in the opposite direction: vision is transformed or transposed. Visibility is both to be taken literally and metaphorically. The world opens itself to us as spaces, landscapes and soundscapes in which we move, seeking to orient ourselves – having the world in view. This is only possible on the condition of the world’s being defined by a horizon moving with us. In the metaphorical transposition of visibility, time plays into vision. Visibility does not show itself as other phenomena or ‘things’ do. It is not visible as ‘visibles’ are. Visibility hides in what is seen. We therefore tend to take it for granted, to be used for making ourselves visible. But visibility concerns the opening of the world. There is a world in which we can make ourselves visible and pursue what we have in mind. Can we capture the character of the world in distinguishing between the visible and the invisible?

3. In-visible In orienting ourselves, we often need to make clear to ourselves what we have seen or heard. In doing so we also need to speak of what we have not seen or heard. The unseen or unheard may be some definite thing: that which we actually did not see or hear (we were mistaken thinking that we did). But the unseen or unheard may also be less specific. This is the case when we try to comprehend our world of experience. In order to do so we need a notion of what we have not – yet – seen or heard. If this is something others have told us about, what we have not yet seen still belongs to ‘our’ world of experience. This is defined by what we can (or could) see or hear, but also by what we imagine or think is possible for humans to experience. In so far as this world is opened to us in seeing we can speak of the visible. Thus in order to speak of what we have seen we need a notion of the unseen, but do we also need a notion of the invisible in order to speak of the visible? If what is unseen is yet to be seen, or could be seen if we saw differently, the unseen seems to be explained in terms of visibility. To orient ourselves in the world we need a notion of the world. Religious and philosophical traditions offer notions of ‘the’ visible and ‘the’ invisible in order to capture what the world is like. We do not see ‘the’ world and yet we may speak of the visible world. What then about the invisible? It is easily turned into a world as well, but only by way of the visible. This means that the world which we actually do not see – we only see something ‘in’ the world – is taken as the visible world,

 

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on the one hand, whereas, on the other hand, the invisible is ‘seen’ as a second world which in turn mirrors, as it were, the first, visible world. This situation should make us pause and re-think. When we seek to give an account of what we see we may be tempted to use notions of the visible and the invisible as two worlds, but we cannot account for these notions themselves if we go back to what we see. More specifically, given the notions of the visible and the invisible as two worlds, it is difficult to account for the fact that the visible gives rise to questions concerning the visible. The move from speaking of something as visible or invisible to ‘the’ visible and ‘the’ invisible may seem unapparent. Is ‘the’ visible not just what is visible, and ‘the’ invisible what is invisible? Yet something happens in this move. It is about what it is to have a world. If the world is open to us as ‘the’ visible, that which can or could be seen, what is beyond the world appears to be ‘the’ invisible. But we only have the invisible beyond the visible ‘world’ by way of the visible. Moving beyond the visible world is a way of being in this world. The invisible is not a world in which we can be situated – as in this world of visibility. Rather ‘the invisible’ belongs to being in the world in which we seek to orient ourselves. ‘The invisible’ concerns what it is to be in the world. ‘Beyond’ belongs to being in the world (Grøn: 2010). The argument put forward here is dialectical. Separating the invisible from the visible, the invisible world mirrors the visible. That is – what we show is not what we have in mind. Yet we encounter the intertwinement of the visible and the invisible. It is only in the world of visibility that we can move beyond ‘the’ visible. The movement ‘beyond’ takes the visible world along. But this shows something about visibility or the character of the visible world. We only ‘have’ this world – as the visible world – in and through the movement beyond. We do not see the visible world – we see something visible, not ‘the’ visible. The world of visibility it is not just there, visible. Rather it is a matter of seeing what there is – to be seen. Seeing is to see what shows itself to us. In a critical sense, then, the world of visibility is invisible, and ‘the’ invisible is not a world but belongs to the world of visibility. This is what I would like to indicate in speaking of the in-visible. The visible is a matter of what we see in what we see. If we would speak of the visible world, we need a notion of the invisible, but the invisible hides in the visible. What is ‘between’ the visible and the invisible? We are – we are ‘there’ ourselves, in seeing, questioning and being questioned as to what we see – in what we see. If the visible and the invisible were two worlds, where would we be situated? We would be in both worlds but also in between in seeing and thinking. We are ourselves visible and invisible: in-visible. While the argument outlined here is dialectical, the approach taken is phenomenological. However, does it not also indicate the limits of phenomenology? If it does, it is – I would claim – still part of phenomenology. This is also indicated by the title: phenomenology of the in-visible.

 

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4. Phenomenology How is the approach taken here phenomenological? It is so already in dealing with the question of visibility and vision as one question – between what is visible and seeing. That which can be seen corresponds to acts of seeing. In seeing we have something in view. It may be unclear to us what we see. In seeking to determine what it is, we still relate to that thing. We may even be wrong in how we determine what we see. What we have in view is a thing that shows itself to us. We may reflect on what we see, asking ourselves whether we have determined it as we see it. Phenomenology deals with the phenomenon as that which shows itself, but this must be qualified: phenomenological reflection is a second look; it is about that which shows itself as it shows itself. We can see things in ways in which we move in ideas, constructions, or theories. Phenomenology as logos is a counter-move. Against interpretations in which we think we know what we see, we must make an effort to go back to the things themselves, the phenomena as phenomena. This move back has the form of a question: what we see – how does that show itself to us? Consequently phenomenology is about the visible as the visible. It moves beyond the seer to the visible, but it does so in that it deals with the difficulty in seeing what is to be seen. As a logos of the phenomenon as that which shows itself, phenomenology is about seeing that which shows itself as it shows itself (cf. SuZ § 7A; Heidegger: 1972, 28: “das Sich-an-ihm-selbst-zeigende”). It begins with the difficulty of seeing which not only comes from what is to be seen but also from how we see: we can see things in ways that do not let what we see appear. How, then, do we let what we see appear? If phenomenology addresses the question of the visible as such, does it move in the immanence of the visible? Remarkably phenomenological reflection, in dealing with the visible as the visible, encounters the question of the unseen or even the invisible. Thus we only see an object, for example a dice, in taking into view what we do not see: the other sides of the object. In fact, we can take it into view by turning the dice around in order to see what we did not first see. What is in front of us may be an object which we cannot have ‘in our hands’ and turn around. If we stand before the entrance of a building, going to visit a friend who lives there, we take into view something we only see when entering the building or when we, for example, have to walk around the building in order to take the back entrance. These examples already indicate that time plays into seeing. The finitude of seeing has to do with seeing as such: what it is to see. What we see in front of us is a thing due to the fact that is has sides which we do not – yet – see but nevertheless take into view. If we move we can see other aspects. The fact that we only see in time and in context comes to the fore not only if we change position or if the object itself changes. Also we cannot put ourselves back into the same act of seeing. If we

 

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try to repeat an experience, for example visit Berlin again (Kierkegaard 1983), we only discover that something has changed – including ourselves. Seeing the thing itself, then, is a matter of taking different positions which we cannot occupy at the same time. It is a matter of how we see. Apparently this can be taken back to acts of seeing, various ways of being directed to that which shows itself to us. Yet if acts of seeing are defined as acts of intending, a phenomenological response must be to ask not only whether the act of intending is fulfilled in seeing, but also if that which shows itself does not escape the act of intending. Is the act of intending not itself at play in seeing, so that it can be changed or even reversed? The questions originating in seeing are questions that concern the phenomenological approach itself. If phenomenology is the methodical effort to go back to that which shows itself, it must reconsider its own beginning, and the beginning concerns the question of what it means to see. Still, if a phenomenological approach is about the visible as such, how can it deal with the invisible? From the beginning, seeing is also a matter of the unseen. We only see what we see if we take into view that which we have not – yet – seen. More than that, the field of vision is open in the sense that we get to see something we did not have in view or did not anticipate. Seeing is itself a matter of time. It takes time, and what shows itself comes to us. We get to see or come to see. This means that we can only account for what it is to see if we take conditions into account, visibility and time, conditions that escape us in seeing and cannot come into view. Both conditions – visibility and time – are unseen or invisible. The visible world cannot be seen, time is invisible. In order to account for what it means to see something, we need to speak of the unseen and even the invisible: conditions that escape us in seeing. Does this exhaust the notion of the invisible? Can the invisible be translated into conditions of seeing? What if we take our point of departure in the invisible? The answer at hand, so to speak, is to place the invisible beyond the visible. If, however, we separate the invisible from the visible, we turn it into a world that mirrors the visible world. This dialectical argument outlined above calls for a phenomenological approach. What does the invisible mean? How does what is invisible show itself to be invisible? Something can be invisible in and through what we see. When we stand in front of a building, we take something into view which – in that moment – is invisible to us. What we do not – yet – see, we may come to see. That may depend on the position we take. But no matter the position we take, there is something we cannot see despite the fact that it plays into our seeing. Visibility and time are in this sense invisible. Still, is there more to ‘the’ invisible? Does that – the invisible ‘in itself ’ – not fall outside of the scope of phenomenology? Yet we must be able to see for ourselves what it means to speak of the invisible. That is – what does it mean for us in seeing the world? The implication of the phenomenological approach is that we do

 

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not have two questions: the visible and the invisible. In question is the meaning of the visible – as a question about what it means to see that which can be seen. If we argue that the invisible falls outside of the visible as the domain of phenomenology, we fail to see that we need a notion of the invisible in order to speak of the meaning of the visible. We would also be unable to account for the question of the invisible. The invisible is not a phenomenological issue at the limit of phenomenology. It is not about that which cannot be ‘phenomenalized’. Rather the invisible concerns the question of seeing implied in the visible as the visible. Consequently my claim here is twofold. First, in a phenomenological approach, the visible and the invisible are to be taken as one issue, and this is not one issue among others but concerns phenomenology itself. Second, phenomenology is not one approach among others but concerns the meaning of the visible and the invisible. When speaking of the visible and the invisible can we see for ourselves what we have in mind? As argued in the opening section, this implies the question: how are we ourselves situated? This question indicates an existential phenomenological approach. Central to a phenomenological approach is the fact that we are situated in seeing. How are we ‘in seeing’? We relate to what we come to see – yet we also find ourselves (in) seeing. Although we find ourselves relating in seeing, it may be questioned in what sense seeing is a doing. It is not something we do as we, for example, move. We can direct the gaze and move in order to see, but seeing is to get to see or to come to see. If we would speak of an act of seeing, e. g. in looking for someone, it has a different character than for example taking a walk. It draws upon the fact that we find ourselves seeing. We may place ourselves in order to see something we intend to see, but we do so while seeing. This has to do with seeing as sensation: we are the subject of seeing only in being ourselves affected. We may seek to come to understand what we see, but seeing is not in the same way as understanding a matter of projecting ourselves. If phenomenology is about seeing that which shows itself as it shows itself, what is the relation between this showing itself (that which shows itself) and (us) seeing? Is seeing intending? Can we intend that which shows itself as it shows itself? Seeing as sensation implies that we come to see. We are not so much intending as being affected. Being affected, however, it may be difficult to see that which affects us. That seems to require seeing as intending. Yet we only intend that which we experience through our being affected: it comes to us – we do not project it. What do we do, then, in seeing when we intend that which shows itself? We look for it as it shows itself – but how? Seeing that which shows itself is a matter of letting it be seen. However, this answer also indicates the difficulty. We can see things in ways that do not let what we see appear but rather cover up. Moreover if seeing the other is a matter of letting her be seen, this very act – intending – lets us appear as the subject. Do we then see her as the other?

 

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This leads us back to the condition of visibility. How does the visible (what is visible) show itself? It does not show itself as ‘the’ visible. Visibility as condition escapes us in seeing. Could we say that it hides itself in that which comes to appear, or even that it lets what is visible appear? That would bring to mind Heidegger’s move: What is it that phenomenology is to ‘let us see’? What is it that must be called a ‘phenomenon’ in a distinctive sense? What is it that by its very essence is necessarily the theme whenever we exhibit something explicitly? Manifestly, it is something that proximally and for the most part does not show itself at all: it is something that lies hidden, in contrast to that which proximally and for the most part does show itself; but at the same time it is something that belongs to what thus shows itself, and it belongs to it so essentially as to constitute its meaning and its ground (SuZ § 7C; Heidegger: 1962, 59/1972, 35). This is a key passage in Heidegger’s hermeneutical turn of phenomenology. The passage continues: “Yet that which remains hidden in an egregious sense, or which relapses and gets covered up again, or which shows itself only ‘in disguise’, is not just this entity or that, but rather the Being of entities [Sein des Seienden] […].” (ibid.). With the key motif of the oblivion of being, there is in Heidegger an appeal to see differently. Yet it is difficult for him to unfold this implied motif of transforming vision. That would require an account of the subjectivity of seeing which is missing in Heidegger. What is the relation between Being that tends to hide itself in beings and our oblivion of being? We are forgetting and covering up, and yet we are not only struck by the oblivion of Being. In Heidegger, it is as if the oblivion of being – and even Being’s hiding itself – is inscribed into being the beings we are. But what we do – forgetting – cannot be taken back into Being’s hiding. Although we tend to overlook in seeing, when we actually fail to see we are to respond. ‘If we saw differently’, or even ‘If we had seen differently’ can call us into question in seeing (for) ourselves. Could we say that what is visible shows itself because visibility hides itself in the visible? There is a critical difference between Being and visibility in that visibility points to the subject of vision. Therefore we should consider two intertwined moves. First a phenomenology of in-visibility asking: how does the visible (that which is visible) show itself? In order to see what shows itself, we must take something unseen into account. We never come to the point where what is visible is simply there to be seen.1 This means, in turn, that the invisible is not there next to the visible. There is, rather, invisibility to the visible. Second, in seeing, we respond to what is there to be seen. We are to see for ourselves, being called into 1 As already noted, there is infinity to the horizon of vision: it is open in opening. Cf. Derrida (2002, 150): “In phenomenology there is never a constitution of horizons, but horizons of constitution.”

 

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question, responsible. This is the move taken in an ethics of in-visibility. If the visible also is what we – already now – could see if we saw differently, the second move is opened in the very question of in-visibility. The ethical begins with us – not first in evaluating but in seeing. It begins with the fact that we can fail, and we can fail already in seeing. Remarkably, we can see the other in ways in which we do not see her: as the other. It is even possible for us to blind ourselves to what we see and to what we do to the other in how we see her. The invisible is not only that which hides in the visible, letting it appear. It is also what we make invisible. The four motifs – visibility, seeing, negativity, time – should be seen in a register that until now has been more implicit: interiority and exteriority. The following variations on in-visibility address more directly the question: how we are situated in seeing. In the variations, we shall move between phenomenology of in-visibility and ethics and philosophy of religion.

5.

Interiority and exteriority: Variations on in-visibility

5.1

Existential Phenomena

Sharing a world implies that we can communicate about how we (should) relate to the world. How does relating to the world show itself? Consider phenomena such as concern and courage. These are ways of relating in which the relation to the world is more or less at stake. Yet ways of relating to the world are not simply part of the visible world. They are rather phenomena of interiority: they concern how we see the world. In what sense, then, are they phenomena? It does not suffice to describe them as a thing that ‘shows itself ’. Phenomena of concern and courage are ways of relating in which one ‘shows oneself ’ – concerned or courageous, for example. What is the difference in phenomena here – between that which ‘shows itself ’ and ‘showing oneself ’? Let us call the latter phenomena existential. They are self-related – not in the form of self-observation but of self-manifestation: one shows oneself in relating to others and a world more or less shared with others. However, this must be qualified. We should also speak of self-manifestation in an intensified sense as self-disclosure. One not only appears to others as a self in relating to others and a world in between – one also comes to appear to oneself. Again, this is not to appear to oneself as if one were to observe oneself as we observe others. Rather, it is to come to self-consciousness – and that changes how one is. It is self-disclosure in the sense that we, in experiencing ourselves, are the one affected. We are disclosed to ourselves so that we have to bear ourselves. Coming to appear to oneself in this existential sense is to appear as oneself, riveted to oneself also in seeking to escape oneself. Self-disclosure goes into selfhood.

 

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Coming to appear to oneself – as a matter of being who one is – is interiority. Is interiority in this sense not visible in a person’s showing herself? Is the one coming to appear (in the existential sense indicated) visible? Here, ‘showing itself ’ changes. It is not corresponding to a subject observing what shows itself but, rather, concerns what it means to be a self. This is a point in Kierkegaard’s analysis of anxiety, defining anxiety as “freedom’s disclosure to itself in possibility” (Kierkegaard: 1980, 111). Anxiety as freedom’s self-disclosure is self-experience in the existential sense (Grøn: 2008c). What does it mean that anxiety is freedom’s disclosure to itself in possibility? Freedom takes place in relating to the time to come, the future. This requires imagination, but anxiety plays into imagination: we are reflected in ‘seeing’ possibilities for ourselves. We can capture ourselves in possibilities (this is a possibility accompanying us in having possibilities). Thus phenomena of anxiety are ambiguous. What should be a phenomenon of freedom may turn out to be self-created unfreedom. Still, making oneself unfree lets freedom appear, albeit negatively. This indicates that existential phenomena may be complex precisely as ways of ‘showing oneself ’. Not only can we hide ourselves in showing ourselves. We may make ourselves unfree in how we relate to others. Thus ‘showing itself ’ changes in ‘showing oneself ’. How does one relate to oneself in ‘showing oneself ’? Existential phenomena may be complex in the sense that seeing – on the part of the one showing herself – may come into view. In anxiety one comes to appear to oneself in seeing – so that one can be captured in the possibilities one sees. However, the interiority implied in ‘showing oneself ’ is also about finding expression. Bringing oneself to words is interiority in communication. This is indicated in the phrase: Speak so that I can see you. Yet interiority remains as a condition for communicating: although we speak we are never ‘spoken’. The task of finding words remains. How do we come to appear when showing ourselves? There is something unsaid and ‘unshown’ in saying and showing. We are not only as we show ourselves – we also come to appear as the one showing oneself. Finding expression means that there is still more to be said and shown. We are only ‘in’ our expressions in that others can seek to understand what is unsaid or unshown – as if we show us beyond ourselves, in what is still to be said and shown. Yet expressions can be definitive even though there is more to be said and shown. Visibility is a question to us between us – also in seeking to find expression for what we see.

5.2

Time and the Art of Seeing

Vision and time are intertwined in the question of visibility. The visible is not only what we remember having seen (memoria) and what we now see (contuitus). It is

 

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also what there is – still – to be seen. If we follow Augustine’s notions (Conf. XX.26; Flasch: 1993, 258), is this a matter of expectatio? In a critical sense it is not. What is to come (à venir) remains to be seen (à voir). The time that comes to us (future) is precisely not to be captured in anticipation but, rather, places our seeing in question. Experiencing time that comes to us is to come to see. This also suggests that the visible cannot be explained in terms of acts of seeing. An act of seeing, rather, implies seeing as sensation: what we see in acts of seeing we experience. Yet seeing also implies forms of anticipating. When we see something, we ‘take into view’ what we do not see, for example the back of a building we are facing. We see more than what we see directly. We also ‘take into view’ what is no longer there (for example, visiting places of the past that have changed). Can anticipating go so far as to turn into looking back or reminding? Heidegger’s analyses of running towards death (SuZ § 53; Heidegger: 1972, 260–267/1962, 304–311) concerns a form of anticipation that breaks off the movement forward: running ahead of ourselves, we are thrown back upon ourselves in this moment, in the middle of life, thereby getting this life into view. This does not let death appear as ‘the other side’ we can take into view. We do not in this sense ‘face’ life. If death is ‘the other side’ of life, it is the other side in this life, letting this life appear as mortal. Time carries the weight of birth and death, in time beyond time. Time is invisible and yet concerns the visible. What do we see in the visible? Seeing takes time, and the time spent in seeing may have been used otherwise. The visible is also what – already now – could be seen if we saw differently. Is this not just something we can ignore? If it is not seen, then it is – not seen. What if the ‘not seen’ is precisely what we ignore in what we see? We may even have seen it in making it invisible. It may be not just unseen but made invisible. This indicates that the invisible – time invisible – is not just beyond the visible but, rather, turns the visible into a question of seeing: what is to be seen in the visible? The ethical begins in the question of the in-visible. It begins with us in time: what we have already seen or what we could have seen (Grøn: 2013). The ethical is not a point of view in which we can install ourselves. It begins with us in that it captures us in having already begun – also in having already failed to see. The intricate relation of time and vision concerns how to see what is visible, the fact that seeing takes time, the demand to see again (seeing in repetition): there is more to be seen, not only in the time to come but already now. While writing this chapter I read a review of Peter Doig’s exhibition No Foreign Lands at the Scottish National Gallery in Edinburgh. Comparing Gauguin and Doig, the review states: “Both have painted what they saw and see” (Synne Rifbjerg: 2013).2 Probably implied is that they saw something others did not see.

2 Peter Doig: No Foreign Lands, Scottish National Gallery, 3rd August − 3rd November 2013.

 

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In looking at their paintings, others (we) may come to see what (we think) they saw, but we come to see it in what we see. It is noteworthy how time plays into seeing and painting. Even if seeing may come as in a moment, both seeing and painting take time. The moment is time intensified and indicates the history of the moment. Painting is itself a matter of seeing again and coming to see. We may argue that an artist paints what he or she comes to see – also while painting. If seeing already deals with the question what is to be seen, the art of seeing forms a repetition, asking what we see in the visible, whether we actually see what we see, and even coming to ask what it is to see. What if the visible also withdraws itself from view? Can art show what does not ‘show itself ’? Can it show what withdraws itself – as withdrawing from view (Grøn 2011b)?

5.3

‘Eyes of the Heart’

If the visible also is what we – already now – could see if we saw differently, it is a question to us: what we actually see bears witness to us. Yet it is difficult to see differently even if we so choose. Why? Because we are the one seeing. Being the subject of seeing, we are also subjected to seeing: we are both ourselves affected and to bear ourselves in how we see (Grøn: 2011a). The subjectivity and the temporality of seeing are intertwined. We come to see and in our ways of seeing we do something. Situated in seeing, we situate ourselves in the world, in relation to others. But how do we come to see differently? We are affected in seeing and cannot just transform how we see. We cannot just move ourselves into a different way of seeing. We only transform how we see – in seeing. Coming to see differently (and not just to change view or opinion) requires that we ourselves are transformed. That indicates the interiority implied in seeing. It may seem a bit strange to speak of interiority in seeing. Directions appear opposite: inwards (interiority) and outwards (seeing). Yet in seeing we may ourselves be affected. What we see means something to us. The implication is not that we just see what matters to us. Rather, ways of seeing are already ways of dealing with what matters to us. Thus we may have to distance ourselves from what (we think) the other matters to us in order to see her. We may even be affected in what we think matters to us: we may come to doubt. Speaking of interiority in seeing, what I have in mind is the intertwinement of movements: inwards and outwards. Interiority concerns what others and the world we more or less share mean to us, but it is interiority in how we take ourselves in answering to what we come to see. Interiority in seeing, being affected and answering, means that, ultimately, the relation to others and the world in between are at stake. Implied in the subjectivity of seeing are both passivity and passion (Grøn: 2011c).

 

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Love and faith are passions – they concern what concerns us. Phenomena of interiority, they ‘appear invisible’, yet they are ways of seeing. Faith and love relate to what is in-visible: what is to be seen in what we see. Although we can (and should) imagine various ways of seeing, they are not available to us so that we could choose, for example, to see with the eyes of faith. ‘Eyes of faith’ is not a position we can take but, rather, concerns the one seeing in seeing. She is herself turned in seeing. She is not first converted and then ‘enacts’ her new way of seeing. Rather she is transformed in seeing. What does that mean? In a critical sense, it is about interiority. If we describe a person as seeing with ‘the eyes of humility’, what is she doing? If she sees herself in the same way as we see her, she would not be seeing with the eyes of humility. Does this mean that she must be unaware of what she is doing (what makes us see her in this way)? No, the point is that one cannot install oneself in the eyes of humility. It is not a point of view one can take or something a person can ‘do’. It concerns oneself in how one sees others. If one sees others with the consciousness of being humble oneself, one’s way of seeing them changes. Seeing with the eyes of humility requires something quite different, maybe even converse: not least a sense of one’s failures or possibilities of failing. It has to do with the interiority of conscience. Something is at stake in seeing others. Therefore there can be doubt in seeing with ‘eyes of faith’. Interiority implies asymmetry. Others cannot see as I do, yet they can see me in ways I cannot see myself. This meta-physical asymmetry is implied in the existential and ethical asymmetry just indicated: a person seeing with the eyes of humility cannot see herself in this way, as if she were some other to be observed. If she were to claim that she acted with the eyes of love, the ethical character of what she was doing would change. She would place the addressee of her acts in a different position. In this sense also, interiority is in seeing. Speaking of ‘eyes of the heart’, what I have in mind is not a special insight, a ‘second’ seeing as it were, in which we were able to see what is ‘behind’. Rather the critical move is precisely that we cannot see each other ‘in the heart’. The interiority indicated by ‘the heart’ implies that the other we see is beyond us in seeing for herself (that is ‘eyes of the heart’). We can see her ‘in the eyes’, see her seeing us, but what this means is an open question. We have to wait for her to tell, and even if she does, we still have to wait for her to show what that means. Is she invisible, then? Interiority suggests invisibility and yet concerns the visible between us.

6.

‘Between’ interiority and exteriority

The visible is what can be seen. ‘Can’ implies that the visible is not just what (we think) we have seen. As there is something unsaid in what we say, so there is some-

 

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thing unseen in what we see. The unseen is not only the ‘other side’ to what is seen but also implications and possibilities. There is ‘more to be seen’. The look does not exhaust what it sees. Seeing the other is to see that there is more to be seen: the other is to show herself. Seeing the other requires us to wait for her. This demand is ethical. It is not just a matter of waiting in order to observe. It is rather how we should see the other now. It is not to see her in a preliminary manner, waiting for her to show herself so that we can see her in full. No, it is to see her as the other. So the ‘more to be seen’ is to be qualified – in terms of ethics and time. But there is more to it than ‘more to be seen’. ‘Seeing’ must also be qualified. To see the other is not to observe her but see her face to face, making it possible for her to see us. Only so can she show herself to us. To see the other, then, is to see her face – yet does the face show the other? This is more a question put to us seeing than to the other showing herself. If the face is the other showing herself, the question still is: do we see the other in her face? If we fix our eyes on specific features of the face, or the colour of the eyes, we do not see the face of the other. In an important sense, seeing the face of the other is not a matter of seeing more but of seeing and yet not seeing: it is not to see the specific features of the face. Does this mean that the face is not visible? Of course not – the other is there, before us, to be seen. But the visibility is a question for us: what do we see in the face? The face of the other is not to be observed, but it is so in seeing her. In a critical sense it is in-visible. On the other hand, it is possible to put on faces or to wear masks. We may then think that we, in seeing the face of another, can move through layers, as it were. But putting on faces or wearing masks requires a face withdrawing from the visible. Is this a face ‘behind’ the face (or faces) we assume? Remarkably, a person can become naked in her face, showing herself beyond the intention of doing so. How does she then ‘show herself ’? As the one to carry herself in what she has experienced and done. If she is subjected to a loss, she appears as the one suffering, having to bear the loss. Paradoxically, in the nakedness of the face the other withdraws herself from us seeing her. Again, this need not be a matter of intention. It is how she appears without appearing to us. Rather it is up to us to see her. The nakedness of the face forms the contrast to making oneself visible. What then about ‘showing oneself ’? While we should wait for the other to show herself, we should not wait for ourselves as if we were others to ourselves. The relation is asymmetrical. We are to show ourselves. But this is not a matter of just making ourselves visible. Rather, visibility ‘shows itself ’ as a condition that escapes us. Therefore we can be questioned as to what we seek to make visible. There is visibility to what we do, to our making visible, visibility that escapes us. Do we see what we make visible? Although we are to show ourselves, we are also to experience ourselves, as argued earlier in the passage on anxiety as self-experience. We may even ask whether making ourselves visible is of our making.

 

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The question is even more open: that which is shown – is that also seen? The prevalent prejudgement now seems to be that sociality defines what is seen and what is real. If it is not seen by ‘us’ (including others and ourselves), it does not count. In contrast, conscience harbours the disturbing question: what is seen? What have we already seen? “My invisible self ” brought into play in Kant’s text does not form an inner realm over against the visible, but concerns the visible as a question put to us: what do we see in that which can be seen? There is interiority in seeing in a twofold sense. First, what we see means something to us. It is a matter of what others and the world matter to us. Interiority in seeing therefore concerns how we see (or should see) others and the world we more or less share. But, second, this lets interiority appear as the fact that we see (for) ourselves and are to answer for ourselves. In seeing, there is conscience at play. How does interiority play into communication? Does sharing a world imply interiority? Taking part in communication we are not just part of it. ‘We’ are both ourselves and others. In that sense, interiority is shared as a condition for communication. The question of interiority even comes from within communication between us (Grøn 2008a). It concerns the possibility and form of communication: how do we communicate about how to see others and the world? This concerns us in what is most inner to us, where things begin for us and how we begin ourselves in seeing. The twofold sense of interiority applies to communication. Something is at stake for us – each of us – in communication, but this leads to interiority in the second sense: we are the one seeing, answering for ourselves. Seeing plays into communication. Interiority in the first sense concerns the importance of what is at stake for us. Interiority in the second sense implies that we take part in but are not just part of communication. This is the interiority of conscience: seeing (for) ourselves is also a matter of what we can answer for, and bear with, ourselves. What then about the ‘we’ of communication? Communication between ourselves does not form a continuous social world. Rather there are ‘gaps’ between us in which we come to see. This has to do with the fact that seeing cannot be captured by seeing. Others cannot see as I do (that is why communication is essential) and others can see me in ways I cannot. We see and live in and through this asymmetry. Seeing (for ourselves) is not absorbed into but opens up communication (between us). If we see knowing us to be seen, seeing changes. Surveillance tends to destroy communication. I have taken two interrelated moves here: accentuating both interiority (the invisibility of conscience) and exteriority (the invisibility of the other). Both concern communication. Taking part we are not just part of communication between us. Otherwise communication would not be between ourselves. However, interiority as a shared condition of communication does not account for the exteriority

 

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of the other. In so far as she takes part, the other belongs to the ‘we’ of communication. Taking part she, too, is not just part of the communication between us. Yet interiority as a shared condition (seeing for ourselves) is also at play in seeing the other. It may even be argued that we, in seeing the other, come to appear ourselves. But that leaves the question open: what it is to see the other. What does it mean to see the other as the other? The critical point is that the other is beyond us in our seeing her. She is other than the other we see. But this is how we should see her: as beyond us seeing her. Seeing the other as the other, then, determines us against ourselves. That is: it determines us ethically. The other is exterior to us: she is before us beyond us. In the nakedness of the face the other withdraws herself in our seeing her. The face of the other is in-visible. She is beyond us in the visible (Grøn 2007). Interiority (singularity) and exteriority (alterity) break open the sociality of visibility (making ourselves visible to us) (cf. Grøn: 2008b; 2011d). Both are beyond or out of reach. Our own interiority (conscience) is not at our disposal. If we seek to make ourselves visible to others, the question is whether we become visible – in our making us visible. But the other is beyond in a different sense: she is beyond us. Without intending, the other, exterior to us, lets us appear – as the one to see the other beyond us. Interiority and exteriority are intertwined but not combined in a social visibility. Exteriority of the other requires us in our interiority (that we are seeing and answering). In these variations, we have been moving between phenomenology of in-visibility and ethics and philosophy of religion. A phenomenology of in-visibility does not provide the foundation for an ethics of in-visibility, nor for a philosophy of religion centred on the question of in-visibility. Yet a phenomenology of in-visibility is indispensable, opening the question: what it means to see what we see, reminding us to see (again) what we see. What do we see in the visible? Ethics, aesthetics and philosophy of religion move in this question of in-visibility. Ethics of in-visibility may even play back into phenomenology, asking again what it means to see the other we see.

Bibliography Derrida, Jacques (2002), Writing and Difference. Trans. Alan Bass, London/New York: Routledge. Flasch, Kurt (1993), Was ist Zeit? Augustinus von Hippo. Das XI. Buch der Confessiones. Historisch-philosophische Studie. Text – Übersetzung – Kommentar, Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann. Grøn, Arne (2008), The Concept of Anxiety in Søren Kierkegaard, Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.

 

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Grøn, Arne (1995), Synligt og usynligt, in: Hans Raun Iversen (ed.), Vinduer til Guds Rige. Seksten forelæsninger om kirken, Frederiksberg: Anis, 135–154. Grøn Arne (2007), Un-sichtbar. Den Nächsten sehen, in Philipp Stoellger (ed.), Unsichtbar. Hermeneutische Blätter 1/2, 5–12. Grøn, Arne (2008a), Kommunikation: Entre nous, in Philipp Stoellger et al., Zwischen den Zeichen. FS Ingolf U. Dalferth. Hermeneutische Blätter 1/2, 75–86. Grøn, Arne (2008b), Subjectivity, Interiority and Exteriority: Kierkegaard and Levinas, in Claudia Welz/Karl Verstrynge (ed.), Despite Oneself. Subjectivity and Its Secret in Kierkegaard and Levinas, London: Turnshare, 11–30. Grøn, Arne (2010), Beyond? Horizon, Immanence, and Transcendence, in Jonna Bornemark/ Hans Ruin (ed.), Phenomenology and Religion: New Frontiers, Södertörn Philosophical Studies 8, Huddinge: Södertörn University, 223–241. Grøn, Arne (2011a), Homo subiectus. Zur zweideutigen Subjektivität des Menschen, in Ingolf U. Dalferth/Andreas Hunziker (ed.), Seinkönnen. Der Mensch zwischen Möglichkeit und Wirklichkeit, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 19–33. Grøn, Arne (2011b), Das Bild und das Heilige, in: Philipp Stoellger/Thomas Klie (ed.), Präsenz im Entzug, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 431–444. Grøn, Arne (2011c), Subjectivity, Passion and Passivity, in: Ingolf U. Dalferth/Michael Rodgers (ed.), Passion and Passivity, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 143–155. Grøn, Arne (2011d), Trust, Sociality, Selfhood, in: Arne Grøn/Claudia Welz (ed.), Trust, Sociality, Selfhood, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 13–30. Grøn, Arne (2013), Time and History, in Nicholas Adams/George Pattison/Graham Ward (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Theology and Modern European Thought, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 435–455. Grøn, Arne (2015), Ethics of In-visibility, in Claudia Welz (ed.), Ethics of In-visibility: Imago Dei, Memory and Human Dignity, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 21–51. Heidegger, Martin ([1927] 1962), Being and Time. Trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson, Oxford: Blackwell. Heidegger, Martin ([1927] 1972), Sein und Zeit, Tübingen: Niemeyer. Kant, Immanuel ([1788] 2006), Critique of Practical Reason, in Immanuel Kant, Practical Philosophy ed. and trans. Mary J. Gregor (The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 133–272. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1844] 1980), The Concept of Anxiety. Kierkegaard’s Writings VIII, ed. and trans. Reidar Thomte/Albert A. Anderson, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1843] 1983), Repetition, Kierkegaard’s Writings VI, ed. and trans. Howard V. Hong/Edna H. Hong, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1847] 1995), Works of Love. Kierkegaard’s Writings XVI, ed. and trans. Howard V. Hong/Edna H. Hong, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Levinas, Emmanuel (1969), Totality and Infinity. An Essay on Exteriority. Trans. Alphonso Lingis, Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press. Merleau-Ponty, Maurice (1968), The Visible and the Invisible. Ed. Claude Lefort, trans. Alphonso Lingis, Evanston: Northwestern University Press. Rifbjerg, Synne (2013): “Paradis med knaster”, Weekendavisen, 16. August 2013, 7.

 

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Visibility and Invisibility in a Phenomenological Trisection of Experience

1.

Introduction

Experience is a key concept in phenomenology. Experience is what we have; it is our starting point and our endpoint. It is thus not only thematized experiences, but also the flowing stream of everyday living experience, which continuously presents us with something seen and also continuously slips away as we try to examine it. Living experience is a complex concept as it involves more than mere sense perception: it includes meanings gained through layers of earlier experiences and perceptions as well as that which escapes meaning. Its complex structure has been a constant inspiration for, and challenge to, phenomenological analysis, and one could even understand the phenomenological task as the attempt to come to grips with the structure of experience. This task would include making the structure of experience fully visible through a transcendental phenomenology. But the possibility of performing this task was early questioned by Edmund Husserl himself. The impossibility of making this structure fully visible soon turned into a century-long attempt to formulate its invisibility. Experience turned out to have sides that elude cognitive, explicit knowledge. The limits of thematization and of objectivating intentionality have thus been a central theme in later phenomenology. In the following I will build mainly upon Husserl’s writings, and only toward the end touch upon some more recent phenomenological debates. I will examine experience in its character of a flowing stream, i. e. not as a static structure. In my investigation, the flowing stream shows itself in a trisected way as it includes the common birth of visibility of self and other, at the same time as an invisibility becomes apparent. Among these three parts there is an asymmetric relation of mutual dependency. Visibility as well as invisibility here becomes intertwined and are necessary parts of experience as the birth of visibility always include birth of invisibility. I have three stations on this journey through the trisection of temporal experience: the body, the self, and intersubjectivity, before I in the end will discuss the

 

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trisection as a structure of the drawing of limits, asymmetric but mutual dependency, and birth. This analysis also shows why experience of transcendence and invisibility are necessary parts of human experience. We need to revisit these central Husserlian analyses – not in order to examine the themes as such, but in order to bring a certain pattern to attention, a pattern that tells us something about the simultaneous visibility and invisibility of experience.

2.

Trisection of temporal experience

The deepest layer of experience in Husserl’s phenomenology can be found in the analysis of inner time consciousness. As he points out in Ideas II, this is the place where the deepest foundation of his phenomenology can be found (cf. § 23, Husserl: 1952, 102f). Jacques Derrida also claims that time-consciousness is the place where everything is settled (cf. Derrida: 1967, 70). It is exactly the flowing character of experience that shows temporality to be the deepest structure of experience. Temporality means coming and going, and its foundational role implies that all stable categories have to be constituted out of this flowing movement. Furthermore it suggests that the verb has a greater capacity to catch the structure of experience than the noun, and indeed that every noun has to be constituted on a verb. But the flowing character of experience does not mean only that it is constantly disappearing, but also that it constantly remains. Husserl calls this phenomenon retention, which means that earlier experiences are still present, but in a different mode. They are present exactly as past experiences. A melody would for example not be a melody if we only heard a succession of notes, one after the other. Instead earlier notes are still present and give a certain ring to those that follow. In a similar way past experiences linger in the succeeding experiences (cf. §§ 8–11, Husserl: 1966, 24–31). In a similar way the melody can only be what it is since there is an expectation of the notes that will come afterward: what Husserl calls protention. All the notes get their meaning only through the notes that came before and the notes that are expected after, and in this way past and future notes are present in the now (cf. text 1, Husserl: 2001, 4). So how should the now be understood? Husserl formulates it as an ideal limit of presence, carried by two forms of non-presence. There is no pure presence, but only a presence incorporated in and dependent upon what is not originally given (cf. § 25, Husserl: 1966, 55). The thematization of the now also opens up the possibility for consciousness: the original impression, the now without reflection, is already living in what is not originally present, in retention and protention (cf. text 1, Husserl: 2001, 20; and text 54, Husserl: 1966, 372). Experience is not pure impression, sensation or perception: rather, such original givenness already carries with it what is not immediately present.

 

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Nevertheless, this limit of the now is all we have; it is only in the now that we have the non-presence of retention and protention. The now harbours retention and protention in a “hospitality of presence”, as Daniel Birnbaum has called it (Birnbaum: 1998). This hospitality provides experience with all the possibilities of consciousness, including its possibility for reflection and for knowledge – which is not present in the original impression. Reflection is a specific re-collecting and reproducing act that brings forth series of retentions, combines them and finds structures and patterns in experience (cf. appendix IX, Husserl: 1966, 119f). The field of phenomenology is a field constituted through the free movement of the gaze of consciousness that sweeps over the field of retentions and protentions (cf. text 51, Husserl: 1966, 340). In the case of the melody, the series of notes can be brought to mind and made into an object in its own right. But this move also requires a sacrifice; reflection always loses the direct, original givenness (Urimpression) of its object.1 Reflection is based on distance and a difference between its own summarizing and investigating gaze, and its object. The object needs to be other than consciousness. This is also the case for phenomenological reflection that tries to make the structure of experience visible. It can only do this by turning the structure into an object and separating the investigating gaze from its investigated object. Such object-intentionality can be called a) transverse intentionality and it is contrasted to b) longitudinal intentionality: a) Transverse (or vertical) intentionality (Querintentionalität) constitutes objects that go through protention, presence, and retention. This means that consciousness constitutes the object as other than itself. It identifies the object as one and the same as it moves through protention, primordial experience, and retention. The object acquires a positive character through this over-lapping, and an essence of its own. It also gets a negative character, since its movement can be prolonged in both directions, and can be understood as existent “before” it came into protention and “after” it left, or has sunk deep into, retention. In this way it gains an existence beyond experience. Through this process a stable and livable world is constituted. b) Longitudinal (or horizontal) intentionality (Längsintentionalität) does not constitute objects, but is present in every transverse intentionality. This intentionality formulates the consciousness of the continuity of the movement itself, instead of the continuity of the object. Through this intentionality the consciousness is aware of its own unity. This unity is not thematized, and thus objectified, or put 1 Rudolf Boehm has emphasized that the distance from the stream of experience in reflection is central for the constitution of the world. Consciousness is exactly this freedom in time and the capacity to make present what is not present through for example memory. Presence therefore always transcends itself. But this capacity has a price and its necessary sacrifice is the loss of pure presence. Consciousness thus starts at the same moment that full presence is lost and being is experienced as past. The central point for Boehm is thus that consciousness starts with the memory (Boehm: 1981, 130).

 

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at a distance from itself; rather it is an immediate consciousness that is always present in the background. As such it is pre-reflective and merely a horizontal consciousness. As the unity of time it cannot be something in time, and Husserl therefore formulates it as quasi-object (cf. § 39, appendix VIII, and text 54, Husserl: 1966, 80, 116–118, 379–380). Now phenomenology is a transcendental investigation of the structure of experience. Through recognizing the foundational character of time, consciousness or subjectivity is understood as a stream in constant movement. But in order to study this subjectivity we have to turn it into an object, and once we have done this, it is no longer the living stream but one object within the stream. We no longer examine subjectivity as “perceiving”, but as something “perceived”. We have turned the longitudinal intentionality into transverse intentionality. When we start to reflect on the experiencing of subjectivity, it becomes one experience among many within time, and it is thus no longer the experiencing subjectivity. In order to get hold of experiencing, we move to another level, but when we have done this, we have once again turned the experience of experiencing into another object, and we find ourselves in the same situation once again. Husserl describes this problem as an infinite regress: each transcendental analysis demands another level of analysis (cf. appendix VI, Husserl: 1966, 111). Here one important question arises: do we really lose something in the transformation of subjectivity from the activity of perceiving into something perceived? Husserl hesitated. In the beginning he said that nothing is lost (see e. g. text 54, Husserl: 1966, 382), but later he more and more embraced a certain scepticism as to the possibility that reflection (and thus that phenomenological analysis) could gain full access to a transcendental field, and instead repeatedly emphasized that it always transcended itself (cf. text 28, Husserl: 1966, 120). This is crucial to phenomenology since it implies the impossibility of a complete analysis of experience. French phenomenology could also be understood as a tradition that focuses on such inaccessibility, and develops a growing interest in radical alterity and in the limits of cognitive knowledge. I will not pursue here the emphasis on radical alterity. Instead I wish to focus on three aspects of experience, which appear as intimately connected in the analysis of inner time-consciousness. Our conscious intentionality always relates to objects: everyday intentionality is transverse. But this intentionality also includes layers of longitudinal consciousness, the immediate experience of presence and of the continuity of presence – regardless of its shifting content. This also means a split in consciousness, a split due to the impossibility of making the longitudinal consciousness into an object of transverse intentionality; it is radically inaccessible to knowledge. All these are parts or layers of experience. There is thus a trisection of experience, including:

 

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1. The experience of objects in transverse intentionality, what is cognitively visible to us. 2. The experience of the continuity of experiencing in longitudinal intentionality, which we can relate to, but not make fully visible. 3. The experience of the radical inaccessibility of the continuity of experiencing for thematizing intentionality. Here we experience an invisibility. I would argue that this third aspect is itself a kind of intentionality, as it is a special gaze without object, a gaze that recognizes a negativity and a limit. This specific experience of the limit of transverse intentionality is also the discovery of the crucial role that negativity plays for the reflective structure. It reveals a gap created through and within the stream of experience. And it reveals the necessity for negativity if directional affirmation is to show itself. In this way a certain kind of invisibility is a necessary part of the structure in which objects become visible. Having a positive content is here the common denominator of the first two kinds of intentionality; the attempt to be reflective binds the first and the third together; and the starting point in the continuity of experiencing binds the second and the third. Here we could see how the first and the third, cognite visibility and invisibility are bound together by the second: the in-between, and how this second is the necessary precondition for the first and the third, whereas the second does not need the other two. We could imagine life forms only existing in the second intentionality, but not only in the other two reflected kinds of intentionality: angels are only abstractions. But the embryos of the other two are always already there in longitudinal consciousness, as it always has a content. The experiencing always experiences something, even if this “something” does not have to be in the form of an object (it could also be prey given only through desire). In human existence, these three belong together: held together they formulate human existence. I follow Husserl in accepting the analysis of inner time-consciousness as the deepest layer of experience. But it is closely intertwined with other central analyses.

3.

Trisection of the living body

The longitudinal intentionality is not only a consciousness of time, but also of the body. One side of it is the kinesthetic sensation of the living organism, i. e. the inner sensation of the moving body that is always there. This bodily side of the longitudinal intentionality could be understood as the spatialization of time. The living body is the realization of experience as it always includes perception. It is central to Husserl’s analysis that the experience of the living body includes both the experience of the other (thing or person), and the experience of the self. As the realization of experience, the living body includes a constant stream of

 

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perceptions (cf. § 41, Husserl: 1992, 133). But this stream is not without a localization of its own; on the contrary, perception only comes about through a simultaneous possibility of perceiving the means for perception as a living body and a now-here. The experience of the living body thus comes about in a trisected way: 1. As perception and knowledge of the opposite object that is experienced, and that can come and go (just as the object given through transverse intentionality), i. e. as the visibility of what is experienced through the body. 2. As perception of one’s own embodiment as experiencing, of the perceiving means (organs) that are always there, i. e. as the visibility of one’s own body. 3. As a pre-reflected experiencing of one’s own embodiment, mostly understood as a kinesthetic experience of one’s own movement. This is a kind of self-affection of the body that makes up the pre-reflexive self-consciousness of the living body:2 a now and here without distance, which could be understood as a part of the longitudinal consciousness that is unknowable for reflection, since it is a foundational experiencing rather than something experienced (just as in longitudinal intentionality). In this way the living body includes an invisibility. Here it is not vision that is the primordial sense, or the metaphor we use: rather sensitivity is the key sense. Materiality of the thing is given through sensitivity, and materiality is central for bodies. This also makes the skin central: it is a limit towards otherness, a relating limit, which does not so much cut off one body from another as relate them to each other. This materiality enables us to experience our own body as one object among many in a world of objects. But this can only happen through the meeting between bodies, i. e. between (1) and (2) above. Materiality is the experience of impenetrability, and such a phenomenon demands two sides, two material bodies, in order to take place. The perception itself is localized to one side of two within one and the same medium: materiality. Every perception is double, and attention can be directed either at the experienced object or the experiencing means. When touching a table we can focus either on the table or on the hand that experiences the table (cf. § 37, Husserl: 1952, 149– 151). And when one part of the living body touches another part, as when the left hand strikes the right hand, attention can oscillate between oneself as object and as means: the right hand can suddenly appear as experiencing the left hand rather than the other way around. The interchangeability of means and object constitutes the living body; this is the central phenomenological analysis that Merleau-Ponty picked up and developed further. The giving of the perception (3), and the means that are experienced as giving the perception (2), constitute the meaning of “me” and what belongs to me. This “mineness” is connected to continuity. The hand

2 This is also discussed and clarified by Dan Zahavi: 1998, 214.

 

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that strikes is what is continual and “the same” in the experience (cf. § 36, Husserl: 1952, 145–146). It is much harder to perceive the motionless hand as the self. “Self ” is here continuity and intentional activity. That which is not moving is other and object, and is only included in the “self ” through the possibility that the roles may be reversed. Movement is thus connected to continuity. It is not the objectified hand that holds together the continuity of the experience: in its objectivity it is a passing object that moves through the stream, and does not compose the stream. Because of the possibility of reversal, this mineness is understood both in its possibility to be an object for itself and in its character of composing the stream. Here too these three parties are not symmetrically related. The perception of the means (2) is intimately connected to the perceiving motion (3), as they both are understood as belonging to a self. They are both “mine”. But they are separated as perceiving and perceived, and as visible, and invisible. (1) and (2) are also intimately connected as two kinds of objects; they are both other than the experiencing movement since they are thematized. They are two of the same kind; they are both material, visible objects, accessible for knowledge, but are also separated as “my” material object and an “other” material object. From here a wide range of phenomenological investigations can unfold, examining each of these three directions as units of their own. One could examine how objects, one’s own body and perceiving itself (which would be the core of a transcendental investigation) are constituted.

4.

Trisection of the self

As we have seen, there is a meaning of “mineness” that connects the first and third layer of the living body. So let us turn our attention to this aspect of the stream of experience. Through the focus on materiality we can investigate how the body is constituted. But the non-thematizable, invisible, immanent, kinesthetic movement can also be investigated in its character of “mineness” and in its character of being a motion with a direction. Through turning to the immanent giving of sensing and experiencing, we can follow how a thematizable, but non-material self is constituted. In Ideas II, Husserl calls such a self a soul, and as a movement with a certain direction it shows itself as will. The self can thereby appear in the world and in time not only through the objectivated materiality of the living body, but also beyond such materialization. What is invisible to the physical eye, here becomes visible to an inner eye: this means that “visibility” goes from being a bodily sense to a metaphorical sense of knowledge. This non-material sphere is more intimately connected to the living movement of experiencing and to longitudinal intentionality, and is thus experienced as more intimately connected to the self than the body. Husserl claims that this is the reason why we often say that the self

 

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and the soul have a body (cf. § 37, Husserl: 1952, 150–151). But we can also say “my soul”, and that “I have a soul”, which shows that this non-material sphere too is separated from the giving movement, and is thus transformed into something different from the giving itself. The intimate connection to the living body, through the experience of mineness, gives the soul a place in time and space. As the continuity of will it has a history and its own causal structures, and as such it can be investigated as a specific object in time and thus as a psyche. But this structure still needs to be separated from the giving movement – that which cannot be given a place in time as it is the continuity of time – which can be investigated in yet another layer, once the soul or the psyche has been objectivated. The trisection of the self, or rather the experience of “mineness”, can thus be formulated in the following way: 1. “My” living experiencing body, which can also be experienced as an object. 2. The giving, experiencing stream with its direction and will, which can be thematized as a soul or psyche. 3. The giving of this direction that cannot be thematized, an elusive “mineness” of the experiencing stream that shows itself in expressions such as “my body”, “my soul” or “my psyche”. Through this process we experience a world of two separate but intertwined, and mutually covering orders: the material as given and the spiritual as giving given, i. e. (1) and (2). They are intimately connected since they appear through the same separating stream of experiences. Since these two orders are intimately interconnected, we have one world and not two, although their fundamental difference makes our experience complex and multilayered. The soul appears as both interwoven with and separated from its materiality, as a layer within materiality. In everyday experience our attention is directed toward the objects that surround us. To be directed toward, and investigate, the layer of the soul demands a higher effort, because of its close relationship with the giving movement. Thus “reality” is often understood as the visible material world given through object-intentionality, and that which escapes thematization is to an increasing degree (at least in modern times) understood as “unreal”. (1) and (2) are here separated within the element of “mineness”, just as our own body and the other body are separated within materiality. As the soul in (2) can become an object to oneself, it is separated from the giving movement and becomes a given something within time. Here we find an asymmetric relation of mutual dependency. The relation is asymmetric since our living body is other for the giving movement to a greater extent than is the soul (as the soul purifies the giving of the living body). The soul is closer to the third giving layer than the living body. Even if the visible in the modern world is considered the most “real”,

 

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the phenomenological investigation also leads to an increasing invisibility of the giving of everything real. Here also a new trisection emerges through a thematization of the longitudinal consciousness, but which goes beyond “mineness”. It is a trisection that leads out of the self through a thematization of the giving structure (i. e. the phenomenological investigation). The thematization of the giving as a structure brings out: 1. The experiencing soul, which can be thematized as having a specific time and place. 2. The transcendental ego. 3. The giving movement. The investigation of the structure of experience, i. e. of the giving rather than of the given, cannot stop with the investigation of the soul: when it becomes a given object in time and space, something of its giving is hidden, which provides space for a further analysis. This analysis leads to the structure itself as a transcendental ego. The soul and the transcendental ego are thus separated as an objectified being in the world, and the giving movement as the structure of the beings of the world. But when this is done, the giving has once again been thematized and it receives a specific place and time as a Husserlian analysis with its specific context and thus with its place and time. Also in this movement something of the giving, experiencing, has slipped away. The transcendental self can thus be separated from the giving movement, since the transcendental ego formulates that which is possible to thematize in a certain context, whereas the giving movement transcends each thematization. The “transcendental” thus constitutes an area that can be thematized, but that nevertheless has its transcending horizons. The giving movement can in this way be associated with the primordial consciousness (Urbewusstsein), longitudinal consciousness and kinesthetic movement, which remain invisible to knowledge.

5.

Trisection of intersubjectivity

So far we have been following an egological phenomenological investigation, even if it goes beyond “mineness” in the transcendental analysis. As we have seen, the self has been intimately connected to the giving movement. But the question if this self really arises on its own remains. This can be answered through relating the theme of trisection to Husserl’s theory of intersubjectivity. Through acts of empathy the other person is given as having a discrete connection to this giving movement; the other person is given not only as an object, but also as an experiencing body. As Husserl shows, neither the living body nor the world acquires its full meaning through the egological analysis. The living body of the other person is not given as one object among many, but as a living body, with

 

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its own will and capability (cf. §§ 43–44, Husserl: 1952, 162–163). This means that its character of being capable of experience is given with its character of being an object. This given-with does not come through reasoning or faith, but is what the experience includes. The experience of the self and the other mirror each other, and only through a mutual interaction are the self and the other constituted. In the beginning the infant lives in the stream of perception, neither its own body nor that of the other person is yet constituted. The living stream is not yet connected to a self. Self and other are subsequently constituted through the separation of will and materiality. Only through finding resistance in another’s will can our own will understand itself, and only through accepting the other’s living body as experiencing, can the nascent I find its own unity within one body. The other person experiences me as one body, a feature which I can not experience without borrowing the gaze of the other person. Here the trisection comes back in a more complex way: 1. One’s own body as experienced – one’s own will and experiencing, i. e. oneself as a person. 2. The body of the other person as experienced – the will and experiencing of the other person, i. e. the other as a person. 3. Once these two are separated, two kinds of radical alterity or of invisibility arise (see below), since these two thematizations and objectivations of persons do not catch the entire living, experiencing stream. In order to understand oneself as a person one has to contrast oneself with another person, but in this contrast the ambition to understand experience is once again incomplete. Empathy is only possible through the doubling of the self: oneself as experienced and as experiencing. The other person is given as the same kind of doubling. But where the other is primarily perceived, the self is primarily perceiving. Nevertheless, just as the self can be experienced as perceived, the other can be experienced as perceiving (cf. § 46, Husserl: 1952, 167–169). In order to constitute myself, I am in need of the other. The perception of the other person is thus a perception of an able, willing body and thus a movement of its own. This able, willing appears in contrast to a more immediately given movement, one that we come to call our own. The activity of the other person is a perceived movement just like one’s own activity. Two contents are given together. Just as materiality can only show itself in the contrast between two, so the self can only appear in contrast to another. And just as in the case of materiality, one side is more closely connected to the giving movement. As mentioned above, a radical invisibility too shows itself in a twofold way: the impossibility of thematizing the giving movement on the one side, and the inaccessibility of the other person (emphasized by Emmanuel Levinas) on the other. These two experiences of radical invisibility have been formulated as radical alteri-

 

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ties and are also related to each other; but in what way is open to discussion. Either the I has already experienced radical alterity within its own streaming experience, and therefore can understand the radical alterity of the other person:3 or it is the other way around, and the inaccessibility of the other person makes it possible to perceive the gap within the I’s stream of experience. This would not however be Husserl’s way of understanding the question. In this way empathy and memory are closely related acts (cf. § 52, Husserl: 1950, 121; § 140, Husserl 1992: 367; § 54, Husserl: 1962, 189). They are both reflecting concepts that make present something that is transcending. They both have their starting point in a gap, and recreate a continuity. The self as well as the other is thus characterized by a central alterity and unknowability. Both acts include a collecting of the giving movement in a secondary and mediated way. And this also shows that the giving movement in itself is anonymous and not “mine” or “yours,” just as life in its very first shapes (for the fetus and the infant) is beyond or before individuality.4 The access to the other person has often been questioned in western intellectual history, but we could ask ourselves which of the overlapping associations it is that is more strange: the self that includes the gap between experienced and experiencing, or empathy that includes the gap between “own experiencing” and “other experiencing”. In the analysis of intersubjectivity, the same layers come forth as in the analysis of the self: materiality as proper and as other, will as proper and as other. Just as the borders between our own materiality and that of others arise through their limitations with regard to each other, so do the borders of the will (one’s own and that of others) arise in the same way. Once again, in order to appear they need resistance within the same element. But as they come forth and become visible as participating in the constitution of the world, both of them also include a layer of radical invisibility: of what cannot be thematized (the gap between experience and experiencing in the self, and the gap between the self and the other in relation to the other person). Here a trisection of radical invisibility can be made, but we could understand its structure in two different ways. Either it looks like this: 1. The gap in one’s own stream of experience. 2. The radical alterity of the other person. 3. These are both experienced within the egological stream of experience. 3 Husserl does not discuss this explicitly, but it has been formulated by Rudolf Bernet in the following way: “This putting-at-a-distance of its own existence is also that which allows the existent to open itself to a world and to the Other. […] The relation of the subject to (the appearing of) its life is another figure of that ‘transcendence in immanence’ which indeed appears to be the key to the Husserlian theory of intentionality” (Bernet: 1994, 252). 4 As I argue in Bornemark 2014 and 2016.

 

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Here the starting-point is the gap in one’s own stream, which makes it possible for us to experience the radical alterity of the other person. But Husserl seems to emphasize that both these alterities have their experiential ground in one’s own experience (3). It is I that experience the gap within myself, as well as the radical alterity of the other. In this way Husserl stays true to the egological phenomenology and its focus on what is given in first-person experience, rather than accepting that experience is given in any other way. In an alternative understanding of this question, inspired more by Merleau-Ponty than by Husserl, the tripartite structure might look like this: 1. The radical alterity of the other person. 2. The gap in one’s stream of experience. 3. The overflowing of the living stream. Here one can only understand oneself, and the central gap within oneself, through the duality of the other and the self. In order to be able to reflect upon myself I need as a child to borrow the gaze of the other person. Only through this can the child understand that the experience of the living body, and the body held together in the mirror, is one and the same. Merleau-Ponty argues that the acceptance of the other-person experience precedes the possibility of understanding myself as both experiencing and experienced (Merleau-Ponty: 1964, 137–141). Such an argument would imply that the ego is secondary in relation to an overflowing, living stream (3). In the first, Husserlian, way of understanding this relation, an egological phenomenology is emphasized: in the second a phenomenology based in a certain anonymity of the living stream is formulated.

6.

Trisection as structure: limit-drawing and birth

In all these analyses there is an interplay between visibility and invisibility. The continual movement of the experiencing stream eludes our thematizing, reflecting consciousness, which at all timess makes experience visible. Life constantly transcends knowledge. But knowledge is nevertheless gathered through reflections in the movement of the experiencing stream. To make each object visible and thematized necessitates separating it from the movement of the experiencing stream (i. e. the continuity of the movement itself, not what is shown in it). This structure of trisection grows out of a reflection over the longitudinal consciousness. Following Husserl, I have tried to unwind these trisections with a starting-point in an egological phenomenology. But we can also see how the analyses here break out of the egological perspective. Following the analysis of the infant consciousness, we can instead see how the relation between two persons takes its

 

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starting-point in a living, giving movement that becomes split up into two persons. This giving movement is a limit-drawing event: it separates. This is what it does and what it is. The two sides are mutually dependent as they become visible only through their separation from the other part within the same element. Knowledge grows through a reflection that gives rise to two opposites within the same element: materiality needs another materiality, the self needs another self, and so on. But the relation between these two sides is asymmetric, since one side is closer to the streaming of the stream than the other. At first it is the self that is more closely connected to the streaming. But in the end the self does not contain this streaming, which as we have seen overflows it, and the self passively receives it. I would say that the need to make this receiving visible is one reason why concepts of the divine have been formulated throughout history. The stream shows itself not as an immanent area of full evidence (as Husserl originally thought), but as a constant self-transcending movement that is the origin of both the self and the other. The stream of experience transcends itself, and this constitutes the possibility for both otherness and transcendental presuppositions to show themselves. Through this movement multiple series of objectivations and thematizations arise, and a stable world can thus be constituted. In phenomenology, what I have called the streaming of the stream has been given many names: Husserl calls it, with the medieval tradition, nunc stans (see e. g. text 3, Husserl: 2006, 8), Klaus Held calls it living presence (Held: 1966), and Michel Henry calls it immanent knowledge and self-affection (Henry: 1973). The gap between the streaming of the stream and reflection can be understood in many ways, and two extreme positions have been formulated by Michel Henry and Jacques Derrida. Henry claims that beyond a split consciousness that divides itself into object and subject, there is an immediate knowledge of self-affection that is without gap or distance. Such immanent knowledge would then be the presupposition for every objectivating intentionality and not be dependent upon objectivating, or transverse, intentionality (Henry: 1973, 234–237). Derrida instead argues that each intentionality carries a gap within itself, and that there is no unbroken self-affection or self-presence. Instead being as such is characterized as always involving a break with itself as he emphasizes the movement of différance (Derrida: 1967, 92–97).5 From Henry’s perspective Derrida makes one kind of appearance invisible: from Derrida’s point of view Henry picks up an old traditional idea of an eternal, complete, and harmonious being beyond the world. The advantage of Henry’s argument is that it provides acceptance for an area beyond knowledge, and the disadvantage is that it could be understood as an area of its own, and not in its relation to what is given through a transverse intentionality. The advantage of

5 Martin Hägglund has emphasized this trait in Derrida’s philosophy in Hägglund: 2008.

 

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Derrida’s position is that it does not split up experience into two separate spheres, and its disadvantage is its tendency to obscure an experience of continuity. I have been trying to find a way somewhere between Henry’s and Derrida’s. The event of limit-drawing constantly engenders new double experiences. Unlike Henry I would argue that the streaming of the stream does not exist apart from its “limit-drawing” activity, and that it cannot therefore be separated from transverse intentionality. But more than Derrida, I would emphasize that there nevertheless is a continuity of this limit-drawing, which constantly moves beyond cognitive knowledge, although its movement is also a continuity that we experience. The phenomenological movement constantly finds new names for the unthematizable, continual streaming, although this need not be considered as a failure, but rather as a necessity or even a richness. Since it eludes all thematization it cannot be conceptualized. Instead it gives birth to ever new concepts and thematizations – concepts and thematizations that unavoidably will become static and petrified and thus need deconstruction so that once again they can be seen in connection to the limit-drawing streaming out of which they were born. Thereby they can either be re-structured, or new concepts can be born. The creative process is thus more important than those concepts that are created through it. One might say that phenomenology succeeds through its failure to thematize the streaming movement and make it fully visible. It succeeds through mirroring, repeating and staging the limit-drawing movement. In this way a certain invisibility continues to give birth to visibility. It also shows that visibility always and necessarily will be accompanied by invisibility.

Bibliography Bernet, Rudolf (1994), An Intentionality without Subject and Object?, Man and World 27, 231–255. Birnbaum, Daniel (1998), The Hospitality of Presence: Problems of Otherness in Husserl’s Phenomenology, Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell International. Boehm, Rudolf (1981), Bewusstsein als Gegenwart des Vergangenen, in Rudolf Boehm, Vom Gesichtspunkt der Phänomenologie, vol. 2, The Hague/Boston/London: Martinus Nijhoff, 113–137. Bornemark, Jonna (2014), The Genesis of Empathy in Human Development: A Phenomenological Reconstruction, Journal of Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 17:2, 259–268. Bornemark, Jonna (2016), “Life beyond Individuality: A-subjective Experience in Pregnancy”, in Jonna Bornemark/Nicholas Smith (eds.), Phenomenology of Pregnancy, Huddinge: Södertörn University. Derrida, Jacques (1967), La voix et le phénomène: Introduction au problème du signe dans la phénoménologie de Husserl, Paris: PUF. Hägglund, Martin (2008), Radical Atheism: Derrida and the Time of Life, Stanford: Stanford University Press.

 

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Held, Karl (1966), Lebendige Gegenwart: Die Frage nach der Seinsweise des transzendentalen Ich bei Edmund Husserl, entwickelt am Leitfaden der Zeitproblematik, Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff. Henry, Michel (1973), Essence of Manifestation, Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff. Husserl, Edmund (1950), Cartesianische Meditationen und Pariser Vorträge, Husserliana I, Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff. Husserl, Edmund (1952), Ideen zu einer reinen Phänomenologie und phänomenologischen Philosophie, Buch 2, Husserliana IV, Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff. Husserl, Edmund (1962), Die Krisis der Europäischen Wissenschaften und die transzendentale Phänomenologie, Husserliana VI, Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff. Husserl, Edmund (1966), Zur Phänomenologie des inneren Zeitbewusstseins, Husserliana X, Haag: Martinus Nijhoff. Husserl, Edmund (1992), Ideen zu einer reinen Phänomenologie, Gesammelte Schriften 5, Hamburg: Felix Meiner Verlag. Husserl, Edmund (2001), Die Bernauer Manuskripte über das Zeitbewusstsein (1917/18), Husserliana XXXIII, Dordrecht: Kluwer. Husserl, Edmund (2006), Späte Texte über Zeitkonstitution (1929–1934). Die C-Manuskripte, Husserliana, Materialien Band VII, Dordrecht: Springer. Merleau-Ponty, Marcel (1964), The Child’s Relations with Others, in: Marcel Merleau-Ponty, The Primacy of Perception and other Essays on Phenomenological Psychology, the Philosophy of Art, History, and Politics, Evanston: Northwestern University Press. Zahavi, Dan (1998), Self-awareness and Affection, in Natalie Depraz/Dan Zahavi (eds.), Alterity and Facticity: New Perspectives on Husserl, Dordrecht/Boston/London: Kluwer.

 

 

Gavin Flood

Becoming Invisible and the Formal Indication of the Religious Life

This paper is written as a tentative inquiry into the nature of invisibility as understood within phenomenology that, as the theory of appearances, has been concerned with the relation between what appears and the invisible. The process of thinking about the invisible is incomplete and does not settle because of the very nature of the invisible as de-stabilizing processes of thought. Thinking attempts to grasp the invisible, to bring it forth into sight, but it slips away because of the reifying nature of thinking and the ungraspable nature of the world. In this paper I would like to examine the elusive nature of this process, paying particular attention to Heidegger’s early lectures that make the point that factical life experience is necessary for understanding religious life. But whereas phenomenology can re-describe the appearance of invisibility, or rather specify invisibility as a constraint upon what appears, it cannot enter into the invisible in the way that the contemplative life of the religious practitioner does. For the practitioner to become invisible is to make the invisible manifest in some sense and we need to account for this process historically, yet grounded in lived experience.

1.

Phenomenology of religion and invisibility

Traditional phenomenology, the phenomenology of Edmund Husserl, begins with intentionality; that consciousness is always ‘consciousness of ’. The object of knowledge (noema) is revealed by the means of knowing (noesis) which is also the flow of cognitions (cogitationes) apprehended by a subject of consciousness (cogito). Intentionality, a foundation concept of phenomenology, is the relation between the cogito and the cogitationes or the cogitatum. Husserl’s famous reduction, the epoché, is the bracketing or suspending the question of being behind appearances. What appears to consciousness is the object of phenomenological inquiry but the question of the being of those appearances, what lies behind them as it were, remains suspended (Husserl: 1950, 18–21). The truth or otherwise of appearance is invisible. We can instantly see the initial attraction of this for a phenomenology of

 

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religion that seeks accurate description while not seeking to evaluate the truth of religious claims. Indeed, this lead to the – often excellent – description of religions on an almost industrial scale in the Western academy. But because of suspending of the question of being, in some sense the intentional objects of a phenomenology of religion remain inaccurately described. The completeness of a religious appearance can never be fully accounted for in the absence of an appreciation or force of the truth claim implicit within it. We can describe the mantras used in a particular ritual but bracketing the question of truth leaves us inevitably with a partial account, only partially empathetic to the yogi repeating a mantra to gain his redemption from suffering. At one level there is little alternative. The detachment necessary for correct description cannot allow the submerging of the scholar into the object of inquiry, into the liberation quest. And yet that very detachment entails that we can never completely understand or explain what is perceived or at stake, while simultaneously highlighting other truths of a sociological or historical nature. Husserl is still trapped in a model of the human in which the transcendental subjectivity remains free from the processes of cogitation, its objects, in which the question of truth is suspended. On this account the truth or falsity of appearance becomes problematic. While the phenomenology of religion based on the epoché as an attempted science of religion has produced some very plausible results for our inquiry into human reality – Eliade’s study of Yoga, Smart’s study of Christianity – the truth of the forms of life that religions are remains a question for a non-participant or for a scientific view. On the Husserlian account, the truth of religions remains invisible while paradoxically attempting to be revealed through the epoché. Many have raised questions about the viability of the Husserlian model. Derrida questions whether we can separate being from appearance so easily, Merleau-Ponty has criticized the very idea of the ‘inner man’ emphasizing that the invisible is the precondition of the world that we are inevitably and richly embedded within, and Michel Henry locates invisibility not in the objects of consciousness but in subjectivity itself, the very characteristic of oneself as interiority (Dan Zahavi: 1999). This insight of Henry points to a kind of invisibility that I wish to inquire into here, the invisibility of the person in relation to spiritual practice or the telos of invisibility for the practitioner. The practices and forms of religion are generally inherited from pre-modernity, as Oliver Davies observes (Davies: 2013, 3f). Prayer, liturgy, religious reading, and fasting, are all cultural forms whose significance lies in the nature of the person revealed, or more precisely the way in which the person comes to inhabit these practices is the way in which the person becomes invisible. In other words, the spiritual practices developed over long periods of time by practitioners in various religions are intended to diminish an egocentric view of the self and to cultivate a habitus that is orientated out of tradition towards the world. Within religions, the inner understanding of this process,

 

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if we might generalize, is that the opening out of the person to the transcendent goals of tradition is simultaneously believed to be the closing in of a limited or egocentric way of being. To help us understand this process, rather than Husserl’s epoché, Heidegger’s early lectures on the phenomenology of religion are a good place to begin. In these remarkable early lectures, Heidegger is aware that in order for the significance of religious practices to come into view for the modern philosopher, we need to understand history. To understand the way in which religion makes visible what would otherwise remain invisible, we must engage with the historical past: the historical past can take on phenomenological appearance (anzeigen). The lectures are divided into two sections, the first concerned with method and the nature of phenomenological inquiry into history and the second with the facticity of Christian living as displayed in the writings of Paul. His argument goes something like this. The first part begins with a reflection on the nature of philosophy, particularly in relation to the sciences that arise from it, and phenomenological inquiry which should begin, argues Heidegger, from ‘factical life experience’ that designates both experiencing and that which is experienced (Heidegger: 2004, 7). Factical life experience is the point of departure of philosophy and its goal. It “designates the whole active and passive pose of the human being toward the world” (ibid., 8). All philosophical reflection must begin in factical life experience and it is towards understanding the truth of that experience that philosophy is orientated. The ‘world’ rather than the Husserlian ‘object’ is a key aspect here, for one lives in the world but cannot live in an object, says Heidegger. Indeed, the spectrum of ‘factical life experience’ is broader than Husserl’s intentionality because it not only includes the ego cogito, the ‘I’, but also the communal world of teachers, students, and so on (ibid., 8). This experience is no detached self, observing phenomena from a distance, but is embroiled in a world that has significance. To inquire into factical life experience is where we must begin and even a phenomenology of religion has to begin here. After outlining the concept of factical life experience Heidegger arrives at a reflection on history via consideration of the essence of religion as found in Troeltsch and the problem of religion being an object for philosophy and thereby being in danger of being misunderstood (because objectified and so divorced from human Dasein). To represent religion as an object is not to see its human significance and yet conversely to understand religion from the perspective of a science, religion has to be objectified. Heidegger wishes to approach this problem from a different angle. When we are speaking about factical life experience and when we are speaking about religion we are necessarily speaking about the historical. The core phenomenon (Kernphänomen) of religion is the historical (das Historische) and we need to understand history not in terms of science (that is, as an object) but in terms of factical life experience (Heidegger: 2004, 22). Factical life experience is fundamentally

 

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temporal and so history is grounded in it. To understand the religious life, that is to say religious practices and views, is to understand the historical. The scientific view of history as an object changing in time, while being understandable, is an account that neglects the human Dasein as bound up with history. Indeed, the historical impacts upon or forms factical life experience positively in so far as the diversity of historical forms gives ‘fulfillment’, and negatively in that it presents us with a burden or hindrance (ibid., 26). In accepting the primacy of the historical we must go against a number of philosophies that have rejected it through positing self-assertion that Heidegger calls “the struggle of life against the historical” (ibid., 26f). Heidegger catalogues three modes that attempt to liberate us from the historical, namely the Platonic way which asserts that a break must be made with the historical through self-assertion; the assertion of history and its formative determinations of life; and the compromise between the two views, that absolute truths are embedded in history (ibid., 27–30; Scott M. Campbell: 2012, 47–49). The Platonic view sees history as mere appearance, the second at first while seeming to assert the historical, in fact is Platonic in orientation because it sees history along with nature as objects that can be manipulated by the human. This is also true of the third view. All of these views misunderstand history because they do not take account of human Dasein and Heidegger rejects any subdivision of philosophy into sub-disciplines (Heidegger: 2004, 24). None of these views of history accepts the force of history and attempt to protect philosophy from history’s disturbance. Heidegger after discussing these views at some length and laying bare their difficulties, particularly engaging with Spengler, raises the question as to how we can grasp the historical in everyday factical existence (and so how we can grasp the religious life). The answer to this question lies in a difficult concept of Heidegger’s, that of the formal indication (die formale Anzeige). This is at the heart of the relation between the historical and everyday factical existence in that through the formal indication we can grasp the historical and so grasp religious life. While there has been much discussion about the formal indication, whether it is continuous with Husserl (Matthew I. Burch: 2011, 1–21) or whether it marks a radical break (Theodore Kisiel: 1993, 164; cf. also Daniel Dahlstrom: 1994, and Hent de Vries: 1999, 158–243), we can understand it not so much as a method as an orientation to phenomena that seeks to point to the essential features of a phenomenon. The formal indication is a pointing to a primordial sense of being which is the topic of philosophy and which points to our historical situatedeness. The linguistic indexicals ‘I’ and ‘here’ point to our situatedness as the presupposition of all phenomenological inquiry. A formal indication is thus a pathway of thought, grounded in the structure of Dasein that indicates an essential realm of being characterized by structures such as care, temporality, and ‘mineness’. The formal indication is itself empty of content but allows access to the content of appearances. The for-

 

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mal indication shows us what would otherwise have remained hidden or invisible and it is the revealing of the invisible that phenomenology then records. To the question ‘what is phenomenology?’, Heidegger responds that it can only be indicated formally. The formal indication guides phenomenological inquiry and is rooted in the kind of being we are; it invites us to recognize our own situation in time as the basis for all understanding and the ways in which we participate in the being of history. What is understood in phenomenological inquiry is, in McGrath’s phrase, “not an object for a subject but a lived experience for a living human being” (Sean J. McGrath: 2006, 70). Related to this concept is the ‘sense of enactment’ or ‘completion of meaning’ (Vollzugssinn). Thus we have a statement followed by its actualisation in the understanding person (the shift from Augustine’s actus signatus to the actus exercitus (Jean Grondin: 1995, 101–02). That is, the formal indication shows that concrete meaning is a new meaning other than that of past cultures where a phenomenon originates (Heidegger: 2004, 35). The historical has fresh meaning for the present, it is completed or enacted in present conditions and so concerned Dasein perceives itself through the concrete enactiment of the historical. The formal indication is necessarily enacted or realized in the present, something that can be contrasted with Dilthey’s historical pursuit of the formation of historical consciousness. For Heidegger we need a more radical temporal interpretation of human existence; we need the completion of meaning (Vollzugssinn), the deeper shift of interpretation implicit in Augustine that Dilthy failed to understand, being restricted to a historical objective understanding that was not sufficiently temporal (ibid., 118). The phenomenology of religion thus needs to produce a completion of meaning in the present as formally indicated. The phenomenology of religion in the Husserlian mode of bracketing, assumes religious life to be opaque to the phenomenological observer. Through suspending the question of being behind appearances, the performance of the epoché, perhaps ironically, restricts understanding. In attempting to reveal the meaning of religious appearances through it, something is inevitably denuded from those appearances. In contrast, Heidegger’s formal indication lays claim to understanding religious appearances not through suspending the question of being, but on the contrary through appreciating temporal facticity and so claiming that some pre-understanding of being (and its temporality) is a precondition of any comprehension of religion. In contrast to the hesitancy of the epoché, the formal indication rather points to the very structure of life as a pre-requisite for understanding the structure of religious life. We can appreciate St Paul because of our temporal nature; we can understand how early Christians lived factically because we inhabit the way we ourselves live factically. The religious appearance from the past is made to partially collapse into the theoretical present. The invisible nature of religious practices, that is, the invisible nature of the historical past, is rendered visible through

 

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recognizing the structures of being and its ineliminable temporal nature. This may not affect actual accounts of history but it does re-orientate the inquirer. Having presented an account of the historical and how it can be related to factical existence through the formal indication, Heidegger goes on in his second course of lectures, part 2 of the book, to present a phenomenological explication of concrete religious phenomena, namely the Epistles of Paul. Here the formal indication allows us to understand the historical situation of Paul through the notion of “being like an I” (Heidegger: 2004, 63). We need empathy (Einfühlung) for Paul’s communal world “given to him in the situation of writing the letter” and although we cannot step into Paul’s shoes, we must draw from factical life experience to shift from object-history to enactment situation (ibid., 61–63). The enactment the historical situation of Paul writing a letter involves our understanding of the temporal reality of the self that can only be gained through the formal indication; understanding the subjectivity of Paul to be ‘being like an I’ from where we can carry out an explication (ibid., 64). The sense of an ‘I’ or ‘something like an I’ that is entailed in historical inquiry tells us about how history is formed. This phenomenological inquiry is itself historically situated. What then has all this to do with invisibility? We have necessarily approached the invisible via this Heideggerian route because we must speak about the invisibility of historical appearance. This invisibility is of being itself or the particular being of historical appearance. This invisibility, however, is not complete invisibility because it comes into view through the formal indication. By being formally indicated we can understand the invisible being of historical situatedness, we can understand ‘being something like an I’. With the letters of Paul we have something from the historical past taking on phenomenological appearance for us. In order to understand religious life we therefore have to understand the historical. To understand religion we need to understand history because the forms of religion are handed down from the past and so, as Davies has observed (Davies: 2013), from a world that we no longer share that is in many ways invisible to us. There are then at least two kinds of invisibility that Heidegger is dealing with. Firstly the invisibility of the historical past – the practices of religion are opaque to us because of the passage of time – and the invisibility of the focus of religious practice such as, in the case of Paul, the invisibility of the coming of the spirit, the parousia. Indeed, we might say that religion attempts to make visible what would otherwise be hidden. Rather as an artist reveals a work hidden in raw material (Jean-Luc Marion: 2004, 24), so religion reveals otherwise invisible structures of being. Heidegger seems sympathetic to Paul’s concerns. To understand Paul it is not enough simply to read his letters text historically or as exemplifying a ‘worldview’, the notion of which Heidegger is critical (Heidegger: 1988, 8–11). We need to come to appreciate the depth of transformative power that the invisible came to exercise

 

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at that time and through that to understand the contemporary force of religious forms. Implicitly Heidegger points us to a parallelism in the phenomenological process and the religious life: both seek to make manifest the unseen and, paradoxically for it can never be seen, the invisible. But phenomenology is always once removed from the process. Thus for the religious practitioner the invisible comes to exert force on his or her life through the repetition of religious tradition such that the limited, everyday self becomes invisible and subordinated to the implied self of tradition. Through repeated practice the practitioner seeks to erase her own self-will in order that a power conceived to be beyond the person can come into play. Through the repeated acts of liturgy, through repeated prayer, and through acting in the world in conformity to tradition, the practitioner seeks to realise the ideals and goals of the religion. The Buddhist repeats the path of the Buddha, the Christian imitates Christ, the Moslem surrenders to a higher power. The practitioner in a sense becomes invisible and the higher the degree of invisibility of the practitioner, the higher the degree of the appearance of transcendence. The invisibility of the practitioner is a way of saying that human limitation, in Christian terminology being bound by sin, is transcended. The opening out of transcendence in the life of the practitioner is simultaneously the closing in of limitation, often through the enforcement of strict rules. In more technical language, the indexical-I of the practitioner becomes overwhelmed by the implicit-I of tradition. The phenomenologist develops empathy but retains outsideness in understanding this process. By way of illustration we can give two examples from the histories of Christianity and Hinduism that illustrate the self-formation by tradition such that the limited self, the subject of first person predicates, becomes invisible in the sense that the tradition lives through them: the saint embodies the virtues of tradition.

2.

Invisibility of the religious self

To recap briefly. So far we have argued that Heidegger’s starting point for a phenomenology of religion grounded in factical life experience has an advantage over Husserlian bracketing in that it offers a deeper human engagement with religious practices that generally come from the past and which have, in a sense, become invisible in modernity. This, I think, is Heidegger’s point about the need to understand the historical. Through understanding the historical, religious life comes into view and can be recognised or formally indicated by the modern self. Heidegger performs a phenomenology with regard to Paul’s letters. What phenomenology shows us is that some forms of religion are concerned with transcending limitation through the person becoming invisible so that the tradition might speak through them. What we might call the ‘religious person’ can be understood through phe-

 

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nomenology that is grounded in existence and the recognition of temporality as the fundamental mode of factical life experience. I cannot deal with the problematic nature of the adjective ‘religious’ here that has come under severe critique (e. g. Fitzgerald: 1999), but by it I mean the person who has intentionally adopted forms that she believes are conducive to a particular transformational or salvific goal. A phenomenological study brings out the shared structures of this process in different religious worlds, although what they share is that both are cosmological in orientation. Let us briefly illustrate the invisibility of the religious self firstly with an example from Christianity and secondly from Hinduism. Our Christian example is Bonaventure (1217–74). In his Itinerarium mentis in Deum, ‘The Journey of the Mind into God’, he presents the cosmos as a ladder with God at the top. The journey of the person to God is up the ladder of ascent, which is also an interiorised ladder within the self. That is, the cosmos is within the self and the spiritual path to God is the gradual elimination of the limited self so that the invisible inner truth of God comes to shine through the limited person. The truth within is perceived; the cognition of God is through experience (cogitionem Dei experimentalem). Limited desire comes to be replaced with a spiritual aspiration through an act of will, the repetition of spiritual practices such as prayer and asceticism. To reach God we must “enter into (intrare) our soul, which is God’s image, everlasting, spiritual and within us” (Itinerarium 1.2; Bonaventura: 1957, 297a/Bonaventure: 1978, 52). Entering into ourselves to find God within is to erase or transcend limitation. The invisibility of God comes into view and by praying “we receive light to discern the steps of the ascent to God” (Itinerarium 1.2). Conversely as God comes into view, so the self recedes and becomes invisible. In these contexts the invisibility of God means that the limited human agent cannot perceive what is beyond limitation. But as human limitation becomes transcended through spiritual practice, so the invisibility of God recedes but never completely. Transcending human limitation is another way of saying that the self becomes invisible. The unlimited invisible of Bonaventure’s God comes to replace the limited invisibility of the self. A second example from a very different context bears remarkable resemblance to the process undergone by Bonaventure. The Hindu Śaiva philosopher Abhinavagupta (c. 975–1050) two hundred years before Bonaventure on a different continent speaks of the goal of spiritual practice to be realisation of the true nature of the self as absolute subjectivity or I-ness (ahantā). This absolute subjectivity is invisible to ignorant consciousness but becomes visible as the deeper sense of self develops. The empirical person is simply an appearance (ābhāsa) of pure consciousness (caitanya, samvit) (cf. Ratié: 2013; Bansat-Boudon: 2011). This empirical person, the subject of first person predicates, begins to vanish, as it were, as the supreme self appears. The unenlightened or ignorant person becomes invisible so that absolute subjectivity can be recognised.

 

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Thus in medieval Europe and South Asia we have a view of the person, the empirical self, as contracting with spiritual practice so that the transcendent source of the traditions may show itself through her life. I would not wish to pursue an argument for a perennial philosophy but what we can learn here is that the religious self across these cultural boundaries is formed through tradition and conforms to a prescribed religious life and theology. Had they been able to speak the same language, both Bonaventure and Abhinavagupta would probably have agreed that the path to the transcendent goal is through our limited self becoming invisible before the overwhelming power of the goal. We can observe this phenomenologically which brings together the medieval Christian and Hindu-Śaiva worldviews in interesting ways. The invisibility that exceeds or even overwhelms the self so that the limited subject becomes an index for a wider communal world, a collective imagination, can be gleaned through a comparative phenomenology that itself is in resonance with a process of reflection. Heidegger’s analysis of the Pauline texts explains early Christian factical existence and shows how Paul is writing from within the horizon of the Christian eschatological problem, that of temporality and expectation concerning the ‘when’ of the parousia and Paul’s urging us to awaken and be sober (Heidegger: 2004, 73f). Heidegger wishes to understand this world from within the horizon of his own temporality. There is no transcendence outside of Being and Heidegger wishes to bring his text into the world, to ground it in life in order that we can understand the Christian factical existence of the historical past. The early Christians were operating within the same constraints of Dasein and the invisibility that pervades it, as modern people. The formal indication allows us to understand the historical past and the religious life through factical life experience, through temporality, but it is not an explanation except in the broadest sense. Heidegger does not develop a materialist, causal explanation as social science has done and yet remains outside of Christian factical experience. Rather, through the living of our life we can understand religious life of those in the past by the careful, empathetic reading of texts that have come down to us. We are close to Ricœur here in his idea of three levels of mimesis. First there is a pre-understanding of action that allows us to have any understanding of factical existence. Secondly there is emplotment, the way text is formed as history or fiction, the formation of the world of the ‘as if ’. Finally we have the reader’s engagement and appropriation of the text which is where the text meets world (Paul Ricœur: 1983, 105–155). The reader’s appropriation of text is the way in which the indexical-I becomes submerged in the broader subject of the text or, in religious terms, the tradition of which the text is a sign. One of the mechanisms through which the subject becomes invisible is through this process of mimesis. We might then make a bold claim that invisibility is part of religious practices across cultures. The practitioner loses the self in favour of a shared subjectivity

 

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that displays or expresses an inwardness that is constitutive of a transcendent goal. There are so many differences between Bonaventure and Abhinavagupta, a Trinitarian God versus a monistic idealism, death and judgment versus reincarnation, heaven versus recognition of identity, and yet they share a structure of the invisible becoming manifested in the practitioner through the contraction of the limited or empirical self. Perhaps Bonaventure and Abhinavagupta are closer to each other in their understanding of the sacrality of the person than the medieval world is to modernity. There is no space to pursue this here, but a detailed study of the communal worlds of Bonaventure and Abhinavagupta reveal that both inhabit a cosmos in which the person is specifically located and that the journey to transcendence is a journey simultaneously through the cosmos and a journey within, into interiority. Phenomenology as a mode of contemporary reflection itself provides parallels with these worlds in bearing some resemblance to contemplative traditions. Practices of prayer and meditation for Bonaventure and Abhinavagupta give the practitioner access to an otherwise invisible realm. The journey of the mind into God or the journey of the self to the realisation that it is actually absolute awareness, are in fact practices. Phenomenology can understand these practices to an extent because it itself is a reflective practice: even, in its Husserlian mode, a kind of detachment akin to Christian apatheia. But unlike prayerful detachment, phenomenology itself cannot offer a transcendent goal because it is silent, secular philosophy grounded in the facticity of human experience. Phenomenology involves practices of thinking rather than practices of stopping thought and cultivating silence. But a phenomenology grounded in factical life experience can be open to the practices of contemplative traditions because of the recognition of empathy and the idea of ‘being something like an I’. We can understand the works of Bonaventure and Abhinavagupta, in spite of the wide temporal gap that separates us, because of the kinship between their spiritual practices and phenomenology, as Heidegger could understand the Epistles of Paul. But is this invisibility behind religious appearance – behind the practitioner meditating upon Shiva, behind the Eucharist – actual invisibility or unseeability? Marion argues for a distinction between the invisible and the unseeable, in so far as the latter can come into view while the former is always elusive (Marion: 2004, 27–29). The invisible of religion is arguably truly invisible rather than unseeable in the sense that it can never itself come into view. The invisible is only glimpsed through its material expression in cultural/religious practices. As space-time is curved because of dark matter, so in a similar way human subjectivity, Heidegger’s Dasein, might be constrained by the invisible. Dasein comes to rely on the power of religion to take on form that shapes it and nourishes it. In contemporary philosophy of religion we need to recognise the invisible as another important constraint, but like Merleau-Ponty we need to see it as the invisible of this

 

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world. Whereas Abhinavagupta and Bonaventure would have lived in cosmological worldviews, in modernity these worlds are gone.

3.

Concluding remarks

Heidegger’s early lectures on the phenomenology of religion are striking in that they perceive the kinship between factical existence and the historical past. It is because of this recognition that religious life can come into sharper focus for phenomenology. Description that is true to history and develops through philology and higher textual criticism is neutral only in a limited sense, being constrained by human Dasein and the recognition of religion that could only occur because of the human resonance between the present and the historical. The invisible that is implicit in any phenomenological account of human Dasein can be recognised as pervading religious worlds from the past through careful analysis (as we find in philology and in detailed phenomenological description such as we find in Heidegger’s reading of Paul). Where, then, lies the force of this account? In the light of the formal indication we see that a phenomenology of religious life is a necessary level or mode of explanation that can complement any other re-description of religious life in terms of ‘third person’ reductionist accounts. As Heidegger’s lectures were at the forefront of knowledge when he delivered them, so a responsible phenomenology needs to absorb new knowledge and reflect this in its accounts of the human. The invisible is a constraint upon what shows itself. Here the invisible is inevitably vague but is nevertheless indicated by a phenomenology of religion that seeks not simply description through philology or even anthropology, but an understanding and explanation of ‘the religious life’. With Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty phenomenology recognises the limitation of the Cartesian dualist model of the human and begins to develop a kind of non-dualism in which primacy is given to world: consciousness is in the world, a feature of world, just as the body is. A phenomenological account of religion must be within the boundaries of this insight (and so a phenomenology of religion is always outside of religion itself which makes different claims). This is important in the contemporary context because phenomenology becomes a necessary complement to scientific, reductionist accounts of religion that are now developing, particularly cognitivism. This cannot be pursued here, but a neurological or cognitivist account of religion in terms of brain processes is extremely limited as an adequate account of religion because it remains committed to a description of brain processes and an account of factical existence in terms of third person descriptions. That is, cognitivism does not take adequate account of meaning, which a phenomenological account does. We can measure

 

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how human brains respond to stimuli evoking pleasure, fear, anger and disgust, but we need a phenomenology to describe or present the contextual meaning of those terms. We need a phenomenology of human Dasein that becomes a foundation for inquiry into the broader cultural field. Phenomenology as presented here offers the promise of a non-reductionist, materialist account of the world: non-reductionist in not offering a causal explanation but favouring a hermeneutical understanding. In such non-reductionist materialism, the invisible exerts a kind of gravitational pull on religious practices and their significance cannot be captured in third person accounts of brain processes, but can be formally indicated. Thus both cognitivist and phenomenological accounts are two kinds of description that show us how human beings share a deep sociality that religions access. We can demonstrate this empirically (cf. Schilbach et al.: 2013) but need phenomenology to allow what shows itself to come to light: while cognitive science shows us what is happening in our brains, phenomenology shows us what is happening in the world, in the face to face encounter, and how the invisible stands ever present behind what we experience. Such a phenomenological account might well be the beginning of theology. But we need not make proclamations about the truth content of religions, it is enough that religious appearances are constrained by the invisible and the truth they proclaim only comes to light phenomenologically as the inevitable and desired consequence of the formal indication.

Bibliography Bansat-Boudon, Lynne/Kamaleshadatta Tripathi (2010), Introduction to Tantric Philosophy: The Parmārthasāra of Abhinvagupta with the Commentary of Yogarāja, London: Routledge. Bonaventura (1957), Itinerarium mentis in deum, in: Opera Omnia, vol. 5, Florence: Quaracchi. Bonaventure (1978), The Soul’s Journey into God, The Tree of Life, The Life of St. Francis, trans. Ewart Cousins (The Classics of Western Spirituality), New York: Paulist Press. Burch, Matthew I. (2011), The Existential Sources of Phenomenology: Heidegger on Formal Indication, European Journal of Philosophy 19:1, 1–21. Campbell, Scott M. (2012), The Early Heidegger’s Philosophy of Life: Facticity, Being and Language, New York: Fordham University Press. Dahlstrom, Daniel (1994), Heidegger’s Method: Philosophical Concepts as Formal Indications, Review of Metaphysics 47, 775–795. Davies, Oliver (2013), Religions, Politics and Globalisation: Imaging the Self of the Future, paper presented at the seminar Religions and Theology at the University of Manchester, February 21: Private Circulation. de Vries, Hent (1999), Philosophy and the turn to Religion, Baltimore/London: John Hopkins University Press. Fitzgerald, Timothy (2000), The Ideology of Religious Studies, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

 

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Grondin, Jean (1995), Sources of Hermeneutics, Albany: SUNY Press. Heidegger, Martin (1988), The Basic Problems of Phenomenology, trans. Albert Hofstadter, Bloomington/Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. Heidegger, Martin (2004), The Phenomenology of Religious Life, trans. Matthias Fritsch/Jennifer A. Gosetti-Ferencei, Bloomington/Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. Henry, Michel (2003), Phénoménologie de la vie, vol. II: De la subjectivité, Paris: PUF. Husserl, Edmund (1950), Cartesian Meditations, trans. Dorion Cairns, Dordrecht: Kluwer. Kisiel, Theodore (1993), Genesis of Heidegger’s Being and Time, Berkeley/Los Angeles: University of California Press. Marion, Jean-Luc (2004), The Crossing of the Visible, trans. James K.A. Smith, Palo Alto: Stanford University Press. McGrath, Sean J. (2006), The Early Heidegger and Medieval Philosophy: Phenomenology for the Godforsaken, Washington/Baltimore/Pittsboro: The Catholic University of America Press. McKewen, Cameron (1995), On Formal Indication: Discussion of the Genesis of Heidegger’s “Being and Time”, Research in Phenomenology 25:1, 226–239. Merleau-Ponty, Maurice (1945), Phénomenologie de la perception, Paris: Gallimard. Merleau-Ponty, Maurice (1964), Le visible et l’invisible, Paris: Gallimard. Ratié, Isabelle (2011), Le Soi et l’Autre: Identité, difference et altérité dans la philosophie de la Pratyabhijñā, Leiden: Brill. Ricœur, Paul (1983), Temps et Récits. Tom. 1: L’intrique et le récit historique, Paris: Seuil. Schilbach, Leonhard et al. (2013), Toward a second-person neuroscience, The Behavioral and Brain Sciences 36:4, 393–414. Zahavi, Dan (1999), Michel Henry and the phenomenology of the invisible, Continental Philosophy Review 32:3, 223–240.

 

 

Language as a Mode of Revealing and Hiding

 

 

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Language and the Revelation of Silence Reflections on Mystical Theology

There is something riddlesome about addressing the theme of Invisibilitas with specific reference to language. Why? Because it seems that “invisibility” and “language” relate to two quite diverse sets of terms, concepts, and problems. “Invisibility” invites reflection on visibility and on the relationship between the visible and the invisible, i. e., on what can and can’t be seen. But this distinction seems not to raise any particularly difficult questions with regard to language. Language, surely, is as well able to deal with things that cannot be seen as with things that can, where “things that cannot be seen” not only comprises objects that are merely contingently invisible, like the dark side of the moon or the internal structures of the atom, but also things that do not have any visible façade, such as algebraic relationships, ideas, or feelings. I don’t have access to how you really feel about me or to what you think about God, but I more or less take it for granted that, given time, occasion, and attentiveness on my part, you will be able to tell me about these things. And although when I do finally understand what you’re saying I may say, “I see!”, we all know (don’t we?) that this is purely metaphorical since this kind of understanding is not something that can be seen. In philosophy and in everyday life language roams freely in the realms of the invisible. At a very elementary level this seems already implicit in the Hegelian critique of immediate sense-experience: that even the most elementary one-syllable word used in the service of ostensive definition – “this” – inducts us into a realm of ideal relationships, the realm of the universal, that reaches far beyond what is merely visible – this tree that we see in front of us. Merleau-Ponty uses the military metaphor of language overrunning the field of visibility, yet language does not deny or negate what is visible. When I say “this tree” I leave the tree standing as an object to be looked at, an appearance within the horizon of all visible things, but I no longer attend to it exclusively with regard to its visibility. “Seeing” and “speaking” seem to be simply different and different in such a way as not to come into a relationship of possible contradiction. “Seeing” marks a certain limit to language, but only in the sense that books are not cheese are not mathematical formulae.

 

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The opposite of language is not seeing, but silence: that whereof we cannot speak, thereof we must keep silent. I can speak freely about the things I see, but I cannot speak at all, it seems, of the things whereof I must keep silent. Yet I can see at least some of the things about which I cannot speak or, to put it more precisely, there is something in what I can both see and speak about that resists being assumed into the possibilities of speech. I look at a landscape or a painting by Cézanne and of course there are many things to say about each. I can describe the contours, colours, objects, and figures of which each is composed. Perhaps I cannot do this very well, but there are writers and art-critics who do it superbly, and who seem, as they speak, to conjure forth a word-picture of what I cannot myself see. Yet even in the best of such descriptions, there is, it seems, a residue. There is that in what is seen that resists being translated into words, which remains determinedly and solely visible, which can only be seen, not talked about. In one of his recent books, Don Cupitt (for whom language is the all-encompassing milieu of being human) comments that it is more interesting to go for a walk with someone who knows the names of the trees, flowers, birds, and animals we encounter on our way than with someone who does not. Being able to speak about the elements and experiences that make up our human lifeworld enhances, expands, and enriches that world. Yes. Maybe. But there are also times when, walking in a beautiful landscape or going round the exhibition, we just want to be silent, to say nothing, and to let what is being seen sink into our minds or (which may be the same thing) to let our minds become absorbed in what we see – to see and to do no more than see without immediately going on to name. In such passages of time we fall silent and we look. That’s all. Speak and the magic is lost. There is much to say about the relationship between what is seen and what can be said. Was I right in my original assertion that visibility and language are, simply, two distinct, different, separate but equal and non-exclusive modes of self-world-relationship? Surely, if we assume the unity of human experience, they cannot be merely co-existent, side by side as entirely autonomous functions within the psychic totality of lived life? Surely there must be some lines of communication between the two? As I stand looking at the tree, I turn to you and say, “What a wonderful oak tree!”, I am constrained in what I say by what I see. Assuming that I am a competent speaker of my language, intending to report on what I am seeing, I am not free to say, “What a wonderful Californian redwood”, still less, “What a wonderful space-ship.” Of course, I can say these things, and they may be meaningful as a flight of fantasy or a joke. What I see and the possibilities of the language “as it is spoke” point me to saying just this: that it is an oak-tree and not a Californian redwood or a space-ship, and a wonderful oak tree at that. I speak of what I see, and, in and through my words, you can come to see it too. Speech and vision are not reducible to each other, each has its own way with the world,

 

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but they are related and, in optimal conditions, mutually serviceable – even if part of that serviceability requires each knowing when to stop. This intercalation of speech and vision is central to the understanding of language developed by Heidegger in the 1920s and thereafter remaining more or less constant throughout his career. From the early 1920s, Heidegger falls under the spell of the Aristotelian definition of the human being as the “living being having logos”. This can lead him to privilege “hearing” over “seeing”, since it is by listening to one another speaking that we come to learn the truth of things and not by merely looking at them: language re-presents the world in such a way as to give not merely acquaintance but understanding. On the other hand, the word in which such an understanding is spoken is at the same time a word that makes it possible for us to see what is being said. As he will say in Being and Time, “Logos as ‘discourse’ means rather the same as dēloun: to make manifest what one is ‘talking about’ in one’s discourse.” “The logos lets something be seen” (Heidegger: 1962, 32, 56) and, to gloss Heidegger further, it lets it be seen for what and as it is in the manner of its appearing. In this way, the logos gives us die Sache selbst, the matter at issue, what is being talked about. Yet, in allowing our being-in-the-world to become visible in this way, the word – discourse – does so to the extent that we are ready not to look but to attend to what is being said in a manner appropriate to the medium of speech, namely, by listening and, by listening, hearing. Listening makes it possible for us to see. Seeing is the yield of attentive listening. This is what Heidegger means by speaking of language as “apophantic” or disclosive. Further to this basic understanding of language, Heidegger also argues at various times for the following points. Firstly, as he will put it in the lecture on “The Principle of Identity”, language belongs to being. By this he means that language does not immediately and without alteration reproduce being. As for Hegel, saying “tree” is already to transcend the simple sensuous being of the tree. A does not simply equal A. Yet, as in my example of the wonderful oak-tree, what I say is not unrelated to what I encounter in the bodily over-againstness of the pre-verbal encounter. What is the connection? Heidegger takes the German term gehören to imply that language “belongs” to being by listening to it, by hearing what is said of being in what is spoken. Secondly, this is not linguistic idealism. In an early lecture on Aristotle, discussing the basic form of language as the judgement (as in “the leaf is green”), Heidegger suggests that even prior to language, perception is already structured synthetically, that is, as a combination of elements. Seeing the leaf as green is the basis for the judgement “the leaf is green” even though I do not and cannot know it to be green or even in the fullest sense see it as green until I can say “the leaf is green”. Being and language are mutually co-ordinated (although “co-ordinated” already sounds too determined for what Heidegger is saying). Thirdly, this implies that what is said in language is also intrinsically related to what precedes speaking, to what is not said or what always holds itself back from being said: in a word – to

 

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what is silent. And, again, this is a theme that spans several phases of Heidegger’s career. In Being and Time Dasein is described as coming into relation to its own potentiality for anticipatory resoluteness by virtue of its capacity for conscience; but living conscientiously means, precisely, listening or attending to the call of conscience, and what conscience says is, exactly, nothing: conscience speaks by keeping silent. Attention to what is not and cannot be said in the fallen mode of average everyday Gerede, to what must remain unsaid in, with, and under the conditions of the present age, is the only route to authentic existence. Later, in what is certainly a different tonality but may not, after all, be so fundamentally different in itself, Heidegger will tell us that it is poetic speech that alerts us to the fundamental trait of language as “the re-sonance of silence” (das Geläut der Stille) (Heidegger: 1985, 33). To see how things are and how we ourselves are in our inter-involvement with our world we must both speak and listen. Speech – not every speech, of course, but speech that is truthful and grounded in attentive listening – inducts us into the silence in which being is brought out of concealment and laid open to be seen for what and how it is. All of these comments are preliminary to the matter at issue in this paper, namely, how we might speak – whether we can at all speak – of the human God-relationship and do so in such a way that the truth of that relationship can come into living speech. And, of course, we cannot assume that a Heideggerian understanding of language can be unproblematically carried over into speaking about God. The warnings issued by negative theology hold here, as in other cases. Even if Heidegger is correct and language can bring into view the what and how of our beingin-the-world by gathering both the things that can be seen and the non-visible things that can be said only in language, there would seem to be a limit of a rather different kind if we once draw God into the picture. For no one can look upon the face of God and live. God is light and light of light and, as such, may be said both to ground and to be given with every illumination of human mental life, yet, as the words of an English hymn put it, this same light is what hides God from our eyes. God’s light is, for us, a “dazzling darkness”. God is invisible. Can we, then, hope to speak of God in such a way that the invisible divine truth might become manifest – visible – in our words? Can we apply the saying that Kierkegaard liked to quote, loquere ut videam: “Speak – that I may see you.” Turning to the data of religious experience,1 this question is compounded by the further near consensus amongst both practitioners and psychologists of religion,

1 At this point, one tendency within modern theology would turn directly to revelation. What we say of God is and can only be grounded in what God chooses to reveal of Himself in His Word. Whatever is to be said for or against this approach, the present argument is merely attempting to see what can be said without making such a move. Proponents of a theology of revelation will immediately predict that, in the end, this will not amount to much – and they may be cor-

 

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that the defining instances of such experience are themselves beyond words. If they offer what some have called a pure intuition, in which the difference of subject and object no longer exists, this cannot be spoken. It is a kind of vision, perhaps, but not a kind that could ever come into appearance in human discourse. Therefore it “passes all understanding” and, in the strictest sense, can neither ground nor validate claims to religious knowledge. It seems then that we might have either vision or discourse, but not both. We have to stop talking and just look – or, if we insist on talking, we must also accept that we must do so in such a way that “what” we are talking about will always be withdrawn into the dazzling darkness of the divine light, hidden from language by a veil of equivocity. In the sixteenth of his lectures on The Varieties of Religious Experience, William James sums up the view I have been outlining when he adduces “ineffability” as the first characteristic of mysticism. The subject of a mystical state of mind will, he says, “immediately say that it defies expression, that no adequate report of its contents can be given in words” (James: 1960, 367). And he seems well-supported by the Christian tradition as well as by the 19th century and mostly non-denominational sources that he himself goes on to cite. Let me briefly take four examples to illustrate the persistence and range of this view. The first is Augustine’s report of his last conversation with his mother. And while we spoke of the eternal Wisdom, longing for it and straining for it with all the strength of our hearts, for one fleeting instant we reached out and touched it. Then, with a sigh, leaving our spiritual harvest bound to it, we returned to the sound of our own speech in which each word has a beginning and an ending – far, far different from your Word, our Lord, who abides in himself for ever, yet never grows old and gives new life to all things (Augustine: 1961, 197f).

Here, interestingly – but, in the light of Augustine’s contribution to the philosophy of time, unsurprisingly – we note the particular emphasis on the limitations of speech being associated with its temporal character, words being strung out in time, having a beginning and an end, whereas the intellectual “touch” of the eternal Wisdom is beyond and outside time. Another example, from the 17th century saint, Jeanne de Chantal, as quoted by Henri Brémond:2

rect. On the other hand, calling on revelation at the first sign of trouble may be somewhat like a card-player who plays his trumps at the first possible opportunity. He wins the game – but only by spoiling it. 2 Of course, in this example, as in most others from the records of mystical experience in the Latin Church, the influence of Augustine is directly or indirectly present.

 

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Au point du jour, Dieu m’a fait goûter, mais presque imperceptiblement, une petite lumière, en la très haute suprême pointe de mon esprit. Tout le reste de mon âme et ses facultés n’en point joui: mais elle n’a duré environ qu’un demi ave Maria. Il y a des âmes, entre celles que Dieu conduit par cette voie de simplicité, que sa divine bonté dénue si extraordinairement de toute satisfaction, désir et sentiment, qu’elles ont peine de se supporter et de s’exprimer, parce que ce qui se passe en leur intérieur est si mince, si délicat et imperceptible, pour être à l’extrême point de l’esprit, qu’elles ne savent comment en parler (Brémond: 1923, 553).

From the Protestant world, we might think of Schleiermacher, who, in the second of his Speeches on Religion, speaks of the impossibility of describing the “natal hour of everything living in religion”, analogous to “that first mysterious moment that occurs in every sensory perception, before intuition and feeling have separated, where sense and its objects have, as it were, flowed into one another and become one, before both turn back to their original position”. This moment is necessarily “indescribable”, since it lacks the differentiation inherent in any speech-act: there is neither self nor world, subject or object, this or that. So too in the “higher and divine religious activity of the mind”, an activity that seems like what Augustine and Jeanne too experienced, although Schleiermacher refrains from directly naming “what” is experienced in this activity as “God”. “Would that I could and might express it, at least indicate it, without having to desecrate it!” he laments, before going on to invoke its presence in “the first scent with which the dew gently caresses the waking flowers […] a maiden’s kiss […] a nuptial embrace”. In such fugitive moments the “I” lies “on the bosom of the infinite world” and feels “its infinite life” as its own, yielding a simple intuition of this infinite life, which, however, is sundered from the lived reality in the moment of taking form as an intuition. Even speaking of it in the poetic fashion that he does is therefore almost a sin for which he prays that “holy fate” might forgive him (Schleier­ macher: 1988, 112f). So, to Kierkegaard – and, strikingly, in terms that turn away from the language of “intuition” common to Augustine, Jeanne de Chantal, and Schleiermacher and towards the language of listening we have already encountered in Heidegger. And what happened then, if you did indeed pray with real inwardness? Something wonderful. For as you prayed more and more inwardly, you had less and less to say, and finally you became entirely silent. You became silent and, if it is possible that there is something even more opposed to speaking than silence, you became a listener. You had thought that praying was about speaking: you learned that praying is not merely keeping silent but is listening. That is how it is. Praying is not listening to oneself speak, but is about becoming silent and, in becoming silent, waiting, until the one who prays hears God (Kierkegaard: 2010, 185).

 

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Finally, from a contemporary spiritual writer on spirituality, Martin Laird, speaking about the practice of what he calls a “prayer word”: The prayer word assists this excavation of the present moment until such time as the prayer word too falls silent. Ultimately all strategies of spiritual acquisition become silent and our practice, if it can be called that any more, is simply luminous vastness gazing on and gazed through by luminous vastness (Laird: 2006, 70).

In all these examples, then – and irrespective of the differences between them that I have also hinted at – the ultimate aim of spiritual ascent (or, if you prefer, deepening) is to pass beyond language to a kind of direct apprehension (whether it is called vision, illumination, or hearing) in which God is directly present to the self. But, precisely because (as Schleiermacher suggests) such direct apprehension is like sensuous experience insofar as it relates to and is founded upon acquaintance with what in itself is pre- or extra-verbal, its articulation in speech is always only going to be a matter of indirectness, allusion, and imprecision. We can never quite “say” what it is. This may, in a sense, be unproblematic for those living within the ambience of a contemplative community. It becomes a problem, however, when – as James says is also typical of those who have mystical experiences – a “noetic” value is claimed for what occurs in the transience of the ineffable moment. What kind of knowledge can such a moment yield if we cannot speak about it? Can there be knowledge where there is no speech? This question has led some late 20th century commentators on mysticism to dispute whether there really is any such experience as the mystics claim to describe. This is not because they regard such persons as aiming to deceive but as being philosophically confused. For the point – largely derived from Wittgenstein but also, in some cases, from a certain reading of Derrida – is that there is no such thing as raw, self-interpreting experience. “Experience” is itself a construct of language. Experiences only occur as experiences, as human experiences, as our experiences, because they occur in a context framed by the beliefs, values and intentions embedded in the universal medium of self-conscious life: language. “Whereof we cannot speak, thereof we must keep silent”– though experiences sometimes referred to as “mystical” are better construed as profoundly anti-mystical: for where language has nothing to contribute, then there is nothing for us to talk about. Only what has its place within language can be regarded as worthy of discussion. A classic statement of this objection is Steven J. Katz’s 1978 essay on “Language, Epistemology and Mysticism”, in which he asserted that There are NO pure (i. e. unmediated) experiences. Neither mystical experience nor more ordinary forms of experience give any indication, or any grounds for believing that they are unmediated. That is to say, all experience is processed through, organized by, and

 

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makes itself available to us in extremely complex epistemological ways. The notion of unmediated experience seems, if not self-contradictory, at best empty (Katz: 1978, 26; emphasis in the original).

In rather different ways this new view can be seen in, e. g., Don Cupitt and Denys Turner. Cupitt, for whom there is nothing outside the flow of language, sees mysticism as an especially liberative play of language, disrupting established meanings and opening a way to new meanings and to the experiences that are themselves dependent on language. Turner, less enthusiastically postmodern than Cupitt, seeks to rescue “mysticism” from what he sees as essentially a modern concept of unmediated and wordless experience and returning it to a pre 14th century usage, where it specifically denotes a kind of theology, that is, a way of speaking about God and doing so with a determinate noetic content. The warning against a certain kind of romanticism of experience may be well made. However, I suggest that Heidegger’s account of the intertwining of thought, language and Being, and of the presence of a certain silence within language itself, offers a better approach to what is going on in mystical speech about what is beyond language. It is “better” in the sense that it does justice both to the claim that there is no simple unmediated or uninterpreted experience that can reappear as such in language, as well as taking the actual texts of mystical literature seriously and acknowledging the writers’ own view that they are writing “about” something that is not but is also more than language. From Being and Time onwards, finding ourselves being a certain way, understanding, and discourse are always co-present and mutually conditioning in Dasein’s consciousness of its being in the world. The task is not to simply cut out one part of the lived and co-implicating reality of world, language, and understanding but to interpret what it all means in the how of its occurring. Here too, the literature of religious experience is already an interpretation that requires further interpretation – but both in the mystics’ own self-interpretation and in our interpretation of their work, what matters is to arrive at an understanding of lived existence. This means both the lived experience of those whose work we now read and, through that reading, releasing possibilities for our own living experience in our own time and place. We stay, then, with the words of mystical or spiritual writers. And we stay too with their reserve vis-à-vis language. How are we to interpret that reserve? And what are we to make of the fact that despite this reserve, these writers do, nevertheless, speak? Why do they not just keep silent? I find help in addressing these questions in some of Martin Buber’s early writings, where he too wrestled with questions of mysticism and speech. These essays also adumbrate aspects of a complex of issues that were central to the problematic of Being and Time, including the interrelationship between the singularity of lived experience, being as a whole (to use Heidegger’s, not Buber’s, expression), lan-

 

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guage, and death.3 In the essay “Ecstasy and Confession”, Buber seems to favour a kind of wordless ecstasy as the ultimate possibility of human beings’ self-experience. Like Heidegger, he starts with dissatisfaction with an everyday life characterized by a busy absorption in the multiplicity of worldly tasks and roles, which Buber calls das Getriebe. Liberation from this condition is only possible for the “I” that is able through its own inner activity to experience or live out an experience (erleben) of itself as essentially unified. In the past, Buber suggests, human beings called the power that was active in producing such experience “God”, but now we realize that “God” is essentially the ecstatic projection of what is most pure and inward in human beings themselves. Yet “God” remains central to how Buber describes a kind of life-experience in which self and world are no longer differentiated but which, by the same token, delivers the self, the I, over into “absolute solitude: the solitude of that which is without boundaries” (Buber: 1920, 23). Such ecstasy is “Unification with God. Ecstasy is original; entrance into God, enthusiasm: being filled with God” (Buber: 1920, 18). It is an Urerlebnis of the Urselbst.4 As we might expect, all of this means that what is lived in this Urerlebnis is beyond language. “Language is a function of community, and cannot speak of anything outside communal life [but] ecstasy is beyond all common experience” (Buber: 1920, 23). However, at the same time Buber acknowledges an inescapable human compulsion to speak: “we must speak (reden)”, he writes, even though speech or discourse, despite offering us poetry, love, and a future, cannot speak of “the one thing needful” (Buber: 1920, 25). The person who lives ecstatically is therefore compelled also to live out a paradox that, at the deepest level, is the paradox of existence as such. In pure ecstasy “there is no longer a You in the I”. Such ecstasy is, so to speak, the I’s pure immediate enjoyment of its own boundless being. But “as soon as they speak, they already speak the other” (Buber: 1920, 26). In this essay and other early writings, Buber makes a number of attempts to characterize the kind of speech that might be most faithful to the Urerlebnis of the Urselbst. In “Ecstasy and Confession” he writes of it as “the impossible message”, thrown in the moment of ecstasy’s passing into the stream of time (Buber 1920, 30ff); it is “an utterly silent way of speaking that does not describe but limits itself to imparting Dasein” (Buber: 1920, 26). In a postscript to a selection of sayings of the Taoist sage Chuang-Tzu, he writes of the specifically Taoist sense of teaching as a kind of speaking that speaks only of the unity of beings and only of what

3 In Daniel Buber will consider the role of death in bestowing true existence on the individual, asking whether “what we call death might be the way” (Buber: 1922, 132) and concluding: “The power of a life is the power of its unity. Whoso dies in the accomplished unity of his life gives utterance to an I that does not posit anything but is bare eternity” (Buber: 1922, 151). 4 A penchant for the prefix Ur- is also a feature of Heidegger’s early writings, and there is also much here that calls Schleiermacher’s second Speech to mind.

 

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is “necessary”, in the sense not of logical necessity but of what is experienced as necessary in being lived (Buber: 1920, 40f). Most famously, he will also speak of it as the “fire” of Hasidic discourse, in which ecstasy is no longer a matter of self-enjoyment but a calling or summons to pour itself out in words, albeit in words that he characterizes as “stammering” and that find their medium in the genre of legend. Like the experience of ecstasy, the joy of the Hasid is boundless, but within the boundlessness of life, it has found a way forward: “To find God means to find the way that is without limits”, so that whereas “the angels rest in God […] the holy spirits stride ever onward within God” (Buber: 1918, 3f). As one who is called to speak, the Hasid is no longer a pure I but an I bound to a Thou, both the Thou who calls him and the Thou to whom he must speak. As Buber puts it in the 1913 dialogues entitled Daniel, such a soul has moved from “the sanctuary of silence” to “the market-place of the word” (Buber: 1922, 29). Those “who truly experience their life in the world, experience it as duality”, that is, the duality inherent in the basic experience of existence as a basic word; what, in his most famous work, he will condense into the formula: “the basic word I-Thou” (Buber: 1970, 53). How does this move us forward? Of course, it must be conceded that this kind of reflection is not likely to solve any problems or yield any breakthroughs. It is a struggle for a ray of understanding that might in some small aspect illuminate a densely layered area of lived human experience. We are looking to see whether a word from the literature of religious experience might bring to view something of the God who reigns in an invisible glory. That is ambitious, but we shouldn’t expect too much. After all, we have only human words to go on. What words then shall we turn to? Spiritual writers, though often producing voluminous works, have called attention to the limits of all words: and most would probably agree with Kierkegaard that the further one progresses in the spiritual life the fewer words one is likely to use.5 Let us briefly examine three such words. The first is from the anonymous medieval English treatise The Cloud of Unknowing. The author, although familiar with the mystical theology of Dionysius, offers a highly practical and readable guide to living the contemplative life to readers who, he assumes, may not even know how to begin. How are they to pray? What are they to say? His answer is that the prayers of contemplatives, “if they are in words, as they seldom are” have “very few words; the fewer the better”. And, he continues, 5 “Progress in the spiritual life” is, of course, an expression that could be taken as implying a certain hierarchical view of the “spiritual ascent”. Such an idea is certainly present in much spiritual literature, but in using it here I do not intend to lay any weight upon it and decline to commit to the kind of measurability or quantification of spiritual virtue it might seem to suggest.

 

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If it is a little word of one syllable I think it is better than if it is of two, and more in accordance with the work of the Spirit. For a contemplative should always live at the highest, topmost peak spiritually. We can illustrate this by looking at nature. A man or woman, suddenly frightened by fire, or death, or what you will, is suddenly in the extremity of his spirit driven hastily and by necessity to cry or pray for help. And how does he do it? Not, surely, with a spate of words; not even in a single word of two syllables! Why? He thinks it wastes too much time to declare his urgent need and his agitation. So he bursts out in his terror with one little word, and that of a single syllable: “Fire!” it may be, or “Help!” (Anonymus: 1961, 96).

Thus, he says, a single monosyllabic word “pierces the ears of Almighty God more quickly than any long psalm churned out unthinkingly” (Anonymus: 1961, 97). Earlier in the work he has given examples of such words, namely “God” and “Love” (Anonymus: 1961, 61). On a certain view of language, such isolated words are meaningless. What kind of understanding could they give of the God to whom they are addressed, the Love they invoke, or, for that matter, of the life-situation of the one who speaks them? Surely – as the Dionysian theology of The Cloud might be assumed to intend – this is language directed at breaking through the barrier of language into the wordless space of mystical ecstasy, rather like Miró’s late canvases that the artist burned through with a blow-torch? If they do assume or involve a certain understanding of God, of love, or of the self, surely this can only be found by stepping back, reading through the work as a whole, seeing it in the theological and philosophical context of its time, and drawing out what is only implicit and infinitesimally condensed in the words themselves by the kind of process that Schleiermacher referred to as the “comparative” or “grammatical” dimension of hermeneutics; or, perhaps in the spirit of Katz or Turner, evaluating their role within the overall language-game or theology of the author and his age. Doubtless there is much that could be learned by such a way of proceeding. All praise to historical reconstruction and systematic exposition where they are needed. But if we are looking to see what such elementary words might show us of the author’s understanding of the contemplative life, that is, of what it means for a soul to come by this means to a direct relation to God, then there is a quicker route. This, I suggest, is provided by the analogy that the author himself proposes – namely, the person whose life is threatened by a fire. What will such a person call out? “Help!” Just that. “Help!” So – my suggestion is – that the more theologically charged words (“God” and “Love”) that the author elsewhere proposes are to be understood essentially as variants on this “Help!” “Help!” interprets and shows what is at issue in “God” and “Love”.6 6 This also corresponds with the practice of the so-called Jesus Prayer (hesychasm), of which the full form is a plea for help: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner”, but which in practice may and generally is reduced over time to the name “Jesus”. Thus, although

 

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But what does this word show us about what is going on in the God-relationship? At the most elementary level, and with the analogy of the fire in mind, “Help!” reveals a self that cannot live out the boundless experience of the “I” of Buber’s ecstatic self; unlike the ecstatic “I” it is not infinite, unified in itself, and solitary. It is a self that is not sufficient unto itself, its reality and being are radically unsettled and it is unable to be its own ground. Consequently, its self-experience directs it towards a power not itself in order to find what it itself lacks. If we then hear the word “God!” as further deepening what is implied in such a “Help!”, then, to adopt Schleiermacher’s expression, we hear God as the “whence” of such possible grounding: “from whence comes my help: my help comes even from the Lord” (Ps 121:1f); God is He who helps or He who may be looked to for help, a “help of the helpless” who might be called upon in such a moment of ontological destitution and unsettling. And if we see “God!” as itself further deepened by another of the author’s key-words, “Love!”, then we may understand what is said – what we are given to see – in “Help!” as invoking a helper who wants to help, a helper who wills to be the ground of being that we are unable (in whatever measure) to give ourselves. In the word “Help!” itself that power remains undefined and may even be lacking. Maybe there is no one there to help – a point to which we shall return. No one is helping – or no one is seen as helping – now. Help is what must come if I am to continue to be, to exist. “Help!” calls out not just in space to what is above (or, if one prefers, to what is to be a sustaining ground beneath),7 but also in time, to what is to come. Let it come, may it come, may it come quickly! Such a praying self is, to use a Kierkegaardian expression, a self that knows its need of God, and very much in the active sense of “need” conveyed by the Danish at trænge, but also known to the author of The Cloud who speaks of the self using its single monosyllabic word to hammer its way through the cloud and darkness that separate it from God (Anonymus: 1961, 61). My second word comes from Kierkegaard. In the journal entry NB5: 22 he writes: To be able without reservations to say Amen to a prayer, O how rarely, how awfully rarely this has happened even to someone who otherwise prays diligently and constantly! It is just as rare, even rarer, than that moment in love when the lovers are absolutely each other’s ideal. To say Amen in such a way that one has not a single word more to add, but the only word that brings peace and satisfaction is precisely Amen; in this way after one expositor suggests “that the word ‘Jesus’ alone should be used” and “when we speak of the invocation of the Name, we mean the devout and frequent repetition of the name itself, of the word ‘Jesus’ without additions” (Monk of the Eastern Church: 1970, 1). Yet the meaning invested in the speaking of the name is and remains precisely a plea for mercy – for help. 7 The author of The Cloud himself comments that “in these matters height, depth, length, and breadth all mean the same” (Anonymus: 1961, 97).

 

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having prayed in such a way that the entire need of the soul has been satisfied in giving utterance to the prayer, that one has got said what lay on one’s heart, said it entirely, i. e., that one has become transparent to oneself before God in all one’s weakness but also in all one’s hope! Ah, if there is a moment, and perhaps this has often been supposed, a moment in which the whole language wasn’t sufficient to express what was causing one pain, wasn’t sufficient to express what lay on one’s heart – oh! such a moment would be the very opposite, the whole language is superfluous, it doesn’t matter if one has forgotten every single word of the language, one has no use for it, no more than to add Amen! (Kierkegaard: 2003, 379; my translation, G.P.).

Kierkegaard’s words too evoke the scenario of the self that looks beyond itself for a help it cannot give itself. It is a self that, in its prayer, has become transparent to itself before God in all its weakness and in all its hope. In concluding its prayer and speaking its “Amen” this self seems not yet to know whether help will or can arrive. Its “Amen” is, in the first instance, simply the affirmation that it has said all that it might say, that there is nothing further to say, and that even the resources of “the whole language” would not add one iota to what is said in “Amen”. Thus, as Kierkegaard says, “Amen” itself says all that the entire language could possibly say with regard to what the self might ask of God. But the “Amen” is not simply a repetition of the cry for help. It is – and perhaps especially when it is less the summary of the multiple petitions contained in the prayer and more the sole word of prayer, “the one thing needful” – also the word of acceptance of whatever help may or could be given. “Amen” is the entire entrusting of the self, with all its articulated needs, to God and, in the context of the total act of prayer, the entire proleptic acceptance of whatever is to be the outcome of that prayer. In relation to the cry for help, “Amen” signifies entire acceptance of whatever help will, in the event, be given – whether or not it is the help sought consciously by the praying mind. So be it – whatever “it” may be. “Help!” and “Amen”, then, reflect two aspects of what Schleiermacher described as the absolute dependence of the self on God, the one revealing this dependence as causing the self to look beyond itself for the help it needs to go on being, the other revealing the self as dependent on God for all it receives. This, maybe, reveals much about the self. Yet with regard to the guiding question of this paper, namely, how the word of prayer might bring to view the invisible things of the God to whom prayer is addressed, it does not seem to have advanced us very far. It shows us a certain comportment of the self towards God that is widely testified to in religious literature, but what does it show us of God? We can see what the self might look to God for, but nothing that has been said can show us whether this is how God actually is or even whether God exists at all or is simply a projection of the needy self. There is a crucial gap between human asking and receiving and it is, precisely, a God-shaped gap. Can we make any progress towards filling this gap, towards completing this unfinished picture?

 

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Reiterating that we cannot expect too much or even much from a paper such as this, let us make the attempt.8 We might begin by trying to deepen what is already being said in our two key-words. In T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets the poet writes of the “purification of the motive / In the ground of our beseeching” (Eliot: 1959, 57). Yes, “Help!” and “Amen” show the self as a needy self, a dependent self, a self that must look beyond itself for the ground of its being and that can have its being only as received: and it has to be acknowledged that this characterization invites the charge of projection. There is only one small step from Schleiermacher to Feuerbach. Yet the ontological need of the self, whilst disclosed to the conscious mind in and through a range of psychological and other needs, may be something other than – greater, higher, deeper, broader, more enduring than – simple psychological need. That the word in which our immediate personal need is articulated is addressed to God – intends God – also marks a kind of surrender on the part of the self in order to understand and to grasp its own good. It is not just a matter of calling God in to fix whatever is not functioning within a human life-world that is otherwise entirely at our disposal. Rather, it is a matter of acknowledging that the structure and development of our life-world is ordered and may need to be re-ordered according to a logic – a logos – that is not constrained by our subjectivity. This, as Eliot’s phrase suggests, is what spiritual literature talks about as the stage of purification or purgation or what Kierkegaard in “An occasional discourse” speaks of as the purification of the heart so that it wills only one thing and becomes like a still and deep ocean, ready to receive the imprint of God’s image. In The Cloud, the author attributes the power of the monosyllabic prayer of need precisely to the fact that “it is prayed with a full heart, in the height and depth and length and breadth of the spirit of him that prays it” (Anonymus: 1961, 97). In other words, the need that comes to expression in such a prayer is not a more or less accidental need for this or that, but the need of the self as such, as a whole, in the concentrated centre – the heart – of its life. Yet we may still say that all this prayer reveals is, in however eminent a form, human subjectivity. Can we go any further? A response – if not an answer – to this question is to note that, as many of the spiritual manuals also insist, the move from praying for accidental and extrinsic needs to prayer as expressive of the need of the self as such is to be understood as itself a work of God in the soul. Again, of course, such a claim proves nothing, but what is at issue here is not the proof or demonstration of a fact or argument but trying to understand and see what is being said in some elementary words of the religious life. In this regard, what the claim says is far-reaching. For whilst it 8 Again, proponents of a theology of revelation might say, “What did you expect? Start with the need of the praying self and all you get is the praying self – ‘through God alone can God be known’.”

 

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remains a given that the self must look beyond itself for its ontological grounding and that, conversely, it is what and as it is only as grounded in God, this “ground” is not related to the exigent self in a solely negative way. In theological parlance, that the soul turns to God and seeks him is made possible by God’s own prevenient grace. Or, as Kierkegaard says at the close of the discourse on “To need God is a human being’s highest perfection” the need of God is itself a gift of God. Saying which, Kierkegaard is once more echoing a long spiritual tradition – Augustine too, for example, speaks of what the soul must most long for as, precisely, the longing for God. And we might think again of Buber’s “necessity” or “one thing needful”: turning to God in prayer is not an arbitrary or merely wilful act on the part of the soul but an act elicited by a lived need. How else could it have the character of a genuinely urgent, genuinely focussed cry for help? We pray truly only when we truly need to pray – and only when we are ready to receive all that is given and whatever is given in response to that prayer. At this point “Help!” begins to fuse with “Amen”. If this is so, if even the prayer for “Help!” discloses not only the need of the self but also, through the co-agency of God in the praying of that prayer, of this same co-agent God, what are we then given to see of God in the word of prayer? A short answer might be: “nothing”. We see nothing of God in such a prayer because the prayer is what it is as a human prayer. If worked – ultimately – by God, all that can be seen of the prayer as prayer is the pray-er who prays it, the one who prays: his need, his expectation, and his hope, expressed or made visible in his word. If, then, we speak of God as agent or cause of the prayer, it is not as agent or cause in any mechanical sense such as could be brought to light by uncovering a longer or shorter chain of causal relationships. God is understood and acknowledged as the cause of the prayer: he is not its explanation. Is there then no word in which the power of God at work in the prayer might become more manifest? What, for example, of the word of thanks? Certainly this is suggestive. The one who thanks is not only asking and not only submitting, but acknowledging what is given as a good and perfect gift, as, so to speak, God-worthy. The Lord gave, the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord. Even the “Amen” would take us only as far as the first two of Job’s assertions. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away: so be it. The word of thanks and blessing goes further. Yet still, we may say, all we see is a human valuation of the situation, the effect of the divine working, and not the divine as it itself is at work. So I come to my third key-word: “Alleluia”. This is the word ascribed to the angels who behold the face of God, who see God as he is and who respond with a word that is the purest verbal reflection and revelation of the divine being itself. But we notice immediately that it is a word of a very different character from “Help!” and “Amen”. This difference can be defined by saying that it is a word of song, a word that is scarcely a word at all, its combination of vowels and liquid

 

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consonants constantly on the verge of dissolving into pure ululation. Even today there is no standard orthography in English. If “Help” and “Amen” can be deepened to reveal a determinate content – help for this, Amen to that – “Alleluia” is a word of pure praise, a word without content. Except that its content is the fullest of all: it is the word in which the radiance of the divine glory is most purely and fully reflected in verbal form. When Kierkegaard speaks of the divine light reflected without distortion in the deep calm heart of the soul, or the self that is transparent to and transfigured in God, “Alleluia” would be the word – perhaps the only word – that might best speak – speak by singing – such immediate divine presence. The God-shaped gap between asking and receiving is, then, articulated in this ancient ululating word of praise. This is the word that says – that bespeaks – the glory of God manifest in the work of redemption that is the fulfilment in human life of the work of creation itself. As such it is more direct, more basic to the lived experience of religious life than even the words expressive of need, acceptance and gratitude. This is no longer prayer. It is praise. It is what is to be said when God is seen as he is. It is the word that makes visible the invisible being of God. It might be objected that, literally, Alleluia is a word of invocation rather than evocation: “Let us praise Jah” (or “O come, let us adore Him”, to borrow a phrase from a well-known English Christmas hymn). As such, then, it is not a word expressive of divine presence but only a summons to turn towards that presence. But these are not exclusive functions. The summons to turn towards the presence is made possible because of that presence itself. “Alleluia” is spoken or sung only when the summons can be fulfilled – as in the Christmas hymn, which assumes the presence of the child in the manger as making it possible for us to go to adore Him. The longing for God is the gift of God and simply is the way in which God is present to us and among us, here. But if we might seem to have made some progress, it has come at a certain cost. If we have found a word that is more than the word of prayer, it is also a word that exceeds the limits of pure reason. It is not a word that can be sublated into concepts or given a determinate content or definition. In being thought, just as in being spoken, it seems constantly to dissolve into the lyrical flow of its own utterance. What can we say about “Alleluia” except to say “Alleluia”? Isn’t this simply another way of surrendering all claims to speak meaningfully about God? Perhaps the clearest way of making this point is the episode in The Brothers Karamazov in which the devil tells Ivan Karamazov the story of a Russian nihilist who, having “rejected everything, ‘laws, conscience faith’, and, above all, the future life dies” (Dostoevsky: 1912, 682). On dying he wakes up in a future life where, as a punishment for his unbelief, he is sentenced to walk a quadrillion kilometres. Being an obstinate Russian nihilist, however, he refuses to budge and lies down on the road in protest. After a thousand years of lying there, he finally gets up and

 

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begins to walk and, after walking for millions of years, the former nihilist finally arrives at paradise, where, the devil concludes, [B]efore he had been there two seconds, by his watch (though to my thinking his watch must have long dissolved into its elements on the way), he cried out that these two seconds were worth walking not a quadrillion kilometres, but a quadrillion of quadrillions, raised to the quadrillionth power! In fact he sang “hosannah” and overdid it so, that some persons there of lofty ideas wouldn’t shake hands with him at first – he’d become too rapidly reactionary, they said (Dostoevsky: 1912, 683).

The point is that, being words of pure praise, “Alleluia” or “Hosanna” cannot be explained, justified, or evoked other than by the pure presence of God itself; they are the verbal correlates of divine light. The nihilist could never be persuaded into saying “Hosanna”, but when he lives the experience of the divine presence, he can say nothing else. Yet it is, still, a word. As such it is, in Buber’s terms, not the articulation of the pure self-enjoyment of the “I”, but the pure welcome of the Thou into the life of the “I”, loosed from the claim of any need and even from the need of gratitude for good and perfect gifts. It speaks – but, in being spoken, it too must go out into the market place and be subject to the dynamics identified in Heidegger’s concept of Gerede. Once spoken in human tongues, it can be repeated and passed along without seeing what is being said in it. The disclosive word that, in its primordial utterance, brought the divine light out from unconcealment and translated it into human speech becomes a cliché, perhaps the stalest and most hackneyed of all the clichés in the vocabulary of religion. Merely saying “Alleluia” or even singing it – even singing it in a perfect rendition of a sublime musical setting – will not and cannot of itself bring to view what is being said in it. And, mostly, it is not even said or sung as thoughtfully as that. Here, at this crucial point, as we attempt to move beyond the revelation of the exigent human spirit so as to see the invisible God to whom that spirit addresses itself in the extreme need of its being, we discover that, as Hölderlin wrote, “holy names are lacking” and the holy names we still have are lacking the power to move us. But, as Hölderlin also goes on to say, this “lack” is not just a matter of a certain epistemological deficit (we are finite, God is infinite, etc.). It is because “our joy is almost too small” (“Heimkunft”; my translation, G.P.). To speak of God in such a way that the divine presence itself becomes manifest in the spoken word requires not just the purifying focus of the heart on the one thing needful, not just hope in the divine good-will towards us, and not just gratitude for gifts bestowed. It requires also that all of these are taken up into the joy that is the only adequate and appropriate human way of being with God. But, to repeat, we live in a cultural situation in which words that might express and convey such joy – were we ourselves to be capable of it – are lacking. The

 

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death of God indicates not just a metaphysical deficit, but the advent of a joyless grey on grey. Where in the prose of average everyday bourgeois life, in the trivia of the workaday world or in the myriad pointless and empty adventures that absorb our surplus energies but serve no greater human good, where might we still find words that could, once more, awaken the echoes of angelic song? A full response to this question is a new and distinct task. One way in which we might proceed to develop such a response is, I think, suggested by one of the central concepts of the spiritual life developed in the spirituality of François de Sales and Jeanne de Chantal, namely, what they call “God’s good pleasure”. Writing in the immediate wake of the 16th century crisis of religion and at the start of the modern era, they experienced in their own way the inescapability of modernity’s grey on grey. Even as founders and leaders of religious orders, they understood that leaving the world could no longer be an exclusive option for those seeking spiritual perfection. The religious or devout life would have to be a life that could be lived as well in the world as in the cloister. Many of their letters of direction are to those who are wanting to live heroic religious lives and to undertake extreme religious commitments, and again and again their counsel is not to overleap the personal and social limits of life. The idea of “God’s good pleasure” combines faith in God as creator, working providentially in the circumstances of human life, with faith in God as redeemer, working in the soul to bring it closer to himself and to make himself known to it. Yet, for most, it is precisely acceptance of our worldly existence, inclusive of its limits and constraints, that is the way to such a more intimate knowledge. To come to know God we must learn that God is the one whose “good pleasure” is that we are as we are in the life that we are living. The fast track to awareness of the presence of God is therefore not striving to liberate oneself from the world and turn from the world to God, but to be aware of God in the circumstances of life. Prayer itself is then less an attempt to focus on God but on growing more aware of how it is God’s good pleasure for us to be as and how we are and who we are. Jeanne de Chantal writes: [S]pend the appointed time of prayer quietly and peacefully, doing nothing in God’s presence, content simply to be there without wishing either to feel his presence or to make an act [of devotion], unless you can do so easily. Just sit there, in inner and outer tranquility and reverence, convinced that this patience is a powerful prayer before God (De Chantal: 1988, 198).

In other words: no ascetic heroics; just be as and how you are, where you are, now. Only in learning to see our lives as “God’s good pleasure” will we again come to possibilities of seeing Him as He is and praising Him as we ought. In a sense, this teaching is the re-iteration of the point that the longing for God is the gift of God. It is reliance on grace for the simple act of being, even of being

 

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the imperfect, unfinished, and striving beings that we are and that we are right now – remembering (as I argued in God and Being) that this act is also necessarily embodied and realized in and through such bodily expressions as tears and trembling, as many mystical texts also suggest.9 But does it at all help us in our question concerning how to speak of God so that his invisible things might become visible? It certainly doesn’t give us an “answer” to that question. But what I hope the winding steps of these reflections have aimed at is the attempt to move the question itself away from being a question about, e. g., the limitations of finite or material being in relation to infinite and immaterial being, to a question of human self-understanding that, at the same time, does not limit itself to knowing itself as pure “I”, but, precisely in and as its self-experience as “I”, knowing itself as bound up with another and in such a way that the relation to this other reveals the possibility that its true existence is to be joy.

Bibliography Anonymous (1961), The Cloud of Unknowing (trans. Clifton Wolters), Harmondsworth: Penguin. Augustine (1961), Confessions (trans. R. S. Pine-Coffin), Harmondsworth: Penguin. Brémond, Henri (1923), Histoire littéraire du sentiment religieux en France depuis la fin des guerres de religion jusqu’à nos jours, vol. ii, Paris: Bloud et Gay. Buber, Martin (1922), Daniel. Leipzig: Insel. Buber, Martin (1970), I and You. A Prologue, Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark. Buber, Martin (1918), Die Legende des Baal-Schem. Frankfurt am Main: Rütten und Loening. Buber, Martin (1920), Die Rede, die Lehre und das Lied, Leipzig: Insel. Dostoevsky, Fjodor M. (1912), The Brothers Karamazov, London: Heinemann. Eliot, Thomas S. (1959), Four Quartets, London: Faber and Faber. Heidegger, Martin (1962), Being and Time, trans. John Macquarrie/Edward Robinson, Oxford: Blackwell. Heidegger, Martin (1985), Unterwegs zur Sprache, Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann. James, William (1960), The Varieties of Religious Experience, London: Collins. Katz, Steven T. (1978), Language, Epistemology and Mysticism, in: Steven T. Katz (ed.), Mysticism and Philosophical Analysis, London: Sheldon Press, 22–74. Kierkegaard, Søren (2010), Kierkegaard’s Spiritual Writings, trans. George Pattison, New York: Harper. Kierkegaard, Søren (2003), Journalerne NB–NB5. Søren Kierkegaards Skrifter, vol. 20, Copenhagen: Gad. Laird, Martin (2006), Into the Silent Land. The Practice of Contemplation, London: Darton, Longman and Todd.

9 See Pattison: 2011. As such, this act is, of course, a mode of potentiality rather than “pure” act, since it is not separable from the process of temporal becoming.

 

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A Monk of the Eastern Church (1970), On the Invocation of the Name of Jesus, Oxford: Fairacres Press. Pattison, George (2011), God and Being. An Enquiry, Oxford: Oxford University Press. de Sales, Francis/de Chantal, Jane (1988), Letters of Spiritual Direction, trans. Péronne M. Thibert, New York: Paulist Press. Schleiermacher, Friedrich D.E. (1988), On Religion: Speeches to its Cultured Despisers, trans. Richard Crouter, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

 

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“Look, there he stands – the god. Where? There. Can you not see him?” Poetic Refigurations of Christ in Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky

1.

Introduction

Why does Jesus Christ appear at Amagertorv, the market square of Copenhagen, in 1850 in Kierkegaard’s Practice in Christianity and in front of the grand inquisitor at the square of the Cathedral in Seville in the 16th century in Dostoevsky’s novel The Brothers Karamazov? There is a long tradition of seeing parallel concerns in the writings of Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky, but as far as I know, their poetic refigurations of Christ have not yet been investigated in relation to each other.1 The two writers are – together with Nietzsche – traditionally identified as the 19th-century fathers of 20th-century existentialism. Leo Shestov described them as “Doppelgänger” existentialist thinkers, both of whom emphasize the abysmal freedom of the individual and the anxious midnight cries of despairing figures giving voice to the dark demonic side of modern underground man. The existentialist interpretation has, particularly in the last couple of decades, been critizised for ignoring the profound polyphonic character of their work, on the grounds that its monologic focus on the despairing underground voice plays down the many other voices and visions they evoke. This critique has been developed with reference to Michael Bakhtin’s work on Dostoevsky’s polyphonic poetics (Fryszman: 1996, 104; Pattison: 2001, 241). According to Bakhtin, Dostoevsky’s polyphonic novel unfolds “a plurality of consciousnesses, with equal rights and each with its own world”, each of them free and “capable of standing alongside their creator, capable of not agreeing with him and even of rebelling against him” (Bakhtin: 1984, 6). Kierkegaard’s writings are also polyphonic, since he communicates through a plurality of pseudonymous voices

1 In Remembering the End. Dostoevsky as Prophet to Modernity, Kroeker and Ward’s interpretation of the grand inquisitor refers to both Nietzsche and Kierkegaard in addressing the problem of modernity. They refer to Kierkegaard’s analysis of the demonic anxiety of the good to describe the grand inquisitor’s demonic relation to Christ, but they do not use Kierkegaard’s rewritings of Christ (Kroeker/Ward: 2001).

 

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each embodying its own perspective on existential, ethical and religious questions, and he furthermore gives voice to a large gallery of textual figures (biblical as well as fictive, literary and historical).2 Bakhtin sees in the Socratic maieutic dialogue a model for the dialogical search for truth in Dostoevsky’s polyphonic poetics, and the Socratic dialogue plays a similarly salient role in Kierkegaard’s way of communicating. Bakhtin does not ignore the influence of ancient Christian literature. He mentions it in relation to carnivalesque inversions of the sacred with the profane, the lofty with the low, the wise with the stupid, as seen in the scene of the crowning and uncrowning of “the King of the Jews” in the canonical Gospels (Bakhtin: 1984, 135):3 but he does not develop this.4 I will explore this biblical dimension in Kierkegaard’s and Dostoevsky’s polyphonic, poetic refigurations of Christ through close readings of three refigurations of Christ. First: Kierkegaard’s poetic analogy of the love affair of a king and a lowly maiden (in Philosophical Fragments), then his narration of how a contemporary Christ is mocked and rejected by the acclaimed Christians in Golden Age Copenhagen (in Practice in Christianity), and thirdly Dostoevsky’s rewriting of Christ (in The Brothers Karamazov) in the legend of the Grand Inquisitor. All three refigurations address the theological question of divine love and human freedom in a polyphonic poetics that ties together seriousness and jest as well as attack and defence in a dialectical knot. Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky share a tradition of rewriting biblical figures and narratives5 that goes back to the Bible itself. Through the interplay of different gen2 Alex Fryszman has demonstrated that though Kierkegaard is hardly mentioned by Bakhtin, his reading of Kierkegaard is nevertheless an important influence on his interpretation of the polyphonic character of Dostoevsky’s novels developed in Problems of Dostoevsky’s Poetics (Fryszman: 1996). 3 George Pattison has argued that Bakhtin’s category of the carnival can be used to shed light on how Kierkegaard deployed carnivalesque elements in his critique of contemporary society and theology (cf. Pattison: 2006). 4 Bakhtin stresses instead the carnivalistic influence on Dostoevsky of the Socratic dialogue and the Menippean satire, which he traces back to the third century BC. 5 I do not investigate their different confessional backgrounds within, on the one hand, the protestant tradition of Lutheran Northern Europe and, on the other hand, the Russian Orthodox tradition. A recent study by Bercken demonstrates that the Christianity of Dostoevsky’s novels has more in common with a Protestant tradition than what is usually acknowledged in – especially Western – Dostoevsky scholarship. He claims that there is “a striking similarity to Protestantism in Dostoevsky’s frequent allusions to the Bible and his characters’ urging to read the Bible” (Bercken: 2011, 5) as well as in Dostoevsky’s emphasis on the “evangelical, based on the ethics of the Sermon on the Mount […]. The source of belief referred to is the Bible, not the church” (Bercken: 2011, 14). Bercken also perceives “an almost Protestant approach to belief as a personal appeal by God to man, widely different from the scholastic Catholic and Orthodox theology of the time. The central point of Christianity is belief as an act of free will not of blind obedience to the church nor as a result of being overwhelmed by miracles and mysteries” (Bercken: 2011, 90).

 

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res and discourses which intertextually interpret each other, the poetic language of the Bible redescribes human reality in the light of God who reveals but at the same time conceals himself.6 The New Testament’s four different Gospels, each from its own perspective, tell and retell the story of how all things have become new in the Christ event. Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky furthermore share a tradition of combining attack and defence, iconoclasm and preaching, that also goes back to the Bible.7 I hope to shed light on how their poetic rewritings of the Christ event combines critique and confession through the narrative interplay between voices of faith, offence, doubt, scepticism and the modern critique of religion. This will be discussed in relation to the position of apophatic theology, which holds that God transcends language and can only be approached negatively in language by saying what God is not, never what he is. I will argue that these poetic refigurations of Christ renew the tradition of apophatic theology, through their ironic ways of using the voices of opponents.

2.

Stealing the Wonder

As suggested by their very names, the pseudonymous authors of Philosophical Fragments and Practice in Christianity, Johannes Climacus and Anti-Climacus, are in some respects quite different. Climacus describes himself in the preface to Philosophical Fragments as “a loafer out of indolence” (Kierkegaard: 1985, 5), a free spirit who passes time by training himself “to be able to dance lightly in the service of the thought” (Kierkegaard: 1985, 7). In contrast, Kierkegaard, who lists himself as the editor of Practice in Christianity, describes Anti-Climacus in the “editor’s preface” as forcing up the “requirement for being a Christian […] to a supreme ideality” (Kierkegaard: 1990, 7). I hope to show, however, that there are good reasons to read 6 This all too brief characterization is inspired by Paul Ricoeur (cf. Ricoeur: 1981). 7 I thus agree with Merold Westphall who notes that Paul Ricoeur should have included Kierkegaard among “the three masters of suspicion – Marx, Nietzsche and Freud” (Ricoeur: 1978, 213), because of Kierkegaard’s critique of reason and society and because of his critique of Christianity from within Christianity, which continues and renews a tradition that reaches through Luther, Augustine and Paul to Hebrew prophets in which “religious faith, in its struggle with idolatry, can be the initiating motive for a hermeneutics of suspicion” (Westphall: 2013, 302). Ricoeur considers Nietzsche as a voice from outside the Christian tradition. It is controversial, however, in what way Nietzsche’s ambiguous critique of Christianity relates to this distinction between within and without. I have explored this in my article on Nietzsche’s Antichrist, which attacks the entire tradition of Christianity for having metaphysically falsified the figure of Jesus, the “great symbolist” and gentle idiot, who spoke symbolically of heaven not as a place beyond this world, but as a new way of living one’s life in an all-inclusive love. Nietzsche thus uses the figure of Jesus polemically against Christianity (cf. Damgaard: 2014). See also Werner Stegmaier’s interpretation of Nietzsche’s Der Antichrist “als eine neue Einübung im Christentum” (Stegmaier: 2013, 44).

 

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them together with regard to their recontextualizing the paradox of the incarnation in new narratives that confront the modern reader with the possibility of offence in existential contemporaneity with God’s appearance on earth as a humble servant. Climacus embarks on a manifold of experimental quests in Philosophical Fragments in the chapters entitled “Thought-Project” (Tanke-Projekt), “A Poetical Venture” (Et digterisk forsøg), and “A Metaphysical Caprice” (En metaphysisk Grille) in order to explore an alternative to the Socratic position. Climacus teasingly claims to speak “algebraically” about this alternative, which is not clothed “in its historical costume” (Kierkegaard: 1985, 109), but he quite soon discloses that he speaks about a “religion of love” (ibid, 39), in which God out of love is moved to make his appearance on earth to meet human beings as equals. Climacus holds that a genuine relationship of love is only possible on the basis of equality, where genuine understanding is possible. This is indeed no small problem in God’s love story, for God and man are not equal and it is rather difficult to make them so when God “is not to destroy that which is different” (ibid., 25). Though Climacus emphasizes that no valid analogy to God’s unhappy love affair is possible in human relations, he suggests that we can imagine a poetic analogy “in an earthly setting” (ibid, 25) of a king who loves a humble maiden. Allthough any poetic analogy of worldly love ultimately turns out to be a dis-analogy8 that fails in fully grasping the divine love shown in the event of the incarnation, Climacus acknowledges that we need imaginative ventures in poetic analogies “in order to awaken the mind to an understanding of the divine” (ibid., 26). This acknowledgment should not be overlooked, since Philosophical Fragments has been accused of advocating blind faith and decisionism. That this charge relies on a misreading is demonstrated in Arne Grøn’s interpretation of the thought-project undertaken in the book, which finds that faith “is not a blind decision without understanding, it implies an understanding” (Grøn: 2004, 87), in the sense that we ourselves have to discover the limits of our understanding and the possibility of misunderstanding. Faith requires that we come to understand that the paradox transcends understanding. Climacus emphasizes that God is the wholly other and transcends what we can think and imagine, but this we can only discover by making the attempt and failing.9 In this understanding of the limits of the understanding, we encounter ourselves and the subjectivity at stake in our thinking, imagining and understanding (Grøn: 2004, 97–99). 8 For Kierkegaard’s use of disanalogies see also Pons: 2004, 96, and Gouwens: 1988, 249 f. 9 Climacus holds that the understanding cannot think God as the wholly other, either through the way of negation, via negationis (the negation of all positive terms predicated of God characteristic of the tradition of negative, apophatic theology) or through the way of idealization, via eminentiae, because the understanding “cannot absolutely negate itself but uses itself for that purpose and consequently thinks the difference in itself, which it thinks by itself ” (Kierkegaard: 1985, 45).

 

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In Climacus’ love story of the king and the girl, a disturbing worry awakens in the king’s mind, when he realizes the problem of inequality and starts to worry about whether she would be happy as his queen. Would she “acquire the bold confidence never to remember what the king only wished to forget – that he was the king and she had been a lowly maiden”? (Kierkegaard: 1985, 27). Or would she perhaps have been happier if she had remained in her humble cottage, loved by an equal, but confident in her love, and cheerful? Climacus invites the poet to find a solution, “a point of unity, where there is in truth love’s understanding” (ibid., 28). There are basically two ways of achieving this. The girl can ascend to the royal castle where the king will show himself in all his pomp and power, causing her to forget herself in worshipful admiration. To transform her through her ascension to the castle is not however the way of love, for love “does not change the beloved but changes itself ” (ibid., 33). The loving king must therefore choose instead to descend from his pomp and circumstance and become a simple man, the equal of his bride so that she can love him with bold confidence. As this poetic analogy suggests, God in the incarnation changes himself into human form out of love, and since he wants to be the equal of every human being, he becomes the lowliest of all persons in the form of a servant. Climacus emphatically rejects a docetic understanding of God’s humanity as merely disguise. God’s humanity is not something put on like the king’s plebeian cloak, which just by flapping open would betray the king […]. It is his true form. For this is the boundlessness of love, that in earnestness and truth and not in jest it wills to be the equal of the beloved, and it is the omnipotence of resolving love to be capable of that of which neither the king nor Socrates was capable, which is why their assumed characters were still a kind of deceit (Kierkegaard: 1985, 31f).

The poetic analogy of the king and the maiden is ultimately an inadequate disanalogy, for the royal incognito is assumed, whereas God’s true form is that of a humble human servant. Climacus remarks that it radically challenges our conceptions and ideas of God that he, out of love, reveals himself as the equal of even the weakest among us, for “it is indeed less terrifying to fall upon one’s face while the mountains tremble at the god’s voice than to sit with him as his equal, and yet the god’s concern is precisely to sit this way” (ibid, 35). That God out of love becomes the powerless and despised outcast who embraces everyone with an all-inclusive love opposes and contradicts worldly conceptions of the divine as the most exalted, glorious and powerful. With manifold allusions to the biblical proclamation of the Christ event as foolishness and an offence to the understanding in 1 Cor 1:23, Philosophical Fragments points to the possibility of offence at the paradox. The Sickness unto Death also explores the possibility of offence poetically through a parallel (dis)analogy of a poor day labourer and the mightiest emperor. Suddenly one

 

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day the emperor sends for the labourer in order to ask him to marry his daughter and become his son-in-law. The poor man is embarrassed. It would have been the greatest moment in his life if he once had the chance to exchange a few words with the emperor: but this is too much, he fears that his neighbours will gossip about him and that the emperor will make a fool of him. Christianity teaches that this individual human being – and thus every single individual human being, no matter whether man, woman, servant girl, cabinet minister, merchant, barber, student, or whatever – this individual human being exists before God, this individual human being who perhaps would be proud of having spoken with the king once in his life, this human being who does not have the slightest illusion of being on intimate terms with this one or that one, this human being exists before God […]. Furthermore, for this person’s sake, also for this very person’s sake, God comes to the world, allows himself to be born, to suffer, to die, and this suffering God – he almost implores and beseeches this person to accept the help that is offered to him! Truly, if there is anything to lose one’s mind over, this is it! Everyone lacking the humble courage to dare to believe this is offended. But why is he offended? Because it is too high for him, because his mind cannot grasp it, because he cannot attain bold confidence in the face of it and therefore must get rid of it (Kierkegaard: 1991, 85f).

God reveals himself as the lowliest human being, but his divinity is invisible. Climacus plays with this teasingly in a dialogic interruption of his argument, directly addressing the reader: “Look, there he stands – the god. Where? There. Can you not see him?” (Kierkegaard: 1985, 32). Climacus notes that the god did not take the form of a servant in order to mock human beings and “his aim, therefore, cannot be to walk through the world in such a way that no one single person would come to know it” (ibid, 56). Climacus points out that though the god was a man, his concerns were not those men generally have, for his whole life was “sheer love and sheer sorrow” (ibid, 32). He is, however, only indirectly recognizable “with the eyes of faith” (ibid., 70). Straightforwardly one sees a common man just like any other, but in faith one perceives at the same time God. It is only the eyes of faith that discover the loving God in the humble servant.10 Climacus stresses that there is therefore no advantage in being historically contemporary, since we might have passed by him in the streets of Galilee without seeing anything but an outcast. Only faith is contemporary with God. That the omnipotent God out of love needs to become the most impotent human being disturbs and reverses our conception of high and low. Climacus’ kenotic Christology points to the self-limitation implied in the omnipotent love’s resolution to become a human being who is bound by his human form (cf. Law: 1996, 185f): 10 Cf. Ettore Rocca’s interpretation of Kierkegaard’s theological aesthetics and the perception of faith (Rocca: 2004).

 

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[F]rom the hour when by the omnipotent resolution of his omnipotent love he became a servant, he has himself become captive, so to speak, in his resolution and is now obliged to continue (to go on talking loosely) whether he wants to or not. He cannot betray his identity; unlike that noble king, he does not have the possibility of suddenly disclosing that he is, after all, the king – which is no perfection in the king (to have this possibility) but merely manifests his impotence and the impotence of his resolution, that he actually is incapable of becoming what he wanted to become (Kierkegaard: 1985, 55).

Because God is love, he places an obstacle in front of his omnipotence, he restrains himself in order to make human beings free and independent. In one of the Christian Discourses, Kierkegaard points out that God’s omnipotence “is in the power of love” (Kierkegaard: 1997a, 127), since this omnipotence that constrains itself (something more wonderful than the coming into existence of all creation!) and lovingly makes the created being something in relation to himself – what wonderful omnipotence of love! […] But precisely for this reason love also requires something of human beings (Kierkegaard: 1997a, 128).

That a human being is free to become himself and assume responsibility for himself is the greatest gift (Gave) and in this resides the eternal dignity of a human being, but it is at the same time an immense task (Opgave) to handle that freedom in respect of the equal freedom and independence of others. This is reflected in Kierkegaard’s indirect communication through a plurality of voices, which does not subject the reader to the authority of a monologic author. In Concluding Unscientific Postscript to Philosophical Fragments, Climacus claims: Therefore no one is as resigned as God, because he communicates creatively in such a way that in creating he gives independence vis-à-vis himself. The most resigned a human being can be is to acknowledge the given independence in every human being and to the best of one’s ability do everything in order truly to help someone retain it (Kierkegaard: 1992, 260).

Kierkegaard stresses that no matter how radically one misuses one’s freedom or is harmed or even victimized by others, God cannot prevent this evil from happening because his power is the power of love, which renounces the possibility of limiting the freedom of humans.11 11 In a journal entry from 1846, Kierkegaard claims that “The whole question of the relation of God’s omnipotence and goodness to evil (instead of the differentiation that God accomplishes the good and merely permits evil) is resolved quite simply in the following way. The greatest good, after all, which can be done for a being, greater than anything else that one can do for it, is to make it free. In order to do just that, omnipotence is required. […] Only omnipotence can withdraw itself at the same time it gives itself away, and this relationship is the very independ-

 

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Climacus explores this theological question of divine love and human freedom in his poetical analogy of the king and the poor maiden, and addresses it anew in an imagined dialogue, which abruptly ends his poetic experiment. Climacus imagines an angry opponent, who interrupts him with the accusation: “What you are composing is the shabbiest plagiarism ever to appear, since it is nothing more or less than what any child knows” (Kierkegaard: 1985, 35). Climacus immediately admits to having stolen it, but contends that his literary theft is perhaps not so very harmful because it is so easily discoverable, since the poem is well known by everyone. But who then is the poet? Climacus confesses that he must have stolen this poem from the deity. It is God’s poem,12 for as Climacus notes with an indirect quotation from the proclamation in 1 Cor 2:9, it would not have arisen in a human heart, that “the blessed god could need him”. This divine poem was, however, “so different from every human poem that it was no poem at all but the wonder” (ibid., 36). “The paradox is the wonder” (ibid, 51). That God out of infinite love needs to become equal with his beloved human being, even the lowliest and most despised, paradoxically overturns human conceptions of the divine, and Climacus reminds his angry opponent that “we both are now standing before this wonder”, which “infinitely drowns out human quarrelling about mine and thine” (ibid., 36). As has been shown by Jolita Pons, what Climacus is stealing is a gift, God’s gift of love, where there is no mine and yours and therefore this “gift of the Word can neither be stolen nor possessed” (Pons: 2004, 145). Climacus’ claim that the paradoxical event of love undermines the distinction of mine and yours prefigures Kierkegaard’s insistence in Works of Love that “Love is a revolution” that overthrows the logic of justice’s dichotomy of mine and yours (Kierkegaard: 1995, 265). The angry interlocutor in the text rebels against Kierkegaard’s pseudonymous author with the accusation of literary theft, and the text thereby self-critically addresses the question of the legitimacy of new texts, which draw on and refigure the old and familiar biblical account. The imaginary opponent discloses that the wonder has now been so absorbed into the contemporary culture that it is seen as the firm foundation that underpins established conventions, hierarchies and ence of the receiver” (Kierkegaard: 1970, 62, nr. 1251). It is, however, problematic that Kierkegaard in this journal entry claims to have resolved the problem of theodicy, i. e. the question of how belief in an omnipotent, omniscient and good God is compatible with the experience of evil in the world. Even if one chooses to accept that this appeal to man’s freedom as the absolute gift of love gives an answer to the problem as to why an omniscient and loving God does not prevent the suffering of an innocent due to the cruel actions of others, it does not give an answer to the problem with the suffering caused not because of human misuse of freedom but by natural catastrophes such as earthquakes, tsunamis and terrible illnesses. Cf. the critical discussions in Schulz: 1994, 371–401, and Welz: 2008, 172–181. 12 For an account of how Kierkegaard’s notion of God as divine poet functions within his larger poetics and his theological reinterpretation of the romantic ideal of living poetically, see Joel Rasmussen: 2005, particularly chapter 2.

 

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dichotomies, rather than the overturning of that logic, which is what Climacus challenges his reader to rediscover in his playing stranger with what has become all too familiar. Climacus emphasizes that the wonder cannot be stolen, since it has been given equally to all humankind, and inscribing and rewriting this gift in new poetical ventures is thus configured as a responsible reception of this gift, which responds to the call of the revolutionary wonder in passing on the gift to others. Climacus stresses that human beings cannot ultimately grasp the paradoxical wonder, which transcends human thinking and language. He emphasizes the inadequacy of language, imagination and thought to grasp the reality of the incarnation, and there is thus an apophatic dimension in his thinking. David Law has argued that Kierkegaard is a negative theologian, allthough Kierkegaard does not share the ontological presuppositions of neoplatonism and is even more apophatic than the negative theologians themselves, because “he does not make the transition to the via mystica but stops at the via negativa” (Law: 1993, 217).13 I agree that Climacus’ negative theology does not mean a mystical encounter with God, but I would argue that it also does not mean that Climacus stops at a traditional via negativa. On the contrary, Climacus renews this tradition in his poetic ventures “to awaken the mind to an understanding of the divine” through the interaction of different genres and voices where the critical voice of the modern sceptical interlocutor plays a prominent role. This polyphonic performance approaches asymptotically the paradoxical wonder in ever new ways.14 All of them ultimately fail to reach it: and thereby they point negatively to the limitations in how we can think and speak of God (cf. also Shakespeare: 2013, 472).

3.

Christ at Amagertorv

In Practice in Christianity, the pseudonym Anti-Climacus argues that the scandalous, radical and paradoxical character of Christianity has disappeared in the domestication of religion in the established church of 19th-century Denmark, where all indifferently call themselves Christians as a matter of course. Accord-

13 Law bases his conclusion on the pseudonymous writings. Concerning the question of the apophatic dimension in Kierkegaard’s writings in general, I think, however, one needs to take into account also Kierkegaard’s reflections on the metaphorical language in Works of Love as well as in some of his Upbuilding and Christian Discourses (cf. Damgaard: 2010, 210). I also think we will reach a more complex picture of Kierkegaard’s relation to the tradition of silence in mystical theology if we take into account his discourse on silence in The Lily of the Field and the Bird of the Air. Three Godly Discourses (1849; in Kierkegaard: 1997b). 14 There are striking similarities to the way Kierkegaard’s pseudonym Johannes de Silentio approaches Abraham and the question of silence and language in Fear and Trembling, cf. Damgaard: 2008, and Tøjner: 1995.

 

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ing to Anti-Climacus, it is a distortion of Christianity that it is communicated in a direct, straightforward language as “direct paragraph-communication” (Kierkegaard: 1990, 123), where everything “is made as direct as putting one’s foot in a sock” (ibid., 126). Christianity is not subscription to an objective teaching but a personal call for faith in Christ as the sign of contradiction that must be communicated indirectly: What modern philosophy understands by faith is really what is called having an opinion […] this would be entirely proper if Christianity were a teaching, but since it is not, all this is totally wrong. Faith in a significant sense is related to the God-man. But the God-man, the sign of contradiction, denies direct communication – and calls for faith (Kierkegaard: 1990, 141).

Christ is no longer understood as a sign of contradiction and offence, for the paradoxical God-man has been reduced and trivialized into “a divine Mr. Goodman” (ibid, 36). Anti-Climacus notes that his contemporaries relate to the story of the exalted God who becomes a humble human being at a distance, and it would be quite another story if one were to relate to it in the here and now: When the poet or orator illustrates this loftiness, that is, depicts it at the poetic distance from actuality, people are moved – but in actuality, in the actuality of daily life, to see this loftiness here in Copenhagen, in the market on Amagertorv, in the middle of the daily bustle of weekday life! […] It is indeed an enormous contradiction – that the loftiest of all has become the everyday! (Kierkegaard: 1990, 59f).

Anti-Climacus therefore insists on speaking “quite frankly” about Christ, just as one talks about a contemporary whom one sees passing in the street. He then proceeds to narrate the first period of the life of Jesus Christ as a contemporary “lowly man, born of a despised virgin, his father a carpenter” (ibid, 40). When this lowly man appears in the streets, he performs signs and miracles and attracts crowds of common people around him, but is rejected and ridiculed by the prominent persons of power and prestige among his contemporaries, who are portrayed very much as Anti-Climacus’ contemporaries in Golden-Age Copenhagen. Anti-Climacus displays how a gallery of esteemed and enlightened cultural figures, who all claim as a matter of course to be Christians, turn out to be offended in each his own way when they encounter the lowly figure in the streets. First we encounter “the sagacious and sensible one”, who finds it inexplicable and ridiculous that the extraordinary fellow is so weak and foolish that he wants to be the servant of all instead of dominatingly keep people at a distance, and accept their adoration only on special occasions. Next the clergyman contends that every religious man must shudder at the blasphemy that this lowly man is God in person,

 

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for he does not look and behave like the expected one, he does not want to join the established order, indeed he wants to do away with it as a revolutionary. The clergyman is confident that the expected one will recognize the authority of the establishment and be “the most glorious flowering and the highest unfolding of the established order” (Kierkegaard: 1990, 47). Then comes the philosopher, who ridicules Christ because “he has no doctrine, no system; basically he knows nothing; there are a few aphorisms, some maxims, and a couple of parables” (ibid., 48). Next, the “solid citizen” follows the opinion of what “Pastor Grønwald said last evening in the club” (ibid, 51) and warns his son against the lowly man in the street, since it is only all the “idle and unemployed people, street loafers and tramps” who follow him, whereas all people of good reputation stay away. Finally, the scoffer claims that assuming that the distinctive mark of being God is (indeed, who in the whole world would have thought of this; how true that such a thing did not arise in any human heart!) to look exactly like everybody else, neither more nor less: then we are all gods (Kierkegaard: 1990, 51).

The succession of opinions on Christ thus ends with the biblical proclamation of the radicality of the Christ event (1 Cor 2:9), but now in the mouth of the scoffer who quotes the biblical proclamation as a satirical mockery of Christ. Anti-Climacus’ portrayal of how the good citizens of Copenhagen who consider themselves Christians perceive a contemporary Christ as a fool, a “madman” (ibid, 52) who cannot be God, because he contradicts their worldly expectations and conceptions of God, discloses their illusions, hypocrisy and self-deception, and reactivates Climacus’ satirical question, “Look, there he stands – the god. Where? There. Can you not see him?” (Kierkegaard: 1985, 32). The very explanations they give for rejecting that the lowly man is Christ, can be understood at another level as a true description and thus defence of him. It is the task of the reader to perceive this dramatic irony, which I see as an imitation of the dramatic irony that we find in the Gospels, most prominently in the passion narratives, where the sarcasm the mockers heap on Jesus is, at a deeper level, a true confession of him. The reader of the Gospel is in a position to perceive this, whereas the characters in the heat of the action are not (cf. Camery-Hoggatt: 1992, 2). This irony in Anti-Climacus’ narration of his contemporaries’ opinions on Christ, which I will claim imitates the dramatic irony in the Gospel narratives, can be further explored in relation to Climacus’ idea of the understanding’s offence at the paradox as “an acoustical illusion” (Kierkegaard: 1985, 51).15 Climacus develops this idea in an appendix to chapter 3 on the absolute paradox in Philosophi15 Cf. a more extended version of this argument in my article “Biblical Variations. Kierkegaard’s Rewritten ‘Life of Jesus’” (Damgaard: 2015, 272; 274–276). The aim in what follows is to explore

 

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cal Fragments, which takes the form of an experimenting dialogue between “the understanding” and “the paradox”. Climacus claims that the offended understanding “parrots the paradox” (ibid, 52) by copying it in the wrong way without understanding that its offensive charge is merely the misunderstood echo of the paradox’s own proclamation. The offence is an acoustic illusion, since the paradox resounds in the offence. When confronted with the paradox, the understanding is offended and declares “that the paradox is the absurd, but this is only a caricaturing, for the paradox is indeed the paradox, quia absurdum” (ibid, 52). Climacus insists that it is “just as odd as an opponent who absentmindedly does not attack the author but defends him” (ibid, 54). Climacus’ idea of offence as acoustic illusion is developed narratively in Anti-Climacus’ account of his offended contemporaries’ mockery of the madness in Christ’s revolutionary love. Just as with the dramatic irony in the Gospels, the reader himself has to perceive that the attack at another level can be perceived as a true depiction of Christ’s revolutionary love. Anti-Climacus uses this playful dialectics between attack and defence in his poetic refiguration of Christ and the burghers of Golden-Age Denmark. He does, however, also give his reader a clue to the dramatic irony when he describes his indirect communication as a combination of jest and earnestness together in such a way that the composite is a dialectical knot. […] If anyone wants to have anything to do with this kind of communication, he will have to untie the knot himself. Or to bring attack and defense into a unity in such a way that no one can directly say whether one is attacking or defending (Kierkegaard: 1990, 133).

Kierkegaard has inserted a complex layer of authorial distance and indirectness into this refiguration of Christ. The narrative is presented by a pseudonymous author, against whom Kierkegaard warns us in his preface. This pseudonym tells us that Christ appears as the lowly man in the streets. We only see him indirectly at one more layer of distance through the eyes of the prominent figures of Copenhagen, who mock and reject this fool who embraces everyone with love. Anti-Climacus’ way of speaking of Christ indirectly, through how he is seen by textual figures that negate him, can be interpreted as a renewal of the apophatic tradition. Anti-Climacus does not say what God is not as in the traditional via negativa. Rather textual figures who negate Christ, in their very explanations for denying him, truly describe him. The narrative thereby imitates the dramatic irony of the gospels, and it is thus a genuinely biblical renewal of the apophatic tradition. The reader has to untie this dialectical knot between attack and defence in the narration. The offended inhabitants of Copenhagen, who claim to be Christians, yet do not recoga new dimension in this interpretation by relating it to the question of apophatic theology in comparison with Dostoevsky.

 

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nize and follow Christ when they meet him as a contemporary, do not themselves discover their self-deception. Through this refigured and recontextualized Christ among his contemporaries, the late Kierkegaard points to how difficult it is to get his contemporaries to discover the gap between the radical nature of Christ’s love and the trivialized Christianity of a modern age.

4.

Stealing a Kiss

The combination of jest and earnestness, attack and defence is also a crucial characteristic of the poetic refiguration of Christ in Dostoevsky’s legend of the grand inquisitor, which is a story within the larger story of The Brothers Karamazov (1879–80; Dostoevsky: 2004). In “Rebellion”, the chapter preceding “The Grand Inquisitor”, Ivan confronts his brother Alyosha with a long list of anecdotes he has collected from newspaper reports on innocent children suffering from extreme cruelties committed by grown-ups. Ivan turns this “nice little collection” of facts into a charge against the Christian teaching of forgiveness. Who could ever have the right to forgive a man who tortured a child to death? Is there in the whole world a being who could and would have the right to forgive? I don’t want harmony, for love of mankind I don’t want it. I want to remain with unrequited suffering. I’d rather remain with my unrequited suffering and my unquenched indignation, even if I am wrong. Besides, they have put too high a price on harmony; we can’t afford to pay so much for admission. And therefore I hasten to return my ticket (Dostoevsky: 2004, 245).

Ivan puts Alyosha on trial with a thought experiment: if it were possible to ensure that all mankind could live happily and peacefully in eternal harmony on the condition that just one innocent child was tortured, would it be justified to agree to that condition? Alyosha agrees with Ivan that it would be eternally wrong to buy happiness for all at the expense of the suffering of one single child. Ivan despairingly dismisses God, when he does not prevent the suffering of innocent children. Alyosha is as tormented as Ivan, and he refrains entirely from embarking on a justification of God. He has no solution to the problem, and he agrees with Ivan that no human being has the right to forgive the person who torments a child, and then he adds, [Y]ou asked just now if there is in the whole world a being who could and would have the right to forgive. But there is such a being, and he can forgive everything, forgive all and for all, because he himself gave his innocent blood for all and for everything. You’ve forgotten about him (Dostoevsy: 2004, 246).

 

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This is the background for Ivan’s narrating a poem he has composed. He introduces it with a literary preface pointing to Dante and Victor Hugo as literary antecedents by virtue of their “poetic works to bring higher powers down to earth”. Ivan makes Jesus reappear in Seville, in the 16th century at the height of the Inquisition. The contrast between Jesus’ message of love and the church’s administration of that message of love is highlighted by setting the scene anachronistically in the period of inquisition. On the square of the Cathedral of Seville, the day after the old grand inquisitor has burned almost a hundred heretics there, “He comes onstage” (Dostoevsky: 2004, 247) “in the same human image” (ibid., 248) as when he walked among men fifteen centuries earlier. Ivan does not call “him” Jesus or Christ, he is simply the nameless “he” and later “the prisoner”: only at the end of the story is he called Jesus by Alyosha. He appears “quietly, inconspicuously”, and yet everyone immediately recognizes him, in contrast to what we have encountered in Kierkegaard’s Amagertorv. Ivan interrupts his poem to comment on the strangeness of all the people immediately recognizing the invisible divinity in the visible man as he enters the square. Ivan notes: “This could be one of the best passages in the poem, I mean why it is exactly that they recognize him” (ibid., 249). Jesus is not only nameless but also speechless. He remains silent throughout Ivan’s poem except when he encounters a funeral gathering of a little dead girl, the only daughter of a noble citizen, and raises her from the coffin when he gently utters “Talitha cumi”, his words in the biblical account of the raising of the daughter of the ruler of the synagogue (Mark 5:41f). When the grand inquisitor appears and witnesses the scene, he immediately orders his guards to seize Jesus and lead him to prison. At night, the inquisitor visits the prisoner, gazes at him and asks: “Is it you? You?” (Dostoevsky: 2004, 250). He does not need an answer, he recognizes him immediately just like the demons in the Gospels. The inquisitor proceeds to his accusation that Jesus has no right to come again and interfere, for “on your departure, you handed the work over to us. […] you gave us the right to bind and loose” (ibid., 251). The inquisitor puts his prisoner on trial, accusing him of having thought too highly of man, of having respected him too much by offering him absolute freedom. The synoptic account of Satan’s three temptations of Jesus in the wilderness is the pivotal point in the inquisitor’s accusation. By rejecting the devil’s three temptations to rule over people by “miracle, mystery and authority” (ibid., 255), he tells Jesus, “you did not want to enslave man by a miracle and thirsted for faith that is free, not miraculous. You thirsted for love that is free” (ibid., 256). The inquisitor accuses Jesus of not having loved man enough by giving him a freedom which he is too weak to handle: Respecting him so much, you behaved as if you had ceased to be compassionate, because you demanded too much of him – and who did this? He who loved him more than

 

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himself! Respecting him less, you would have demanded less of him, and that would be closer to love, for his burden would be lighter (ibid., 256).

Instead of “a firm foundation for appeasing human conscience once and for all, you chose everything that was unusual, enigmatic, and indefinite” (ibid., 254). Left with only Jesus’ image as a guide in the dizzying abyss of freedom, humans are suffering in restlessness, confusion and unhappiness: “instead of the firm ancient law, man had henceforth to decide for himself, with a free heart, what is good and what is evil, having only your image before him as a guide” (ibid., 255). The inquisitor’s accusation gradually becomes a confession of how he himself once was devoted to Jesus and blessed this freedom, until he came to his senses and refused to “serve madness” (ibid., 260) and allied himself with Jesus’ opponent, Antichrist. He puts the prisoner on trial, but the prisoner remains silent and utters no word of self-defence, mirroring the biblical interrogation scene in the Gospels, where Jesus remains silent before the high priests and Pontius Pilate, who questions his divine identity (cf. Thompson: 1991, 285). The inquisitor refuses to accept the offer of love expressed in his prisoner’s silent gaze: “Why are you looking at me so silently and understandingly with your meek eyes? Be angry! […] I do not want your love, for I do not love you” (Dostoevsky: 2004, 257). Confronted with the silent, loving gaze, the old man, however, needs to speak out and say aloud that which he has kept hidden. As noted by Kroeker and Ward, this impulse of the inquisitor to speak out may be understood with reference to Kierkegaard’s description of the demonic despair that keeps itself hidden in self-inclosing reserve, but when confronted with the good, which is absolutely able to keep silent, can no longer endure silence and discloses its heart (Kroeker/ Ward: 2001, 258). The inquisitor argues that he has recognized that only a small minority of strong persons can endure freedom, whereas the vast majority are too weak to bear the burden of a free conscience, and that therefore it is the duty of the strong to rule over the weak and protect them from their own conscience. He claims that it is his love for humanity and his wish to make them happy that requires him to abolish Jesus’ idea of free love and human equality. Instead he must deceive the weak majority into believing that they are free even when they have resigned their individual freedom to the authority of the church: “we corrected your deed and based it on miracle, mystery and authority” (Dostoevsky: 2004, 257). According to the inquisitor, most men do not long to be a single individual bearing the responsibility of his own free conscience, but yearn primarily for security and the happiness of being one of a flock united in having “someone to bow down to, someone to take over his conscience” (ibid.). Finishing his monologue, he repeats his opening charge that the prisoner has no right to interfere and will therefore be burned as a heretic on the square the next morning.

 

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Alyosha has listened silently and now interrupts his brother: “But … that’s absurd! […] Your poem praises Jesus, it doesn’t revile him … as you meant it to” (ibid., 260). In my interpretation of Kierkegaard’s Christ at Amagertorv, I argued that he employs the dramatic irony so characteristic of the passion narratives of the Gospels. Dostoevsky also uses this biblical irony and he provides a receiver of the narrative, Alyosha, who perceives the dramatic irony in Ivan’s poem. In the poem Jesus’ message is interpreted exclusively by his opponent, the grand inquisitor, who denies it and condemns it, and yet the reader – as configured in the listening Alyosha – perceives it as praise of Jesus, who respects human beings so much that out of love he constrains himself from limiting their freedom even when they misuse it. This was equally the pivotal point in Kierkegaard’s description of the self-limitation in God’s power of love. Alyosha meanwhile asks how the poem ends, and Ivan answers: “I was going to end it like this: when the Inquisitor fell silent, he waited some time for his prisoner to reply. His silence weighed on him. He had seen how the captive listened to him all the while intently and calmly, looking him straight in the eye, and apparently not wishing to contradict anything. The old man would have liked him to say something, even something bitter, terrible. But suddenly he approaches the old man in silence and gently kisses him on his bloodless, ninety-year-old lips. That is the whole answer. The old man shudders. Something stirs at the corners of his mouth; he walks to the door, opens it, and says to him: ‘Go and do not come again … do not come at all … never, never!’ And he lets him out into the ‘dark squares of the city.’ The prisoner goes away.” “And the old man?” “The kiss burns in his heart, but the old man holds to his former idea.” “And you with him!” Alyosha exclaimed ruefully (Dostoevsky: 2004, 262).

Jesus is patiently, silently listening to the inquisitor throughout the trial. The inquisitor wishes and expects opposition, but Jesus’ answer is not argumentative, he does not dispute with his opponent. God’s only answer to the indictment of God is a silent, compassionate gaze and a kiss on the lips. The whole answer in a kiss. The kiss does not answer the accusation in the rational logic of accusation and defence, but deconstructs that logic in love’s embrace of the accuser parallel with Anti-Climacus’ insistence that faith is not about having an opinion to defend in “paragraph-communication”, but a personal response to the call of love. The originality of this kiss has been highlighted by Bercken, who notes that the biblical Jesus is never shown kissing anyone, and that whereas Dostoevesky does not put one single nonbiblical word into Jesus’ mouth, he does add this gesture of a kiss and thereby finds a new literary way of expressing Christ’s loving forgiveness (Bercken: 2011, 88). We might further note that the gesture of a kiss is the decisive gesture in the Gospel account of man’s betrayal and rejection of God’s love. The Judas-kiss of betrayal is turned upside down typologically in Dostoev-

 

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sky’s rewriting, when God’s love reaches out to the old betrayer with a gentle kiss on those bloodless lips. The kiss burns into the inquisitor’s heart, so that he cannot bring himself to kill God as planned, and instead lets the prisoner out into the dark night. Alyosha answers his brother in the same way as the prisoner by silently kissing Ivan. Through this gesture of imitatio Christi, the legend explicitly points to a poetic analogy between Alyosha and the prisoner: Alyosha meets Ivan with a loving gaze that makes him disclose and confess his despairing thoughts, to which Alyosha responds with a kiss. What is said about Christ in these polyphonic rewritings by Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky is constantly questioned and challenged by the explicit emphasis on the limitations of the narrator’s perspective, both by the narrator himself, by figures interrupting him, and by the dialogue between protagonists offering contradictory interpretations. Just as we saw Climacus’ ironic and intrusive approach to his own poetical venture, so Ivan repeatedly insists that his poem is crazy, confused, “an absurd thing” (Dostoevsky: 2004, 246), “it’s nonsense, Alyosha, it’s just the muddled poem of a muddled student” (ibid., 262). Through this undermining of their own authority as narrators, they acknowledge the freedom of their reader to judge for himself. The seriousness of the theological problem of God’s love and human freedom that both Climacus and Ivan raise is challenged by their own playfully teasing and ironic interruptions in order to comment, criticize and mock the whole exercise. The seriousness is, however, disclosed in Alyosha’s reception of the poem, which prompts Ivan to tease him for taking it all too seriously. There is no figure of faith like Alyosha to receive Climacus’ poetical venture. For his part, he constantly anticipates impatient and critical readers, and finally his tale is accused of plagiarism by an imagined interlocutor, who complains that everybody already knows this story by rote, which ironically discloses why it needs to be rediscovered in rewritings that disturb the familiarity. Another variant of the accusation of “literary theft” (ibid., 263) is launched in Dostoevsky’s novel, when Alyosha silently stands up, goes to his brother and kisses him gently on the lips. Ivan cries aloud that Alyosha stole the kiss from the poem, but then thanks him. These refigurations of Christ display manifold ways of responding to this continually rewritten story of the incarnation’s disruptive event of love. Whereas Kierkegaard’s refigurations display a variety of ways of mocking and rejecting it, Dostoevsky gives voice too to the existential appropriation of faith in the figure of Alyosha. Kierkegaard placed many layers of authorial distance over his rewritings of Christ. This is equally the case in Dostoevsky’s legend of Christ in Seville, presented as it is by Ivan, one of the characters of the novel, who constantly questions his own approach and puts the whole interpretation of Christ at one more remove through the figure of the inquisitor. Bercken has suggested that the indirectness in Ivan’s poetic disclosure of Christ is a form of apophatic theology:

 

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here it is not the traditional apophasis in which the negative expresses the opposite, but the apophasis is transferred from the words to the speakers: it is not opposing words that say what God is not, but a speaker in opposition, who specifically does not want to be ‘with God’. This means that it is not Jesus, but his denier, his opponent, who says what Jesus’ message is (Bercken: 2011, 87).

I agree in this interpretation, and would add the observation that this narrative renewal of apophatic theology is peculiarly biblical in its use of dramatic irony, which imitates the passion narratives of the Gospels, where the opponents of Jesus, by the very words they use to mock and reject him, ironically utter the truth regarding his identity, which the reader of the Gospel is in a position to perceive. I have interpreted Anti-Climacus’ rewriting of Christ at Amagertorv as a parallel renewal of the apophatic tradition. There is, however, an important difference, for Dostoevsky’s speaker in opposition admits that he sides with Satan and speaks from the perspective of Antichrist. The inquisitor does not want to be with God and only pretends to be Christian out of strategic reasons. Again, the inquisitor recognizes Christ in the lowly man on the square, in contrast to the prominent inhabitants of Golden-Age Copenhagen, who consider themselves Christians. They mock him and reject his being Christ on the grounds that his love is too radical, too paradoxical, and thereby expose the self-deception in their domesticated understanding of Christianity as identical with their worldly wisdom. The reader may detect the irony in that the supposed Christians’ rejection and critique of Christ ironically can be recognized as a true description of Christ’s love. Anti-Climacus gives his reader a clue by describing his indirect communication as a combination of jest and earnestness, an attack and defence in a dialectical knot, which the reader has to unravel himself. Such a reader is configured in Dostoevsky’s novel: that Ivan’s poetic description of the inquisitor’s rejection of Christ ironically praises Christ’s love is perceived by Alyosha, who responds to the call of love by finding still new ways of imitating and stealing that kiss.16

Bibliography Bakhtin, Mikhail (1984), Problems of Dostoevsky’s Poetics, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Bercken, Wil van den (2011), Christian Fiction and Religious Realism in the Novels of Dostoevsky, London: Anthem Press.

16 I would like to thank Lars Albinus and Carsten Pallesen for reading and commenting on a draft of this study.

 

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Camery-Hogatt, Jerry (1992), Irony in Mark’s Gospel. Text and Subtext, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Caputo, John D. (2006), The Weakness of God. A Theology of the Event, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Damgaard, Iben (2008), At lege fremmed med det kendte, København: Anis. Damgaard, Iben (2010), Kierkegaard’s Biblical Rewritings, in Lee C. Barrett/Jon Stewart (ed.), Kierkegaard and The Bible. Vol. 1: The Old Testament, Farnham: Ashgate, 207–230. Damgaard, Iben (2014), Jesus as the “great symbolist” in Nietzsche’s The Antichrist, Transfiguration 2012, 143–161. Damgaard, Iben (2015), Biblical Variations. Kierkegaard’s rewritten “Life of Jesus”, in Jon Stewart (ed.), A Companion to Kierkegaard, Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 269–280. Dostoevsky, Fyodor (2004), The Brothers Karamazov (trans. Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky), London: Vintage Books. Fowler, M. Robert (1992), Reader-Response Criticism: Figuring Mark’s Reader, in Janice C. Anderson/Stephen D. Moore (ed.), Mark and Method. New Approaches in Biblical Studies, 50–83. Fryszman, Alex (1996), Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky Seen Through Bakhtin’s Prism, Kierkegaardiana 23, 100–125. Gouwens, David (1988), Kierkegaard’s Dialectic of the Imagination, New York/Bern/Frankfurt a.M./Paris: Peter Lang. Grøn, Arne (2004), Transcendence of Thought. The Project of Philosophical Fragments, Kierkegaard Studies Yearbook 2004, 80–99. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1844] 1985), Philosophical Fragments (Kierkegaard’s Writings VII, ed. and trans. Howard V. Hong/Edna H. Hong), Princeton: Princeton University Press. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1846] 1992), Concluding Unscientific Postscript to Philosophical Fragments, vol. 1 (Kierkegaard’s Writings XII.1, ed. and trans. Howard V. Hong/Edna H. Hong), Princeton: Princeton University Press. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1847] 1995), Works of Love, (Kierkegaard’s Writings XVI, ed. and trans. Howard V. Hong/Edna H. Hong), Princeton: Princeton University Press. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1848] 1997a), Christian Discourses. The Crisis and A Crisis in the Life of an Actress (Kierkegaard’s Writings XVII, ed. and trans. Howard V. Hong/Edna H. Hong), Princeton: Princeton University Press. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1849] 1991), The Sickness unto Death: A Christian Psychological Exposition for Upbuilding and Awakening (Kierkegaard’s Writings XIX, ed. and trans. Howard V. Hong/Edna H. Hong), Princeton: Princeton University Press. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1849] 1997b), The Lily in the Field and the Bird of the Air, in: Søren Kierkegaard, Without Authority (Kierkegaard’s Writings XVIII, ed. and trans. Howard V. Hong/Edna H. Hong), Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1–45. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1850] 1990), Practice in Christianity (Kierkegaard’s Writings XX, ed. And trans. Howard V. Hong/Edna H. Hong), Princeton: Princeton University Press. Kierkegaard, Søren (1970), Søren Kierkegaard’s Journals and Papers, vol. 2 (ed. and trans. Howard V. Hong/Edna H. Hong, assisted by G. Malantschuk), Bloomington/London: Indiana University Press. Kroeker, P. Travis/Ward, Bruce (2001), Remembering the End. Dostoevsky as Prophet to Modernity, Boulder: Westview Press.

 

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Law, David (1993), Kierkegaard as negative Theologian, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pattison, George (2001), Freedom’s dangerous dialogue: Reading Dostoevsky and Kierkegaard together, in George Pattison/Diane Oenning Thompson (ed.), Dostoevsky and the Christian Tradition, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 237–256. Pattison, George (2006), Bakhtin’s Category of Carnival in the Interpretation of the Writings of Søren Kierkegaard, Kierkegaard Studies Yearbook 2006, 100–128. Pattison, George (2012), Kierkegaard and the Theology of the Nineteenth Century. The Paradox and the ‘Point of Contact’, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Pons, Jolita (2004), Stealing a Gift: Kierkegaard’s Pseudonyms and The Bible, Fordham: Fordham University Press. Rasmussen, Joel D.S. (2005), Between Irony and Witness. Kierkegaard’s Poetics of Faith, Hope, and Love, New York/London: T&T Clark International. Ricœur, Paul (1978), The Critique of Religion, in Lewis S. Mudge (ed.) Essays on Biblical Interpretation, London: SPCK, 73–118. Ricœur, Paul (1981), Toward a Hermeneutic of the Idea of Revelation, in Charles E. Reagan/ David Stewart (ed.), The Philosophy of Paul Ricœur. An anthology of His Work, Boston: Beacon Press, 213–222. Rocca, Ettore (2004), Kierkegaards teologiske æstetik. Om troens perception, Kierkegaardiana 23, 76–95. Schulz, Heiko (1994), Eschatologische Identität. Eine Untersuchung über das Verhältnis von Vorsehung, Schicksal und Zufall bei Sören Kierkegaard, Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter. Shakespeare, Steven (2013), Kierkegaard and Postmodernism, in John Lippitt/George Pattison (ed.), Oxford Handbook of Kierkegaard, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 464–483. Stegmaier, Werner (2013), Vergangenheit in der Zukunft: Nietzsches Nachricht vom “Tod Gottes”, in Marius M. Mjaaland/Ulrik Houling/Philipp Stoellger (ed.), Impossible Time. Past and Future in the Philosophy of Religion, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 33–44. Thompson, Diane Oenning (1991), The Brothers Karamazov and the Poetics of Memory, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Tøjner, Poul Erik (1995), Stilens Tænker, in Poul Erik Tøjner/Joakim Garff/Jørgen Dehs (ed.), Kierkegaards æstetik, København: Gyldendal, 65–79. Welz, Claudia (2008), Love’s Transcendence and the Problem of Theodicy, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Westphall, Merold (2013), Society, Politics and Modernity, in John Lippitt/George Pattison (ed.), Oxford Handbook of Kierkegaard, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 301–331.

 

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Hymn and Ending The Scope of the Eyes of Faith in Grundtvig’s Hymn “Velkommen igien Guds engle smaa”1

1.

Introduction

“Velkommen igien Guds Engle smaa” was written by N.F.S. Grundtvig in 18242 and has become one of his most beloved hymns for Christmas. The original text is made up of eight stanzas, but from the reprints of the text in later hymnbooks it becomes clear that the number of stanzas has varied from four to eight. Particularly when it comes to the significance or the status of the last stanza (stanza 8) there seem to have been some indecision.3 In his Sang-Værk til den Danske Kirke, Grundtvig has marked the transition from the 7th to the 8th stanza by a horizontal dash line. The concern makes sense: One could get the feeling that the hymn indicates two different kinds of endings, almost as if the text does not seem to be able to end. This article is concerned with the original eight-stanza version of the text and explores the play between the last stanzas of the hymn, which alternates between a mighty eschatological vision and a more hesitating and fearful expression of hoping to be able to see. The text thus addresses the question of seeing with the eyes of faith, of how to face the invisible, which here clearly is related to the timely perspectives of Advent and eschatos. Being a song, characterized by stanzas and meter, the hymn is similar to a poem, having clearly defined limits marked by line endings, stanza-units and of course the beginning and closing stanzas. Considered as poetry, as a poetic text, the hymn thus appears delimited and confined. The same is true of the song, which has its

1 This article is based on a paper given at the In-visibilis conference “Language and Image Formation” in Copenhagen April 2011. In its current form it is a translated and revised version of what came out of this paper, namely a chapter called Drømmesyn (“Dream-sight”) in my PhD-dissertation, Troens Øjeblik (Solten: 2014, 137–153). 2 Grundtvig read the text aloud during his service on Christmas morning this year (Thaning: 1963, 69). The hymn was published in 1830 in Grundtvig’s Christelige Prædikener eller Søndagsbogen III (Grundtvig: 1860). 3 For a more detailed bibliographical insight, see Solten: 2014, 137; 306.

 

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own time and also, as St Augustine points out, figures time (Conf. XI, 28–31). What happens then when the hymn ends? The Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben calls attention to exactly this aspect of the hymn or the poem – that eventually it will come to an end (Agamben: 2003, 46–47).4 According to Agamben the poem can be understood as a temporal phenomenon or a kind of machina, which from the moment it gets going, strives towards its own end (Agamben: 2005, 82). Thus, the poem has a ‘build-in’ eschatology. But at the same time the poem shows reluctance or resistance against its own going towards the end. This reluctance has to do with the very nature of the poem, since the specific poetic means such as riming and metrics strive towards establishing a time of fullness in the poem, a time of its own. This Agamben designates the messianic time of the poem (2005, 79). Agamben therefore suggests that the enjambment is the constituent of poetry, since the possibility of letting meaning ‘flow over’ the limits of the lines, and hereby letting metrics challenge syntax, is an advantage poetry has (in contrast) to prose, where syntax constitutes the linguistic units, marked by punctuation. As long as there is (possibility of) enjambment, there is poetry, seems to be Agamben’s argument (Agamben: 2003, 45). This leads him to the question of the ending of the poem: At the point where the poem comes to full stop, the hesitation or displacement between sound and meaning is impeded. This means that when metrics and syntax thus coincide, poetry turns into prose. According to Agamben’s somewhat radical argument this means that the last stanza is actually not a stanza (ibid.). Ways in which the poem can cope with the prospect of its own falling apart, are pointing back at its own beginning or dissolving in some kind of anti-ending, e. g. by performing a break in style or some other kind of deviance from the previous (Ringgaard: 2003, 51). The aim of the following is to present some ways in which Grundtvig’s hymn “Velkommen igien Guds Engle smaa” copes with the problem of ending. I do not, however, take my point of departure in the metrics or prosody of the hymn; instead Agamben’s considerations on the ending of the poem are placed in the broader context of the hymn and the ones singing it. The length of a hymn must suit the context or rhetorical situation of the hymn which is the service. Although the opinion of what is a suitable hymn-length, has varied over time, the very circumstance that the hymn forms part of a larger context (the sermon) necessitates that it comes to an end to give room for other liturgical parts of the service. At the same time, the hymn relates to not only these other different parts of service (by referring for instance to the Lords’ Supper or Scripture), Grundtvig’s hymns 4 Agamben’s thought on the ending of the poem involves reflections upon metrics and enjambment which are not taken into consideration in this article, which has considerations upon the ending of the hymn as text and as liturgical element as its focal point.

 

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also often relate very directly to the life and experiences of the ones singing, as it is the case in “Velkommen igien”. In this way words and meaning of the hymn effect not only the actual service going on, but broaden the context so that the hymn encompasses human life, both in its specificity and as it develops as part of salvation history. Thereby the time of the hymn itself is prolonged. Alongside with the eschatological aspect or time of the poem, Agamben emphasizes the messianic time of the poem: As long as it goes on, as someone reads it, it has an unmistakeably temporality, it has its own time, and expresses the fullness of time. The rhymes give weight to the words in a way that establishes and secures this temporality (Agamben: 2005, 79).5 Agamben focuses on the sestina or sonnet. “Velkommen igien” surely is not a sonnet, one can, however, identify a route through the hymn, provided not by a sonnet form, but by the use of imagery, by which one stanza leads over to the next. Perspectives such as these give rise to the following considerations on the time and place for the ending of the hymn.

2.

The text6

Velkommen igien, Guds Engle smaa, Fra høie Himmel-Sale, Med deilige Solskins-Klæder paa, I Jordens Skygge-Dale! Trods klingrende Frost godt Aar I spaae For Fugl og Sæd i Dvale!

Willkommen, du liebe Engelschar, aus hohem Himmelssaale mit Kleidern aus Sonnenschein so klar im finstern Erdentale! Trotz klirrendem Frost ein gutes Jahr ihr bringt für Felder kahle!

Velmødt under Sky paa Kirke-Sti, Paa Sne ved Midnats-Tide! Udbære vor Jul ei nænner I, Derpaa tør vi nok lide,

Willkommen zur Mitternacht allhier im Schnee auf Kirchenpfade! Die Freude der Weihnacht bringet ihr, wo immer man euch lade.

5 Agamben suggests that the rhyme as a poetic expression for messianic time is left to modern poetry by St Paul (Agamben: 2005, 87): “rhyme issues from Christian poetry as a metrical-linguistic transcodification of messianic time and is structured according to the play of typological relations and recapitulations evoked by Paul” (Agamben: 2005, 85). 6 I make use of a German translation of the hymn (“Willkommen, du liebe Engelschar”, Grundtvig: 2010, 173–175), which comes very close to the meaning of the Danish hymn. There are admittedly – and inevitably will be – several philological and poetic differences between the Danish text and the German. It is not the scope, however, of this article to point out the differences between the Danish text and the translation, although the question to which degree a translation is also an interpretation is very relevant and points at some very important discussions of the interconnection between the use of the mother tongue and, not least, the understanding of poetic language and also of the theological implications of the linguistic or poetic nuances.

 

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O ganger dog ei vor Dør forbi, Os volder ei den Kvide!

O geht nicht vorbei an unsrer Tür, o gönnet uns die Gnade!

Vor hytte er lav og saa vor Dør, Kun Armod er derinde, Men giæstet I har en Hytte før, Det drages vi til Minde, Er Kruset af Leer og Kagen tør, Deri sig Engle finde!

Die Hütte ist eng, wo ihr euch schart, in unsren armen Tagen. Ihr früher schon Hüttengäste wart, das ließen wir uns sagen. Ob irden der Krug, der Kuchen hart, das werdet ihr ertragen.

Med venlige Øine himmelblaa, I Vugger og i Senge, Vi Rollinger har i hver en Vraa, Som Blomster groe i Enge; O, synger for dem, som Lærker slaae, Som hørt de har ei længe!

Mit freundlichen Augen himmelblau die kleinen Kinder liegen wie Blumen, die wachsen auf der Au, o singt an ihren Wiegen, ja singt, wie im Lenz die Lerchen grau, die allzu lange schwiegen!

Saa drømme de sødt om Bethlehem, Da schlafen sie süß und sehn im Traum, Og er det end forblommet, dem dunklen und doch wahren, De drømme dog sandt om Barnets Hjem, das Bethlehemskind im Krippenraum, Som laae i Krybbe-Rummet, wie sie von euch erfahren; I Drømme de lege Jul med dem, da tanzen sie um den Weihnachtsbaum Hvis Sang de har fornummet! mit euch, ihr Engelscharen! Da vaagne de mildt i Morgen-Gry, Da wachen sie morgens auf voll Freud Og tælle meer ei Timer, und zählen nicht mehr Stunden; Da nynne de Jule-Sang paany, da summen sie Lieder, die erneut Der sig med Hjertet rimer, dem Herzen sind verbunden; Da klinger det sødt fra Morgen-Sky, da Glocken mit lieblichem Geläut Naar Kirke-Klokken kimer! das Weihnachtsfest bekunden. Da vandre Guds Engle op og ned Die Stufen der Töne steigen dort Paa Psalmens Tone-Stige, die Engel auf und nieder. Da siger vor Herre Selv “Guds Fred” Uns bringen sie Gottes Friedenswort Til dem, den efterhige, und ihm die Lobeslieder. Da aabner sig Himlens Borge-Led, Da öffnet sich Gottes Himmelspfort, Da kommer ret Guds Rige! da recht sein Reich kommt wieder! — — O, maatte vi kun den Glæde see, O dürfen wir nur die Freude sehn Før vore Øine lukkes! vor unsrem letzten Schlummer, Da skal, som en Barne-Moders Vee, dann schwindet der Schmerz, wie Mutterwehn,

 

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Vor Smerte sødt bortvugges! Vor Fader i Himlen! lad det skee! Lad Jule-Sorgen slukkes! (Grundtvig: 1944, 405–406)

3.

beim Wiegenlied im Schummer! Lass, Vater im Himmel, dies geschehn! Wieg fort den Weihnachtskummer! (Grundtvig: 2010, 173–175)

Paraphrase

To understand how the last stanzas (7 and 8) work in context with the whole hymn, a paraphrase is required. The three first stanzas of the hymn perform an impressive zoom, moving from the angels descending from the high halls of heaven, taking ground on the church path, and entering into the modest earthly homes. The first stanza is thus a greeting expressed by the singing congregation, who are welcoming the angels once again to the earthly spheres. The imagery is telling, and the vision it provides is rhetorically reinforced by onomatopoiesis (klingrende Frost/ klirrendem Frost) and a direct speech form, leading to the impression that this event is actually taking place right now. The third stanza describes the lowly conditions of the earthly houses. Here, things seemingly couldn’t be more miserable. But as a dawning fulfilment of the angels’ promise (see stanza 1:5–6) something beautiful shows up in the midst of poverty in the figure of sleeping children tugged away in cradles and cots (stanza 4). The eyes of the children are supposedly closed, given that they are asleep, yet we are told that they are blue mirroring the color of the sky, which can be seen as a sure sign of promised life (Toldberg: 1950, 115ff). Realizing that Christmas will only come round via the childish minds, the adults implore the angels to sing to the children. Through the dreamy vision of the children the perspective of the song is now broadened, and the dream becomes the point of contact between the present (represented by the song itself) and the Birth of Christ, the historic event marking the beginning (or renewal) of salvation history (stanza 5). As a result of the nightly vision an almost symbiotic connection is made between the angel song and the tune breaking through on the lips of the children as they awake, and the sound of the pealing church bell merges with this song. Stanza 6 thus indicates, that there was a time before, when the expression of the song and the content of the heart were in concordance. This was the case at the time of Creation, were man, according to Grundtvig, spoke a poetic word (Grundtvig: 1817, 266), and this was also the case on the night when Christ was born and the angels sang the alleluia, announcing how fear was to be replaced by joy (Luke 2:14). The dream vision thus opens towards a future moment where the heart and the hymn will once again concord. The movement which the hymn points out, indicates transformation of time and space in different ways: from heaven to earth, between presence, past and future,

 

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from an adolescent to a childish state of mind, from outer to inner, from night to morning. These movements are gathered in the vision of the child in the crib, both as a past event, a nightly vision and a present realization of faith and hope being born in the heart of the believer. From here the future approaches: morning breaks, the church bell chimes to announce and call for Christ-Mass, and eschatos finally becomes manifests in a mighty vision (stanza 7). The hymn thus shows a clear V-structure (Helweg: 1978), revealing coherence between the stanzas 1 and 7, 2 and 6, 3 and 5: 1 7 2 6 3 5 4 The text thus reflects the movement of the angels and the way that the inhabitants in the earthly spheres are awakened and moved towards the heavenly spheres and divine reality. The movement from the high halls (stanza 1) to the gate to heaven (stanza 7) is emphasized by the way that the prediction of natures’ reawakening and the good harvest fulfil in the eschatological envisioning of the kingdom of God. Between stanzas 2 and 6 time runs from midnight till early morning. That the angels have succeeded in bringing the Christmas tidings into the small cabins shows in the fact that the song breaks through as a sign of the superiority of joy over anxiety. In stanza 2 the angels’ descent marks the movement from heaven to earth (the church path), as a response to this, in stanza 6 the sound of the church bell moves towards the sky, almost as an announcement of ‘mission accomplished’. The parallel between stanza 3 and 5 accentuates the comparison between the poor homes and the shed where Christ was born. At the same time the two important figures of cognition, the dream and the memory (Balslev-Clausen: 1988, 9f; 1991: 34ff), are associated and pointed out as ‘means of access’ to understanding incarnation and drawing it near as reality instead of it being at a distance as either long time past historical event or as hard to believe dogma. Not only the hovels but also the entrance is described as low (stanza 3). This is a symbol of a limited human condition in terms of understanding and accommodating to Gods’ intervention in the world (Holm: 2009, 182). The angels’ entry into the earthly spheres therefore is a prolepsis of man’s entrance through the gate of Heavens (as sign of gaining citizenship or membership, cf. Phil 3:21). Stanza 4 makes up the tip of the V: At this point where man ‘lowers’ himself the most, acknowledging that true humanity is child-like, human mind is opened to divine reality and immediately after (in stanza 5) it shows how child-like is equivalent to Christ-like. The tip of the ‘V’ is the turning point, which enables the subsequent ascending movement. The way or order of the hymn is becoming (like) a

 

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child again (Mk 10:15; Thodberg: 1989, 65ff). The point of departure of the epiphany in stanza 7 is therefore actually this stanza where human poverty or lowliness is revealed as entrance for divine reality and will. The biblical background for the summer scenario with images of flowering fields and larks’ song is Matt 5:26–30 with its proclamation of freedom from worry. The stanza also underlines the belief that in the earthly sphere there are traces of the divine. The light and the colours in this stanza show as reflections of divine reality: the sunny garments of the angels, the children’s eyes mirroring the sky and the light that breaks through at dawn.

4.

The birds of Paradise

In this hymn it seems as if images reveal or open into each other as a nest of Chinese boxes: the images in one stanza give rise to both scenery and scenario which follow. Equivalent to this, the sound of the hymn (the singing) itself is reinforced by the sound images. The angel song and lark song in stanza 3 thus point back towards stanza 1 (the birds who will, implied in the prophecy, sing again) and forth towards stanza 7 (the unison song of angels and humans). The real sound of the hymn is extended by an imaginary sound level, this points at how man must release his ‘bird nature’ (Toldberg: 1950, 121), which means expressing himself as human before God in a soulful manner through song. Hereby a very dominant and important motive in Grundtvigs’ hymn-poetry, man as bird, is thus portrayed. Taking his point of departure in an 1842 sermon of Grundtvig, Allchin describes the poetic-theological significance of the angels in Grundtvig’s writing (Allchin: 1997, 297ff). Despite the fact that there are almost two decades between the hymn and the sermon, Allchins’ descpription fits the hymn rather well: “To recover and revive that childlike faith in the nearness of heaven and earth can never be an easy thing. For Grundtvig […] it is intimately bound up with the whole possibility of belief in the incarnation” (Allchin: 1997, 298). Allchin further notices how Grundtvig’s talk of angels always has an eschatological element. Emphasizing the influence from Byzantine liturgical theology on Grundtvig, Allchin states that the high impact on Eucharist (thanksgiving) and Doxology (praise) in the Danish church service owe much to Grundtvig’s hymns: “In this work of preparation the angels have their part, in visiting us, and lifting up our feeble prayer and uniting it with theirs, so that the Church’s liturgy becomes a real participation in the celestial liturgy, a foretaste of the life of Heaven” (ibid., 299). Most importantly, Allchin notes how Grundtvigs’ angelic references always have Christological determination (ibid.). This is of course very clear in the Christmas hymns and thus also in “Velkommen igien”, where the role of the angels as mediators between heaven and earth serves to draw man near to Christ.

 

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The predominant figurations of angels in both the beginning and by the end of the hymn indicates a connection between Paradise lost and regained, although the Kingdom of God is not yet completely fulfilled. For the time being it shows only on the limits or interface of the text: e. g. in the transition from stanzas 7 to 8 and depicted as dream vision (stanza 5).

5.

Adventus – the grammatical time of the final stanzas

In stanzas 5 and 6 a grammatical change occurs. Saa (meaning “then” or “so”) in stanza 5 indicates something happening as a consequence or in succession with the preceding. In stanza 6 three times Da (meaning “then”) indicates futurity and in stanza 7 this time perspective is accentuated by four times Da, emphasizing the anticipatory character of the depicted.7 The expression “Psalmens Tone-Stige” is central. Tone-Stige is the gamut or scale of the angels’ song, literally meaning a “ladder of tones”. By use of this expression Grundtvig in a very concise, yet poetic, way illustrates the idea from the Early (Eastern) Church that in the song of praise during worship a temporarily connection is established and a certain form of interaction is taking place between heaven and earth. The motive is therefore also a reference to Gen 28:17, Jacob’s dream at the place he ends up calling Bethel meaning “House of God”. The image of a ladder making access from Earth to Heaven is combined with the description of the Gate to Heaven marking the point where one gains citizenship or membership (Phil 3:20) and the imagery thus is strongly directed towards future events. Drawing on Gen 28 the depiction also has a present time perspective in the sense that there is an analogy between Jacobs’ stone and worship (Gen 28:22) and the rhetorical situation which underlies the hymn: the actual service where the hymn is now being sung. Alongside these biblical motives the Greeting of Peace is presented as a word coming from the Lord himself (Guds Fred, meaning “God’s peace”, occurs as a quotation). Now is the time to ask the question, what becomes of stanza 8 in relation to this construction of a V-structure in the hymn? Doesn’t it just take out the air of the balloon and explode the grand vision, which was conjured up in the previous sequences?

7 In the German translation the repetitive use of ‘Da’ is not as conspicuous, since we have here only to times ‘Da’ and one ‘dort’ (ending the first line).

 

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6.

Nunc movens and nunc stans

The depiction of the Kingdom of God in stanza 7 is very clear and because of the indicative mode, in this stanza and also the prevoious ones (5 and 6) the reader becomes convinced that this will be so. Stanza 7 concludes with words imitating the Lords Prayer: “Da kommer ret Guds Rige!” (“da recht sein Reich kommt wieder”) and this thus seem to have conclusive character. By being an imitation of words from the Lords Prayer this exclamation, as convincing as it may be, points towards a not so convinced state, expressed through the subjunctive mode (optative) of the next stanza. The line between stanzas 7 and 8 then marks this transition from the indicative to the subjunctive mode and in a sense functions as a membrane through which the two conceptions of time in relation to salvation (the ‘already’ and the ‘not yet’) can diffuse. And it becomes clearer how one scenario only comes clear through the other. That the joyful state is pre-empted also shows in the way that the 8th stanza breaks with the pattern made up by the repetitive and gradually enforced use of Da in the previous stanzas,8 where these Da’s enforced the image of the ladder building up to a kind of apotheosis (Malling: 1966, 107). As much as this resembles the romantic notion of man rising himself to the divine by the powers of his own imagination, it also involves and depends upon the opposite movement (Kjærgaard: 2002, 103): Mans striving and longing for the union with God is expressed in terms of memories, dreams and visions, and can be realized only as a coming (adventus). The one Da which remains in stanza 8 marks the point where anguish and fear is taken over by joy and relief. A poetic representation of time such as this could give rise to further considerations upon a metaphorical speaking of time as something moving forwards, something going and moving as counterpart to the idea that man moves forward or strives through time (where time accordingly must be still or perhaps even moving to the rear in order for the human movement to actually be going forward).9 Stanza 8 breaks the triumphant scenery by focusing on the present moment, which is placed between promise and final redemption and hereby marks hope as a balancing point between the anabatic and katabatic movement, which characterizes divine service, both as churchly business and as form of life. The dash line between the last two stanzas bears poetic-theological meaning as marker of transcendence in several ways. The prayer to be able to see, in accordance with the dreamy visions of the children, emphasizes how cognition of faith neither depends on an act of intellect or will, but demands the intervention of the divine. The angels represent such an intervention. At the same time the blue col8 Stevns notices that the hymn really should be read backwards, a remark which underscores the shuttling consciousness of time in the hymn (1950, 49). 9 Cf. Currie: 2013, 26–27, for such reflections.

 

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our of the children’s eyes and the emphasis given to hymn singing indicates predispositions in man that the divine can connect to. In this way Incarnation is laid out not in terms of dogmatic, but of poetry and hereby it is connected to both the existential and religious levels of experience (joy, anxiety, hope) and to the actions of divine service (hymn singing and prayer). All of these, poetic presentation, religious experience and divine praxis are expressions of transcendence and reflect different dimensions of the same reality.

7.

Hymn and prayer

Himlens Borge-Led (“The Gate of Heaven”) can be seen as a reference to Phil 3:20.10 On this background and in relation to the scenery with the exalted Saviour (stanza 7:3–4, and Phil 2:9–11) the anxiety which marks the transition from stanza 7 to 8 must be described by the word pair fear and trembling (Phil 2:12), which was later so thoroughly considered by Kierkegaard. What is the singing congregation to make of themselves in a state of fear and trembling? This is a fragile and very atypical state for a hymn to end in. In the centre of the last stanza comes a reference to John 16:21 saying that this pain shall be lulled away like the birth pains of the woman in labour. This part of the Gospel concerns the time from Jesus dies until his return and especially deals with the reversal, which will take place from sorrow and pain to joy. Jesus admonishes his disciples to pray in His name, they will be given everything they ask for and this will complete their joy (John 16: 23–24). This biblical perspective makes it understandable that prayer must burst out in the hymn. The final words of the stanza “Vor Fader i Himlen! lad det skee! / Lad Jule-Sorgen slukkes!” (“Lass, Vater im Himmel, dies geschehn! / Wieg fort den Weihnachtskummer!”) thus mimic words from the Lord’s Prayer (Matt 6: 9–10): Vor Fader, du som er i himlene! helliget vorde dit navn; komme dit rige; ske din villie, som i himlene, saa og paa jorden.11

10 ἡμῶν γὰρ τὸ πολίτευμα ἐν οὐρανοῖς ὑπάρχει ἐξ οὗ καὶ σωτῆρα ἀπεκδεχόμεθα κύριον Ἰησοῦν Χριστόν. In the King James Bible, πολίτευμα is translated to “conversation”, in the Danish Bible Grundtvig used as in later Danish (and English) translations it says “citizenship” (borgerskab). 11 “Our Father which art in heaven, / Hallowed be thy name. / Thy kingdom come. / Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.”

 

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Following Bakhtin (2000, 94f)12 I here understand the hymn as a secondary or complex genre, which incorporates a primary genre or speech act, namely that of prayer: “Vor Fader i Himlen! lad det skee! / Lad Jule-Sorgen slukkes!” (“Lass, Vater im Himmel, dies geschehn! / Wieg fort den Weihnachtskummer!”). The prayer thus appears in the hymn, at least to some extend, detached or disconnected from its known generic contexts (or, with Bakhtin, the secondary genres) namely gospel (as a literary genre) and church service (as a rhetorical or liturgical genre). The recontextualization of the prayer into the hymn thus can be perceived as a rewritten or poeticized form of the prayer of the Gospel but at the same time, since hymn singing is a liturgical act, the Church service is stressed as the rhetorical situation that the prayer belongs to. In contrast to the Gospel (Matt 6:9) where the act of prayer is presented as possibility, in the hymn it seems almost as if the prayer arises from an urgent need on basis of the poetic presentation. As the prayer arises exactly between the presentation of the child in the crib in the children’s dreams and the eschatological vision of the Saviour at the end of the ladder, the Lord’s Prayer shows itself as a present possibility to hold together the first and the second coming of Christ as two poles of salvation history. The presence of the prayer thus gives the hymn a strong expression of hope. This, on one hand, emphasizes a distance to the eschatological events but, on the other hand, it functions as remedy against the anxiety and worry caused by this distance. The inscribing of the prayer thus in a sense expands the hymn’s range of competence and brings it in closer dialogue with the other actions (genres) of the church service and the Christian life as a whole. The hymn does not transform or turn into another genre by including the prayer element, though. At the contrary, the expressing of the words, which are so close to the well-known prayer strengthens the experience of belonging to the congregation or, to speak in the theo-poetical language of the hymn, of being children of God. Since the wording resembles but is not an accurate reproduction of the Lord’s Prayer, both the rhetorical and the poetic characteristics of the hymn are maintained, and the hymn itself (as genre) functions as a link between religious imagination and acts of faith (praying and singing). Grundtvig insisted on the antithetic structure of human existence, polarised between life and death (Høirup: 1954). “Velkommen igien” is literally stretched out between the discrepancy of joy and sorrow. To Grundtvig these phenomena

12 Bakhtin distinguishes between primary (simple) and secondary (complex or composite) forms of genres. Primary genres are forms of speech, which cannot be broken down into other genres, for instance a greeting such as “hello”. Most genres are secondary genres though, which means they are made up of two or more genres, for example a telephone conversation beginning with “hello”.

 

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are not somewhat superficial emotions, but expressions of experience, of being either saved or lost. Therefore, in this hymn the reality of sorrow, the possibility a broken or unfulfilled hope, is maintained.

8.

One more time!

At the point where man recognizes himself as a finite and limited creature it becomes crucial for him that future shows as something that approaches, as advent. As Kermode points out, it is only in light of the final understanding, that prior events will make sense (Kermode: 1967, 7). Whether it is being read or sung, the hymn moves forward towards the kind of gnosis that only a final perspective provides. But what is to be done – now – when this final understanding shows as provision, as a not yet realized event and thus must be expressed in the optative mode? There is need for a movement that may stabilize or restrain this state of fear and trembling, a movement that will actually be able to unfold the relation between memory and expectation. The poetic representation of the hymn makes it clear that it is of utmost importance for man to be able to relate to incarnation as more than a long past (and thus no more accessible) event. In this way the hymn shows itself a genre strongly related to the movement of repetition. The last two stanzas reflect the mutual evoking of the visionary and the hopeful state. The tension brought forth by the final stanzas is in that sense not dissolved but the hymn does hint at a way of coping with this tension, a way that has to do with the hymnal genre and the rhetorical situation to which it belongs. Let us go back to the beginning of the hymn: the very first words are “Velkommen igien” – “Welcome again”. From the very beginning the hymn thus seems to deal with the uneasy movement of the ending, by incorporating it in and thus stabilizing it by a larger, repetitive movement, which is that of the churchly celebration of the Saviour’s birth. The special moment, the grand vision, which is the focal point of the hymn, is thus kept in the horizon at the same time as it is connected to the repetitive movement of the service and the church year. Advent is a time of expectation and is thus both a joyous and anxious time. The structure of the hymn is both poetic and theological. That the historical circumstances relate to human existence is showed in the way that the Messiah-interpretations and the covenantal signs of the New Testament are mirrored in common human experiences of how death and life, sorrow or pain and joy are related. In this way the hymn can be said to be a poetic representation or figuration of the words of the Psalm: Sing unto the Lord, o ye saints of his, and give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness. For his anger endureth but a moment; in his favour is life: weeping

 

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may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. And in my prosperity I said, I shall never be moved (Ps 30: 4–6). Grundtvig’s hymn shows how consolation lies exactly in ‘being moved’.

9.

The ending of the hymn

Through ‘anamnestic’, dreamy and visionary figurations the reader of this hymn is brought to see Christ and through him oneself in ones relation to him, as a believer with a childlike mind, as a brother who can pray in His name and finally as a future citizen in the Kingdom of God. The hymn thus displays the coming of Christ in its three modes: his birth in Bethlehem, his birth in the hearts of the believers and his coming at eschatos as the last event realizing his kingdom. The reader (or singer) and her earthly surroundings are thus inscribed in the imagery of the Bible and poetical language of the hymn in such a way that the hymn challenges the readers understanding of her own identity and understanding of the world. This challenge also comes from the conception of time that the hymn unfolds. At the same time the reader is in medias res and held at a distance. Because of the meta-reflection that comes of the feeling of not yet belonging in the scenery of stanza 7, stanza 8 not only stands out as an expression of hope but also of homelessness or a kind of alienation.13 When Grundtvig speaks of the Christmas sorrow (Jule-Sorgen/Weihnachtskummer) in the hymn, he contextualizes this feeling very strongly within the framing of salvation history, church history and church service. Articulating the unease does not dissolve it though. Anxiety only seems even more insistent in the articulation of the hope to be able to see different, to see more.

10. A little while14 Despite the strong orientation the hymn has towards both past and future, the point of departure is the present now. Stanzas 1 and 8 are identical with the time of the ones singing, the hymn thus begins and ends at the point from where the readers orientate themselves. The final words of the hymn “O maatte vi kun den Glæde / see før vore Øine lukkes” (“O dürfen wir nur die Freude sehn / vor unsrem letzten Schlummer”) 13 Thodberg (1969) has written of the classical motives of homecoming in Grundtvig’s hymns and demonstrated their relation to religious acts such as prayer, blessing and baptism. In this way, I believe, he has shown how these motives function as poetic-theological defence against the fear of perdition. 14 John 16:16.

 

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underscore Kermode’s point, that death is the final sanction of the knowledge of every storyteller and thereby every life. The story of human life in both ends is lost in the dark or invisibility; man himself thus cannot account for either beginning or the end. Man is born and dies in medias res (Kermode: 1967, 7). As Ricœur explains through his threefold mimesis, an important aspect of the second mimesis, the configuration, is how it mediates between time as bound to existence, and cosmic time: To follow a story is to move forward in the midst of contingencies and peripeteia under the guidance of an expectation that finds its fulfilment in the ‘conclusion’ of the story. […] To understand a story is to understand how and why the successive episodes led to this conclusion, which far from being foreseeable, must finally be acceptable, as congruent with the episodes brought together by the story (Ricœur: 1984, 66f).

Ricœur in this way points at how the building up of a story (or the reading of it) is equivalent to the existential experience of being ‘in between’: The story as configuration has a centre, in the same way the ‘now’ of reading makes up a centre for the hermeneutic understanding of our existence (Frederiksen: 2008, 139). This is the point where memory, present attention and expectation are bound together. In this way the text (or the reading of it) reflects human time (Ricœur: 1984, 67). The hymn reflects exactly this kind of simultaneous restraining (in memory) of what has already happened and a forward striving movement, also it describes how human experience of time can be in conflict with the longing for the harmonious telos. According to Ricœur, the Old Testament Psalms is a genre, in which God’s hiddenness is truly acknowledged. In his essay on the hermeneutic of the idea of revelation (Ricœur: 1980), he explains how the relation between I and you (in Buber’s sense) truly is constituted in these texts, especially in the psalms of prayer. The Psalms belong to the wisdom literature, which recognizes God as a hidden god. The revelatory character of the Psalms seems to lie in the constellation of or the passing though the ‘I’ the ‘You’ and the ‘He’, by which the psalm seeks to encircle the source of revelation (Ricœur: 1980, 90). Overcoming feelings is what Ricœur sees as the theme of the Psalms; by way of the poetic representation religious feeling is transformed to religious recognition. In line with these thoughts Grundtvig’s hymn can be seen as a circling about the indirect representation of the meeting or union with God. The revelatory force of the hymn thus lies not as much in what it says or shows, as in the feelings it discloses, feelings which are shaped in accordance with that which the hymn addresses (Ricœur: 1980, 90).

 

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11. Repetition as the movement towards the decisive moment In the light of the philosophical hermeneutics of Ricœur, Damgaard writes of Kierkegaards focus on possibility as the platform for formation (dannelse): The future lies indecisive and unpredictable in front of us, and the only thing we can do is to shape it in the image of our expectations or fears. The way we see the future reveals who we are (Damgaard: 2005, 99f). In the hymn the contours of the nearing or possible salvation is seen as Christlike images in memories, dreams and visionary sight. The ones singing mirror themselves in the reflections of Christ, they are Christians in becoming, or in growth (vækst) to use Grundtvig’s own term. The only way to foresee salvation for man is by articulating the hope of the fulfilment of vision and of time itself. To make the expression of this hope as strong as possible the hymn makes use of the prayer-genre, providing the reader or the singer the opportunity of asking to be able to see that which is made foreseeable through the outline of the hymn or its poetic representation, namely the eschatological events, but which in a religious sense is by no means foreseeable. The poetic representation thus can be described as an opener of the eyes of faith.

Bibliography Allchin, Arthur M. (1997), N.F.S. Grundtvig. An Introduction to his Life and Work, Aarhus: Aarhus Universitetsforlag. Agamben, Giorgio (2003), Digtets Slutning, in Stefan Iversen/Henrik Skov Nielsen/Dan Ringgard (ed.), Ophold – Giorgio Agambens Litteraturfilosofi, København: Akademisk Forlag, 42–48. Agamben, Giorgio (2005), The Time that Remains. A Commentary on the Letter to the Romans, California: Stanford University Press. Augustine, Aurelius (1988–89), Confessions (trans. William Watts), London: Heinemann. Bakhtin, Mikhail M. (2000), The Problem of Speech Genres, in David Duff (ed.), Modern Genre Theory, London: Longman. Balslev-Clausen, Peter (1988), Motiv og Struktur. Studier i N.F.S. Grundtvigs Salmedigtning, (Ph.D.-Dissertation), København: Københavns Universitet. Balslev-Clausen, Peter (1991), Det Vingede Ord. Om N.F.S. Grundtvigs Salmedigtning, Frederiksberg: Materialecentralen. Currie, Mark (2013), The Unexpected. Narrative Temporality and the Philosophy of Surprise, Edingburgh: Edingburgh University Press. Damgaard, Iben (2005), Mulighedens Spejl. Forestilling, fortælling og selvforhold hos Kierkegaard og Ricœur (Ph.D.-Dissertation), København: Det Teologiske Fakultet. Frederiksen, Karen (2008), Tid, Fortælling og Subjekt (Ph.D.-Dissertation), Aarhus: Aarhus Universitet. Grundtvig, Nikolai F.S. (1817), Om Aabenbaring, Kunst og Vidskab, in Nikolai F.S. Grundtvig, Danne-Virke III, København: A. Schmidts Forlag, 201–298.

 

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Grundtvig, Nikolai F.S. (1860), Christelige Prædikener eller Søndags-Bog af Nik. Fred. Sev. Grundtvig III (2nd ed.), København: Schønberg. Grundtvig, Nikolai F.S. (1944), Grundtvigs Sang-Værk I, København: Det danske Forlag. Grundtvig, Nikolai F.S. (2010), Schriften in Auswahl (ed. Knud E. Bugge/Theodor Jørgensen/ Flemming Lundgreen-Nielsen), Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Helweg, Lise (1978), Til Glæde for Graad – Om V-strukturen i Grundtvigs “håbssalme”, in Christian Thodberg (ed.), For Sammenhængens Skyld, Aarhus: Aarhus Universitet, 247–259. Holm, Anders (2009), To Samtidige. Kierkegaards og Grundtvigs kritik af hinanden, København: Anis. Johansen, Steen (1948–54), Bibliografi over Grundtvigs Skrifter I–IV, København: Gyldendalske Boghandel/Nordisk Forlag. Høirup, Henning (1954), Fra Døden til Livet. Grundtvigs Tanker om Liv og Død, København: Gyldendal. Kermode, Frank (1967), The Sense of an Ending. Studies in the Theory of Fiction, New York: Oxford University Press. Kjærgaard, Jørgen (2002), Dansk Salmehåndbog II, København: Det Kgl. Vajsenhus’ Forlag. Lundgreen-Nielsen, Flemming (1980): Det handlende ord. N.F.S. Grundtvigs digtning, litteraturkritik og poetik 1798–1819, København: Gad. Malling, Anders (1966), Dansk Salmehistorie, vol. V, København: J.H. Schultz. Ricœur, Paul (1980) Towards a Hermeneutic of the Idea of Revelation (trans. David Pellauer), in Lewis S. Mudge (ed.), Paul Ricœur. Essays on Biblical Interpretation, Chicago: Fortress Press. Ricœur, Paul (1984), Time and Narrative I, trans. McLaughlin/Pellauer, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Ricœur, Paul (1988), Time and Narrative III (trans. Kathleen Blamey/David Pellauer), Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Ringgaard, Dan (2003), Enjambementer. Udkast til en metrets filosofi, in Stefan Iversen/Henrik Skov Nielsen/Dan Ringaard (ed.), Ophold – Giorgio Agambens litteraturfilosofi, København: Akademisk Forlag, 49–67. Solten, Therese B. (2014), Troens øjeblik. Et tematisk, hermeneutisk og genreteoretisk studie i N.F.S. Grundtvigs salmer (Ph.D.-Dissertation), København: Københavns Universitet. Stevns, Magnus (1950), Fra Grundtvigs Salmeværksted, Høirup/Johansen (ed.), København: Gyldendalske Boghandel, Nordisk Forlag. Thodberg, Christian (1989), Syn og sang, poesi og teologi hos Grundtvig, København: Gad. Toldberg, Helge (1950), Grundtvigs Symbolverden, København: Gyldendal.

 

Christine Helmer

To Refer or Not to Refer, That is the Question1

1.

Introduction

In Shakespeare’s tragedy Hamlet the Prince of Denmark opens act III with some of the most memorable words in the history of English theatre. “To be, or not to be; that is the question”, Hamlet muses as he paces the stage, contemplating the absurd meaning of life and his own eventual suicide. The question regarding personal existence, whether contingent or necessary, whether chosen or given, is posed in the face of the tragedy that awaits every hero. The story unravels when contingent circumstances, unfortunate choices, personality traits, and impetuous desires, confront the law of fate that acknowledges no individual. The hero finally has his eyes opened, but only at the moment preceding his own death. It is fate that inexorably accompanies the hero to his violent deathbed, but only apparent when it has achieved its end. Although I will not dwell much longer on Hamlet – I introduce this chapter with a gesture to the conference in Copenhagen from Oct. 2012 for which I wrote an original version of this paper – except to say that the cited sentence from act III, scene 1, is, in a slightly revised form, a fitting comment on the central question occupying my reflections on the function of language in relation to reality. The role of language, as Martin Luther and Martin Heidegger, although in different ways have taught us, is its role in rendering aspects of reality visible as well as its opposite, concealing aspects of reality. To refer again to prince Hamlet, who incidentally is reported to have studied in Luther’s Wittenberg, his eyes are opened only when Laertes tells him that his uncle Claudius is actually responsible for Hamlet’s father’s death. The insidious murder that has silently driven the entire drama perpetuating Hamlet’s unravelling is finally brought to light by a judgment uttered by the dying Laertes: “[T]he king, the king’s to blame” (act V, scene 2). The moment 1 I am grateful to the EURIAS (European Institutes of Advanced Study) foundation, specifically the Helsinki Collegium of Advanced Studies in Helsinki, Finland, for generous funding during 2012–13 that facilitated the writing of this article.

 

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of truth is reached when language pronounces the judgment. The reality hidden all along, although present, is made visible by speech. Word is the bearer of revelation, the tragedy is that the hearer must die when he sees. This article addresses the topic of language in relation to reality. I will not treat the topic from phenomenological perspective, although the topic lends itself nicely to phenomenological analysis on the disclosing and occluding function of language vis-à-vis the way reality appears to be seen. Rather, my intention is to raise the issue of the referential status of theological language in contemporary theology: Hence the reformulation of the famous beginning of Hamlet’s speech as the title of this paper, “To refer, or not to refer that is the question”. It is my contention that much of contemporary theology is characterized by a loss in the referent of theological language. God-talk in theology today has to do with the way Christian discourse functions, not with the way that talk actually refers to a deity who exists outside of human speech about God. This loss of referentiality, I contend, results in a theological normativity that has little room for theological novelty or the living God. My exploration of the topic will take the form of a discussion between “Luther” and “Schleiermacher”. I will show how contemporary theology constructs these two theologians for the specific purpose of isolating their respective positions on language. I show how on the surface the contemporary debate has situated Luther’s advocacy of the “external” word of God in opposition to Schleiermacher’s alleged position that renders word immanent in human self-consciousness. Yet the surface positioning betrays a conceptual framing of both Luther and Schleiermacher that has to do with the contemporary understanding of theology as Christian discourse. In the course of moving from surface to depth, I argue that both Luther’s position on the verbum externum and Schleiermacher’s take on religious self-consciousness are misunderstood. In conclusion I show that this double misunderstanding has to do with a position on doctrine that is frozen at the literary-linguistic level. So what is going on? To anticipate my argument, the main issue in question is the status of the word of God. Can God’s word be secured theologically as external to human hearing, transforming one’s status before God (coram deo) without being taken into the interiority of human self-consciousness? Can word be tied to doctrine in such a way as to underline the truth of doctrine that articulates who God is independently of the human community of Christian practitioners? The way in which the opposition between exteriority and interiority, between God’s word and human self-consciousness, is constructed by contemporary theology is the topic of this essay, then, as it reveals itself in the critical construal of Schleiermacher.

 

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2. Luther and Schleiermacher in contemporary theological discussion While Friedrich Schleiermacher is acknowledged as the father of modern theology, he appears in contemporary theology in contrast to the 16th century “founder” of the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther. The relation between the two is not favourable to Schleiermacher. The terms of disfavour uphold Luther for his insistence on the primacy of the word of God over human traditions. Indeed it is around this pairing that much contemporary Protestant theology pivots. The 16th century Protestant reformer is generally hailed as a “word of God theologian”, particularly by theologians determined to identify the one central theological insight of Luther’s Reformation theology. Contemporary German theologian Oswald Bayer, who is representative of this view, has written about Luther as champion of God’s word that is identified in the promise of forgiveness, which is concretely heard in scripture and the church’s liturgy.2 In North America, likewise, a particular line of Luther scholarship connects Luther’s emphasis on God’s word of law and gospel to doctrine. Rather than viewing Luther as champion of the word over church tradition, however, this group favours the study of a “Catholic Luther” who upholds the primacy of God’s word while also deploying a biblical hermeneutic that is conceptually consistent with the church creeds. The doctrines of Christ and Trinity are compatible with a high regard for God’s word that is communicated in scripture, preaching, and doctrine. Both perspectives on Luther – whether “word alone” or word in relation to scripture and tradition – concur on one common point. Both positions place their respective Luthers in opposition to Schleiermacher. Perhaps it was inevitable that Luther and Schleiermacher would be one day compared with each other and that this comparison would be taken as essential in marking two divergent strands of Protestant inheritance. Both were caught up in times of historical transition, when fundamental matters of family life, of political power and affiliation, and of the impact of new technologies were undergoing profound and disruptive transformation. Both were formed by the worlds they so deeply engaged. The Protestant Reformation of the 16th century is inconceivable without the person and work of Martin Luther; modern theology is likewise inconceivable without Schleiermacher. There are existential resonances between the two lives. Both were ordained ministers of the gospel; both were trained theologians. Both were born in the month of November and both died in the month of February. Both struggled against their parents’ ambitions for them and both found life partners at around age forty. Both were appointed early on in their 2 Bayer uses the term “bodily word” to connote the concrete and tangible speaking and hearing of God’s word in the worship service (cf. Bayer: 2011, 19).

 

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careers to introduce the study of theology at new universities, Luther by Frederick the Wise, elector of Saxony, to teach in Wittenberg, Schleiermacher by Wilhelm von Humboldt to whom the Prussian King Frederick William III had given responsibility for the founding of the University of Berlin as the major Prussian university after the loss of Halle to Napoleon in 1806. Both were staggeringly busy, adding to their theological professorships the tasks of preaching and the care of souls, and both were almost unthinkably productive given all these other responsibilities. And across the centuries that separated them, both were committed to a common theological cause: Christ’s incarnation as having introduced the new reality of redemption into human history. Through the interest of these two German theologians, the history of Western Christian theology, if not also the history of Western Christianity, was changed. It can of course be debated whether or not Luther represents the theological positioning that claims Schleiermacher as its antithesis. My assigning to Luther a representative function on the North American theological map has both conceptual and autobiographical rationales. The conceptual rationale is Luther’s mobilization as the protagonist in the “linguistic turn” in contemporary theology. Some Lutheran (or formerly Lutheran) theologians concerned with building ecumenical bridges to Rome have appreciated Martin Luther for his catholic commitment to church tradition. George A. Lindbeck’s The Nature of Doctrine ([1984] 2009) occupies a central place in this agenda. Lindbeck sought to develop an ecumenical bridge to Roman Catholicism from a Lutheran theological perspective. Lindbeck’s ecumenical-theological work consisted in proposing a new theological theory of doctrine that conceived religion in the context of distinct cultures and languages. In conversation with American cultural anthropologist Clifford Geertz, Lindbeck showed how Luther’s Reformation idea of the faith that comes by hearing (fides ex auditu) could be coherently related to the system of doctrine that regulated the discourse and practice of a particular Christian confession.3 A Lutheran outlook on justification can co-exist, he argued, “in reconciled diversity”4 with a Roman Catholic understanding of justification that is coherent within its particular cultural, linguistic, and historical arrangement of doctrines. The Luther who historically held up the external word as God’s communication of the gospel is rendered in contemporary theology in terms of a Christian discourse that has primacy in producing and forming a way of religious life.

3 Lindbeck extends the fides ex auditu to non-Christians by arguing that religion functions as a discursive realm that introduces participants into a particular way of speaking and acting. The fides ex auditu “produc[es] and form[s]” “explicit faith” (Lindbeck: 1984, 60). 4 This is Avery Dulles’ sympathetic term found in his review of Lindbeck’s collection of essays, The Church in a Postliberal Age (Lindbeck: 2003), Dulles: 2003.

 

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In my own study of Luther, I followed Lindbeck’s lead in exploring the “Catholic Luther”. My work aimed to show how the reformer’s understanding of God’s word was articulated in a sustained and complex dialogue with the Trinitarian and philosophical-theological discussions of the late-medieval period (cf. Helmer: 1999). When Luther highlights God’s word in a doctoral disputation from 1544, he uses a biblical quotation as starting-point for the theses in order to refer doctrinal explication and articulation to the source of divine revelation. Thesis 1 is a direct quotation from Matthew’s account of the Father’s voice at the transfiguration of Jesus: “Listen to him!” (NRSV) (Die Promotionsdisputation von Georg Major und Johannes Faber, 12. Dezember 1544, WA 39/II, 287,6). The Father’s address to Jesus’ disciples (and to all believers who hear God’s word) in Matt 17:5 becomes the biblical starting-point for explicating the doctrine of the Trinity as the nature of God who speaks in the person of the Father. I learned from Luther that word requires doctrine in order to identify the God who speaks. A Trinitarian theology is a natural complement to the word of gospel. To understand the nature, intention, and action of divine speech, it is necessary to know who the speaker is. Yet when I turned to Schleiermacher as the subject of my subsequent research, I found out that theologians working in the broad Lutheran vein expressed hostility to Schleiermacher. Specifically Schleiermacher’s theological turn to religious states of consciousness and the linguistic “expressions” of specific religious states as Christian discourse posed an important problem. Theologians diagnosed the problem as a conflict between the two that specifically concerned 1) the conflict between two kinds of biblical interpretation; and 2) the conflict between Reformation and Modernity. Both of these circumscriptions show up a battle between Luther and Schleiermacher that has become more than just a difference between two theologians who lived in different historical contexts. Rather, the interpretation of Luther is constructed with categories that are negatively invoked in relation to Schleiermacher. Luther and Schleiermacher, if one lets one’s imagination loose for a moment, are paired off like the famous mirror scene in the Marx Brothers’ Duck Soup, copying and parodying each other at the same time. The construction of the opposition between the two theologians is symptomatic of deeper issues at the heart of the theological enterprise today. Luther and Schleiermacher do not exhaust the theological landscape, but their positions vis-à-vis each other in the contemporary theological imagination help us to surface and focus on the central issue of the way that doctrine’s language relates to the reality of God. In the following I look at the two conflicts, namely biblical interpretation and historical epochs, and show how the question concerning the relation of language to reality insinuates itself in this discussion.

 

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Christine Helmer

The conflict between two kinds of biblical interpretation

The identification of the Protestant Reformation with the Bible is one of the most common claims in the history of Christianity. Both Luther and Calvin explicitly highlight scripture – in its Protestant canonical form – as the norm for true theological claims. The doctrine of scripture associated with 18th century Protestant Orthodoxy emerges, or so it is said, in nascent form in the reformers: scripture is self-authenticating, in Latin sacra scriptura sui ipsius interpres, which means that scripture confirms the truth of its own content. The truth of scripture does not require any interpretative tools external to it in order to understand its content. Rather, scripture contains the hermeneutical strategies and criteria necessary to understanding its message. Furthermore, it is commonly argued that the reformers proposed an embryonic formulation of the doctrine that scripture is sufficient for apprehending its content. The sola scriptura – a doctrine that must correctly be identified with the later 18th century Pietist understanding of individual access to biblical content through reading and not with Luther – makes its appearance when Luther and Calvin recommend a religion that has broad appeal by virtue of its basis in a text that is made available through translation and publication. To support these efforts, the reformers advocated educational reforms that would make literacy a cultural requisite for reading the Bible. All of these by now have attained the status of historical givens. The Reformation cannot be isolated from the Middle Ages in terms of its high regard for scripture. Yet the Reformation can be distinguished from late-medieval Catholicism by an unprecedented claim concerning the distinction between divine and human words. Luther distinguished between human traditions that had accrued to both canon law and liturgical practices and the divine word contained in scripture. For Luther, the distinguishing criterion was a material one, the result of his own difficult struggles with the imminence of eternal punishment because of personal sin. Luther found solace in the divine word of the gospel. He discovered that God’s mercy in Christ was not only available in but also created as a personal reality by the divine word of forgiveness. The gospel was the efficacious word of God that freed the terrified conscience and set it free for freedom (cf. Gal 5:1). Thus the Reformation breakthrough for Luther is the isolation of the efficacious word of the gospel in setting the sinner free from “sin, death, and the devil”, from any human word that would masquerade as God’s word in order then to bind human consciences. The hermeneutic of the gospel, whether the texts “preach and inculcate Christ” as Luther writes in the famous preface to James (LW 35, 396),5 and its dialectical relation to God’s word of law, inform the hermeneutic that Luther

5 WA DB 7,384,26: “Christum predigen und treyben”.

 

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applies to any religious and theological text in order to pull the true word of God out from under the centuries of human words with which it had been intermingled. Luther’s Reformation would pronounce the gospel as the “good story and report, sounded forth into all the world by the apostles, telling of a true David who strove with sin, death, and the devil, and overcame them, and thereby rescued all those who were captive in sin, afflicted with death, and overpowered by the devil” (“Preface to the New Testament” [1522], LW 35, 358).6 The word of God would be discerned by its promise and creation of the new reality of forgiveness. Scripture, proclamation, and theology would all be subject to this hermeneutic. The (anachronistic) motto of sola scriptura points out that God’s word alone in scripture is sufficient to convey the message of salvation. But a closer look is required in order to see that the motto presupposes information concerning the nature of the speaker and the speaker’s capacity to create the reality of the word that is spoken. It is on this key point that George Lindbeck most famously advanced the claim that a pre-critical (meaning historically prior to Enlightenment and Modernity) reading of scripture is informed by Christian doctrine (Lindbeck: 1996, 144– 160). When testing this claim on Luther’s commentaries on scripture, one finds that he does indeed appeal to more than “just scripture” in order to make judgments about the biblical texts. Implicit in Luther’s biblical hermeneutic is his presupposition concerning the unity of the subject matter that is preserved by Christian doctrine. In his interpretation of the ascension Psalm 110:1, for example, Luther uses a Trinitarian lens through which to appreciate the text’s literal level.7 Luther takes the direct speech announced by the phrase, “The Lord said to my Lord”, to introduce a speaker (the first Lord) and a hearer (the second Lord). Luther further distinguishes between first and second Lord by showing the difference in the original Hebrew between the two names for God (YHWH and Adonai) in the font he uses for the German term “Herr” for Lord.8 The first speaker is “LORD” in capital letters, while the hearer is “Lord” in regular lettering. In addition the content enclosed in the quotations marks, “Be seated at my right hand”, that is the Father’s direct speech to the Son is actually revealed to the Psalmist, David, by the third person of the Trinity. According to Luther’s Trinitarian reading of this passage,

6 WA DB 6,2–10: “eyn gutte meher und geschrey ynn alle wellt erschollen durch die Apostell, von eynem rechten David, der mit der sund, tod unnd teuffel gestritten, und uberwunden hab, unnd damit alle die, ßo ynn sunden gefangen, mit dem todt geplagt, vom teuffel uberweldiget gewesen, on yhr verdienst erloset, rechtfertig, lebendig und selig gemacht hat”. 7 Cf. Helmer: 2002, 49–73. See also the recent book on Luther’s theology in relation to language by Joachim Ringleben, Gott im Wort: Luthers Theologie von der Sprache her (2010, esp. 30–90 on Luther’s hermeneutics). 8 For a compelling modern theological account that situates the tetragrammaton at the center of Christian Trinitarian theology, see R. Kendall Soulen: 2011.

 

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the Holy Spirit faithfully renders for the Psalmist in exact literal translation the words spoken by the Father to the Son. Luther’s Trinitarian interpretation of the Old Testament is characteristic of pre-critical theologians who use particular hermeneutical strategies to hold onto the same divine referent for both Testaments in the Christian Bible. The same doctrines are used as an exegetical presupposition for interpreting references to God in both Old and New Testaments. Whether Trinity or Christology, these doctrines inform the common practice among pre-critical theologians to read the entire Christian scripture in terms of its witness to the one (triune) God. Doctrine informs the Christian hermeneutic for reading the Bible, so that pre-critical consensus is hardly questioned concerning the way in which text refers to Trinity. As presupposition, referent, and consensus, doctrine is constitutive of the hermeneutic that the Christian church deploys in its reading of scripture. From 4th to 16th century, Bible is joined to doctrine by the church. Once critical reason emerges in the Enlightenment, the intimate relation between Bible and doctrine is challenged on historical grounds and churches in the West begin to proliferate along doctrinal-confessional lines. Schleiermacher’s biblical hermeneutics is treated towards the end of Hans W. Frei’s epic Eclipse of Biblical Narrative, where it falls under the same judgment Frei pronounces on Enlightenment and modern interpretations of the Bible (Frei: 1974). According to Frei, the advent of historical criticism opens a new chapter in the way the Bible is read. Rather than read the literal level of scripture through the unifying lens of Trinitarian and Christological doctrines, as was the case until Luther and Calvin, the biblical text is now read under the new condition of historical referentiality. The literal level refers not to a single subject matter rendered by the text, its prophetic-Christological sense, to use Luther’s example, but to an external referent that is posited by academic investigation independent of the way the Bible is read by the church. Criteria alien to the Bible-church analytic are developed according to the standards of academic rational legitimacy, and these criteria, when applied to the Bible, adjudicate the truth claims of the text in terms different than their intratextually derived theological claims. History and culture, not doctrine and God, become the rational standards measuring the Bible’s truth. With this shift to extrabiblical hermeneutical strategies, the Bible no longer is a book that is sufficient for conveying the message of salvation. Its canonical unity is fragmented by its judgment according to alien cultural idioms. The periodization between pre-critical and critical phases in biblical interpretation is of importance because it marks the break at which a coherent reading of scripture breaks down. Historical criticism, as Frei and more recently Alvin Plantinga argue, paves the way for an erosion of meaning unified by doctrine (Plantinga: 1998). The Bible’s unified meaning, which allows it to be read as Christian canon, is established by the narrative that Christian doctrines compose. When

 

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the canon is correlated with distinct doctrines, it is seen in the narrative sequence from creation and fall, to incarnation and redemption, to apocalypse and the eternal Jerusalem. Doctrines are strung as pearls on a canonical string, connected by the relation of the triune God to the world through various actions in creation, redemption, and consummation. When history, rather than doctrine, is deemed the meaning of the text, and meaning determined by extra-textual reference, then the two testaments lose their precarious semantic identity in the Christian Bible. The result becomes blatantly obvious in Schleiermacher’s identification of the Old Testament to a historical document for the purpose of interpreting the historical, cultural, and linguistic backdrop to Jesus’ appearance as recorded in the New Testament. The criterion of Jesus’ historical existence is the criterion by which canonicity is measured; the Old Testament falls to the canonical wayside as it is historically unrelated to Jesus of Nazareth.9 The loss of the canon by historical biblical criticism is, to refer to the case of Schleiermacher, a loss of the Trinitarian doctrine. With the diagnosis of a loss comes a prescription. Lindbeck advocates a return to the “faith-world” of Bible and reformers.10 The intention of this history of hermeneutics is to prescribe a recovery of the way in which the Christian church has read the Bible as a “narrationally and typologically unified whole” (Lindbeck: 2002, 204). Such a recovery entails abandoning modern hermeneutical strategies and returning to the hermeneutical practices deployed in the pre-critical era that approached the Bible in terms of its canonical unity, such as typology, prophecy-fulfillment, allegory, or doctrine. These hermeneutical practices had historically developed in contexts of religious usage, such as liturgical or spiritual community settings. By recovering practices deployed by historic Christian communities, the hope is that the Bible can function again as the Christian canon in and for the Christian church. The mandate for recovering exegetical strategies that insist on a unified canonical meaning is conceived in intimate relation to the community that reads the Bible in the first place. The picture then that emerges from the mandate is that a coherent canonical meaning, rendered by the use of a pre-critical hermeneutic, is analytic with the church. A transhistorical consensus has arisen in the church that regards this unified way of reading the Bible the most apt for rendering its meaning. The faith-world of Bible and reformers then is a coherent worldview, one that 9 See the distinction Schleiermacher makes between Christian Bible (which includes both testaments) as the text read by the church in its liturgical and pious practices and the Christian canon, which for Schleiermacher is restricted to the New Testament, in Brief Outline § 104 (Schleiermacher: 1990, 34). 10 Although the term “faith-world” is not Lindbeck’s, I appropriate it here from Emil Brunner in order to argue that for Lindbeck, specific kinds of biblical interpretation render the Bible as the worldview for Christians. In his book first published in 1924 Die Mystik und das Wort, Brunner pits Schleiermacher’s modern religion against “the faith-world of the apostles and reformers” (cf. Brunner: [1924] 1938).

 

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has unrestricted epistemic range. In the famous words of Lindbeck, “A scriptural world is thus able to absorb the universe” (Lindbeck: 1984, 117). What is at stake in this contemporary recovery of a pre-critical hermeneutic that ends up situating Schleiermacher as negative foil? It seems that a distinct and separate faith-world is at stake. The positioning of the contemporary theological prescription posits a unified worldview that is coherent by virtue of a canon-doctrine-community analytic. The unity of the canon is shaped by a coherent narrative of doctrines that is related to the action of the one triune God, while it is precisely this worldview that is deemed the transhistorical consensus of the community that has been shaped by this reading in the first place. From the perspective of this theologically articulated worldview, Schleiermacher emerges as a dangerous threat. He proposes hermeneutical methods that are regarded as alien to the faith-world’s intratextual interpretative strategies. He dissents from the doctrinal truths that are deemed by the consensus to be the “rule of faith” by which the canon should be read (“canon” after all in its Greek original means “rule”). And he is immoderately preoccupied with extra-ecclesial academic concerns that are opposed to the truth of the word that can never be subsumed under the conditions of human consciousness. Schleiermacher conveniently supplies the nails for his own heterodox coffin: his opinion that the Old Testament is not a necessary part of the Christian canon and his rejection of the Trinity as a speculative doctrine belong to an alien worldview that opposes the consensus of the Bible and reformers. On the terms of canon, doctrine, and church consensus, Schleiermacher finds himself outside orthodoxy’s bounds. What appears to be articulated in historiographical terms is, in fact, a conceptual argument between two worldviews. But Schleiermacher is being forced here into a corner by the terms of a debate to which he has not consented. It seems that the battle between two worldviews is the way in which the problem with Schleiermacher is being staged. The one worldview from which he is read as “other” is designed precisely to exclude him on the basis of the epistemic unity prescribed by the text-doctrine-community complex. But Schleiermacher’s theological interest is not the reception of doctrine for its repetition as the same old story that is invoked by consensus. Rather, he is interested in studying the history of Christianity in order to discover the novel element in that history that continues to generate a living religious tradition. His religious and intellectual commitment is precisely the referent of the Bible and any other texts that tell of the strange and new ways in which God encounters humanity in Christ. The oppositional casting between the faith-world of Bible and reformers and Schleiermacher’s alien hermeneutic and heterodox doctrine does not fairly represent his view that Christian discourse is invented under the pressure of a unique experience with the Christus praesens. The more accurate terms of the theological discussion should be the relation of language to reality.

 

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4.

Theology as conflict between Reformation and Modernity

It is not only the scripture-community analytic that is at stake in the contemporary theological discussion. Another issue will serve in this section to show how the historical periodization of the rift between Reformation and Modernity ends up imputing another problem to Schleiermacher. We turn now to the particular Lutheran-theological idiosyncrasy that Christ is the two words of God, law and gospel, and investigate the positioning of Schleiermacher from the perspective of this theological claim. We will see that the problem arises with Schleiermacher on the subject of the word’s externality to human consciousness. Contemporary German theologian and Luther scholar Oswald Bayer insists that one of the key ideas in Luther’s theology is the verbum externum, the word of God that remains external to human reality even in its most intimate address to humans. The divine word is in Lutheran theological terms actually two words: the one word of law judges all things human as condemned, the word of gospel pronounces and also effects all things human to be forgiven.11 The twofold word of God is theologically deemed to be “external” to human reality because it speaks God’s perspective into human reality in such a way as to shatter any human pretensions at speaking the truth about its own reality to itself. God cannot be rendered under human control even though divinity appears in human flesh. God is uncontrollable, unconfined, even when delivered over to a human judicial system and condemned to death on the cross (cf. Phil 2:8). When God speaks either law or gospel, the word remains the divine prerogative when addressed to humans. Although it speaks the truth of sin and forgiveness as the human condition, it resists absorption into human reality. The Lutheran theological axiom of the word’s externality contrasts with its diametrical opposite. If the Bible and the reformers are characterized by their emphasis on the verbum externum, Modernity is determined in the opposing position of interiority. Thus Schleiermacher as chief example of modern theology appears as the antagonist. Bayer iterates a representative view. He writes: “The new Protestantism, that Schleiermacher represents, is significantly distinguished from the old Protestantism by the fact that he transforms the doctrine of the word of God into the doctrine of human faith” (Bayer: 1994, 463; trans. by C.H.).12 Bayer specifies interiority as Schleiermacher’s appeal to self-consciousness – its states and its relation to immediate self-consciousness – as theology’s subject matter. Human

11 See Bayer on Luther’s understanding of the twofold word of God as law and gospel in Bayer: 2008, 58–62. 12 “Der Neuprotestantismus, wie Schleiermacher ihn repräsentiert, unterscheidet sich vom Altprotestantismus wesentlich dadurch, daß er die Lehre vom Wort Gottes in die Lehre vom Glauben des Menschen umformt.”

 

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consciousness, on Bayer’s reading of Schleiermacher, is not fundamentally oriented to the external word that addresses it with God’s true judgment. The self produces its own word by its own psychological mechanisms, thereby confusing what it thinks to be a divine word with a human word. Self-consciousness is caught in its own solipsism. It cannot speak to itself a reality other than its own attempt at self-justification.13 Interiority represents the Reformation-theological doctrine of sin as incurvatus in se, the self that is curved in upon itself. The type of theology that Bayer proposes as helpful in exposing this central dualism of the human condition is Konfliktwissenschaft, or the science of conflict.14 The task of this theology is to work out a theological position that affirms the externality of God’s word against the sin of modern theology that is grounded in the psychological terms of interiority. Theology must represent the basic opposition between a worldview that is curved in upon itself in a solipsistic vicious circle of self-justification and a worldview that is oriented to God’s word that speaks the truth about the human condition when it addresses the human in the word of law and the gospel. The conflict for Bayer is less a historical opposition between Reformation and Modernity and more, as we have also seen in the case of Lindbeck, a conceptual-theological opposition between two worldviews, one that is grounded in the truth of God’s word, the other that is represented in terms of the sin of interiority. Schleiermacher emerges as representative of Modernity because his theology of self-consciousness is judged to be a theology of self-justification. The problem with Schleiermacher is that he represents the position of “sin”. The self curved in upon its interiority and the self constituted by the external divine word – this is the fundamental conflict that Bayer assigns to theology to evaluate. Yet on closer look the conflict is actually constructed on the basis of an already theologically affirmed position. The position attributed to Luther – the twofold word of law and gospel in their externality to human consciousness – is in fact one that was developed within the temporal frame of the modern which is then set in judgment against the modern. God’s word of law is seen as extending from the Reformation over Modernity to the condemnation of its theological paradigm of psychological interiority. The conflict between Reformation and Modernity is, then, not a contest of equals, but a fixed fight that issues from the affirmation of the word and already judges the position of interiority that is constructed as its opposition. Interiority cannot distinguish between self and God. Rather, it is from the perspective of the affirmative that the negative position is judged to be under the law of its own solipsism, a situation that is in need of redemption. 13 See Bayer’s argument that connects interiority to self-justification in Bayer: 1999, 80. 14 Konfliktwissenschaft is Bayer’s term in: 1994, 115. Bayer explicitly claims that modern thought is in conflict with reformation theology on the central point of God’s immediacy in self-consciousness, in: 1999, 83.

 

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Could it be that the terms on which Schleiermacher emerges as problem is the Lutheran theological distinction between law and gospel? So the judgment against Schleiermacher and by extension against the whole modern project from the Lutheran perspective entails the ahistorical extension of the law/gospel relation. The Lutheran position that valorises the externality of God’s word of law and gospel is extended over other areas outside of Lutheran theology by virtue of its judgment concerning these areas as opposed to the theological truth upheld from Lutheran perspective. If the truth of law/gospel as word of God in Lutheran understanding is unrestricted in its range, then it can determine its opposing position – the interiority of Schleiermacher’s position – to be false. The conflict between Luther and Schleiermacher is not a battle between historical epochs of Reformation and Modernity, as the rhetoric would lead one to believe, but a theological argument that issues from the determination to uphold the theology of the verbum externum. The battle is about the truth of Christ as God’s word of address to humans in law and gospel. If culture has betrayed Christ by translating Christ into the modern idiom of interiority, then it must be judged as false under the word of law. The problem of Schleiermacher is the conflict that is set up on Lutheran terms of law and gospel, with the added twist that the twofold word of God’s epistemic range is unrestricted. When Modernity is interpreted from the perspective of the epistemic primacy of the faith-world of Bible and Reformation, it is inevitably seen under the judgment that God’s law declares on the human condition. Christ speaks the word of judgment on culture, a word already and always spoken for all time in Lutheran theology. We come here to the crux of the problem with Schleiermacher today. Where Luther and Schleiermacher, gospel and law, Christ and culture are concerned, the position that upholds the word above consciousness, doctrine above cultural expression, can claim all the rights of theological authority. From Luther’s perspective, Schleiermacher’s theology is in bondage to its own consciousness because there is no place external to it that can interrupt it from its self-preoccupation and free itself to be oriented by another. Consciousness is deemed “pre-linguistic” and “pre-conceptual”, bereft of the capacity to make truthful distinctions necessary for salvation.15 Luther’s Reformation distinction between God’s true word and false 15 This criticism is first articulated by Lindbeck: “Nevertheless, whatever the variations, thinkers of this tradition [experiential-expressivism] all locate ultimately significant contact with whatever is finally important to religion in the prereflective experiential depths of the self and regard the public or outer features of religion as expressive and evocative objectifications (i. e. nondiscursive symbols) of internal experience” (Lindbeck: 1984, 21). Bruce Marshall has a similar criticism: “Rather, as the interiority thesis already suggests, having beliefs which express these experiences depends upon having the experiences; the outward linguistic formulations of the experiences is revisable and correctable, but not the experiences themselves” (Marshall: 2000, 56).

 

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words human speak becomes mapped by contemporary theology onto the conflict between the word and modern consciousness. The opposition between language and experience emerges at the fulcrum of the conflict. The surface rhetoric couches the contemporary theological landscape in an either/or: either a pre-critical hermeneutic applied faithfully to the Bible that guarantees the identity of Christian communities through time by virtue of their consensual commitment to an orthodox Trinitarian reading of the Bible or a critical reading that surrenders hermeneutics to culture and thereby loses doctrinal truth and transhistorical Christian identity; either the Protestant Reformation’s insistence on the word’s externality or Modernity’s collapse into experiential interiority. But beneath the rhetoric rests the truth of the matter, an issue that Schleiermacher has continued to raise as a problem, and which is why the problem with Schleiermacher has not gone away.

5.

Beyond the Christian worldview

Schleiermacher has been one big and unending problem in 20th century mainstream Protestant theology. Lindbeck and Bayer agree on a historical periodization that severs a pre-critical view of Christian doctrine from Modernity’s view. Although Lindbeck’s concern more closely ties a doctrinal hermeneutic to the transhistorical identity of the church while Bayer appreciates Luther’s verbum externum as criterion for truth in theology, both theologians argue against Schleiermacher’s interiority that allegedly collapses the word and doctrine of God into the confusion of human consciousness. The irony is how Schleiermacher is viewed from a distinct perspective. Schleiermacher is constructed from a position that I have shown is sympathetic to Luther’s insights concerning the verbum externum. This position is ironically construed by a distinct theological commitment to an understanding of discourse that is related to the Christian worldview. Language has appropriated the verbum externum and has rendered the word in doctrinal formulations that constitute the grammar of the distinct Christian worldview. In the case of biblical hermeneutics, the position advocating the appropriation of pre-critical interpretative strategies privileges an understanding that the Bible constitutes a particular worldview. Any interpretation of the Bible that adopts biblical hermeneutical strategies will result in a position that is conceived from within this particular perspective. If one, however, adopts a “critical” perspective, then the resulting position has translated the biblical idiom into an alien cultural concept. In the case of historical periodization, the conflict between Reformation and Modernity is precisely the conflict between a biblical and a modern worldview. While the biblical worldview is construed in the Lutheran theological category of gospel, it is deemed to oppose the modern

 

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worldview that is construed in terms of law. Law and gospel are mapped onto an historical periodization that actually doubles as a conflict between Reformation and Modernity. The Biblical (or Reformation) worldview is based on an appropriation of Luther’s verbum externum. Yet the appropriation is actually a transformation of this category in terms of a worldview that is constituted by Christian discourse. Language is immanent; even talk of the gospel takes place on the grounds of the worldview so that its exteriority is rendered in terms of immanence. The irony is that the worldview model of Christianity has rendered the verbum externum as immanent to the system. Word informs the doctrinal grammar of the worldview. By this move doctrine is cut off from the living word of God that might call the discourse about God into question. The problem of Schleiermacher has exposed theology’s challenge to conceptualize and articulate the God-human relationship, the mode of constituting relationship, and its implications for the formulation of doctrine. How can theology conceive and explain the way God addresses humans through the word, while also making sense of the epistemological and experiential aspects of human hearing? How can doctrine affirm the truth of God in relationship to humans while also opening itself to spiritual and intellectual curiosity? It seems that the trajectory of 20th century theology, with the collapse of the word’s externality into the interiority of a worldview, has been established at the expense of an honest consideration of the kind of reality, whether historical, spiritual, or metaphysical, that can be discerned and explained in theological terms. The contemporary discourse insists on the word’s primacy in bearing revelation that is compressed in the doctrines of Christianity. But does word require emphasizing at the expense of experiencing the referent of doctrine? What happens when word loses its referent and becomes embedded in doctrines that have an epistemic or ideological function in constituting a worldview? How can theology then account for experiences of God’s word as life-giving, as opening human hearts and minds to new formulations of doctrine? The problem that Schleiermacher poses for us today is, in short, how doctrine can be conceptualized in view of the prerogative of God’s word while also doing justice to the human hearer’s humanity. Theology’s task is to produce knowledge of God as God initiates and enjoys dynamic, joyous, and surprising relationships. The way forward is to look at how theological language can indeed refer to a unique referent that affects the way language arises in relation to that referent. Schleiermacher was interested in the emergence of new languages at moments of encounter with the living Christ. But language does not stall in submission to the received tradition, according to Schleiermacher. Rather, novel experiences of Christ in history continue to generate new discourse that refers to God’s contemporary presence in the world. By addressing the issue of how language refers to God, while articulated in relation to human experience, theology can

 

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move beyond its current fascination with what it assumes to be the Christian worldview and be opened to new and surprising ways in which God comes into world.

Bibliography Bayer, Oswald (1994), Theologie (Handbuch systematischer Theologie 1), Gütersloh: Güters­ loher Verlagshaus Gerd Mohn. Bayer, Oswald (1999), Gott als Autor: Zu einer poietologischen Theologie, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Bayer, Oswald (2003), Martin Luther’s Theology, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Bayer, Oswald (2011), Philosophical Modes of Thought of Luther’s Theology as an Object of Inquiry, in Jennifer Hockenbery Dragseth (ed.), The Devil’s Whore: Reason and Philosophy in the Lutheran Tradition, Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 13–21. Brunner, Emil ([1924] 1938), Die Mystik und das Wort: Der Gegensatz zwischen moderner Religionsauffassung und christlichem Glauben dargestellt an der Theologie Schleiermachers (2nd ed.), Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck). Dulles, Avery (2003), Postmodernist Ecumenism, First Things 14:8, 57–60 (available on http:// www.firstthings.com/article/2008/08/the-church-in-a-postliberal-age-5 [04.06.2014]). Frei, Hans W. (1974), The Eclipse of Biblical Narrative: A Study in Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century Hermeneutics, New Haven: Yale University Press. Helmer, Christine (1999), The Trinity and Martin Luther: A Study on the Relationship Between Genre, Language, and the Trinity in Luther’s Works (1523–1546) (Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Europäische Geschichte/Abteilung Abendländische Religionsgeschichte 174), Mainz: Zabern. Helmer, Christine, The Trinity and Martin Luther, 2nd rev. edn. (Studies in Historical and Systematic Theology), Bellingham, Washington: Lexham Press, 2017. Helmer, Christine (2002), Luther’s Trinitarian Hermeneutic and the Old Testament, Modern Theology 18:1, 49–73. Lindbeck, George A. ([1984] 2009), The Nature of Doctrine: Religion and Theology in a Postliberal Age, Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press. Lindbeck, George A. (1996), Atonement and the Hermeneutics of Social Embodiment, Pro Ecclesia 5, 144–160. Lindbeck, George A. (2002), Scripture, Consensus, Community, in George A. Lindbeck, The Church in a Postliberal Age, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 201–222. Lindbeck, George A. (2003), The Church in a Postliberal Age, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Luther, Martin (1522), Preface to the New Testament. 1546 (1522), in Luther’s Works: American Edition, vol. 1–55, St. Louis and Philadelphia: Concordia Publishing House and Fortress Press, 1958–1986, LW 35, 357–362. Luther, Martin (1522), Preface to the Epistles of St. James and St. Jude. 1546 (1522), in Luther’s Works: American Edition, vol. 1–55, St. Louis and Philadelphia: Concordia Publishing House and Fortress Press, 1958–1986, LW 35, 395–398. Luther, Martin (1522), Vorrede auf das Neue Testament. 1522, in D. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), vol. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA DB 6, 2–10.

 

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Luther, Martin (1522), Vorrede auf die Episteln S Jacobi und Judas. 1522, in D. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), vol. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA DB 7, 384–386. Luther, Martin (1544), Die Promotionsdisputation von Georg Major und Johannes Faber. 12. Dezember 1544, in D. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), vol. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 39/II, 287–336. Marshall, Bruce (2000), Trinity and Truth (Cambridge Studies in Christian Doctrine), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Plantinga, Alvin (1998), Two (Or More) Kinds of Scripture Scholarship, Modern Theology 14:2, 243–278. Ringleben, Joachim (2010), Gott im Wort: Luthers Theologie von der Sprache her (Hermeneutische Untersuchungen zur Theologie 57), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Schleiermacher, Friedrich D.E. ([1811/1830] 1990), Brief Outline of Theology as a Field of Study (Schleiermacher Studies and Translations vol. 1; trans. Terrence N. Tice), Lewiston: Edwin Mellen. Soulen, R. Kendall (2011), The Divine Name(s) and the Holy Trinity, vol. 1: Distinguishing the Voices, Louisville: Westminster John Knox.

 

 

Human Existence between Visibility and Invisibility

 

 

Antti Raunio

Inner and Outer Man in Luther’s Thought

1.

Introduction – the question of Luther’s use of anthropological terminology

The topic of this paper is the relationship between visibility and transcendence in Martin Luther’s conception of the human being. First I introduce his complicated use of philosophical and theological terms concerning the human being. Secondly the relation between visible and invisible reality in man will be discussed. In the last section the results of the preceding scrutiny will be related to Luther’s view of the Christian as simultaneously righteous and sinful. In his celebrated treatise On the Freedom of a Christian, Luther makes a distinction between spiritual and bodily man. According to the spiritual nature that men refer to as the “soul”, the human being is called spiritual, inner, or new man. And according to the bodily nature that men refer to as “flesh”, he is called carnal, outer, or old man. Luther combines here a philosophical or natural understanding of the human being with a theological way of speaking about man.1 These two points of view are more clearly set out in the interpretation of the Magnificat that Luther wrote a little later. There he explains the two ways of speaking about a human being which are found in Scripture. First there is the threefold conception of the human being consisting of the spirit, the soul, and the body. For Luther this is the natural, created constitution of man. And second there is the twofold, theological understanding of a human being as “spirit” and “flesh”.2 In his Freedom of a Christian, he does not differentiate between spirit and soul when speaking of the constitution of 1 WA 7, 50,5–10. The standard existential-theological presentations of Luther’s anthropology by Joest (1967) and zur Mühlen (1972) take the criticism of the Aristotelian view into account, but not Luther’s positive use of philosophical concepts. 2 WA 7, 550,20–28: “Die schrifft teilet den menschen ynn drey teil, da S. Paulus 1. Thessal. ult. [1 Thess 5:23] sagt: ‘Got der ein got des frids ist, der mache euch heilig durch und durch, alszo das ewer gantzer geist und seele und leip unstreflich erhalten auff die zukunfft unszers herrnn Ihesu Christi’. Und ein iglichs dieszer dreier sampt dem gantzen menschen wirt auch geteylet

 

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man, but employs only the term “soul”. The soul here includes the aspects that in the Magnificat belong to the spirit. In the Lectures on the Epistle to the Galatians (1519) Luther stresses that he understands by “spirit” and “flesh” the whole human being or the soul. Here “soul” is used in a theological sense which embraces the soul and body in the natural sense.3 How then does Luther’s notion of “inner” and “outer” man4 relate to these natural and theological views? His use of these terms in The Freedom of a Christian is not abundantly clear in this respect. But his view in the Magnificat that “spirit” and “flesh” do not refer to human nature but to qualities, so that every part of human nature may be good or bad, leads to the presumption that the soul and body or inner and outer man may also be understood in both the natural and the theological sense, in the same way as for example the spirit. In Luther’s vocabulary “spirit” may refer either to a part of human nature, or to the quality of this and other parts of a man. He does not, however, always make the distinction explicit. This can complicate his utterances concerning the human being, and they may easily be misunderstood. For example, in The Freedom of a Christian “soul” indicates primarily the new spiritual and inner man (cf. Raunio: 2010). And “inner man” may mean either the invisible natural human capacities such as spirit and soul, or the invisible spiritual man: and “outer man” may signify either the visible body with all its members and actions, or the sinfulness of the whole human being. Especially the latter, theological use of the terms “inner” and “outer” raises the question of the relation between visibility and invisibility. The chapter in The Freedom of a Christian in which Luther explains his notion of the human being is made difficult by his introduction of our twofold nature (duplici natura). In this context he seems to equate the term “nature” with “spirit” and “flesh”. He states that because of the diversity of nature the Scriptures make contradictory assertions concerning the same man, since these two men (or natures) in the same man contradict each other. As St Paul writes in Gal 5:17: “The desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh” (cf. WA 7, 50,10–12). The case, however, is not quite so simple: for at the same time Luther speaks of inner and outer man in such clearly natural or “philosophical” terms as “soul” auff ein ander weisz ynn zwey stuck, die da heissen geist und fleisch, wilch teilung nit der natur, szondernn der eygenschaff ist, das ist, die natur hat drey stuck: geist, seel, leip, und mugen alle sampt gut oder bosz sein, das heist denn geist und fleysch sein, davon itzt nit zu reden ist.” 3 WA 2, 585,31–33: “Ego mea temeritate carnem, animam, spiritum prorsus non separo […], sed spiritum et carnem intelligo totum hominem, maxime ipsam animam.” 4 In his later writings Luther abandons almost entirely the terminology of inner and outer man. However, the matter to which he refers with these terms does not disappear. Zur Mühlen (1972, 265) presumes that the reason for the abandonment of those terms is Luther’s criticism on the scholastic understanding of inner and outer man as parts of the human being. Zur Mühlen refers here to Joest: 1967, 197 ff.

 

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and “body”. The conception of the twofold nature, then, does not seem to refer to the qualities only, but also to a human being consisting of soul and body so that soul is the inner, and body the outer aspect of the whole. Therefore Luther’s views in The Freedom of a Christian and elsewhere indicate that his use of theological concepts includes the natural meaning. In other words, when he speaks of human nature in the theological sense, he refers simultaneously to human nature in the natural sense. In his Lectures on Genesis he addresses animal or corporal, and spiritual or immortal, life. The creature is initially a “living soul”, but after that he will be renovated into a spiritual man. He will become an image of God who is similar to God in life, righteousness, holiness, wisdom, and other qualities.5 For Luther the human being as the image of God refers to the spiritual life that embraces eternal life, eternal security, and everything good (WA 42, 48,38–40). The term “imago Dei” refers to the invisible transcendent reality and not to such natural human capacities as memory, reason, and will.

2.

The human being in the philosophical and theological sense

Luther in the Magnificat explains the relationship between inner and outer man to some degree when he describes the three parts of a human being. The spirit is the highest, deepest, and most noble part. Through it one is able to grasp inconceivable and invisible eternal verities. It is the “house” where the faith and God’s Word dwell. Even though it grasps unintelligible things, the faith is darkness, which believes what it does not see, feel, or conceive. The soul is, then, according to the nature the same spirit but in another action: it makes the body living and effects through the corporeal senses and body parts. The reason is the light in this house. Its task is to grasp not what is unintelligible but those things that it is able to understand and to measure, that is, it may know all kinds of bodily and visible things. The reason is, however, too limited for dealing with things divine. Therefore without faith it will always err. The third part is the body with its various members. All of its doings are according to the knowledge of the soul and the faith of the spirit. Through the body others may see what we do and how we live (WA 7, 550,28–551, 24). As the Reformer states in the Magnificat, the spirit and the soul, in other words the inner man in the natural sense, may be either good or bad. In The Freedom 5 WA 42, 49,12–16: “Ideo Paulus dicit: ‘Primus homo factus est in animam viventem’, hoc est, vivit vitam animalem, quae indiget cibo, potu, somno etc. Sed ‘secundus renovabitur in spiritum vivificantem’, hoc est, erit spiritualis homo, ubi redibit ad imaginem Dei. Erit enim similis Deo in vita, iusticia, sanctitate, sapientia etc.”

 

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of a Christian his first aim is to consider how the inner man becomes righteous, free, and truly Christian, that is, how it turns into a spiritual and new inner man.6 Luther stresses that no external thing has any influence in producing either Christian righteousness and freedom or unrighteousness and servitude. Neither righteousness nor unrighteousness is a bodily thing. Bodily health, freedom and activity profit the soul not a whit more than eating and drinking (WA 7, 50,15– 20). Here the Reformer refers first to external and internal things in the natural sense, but simultaneously he indicates that external actions cannot produce the new man who belongs to the invisible and transcendent reality. Only one agency is needed for Christian life, righteousness and freedom. This factor is the most holy Word of God or the Gospel of Christ. It is thus certain that the soul can go without all things except the Word of God. If it has the Word it is rich and lacks nothing, since in the Word it has life, truth, light, peace, glory and every immeasurable blessing. But where the Word is missing there is no help for the soul.7 The Word is thus the Gospel of Christ, who has become flesh, suffered, risen from the dead and who is glorified by the sanctifying Spirit. To preach Christ is to feed the soul, make it righteous and free, and save it, once it believes. Faith then is the only saving and efficacious use of the Word of God (WA 7, 51,15–20). Luther in fact speaks of both the Word and the faith that uses it as works of God (opera Dei). The task of a Christian is to do God’s work, which means that the first work is to believe in Christ and strengthen oneself more and more in faith. Believing in Christ is to learn to know Him who has suffered and risen from the dead for the human being. Such faith is the only work that makes one a Christian (WA 7, 52,5–11). The Word of God cannot be received and cherished by works of any kind, but only by faith. This is central for Luther’s whole understanding of the Christian life. As the soul needs only the Word of God for its life and righteousness, so it is justified by faith alone and not by any works. This must be the case since if the soul could be justified by anything else, it would not need the Word, and consequently it would not need the faith. Luther means, of course, that it would need neither the Word nor the faith for its righteousness

6 WA 7, 50,13–15: “Primum autem interiorem hominem apprehendimus visuri, qua nam ratione iustus, liber, vereque Christianus, hoc est spiritualis, novus, interior homo, fiat.” 7 WA 7, 50,33–51,3: “Una re eaque sola opus est ad vitam, iustitiam et libertatem Christianam. Ea est sacrosanctum verbum dei, Euangelium Christi, sicut dicit Ioh. xi. [Joh 11:25] ‘Ego sum resurrectio et vita, qui credit in me non morietur inaeternum’, Item 8. [Joh 8:36] ‘Si filius vos liberaverit, vere liberi eritis’, Et Mat. 4. [Matt 4:4] ‘Non in solo pane vivit homo, sed in omni verbo, quod procedit ab ore dei’. Certum ergo habeamus ac firmiter positum, animam posse omnibus rebus carere excepto verbo dei, sine quo nullis prorsus rebus est illi consultum. Habens autem verbum dives est, nullius egens, cum sit verbum vitae, veritatis, lucis, pacis, iustitiae, salutis, gaudii, libertatis, sapientiae, virtutis, gratiae, gloriae et omnis boni inaestimabiliter.”

 

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(WA 7, 51,21–24). The faith may reign only in the inner man and a human can be justified and made free and saved only by the faith and not by external works and actions. As for the condition of the inner man, the actions of the outer can achieve nothing (WA 7, 51,35–52, 4). The decisive reason for this is that the inner man in the theological sense is no natural human capacity or quality, but a creation of the Divine Word. As was mentioned above, the only work that influences the inner man is God’s Word, or to put it more exactly, God’s speaking. Luther uses also the term God’s Scripture, which has two parts: the precepts and the promises. The precepts or the Word of God as Law oblige us to acknowledge our incapacity for good, and to grow desperate as to our own capacities. In other words, they show that we lack something that cannot be produced by human powers. We can only seek help from somewhere else and somebody else (WA 7, 52,24–34). The divine precepts refer thus to both the outer deeds and the inner condition of man, but they impart no power to accomplish good works. Later in The Freedom of a Christian Luther states that in the eyes of his peers a man is made good or evil by his works. However, all this remains on the surface. Our wisdom may have been deceived by appearances, and therefore write and teach that one may be justified by good works (WA 7, 62,27–34). The term “good works” is here used in the philosophical or moral sense without taking into account that in theology the meaning is not the same. By maintaining that the Law reveals human incapacity, Luther refers also to the qualities of human works. The Law teaches what is good. It demands not only certain works, but the goodness of the agent. And the human being learns to know his inability to do good. Luther’s point seems thus to be in the conception of goodness. He is not saying that we are unable to do works which the Law prescribes, but are unable to do good works. This thought refers to a specific relationship between the inner man and the outer works.

3.

Word and the faith as creators of the new spiritual man

Luther states that the quality of the soul depends on the Word and the faith. Through faith the soul becomes alike with the Word. Faith is the only work that can cling to the Word of God and dwell in the soul (WA 7, 53,24–27). God’s promises are holy, true, righteous, free, and peaceful words. Moreover, they are full of all kinds of goodness. The soul participates in all these good qualities and – as Luther stresses – is even saturated and inebriated with them (WA 7, 53,15–18). The “swallowing” (absorbtio) of the Word communicates to the soul all its qualities. This means that in this way the soul will be justified, sanctified, made truthful, peaceful, free, and filled with everything good. So the soul is also made a child of

 

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God (WA 7, 53,19–22). The promises in this way give what the precepts demand and fulfil what the Law commands. Thus the whole Word belongs only to God, being both the precepts and their fulfilment by goodness and all the other good qualities. He is the only one who commands and the only one who fulfils the commandments (WA 7, 53,11–13). The Word as Law and Gospel is thus God’s work which renews the inner man with those divine qualities, or in other words, creates the new, spiritual man. In the Magnificat Luther states that everything depends on the faith of the spirit. This faith that makes humans acceptable, righteous, and blessed is firm confidence in the invisible grace of God. The believing spirit owns “everything” or the “whole heritage” (WA 7, 552,21–31). As Luther says in The Freedom of a Christian “everything” means all the qualities that are promised and given to those who believe in Christ. God has set grace, peace, righteousness, freedom, and all divine things in the faith, so that all who have faith have all of them, and those who have no faith have nothing of them (WA 7, 53,5–10). If the spirit which owns the whole heritage stands firm, the soul and the body also may stay free of error and of bad works. But if the spirit is without faith, the soul also, and the whole life, can only go astray even though the soul acts with good intention and as best it can.8 So Luther says of faith almost exactly what he says of the Word. God has to take care first of the mortal spirit and then of the soul and body. Then people no longer live and act without purpose, but become truly holy. This concerns not only the public sins but also the false and only outwardly good works (WA 7, 553,6–10). As we have seen, Luther refers to the inner condition of man by drawing on many different terms. They all, for example righteousness, blessedness, holiness, and goodness, name a special aspect of the same reality. And this reality determines also the quality of the outer man, the body, and its actions and works. In this context the term “quality” has to be understood in the theological sense. How does Luther understand the inner qualities of a spiritual man? In The Freedom of a Christian he explains for example the inner righteousness. The Latin equivalent for righteousness, iustitia, also means justice. The term refers implicitly to the common classical rule for justice, the suum cuique-principle. According to it, justice is the will to give everyone his or her due. The principle does not, however, define how to evaluate what is due. In practice it depends on the individual’s nature and position, or on his merits and needs. At all events the inner spiritual

8 WA 7, 552,34–553,4: “[W]enn nu solcher gantz erbbesitzender geyst erhalten wirt, mag darnach auch die seele und der leip on yrthum und bosze werck bleiben, szonst ists nit muglich, wo der geist glawblosz ist, das da die seel und gantzes lebenn nit unrecht und yrrhe gahen solt, ob sie wol gutte meinung und gut dunckel fur wende und eygen andacht und wolgefallen drinnen hab.”

 

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man applies a certain form of the suum cuique-principle in relation to God. This means that faith considers God truthful and worth believing in. One cannot ascribe to God anything less than truthfulness, righteousness and complete goodness. When the soul believes firmly in that God who promises or speaks the Gospel, it regards Him as truthful and righteous. It can have no higher opinion of Him. Having this view of God is also the highest worship of Him. It means that the soul consents to everything that God wills, sanctifies His name and allows itself to be treated according to His pleasure. Because it inheres in God’s promises, it does not doubt that He who is true, just, and wise will do, dispose and take care of all things well (WA 7, 53,34–54, 7). God’s truthfulness is unquestioned: He is honored because of what He is. As Luther often says this means to let God be God. Moreover faith goes beyond this and ascribes everything good to God. And when God sees faith doing so, He in turn honours the believers by bestowing on them truthfulness and righteousness. Luther states that faith makes (facit) the truth and the justice by ascribing to God what is His due. In other words, faith acts in a truthful and just way and thus makes the soul truthful and righteous. It is true and just that God is truthful and just, and to consider and confess Him to be so is the same as being truthful and just. God himself acknowledges this by honouring the believer’s righteousness when his faith gives God what belongs to Him (WA 7, 54,21–30). Moreover faith unites the soul with Christ as the bride is united with her bridegroom. Through this sacrament or mystery Christ and soul become one flesh or body. In this marriage everything they have – both the good and the evil – is held in common. Therefore the faithful soul may boast and glory in whatever Christ has as though it were its own, and whatever the soul has Christ claims as His own. This means that Christ’s grace, life, and salvation will be the soul’s as well, and its sins, death and damnation will be His. But – what is important for our theme – Luther speaks here of Christ and the soul as corporeal as much as spiritual beings. The marriage between them means that they give to each other not only their invisible qualities but their bodies to boot.9 In other words, they give themselves wholly one to the other.

9 WA 7, 54,31–55,6: “Tertia fidei gratia incomparabilis est haec, Quod animam copulat cum Christo, sicut sponsam cum sponso [Eph 5:30ff]. Quo sacramento (ut Apostolus docet) Christus et anima efficiuntur una caro. Quod si una caro sunt verumque inter eos matrimonium, immo omnium longe perfectissimum consumatur, cum humana matrimonia huius unici figurae sint tenues, Sequitur, et omnia eorum communia fieri tam bona quam mala, ut, quaecunque Christus habet, de iis tanquam suis praesumere et gloriari possit fidelis anima, Et quaecunque animae sunt, ea sibi arroget Christus tanquam sua. Conferamus ista, et videbimus inaestimabilia. Christus plenus est gratia, vita et salute, Anima plena est peccatis, morte et damnatione. Intercedat iam fides, et fiet, ut Christi sint peccata, mors et infernus, Animae vero gratia, vita et

 

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So in this marriage with Christ the soul is free of all sin, secure against death and hell, and endowed with eternal righteousness, life and salvation. Through this union with Christ, wherein Christ gives himself completely to the soul, it turns into a new, inner and spiritual man. This happens because Christ is both God and man in one person who cannot sin, die or be condemned. When He takes the bride’s sins, death, condemnation, and acts as if they were His own, He wins the struggle against them and swallows them up (WA 7, 55,7–23). The goodness of the inner man means that Christ adorns the soul with all His good gifts that are received by faith (WA 7, 55,25–33). Faith for its part makes all other works good, pleasing and worthy because it trusts in God and does not question the fact that everything that a human being does before God, is good. This kind of faith brings love along with it. From the faith and confidence in God’s graciousness proceed all other works. They too exist “in faith” and must be judged and assessed by it (WA 6, 206,22–24; 209,33–210,2). A mortal being may himself notice and experience whether his works are good or bad. When he is confident that his works please God, they are good; but if the confidence is missing or the pleasantness of the works is doubted they are not good. The goodness does not depend on what appears to the eye, but only on the inner confidence or faith (WA 6, 206,8–13). However, the inherent quality of the works may be experienced and in this sense known by evaluating the affectus with which one performs the works. So the invisible transcendent reality is through faith present in all the inner and outer actions of a human life.

4.

Activity of the inner man

The treatise On the Freedom of a Christian explores how a human being is turned into a spiritual man by the Word and by faith in Christ. But the second part of the treatise explains also the relationship of the spiritual man with the outer body and the works that the Christian performs. Luther repeats often that works do not make us righteous because by them we cannot adhere to Christ. He stresses moreover that concerning works, a Christian should form and contemplate only the one thought, that he will serve and benefit others by all his deeds, and look only to the need and the advantage of his neighbour. Luther remarks that the Apostle Paul commands the Christians to work with their hands so that they may be able to give to those in need. This kind of acting for those who are in need, makes caring for the body a Christian work. Each member of the body of Christ serves salus: oportet enim eum, si sponsus est, ea simul quae sponsa habet acceptare et ea quae sua sunt sponsae impartire. Qui enim corpus suum et se ipsum illi donat, quomodo non omnia sua donat? Et qui corpus sponsae accipit, quomodo non omnia quae sponsae sunt accipit?”

 

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another; they bear each other’s burdens and so fulfil the Law of Christ. According to Luther, this is a truly Christian life. Here faith finds expression in works of the freest service. The believing man serves another willingly, cheerfully, and lovingly with no hope of reward. For himself he is satisfied with the fullness and wealth of his faith.10 However Luther has much more to say about the inner man and his relation to outer deeds. I would indicate especially the functions of the intellect or the reason, the imagination, the will, and the conscience in the spiritual man. Luther’s view of the human being in relation to God and all things spiritual is often characterized as “passivity”. This has of course some grounds in Luther’s own utterances, but it should not be so understood as to deprive the human soul wholly of activity. By “passivity” in this respect Luther means that the human inner as well as outer capacities are unable to produce anything concerning the spiritual condition with their own powers. The teaching that the human capacities can at least partly do what is demanded mixes philosophy and theology in an erroneous and misleading way. However the powers of the soul may: and they also should be active in knowing and contemplating God, as well as obeying His will with good and joyful conscience. Luther recognizes human natural reason in an Aristotelian sense:11 such reasoning follows the syllogistic that consists of a major premise, a minor premise and a conclusion. This manner of reasoning applies both to theoretical and to practical knowledge. In practical inference the major premise identifies some good to be achieved, and the minor premise locates the good in some situation at hand. The conclusion then gives a suggestion or precept for action. Luther at no point expounds his understanding of practical reasoning as a whole, but he discusses the role of the major and minor premises. For him the major premises consist of the natural knowledge of God and divine Law. The premise of practical reasoning identifies the good to be achieved both in the moral and in the theological sense. In other words, the commandments of the divine Law may be obeyed both mor-

10 WA 7, 64,24–37: “Nullo tamen horum opus ei est ad iustitiam et salutem. Ideo in omnibus operibus suis ea debet opinione esse formatus et huc solum spectare, ut aliis serviat et prosit in omnibus quaecunque fecerit, nihil ante oculos habens nisi necessitatem et comoditatem proximi. Sic enim Apostolus iubet [Eph 4:28], ut manibus laboremus, quo demus necessitatem habenti, cum potuisset dicere, quo nos ipsos alamus, sed ‘det’, inquit, ‘necessitatem habenti’. Nam et in hoc ipsum corporis curam habere Christianum est, quo per eius salutem et comoditatem laborare, res quaerere et servare possimus in subsidium eorum, qui indigent, ut sic membrum robustum serviat membro infirmo et simus filii dei, alter pro altero sollicitus et laboriosus, invicem onera portantes et sic legem Christi implentes. Ecce haec est vere Christiana vita, hic vere fides efficax est per dilectionem, hoc est, cum gaudio et dilectione prodit in opus servitutis liberrimae, qua alteri gratis et sponte servit, ipsa abunde satura fidei suae plenitudine et opulentia.” 11 In this chapter I follow mostly my presentation in Raunio: 2010, 53.

 

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ally and theologically (WA DB 7, 34). Outwardly these two ways of acting look similar, but their interior quality is distinct. The difference is that in a moral action a good work presupposes the right reason, which is able to establish the minor premise of a practical inference. This does not hold true in theologically good works, because for theology there is under no circumstances any human right reason. Only faith is the right reason that shows what is good in the situation at hand. This is so because faith shows God who is able and willing to help. For the believer it is God, not the creature, who is the only one to enact good works and the only source of knowing what is right or wrong. Luther discusses the theological understanding of the will often in connection with right reasoning. Theologically understood, right reasoning and good will mean that through the Gospel one knows and believes that God has sent His Son into the world to save humankind. This sort of divine action is new and unknown to human reason (WA 40/I, 411, 24–412,13). The theological understanding of right reasoning and good will is thus incomprehensible to our logic. It is blind at this point and a new reasoning, namely faith, is generated. Faith includes theologically sound reasoning and theological good will. By theological good will Luther refers to the love of God and of one’s neighbour, or to presence of the Holy Spirit (Raunio: 2010, 54). When the human being is made similar to God, he resembles God not only by his capacities such as reason, intellect and will. The similarity means that he has the kind of intellect that understands God, and that his will seeks/is at one with what God wills.12 Luther concludes that the human being in the theological sense is a believing or faithful creature whose right reasoning and good will are correspondingly formed by faith. Faith is consequently the divinity in the works, the person and all parts of the human being. Faith is also the form of theological good works. When faith is present as the believer’s form, the corporal matter of the believer is also justified and his works are righteous. Theologically righteous works assume a theologically righteous human doer (WA 40/I, 417,25–29). So the invisible new and spiritual man, who ascribes all justice and all goodness to God, is intertwined in the outer works of the believer and makes them acceptable and pleasing to God. How, then, does the spiritual man learn to know God as good and righteous? Natural reasoning is not sufficient for that. Though it may form an image of God, the Almighty in that image is demanding, angry and condemnatory. Only the Gospel and the faith give the human heart an image of the loving and forgiving divinity. It presupposes that the Gospel annihilates the natural light and transforms it into 12 WA 42, 248,9–13: “Quod igitur Moses dicit Hominem etiam ad similitudinem Dei factum esse, ostendit, quod homo non solum referat Deum in eo, quod rationem seu intellectum et voluntatem habet, sed etiam, quod habet similitudinem Dei, hoc est, voluntatem et intellectum talem, quo Deum intelligit, quo vult, quae Deus vult etc.”

 

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a new light. The natural light of human reason is not annihilated entirely in this way, but only so far as it is intertwined with sinfulness and a carnal understanding of things. The human being is transformed into a wholly new creature in the sense that he sees everything differently thereafter (WA 10/I/1, 203,5–9; 205,4–21). Luther does not speak of “seeing” by accident; seeing God and everything else in a new light is an important part of his understanding of the spiritual man. The picture of God as good and righteous can be born only through the revealed God, that is, through the God who has attached himself to the created reality. The image in the heart is formed with a certain kind of imagination. That is to say, the theological thinking and understanding is done with the help of images. However, for the theological imagination, it is essential that the image in the heart is not a spontaneous creation of the human mind that combines the perceptions saved in the memory and makes God intelligible. Luther deplores what he sees as the erroneous use of the imagination in theology. He makes remarks on this topic often in contexts where he deals also with the relation between speculative or contemplative and active life. The Reformer calls “the speculations of the monks” cold, dead, and disastrous imaginings. Their error is that they are based on people’s own decisions and reasoning without the word/Word and promises of God. The speculation of our own reason may lead us to think that we have been lifted up to heaven. In reality, however, those who speculate in this way do not know the Law and the Gospel (WA 44, 194,4–14). For Luther the doctrine and the speculative life are taught correctly only if a distinction is made between the Decalogue and the promises. Precisely this is misunderstood in the monks’ speculative theology. Luther explains the difference as follows: the Decalogue shows all their callings (WA 44, 194,33–37) and leads them to action, but the promises guide them to contemplation or looking to God (WA 44, 195,3–4). It is worth noticing, however, that the differentiation between Law and Gospel here concerns the relation of faith and works to justification. Luther states that God creates both the faith and the action. In contemplation, faith grasps the pure and perfect justice of the Son of God, and therefore that faith justifies. Obedience to God’s Law that results in works is imperfect and does not make the doer righteous. Nevertheless it is an inevitable fruit of faith (WA 44, 195,13–18). In the true speculative life of the believer not only the human natural reason but also the natural imagination vanishes: the mind and intellect, with all their capacities, are annihilated. When the powers of the soul have been thus mortified the human chastened Christian lives only through the Word of God (WA 44, 193, 32–39). In Luther’s view the correct use of the speculation that hangs on faith and the promises comes especially into its own in the agony of death, when no counsel or help is to hand. Then if ever there is need of the speculation or contemplation that is connected only with the Word, and disconnected from any other sense (WA 44, 294, 15–21).

 

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On the other hand, Luther refers us to the believer’s inner imagination. It is important to notice that this kind of imagination is not only intellectual but also affective. The mortifying of the natural powers of the soul does not mean that they are entirely useless in theology. One example of the theological imagination is the biblical story of Jesus approaching His disciples by walking on the sea. They were afraid because they did not recognize the Lord, who in their eyes looked like a ghost or a devil. With that kind of seeing was combined the affect of fear. But when they heard Jesus say, “It is I”, the frightening form changed and they recognized Him. This example concerns perception and an image based on it. The disciples see the same sight that is at first a ghost or devil and then their own master. The imagination of faith, in which God is seen face to face, is born so that God leads first to Hell and then raises to Heaven. In this process occurs the mortification of the human soul’s natural powers. In their place come the perception, imagination, and understanding which are based on the Word. God’s Word, in this case, “It is I”, changed the image and understanding that was based on perception. Thus the soul that is living by the Word no longer worships the wrathful, but the beneficent and favorable God. For Luther knowing such a God presupposes exercise and experience that have to be taught and practised carefully. Exercise is needful if we are to see the characteristics of God’s firm love and benevolence there where we tend to see marks of His wrath (WA 44, 113,1–14). The obstacle to recognizing and understanding God’s love and compassion is the “flesh’s objection that prevents the spirit having the right view of God”. Correct understanding is possible only when the obstacles that the flesh has raised have been removed (WA 44, 112,1–4). As for knowing God the human reason and wisdom is obscure or dark. But when God gives His Word to enlighten this darkness He allows our intelligence to understand Him. Beams of the light that enlighten the human mind and make God knowable are, besides the Word, the doctrine and the sacraments. When God is embraced through them He is no longer hidden in the spirit, but only in the flesh (WA 44, 110,34–38). He is seen and known for the spirit but not for the flesh. Thus theology needs imagination that is based on the image of God given by the Word, doctrine, and sacraments. Pious and cheerful speculation cannot actualize without the Word. The thinking concerning God grasps the incarnate Son of God; it begins with the crib and the straw and ends with the ascension. In other words the correct theological speculation dwells on Christ’s life (WA 44, 194,6–10). And Christ’s life is received in the images given by the Word. God reveals Himself also in and through certain visible things, such as the incarnated Son or the Word of God and the sacraments. Only through them may a human being attain the image of the good, benevolent, righteous and loving God and become a believing and a spiritual man. The theological imagination leads us to know God, so that what for the natural perception, imagination, and intelligence does not seem divine will be recognized

 

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as God and the sign of divine goodness. The theological imagination helps us further to act according to God’s will, to fulfil the Law. The imagination then has a task in the active life as well. The foundation and order of the active life is God’s Law that shows our calling in the outer life (WA 44, 194,22–28). An example of the application of the theological imagination in actualizing one’s calling is Luther’s description of the acting of a Christian prince. The prince shall first look at his subject and “send” his heart there. This means that he directs all his powers to the benefit and service of his subjects. The prince has to think how to protect and defend the inhabitants of his land. Luther writes: “He needs to imagine Christ before his eyes and say: ‘Christ, the highest Prince, has come and served me. He has not tried to govern me and to seek his own good and glory from me, but he has only looked at my misery and aimed in every way to give me strength, everything good, and glory through him. Therefore I want also to do likewise, that I do not seek my own advantage from my subjects but what is good for them, and serve them with my office. I will rule so that they will get the advantage and the benefit, not I’” (cf. WA 11, 273,13–20; my translation, A.R.). Thus theological imagination means that with the help of the Gospel a human being forms the image of Christ. In the imagination of a prince the image of Christ combines his own status and service of his fellow man. In the same way as a prince, Christ is a pastor, deacon, carpenter, doctor, teacher, and so on. The theological imagination combines the tasks of our own calling and the misery and needs of those around us. The need may be spiritual, mental, or material. The image of Christ before the eyes guides all our senses and powers to serve our neighbour. The presupposition of the theological imagination is, however, what Christ has done and still does through the Word and sacraments to us as an individual. So the invisible reality and renewal is given through visible reality; through seeing and receiving Christ and the sacraments, where God is united with created visible things. It is well known that the Luther research of the 20th century has largely considered “conscience” to be one of, or even the central, theme in the Reformatory understanding of Christian life. A believer needs a joyous and free conscience. However, like other anthropological concepts, “conscience” is understood in several ways (cf. Raunio: 2010, 56f). Luther applies it principally in a theological sense as a divine evaluation of the whole person and his acting taken together. But he also recognizes the evaluating conscience in the philosophical sense. Here it estimates the moral goodness of human deeds. But sometimes he refers with the word “conscience” to the conclusion of a practical inference. Conscience in these cases is a suggestion of what to do in a given situation. Theologically, Luther has this often in mind when he mentions conscience which is bound to the Word of God. In this sense the conscience does not evaluate the human action afterwards but recommends what is to be done in a particular exigency. This was the case in Luther’s famous statement at the Diet of Worms in which he denied retracting his teachings (Brecht: 1981, 438f).

 

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He also differentiates between the inner and outer activity of the conscience. Firstly, according to the moral and philosophical meaning, it evaluates how human external works obey the Law (WA 7, 795,25–799,10). Secondly, the conscience evaluates such inner “real good works” as humility, leniency, patience, faithfulness, and love. These kinds of “works” are in fact emotions out of which the concrete deeds arise. The works may be done in two different ways; either from fear of punishment and desire for reward, or simply because such works are good and please God. Luther believes that the conscience may accept such works erroneously when they are done before there is clear understanding that no one has by nature such reason and will as God demands. People may thus believe that the inner emotions and the works based on them can be produced by human reason and will. For Luther this is the case of false security which, however, leaves the inner conscience insecure (WA 5, 556,26–36). In other words, the conscience is not sure to what extent if at all the person and the works are acceptable to God, even though the moral conscience accepts the outer deeds. The proper theological task of the conscience is thus to evaluate whether the deeds of a human hand can be accepted in the eyes of God. The acceptance of the theological conscience has two aspects. First, for the justification and the righteousness of the Christian, Christ and the human conscience have to become “one body” so that the believer sees only the crucified and risen Christ (WA 40/I, 282,16–22). Second, the conscience is good in the theological sense only when Christ and the Holy Spirit influence all good works in the human agent and so fulfil the divine Law. The theological conscience accepts only those works which are done out of love and in order to “carry the others’ weaknesses” (WA 2, 607,15–19). Such works cannot be done with the innate natural capacities, but proceed from God’s invisible transcendent reality and activity. The theological conscience thus makes a distinction between the human works and those of Christ. It rejects the first and accepts the latter. The believing conscience (fidelis conscientia) holds solely to Christ’s works, because it knows that it can be secure and peaceful only in Him. In Christ’s works, which are all done for the benefit of humankind, the conscience has reconciliation, forgiveness of sins, righteousness, and peace. It seizes His good works and leads the human disciple to these works which Christ has done for him and teaches him to do such works for the benefit of his neighbour and in order to practice his body in the works of love of God and neighbour (cf. De libertate Christiana, WA 7, 60,1–29; 61,12–17; 64,15–23; 66,23–28). The works are commanded in the Decalogue, but they should be done – as Luther says – according to the substance. This means that they should be done as Christ’s works for us, freely and without charge for the good of our neighbour. Thus they are not works of Law but deeds of Christ who is acting in the believer through faith (cf. WA 8, 606,34–607,17; 808,22–35).

 

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5.

Visibility and invisibility in relation to simultaneous righteousness and sinfulness

So far we have looked at Luther’s view of inner and outer man without considering their simultaneous presence in the believer.13 The correct understanding of this simultaneity has been disputed in Lutheran theology, but I accept the view that the sources contain both total and partial aspects of simultaneous righteousness and sinfulness. The first means that in Christ the believer is totally righteous but intrinsically a full sinner. The latter aspect Luther describes by saying that a Christian is partly flesh and partly spirit (WA 40/II, 93,1). It refers to the inner process of the faithful, whereby Christ and the Holy Spirit are at work renewing the sinner toward complete righteousness. All Christians live under the influence of both aspects and forces. In the earlier Lectures on Galatians (1519) Luther describes the situation as follows: “The righteous are sinners because of their flesh. But the sinfulness is not ascribed to them due to the faith of the inner man who is becoming God-formed and hates and crucifies sin in the flesh as long as the believer is perfect in both flesh and spirit” (WA 2, 497,36–39; my translation, A.R.). Here again appears Luther’s way of combining different senses of concepts without explanation. “Flesh” may mean, besides the sinful “old man”, the human body as such. He goes on to state that the human being, that is, the soul and the spirit of man that is mixed and corrupted by the fleshly affect (affectus carnis), is spirit as far as he knows what belongs to God, and flesh to the extent that he is moved by the flesh. So the believer is partly spirit and partly flesh. But it is perfectly possible to be totally spirit or totally flesh. When he consents wholly to God’s law he is spirit and his body is likewise spiritual, but if he yields to the temptations of the flesh he is entirely flesh. These descriptions do not refer to two different human beings, but to one and the same from different aspects. The whole human being loves purity (castitatem) and the whole human being is tempted by lust. So there are two whole human beings and one whole man. And therefore he fights against himself; wills and does not will at the same time (WA 2, 586,5–18). In the large Lectures on Galatians (1532/1535) Luther writes about the fight between Spirit and flesh. He states that the Christian life cannot be perfected as the Spirit would have it be. The spirit would like to be wholly pure, but that the flesh does not allow (WA 40/II, 99,11–13). In the earlier lectures Luther states that the inner and outer or the new and old man are not differentiated between soul and body but by the affect (WA 2, 588,31–32). “Affect” refers here to the same reality as “quality” in the Magnificat. Luther clarifies this by saying that a human is spiritual as far as he knows what is 13 On simultaneous righteousness and sinfulness see, for example, WA 40/I, 366,6–373,2 [Hs]; WA 40/II, 88,3–96,6.

 

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God’s and carnal as far as he knows what is his own. This means that the affect or quality determines also our knowing, as far as the relation to God is concerned. Luther states further that the Apostle Paul does not call the vice of searching after our own a habit of the soul, as Aristotelian philosophy does. The Aristotelians seek after the origin of vices and virtues, but do not know whether they are located in the rational or the irrational parts of man. But the Apostle sees in it the vice of one “habit”, to wit the flesh, at work, i. e. not any part but the whole man who is born of Adam (see also zur Mühlen: 1972, 265–267). Finally Luther stresses that both the flesh and the spirit are known by their fruits (WA 2, 589,1–12). The large Lectures on Galatians contain a lengthy treatment of the achievements of the flesh and the fruits of the spirit. The source of all evil deeds is the flesh that Luther here connects with such human capacities as the desiring will, the irascible will, and the intelligence. The first causes for example adultery and fornication; the second generates quarrel, controversy, and murder; and the third brings about for instance false religions and beliefs, idolatry, heresies, and sects (WA 40/ II, 111,22–112,13 [Dr]; WA 40/II, 111,6–10 [Hs]). The fruits of the Spirit are those that the Apostle Paul has listed in Gal 5:22. For Luther it would have been enough to mention love alone, because it embraces all the fruits. The Apostle has, however, taken care to refer to it first in order to encourage Christians to love one other and to compete in mutual honouring, and to regard the other as more competent than oneself. All this should happen because of Christ and the Holy Spirit, who dwell in Christians, as well as because of the Word, the Baptism, and all the divine gifts that they enjoy. So the mutual love and honouring of the Christians has both invisible and visible grounds in the divine persons and actions. The simultaneous righteousness and sinfulness of a Christian is a complex condition. The invisible reality is first of all the utter righteousness and utter sinfulness. But at the same time this is based on visible works of God, that is, on the Word and the Sacraments. The partial righteousness and partial sinfulness is a partly visible reality, visible in the “fruits” or actions and deeds of a Christian, but its invisible aspect is the inner fight between Spirit and flesh.

6.

Conclusion

To conclude briefly, a Christian has by faith received the incarnated visible Word or Son of God, and by virtue of this comes to be inwardly renewed and made into an invisible spiritual human being. Through and with the Christian, the incarnate Son and the Holy Spirit who dwell in the faith, do outwardly visible works and take care of the neighbours. But all the time the flesh fights against the Spirit and prohibits the Christian from living as the Spirit would wish. The task of a Christian is to let the Spirit guide him and not to give in to the flesh. Christ and the faith and hope

 

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that cleave to Him make it possible to fight with the power of Spirit against the flesh (WA 40/II, 88,17–89,10; 91,16–30 [Dr]). So the visible immanent reality and the invisible transcendent reality stay in reciprocal relation, and are simultaneously united with each other in the Christian’s faith and in his outwardly visible deeds.

Bibliography Brecht, Martin (1981), Martin Luther. Sein Weg zur Reformation 1483–1521, Stuttgart: Calwer Verlag. Joest, Wilfried (1967), Ontologie der Person bei Luther, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Luther, Martin (1519), In epistolam Pauli ad Galatas M. Lutheri commentarius. 1519, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 2, 443–618. Luther, Martin (1520), Epistola Lutheriana ad Leonem Decimum summum pontificem. Tractatus de libertate christiana. 1520, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 7, 42–73. Luther, Martin (1521), Das Magnificat verdeutschet und ausgelegt. 1521, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 7, 522–604. Luther, Martin (1523), Von weltlicher Oberkeit, wie weit man ihr Gehorsam schuldig sei. 1523, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 11, 245–281. Luther, Martin (1531/1535), In epistolam S. Pauli ad Galatas Commentarius ex praelectione D. Martini Lutheri. 1531, collectus 1535, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 40/I, 1–40/II, 184. Luther, Martin (1535–1545), Genesisvorlesung 1535–1545, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 42–44. Raunio, Antti (2010), The Human Being, in: Vainio, Olli-Pekka (ed.), Engaging Luther: A (New) Theological Assessment, Eugene: Cascade, 27–58. zur Mühlen, Karl-Heinz (1972), Nos extra nos. Luthers Theologie zwischen Mystik und Scholastik, Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck.

 

 

Anna Vind

Hoc est, tua iusticia non est visibilis, non est sensibilis Glaube und christliches Leben bei Luther – mit einem kurzen Ausblick auf die lutherische Tradition in Dänemark

1. Einleitung Zwei besondere, aber verbundene Themen stehen im Zentrum des vorliegenden Artikels: nämlich einerseits das Verständnis des Glaubens und andererseits die Distinktion zwischen sichtbar und unsichtbar. Die Erörterung von Luthers Glaubensbegriff ist unlösbar mit der Frage nach dem Verhältnis von Sichtbarkeit und Trans­ zendenz verknüpft. Wenn vom Glauben die Rede ist, verweist Luther gern auf den locus classicus im Hebräerbrief (11:1): „Es ist aber der Glaube eine feste Zuversicht auf das, was man hofft, und ein Nichtzweifeln an dem, was man nicht sieht.“ Glaube wird hier als Einstellung und Verhalten zum Unsichbaren bestimmt, und damit stellt sich die Frage, welche Form dieses Sich-Verhalten annimmt. Was sagt Luther von diesem Verhalten zu dem, was man nicht sieht – wobei ‘sehen’ hier bei Luther, wie sich im Folgenden zeigt, sich nicht allein auf den Gesichtssinn bezieht, sondern auf die ganze menschliche Erkenntnisfähigkeit, Denken wie Sinneserkenntnis. Was hier mit anderen Worten zur Untersuchung steht, ist also – etwas zugespitzt ausgedrückt –, was es für Luther heißt, sich zu dem zu verhalten, was sich weder denken noch empfinden lässt. In dieser Untersuchung soll ein späterer Text interpretiert werden, nämlich der große Galaterbriefkommentar von der 1530er Jahre. Unbeschadet seines von mancher Seite bezweifelten Quellenwerts, hat der große Galaterbriefkommentar stets einen Kerntext der Lutherforschung gebildet. Und hier sagt Luther Wesentliches zu Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit, menschlicher Erkenntnis und Glauben. Die hier vorgelegte Interpretation schließt sich an eine langjährige Tradition der dänischen Lutherforschung an, nicht zuletzt an Leif Granes, Regin Prenters og Steffen Kjeldgaard-Pedersens Deutungen. Abgesehen von dieser dänischen Linie der Lutherforschung ist die vorliegende Arbeit darüber hinaus beeinflusst von einem bestimmten – in späteren Jahren durchaus kontrovers diskutierten1 – Aspekt der 1 Die These wurde hauptsächlich von Oswald Bayer in seinem Buch Promissio, Geschichte der reformatorischen Wende, kritisch hinterfragt und wurde auch von Theodor Dieter geprüft und verworfen, 2001, 107–130.

 

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dialektisch-theologischen Deutungstradition, die sich – neben anderen – mit Namen wie Wilfried Joest oder Gerhard Ebeling kennzeichnen ließe: Die Betonung – erstens – der Kreuzestheologie Luthers und ihrer Bedeutung für Luthers sogenannte theologische Ontologie. Wilfried Joests bekannte Definition der Ontologie erscheint in all ihrer Vagheit (oder bewussten Naivität?) weiterhin fruchtbar anwendbar zu sein, gerade weil sie, was sie im Namen Luthers zu sagen sucht, von philosophisch-ontologischen Vorentscheidungen freizuhalten möchte. Joest schreibt: Der Begriff Ontologie soll […] bei der rein formalen und neutralen Bedeutung belassen werden: Frage nach der Bedeutung von „Sein“ und nach der Weise, wie Wirkliches da ist. (Joest: 1967, 14).

Von Belang für die vorliegende Arbeit ist ausserdem – zweitens – die Bedeutung der Kreuzestheologie für das Verständnis von Luthers Begriff der menschlichen Erkenntnis.2 Nicht zuletzt spielt aber auch die Kritik der finnischen Lutherforschung an eben dieser deutschen Deutungstradition eine entscheidende Rolle für die hier vorgelegte Interpretation. Die finnische Forschung hat an der deutschen Luther­ deutung des 20. Jahrhundert bekanntlich ihren im Neukantianismus begründeten Anachronismus beanstandet. Der Großteil der deutschen Forscher habe damit auch – laut finnischer Forschung – Luthers Betonung von Christi realer Gegenwart im Glauben übersehen oder auch bewusst ignoriert.3

1.1

Kreuzestheologie

Die Kreuzestheologie findet ihren vielleicht deutlichsten Ausdruck in der Heidelberger Disputation von 1518, die heute von mehreren Forschern als vor-reformatorisch betrachtetet wird.4 Nach einem Lutherforscher wie Wilfried Joest – der sich auf Walter Loewenichs berühmte Monographie zum Thema von 1929 beruft – lässt sich aber Kreuzestheologie im gesamten Werk Luthers nachweisen.5 Überall zeigt sie sich, von seinen frühen Psalmenvorlesung bis zu seinem späten Genesiskommentar. Die Theologie des Kreuzes – die auch in der zweiten Psalmenvorlesung zur ‚einzigen Theologie‘ erklärt wird (crux sola est nostra theologia) – handelt für Luther, unter Bezug auf Röm 1–3 und 1 Kor 1, davon, dass Gott wählte, sich unter dem

2 Siehe vor allem die in der dialektischen Tradition stehenden Thadigismann, 1987, und Bühler, 1981. 3 Siehe vor allem Saarinen (1989). 4 Siehe Bayer, 1971 und 2003 und nach ihn u. a. Holm, 2006, Rolf, 2008, Dietz 2009. 5 Joest, 1967, 89–111.

 

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Zeichen des Gegensatzes zu erkennen zu geben. Dies geschah, da sich der Mensch im Sündenfall von der ursprünglichen natürlichen Gotteserkenntnis abkehrt hatte. Darum – so heißt es in einer der äußerst prägnanten Erörterungen zur Theologie des Kreuzes in der zweiten Psalmenvorlesung (zu Ps 2; AWA 2/II, 106–111) – hat Gott sich entschieden, dass der Mensch ihn nicht in Erfolg und Gelingen, Glück und Gedeihen, sondern in Gefahr und Verlust, in Furcht und Zittern erkennen solle.6 Weil der gefallene Mensch alle Dinge Gottes pervertiert oder umkehrt, stellt Gott die Dinge der Welt auf den Kopf. Die Schöpfung war ursprünglich dem Menschen zu Aufklärung und Belehrung gegeben; da er sie nach dem Fall jedoch blind und selbstsüchtig brauchte, macht Gott es ihm sozusagen nach: Er braucht die Schöpfung, um den Menschen zu blenden und zu verhärten. Hier also, im Werk seiner Schöpfung, gibt sich Gott dem Menschen nicht mehr zu erkennen; ganz im Gegenteil gibt sich Gott dem Menschen jetzt zu erkennen, wo dieser es am Wenigsten erwartet und versteht. Gott ist – so Luther – wo sich die „Sinne [dem] heftig entgegensetzen, die Vernunft [es] verabscheut, der gemeine Brauch [es] leugnet, [es] ohne Vorbild [ist]“ (eigene Übersetzung, AV).7 Gott offenbart sich, mit anderen Worten, im Elenden und Gedemütigten, im Gekreuzigten und Sterbenden. Daraus ergibt sich eine Umkehrung oder Umdeutung der Bedeutung der Wörter und Dinge. Die ursprüngliche Bedeutung der Dinge und Wörter wird, so Luther, in Christus – eben als Gottes Offenbarung unter dem Zeichen des Gegensatzes – umkehrt und erweitert. Wörter und Dinge umfassen nun mehrere Bedeutungen. Eine in menschlichem Kontext (im philosophischen Kontext coram hominibus), eine andere im göttlichen Kontext (im theologischen Kontext coram deo). An zahlreichen Stellen spricht Luther von dieser Umkehrung oder Ausweiterung. Auch im großen Galaterbriefkommentar ist von dieser hermeneutischen Wende die Rede, in der Auslegung von Gal 2:19–20a, wo es heißt: „Denn ich bin durchs Gesetz dem Gesetz gestorben, damit ich Gott lebe. Ich bin mit Christus gekreuzigt. Ich lebe, doch nun nicht ich, sondern Christus lebt in mir.“ Dazu sagt Luther: Paulus hat seine eigene, nicht menschliche, sondern göttliche und himmlische Redeweise […]. Es ist nämlich völlig ungewöhnlich und unerhört zu sagen: Ich lebe – ich lebe nicht; ich bin gestorben – ich bin nicht gestorben; ich bin ein Sünder – ich bin nicht ein Sünder; ich habe ein Gesetz – ich habe kein Gesetz. Aber diese Redeweisen sind wahr in Christus und durch Christus (Luther: 1980, 111; Übersetzung ergänzt und bearbeitet, AV).8

6 Siehe Vind 2015, 71–72. 7 AWA 2/II, 106,24–27: „Sensus fortiter repugnat, ratio abhorret, usus negat, exemplum deest […].“ 8 WA 40/I, 285,8–15: „Paulus suam peculiarem phrasin habet, non humanam, sed divinam et colestem […]. Est enim plane insolens et inaudita, Ut: ‚Vivo‘,‘non vivo‘; ‚mortuus sum‘, non mortuus sum; sum peccator, non sum peccator, habeo legem, non habeo legem. Sed ista phrases vera est in Christo et per Christum.“

 

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Dieser Gedanke von der Mehrdeutigkeit der Sprache hat einige entscheidende Facetten – auf die später zurückzukommen sein wird. Aus dem Dargelegten geht hervor, dass die Kreuzestheologie erhebliche Bedeutung hat für „Sein und wie Wirkliches da ist“, um auf Joests Definition der Ontologie zurückzugreifen. Was Sein und Wert coram hominibus, also für Menschen hat, hat nicht eigentlich Wert und Sein coram deo, für Gott. Menschliche Weisheit ist Torheit für Gott; was Menschen bewundern, wird von Gott geringgeachtet; was Menschen verachten, wird von Gott erhöht usw. Was der Mensch also zunächst erwartet und erhofft, muss er verachten lernen; was er fürchtet, muss er lieben lernen: vor ihm steht Kreuz und Tod. Kann das nun wirklich seine Richtigkeit haben, fragt man sich: All das Schöne und Gute, an dem der Mensch in der Welt seine Freude hat, hat schlechterdings keinen Wert für Gott? Friede, Freude, Zuversicht, Vertrauen – und was der Mensch ansonsten an Gutem empfinden möge: ist nichts wert für Gott, dessen Gegenwart sich ausschließlich in Sorge, Angst, Zweifel und Unruhe erfahren lässt? Das kann man man wohl ‚negative‘ Theologie nennen. Nicht unbedingt im apophatischen Sinne des Wortes, wohl aber in der dialektisch-theologischen Bedeutung, die mit Identität und Korrespondenz von dialektischen Gegensatzpaaren wie z. B. Gericht/ Erlösung, Untergang/Neugeburt und Tod/Leben operiert. Was hat Luther zu dieser Sache näher zu sagen?

1.2

Glaubenserkenntnis

Das soeben Umrissene mag zwar negativ erscheinen. So hat es Luther jedoch nicht aufgefasst wissen wollen. Zum besseren Verständnis von Luthers Gedanken müssen wir näher auf die Konsequenzen der Kreuzestheologie für die Bedingungen der Gotteserkenntnis in dieser zeitlichen und endlichen Welt eingehen. Der Hauptgedanke besteht darin, dass das, was wir ‚die kreuzestheologische Wirklichkeit‘ nennen können, aufgrund der fortwirkenden Gegenwart der Sünde bis zum Ende der Zeiten ein unhintergehbares Faktum ist und bleibt. Und da die Sünde, wie angedeutet, die menschliche Erkenntnis verkehrt, stellt die kreuzestheologische Wirklichkeit ein Reich des Glaubens dar, das für Luther erst nach dem Ende aller Dinge und dem Auslöschen der Sünde von einem anderen Reich abgelöst werden wird, in dem der Mensch Gott von Angesicht zu Angesicht schaut. Das Entscheidende für Luther ist nun die Einsicht, dass es für den gefallenen Menschen als solchen zunächst und unmittelbar keinen Weg zu Gott gibt. Die Sinnes- und Erkenntnisfähigkeiten des sündigen Menschen vermögen schlechterdings nichts dem Göttlichen gegenüber. Luther ist bereits dafür zitiert worden, dass Gott gerade dort zu finden ist, wo die Sinne, die Vernunft und der gemeine

 

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Brauch es leugnen. Das bildet für Luther den Kerngedanken in den ersten Kapiteln des Römerbriefes wie im Ersten Korintherbrief. Und dennoch hat Gott sich entschieden, sich in seinem Sohn zu erkennen zu geben. Zwar nicht für die eigenen Sinnes- und Erkenntnisfähigkeiten des Menschen, wohl aber für den Glauben. Damit sind wir zum Ausgangspunkt der Darlegung zurückgekehrt: Wie lässt sich dieser Problemkomplex näher verstehen, dass Gott sich einem Menschen offenbart, dessen Erkenntnis- und Sinnesfähigkeiten Ihn schlechterdings nicht erfassen können? Die Offenbarung geschieht laut Luther, wie gesagt, unter ‚entgegengesetzter Gestalt‘, sub contraria specie, das heißt dem menschlichen Verstehen und Erwarten diametral entgegengesetzt. Das bedeutet nun keinesfalls – und das wird Luther nicht müde zu betonen –, dass man etwa ein positives Verhältnis zu Gott einnehmen könnte, indem man sich an etwas klammert, das einem negativ erscheint, wie etwa Askese oder Armut, oder indem man den Intellekt opfert und sich in klösterlicher Abgeschiedenheit geistlicher Exstase hingibt.9 In seiner Kritik zeitgenössischer Irrtümer wendet Luther sich zum Beispiel wiederholt wider die falsche Demut der Ordensbrüder und die Fehlschlüsse der Mystiker, die wähnen, durch Selbstentsagung, durch Verzicht auf Eigentum und durch Streben nach allem menschlich gesehen unmittelbar Wertlosen sich Zugang zu Gottes Reich sichern zu können. Offenbarung sub contraria specie bedeutet vielmehr, dass die Vorstellungen des gefallenen Menschen, seine Fähigkeiten und sein Vermögen, ja, alles, was er ist, umgestürzt wird und etwas Neues an seine Stelle tritt. Im Galaterbriefkommentar erläutert Luther diesen Gedanken im Zusammenhang mit der Auslegung von Gal 2:16 anhand der Unterscheidung von Gesetz und Evangelium. Das Gesetz, so sagt Luther, unterrichtet, erschrickt und demütigt den Menschen, damit er sein Unvermögen und seine Nichtigkeit, also seine radikale Sündhaftigkeit erkenne: Das Gesetz nämlich sagt: Du bist ein schlechter Baum, daher streitet alles, was du denkst, redest und tust, gegen Gott (Luther: 1980, 87).10

Das Evangelium jedoch verheißt: […] sondern Gott sandte seinen eingeborenen Sohn in die Welt, dass wir durch ihn leben sollen. […] Denn Gott hat in seinem Wort offenbart, dass er ein gnädiger Vater sein möchte, der uns ohne unser Verdienst, da wir nichts verdienen können, Vergebung

9 Siehe z. B. seiner Auslegung der Magnificat 1521: ‚[Es ist] nichts nutz, das man demut lere auf die masse, das man ynn die augen bildet geringe, vorachte ding‘, WA 7, 563,5–7. 10 WA 40/I, 223,31–32: „Lex enim dicit: Tu es arbor mala, ideo omnia quae cogitas, loqueris et facis, pugnant contra Deum.“

 

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der Sünden, Gerechtigkeit und ewiges Leben Christi wegen umsonst geben will (Luther: 1980, 87; Übersetzung ergänzt, AV).11

Und um diese Botschaft zu ergreifen, so fährt Luther fort, reichen alle Fähigkeiten und Vermögen des Menschen nicht aus; da bedarf es des Glaubens. Keines ‚geschichtlichen‘ Glaubens, unter dem Luther ein rein intellektuelles Wissen von Christus versteht. Und auch keines schwärmerischen Glaubens, der lediglich ein menschliches Gefühl im Herzen ohne Christus darstellt (WA 40/II, 78). Nein, es bedarf des wahren Glaubens. Und der wahre Glaube, so Luther, ist die gewisse Zustimmung des Herzens und die feste Zuversicht, mit der Christus ergriffen wird (WA 40/I, 186). Oder, genauer gesagt: […] so dass Christus der Gegenstand des Glaubens ist, oder vielmehr nicht der Gegenstand, sondern, um es so auszudrücken: Christus ist gegenwärtig im Glauben selbst. Der Glaube ist also eine gewisse Erkenntnis oder Finsternis, die nichts sieht. Und dennoch sitzt in dieser Finsternis Christus, im Glauben ergriffen, so wie der Herr auf dem Sinai oder im Tempel mitten in der Finsternis saß (Jes 6:ff). […] unsere Gerechtigkeit ist der Glaube selbst und die Finsternis des Herzens, d. h. unser Vertrauen in eine Sache, die wir nicht sehen (Hebr 11:1), d. h. unser Vertrauen auf Christus, der, mag er auch in keiner Hinsicht gesehen werden, dennoch gegenwärtig ist (Luther: 1980, 89f; Übersetzung bearbeitet, AV).12

Hier haben wir eines der zahlreichen Beispiele für Luthers Gebrauch von der Glaubensbestimmung im Hebräerbrief und für seine Überlegungen zum Glauben als ein Sich-Verhalten zum Unsichtbaren. Zwar ist Christus gegenwärtig, für den Gläubigen verbleibt er jedoch unsichtbar. Der Glaube selbst, also das Sich-Verhalten, wird ebenfalls beschrieben als etwas, das der Gläubige nicht zu sehen vermag, als eine Dunkelheit und Finsternis im Herzen. Zugleich beschrieb Luther jedoch den Glauben als eine gewisse Zustimmung, ein festes Vertrauen und einen starken Trost, mit denen Christus ergriffen wird, und so erscheint der Glaube dem Gläubigen also doch in irgendeinem Sinne. Das oben zitierte Zitat ist auch ein Beispiel dafür, wie Luther mit Ausdrücken und Definitionen spielt: Prüfend wird

11 WA 40/I, 224,20–28: „Sed Deus misit unigenitum filium suum in mundum, ut nos per eum vivamus. […] Deus enim revelavit per suum verbum se fore propitium patrem qui velit sine nostro merito, cum nihil mereri possimus, nobis gratis donare remissionem peccatorum, iustitiam et vitam aeternam propter Christum.“ 12 WA 40/I, 228,34–229,21: „[…] Sic ut Christus sit obiectum fidei, imo non obiectum, sed, ut ita dicam, in ipsa fide Christus adest. Fides ergo est cognitio quaedam vel tenebrae quae nihil videt, Et tamen in istis tenebris Christus fide apprehensus sedet, Quemadmodum Deus in Sinai et in Templo sedebat in medio tenebrarum. Est […] nostra iustitia […] ipsa fides et nebula cordis, hoc est, fiducia in rem quam non videmus, hoc est, in Christum qui, ut maxime non videatur, tamen praesens est.“

 

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angedeutet, dass Christus und der Glaube nicht zweierlei Ding sind. Der Glaube ist eben dies, dass Christus den Gläubigen in ihm selbst gegenwärtig ist. Vielleicht ließe sich sagen, dass der Glaube an und für sich nichts handgreiflich Fassbares darstelle. Er ist, nach Luthers Erklärung, weder eine intellektuelle Überzeugung noch ein Gefühl, sondern eben jenes Verhältnis, das zwischen Christus und dem Einzelnen etabliert wurde. Der Glaube hat offensichtlich mehrere Gesichter: Er ist düster und unnahbar und somit nicht-sinnlich; er zeigt sich aber auch als Vertrauen, Gewissheit und Trost, und das heißt: in sinnlicher Gestalt.

1.3

Der gläubige christliche Sünder

Die Erklärung für diese Vieldeutigkeit und Komplexität der Erscheinungsformen des Glaubens ergibt sich aus der Definition des Gläubigen. Im Galaterbriefkommentar finden sich gute Beispiele für die klassische lutherische Erkenntnis schlechthin: Immer wieder betont Luther, dass der heilige, fromme, gläubige Christenmensch Sünder sei. So ist der Christenmensch zugleich gerecht und Sünder, heilig und unheilig, Feind und Sohn Gottes (Luther: 1980, 142).13

Zum besseren Verständnis dieser Erklärung kann man an dem anknüpfen, was früher zur Mehrdeutigkeit der Sprache gesagt wurde: Bei jener von der Kreuzestheologie hervorgerufenen Mehrdeutigkeit der Wörter und Dinge muss man unterscheiden zwischen einer philosophischen Bedeutung, die unter Menschen (coram hominibus) gilt, und einer theologischen Bedeutung, die die Dinge bennent, wie Gott sie sieht (coram deo). Im philosophischen Kontext, also dem menschlichen Sprachgebrauch entsprechend, weiss man sehr wohl, was die Wörter ‚Gerechtigkeit‘ und ‚Weisheit‘ bedeuten. In seinem Kommentar zu Gal 3:28 malt Luther in seiner Darstellung der Familie und des bürgerlichen Lebens aus, wie sich außergewöhnliche Individuen bereits in vor-christlicher Zeit zum allgemeinen Besten hervortaten: […] Es gab große und einzigartige Männer […], die, mit hervorragenden und wahrhaftig heroischen Tugenden ausgestattet, das Staatswesen aufs Beste leiteten und viele herrliche Taten für das Heil des Staates vollbracht haben […] (Luther: 1980, 208).14 13 WA 40/I, 368,26–27: „Sic homo Christianus simul iustus et peccator, Sanctus, prophanus, inimicus et filius Dei est.“ 14 WA 40/I, 543,13–17: „[…] fuerunt magni ac praestantes viri, […] qui insignibus ac vere Heroicis virtutibus praediti respublicas optime administraverunt et multa praeclarissime gesserunt pro salute Reipublicae etc.“

 

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Hier in dieser unserer Welt, bemerkt Luther, also im menschlichen, philosophischen Kontext, ist jeder verpflichtet, seine Schuldigkeit zu tun, indem er sich seinen Mitmenschen gegenüber weise und gerecht erweist. Ein Mann hat sich daheim wie im Beruf anständig zu benehmen. Eine Frau hat ihrem Mann zu gehorchen und für Haus und Kind zu sorgen. Ein Knecht hat seinem Herrn zu dienen; und sein Herr hat seinen privaten wie öffentlichen Angelegenheiten würdevoll nachzukommen. Hier erhält man einen Eindruck von Luthers Vorstellungen vom rechten Benehmen in zwischenmenschlichen Beziehungen: In privaten wie in beruflichen oder in öffentlichen Verhältnissen hat man sich um Anständigkeit zu bemühen. Entscheidend für uns ist hier jedoch, dass Luther, während er das heroische Handeln außerordentlicher Individuen in höchsten Tönen lobt, zugleich erklärt: All diese, sage ich, sind – mit all ihrem Schmuck – nichts vor Gott. Was auch immer es gibt an wirtschaftlicher, politischer oder religiöser Gerechtigkeit – und solcher Art war die Gerechtigkeit des Gesetzes – mit äußerstem Gehorsam, Vollstreckung des Rechts und Heiligkeit, gilt überhaupt nichts Gott gebenüber (eigene Übersetzung, AV).15

In den Augen Gottes, coram deo, gilt etwas gänzlich Anderes. Hier ist Gerechtigkeit nicht der Ausdruck einer Aktivität, die ein ‚Wie du mir, so ich dir‘ widerspiegelt; hier ist Gerechtigkeit Ausdruck einer Passivität, die Gottes Gnade bezeichnet: seine Vergebung der Sünde und seine Anrechnung von Christi Gerechtigkeit im Glauben. Und Weisheit bezeichnet hier nicht den beredten und gleißenden Gebrauch der Vernunft, sondern ganz im Gegenteil die Abtötung der machtbegierigen Vernuft, nämlich unter Bezug auf die vernunftswidrige Aussage, die die Botschaft von Gottes Gnade darstellt: Wenn du mich versöhnen möchtest, dann biete mir nicht deine Werke oder Verdienste dar, sondern glaube an Jesus Christus, meinen eingeborenen Sohn, der geboren wurde, gelitten hat, gekreuzigt und tot ist um deiner Sünden willen, so werde ich dich annehmen und als gerecht erklären (eigene Übersetzung, AV).16

Luther kann, mit Paulus, auch schreiben, dass ein Mensch im theologischen Kontext ein Tor werden muss, um ein Weiser sein zu können. In Bezug auf die mehrfache Bedeutung der Wörter soll auch dieser letzte Aspekt noch aufgegriffen werden: Da der Glaubende, der sowohl Gesetz und Evangelium 15 WA 40/I, 543,22–25: „Hi, inquam, istis omnibus ornamentis nihil sunt coram Deo. Quidquid igitur est iustitiae Oeconomicae, Politicae et Divinae, qualis erat iustitia legis, cum summa obedientia, executione iuris et sanctitate, nihil prorsus valet coram Deo.“ 16 WA 40/I, 365,30–12: „Si vis me placare, non offeras mihi tua opera et merita, sed crede Iesum Christum, filium unigenitum meum, natum, passum, crucifixum et mortuum pro peccatis tuis, tum acceptabo et pronuntiabo te iustum.“

 

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vernimmt, weiterhin Sünder ist und bleibt, muss von ihm im theologischen Kontext stets zweierlei gesagt werden. Hier findet man die charakteristischen lutherischen Doppelausdrücke paradoxaler oder dialektischer Art, auf die wir bereits gestoßen sind: lebt – lebt nicht; tot – nicht tot; Sünder – gerecht; unter dem Gesetz – frei vom Gesetz; unrein – heilig; Gottes Feind – Gottes Kind. Die eine Aussage gilt dem alten Menschen, dem sündigen Menschen, der das Urteil des Gesetzes vernimmt. Die andere Aussage gilt dem neuen Menschen, der mit dem Evangelium entsteht, indem Christus nun im Glauben gegenwärtig ist und den Gläubigen an seiner eigenen Gerechtigkeit teilhaben lässt. Diese beiden Menschen – das hat Luther mehrmals dargelegt – sind gleichzeitig gegenwärtig in demselben gläubigen Christenmenschen. Luther setzt diesen Gedanken bisweilen auf die Spitze, wenn er schreibt, im gläubigen Christen gibt es zwei ganze Menschen in einem ganzen Menschen.17 Um kurz zusammenzufassen: Luther hat die unterschiedlichen Lebenssphären beschrieben, in denen der christliche Mensch existiert: Erstens das bürgerliche mitmenschliche Leben, dessen Anforderungen zu genügen er sich bemühen soll. Wie anständig auch immer er sich hier jedoch erweisen mag, hat sein Verhalten keinerlei Bedeutung für das Gottesverhältnis. Zweitens das Leben im Glauben an Gott, dass den Menschen eben diesen ersten Punkt lehren soll: dass menschliche Leistungen keinerlei Wirkungen haben für das Verhältnis zu Gott. Das hat allein der Glaube, der eben darin besteht, den Drang aufzugeben, selbst etwas leisten zu wollen. Dieses christliche Leben ist ausgespannt zwischen einem Noch-nicht und einem Jetzt-schon.18 Einerseits ist und bleibt der Gläubige ein Sünder und hat Gott deswegen nichts darzubieten (das heißt: Sünde = der verkehrte, pervertierte Gebrauch des bürgerlichen Lebens = noch nicht). Andererseits hat er das Evangelium von der Vergebung und Erlösung im Glauben an Christus und ist deswegen befreit von seinem Leistungseifer im Verhältnis zu Gott (hier haben wir Gerechtigkeit = der rechte Gebrauch des bürgerlichen Lebens = jetzt schon). Wenn man an dieser Stelle nun eine Antwort wagen sollte auf den ersten Teil der einleitend gestellten Frage – Hat all das Gute und Schöne, an dem sich der Mensch in der Welt erfreut, gar keinen Wert für Gott? Ist alle Freude, Gewissheit, Zuversicht und Ruhe völlig ohne Bedeutung im Verhältnis zu Gott? – dann müsste sie im Sinne Luthers unmittelbar lauten: Nein, alles Gute und Schöne, an dem der Mensch seine Freude hat, alle positiven Gefühle, die der Mensch in dieser Welt empfinden mag – und hier sprechen wir von den Dingen in ihrem philosophischen Zusammenhang – haben tatsächlich keinerlei Bedeutung für das Gottesverhältnis. Das heißt nun nicht, dass sie als solche ohne Bedeutung sind für Gott, der sie ja 17 Siehe z. B. im kleinen Kommentar zu den Galatherbriefen 1519: ‚Totus homo est qui castitatem amat, idem totus homo illecebris libidinis titillatur. Sunt duo toti homines et unus totus homo‘, WA 2, 586, 15–17. 18 Siehe Vind, 2004, Vind 2007 und auch Vind, 2015, 78.

 

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erschaffen und gewollt hat, so wie sie sind. Versteht man sie als das, was sie sind, nämlich Gottes Schöpfung, belässt man sie an ihrem rechten Ort und Platz. Missversteht man sie jedoch und betrachtet sie als entscheidend für das Gottesverhältnis, dann werden sie vom gefallenen Menschen missbraucht zur Verkehrung eben dieses Gottesverhältnisses und erhalten damit eine negative Funktion.

1.4

Die Erfahrung des Christenmenschen

Hier im letzten Abschnitt der Lutherdarstellung seien die zentralen Fragen des Artikels nochmals wiederholt: Wie sieht der Glaube eigentlich aus? Ist er eine Finsternis und unsichtbar? Oder ist er Vertrauen, Gewissheit und Zuverversicht? Welche Erfahrungen haben die zugleich sündigen und gerechten gläubigen Christen – wenn von ihnen gilt, dass ihre Erkenntnisfähigkeiten einerseits völlig verdunkelt sind und das Wort nicht zu erfassen vermögen, und sie andererseits Christus, das Wort, dennoch im Glauben ergreifen? Um nun diese letzte Frage als erstes aufzugreifen: Der Hauptgedanke ist hier, dass der gläubige Sünder, wie jeder andere Sünder auch, mit Ablehnung und Empörung auf das Evangelium reagiert. Eben aufgrund der Sünde möchte niemand hören, was Gesetz und Evangelium zusammen verkünden: Dass alles, was der Mensch selbst darstellt und ist, vergehen muss, während das wahre Leben im Glauben an Christus als den einzigen Gerechten besteht. Er möchte nicht Verzicht leisten auf das, was ihm wert ist, und zu nichts werden, und deswegen reagiert er unmittelbar auf Gottes Botschaft laut Luther folgendermassen: So wirft uns Gott allezeit, wenn er Artikel des Glaubens vorstellt, einfach unmögliche und absurde Dinge entgegen, wenn du nach dem Urteil der Vernunft gehen willst. So erscheint es der Vernunft gewiss lächerlich und absurd, dass uns im Hl. Abendmahl Leib und Blut Christi ausgeteilt werden; dass die Taufe Bad der Wiedergeburt und Erneuerung durch den Hl. Geist sei; dass die Toten am Jüngsten Tag auferstehen; dass Christus, der Sohn Gottes, empfangen und getragen wurde im Schoß der Jungfrau, dass er geboren wurde, den unwürdigsten Tod am Kreuze erlitt, auferweckt wurde, jetzt sitze zur Rechten des Vaters und alle Gewalt habe im Himmel und auf Erden. (Paulus nennt das Evangelium von dem gekreuzigten Christus das Wort vom Kreuz und eine törichte Predigt […]). So urteilt die Vernunft über alle Artikel des Glaubens. Sie versteht ja nicht, dass es höchster Gottesdienst ist, das Wort Gottes zu hören und zu glauben. Sondern sie meint, dass das, was sie selbst auserwählt und Gutes tut – wie man sagt: mit rechter Absicht und Hingabe – Gott gefalle. Daher, wenn Gott redet, urteilt die Vernunft, sein Wort sei Ketzerei und Teufelswort […] (Luther: 1980, 140; Übersetzung leicht verändert, AV).19 19 WA 40/I, 361,19–362,13: „Sic semper Deus, cum obiicit articulos fidei, simpliciter impossibilia et absurda, si iudicium rationis sequi voles, obiicit. Ut certe ridiculum et absurdum videtur rationi, in Coena nobis exhiberi corpus et sanguinem Christi; Baptismum esse lavacerum rege-

 

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Andererseits haben die gläubigen Sünder ihren Glauben, also ihr Verhältnis zu Christus, von Gott empfangen. Sie sind betroffen vom Gesetz, das sie auslöscht – dagegen empört sich der alte Mensch in ihnen. Aber sie haben auch das Evangelium von der Vergebung der Sünden und der Anrechnung von Christi Gerechtigkeit vernommen – und daran klammert sich der neue Mensch. Diese Zwiespältigkeit oder Ausgespanntheit im Gläubigen zwischen entgegengesetzen Polen – die Luther gern mit einer Kampfmetapher beschreibt – bildet für Luther die Lebensbedingung des Christen. Im Kommentar zu Gal 3:7 heißt es: So bleibt ein Christ in der reinen Niedrigkeit, weil er ja wahrhaftig die Sünde fühlt und weiß, dass er ihretwegen des Zorns und Gerichtes Gottes, ja des ewigen Todes würdig sei; so wird der Christ in diesem Leben gedemütigt. Er bleibt dennoch zugleich in reinem und heiligem Übermut, in welchem er sich Christus zuwendet, und durch ihn [scil. Christus] richtet er sich gegen dieses Gefühl des Zorns und göttlichen Gerichtes auf; er glaubt, dass er vom Vater geliebt wird, nicht seiner selbst, sondern des geliebten Christus wegen (Luther: 1980, 143; Übersetzung leicht verändert, AV).20

Um kurz zusammenzufassen: Luther sagt hier, dass sich der Christ Christus zuwendet „gegen dieses Gefühl des Zorns und göttlichen Gerichtes“. Je größer die Frömmigkeit, desto inniger auch das Gefühl der Sünde, wie Luther an anderer Stelle schreibt.21 Christus im Glauben zu ergreifen ist nicht einfach, schreibt Luther, sondern erfordert einen unermüdlichen Kampf mit dem alten Menschen, der sich weigert, ihn zu fassen.22 Das Leben des Gläubigen ist gezeichent von diesem Kampf und den damit verbundenen negativen Erfahrungen. Hier gilt es, fährt Luther fort, ausdauernd und standhaft zu sein. Man muss seinen Blick fest auf Christus richten: […] ihm sollen wir mit festem Blick anhängen und voll Überzeugung erklären, dass er unsere Gerechtigkeit und unser Leben sei, ohne dass wir uns bei den schrecklichen

nerationis ac renovationis Spiritus sancti; Mortuos resurgere in extreme die; Christum filium Dei concipi, gestari in alvo virginis, nasci, pati mortem indignissimam crucis, resuscitari, sedere nunc ad dexteram Patris et habere potestatem in coelo et terra. (Paulus enim Evangelium de Christo crucifixo vocat verbum crucis et stultitiam praedicationis […]). Sic de omnibus articuli fidei iudicat ratio. Non enim intelligit summum cultum esse audire vocem Dei et credere. Sed ea quae ipsa eligit et facit bona, ut vocant, intentione et propria devotione, sentit Deo placere. Ideo cum Deus loquitur, iudicat verbum eius esse haeresim et diaboli verbum […].“ 20 WA 40/I, 372,19–23: „Sic Christianus manet in pura humilitate, sentiens re vera peccatum et propter hoc se dignum ira, iudicio Dei et morte aeterna, ut humilietur in hac vita. Manet tamen simul et in pura et sancta superbia, qua sese vertit ad Christum et per eum sese erigit contra hunc sensum irae et iudicii divini et credit se amari a Patre, non propter se, sed amatum Christum.“ 21 WA 40/II, 94,14–15. 22 WA 40/I, 345, 31–35.

 

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Drohungen des Gesetzes, der Sünde, des Todes, des Zornes und Urteils Gottes weiter aufhalten (eigene Übersetzung, AV).23

Es wäre ein Irrtum zu glauben, man könne sich das Evangelium ein für alle Mal aneignen.24 Es muss stets aufs Neue begehrt und empfangen werden. Auch darf man nicht verzeifeln, weil man nicht von der Stelle zu kommen meint und der Kampf mit der Sünde unendlich erscheint. Was dem Menschen nämlich Unbeweglich zu sein oder sich bestens Falls kriechend langsam davonzubewegen scheint, ist rasch und geschwind für Gott. Was Menschen schlecht anmutet, ist in den Augen Gottes gut: […] doch was uns langsam erscheint, ist rasch für Gott; was sich für uns kaum aus der Stelle bewegt, das eilt für Ihn dahin. Entsprechend, was in unseren Augen Betrübnis, Sünde und Tod ist, ist bei Gott Freude, Gerechtigkeit und Leben.25

Wenn man hier, sozusagen als Fazit, eine Antwort auf den zweiten Teil der anfangs gestellten Frage geben soll – Korrespondiert Gottes Gegenwart mit menschlicher Sorge und Angst, mit Zweifel und Unruhe? –, dann muss sie lauten: Ja, so ist es, doch nicht in einem unmittelbaren oder direkten, sondern in einem dialektischen oder paradoxen Sinne. Das Positive und das Negative sind unlösbar miteinander verbunden. Sorge, Angst, Zweifel und Unruhe rühren von der Finsternis des Glaubens her, der Verborgenheit des Glaubens selbst sowie seines Gegenstandes. Das ist das eine von den Gesichtern des Christusglaubens. Hier wird das Wirken des Gesetzes im Gläubigen erfahren als der Untergang des Sünders, des alten Menschen. Zugleich gibt es aber das andere Gesicht des Glaubens, den Glauben als feste Zuversicht und Vertrauen auf das Evangelium vom unsichtbaren Christus, von dem Gott nichtdestominder gelobt hat, er werde da sein, Sündenvergebung gewähren und an seiner Gerechtigkeit teilhaben lassen. Und dieses Gesicht des Glaubens wirft Glanz und Licht auf das erstere. Nicht in dem Sinne, dass negative Erfahrungen ausgelöscht würden, sondern so, dass sie in rechter Perspektive erscheinen und verständlich werden. Von dieser Doppelheit heißt es bei Luther: So können wir einen Christen so bestimmen, dass wir sagen: Nicht der ist ein Christ, der nicht hat oder fühlt Sünde, sondern der, dem die Sünde wegen des Glaubens an

23 WA 40/I, 283,12–14: „[…] in quo haerentes fixo intutu certo statuamus eum esse iustitiam et vitam nostram, nihil morantes minas et terrores legis, peccati, mortis, irae ac iudicii Die.“ 24 WA 40/I, 368, 16–17. 25 WA 40/II, 13–15: „[…] sed quod nobis tardum videtur, coram Deo velox est, quod nobis vix reptat, hoc illi velociter currit. Item quod in oculis nostris tristicia, peccatum, mors est, hoc apud Deum est gaudium, iusticia et vita […].“

 

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Christus nicht angerechnet wird. Diese Lehre bringt festen Gewissenstrost in wirklichen Schrecken (Luther: 1980, 92).26

In seinem Kommentar zu Gal 5:5 drückt Luther diesen Gedanken so aus, dass er in seiner Entfaltung des Glaubens die Hoffnung entsprechend mit einbezieht. Hier ein längerer Auszug, aus dem auch der Titel dieses Artikels stammt: In diesem Kampf des Gewissens, den wir aus Erfahrung kennen, herrscht das Bewusstsein der Sünde, des Zornes Gottes, des Todes, der Hölle und allen erdenklichen Ängsten mit grosser Gewalt. Hier muss man dem Angefochtenen sagen: Bruder, du möchtest eine spürbare Gerechtigkeit, d. h. du wünschst deine Gerechtigkeit zu spüren, wie du deine Sünde spürst – das wird niemals geschehen. Vielmehr muss deine Gerechtigkeit sich über das Sündenbewusstsein erheben und hoffen, dass du vor Gott gerecht seist. D. h. deine Gerechtigkeit ist nicht sichtbar, sie lässt sich nicht spüren [meine Hervorhebung, AV] – man muss hoffen, dass sie zu ihrer Zeit offenbart werde. Deswegen hast du nicht nach dem Sündenbewusstsein zu urteilen, das dich ängstigt und verwirrt, sondern nach der Verheißung und Lehre des Glaubens. Diese verheißen dir Christus, der deine vollkommene und ewige Gerechtigkeit ist (eigene Übersetzung, AV).27

Eine letzte Beobachtung sei noch erlaubt vor der Abrundung des gegenwärtigen Abschnitts: Wenn Luther derartige Erfahrungen illustrieren und ausmalen möchte, erinnert er gern an die Gestalten Abrahams und Hiobs.28 Ganz besonders hebt er an ihnen zwei Dinge hervor, die sich mit den obigen Überlegungen decken: Zum Einen vergeht lange Zeit, bevor sie das Wort des Trostes vernehmen. Sie befinden sich lange in Dunkel und Finsternis, doch auch hier sind sie gläubig. Als sie – zum Anderen – endlich das Wort des Trostes vernehmen, wirft es sein Licht auf ihr Leid, ohne es auszulöschen, dass heißt, das Wort setzt sie imstande, mit dem zu leben, was ihnen sinnlos erscheint.

26 WA 40/I, 235,15–18: „Definimus ergo hunc esse Christianum, non qui non habet aut non sentit peccatum, sed cui illud a Deo propter fidem in Christum non imputatur. Ista doctrina affert firmam consolationem conscientiis in veris pavoribus.“ 27 WA 40/II, 25–34: „In illo enim certamine conscientiae, ut experientia docti scimus, fortiter dominatur sensus peccati, irae Dei, mortis, inferni et omnium pavorum. Ibi tum dicendum est tentato: Tu, frater, vis habere iusticiam sensitivam, hoc est, cupis ita sentire iusticiam, ut peccatum sentis; hoc non fiet. Sed tua iusticia debet transcendere sensum peccati et sperare te coram Deo iustum esse. Hoc est, tua iusticia non est visibilis, non est sensibilis, sed speratur suo tempore revelanda. Ideo non debes iudicare secundum sensum peccati, quod perterrefacit et perturbat te, sed secundum promissionem et doctrinam fidei, qua promittitur tibi Christus, qui est perfecta et aeterna iusticia tua.“ 28 Siehe Luthers Auslegung von Psalm 5,12 in Operationes in Psalmos: AWA2II, 301,4 ff.

 

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Glaube und christliches Leben bei Luther

Ein besonders klares und deutliches Zitat stammt aus einem Schreiben, dass Luther 1528 einigen Pastoren sandte, die sich gefragt hatten, ob sich die Wiedertäufer unter Bezug auf die Betonung des Glaubens zu Recht auf Luther berufen könnten. Hier heisst es: Denn es kompt, ia es gehet also zu mit dem glauben, das offt der, so das meinet, er glewbe, nichts uberall glewbe, und widderumb, der da meinet, er glewbe nichts, sondern verzweivele, am aller meisten glewbe (WA 26, 155,18–21).29

Diese entscheidende Einsicht setzt die hier dargelegte Deutung in Perspektive und soll hier ihren natürlichen Abschluss bilden: Luther kennt keine eindeutige Antwort auf die Frage, wie der Gläubige seinen eigenen Glauben erlebt. Wer zweifelt und angefochten ist, glaubt vermutlich trotzdem, und wer Ruhe und Gewissheit, Trost und Zuversicht im Glauben erfahren hat, glaubt vermutlich auch. Und umgekehrt: Wer zweifelt und angefochten ist, verwirft damit möglicherweise den Glauben ganz und ganz, während derjenige, der wähnt, Ruhe, Gewissheit, Zuversicht und Trost im Glauben gefunden zu haben, möglicherweise gerade damit ebenfalls den wahren Glauben verwirft, der eine ihm unerträgliche Unruhe erregen würde. Es lässt sich also keine Definition dafür geben, wie der Glaube vom jeweiligen Gläubigen erfahren wird. Einer der wesentlichen Anklagepunkte Luthers wider Schwärmer, Wiedertäufer und anderen bestand eben darin, dass sie wähnten, über eine solche Definition des Glaubens zu verfügen. Der Glaube – der eigene oder der anderer – lässt sich weder messen noch wiegen. Sucht man den Glauben zu definieren, macht man aus der Gabe des Glaubens eine Forderung – und wenn Luther in der Theologie etwas zuwider war, so war es das Aufstellen von Forderungen und Gesetzen. In diesem Sinne ist Luthers Rede vom Glauben eine radikale und freudige Freiheitsbotschaft. Wenn man sich somit also nicht an den Glauben halten kann und soll, wie verhält es sich dann mit dem sola fide-Prinzip, ließe sich fragen? Nun lässt sich die versimpelnde Reduktion theologischer Einsichten auf solus-Partikel nicht auf Luther selbst zurückführen. Wenn man dennoch eine Antwort versuchen sollte, dann muss man sagen, dass der Glaube in einem Verhältnis zu Christus selbst bestehe. Christentum ist nicht im Glauben und seinen Erscheinugnsformen verankert, sondern in Christus. Dies betonte Luther auch gegenüber dem angefochtenen Gläubigen, dem er anriet: ‚Dem gekreuzigten Christus sollen wir mit festem Blick anhängen.‘ Damit hat er auch anerkannt, was man ‚christliche Frömmigkeitspraxis‘ nennen könnte,

29 Siehe Vind 2010, 27.

 

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und ihre Ausübung nicht allein in Predigt und Sakramenten, sondern auch in Bildern, Musik, Psalmen, Gebet und Katechese. All dies hilft in Luthers Perspektive, den Blick fest auf Christus zu heften und den Glauben zu üben – all diese verschiedenen Formen der praxis pietatis nehmen für ihn einen völlig unverzichtbaren Ort ein. Luther beschreibt und erklärt das wahre Christenleben als einen Gottesdienst. Im großen Galterbriefkommentar rät er: […] rufe ihn an, sage Dank, predige, lobe, bekenne Gott, tue wohl und diene dem Nächsten, tue deine Pflicht (Luther: 1980, 92).30

Der erste Teil des Zitats lässt sich dahingehend umschreiben, dass der Gläubige seinen Blick auf Christus zu heften hat, indem er regelmäßig von ihm hört, ihn anbetet, lobt und sich zu ihm bekennt, wo auch immer er ihm begegnet. Wie dargelegt, gibt es für Luther keine eindeutige Antwort auf die Frage, wie der Glaube vom Gläubigen erfahren wird. Entsprechend bedeutet der lutherische Freiheitsgedanke für Frömmigkeitspraxis und Kirche, dass sich der Ort für die Begegnung mit Christus nicht bestimmen lässt. Zwar kennzeichnet es insbesondere Predigt und Sakrament, dass in ihnen Christus selbst zuverlässig zu finden ist, da sie von Ihm selbst gestiftet sind. In Grunde jedoch ist er überall zu finden, wo das Evangelium von „Christo, das er gottis ßon und mensch sey, fur unß worden, gestorben unnd aufferstanden, eyn herr ubir alle ding gesetzt“31 ertönt – wie Luther den Hauptinhalt des Evangeliums in seine Weihnachtspostille von 1522 zusammenfasst. Die Kirche als Institution sichert einen konkreten Rahmen für Christi Gegenwart, wo man ihn in christlicher Gemeinschaft finden und begegnen kann. Diese Ordnung bildet eine Schutz und Wehr, die notwendig ist, da der alte Mensch das Wort schlechterdings nicht vernehmen will, sondern es als grotesk und absurd auffasst und es von sich schieben und abschaffen möchte. Der zweite Teil des Zitats – „tue wohl und diene dem Nächsten, tue deine Pflicht“ – ist zu verstehen im Sinne von Luthers Erläuterungen zum bürgerlichen Leben. Luther bezieht sich hier auf den rechten Gebrauch des bürgerlichen Lebens, nach dem der Mensch sein Leben für seinen Nächsten zu führen hat. Im Christusglauben geschieht einerseits tatsächlich eine solche Befreiung zum Dienst am Nächsten. Andererseits jedoch auch nicht, weil die Sünde im Gläubigen niemals ausgelöscht wird. Der gläubige christliche Sünder ist sich beiderlei bewusst und wird dadurch ermutigt, den Kampf auf sich zu nehmen und sich Mühe zu geben – obgleich er sein Vorhaben aller Wahrscheinlichkeit nach nicht durchzuführen vermag. 30 WA 40/I, 234,19–21: „[…] Invoca, Gratias age, praedica, lauda, confitere Deum, Benefac et servi proximo, fac officium tuum.“ 31 WA 10/I,1,9, 19–20.

 

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Anna Vind

Ausblick: Glaube und Christenleben in der lutherischen Tradition

Damit ist der kurze abrundende Abschnitt errreicht, in dem ein Beispiel für die lutherische Tradition in Dänemark aufggegriffen und darstellt werden soll. Der dänische Theologe, Schriftsteller und Dichter Nikolaj Frederik Severin Grundtvig (1783–1872) ist nicht allein im dänischen Geistesleben eine faszinierende Gestalt: Sein Verhältnis zu Luther ist ganz entschieden auch von übernationalem Interesse.32 Sein Denken war bestimmend für die lutherische Tradition in Dänemark. Gerade dadurch unterscheidet sie sich in zentralen Punkten vom Luthertum in den Nachbarländern. Das entscheidende Charakteristikum Grundtvigs bildet sein Freiheitsgedanke, der – in Verbindung mit seinem theologischen Scharfsinn – seine besondere Verwandtschaft mit Luther ausmacht. In seiner Schrift Kirkelige Oplysninger især til lutherske Christne („Kirchliche Erläuterungen besonders für lutherische Christen“) von 1840–42 macht sich Grundtvig eine ganze Reihe von Gedanken, die auch für den vorliegenden Zusammenhang von entscheidender Bedeutung sind. Die Frage, was das neue Leben eigentlich sei, steht im Zentrum dieser Schrift. In seiner Darstellung berührt Grundtvig kirchengeschichtliche Gestalten und Strömungen, deren Grundgedanken und Ziel er kritisch fortführen möchte. Ein wesentliches Anliegen dieser Schrift – verfasst unmittelbar vor der Verabschiedung einer freien Verfassung mit dem Grundgesetz des dänischen Reiches von 1849 – ist die Bestimmung der Staatskirche als eines äußeren Rahmens für die absolute Freiheit nicht allein der Pastoren, sondern auch der Kirchgänger. Diese Freiheitsbestimmungen verstand Grundtvig als die Freiheit des Kirchgängers, sich einer Gemeinde und einem Pastoren eigener Wahl anschliessen zu können, und der entsprechenden Freiheit des Pastoren, dass Wort nach eigenem Gewissen und persönlicher Überzeugung zu verkünden. Das Entscheidende in Grundtvigs Text ist jedoch das Verständnis des christlichen Lebens, für dessen Gedeihen er den entsprechenden kirchlichen Rahmen bereitstellen möchte. Vom neuen Leben sagt Grundtvig zweierlei, das von unmittelbarer Bedeutung für die hier dargelegte Lutherdarstellung ist: Zum Einen, dass ein wahres Christenleben zu leben uns allen fremd ist, und, zum Anderen, dass der Grund dafür, dass man trotzdem einem wahren Christenleben nachstreben möchte, nicht im nachweisbaren Glauben des Gläubigen liegt, sondern – mit Grundtvigs eigenen Worten: […] ganz allein [im] Wort aus dem Mund des Herren, das in seinem Namen bei der Taufe und beim Abendmahl für uns erklingt (N.F.S. Grundtvig: 2010, 742f). 32 Eine Einführung zu Grundtvig, vgl. Anders Holm, „N.F.S. Grundtvig“, in: Nineteenth-Century Lutheran Theologians, Matthew Becker (ed.), Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2016, 67–86.

 

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Von der unmöglichen Möglichkeit des Christenlebens heißt es zum Beispiel: Kennen wir indessen etwas unser eigenes Herz, dann kennen wir nur allzu gut die Eigenliebe, den Eigensinn und den Eigendünkel, die uns nicht nur von dem alten Menschenleben nach dem Bilde Gottes getrennt haben, sondern auch unaufhörlich das neue in Christo Jesu bekämpfen. Wenn wir dann bedenken, was dazugehört, sich den Anordnungen des Herrn zu fügen und ihnen zu folgen, erkennen wir leicht, dass der Weg des Lebens schmal und die Pforte eng ist; denn die rechte Verbindung zwischen dem Äußerlichen und dem Innerlichen, dem Leiblichen und dem Geistlichen, dem Zeitlichen und dem Ewigen, dem Menschlichen und dem Göttlichen, dem Einzelnen und dem Allgemeinen kommt uns allen, selbst wenn wir nicht daran zweifeln, wunderlich fremd vor (Grundtvig: 2010, 739).

Was die Frage nach dem Glauben angeht, wirft Grundtvig selbst die Frage auf, ob man sich nicht einfach auf den persönlichen Glauben stützen und verlassen könne. Seine Antwort lautet jedoch: Nein! Stützt man sich nämlich auf den eigenen Glauben, stützt man sich letztlich auf sich selbst – oder auf etwas, was man aus der Luft gegriffen hat: Wer dagegen wirklich an ihm und seinem Leben teilhaben will, wie die Schrift es beschreibt, der widerspricht nur sich selbst und versäumt es notwendigerweise, indem er den Geist und das Leben vom Glauben selbst haben will, und nicht von einem Gotteswort, woran sich der Glaube heftet (Grundtvig: 2010, 745).

Der Glaube des einzelnen Gläubigen ist nämlich ein Problem, setzt Grundtvig in Übereinstimmung mit Luther fort. Der Glaube mag zwar als naiver Kinderglaube annehmbar sein, sobald jedoch der Erwachsene dem Glauben nach-denkt, wenn also Selbstreflexion einsetzt, bemerkt man mit Entsetzen, dass der Glaube sein Leben verliert, insofern man nicht das Gotteswort ergreift. Und man arbeitet „ganz vergeblich daran, ihm Leben einzuhauchen“ (Grundtvig: 2010, 745). „Das Gottes-Wort wirkt nämlich“, so heißt es bei Grundtvig – und seine Worte sollen hier den abschließenden Kommentar zur vorgelegten Lutherdarstellung bilden, wobei besonders zu bemerken sei, dass der Glaube sich hier sowohl bewusst als auch unbewusst ans Wort klammern kann: Das Gottes-Wort wirkt nämlich, solange es bewusst oder unbewusst vom Glauben festgehalten wird; aber sobald sich der Glaube an etwas anderes heftet, wird die Wirklichkeit abgebrochen, und dies umso schroffer und vollständiger, je fester man sich in den Kopf setzt, das nicht dieses, sondern der Glaube, die Schrift oder etwas anderes die Lebenskraft hat (Grundtvig: 2010, 746).

 

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Bibliographie Bayer, Oswald (1971), Promissio. Geschichte der reformatorischen Wende in Luthers Theologie, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht. Bayer, Oswald (2003), Martin Luthers Theologie. Eine Vergegenwärtigung. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Bühler, Pierre (1981), Kreuz und Eschatologie, eine Auseinandersetzung mit der politischen Theologie im Anschluss an Luthers theologia crucis, Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr. Dieter, Theodor (2001), Der junge Luther und Aristoteles. Eine historisch-systematische Untersuchung zum Verhältnis von Theologie und Philosophie, Berlin: De Gruyter Verlag. Dietz, Thorsten (2009) Der Begriff der Furcht bei Luther, in: Beiträge zur Historischen Theologie, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Ebeling, Gerhard (1964), Luther. Einführung in sein Denken, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Grundtvig, N.F.S. (2010), Kirchliche Erläuterungen besonders für lutherische Christen, in N.F.S. Grundtvig: Schriften in Auswahl. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 678–751. Holm, Bo Kristian (2006) Gabe und Geben bei Luther. Das Verhältnis zwischen Reziprozität und reformatorischer Rechtfertigungslehre. Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter. Joest, Wilfried (1967), Ontologie der Person bei Luther. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Luther, Martin (1540), In epistolam S. Pauli ad Galatas Commentarius ex praelectione D. Martini Lutheri (1531) collectus 1535, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 40/I–II. Luther, Martin (1980), Auslegung des Galaterbriefes (Vorlesung von 1531), in D. Martin Luthers Epistel-Auslegung, Band 4. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 11–358. Mannermaa, Tuomo (1989), Der im Glauben gegenwärtige Christus: Rechtfertigung und Vergottung. Zum ökumenischen Dialog. Hannover: Lutherisches Verlagshaus. Rolf, Sibylle (2009), Zum Herzen sprechen. Eine Studie zum imputativen Aspekt in Martin Luthers Rechtfertigungslehre und zu seinen Konsequenzen für die Predigt des Evangeliums, Arbeiten zur Systematischen Theologie 1, Leipzig. Saarinen, Risto (1989), Gottes Wirken auf uns. Die transzendentale Deutung des GegenwartChristi-Motivs in der Lutherforschung, Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner. Thadigismann, Edgar (1987), ‚Gottes Schöpferisches Sehen. Elemente einer theologischen Sehschule im Anschluss an Luthers Magnificat‘, in Neue Zeitschrift für Systematische Theologie und Religionsphilosophie, Vol. 29, 19–37. Vind, Anna (2004), ‚Latomus und Luther. Ein Streit um Worte‘ in Neue Zeitschrift für Systematische Theologie, 46, 448–466. Vind, Anna (2007), ‚Christus factus est peccatum metaphorice‘. Über die Theologische Verwendung Rhetorischer Figuren bei Luther unter Einbeziehung Quintilians’ in Creator est Creatura. Luthers Christologie als Lehre von der Idiomenkommunikation, ed. Oswald Bayer/ Benjamin Gleede, Theologisches Bibliothek Töpelmann Band 138, Berlin-New York, 109–113. Vind, Anna (2010), ‚God’s peace exceeds the power of the senses, that is, it is incomprehensible except in faith‘ – An Interpretation of Luther’s Concept of Sin and Faith in Luther-Bulletin, Tijdschrift voor interconfessioneel Lutheronderzoek 19, 17–39. Vind, Anna (2015), ‚The Human Being according to Luther‘ in Anthropological Reformations – Antropology in the Era of Reformation, ed. Anne Eusterschulte/Hannah Wälzholz, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 69–85.

 

Pierre Bühler

Homo absconditus und homo revelatus Un-sichtbarkeit als Herausforderung für die theologische Anthropologie

1.

Zum Einstieg

Dieser Aufsatz unternimmt eine Art systematische Exploration zum Thema „Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit“,1 mit Hilfe von Texten, aber auch von fiktiven Gestalten und von Bildern, da am Schnittpunkt zwischen Religion, Kunst und Ethik gearbeitet wird. Unter den Weggefährten der Exploration befinden sich unter anderem Gerhard Ebeling, dessen 100. Geburtstag in diesem Jahr gefeiert wird, und Søren Kierkegaard, dessen 200. Geburtstag nächstes Jahr Thema sein wird.2 Der Ausgangspunkt dieser Exploration kann folgendermassen formuliert werden: Geht man im Sinne der Reformation davon aus, dass Theologie cognitio Dei et hominis ist und dass Gott immer als Deus absconditus und Deus revelatus zugleich zur Sprache kommt, kann man überlegen, inwiefern es auch sinnvoll wäre, vom Menschen als homo absconditus und homo revelatus zu sprechen. Diese Überlegung bildet die Grundperspektive, aus der heraus die Thematik „In-visibilis“ als anthropologische Herausforderung hier behandelt werden soll.3 Daraus folgt die Gliederung des Aufsatzes. In einem ersten, anthropologischen Teil soll zuerst die Un-sichtbarkeit als menschliche Grundgegebenheit behandelt werden. Ausgehend von der leiblichen Opazität wird die Erfahrung des Nicht-Sehens und Nicht-Gesehenwerdens in sozial-relationaler Sicht vertieft, was schließlich zum Menschen führt, der in einem grundsätzlichen Sinne sich selbst verborgen bleibt (homo absconditus). 1 Dass Unsichtbarkeit immer in Spannung mit Sichtbarkeit steht, wird orthographisch durch einen Trennungsstrich zum Ausdruck gebracht: In diesem Sinne meint im Folgenden „Un-sichtbarkeit“ immer dieses Ineinander von Unsichtbarkeit und Sichtbarkeit. 2 Die Tagung, in deren Rahmen das Referat vorgetragen wurde, fand im Oktober 2012 in Kopenhagen statt. 3 In Luthers erster Psalmenvorlesung heisst es zwar etwas pauschal (WA 3, 302,19f): „Quia homo est manifestus, deus autem invisibilis“; so trivial wird man es aber kaum aufteilen können, wie wir noch sehen werden.

 

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In einem zweiten, christologischen Teil wird göttliche Offenbarung interpretiert als die Möglichkeit für den Menschen, sich selbst offenbar, also zum homo revelatus zu werden. Indem die göttliche Transzendenz ins menschliche Diesseits einbricht (Bonhoeffer), wird dieses aus seiner Finsternis herausgeholt, erleuchtet und offenbart. Es könnte den Anschein machen, als ob sich damit alles schönstens löst. Doch das täuscht. Damit nicht die Gefahr eines Offenbarungspositivismus aufkommt, bedarf es eines dritten Teils, in dem das Ineinander von homo absconditus und homo revelatus kreuzestheologisch reflektiert wird. Wie Christus als Offenbarer absconditus sub contrario bleibt, so ist auch der Mensch als homo revelatus stets in Zweifel und Anfechtung absconditus (simul absconditus et revelatus!). Er kommt nie aus seiner Un-sichtbarkeit heraus, sondern muss sie gerade als ständiger Stachel seines Gottesverhältnisses integrieren. In diesem Sinne darf er mit Christus in Gott verborgen bleiben, bis er mit Christus offenbar werden darf (Kol 3:3f). Anders gesagt: Un-sichtbarkeit verweist stets in die eschatologische Existenz. Die Leitlinie, oder besser: der rote Faden der ganzen Exploration bildet die Thematik des Angesichts.

2.

Un-sichtbarkeit als menschliche Grundgegebenheit

Dass die Spannung von Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit grundsätzlich zur menschlichen Wirklichkeit gehört, soll hier nur kurz mit Hilfe einiger Grunddaten illustriert werden. Leiblichkeit und Opazität. Der französische Phänomenologe Maurice Mer­leauPonty hat mit seiner Kategorie des Eigenleibes (auf Französisch: ‚corps propre‘) die Leiblichkeit als fundamentale Dimension menschlichen Lebens bestimmt (Merleau-Ponty: 1974). Der Eigenleib ist sichtbar, nimmt Raum ein und kann sich nur begrenzt frei bewegen. Diese Realität des leiblichen Sichtbarseins stiftet das altbekannte, diese Realität kompensierende Fiktionsmotiv der unbegrenzten Unsichtbarkeit: so etwa im Hollywood-Film The Invisible Man4 oder in der französischen Filmkomödie Le passe-murailles,5 was wörtlich heißt: „der, der durch Mauern geht“ (in christlicher Theologie gelingt das höchstens dem Auferstandenen!). Durch den Eigenleib sind wir also als irdische Lebewesen sichtbar. Zugleich muss betont werden, dass dazu auch Opazität gehört. Wir sind sichtbar, aber nicht durchsichtig: Man sieht nicht in den Eigenleib hinein, und auch nicht durch ihn hindurch. In diesem Sinne bin ich also in meinem Eigenleib auch verborgen, als Innerlichkeit unsichtbar. Leiblichkeit enthält also die Spannung von Un-sichtbarkeit. 4 USA, 1933; Verfilmung der 1897 veröffentlichten Novelle von H. G. Wells. 5 Frankreich, 1951; Verfilmung einer Erzählung von Marcel Aymé aus dem Jahr 1943.

 

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Soziale Vermittlung von Un-sichtbarkeit: Nacktheit und Kleidung. Der Umgang mit dem Eigenleib ist auch sozial vermittelt, unter anderem durch Kleidungscodes, die mit dem kulturell geprägten Schamgefühl verbunden sind: In der einen Kultur sieht man von den Frauen höchstens die Augen, vielleicht sogar hinter einem Gitter versteckt; in einer anderen bei heissem Wetter grosse Teile des Körpers. So stehen Nacktheit und Kleidung in einem spannungsvollen Verhältnis, das für unser Thema anthropologisch bedeutsam ist: Was sichtbar wird und was nicht, sagt etwas über den Umgang mit sich selbst, mit den Mitmenschen und mit Kultur und Gesellschaft aus. Diese Aspekte hat Giorgio Agamben in seinem Buch Nacktheiten auf spannende Weise erforscht (Agamben: 2010). Relationale Un-sichtbarkeit. Dieser Aspekt der sozialen Unsichtbarkeit sei mit einem literarischen Zwischenspiel vertieft. 1952 veröffentlichte Ralph Ellison seinen Roman Invisible Man:6 Der Ich-Erzähler des Romans ist ein junger schwarzer Mann, der in den USA lebt und erfahren muss, dass er von den anderen ständig ignoriert, übersehen wird. Er hat zwar einen Eigenleib, er betätigt sich, bewegt sich in der Gesellschaft, aber die Leiblichkeit seines Schwarzseins macht ihn unsichtbar, bis zu physischen Zusammenstößen auf dem Gehsteig. Er wird ignoriert, weil er nicht anerkannt wird, und deshalb erlebt er eine ständige Ausgrenzung. Es gebe, so der Erzähler, wie innere Augen bei den anderen, die für einen jungen, schwarzen Mann kulturell blind sind. Diese relationale Nichtanerkennung stiftet denn auch das Problem der eigenen Identitätsfindung, so dass der Ich-Erzähler bis ans Ende des Romans namenlos bleibt. Diese Spannung von Un-sichtbarkeit und Anerkennung hat Axel Honneth in Hinsicht auf Herrschaftsverhältnisse thematisiert: In der Kulturgeschichte zeigt sich an vielen Beispielen, dass Herrschende ihre Überlegenheit den Untertanen gegenüber dadurch zum Ausdruck brachten, dass sie sie schlicht nicht wahrnahmen, ignorierten (Honneth: 2003). Blick und Gesicht (frei nach Levinas). Dass Ralph Ellison von inneren Augen spricht, stiftet eine freie Assoziation zu einem Aspekt im Werk von Emmanuel Levinas. Er hat die Spannung von Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit ganz stark am Gesicht, am Antlitz, festgemacht (vgl. vor allem Levinas: 1993). Indem Menschen einander von Angesicht zu Angesicht anblicken, im Anschauen und Angeschautwerden ereignet sich ein Geschehen, das zugleich Enthüllung und Verhüllung ist. Der Mensch zeigt sich in seinen Gesichtszügen, aber zugleich verbirgt er sich in ihnen. Das Antlitz ist nicht durchsichtig, und man kann nicht durch es hindurchdringen. So spielt das Gesicht in der Spannung der Un-sichtbarkeit eine wesent-

6 In deutscher Übersetzung erschien der Roman von Ralph Ellison zuerst beim Fischer Verlag unter dem Titel Unsichtbar, und seit 1987 beim Rowohlt Verlag unter dem Titel Der unsichtbare Mann.

 

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liche Rolle, was sich an Sprachausdrücken konkretisiert, wie ‚das Gesicht verlieren‘ oder ‚das Gesicht wahren‘.7 Diese Dimension sei hier mit einem Bild von Kambiz aus der Asylthematik illustriert: Vom Migrationsamt kommend ist der Asylbewerber so mit administrativen Dokumenten versehen, dass er dabei sein Gesicht verloren hat; er ist als Mensch ganz hinter seinen Amtsakten verschwunden.

Abb. 1: Cartoon von Kambiz. © Caricartoons Exil.

Suche nach Anerkennung und forensische Existenz. Was sich durch unsere ersten Schritte ankündigt, ist ein spannungsvolles Ineinander von Bezügen, in denen menschliches Dasein geschieht: Bezügen zu sich selbst und zu den anderen, Bezügen zur Gesellschaft und zur Welt. All diese Bezüge sind auch Instanzen, vor denen der Mensch zu bestehen versucht, Instanzen, von denen er sich eine Anerkennung erhofft. Deshalb kann man sagen, dass menschliche Präsenz in Un-sichtbarkeit immer schon im Zeichen einer Suche nach Anerkennung steht.8 Es ist dabei eine offene, oft komplexe, verworrene Frage, welche Anerkennungsinstanz letztlich zählt. Woher schöpfe ich, was mir Würde, Wert und Bestand schenkt? In Anlehnung an Luthers coram-Relationen (coram mundo, coram seipso, coram hominibus, coram 7 Der Mikrosoziologe Erving Goffman hat auf das Gesichtwahren als entscheidendes Moment in der Lösung von Konfliktsituationen hingewiesen; vgl. Goffman: 2013. 8 Vgl. dazu: Honneth (2007); im Gespräch mit Honneth: Ricœur: 2006.

 

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Deo) spricht Gerhard Ebeling, vom lateinischen forum ausgehend, von einer forensischen Existenz.9 Vor welcher Instanz stehe ich in Hinsicht auf meinen letztgültigen Wert? Stehe ich „vor den Augen der Welt“?10 Oder vor den Mitmenschen, denen gegenüber ich mich bewähren muss? Oder vor mir selbst, so dass ich meinen Selbsturteilen entsprechen muss? Die menschliche Existenz steht im Zeichen dieses ständigen Konfliktes der Instanzen, in ihrem verwirrenden Zusammenspiel, und darin verliert sich der Mensch öfter, als er sich darin zurechtfindet. Homo absconditus. Im radikalen Sinne ist der Mensch, wenn er mit diesen Instanzen kämpft, letztlich sich selbst verborgen, weil er im Widerstreit der Instanzen nie mit sich selbst ins Klare kommt, in diesem Widerstreit auch mit sich selbst im Widerstreit steht. Deshalb kann man von einem homo absconditus sprechen, weil er hier die Unfähigkeit erfährt, mit sich selbst in Einklang zu kommen. In Römer 7 hat der Apostel Paulus dieses „Sich-selbst-verborgen-Sein“ als die Herrschaft der Sünde über den Menschen charakterisiert: „Was ich bewirke, begreife ich nicht; denn nicht, was ich will, treibe ich voran, sondern was ich hasse, das tue ich“ (Röm 7:15).11 Diese Erfahrung sei mit einem künstlerischen Einschub gleichnishaft zum Ausdruck gebracht. Es ist ein Bild von 1937 des belgischen Malers René Magritte (1898–1967), der auf paradoxe Bilder spezialisiert war, mit der Überschrift „La reproduction interdite“ („Die verbotene Wiedergabe“): Ein Mensch schaut sich im Spiegel an, aber sieht sich nur von hinten. Er sieht nicht sein Angesicht im Spiegelbild, das ihm verborgen bleibt, sondern nur seinen Nacken, und wir, als das Bild Betrachtende, sehen auch nur diesen doppelten Nacken. In gewisser Hinsicht ist hier das Angesicht dieses Menschen verloren. Könnte man dieses Bild als ein Gleichnis dessen verstehen, was die christliche Tradition mit Paulus ‚Sünde‘ nennt? Eine eschatologische Hoffnung. Mit dieser Spiegelerfahrung von Magritte verbindet sich eine eschatologische Hoffnung, die Paulus folgendermassen zum Ausdruck bringt: „Denn jetzt sehen wir alles in einem Spiegel, in rätselhafter Gestalt, dann aber von Angesicht zu Angesicht. Jetzt ist mein Erkennen Stückwerk, dann aber werde ich ganz erkennen, wie ich auch ganz erkannt worden bin“ (1 Kor 13:12). Von Levinas her gewinnt diese Stelle an anthropologischer Bedeutung. Der Mensch, der im Spiegel nur seinen Nacken sieht, sieht alles nur in rätselhafter Gestalt und erkennt nur Stückwerk. Es bedarf der Begegnung mit einem anderen, dem göttlichen Angesicht, um „ganz zu erkennen“. Aber dieses Erkennen ist zugleich ein Erkanntwerden: eine passiv erfahrene Enthüllung vor dem gött­lichen

9 Für eine knappe Darstellung, vgl. Ebeling: 2017, 219–238. 10 Hinweis auf den französischen Film Aux yeux du monde (Frankreich, 1991), in dem der Held einen vollen Schulbus entführt, um in die Zeitung zu kommen und damit für „die Welt“ wichtig zu werden. 11 Die Bibeltexte werden nach der Zürcher Bibel von 2007 zitiert.

 

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Abb. 2: René Magritte: La Reproduction interdite, 1937. Museum Boijmans Van ­Beuningen, Rotterdam/ Creditline photographer: Studio Tromp, Rotterdam. © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2019.

Antlitz. Darin liegt die Verheißung, aus der radikalen Selbstverborgenheit herauszutreten, das verlorene Gesicht wieder zu finden, in einem eschatologischen Lichtwerden. Damit kommen wir zum zweiten Teil unserer Exploration.

3.

„Was durch die Offenbarung ans Licht kommt, ist der Mensch …“

Was im 1. Korintherbrief als eschatologische Hoffnung zum Zuge kommt, hat die christliche Tradition christologisch verarbeitet. Um es kurz zur Sprache zu bringen, könnte man sagen: Im Angesicht Jesu Christi, in seinen Gesichtszügen hat Gott uns gegenüber ein Gesicht angenommen, was Paulus etwa damit formuliert, dass er Christus als das Ebenbild Gottes bezeichnet.12 So wird Gott zum Deus revelatus, was offenbarungstheologisch dadurch zur Sprache gebracht wird, dass von einem 12 Vgl. etwa 2 Kor 3:18; vgl. auch 2 Kor 4:6: „Denn der Gott, der gesagt hat: Aus der Finsternis soll Licht aufstrahlen, er ist es, der es hat aufstrahlen lassen in unseren Herzen, so dass die Erkenntnis aufleuchtet, die Erkenntnis der Herrlichkeit Gottes auf dem Angesicht Jesu Christi.“

 

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Eintreten der göttlichen Transzendenz in unsere menschliche, allzumenschliche Immanenz die Rede ist.13 „Gott ist mitten in unserm Leben jenseitig“: In seinen Gefangenschaftsbriefen und -notizen hat Dietrich Bonhoeffer dieses Eintreten der Transzendenz in unsere Immanenz prägnant ausgedrückt, wie hier etwa in diesem kleinen Satz aus dem Brief vom 30. April 1944 (Bonhoeffer: 1998, 408). Gott ist nicht an den Rändern der Wirklichkeit zu finden, nicht in einer Hinterwelt, als ein Lückenbüßer-Gott, der immer mehr hinaus gedrängt wird. Damit setzt Bonhoeffer der Tradition gegenüber einen kritischen Akzent: Es ist nämlich ein altbewährtes traditionelles Motiv, die Transzendenz „irgendwo dahinter“ zu suchen. Auch in künstlerischer Reflexion, wie etwa bei der östlich-orthodoxen Ikone, spielt dieser Aspekt eine wichtige Rolle: Transzendenz kann nur durch die Ikone hindurch, als eine Art ‚Fenster zum Himmel‘, wahrgenommen werden, als ein „hinter der Ikone“. Im Gegenzug setzt Paul Ricœur eine in hermeneutischer Perspektive klare Umkehr, ganz im Sinne von Bonhoeffers Christologie: Was ich mir schließlich aneigne, ist ein Entwurf von Welt; dieser findet sich nicht hinter dem Text als dessen verborgene Intention, sondern vor dem Text als das, was das Werk entfaltet, aufdeckt und enthüllt. Daher heißt Verstehen Sich-Verstehen vor dem Text. Es heißt nicht, dem Text die eigene begrenzte Fähigkeit des Verstehens aufzuzwingen, sondern sich dem Text auszusetzen und von ihm ein erweitertes Selbst zu gewinnen […]. Nicht das Subjekt konstituiert also das Verstehen, sondern – so wäre wohl richtiger zu sagen – das Selbst wird durch die ‚Sache‘ des Textes konstituiert (Ricœur: 1974, 33).14

Der Mensch als Inhalt der göttlichen Offenbarung. Was hier mit Bonhoeffer und Ricœur betont wurde, hat klare Implikationen für unser Thema: Wenn in Christus Gott offenbar, Deus revelatus wird, dann wird dadurch der Mensch zum homo revelatus. Das sei hier mit einem Text von Gerhard Ebeling exemplifiziert: Von dem soteriologischen Charakter der Offenbarung her wird deutlich, dass es nur bedingt richtig ist, Gott als Inhalt der Offenbarung zu bezeichnen. Wenn sich im Geschehen der Offenbarung das Zusammensein von Gott und Mensch ereignet, dann fällt das Licht […] auf den Menschen und seine Welt. Wie der unmittelbare Gegenstand des Sehens nicht die Lichtquelle sein soll, sondern das von ihr Erleuchtete, das ins Licht Getauchte, so könnte man auch sagen, dass der nächstliegende Gegenstand, der in der Offenbarung offenbar wird, der Mensch und seine Welt ist. Man hat […] Offenbarung schon verfehlt, wenn man mit Selbstverständlichkeit davon ausgeht, dass Gott etwas Dunkles sei, was durch die Offenbarung der Erhellung bedarf. Was durch die Offenbarung ans Licht kommt, ist der Mensch, der sich in der Finsternis und im Schatten des Todes befindet (Ebeling: 2012, 253). 13 In Anspielung an die Thematik der Tagung könnte gesagt werden: In Christus vollzieht sich eine Verknüpfung von Visibility und Transcendence. 14 Ähnliches ließe sich vom Bild sagen: Ein Bild verstehen heißt, sich vor dem Bild verstehen.

 

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Auch hier findet man dieselbe Umkehr wieder: Von der Betonung der Selbstoffenbarung Gottes in der dialektischen Theologie Abstand nehmend, betont Ebeling, dass es in der Offenbarung gerade nicht um die Selbstoffenbarung Gottes geht, sondern um die Offenbarung des Menschen. Wenn die Offenbarung einen soteriologischen Charakter hat, dann ist der Mensch ihr eigentlicher Inhalt. Es geht also nicht darum, sich auf Gott auszurichten und damit in die Lichtquelle zu schauen und von ihr geblendet zu werden, sondern auf das durch sie Erleuchtete zu schauen. Es heißt also nicht, Gott aus seinem Dunkel herauszuholen, sondern vielmehr den Menschen aus seinem Dunkel und Dünkel herauszuholen. Glaube als Klärung der Anerkennungsinstanzen. In Hinsicht auf unseren ersten Teil heißt das: Aus der Offenbarung geht eine Klärung der Anerkennungsinstanzen hervor: „In den Augen des in Jesus Christus zu Gesicht gekommenen Gottes liegt deine Anerkennung. Da bist du in allem angenommen, was dich ausmacht. Hier wirst du dir selber wieder sichtbar, offenbar, weil wahrlich von Angesicht zu Angesicht angeschaut. Die anderen Anerkennungsinstanzen kannst du als vorletzte Instanzen an ihren Platz verweisen. Sie haben ihre Wichtigkeit, aber auf die Gottesbeziehung hin werden sie relativiert. Was in den Augen der Welt, der Geschichte, der Gesellschaft gilt, wird in Gottes Urteil über dich in die Schranken gewiesen und damit auch mit aufgehoben.“ Homo revelatus: neue Sichtbarkeit coram seipso. Was soeben in der zweiten Person Singular formuliert wurde, könnte als Zuspruch des Evangeliums, der frohen Botschaft bezeichnet werden. Um hier eine hermeneutische Einsicht von Ebeling aufzugreifen, könnte man sagen, dass darin ein Wortgeschehen stattfindet, in dem ein neues Sichverstehen ermöglicht wird. Das Verstehen, das hier auf dem Spiel steht, ist nicht ein Verstehen von Sprache, sondern durch Sprache, durch die befreiende Sprache des Wortgeschehens, das den Menschen neu ausrichtet.15 Das schafft im Menschen eine neue Klarheit, eine neue Sichtbarkeit coram seipso. Diese Möglichkeit, die im Menschen als ein opus Dei gnadenhaft gestiftet wird, ist die des Glaubens im Sinne der fiducia, eines vertrauensvollen Umgangs mit dem Leben in all seinen komplexen Bezügen. Johannes de Silentio: Steuererheber … und doch Ritter des Glaubens. Diese Klarheit des Glaubens nach innen hin hat ein Pseudonym Kierkegaards, Johannes de Silentio, in seinem Buch Furcht und Zittern eindrücklich beschrieben (Kierkegaard: 1962, 34ff). Ausgehend vom Erzvater Abraham entfaltet er die innere Doppelbewegung, die der Ritter des Glaubens ständig vollzieht: die unendliche Resignation, durch die er allem gegenüber radikal Abstand nimmt, und die Rückkehr ins Leben, in der er alles wieder als Geschenk empfangen darf. Er fragt danach, ob sich so ein Ritter finden ließe. Es gelingt ihm jedoch nicht, einen zu finden, so dass er sich schließ-

15 Für diese Unterscheidung, vgl. Ebeling: 1967, 319–348, vor allem 333 ff.

 

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lich einen nur fiktiv vorstellen kann, und zwar in der Gestalt eines Steuererhebers, der äußerst gewöhnlich lebt, sich in der Immanenz des Lebens von niemandem grundsätzlich unterscheidet: Gediegen, kraftvoll, dem Endlichen zugewandt, geht er seiner Arbeit nach und genießt seine Freizeit, gibt sich mit allem ab, was er beobachtet, nimmt Anteil an allem und freut sich ständig des Alltäglichen. Und doch, doch ist die ganze irdische Erscheinung, die er hervorbringt, eine neue Schöpfung in kraft des Absurden. Er hat in unendlicher Resignation auf alles verzichtet, und dann hat er alles wieder ergriffen in kraft des Absurden. Er macht ständig die Bewegung der Unendlichkeit, aber er tut es mit solch einer Richtigkeit und Sicherheit, dass er ständig die Endlichkeit herausbekommt (Kierkegaard: 1962, 40).

Johannes de Silentio vergleicht diesen Ritter mit einem Seiltänzer und betont, es sei für ihn die schwierigste Aufgabe, aus einem Sprung heraus gleich in die richtige Stellung zu kommen, ohne zu wanken, ohne zu zögern. Vielen Menschen gelinge dies nicht: „sie wanken einen Augenblick, und dies Wanken zeigt, dass sie gleichwohl Fremdlinge sind in der Welt“. Beim Glaubensritter jedoch verbindet sich damit das Wunder: Ihm gelingt es, aus dem Sprung ohne Wanken in den Alltag hinein zu gehen: „so herniedergleiten können, dass es in der gleichen Sekunde aussieht, als ob man stünde und ginge, den Sprung ins Leben zum Gange wandeln, das Erhabene schlechthin ausdrücken im Platten, – das vermag allein jener Ritter, – und dies ist ein einziges Wunder“ (ibid., 40f). Selbstoffenbarung als Selbsttransparenz, Selbstverwirklichung und Selbstbeherrschung. Enthält das Ideal eines homo revelatus im radikalen, vollkommenen Sinne nicht auch eine Gefahr? Wenn ein Mensch sich ganz offenbar wird, ist die Versuchung groß, diese Selbstoffenbarung als Selbsttranszendenz in Anspruch zu nehmen, jegliche Undurchsichtigkeit überwindend. Von einem solchen sich selbst durchsichtigen Selbst ging wohl Descartes aus, als er in seinem cogito ergo sum seine denkerische Selbstsetzung vollzog. Damit verbindet sich allzu leicht das neuzeitliche Programm der Selbstverwirklichung, getragen von der Gewissheit, alles im Griff zu haben, alles in Selbstbeherrschung unter Kontrolle zu haben. Das sei mit einer humoristischen Zeichnung aus heutiger Lebenswelt illustriert: In direkter Anlehnung an Descartes zeichnet Chappatte einen Mann, der vor den anderen selbstbewusst auftritt, indem er mit seinem iPhone hantiert und dabei in einem schönen Wortspiel ausruft: „iPhone, therefore I am!“ Offenbarung hebt nicht Verborgenheit auf. Gegenüber Barth hat Bonhoeffer den Einwand des Offenbarungspositivismus geäussert: Die Offenbarung werde zum Faktum objektiviert, so dass der Prozess der Interpretation durch kirchliche Gesetzlichkeit ersetzt wird (Bonhoeffer: 1998: 404f, 415 und 481). Was wir soeben mit Selbsttransparenz, Selbstverwirklichung und Selbstbeherrschung angesprochen

 

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Abb. 3: Cartoon von Chappatte. © Chappatte.

haben, bildet ein anthropologisches Äquivalent dazu: Das Offenbarwerden wird so radikal, dass es nichts mehr Verborgenes gibt, alles Widerständige überwunden wird. Demgegenüber gilt es, mit Gerhard Ebeling zu betonen, dass die Verborgenheit konstitutiv zur Offenbarung gehört: „Nun zeigt sich aber, sobald man tiefer in den Offenbarungsbegriff eindringt, dass die Offenbarung die Verborgenheit nicht aufhebt […]. Vielmehr lässt die Offenbarung die Verborgenheit erst als Geheimnis erscheinen und begreifen. Das Geheimnis wird als offenbartes […] allererst als Geheimnis erfahren und wahrgenommen“ (Ebeling: 2012, 254). Das heißt für unsere anthropologische Thematik: Der Mensch muss sich auch in seinem Offenbarwerden immer wieder mit der absconditas auseinandersetzen. Er ist homo revelatus nur, insofern er immer wieder vom homo absconditus zum homo revelatus verwandelt wird. Das soll in unserem dritten Teil vertieft werden. Anders gesagt: Der Mensch ist semper revelandus.

4.

Simul absconditus et revelatus, oder: kreuzestheologische Un-sichtbarkeit

Hat Luther im Rahmen seiner Rechtfertigungslehre die Formel simul iustus et peccator geprägt, so wollen wir nun ähnlich von der Un-sichtbarkeit des Menschen

 

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mit Hilfe der Formel simul revelatus et absconditus sprechen, und diese Formulierung kreuzestheologisch durchdenken. Theologia crucis vs. theologia gloriae. Arbeitet man mit der Begrifflichkeit der Heidelberger Disputation (vgl. WA 1, 353–365, vor allem 354,17–28 und 361,31– 363,37), so kann man sagen, dass der Mensch, der in Selbsttransparenz in Anspruch nimmt, sich selbst zu verwirklichen und zu beherrschen, im Zeichen der theologia gloriae lebt, die aufbläht und wichtig macht. Die Offenbarung wird unmittelbar in Anspruch genommen: Der Mensch, mit all dem, was er macht, vollendet, wird verherrlicht. Demgegenüber betont die theologia crucis, dass die Offenbarung immer nur durch Leiden und Kreuz geschieht (vgl. WA 1, 354,19: „per passiones et crucem“). Das heißt: Sie leuchtet in die Widerwärtigkeiten des Lebens so hi­nein, dass sie sie nicht überwindet und hinter sich lässt, sondern sie sich zum Stoff des Glaubensvollzugs macht. Das kann christologisch begründet werden: Wenn Gott in Jesus Christus zum Deus revelatus wird, dann sicher nicht so, dass alle Verborgenheit abgeschafft wäre. Der Deus revelatus, so betont Luther, ist zugleich absconditus sub contrario. Er zeigt sich unter seinem Gegenteil, wie das im Wort vom Kreuz bei Paulus zum Ausdruck gebracht wird, als Ärgernis für die Juden und Torheit für die Griechen: „Denn das Törichte Gottes ist weiser als die Menschen, und das Schwache Gottes ist stärker als die Menschen“ (1 Kor 1:25). Für unser Thema heißt das, dass Gottes Anwesenheit auch immer wieder als seine Abwesenheit, seine Präsenz als Verlassenheit erfahren wird. Das haben Markus und Matthäus in ihrer Passionsgeschichte zur Sprache gebracht, indem sie, in Anlehnung an Psalm 22, Jesus mit dem Schrei „Mein Gott, mein Gott, warum hast du mich verlassen?“ sterben lassen (Mark 15:34; Matt 27:46). Dem Glauben Raum geben durch Verborgenheit. Auch hier kann ein anthropologisches Äquivalent formuliert werden: Der Glaubensvollzug geschieht im konkreten Leben im Zeichen der Verborgenheit des Gegensatzes, wie das Luther in seinem De servo arbitrio in Anlehnung an Hebr 11:1 prägnant zum Ausdruck gebracht hat: Der Glaube hat es [nach Hebr 11:1] mit Dingen zu tun, die man nicht sieht. Damit also Raum da sei für den Glauben, muss alles, was geglaubt wird, verborgen werden; es wird aber nicht tiefer verborgen als unter gegensätzlichem Anblick, Empfinden, Erfahren. So, wenn Gott lebendig macht, tut er dies dadurch, dass er tötet; wenn er rechtfertigt, tut er dies dadurch, dass er schuldig macht; wenn er zum Himmel emporhebt, tut er dies dadurch, dass er zur Hölle führt.16

16 WA 18, 633,7–11: „quod fides est rerum non apparentium. Ut ergo fidei locus sit, opus est, ut omnia quae creduntur, abscondantur. Non autem remotius abscionduntur, quam sub contrario obiectu, sensu, experientia. Sic Deus dum vivificat, facit illud occidendo; dum iustificat, facit illud reos faciendo; dum in coelum vehit, facit id ad infernum ducendo.“

 

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Interessant ist an Luthers Formulierung, dass es gerade darum geht, dem Glauben durch Verborgenheit Raum zu geben. Allein in der Verborgenheit kann der Glaube sich voll entfalten, und deshalb steht er immer vor der Aufgabe, der Widersprüchlichkeit der Lebenserfahrung standzuhalten, sie als entscheidende Prüfung zu bestehen. So bleibt bei Kierkegaard das kleine Wanken beim Springen des Seiltänzers, als das Zeichen, dass der Gläubige doch ein Fremdling auf Erde ist. Für Kierkegaard wie für Luther ist der Glaube stets ein angefochtener, und deshalb auch ein mit dem Unglauben ringender, ein zweifelnder Glaube. Mit unseren Begriffen zum Ausdruck gebracht: Der homo revelatus ist stets in Anfechtung und Zweifel absconditus. Das kann hier mit einer humoristischen Zeichnung des französischen Karikaturisten PIEM zum Ausdruck gebracht werden: Mönche spielen eine Art Gänsespiel des Glaubens, und da kommt einer auf ein Feld zu stehen, wo die Anweisung lautet: „Sie zweifeln, gehen Sie drei Felder zurück!“ (aus PIEM: 1996).

Abb. 4: Cartoon von PIEM. © Le cherche midi éditeur, Paris

 

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In unserem Verständnis wäre nun aber zu betonen, dass der Zweifel gerade keinen Rückschritt bedeutet, sondern vielmehr ein Weg des Wachsens und des Reifens sein kann, so dass die richtige Anweisung eigentlich wäre: „Sie zweifeln, gehen Sie drei Felder vorwärts!“ Visibilia et posteriora Dei. Das sei hier mit einem weiteren Zug von Luthers Kreuzestheologie erläutert: Der Herrlichkeitstheologe will die invisibilia Gottes sehen, der Kreuzestheologe hingegen die visibilia et posteriora, das Sichtbare und Hintere Gottes (WA 1, 354,17–21). Luther spielt hier wohl auf Mose an, der in Exodus 33:18–23 Gott nur von hinten sehen kann: „Dann werde ich meine Hand wegziehen, und du wirst hinter mir her sehen. Mein Angesicht aber wird nicht zu sehen sein“ (V. 23). Nur die posteriora Gottes offenbaren sich dem Menschen. Das hat seine Entsprechung darin, dass der Glaube mit Dingen zu tun hat, die man nicht sieht, wie die Stelle im Hebräerbrief betont, auf die Luther anspielt. Auch als durch Glauben offenbar gewordener bleibt der Mensch sich selbst verborgen. Er hat sich nicht selbst im Griff, sondern kann immer nur sich selbst von neuem als Geschenk Gottes empfangen. Das erlaubt uns eine neue Deutung des Bildes von René Magritte, das wir zunächst als ein Gleichnis der Sünde interpretiert hatten. Vielleicht könnte man das Bild auch als Gleichnis des Glaubens verstehen: Ist es nicht so, dass der Mensch sich im Glauben auch immer nur von hinten sieht? Denn sein Erkennen ist hienieden immer noch ein Stückwerk, rätselhaft, in Anfechtung, weil unter dem eschatologischen Vorbehalt des Erkanntwerdens von Angesicht zu Angesicht. Damit zeigen sich Spuren der Verborgenheit im Glaubensvollzug. Die seien hier mit einem literarischen Motiv illustriert. Ein Loch der Gnade in der Flanke der Nacht. Aus einem Roman der französischen Schriftstellerin Sylvie Germain, der Jakobs nächtlichen Kampf am Jabbok fiktiv nacherzählt, sei eine Stelle zitiert, in der göttliche Gnade als Loch, als Riss thematisiert wird. Diese Stelle erläutert die Gedanken der Jakobsfigur, als sie von der Kampfstätte wegzieht: Der Augenblick reiner Gnade war vorbei, wie die Augenblicke der amour fou vorbeigehen. Dann schließt sich die Nacht wieder. Aber sie ist nicht mehr dieselbe. Wird nie mehr dieselbe sein. Nun trägt die Nacht, an ihrer riesigen Flanke, ein Loch. Eine Öffnung, durch die jederzeit der Tag anbrechen kann; aufleuchten und zu scheinen beginnen. Die Gnade ist nur ein Riss, sehr kurz, blitzartig. Aber nichts kann sie wieder schließen. Ein winziger Riss, und alles rings herum wird verwandelt. Nicht verherrlicht, sondern verklärt. Denn alles nimmt nun Gesicht an. Nicht Antlitz von Herrlichkeit und Macht, sondern Profile von Armen. […] Die Gnade ist nur eine Pause, in der die Zeit umkehrt, die Ewigkeit berührend. Danach muss man wieder beginnen, an die Arbeit gehen, ins Dauern wiederkehren (Germain: 1987, 429f; Übersetzung P. B.).

Was hier schön zum Ausdruck kommt, ist, wie die nicht wieder zu schließende Öffnung, die der Riss der Gnade vollzieht, alles verwandelt, und zwar dadurch, dass

 

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nun alles Gesicht annimmt, nicht im Sinne einer Verherrlichung (theologia gloriae!), sondern „Profile von Armen“. Darin ist eine kreuzestheologisch bestimmte Ethik angelegt: Angesichts der hier betonten Verklärung kommt aus dem Riss der Gnade die Aufforderung heraus, den Profilen von Armen, von Unterdrückten, von Ausgegrenzten, zu begegnen, auf sie zuzugehen und sie anzuerkennen, so wie Jakob nach seinem nächtlichen Kampf mit Gott auf seinen Bruder Esau zugehen kann : „ich habe dein Angesicht gesehen, wie man das Angesicht Gottes sieht“ (Gen 33:10). Auf unseren ersten Teil bezogen, heisst das: Aus dem Riss der Gnade geht eine Dynamik hervor, die verhindern sollte, dass es weiterhin „unsichtbare Menschen“ im Sinne von Ralph Ellison gibt. Weil das nur im Sinne einer unverfügbaren Gnade gilt, die überraschend einbricht, muss die ethische Bemühung auch immer wieder in Angriff genommen werden. Wie Jakob hinkend, aber gesegnet, von der Kampfstätte bei Tagesanbruch aufbricht, so gilt auch: „Danach muss man wieder beginnen, an die Arbeit gehen, ins Dauern wiederkehren.“ Vita abscondita in Deo. Eine schöne Stelle im Kolosserbrief beschreibt das christliche Leben als ein in Gott verborgenes: „Denn ihr seid gestorben, und euer Leben ist mit Christus verborgen in Gott. Wenn Christus, euer Leben, offenbar wird, dann werdet auch ihr mit ihm offenbar werden in Herrlichkeit“ (Kol 3:3f). Es steht zwar im Zeichen der Hoffnung, mit Christus offenbar zu werden in Herrlichkeit. Aber gerade deshalb ist, in eschatologischer Spannung, das Heute des Glaubenden eine vita abscondita in Deo. Anders gesagt: Dass die künftige Offenbarung in die gegenwärtige Verborgenheit einweist, macht aus der christlichen Existenz eine eschatologische. Im Jetzt kommt der gläubige Mensch nie aus seiner Un-sichtbarkeit heraus, sondern darf sie im Zeichen der erhofften Offenbarung als ständigen Stachel seines Gottesverhältnisses integrieren. Damit verbindet sich ekklesiologisch die Wahrnehmung der Kirche als einer verborgenen, unsichtbaren communio, die zwar stets sichtbar Gestalt annimmt, diese sichtbaren Formen auf Hoffnung hin immer auch transzendiert. Ein Schatz in irdenen Gefäßen. Diese eschatologische Existenz gilt auch für die leibliche Existenz, von der wir am Anfang ausgegangen sind. Um diese Leiblichkeit zur Sprache zu bringen, spricht Paulus in 2 Kor 4:6–10 von „irdenen Gefäßen“, deren eschatologische Bestimmung, in aller diesseitigen Zerbrechlichkeit, jedoch ist, einen großen Schatz zu beherbergen (V. 7), nämlich „die Erkenntnis der Herrlichkeit Gottes auf dem Angesicht Jesu Christi“ (V. 6). Das führt die christliche Existenz in ein spannungsvolles Kämpfen hinein, das knapp an der Grenze des Scheiterns vorbeikommt und in der Kraft eines ‚Dennoch‘ den Kampf getrost weiterführt: „In allem sind wir bedrängt, aber nicht in die Enge getrieben, ratlos, aber nicht verzweifelt, verfolgt, aber nicht verlassen, zu Boden geworfen, aber nicht am Boden zerstört“ (V. 8f). Diese Auseinandersetzung wird schliesslich christologisch interpretiert, als das Ineinander von Sterben und Leben Jesu, das in leib-

 

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licher Gestalt bezeugt wird: „Allezeit tragen wir das Sterben Jesu an unserem Leib, damit auch das Leben Jesu an unserem Leib offenbar werde“ (V. 10). Dadurch, dass das Sterben Jesu verborgen getragen wird, wird das Leben Jesu offenbar.

5.

Zum Abschluss

Damit die Erkenntnis der Herrlichkeit Gottes auf dem Angesicht Jesu Christi aufleuchtet, hat „der Gott, der gesagt hat: Aus der Finsternis soll Licht aufstrahlen“, dieses Licht „aufstrahlen lassen in unseren Herzen“ (2 Kor 4:6). Damit wird ein Anschluss an Saint-Exupérys kleinen Prinzen möglich, der vom Fuchs folgendes Geheimnis erlernen muss: „Voici mon secret. Il est très simple : on ne voit bien qu’avec le coeur. L’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux“ (Saint-Exupéry: 2007, 92).17

Bibliographie Agamben, Giorgio (2010), Nacktheiten, Frankfurt a. M.: S. Fischer. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1998), Widerstand und Ergebung. Briefe und Aufzeichnungen aus der Haft [1942–45] in: Christian Gremmels/Eberhard Bethge/Renate Bethge in Zusammenarbeit mit Ilse Tödt (Hrg.), Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke 8, Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser/Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Ebeling, Gerhard (31967), Wort Gottes und Hermeneutik, in: Idem, Wort und Glaube, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 319–348. Ebeling, Gerhard (62017), Luther. Einführung in sein Denken, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Ebeling, Gerhard (42012), Dogmatik des christlichen Glaubens, Bd. I, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Ellison, Ralph (1987), Der unsichtbare Mann, Reinbek bei Hamburg: Rowohlt. Germain, Sylvie (1987), Nuit-d’Ambre, Paris: Gallimard. Goffman, Erving (102013), Interaktionsrituale. Über Verhalten in direkter Kommunikation, Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp. Honneth, Axel (42007), Kampf um Anerkennung. Zur moralischen Grammatik sozialer Konflikte, Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp. Honneth, Axel (2003), Unsichtbarkeit. Stationen einer Theorie der Intersubjektivität, Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp. Kierkegaard, Søren (1962), Furcht und Zittern (1843), in: Idem, Gesammelte Werke (hg. von Emmanuel Hirsch), 4. Abteilung. Levinas, Emmanuel (21993), Totalität und Unendlichkeit, Freiburg i.Br.: Karl Alber Verlag. Luther, Martin (1513–1516), Dictata super Psalterium, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kriti-

17 „Hier ist mein Geheimnis. Es ist sehr einfach: Man sieht nur mit dem Herzen gut. Das Wesentliche ist für die Augen unsichtbar“ (Übersetzung P. B.). Dass der Autor trotzdem in seinem Büchlein gezeichnet hat, gehört zu den Paradoxien dieses dichterischen Werkes.

 

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sche Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 3. Luther, Martin (1518), Disputatio Heidelbergae habita, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 1, 350–374. Luther, Martin (1525), De servo abitrio, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 18, 551–787. Merleau-Ponty, Maurice (1974), Phänomenologie der Wahrnehmung, Berlin: De Gruyter. Piem (1996), Dieu et vous, Paris: Le Cherche Midi. Ricœur, Paul (1974), Philosophische und theologische Hermeneutik, in: Paul Ricœur/Eberhard Jüngel, Metapher. Zur Hermeneutik religiöser Sprache (Evangelische Theologie Sonderheft), München: Christian Kaiser Verlag. Ricœur, Paul (2006), Wege der Anerkennung. Erkennen, Wiedererkennen, Anerkanntsein, Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp. Saint-Exupéry, Antoine ([1946] 2007), Le petit prince, Paris: Gallimard. Zürcher Bibel (2007), Zürich: TVZ Theologischer Verlag.

 

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Imago Dei – A Self-Concealing Image

1.

Introduction: The imago Dei as object and subject of interpretation

What does it mean to see the human being as imago Dei, as the image of the invisible God? This is the question that will be investigated here. The point of entry to the investigation is a comparison of the imago Dei with three other types of ‚images‘. How does the human being as image of God differ from (1) painted, filmed or photographed pictures, (2) metaphors or symbolic signs as images in the context of figurative language, and (3) mental images such as memory or dream images? These three types of images – pictures, metaphors, and mental images – are first and foremost objects of interpretation. By contrast, the human being as imago Dei is at the same time the subject of interpretation. The hypothesis that I would like to explore is that human beings as ‚self-interpreting animals‘ (cf. Charles Taylor: 1985) who are simultaneously subjects and objects in the process of self-understanding not only reveal, but also conceal themselves when seeing themselves and knowing that they are seen. This double movement of disclosing and concealing oneself is due to deixis. Used in linguistic and visual studies, the term denotes references in which the meaning of a word, phrase or picture is determined by contextual information about persons, places, times, or situations. Deictic references (of the order of ‘I’ – ‚here‘ – ‚now‘) imply that we cannot direct our attention to one aspect of a situation or some specific person, place, or time without at the same time becoming blind to something else, which eludes our attention. If the imago Dei is a self-interpreting image that is able to see itself in one way or another, it is inevitable that self-reference remains selective. When indicating one aspect, another aspect remains invisible, at least temporarily, until we turn to it. This applies equally to speech acts and to silent gestures, the verbal and the visual. As the Latin verb dicere is related to the Greek verb deiknymi, there is no dichotomy between ‚saying‘ and ‚pointing‘ (cf. Karl Bühler: 1999, 79–148). Regardless of whether we choose one or the other mode of reference, the effect is the same: the ‚whole picture‘ or ‚story‘ cannot be available if this picture or story stands for human life as a whole. Thus, human self-expression must always remain fragmentary.

 

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The self-expression of an embodied, self-conscious imago Dei includes affective, perceptual and intellectual forms of self-reflection during which self-consciousness turns upon itself. Without such movements, human beings could not influence the way they see and are seen. Their appearance, behaviour and words express who they are. But how to express visibly that one is created as or in the image of an invisible God?1 Does the image of God somehow ‘fade over’ the image of the human being? Or does the invisible appear in and through the visible – such that the images of God and man merge with each other in a paradoxical process of in-visibilization? If the imago Dei becomes visible as an image of God that is represented by the human being only on condition that the latter understands him- or herself as an image of God, our self-understanding must reflect that we are more than just images of ourselves. This implies that in referring to ourselves, we simultaneously refer to another who becomes co-present in our acts of self-presentation. If this is correct, self-knowledge and the knowledge of God emerge together. In seeing oneself as a personified reference to another, one participates in the ‘reproduction’ of the image of the other to whom one deictically refers. Provided that the appearance of the image of God is mediated by a hermeneutical process of human self-understanding, then we are to some extent ‘co-producers’ of the imago Dei. On the one hand, each person finds him- or herself created as imago Dei, that is, the image of God already exists when it begins to understand itself. On the other hand, human self-understanding is not ready-made, but requires a journey of self-discovery. It is impossible to feel, see or understand all that there is of oneself at once. Therefore the ‘vision’ of the invisible imago Dei is an openended project. The object of ‘vision’ arises in and through the seeing subject. In other words, understanding the self as an image of God becomes possible when we become aware of our God-related conditio humana. This process of self-under­ standing involves not only heterodeixis where one thing (passively) points to something else, but also autodeixis (cf. Emmanuel Alloa: 2011, 292f) where the subject of pointing (actively) points to its own image, which in turn points to another. In giving itself to be seen, the seeing image presents itself and represents the other, which then enables the imago Dei to make visible the invisible. Yet the visualization of the invisible is limited insofar as there is, so to speak, a ‘blind spot’ to the first-person perspective. The impossibility of seeing all of oneself at once and the necessity of seeing through a medium implies that without some minimal self-distance we could neither see nor understand ourselves. In this paper, the play of this self-distance and the double movement of simultaneous self-disclosure and self-concealment will be explored. Section 2 considers artists’ self-reflective glances, as reproduced in painted self-portraits, in contradistinc1 Cf. Gen 1:26f; 5:1–3; 9:6. As to different options of translating the polysemous Hebrew phrase b’tselem elohim, cf. Claudia Welz: 2011.

 

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tion to God’s all-seeing gaze. Section 3 focuses on poetic language and discusses to what extent the imago Dei may be interpreted mimetically. Section 4 will try to find an answer to the question of how the imago Dei can shine through our searching glances and mental self-images even if God’s image will never be represented adequately, and section 5 contains my conclusion.

2.

The glance

Painted self-portraits display and play with human self-distance. The imago Dei is akin to a self-portrait insofar as both images have a face and a glance. It seems that they can return the viewer’s look, or at least produce the illusion of an exchange of glances. Self-portraits mirror, form and transform the artists’ glances upon themselves. Their ways of seeing influence what they come to see and express. This demands that the bodily self be looked at not only once, but twice, and once more – and, confronted with the gaze as represented in the painting, the self-image may then be adapted, revised or subverted. Thereby, the painter’s perspective on the painting is reversed as soon as the painted face looks back at him or her. This reversal of perspectives implies that one sees oneself, and then sees oneself seen. In order to unravel the deictic double movement of simultaneously disclosing and concealing the self, which is due to the selectivity of vision, let us first have a look at self-portraits by Rembrandt and Frida Kahlo – and then contrast these pictures of finite sight with God’s all-seeing gaze as described by Nicolaus Cusanus.

2.1

Deixis, interiority and exteriority in self-portraits by Rembrandt and Frida Kahlo

What is disclosed by a self-portrait and the painter’s look at himself is first and foremost the way he sees himself. In addition, one might also try to decode what his outer ‘says’ about his inner life. In line with the increasing use of mirrors, self-observation and self-reflection has become a central concern in the arts (cf. Sabine Melchior-Bonnet: 2001). In 1630 the 24-year-old Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (1606–1669) made an etching of himself that shows a vivid face, astounded, with untamed hair and an intense gaze that seems to contain a question (see fig. 1).2 Laura Cumming interprets his gaze as follows: 2 Self-Portrait, Wide-Eyed, 1630, etching and burin, 51 × 46 mm (cat. no. 20). London, British Museum, inv. no. 1973-U-769. The catalogue numbers in parentheses refer to White/Buvelot: 1999 (and the exhibition Rembrandt by Himself in London and The Hague), reproducing all

 

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Rembrandt is acting with his eyes. He hooks you by reeling back and showing the whites. The etching has been given the title Self-Portrait, Wide-Eyed, but it might as well be called ‘Shocked to See You’. It is as if you personally have caused this effect: you come before him and he reacts, that is the one-two-action of the image. The meeting of eyes amounts to an incident (Cumming: 2010, 31).

Regardless of whether a stranger or the artist himself looks at the painting, the painted face expresses bafflement, even bewilderment. When looking at himself, Rembrandt might have wondered: ‘Who is this man, what are his deepest wishes and what is the purpose of his life? Has he already become what he is to be?’ Rembrandt’s approximately 70 self-portraits can be seen as a visual autobiography.3 However, an existential interpretation, which treats the painted expressions as the artist’s various ways of relating to himself – be it in a self-critical or more self-affirming manner – must be supplemented by another interpretation, which takes into account the historical context and the painting techniques of the time. Rembrandt’s pupil Samuel van Hoogstraten advised his own pupils to empathize as closely as possible with the emotions of the figures in history pieces while looking into a mirror, and to depict their own passions, thus reshaping themselves entirely into actors, being both exhibitors and beholders with rapt attention. It is very likely that van Hoogstraten based this advice on his own experiences in Rembrandt’s studio. Recording passions in front of the mirror was a more or less common practice. Rembrandt’s early, etched self-portraits (see fig. 1 and 2) display a variety of grimaces and appear to illustrate this practice of studying a specific distortion of the features under the influence of an emotion, albeit one faked in the studio. It is this true-to-life rendering of emotions for which Rembrandt has continued to be celebrated through the ages.4

the paintings, drawings and etchings that can reasonably be considered as self-portraits by Rembrandt. 3 Cf. Finn Skårderud: 2012, 16–20, here 18 f. The term ‘self-portrait’ did not exist in Rembrandt’s day. To speak of a Rembrandt self-portrait, one might have described it as ‘contrefeitsel van Rembrandt door hem sellfs gedaen (Rembrandt’s likeness done by himself)’. The term ‘self-portrait’ only came into use in the 19th century, and inherent in it was a form of self-awareness that had a specific existential connotation. Cf. Ernst van de Wetering: 1999, 8–37, here 17, with reference to Amsterdam, Gemeentearchief, PA 234, inv. no. 309, dated September 6, 1685, and Woordenboek der Nederlandsche Taal, s.v. ‘Zelfportret’. 4 Cf. van de Wetering: 1999, 21, referring to Samuel van Hoogstraten, Inleyding tot de hooge schoole der schilderkonst (‘Introduction to the Art of Painting’), Rotterdam 1678, 109f, as well as the catalogue text by Peter Schatborn in Rembrandt by Himself (White/Buvelot: 1999), here Schatborn: 1999, 126.

 

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Fig. 1: Rembrandt: Self-Portrait, Wide-Eyed, 1630. © 2007 The British Museum Company Limited.

Fig. 2: Rembrandt: Self-Portrait, 1634. © Gemäldegalerie, Staatliche Museen zu ­Berlin – Preußischer Kulturbesitz; Foto: Jörg P. Anders.

Fig. 3: Rembrandt: Self-Portrait with Angry Expression, 1630. ©Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.

 

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If the transition from being oneself, seeing oneself, and staging oneself is fluent, how can one see the mind behind the mask? As we cannot make eye contact with our innermost being, we can only see our exterior mirror-reflection together with our interior self-image (cf. Skårderud: 2012, 16f). The invisible self-image, which accompanies our visible appearance, can be understood as a conglomeration of feelings, thoughts, decisions, and dreams, of which we may be more or less conscious. Rembrandt’s Self-Portrait with Angry Expression (fig. 2)5 belongs to a group of four prints dating from 1630. As Peter Schatborn explains, in this one “Rembrandt glares furiously at the viewer. His anger is conveyed most eloquently by the straight lines of his mouth, the round, dark eyes and his knotted brow. The artist is bare-headed and his unruly hair adds to the drama of the picture” (Schatborn: 1999, 126). Here I would like to ask whether Rembrandt’s frowning might not also be his eyebrows being raised at himself. After all, the painter was forced to look himself in the eye when painting his picture, albeit by being distant from himself. In turning his anger against himself, the painter’s self-relation was mediated by self-distance. Yet his self-relation cannot only have been a matter between ‘him’ and his ‘self ’. Rather, one’s self-relation naturally takes a detour around other faces and gazes. Sometimes others get a better glimpse of what is hidden within a person than that person herself, for one cannot always see what one expresses, and even if one succeeds in expressing one’s interiority with the help of mirror images, this exteriorized interiority is not diaphanous, but remains opaque. Total clarity about oneself, or complete self-transparency, is not available to us now, and probably never will be. The man having portrayed himself from a frontal perspective in a fur coat and beret (see fig. 3)6 is aware of himself and his effect on others. His outfit tells them something about his social standing, his environment, and maybe also his profession. And he can in turn influence their perception of him as a person. He looks much more provocative, even a little arrogant, in this portrait – we could imagine him asking us, ‘What do you people want?’ – while the etchings seem to express astonishment and scepticism in relation to himself. Inter-subjectivity emerges as a form of inter-iconicity in the sense of one person saying to another: ‘I’ll be your mirror’. However, this personified mirror does not render a subject in a ratio of one to one. A person can only give a rendering of what she observes, and her observation is put into the Gestalt of her own gestures and facial expression. When observing and interacting with each other, people cannot remain completely untouched. They are involved in communication, 5 Self-Portrait with Angry Expression, 1630, etching, 75 × 75 mm (cat. no. 21). Amsterdam, Rijks­ museum, Rijksprentenkabinet, inv. no. RP-P-1961–978 (II). 6 Self-Portrait, 1634, panel, 58.3 × 47.4 cm (cat. no. 39). Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Gemäldegalerie, Preußischer Kulturbesitz, inv. no. 810.

 

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which may variously please, annoy, hurt or edify them. Thereby they mirror each other, reacting to each other’s words and deeds. There is no self-portrait without a previous physical mirror-reflection. Furthermore, before one is able to paint one’s own eyes, one must have looked into another’s eyes. Thus self-visualization presupposes experience with and feedback from visible others. There remains a difference between the image one is and the image someone else can see. What is at stake in the dialectics of the visible and the invisible, the interior and the exterior, is not just the seeing subject’s self-understanding, but also inter-subjective understanding ‘between us’. This might involve misunderstanding, traces of the in-visibilization of the visible, and camouflage, which glosses over something we have seen, but want to hide. An artist’s self-presentation in and through his self-portrait enters into this play with roles and masks. There might for instance emerge emotions we would rather not show. How can they be concealed? One might try to imagine oneself as another, while nonetheless remaining oneself – with another’s image in mind, which might help us to present ourselves in a way that seems appropriate in a certain situation.

Fig. 4: Rembrandt: Self-Portrait with Beret and TurnedUp Collar, 1659. © NGA Images, National Gallery of Art, Washington.

 

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In his subtle and sombre Self-Portrait with Beret and Turned-Up Collar of 1659 (fig. 4),7 Rembrandt conveys concern. In his face, one can see the sagging of old age. Although he is seated and relaxed, his hands resting serenely in his lap, he seems much more vulnerable and exposed to the viewer than in the paintings we have so far considered. His gaze does not offer the same defiant or rebellious resis­ tance to the onlooker. On the contrary, it is as if the viewer’s gaze could penetrate the depth of the dim room and at the same time be contaminated by the gloomy mood of the man. Rembrandt’s solicitude evokes compassion. One might almost feel an impulse to gently clap him on the shoulder. When regarding the self-portraits of the teasing and challenging young man, one hardly feels this appeal, for he creates a stronger barrier around himself. What is interesting in this comparison of the effects of the early and the late paintings is the difference in the quality of personal presence, which is at once bodily and psychic. The man portrayed is not just visible in the sense that objects lying around in the room would be. Rather, his presence is subjective and invites concrete forms of inter-personal co-presence. Ours, the viewers’, way of looking at the man is influenced by the way he looks at us, and his posture, glance and attunement affect and ‘colour’ our reactions, our engagement with the one we see. The sight of one whom we see moves us, and the sight of someone ‘like us’ evokes our identification with him, at least to some extent. It is as if our three-dimensional seeing caused vibrations within us – vibrations involving one more dimension of being or co-existence, which cannot be sensed with the eyes alone. Vision, sound, and feeling are interrelated. While the portrait of young Rembrandt with his eyes wide open (see fig. 1) seems to shout at us, the old man (see fig. 4) is silent. While the young man radiates some sort of strangeness that takes us aback, we are touched by the tiredness and tristesse of the aged one. ‘Seeing’ the invisible ‘between’ us is a synaesthetic experience – and more than this, for our senses are overcharged with super-sensory meaning, which somehow surfaces in what is visible to our eyes. As Edwin Buijsen observes, in most of Rembrandt’s early self-portraits the painter would place the mirror to the left of the easel, so that the painting arm would not block his view. In the mirror image thus obtained, the body inclines somewhat to the right. By contrast, in the self-portrait of 1659, Rembrandt painted himself turning to the left, which gives a different view of his face. The light comes from the upper right, and in this lighting, the right-hand side of his face is noticeably hollow-cheeked. Is the unusual pose adopted under the influence of R ­ aphael’s famous Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, of which Rembrandt had drawn a copy in 1639? Rembrandt’s painting is simpler in character and the clothing has no 7 Self-Portrait with Beret and Turned-Up Collar, 1659, oil on canvas, 84.4 × 66 cm (cat. no. 73). Washington, National Gallery of Art, Andrew W. Mellon Collection, inv. no. 1937.1.72.

 

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explicit allusions to glorious moments in the history of painting (cf. Buijsen: 1999, 200). He does not distinguish himself by the modesty of his garb. When looking at his portrait, we relate to him as we would in a face-to-face encounter, for the painting is realistic. However, artists also have the possibility of playing with alienation effects, for instance by placing the one portrayed in unnatural, surreal or exotic settings, or by enrobing the sitter in unusual garments that elicit estrangement and give the impression that we do not share one and the same world with the portrayed. A prime example of play with such effects are the self-portraits by the Mexican painter Frida Kahlo (1907–1954), daughter of a Jewish Hungarian-German father and a Roman-Catholic Spanish mother. More than a third of her work consists of self-portraits. Her Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird of 1940 (fig. 5)8 shows a beautiful woman with southern flair, surrounded by diverse animals such as butterflies, a little spider monkey and a black cat. She looks straight out of the picture, looking at us and paying no attention at all to the animals, which seem to be tame and familiar with her. Clearly she has dominion. She seems to be the sovereign queen of nature, the potnia theron. In fact, the garden of her blue house, the “Casa Azul” in Coyoacán, was for some time also the home of these animals. Yet the apparently idyllic picture houses hidden cruelty. The paradisiac scenario is disturbed by the pectoral of thorns. Why does the hummingbird not fly around freely, although it stretches its wings, but is caught on the thorns? Kahlo alludes to religious symbols, e. g. to Jesus’ crown of thorns and his passion, but why does she adorn herself with a dead bird? On the one hand, she bleeds because of the thorns around her neck; on the other hand, she seems indifferent to the pain they surely cause. These tensions induce confusion in the viewer. We are at once attracted and appalled. As Helga Prignitz-Poda explains, the Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird was painted after Frida Kahlo had separated from her husband Diego Rivera. She was on her own and trying to earn her living with her painting. She had been successful in this, had held a solo exhibition in New York, and the Louvre in Paris had purchased one of her paintings. Yet she was also sad, and the self-portrait might be a complex attempt to avert the evil spirits, to acquire self-reliance and fortitude, to protect herself against a love that brought her to the verge of despair, and to shake off bad memories of, inter alia, Diego’s adultery. Seen against the backdrop of Roland Penrose’s painting Winged Domino: Portrait of 8 Frida Kahlo, Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird, 1940, oil on canvas on Masonite, 62,6 × 47,9 cm, Nickolas Muray Collection, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, The University of Texas at Austin (Cat. Rais. 76). The abbreviation “Cat. Rais.” stands for Catalogue Raisonné by Helga Prignitz-Poda/Salomon Grimberg/Andrea Kettenmann: 1988.

 

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Valentine (1938) – composed as a tender memorial to his marriage with Valentine who had left him – it is conspicuous that Frida’s self-portrait subverts the motifs in a bitter reversal: the ornamental rose at Valentine’s décolleté is turned into a constricting, maybe punitive cage of thorns; the butterflies signalling Valentine’s living power have become stiff filigree brooches for Frida; the bird that could build a nest of Valentine’s hair hangs dead at Frida’s neck. The leaves behind her might shield her and the attendant animals. The black cat on her shoulder is the classic familiar of a witch. Traditionally, the monkey symbolizes human lust and harmful excesses of love (cf. Prignitz-Poda: 2010a, 126).

Fig. 5: Frida Kahlo: SelfPortrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird, 1940. © Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin/© 2013 Banco de México Diego Rivera/Frida Kahlo Museums Trust, Mexico, D.F./billedkunst.dk.

The hummingbird has triggered antithetical interpretations. On the one hand, it has been taken as aphrodisiac and a talisman against assaults in love and tirades of hate (cf. Prignitz-Poda: 2010a, and Bettina Gockel: 2006, 45: “Liebesangriffe sowie Hasstiraden”); on the other hand, it has been understood as a symbol of the Holy Spirit tied to a female Christ enduring her suffering with dignity and composure (cf. Hayden Herrera: 1992, 84f). What are we shown, and what are we supposed to learn – the conquest of suffering, or the embracing of it, or the paradox of overcom-

 

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ing suffering by surrendering to it? In the late 1930s Frida Kahlo operated with the visual codes of Christian icons and depictions of saints, yet placing her own face in the centre of the painting. The result – the representation of a person with an unyielding gaze and an authoritarian charisma – has been called the “Frida Icon” (Florian Steininger: 2010, 44–51, here 44). The Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird marks the peak of this style. In 1940 she sold it to her current companion, Nickolas Muray. For years the portrait hung in his living-room. The frontal orientation and the besetting, hieratic presence of the portrayed can be compared with representations of ‘Christ Pantocrator’ in Byzantine art (cf. Salomon Grimberg: 2004, 9). Here, too, the glance exerts power, distance, and control. That Frida Kahlo portrayed herself in positions of sovereignty and resistance might be a counter-reaction to her actual fate. She suffered with chronic back pain from the age of six. As an 18-year-old, she was crippled in a traffic accident. As a consequence her spinal column needed surgery. Altogether she underwent 32 operations. Again and again, she had to stay in hospital for weeks or even months, caught in traction bandages and corsets. Thrown back onto herself in loneliness, melancholy and despair, dreaming of the world outside, she often had nothing vibrant but her own mirror image for company. Above her bed, there was mounted a mirror and a specially constructed scaffold so that she could paint or write even when lying in bed (cf. Peter von Becker: 2010, 37). Her self-portraits present her as an ambivalent character, between emancipation and the need for protection, between femme fragile and femme fatale. Despite her frailty, she wrested joy from life. The logo “Viva la vida” appears repeatedly on the paintings of the final years of her life (cf. Ingried Brugger: 2010: 16). She died at the age of 47. Did Frida Kahlo create icons of herself in order to obtain alleviation or even the healing of her malady?9 At all events she gives us much to think in particular about the conditions of creatureliness and finitude. These themes are also occasioned by the next two self-portraits. Time Flies (fig. 6), painted in 1929 shortly after her marriage,10 shows Frida Kahlo with her head raised. She looks directly into our eyes, standing in a room with thick curtains in front of a French balcony and a stack of books supporting an alarm clock. In the background, we see an airplane climbing. However, seen from 9 This is a question raised by Steininger: 2010, 45. 10 Frida Kahlo, Self-Portrait: Time Flies 1929, oil on masonite, 77,5 × 61 cm. The self-portrait is cata­logued as Privatbesitz. Cf. the catalogue mentioned above connected to the Berlin exhibition Frida Kahlo Retrospektive (Martin-Gropius-Bau/Bank Austria Kunstforum: 2010), 22 and 33. According to Helga Prignitz-Poda, who organized and conceptualized the exhibition, Kahlo frequently used watch hands in order to indicate numbers referring to letters in the Spanish alphabet. In Time Flies, the digits stand for the initials of her baptismal name: Frida Carmen (7 before 3). The self-portrait might be a throwback to her childhood and youth. Cf. Prignitz-Poda: 2010c, 24.

 

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Fig. 6: Frida Kahlo: Time Flies, 1929. © Sotheby’s New York/© 2013 Banco de México Diego Rivera/Frida Kahlo Museums Trust, ­Mexico, D.F./billedkunst.dk.

far away, it seems rather to be falling. The composition resembles a vanitas still life proper to the technocratic age. The alarm clock symbolizes the passage of time, although it seems to stand still in this static moment. The aircraft might be a metaphor for accelerated movement, which at once produces unknown possibilities of travel and a heightened risk of crashing down. In their combination, the alarm clock and the aircraft illustrate the meaning of the portrait’s title: time itself flies … In a Self-Portrait from 1948 (fig. 7),11 Frida Kahlo has portrayed herself in the classic Mexican Tehuana-robe, which frames her face and covers her head. Traditionally the robe was destined for church attendance on Sundays. Frida owned several of them. Yet she has here modified the lace pattern. The pistils of the flowers around her face contain the Yin and Yang sign, and the snails and shells might express her desire for harmony. At that time she was in frail health, and engaged with Buddhism, through which she hoped to overcome her solitude and suffering (cf. Prignitz-Poda: 2010b, 160).

11 Frida Kahlo, Self-Portrait, 1948, oil on fibreboard, 50 × 39,5 cm (Cat. Rais. 117).

 

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Fig. 7: Frida Kahlo: Self-­ Portrait, 1948. © ­Rafael Doniz/© 2013 Banco de México Diego Rivera/­Frida Kahlo Museums Trust, ­Mexico, D.F./billedkunst.dk.

The robe’s folds pattern an astral fabric that brings to mind an aureole. The headgear appears like a nimbus. Frida’s gaze has been described as mesmerizing, exerting a magnetic power that captures the viewer in an ‘optic pull’ (cf. Florian Steininger: 2010, 45). However, upon closer inspection, we can see three teardrops welling up in her eyes. At the same time, they seem immovable, somehow fixed on her face. The self-portrait was commissioned by Frida’s dentist, Dr. Samuel Fastlicht, as payment for false teeth. After this piece, Frida produced nothing for a year. In a letter to her dentist, she wrote that the painting had taken much longer than expected because she was having terrible times, her state of mind being reflected in the portrait. She could not bring herself to deliver it to its new owner, but sent her sister Cristina. She apologized with the words that she felt like a ‘wet cat’ and that he, in her place, would already have thrown himself down from the cathedral roof (cf. Prignitz-Poda: 2010b, 160, with reference to a letter from January 9, 1948, published in Kahlo: 2004, 317f). Frida’s face turns slightly to the side in the painting, she seems to have a lazy eye, and the half-withered leaves around her head, as well as her strangely oversized embroidered apparel, convey the impression that we are not looking at a person standing opposite us in front of a floral wallpaper, but rather looking down at her

 

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lying on the ground. Her face is still rosy, but the faded flowers at the corners of the painting awaken associations of death. Is this a self-fashioned “Frida Dolorosa” (Steininger: 2010, 47)? Again, Kahlo plays with the ambiguity of opposed movements and events: rising up and falling down, living and dying. Only one of them is visible directly, but it alludes to the other, which lurks as a frightening possibility. This invisible possibility is made present by means of mental images that blend in with what is actually perceived. When seeing the mask-like face looking through the collar, with ornamented cloth and leaves around it, we perceive that this person is alive, but, reminded of a deathbed or sickbed, we wonder whether this relatively young woman already imagines her end. In both of these last two portraits (Time Flies, 1929, fig. 6, and Self-Portrait, 1948, fig. 7), the onlooker’s gaze simultaneously sees objects belonging to the present and objects that are pregnant with the future. In this way the paintings have temporality inscribed in them: time as friend and time as foe. By means of synchronization, the future can be anticipated in the present. Fugitive diachronic time is implied in the irreversible dying-away of our lifetime. By depicting objects that signal different points of time, Kahlo succeeds in representing the non-representable. With our mind’s eye, with the help of imagination and memory, we come to ‘see’ what cannot be seen. The outer image gives rise to the inner image, perception to intellection. Here we are at the crossroads of painted, mental, and metaphorical images, which are engendered by each other. What we see optically refers to something else – such as time – that is invisible to our sensory eyes; yet, arising before our inner eye, it suddenly assumes visibility. Regarding painted self-portraits, the condensed results of a temporally extended process of self-understanding, the focus is on the duplicity of self-disclosure and self-concealment connected to the artists’ repeated glances at and reflections about themselves. In this process, the artists show something of themselves, they might wish to hide something else, come to reveal it nonetheless against their will, or succeed in keeping their secret. Through their ways of presenting themselves, they can direct the viewers’ glance, emphasize certain aspects and thereby divert attention from others. Because of the conditions of creaturely finitude, the hermeneutical process of seeing and interpreting the self is perspectival – but what if the boundaries of perspectivity and the circles of deictic referencing were broken and opened up to an unlimited vision?

2.2

God’s all-seeing gaze and the imago Dei in Cusanus’ De visione Dei

Let us turn to Cusanus’ account of God’s all-seeing gaze and the imago Dei. In response to a request for a method of contemplation, Nicolaus Cusanus (1401–64),

 

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Cardinal-Priest and Bishop of Brixen, sent, in December 1453, his little book De visione Dei to the Benedictines of Tegernsee. The treatise can be read as a commentary and meditation on the picture described in the Preface: the icon or image of the all-seeing God. Cusanus brings his pupils to a certain vision of God by showing them the gaze of the Omnivoyant. Yet how is it possible to see the gaze of Godself? Cusanus refers to pictures of faces in which the face is made to appear as though looking on all around it. For instance, he refers to the Veronica in his chapel at Coblenz, and to the angel in the castle of Brixen. Together with his book, he sends such a picture, which he calls “the icon of God” (Preface; Nicholas of Cusa: 2007, 3). He instructs the Benedictines to set it up in some place, to stand around it and to look upon it. Then each of the brethren shall find that, from whatsoever quarter he regards it, it looks upon him as if it looked upon no other. They will marvel how it can be that the face should look on all and each at the same time. Then Cusanus asks the brother standing eastward to place himself westward. He will find the gaze fastened on him in the west just as it was in the east. If he then, while fixing his eyes on the icon, walks from west to east, he will find that the gaze continuously goes along with him. Afterwards, Cusanus suggests that the brethren walk in contrary directions – and still, they will see that the icon’s face keeps in sight all of them as they go on their way (cf. ibid., 4). From this peripatetic experience of seeing oneself seen, Nicholas of Cusa draws the following conclusion about the gaze of God: “it taketh such diligent care of each one who findeth himself observed as though it cared only for him, and for no other” (ibid., 5). It is noteworthy that Cusanus does not interpret the all-seeing gaze as general surveillance, but rather as a considerate attention to everyone.12 Unlike the mechanism of “panopticism” in modern “disciplinary” societies and their pervasive inclination to monitor and control the individual – where conscious and permanent visibility assures the automatic functioning of power, prominently described by Foucault (1926–84) in Surveiller et Punir13 – the attentive gaze of God’s eye is, for Cusanus, the “providence” that guards him (Chapter IV; Nicho12 Cf. Philipp Stoellger: 2008, 202. In a Danish context, one might be reminded of N.F.S. Grundtvig’s hymn “På Guds nåde” which speaks of ‘God’s eye from a height’ that may rest on us ‘peacefully’ (cf. Den Danske Salmebog, no. 518, verse 3: “Ene råde / skal Guds nåde / for vor fromhed / og vor dyd, / om Guds øje / fra det høje / hvile skal på os med fryd” (cf. Grundtvig: 2003). 13 Cf. Michel Foucault: 1995, 195–228, on “Panopticism”. Foucault depicts Jeremy Bentham’s Panopticon as follows: “The panoptic mechanism arranges spatial unities that make it possible to see constantly and to recognize immediately. In short, it revises the principle of the dungeon; or rather its three functions – to enclose, to deprive of light and to hide – it preserves only the first and eliminates the other two. Full lighting and the eye of a supervisor capture better than darkness, which ultimately protected. Visibility is a trap.” In panoptic prisons, the see/be seen dyad is dissociated: “in the peripheric ring, one is totally seen, without ever seeing; in the central tower, one sees everything without ever being seen” (ibid., 202), and this way, those who are subjected to a field of visibility, and who know it, become the principle of their own subjection.

 

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las of Cusa: 2007, 14). He is confident that God never ceases to behold him most lovingly. In the icon, he perceives how God is ready to show His face to all who seek Him – He who never closes His eyes of mercy and never turns them away (Chapter IV and V; ibid., 17, 20f). Comparing divine and human sight, Cusanus finds that our sight is limited to time and place, and to particular objects. We are unable to look on more than one thing at a time. By contrast, God’s sight is “Absolute Sight” from which all other sight springs. God’s sight is unlimited and surpasses in keenness, speed and strength the sight of all creatures (cf. Chapter I; ibid., 8). Further, Nicholas points out that God’s sight embraces at one and the same time each and every mode of seeing, while our sight follows the affections of our eye and mind. Our looks are now loving and glad, then sad and wrathful; first the looks of a child, later of an aged person. According to Cusanus, “Absolute Sight” is “the limiting of limitations” and exists in all sight because through it all limited sight exists (cf. Chapter II; ibid., 10f). This implies that God’s look, too, involves feelings. Yet, unlike human affection, divine affection does not change. However, human beings tend to attribute their own ways of seeing God to Him. One who looks on God in wrath finds God’s face wrathful; another who looks on Him with a loving face will find His face looking on him or her with love (cf. Chapter VI; ibid., 24). Thus it is decisive how we see God and how we see ourselves as seen by Him. Cusanus moreover states that God’s sight is “not other than hearing, or tasting, or smelling, or touching, or feeling, or understanding” (Chapter III; ibid., 12). It seems to Cusanus that God’s glance speaks, for speech and sight are one within God who is absolute simplicity. In Him, “all otherness is unity, and all diversity is identity” (Chapter III; ibid., 13; cf. Chapter X; ibid., 45). In God, opposites or contradictories coincide (cf. Chapter IX, X; ibid., 43f, 46). That is why God’s face can be “the true type of all faces” (Chapter VI; ibid., 23). For Cusanus, God’s glance is God’s face. While conceding that all concepts of a face fall short of the divine face, he nonetheless tries to find formulations that express the proprium of God’s face (cf. Chapter VI; ibid., 24 and 26). For example, he describes it as “that power and principle from which all faces are what they are” – namely their truth and exemplar (Chapter VII; ibid., 28, cf. 30). Now, in what ways does God’s face differ from the faces that are created in His image (Gen 1:26)? The text gives us three clues. First, Cusanus puts forward that God’s face is the pattern or prototype of all human faces (cf. Chapter VI; ibid., 25). Elsewhere he considers the Absolute as being in the limited, just as the cause is in the effect and the truth in the image. Then God appears to him as “the Exemplar” of all men. Cusanus emphasizes that God is not a composite of several exemplars, but the one, most simple and infinite exemplar, the “Essence of essences” that pervades all things (Chapter IX; ibid., 41).

 

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Furthermore, God’s sight is God’s essence. Can something similar also be said of the human being? On the one hand, Cusanus draws our attention to certain similarities. For instance, for God, “seeing is one with being seen” and the being of the creature, too, is dependent upon its being seen by God (Chapter X; ibid., 46, cf. 47). Cusanus assumes that God is seen of all creatures and sees all of them, since they exist by His seeing. On the other hand – and this is the second clue – Cusanus denies that God resembles any creature: “And if anyone should set forth any likeness, and say that Thou wert to be imagined as resembling it, I know in like manner that that is no likeness of Thee” (Chapter XIII; ibid., 58f). God is not even identical with that which can possibly be said or thought of Him. He remains above all concepts. While God’s infinity includes all things and nothing can exist outside it, His infinity is not equivalent to anything that exists (cf. Chapter XIII; ibid., 62). Another difficulty is that God is at once invisible and visible, the One who cannot be seen of any creature and the One who is seen of all. Is God, then, like a medium that remains invisible but nonetheless makes visible something else? Cusanus compares God with a mirror – only to admit that God surpasses it in “the coincidence of shining and reflection, of cause and effect alike” (Chapter XII; ibid., 55, cf. 54). The third clue consists in the insight that human beings do not resemble God in any static manner, as if they already were like Him. Rather, our resemblance to God is first to be achieved by coming to resemble Him – yet not unaided, but by letting His grace take effect upon us: And this power, which I have of Thee, wherein I possess a living image of Thine almighty power, is freewill. By this I can either enlarge or restrict my capacity for Thy grace. The enlarging is by conformity with Thee, when I strive to be good because Thou art good, to be just because Thou art just, to be merciful because Thou art merciful; when all my endeavour is turned toward Thee because all Thy endeavour is turned toward me […] (Chapter IV; ibid., 16f).

The final sentence of the extract shows that human efforts of con-formation with God remain dependent on His prior turning to the human being. As God’s living image, the human being has then, in Cusanus’ view, the option of developing in accordance or discordance with God’s example. Despite the shared notion of God’s gratia praeveniens that precedes human choice and action, Cusanus’ emphasis on the freedom of the will, which determines the eventual impact of God’s grace on human striving, is at odds with Re­ formation theology. While Cusanus defines the imago Dei as a human capacity, namely free will reflecting God’s omnipotence, Reformation theology understands the human being as a creature that first of all needs to be freed from its own servum arbitrium in sin and unbelief, before it can accept God’s grace. Before being

 

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liberated from our unbelief, which manifests itself as mistrust in relation to God, we do not have the option of either restricting or enlarging our capacity for God’s grace.14 Deliverance from sin and the emergence of faith are, according to this view, something that happens to us, while we remain mere passive. We cannot master our own becoming. Our becoming free is due to God’s creative action and His heartening self-presentation – not to any works and achievements of ours. Human conformitas Dei presupposes divine revelation. Otherwise, human creatures would not know who or what they were to conform with, and consequently, they could not choose either concord or discord with God. Another question arising from Cusanus’ approach is the manner of our noticing whether or not we accord with God. To what extent can this be experienced in what might be called ‘an exchange of glances’ – given that Cusanus is right in his claim that God in Himself remains invisible, but becomes visible only by means of His glance, and that we can only come to see ourselves seen by God when looking at Him, turning to Him, listening to Him? Correspondence between God and man cannot be stated from the detached third-person perspective of an observer. It can only be experienced from the first-person perspective of those who are sensitive to God’s view of them. Therefore the imago Dei is first and foremost a mental image that becomes ‘visible’ before the mind’s eye and nowhere else, on condition that a person understands herself as receiving her characteristic contours not only in human interaction, but also through the relationship with God. Yet, speaking of ‘contours’ is metaphorical language, based on images of the human body, linking matter and spirit, the visible and the invisible. Whether or not the human being is indeed in God’s likeness can only be stated if there is a mutuality of seeing and being seen. When videre and videri coincide, when the glance is reciprocated, then a purely apophatic theology is surmounted. As Günter Bader comments in his essay on Cusanus, De visione Dei of 1453 is to be read in the context of De docta ignorantia, which was circulated in 1440. While Cusanus dealt with knowing ignorance (wissendes Nichtwissen) in his earlier work, he then moved on to seeing blindness (sehendes Nichtsehen). While De docta ignorantia was taken as suggesting the via negativa as preferable to affirmative, cataphatic theology, De visione Dei can be read as recommending a mystical theology, which is not exhausted by negations (cf. Bader: 2011, 333). When seeing the icon of God, one sees oneself seen – yet without seeing more than a glance directed at oneself. What the icon brings about is presence without representation (Präsenz ohne Repräsentation): the presence of an all-seeing gaze, which is the apex of withdrawal from visibility (cf. ibid., 345). 14 As to the relation between trusting faith and (un)freedom, cf. Welz: 2010, 242–256; Welz: 2011b; and Welz: 2009.

 

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3.

Mimesis?

Does this, at least to some extent, apply to human beings, too? Let us return to the problem of whether the imago Dei can be interpreted in terms of mimesis, where the ‘copy’ imitates its ‘original’.

3.1

The imago Dei – outside the picture

As we have found in the discussion of Rembrandt’s and Kahlo’s self-portraits, we cannot see our own glance. How can we come to see ourselves seeing? It seems impossible without a mirror. Our glance is being bounced back to us only if it is confronted with something that stops it and casts it back. The encounter with another person who reflects our looks, or with God’s all-seeing gaze, can function analogously to a mirror. The experience of this encounter with alterity is expressed in painted self-portraits. Let us dip into a little thought experiment. What would we have to paint if we wanted to paint ourselves as images of God? Would it be enough to paint our faces, or would that already be too much? When looking into another’s face, we do not necessarily think, ‘Ah, here is the face of God in front of me’. Whether or not we discover God in another depends on how we imagine God. By means of His self-revelation, He simultaneously reveals and conceals Himself.15 Is the reverse true as well – that the human being as imago Dei is homo simul absconditus et re­velatus? This would suggest a correspondence between divine self-revelation and human self-knowledge. What exactly do we learn about humanity through the revelation of divinity? To what extent and in what ways do human beings bear a likeness to God? And how can we express this likeness without forgetting the difference between God and man? The biblical prohibition of idols (cf. Exod 20:4; 32; Deut 4:15–20) sets strict limits on artistic representations of God. We are not allowed to make graven images of Him that would be similar to anything in this world. The difference between the creator and His creatures is thereby underlined. How, then, can we signal that this visible world is nonetheless tied to its invisible origin and ground? And how can we indicate that we understand ourselves as visible images of an invisible God? How can the paradox of an exchange of glances with the invisible enter a visible picture? The point is precisely that an image constituted by an exchange of glances cannot be captured by any picture. In trying to do this, one would fixate the glances – and anyway, one would only catch the representation of a visible glance. One would

15 As to this paradoxical duplicity of revealment and concealment, cf. Welz: 2014a.

 

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not, however, catch the acts of seeing, nor the passivity of the seer being seen and of vision being transformed.16 It therefore seems to me that the imago Dei is not to be found in a picture or portrait, but outside of it. It is constituted by the encounter of the visible with the invisible, and the vitality and event-structure of this encounter explodes the pictures we might make of it. Even if we were to assume that the tertium comparationis between the imago Dei and painted images is the possibility of an exchange of glances, this exchange itself transcends anything that can be represented. In representation, presence itself has passed away. Living co-presence cannot be preserved after the event. It lives only in the present.

3.2

Edmond Jabès on the dis-similarity between creator and creature

The Egyptian Jewish poet Edmond Jabès (1912–1991), who lived in France after he was forced into exile by the Suez Crisis of 1957 (cf. article “Edmond Jabès”), described this dilemma by resorting to the oxymoron of a dissimilar similarity. In his Book of Resemblances (1976), we find the question of whether we can be like Him who, in His essence, is without likeness. The question is attributed to a pseudonymous rabbi, Reb Eliav, who is then told: “Are we not the image of the void which has no image?” (Jabès: 1991, 155). Another pseudonym invented by Jabès holds that the divine prohibition is not against images, but against the resemblance, the likeness every image introduces (cf. ibid., 156). Yet Jabès is aware of the fact that all creation is the actualization of similitude, an achievement of likeness, an act in which it takes the risk of asserting itself. Whatever we create is like us. “Only across likeness – as across an ocean – could God create man” (ibid., 157). In Intimations (1978), Jabès suspects that God died of wanting to be without likeness (cf. Jabès: 1991, 165). In The Little Book of Unsuspected Subversion (1982), he points out that “We need continuity, resemblance, reciprocity, as we need fresh bread. Man is both his own origin and his own beyond” (Jabès: 1996, 12). This statement seems to contradict another in which Jabès takes sides with the refutation of this need for resemblance. If we needed no more than resemblance, there would not be true transcendence, i. e., a beyond that is not our own, but is foreign, uncatchable, out of reach. We would probably succumb to the illusion of being self-sufficient. If we assume, however, that we are not our own origin and that God is beyond us in a way irreducible to ourselves, the need for resemblance must be counterbalanced with the need for that which remains different from us.

16 As to the transformation of vision through which we are seeing beyond what we see, cf. Grøn: 2010.

 

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The original interdiction gives nonrepresentation its sacred character. The language of God is a language of absence. The infinite admits no barrier, no wall. We write against this interdiction, but is that not, alas, to run the more violently afoul of it? Saying is never more than a challenge to the unsayable, thought no more than a denunciation of the unthought. At the heart of the book, the face prohibited deals a mortal blow to the human word in its likeness to the divine Word (ibid., 51).

What is thematized here is not primarily the prohibition of painted or graven images of God, but the problem that language, too, can produce idols. The question then is how to speak of God and the imago Dei without divinizing the human or ignoring the difference between creator and creature. On the one hand, Jabès does not worry about that: “The written page is no mirror. To write means to confront an unknown face” (Jabès: 1996, 1). Jabès regards the written page as a place where we can subvert the word. “Subversive Himself, how could God have thought that man would not be so toward Him? God created man in the image of His subversiveness” (ibid., 25). On the other hand, he is aware of the danger that writing, too, embraces mimesis. Subversion presupposes imitation. We could not speak at all if we had never heard anyone else speaking. Our words respond to another’s words. Our creativity refers back to our creator’s creativity. If the interdiction of images also applies to representation in language, then there is no way to avoid the forbidden images. Then we can only be conscious of the inadequacy of language – and conscious of the fact that whatever we say mirrors what someone else has said. Yet, if the mirror of resemblance is broken, the writer is saved. Then the image of God cannot be reproduced other than fragmented. ‘Why,’ he was asked, ‘is your book just a sequence of fragments?’ ‘Because the interdict does not smite a book that is broken,’ he replied. But had he not recently jotted in his journal: ‘I write a book to give back to God the entire image I have made of Him with words.’ ‘Would writing, under these conditions, not mean perishing of the divine wrath?’ ‘… to perish of a forbidden image at the heart of all images?’ (ibid., 39)

The poetic rendering of the image of God remains incomplete and ends with an unsettling question. The person who wants to see herself as imago Dei must take into account that speaking about this image means speaking about an image-producing image, and that the divine One whose image is mirrored in us can be represented neither by a coherent picture nor by a whole book. Giving back to God the image we can make of Him with words means giving ourselves piecemeal. Maybe God can be represented only if the multiplicity of human individuals work together, join the pieces, and thereby compose the imago Dei – contributing themselves to a pluriform unfinished picture to be seen by God alone at the end of times?

 

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Understood in this way, the imago Dei would stand for something which is not yet determined, something yet to be assembled, of which the historical telos has not yet been accomplished. What does this imply for our self-understanding? How can we understand ourselves as non-perfect images of God who yet await our eschatological completion? How shall we be present in God’s non-representable presence? Jabès himself gives a preliminary answer in The Journey (1985). He tells the story of ten interlocutors sitting around a table, of the discussion growing heated. Only one of them said nothing. “He was listening with the keenest attention for what, behind the deafening flood of words, remained obstinately silent.” At length the oldest among them said to him: “Your attitude has given us a true image of God. Like Him, you have tried to hear what we shall never be able to express” (Jabès: 1991, 202f). Remarkably, the true image of God cannot be seen at all. It manifests itself in listening, in trying to hear the inexpressible. Why is God’s image reflected in a silent listener? There emerges a consciousness of human limits, which are also limits of language. Jabès goes on to speak of the incompleteness of divine creation. The collective ‘creation’ of the imago Dei involves human co-creation building on God’s initial creation. He asks: “What if it were not God who had modeled man in His likeness, but man who one day took to imagining God in his image? Pride and humility of the creature also able to create” (ibid., 204). Does human pride consist in being a homo faber, pictor and creator who shapes God and the world in anthropomorphous ways? In this case, the imago Dei would be identical with an imago hominis. Then the images of God and man would have been created by human creativity. Can one affirm at one and the same time the pride of human creativity and the humility of human createdness? Jabès suggests that being created in God’s image is itself often a cause of human pride. Further, one and the same cause of pride entails consequences that occasion humility as well. He quotes two maxims that have accompanied his wanderings. For breathing in: “God created man in His image”; for breathing out: “ … dust thou art to dust thou shalt return” (ibid.). These maxims call attention to the fragility of the human condition. While we can assemble the image of God, human effort cannot hinder the dissolution of this selfsame image. Due to our mortality, we cannot preserve what we have wrought. Again, we are faced with the question of whether the image of God really is a work of human production – or at best an image reproduced: an image of God that cannot be at our disposal because it is an image living by the grace of God’s non-representable presence.

 

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4.

In God’s non-representable presence

What is the adequate human attitude coram Deo? How are pride and humility, recognition and embarrassment concerning the human condition connected to each other? In the following sections, I will outline the views of the Danish writer Søren Kierkegaard (1813–55), who represents a Protestant Lutheran tradition, and the Polish-born American Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907–72) to see what they have to say about the matter.

4.1

Kierkegaard on pride and humility

To Kierkegaard human self-importance is a problem not only in relation to fellow human beings, but also in relation to God. In a journal entry, he offers the caricature of a sermon in which the pastor wants to tackle this problem by means of minimizing his own importance coram Deo. Coaxingly the preacher addresses God with: ‘You are the Infinite One, I am nothing, less than a sparrow.’ Kierkegaard comments that this might pass muster if said in humility. Yet it might equally be deceit aimed at escaping that which is demanded of one who is more than a sparrow for God: discipleship. Just as a cunning child might hit upon the idea of wanting to be small in the eyes of the father, as small as a little bird, that he evades the severity of education, so might an adult hide behind feigned humility in order to evade the task of doing God’s will (cf. NB 25:82; Kierkegaard: 2007, 498). As Kierkegaard has it, Christian humility is dialectical. It presupposes pride humiliating itself (cf. NB 33:18 (1854); Kierkegaard: 2009, 260). However, it is dangerous to exaggerate self-humiliation in asceticism. Kierkegaard is critical of attempts at withdrawal from the world to the monastery where humans try to imitate God and thereby want to become more than mortal, more than they are. The absolute difference between God and man is respected best when we abstain from such attempts – because in making them, humility changes to its contrary, to loftiness and hubris (cf. Kierkegaard: 2002, 446). For Kierkegaard, true pride is humility in relation to God – which is, it should be noted, a form of humility in which the human person dares to be herself before God, neither inflating nor belittling her own importance (cf. Kierkegaard: 2004, 269). That true humility and pride are identical is demonstrated by the fact that it is boastful to say, ‘I fear God – and nothing else’ (cf. NB 11:36; Kierkegaard: 1997, 29). The problem is that few are able to speak humbly of humility (cf. NB 21:102 (1850); Kierkegaard: 2007, 64). Here we return to the problem of language and mimesis thematized by Jabès. In what ways do the dialectics of pride and humility correspond to the dialectics of similarity and dissimilarity between God and man? Kierkegaard seems to indicate that, in order to be truly humble and able to speak

 

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of humility in the right spirit, one needs the pride of a creative creature, which gains strength from the ability to differentiate between cases in which it can and cases in which it cannot rely on its own capability and creativity.

4.2

Heschel on recognition and embarrassment

According to Heschel, embarrassment is a shield against arrogance, hubris, and self-deification. He understands embarrassment as the foundation of religiosity and also of ethics. Religion, he writes, begins with embarrassment – but does not stop there (cf. Heschel: 2011, 47). Embarrassment is “the awareness of the incongruity of character and challenge” and “of mystery and comprehension” (Heschel: 2011, 54/1965, 112). Without embarrassment, humankind would transgress the boundaries between humanity and divinity. They would lose the sense of their inadequacy in God’s presence. Thus, for Heschel, the end of embarrassment would be the end of humanity: It is only before God that we all stand naked. […] The honest man is humbled by the awareness that his highest qualities are but semiprecious; all ground for firmness is mud. […] Embarrassment not only precedes religious commitment; it is the touchstone of religious existence. How embarrassing for man to have been created in the likeness of God and to be unable to recognize him! […] I am afraid of people who are never embarrassed at their own pettiness, prejudices, envy, and conceit, never embarrassed at the profanation of life (Heschel: 2011, 55/1965, 113f).

Human inadequacy in God’s presence is not necessarily the difference or abyss between God and man, but the lack of insight into their likeness. We cannot recognize God where we are not aware of being created in His image, a fact which puts specific constraints on our behaviour: we are to be holy because God is holy (cf. Lev 20:26). The sense of embarrassment is linked to the sense of our being guilty – guilty of misunderstanding the meaning of existence, guilty of distorting our goals and misrepresenting our souls. True humanity is allied with “the lack of pretension, the acknowledgment of opaqueness, shortsightedness, inadequacy. But truth also demands rising, striving, for the goal is both within and beyond us. The truth of being human is gratitude; its secret appreciation” (Heschel 2011, 56/1965, 114). It is remarkable that Heschel does not link divine-human likeness to a relation of transparency. Rather, the human ‘Yes’ to opaqueness, which reveals our shortsightedness, is the entrance to gratitude. We have every reason to be grateful – even more when we are aware of our shortsightedness and our shortcomings and discover that we have received good that we do not deserve. In joining guilt, embarrassment, and gratitude, Heschel performs

 

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a double movement similar to Kierkegaard’s dialectical connection between pride and humility. Guilt and embarrassment, pride and humility are self-conscious feelings that emerge in the presence of another, as one comes to understand oneself in relation to this other who has an eye on one. Heschel writes: “The trembling sense for the hereness of God is the assumption of our being accountable to Him. God-awareness is not an act of God being known to man; it is the awareness of man’s being known by God. In thinking about Him we are thought by Him” (Heschel: 2011, 94/1955, 160). What is implied here is the mutuality of the glance. The ability to sense God’s presence is created by our being present before Him and seeing ourselves seen by Him. The sense of being open to divine scrutiny elicits a sense of obligation and accountability. Heschel describes faith as “a blush in the presence of God” (Heschel: 2011, 184/1951, 91) – a blush instead of a mask we might wear to veil our sensitivity to the holy ineffable dimension of reality. In putting on a mask, we relate to ourselves by virtue of the distance the mask permits. This is essential in social interaction in which people come to bind themselves to what they show of themselves, while at the same time being more than the masks that they use and more than others can see in them. Masks reveal this and hide that, thereby helping to conceal vulnerability. When one is ashamed, one wishes to hide. Shame provokes the play with masks (cf. Welz: 2014b). By contrast, humans are embarrassed in God’s presence precisely because He can see through our masks. Seen by an all-seeing eye, we feel naked even when clothed, and for that reason blush when made aware of our being seen, if this amounts to being found guilty: We all wear so much mental make-up, we have almost forfeited our face. But faith only comes when we stand face to face – the ineffable in us with the ineffable beyond us – suffer ourselves to be seen, to commune, to receive a ray and to reflect it. But to do that the soul must be alive within the mind. Responsiveness to God cannot be copied; it must be original with every soul (Heschel: 2011, 185/1951, 91f).

The encounter between God and His creature is here depicted as if God stood over against us, a Gegenüber in faith, One who sees through not only our masks on the surface, but also our “mental make-up” within. This description of the encounter in faith is reminiscent of that between a mother and her newborn child, whose gaze is immediate in the sense that the distinction between an ‘inner’ and an ‘outer’ world is not yet established for it. Trusting faith in God is similar to the exchange of glances between mother and child insofar as human nakedness does not arouse shame, but is, as it were, ‘covered’ and rescued in caress. Once the distinction between ‘the ineffable in us’ and ‘the ineffable beyond us’ has been made, the encounter between God and humanity contains a double question – not only

 

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as to whether we can mirror God outwardly, pointing to the One beyond us in a manner visible to others, but also the extent to which the imago Dei has come to form a person inwardly, in her visibility to God’s glance alone. Creaturely creativity – human responsiveness and responsibility for what one becomes – cannot be lived out by proxy, and no one can substitute for us face to face with God. When we are and become ourselves in relation to God, the divine image is at once produced and reproduced in us. The imago Dei shines forth if interiority shapes exteriority and vice versa. The awareness of an eternal ‘You’ within the finite ‘I’ has an impact on how one comes to see what one sees. The history of one’s vision will be transformed. But what does it mean to see oneself as an image of an invisible God?

5.

Conclusion

The metaphor of an ‘exchange of glances’ refers to another metaphor: the ‘exchange of thought’ in dialogue. ‘Seeing’ God means ‘speaking’ to Him and ‘being spoken to’ by Him. May we conclude that the authentic imago Dei is an image that speaks for itself by speaking of God? By now it has become clear that the human being as imago Dei is not just a self-concealing, but also a self-revealing image. It is an informative image, which speaks not only of itself, but also of the invisible that has left its imprint on the visible. It points away from itself, from the visible to the invisible. Instead of seeing God Himself optically or listening to Him acoustically, divine-human encounters are mediated by interhuman encounters that involve action, affection, perception, and intellection. God’s image appears indirectly in the encounter with other human beings. How can divinity be recognized in humanity if mimesis is, for the time being, broken – just as the imago Dei is shattered and fragmented? If Jabès is right in arguing for the duplicity of the dis-similarity between creator and creature, are we then able to collect the pieces and complete the picture without further ado? If this were possible, we could capture ourselves – yet at the expense of the vitality of the image of God that cannot be objectified, neither in self-portraits by painters such as Rembrandt or Kahlo, nor in metaphors or mental images. The subjectivity of the living image of God might suggest that it can produce itself by means of a self-reflexive glance. The subject of vision would be seeing itself in forming itself and its own sight, seemingly ad libitum, ad infinitum. Yet this suggestion overlooks the creatureliness, finiteness, and mortality of an image that owes its life to another and must die some day. The imago Dei is not made by the activities through which humans create and modify their self-images. God does not only make creatures make themselves, as Austin Farrer has it. Human becoming can also be thought of as an empowering or ‘creative passivity’ which involves

 

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the reception of unexpected possibilities grounded in God’s creativity. Accordingly, Ingolf U. Dalferth has argued that human beings become God’s images by becoming the places for each other where His presence is revealed or concealed – dependent on how they live (cf. Dalferth: 2011, 229ff, here 234). This formulation shows that one is not simply God’s image. There are many ways of becoming God’s image – ways that without doubt are opened up by possibilities we cannot give to ourselves. Still, human ways of developing as imagines Dei can never consist of pure passivity. As subjects of seeing, interpreting themselves and others, human beings contribute to what they are and who they come to be. Ways of being and becoming are linked to ways of life – ways that are opened by movements in one or another direction. We might also be moved in moving. Nonetheless, even if we are moved and drawn, we must choose to walk, or resist walking a certain way. Like Cusanus’ description of the peripatetic experience of walking around the ‘icon of God’, this raises the question of how moving impinges on seeing.17 Whence does God see us, and from where or in which situations can we see His image when walking on the road of life? God’s alleged ‘omnivoyance’ can, at best, be indicated by the gaze of an icon standing firm – yet in fact, His gaze cannot be equivalent to an icon’s gaze because the icon is positioned somewhere, and nothing that has a specific place can be ‘all-seeing’. The icon’s gaze is limited to the space in which it is located. If Cusanus’ brethren had moved outside that space, they would no longer have been able to perceive the icon’s gaze; then they could only remember or imagine it. Similarly, God’s image in the human being cannot be fixed in any specific place. It is still on its way to becoming what it is meant to be. Not even memory or imagination can present it to us in any satisfying manner. That is why the imago Dei eludes visibility just as an all-seeing gaze remains invisible for human eyes. We can only point to a presence without representation. If the imago Dei cannot be represented adequately, how can it shine through our deictic movements and our searching glances? The point of this paper is that this happens in a peculiar form of divine-human co-presence: when God and human beings are looking for each other. Looking for one whom one cannot place here or there, but who is still en route, demands an unceasing move without stagnation – until both of them find themselves found by each other, speaking not only of, but to each other, for instance in prayer.18

17 Thanks to Heinrich Assel who posed this question. 18 That this peculiar form of divine-human co-presence is inseparable from speech and the at once sensual and super-sensual language of love has been demonstrated by Franz Rosenzweig, cf. Welz: 2006. As to the language of prayer and the role of silence cf. Welz: 2012. This chapter was supposed to appear in 2014; in the meantime, a modified version was publisched in Welz 2016.

 

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Bibliography Alloa, Emmanuel (2011), Das durchscheinende Bild: Konturen einer medialen Phänomenologie, Zürich: Diaphanes. Art. “Edmond Jabès” in Poetry Foundation, available at http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/ edmond-jabes [18.04.2014]. Bader, Günter (2011), Nicht-Sehen im Sehen Gottes: Zu Cusanus, De visione Dei, in Philipp Stoellger/Thomas Klie (ed.), Präsenz im Entzug: Ambivalenzen des Bildes, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 325–346. Brugger, Ingried (2010), Eine kleine Welt, die so gross geworden ist …, in Martin-Gropius-Bau/ Bank Austria Kunstforum (ed.), Frida Kahlo – Retrospektive: Ausstellungskatalog Martin-Gropius-Bau, München/Berlin/London/New York: Prestel, 12–17. Bühler, Karl ([1934] 1999), Sprachtheorie: Die Darstellungsfunktion der Sprache, Stuttgart: Lucius & Lucius, 79–148. Buijsen, Edwin (1999), Self Portrait with Beret and Turned-Up Collar (1659), in Christopher White/Quentin Buvelot (ed.), Rembrandt by Himself, London: National Gallery Publica­ tions Limited, 202–204. Cumming, Laura (2010), A Face to the World: On Self-Portraits, London: Harper Press. Dalferth, Ingolf U. (2011), Umsonst: Eine Erinnerung an die kreative Passivität des Menschen, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Foucault, Michel (1995), Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison (trans. Alan Sheridan), London: Penguin Books. Gockel, Bettina (2006), Opfer und Heilerin. Frida Kahlo als Schamanin?, in Frida Kahlo (Ausstellungskatalog), Hamburg/München: Bucerius Kunstforum 2006, 40–51. Grimberg, Salomon (2004), “Ich werde Dich nie vergessen …”, in Salomon Grimberg (ed.), Ich werde Dich nie vergessen …: Unveröffentlichte Photographien und Briefe. Frida Kahlo und Nickolas Muray, München: Schirmer-Mosel, 9–42. Grøn, Arne (2010), Beyond: Horizon, Immanence, and Transcendence, in Jonna Bornemark/ Hans Ruin (ed.), Phenomenology and Religion: New Frontiers, Södertörn: Södertörn University Library, 223–241. Grundtvig, Nikolai Frederik Severin (2003), På Guds nåde, in: Den Danske Salmebog (ed. by Carl H.K. Zakrisson), Copenhagen: Det Kgl. Vajsenhus’ Forlag, 518f (available at http:// www.dendanskesalmebogonline.dk/salme/518) [18.04.2014]. Herrera, Hayden (1992), Frida Kahlo. Die Gemälde, München: Schirmer-Mosel. Heschel, Abraham J. (1951), Man Is Not Alone: A Philosophy of Religion, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Heschel, Abraham J. (1955), God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Heschel, Abraham J. (1965), Who Is Man? Palo Alto: Stanford University Press. Heschel, Abraham J. (2011), Essential Writings. Selected with an Introduction by Susanna Heschel, New York: Orbis Books. Jabès, Edmond (1991), From the Book to the Book: An Edmond Jabès Reader (trans. Rosmarie Waldrop), Hanover/London: Wesleyan University Press. Jabès, Edmond (1996), The Little Book of Unsuspected Subversion (trans. Rosmarie Waldrop), Stanford: Stanford University Press.

 

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Kahlo, Frida (2004), Jetzt, wo Du mich verlässt, liebe ich Dich mehr denn je: Briefe und andere Schriften, München: Schirmer Graf 2004. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1846] 2002), Afsluttende uvidenskabelig Efterskrift (Søren Kierkegaards Skrifter, vol. 7), København: Gads Forlag. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1847] 2004), Kjerlighedens Gjerninger (Søren Kierkegaards Skrifter, vol. 9), København: Gads Forlag. Kierkegaard, Søren (1997), Journalerne NB11-NB14 (Søren Kierkegaards Skrifter, vol. 22), København: Gads Forlag. Kierkegaard, Søren (2007), Journalerne NB21-NB25 (Søren Kierkegaards Skrifter, vol. 24), København: Gads Forlag. Kierkegaard, Søren (2009), Journalerne NB31-NB36 (Søren Kierkegaards Skrifter, vol. 26), København: Gads Forlag. Melchior-Bonnet, Sabine (2001), The Mirror: A History, London/New York: Routledge. Martin-Gropius-Bau/Bank Austria Kunstforum (ed.) (2010), Frida Kahlo  – Retrospektive. Ausstellungskatalog Martin-Gropius-Bau, München/Berlin/London/New York: Prestel. Nicholas of Cusa (2007), The Vision of God (trans. Emma Gurney Salter), New York: Cosimo Classics. Prignitz-Poda, Helga (2010a), Selbstbildnis mit Dornenhalsband, 1940, in: Martin Gropius Bau/Bank Austria Kunstforum (ed.), Frida Kahlo – Retrospektive. Ausstellungskatalog Martin-Gropius-Bau, München/Berlin/London/New York: Prestel 2010, 126. Prignitz-Poda, Helga (2010b), Selbstbildnis, 1948, in: Martin-Gropius-Bau/Bank Austria Kunstforum (ed.), Frida Kahlo – Retrospektive. Ausstellungskatalog Martin-Gropius-Bau, München/Berlin/London/New York: Prestel, 160. Prignitz-Poda, Helga (2010c), Die himmlische Liebesgeschichte und chiffrierte Geheimschriften im Werk von Frida Kahlo, in: Martin-Gropius-Bau/Bank Austria Kunstforum (ed.), Frida Kahlo – Retrospektive. Ausstellungskatalog Martin-Gropius-Bau, München/Berlin/ London/New York: Prestel, 18–27. Prignitz-Poda, Helga/Grimberg, Salomon/Kettenmann, Andrea (ed.) (1988), Frida Kahlo: Das Gesamtwerk, Frankfurt am Main: Verlag Neue Kritik. Schatborn, Peter (1999), ‘Self Portrait’ with Angry Expression (1630), in Christopher White/ Quentin Buvelot (ed.), Rembrandt by Himself, London: National Gallery Publications Limited, 126. Skårderud, Finn (2012), Selvets portrætter: Refleksioner om selvrefleksioner, in Michael Juul Holm/Jeanne Rank Schelde/Helle Crenzien (ed.), Selvportræt (Lousiana Revy 53:1), Esbjerg: Rosendahls, 16–20. Steininger, Florian (2010), “Frida Icon”: Das autoritäre Auge bei Frida Kahlo, in Martin Gropius Bau/Bank Austria Kunstforum (ed.), Frida Kahlo – Retrospektive. Ausstellungskatalog Martin-Gropius-Bau, München/Berlin/London/New York: Prestel, 44–51. Stoellger, Philipp (2008), Das Bild als unbewegter Beweger? Zur effektiven und affektiven Dimension des Bildes als Performanz seiner ikonischen Energie, in Gottfried Boehm/Birgit Mersmann/Christoph Spies (ed.), Movens Bild: Zwischen Evidenz und Affekt, München: Wilhelm Fink, 182–222. Taylor, Charles (1985), Self-Interpreting Animals, in Charles Taylor, Philosophical Papers, vol. 1: Human Agency and Language, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 45–76.

 

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van de Wetering, Ernst (1999), The Multiple Functions of Rembrandt’s Self Portraits, in: Christopher White/Quentin Buvelot (ed.), Rembrandt by Himself, London: National Gallery Publications Limited, 8–37. van Hoogstraten, Samuel (1678), Inleyding tot de hooge schoole der schilderkonst, Rotterdam: Fransois van Hoogstraeten. von Becker, Peter (2010), Frida Kahlo, die Poetin: Zu den Briefen, Gedichten und Aufzeichnungen einer literarischen Künstlerin, in: Martin Gropius Bau/Bank Austria Kunstforum (ed.), Frida Kahlo – Retrospektive. Ausstellungskatalog Martin-Gropius-Bau, München/Berlin/London/New York: Prestel, 36–43. Welz, Claudia (2006), Rupture, Renewal and Relations: Rosenzweig and Levinas on Co-­ Presence, Language and Love, Jahrbuch für Religionsphilosophie 5, 69–96. Welz, Claudia (2009), Frihed til kærlighed hos Luther og Kierkegaard, Dansk Teologisk Tids­ skrift 72:2, 99–121. Welz, Claudia (2010), Vertrauen und Versuchung, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Welz, Claudia (2011a), Imago Dei – References to the Invisible, Studia Theologica 65:1, 74–91. Welz, Claudia (2011b), Das Gewissen als Instanz der Selbsterschließung: Luther, Kierkegaard und Heidegger, Neue Zeitschrift für Systematische Theologie 53:3, 265–284. Welz, Claudia (2012), At give stemme til det usynlige: Overvejelser over bønnens sprog, Dansk Teologisk Tidsskrift 75:4, 254–274. Welz, Claudia (2014a), Resonating and Reflecting the Divine: The Notion of Revelation in Jewish Theology, Philosophy, and Poetry, in Ingolf U. Dalferth/Michael Ch. Rodgers (ed.), Revelation, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 141–183. Welz, Claudia (2014b), Scenes of Shame, Social Roles, and the Play with Masks, Continental Philosophy Review 47:1, 107–121. Welz, Claudia (2016), Humanity in God’s Image: An Interdisciplinary Exploration, Oxford/ New York: Oxford University Press. White, Christopher/Buvelot, Quentin (ed.) (1999), Rembrandt by Himself, London: National Gallery Publications Limited.

 

The Manifestation of a ‘Beyond’ in the Arts: Images

 

 

Olivier Boulnois

Beyond Image: Reading, Meditating, Venerating – Three Uses of Image Luther and the Middle Ages

What is the relation between God’s transcendence and the visible? If God is invisible, does it mean that we cannot represent him in any manner? At first, this seems the most reasonable way to comply with the transcendence of God. But what is the criterion we use in order to behave in such a manner? The criterion is clearly our concept of God, as an infinite and invisible being. Now are we sure that our concept is rigorous? Are we not submitting to it as to a conceptual idol? – an idol being a reality man makes up, and before which he bows. So how can we be sure that our concept of God is not an idol we have made up? Are we sure that the difference between an image and a concept is sufficiently sharp? God’s invisibility is not the invisibility of X rays: it is not the pure privation of vision, but a form of transcendence towards visibility. In order to reach an understanding of God’s transcendence, should we stop in front of his invisibility, or go beyond all visibility? Maybe through all visibility? The main opposition is perhaps not between our image and our concept of God, but between iconic and idolatrous representations. Let us call idolatrous an image or a concept that is the result of man’s projections of the divine: and iconic, an image or a concept that expresses a divine revelation. Can we trace such a distinction in the history of art? In his masterpiece, Likeness and Presence, Hans Belting contrasted the concept of artistic image and the concept of religious cult, as the original title of his book, Bild und Kult (Belting: 1990) makes clear. He demonstrated that one could write a book on the history of Image before the era of art, as the subtitle indicates. This leads us immediately to our topic, since the turning point, according to Belting, lies in the Reformation. He shows that, for the theology of icons, as well as for the practice of Byzantine and medieval art, the image not only bore a likeness, but also provided a presence, of the divine. The veneration of icons is an equivalent to the veneration of relics: the relics lead us to the saint through metonymy (they are parts, or containers of the saint), while the images connect us to them through metaphor (they establish a link through a likeness). According to Belting, the event of Reformation led to a new manner of understanding images, to a new era, the

 

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era of art. Images, as well as relics, were no longer admitted as media in order to worship the divinity, they were therefore liberated for another purpose, the pleasure of beauty, the aesthetic vision of ordinary life – let us recall the still lives of Flanders, or the exquisite transparency of ver Meer’s View of Delft. This analysis, although true enough, leaves unanswered questions. The first one is the fact that the opposition between art and cult is far from self-evident. It is not possible to find a clear-cut divide between art objects and objects of worship. The same artefact can be described as a beautiful masterpiece and as a means of veneration of the deity. Our museums are full of works of art which were originally used in liturgical contexts. And the same object can be classified under different descriptions, even at the same time. The point is made in a famous passage of Kierkegaard. In his Practice in Christianity he evokes a child who is shown for the first time a picture of Christ on the cross, and then told the story of Christ’s life (cf. Kierkegaard: 2008, 177). The visual image of the crucifix, and the literary narrative of the passion of Christ – which both belong to aesthetics – move the child deeply, and continue to move him throughout his life, until he wishes to imitate the image he retains from his childhood. When he grows older, he wants “only one thing, to suffer in some measure as He suffered in this world, which the philosophers have always called the best of worlds […], but which nevertheless crucifies love and cries Viva! to Barabbas” (Kierkegaard: 2008, 180; my translation, O.B.).1 In this fine example of indirect communication, Kierkegaard shows us how the aesthetical is involved in the religious. In the mind and body of the young Christian, the image transforms itself into a model to imitate. It shows that the aesthetic (the picture), is efficient at the ethical and religious levels (as a model). Through this example, Kierkegaard transcends his own opposition between aesthetics and religion, and shows how the aesthetical conveys the religious. More generally, we can no longer oppose mind to body, or mental cult to corporeal practice. It is insufficient to suppose that, on this matter, the Reformers were immediately opposed to Catholic thought. We cannot understand the position of Reformation on the theory of images if we do not read it in continuity with its background: the theology of the late Middle Ages. Even if devotional images were generally admitted in practice, in the field of theory, the late Middle Ages do not bequeath a simple, united system, but a complex of questions and discussion.2 Even if the idols are normally prohibited as such, the border between what is and is not an idol is

1 “[H]an ønskede nu kun Eet, tilnærmelsesviis at lide, som han leed i den Verden, hvilken Philosopherne altid have kaldt den bedste, men som dog […] korsfæster Kjerligheden og raaber Leve for Barrabas.” 2 As Norbert Schnitzler has remarked, we still lack studies of theological criticisms towards images in the late Middle Ages (1996, 19).

 

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blurred, and the instances that define images as idols are numerous, complex, and involved in various ideological strategies (cf. Michael Camille: 1989). From this historical point of view, the main Reformers (Luther, Zwingli, Calvin) take sides in a series of possible positions, within a set of questions previously elaborated before them. Can we think without images? Can we meditate on Scripture without mental images? What is the relation between visualizing the Scriptures and reading images? Can we represent God (the invisible Father) through an image? Can we venerate the humanity of God (the Son) through material images? And so on. In the space available to us, let us confine our scope to Luther and his relation to the Middle Ages.

1.

Image and cult in the Middle Ages

For the sake of clarity we should first summarize some data concerning mediaeval image and cult. From the beginning to the end of the Middle Ages, images were present in places of worship. This practice was almost generally admitted. But the theory justifying such a practice was much more problematic. It was generally discussed in every treatise of theology. It dealt with the very roots of anthropology. Broadly speaking, while one may understand the iconography of the Western images by comparing them to Byzantine art, one may not go on to suppose that the justification of them was the same in the West as in the Eastern tradition. We cannot describe the images of the Latin West by referring to the theology of icons. This theology was developed in the Eastern Empire, before the second council of Nicaea (787). The icon was understood as coming from above. It was not an object simply to be regarded through our eyes; rather it exerted a sort of counter-intentionality: the icon was the face of God who made himself visible through the hands of the painter, who was not exactly an artist. Indeed, the great justification of icons is that they do not violate the prohibition of idols. Of course, it is forbidden – says the Bible – to depict God, for he is in himself invisible. But a Christian admits that God has made himself visible in the form of Christ. Therefore since he is one person in two natures, when we depict the humanity of Christ, we depict his person, and at the same time we depict his divinity. No icon of God is possible, but an icon of Christ makes sense. And if we venerate his visible form, we venerate through it his invisible divinity. All icons are justified because they have the form of an incarnation. They are christomorphic. Besides the Revelation of God through his Word, registered in the Bible, there is a visual revelation of God’s face through his Son, through the saints, and through their icons.

 

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In its symbolic meaning, the icon is not made by human hands. It embodies divine revelation. In a painting at the St Catherin’s monastery we see king Abgar of Edessa carrying the Mandylion: an acheiropoiete image of God, i. e. an icon not made by human hands. This first icon known to history has, according to a legend of the 6th century, the face of Jesus miraculously imprinted. It is a sort of legendary justification of the symbolic meaning of icons. No icon is intentionally made by man’s hand. They all depend on a divine revelation given to the painter. This theory is endorsed by the second council of Nicaea. But in the Latin West that council had been severely contested by the Carolingians. It began only slowly to gain authority in the 11th century. Nevertheless its theological justification was not known; so major a theologian as Aquinas did not know the motivations of Nicaea II; he had to reconstruct a justification of his own, by a mixture of Aristotle and John of Damascus. So even if there was a practice of veneration through images, we cannot characterize the western theology of images as a theology of icons.3 Here we must disagree with Belting. In fact the West hesitates between three explanations of the use of images: reading them, meditating upon them and venerating them.4 We must remind ourselves that medieval thought was pervaded with Augustinian thought. Augustine’s position is clearly akin to Plato’s remarks in the Phaedrus: “writing is unfortunately like painting; for the creations of the painter have the attitude of life, and yet, if you ask them a question, they preserve a solemn silence” (Phaedrus 275 d; my translation, O.B.) The image, as well as the text, only reflects the idea. It is no more than an aid to memory. The image encloses our memory within a dead inscription (graphé, which means at the same time writing and drawing). Like writing, the image is a remedy for the difficulties of reminiscence; it multiplies information; but it does not really teach, and gives us the illusion of knowing. Augustine’s position is clearly in the same inspiration: but for him, the perfect image is invisible. God himself cannot be grasped in any visible image. To make an idol is not only forbidden, it is clearly impossible. The image is simply an object of knowledge, linked with the memory of what it stands for, but its function is only to recall its meaning. That is why the image has nothing worth venerating: it is only a reminder of the divine, which is conceived through a mental word. This leads us to three conclusions.

3 Thomas knew Nicaea only through the files of texts transmitted with the acts of Ephesus, Chalcedon and Constantinople II; there has not been an official redaction of Nicaea II, and the copy sent to Charles the Great (and its Carolingian refutation) was forgotten. Cf. Martin Morard: 2005, 211–365, especially on Nicaea II: 252–260; and Morard: 1997. 4 Here, and throughout this paper, I rely on Boulnois: 2008.

 

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1. For Augustine, the perfect image of God is nothing less than God himself (his Word). Now the nearest image of God after God himself is our mind, which is intellectual and invisible. Our mind is the only adequate image of God, and it is paradoxically an invisible image, the image of God the invisible. We find this idea at the heart of mysticism, when Eckhart insists that we must go beyond all created images to attain the image of God, which is the invisible God in our soul. This idea was challenged by neither mediaeval thinkers, nor the Reformers. 2. A second Augustinian idea played an important role: we cannot read a text without forging, in our mind, a mental image of the characters and the events described. The mental image is a place of translation between Scripture and the visible image. We must make up an image in our mind when we read Scripture, and we can identify the images and translate them into a biblical scene when we see them. 3. A third Augustinian topic was generally admitted in the Latin west. It is the idea that the visible image is a copy of the mental image. This leads us to the idea that the artist has a certain freedom: he can depict outside what he represents internally. This is why the Latin image generally contrasts with the Byzantine image, about which the standards and canons are so tight that some visionaries have recognized the saints because they looked like their image (and not the other way round). For an Augustinian, and this contrasts with the theology of icons, it cannot be said that the Bible and images are revelations at the same level. The essential revelation comes from the Word. It begins, first, with the invisible Word of God, it continues, second, with the written word in the Bible, it is, third, represented in our mind, and it can be, fourth, materially illustrated in visible images. Hence the image is not itself the channel of revelation. This is why Gregory the Great, around the year 600, explained images as a book for the illiterate: “what writing presents to readers, this a picture presents to the unlearned who behold” (Registrum Epistolarum, XI, 13; Gregorius Magnus: 1982, 874; my translation, O.B.). From an anthropological point of view, compared to the revelation contained in Scripture, images are secondary but necessary. They are not foes to the book, but friends. Images enable the unlettered majority to access the teaching contained in the Book, which cannot be restricted to the small number of those who know how to read. Nevertheless there were occidental icons. But apart from these particular images of veneration, most of the images we find in the West were not icons. They were not frontal portraits intended for the veneration of the faithful. They were generally placed too high to be kissed and touched. Gregory the Great called them historiae, narrative images, because they retraced scenes of Scripture. In these complex scenes, it is sometimes impossible to venerate one figure, since there are many, some of them not saints at all. As the Libri Carolini said around 800, in a Flight to Egypt, if you seek to venerate the Virgin Mary, you might perforce in addition venerate the donkey as well. But these images

 

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have the “authority of art”, they give credit to the truth by their power of staging it (cf. Pierre Legendre: 2005). These images give an identity to the community of believers, indeed they institute their society (cf. Boulnois: 2008, 92). Image and text do not conflict. They support each other. This structure explains precisely the great exception that arose during the Middle Ages: Saint Bernard and the Cistercians prohibited images. Why? Precisely because images are victims of their own success. If they are substitutes for texts for those who cannot read, they are useless for monks, who are literate: “What are they doing [these images] in cloisters, for brothers who can read?” (Apologia, XII, 29; translation Conrad Rudolph: 1990, 282). Bernard had no quarrel with images in parish churches, for those who could not read. But he prohibited them for Cistercian monks. And even there, there was some toleration. A visit to the Abbey of Thoronet in the south of France will show that the monastic church is duly deprived of images. But why do we find some columns with carved and peopled capitals on one side of the cloister? The answer is probably that it was the side of the converse friars. Since those brothers were generally illiterate, for them one could tolerate some images, in order to prepare them for a transition to meditation, on their way to the choir. The function of the reminder leads us to a second use of images: meditation. Many authorities explain the use of images as a means of supporting prayer. For example Aelred of Rievaulx, another Cistercian, has a remarkable theory of meditation. For him the reader of Scripture must stop his reading, and contemplate the scene that has formed in his mind, as a sort of scenery where the viewer can enter into the picture. He calls this method representation (repraesentatio). But at the same time, he knows that there are visual representations: if nothing else, the crucifix. “It is enough for you to have an image of the Savior hung to the Cross, which will make present (repraesentet) to you his passion in order for you to imitate it” (De institutione inclusarum, XXVI; Aelred of Rievaulx: 1961, 102–106, here 104; my translation, O.B.). The method of mental representation is a way of replacing the visual representation we do not find in a Cistercian cloister. But this shows exactly the purpose of the images. They are visions of a scene taken from Scripture (representationes): but what is essential is not the reminder, it is the interior act of meditating: “Find your happiness in those interior realities and not outside, in true virtues, and not in paintings (picturis) and images” (ibid.; Aelred of Rievaulx: 1961, 102; my translation, O.B.). This leads us to our third use of images. For most of the Latin writers who analyse the process of veneration, what the viewer should venerate is never the material image. This would lead to superstition. It is the meaning of the image that is venerable, the personage represented by it. Through the image, the veneration goes back to the original it represents. The viewer venerates what, or whom, is meant by the image. And some writers say that we do not adore the image. That indeed

 

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is what Aelred intends to say: we do not adore the image, but we adore God who is recalled to us through it. He was anticipated by Gregory the Great: “It is one thing to adore a painting, but another to learn through a painted ‘history’ (historia) [a narrative painting] what we must adore” (Registrum Epistolarum, XI, 10; Gregorius Magnus: 1982, 874). It has to do with the Augustinian epistemology: the outer image is not the cause and content of our knowledge, it is a reminder that wakens us to the treasures of truth present in our mind. In the 14th and 15th centuries Ockham, Holkot, and Gabriel Biel understood the image as a sign associated with our memorization: one venerates God before the image, but not through it (cf. Jean Wirth: 2003; 2008; 2011). A word of caution, before we move on to Luther. Even those who admit the veneration of images do not speak of adoration. They maintain that God alone can be adored, the images and relics being venerated. It is sometimes expressed with the Greek vocabulary of latreia, adoration, and douleia, service, veneration. Since a degree of respect or reverence is exhibited, in a hierarchical society, to lords and kings, it is unsurprising to find the same attitude adopted towards the elements that represent our salvation. But this is normally termed veneration, not adoration. Let us now take the three aspects we have so far mentioned and examine the position of the principal Reformers in continuity with medieval thinking. Through the image, we are recalled to ourselves, to the aim of prayer: the interior veneration of God.

2.

The necessity of images

In his De genesi ad litteram, Augustine assumes that we have phantasms of material objects, that is, imaginary representations of them. But images are not the whole truth. The true knowledge of being happens at the level of thought, not at the level of sensory images: “just as it [the intellect] has been enraptured far from the bodily senses, so as to be among these likenesses of bodies that are seen by the spirit (spiritu) [i. e. the representations of imagination], so also may it be enraptured far from these likenesses themselves [… in the] place of the intelligence and of the things intelligible, where truth appears in all transparency (perspicua), without any likeness to any body, then, it is no longer overcast (offuscatur) by clouds of false opinion” (De genesi ad litteram, XII, 26, 54; Augustine: 1972, 422; my translation, O.B.). The only way to truth, to the intelligible and to God is to break away from images, to get back to oneself, and finally to behold the intelligible. In a word, “Truth can be seen, not by the eyes of the body, but by the pure mind (mens) […] one must therefore heal one’s own soul, so that it can set its eyes on the immutable form of things” (De vera religione, III, 3; Augustine: 1982, 26f; my translation, O.B.).

 

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In the Middle Ages this position was heatedly debated. Facing the platonic trend of thought, there was an Aristotelian tendency, which maintained that nothing can be known if it does not come through sensitive experience – nihil est intellectu nisi prius fuerit in sensu. So the status of phantasms was reassessed: they are necessary conditions for knowledge. We cannot think without them. This theory of images interferes with our knowledge of God: if God cannot be attained in himself through a participation in his idea or essence, we have to resort to images, mental or material. This leads to an admission of images, not necessarily as objects of worship, but at least as a means of meditation. 1. What is Luther’s position on this problem?5 In an unpredictable manner, he sides with Aristotelian philosophers. The Platonic ideal is impossible to attain. We are incapable of thinking about God without images. That ideal reveals the pride of philosophers, but we must confess the humility of the sinner. “If you want to give a true definition of the human being, take your definition in this passage [Gen 8: 21: ‘the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth’]: the human being is a rational animal which has a heart apt to forge images. And what does he forge? Moses answers: evil, against God, or against God’s law and men” (Luther, Vorlesungen über das erste Buch Mose (1535–1545), on Gen 8:21; my translation, O.B.).6 Man is an animal that never thinks without images. Our limitation cannot be overcome through some conversion of the intellect. The difference between the temporal and the spiritual world has become a radical separation, a mark of man’s corruption. The human mind does not see clearly, human beings make up images in an evil way, especially when they presume to understand the divine. 2. Secondly Luther considers, this time as a true Augustinian,7 that there is no reading without production of a mental image: “When I hear or think something, it is impossible for me not to make an image of it in my heart; whether I like it or not, if I hear [the word] Christ, the image of a man hung on the cross is projected in my heart, just as my face appears naturally in the water when I look at it” (Wider die himmlischen Propheten, von den Bildern und Sakrament, 1525; my translation, O.B.).8 The interior image is associated with the act of 5 On Luther’s position, see Margarete Stirm: 1977; Hans Belting: 1991, 510–523, 608–611. 6 WA 42, 348,37–39: “Si igitur Hominem voles vere definire, ex hoc loco definitionem sume, quod sit animal rationale, habens cor fingens. Quid autem fingit? Respondet Moses ‘malum’, contra Deum scilicet seu legem Dei et homines.” On the status of this commentary on Genesis, see Philippe Büttgen: 2011, 87–121, mainly 89–97. 7 On the relationship between Luther and Augustinian epistemology, see Kristin E. S. Zapalac: 1990, 26–54. 8 WA 18, 83,6–13: “Soll ichs aber hoeren odder gedenken, so ist myrs unmöglich, das ich nicht ynn meym hertzen sollt bilde davon machen, denn ich wolle, odder wolle nicht, wenn ich Christum hore, so entwirfft sich yn meim hertzen ein mans bilde, das am creutze henget, gleich als sich meyn andlitz naturlich entwirfft yns wasser, wenn ich dreyn sehe […].”

 

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reading, is connected to it as a necessary and natural expression of it. This position is classical in the Middle Ages: the decisive place for images is in the interior (“the heart”), not to be confused with material and exterior artefacts.9 3. Third, Luther admits that, besides mental images, sensory images are necessary. He recalls that God reveals himself through sensory signs, the sacrements. Therefore it is perfectly licit to illustrate the books of the Bible. We may also represent sacred history on our walls in order to understand it better and to memorize it more easily. “But the other images, in which we only see stories of the past and things as through the mirror, are reflections. We do not reject them, because they are not images of superstition. […] These images, we do not adore them, we do not put our confidence in them, they are just reminders (Merkbilder)” (Predigten uber das fünfte Buch Mose, 31 October 1529; my translation, O.B.).10 Images as such are no more blameworthy than mirrors, which multiply natural images. Their value depends on the use made of them by the viewer. Luther rehabilitates precisely Gregory the Great, and his theory of historia as a reminder of Scripture.

3.

Against veneration

On the other hand he condemns veneration. As positive as the images are, they must not be misused. Men seek salvation in the mediation of images, they venerate them with a misplaced confidence, they pray to them, thinking they may obtain merit through them. The best way to avoid this misuse is to preach the Word of God (cf. Litz: 2007, 23). First of all, Luther establishes that the biblical prohibition bears only on the veneration of images: “Jews certainly have the commandment: do not have images, but they have understood it too restrictively. Because God forbids that images be erected, worshipped and put in place of God. Indeed, there are two kinds of images, and that is why God makes a difference. […] No image is prohibited here, except that of God when one adores it (anbetet)” (Predigten über das 2. Buch Mose, 24 Sep-

9 As has been noted by Gudrun Litz: “Er ist der Meinung, dass der Mensch überwiegend nicht in abstrakten Gedanken, sondern in Seelenbildern lebt und nur durch Vermittlung von Bildern erkennen und verstehen kann” (2007, 21). 10 WA 28, 677,31–37: “Aber die andren Bilder, da man allein sich drinne ersihet vergangener Geschicht und Sachen halben als in einen Spiegel, Das sind Spiegel Bilde, die verwerffen wir nicht, denn es sind nicht Bilder des Aberglaubens, sonst duerfen wir auch kein Bilde auf der Muentze haben und es duerffte eine Jungfraw auch keinen Spiegel haben, darin man des Gestalt und Angesicht schawet, der hinein gucket. Die Groschen Bilder betet man auch nicht an, man setzet kein vertrawen drauff, sondern es sind Merckbilde” (my italics, O.B.).

 

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tember 1525; my translation, O.B.).11 Luther’s interpretation can be traced back to the early Middle Ages. The prohibition of images is not absolute. It means only the prohibition of idols, that is, of adored images, but it has been understood wrongly as the prohibition of all images. That is for example the position of Alain of Lille: “We must receive the commandment of the Law […] in the same sense that the Legislator proclaimed it: he says: ‘Thou shalt not make graven images’ and he gives the reason: ‘Thou shalt not adore it nor give it a cult (coles).’ Hence once the perfidious cult of idolatry is excluded, sculpted images have been made by them [the Hebrews], and they may be made by us” (Alanus de Insulis: De fide catholica, IV, 12; MPL 210, 427D). Therefore the correct exegesis of the prohibition of images is explained by their biblical context: they are allowed, when they do not lead to adoration. More precisely, Luther insisted on the use of images as reminders. He follows the line of Augustine and Gregory the Great: “My iconoclasts will therefore leave me a crucifix or a marian image […] as long as I do not worship them, but use them for memory.” (Wider die himmlischen Propheten; my translation, O.B.).12

4.

Against iconoclasm

As we know, Luther was horrified by the burst of iconoclasm provoked by Carlstadt in Wittenberg in 1521–1522. Iconoclastic violence was in no way new: we have testimony of such scenes during the Middle Ages, motivated by social or political reasons (Guy P. Marchal: 1995). What was new here was the religious motivation of the iconoclasts: the images were destroyed in order to render impossible the veneration; it was a self-refuting performance, showing that the image had no religious power. As early as 1522 Luther reacted against the iconoclastic excesses of Carlstadt. One should not worship the images, and, at the same time, one should not destroy them. First of all, iconoclasm stoops to violence, which is not a good way to tear up the roots of superstition. The root is the heart of man, and only the Word of God can go deep enough into that dark place. “I attacked the destruction of images, in order to tear them first out of the heart by the word of God, to make them worthless and contemptible […] without resorting to the destruction of images dreamed 11 WA 16, 441,12–30: “Die Jueden haben zwar ein gepot, das sie nicht sollen bilder haben, aber das gepot haben sie zu enge gespannen, Denn Gott verpeut die bilder, die man auffricht, anbetet und an Gottes stat setzet, Dem es sind zweyerley bilder, druemb macht er einen unterscheid […]. So wird nu hie kein ander bild verpoten denn Gottes bilde, das man anbetet.” 12 WA 18, 70,33–36: “So werden myr auch meyne bildstuermer ein Crucifix oder Marien bilde lassen muessen […], so ferne ichs nicht anbete, sondern eyn gedechtnis habe” (underlining is mine).

 

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up by Carlstadt. For when they have disappeared from the heart, they do not harm the eye” (Wider die himmlischen Propheten; my translation, O.B.).13 “I behave as a preacher who diverts people [from images] and I try to remove them in an ordered way, without fanaticism or violence” (ibid.).14 A similar idea is expressed the same year, in his commentary on Exodus: “We must not break the arms and legs of such images […] because our hearts would nevertheless remain impure, but we must, through the word, lead the people not to trust them any more. […] For the heart must understand that nothing will help it […] apart from the grace and goodness of God alone […]” (Predigten über das 2. Buch Mose, 24 September 1525; my translation, O.B.).15 More deeply, Luther understands the problem according to his own dialectic: we find salvation only in the grace of God, and not in our works. But the destruction of images is itself a work of man. To put our trust in iconoclasm is still a way of moving away from the grace of God. Hence iconoclasm is still idolatry: it is an idolatry of human action, of so-called good deeds: “Iconoclasts are based on the constraint of the Law, and the mistake of believing that by simply destroying images they win God’s approval. Following such laws, they remove external images while filling their hearts with idols, […] with false justification and with glory [attained] through works” (Wider die himmlischen Propheten; my translation, O.B.).16 Worse than the visible idol is the conceptual idol – and iconoclasm is nothing but a conceptual idol. So Luther’s position has much in common with that of Gregory the Great. 1. Images are histories and reminders; 2. No veneration is allowed, and 3. No destruction is allowed.

13 WA 18, 67,9–13: “Das bilde stuermen habe ich also an gryffen, das ich sie zu erst durchs wort Gottes aus den hertzen rysse und unwerd und veracht machte […], eher denn D. Carlstad von bildestuermen trewmete. Denn wo sie aus dem hertzen sind, thun sie fur den augen keynen schaden.” 14 WA 18, 75,7–10: “Was kan ich dazu? der ich als eyn Christen keyn gewalt habe auff erden, Setze eynen prediger hin, der die leutte ab weyse oder schaffe, das mit oerdentlcher weyse werde abgethan, nicht mit schwermen und stuermen.” 15 WA 16, 440,19–24: “Nu mus man solchen bildern nicht arm und beyn brechen, sie zu schlagen, […] denn das hertz bliebe gleich wol unrein, sondern man mus das volck mit dem wort dahyn bringen, das sie kein zuversicht haben zun bildern […]. Denn das hertz mus wissen, das ihm nichts […] hilfft denn Gottes gnade und gueete allein […].” 16 WA 18, 67,21–68,3.15f: “[W]o man […] alleyn mit der faust dran feret, da folget nichts, denn das sie druemb lestern, die es nicht verstehen, un die es thun alleyn aus zwang des gesetzs als ein gut noettig werck und nicht mit freyem gewissen thun, Sondern meynen Gott mit dem werck gefallen, wilche meynung eyn rechte abgott und falsch vertrawen ym hertzen ist. So geschieht durch solch gesetz treyben das sie eusserlich bilde ab thun und das hertz voll goetzen da gegen setzen […], Nemlich falsch vertawen und rhum des wercks.”

 

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He follows the position of Gregory, which characterizes the main stream of Latin thought: “The fact that you have prohibited adoring a painting, we have approved it, but that you have broken them, we blame it” (Registrum Epistolarum, XI, 10; Gregorius Magnus: 1982, 873; my translation, O.B.). This trend was called by the Court of Charles the Great the via media of the Latin West: neither veneration, nor destruction. “To adore images or to break them is against the orders of the blessed Gregory. […] This contempt towards the adorers on the one hand, towards the breakers on the other, transforms him into an ally for the Church of our country [the Carolingian Empire]” (Opus Caroli Regis, II, 23; Theodulf: 1998, 278; my translation, O.B.; on via media, see 102). Luther remains precisely at an equal distance between Catholic idolatry and reformed iconoclasm. The images are considered as adiaphora, as neither good nor evil in themselves (cf. Thomas Kaufmann: 2002, especially 407–410). The image of art is either allowed or excluded in a religious context, but it is not understood as a religious phenomenon in itself.17 And Lutheranism will remain as a middle way “between protestant asceticism and catholic counter reformation sensitivity” (cf. Holger Reimers: 1993). Therefore the personal relation to images is free. But, as an historian has remarked, this apparently neutral position, as well as the appeal to a notion of freedom, already is a position: it “settles the theological position of religious art” (Sergiusz Michalski: 1993). Therefore even when he is repeating the old Gregorian position in a new context, Luther adds new elements to the scholastic tradition.

5.

God as an old man

We know that Luther insisted on the idea that God’s revelation is paradoxical. He emphasized one verse of Isaiah: he “Who had no appearance or beauty to attract our eyes” (Isa 53:2). This means that the supreme transcendence is manifested in the lowest form of immanence, through incarnation, pain and death. God’s manifestation takes the form of his own contrary. As Eberhard Jüngel (quoting Schiller) pointed out, even beauty must die (Jüngel: 1984). Therefore, in a way, we can say that all our images of God are negative. We know that the image depicts him as he is not. Since no image is adequate, no canon can limit the freedom of artists. The consequence is that we are not entitled to distinguish between good, or correct images, and bad or incorrect ones. No image is adequate to God, all of them are useful. The proclamation of the 17 Cf. Hans Belting who speaks about a “Geburt der Moderne aus dem Geist der Religion” (Belting: 1990, 510): “Die Kunst wird entweder zur Religion zugelassen oder von ihr ausgeschlossen, aber sie ist kein eigentlich religiöses Phänomen mehr” (ibid., 511).

 

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Gospel is still associated with the image, and Luther does not hesitate to support his preaching with images of all kinds, paintings, illustrated Bibles, leaflets, and so on. Moreover he feels no qualms about representing God the Father as an old man. He even gives a justification for it, and this is altogether new: “Because we cannot conceive them, it is necessary to paint the spiritual realities by such images. God is not the human image in which Daniel depicts him: a fine old man, snow-haired, with beard, rays and throne. God has no hair or beard, he is of no human figure, and yet Daniel depicts him so, the true God, as an old man. This is the way we must paint a picture of Our Lord. […] For he who is incomprehensible, he has given himself to us in a human form. Christ said: ‘Whoever sees me, sees also the Father’ [John 14:9]” (Predigten des Jahres 1538, 20 April; my translation, O.B.).18 This text invites close examination for four reasons. 1. The first is the fact that Luther goes back to the primary authority for the theology of images, and more precisely the theology of icons. If we see the invisible Father when we see the Son, then each time we depict his visible humanity, we depict the invisible God. But, like most of his contemporaries, Luther was unaware of the theology of icons, and would never have agreed with it had he encountered it. He uses this authority in another way: 2. He stresses the ontological chasm between God and man, between the visible and the invisible: “We cannot conceive them.” The transcendence of God is beyond all concepts. 3. He chooses a very specific example: the image of God as an old man. The image of Christ was generally admitted in the Middle Ages. It imitates precisely the self-manifestation of God who makes himself visible in human flesh. But other images of God are more problematic. For example the image of the Trinity as a three-headed man, which appears in the 13th century, is often considered as monstrous, even if it is a visual representation of an essential dogma.19 This kind of image is generally condemned, for three reasons: that it shows God as a monster, that it is not justified by a biblical text, and that it has not the status of a christomorphic revelation, the Trinity never having revealed itself in such a form. 18 WA 46, 308,2–8: “[Q]uia kuennens sonst nicht begreiffen, ideo etc. Sic die geistlich sachen in solche bildnis fassen. Deus non ist menschlich bild, ut Daniel malet: Ein schon, alt man, hat schne weis har, bard, rotae etc. et strale giengen etc. non habet nec barbam, har etc. et tamen sic pingit deum verum in imagine viri antiqui. Sic mus man unserm herr Gott ein bild malen […]. Ipse met se dedit in humanitatem, qui unbegreiflich gewest. Christus dicit: ‘qui me’, ‘et patrem vidit’ &c.” 19 Wyclif condemned representations of the Trinity, because God the Father and the Holy Spirit were unrepresentable; cf. Wirth: 2008.

 

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The same fate befell the image of God the Father. It is the result of a long series of transformations in religious art. As Luther correctly mentions, this image is derived from the book of Daniel: it is the vision of the Ancient of Days.20 In Byzantine art, the Ancient of Days was originally identified with Christ, eternally pre-existent. So even when the artists depicted the Ancient of Days, they depicted the humanity of God the Son. It remained christomorphic. But in the West, Dan 7:13 was differently interpreted. Hence the (previously existing) image of God as an old man came to be understood as the representation of God the Father, of the invisible God.21 It is the contrary of an icon: an icon is the representation of the visible person of Christ – God and man; the image of the Ancient of Days is the representation of an invisible person of the Trinity.

Fig. 1: William Blake: The Ancient of Days setting a compass to the earth, 1794. ©Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge.

20 Dan 7:13: “I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him.” 21 On the image of God the Father and of the Trinity, cf. François Boespflug: 1984, 1998.

 

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Now, the fame of the Last Judgement in the Sistine Chapel has transformed this questionable image into an essential part of our visual unconscious. It was reversed by Blake into the picture of an evil creator (fig. 1).22 However let us not forget that this image is precisely the result of a derivation of Western art far removed from the theology that grounded it at the beginning. The image of God the Father is not a christomorphic image. Through it, the possibility of representing God (the invisible) is now admitted. God is freed from his invisibility. And we have testimonies of Renaissance artists who see no difference between this kind of image and an image of Jove. Which is in a way right enough: when the image of a visible God is not derived from his christomorphic revelation through the Son, it is nothing other than an idol, a projection of man’s representation of God, instead of a self-revelation of God by himself and in himself. The circle is complete. But Luther does not read the image as do the Renaissance artists. He situates himself one degree above them. He is clearly conscious that no image can represent God, because we can neither see him nor conceive him. But at the same time if we must have representations of him we may admit any arbitrary representation. Luther goes so far as to reverse the interpretation of the verse of the Gospel of John: he does not find the manifestation of God in the visible flesh of Christ; he finds in this authority a freedom to represent arbitrarily the invisible divinity. If no image depicts God, and if we must have images of God, any image will do. We can represent God in all the ways we imagine him. For example as an old man. Thus Luther justifies anthropomorphism. We find in the work of Cranach an illustration of this theory (fig. 2).23 Illustration 2 shows the Trinity: it depicts clearly the Father as a king, in the centre of a nimbus; he bears the crucified Son on his right knee, curiously sideways and unstable; and the Holy Spirit as a dove upon the orb, resting on his left hand. The nimbus is situated behind a very precise landscape, which here and there overlies the nimbus of angels. Cranach here transforms the image of the Father into a projection of the image of a king, a sort of apparition seen in the visible sky, behind the trees. We see that anthropomorphism (and even more, political anthropomorphism) is unreservedly admitted by Cranach. 22 This is not exactly an image of God the Father, but of Urizen, the principle of abstraction, opposed to imagination, and a sort of figure of Satan. The image features an old and strong man, crouching on one knee in a sphere and bending down, looking like a sun surrounded by darkness. The image is the conflation of two iconographic models: the Ancient of Days (the man has long white hair and a white beard); the creator with golden compass (he is holding a compass in his left hand, as if taking a measurement, the most famous example being the frontispiece of Bible Moralisee, Codex Vindobonensis 2554). 23 This is not to say that the theoretical justification of anthropomorphism has changed iconography. Cranach’s innovations are completely inserted in the history of art, and this kind of image, at least as a frontal image, is very frequent in Catholic art, before and after Cranach. I use this image only as an illustration of the Lutheran position.

 

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Fig. 2: Cranach the Elder: Trinity, c. 1515. [???]

Nevertheless this representation of God as an old man will be totally secularized in modern movies and comics. God has become an old man like us, only a little bit wiser. In a film poster for the movie La creation du monde by Jean Effel (1958), the artist has represented God as a kind of grandfather happy to marry his grandson Adam with his granddaughter Eve. The caption reads: “Now I exist!” I think we have shown the contrary: when God has lost his invisibility, even if he seems omnipresent in art, he has ceased to exist as a transcendent being. 4. Coming finally to our fourth reason for paying particular attention to the Predigten des Jahres 1538: Luther’s analysis finds the decisive element in subjectivity. It is the viewer, finally, not the existence or destruction, nor for that matter the staging, of the picture that renders correct or faulty our use of the image. It is not its form or objective status that steer the believer’s personal attitude, it is the

 

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gaze of the believer that gives meaning to it. It is he who decides to read, to meditate or to venerate the image.

6.

Conclusion

I have tried here to show Luther’s seamless continuity with the medieval debate. He is clearly reassessing the royal road, or via media, of Latin tradition: the mental image is connected to the act of reading, and it is necessary as a reminder of the Scriptures. The material image is necessary for those who cannot read, or for those who wish to meditate this or that Scriptural scene. One may not venerate it, but nor should one destroy it either. It is also a pedagogical support of preaching. It is only when this continuity has been reestablished that Luther’s originality can reappear: together with the humanistic sense of the arts, his theory is part of a new paradigm. Beyond the religious question, Luther, the Reformers, and the Renaissance artists build a new organization of image, art, prayer and thought. Three points are important here. The first is the legitimacy of anthropomorphism. When the invisible God, God the Father, loses his invisibility, all human projections can represent him. The portrayal of God as an old man will be entirely secularized in the cinema and comic strips. Luther’s anthropomorphism is a direct consequence of his understanding of image as morally indifferent (adiaphoron). Secondly it is no longer art as such that tries to realize the invisible through the visible. The question of image is now split into two problematics: the question of the perfection of representation, which is integrated into the art of the beautiful, and the question of veneration, which is now another way of addressing those works of art considered to be sacred art. Thirdly this status of the artistic image is correlated with the emergence of a sovereign self. The meaning is not beyond the image, in the transcendent object it signifies; the meaning is below the image, it is the self who decides.24 Maybe Luther’s choice has now shown its final consequences. And maybe the question of images has grown so pressing that we can no longer consider them to be morally indifferent.

24 In the case of Luther, it is not an arbitrary self, it remains a Christian self, illuminated by the word of God. Nevertheless it is its interiority that decides what behaviour he should adopt in front of images: to venerate them or not.

 

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Bibliography Aelred of Rievaulx (1961), La vie de recluse. La prière pastorale (Sources chrétiennes 76; ed. and trans. Charles Dumont), Paris: Cerf. Alanus de Insulis, De Fide Catholica, MPL 210, 305–430A. Augustine (1972), La Genèse au sens littéral (Bibliothèque Augustinienne 49; ed. and transl. Paul Agaësse/Aimé Solignac), Paris: Desclée de Brouwer. Augustine (1982), La vraie religion (Bibliothèque Augustinienne 8; ed. and transl. Joseph Pegon/ Goulven Madec), Paris: Desclée de Brouwer. Belting, Hans (1990), Bild und Kult, Eine Geschichte des Bildes vor dem Zeitalter der Kunst, München: Fink. Boespflug, François (1984), Dieu dans l’art. Sollicitudini nostrae de Benoît XIV (1745) et l’affaire Crescence de Kaufbeuren, Paris: Cerf. Boespflug, François (1998), Apophatisme théologique et abstinence figurative. Sur l’“irreprésentabilité” de Dieu (le Père), Revue des sciences religieuses 72:4, 425–447. Boulnois, Olivier (2008), Au-delà de l’image, Une archéologie du visuel au Moyen Age, Ve– XVIe siècle, Paris: Seuil. Büttgen, Philippe (2011), Luther et la philosophie, Paris: Vrin. Camille, Michael (1989), The Gothic Idol. Ideology and Ideology-making in Medieval Art, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gregorius Magnus (1982), Registrum Epistolarum (Corpus Christianorum Series Latina 140– 140A; ed. D. Norberg), Turnhout: Brepols. Jüngel, Eberhard (1984), “Auch das Schöne Muss Sterben”. Schönheit im Licht der Wahrheit, Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche 81, 106–126. Kaufmann, Thomas (2002), Die Bilderfrage im frühneuzeitlichen Luthertum, in Peter Bickle/ André Hohlenstein/Heinrich R. Schmidt/Franz-Josef Sladeczek, Macht und Ohnmacht der Bilder. Reformatorischer Bildersturm im Kontext der europäischen Geschichte, München: Oldenbourg, 407–454. Kierkegaard, Søren ([1850] 2008), Indøvelse i Christendom, in Søren Kierkegaard: Samlede Skrifter, vol. 12, København: Gad, 7–253. Legendre, Pierre (2005), Valeur dogmatique de l’esthétique, in Ruedi Baur (ed.), La loi et ses conséquences visuelles, Leipzig : Lars Müller, 326–341. Litz, Gudrun (2007), Die reformatorische Bilderfrage in den schwäbischen Reichsstädten, Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck. Luther, Martin (1524–1527), Predigten über das zweite Buch Mose, 1524–1527, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 16. Luther, Martin (1525), Wider die himmlischen Propheten, von den Bildern und Sakrament, 1525, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 18, 62–214. Luther, Martin (1529), Predigten über das fünfte Buch Mose, 1529, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 28, 509–763. Luther, Martin (1535–1545), Vorlesungen über das erste Buch Mose, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 42.

 

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Luther, Martin (1538), Predigten des Jahres 1538, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 46, 113–537. Marchal, Guy P. (1995), Jalons pour une histoire de l’iconoclasme au Moyen Age, Annales, Histoire, Sciences Sociales 50, 1135–1156. Michalski, Sergiusz (1993), Reformation and the Visual Arts. The protestant image question in Western and Eastern Europe, London/New York: Routledge. Morard, Martin (1997), Une source de saint Thomas d’Aquin: le deuxième concile de Constantinople (553), Recherches de Sciences Philosophiques et Théologiques 81, 21–56. Morard, Martin (2005), Thomas d’Aquin lecteur des conciles, Archivum franciscanum historicum 98, 211–365. Nelson, Robert S./Collins, Kirsten M. (ed.) (2006), Holy Images, Hallowed Ground. Icons from Sinai, Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum. Reimers, Holger (1993), Ludwig Münstermann. Zwischen protestantischer Askese und gegenreformatorischer Sinnlichkeit, Marburg: Jonas Verlag. Rudolph, Conrad (1990), The “Things of Greater importance”. Bernard of Clairvaux’s Apologia and the Medieval Attitude Toward Art, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Schnitzler, Norbert (1996), Ikonoklasmus – Bildersturm. Theologischer Bilderstreit und ikonoklastisches Handeln während des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts, München: Fink. Stirm, Margarete (1977), Die Bilderfrage in der Reformation, Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus Mohn. Theodulf (1998), Opus Caroli Regis contra Synodum (Libri Carolini), Miscellanea Germaniae Historica (Concilia, 2, supplementum 1; ed. Ann Freeman/Paul Meyvart), Hannover: Hahnsche Buchhandlung. Wirth, Jean (2003), Théorie et pratique de l’image sainte à la veille de la Réforme, in: Jean Wirth, Sainte Anne est une sorcière, Genève: Droz, 233–253. Wirth, Jean (2008), L’image à l’époque gothique, Paris: Cerf. Wirth, Jean (2011), L’image à la fin du Moyen Age, Paris: Cerf. Zapalac, Kristin E. S. (1990), “In His Image and Likeness”. Political Iconography and Religious Change in Regensburg, 1500–1600, Ithaca/London: Cornell University Press.

 

 

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Christus, Mensch, Bilder Zur intermedialen Hermeneutik des Bildes bei Martin Luther und seinen barocken Erben

1.

Imago Dei bei Luther

Anders als die Tiere und alle anderen nicht beseelten Kreaturen (vgl. z. B. Vorlesungen über das erste Buch Mose 1535–1545, WA 42, 43,5f) ist der Mensch als imago Dei geschaffen (Gen 1:26). Martin Luther zufolge1 ist die Gottebenbildlichkeit des Menschen indes seit dem Sündenfall zerstört. Um die Radikalität der Gottesferne des sündigen Menschen in den Vordergrund zu stellen, spricht Luther oft davon, der Mensch sei durch den Sündenfall zum Ebenbild des Teufels geworden.2 Die imago Dei ist, so Luther, „per peccatum amissa“ (WA 42, 46,4). Wäre Adam nicht gefallen, weren wir alle Gott enhlich gewesen, Das hette man denn geheissen ein erbgerechtickeit, als die da gebracht und geerbet were von Adam durch die geburt. Nu ist er nicht also blieben, und ist das bilde umbkomen, und wir sind dem Teuffel enhlich worden durch diese geburt (WA 24, 51,21–24).

Als Ebenbild war der Mensch in statu innocentiae in Gott eingebildet, hat sich aber, indem er Gott nicht glaubte und der Schlange gehorchte, dem Teufel zugewandt und sich in dessen Bild eingebildet. Anders als Augustin ist Luther nicht bereit, im menschlichen Erinnerungsvermögen, in Geist und Willen (memoria, mens, voluntas) nach dem Sündenfall Spuren (vestigia) der Trinität zu sehen. Auch lehnt es Luther ab, mit der scholastischen Tradition den Fortbestand einer naturhaften

1 Aus der reichhaltigen Literatur zum Thema seien an dieser Stelle nur genannt: Gerhard Ebeling (1989, bes. 494–500) und Albrecht Peters (1991, 83–91). Die folgenden Ausführungen greifen zum Teil Gedanken auf, die erstmals publiziert wurden in Johann Anselm Steiger: 2002, 107– 125. 2 Vgl. Predigten über das erste Buch Mose 1527, WA 24, 51,12f: „Der mensch mus ein bilde sein entwedder Gottes odder des Teuffels, Denn nach wilchem er sich richtet, dem ist er enhlich.“

 

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imago Dei und lediglich den Verlust der gnadenhaften similitudo zu behaupten.3 Vielmehr müsse beachtet werden, dass die Seelenkräfte des Menschen und seine Vernunft nach dem Fall in geistlichen Dingen völlig unfähig und finster geworden sind.4 Ziel des Heilsplanes Gottes ist es, die imago Dei durch den Mittler Christus wiederherzustellen, die Menschen also im Sinne eines Bildwechsels mit der Ebenbildlichkeit des Gottessohnes erneut zu überkleiden bzw. das durch Adams Fall versunkene Bild wiederaufzurichten,5 weswegen Christus, der von Ewigkeit her Ebenbild des Vaters ist (Kol 1:15), Mensch wird, also Ebenbild des Menschen. Hier zeigt sich, wie eng Luther die imago-Anthropologie und die imago-Christologie mit der Zwei-Naturen-Lehre verschränkt. Die reparatio der Gottebenbildlichkeit ist für Luther gleichbedeutend mit der Rechtfertigung allein aus Glauben,6 die sich in der imputatio der fremden Gerechtigkeit Christi vollzieht und in der Taufe ihren Ort hat.7 Indem Gott Mensch wird, wird die vollgültige und durch keinerlei Sünde entstellte göttliche Eikon wahrhaft Ebenbild des Menschen und nimmt alles, was den Menschen auszeichnet, auf sich: Sünde, Tod, Bedürftigkeit usw. Zwei-Naturen-Lehre ist bei Luther die Lehre von der Doppelebenbildlichkeit Christi. Die in der christologischen Formel von Chalkedon (451) thematisierte Homousie der göttlichen Natur Christi mit Gott und die Homousie der menschlichen mit den Menschen wird aussagbar in dem Satz, dass Christus zwar eine Person, aber imago Dei und imago hominis, also ein Doppelbild ist, das Gottheit und Menschheit in ein intermediales Verhältnis setzt. Der fröhliche Wechsel und Streit, im Zuge dessen Christus alle Wesensbestimmungen des Menschen auf sich nimmt und den 3 Vgl. z. B. WA 24, 49,23–30: „Hie bey haben sich nu unsere lerer beyde alt und new seer gebrochen, das sie auslegen was das bilde Gottes sey, darnach der mensch geschaffen ist, und gesagt, das dreyerley krefft ynn der seelen seyen, nemlich gedechtnis, verstand und wille, damit sie enhlich sey der heyligen Dreifaltickeit, dem vater, son und heiligen geist, Darüber haben sie sich wünderlich müssen brechen und sind ynn so viel frage komen, das man sie nymmer kan aus erbeyten. Den synn lassen wir gehen und bleyben bey den einfeltigen sprüchen und rede der schrifft […].“ Vgl. hierzu auch WA 42, 45,3–17. 4 Vgl. WA 42, 46,5–7: „Memoriam, voluntatem et mentem habemus quidem, sed corruptissima et gravissime debilitata, imo, ut clarius dicam, prorsus leprosa et immunda.“ Vgl. hierzu Steiger: 2009. 5 Vgl. WA 14, 178,10–12 (Predigten über das erste Buch Mose 1523/24): „Hec imago iam submersa est per Adae casum, ut iam in posterum homo pronus sit ad peccatum etc. Per Christum hec imago iterum erecta etc.“ 6 Vgl. Promotionsdisputation von Hieronymus Nopp und Friedrich Bachofen 1543, WA 39/II, 236,3– 6: „4. Fides Christi affert remissionem et mortificationem peccatorum per Spiritum sanctum, 5. Qui veterem hominem cum suis concupiscentiis et crucifigit et renovat ad imaginem Dei.“ 7 Vgl. Operationes in Psalmos 1519–1521, WA 5, 639,31f, sowie Predigten des Jahres 1539 [Nr. 18], WA 47, 734,33–37: „Mundo delectantur et viciis dant operam, hi indigent reprehensione nec sunt consolandi tantum aut ad exemplum Christi reducendi tantum, ut Antinomi volunt, sed arguendi, ut tandem etiam incipiant uti fructu baptismi et sic conformes fieri imagini filii Dei. Si respicias personam Christi, omnino erubescere te oportet etiam propter peccata tua.“

 

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Menschen im Gegenzug all das, was sein und göttlich ist, appropriiert, ist insofern nichts anderes als ein Bild-Wechsel. Wie aber ist es möglich, dass die Gottebenbildlichkeit des Menschen durch den Gottessohn, der seinerseits Bild Gottes ist, repariert wird, zumal nach üblichem, auch platonischem Verstand ein Abbild nicht das Abgebildete selbst, sondern allenfalls Schattenriss und unvollkommenes Gleichnis, also ein ontologisch depotenziertes Abbild eines Urbildes ist? Christus ist Luther zufolge nicht eine defizitäre Abbildung des Vaters, sondern imago essentialis, wesentliches und wahres (vgl. WA 42, 167,17) Bild des Vaters, „imago Dei perfecta“ (Disputation über Joh 1,14 1539, WA 39/II, 23,33), „eyn eygen bild“ (Kirchenpostille 1522, WA 10/I/1, 157,19), wie Luther χαρακτήρ (Hebr 1:3) übersetzt. Daher kann von Christus als Bild allein gesagt werden: „‚das bild ist auch got, in einerley wesen, krafft, sapientia‘“ (Predigten des Jahres 1526 [17.4.], WA 20, 375,23f). Hierin unterscheidet sich die imago essentialis von allen anderen irdischen Bildern, denn: „Talis imago non videtur in creaturis“ (WA 20, 375,24). Kein Künstler, so Luther, ist im Stande, ein wesentliches Bild von einem Menschen zu verfertigen, „eyn bild des menschlichen weßens oder natur; denn es ist nit eyn mensch, ßondern steyn odder holtz“ (WA 10/I/1, 155,9–11). Anders jedoch Christus: Er ist gewissermaßen sakramentales Bild Gottes und repräsentiert die erste Person der Trinität nicht nur, sondern vergegenwärtigt den Abgebildeten derart, dass man von einer Realpräsentierung sprechen muss. „Aber alhie ist der ßon eyn solchs bild veterlichs weßens, das das vetterlich weßen ist das bild selbs […]“ (WA 10/I/1, 155,17–19). In Christus als dem Bild Gottes ist der Abgebildete realpräsent, denn es ist Luther zufolge klar, „das die gottliche natur alßo gepildet wirt, das sie ynß bilde gantz mit folget unnd sie das bild selbs wirt und ist […]“ (WA 10/I/1, 186,17–19). Im direkten Anschluss setzt der Reformator nicht nur die Rede von Christus als imago patris essentialis in unmittelbaren Konnex mit dem Umstand, dass Gottes Wort signum efficax insofern ist, als es ist, was es sagt, weil es Schöpferwort ist. Vielmehr bezeichnet Luther das Wort Gottes, das tut, was es sagt, und sagt, was es tut, explizit als Bild, das ebenfalls selbst ist, was es bildet: Sihe, da sehen wyr, woher der Apostel seyne rede hatt, das er Christum nennet eyn bild gottlichs weßens unnd eyn scheyn gottlicher ehren, Nemlich auß dißem text Mosi, der do leret, das gott von sich spricht eyn wortt [scil. Gen 1:3], wilchs mag nit anderß seyn denn eyn bild, das yhn tzeychent. Sintemal eyn iglich wort ist eyn tzeychen, das ettwas bedeutte. Aber hie ist das bedewt wirt naturlich ym tzeychen odder ym wort, wilchs ynn andernn tzeychen nit ist; drumb nennet er es recht eyn weßenlich bild odder tzeychenn seyner natur (WA 10/I/1, 187,1–8).

Der Sohn Gottes ist imago essentialis, weil und insofern in ihm das Göttliche in seinem Gegenteil sichtbar wird: Gott im Menschen, Licht in der Finsternis, das Leben

 

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selbst in einer vom Tod gezeichneten Wirklichkeit. Zugleich aber ist Christus imago essentialis des Menschen, indem er alle diese Verderbensmächte auf sich nimmt und in ihr Gegenteil verkehrt. Nur weil Christus imago essentialis des Vaters und zugleich Prototyp des neuen Menschen ist, kann er die sündigen Menschen zur vollgültigen Gottebenbildlichkeit bilden und ihnen die göttlichen Eigenschaften wie Gerechtigkeit, ewiges Leben usw. zueignen. Von Christus – so Luther – geht eine ungeheure Attraktion aus, denn dieses wesentliche Bild zieht die teufelebenbildlichen Menschen an, überkleidet sie mit der Gerechtigkeit und dem Bild des neuen Menschen und führt sie so in die conformitas und letztendlich in die mystische Union mit Christus hinein. Im Akt der Rechtfertigung des Menschen allein aus Glauben vollziehen sich – so Luther – die reformatio ad meliorem imaginem, die regeneratio per fidem und die unio cum Christo zugleich (vgl. WA 42, 48,11–16). Die reparatio der Gottebenbildlichkeit begreift Luther als einen kontinuierlichen eschatologischen Prozess, der am Jüngsten Tag in der Aufrichtung der mystischen Lebensgemeinschaft mit Christus zu seinem Ziel kommen wird. Der Mensch, der als Glaubender im commercium mit Christus steht, wird dann vollgültig in Christus eingebildet werden8 und so in einem lebendigen Wechselverhältnis zweier Bilder stehen. In diesem Leben jedoch kann dieser Prozess nur ‚anheben‘,9 „sed non perficitur in hac vita“ (WA 42, 48,28), da der Mensch bis zur Vollendung aller Dinge noch gerechtfertigt und Sünder zugleich ist. Aber auch dieser Prozess ist ein wechselseitiger, insofern die Einbildung des Sohnes Gottes in den Menschen reziprok einhergeht mit der Einbildung des Menschen in das Bild Christi: „Formatur enim Christus in nobis continue, et nos formamur ad imaginem ipsius, dum hic vivimus“ (Promotionsdisputation von Palladius und Tilemann 1537, WA 39/I, 204,12f). Genau dies wird sinnenfällig bei Albrecht Dürer, der in einer Bleizinngriffel-Zeichnung aus dem Jahre 1522 dem Schmerzensmann Christus seine, Dürers, Gesichtszüge verleiht (vgl. Heinrich Assel: 2011, 365f). Hier wird im Medium Bild der Tatsache Rechnung getragen, dass die Einbildung des Menschen in Christus die Verähnlichung mit dem leidenden Gottessohn in sich schließt und sich so die Gleichgestaltung mit dem in die gloria eingegangenen Christus unter ihrem Gegenteil zeigt (vgl. Phil 3:10.21). In Dürers Zeichnung jedenfalls wird der dem Sohn Gottes eingebildete Mensch exemplarisch als Bild Christi im Medium Bild sichtbar. Im Glauben allein erlangt der Mensch die imago Dei in der Zueignung der iustitia aliena zurück – und zwar vollgültig, weil diese die imaginatio hominis in 8 Vgl. hierzu auch Randbemerkungen zu Augustini opuscula, WA 9, 13,36–40: „creavit deus hominem ad imaginem et similitudinem suam i. e. ad filium suum qui est imago et similitudo patris per quam omnia sunt similia et imaginata. Ut enim veritate vera sunt quae sunt vera, ita similitudine similia sunt quae similia sunt, sic imagine imaginata sunt quae imaginata sunt.“ 9 Vgl. WA 42, 48,27f: „Ad hunc modum incipit imago ista novae creaturae reparari per Euangelium in hac vita […].“

 

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Christo als Transformation bewirkt: Allein durch den „glauben [wird] der mennsch Christo eingebildet und gantz und gar mit jm ein kůchen“ (Roths Festpostille 1527, WA 17/II, 441,14f). Die Transformation des Menschen in die Christusebenbildlichkeit aber – und hier steht Luther in der Tat in der Tradition mittelalterlicher Mystik, etwa Heinrich Seuses10 – geht einher mit einer Distanzierung desselben von den sündlichen Bildern der Welt, vollzieht sich mithin als Prozess der Entbildung. „Nam Deus pater Christum fecit, ut esset signum et idea, cui adherentes per fidem transformarentur in eandem imaginem ac sic abstraherentur ab imaginibus mundi“ (Vorlesung über den Hebräerbrief 1517, WA 57, 124,12–14). Das alleinige, die Wiederherstellung der imago bewirkende Medium ist das Evangelium; und die Predigt des Evangeliums als der einzig wahre Gottesdienst bewirkt die formatio imaginis Dei in hominibus und ist darum Inbegriff der pietas.11 Dennoch bedarf diese Restitution der Gottebenbildlichkeit laut Luther noch der eschatologischen Vollendung – eines Prozesses der eruditio, der Bildung. Da der Gerechtfertigte in diesem Äon noch zugleich Sünder ist, handelt es sich bei dem wiederaufgerichteten Gottesbild um eine „imago obscurata et viciata“ (WA 42, 48,40), um eine imago rudis, die der eschatologischen eruditio harrt, wie auch die Wüstenei des ersten Schöpfungstages noch der Ausformung bedurfte (vgl. WA 42, 48,35–37, sowie Disputation de homine 1536, WA 39/I, 177,7–10).

2.

Bildung durch Bilder

Die eschatologisch-prozessuale Wiederherstellung der imago Dei vollzieht sich durch Bildung, deren Fundament das göttliche Wort des Evangeliums ist. Der rechtfertigende Glaube, der Röm 10:17 zufolge aus dem Gehör der Predigt des 10 Vgl. hierzu Thomas Lentes: 2002, 179–219, bes. 190, sowie Volker Leppin: 2010, 50. So sehr das mittelalterliche Konzept der Entbildung bei Luther im Schwange ist, so wenig scheint mir dieses Motiv in Luthers Sermon der Bereitung zum Sterben im Zentrum zu stehen, denn Luthers Anliegen geht nicht darin auf, „die Glaubenden dazu [zu] führen […], von allen Bildern Abstand zu nehmen, damit Raum für Christus als das alleinige Bild im Glaubenden sei“ (Leppin: 2010, 50). Vielmehr geht es ja gerade darum, dass der Mensch die drei verderblichen Bilder (Sünde, Tod und Teufel) nicht einfach verdrängen, sondern diese außerhalb seines eigenen Gewissens in Christus ansehen soll. Die Schreckensbilder sind mithin in den heilbringenden Gegenbildern des ewigen Lebens, der Gnade und des Himmels als durch Christi Leiden und Sterben überwundene in einem neuen Kontext im Blick zu behalten. Es geht hier mithin weniger um Entbildung als um einen Bildwechsel, doch wohlgemerkt um einen solchen, innerhalb dessen die Verderbensbilder in die Gegenbilder hinübergeblendet werden und eine Neukontextualisierung erfahren. Vgl. hierzu Steiger: 2002, 133–135. Ähnlich Berndt Hamm: 2004, 344 f. 11 Vgl. Vorlesungen über den 1. Timotheusbrief 1528, WA 26, 110,7–11: „Deum colere maxime situs in praedicando verbo, quia docendo Euangelium colitur deus, gratiae aguntur et omnia sacrificia veteris testamenti implentur et omnis cultus veteris testamenti. Eo cultu servitur proximo et formatur imago dei in hominibus, ut se necant, vivant, ut sint similes deo. Das ist pietas.“

 

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Wortes Gottes kommt, zieht die iustificatio und die reparatio des Ebenbildes nach sich. Weil es also um die Wiederherstellung der imago geht, bedient sich Luther als Pädagoge, Prediger und Seelsorger stets der Bilder,12 um nicht nur das Gehör, sondern auch den Gesichtssinn des Menschen anzusprechen und die imaginatio der Heilsbotschaft, ja die Einbildung des Sohnes Gottes in die Herzen der Menschen in Gang zu setzen. Dieser Imaginationsprozess bringt – anders als bei Ludolf von Sachsen (ca. 1300–1378), Heinrich Seuse (1295/97–1366) und anderen mittelalterlichen Autoren13 – die Wiederherstellung des durch die Sünde zerstörten Bildes Gottes im Menschen mit sich und nicht nur dessen Reinigung. Hierbei folgt Luther der rhetorischen Strategie des Apostels Paulus, der als Prediger zugleich die Rolle des pictor einnimmt (Gal 3:1) und den Sohn Gottes derart „furpingirt“ (In epistolam S. Pauli ad Galatas Commentarius 1531, WA 40/I, 323,8f), dass eine Vergegenwärtigung des Kreuzigungsgeschehens bei den Adressaten stattfindet. So wie Christus als Logos und wesentliches Bild des Vaters eben diesen den Menschen ‚fürbildet‘,14 so hat es auch die Predigt des Wortes Gottes mit der Promulgation dessen zu tun, der beides ist: Wort und Bild, bildhaftes Wort und beredtes Bild. Hierbei hat die Predigt der göttlichen Redeweise imitatorisch nachzueifern, die bestrebt ist, die Herzen der Adressaten zu Bildträgern zu machen, indem sie den Menschen in die Herzen malt, was zu sagen ist, freilich in einer Weise, die nicht ohne das verbum externum und darum auch nicht ohne imagines externae auskommen kann,15 denn Gott malt mit dem Wort. Er ist ein Deus per verbum pingens.16 Und er wirkt in den Herzen den Glauben, indem er sich des äußeren,

12 Umgekehrt ist es bei Karlstadt, der die äußeren Bilder gerade deswegen ablehnt, weil diese dem inneren Menschen dabei hinderlich sind, sich seiner innerlichen Bilder zu entschlagen. Dies aber ist Karlstadt zufolge notwendig, damit vermittels dieser – Eckhartsch gedachten – Entbildung die imago Dei erneuert werden kann. Vgl. hierzu Ulrich Bubenheimer: 1988, 654. 13 So die verbreitete mittelalterliche Sicht der Dinge. Vgl. hierzu Lentes: 2002, 186–188. 14 Vgl. Predigten des Jahres 1534 [Nr. 42], WA 37, 456,28–31, wo Luther dem Beter folgende Worte in den Mund legt: „Jch bin ein armer sunder, das weistu, mein lieber herr, aber du hast dich mir lassen für bilden durch deinen lieben son Jhesum Christum, das du wollest mir gnedig sein, die sunde vergeben und von keinem zorn noch verdamnis wissen […].“ 15 Dies nicht beachtend, sondern eine Luthers Hermeneutik unangemessene, geradezu spiritualistische Diastase zwischen Äußerlichem und Innerlichem, Zeichen und Sache annehmend, spricht Angelika Michael (2012, 135) wiederholt von der Unanschaulichkeit der „Relation Gott-Mensch“, worin sich sehr anschaulich das Versäumnis der Verfasserin spiegelt, den christologischen Fokus von Luthers Bildtheologie nicht beachtet, geschweige denn behandelt zu haben. 16 Vgl. WA 37, 456,33–38; 457,15: „Sihe, so hastu das rechte bilde gefasset und darffst nicht weiter forschen noch gen himel gaffen, wie Gott gegen dir gesinnet sey, oder sorgen und fürchten, wie dirs gehen werde, Sondern hie hörestu des Herrn Christi wort und hertz: Wie du gleubest, so geschehe dir, Und hasts bereit also, wie dirs im hertzen gemalet ist, Denn wie ich gesagt habe, er hat dirs nicht jnn die hand oder fur augen, sondern jnn dein hertz gemalet mit dem wort, das er spricht […].“

 

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hörbaren, leiblichen Wortes bedient17 – so wie er den Menschen innerlich bildet, indem er „fur die augen stell[t]“, was diesen in die Herzen einzubilden ist.18 Die Adressaten dieser multimedialen Botschaft aber sollen sich das tröstliche „gemeld“ der Inkarnation „fur bilden“ (Predigten des Jahres 1543 [Nr. 3], WA 49, 283,29), mithin die Weihnachtsbotschaft „fur augen haltten, ins hertz bilden unnd spiegeln, was uns gott hie geschenckt hatt […]“ (WA 49, 284,17f). Wie ein Maler bildet sich Gott laut Luther den Menschen in seinem Sohn und durch das Evangelium ‚für‘. Sodann kommt es aber darauf an, dass der Glaubende als rechter Spiegel sich den ihm ‚fürgebildeten‘ Gott recht einbildet, ja Gott selbst richtig bildet. 1. Bildet er [scil. Gott] sich in uns per Euangelium, sicut etiam uns fur gebildet per Christum, qui est das lebendig wort […]. Das gehort dazu, ut das bild wol fasse, wenn der spiegel nicht gut, non fehet sich fein. Ego me pingo tibi recte. Si speculum falsum, so wird das bild auch falsch empfangen. Ideo vide, ut me recht bildest (Predigten des Jahres 1534 [Nr. 42], WA 37, 452,4 f.8–1).

Der Mensch also wird, indem ihm das göttliche Wort eingestiftet wird und er zu glauben beginnt, bildnerisch und künstlerisch tätig. Innerhalb einer fingierten Gottesrede fordert Luther seinen Hörer darum nochmals auf, Gott im Glauben recht zu malen: „Modo vide, ut nunc me recht malest per fidem“ (WA 37, 453,14). Dadurch, dass Gott dem Menschen sein Wort ‚fürbildet‘ und dieser es sich einbildet, indem er sich Gott recht ins Herz malt, vollzieht sich die Wiederherstellung der imago Dei: „So ists bild fertig“ (ebd.). Indem der Mensch, dem das Wort Gottes eingebildet ist, Gott recht bildet und malt, wird der Sünder zum Ebenbild gebildet. Was das bildnerische Schaffen angeht, gibt es also eine Wechselbeziehung zwischen Gott und Mensch. Dieses die Theologie Luthers zutiefst prägende dialektische Korrespondenzverhältnis von Äußerlichem und Innerlichem, von Hörbarem, Sichtbarem und Greifbarem auf der einen Seite und von Ins-Herz-zu-Fassendem auf der anderen lässt sich schlechterdings nicht auflösen. Insofern ist es nicht zutreffend, davon zu

17 Vgl. Sermon von dem Sakrament des Leibes und Blutes Christi, wider die Schwarmgeister 1526, WA 19, 489,9–16: „Jtem ich predige das Euangelion von Christo und mit der leiblichen stim bringe ich dir Christum yns hertz, das du yhn ynn dich bildest. Wenn du nu recht glewbist, das dein hertz das wort fasset und die stim drinne hafftet, so sage mir, was hastu ym hertzen? Da mustu sagen, du habest den warhafftigen Christum, nicht das er also darin sitze, als einer auff einem stul sitzet, sondern wie er ist zur rechten des vaters. Wie das zugehet, kanstu nicht wissen, dein hertz fület yhn aber wol, das er gewislich da ist, durch die erfarung des glaubens.“ 18 Vgl. Auslegung des dritten und vierten Kapitels Johannis 1538–1540, WA 47, 195,31f: „Ehr wil aber in uns bilden und treiben, auch fur die augen stellen, das wir nichts horen noch sehen den allein Christum.“

 

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sprechen, dass die Luthersche imago-Dei-Lehre dazu führte, dass „die Kultur des Sehens grundlegend infrage gestellt“ wurde (Lentes: 2002, 196).19 Das die imaginatio ins Zentrum stellende Konzept Luthers, das sich nicht zuletzt mittelalterlicher Tradition verdankt und mit spezifisch-konfessioneller Zuspitzung auch im frühneuzeitlichen Katholizismus begegnet (vgl. David Ganz: 2010, 283–324, bes. 297, sowie Lentes: 2002), prägt das Predigtverständnis des barocken Luthertums zutiefst, was etwa bei dem Rostocker Theologen Heinrich Müller (1631–1675) (vgl. Helmut K. Krausse: 2010; Helge Bei der Wieden: 1997) greifbar wird, der die Aufgabe des Predigers darin sieht, seinen Hörern vermittels von Worten wie ein Maler den Gekreuzigten in die Bildtafeln der Herzen zu malen: Der Prediger Zunge soll seyn der Griffel, der den gecreutzigten JEsum ins Hertz mahlet. Das Hertz aber der Zuhörer soll seyn die Taffel darauf der gecreutzigte JEsus wird abgemahlet. […] Meine Hertzen, darzu predige ich euch heute auch, daß ich euch JEsum möge recht ins Hertz bilden, als wäre er hier gecreutziget vor euren Augen. So bereite nun ein jeder sein Hertz zu wahrer Andacht, daß es sey eine Taffel, ja, ein Stein, darinne die Gestalt JEsu fest halte (Heinrich Müller: [1679] 1738, 1073).

Luthers Bildhermeneutik steht im engsten Zusammenhang mit seiner Sakramentstheologie, der zufolge die signa selbst sind, was sie bezeichnen, insofern der Bezeichnete in, mit und unter ihnen wahrhaft zugegen ist und die Zeichen in Stand setzt, das Verkündigte, nämlich die remissio peccatorum sichtbar und mit Händen greifbar zu machen. Sic hic non solum befilhet essen, trincken geistlich per verbum usque ad diem extremum, sed setzt auch eusserlich zeichen, das wir mit augen sehen, ut baptisamus, praedicamus toto mundo, sed non solum audio, sed etiam video et manibus contrecto. Video eum in baptismo et audio non in maiestate, sed certus, quod signum, quod in die augen scheinet, quod Deus adsit, baptiset, sic per totum annum praedicat de baptismo. Sic perpetuo praedico de remissione peccatorum. Noch bleibet das zeichen da, quod priester me absolvat, das ichs auch mag brauchen. Dis ist allein in die ohren gericht teglich usque. Sacramentum vero ist in die augen gericht, das sterckt uns neben dem wort (Predigten des Jahres 1540 [Nr. 16], WA 49, 76,4–13).

So ist das Bild20 im Verein mit dem Wort Träger auch der von Menschen zu betreibenden Evangeliums-Verkündigung, die notwendigerweise auf Visualisie19 Vgl. Lentes: 2002, 195f: „Im gleichen Maße aber wie die These von der im Menschen vorhandenen und durch keine Sünde zerstörbaren Gottebenbildlichkeit ins Wanken geriet, wurde das Vertrauen in das Sehen erschüttert.“ 20 Vgl. zur Bilderfrage in der Reformation folgende ausgewählte Literatur: Margarete Stirm (1977, 24–68); Jan Rohls (1984, bes. 322–327); Sergiusz Michalski (1990); Ulrich Köpf (1990); Jörg Jochen Berns (1992); Christoph Weimer (1999, bes. 30–42); Thomas Kaufmann (2002); Thomas

 

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rung ausgerichtet ist. Daher hat Luther z. B. in seiner Pestschrift 1527 empfohlen, die Friedhofsmauern zu bebildern, um die meditatio mortis in Gang zu setzen und die Hoffnung auf die allgemeine Totenauferstehung sichtbar werden zu lassen (vgl. Ob man vor dem Sterben fliehen möge 1527, WA 23, 375,28–30.33f). Auch die – von Luther selbst angeregten21 – Bebilderungen seiner Deutschen Bibel sowie z. B. des Kleinen Katechismus (vgl. Karl Adolf Knappe: 1980) bis hin zu den ‚lebendigen Bildern‘ im geistlichen Theaterspiel (vgl. hierzu etwa Glenn Ehrstine: 1998) verfolgen das Ziel, das in der Predigt Gesagte bzw. das Gelesene auch den Augen vertraut zu machen, „das es […] deste sicher und fester behalten werde“ (WA 10/ II, 458,22). Luther zielt hierbei darauf, die Gleichnis-Pädagogik Jesu und die biblische Bildlichkeit nachzuahmen (vgl. WA 10/II, 458,19f), so z. B., wenn er darauf hinweist, „wie Christus selbs allenthalben im Euangelio dem volck das geheimnis des himelreichs durch sichtige bild und gleichnis fur hellt“ (Predigten des Jahres 1533 [16./17.4.?], WA 37, 64,9f).22 Ein Beispiel hierfür bietet eine der zahlreichen Lutherschen Exegesen von Mt 23:37, innerhalb deren er bestrebt ist, den „trost Christi“ äußerlich „fur unßer augen [zu] haben“ und diesen innerlich „in das hertz [zu] bilden“ (Predigten Luthers gesammelt von Joh. Poliander 1519–1521, WA 9, 529,6f). Zwecks Ausrichtung und konsequenter Visualisierung seiner im höchsten Maße tröstlichen Botschaft bedient sich der Sohn Gottes eines Bildes aus der Natur, nämlich der Henne, die ihren Küken unter ihren Flügeln Schutz bietet – eines Bildes mithin, das im späteren Luthertum rege Rezeption fand und dies nicht nur bei Paul Gerhardt (vgl. Steiger: 2007, 55–61). „Darzcu braucht ehr eyn schohn gleichniß von der hennen, dye ire jungen unter iren flugeln samlet und darmit beschirmet. Jn der Creatur hat goth angesehen seynen gothlichen willen, der do iderman helffen wil“ (WA 9, 529,15–18). Zwecks Stiftung innerlichen Herzenstrostes nutzt der Sohn Gottes ein Bild, das dem liber naturae entnommen ist und auf seinen geistlichen Sinn hin befragt wird; und all diejenigen, die diesen Bibeltext zu predigen haben, sind gehalten, eben diesem durch den Text vorgegebenen Konnex zu folgen. Bemerkenswerterweise aber lässt es Luther hierbei nicht bewenden, sondern lässt dem von Christus verwendeten Naturbild eine ‚figürliche‘, mithin allegorische Deutung zukommen, indem er die Flügel der Henne als das beschirmende und rettende, weil Gnade anbietende verbum Dei dekodiert. Lentes (2007); Gudrun Litz: 2007. Mehr Beachtung innerhalb der theologischen Zunft verdient Reimund B. Sdzuj (2005). 21 Vgl. Vorrede zum Passional 1522, WA 10/II, 458,27–30: „Und was solts schaden, ob ymand alle furnemliche geschichte der gantzen Biblia also lies nach einander malen yn ein büchlin, das ein solch büchlin ein leyen Bibel were und hiesse?“ 22 Zu Recht sagt Hans von Campenhausen (1957, 122): „Auch die biblischen Autoren haben ja von Gott nicht in der Abstraktion, sondern durchaus anschaulich und anthropomorph geredet, sie haben ‚mit Worten gemalt‘.“

 

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Dye flugel bedeuten das heylig worth gotes. Denn ehr seyn worth leßt außgehen, nicht anders denn das ehr darmit iderman woll bedecken und beschutzen. Darvon sagt David ‚Sub umbra alarum tuarum protege me‘ [scil. Ps 17:8]. Et alio loco ‚Scapulis suis obumbrabit tibi, et sub pennis eius sperabis‘ [scil. Ps 91:4]. Item Malach. ultimo ‚Orietur vobis timentibus nomen meum, sol iusticiae et salus in pennis eius‘ [scil. Mal 3:20]. Alßo breitet goth seyn flugel, das ist seyn heyligs worth, beuth uns seyn genad an durch das worth, das wir im glauben sollen. Wenn wir im geleuben, ßo werden wir beschutzt unter dem schatwen seyner flugel. Denn der schatten der flugel heyst der gelaub &c. (WA 9, 529,18–26).

Die Bilder bedürfen Luther zufolge des Wortes, um recht ausgelegt werden zu können; sie müssen schriftgemäß sein, wobei hiermit keine Reduktion auf biblische Historienbilder verbunden ist, wie z. B. Luthers Hochschätzung des allegorisch als Bild eines jeden Christen gedeuteten Christophorus zeigt (vgl. Steiger: 2012b, 16–30). Aber auch umgekehrt bedarf die Wortverkündigung der Bild(wort)haftigkeit, da sie den Menschen sonst nicht erreicht. Eine welch hohe Relevanz die Bildsprachlichkeit Jesu für Luther hat, wird z. B. in einer Predigt deutlich, wo der Reformator innerhalb der Auslegung von Joh 3:12 in die Rolle Christi schlüpft und in der ersten Person sagt: Jch habe ein grob gleichnis gegeben von der gepurt, darnach vom winde, das ist ye yrdisch ding, noch gleubstu nicht. Jch habe die leer gefasset ynn bilde unnd exempel, wie sollt es werden, wenn ich blos on bilde und Enigmata davon redet, darynn Christus gemeiniglich seine leere gefasset hat und das alte Testament gar vor her hat lassen gehen, mit eytel bilden und figuren gefasset (Predigten des Jahres 1526 [27.5.], WA 20, 426,18–23).

Die typisch lutherischen Altäre, die Bild und Wort vereinen, indem sie z. B. Abendmahlsdarstellungen mit den Einsetzungsworten intermedial kombinieren, sowie die häufig reiche Bildausstattung lutherischer Kirchen und der Umstand, dass sich in vielen lutherischen Kirchenräumen weitaus mehr mittelalterliche Kunstwerke erhalten haben als in römisch-katholischen (Johann Michael Fritz: 1997, 16), verdanken sich letztlich dieser Bildworthermeneutik. Doch nicht nur Sakralräumen steht nach Luther eine biblische Bebilderung gut zu Gesicht. Vielmehr gehören sie, wie der Reformator in der Vorrede zu seinem Passional fordert, gemeinsam mit den Bibelsprüchen genauso „ynn Stuben und ynn kamern […], damit man Gottes werck und wort an allen enden ymer fur augen hette, und dran furcht und glauben gegen Gott ubet“ (WA 10/II, 458,25–27). Ja, es wäre nicht nur wünschenswert, so Luther, dass eine komplette Bilderbibel als „leyen Bibel“ (WA 10/II, 458,29) produziert wird, sondern auch, dass biblische Motive das gesamte Stadtbild zieren (vgl. Wider die himmlischen Propheten, von den Bildern und Sakrament 1525, WA 18, 83,3–5). Die Bilder – und zwar sowohl die äußerlich mit den Augen wahrnehmbaren als auch die Sprachbilder, die dem Rezipienten in Form von Rede oder als Texte fass-

 

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bar werden – haben bei Luther ihren festen Platz innerhalb einer Hermeneutik der multimedialen Verkündigung des Evangeliums. Sie bedient sich des gesprochenen, gesungenen, geschriebenen und gemalten Wortes – oder, wie Luther sagt, sie „singet und saget, klinget und predigt, schreibt und lieset, malet und zeichent“ (WA 10/II, 458,31f).23 Im Anschluss an den jüdischen Brauch, die Bestimmungen der Tora sichtbar als ‚Denkzettel‘ an der Stirn zu tragen (Ex 13:9; Mt 23:5) profiliert Luther die Notwendigkeit, alle verfügbaren Medien für die Ausrichtung des Wortes Gottes zu nutzen: Die Jüden haben eine weise aus diesem Text [scil. Dtn 6:7] genomen, davon Math. am 23. Das sie ein Pergamenthaut umbs heubt machten, daran die Zehen gebot geschrieben waren, und schriben sie auch umb die Kleider, gleich wie wir jtzt Gottes Wort predigen, lesens, singens, malens, Drückens und schreibens. Dieses war bey den Jüden nicht ein bose weise und gewonheit, denn sie wolten Gottes Wort fur den augen haben und maletens an allen orten, auch in den Gerten (Predigten über das fünfte Buch Mose 1529, WA 28, 630,20–26).

Nur so kann der Aufgabe Rechnung getragen werden, dem verbum Dei den notwendigen Lobpreis zu zollen, „wie wir denn auch teglich thun mit schreiben, lesen, predigen, singen, tichten und malen“ (Der 147. Psalm, Lauda Jerusalem, ausgelegt 1532, WA 31/I, 453,4f). Was die Adressaten des Wortes Gottes hingegen anlangt, wird durch das mediale Netzwerk der Artikulationsformen desselben sichergestellt, dass eine persuasio Platz greift, der sich niemand entziehen kann. Gottes Wort ‚fürzubilden‘ ist die gemeinsame Aufgabe aller dieser Artikulationsformen, zu denen auch das Malen von Bildern gehört, weswegen es unsachgemäß ist, von einer Reduktion der Bildmedien auf reine „Historienbilder“ (Hans Belting: 2004, 519) zu sprechen, die dem Wort gegenüber eine völlig untergeordnete Funktion wahrnehmen. Denn die Bilder partizipieren Luther zufolge als integrale Bestandteile an dem einen Prozess der göttlichen persuasio. „So wird Gottes wort mit predigen, singen, sagen, schreiben, malen so gewaltiglich helle und klar furgebildet, das sie es bekennen müssen, Es sey das recht Gottes wort, haben nicht mehr, das sie können da wider reden […]“ (Auslegung des 101. Psalms 1534–1535, WA 51, 217,35–38). Letztlich stellt die vom Medium ‚Bild‘ bestimmte Zielsetzung, die Botschaft von der den Sünder rettenden Gnade Gottes den Sinnen der Adressaten ‚fürzubilden‘,24 damit diese imaginiert und ergriffen werden könne, die Moti23 Vgl. Predigten des Jahres 1538 [Nr. 33], WA 46, 336,12f: „Gottes wort“ ist ein solches, „das doch fur unsern augen und ohren geschrieben, gemalet, gespielet, gesungen und geklungen hat.“ 24 Vgl. Winterpostille 1528, WA 21, 122,30–33: „Und das heist recht das Euangelion predigen, wenn man Christum also furbildet, das er helffe, rette und erlöse, auff das seine gnade yederman kund und offenbar werde, und das er solchs thue lauter umbsonst, one verdienst, one unsere werck, one koste, one mühe und erbeyt.“

 

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vation für die Begründung einer Hermeneutik dar, die konsequent auf die Intermedialität von Predigt, Rede, Gesang, Bildwerken und Dichtung ausgerichtet ist. Die letztlich auf neuplatonische Wurzeln zurückgehende Frage, ob Bilder für sich genommen am Abgebildeten ontologisch partizipieren und darum eine Repräsentanz des Urbildes bewerkstelligen, ist für Luther nicht vorrangig. Denn wenn feststeht, dass überall dort, wo Gottes Wort – unabhängig davon, in welchem Medium – traktiert wird, Christus, der Logos, als dessen Autor präsent ist, dann folgt hieraus notwendigerweise, dass der Sohn Gottes nicht nur in den Elementen, den signa der Sakramente, wahrhaft und wesentlich gegenwärtig ist, mit denen die göttlichen Worte der Verheißung verbunden sind. Vielmehr ist dann auch von einer Präsenz des Logos in schriftgemäßen Bildmedien zu sprechen – zumal, wenn den Bildträgern das Wort Gottes zitatweise eingeschrieben ist und hierdurch ihre göttliche Worthaltigkeit gewährleistet ist. Die Zitation von Bibelsprüchen in Bildern ist demnach nicht Ausdruck der Abwertung bzw. Unterordnung der Bilder unter das Wort, sondern Sicherstellung der medialen Repräsentanz Gottes in den Bildern. Zudem wird dadurch die z. B. von Guillaume de Peyraut (ca. 1190–1271) vertretene Meinung als Missverständnis ausgeräumt, das der mittelalterlichen Tradition der biblia pauperum durchaus anhaftete, dem zufolge sich die Bilder an den vulgus richten, die rechte Interpretation der Heiligen Schrift aber den ordinierten Amtsträgern vorbehalten sei.25 Luther ist der Auffassung, dass die leibliche Präsenz Christi im Sakrament darauf zurückzuführen ist, dass das göttliche Wort der promissio zu den äußerlichen Elementen hinzutritt (s. u. Anm. 33). Der Christus praesens wird überall dort greifbar, wo das Wort Gottes rein gelehrt wird, weswegen in barock-lutherischer Tradition die Predigt als sacramentum audibile gilt und die Sakramente als verba visibilia, woran deutlich wird, dass es sich bei der Lehre von den media salutis um eine solche handelt, die die Kategorie der Intermedialität zentral stellt. Hieraus folgt, dass auch alle Bildmedien, denen das Wort Gottes eingeschrieben ist, für eine Repräsentanz dessen sorgen, der ihre Worthaltigkeit konstituiert, wiewohl die Bilder dadurch nicht zu Sakramenten werden, da Sakrament nur sein kann, was auf eine biblisch bezeugte göttliche institutio zurückzuführen ist. Die Frage der Repräsentanz des Abgebildeten im Bild ist für Luther demnach keine bildtheoretisch-ontologische, die dadurch zu beantworten wäre, dass gesagt wird, das Abbild repräsentiere im Sinne platonischer μέθεξις das Urbild, wenngleich in depotenzierter Weise. Darum lehnt Luther auch die auf das Konzil von Nicäa (787) zurückgehende altgläubige und durch das tridentinische Bilderdekret (1563) bekräftigte Überzeugung ab, die dem Kultbild gezollte veneratio komme dem Abgebildeten zugute. Für Luther handelt es sich bei der Frage um den rechten usus der Bilder vielmehr um einen 25 Vgl. Johann Gerhard: 1863–1875, Bd. 3, 34b, wo Guillaume de Peyraut mit den Worten zitiert wird: „Ut Scripturae literae sunt clericorum, sic picturae et sculpturae sunt laicorum.“

 

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Sachverhalt, der seinen Ort in der Hermeneutik des sich multimedial und ubiquitär in seinem Wort leiblich und wesentlich vergegenwärtigenden Gottes hat. In dieser hermeneutisch auf das verbum Dei zugespitzten Ontologie, die gewiss ist, dass „tota vita et substantia Ecclesiae […] in verbo Dei“ (Ad librum eximii Magistri Nostri Magistri Ambrosii Catharini, defensoris Silvestri Prieratis acerrimi, responsio 1521, WA 7, 721,12f) bestehen, geht es nicht um partitive Repräsentanz, sondern um wesentliche, vollgültige Realpräsenz Gottes in seinem Wort. Denn: „Deus est ubi verbum eius est, alias essentia sua est ubique“ (Predigten des Jahres 1524 [Nr. 62], WA 15, 792,13f). In diesem Zusammenhang ist auch daran zu erinnern, dass Christus Luther zufolge in allen Dingen leiblich gegenwärtig ist, freilich paradoxerweise so, dass er in den Dingen gegenwärtiger ist, als es dieselben sich je selbst sein können, und zugleich nicht in ihnen ist, da er ihnen als deren Schöpfer souverän und letztlich unverfügbar gegenübersteht. Hat er nu die weise funden, das sein eigen göttlich wesen kan gantz und gar ynn allen creaturn und ynn einer iglichen besondern sein, tieffer, ynnerlicher, gegenwertiger denn die creatur yhr selbs ist, und doch widderumb nirgent und ynn keiner mag und kan umbfangen sein, das er wol alle ding umbfehet und drynnen ist, Aber keines yhn umbfehet und ynn yhm ist, solt der selbige nicht auch etwa eine weise wissen, wie sein leib an vielen orten zu gleich gantz und gar were, vnd doch derselbigen keines were, da er ist? (WA 23, 137,31–138,2)26

Dies freilich gilt nicht nur für die Schöpfungswerke, die Luther als „imagines seu similitudines“ (WA 43, 139,11) bezeichnen kann, sondern mutatis mutandis gilt dies auch für Bildwerke (und nicht nur geistliche). Überall ist Christus leiblich gegenwärtig, doch wahrhaft unter äußerlichen Zeichen ergriffen werden kann er nur dort, wo er dem Glaubenden verheißen hat, greifbar zu sein, nämlich im Sakrament. Uberal ist er, er will aber nicht, das du uberal nach yhm tappest, sondern wo das wort ist, da tappe nach, so ergreiffestu yhn recht. […] Er ist gegenwertig da mit dem wort, wie wol nicht also wie hie ym Sacrament, da er sein leib und blut mit dem wort anbindet ym brod und wein auch leiblich zu entpfahen (WA 19, 492,22–24.30; 493,7f).

Im intermedialen Miteinander wird das Bild dem Wort nicht subordiniert, vielmehr stehen beide in einem permanenten Wechselverhältnis miteinander. Dieser Umstand wird u. a. darin sinnenfällig, dass in lutherisch-frühneuzeitlichen Kultur-

26 Vgl. hierzu Jörg Baur: 2002, 234, sowie Steiger: 2005a, 137–139.

 

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kreisen nicht nur Bilder (z. T. sehr reichhaltig) beschriftet wurden, sondern auch das geschriebene, gedruckte Wort selbst zum Bild avancieren konnte, indem aus Worten (etwa in Form von Figurengedichten, aber auch in anderen Textmedien) Kreuze, Abendmahlskelche, Opferaltäre etc. gebildet wurden. Hier treten geistliche Schriftsteller als „mit Worten malende Maler“ auf.27 Auch wurden Texte, die auf die Förderung der inneren Frömmigkeit abzielen, so abgedruckt, dass ihr Adressat, nämlich das Herz, dem Rezipienten vor Augen geführt wurde: Die Rede ist von Gebetbüchern, deren Buchblöcke herzförmig sind, so dass der Leser gewissermaßen in ein aufgeschlagenes Herz sieht, während er die Gebete liest bzw. meditiert.28 Vor dem Hintergrund solcher Bildwort- und Wortbild-Intermedialität wären auch die lutherischen sog. Schriftaltäre (vgl. Dietrich Diederichs-Gottschalk: 2005; Thomas Kaufmann: 2012) nochmals genauer zu untersuchen, da diese keineswegs die Funktion erfüllen, das Medium Bild durch Worte ‚ikonoklastisch‘ zu ersetzen, sie vielmehr die Aufgabe haben, die Texte der katechetischen Hauptstücke den Augen ‚fürzubilden‘. Während die Predigt mit Worten malt und die Bilder mit Farben, Figuren, Kontrasten etc. predigen, setzen die Schriftaltäre das Wort ins Bild, verstärken das von der Kanzel zu Hörende durch Lesestoff – und zwar in einem Medium, dem Altar, dem graphisch kunstvoll ein Schriftbild eingeschrieben ist. Die basale Intermedialität von Wort und Bild, d. h. die Ikonizität von Sprache und Texten sowie die Rhetorizität der Bilder konkretisieren sich im frühneuzeitlichen Luthertum darin, dass bezüglich der Altäre mit allen drei Varianten gerechnet werden darf: Mit Altären, die nur Bilder aufweisen, solchen, die Wort und Bild aufeinander beziehen, und solchen, die ausschließlich Text enthalten. Hierzu fügt sich, dass nicht nur in Printmedien, sondern auch auf sog. Schriftaltären mit Worten visuell wahrnehmbare Textbilder dargeboten wurden. Dies ist z. B. auf der Mitteltafel des Altars in der Kirche zu Roggenstede (Ostfriesland) der Fall, wo die Einsetzungsworte in Kelchform und der Text des Vaterunser als Oblate zu sehen sind (vgl. Diederichs-Gottschalk: 2005, 120, 371). Zwar ist es richtig, dass Luther recht häufig die Anschaulichkeit um der ‚Einfältigen‘ willen anmahnt bzw. sich ihrer befleißigt.29 Aber es wäre verfehlt, wollte man hierin lediglich einen Akt pädagogischer Akkommodation oder eine der Sache 27 Grundlegend hierzu Seraina Plotke: 2009, bes. 128–136, 246–261 (Zitat 133). 28 Ein Beispiel hierfür ist folgender Druck des äußerst weitverbreiteten Habermannschen Gebetbuches: Johann Habermann, Bettbüchlein D. Ioannis Avenarii, Erfurt 1589. Vgl. die kritische Edition dieses lutherischen Bestsellers: Johann Habermann, Christliche Gebet für alle Not vnd Stende der gantzen Christenheit (Habermann: [1567] 2009), sowie Traugott Koch (2001). 29 Vgl. z. B. WA 10/II, 458,16–19: „JCh habs fur gut angesehen das alte Passional büchlin zu dem bettbüchlin zu thun, allermeist umb der kinder und einfeltigen willen, welche durch bildnis und gleichnis besser bewegt werden, die Göttlichen geschicht zu behalten, denn durch blosse wort odder lere […].“ Vgl. weiter WA 40/I, 548,10; 549,1f: „Vulgus libentius videt ein gemald bild quam bene scriptum librum et libenter audiunt fabulam. Et maxima ars, posse abundare similitudinibus, exemplis […].“

 

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unangemessene Elementarisierung sehen, die nicht mehr notwendig ist, sobald man die Grundschule des Glaubens verlassen hat. Vielmehr ist zu beachten, dass Luthers Ringen um Anschaulichkeit und Bildlichkeit ein wesentlicher Bestandteil seiner theologischen Hermeneutik ist. Hier konkretisiert sich – im Unterschied etwa zu Karlstadt30 – Luthers fundamentaler Grundgedanke in die Ästhetik, Rhetorik und Pädagogik hinein, dem zufolge sich der Geist an das verbum externum bindet und sich daher auch in sichtbaren Zeichen und Bildern inkarniert, so wie Gottes Inkarnation in Christus selbst ein Prozess der Bildwerdung ist. Insofern ist Luthers Bildverständnis keineswegs randständig, vielmehr wurzelt die Bildtheologie des Reformators im Zentrum seiner Theologie, nämlich in der soteriologisch reflektierten Christologie und hat hier ihr hermeneutisches Fundament. Gerade auch die im Glauben Fortgeschrittenen und die Gelehrten bedürfen der Bilder, ohne die das Evangelium nicht sein kann: „Sic mus man unserm herr Gott ein bild malen propter pueros et nos, si etiam docti. […] Man kan die geistlichen sachen nicht begreiffen, nisi in bilder fasse“ (Predigten des Jahres 1538 [20.4.], WA 46, 308,6–9).31 Diesen Gedanken Luthers, der z. B. auch in seiner Schrift Wider die himmlischen Propheten begegnet, greift später der führende Straßburger Barocktheologe Johann Conrad Dannhauer (1603–1666) (vgl. Wilhelm Kühlmann: 2008; vgl. ferner Daniel Bolliger: 2010) auf. Das, was der menschliche Verstand tut, nämlich nach vorgängiger ‚Fürbildung‘ Imagination zu betreiben, vollzieht die bildende Kunst mit ikonographischen Mitteln: Hieher gehört auch die Taubengestalt / in welcher sich der H. Geist bey der Tauff Christi am Jordan erzeigt. Daß dergleichen visiones vnnd Figuren nach zu mahlen vnverbotten / erhält daher / dieweil vnser verstand / nicht anders kan als solche visiones vnd gestalten / wann wir dieselben in der Bibel lesen / jhm einbilden. Jsts nun vnserm verstand erlaubt / warumb wolts der Kunst verbotten sein? (Johann Conrad Dannhauer: 1642, 206)

30 Vgl. Andreas Karlstadt: (1522) 1911, 9, wo Karlstadt unter Hinzuziehung der Bibelstelle Joh 6:63 (‚das Fleisch ist nichts nütze‘), die auch eines der Hauptargumente für seine Ansicht darstellt, dass Christi Fleisch unmöglich im Abendmahl sein kann, seine These entwickelt, dass Bilder darum abzulehnen seien, weil sie als rein äußerliche Dinge niemals Geistiges vermitteln können: „Du must ye sprechen / das man eytel fleischlich leben vnd leyden darauß [scil. aus Bildern] lernet / vnd das sie nit weider furen dan yns fleisch / ferner mogen sie nit brengen. Exemplum / Auß dem bild des gecreusigten Christi lernestu nicht / dan das fleischlich leyden Christi. wie Christus seine heubt geneigt / vnd der gleichen. Nhu sagt Christus / das sein eygen fleisch nit nutz sey / sonder dz der geist / nutz sey vnd lebendig thun machen.“ 31 Insofern ist es verfehlt, Luthers Bildauffassung folgendermaßen zusammenzufassen: „Das Wort muß nicht Bild werden“ (Margarete Stirm: 1977, 102). Die von Stirm behauptete Diastase von Wort und Sakramenten, die heilsnotwendig sind, einerseits und den Bildern als Adiaphora andererseits, ist insofern nicht angemessen, als Luther ja gerade hervorhebt, dass sich das göttliche Wort selbst der Bildhaftigkeit bedient. Die Bilder in ihrer biblischen, hermeneutischen, sprachlichen und künstlerisch-ästhetischen Relevanz gehören für Luther daher gewiss nicht „zu den nebensächlichen Dingen“ (ebd.).

 

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Freilich braucht nicht nur die befreiende Botschaft des Evangeliums Luther zufolge eine Umsetzung, innerhalb deren es zu einer intermedialen amplificatio der heterogenen Medien kommt. Vielmehr gilt dies auch für die Promulgation der lex Mosaica. Das ‚Fürbilden‘ des Gesetzes nimmt jedoch nicht nur im Rahmen des usus elenchticus die Sünder in den Blick, die ihrer Sündhaftigkeit erst noch im Sinne von Gal 3:24 zu überführen sind, sondern auch die gerechtfertigten Sünder, die das mosaische Gesetz tagtäglich benötigen, um erstens die bis zum Jüngsten Tag kontinuierlich notwendige Bekämpfung des alten Adam bewerkstelligen zu können, und zweitens, um zu gewährleisten, dass die Gnade Gottes nicht in Vergessenheit gerät. Über die stets erneut notwendige Visualisierung der beiden Gesetzestafeln sagt Luther daher: DAs sind die Tugenten, darauff sie sehen sollen, dis verzeichnis sollen sie anschawen und herunter sitzen, hinter sich sehen und gewar werden, wer sie gewesen sind, sie sollen dis gemelde nicht unter die banck stecken, sondern für augen stellen und ja ansehen, auf der Cantzel davon predigen und daraus jnen lassen auffrücken jre untugent und stets für die Nasen halten lassen, wie sie es von jugent auff getrieben und was für böse stücke sie wider Gott begangen haben. Auff das jr hertz dafür erschrecken möchte und das volck sagen: ‚Herr, handele nicht mit uns nach unsern sünden, vergelte uns nicht nach unsern Missethaten, sondern sei uns armen sündern gnedig‘, wir begeren gnade und nicht Recht, also würden sie fein demütig bleiben. Darumb wenn wir den alten schelmen nicht dempffen, so vergessen wir auch der gnaden Gottes. Daher rücket Moses den kindern von Jsrael jmerdar für die Nasen, das er die Tafeln hab einzwey gebrochen, die Gott selber geschrieben hatte. Er macht jre sünde gros und schweer, das sie schier verzweifeln musten, denn er spricht, das er uber jre Sünde erzörnet sey und die zwo Tafeln der zehen Gebot zu brochen hab (Predigten über das fünfte Buch Mose 1529, WA 28, 760,11–26).

Das „gemelde“ der beiden Dekalogtafel „nicht unter die banck [zu] stecken, sondern für augen [zu] stellen“ (WA 28, 760,13f) ist freilich nicht nur das Ziel der angemessenen Predigt des Gesetzes, sondern diese Maßgabe konkretisierte sich bereits im 16. Jahrhundert auch in lutherischen Kirchenausstattungen, insbesondere in der Abbildung des Mose mit den beiden Gesetzestafeln als Kanzel-Trägerfigur (vgl. Heimo Reinitzer: 2012). Im ersten lutherischen Kirchen-Neubau überhaupt, in der Hauptkirche Beatae Mariae Virginis zu Wolfenbüttel (Baubeginn 1608), findet sich eine solche Mose-Plastik (Abb. 1). Sie wurde 1619 in Auftrag gegeben (Reinitzer: 2012, 114) und stellt nicht nur Mose mit den Gesetzestafeln vor Augen, sondern bietet auf den Tafeln auch den (gekürzten) Text der Zehn Gebote dar (Abb. 2), leitet mithin die Betrachter zur visuellen Repetition des ersten Hauptstückes der Lutherschen Katechismen an. Hält man sich vor Augen, dass der Dekalog im Rahmen von Katechismuspredigten im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert regelmäßig traktiert wurde, wird deutlich, dass man es mit einem intermedialen Phänomen zu tun hat, insofern die katechetische Bildausstattung der Kanzeln visuell ‚mitpredigt‘. Mose

 

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als Kanzelträger begegnet auch an zahlreichen anderen Orten, so z. B. in St. Nicolai zu Kiel (Abb. 3) sowie in der Holmens Kirke in Kopenhagen (Abb. 4). Sowohl in Kiel als auch in Kopenhagen sind auf den Tafeln allerdings nur die Nummern der Gebote zu sehen. Die Gebotstafeln, die die Mose-Figur in St. Nicolai zu Stralsund (Abb. 5 und 6) trägt, weisen dagegen hebräische Schriftzeichen auf (Abb. 7). Zitiert werden von der ersten Tafel des Dekaloges das Fremdgötterverbot (Ex 20:3) und von der zweiten das Gebot, Vater und Mutter zu ehren (Ex 20:12). Jedoch erscheinen die beiden Tafeln des Gesetzes in der barock-lutherischen Bildkultur nicht nur als Schriftträger, sondern auch als Bildträger, wobei der das frühneuzeitliche Luthertum prägende permanente Schrift-Bild-Medienwechsel hier geradezu emblematisch in Erscheinung tritt. Ein Beispiel hierfür ist in der Christliche[n]/Gottselige[n] Bilder=Schule (Sigismund Evenius: [1636] 1666) des lutherischen Theologen und Pädagogen Sigismund Evenius († 1639) (vgl. Ludolf Bremer: 2001) zu finden. Einer der Kupferstiche visualisiert szenisch die Zehn Gebote. In der Mitte des Bildes sieht man den Berg Sinai, auf dem die beiden

Abb. 1: Wolfenbüttel, Kirche Beatae Mariae Virginis, Mose als Trägerfigur an der Kanzel (1619 in Auftrag gegeben). Foto: Johann Anselm Steiger.

Abb. 2: Dasselbe, Detail. Foto: Johann Anselm Steiger.

 

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Abb. 3: Kiel, St. Nicolai, Mose als Trägerfigur an der Kanzel (1705). Foto: Johann Anselm Steiger.

Johann Anselm Steiger

Abb. 4: Kopenhagen, Holmens Kirke, Mose als Trägerfigur an der Kanzel (1662). Foto: Johann Anselm Steiger.

Gebotstafeln positioniert sind. Die Gebotstafeln sind freilich keine Schrift-, sondern Bildtafeln, Bilder mithin im Bild, wobei die linke, erste Tafel des Dekaloges, die die Relation des Menschen zu Gott zum Thema hat, einen in betender Haltung auf der Erde stehenden und in den Himmel zu Gottvater aufblickenden nackten Menschen zeigt. Auf der rechten, zweiten Tafel, die die Gebote enthält, die das soziale Leben betreffen, ist das zehnte Gebot ins Bild gesetzt. Man sieht einen Mann, der – wie die Bildlegende erläutert – von Räubern beraubt und verwundet worden ist und von seinem Knecht gestützt wird (Evenius: [1636] 1666, b 4r). Ein Wanderer ist zu Hilfe gekommen und reicht dem Verwundeten „Salben“ sowie „einen Beutel voll Geld“ und „vermahnet endlich den Knecht / daß er seinen Herrn nicht solle verlassen“ (ebd., b 4r, b 4v). Die Intermedialität von Wort und Bild konkretisiert sich hier darin, dass die Gebotstafeln, die ursprünglich als Textträger fungieren, zu Bildträgern transformiert werden, die wiederum durch Texte eine Kommentierung erfahren.

 

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Abb. 5: Stralsund, St. Nicolai, Mose als Abb. 6 (oben): Dasselbe, Detail. Foto: Johann Anselm Trägerfigur an der Kanzel (1611). Foto: Steiger. Johann Anselm Steiger. Abb. 7 (unten): Dasselbe, Detail. Foto: Johann Anselm Steiger.

3.

Die Wiederherstellung der imago Dei im Bild: Münzprägung

Das barocke Luthertum strebte in allen verfügbaren Textgattungen Schreib- und Redeweisen an, die zutiefst von Bildlichkeit geprägt waren und sich in engster Interaktion mit heterogenen Bildmedien, nicht zuletzt der geistlichen Sinnbildkunst (Emblematik) befanden. Vor diesem Hintergrund verwundert es nicht, dass auch der Sachzusammenhang von Konstitution der imago Dei im Menschen, deren Verlust und Ersetzung durch die imago diaboli sowie die Wiederherstellung der Gottebenbildlichkeit eine sinnbildliche Behandlung erfuhr. Im Anschluss an das Gleichnis vom verlorenen Groschen (Lk 15:8–10) deutet Johann Gerhard (1582– 1637) (vgl. Steiger: 2012a) den Prozess der Bildung des Menschen zum Bild Gottes bildlich, indem er ihn als einen mehrstufigen Münzpräge-Prozess vor Augen stellt. In diesem Prozess gehen Bildung und Entbildung, d. h. die Distanzierung von weltlich-sündlichen Bildwelten, Hand in Hand:

 

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Vnsere Seele ist im Anfang gewesen die völlgültige Müntz / auff vnd in welche Gott der Herr sein Bild gedrücket / denn der Mensch ist erschaffen zu Gottes Bilde / aber diß Bild im Menschen ist durch die Sünde fast verbliechen / wie denn daher Christus den Menschen vergleicht einem verlohrnen Groschen / Luc. 15. sollen wir zurecht gebracht werden / muß diß bald wiederumb zu ernewern angefangen werden / vnd wir müssen auch das Bild des himlischen Adams / das ist / Christi / vberkommen / Vnser Hertz vnnd Seele muß Gott ergeben werden / denn in demselben ist vnser rechtes Wesen / vnd vnsere Ruhe. Wie auch eine Müntze muß ledig seyn oder ledig werden von allen andern Bildern / wenn sie ein Bild soll annehmen / Also muß vnser Seele Gott gelassen vnd ergeben seyn / von den Bildern der Creaturen sich erledigen / damit Gott sein Bild / welches in der Liebe stehet / möge in dieselbe drücken (Johann Gerhard: 1613, II, 401).32

Eben diesen Prozess der Wiedereinprägung der imago Dei in den Menschen nimmt der Nürnberger Barockdichter Sigmund von Birken (1626–1681) (Hartmut Laufhütte: 2007) in den Blick, wenn er in einem seiner zahlreichen Gedichte zu Johann Michael Dilherrs (1604–1669) Postille mit dem Titel Hertz= und Seelen=Speise (1663) zunächst folgendermaßen kontrakt formuliert: GOtt hat sein Göttlichs Bild der Menschheit eingepräget. Der Teufel kratzt es aus / tüncht seine Larve drauf. Das Bild ward wieder neu / durch JEsu Blut und Tauf: das glänzt / wann GOttes Geist sich in das Herze leget. (Sigmund von Birken: 2012, II, 771)

Das auf diesen Text folgende Gedicht reflektiert den Prozess der erneuten Bildung der Gottebenbildlichkeit verstärkt und recht ausführlich im Kontext des Bildfeldes der Münzprägung:

32 Vgl. auch Johann Gerhard: 1613, II, 57f: „Zwar Gott der HErr hatte anfenglich Engel vnnd Menschen im seligen Stande erschaffen […]. Vnd wie ein Landesfürst sein Gepreg vnd Bildnis auff eine Müntze drücket / Also hatte GOtt der HERR den Menschen nach seinem Ebenbild erschaffen / daß er im Verstand / im Willen vnnd an allen Krefften der Seelen Gottes Bild truge / Aber der Mensch ist in solchem seligem Stande nicht blieben / sondern der hellische Wolff rieß diß Schaff weg von der Herde / Vnnd dieser Grosche verlohr durch die Sünde das göttliche Bild / vnd weil aus Adam alle Menschen herkommen / sihe / daher kam es / daß sie auch alle semptlich in der Jrre giengen wie Schafe / Esa. 53. sie waren verjrrete vnnd verlohrne Schafe / Ps. 119. vnd trugen das Bild des Jrrdischen / 1. Cor. 15. Das war der grosse Jammer / darinnen das menschliche Geschlecht stack / vnnd wie ein Schaff / wenn es einmal von der Herde sich verjrret / von jm selber sich nit zu recht kan finden / sondern es leufft so lange herumb / biß es endlich dem wolff zu theil wird / auch wie ein Grosche / wenn er verlohren / sich selber nit kan wiederumb finden / sondern er ligt so lang / biß er endlich vom Rost gefressen wird / Also hetten wir arme Menschen aus eigenen Krefften vns nicht können zu rechte finden / sondern weren semptlich dem hellischen Wolffe zu theil worden / hetten auch müssen vom ewigen Fewer gefressen vnd verzehret werden.“

 

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GOtt! dein Göttlichs Bild wir tragen / du hast uns zur Münz geschlagen und dich selbst in uns geprägt. Den Verstand must Weißheit füllen; Heiligkeit ward in den Willen und in die Begierd gelegt. Ach! der Fürst der Höllenhütten / hat an Korn die Münz beschnitten und den Schrot mit Rost verhüllt. Dein Gepräg hat er geblendet. seine Sünden-Larve schändet diß dein schönes Ebenbild. JEsus zwar hat uns verneuet / durch sein Blut von Rost befreyet / und ergänzt durch sein Verdienst. Durch die Tauf / so neu gebahre was in uns verlohren ware / du dein Bild uns wieder günnst. Aber ach! der Rost der Sünden will sich immer wieder finden / und des Satans Ebenbild. Warüm soll ich seyn der seine? ich bin / ich will bleiben / deine / deine Münz / die vor dir gilt. Ach dein Geist dich in mich präge/ Frömmigkeit ins Herze lege und Verstand in den Verstand: daß ich deine Münz auf Erden gültig und gerecht mög werden / gäng und gäb im Himmels-Land. […] (Birken: 2012, II, 771f)

In diesen Sachzusammenhang gehört auch die Überzeugung, die Gerhard im Anschluss an (Ps-)Makarios entwickelt, der zufolge der Betrachter des Gekreuzigten diesem als Maler (εἰκονογράϕος) begegnet, der durch sein Ansehen des Glaubenden die imago Dei in diesen hineinmalt (vgl. Steiger: 2010, 125f). Hierzu fügt sich, dass Gerhard zufolge schlichtweg alles, was Gott dem Menschen zuschickt, auch Anfechtungen und Leiden, Pinselstriche sind, mit denen Gott als Deus pictor an der Vollendung seines Heilswerkes, nämlich der reparatio der Gottebenbildlichkeit, arbeitet. Die Bildung des Menschen zum Bild Gottes ist gleichbedeutend mit der Einbildung in Christus:

 

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S. Paulus Rom. 8. lehret / Daß Gott der HERR die Auserwehlten zuuor von Ewigkeit verordnet / daß sie gleich seyn sollen dem Ebenbilde seines Sohns / Alles nu / was Gott der HERR den seinen zuschicket / ist dahin gemeynet / daß sie dem Ebenbilde Christi gleichförmig mögen werden. Wie nu ein Mahler manchen Strich thut / vnd doch alles mit grosser Bedacht / daß er ein Bild dem Menschen ehnlich mache: Also lesset Gott der HERR mancherley Striche vnd Streiche vber vns ergehen / vnd doch alles mit grosser Bedacht / denn alles was er in der Zeit thut / das hat er von Ewigkeit her zu thun beschlossen / mit allen solchen Strichen vnd Streichen ist es dahin gemeinet / daß wir dem Sohn Gottes mögen gleichformig werden / gleube getrost / es geschicht kein Strich an diesem Bilde / Gott hat jhn von Ewigkeit her beschlossen / wenn wir das bedächten / würde gewiß daraus die rechte Gelassenheit im Hertzen entstehen / daß wir würden sagen: Ach Herr mache vnd schicke es mit mir nach deinem Willen / bilde vnd formiere mich wie du wilt / hilff nur / daß ich dein Werck nicht zerstöre (Gerhard: 1613, I, 274).

4.

Intermedialität von äußerlich-innerlichem Wort und äußerlich-innerlichem Bild

Der Leipziger Archidiakon an St. Thomas und Extraordinarius für Theologie August Pfeiffer (1640–1698) veröffentlichte im Jahre 1683 seinen Paßion= u. Oster=Spiegel (August Pfeiffer: 1683). Die in diesem Werk von Pfeiffer entwickelte Bild- und Spiegel-Hermeneutik kommt nicht schon darin zum Ziel, den Christenmenschen zur Betrachtung der Passion als einer solchen anzuleiten, die ein Gegenüber, mithin Objekt bleibt. Sinn und Zweck der meditatio passionis ist es vielmehr, das Passionsgeschehen derart zu betrachten, daß es – und hierin folgt Pfeiffer Luthers Ansatz – der Glaubende in sich bildet, also durch das Ansehen des Bildes des Gekreuzigten per imaginationem selbst von eben diesem ins Bild gesetzt wird. Durch meditatio und fides wird der crucifixus zum inneren Bild, zum Herzensbild. Die paulinische Rede von der Gestaltgewinnung Christi im Glaubenden (Gal 4:19: ‚Meine lieben Kinder / welche ich abermal mit engsten gebere / bis das Christus in euch eine gestalt gewinne‘) bezieht Pfeiffer derart in seine bildtheologische Reflexion ein, dass er sie im Rahmen einer herzenstheologischen Imaginationstheorie fruchtbar macht: Wer das Bild des leidenden Christus (ob in einem Bild, auch einem Kunstwerk, oder in solchen Texten, die die Passion bildlich-typologisch ‚vorbilden‘) recht meditiert, dem prägt der betrachtete Christus sein Bild in das Herz bzw. in die Seele ein. Hierbei wird die Diastase zwischen dem betrachtenden Subjekt und dem Objekt der Betrachtung überwunden. Das aber heißt, dass derjenige, der den leidenden Sohn Gottes in einem gegenständlichen Bild vor Augen sieht, neben diesem äußerlichen Bild stets auch die geistlich-innerliche pictura des Gekreuzigten in seinem Herzen vor dem innerlichen Auge hat, mithin zwei intermedial vernetzte Bilder zugleich ansieht.

 

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So trage ich denn desto weniger Zweifel / es werde meinen hochzuehrenden Gönnerinnen [scil. den Adressatinnen der Widmungsvorrede] dieser von meiner schwachen Hand neu=polirte Paßions=Spiegel nicht unanständig seyn / indem ich weiß / daß sie das darinn abgebildete vorhin in ihre Hertzen fest geschlossen haben / JEsus Christus hat in ihnen eine Gestalt gewonnen / und sein Bild in ihre Seele gedrückt Gal. IV. 19. also daß ich Sie […] einen Spiegel des gecreutzigten JEsu heissen könte! Was könte ihnen denn lieber seyn / als das Bild / welches sie ohne dem in ihren Hertzen tragen / auch in diesem Spiegel anzusehen? (Pfeiffer: 1683, b 2v)

Die Konzentration auf die scriptura sacra in der lutherisch-theologischen Wissenschaftstheorie, mithin in der sog. Prinzipienlehre, bildete somit die Grundlage für die pluriform-multimediale Promulgation des offenbarten Wortes und – in Christus selbst – des Bildes Gottes, die sich der Intermedialität nicht nur bedient, sondern diese von ihrem hermeneutischen Ansatz her notwendigerweise erfordert. Dieser hermeneutische Sachzusammenhang wird nicht schon dann sichtbar, wenn man die zeitgenössischen Loci-Dogmatiken sowie Martin Chemnitz’ Kommentierung des tridentinischen Bilderdekrets auswertet (vgl. Martin Chemnitz: 1972, 761–799). Vielmehr ist hierfür die Analyse eines gattungsmäßig sehr viel weitergespannten Quellencorpus frühneuzeitlicher lutherischer Theologie und Spiritualität nötig, zu dem Bibelkommentare, Postillen, Meditationsbücher, emblematische Werke, geistliche Lyrik und bibelkatechetische Schriften gehören müssten. So setzt z. B. Sigismund Evenius die Aufforderung Luthers, Bilderbibeln zu produzieren, mit explizitem Bezug auf des Reformators Vorrede zu seinem Passional in die Tat um, indem er seine Christliche/Gottselige Bilder=Schule publiziert (Evenius: [1636] 1666; zum Rekurs auf Luther vgl. a 4r–5r). Die Zielsetzung von Evenius’ Bilderbibel besteht darin, dass seinen Adressaten „GOTTES Wort […] vielfältig vor Augen gestellet“ (ebd., a 5r) und ihnen im Sinne von Gal 3:1 „CHristus JEsus vor Augen gemahlet“ werde (ebd., a 6r), wobei den Erfordernissen der imaginatio interna Rechnung zu tragen sei. Zu nutzen sind diesbezüglich laut Evenius nicht nur „der Catechismus und Evangelien Bilder“, sondern auch „Emblematische Figuren und Bilder“ (ebd., a 5r). Der Nürnberger Barockdichter Georg Philipp Harsdörffer (1607–1658) überträgt die im Anschluss an Luther in der zeitgenössischen Bibelhermeneutik ausführlich betriebene Differenzierung zwischen sensus literalis, tropolocicus, allegoricus und anagogicus auf die Klassifizierung heterogener Bildmedien, indem er zwischen Historienbildern, bildlichen Allegorien und Emblemata unterscheidet. Solche Beschaffenheit hat es auch mit den Bildern und Gemählen gleichende: I. Den Reden in jhren eigentlichen Wortverstand / die Bilder in den Geschichten oder Historien / welche einer Sachen Verlauff eigentlich vorstellen / oder erfinden / wie in den Lehrgedichten zu geschehen pfleget. II. Den figurlichen Gleichnußverstand der Wörter / ahmet nach die Bildkunst (Iconologia) wann man mahlet die Gerechtigkeit mit der

 

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Waage und dem Schwert / den Glauben mit dem Kelch und dem Creutz / die Hoffnung mit dem Anker. III. Gleicheten dem verblümten und gesuchten heimlichen Verstand / die Sinnbilder / (Emblemata) welche die Gleichnuß zu Außbildung der Gedancken etwas weiters herholen […] ([Georg Philipp Harsdörffer]: [1652] 2007,):():():(2r–v).

Luther und der ihm folgenden bibelhermeneutischen Diskussionslage zufolge gebührt dem Literalsinn der Heiligen Schrift zwar der fundamentaltheologische Vorrang. Gleichwohl kommt den übrigen sensus scripturae eine wichtige Funktion mit Blick auf die rhetorische amplificatio des buchstäblichen Sinnes, die Stiftung von bildlich-figürlicher memoria und die Findung von ornatus zu. Leitlinie hierbei ist, die metaphorisch-mystische Exegese so zu betreiben, dass sie den Literalsinn nicht konterkariert, sondern diesen analogisch amplifiziert, visualisiert und internalisiert (vgl. Steiger: 2002, 145–216). Genau dieser Zielsetzung ist Harsdörffer verpflichtet, indem er jedes von ihm verwendete anagogisch-emblematische Bild unter das Motto eines Bibeltextes stellt und diesen Wort-Bild-Kombinationen in geistlichen Gedichten, die die subscriptiones der Emblemata bilden, Exegesen angedeihen lässt, die der analogia fidei verpflichtet sind. Die Bildwort-Hermeneutik Luthers und des frühneuzeitlichen Luthertums stellt einen in mehrfacher Hinsicht höchst komplexen Sachverhalt dar, dem Hans Beltings Deutung (vgl. Belting: 2004, 510–523) nicht gerecht zu werden vermag, da er der in der Christologie verwurzelten Intermedialität von äußerem und innerem Wort sowie äußerem und innerem Bild auch nicht nur ansatzweise auf die Spur kommt und zudem bezüglich des tatsächlich gegebenen Sachzusammenhanges von Luthers Bild- und Sakramentsverständnis von Voraussetzungen ausgeht, die als historisch wie sachlich schlicht inkorrekt und irreführend zu bezeichnen sind.33

33 Vgl. z. B. Belting: 2004, 518: „Luther bleibt Augustin treu, als er dem Wort die Macht zutraut, ‚das Element in das Sakrament‘, das Brot in den Leib Christi zu verwandeln. Für Calvin dagegen ist das Brot nur ein Zeichen, das wie alle Zeichen niemals zu dem werden kann, was es bezeichnet. Der Leib ist denn auch nur eine Redefigur.“ Zum einen ist unzutreffend, dass Luther am Gedanken der Wandlung festhält. Die Transsubstantiationslehre, die im Übrigen nicht auf Augustinus zurückgeht, hat Luther bekanntermaßen seit 1520 abgelehnt. Vgl. z. B. Johann Anselm Steiger: 2005b, 539. Mit Augustin, und hierauf vermutlich bezieht sich Belting, der diesbezüglich (wie auch sonst häufig) keinen Beleg anführt, war Luther der Auffassung, dass die Sakramente dadurch konstituiert werden, dass das Wort Gottes zu den Elementen hinzutritt. Vgl. Aurelius Augustinus: 1954, 529, 5–7: „Accedit uerbum ad elementum, et fit sacramentum, etiam ipsum tamquam uisibile uerbum.“ Luther zitiert diese Passage häufig, z. B. in WA 30/I, 24,5 f. Entscheidend aber ist, dass Luther die Transsubstantiation verwirft, weil seiner Auffassung nach in der Sakramentslehre die Dialektik der Zwei-Naturen-Lehre durchzuhalten ist: So wie in der unio personalis göttliche und menschliche Natur zusammenkommen, so verbindet sich in den Sakramenten die leibliche Präsenz Christi mit den äußerlichen Elementen. Was Calvin anlangt, reduziert Belting dessen Abendmahlsauffassung unsachgemäß auf die Zwinglische Position – nicht ohne auch hier ein Missverständnis unterzubringen, da nicht der Leib Christi „eine Redefigur“ darstellt, sondern Zwingli zufolge das „est“ innerhalb der Einsetzungsworte

 

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Aufgabe der historischen Intermedialitätsforschung ist es vor diesem Hintergrund, zu rekonstruieren, wie geistliche Bilder in- und außerhalb von Kirchenräumen aktiv an den Auslegungs- und Verkündigungsprozessen beteiligt waren und sind. Ziel der Verkündigung des Wortes Gottes in Predigt, in Gebet und nicht zu vergessen im Gemeindegesang – erinnert sei daran, dass die Reformation in Lübeck erzwungen wurde von den Gemeinden, die das neue geistliche Liedgut nicht nur kannten, sondern permanent sangen34 – Ziel der Verkündigung also ist laut Luther und den lutherischen Theologen der Barockzeit, den Adressaten das Evangelium und letztlich Christus mit seiner befreienden Botschaft vor Augen zu malen und ins Herz zu bilden. Hierzu bedarf es nicht nur einer alle Strategien der Bildlichkeit nutzenden Redeweise, sondern auch des äußerlichen Mediums Bild, um den Prozess der innerlichen imaginatio zu befördern. Hier von einer radikalen „Unterordnung des Bildes unter Schrift und Wort“ (Belting: 2004, 522) zu sprechen, ist schlicht abwegig. Das nicht nur von Belting, sondern auch anderwärts in diesem Kontext immer wieder angeführte Luther-Zitat „Und ist Christi Reich ein hör Reich, nicht ein sehe Reich“ (Predigten des Jahres 1545 [Nr. 21], WA 51, 11,29f) bietet keinen Beleg für die genannte These. Denn Luther spricht in seiner am 6. August 1545 in Merseburg gehaltenen Predigt überhaupt nicht von der Relevanz geistlicher Bilder, sondern stellt das Reich Gottes dem Reich der Welt kontrastiv gegenüber, entfaltet mithin (erneut) seine Lehre von den zwei Regimenten. Im weltlichen Regiment wird empirisch Sichtbares ins Werk gesetzt, nämlich der Schutz der Frommen, die Erhaltung von Recht und Frieden, der Erwerb des Lebensunterhaltes und manch anderes. Im geistlichen Regiment aber geht es nicht zuvörderst um die menschlichen Werke, sondern um die Wirkweisen des Wortes Gottes, das z. B. in der Taufe die Wiedergeburt des Täuflings bewirkt, „welches weit ein andere geburt ist dann die erste, die wir sehen und fůlen, Die andere und new geburt, welche durch das wasser, wort und Geist geschicht, die sihet man nicht, da hört man allein das wort […]“ (WA 51, 12,24–27). Zu unterscheiden ist also die Unsichtbarkeit des Bewirkten von der Sicht- und Hörbarkeit der Medien Wasser und Wort, mittels deren sich vollzieht, was den Sinnen nicht wahrnehmbar wird. Hierzu fügt sich, dass Luther in der in Rede stehenden Predigt auffällig häufig vom Wort Gottes spricht, das zu hören und zu sehen bzw. (mehrfach in dieser Reihenfolge) zu sehen und zu hören ist. So heißt es z. B. bezüglich der Absolution: „Da höre ich und sehe nichts denn allein das wort, damit er [scil. der Priester] mich von meinen sůnden los spricht […]“ (WA 51, 13,9–11). Mit Blick auf die Sakramente Taufe und Abendmahl hebt als Tropus aufzufassen ist. Völlig außer Acht gelassen ist hierbei, dass Calvin mit seinem Konzept der sog. Spiritualpräsenz Christi im Abendmahl eine Position anzubieten bestrebt war, die zwischen Luther und Zwingli zu vermitteln versuchte. 34 Zum sog. Singekrieg 1529/30 in Lübeck vgl. Wolf-Dieter Hauschild: 1981, 181 f.

 

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Abb. 8: Daniel Cramer, Emblemata Sacra […] Pars Prior […], Frankfurt a. M.: Lucas Jennis 1624, 17. © Herzog August Bibliothek Wolfenbüttel.

Luther ebenfalls die mediale Sichtbarkeit der in den Elementen verborgenen Heilsgüter hervor, wenn er sagt: Also auch, wenn wir sehen die heilige Sacrament reichen, darinnen uns Gott anbeut und schencket alle unsere sůnde, gnade, seligkeit und das ewige leben, Da sihestu die errettung und freiung von sůnden und Todt, das du auch nicht mehr jnns Teuffels Reich gefangen gehalten werdest, sihestu nicht, sonder hörest es allein, das dirs mit der zungen des Predigers durchs wort angebotten und geschenckt wird (WA 51, 12,14–19).

Die Konzeption der eruditio cordis, der schon Luther einen zentralen Ort in seiner Theologie anwies, führte in der Folgezeit u. a. zur Ausbildung der sog. Herzensemblematik. In besonders intensiver Weise wurde diese von Daniel Cramer (1568– 1637) gepflegt (Sabine Mödersheim: 2012). Cramer wirkte seit 1597 als Pastor in Stettin, nachdem er zuvor als Professor für Philosophie in Wittenberg sowie am

 

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Abb. 9: Flensburg, St. Marien, Altar von Heinrich Ringerinck (1598), Öltafelgemälde von Jan von Enum. Foto: Johann Anselm Steiger.

Akademischen Gymnasium in Stettin tätig gewesen war. Cramer trat nicht nur als Verfasser gewichtiger exegetischer und dogmatischer Abhandlungen sowie der ersten Kirchenchronik Pommerns (1. Auflage 1602) in Erscheinung (Daniel Cramer: [1628] 2009), sondern auch als Autor einer Reihe von Emblembüchern, die weite Verbreitung und zahlreiche Nachahmer fanden. Dem ersten Emblem (Abb. 8) in Cramers Emblemata Sacra (1624) kommt programmatische Bedeutung zu (Daniel Cramer: 1624, 17). Es veranschaulicht, wie stark die reformatorische Zentralsetzung des Wortes Gottes nicht nur auf das Gehör zielt, sondern auch auf das Herz, das pars pro toto den ganzen Menschen und dessen Affektivität visualisiert. Die Gottesrede in Jer 23:29 (‚Jst mein wort nicht wie ein Fewer / spricht der HERR / vnd wie ein Hamer der Felsen zerschmeist?‘) stiftet hierbei die ikonologische inventio. Die kreative Wirkmächtigkeit (efficacia) des göttlichen Wortes besteht darin, dass es die sündhafte Herzenshärtigkeit mit einem Schlag (ictus) beseitigt und die Herzen erweicht. Cramers Embleme fungierten im Übrigen als

 

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Abb. 10: Hendrik Goltzius, Miracula Christi (1578), Kupferstich. Foto: Johann Anselm Steiger.

Johann Anselm Steiger

Abb. 11: Kolding, St. Nikolai, ­Altar (1589), Gemälde vermutlich von Hans Paludan. Foto: Johann Anselm Steiger.

Vorlagen für zahlreiche Bildprogramme in Kirchenräumen bis hinein in den skandinavischen Raum. Bemerkenswert nun ist, dass die barock-lutherische Ikonographie bestrebt war, die Hermeneutik des äußerlich-innerlichen Für- und Einbildens ins Medium Bild zu bringen. Denn zahlreich waren die Versuche, den letztlich nicht sichtbaren inneren Prozess der imaginatio des Wortes Gottes äußerlich zur Anschauung zu bringen. Ein Beispiel hierfür bietet das von Jan von Enum geschaffene Bildnis auf dem Altar in St. Marien zu Flensburg (Abb. 9) aus dem Jahre 1598. Die Vorlage für dieses Bild stammt von dem Antwerpener Kupferstecher Hendrik Goltzius (1558–1616/17) (Abb. 10). Auf denselben Kupferstich geht das vermutlich von Hans Paludan gemalte Bild auf dem Altar in St. Nikolai im dänischen Kolding (Abb. 11) zurück. Zu sehen ist in allen drei Fällen Christus, der sich nicht nur im Bild selbst zeigt, sondern sich darüber hinaus in zwei Bildern, die dem Bild eingemalt sind, doppelt visualisiert: erstens dadurch, dass er auf sich als Lamm Got-

 

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Abb. 12: Lucas Cranach d. J., Colditzer Altar (1584), Nürnberg, Germanisches National­ museum, Gesamtansicht. Foto: Johann Anselm Steiger.

Abb. 13: Dasselbe, Detail. Foto: Johann Anselm Steiger.

Abb. 14 (links), 15 (Mitte), 16 (rechts): Dasselbe, Details. Fotos: Johann Anselm Steiger.

tes (Joh 1:29.36) zeigt, und zweitens, indem er das Innere seines Herzens öffnet, das ihn als Guten Hirten zeigt. Dieses Herzensbild wiederum dient als Vorlage für die fromme Seele, die als sitzende Frauengestalt vor einer Staffelei dargestellt ist. Die Strategie der göttlichen Verkündigung wird damit als eine solche sichtbar, die sich der sowohl inneren als auch der äußeren Bilder bedient, wobei aber auch

 

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die inneren Bilder wiederum zur medialen Vergegenständlichung drängen. Der Akt der imitatio Christi nun besteht darin, daß die Glaubende das ihr vor Augen gestellte Bild in ihr eigenes Herz hinein kopiert, es sich imaginiert. Auch dieser, eigentlich nicht sichtbare Akt, diese imaginatio interna, wird in vorliegendem Altargemälde als imaginatio externa visualisiert. Die fromme Seele nutzt das ihr vor Augen stehende Herzensbild dazu, sich das Bild des Guten Hirten in ihr eigenes Herz einzubilden und es dem affectus fidei zugänglich zu machen. Imitatio Christi, so die inscriptio des Bildes, ist hier mithin ein Prozess glaubender Herzens-Imagination. Eng verwandt hiermit ist der von Lucas Cranach d. J. (1515–1586) im Jahre 1584 geschaffene Colditzer Altar (Abb. 12). In Herzform dargestellt sind hier Sündenfall und Mariae Verkündigung (Abb. 13), Geburt (Abb. 14), Kreuzigung (Abb. 15) und Auferstehung Jesu Christi (Abb. 16). An den Betrachter ergeht somit die Aufforderung, dasjenige innerlich, mithin meditativ-imaginativ nachzuvollziehen, was äußerlich bereits vor Augen und im gewissermaßen extrovertierten Herzen steht, nämlich sich die Heilsgeschichte ins Herz zu bilden.

5.

Intermediale Präsenz der Reformation

Wer glaubt, hat es demnach mit einem doppelten Sehen zu tun, und die Objekte seiner Betrachtung, die Bilder, sind sowohl äußerliche als auch innerliche. Die meditatio von gegenständlich-äußerlichen Bildern – diesem Aspekt kommt fundamentale theologisch-medientheoretische Relevanz zu – verhindert, anders als dies der reformierten Sicht der Dinge zufolge der Fall ist, nicht die innerliche Imagination. Vielmehr stehen – und dieser Gedanke ist bereits bei Luther nicht nur angelegt, sondern tragend – der Umgang mit den sichtbaren Bildern und die Einbildung der in ihnen zur Darstellung gebrachten geistlichen Inhalte in einem produktiven Wechselverhältnis miteinander. Als hermeneutische Matrix fungiert die auf die Medientheorie übertragene Zweinaturenlehre: So wie in Christus Gottheit und Menschheit, Kontingentes und Absolutes, Zeitlichkeit und Ewigkeit zusammenkommen und eine untrennbare Einheit bilden, so interagieren in der lutherischen Bildhermeneutik äußerliche und innerliche Bilder in einer Weise, dass keineswegs die ersteren einfach verzichtbar wären. Gewiss gehören nach reformatorischer Definition die Bilder (wie die gottesdienstliche Musik) zu den Adiaphora, also zu den Mitteldingen, die weder geboten noch verboten sind. Klar ist aber auch, dass damit die tatsächliche fundamentalhermeneutische Relevanz der Bilder im Kontext der von Wittenberg ausgehenden Reformation wie im nachreformatorischen Luthertum nicht in ihrer facettenreichen Tragweite erfasst ist. Denn die Aussage, Bilder seien Adiaphora, gehört in den Bereich des Kirchenrechts, genauer der Kirchenordnung, beansprucht indes nicht, einen hermeneutischen Sachverhalt namhaft zu machen. Die immer

 

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noch, auch in den jüngsten Reformationsgeschichten, vertretene These, die Reformation, auch die Luthersche, habe einen „radikalen Reduktionismus“ betrieben (Kaufmann: 2009, 716), indem sie die multidimensionale Sinnlichkeit des Menschen zugunsten des Gehörs, vor allem des Hörens der Predigt, letztlich desavouiert, um nicht zu sagen eskamotiert habe, bedarf dringend einer medienhistorisch fundierten Revision. Denn zum ‚Ereignis‘ wurde die Reformation erst durch die mediale, sinnlich wahrnehmbare Vergegenständlichung ihrer Botschaft in allen verfügbaren Literaturgattungen und zahlreichen Artefakten, in der Musik, in der Kunst, im Kirchenbau etc. Auch wenn nicht wenig Quellenmaterial im Laufe der Jahrhunderte verlorengegangen ist, so ist doch die intermediale Präsenz der reformatorischen Verkündigung noch heute an vielen Orten sichtbar, lesbar und hörbar – und nicht nur dem Historiker.

Bibliographie Assel, Heinrich (2011), Tamquam visibile verbum. Bild versus Sakrament?, in: Philipp ­Stoellger/ Thomas Klie (Hg.), Präsenz im Vollzug. Ambivalenzen des Bildes, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 347–371. Augustinus, Aurelius (1954), In Johannis Euangelium Tractatus LXXX (Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 36), Turnhout: Brepols. Baur, Jörg (2002), Art. Ubiquität, TRE 34, 224–241. Belting, Hans (2004), Bild und Kult. Eine Geschichte des Bildes vor dem Zeitalter der Kunst (6. Ausgabe), München: C. H. Beck. Berns, Jörg Jochen (1992), Die Macht der äußeren und der inneren Bilder. Momente des innerprotestantischen Bilderstreits während der Reformation, in: Italo Michele Battafarano (Hg.), Begrifflichkeit und Bildlichkeit der Reformation (Ricerche di cultura europea 5), Frankfurt a. M./Berlin/Bern: Lang, 9–37. Birken, Sigmund von (2012), Anhang zu Todes-Gedanken und Todten-Andenken sowie Em­­ blemata, Erklärungen und Andachtlieder zu Johann Michael Dilherrs Emblematischer Handund Reisepostille, hg. von Johann Anselm Steiger, Teil I: Texte, Teil II: Apparate und Kommentare (Neudrucke Deutscher Literaturwerke NF 67/68), Berlin: de Gruyter. Bolliger, Daniel (2010), Methodus als Lebensweg. Johann Conrad Dannhauer (1603–1666) und die Existentialisierung der Dialektik in der altdorfinisch-straßburgischen Richtung der lutherischen Orthodoxie (Habil. masch.), Hamburg: Universität Hamburg. Bremer, Ludolf (2001), Sigismund Evenius (1585/89–1639). Ein Pädagoge des 17. Jahrhunderts (Beiträge zur Historischen Bildungsforschung 26), Wien/Köln/Weimar: Böhlau. Bubenheimer, Ulrich (1988), Art. Karlstadt, in: TRE 17, 649–657. Campenhausen, Hans von (1957), Die Bilderfrage in der Reformation, Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 68, 96–128. Chemnitz, Martin (1972), Examen Concilii Tridentini, hg. von Eduard Preuß, 1861, Nachdruck, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Cramer, Daniel ([1628] 2009), Das Große Pomrische Kirchen-Chronicon, Stettin 1628, Nachdruck, Hildesheim: Georg Olms.

 

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Cramer, Daniel (1674 [recte: 1624]), EMBLEMATA SACRA. Hoc est, DECADES QUINQUE EMBLEMATUM EX SACRA SCRIPTURA, DE dulcissimo Nomine & Cruce Jesu Christi, figuris aeneis incisorum. PARS PRIOR Primò per Reverend. Dn. DANIELEM CRAMERUM, SS. Theologiae Doctorem collecta. POSTEA VERO A DN. CUNRADO BACHMANNO, Hist. & Poetices Professore Epigrammatibus Latino-Germanicis illustrata, tandem opera M. C. R. Versibus & Rhythmis Gallo Italicis declarata, ornata, & ad instar Philotheca Christiana sive Albi Amicorum exibita, Frankfurt a. M.: Lucas Jennis. Dannhauer, Johann Conrad (1642), CATECHJSMVS MJLCH Oder Der Erklärung deß Christlichen Catechismi Erster Theil / Begreiffend die Lehr deß Catechismi ins gemein / vnd die Erste Taffel deß Gesetzes der Heiligen zehen Gebott Gottes, Straßburg: Sporr. Diederichs-Gottschalk, Dietrich (2005), Die protestantischen Schriftaltäre des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts in Nordwestdeutschland. Eine kirchen- und kunstgeschichtliche Untersuchung zu einer Sonderform liturgischer Ausstattung in der Epoche der Konfessionalisierung, Regensburg: Schnell & Steiner. Ebeling, Gerhard (1989), Lutherstudien, Bd. 2: Disputatio de homine. 3. Teil: Die theologische Definition des Menschen, Kommentar zu These 20–40, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Ehrstine, Glenn (1998), Seeing Is Believing. Valten Voith’s Ein schön Lieblich Spiel von dem herlichen vrsprung (1538), Protestant ‚Law and Gospel‘ Panels, and German Reformation Dramaturgy, in: Daphnis 27, 503–537. Evenius, Sigismund ([1636] 1666), Christliche/Gottselige Bilder=Schule: Das ist: Anführung der ersten Jugend zur Gottseligkeit / in und durch Biblische Bilder / aus und nach den Historien / Sprüchen der Schrifft / Einstimmung des Catechismi / und nützlichem Gebrauch erkläret / Förderst zu GOttes Ehren / und dann Zu der Christlichen Jugend früezeitiger Erbauung in der Gottesfurcht: Nach Ordnung und Weise / wie es bißhero in öffentlicher übung der zarten Jugend gut / heilsam und nützlich befunden. Auff Gutachten fürnehmer Theologen Allen Christlichen Schulen und häußlichen Unterweisungen zum besten in Druck außgefertiget, Nürnberg: Christoph Endter. Fritz, Johann Michael (1997), Die bewahrende Kraft des Luthertums. Mittelalterliche Kunstwerke in evangelischen Kirchen, in: Johann Michael Fritz (Hg.), Die bewahrende Kraft des Luthertums. Mittelalterliche Kunstwerke in evangelischen Kirchen, Regensburg: Schnell & Steiner, 9–18. Ganz, David (2010), Die Crux des wahren Bildes. Die Maler des kreuztragenden Christus in einem Titelkupfer Theodoor Galles, in: Johann Anselm Steiger/Ulrich Heinen (Hg.), Golgatha in den Konfessionen und Medien der Frühen Neuzeit (Arbeiten zur Kirchengeschichte 113), Berlin: de Gruyter, 283–324. Gerhard, Johann (1863–1875), Loci theologici, hg. v. Eduard Preuß, 9 Bde., Berlin bzw. Leipzig: Gustav Schlawitz. Gerhard, Johann (1613), Postilla: Das ist / Erklärung der Sontäglichen vnd fürnehmesten Fest=Euangelien / vber das gantze Jahr. Auch etlicher schöner Sprüche heiliger Schrifft / vornemlich dahin gerichtet / daß wir Gottes Liebe vnd Christi Wolthaten erkennen / auch am innerlichen Menschen seliglich zunehmen mögen, 3 Teile und Appendix, Jena: Tobias Steinmann. Habermann, Johann ([1567] 2009), Christliche Gebet für alle Not vnd Stende der gantzen Christenheit (1567), kritisch hg., kommentiert und mit einem Nachwort versehen von Johann Anselm Steiger unter Mitwirkung von Corinna Flügge (Doctrina et Pietas II, 4), Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: frommann-holzboog.

 

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Habermann, Johann (1589), Bettbüchlein D. Ioannis Avenarii, Erfurt: Johann Beck. Hamm, Berndt (2004), Luthers Anleitung zum seligen Sterben vor dem Hintergrund der spätmittelalterlichen Ars moriendi, in: Jahrbuch für Biblische Theologie 19, 311–362. [Harsdörffer, Georg Philipp] ([1652] 2007), Hertzbeweglicher SonntagsAndachten Andrer Theil: Das ist Bild= Lieder= und Betbuch / nach Veranlassung der Sonntäglichen EpistelTexten verfasset: Samt angefügten Wochen=Andachten / als Morgen= und Abentsegen / aus den Sieben Bitten deß heiligen Vater unsers / etc. Wie auch aus den Sieben Worten deß HERRN Christi am Creutz verabfasst, Nachdruck, Hildesheim: Georg Olms. Hauschild, Wolf-Dieter (1981), Kirchengeschichte Lübecks. Christentum und Bürgertum in neun Jahrhunderten, Lübeck: Schmidt-Römhild. Karlstadt, Andreas ([1522] 1911), Von Abtuhung der Bilder und das keyn Bedtler vnther den Christen seyn sollen, hg. von Hans Lietzmann (Kleine Texte für theologische und philologische Übungen 74), Bonn: Marcus und Weber. Kaufmann, Thomas (2002), Die Bilderfrage im frühneuzeitlichen Luthertum, in: Peter Blickle/ André Holenstein/Heinrich R. Schmidt/Franz-Josef Sladeczek (Hg.), Macht und Ohnmacht der Bilder. Reformatorischer Bildersturm im Kontext der europäischen Geschichte (Historische Zeitschrift, Beiheft 33), München: Oldenbourg, 407–454. Kaufmann, Thomas (2009): Geschichte der Reformation, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Kaufmann, Thomas (2012), Der ‚Schriftaltar‘ in der Spitalkirche zu Dinkelsbühl – ein Zeugnis lutherischer Konfessionskultur, in: Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 103, 117–148. Knappe, Karl Adolf (1980), Art. Bibelillustrationen, in: TRE 6, 131–160. Koch, Traugott (2001), Johann Habermanns ‚Betbüchlein‘ im Zusammenhang seiner Theologie. Eine Studie zur Gebetsliteratur und zur Theologie des Luthertums im 16. Jahrhundert (Beiträge zur historischen Theologie 117), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Köpf, Ulrich (1990), Die Bilderfrage in der Reformationszeit, in: Blätter für Württembergische Kirchengeschichte 90, 38–64. Krausse, Helmut K./Redaktion (2010), Art. Müller, Heinrich, in: Wilhelm Kühlmann et al. (Hg.), Killy Literaturlexikon. Autoren und Werke des deutschsprachigen Kulturraumes. 2., vollständig überarbeitete Auflage, Bd. 8, 394–396. Kühlmann, Wilhelm (2008), Art. Dannhauer, Johann Conrad, in: Wilhelm Kühlmann et al. (Hg.), Killy Literaturlexikon. Autoren und Werke des deutschsprachigen Kulturraumes, Bd. 2, 551–553. Laufhütte, Hartmut (2007), Leben, Werk und Nachleben. Gesammelte Studien, Passau: Ralf Schuster Verlag. Lentes, Thomas (2002), Inneres Auge, äußerer Blick und heilige Schau. Ein Diskussionsbeitrag zur visuellen Praxis in Frömmigkeit und Moraldidaxe des späten Mittelalters, in: Klaus Schreiner/Marc Müntz (Hg.), Frömmigkeit im Mittelalter. Politisch-soziale Kontexte, visuelle Praxis, körperliche Ausdrucksformen, München: Fink, 179–219. Lentes, Thomas (2007), Zwischen Adiaphora und Artefakt. Bildbestreitung in der Reformation, in: Reinhard Hoeps (Hg.), Handbuch der Bildtheologie, Bd. I: Bild-Konflikte, Paderborn: Schoeningh, 213–240. Leppin, Volker (2010), Bild und Bilder zwischen Repräsentation und Imagination. Zur Spiritualität des Bildes in Mittelalter, Renaissance und Reformation, in: Elisabeth Gräb-Schmidt/Reiner Preul (Hg.), Ästhetik (Marburger Jahrbuch Theologie 22), Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 39–52.

 

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Litz, Gudrun (2007), Die reformatorische Bilderfrage in den schwäbischen Reichsstädten (Spätmittelalter und Reformation, Neue Reihe 35), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Luther, Martin, Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009. Michael, Angelika (2012), Luther und die Bilder: Von Bildern, die man sieht, und solchen, die man nicht sieht, in: Luther-Jahrbuch 79, 101–137 Michalski, Sergiusz (1990), Die protestantischen Bilderstürme. Versuch einer Übersicht, in: Bob Scribner (Hg.), Bilder und Bildersturm im Spätmittelalter und in der frühen Neuzeit (Wolfenbütteler Forschungen 46), Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 69–124. ­ üller/ Mödersheim, Sabine (2012), Art. Cramer, Daniel, in: Wilhelm Kühlmann/Jan-Dirk M Michael Schilling/Johann Anselm Steiger/Friedrich Vollhardt (Hg.), Frühe Neuzeit in Deutsch­­ land 1520–1620. Literaturwissenschaftliches Verfasserlexikon, Bd. 2, Berlin: de ­Gruyter, 23–30. Müller, Heinrich ([1679] 1738), Evangelischer Hertzens=Spiegel, Das ist: Erklärung aller Sonn= und Fest=Tags=Evangelien, Nebst beygefügten Paßions=Predigten Ueber das Gantze Leyden CHristi, Jn öffentlicher Kirchen=Versammlung der Gemeine GOttes zu St. Marien vorgestellet; jetzo aber auf das neue wegen der schönen Lehr=Art auf vieler Ersuchen dem Druck überlassen, und mit dreyfachen Registern versehen, Nebst einer Vorrede S. T. Herrn Friederich Caspar Hagens, Hof: Johann Gottlieb Vierling. Peters, Albrecht (1991), Kommentar zu Luthers Katechismen, Bd. 2: Der Glaube – Das Apostolikum, Göttingen. Pfeiffer, August (1683), Paßion= u. Oster=Spiegel / Aus Der Historia Jsaacs Gen. XXII. Jn Sechs Predigten / und Aus der Weissagung Des Propheten Jonä / Durch richtige Erklärung Des gantzen Prophetischen Textes Und Vorzeigung Der ähnligkeit des Leidenden / Sterbenden und Erstandenen JESU Mit dem Propheten JONA Jn funffzig Puncten dargestellet […], Leipzig: Christian Michael. Plotke, Seraina (2009), Gereimte Bilder. Visuelle Poesie im 17. Jahrhundert, München: Fink. Reinitzer, Heimo (2012), Tapetum Concordiae. Peter Heymans Bildteppich für Philipp I. von Pommern und die Tradition der von Mose getragenen Kanzel (Abhandlungen der Akademie der Wissenschaften in Hamburg 1), Berlin: de Gruyter. Rohls, Jan (1984)‚ ‚… unser Knie beugen wir doch nicht mehr‘. Bilderverbot und bildende Kunst im Zeitalter der Reformation, in: Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche 81, 322–351, Sdzuj, Reimund B. (2005), Adiaphorie und Kunst. Studien zur Genealogie ästhetischen Denkens, Tübingen: Niemeyer. Steiger, Johann Anselm (2002), Fünf Zentralthemen der Theologie Luthers und seiner Erben. Communicatio – Imago – Figura – Maria – Exempla. Mit Edition zweier christologischer Frühschriften Johann Gerhards (Studies in the History of Christian Thought 104), Leiden/ Boston: Brill. Steiger, Johann Anselm (2005a), Medizinische Theologie. Christus medicus und theologia medicinalis bei Martin Luther und im Luthertum der Barockzeit. Mit Edition dreier Quellentexte: Wilhelm Sarcerius, Der Hellische Trawer Geist (1568) – Simon Musäus, Nützlicher Bericht vnnd Heilsammer Rath aus Gottes Wort wider den Melancholischen Teuffel (1569) – Valerius Herberger, Leichenpredigt auf Flaminius Gasto (1618) (Studies in the History of Christian Traditions 121), Leiden: Brill. Steiger, Johann Anselm (2005b), Art. Transsubstantiation, in: RGG4, Bd. 8, 539.

 

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Steiger, Johann Anselm (2007), „Geh’ aus, mein Herz, und suche Freud“. Paul Gerhardts Sommerlied und die Gelehrsamkeit der Barockzeit (Naturkunde, Emblematik, Theologie), Berlin/New York: de Gruyter. Steiger, Johann Anselm (2009), Kontrarationalität und neue Rationalität des Glaubens in der Theologie Martin Luthers, in: Wilfried Härle/Barbara Mahlmann-Bauer (Hg.), Prädestination und Willensfreiheit. Luther, Erasmus, Calvin und ihre Wirkungsgeschichte. Festschrift für Theodor Mahlmann zum 75. Geburtstag, Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 23–34. Steiger, Johann Anselm (2010), Christus pictor. Der Gekreuzigte auf Golgatha als Bilder schaffendes Bild. Zur Entzifferung der Kreuzigungserzählung bei Luther und im barocken Luthertum sowie deren medientheoretischen Implikationen, in: Johann Anselm Steiger/ Ulrich Heinen (Hg.), Golgatha in den Konfessionen und Medien der Frühen Neuzeit, Berlin: de Gruyter, 93–127. Steiger, Johann Anselm (2012a), Art. Gerhard, Johann, in: Wilhelm Kühlmann/Jan-Dirk Müller/Michael Schilling/Johann Anselm Steiger/Friedrich Vollhardt (Hg.), Frühe Neuzeit in Deutschland 1520–1620. Literaturwissenschaftliches Verfasserlexikon, Bd. 2, Berlin/Boston: de Gruyter, 557–571. Steiger, Johann Anselm (2012b), Christophorus – ein Bild des Christen. Heiligengedenken bei Martin Luther und im Luthertum der Frühen Neuzeit, Neuendettelsau: Freimund. Stirm, Margarete (1977), Die Bilderfrage in der Reformation (Quellen und Forschungen zur Reformationsgeschichte 45), Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Weimer, Christoph (1999), Luther, Cranach und die Bilder. Gesetz und Evangelium – Schlüssel zum reformatorischen Bildgebrauch (Arbeiten zur Theologie 89), Stuttgart: Calwer Verlag. Wieden, Helge Bei der (1997), Art. Müller, Heinrich, in: Neue Deutsche Biographie 18, 405– 406.

 

 

Dietrich Korsch

Verborgenheit macht sichtbar Ein Gedanke zur Ikonologie im Anschluss an Martin Luther

In seiner Heidelberger Disputation von 1518 spricht Martin Luther von den visibilia Dei und den invisibilia Dei (LDStA 1, 52), in De servo arbitrio von 1525 vom Deus praedicatus und vom Deus absconditus (LDStA 1, 404). Haben diese Aussagen eine Bedeutung für das Forschungsprogramm In-visibilis – und wenn ja, welche? Um diese Frage zu beantworten, werde ich nachfolgend eine Reihe von systematischen Aufstellungen und Erwägungen voranschicken. Denn mit der Ermittlung der historischen Rahmenbedingungen von Luthers Aussagen ist über deren sachlichen Sinn und ihre Reichweite noch keine Entscheidung getroffen. Meine These ist vielmehr, dass wir erst unter weiter entwickelten Bestimmungen des Sachverhalts, wie wir sie insbesondere der Philosophie des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts verdanken, die tatsächliche Bedeutung von Luthers Aussagen erschließen können. Der hier zunächst zu entfaltenden Problemstellung kommt damit ein heuristischer Rang zu, der die historische Dimension der reformatorischen Position auf systematische Weise unterstreicht. Dass die Argumentationen, die zu diesem Zweck vorgenommen werden, sich der üblichen Aufteilung in transzendentale, phänomenologische und theologische Methodik entziehen, kann insofern nicht als Einwand gelten, als sich derartige Rubrizierungen doch selbst erst der Beschäftigung mit dem Problem verdanken, das ins Auge gefasst werden soll.

1.

Das Sehen und das Gesehene (Kant)

1.1

Warum sehe ich etwas und nicht vielmehr nichts?

Warum sehe ich etwas und nicht vielmehr nichts? Das ist, leicht erkennbar, eine Variante der metaphysischen Grundfrage, wie sie Leibniz, Schelling, Heidegger und andere gestellt haben. Im Unterschied zu jener metaphysischen Fassung der Frage wird hier nicht nur auf das Verhältnis von Denken und Sein abgehoben, sondern es wird die Seite des Erscheinens und Wahrnehmens mit aufgenommen. Allerdings in einer Gestalt, die nach der Bedingung der Möglichkeit des „Sehens

 

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als …“ fragt, mithin transzendental ausgerichtet ist. Phänomenologisches und Transzendentales verbinden sich also hier miteinander. Aber wie? Warum sehe ich etwas und nicht vielmehr nichts? Lassen Sie uns diese Frage in ein paar Schritten näher betrachten. Einmal ist mit ihr auf den Prozess des Sehens abgehoben, in dem etwas zu sehen ist. Das Sehen zeichnet sich dadurch aus, dass es sich auf Verschiedenes richten kann bzw. seine Aufmerksamkeit von Unterschiedlichem geweckt wird. Das im Sehen Unterschiedene ist im Sehen präsent – und muss doch vom Sehen unterschieden bleiben. Die Frage lässt sich auch andersherum lesen. Etwas kommt (bereits) im Sehen zustande. Es ist nicht nur und nicht erst das Denken, das etwas als etwas festhält. Der Akt des Sehens ist selbst sachhaltig, das Sehen ist schon immer mit Sachhaltigkeit verknüpft. Vermutlich ist diese doppelte Lesart der Grundfrage nicht zufällig, wird mit ihr doch anvisiert, dass es sich bei dem Ineinsfallen von Sehen und Etwas um eine Art Synthese handelt, die nicht erzeugt werden kann, sondern von der immer wieder auszugehen ist. Diese Überlegung kann dann auch zu verstehen geben, dass die Warum-Frage mit dem Ich-Index verbunden wird: Warum sehe ich etwas und nicht vielmehr nichts? Einerseits nämlich steckt in der Warum-Frage die Suche nach Begründung und damit nach Allgemeinheit; der fragliche Fall soll als „Fall von …“ verstanden werden können. Andererseits aber lässt sich die gemeinte Synthese ja, wenn es ums Sehen und nicht ums Denken geht, gar nicht allgemein beantworten, sondern immer nur im Ausgang vom Sehen, das stets individuell ist, also „mein Sehen“. Wie es nun aber sein kann, dass das individuelle Zusammenfallen von Sehen und Etwas zugleich allgemein sein soll, das scheint einigermaßen rätselhaft. So rätselhaft, dass die Nichts-Frage gleich mit aufscheint. Nicht nur ein Sehen von etwas wird von einem anderen Sehen von etwas unterschieden, sondern das Ineinsfallen von Sehen und Etwas von einer strikten (und darum auch wieder unbegreiflichen) Differenz von jeglichem Sehen und jeglichem Etwas, also dem Nichts – welches mithin hier als Nichts dieser Synthese auftritt; um es einmal paradox zu sagen: das Nichts als grundsätzlicher Einzelfall oder als singuläres Allgemeines, das eben auch noch diese Unterscheidung in sich verschlingt. Der Frage „Warum sehe ich etwas und nicht vielmehr nichts?“ nachzugehen, erfordert also einigen Aufwand. Den reduziert man am besten, indem man sich auf klassische Modelle bezieht, die bereits eine Antwort gegeben haben. An ihnen und ihren offenen Flanken lassen sich am genauesten die Aspekte erkennen, die weiter zu thematisieren sind. Ich will mich hier für einen ersten Zugang auf Kant beschränken: In weiteren Schritten werde ich Fichte und Cassirer hinzuziehen, um von dieser philosophischen Argumentation her am Ende zu Luther zurückzukehren.

 

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1.2

Die transzendentale Analyse und ihre Voraussetzungen

Kants Antwort ist klassisch, weil sie einerseits Sehen und Etwas unterscheidet, weil sie andererseits an dem Zusammenfallen beider festhält und weil sie drittens auf Voraussetzungen zurückgreift, die sie immer schon in Anspruch nimmt. Ich sehe etwas, weil ich über die Anschauungsformen Raum und Zeit verfüge. Raum und Zeit sind Ordnungshorizonte, die es erlauben, Mannigfaltiges in einer präbegrifflichen Kontinuität aufzufassen. Dabei kommt dem Zugleich des Raumes eine umfassende Rolle zu, dem durch die Diskretion des Nacheinanders in der Zeit eine Abfolge eingeschrieben ist. Insofern verweisen beide aufeinander: der Raum bietet den Horizont für die Zeit, die Zeit durchmisst den Raum. Und für beide Dimensionen der Sinnlichkeit gilt, dass sie als Anschauungsformen zwar auf die Seite des Subjekts gehören, zugleich aber immer nur als Ordnung von und für Etwas Geltung haben. Bereits das Ineinander und Miteinander von Raum und Zeit stellt in dieser Verschränkung eine gefügte Rezeptionsweise für das Sehen bereit. Explizit auf das Etwas als Etwas gewandt ist dann der Verstand in seiner kategorialen Differenzierung als der Inbegriff der Zuordnung inmitten von Raum und Zeit. Die Kategorien der Quantität (Einheit, Vielheit, Allheit) und der Qualität (Realität, Negation, Limitation) entsprechen dabei am ehesten der Präsenzvergewisserung im Raum, wogegen die der Modalität (Notwendigkeit, Dasein, Wirklichkeit) und die der Relation (Substanz, Kausalität und Wechselwirkung) stärker auf Abfolgen und Zuordnungen eingestellt sind. Wie auch immer – es bedarf ja, damit Etwas gesehen (und erkannt) wird, der Interaktion aller dieser durch die Urteilsvollzüge hindurch sich ergebenden Kategorien. Manchmal unterschätzt wird aber die Frage nach dem Ort und Modus dieser Interaktion, der Kant ausdrücklich im Schematismuskapitel der Kritik der reinen Vernunft nachgeht. Es gibt nämlich immer schon eingeschliffene und eingeübte Weisen des Zusammenspiels, so dass man sie nicht erst fallweise und je aktuell erzeugen müsste. „Dieser Schematismus unseres Verstandes“, schreibt Kant, „in Ansehung der Erscheinungen und ihrer bloßen Form, ist eine verborgene Kunst in den Tiefen der menschlichen Seele, deren wahre Handgriffe wir der Natur schwerlich jemals abraten [= aus ihr erraten], und sie unverdeckt vor Augen legen werden. So viel können wir nur sagen: das Bild ist ein Produkt des empirischen Vermögens der produktiven Einbildungskraft, das Schema sinnlicher Begriffe (als der Figuren im Raume) ein Produkt und gleichsam ein Monogramm der reinen Einbildungskraft a priori, wodurch und wonach die Bilder allererst möglich werden […]“ (KrV, B 180f, Kant: 1968, 190). Diese Stelle besitzt eine schlüsselhafte Bedeutung für unser Problem, und zwar in dreifacher Hinsicht. Es ist erstens kaum zufällig, dass hier der Bild-Begriff auftaucht – als Produkt des empirischen Vermögens der produktiven Einbildungskraft. Das Bild also stellt vor Augen, was die Anwendung der Urteilskraft als die Ineins-

 

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fügung von Sinnlichkeit und Verstand ergibt; und dies nicht als subjektiv-willkürliches Verfahren, das man auch unterlassen könnte, sondern quasi wie von selbst, wie ein sich stets neu aufbauendes Resultat, hinter das wir nicht zurückkommen. Allerdings, und das ist das zweite Moment, korrespondiert diesem Bild durchaus das Schema, das aus der (Selbst-)Anwendung von Begriffen in Richtung auf Sinnlichkeit generiert wird. Das Bild, so könnte man sagen, fixiert die im Medium der Sinnlichkeit stattfindende synthetische Einheit, um deren Einheitscharakter man aber nur darum wissen kann, weil die reine Einbildungskraft selbst schon dessen inne ist, dass sie ohne Sinnlichkeit nichts vermag. Anders gesagt: Die vorliegende Synthese, in der ich etwas sehe, kann auch dann nicht aufgelöst werden, wenn ich mich auf eine der Seiten – Sinnlichkeit oder Verstand – schlage, weil jede dieser beiden Seiten selbst schon auf die andere hin orientiert ist. Das ist nun auch der Grund dafür, dass Kant davon spricht, beim Eintreten dieser Synthesis handle es sich um „eine verborgene Kunst in den Tiefen der menschlichen Seele, deren wahre Handgriffe wir der Natur schwerlich jemals“ werden entlocken können – und das ist die dritte hier interessante Hinsicht. Denn dass hier die Worte „Kunst“ und „Natur“ auftauchen, dürfte ebenfalls nicht zufällig sein, sondern auf die geheimen Voraussetzungen weisen, die dem „Etwas sehen“ zugrunde liegen und über die die Kritik der Urteilskraft nähere Auskunft gibt.

1.3

Bilder der Kunst und Natur

Ich nehme diesen Aspekt einigermaßen frei und verkürzt auf. Bekanntlich sind es ja die großen Wirklichkeitsbereiche der Kunst und der Natur, die Kant in der Kritik der Urteilskraft thematisiert. Dabei kommt zunächst die Kunst als die Dimension der Erfahrung zur Sprache, in der sich die Eindrücklichkeit der geformten Wirklichkeit auf den Menschen prägend auswirkt. So sehr die ästhetischen oder Geschmacks-Urteile eine bestimmte Weise der Selbstbegegnung darstellen, so sehr leben sie doch von den Auslösern, auf die sie bezogen sind. Und so sehr Erfahrungen des Schönen und des Erhabenen zu unterscheiden sind, so sehr gehen sie doch auf sinnhaft Erscheinendes zurück. Sinnhafte Erscheinung – das könnte sich als Formel anbieten für die Erfahrungen, von denen die Kritik der Urteilskraft handelt. Nicht, dass die Sinnhaftigkeit aus den Objekten stammt, die Gegenstand der Kunsterfahrung werden; sie ergibt sich aber gleichsam angesichts ihrer im eigenen Inneren. Und es ist diese nur zu konstatierende, nicht zu rekonstruierende Konsonanz von Äußerem und Innerem, die in der ästhetischen Erfahrung aufscheint. Weil das aber so ist  – und weil sich bereits die ästhetische Erfahrung des Erhabenen vorzüglich an Erscheinungen der Natur abspielt, sofern sie auf ihre Gestalthaftigkeit hin wahrgenommen werden –, geht der Weg dann von der Kunst

 

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weiter in die Naturteleologie. Angesichts der Tatsache, dass Schelling wenige Jahre später die umgekehrte Reihenfolge proklamieren wird, ist dieses Vorgehen Kants in einem besonderen Maße aufschlussreich, aber auch auslegungsbedürftig. Mir drängt sich derzeit folgende Interpretation auf: Während es in der ästhetischen Erfahrung, wie sie sich über Kunst und Natureindrücke vermittelt, um die Selbstbegegnung angesichts eines Anderen geht, fasst die teleologische Erfahrung den Zusammenklang von Innerem und Äußerem enger im Sinne eines gemeinsamen Werdens von Objektivem und Subjektivem. Unter der Betrachtung der Teleologie geht es also nicht nur um Konsonanz, sondern um (geheime) Kohärenz. Nicht nur in der subjektiven Erfahrung stellt sich die Zusammengehörigkeit des Synthetisierten heraus, sie ist auch schon in der Genese dieser Erfahrung am Werk, wiewohl hier genauso unergründlich wie im Falle der Ästhetik. Das also wäre mein Vorschlag, den Übergang von der Ästhetik zur Teleologie in der Kritik der Urteilskraft zu deuten als Übergang in der Weise des hintergründigen Vermitteltseins von Subjekt und Objekt. Demnach wären dann die Zuordnungsverhältnisse der teleologischen Erfahrung und der Sinneswahrnehmung bei Kant der Versuch, der Erfahrungssynthesis so etwas wie einen schlechthin umgreifenden Rahmen vorauszudenken. Damit taucht aber gleichsam unter der Hand ein naturalistisches Moment im transzendentalen Idealismus auf – und die kantischen regulativen Ideen wären gewissermaßen Rahmenannahmen dafür, die über die Natur laufende Koordination, die Synthese von Subjekt und Objekt, zu schematisieren. Auf die Frage, warum ich etwas sehe und nicht vielmehr nichts, ergibt sich von dieser Auslegung her folgende Antwort: Die Verbindung von Sehen und Etwas ist eine Selbstauslegungsform der Natur, die sich so weit ausdifferenziert, dass ihr Begreifen nur unter Voraussetzung der menschlichen Freiheit möglich ist. Die Inanspruchnahme der Freiheit als Ausgangspunkt auch der theoretischen Erkenntnis lässt sich aber nur dann und so rechtfertigen, wenn und sofern im Schema der Subjekt und Objekt verbindenden Teleologie der Unterschiedenheit von Subjekt und Objekt ein gemeinsam werdender Grund vorausgedacht wird. Kant ist so dualistisch nicht, wie man auf den ersten Blick meinen könnte. Allerdings ist dann auch das „Sehen als etwas“ nichts anderes als ein besonderer Fall dieser Subjekt und Objekt vermittelnden Binnenspannung. Das spezifische individuelle Ich, das nach dem Warum seiner Erfahrung fragt, kommt nur als allgemeines, nämlich transzendentales Ich in Betracht. Und das Warum, nach dem gefragt wurde, stellt sich als allgemeines „so ist es eben“ heraus. Das sind immerhin Gründe, sich mit diesem Ergebnis nicht abzufinden. Welchen anderen Weg könnte es geben? Man könnte eine Argumentation über einen spezifischen Begriff des Bildes versuchen.

 

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2.

Das Sehen und das Bild

2.1

Warum sehe ich ein Bild und nicht vielmehr kein Bild?

Von der Allgemeinheit des Sehens richtet sich unsere Aufmerksamkeit jetzt auf die Gestaltetheit des Bildes. Nicht einfach Subjekt und Objekt werden im Vorgang des Sehens verknüpft, sondern gesehen wird eine als Bild gestaltete Form. Das heißt: Es gibt bereits so etwas wie eine Konkretion von Subjekt und Objekt, eine schlüsselhafte Repräsentanz des noch unbestimmten Etwas, die dann den Zugang zum Etwas erschließen soll. Für den Sinn dieses Umwegs über das Exemplarische lassen sich mehrere Gründe angeben. Einmal der, dass ja auch unsere Welt uns nicht als unbestimmtes Material begegnet und wir auch nicht mit ihr umgehen, als wäre sie ein solches. Vielmehr haben Formungs- und Verständnisprozesse immer schon gewirkt, an die wir uns anschließen und die unseren Umgang prägen. Sodann kommt hier auch das Moment des individuellen Erfahrens zur Geltung: Repräsentanzen üben ihre schlüsselhafte Funktion so aus, dass sie Individuen orientieren, nicht Allgemeinheiten konstituieren. Schließlich wird auch das Moment der Begründung schärfer gesehen. Denn nun kommt einem besonderen Wirklichkeitsbereich die Aufgabe zu, die gestellte Frage nach dem Warum des Sehens des Etwas zu beantworten. Diese Gründe spiegeln sich in der Logik des Bildes selbst.

2.2

Die Logik des Bildes und ihre Konsequenzen

Hinsichtlich der Frage nach dem Warum des Sehens von Etwas oder der Sichtbarkeit des Seins zeigen sich am Phänomen des Bildes unterschiedliche, miteinander interagierende Bezüge. Zuerst: Bild und Rahmen. Nehmen wir den Rahmen im weiten Sinne als Metapher, dann bedeutet das: Jedes Bild konstituiert sich als solches durch Abgrenzung, durch das, was dazu gehört und was nicht. Dabei ergibt sich diese Abgrenzung nicht zwingend aus dem „Gehalt“ des Bildes, der Schnitt kann durchaus willkürlich gemacht werden. Entscheidend ist, dass er gemacht wird. Man könnte sagen: Der Rahmen ist eine kategoriale Notwendigkeit für das Bild als Bild. Sodann: Bild und Abgebildetes. Stellt der Rahmen eine äußere und formale Grenze dar, so konstituiert sich das Bild innerhalb dieses Rahmens durch einen inneren und inhaltlichen Unterschied, nämlich durch das Verhältnis von dem, was es selbst ausmacht, zu dem, was es nicht ausmacht. Das liegt im Falle eines Abbildes rasch auf der Hand, gäbe es doch grundsätzlich die Möglichkeit, Bild und auf dem Bild Gezeigtes miteinander zu vergleichen. Doch auf einen „realistischen“ Vergleich muss und kann man sich nicht beschränken. Denn auch scheinbar realistisch referenzlose Bilder (zum Beispiel gegenstandslose Malerei) machen

 

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„etwas“ sichtbar – nur dass sich dieses Etwas allein über das Bild selbst erschließt. Das Verhältnis von Bild und Abgebildetem schließt also auch eine nicht anders als im Bild sichtbare Referenz ein. So gilt auch hier: Der Referenzcharakter des Bildes gehört zu seinem kategorialen Bestand. Drittens: Produzent und Rezipient. Das Bild als Bild ist, mit welchen Mitteln oder Intentionen auch immer, hervorgebracht (und wenn das Hervorbringen auch nur im Ausschneiden bestehen sollte). Und es funktioniert als Bild nur, wenn es auch wahr- und aufgenommen wird. Wenig Sinn hat es bekanntlich, jenseits des Bildes nach Aussageabsichten des Bildes zu fragen – wäre das erfolgreich, bräuchte man das Bild als Bild gar nicht; und worin dann allenfalls noch der Überschuss läge, würde sich alsbald als der wahre Eigenwert des Bildes herausstellen. Darum ist das Verhältnis von Produktion und Rezeption ein Kommunikationsverhältnis, in dem jeweils die virtuelle Präsenz des anderen zu beobachten ist: Der Produzent rezipiert produzierend und produziert rezipierend; und für den Rezipienten gilt dasselbe, nur mit umgekehrter Schwerpunktsetzung. Die Kommunikation über das Bild ist eine Kommunikation anhand des Bildes über mehr als das Bild, ohne doch das Medium des Bildes überschreiten zu können. In dieses Kommunikationsverhältnis sind nun alle weiteren geschichtlichen, sozialen und kulturellen Umstände wie Stil und Gewohnheit, Provokation und Kritik eingeschlossen. Das Bild existiert nur in dieser mehrfachen intersubjektiven Vermittlung. Alle drei Hinsichten gehören zum kategorialen Bestand des Bildes. Und alle drei lassen nachvollziehen, inwiefern dem Bild ein exemplarisch-repräsentativer Charakter für das Sehen von Etwas zukommt. Denn immer geht es um den Aufbau und die Überwindung einer Grenze. Einer Grenze, die, wohlgemerkt, nicht der allgemeine Unterschied zwischen Subjekt und Objekt ist, sondern zwischen Vermittlungsweisen von Subjekt und Objekt, die geformt sind und erfahren werden müssen. Das Sehen von Etwas ist daher ein Vorgang mehrfacher Vermittlung. Und es lässt sich vermuten, dass sich erst in dieser Vielfalt von Vermittlungen das Synthesisproblem des Sehens von Etwas einigermaßen befriedigend beantworten lässt. Die Frage ist, ob und wie sich diese Ebenen einander zuordnen lassen.

2.3

Das Bild, seine Vielfalt und seine Grenzen

Man kann versuchen, diese Mehrheit der Perspektiven mit Hilfe der Kulturphilosophie Ernst Cassirers zu ordnen. Cassirer selbst hat in seiner Philosophie der symbolischen Formen dem Bild keine explizite Aufmerksamkeit gezollt, sondern sich vor allem der Sprache, dem Mythos und der Wissenschaft als Feldern symbolischer Formenzugewandt. Erst in dem späten Versuch über den Menschen gibt es ein ausführliches Kapitel über die Kunst (Cassirer 1996: 212–261). Beides verknüpfend, kann eine der handlichen Zentralformeln Cassirers, dass es nämlich um

 

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das Beziehungsverhältnis von Sinn und Sinnlichkeit gehe, gut auch zur Analyse des Bildbegriffs verwendet werden (vgl. Cassirer 1994: 274f). Insbesondere dann, wenn man die kommunikative Seite, also das soziokulturelle Verhältnis von Produzenten und Rezipienten in den Mittelpunkt stellt: „Wie der Prozess der Sprache so ist auch der künstlerische Prozess ein dialogischer oder dialektischer. Auch dem Zuschauer kommt hierin keine bloß passive Rolle zu“ (Cassirer 1996: 229). Die kulturelle Gebrauchsweise des Bildes gibt also den umfassenden Rahmen ab, in dem sowohl die Darstellungs- als auch die Abgrenzungsfunktion des Bildes aufgefasst werden können. Die Selektion des Bildes als Bild schafft nämlich die Voraussetzung der Kommunikation – es geht um das Bild als solches; und diese Aussonderung ermöglicht den Umgang mit dem Dargestellten in seinem Verweisungscharakter auf Außerbildliches (bzw. in dessen Negation). Im Anschluss an Cassirer könnte man daher sagen, dass das Bild ein exemplarisches Medium darstellt, welches die Erschließung von Wirklichkeit ermöglicht und fördert. Indem es in einen kulturellen Auslegungs- und Rezeptionsmechanismus gestellt wird, ist der bei Kant beobachtete geheime Naturalismus der Synthesis überwunden. Insoweit stellt das Bild einen komplexen Repräsentanzmodus der Wirklichkeit überhaupt dar. Aber auch noch mehr als bloß einen unter anderen, welches dann ebenfalls noch eine neue und intensivere Sicht auf das Bild erlaubt. Betrachtet man die vielfachen Vermittlungsebenen, die sich im Bild kreuzen, dann zeigt sich in ihnen insofern eine gemeinsame Struktur, als sie alle mit dem Aufbau und der Überwindung von Grenzen zu tun haben: Drinnen und Draußen (der Rahmen und das Darüberhinaus), Darstellung und Dargestelltes (das Referenzproblem), Produktion und Rezeption (die Kommunikationssituation). In der Dialektik dieser Grenzen spiegelt sich die Tatsache, dass das Setzen des Bildes stets das Andere des Bildes mit heraufführt. In diesem Sinne konzentriert sich im Bild das Problem der Erschlossenheit von Wirklichkeit überhaupt, sofern sich diese Erschlossenheit stets in der Duplizität von Sehen und Etwas darstellt. Eben dieser Gedanke einer vom Bild selbst heraufgeführten Grenze und ihrer Überbrückung eröffnet nun eine neue Frage hinsichtlich des Funktionierens des Bildes. Denn so sehr diese Funktionsweise auch festgestellt werden und als Form und Ort kultureller Kommunikation aufgesucht werden kann, so sehr greift doch die hiermit angesprochene Dialektik weiter aus. Und so sehr mit der Selektion des Bild-Begriffes eine Besonderung vorgenommen ist, die für die Erschließung des Etwas, das zu sehen ist, Bedeutung besitzt, so sehr stellt sich Frage, wie sich diese Strukturdialektik nun selbst begründet. Lässt sie ihre eigene Genese noch einmal sichtbar werden? Welches ist der Horizont, in dem das Funktionieren des Ineinander von Vernunft (Sehen) und Bild verstanden werden kann?

 

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3.

Das Bild und das Unsichtbare

3.1

Warum scheint im Bild etwas auf und nicht vielmehr nichts?

In unseren Überlegungen haben wir jetzt zwei Stufen abgeschritten: Die anfängliche Frage nach dem Sehen von Etwas hat sich zur Frage nach dem Bild als Schlüssel zum Etwas präzisiert. Nun stellen wir die Frage nach dem Bild als Bild. Unter jenem ersten Aspekt ging es um die Synthesis, die im Sehen von Etwas vorliegt und die sich unwillkürlich einstellt. Kants Versuch, diesen Zusammenhang zu erläutern, haben wir vorsichtig befragt und unter leichten Naturalismusverdacht gestellt. Der Bildbegriff als Repräsentant des Synthesisproblems half uns, aus der einfachen Subjekt-Objekt-Dialektik herauszutreten und eine mehrfache Vermittlung zu entdecken, die über die Kultur chiffriert ist. In dem Maße, als wir der Dialektik gewahr wurden, die auch den Bildbegriff prägt, stellte sich aber die Frage nach einem Begriff dieser Dialektik selbst. Sie lässt sich genauer so fassen: Die Aussonderung des Bildes als Schlüssel zur Wirklichkeit bewegt sich in der – gewissermaßen horizontalen – Dialektik von Ausschnitt und Anderem, Darstellung und Dargestelltem, Produzent und Rezipient. Damit diese Dialektik aber funktioniert, muss ihr eine – sozusagen vertikale – Dialektik hinzugedacht werden, nämlich die von Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit. Die operationale Metapher für die in dieser Dialektik gemeinte Bewegung nenne ich: Aufscheinen. Aufscheinend zeigt sich das Bild als Bild (in den zugehörigen, mit seinem Begriff verbundenen Relationen). Damit wird unterstrichen, dass es weder die Natur noch die Kultur sein können, die letztlich für das Funktionieren des Bildes als Bild ausschlaggebend sind. Diesem Sachverhalt soll jetzt genauer nachgegangen werden.

3.2

Die Logik des Sichtbarwerdens und ihre Implikationen

Sichtbarwerden ist die dynamische Vollzugsform von Bild als Bild, also das, was geschieht, wenn sich die Dialektik von Drinnen und Draußen, von Darstellung und Dargestelltem, von Produktion und Rezeption vollzieht. Der späte Fichte hat in der Wissenschaftslehre von 1804 diese Dialektik des Bildbegriffs grundsätzlich reflektiert. Die genannte Fassung der Wissenschaftslehre zeichnet sich durch zwei Teile aus, die zwei gegenläufige Bewegungen vornehmen. Dies sind einerseits eine Wahrheits- und Vernunftlehre, die in einem aufsteigend-rekursiven Verfahren nachweist, wie die vielen Differenzen wahrheitstheoretisch in einer reinen Identität aufgehen, und andererseits – spannender noch – eine Erscheinungslehre, die die Entfaltung der Differenzen unter der Signatur der Einheit in einem absteigend-interpretativen Verfahren beobachtet. Besonders in dieser zweiten Bewegungsrichtung wird nun dem Bildbegriff eine

 

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wichtige Position zugewiesen. Wenn nämlich die erarbeitete Position der Identität eingenommen wird und nicht wieder zugunsten einer Subjekt-Objekt-Dialektik verlassen werden darf, dann besteht der Kern der Vernunfttätigkeit in einem solchen Machen, das ein Sich-Machen zum – Sehen ist; und was gesehen wird, ist das Bild. „Es entsteht hier zugleich eine absolute Urtätigkeit und Bewegung, als an sich: und ein Machen und Nachmachen dieser Urtätigkeit, als ihr Bild“ (Fichte 1971: 309). Die anschauend-tätige Vernunft konstituiert mithin das Bild – das Bild ist selbst der Ort der Vernunft, sie ist immer schon in es eingegangen. Und das kann auch gar nicht anders sein. Denn weder vermag die Vernunft ihr Anderes einfach selbst zu machen, noch kann die Sinnlichkeit als Ausgangspunkt für die Rekonstruktion der Vernunft gelten. Vielmehr gibt es dieses Entsprechungsverhältnis zwischen Vernunft und Bild, zwischen eigener vernünftiger Tätigkeit und dem, worin sich das Tätiggewordensein immer schon wiederfindet, gewissermaßen das Andere seiner selbst, das dann als solches wahrzunehmen, eben: zu sehen ist. All das, was als Etwas, als Sein, auftritt, erschließt sich über das Bild. Fichtes Aufstellung lehrt: Sichtbarwerden lässt sich nicht aus dem Sehen herleiten, so sehr auch das Sichtbare nur im Sehen zu sehen ist. Sichtbarwerden kann aber auch nicht von bereits Sichtbarem ausgehen, weder vom Bild noch vom Abgebildeten, um dann nur die Brücke zur anderen Seite zu schlagen. Zwar nimmt das Sichtbarwerden diese Dialektik der Grenze des Bildes, wie wir sie jetzt schon mehrfach erörtert haben, in Gebrauch, aber es geht nicht aus ihr hervor. Vielmehr muss das Sichtbarwerden aus dem Unsichtbaren entspringen. Das bedeutet aber: Dem Sichtbaren ist nicht nur eine Grenzdialektik inhärent, sondern darüber hinaus ein Widerspruch, eine Antinomie, die nicht aufgehoben und vermittelt werden kann. Diesem Gedanken möchte ich jetzt genauer nachgehen – und er wird uns nun auch auf Luther bringen, den wir jetzt in einer philosophisch vertieften Perspektive wahrnehmen. Vergewissern wir uns noch einmal unserer Ausgangsposition. Im Bild als Bild (also in der Begründung seiner Wirklichkeit erschließenden Funktion) ereignet sich Sichtbarwerden. Was sichtbar wird, muss zuvor oder in anderer Hinsicht unsichtbar sein. Wie ist nun dieses Verhältnis von Unsichtbarkeit, Nicht-Sichtbarkeit und Sichtbarkeit zu verstehen? Auszuschließen ist die einfache (obwohl zunächst naheliegende) Deutung, dass Unsichtbarkeit gewissermaßen nur die Negation von Sichtbarkeit darstellt, wie die Vorsilbe ‚Un-‘ nahelegt. Dies ist nicht das (wesentlich) Unsichtbare, sondern etwas (temporär) Nicht-Sichtbares, etwa wenn etwas aus den Augen entschwindet, seinen Aggregatzustand verändert oder ins Finstere rückt. Doch für diese Negation ist die Sichtbarkeit ja bereits vorausgesetzt, so dass beide Ausdrücke, Sichtbarkeit und Nicht-Sichtbarkeit, sich auf dasselbe Phänomen beziehen. Die hier gemeinte Unsichtbarkeit im genauen Sinn ist aber das Gegenüber zur Sichtbarkeit überhaupt, aus dem sie selbst entspringt. Nur was in die-

 

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sem Sinne unsichtbar ist, kann sichtbar werden. Das ist meine These, die im Folgenden erörtert werden soll. Jedoch: Wie kann man von dieser Unsichtbarkeit sprechen, wenn sie doch erst durch die Sichtbarkeit und ihr Werden erschlossen wird? Sie kann ja auch gar nichts an sich „sein“, jenseits des Sichtbarwerdens. Kann denn die Unsichtbarkeit in der Sichtbarkeit sichtbar werden? Ja, wenn klar ist, dass die Dialektik in der Sichtbarkeit, also die Dialektik des Bildes, selbst widersprüchlich ist – so dass in dieser (ich sagte vorhin: horizontalen) Dialektik des Bildes die (dort schon vertikal genannte) antinomische Dialektik von Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit aufspringt. Festzumachen ist das an solchen Bildern, die als Bilder des Widerspruchs, der Negation zu verstehen sind. Wenn es also nicht darum geht, dass an dem Bild seine Grenze aufscheint gegenüber der „Wirklichkeit“, sondern dass der Widerspruch, die Negation selbst ins Bild gefasst ist. Der dann richtig belehrte Blick sieht, wie im Bild der Negation das Sichtbarwerden selbst sichtbar wird.

3.3

Christus, das Bild des unsichtbaren Gottes

Nicht zufällig ist es, dass die Artikulation dieses Sichtbarwerdens in der Religion geschieht. Die philosophischen Erwägungen, von denen wir uns bis jetzt leiten ließen, führen auf die Erwartungsstruktur, von der her die Negativität des Sichtbarwerdens aufschlussreich werden kann. Das ist, wie wir gemerkt haben, ein intellektuell nicht gerade trivialer Vorgang. Und in jeder Philosophie, die sich mit dem Phänomen beschäftigt, taucht ein Platzhalter für die Unbeherrschbarkeit des Erscheinens auf. Die Religion unterscheidet sich nun insofern funktional von der methodisch strenger angelegten Philosophie, als sie die Erwartungshaltung des Erscheinens als eine ihr eigentümliche hegt. Das ließe sich durch die Religionsgeschichte hindurch an vielen Beispielen zeigen. Aber die Religion hat auch, durch ihre Geschichte hin, mit dem Phänomen zu tun gehabt, die Klarheit und Präzision, mit der das Unsichtbare sichtbar wird, zu erringen und festzuhalten. Schon der Gedanke der Schöpfung der Welt durch Gott verlangt hohe Genauigkeit, um ihn von einer bloßen Verdopplung eines kosmologischen Werdens zu unterscheiden, und ähnliches gilt für Epiphanien und Offenbarungen aller Art. Auch der Religion wohnt die – scheinbar selbstverständliche – Tendenz inne, vom Sichtbaren auszugehen und das Unsichtbare als von dort aus erschlossenes Jenseits aufzufassen. Wo das aber geschieht, geht nicht nur der Sinn der Religion verloren, es verdirbt auch das Verständnis des diesseitig Sichtbaren – und beides zusammen bedeutet nicht weniger, als dass der Mensch in seinem Unheil zugrunde geht, weil damit sowohl der Sinn des Sichtbaren als auch seine eigene Haltung zum schlechthin Unsichtbaren verdorben sind.

 

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Martin Luthers Formulierungen entstammen scheinbar einem anderen Zusammenhang, sie sind aber für das damit angesprochene Problem hochinteressant. Sie gehen von der Heilsfrage aus, die aber in einen erkenntnistheoretischen oder sinntheoretischen Kontext hinein verfolgt werden muß. Dabei verläuft die Argumentation – sachlich und zeitlich – auf zwei verschiedenen Ebenen. In der Heidelberger Disputation, zu der Luther im Jahre 1518 von seinem Ordenskapitel eingeladen wurde, stellt Luther die Frage nach der Gewissheit des menschlichen Heils in den Mittelpunkt. Die Heilsgewissheit, so seine dezidierte These, kann weder auf der Subjektivität des Menschen beruhen noch Konsequenz seiner Taten sein. Denn auf dieser Basis würde er das Sichtbare, den Horizont seines Lebens, zum maßgeblichen Ausgangspunkt für das Unsichtbare, Gott, machen. Dabei entschwindet Gott aber in die bloße Negation der Sichtbarkeit, so dass positive Aussagen über den an sich Unaussagbaren nur mittels Analogiebildungen aus der endlichen Welt vorgenommen werden können, die dann freilich stets und ganz unter dem Vorzeichen der Untriftigkeit stehen – so dass sich Gott erst recht entzieht: er ist unsichtbar und unbegreifbar und kann nur (von der kirchlichen Autorität, die aber auch keine anderen Gründe hat) behauptet werden. Diejenigen Theologen, die ein solches Vorgehen rechtfertigen wollen – natürlich aus dem lauterstem Anliegen der möglichst leichten Zugänglichkeit des Religiösen für die Menschen –, nennt Luther Theologi gloriae. Von ihnen gilt, dass sie „invisibilia Dei, per ea, quae facta sunt“, begreifen wollen (LDStA 1, 52). Dagegen heißt nur der zu Recht ein Theologe, der „visibilia et posteriora Dei, per passionibus et crucem conspecta“ erkennt (ibid.). Darum trägt er auch den Namen Theologus crucis. Während der Theologus gloriae das Unsichtbare vom Sichtbaren aus zu rekonstruieren versucht und dabei alles verwirrt, weil er die Sichtbarkeit des Unsichtbaren eben nicht versteht, gilt vom Theologus crucis: „dicit id quod res est“ (ibid.), er trifft also die Sache, versteht, dass das Sichtbare gerade in seinem erscheinenden Widerspruch die Erscheinung des Unsichtbaren ist. Gute Theologie ist dann eine solche, die diese Wahrnehmungshaltung lehrt; die entsprechende aufschließende Erfahrung muss freilich jeder Christenmensch selbst machen, die kann ihm die Theologie weder abnehmen noch vormachen. Die Gestalt des erschließenden Widerspruchs ist Jesus Christus, der Leidende und Gekreuzigte. Er vertritt in dem an ihm selbst erscheinenden Widerspruch von Tod und Leben das unendliche Leben Gottes und das Leben aus Gott. Die an Christus orientierte, ihn als Bild des unsichtbaren Gottes anschauende Religion ist damit ein Schlüssel zur Wirklichkeit des Bildes als der Erschließung der Wirklichkeit überhaupt. Man könnte und müsste diese Einsicht nun auch religionsgeschichtlich rekonstruieren, insbesondere was die Bedeutung des Kreuzes Jesu für die Gotteserkenntnis angeht. Das kann selbstverständlich hier nicht geschehen. Mir ging es zunächst erst einmal um ein Verständnis der Schlüsselfunktion der Christus-

 

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erkenntnis als Erkenntnis des Deus absconditus in passionibus. Die Unsichtbarkeit muss hier präzis als Verborgenheit gedacht werden. In dieser Verborgenheit wurzelt die Unsichtbarkeit, die sichtbar wird und sichtbar macht. Dass dabei eine enge Verbindung von Erkenntnistheorie und Soteriologie auftaucht, ist nicht zufällig. Denn die Begründung der Sichtbarkeit des Bildes vollzieht sich in einer individuellen Erfahrung, die zugleich eine definitive Orientierung über das eigene Leben in der Welt vor Gott einschließt. Damit sind unsere beiden vorhin geäußerten Kriterien, nämlich die Individualität der Erfahrung und die Besonderheit der Begründung, erfüllt. Das Bild des gekreuzigten Christus ist das Schlüsselbild für das Sichtbarwerden des Unsichtbaren. Allerdings kommt nun noch eine weitere Wendung des Gedankens ins Spiel, und die führt uns auf eine andere Ebene der Argumentation über die Verborgenheit Gottes bei Luther. Denn Verborgenheit und Erscheinung im Modus der Negation in eins zu setzen, also von einer absconditas in passionibus zu sprechen, ist keineswegs eine Operation, die sich von selbst versteht. Vielmehr stellt sich diese Einheit ja selbst her und ist nur im Vollzug der Sichtbarkeit präsent. Allerdings kann nun dieses Sichtbarwerden nicht abermals nach dem Muster der Sichtbarmachung eines Unsichtbaren gedeutet werden. Das ergäbe entweder einen infiniten Regress, der die Schlüsselhaftigkeit dieses Erscheinens sogleich wieder dementierte, oder eine Wiederholung derselben Begründungsfigur, die damit auf der Stelle treten würde. Stattdessen legt sich der folgende Gedanke nahe. Wenn streng von der Ereignishaftigkeit des Erscheinens Christi als Bild des verborgenen Gottes ausgegangen werden muss, dann kommen zur Erläuterung dieses Ereignisses drei Umstände ins Spiel. Erstens muss ein Horizont dieses Sichereignens gedacht werden, in dem es sich vollzieht. Zweitens kann dieser Horizont nicht selbst wieder Ereignis sein; das wäre widersprüchlich. Drittens kann dieser zuständliche Horizont nicht von Gott verschieden sein. Stellt man nun diese drei Bedingungen zusammen, dann ergibt sich Luthers Gedanke vom Deus absconditus, wie er ihn vor allem in De servo arbitrio 1525 zur Geltung gebracht hat. Wenn in Christus Gott erscheint, dann kann die Herkunft Christi nur Gott sein. Wenn das Erscheinen aber das Erscheinen Gottes ist, dann gibt es keinen erscheinenden Gott anderswo. Diese absconditas Dei ist eine von der absconditas in passionibus unterschiedene, eben nicht zur Erscheinung kommende, aber als Hintergrund der Erscheinung notwendig zu denkende Verborgenheit Gottes. Die erscheinende Verborgenheit nimmt als verschwiegene Voraussetzung eine nicht und niemals erscheinende Verborgenheit in Anspruch, von der sie sich durch ihre sichtbarmachende Erscheinung unterscheidet, ohne dass dieses Unterschiedene als solches noch einmal benannt werden könnte. Vielmehr ist mit dieser Verborgenheit stets als zurückgelassene Herkunft der Erscheinung zu rechnen. Von diesen Überlegungen her lassen sich die wichtigsten Aussagen verstehen, die Luther in De servo arbitrio über den verborgenen Gott trifft. Als der defini-

 

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tiv nicht erscheinende bleibt Gott unerkennbar; erkennbar ist stattdessen der im Widerspruch erscheinende Gott, der aktual den verborgen bleibenden Gott hinter sich lässt. Für den Aufschluss über diesen Sachverhalt ist aber die Erfahrung vom erscheinenden Gott unerlässlich. Wer diese Erfahrung nicht macht (und das ist immerhin, da es sich um eine individuelle Erfahrung handelt, nicht ausgeschlossen), der bleibt – so sagt es der, der Gott in der Erscheinung erkannt hat – mit dem unerkennbaren und unbegreiflichen Gott konfrontiert, unter welchen Larven er auch immer subjektiv imaginiert werden mag. Ja, man könnte sogar annehmen, dass die Suche nach Gott, die auf der Basis des eigenen Vermögens unternommen wird, zu nichts anderem als zu diesem unerscheinend verborgenen Gott führt, sei es auf der via negationis oder der via exaltationis. Der Gott, der analogice erschlossen werden soll, ist und bleibt der unerkennbar verborgene Gott, dem gegenüber es auch keine Heilsgewissheit gibt (vgl. Korsch 1989: 234–241).

4.

Religion und Bild: Verborgenheit macht sichtbar

Wir haben einen Weg hinter uns gebracht, der mit der Frage nach dem Warum des Sehens von etwas begann, also einer bestimmten Fassung der Synthesis, die all unserem Erkennen, sinnlich und begrifflich, zugrunde liegt. Wir haben gesehen, dass es sich um eine Verwiesenheit des Verschiedenen aufeinander handeln muss, die in der Sichtbarkeit des Etwas ergriffen wird. Allerdings stellt sich die Frage, von woher diese Verwiesenheit sich selbst erschließt. Ist es der allgemeine Rahmen des natürlich-gesellschaftlichen Lebens, in dem sie sich gründend zur Darstellung bringt? Kants Konzentration aufs humane Bewusstsein und seine weltlichen Lebens­ umstände legt nahe, dass es sich nicht einfach um einen vorliegenden Tatbestand der Welt handeln kann. „Bild“ heißt dann die Vermutung, die für die Erschlossenheit der Synthesis nach Schlüsselerfahrungen suchen lässt. Sie lassen sich in Strukturen und Vollzügen identifizieren, in denen Sinn und Sinn­lichkeit miteinander zur Sprache kommen, also von kultureller Art sind. Doch diese Erfahrungen bleiben, sowenig sie abgewertet werden dürfen oder ihnen widersprochen werden müsste, noch unvollständig. Es kommt auf eine noch stärker zu zentrierende, durchaus in Form individueller Erfahrung sich darstellende Schlüsselhaftigkeit des Bildes für die grundsätzliche Interpretation des Erscheinens an. Eben dafür spielt die Religion eine maßgebliche Rolle – und insbesondere eine Fassung der Religion, die den Widerspruch des Erscheinens in sich aufgenommen hat. Mittels dieser Beschreibung könnte man verschiedenen religiösen Bildgebrauch analysieren, wobei sich die hier eher kategorial orientierten Überlegungen dann auch hermeneutisch überprüfen lassen würden.

 

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Bibliographie Cassirer, Ernst (1994), Philosophie der symbolischen Formen, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Cassirer, Ernst (1996), Versuch über den Menschen. Einführung in eine Philosophie der Kultur (1944), Hamburg: Meiner. Fichte, Johann Gottlieb (1971), Wissenschaftslehre (1804), in Fichtes Werke, hg. v. I.H. Fichte, Band X, Nachdruck der Ausgabe Bonn 1834/1835, Berlin: de Gruyter, 87–314. Kant, Immanuel (1968), Kritik der reinen Vernunft, in: Immanuel Kant, Werke in zehn Bänden, hg. v. W. Weischedel, Bd. 3, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Korsch, Dietrich (1989), Glaubensgewissheit und Selbstbewusstsein, Tübingen: Mohr. Luther, Martin (1518), Disputatio Heidelbergae habita/Heidelberger Disputation, in Martin Luther, Lateinisch-Deutsche Studienausgabe, Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt 2006– 2009, LDStA 1, 35–69. Luther, Martin (1525), De servo arbitrio/Vom unfreien Willensvermögen, in Martin Luther, Lateinisch-Deutsche Studienausgabe, Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt 2006–2009, LDStA 1, 219–661.

 

 

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Homo invisibilis

The struggle between iconoclasts and iconodules has primarily been centred on pictures of God and the divine. Imago homini – the image of Man – has not been an issue in the same way as imago dei. Initially, this is no surprise. After all, human beings are visible, and their visibility may easily be represented in a picture, a painting or a sculpture. However, is the case really that simple? When the question about the visibility of God leads to the question of who and what God is, is it not reasonable to expect the question of the visibility of man to lead us to the question as to what man really is? Is it not possible that the question of man’s visibility raises the question of his humanity, more or less in the same way that the question concerning the visibility of God raises the question as to the divinity of God? These questions have triggered my considerations in what follows.

1. Through the centuries, a major point of reference in the discussion about the visibility of God has been the second commandment in Exod 20:4–5: You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them.

The discussion has swung back and forth as to whether it is picture-making or just the worship of pictures that is prohibited. The former position may be radicalized to say that it is pictures of any kind that are forbidden, and not only pictures of God and divine beings. A more moderate position is to focus on religious pictures only. What is prohibited, then, is to make pictures in which God is made visible in a kind of resemblance to anything that is visible in this world. The reason for this is by implication that God is transcendent and, as a consequence, invisible.

 

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God’s invisibility and transcendence is a complicated topic in the Old Testament. There is, again, a decidedly radical line of thinking about the transcendence of God, and a more moderate way. The radical position is found for example in Exod 3, when Moses asks God about his name and gets the enigmatic answer, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you’” (Exod 3:14). This verse has been read as an expression of the inaccessibility of God, and hence as a parallel to the idea developed in the middle ages, that God is impossible to define. There is an evident connection between Exod 3 and Exod 33, where Moses urges the Lord: “Show me your glory.” The answer is: “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the LORD, in your presence […]. But you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live” (Exod 33:18– 20). As a kind of compromise, Moses is allowed to see the Lord from behind, but not from the front, that is: not allowed to see his face. The glory of God, his kabod or doxa (LXX), is in this text synonymous with God’s face. Although Moses is not allowed to see the face of God, God in fact has a face, and he has a back. There is, to a certain extent, a degree of resemblance between God and man in Exod 33. Face is on the other hand not simply visible features or traits. Face is tantamount to glory – to doxa – and the glory of God may be seen indirectly through the work of his hands and his kindness towards his people. This is the reason that God intervenes in the first place in Exod 3. He will put an end to his people’s suffering in Egypt. He makes himself present to Moses in the burning bush, and then says: I have surely seen the affliction of My people who are in Egypt, and have given heed to their cry because of their taskmasters, for I am aware of their sufferings. So I have come down to deliver them from the power of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey (Exod 3:7–8).

God however comes not merely down from above; he comes from the past, from history and from the beginning of all things. Even if it is easy to be wrapped up in thought over the enigmatic words of Exod 3:14 we must not forget how they continue: God also said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, ‘The LORD, the God of your fathers – the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob – has sent me to you. This is my name forever, the name you shall call me from generation to generation’” (Exod 3:15).

 

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Then, God has a name after all, and the name is the God of the fathers, of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, which is to say that the name of God is a story about God and his people. God is indirectly visible through his redeeming actions towards his people in history and may even appear in the shape of a burning bush, a pillar of cloud and a pillar of fire (Exod 13:21). As a pillar of cloud, God is both visible and hidden. Nor is the God of the fathers only the deliverer, but the lawgiver and the judge as well. Yet there is a primordial connection between the glory of God and his deliverance, as we see in Exod 3, and for this reason Moses prays to him, “Show me Your glory” (Exod 33:18). This prayer reverberates through the Old Testament in times of difficulty and distress, as when the pious psalmist breaks into a desperate cry: “Why, Lord, do you stand far off? Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?” (Ps 10:1). Bad times mean that God is hiding his face: “How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me?” (Ps 13:1). When God shows his face, his doxa, then difficulties and distress come to an end. The invisibility of God is an undisputed premise in the New Testament also, and Paul refers to it several times. In Rom 1:20, he speaks of God’s invisible qualities, which are his eternal power and divine nature. Although his power and nature may be clearly seen and understood from what has been made, God himself is invisible. This is clearly in line with the Old Testament. Paul also abides by the Old Testament prohibition against divine images. There is no reason to mistrust Luke’s rendering of Paul’s speech at the Areopagus from this point of view, when he reproaches the Athenians, saying that “we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone – an image made by human design and skill” (Acts 17:29). There may be more than simply invisibility at play here, in so far as it seems to be the material substance of the pictures – gold, silver, stone – which causes problems. One may be tempted to read the principle finitum non capax infiniti into this speech, but that would be anachronistic. The point is simply that God is spirit, not matter. Although Paul moves within common Jewish ways of thinking, he also modifies the Jewish iconoclasm in a specifically Christian in saying, in Col 1:15, “the Son is the image of the invisible God”. This point is again stated in 2 Cor 4:4, when he says that the light of the gospel displays the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. This is without doubt an intended commentary to Exod 33, where Moses is forbidden to see the face of God, which is the glory of God. That glory of God is now visible, in the glory of Christ, which is the gospel. This glory however, is the glory of Christ crucified, which is a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles. So the invisibility of God is not simply nullified in Christ, it has only been twisted into another direction. It is a dialectical visibility.

 

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To see the glory of God in the image of Christ, however, is to be transformed by this sight into a likeness to his image: “And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit” (2 Cor 3:18). There is a connection between the face of God in Christ and the face of man, between the doxa of God in Christ and the doxa of man, between the glory of God in Christ and the glory of man. Hence the visibility of man may not be so simple after all. It is a glory that is dialectical as well as eschatological. The soteriological connection between the glory of God and the crucified Christ is prominent in the Gospel of John as well. The fulfillment of the mission of Jesus is that his disciples come to see his glory (John 17:24). When Jesus is glorified, God is glorified in him (John 13:31; 17:1), which is tantamount to God’s glorifying his name (John 12:28). The glorifying of God through Jesus is fulfilled in the death and resurrection of Jesus (John 12:23–24.31–33). The standpoint from which these connections are seen and understood is however that of the believers, who after the resurrection have received the Holy Spirit. It is a spiritual seeing. These connections between the glory of God, the glory of Christ and as a consequence the glory of man may of course be interpreted in different ways and in different directions. This is apparent already in the New Testament. The basic correspondence between Paul and John does not exclude that there are important differences too (cf. Jörg Frey: 2013). However, this is not our immediate concern. The point is the triangular connection between God, Christ and man, and the convergence between glory and truth. The glory of God, of Christ and of man tells us nothing if not that Christ is the true image of God and of man.

2. In the Middle Ages, God is not only understood as invisible, but as indefinable as well. He cannot be defined, at least not according to Thomas of Aquinas, yet we may speak of him with regard to his works (Gerhard Ebeling: 1977, 97ff). Even if we cannot apply words with reference to this world unequivocally to God, we may apply human words to God by analogy. But what of man? Is he definable? What it means to define has been a highly controversial issue from antiquity to the present day, but here it is sufficient to say that to define man is to express in words what he truly is. How can we define man, and what bearing have questions concerning his definition on images of him? With regard to God and divinity, esse and essentia are one and the same thing. With regard to man, however, esse and essentia are not identical. We may differentiate between homo and humanitas; man participates in his essence, without being unified with it. Therefore, he can be defined (Ebeling; 1977, 112f). There is,

 

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however, a limit, and that is the definition of man as an individual. The individual lies beyond the limits of a definition (Ebeling: 1997, 115ff). Let us bear this in mind and turn to Luther’s thesis De homine. In his Disputatio de homine, Luther begins with the definition of man as the “animal rationale, sensitivum, corporeum” (Thesis 1). This is, according to Luther, man seen from a philosophical point of view. Philosophy, however, is in these theses not an academic profession, but the quintessence of human wisdom, of sapientia humana. Luther’s definition represents a long and well-worn philosophical tradition, which may be traced back at least to Aristotle, in so far as animal rationale is commonly regarded as equivalent to Aristotle’s definition of man as zoon logon echon. Aristotle’s definition differs, however, from the definition of man as animal rationale in so far his scope is much broader. His definition is not restricted to the field of logic, as becomes the case later on, but belongs within the field of politics. Zoon logon echon is closely connected to the notion of man as zoon politikon. It conveys not only man’s rationality in his ability to think and speak, but also his ability to constitute a specific kind of human society. Man is a rational being in so far as he is a sociable agent in the perspective of the polis and the political. In Aristotle, rationality is more than pure logic (Ebeling: 1977, 73ff). Far from dismissing the philosophical definition of man, Luther affirms it. Man is in fact a rational animal, and his rationality is what distinguishes him from other creatures. Luther is in no way constrained when he sets out to praise man’s reason. The reason is inventrix et gubernatrix, inventor and conductor of all human skill, wisdom and power in this world (Thesis 5), and Luther even refers to the Bible as confirmation of this praise (Thesis 7). According to Holy Scripture, man’s reason is installed as a sun and a divine power in man’s way of ruling the world (Thesis 8). Moreover, Luther states explicitly that the fall of man did not put an end to this majestic greatness of the human reason. The greatness of the human reason is still valid also post lapsum (Thesis 9). So far, the reason of man is the glory of man, it is his doxa and his face, philosophically speaking. However, Luther modifies this definition in two important but also quite different ways. The first modification is that the definition of man as animal rationale is known to reason only from experience, from the works of reason. It is not something that reason knows a priore, but only a posteriore (Thesis 10). In what way and to what extent man is a reasonable animal is an empirical question, and because philosophy understands the rationality of man only through its consequences, the understanding – and not merely the definition – of man is rudimentary and insecure (Thesis 19). There is no agreement in philosophy regarding body and soul, matter and spirit, and even his own thoughts and decisions seem to be beyond man’s own powers (Thesis 18). In short: man is an enigma and a mystery, in spite of his being a rational animal. Reason does not make him transparent to himself.

 

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The root of this limitation is that philosophy knows neither the causa efficia nor the causa finalis of man (Thesis 13). This, however, is the field of theology, which is able to define man in a far more profound sense, starting with man as God’s creation (Thesis 21). From this point on Luther unfolds a brief summary of the history of salvation (Thesis 22–23). At first glance, the reader may get the impression that theology has all the answers to philosophy’s unsolved questions. But this is far too simple: the reading of the salvation history does not supply us with the right answers to the philosophical questions. It only explains why man cannot solve the problems, the reason being that he is subjected to sin, death and the devil (Thesis 25). And then the salvation history takes a logical but nevertheless surprising turn as Luther asserts that the theological definition of man culminates in Paul’s statement that man is saved by faith alone (Thesis 32). This is, according to Luther, a brief definition of man: Man is justified by faith. This means that man, body and soul is to God just matter to man’s eschatological character (Thesis 35). This is Luther’s second modification of the philosophical definition of man as a reasonable animal. From a theological point of view the glory of man, his face, his doxa, is not his achievements in this world, but what God does for him by grace. Thus, man is not identified with his own works. He is not simply what he does by the help of his reason. Basically, man is what he receives through grace. Therefore, it is impossible to define him a posteriori in this world. The visibility of man lies in the future. It is God’s eschatological act. So from both a philosophical as well as a theological point of view, the existence of man is enigmatic and a mystery. This is tantamount to saying that every definition of man is open-ended and cannot or should not be closed. The point is not, as in Pico della Mirandola, that man is undefined and hence must define himself. The point is that man is indefinable. From the time of Luther to the present day, the definition of man as a rational animal has been challenged from different points of view. The definition of him as an animal has indeed been confirmed and even strengthened with the help of Darwin and modern genetics, but man’s reason has grown more and more dubious thanks once again to Darwin, and a chain of thinkers from Freud to Foucault. Today there is no common definition of man, and Luther’s statement on the philosophical definition of man as uncertain and insecure is more appropriate than ever. On the one hand we have Nietzsche’s assertion that man is “das nicht festgestellte Tier”, or the undetermined animal, which is in line with the biotechnological definition of man as his own experiment. On the other hand, modernity is characterized by a series of attempts to close the definition, saying that man is just a “survival machine for its genes” or a mere “social construction” – to name extreme examples. In short, the definition of man as the undetermined animal is open to a range of different attempts to close the definition.

 

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According to Luther, the philosophical definition of man has to be made a posteriori, out of experience. Experience, however, is not only scientific experience, but our social experience as well. How man is treated by man is also a way of defining him. It is no exaggeration to say that the 20th century is the high tide of cruelty above all other centuries. Men and women, young and old have been slaughtered on a scale hitherto unknown in history. What is more this cruelty has been indulged as if a human life were of no value or importance at all. Life has been snuffed out with indifference, as was shown in the trial of Adolf Eichmann. Any attempt to define man today has to face this cruelty of indifference. In the 20th century, the understanding of man has been destabilized both in theory and in practice. Humanity as the quality of being human has become an open question, in a ground-breaking way unheard of in previous centuries. How 20th-century art, and especially 20th-century painting has responded to this destabilization is a fascinating question, but a question that cannot be treated properly in a brief article. A short visit to two 20th-century painters, however, may suggest at least one important point.

3. Figurative art was challenged, transformed and abandoned in the 20th century. This has to do with formal and technical developments, developments in the understanding of viewing and perceiving: and it has to do with the social context and function of art – just to mention a few keywords. However, it also has to do with the destabilization of the understanding of man. Even figurative painters have to a certain extent omitted human figures from their pictures, as Anselm Kiefer usually does. In his paintings after the Second World War, Kiefer constantly addresses the human condition, but man is very often visually absent, or almost so. Yet some figurative painters have persistently insisted on human figuration as an important element of modern art, among them the British painter Francis Bacon (1909–1992) and the Dane Peter Brandes (1944). They differ from each other of course in approach and style, but if we take a look at them side by side, we may nevertheless discover a common feature which may be a basic feature in the way man is depicted in 20th-painting. The humanity of man is no longer visually evident any more, and this is a fact that 20th-century painters could not ignore. Hence they have had to render visible that is basically invisible in such a way that the invisibility, or the problem of visibility, is addressed at the same time. They have had to express a view on the humanity of man in a way that challenges any attempt to take that humanity for granted. Let us look at Francis Bacon from this point of view.

 

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Bacon’s œuvre seems to be all about the human body. To a certain extent this is almost a truism, in so far as the visibility of man is his embodiedness. However, the human body assumes an unusual significance in Bacon’s paintings, and this significance is a key to his understanding of man and the human condition. Bacon’s bodies are often spoken of as violated, mutilated and dismembered, showing the brutality of the 20th century. A brutal century calls for brutal pictures. Bacon, however, denied that his pictures were violent. “I’m always very surprised when people speak of violence in my work. […] life is so violent, so much more violent than anything I can do!” (Archimbaud: 1993, 151). Even if it is wise not to trust a painter when he is speaking of his own work, I think Bacon’s statement here is valid. If we take his twisted and distorted bodies as simply representative of a brutalized world in all its cruelty, or as humanist proclamations of non-violence, we may have missed the point. Bacon wanted his pictures to be beautiful, and he was in love with the beauty of the human body, even if it was in an unfamiliar way. Therefore, we have to approach his pictures from another angle. Bacon was no incidental atheist: he was, as his old friend Michael Peppiatt puts is, a vehemently atheistic artist. He was nevertheless obsessively occupied with basic imagery in the Christian tradition, not least the crucifixion (IVAM: 2003, 32). His preoccupation with Christian themes disappeared in the second half of his career, but he was still taken up with ancient myth and literature. “Often in my painting”, he once said, “I have this sensation of following a long call from Antiquity” (ibid., 160). What he had in mind was not primarily the visual remains of Antiquity, pictures, sculptures and so on, but the literary legacy. In Aeschylus and other ancient writers he found a poetic visuality that triggered his own pictorial imagination. Bacon was in short a heavy reader and a most erudite painter. It is said that by his bedside there always seemed to be a copy of the Oresteia along with Eliot’s Waste Land, van Gogh’s Letters and Proust in English and French (ibid.). With regard to so widely read an artist as Bacon, it is natural to approach his pictures as a kind of philosophical statement, as does Kosme de Barañano, when he says with regard to some of Bacon’s pictures that they are existential icons, or x-rays of the human soul. They are icons of the nothingness of existence, images of existential emptiness (ibid., 22). This reading of Bacon’s paintings as expressing a sort of atheist existentialism is not amiss, but it overlooks the importance of the body: and Bacon repeatedly emphasized that his paintings meant nothing. I am not an expressionist, he said, after all, I have nothing to express (ibid., 128). If anyone asked him what his pictures meant, he would retort: “I have no idea.” This was not just the usual artistic coquetry. Bacon vehemently denied that his paintings illustrated anything or were meant to be read as narratives. The moment you start to elaborate on the story in a picture, he said, the boredom sets in, and the story talks louder than the paint (ibid., 124). In short, his paintings neither illustrate nor make a story, nor a statement.

 

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So to start with, we have to let the paint speak, and go no further. But about what does the paint speak? This way of posing the question displays, however, the narrative mistake all over again. Speaking is not always about something, for instance a thing that has happened or an act that has been performed. The speech may also be an act in itself, and that is the way I think the paint speaks in Bacon’s pictures; they are speech acts. When we speak of a thing, the words become transparent. We “see” through them as through a pair of spectacles. The words withdraw in favour of the objects which they denote. In a speech act, on the other hand, the words do not become transparent, they do not withdraw. They stay in focus because they are in themselves an act. They strike the hearer and transform the situation in which he finds himself. When paint speaks, then the process between the painting and the viewer is the crux. Even if nothing goes on in the picture, something definitely goes on between the picture and the viewer, and that is what Bacon aims at. The picture is meant to strike you not in your intellect or your brain, but in your nervous system (IVAM: 2003, 186; Ernst van Alphen: 1992, 32). It is meant to affect you as a sense experience. Sensation is a word that Bacon frequently used when speaking of his paintings. He mentioned orders of sensation, levels of sensation and domains of sensation. What he meant by these expressions is to a certain extent enigmatic, and Deleuze has laid out at least four different interpretations (Alphen: 1992, 30). It is not necessary to go into that debate in detail. Let us just take into consideration Bacon’s insistence on the paintings as sensations or sensational experiences and his focus on the human body. When a painting affects the viewer in his or her nervous system, the viewer is marked as a sense organ, and this is exactly what the body becomes in Bacon’s paintings: an integrated sense organ (ibid., 32). Hence Bacon explores the human body as a sense organ, not only intellectually, in a collection of theses about the body, but by affecting the viewer’s own bodily sensation. It is a correspondence between what is going on in the painting and what is going on between the painting and the viewer, or what is happening when the painting impacts on the viewer. The pictures are meant to hit you almost biologically, in the stomach. From this point of view sensations are by their nature violent. They attack you, affect you, make you shiver; make you lose control over yourself. Sensations may be sweet, but they may also be painful, and Bacon with his bent towards a sado-masochistic sexuality was well aware of the connection between pleasure and pain. His bodies are often characterized what appear to be convulsive movements. To have sense experiences is to lose control and to a certain extent to lose yourself. His pictures undermine the modern idea of a self or soul in charge of itself and its body. As an embodied being, I am not in charge of myself. I am instead constantly losing myself.

 

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But is there a self to lose? If we say that man is no more than a sense organ, we seem to imply that the self is abolished. Has Bacon simply removed rationality from the definition of man as an animal rationale, sensitivum, corporeum, so that what is left is a definition of man as nothing but an animal sensitivum, corporeum? And if so, is this not the quintessence of atheism? Bacon was an outspoken atheist, but had he restricted himself to painting atheistic statements, illustrating atheist anthropology, boredom would surely have been the outcome. However, his pictures are anything but boring, and that is because the self is not abolished. It is destabilized, and this destabilization is driven to extremes when the body is lost. Let us take a closer look at one of his triptychs. A triptych is a type of Christian altarpiece which goes far back into Antiquity. It has a central panel displaying the main subject and two side panels which relate to the main panel in one way or another. Very often, but not always, the crucifixion occupies the central panel. Bacon used the triptych as a formal frame throughout his career. He was of course well aware of the Christian background, and sometimes gave his triptychs the title crucifixion, even if there were no depiction of a crucifixion in them. He did not, however, choose the crucifixion as a Christian symbol. Nor did he choose it for atheistic reasons, in order to rebut a Christian worldview. As he once said: “I haven’t found another subject so far that has been as helpful in covering certain areas of human feeling and behaviour” (IVAM: 2003, 38).

Fig. 1: Francis Bacon: Triptych May–June, 1973. ©The Estate of Francis Bacon/billedkunst.dk 2013.

Bacon’s Triptych May – June (fig. 1) is of special interest from this point of view. An all too brief description of what we see might run: from right to left the panels depict a naked man vomiting into the bathroom sink, then crossing the room, then sitting or defecating on the toilet pan. But is the man in the central panel merely crossing the room? Is there not something disturbing in the almost fright-

 

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ening shadow that in a strange way emanates from him and into the open space outside? The shadow is almost like a fluid, and the bony body seems to be in a state of dissolution. It is as if it is the body as such that is melting into the shadow. Contemplating the panel, we get an unavoidable taste of death, and with death in the middle, the panels at the right and left depict a man in pain and agony. Two years earlier, on the eve of Bacon’s retrospect in Paris, his friend and lover George Dyer met his end in a bathroom at the hotel at which they were staying. Dyer had taken too many pills, and may perhaps have tried to fetch them up again, but in vain. Afterwards Bacon had the feeling that he had failed him. He felt guilty. There is then a story behind the picture, but the picture neither illustrates nor narrates the story about Dyer’s death. We do not need the story to be struck by the picture. It creates a sinister atmosphere without the story, and the central panel is a magnificent or even majestic image of death, where the paint speaks metaphysically, proclaiming the importance of the person who is dying in front of us. Who he is does not matter. What matters is that his life – not his soul – is seeping into an insignificant void. Death is not only biological, and a dying man is not just another carcass. Death is a loss. Death is to lose yourself, and not merely to shed your body. So what is a self, and who am I, who may lose my self in darkness? There are no answers in the painting: there are simply questions of metaphysical dimensions. Michael Peppiatt says that Bacon “came to the profane through the sacred and infused the profane with the sacred to such an extent that the division between the two ‘categories’ becomes increasingly difficult to define” (IVAM: 2003, 48). What Peppiatt has in mind here is that Bacon brought such a charge of vitality to everything he painted that all his work is to a greater or lesser degree sacred, “because it radiates the exceptional vitality that was the wellspring of his creativity” (ibid.). This does not, however, fully explain the metaphysical atmosphere in a painting such as this triptych. It is not the painting alone which is charged with vitality. Basically it is life itself, and in a strange way even the “self ” that is charged with vitality. This is why the death of the self has a metaphysical dimension. At the time the painting was made, Bacon had already found another partner. Dyer was replaced. However, the loss was still present, and Bacon felt guilty. His guilt is not visualized, it is invisible. But it may be expressed indirectly in the metaphysical atmosphere, and it is perhaps emphasized in the formal frame of a triptych, which conventionally shows in the central panel a betrayed man, dying in solitude. So the frame indicates a situation in which a man has to face death alone, in his solitude. Is he betrayed, or even crucified? And if so, who has betrayed him? “Man is haunted by the mystery of his own existence”, Bacon once said in an interview (ibid., 186). This hauntedness is the talk of the paint in his pictures.

 

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Fig. 2: Francis Bacon: Study after Vélázquez’s ­Portrait of Pope Innocent X, 1953. © Nathan ­Emory ­Coffin Collection of the Des Moines Art Center/ © The Estate of Francis Bacon/billedkunst.dk 2013.

Let us briefly consider Bacon’s many studies after Velasquez’ Portrait of Pope Innocent X (fig. 2). He painted a version of this portrait at least forty times during his career, so that it is safe to say that he was obsessed by it – he spoke of it as the most perfect painting in history. He claimed not to be interested in the Pope as a Pope; he was interested in the qualities of Velasquez’ portrait of him. He admitted, however, that the Pope is of course in a unique position simply by being what he is. There have been different interpretations of these pictures. Some have said that it is the Pope when he is alone, or indeed when no one is looking. Some have associated them with the chapter on the last Pope in Nietzsche’s Also sprach Zarathustra. Others have said that it is the Pope placed in an electric chair, where he belongs. All such interpretations however are too psychological or too ideological. If Velazquez’ painting is the most perfect in history, it must be, according to Bacon, because it hits you in your nervous system. You are captured by the sight of it, and sight is the be-all and end-all of this portrait. Velazquez’ Pope is condensed in the penetrating glance, cutting right through to your soul, asking with majestic authority and control: who are you? It is the glance from a universe in balance.

 

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The self-control that is displayed in that glance, however, is no longer possible, not even for a Pope. In the 20th century the Pope is not in a position to repress or compel by his majestic look. Nor is anyone else to do so. There is no fixed point remaining, from which the universe and the soul or the self can be moved. This does not mean, however, that the self has become immobile, grounded in itself, as modernity is prone to think. The self is still movable, but it does not move in a fixed orbit, rather it drifts away in any direction that seems open. The Pope does not scream in all of Bacon’s paintings of him. Yet in this one he does, and the scream appears not just to come from his mouth, but to radiate from his body, while at the same time falling down on him like a heavy rain. Chained to his chair, he can escape neither his own scream, nor his body. “The greatest art always returns you to the vulnerability of the human situation”, Bacon once said in a conversation with David Sylvester (Sylvester: 1996). This in my opinion is what is expressed in his pictures of the Pope. In Velazquez’ painting the Pope seems invulnerable. Bacon however turns the image of invulnerability into the opposite, into a series of images of vulnerability. Or perhaps he has spotted a hidden vulnerability in Velazquez’ picture of Innocent X, and then spelled out this vulnerability in a picture of the human condition. In the 20th century, man’s vulnerability can no longer be ignored.

4. Peter Brandes is one of today’s most prominent Danish artists. In addition to numerous exhibitions both in Denmark and abroad, he has also received several public commissions. Among his most important works are the decoration of Vejleå Church in Ishøj (Denmark) and his glass mosaics in the Village of Hope in Los Angeles. Brandes has designed the new Royal Gate and St Andrew’s Chapel in Roskilde Cathedral, and very recently the Nordic Light Cathedral in Alta (Norway). In 2013 he was awarded the Friedrich-Hölderlin-Preis. A subject that Brandes has long elaborated, and of which he has made multiple variations, is the story of Abraham and Isaac in Gen 22. Although usually called the offering of Isaac, it is a story about an offering that was not made. However, in Brandes’ case, it makes perfectly sense to speak of the offering of Isaac. In Gen 22 God calls upon Abraham to go to a mountain in the region of Moriah and there sacrifice his son as a burnt offering. The patriarch obeys and sets off to Moriah with Isaac. When all is prepared for the offering, however, an angel intervenes and orders Abraham not to proceed: “Do not lay a hand on the boy,” he said. “Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.” Abra-

 

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ham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son (Gen 22:12–13).

When Abraham abstains from offering his son, it is not because he lacks piety and fear of God. Quite the contrary; he abstains from offering his son because he is a profoundly pious man. He would have sacrificed his son, if necessary. But God did not want Abraham to sacrifice his own son; he wanted rather to put Abraham to the test. As a model narrative for the Israelite religion, this story says inter alia that when the Israelites abstain from human sacrifice, it is not because they are less pious than their neighbours who practise human sacrifice, but that they are more pious. God does not require human sacrifice, and the Israelites obey his will. Regardless of what we think of the “plot” in this story, the conclusion is that human sacrifice is strictly forbidden. Fear of God and human sacrifice cannot be combined. It is just – eventually – animal sacrifice that is allowed. In the Christian tradition Gen 22 has been read Christologically, as pointing to Christ the Son of God who was sacrificed instead of each and every other. Christ is the antitype to Isaac. He, the only one without sin, sacrifices himself in order to save the sinners. Thus the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross of Calvary is the reason that not only human sacrifice but animal sacrifice also is suppressed in the Christian religion. God has taken upon himself the only sacrifice that is necessary in order to reconcile God and man. In this way the main thrust of Gen 22 is preserved; human sacrifice is strictly forbidden. Since antiquity the story of Abraham and Isaac has been among the most popular motif in Christian art. Painters such as Rembrandt and Caravaggio focused on the moment when the angel intervenes and prevents Abraham from making the sacrifice. In 20th-century art, however, this motif has been turned around in a way which at first glance seems to contradict the old reading. A striking example is Wilfred Owen’s (1893–1918) rendering of the story in his The Parable of the Old Man and the Young, written during the First World War. In this poem, Owen reproduces the text of Gen 22 almost word for word, until the angel has said: “Offer the Ram of pride instead of him.” At this point Owen continues: “But the old man would not so, but slew his son / And half the seed of Europe, one by one” (Owen: 1988, 78). Thus Abraham becomes the symbol of all those powerful men who during the war sacrificed their own offspring at the altar of war. Isaac is no longer the one who was saved, but all those countless others who were offered up. Owen served in the front line and died in 1918. He, too, was sacrificed. Brandes’ work on this motif is crystallized in the exhibition “Isaac” at Tel Aviv Museum of Art in 1995 (cf. Brandes: 1995). Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was present when the exhibition was opened and said according to the Jerusalem Post: “Isaac? That’s my name, but his fate will never be mine” (Angelica Levine: 1995). One week later he was murdered. Compared to the Isaac of the Bible, he was right. Compared to the Isaac in Brandes’ pictures, he was wrong.

 

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Fig. 3: Peter Brandes: Isaak (black and white image). With kind permission from the artist.

In Brandes’ rendering of this motif, two things are noticeable (fig. 3). Firstly, Abraham is left out, as are all the other components of the story. There are no firewood, no angel speaking from heaven, no ram to substitute. It is just Isaac, alone: so alone that it is only the title that identifies him. But – secondly – he is undoubtly a victim, one who is about to be executed. His neck seems to be broken, physically as well as mentally, as if he were already hanged. The unnaturally long neck is stretched out as an invitation to the executioner. He may not have received the final cut yet, but it is coming. Isaac is, as in Owen’s poem, a symbol for all those who were sacrificed. In Brandes’ pictures, Isaac as a person, however, is not simply the Isaac of the Bible. This Isaac was also Brandes’ grandfather, a Jew who died in Auschwitz during the Second World War. This is indicated with a somewhat sealed up and formally puzzling reference, namely the pointed projections jutting out of the back of the kneeling figure. These projections refer to the fences that surrounded the camp at Auschwitz, alluding to imprisonment, immobility, and the inability to choose.

 

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Owen and Brandes, however, do not stop at turning the biblical story upside down; they have applied it to a new context as well. Gen 22 is now neither a text about religious sacrifice nor a Christological statement. It is transferred to a secular context and applied to violence, warfare and the killing of innocent men and women in our own time. In doing this, Owen and Brandes preserve the initial thrust of Gen 22: such killings are sacrilege. Not only has the Isaac of the biblical story become a symbol for all the millions sacrificed in warfare and in other ways in our own time, but they have at the same time been absorbed into the biblical Isaac, who now becomes a corporate person. In the First and Second World Wars, men and women were sacrificed as if their lives counted for nothing, as if they were nobody. Owen and Brandes contradict this negligence by saying that they are not nobody; they are Isaac, the boy on whom God himself forbade us to lay hands.

5. As the art historian Walter Hofmann has pointed out, physical suffering is one of the salient themes of modern painting (Hofmann: 1983, 141). Bacon and Brandes seem to affirm Hofmann’s statement. Human suffering and vulnerability play a major role in their work. But why have suffering and vulnerability been accorded this prominent place in modern painting? Is it simply because the last two hundred years have been so cruel and violent that suffering cannot be ignored? Both Bacon and Brandes, however, seem to reject this answer, because they are not occupied with suffering as such; they are concerned with it as a catalyst of man’s or the viewer’s self-understanding. Both artists not only summarize the cruelty and violence which seem to be present everywhere; they point up the suffering in order to come at the basis of what it is to be human. So the question is: why have suffering and vulnerability achieved this prominent place in man’s self-understanding? There may of course be several reasons for this, but it seems that one of them has to do with credibility and truth. To express a credible view on the doxa or humanity of man has become increasingly difficult in modern times. It seems that almost every option is doomed to be contradicted or punctured by irony, except for man in the state of suffering. Man in pain seems to express a certain view of humanity which is resistant both to irony and to social deconstruction. Neither Bacon nor Brandes makes the sufferer into a hero. They do not praise man’s ability to withstand suffering; nor do they advocate suffering as the meaning of life. Suffering is proper to the human condition. This must be accepted, but it has to be contradicted at the same time, because suffering, death and destruction mean that something valuable – humanity, doxa – is destroyed. Suffering and death is a loss, and for this reason the suffering individual counts as valuable or even in an undefined, metaphysical sense, sacred.

 

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It seems to be the case, then, that in modernity man’s doxa can be expressed convincingly only when it is on the verge of being dissolved into nothingness. Man’s doxa is not visible in any plain and simple way, not even in the moment of destruction. It is not a quantum which simply “is”. In Bacon’s and Brandes’ pictures doxa is visible only in so far as the viewer reacts in passion and engagement. It is visible only in so far as the viewer rejects the attitude of indifference. In order to release this rejection, the pictures of Bacon and Brandes are aesthetically charged with vitality. Hence the viewer does not have to produce a passionate contradiction from within his own “self ”. His “self ” is charged with passion drawn from the pictures. The most powerful image of the suffering Isaac in Brandes’ portfolio is perhaps the woodcut in which Isaac has almost become a calligraphic sign in red on a black background (fig. 4).

Fig. 4: Peter Brandes: Isaak (colour image). With kind permission from the artist.

“The greatest art always returns you to the vulnerability of the human situation” (Bacon in David Sylvester: 1996). Vulnerability may of course be understood as a kind of weakness and failure, as unavoidable but also regrettable. Yet both Bacon and Brandes seem to find that which is deeply human in the vulnerability. The human doxa is present in vulnerability and fragility, and not in spite of it. This

 

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connection between doxa and vulnerability is not self-evident, but is contextualized culturally. Werner Hofman has detacted a change which occurs in the representation of the suffering victim in fine art around the time of Goya. Previously this motif was not a theme in itself: “The defeated seem to deserve their fate as in a sporting contest when the stronger will win without any moral complications or frustrations.” Goya however turned this sentiment on its head: “the vanquished takes the place of the vanquisher, the defeated speaks more convincingly than the defeater” (Hofmann: 1984, 142). As a cultural background for this change, Hofmann points to the Christian tradition and its focus on the suffering Christ: “His passion shows the human being in all his fragility, but the vulnerability frames the triumph of the spiritual message.” The suffering Christ is a “mould” which makes it possible to see suffering from the victim’s point of view. As a “mould” Christ ennobles the victim (ibid., 147).1 Thus the crucified Christ enables Goya and others to be aware of, see and recognize the sanctity of the victim. Hofmann’s reference to the suffering Christ seems to be a self-evident background for the installation of the sanctified victim in modern art. The question, however, arises as to why this has come to be so prominent in the last two centuries. After all, the crucified Christ has been a basic religious symbol for more than fifteen hundred years. Hofmann’s assertion is not, of course, that the suffering Christ became culturally important for the first time in Goya’s work, because this would be evidently wrong. What Hofmann points to is a change in the history of painting. This change occurs almost at the same time that art liberates itself from the power of both state and church and becomes “art” in the modern sense of the word. Art has to find its own way of speaking with credibility about humankind in a secularized context, where man’s doxa has been made insecure and problematized. From this point of view the suffering Christ as the “mould” makes it possible to represent a humanity that transcends the empirically visible.

Bibliography Alphen, Ernst van (1992), Francis Bacon and the loss of self, London: Reaktion Books 1992. Archimbaud, Michel (1993), Francis Bacon in Conversation with Michel Archimbaud. London: Phaidon Press. Brandes, Peter (1995), Isaac – Paintings, Graphic Works, Ceramic Sculpture, Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv Museum of Art. Ebeling, Gerhard (1977), Disputatio de Homine. Erster Teil. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck.

1 “Mould” is a concept Hofmann has borrowed from Delacroix.

 

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Frey, Jörg (2013), “… dass sie meine Herrlichkeit schauen” (Joh 17,24), in: Jörg Frey, Die Herrlichkeit des Gekreuzigten, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 639–663. Hofmann, Werner (1983), Picasso’s “Guernica” in its Historical Context, Artibus et Historiae 4/7, 141–169. IVAM (Institut Valencià d’Art Modern) (ed.) (2003), Francis Bacon. Lo Sagrado y lo Profano/The Sacred and the Profane, Valencià: IVAM. Luther, Martin (1536), Disputatio D. Martini Lutheri de homine/Disputation D. Martin Luthers über den Menschen, in Martin Luther, Lateinisch-Deutsche Studienausgabe, Bd. 1–3, Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt 2006–2009, LDStA 1, 663–669. Owen, Wilfred (1988), Selected Poetry and prose, ed. by Jennifer Breen, London: Routledge. Levine, Angela (1995), Sacrifice Revisited, The Jerusalem Post, 15 December 1995 (available at http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1–6002462.html). [02.05.2014] Sylvester, David (1996), notes on FRANCIS BACON, The Independent, 14 July 1996 (available at http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/notes-on-francis-bacon-1328657. html). [10.05.2015]

 

 

The Manifestation of a ‘Beyond’ in the Arts: Music, Liturgical Inventory and Architecture

 

 

Sven Rune Havsteen

Moments of an Aesthetics of the Invisible: The sermo humilis

1.

Preliminary

In one of the texts from Erasmus of Rotterdam’s Adagia,1 his famous collection of essays on ancient proverbs, we find a good-humoured interpretation of the expression “The Sileni of Alcibiades”, which, according to the author, was in circulation among educated people. The saying is inspired by Plato, who in the Symposium makes Alcibiades (5th century BC), the statesman and pupil of Socrates, deliver a panegyrical speech to his teacher (Symposium, 215a–222b). In this he compares the philosopher to the figures of the Sileni. In 5th century Athens the Sileni could refer to a popular piece of furniture, in which statuettes of gods were kept. These items were carved artefacts. When closed they had the shape of the hideous flute-playing Silenos (cf. Balbina Bäbler: 2008), the foster-father of Dionysos and the buffoon of the gods; when opened one had access to a deity. For Alcibiades the Sileni may serve as images that eminently point to the special nature of Socrates’ character and philosophical attitude. Erasmus elaborates on this observation. “Anyone,” he says, who had valued him skin-deep […] would not have given a twopence for him. With his peasant face, glaring, like a bull, and his snub nose always sniffling, he might have been taken for some blockheaded country bumpkin. The care of his person was neglected, his language simple and homely and smacking of common folk; for his talk was all of carters and cobblers, of fullers and smiths, and it was from them, as a rule, that he derived the analogies which he used in any discussion to press home his point (Erasmus: 1992, 262f).2

1 Adagia, Paris: 1500, 1508 and later. Latin text, Desiderius Erasmus: 2010; English translation, Erasmus: 1982, 1989, 1992a, 1992b, 2005, 2006. On the Adagia, see Kathy Eden: 2001. 2 Erasmus: 2010, 1593: “Quem si de summa, quod dici solet, cute quis aestimasset, non emisset asse. Facies erat rusticana, taurinus aspectus, nares simae muccoque plenae. Sannionem quem­ piam bardum ac stupidum dixisses. Cultus neglectus, sermo simplex ac plebeius et humilis, ut qui semper aurigas, cerdones, fullones et fabros haberet in ore. Nam hinc fere sumebat illas suas εἰσαγωγάς, quibus urgebat in disputando.”

 

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As an amplification of these observations the Socratic ignorance is emphasized as a most striking trait. All this, however, is only one side of the coin. A closer examination of the figure of Socrates reveals a notable difference between, on the one hand, the ugliness of his outward figure, his ridiculous behaviour in the optics of common opinion – and, on the other hand, the beauty of his inner being. As Erasmus points out: […] had you opened this absurd Silenus, you would have found, you may be sure, a divine being, rather than a man, a great and lofty spirit worthy of a true philosopher, one who despised all the things for which other mortals run their races […] (Erasmus: 1992b, 263).3

And further a human being of whom the foremost personal characteristics included fearlessness in the face of death, and a wisdom passing all understanding. According to Erasmus the proverb on the Sileni applies to things that “on the surface” or “at first sight” seem “worthless and absurd”, and yet, as the consequence of a more thorough consideration, are found “admirable” – or it can be applied to a human being with an appearance that “promises far less, than what he hides in his heart” (Erasmus: 1992b, 262).4 The proverb in question Erasmus relates to a central philosophical topos, which, though rooted in Platonic thinking, has been widely diffused in the ancient world and later contextualized in Christian thinking. Erasmus demonstrates in his commentary the scope of application. Apart from pre-Christian figures such as the philosophers Diogenes or Epictetus, he brings Christian religious history into focus. In the perspective of Erasmus, Christian religion constitutes an impressive array of agents and phenomena that come under the category of the Sileni. In the first place Christ. The figure of Christ displays most remarkably the essential qualities of Silenic nature. Erasmus points to the features of Christ’s incarnation that cover a variety of important markers found in the Biblical accounts. He underlines the low social status of Christ: “Observe”, he says, the outside surface of this Silenus: to judge by ordinary standards, what could be humbler or more worthy of disdain? Parents of modest means and lowly station, and a humble home; poor Himself and with few and poor disciples, recruited not from noblemen’s

3 Erasmus: 2010, 1593: “Atqui si Silenum hunc tam ridiculum explicuisses, videlicet numen invenisses potius quam hominem, animum ingentem, sublimem ac vere philosophicum, omnium rerum, pro quibus caeteri mortales currunt navigant […].” 4 Erasmus: 2010, 1592: “[…] vel de homine, qui habitu vultuque longe minus prae se ferat, quam in animo claudat.”

 

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palaces or the chief sects of the Pharisees or the lecture rooms of philosophers, but from publicans’s office and the nets of fishermen (Erasmus: 1992b, 264).5

This perception is further substantiated by reference to Christ’s way of life: “[W]hat a stranger he was to all physical comforts as he pursued through hunger and weari­ ness, through insults and mockery, the way that led to the cross”, and Erasmus continues his commentary by quoting Isa 53:2–3, “He had no form nor comeliness; we beheld him and there was nothing to look upon … etc.” (Erasmus: 1992b, 264). A closer view of these features, however, paves the way for an insight into the hidden excellence of the Christ figure and, accordingly, into the paradoxical character of the incarnation. […] in that cheap setting what a pearl, in that lowliness what grandeur, in that poverty what riches, in that weakness what unimaginable valour, in that disgrace what glory, in that bitter death […], a never-failing spring of immortality (Erasmus: 1992b, 264).6

These Erasmian reflections form part of what may be described as a kind of cultural historical enterprise that aims at elucidating a fundamental structure that features the various articulations of Christian commitment, including morals, religious practices and social life, institutions, even organic and inorganic nature. Erasmus is not short of examples. They include, apart from Christ, religious persons such as, for instance, the prophets, John the Baptist, or the bishops of the early Church, phenomena belonging to organic nature (the mystery of growth), and the language of the Biblical parables, or ritual devices such as the sacraments. To complicate things further, and in line with his reforming theological agenda, Erasmus feels obliged to call attention to the existence of what he names the inverse or “inside-outside” Sileni (Erasmus: 1992b, 265/2010, 1596). They are present everywhere in society, including the Church. They may be distinguished people with brilliant appearances, but covering dubious characters of various sorts, or could be impressive and lavish Church ceremonies, that offend the message of Christ. All this pertains to the hidden, concealed, but also ambiguous nature of reality – to the relation between what is visible and what is not visible, at least not visible immediately, and only accessible on certain conditions: further, it con5 Erasmus: 2010, 1594f: “Si summam Sileni faciem intuearis, quid juxta popularem aestimationem abjectius aut contemptius? Tenues et obscuri parentes, domus humilis, ipse pauper et pauculos et pauperculos habuit discipulos, non e magnatum palatiis, non e pharisaeorum cathedris, non e philosophorum scholis, sed a telonio et retibus ascites.” 6 Erasmus: 2010, 1595: “[…] in quanta vilitate quale margaritum, in quanta humilitate quantam sublimitatem, in quanta paupertate quantas divitias, in quanta infirmitate quam incogitabilem virtutem, in quanta ignominia quantam gloriam, in quantis laboribus quam absolutam requiem, denique in morte tam acerba perennem immortalitatis fontem.”

 

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cerns the cognitive challenges and risks that this constitution of reality implies, in relation both to the proper, and to the inverted Sileni, to remain within the Erasmian vocabulary. Although developed in a humanistic and intellectual context, these briefly sketched considerations of Erasmus summarize a conception of Christian salvation history and existence, characterized by a paradox thinking, which points to a radical revaluation of values. As articulated in the context this viewpoint covers, as we have seen, a particularly emphasized focus on the lowliness, ugliness and humble condition of life in which the salvific event of Christ is manifested. And it questions, as a consequence, man’s immediate approaches to the visible sphere, marked as they are by their narrowing cognitive settings and suppositions – with the aim of surpassing these conditions in favour of unexpected insights. This profile of Christian religion is in no way unique. As an overall view it represents a commonplace insight, shared by various theological traditions and widely diffused in Protestant theological discourse since the 16th century. At its centre are the idea of incarnation and the theology of the cross. Closely related to these basic theological issues is the question of the modes of representation – and perception – of the paradoxical message and reality of the Christ event as a divine saving act and as a model for Christian existence. When it comes to the elucidation of this representational aspect of theology, a number of general approaches are available to the historian. One track to pursue is the theological discourses on the artistic representation that have been displayed in various historical situations, among which the period of the Reformation was rather productive. They cover in particular reflections concerning the visual arts, but do not exclude music and literature. These theological discourses on art in the Reformation respond to concrete uses current in Late Medieval religious representational practice. From an overall point of view, as many historians have pointed out, Late Medieval Christianity was characterized by a marked focus on visibility (see for instance Johan Huizinga: 1976; Margaret R. Miles: 2006; Lee P. Wandel: 1994; Robert W. Scribner: 2001). This had its effects in various domains. It cover­ ­ed visible religious practices materialized, for instance, in a hierarchal Church, and in a highly developed ritual system, including the cult of images and elaborate musical performances. In relation to this development the Protestant agenda may be characterized by a comprehensive critique of the visible, with the aim of calling attention to the invisible dimensions of religion. The actual development of this critique showed notable differences and gave rise to considerable disputes within the Protestant world. The differences were manifest also in relation to the artistic media. From an overall point of view the Protestant discourses on the arts were prompted by the need for a clarification of the cognitive status of the arts. This was perhaps most evident in the development of the critique of images, which may be considered indicative of the Protestant attempts to define

 

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the relation to the visible. The radical attitude implied an iconoclastic view (Calvin and Zwingli), and the moderate formulations (in Lutheranism) pointed to what might be called a dialectical understanding that perceived the visible as a field where the invisible may be mediated. The main positions in this on-going discussion are quite well known, although its theological premises, and the more comprehensive intellectual frameworks involved, still constitute a challenging research field in which much work remains to be done. The same can be said of the artistic practices developed in the interactions with religious institutions and normative discourses.7 Our purpose here is to take up the question concerning an aesthetics of the invisible within the Lutheran tradition. The artistic representation of religious themes was from the outset and in the main recognized by Luther and his followers,8 and this attitude came to be a confessional point of identification, for instance in relation to the Calvinist Church. To what extent the Lutheran Reformation in relation to the arts represents a break with tradition has been and is still a recurrent issue, although the research community of today is more inclined to attach less importance to ruptures than to continuities. But the question remains, is it possible to identify special features of a Lutheran aesthetics, which reflects the attitude to the visible just mentioned? A definitive historical answer to this question is not desirable, in view of the complicated and multi-faceted nature of the topic. Let us, in this context, be more modest. I will take into consideration an aspect of aesthetic representation that relates to the cross of Christ as the pivotal point of the incarnation and central salvation-historical event in the Christian imagination. The aesthetico-theological effects of this issue in Luther’s thinking and in later Lutheran tradition represent a vast research field that covers a variety of genres within the arts. My point is to call attention to features in Lutheran religious culture that underline a dependence of its representations on a much larger space of cultural perception. This feature may be considered a significant factor in aesthetic settings and modes of representation in the artistic domains of Lutheran provenance.

7 On the image discourses in the Reformation, see, for instance, Hans von Campenhausen: 1957; Margarete Stirm: 1977; Carlos M. N. Eire: 1986; Sergiusz Michalski: 1993; Thomas Lentes: 2007; Johann A. Steiger: 2002. 8 The literature on Lutheranism and the arts is vast: see, for instance, on the visual arts, Carl C. Christensen: 1979; Werner Hofmann (ed.): 1983; Franck Muller et al. (ed.): 1997; Joseph L. Koerner: 2004. On music, Friedrich Blume: 1965 (eng. transl. Blume et al. 1974); Walter Blankenburg: 1979; Robin A. Leaver: 2007. On literature, Ingeborg Röbbelen: 1957; Gerhard Hahn: 1981; Patrice Veit: 1986; Irmgard Scheitler: 1982; Elke Axmacher: 2001.

 

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Sermo humilis

At this point I would like to introduce the concept of sermo humilis that was expounded by Augustine and applied by the literary historian Erich Auerbach (1892–1957) as a key concept in his account of literary realism in European history. Auerbach has been variously received, his approaches were from the outset disputed, but they have recurrently, and also today, aroused interest among literary scholars, art historians, philosophers, and theologians.9 The Biblical texts, in the perspective of Auerbach, among them in particular the narratives of the passion of Christ, represent a decisive moment in the European representation of reality, with significant effects on later literary productions. This observation Auerbach related to the ancient or Classical rhetorical system that worked with a separation of the three main characters or levels of style: the low (the genus humile), the middle (the genus modicum), and the ‘sublime’ and elevated style (the genus grave).10 With the arrival of Christianity, this rhetorical system was broken up, and the matter of style was approached in a new way. The notion of ‘style mixture’ points to this new situation, which contrasts with the rhetorical and literary thinking of antiquity. In the ancient theory each style was, roughly speaking, assigned a particular topical field, that could not be taken up in another style (that being the implication of the separation of styles). The style mixture, emerging in the Christian cultural context, opened the way for a fusion in the sense that subjects or topics which in the ancient system belonged to one specific style, were now accessible in other modes. Put in another way, “the usual correspondence between style and subject were broken” (Robert Doran: 2007, 358). Through the lens of Auerbach, this was an effect of Christ’s incarnation and Passion, and the literary modes of representation related to it, “which realize and combine sublimitas and humilitas in overwhelming measure” (ibid., quoting Auerbach: 1959, 147/2003, 151).” The ‘mixture of style’ is a question of the relation between style and subject (Doran: 2007, 358), and it was “directed against the hierarchal view of subject matters for art” (René Wellek: 1954, 301). Auerbach takes up the meaning of the Christ event in different texts. The earliest statement is to be found in the Dante study, Dante als Dichter der irdischen Welt, published in 1929 (Auerbach: 2001). It returns in the article “Sacrae scripturae sermo humilis” of 1941 (Auerbach: 1967), in his principal work, written in exile in Istanbul, Mimesis. Dargestellte Wirklichkeit in der abendländischen 9 Ernst Robert Curtius: 1952; Hans Sedlmayer: 1962; Max Imdahl: 1996; Hans Robert Jauß: 1968a and 1968b; Jan Lindhardt: 1975; Hans-Henrik Krummacher: 1976; David Norton: 1993; Stephan Berning: 1984; Peter Auksi: 1995; Seth Lerer: 1996; Bernhard F. Scholz (ed.): 1998; Jacques Rancière: 1998; Birgit Stolt: 2000; Karl-Heinz Barck/Martin Treml: 2007; Sebastian Sobecki: 2006; Dietmar Till: 2006. 10 Cicero, for instance, presents the three main styles in Orator, 75–99. See also Heinz Weniger: 1932; Klaus Spang: 1994.

 

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Literatur (1946; later enlarged edition 1949, Auerbach: 1959; English translation, Auerbach: 2003); and in the important article “Sermo Humilis” of 1952, with a postscript on “Gloria passionis” (Auerbach: 1958a; English translation, Auerbach: 1965a). In Mimesis we find a summary passage of Auerbach’s basic premise, which I – in spite of its length – shall quote in its entirety: The true heart of the Christian doctrine – Incarnation and Passion – was […] totally incompatible with the principle of the separation of styles. Christ had not come as a hero and king but as a human being of the lowest social station. His first disciples were fishermen and artisans; he moved in the everyday milieu of the humble folk of Palestine; he talked with publicans and fallen women, the poor and the sick and the children. Nevertheless, all that he did and said was of the highest and deepest dignity, more significant than anything else in the world. The style in which it was presented possessed little if any rhetorical culture in the antique sense; it was sermo piscatorius and yet it was extremely moving and much more impressive than the most sublime rhetorico-tragical literary work. And the most moving account of all was the Passion. That the King of Kings was treated as a low criminal, that he was mocked, spat upon, whipped, and nailed to the cross – that story no sooner comes to dominate the consciousness of the people than it completely destroys the aesthetics of the separation of styles; it creates a new elevated style, which does not scorn everyday life and which is ready to the sensorily realistic, even the ugly, the undignified, the physical base. Or – if anyone prefers to have it the other way round – a new sermo humilis is born, a low style, such as would properly only be applicable to comedy, but which now reaches out far beyond its original domain, and encroaches upon the deepest and the highest, the sublime and the eternal (Auerbach: 2003, 72).11

What is related to in this and in similar statements is the phenomenon of decorum. According to Auerbach Christianity introduces, with its sacred texts and their 11 Auerbach: 1959, 73f: “Der eigentliche Mittelpunkt der christlichen Lehre, Inkarnation und Passion, war […] mit dem Stiltrennungsprinzip ganz unvereinbar. Christus war nicht als ein Held und König, sondern als ein Mensch niedrigster sozialer Stufe erschienen; seine ersten Schüler waren Fischer und Handwerker, er bewegte sich zwischen der alltäglichen Umwelt des kleinen Volks in Palästina, sprach mit Zöllnern und Dienern und mit Armen und Kindern; und jede seiner Handlungen und Worte war nichtdestoweniger von höchster und tiefster Würde, bedeutender als alles, was je sonst geschah; der Stil, in dem es erzählt wurde, besaß gar keine oder doch nur eine sehr geringe Redekultur im antiken Sinne, es war ‘sermo piscatorius’, und trotzdem überaus ergreifend und wirksamer als das höchste rhetorisch-tragische Kunstwerk. Daß der König der Könige wie ein gemeiner Verbrecher verhöhnt, bespien, gepeitscht und ans Kreuz geschlagen wurde – diese Erzählung vernichtet, sobald sie das Bewußtsein der Menschen beherrschte, die Ästhetik der Stilmischung vollkommen; sie erzeugt einen neuen hohen Stil, der das Alltägliche keineswegs verschmäht, und der das sinnlich Realistische, ja, das Häßliche, Unwürdige, körperlich Niedrige in sich aufnimmt; oder wenn man es lieber umgekehrt ausdrücken will, es entsteht ein neuer ‘sermo humilis’, ein niedriger Stil, wie er eigentlich nur für Komödie und Satire anwendbar wäre, der aber nun weit über seinen ursprünglichen Bereich ins Tiefste und Höchste, ins Erhabene und Ewige übergreift.”

 

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message, a new set of rhetorical rules that opposes the norms of Classical rhetoric, set forth by Cicero and Quintilian in relation to the application of the three main characters of style, mentioned above. The new departure implied, as we have seen, a revaluation of the low styled medium of artistic representation. As a rhetorical model the Bible, both the Old and New Testaments, but in particular the Christ narratives, were, for Auerbach, an essential pre-condition for the legitimization of a simple form representation that stylistically was in conformity with its low objects, but at the same time had the capacity of assigning a sublime meaning to them, and in this way completely contradicting the Classical rules of decorum. The features of this new style cover a range of elements. To mention a few: accessibility to all, use of everyday idiom, realistic words, direct speech, a general distanciation from decorated or impressive diction, and all this assigned to an object at the same time both low and sublime (Auerbach: 1958a, 42f/1965a, 51f). But it concerns also a particular quality of representation that Auerbach referred to through the German word hintergründig (Auerbach: 1959, 14, 26/2003, 12, 24) The word points to the intimation of a hidden dimension of represented reality. In the Biblical context this is true in relation to the representation of God, who is maintained as incomprehensible and for this reason always only partially accessible to man. As Auerbach puts it, God “is not comprehensible in his presence”, “it is always only something of him that appears, he always extends into depth” (Auerbach: 2003, 12).12 But also the Biblical representations of man contain a notable depth dimension. This relates to the fact that they “are never totally emerged in the present”, by reason of their connectedness to their past and their consciousness of being caught ineluctably in a large-scale historical process. As a consequence their inner constitution is complicated and difficult to express adequately (Auerbach: 1959, 14/Auerbach: 2003, 12). According to Auerbach the Biblical texts contain what could be called a surplus of meaning which makes them ambiguous, mysterious, and for this reason they are in need of interpretation. This relates in particular to the interconnection between lowly style and the sublime, which is rooted most concisely in the paradox of the incarnation: The humility of the Incarnation derives its full force from the contrast with Christ’s divine nature: man and God, the lowly and the sublime, humilis et sublimis, both the height and the depth are immeasurable and inconceivable: peraltissima humilitas (Auerbach: 1965a, 41).13

12 Auerbach: 1959, 14: “Er reicht immer in die Tiefe.” 13 Auerbach: 1958a, 36: “Die Demut der Inkarnation im ganzen erhält ihr volles Gewicht erst durch den Gegensatz zur göttlichen Natur, was die paradoxale Grundantithese der christlichen Lehre ausmacht: Mensch und Gott, niedrig und erhaben, humilis et sublimis; beides in unausdenkbarer, unermessbarer Tiefe und Höhe: peraltissima humilitas.”

 

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The sermo humilis reflects this fundamental mystery, and at the same time points to another aspect: the all-inclusive nature of the literary communication of the Bible, which discloses the universal character of the divine revelation in Christ that addresses men of any status. On the basis of observations on various statements by Augustine, Auerbach summarizes the purpose of the lowly style, which is to make the Scriptures available to all; the humblest of men should be drawn to them, moved by them, at home in them. Yet Scripture is not always simple; it contains mysteries and hidden meaning; much of it seems obscure. But even the difficult ideas are not presented in a learned, “haughty” style that would intimidate and repel the simple man. On the contrary, anyone who is not light-minded (hence superficial and lacking in humility) can find his way to deeper meaning […] (Auerbach: 1965a, 50f).14

The Auerbach account of the development of the sermo humilis is complicated and in various respects also problematic, and will not be taken up in any detail in this context. Apart from its focus on the Biblical paradigm, Augustine represents a milestone in the recognition of the particular stylistic mode related to the Christian revelation, as is documented in, for instance, the Confessions (VI, 5), in On Christian Doctrine, and in Epistle 137. An important observation also is that since works orientated on sermo humilis made their breakthrough rather late in the history of Christian Europe, they were to interact with other, classically orientated, representational modes. An important station in this process is the Divine Comedy of Dante, but Auerbach also recognized, for instance, the Cistercian and Franciscan movements as important contributors to an aesthetics of the humble style. Auerbach’s account is established on carefully selected sections from the literary history, in particular taken from his own domain of Romance philology. It seems clear enough that Auerbach’s basic insight, perhaps with modifications, can be further substantiated in other contexts. A fine example of this is the text of Erasmus referred to at the beginning of this discussion.15 In the exposition of the Silenic theme Erasmus reveals a high degree of consciousness of the elements that constitute the humble style and its perception of reality, as just described. This he 14 Auerbach: 1958a, 42: “Absicht und Charakter dieser Demut oder Niedrigkeit des Stiles ist Allgemeinzugänglichkeit; den Geringsten soll die Heilige Schrift zugänglich sein, sie sollen sich von ihr ergriffen und angezogen, sich in ihr zu Hause fühlen; Doch ist der Inhalt der Schrift nicht durchwegs einfach; sie enthält Mysterien, tieferer Sinn ist in ihr verborgen, und vieles in ihr erscheint dunkel. Allein auch dies wird nicht in einem gelehrten und ‘hochmütigen’ Stil vorgetragen, so daß es den einfachen Hörer einschüchtert und abschreckt. Sondern jeder, der nicht leichten Herzens ist, mag auch in den tieferen Sinn eindringen.” 15 Actually Auerbach in Mimesis refers to the erasmian text in connection with his reading of Rabelais and Montaigne and their reference to Socrates (chapter 11; Auerbach: 1959/2003).

 

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demonstrates not only by connecting the idea of the manifestation of the sublime in the lower spheres of reality to the Silenic figures, but also by applying the concept of sermo humilis to the particular communicative mode that characterizes Silenic existence. And alongside this should not least be observed the theologico-historical approach that sets the scene for the development of a grand scale narrative that may serve the construction of a reception history of sermo humilis as a basic religious and cultural component of European history.

3.

Features of Lutheran theology and the sermo humilis

With these considerations in mind let us turn to the question of artistic representation and aesthetic attitude in the Lutheran context with respect to the theological issue concerning the role of the visible in relation to the invisible dimensions of reality. It is my contention that a point of intersection between the tradition of sermo humilis and Lutheran thinking may be discerned in the theological topic of the incarnation including the cross as its focal point.16 Among the features observed by readers of Luther is his notable accentuation of the paradoxical nature of the Christ figure. His dogmatic basis is at one with the classical Christological formulations of the Early Church that point to the two natures, the divine and the human, and their mysterious unity in the person of Christ. The two opposing poles of Christology, however, are maintained by Luther in such a way that the antitheses are highlighted recurrently. The humanity of Christ, with its adjacent aspects of lowliness, humiliation and suffering, is constantly brought into focus with a view to its opposite, thus pointing to the fundamental tension between the perception of lowliness and exaltation at work in Luther’s understanding of Christ. Numerous texts substantiate this approach, so for instance a sermon on Ps 68:19: Mit diesen kurtzen worten ‘Du bist in die Hoehe gefuren’ &c. zeigt der Prophet an, das die Person, Christus, warer Gott und Mensch sey. Denn, ist er auffgefaren, so mus er ja zuvor erunten gewest sein, wie S. Paulus solchs seer fein aus den worten des Propheten anzeigt und schleusst Ephe. iiij. [Eph 4:9.10] da er spricht ‘Das er aber auffgefaren ist, was ist? denn das Er zuvor ist hinunter gefaren in die untersten oerter der Erden. Der hinunter gefaren ist, das ist derselbige, der auff gefaren ist uber alle Himel, Auff das Er alles erfuellet.’ Er ist, spricht er, zuvor hinunter gefaren, das ist, Er ist der aller unseligst und verachtest Mensch anzusehen gewest, wie Esa. liij. [Isa 53:2.3] geschrieben stehet ‘Er hatte keine gestalt noch schoene &c.. Er war der aller verachtest und unwerdest, voller 16 On Luthers’s ‘theologia crucis’ and related subjects, see for instance, Walter von Loewenich: 1982; John Dillenberger: 1953; Paul Althaus: 1926–28; Paul Althaus: 1983; Gerhard Ebeling: 1964; Kjell Ove Nilsson: 1966; Alister E. McGrath: 1990.

 

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schmertzen und kranckheit, Er war so veracht, das man das angesicht fur im verbarg, darumb haben wir in nichts geacht’ &c. (WA 23, 702,21–32).17

It has further been observed that within this theological frame of mind Luther has to a great extent given substance to the humanity of Christ in the elaboration of his numerous sermons based on the synoptic gospels (Walter von Loewenich: 1954). In these texts Luther comments on the concrete incidents and details of the life of Jesus. From an overall point of view this focus on the historical Jesus of the gospels is closely connected to Luther’s view of the incarnation as a sine qua non in relation to man’s knowledge of God. The revelation of God is displayed through the concrete, visible acts of Christ, and only through them, not apart from them, can man reach a proper understanding of God. To get a right comprehension of Luther’s application of the idea of incarnation, however, it should be seen, according to notable scholars, against the background of basic theological considerations that determine his theological discourses from early on. Of special interest in this context is Luther’s so-called ‘theologia crucis’, which in the first place relates to what is to be identified as the essence of theology and the criteria of theological thinking (Althaus: 1983, 24; Ebeling: 1964, 260). This highly important and rather complicated layer of Luther’s theology is articulated in various contexts, for instance in the Heidelberger Disputation (1518; WA 1, 353–374). A basic issue is the question of the authentic revelation, i. e. the mode in which God makes himself known to man.18 In Thesis XX (WA 1, 362,1–19) of the disputation Luther points to the cross of Christ as the ground of theological knowledge. It relates to the visible aspects of God (his visibilia), which are mani­ fested only in the human nature of Christ, characterized by weakness, suffering, folly. But what is revealed is what Luther categorizes as God’s “back” or “rearward parts” (posteriora Dei). The formulation indicates that theological cognition is indirect. This view has several implications. It distances itself from speculative approaches that, by means of human conceptual constructions, aim at gaining knowledge of the invisible essence of God. It acknowledges further that although revealed visibly through outward things in Christ, God is at the same time also a hidden God (a deus absconditus) who is concealed in his revelation (cf. for instance Nielsson: 1966, 36, 159ff, 167f, 210). Even if the idea of the divine hiddenness may be interpreted in different ways, as is documented by the interpretation history, one interpretational approach is connected with the fact that God manifests himself sub contrariis, in an antithetical, or contrary (paradoxical) form with respect to human pre-understandings and expectations. This means that God’s revelation

17 Predigten des Jahres 1527. 18 On this topic see Loewenich: 1982, 26ff; Althaus: 1983, 34ff; McGrath: 1990, 148 ff.

 

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is not self-evident. It is not available to the natural man. It calls for a spiritual cognition through faith (Althaus: 1926–28, 101; Dillenberger: 1953, 57f). However difficult it is to interpret this aspect of Luther’s theology and its implications, one line of thought may be discerned that, in the perspective of revelation, maintains the visible as a necessary but ambiguous and mysterious sphere. Ambiguous because the same event may be perceived differently by the unbeliever and the believer respectively. Mysterious, in the first place with respect to the fact that infinite, immaterial God makes himself accessible in the humiliated Christ, in the second place because this manifestation of the divine is at the same time an indication of its hiddenness. Put in another way, the transcendent God remains hidden in the revelation. The cross-theological orientation of Luther’s thought and the implied considerations of the visible and transcendence may be related in different ways to the question of the representation of Christian faith. I find the notion of sermo humilis productive for a discussion of this issue within the Lutheran tradition. As a representational style viewed in the perspective of Auerbach it contains features that are dependent on a theological discourse that has structural similarities with Luther’s thinking. Thus it is from the outset – as can be observed in Scripture – correlated with the incarnation and the passion of Christ with respect to thematic focus, to the mode of representation, and to those who hear or read it. The particularities of the sermo humilis, as Auerbach points out, make it the only adequate mediating form of the message of the cross, a contention developed in the following passage: Thus the style of the Scriptures throughout is humilis, lowly or humble. Even the hidden things (secreta, recondita) are set forth in a “lowly” vein. But the subject matter, whether simple or obscure, is sublime. The lowly, or humble, style is the only medium in which such sublime mysteries can be brought within the reach of men. It constitutes a parallel to the Incarnation, which was also a humilitas in the same sense, for men could not have endured the splendour of Christ’s divinity. But the incarnation, as it actually happened on earth, could only be narrated in a lowly and humble style (Auerbach: 1965a, 51).19

19 Auerbach: 1958a, 42: “So ist der gesamte Stil der Heiligen Schrift humilis, niedrig oder demütig. Auch das Verborgene (secreta, recondita) wird auf ‘niedrige’ Art vorgetragen. Aber der Gegenstand, ob einfach oder verborgen, ist erhaben. Das Niedrige oder Demütige des Vortrages ist die einzige angemessene Form, in der so erhabene Mysterien den Menschen zugänglich gemacht werden können; entsprechend der Inkarnation, die auch in dem Sinne sich neigende humilitas war, als die Menschen den Glanz der Gottheit Christi nicht hätten ertragen können. Die Inkarnation aber, in ihrem irdischen Verlauf, ließ sich gar nicht anders berichten als in einem niedrigen und demütigen Stil.”

 

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The sermo humilis or plain style of Scripture is conformed to the subject it mediates and adjusted to the cognitive limits of the recipients. And in this capacity it represents a reality that in spite of its low nature has a sublime character. These features of the plain style point, as we have seen, to a surplus of meaning that provides it with a hidden and mysterious dimension, a quality that Auerbach conveyed with the term “hintergründig”. It is congruent with a new sublime mode of expression that reflects the paradox of the salvation event in Christianity and its complicated dialectical relation between the visible and the invisible, between manifestation and withdrawal. In this respect the plain style represents more than is articulated. It points – indirectly - to a much wider horizon of meaning. And it is antithetical in relation to established modes of artistic representation, a characteristic to which Auerbach called attention with reference to the classical rhetorical system. Luther’s theological orientation implies a positive attitude to the uses of the arts as communicative and devotional instruments. When it comes to the identification of the style practised by Luther several scholars have pointed to features in his writings that are consonant with the sermo humilis. Auerbach, for instance, observed the reformer’s dependence on it: […] for his style and vocabulary are derived from the tradition of the sermo humilis, which his genius incorporated into German language (Auerbach: 1965b, 329).20

This is not surprising when the constituents of his theology, referred to above, are taken into consideration. The stylistic question can be pursued in several directions in Luther’s works. Among Luther’s contributions his hymns hold a most central position. In connection with the reformation of the mass they were assigned an essential liturgical role. The function of the hymn, performed by the community members, was to mediate the gospel message in a comprehensible and accessible form. This demand required not only texts in the vernacular. They should further lean on Scripture and feature the choice of simple words, as Luther points to in a letter: It is my plan following the example of the prophets and the venerable fathers of the Church to create vernacular psalms for the people, i. e. spiritual songs through which the word of God also through song can remain among the people. […] I would like to avoid new and courtly words; for the sake of the understanding of the people, the most

20 Auerbach: 1958b, 252: “[…] Vokabular und Stil hat er aus der Überlieferung des sermo humilis, die er aufs genialste im Deutschen heimisch macht.” Scholars such as Birgit Stolt and Peter Auksi have also examined the question and confirmed Luther’s reception and acknowledgement of the plain style (Stolt: 2000; Auksi: 1995).

 

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simple and common, but at the same time fine and proper words should be applied in singing (Letter to Spalatin, 1523; my translation, SRH).21

Luther’s theory, and output, of hymns materializes the idea of the plain style. And from the point of view of reception history they became normative with considerable effects in the succeeding centuries in spite of changes in aesthetic preferences (cf. Walter Blankenburg: 1961, 559–660; Irmgard Scheitler: 1982). From the theological point of view the hymn was with its special stylistic features, described by Luther, a most significant instrument of communication, and perhaps one of the decisive factors behind the successful circulation of the religious message of the Lutheran reformation (cf. Christopher B. Brown: 2005). And this position was maintained and developed further in Lutheran orthodoxy and pietism.22

4.

Lutheran Passion Music: J. S. Bach’s St Matthew Passion

Bearing in mind the considerations set out above, I shall now focus on one specific domain, the tradition of passion music in the Lutheran context, with a view to some representational features relating to the overall issue of invisibility. When it comes to principal artistic contributions of Lutheran religious representations from the 16th to 18th centuries, the musicalizations relating to the passion no doubt stand out.23 They cover a huge source material that includes a number of different genres, such as the hymn, the sacred or spiritual concerto, the cantata, and the oratorio, all dependent on the compositional strategies and stylistic characteristics developed in this epoch. J.S. Bach’s St Matthew Passion of 172724 is a monument in this thematic context, and provides rich material for the elucidation of theological representation. The work is constructed on a textual basis, composed by three layers: the entire passion narra21 WA Br 3, 220,1–3.7–9: “Consilium est, exemplo prophetarum & priscorum patrum ecclesiae psalmos vernaculos condere pro vulgo, id est spirituales cantilenas, quo verbum Dei vel cantu inter populos maneat […]. Velim autem nouas & aulicas voculas omitti, quo pro captu vulgi quam simplicissima vulgatissimaque, tamen munda simul & apta verba canerentur […].” 22 The Biblically informed plain style that features the hymn may also be identified in other parts of Luther’s work. Salient examples are of course his sermons and Bible translations (see Stolt, 2000). The Biblical orientation of the stylistic emphasis on simplicity, observed in Luther, should not, however, exclude the observation that the literary universe of the Bible is not exclusively determined by the low style of for instance, the Gospels. It comprises other higher stylistic levels, applied for instance in the Psalms of David, on which Luther and the Lutheran tradition also have been dependent. The theological discourses on the stylistic features of the Bible, before and after Luther, bear witness to this insight, although the identification of styles may vary. 23 Friedrich Blume: 1965 (Eng. transl. Blume et al.: 1974); Basil Smalman: 1970; Kurt von Fischer: 1997. 24 Emil Platen: 2006; Sven R. Havsteen: 2005; Heinrich Poos: 1986; Renate Steiger: 2002, 129–162.

 

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tive of the Gospel of St Matthew, a libretto that intersects and in various ways comments on the Gospel narrative, and finally a number of hymn stanzas, the chorales, distributed around the work and reflecting and interpreting the course of events. The question of the visible/invisible is brought in at the outset as a matter of seeing. In the exordium the Way to Golgotha is represented by means of a dialogue between two groups of people, of which the first, deploring what they witness, tries to motivate the other group to see, and participate in the mourning. The second group appears to be ignorant, with no understanding of what is taking place, and refrains. Instead they respond with questions concerning the object to be seen: Whom, How, What, Where? The answers given to these questions reveal how the eyes of faith comprehend the incident. They witness the Saviour passing by, and sinful man’s need of salvation. This initial happening sets the scene for the drama of the entire passion: it is about learning to see. But what is visualized through the musicalization is the ugly reality of the humilitas passionis, which the realism of the Biblical passion narrative maintains and to which Bach’s work is strongly committed. The task of learning, then, consists in learning to see “in” the ugly a relation to a hidden reality, which is achieved in an act of faith that transforms the nature of the ugly and makes it sublime. Now in this process indications of the relation to the hidden are given through a variety of markers on the level of language that cover allegories, for instance the nuptial imagery, typology, which point to an eschatological perspective on the Biblical action. Some of this is grounded in the passion narrative itself, but it is further expanded in the libretto, that comprises various forms of devotional appropriations such as meditational approaches, emotional responses and ethical considerations. A general feature of the St Matthew Passion’s musical setting is the great variety of musical forms and form elements. This makes it a complex work. It calls upon a comprehensive instrumental and vocal apparatus that enables a display of the major musical forms known in Bach’s religious œuvre. It includes grand-scale monumental sections for double choir and orchestra, such for instance as the exordium just referred to, or various forms of solo arias, some rather extended, some restricted in scope. All this, together with, for instance, the polyphonic structures and the use of various forms of rhetorical devices, that support the dramatic and emotional moments in the passion story, and the reactions to them, point to a rather elevated stylistic level. In relation to these compositional elements, the chorales of the work, however, constitute another mode of style. This musical form, developed within the frame of the so-called Kantional-Satz, a note-against-note setting for four voices with the melody in the upper voice, was gradually established in Lutheran tradition as a principal musical vehicle for congregational hymn singing.25 It represents a simple, apprehensible, and popular musical form, with 25 On the chorale, see Andreas Marti: 2001; Sven R. Havsteen: 2012; Walter Blankenburg: 1961, 559–660, note 42; Johannes Riedel: 1967.

 

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regard to melody and setting. Precisely in this capacity it was assigned a decisive role within Lutheran liturgy as it matched the plain style of the Lutheran hymns that appealed to the common man. In the framework of the St Matthew Passion, the chorale makes a most significant musico-poetical layer. It counterbalances the elaborate artistic creations in the work, because of its stylistic features, and because of the fact that it as a liturgical form comes closest to ordinary devotional practice or the religious Lebenswelt in the Lutheran context. Paul Gerhardt’s hymn “O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden”, after a medieval text of Cistercian provenance, is a main chorale element in the work (on the hymn, see Waldtraut I. Sauer-Geppert: 1984, 212–239). It displays an affect-orientated meditation on the utter debasement of the crucifixion, in which the paradoxical character of the event of the cross stands out, as the sublime nature of the humiliated one is hinted at. This focus adds a subjective-existential dimension to the realism of the Gospel narrative whereby it is amplified considerably. The last stanza of the hymn, “Wenn ich einmal soll scheiden, so scheide nicht von mir” (No. 62) concludes the Actus Crux of Bach’s passion. The words of the Evangelist on the death of Christ, pointing to the uttermost degradation, are the cue of the chorale. It develops a consideration of the death of man in light of the death of Christ and contextualizes thus man’s basic negative existential condition within the framework of salvation history as the grounds/grounding for the experience of comfort. This points to one of the basic insights developed throughout the work, and which may be perceived as an application of the Lutheran pro me aspect of faith: salvation history becomes only a reality for man when appropriated, i. e. applied to man himself. Now it is notable that with the chorale it is the simple style that is chosen where the meaning of Christ’s death becomes a most urgent question. Other musico-poetical options were available. Even though the style is simple, the musical setting applied in relation to the hymn stanza is extraordinary, and may be considered a highlight in the entire Passion. It is qualified by a complicated chromatism, false tone relations, and a surprising harmonic progression, which, for instance at the passage “kraft deiner Angst und Pein,” appears as movement by which something “finds its place”. The exquisite musical elaborations amplify the simple chorale form with respect to expressive intensity and point to an aesthetic formation that may be related to the category of the sermo humilis where the sublime is fused with the simple, low style. In the storyline of the passion the chorale articulates what one could call an experience where seeing is transformed into a “seeing in depth”. And this perception is indicated by means of the expressive elaborations of the chorale. Even if the chorale form in the St Matthew Passion is placed side by side with elements belonging to a more elaborate style, forming part of a style mixture, the importance attached to the chorale may be perceived as a tribute to an aesthetic mode widely diffused in the Lutheran tradition that, in relation to the invisible dimension of reality, “promises far less than what it hides” (Erasmus: 1992b, 262).

 

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Christensen, Carl C. (1979), Art and the Reformation in Germany, Athens: Athens University Press. Curtius, Ernst Robert (1952), Die Lehre von den drei Stilen in Altertum und Mittelalter, Romanische Forschungen 64, 57–70. Dillenberger, John (1953), God hidden and revealed. The interpretation of Luther’s deus absconditus and its significance for religious thought, Philadelphia: Muhlenberg Press. Doran, Robert (2007), Literary History and the Sublime in Erich Auerbach’s Mimesis, New Literary History 38, 353–369. Ebeling, Gerhard (1964), Luther. Einführung in sein Denken, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Eden, Kathy (2001), Friends Hold all Things in Common: Tradition, Intellectual Property, and the Adages of Erasmus, New Haven: Yale University Press. Eire, Carlos M. N. (1986), War Against the Idols. The Reformation of Worship from Erasmus to Calvin, Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press. Erasmus, Desiderius (2010), Les Adages d’Erasme. Lyon: Université de Lyon/Groupe Renaissance et âge Classique (available at http://sites.univ-lyon2.fr/lesmondeshumanistes/wp-content/uploads/Adages.pdf) [03.06.2014]. Erasmus, Desiderius (1982), Adages I.i.1–I.v.100, in Collected Works of Erasmus, vol. 31 (ed. by R.A.B. Mynors), Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Erasmus, Desiderius (1989), Adages I.vi.1–I.x.100, in Collected Works of Erasmus, vol. 32 (ed. by R.A.B. Mynors), Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Erasmus, Desiderius (1992a), Adages II.i.1–II.vi.100, in Collected Works of Erasmus, vol. 33 (ed. by R.A.B. Mynors), Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Erasmus, Desiderius (1992b), Adages II.vii.1–III.iii.100, in Collected Works of Erasmus, vol. 34 (ed. by R.A.B. Mynors), Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Erasmus, Desiderius (2005), Adages III.iv.1–IV.ii.100, in Collected Works of Erasmus, vol. 35 (ed. by John N. Grant/Denis L. Drysdall), Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Erasmus, Desiderius (2006), Adages IV. iii.1–V.ii.51, in Collected Works of Erasmus, vol. 36 (ed. by John N. Grant/Betty Knott-Sharpe), Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Fischer, Kurt von (1997), Die Passion. Musik zwischen Kunst und Kirche, Stuttgart/Weimar: Metzler. Hahn, Gerhard (1981), Evangelium als literarische Anweisung. Zu Luthers Stellung in der Geschichte des deutschen kirchlichen Liedes (Münchener Texte und Untersuchungen zur deutschen Literatur des Mittelalters 73), München/Zürich: Artemis. Havsteen, Sven R. (2005), Matthæuspassionen. Baggrund og fortolkning, Copenhagen: Det Danske Bibelselskab. Havsteen, Sven Rune (2012), Art. Chorale, Encyclopedia of the Bible and its Reception, vol. 5, Berlin: De Gruyter, col. 137–138. Hofmann, Werner (ed.) (1983), Luther und die Folgen für die Kunst, München: Prestel Verlag. Huizinga, Johan ([1924] 1976), The Waning of the Middle Ages. A Study of the Forms of Life, Thought, and Art in France and the Netherlands in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Imdahl, Max ([1964] 1996), Das Gerokreuz im Kölner Dom, in Max Imdahl, Gesammelte Schriften, Band 2: Zur Kunst der Tradition, Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 104–146. Jauss, Hans Robert (1968a), Die klassische und die christliche Rechtfertigung des hässlichen in mittelalterlicher Literatur, in: Hans Robert Jauß (ed.), Die nicht mehr schönen Künste.

 

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Nils Holger Petersen

The Notion of an Imaginary Space in Music: Interpreting Mozart’s Requiem in Liturgical, Denominational, and Secular Contexts

Taking its point of departure in the traditional musicological question of how to understand the notion of the “musical work” – in terms of its – visible – notation or its – invisible – performance? – this article discusses the consequences of new listening practices for historical compositions of liturgical texts in other religious or secular contexts than the original. The article raises the question, what this may mean for the understanding of the musical work. Based on a philosophical idea expressed by the Danish theologian-philosopher K.E. Løgstrup, this leads to notions of different imaginary (and thus invisible) musical spaces connected to what is traditionally understood as one musical work. Along the way, Mozart’s Requiem (1791) and its reception history are used as the overarching example.

1.

Introduction

Is music visible or invisible? The answer to any such question depends inevitably on our understanding of the notion of music. In Western cultures, general practices of notating, and thus visualizing, liturgical chant were established in scriptoria, most of them monastic, around the year 800 through a complex process connected to the Carolingian reforms. The precise relationship between the notational image of the music and the sounds thus indicated in early notations is still a matter of debate. In a long perspective, such notational practices led to a transmission of music which increasingly was dominated by music writing: which, over the centuries, gradually came to include more performance indications so that, in the modern culture of classical music, especially since the 19th century, statements can be found that go so far as to identify a musical work of art with its written score. At the same time, however, such music aesthetics have also been contradicted, not least by ethnomusicologists referring for instance to improvisational practices in music-making, with inspiration from ethnic musical traditions and popular music genres, but also by theoreticians and musicians inspired by earlier European traditions which have

 

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re-emerged as re-contextualized modern practices (Rankin: 1994; Petersen: 2004; Cook: 2003; Petersen: 2012 a). One may enter into this problematic from many angles. One very specific – and therefore in my view particularly illuminating – starting point is to look at the circumstances surrounding Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s illustrious last composition, his Requiem mass, KV 626, left unfinished at his death on 5 December 1791, circumstances which very soon gave rise to a mythology around and about the work, ultimately influencing the reception of Mozart’s work as a whole (Wolff: 1991; Keefe: 2012). Within a decade of his death, the Requiem was described with words rarely found in musical descriptions at the time, notions which, however, would soon after abound in references to music by the early Romantics: the work was described as “das furchtbarerhabene Requiem”, the frighteningly sublime Requiem, by Franz Xaver Niemetschek (1766−1849) in his Leben des K.K. Kapellmeisters Wolfgang Gottlieb Mozart, nach Originalquellen beschrieben, published in Prague in 1798 (and slightly revised in 1808), the first biography of Mozart to be published (Niemetschek: 2005, 48). The well-known story of the Requiem revolves around a mysterious anonymous commission which Mozart received in the summer of 1791 of a mass for the dead. The narrative was appropriated in the brilliant, although far from historically accurate, presentation in the feature film Amadeus directed by Miloš Forman (1984, based on Peter Shaffer’s play of 1979). Especially in academic music history, attention has been drawn to the complex process through which Wolfgang’s widow Constanze, for financial and other reasons, tried to find someone to finish the torso that Wolfgang had left behind at his death, and not least to the question of how much Wolfgang had actually finished. In the end, the young composer Franz Xaver Süssmayr (1766–1803), who had studied with Mozart and possibly talked with him about the Requiem during the period of illness prior to his death, was persuaded to take up the challenge, finishing the work in 1792 after another Mozart student, Joseph Eybler (1765–1846), had given up. A glance at one page of the preserved autograph manuscript from the Lacrimosa movement, where Mozart’s hand stops after bar eight and one can see the short two-bar attempt by Joseph Eybler at continuing the soprano voice, gives an impression of Eybler’s not having felt up to the task, although, as many scholars have acknowledged, he did a fine job with the instrumentation of parts sketched out by Mozart (Mozart: 2006, vol. 1, xxiv;1 Wolff: 1991, 62; cf. Keefe: 2012, 172f). It stands to reason that in this case any clear conception of what the musical work is may easily be challenged. What is Mozart’s Requiem? Is it the overall con1 The facsimile referred to is not found in the printed volume (here vol. 2) of 1965, but is included in the online version (Mozart 2006), where, also, vol. 1 and 2 have been interchanged.

 

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ception of the planned work which in all likelihood Mozart would have had in his head at his death? Numerous musicologists have worked hard and ingeniously to come closer to some phantom of a truth about what the work would have been like had he finished it. We cannot know; yet what Mozart did is more than enough to trigger the ambition behind such a quest. Or should we say that Mozart’s Requiem is simply the preserved fragment? A fragment which was not in a condition to be performed except, as it seems, the first two movements with their all but finished instrumentation, these movements probably being the ones that were heard at his obsequies in the St Michaels Kirche on 10 December, less than a week after his death (Deutsch: 1961, 374; Eisen: 1997, 74f; Wolff: 1991, 173f; Keefe: 2012, 3). Or should one rather say that Mozart’s Requiem must be one of the versions that we have been enabled to actually hear through Süssmayr’s completion? – as well, of course, as later attempts at alternative completions (Keefe: 2012, 172–246)? Süssmayr’s work on the fragment has been and still is the most frequently performed; it must also be remembered in this context, not least in view of the many critical assessments of Süssmayr’s work, that it has a historical priority among the completions because of his affiliation with Wolfgang and also, as recently emphasized by Simon Keefe, because it cannot be entirely detached from the experience of the Requiem (Keefe: 2012, 223–233). In any case, Süssmayr’s version, clearly, is not authentic Mozart. What we have, in other words, are approximations to or ideas about something we do not know. The problematic is easily generalized. What constitutes the musical work of art: the score? Any performance of the score? Or the idea of the composer? When, as here, we are dealing with liturgical music, another aspect must be added, one which surely exists also in variants for other genres and performance contexts. Mozart wrote the Requiem – as well as his other masses – for liturgical not for concert performance. The Requiem was anonymously commissioned, as we now know, by Count Walsegg as prayers for his deceased wife, to be performed on the anniversary of her death. As reported in an interesting document, written in 1839 but only published in 1963, by Anton Herzog, a member of the household of Count Walsegg, it was tacitly performed as the work of the count himself, as was his general practice with pieces of music, of which he commissioned a number from various composers (Eibl: 1978, 101–107; Robbins Landon: 1990, 76–82; Wolff: 1991, 130–137). Apart from the unusual circumstances, in such a performance context, as music for the solemn prayers for a deceased person, it would have been performed in between a number of other liturgical items proper to the mass for the dead, since from the 15th century, where polyphonic Requiem compositions began to be composed, only certain parts of the missa pro defunctis were traditionally set in polyphony. The same is true, from the 17th century, in the so-called concertato settings with soloists, chorus and orchestra (Karp et al.: n.d.). These other elements of the mass would traditionally

 

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be sung in plain chant, and with the institution of the Eucharist and the communion as liturgical highpoints. Most of us know Mozart’s Requiem today as a concert piece, or as a performance to be heard on a CD player, MP3 or the radio, and, most of the time, the liturgical parts not set by Mozart (and the tradition for what was set was almost completely fixed by his time) are omitted. But then again the question arises: what is the work? Is it the music we might listen to as if it were a symphony in so many movements? Or is it rather the whole formulary of the mass for the dead at the time of the composer, including parts set by him and parts not set? And how are we to think about the sacred liturgical action, not least the institution of the Eucharist, an integral part of the mass which, for the composer, would have been the raison d’être of the music? Is Mozart’s Requiem “just” the music, or should the whole service including the priestly actions be seen as integral to the work? Mozart and indeed anyone at the time would have thought of a performance of a requiem only as part of the religious act; musical settings of masses were not performed in the concert hall at the time. Probably only the special circumstances mentioned above led to the performance of Mozart’s Requiem very soon after his death in the concert hall. It was for the benefit of Constanze, and was put on with the aid of Mozart’s influential and high-ranking enlightenment friend Baron Van Swieten, the first time probably being on 2 January 1793 (Deutsch: 1961, 409; Eibl: 1978, 78; Wolff: 1991, 117; Bauer et al.: 2005, IV, 296; Keefe: 2012, 3). I know of no other requiem mass composition to be performed in a concert hall before this. So what do we have, one work, two works, or many works? The historical difficulties, concerning the finer nuances of how much of the music Mozart had finished at his death, and who did what afterwards, are complicated, and have been studied in great detail by many scholars (Wolff: 1991, 9–66; Keefe: 2012, 172–233). The general picture, however, is fairly clear, although the unsolved questions remain. The comprehensive and complex reception history of Mozart’s Requiem as a solemn mass and as a concert piece also includes the performance of a requiem for the composer on 5 December 1991, the 200th anniversary of his death, in St Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna, before an illustrious audience which included the president of Austria, by an array of famous soloists, the Opera Chorus of the Vienna Staatsoper, and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Sir Georg Solti. The mass was broadcast live to a number of European countries and published as an audio CD as well as on DVD (Mozart: 1992), “selling” not only the illustrious performers but also an “event”. It was at the same time a religious ceremony, celebrated according to present day Catholic post-Vatican II liturgy and presided over by the archbishop of Vienna. The event was marked by a historical incongruity: it brought together the Latin parts of the requiem mass traditionally set to music,

 

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here by Mozart, according to the pre-Vatican II, post-Tridentine liturgy, and the reading of German Vatican II parts. Be that as it may, the event may be described as an officially legitimized service and hence a performance of Mozart’s Requiem in a truly liturgical (if not properly historical) setting, although at the same time strangely wedded to a different cultural genre, that of the elite cultural, here musical event. This is brought out very clearly by the wording of the subsequent DVD cover, on the front of which Mozart’s name with those of the renowned musicians constitutes the only information. It is on the back cover that we learn that “Mozart’s music was performed as an integral part of the liturgy for which it was originally intended” (Mozart: 1992, back cover). This particular performance constituted in one way a consistent updating of the performance context originally intended, and in another the fruit of a reception history which has made of Mozart’s work a masterpiece of classical music.

2.

Mozart, Liturgical Music, and the Notion of the Sublime

Let us briefly summarize some salient points concerning the literary or philosophical reception of the notion of the ‘sublime’: During the 16th to 18th centuries the Greek treatise On the Sublime (Peri Hupsous) − the unknown, possibly first-century writer of which is now commonly referred to as Pseudo-Longinus − was translated into Latin, then French and English, with a deep impact on the literary criticism of the day. On the Sublime treats the idea of the elevated, or the sublime, as a branch of what in modern terms would be called the aesthetic or rhetorical: how does an author convey importance and loftiness to his readers? Summarizing in the briefest possible way, one might say that Pseudo-Longinus discusses literary techniques, which he illustrates primarily by way of such examples from Greek antiquity as Sophocles, as well as one biblical example, that of the creation of light in Genesis 1 (“Longinus”: 1982; Longinus: 1975). In the 18th-century literary and philosophical reception of the idea of the sublime, however, a very different yardstick came into use, not least through Edmund Burke’s as it seems highly original discussion of the concept in his youthful treatise A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful (1757, extended in 1759). Burke makes a fundamental distinction between the concepts of the beautiful and the sublime, as opposed to Pseudo-Longinus and his translators. The sublime, in Burke’s understanding, is based on the encounter with terror. It is not possible to discuss Burke and his − largely empiricist inspired − ideas here, but it is worth pointing out that he, in the end (as formulated in the 1759 edition), refers us to religious awe and points to biblical texts and conceptions:

 

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But the scripture alone can supply ideas answerable to the majesty of this subject. In the scripture, wherever God is represented as appearing or speaking, every thing terrible in nature is called up to heighten the awe and solemnity of the divine presence. The psalms, and the prophetical books, are crouded with instances of this kind. The earth shook (says the psalmist [Ps 68:8 misquoted]) the heavens also dropped at the presence of the Lord. And what is remarkable, the painting preserves the same character, not only when he is supposed descending to take vengeance upon the wicked, but even when he exerts the like plenitude of power in acts of beneficence to mankind. Tremble, thou earth! At the presence of the Lord; at the presence of the God of Jacob; which turned the rock into standing water, the flint into a fountain of waters! [Ps 114:7f misquoted] […] Thus we have traced power through its several gradations unto the highest of all, where our imagination is finally lost; and we find terror quite throughout the progress, its inseparable companion, and growing along with it, as far as we can possibly trace them. Now as power is undoubtedly a capital source of the sublime, this will point out evidently from whence its energy is derived, and to what class of ideas we ought to unite it (Burke: 1990, 63f).

It is well known that Immanuel Kant, in his Kritik der Urteilskraft published in 1790, based his understanding of the concept of the sublime (“das Erhabene”) on Burke’s idea (Kant: 2001, see esp. 128f). Although I do not think that there are any terminological connections between the ideas of Burke and Kant and medieval notions of liturgy and sacraments, it is my contention that medieval ideas of the holy, and consequently the experience of it by the faithful in church, were not dissimilar to what was described by Kant and Burke as sublime experiences, although their reference was to encounters with nature. A biblical text which Burke does not quote in his discussion, but which would fit perfectly into his context, is the well-known statement of Jacob (Genesis 28:17) in the narrative of his dream at Beth-El (the “House of God”) when he wakes and, realizing that he is in a holy place, exclaims “terribilis est locus iste” (“how awesome is this place”). This Vulgate text was used as the beginning of the Introitus for the Mass of the Dedication of a church throughout the Middle Ages (Hiley: 1993, 45) and later in the post-Tridentine Catholic Church; it expresses the awe, the terror, what in Burke’s terminology has become the sublimity, of the encounter with God in the sacred place of a church where the human meets the divine. Let us now consider an interesting and well-known – but also fairly controversial – anecdote, transmitted by Friedrich Rochlitz (1769−1842), the editor and founder of the Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung, in one of its first issues, presumably concerning an episode at which he himself was present. The historical context is Mozart’s visit to Leipzig in 1789, when he improvised on the organ of the Thomaskirche for an hour on 22 April. According to Rochlitz, in the evening after the concert, Mozart was invited to the home of Johann Friedrich Doles (1715–97), Thomaskantor since 1755 (Rochlitz: 1801, col. 494; Deutsch: 1961, 298). There, at

 

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some point the conversation came round to composers and church music, and a deprecatory remark on the artistic limitations of church music provoked Mozart to the following speech, which, Rochlitz insists, he has rephrased: This is some more of the usual mindless chatter about the arts! Perhaps for you enlightened Protestants, as you call yourselves when you remember your religion, there may be some truth in such a statement; I cannot say. But for us, it is a different matter. You have no conception of what it means: Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, dona nobis pacem, etc. But if someone like myself, who from earliest childhood was introduced into the mystical sanctuary of our religion; if someone, not yet knowing where to go with his dark yet urgent feelings, full of heartfelt inner passion, sits through the holy service without really knowing precisely what has happened to him; if you call blessed those who kneeled down to the touching sounds of the Agnus Dei and received communion, while the music at the same time spoke: Benedictus qui venit etc. joyfully and softly from the hearts of those kneeling, then it is a different matter. Of course, this admittedly tends to get lost as one goes through life on this earth; but – at least in my case – if one looks once again at those words heard a thousand times over with the intent of setting them to music, all of this revives and stands before you, and moves your soul (English translation Solomon: 1991, 39).2

The historicity of this and other anecdotes which Rochlitz transmits in the Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung has been questioned, in a notably balanced way in Solomon’s recent discussion (Solomon: 1991, 40f and 48f). The only argument however against the historicity of this particular anecdote seems to be that Rochlitz is not always reliable, and that the language of the passage seems better suited to an early Romantic author such as Rochlitz than to the manner in which Mozart ordinarily expressed himself. The style, however, is already explained by Rochlitz, and in any case, as remarked by Hans Küng, the content of the remark fits comfortably into the picture of Mozart’s relationship to the Catholic faith as recorded in his let-

2 Original German text, Rochlitz: 1801, col. 494f: “Das ist mir auch einmal wieder so ein Kunstgeschwätz! Bei Euch aufgeklärten Protestanten, wie ihr Euch nennt, wenn ihr eure Religion im Kopfe habt – kann etwas Wahres darin seyn; das weis ich nicht. Aber bey uns ist das anders. Ihr fühlt gar nicht, was das will: Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, dona nobis pacem. u. dgl. Aber wenn man von frühester Kindheit, wie ich, in das mystische Heiligthum unsrer Religion eingeführt ist; wenn man da, als man noch nicht wusste, wo man mit seinen dunkeln, aber drängenden Gefühlen hinsolle, in voller Inbrunst des Herzens seinen Gottesdienst abwartete, ohne eigentlich zu wissen was man wollte; und leichter und erhoben daraus wegging, ohne eigentlich zu wissen was man gehabt habe; wenn man die glücklich pries, die unter dem rührenden Agnus Dei hinknieten und das Abendmal empfingen, und beym Empfang die Musik in sanfter Freude aus dem Herzen der Knieenden sprach: Benedictus qui venit etc. dann ist’s anders. Nun ja, das gehet freylich dann durch das Leben in der Welt verlohren: aber – wenigstens ist’s mir so – wenn man nun die tausendmal gehörten Worte nochmals vornimmt, sie in Musik zu setzen, so kommt das alles wieder, und steht vor Einem, und bewegt Einem die Seele.”

 

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ters, if those statements are taken seriously. Moreover, and this is probably Küng’s most important argument, it seems to provide an understandable background to his church music, which we can hear (Küng: 1991, 19 and 33–36). The anecdote is not necessarily accurate in all details, although there seems to be no reason, except for the general scepticism as to Rochlitz’ reliability, to dismiss it. In its substance, I would suggest, it touches upon something which seems present in Mozart’s important liturgical musical compositions. I shall come back to that something in connection with the Requiem: but first let us set the context by digressing briefly to his second Litaniae de venerabile altaris sacramento, K. 243, composed in Salzburg in 1776. In these sacramental litanies, we find striking texts − going back at least to the late 16th century and found for instance in settings by Palestrina as well as others. In the 18th century it seems specifically to have become a musical tradition in Salzburg to perform such litanies in connection with the Forty Hours Devotion observed in the Cathedral every year, beginning on Palm Sunday and including, at least on some occasions, such a Eucharistic litany towards the end of each day. Even in Mozart’s case, much remains obscure about the liturgical context of the litanies. Eucharistic litanies never obtained an official liturgical position, and were only used on local authorization, in many different textual versions which overlap but rarely coincide completely, except in 18th century Salzburg (Marx-Weber: 2006; Schmid: 2006, esp. 73–77; Petersen: 2012 c). The text of the litany clearly emphasizes Catholic Eucharistic theology as defined by the Council of Trent, containing formulations which strongly underline the real presence, the divine vivacity of the consecrated host itself, also outside of the actual celebration of the Eucharist. Already the form of the litany, in which prayers are addressed directly to the host, marks an understanding of the Eucharistic elements in strong contrast to any Protestant interpretation, including the Lutheran, and probably derives from polemics against the Protestant heresies (Petersen: 2012 b, 118–121). The Catholic theology of the Eucharist in the 16th century was not different from that of the 18th century in this respect. Palestrina’s settings are however straightforward and may be described as functional; they do not seem to respond to the textual content, but underline the structure of the litany with the repeated formula miserere nobis. The texts, more than the music, tell of the devotional, theological, and political context in which these prayers were offered (Petersen: 2011, 10–12; Petersen: 2012 b, 120f). Conversely, the Salzburg sacramental litanies of the 18th century place the text, in accordance with the general church style, in larger structures of movements, and introduce emotional or even dramatic emphasis into their settings of individual textual elements. Mozart’s later setting in E flat major, K. 243 (1776), for instance, dramatically exposes the words of the Tremendum movement:

 

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Life-giving sacrament, causing us to tremble in awe, have mercy upon us. Bread made flesh through the omnipotence of the Word, have mercy upon us. Sacrifice without bloodshed, have mercy upon us. Nourishment and fellow table guest, have mercy upon us (Marx-Weber: 2006, 212–13).3

An ecclesiastical decree of 1784 from Salzburg underscores the extent to which an emotional impact was presupposed in this ceremony: the terror-struck awe of the confrontation with the divine (Petersen: 2011, 12). Mozart’s setting clearly achieves no less. As much may be said of his non-liturgical music, to be sure, but it is to a high degree emphasized in his major liturgical works: witness the “Rex tremendae majestatis” in the Dies irae of the Requiem, and indeed an early C minor mass from 1768. In the Credo of this solemn mass, composed for the inauguration of the Waisenhauskirche on 7 December 1768 by the not quite 13-year-old Wolfgang, the central verse “Crucifixus etiam pro nobis: sub Pontio Pilato passus, et sepultus est” stands out as a remarkably dramatized representation of the crucifixion (see the discussion of these and other examples in Petersen: 2012 c). Beside the astonishingly ripe musicalization by the young composer, this type of setting has raised a number of questions as to the appropriateness of such dramatic – or, as many in the 19th century would claim, operatic – settings of a liturgical and biblical text in a religious service. I would, however, argue that this is an expression of the sublime character of the holy, a tenet reasserted much later (in 1917) by Rudolf Otto in The Idea of the Holy (Das Heilige – Über das Irrationale in der Idee des Göttlichen und sein Verhältnis zum Rationalen). The sacred, he pointed out, was the proper realm of the sublime, not the arts, which in a sense seemed to have appropriated it: if not directly from the sacred, then at least from biblical notions as to the confrontation with the divine. Such notions had in practice been strongly represented in the medieval as well as the early modern post-Tridentine liturgy, and would thus have played a major role in composers’ settings of liturgical music, Mozart being particularly sensitive to such aspects. The “sublimity” of Mozart’s liturgical music is not attributable to the new aesthetic thinking of the 18th century, but is rather a contemporary, 18th century, musical response to a medieval and early modern liturgical sensibility.

3 Original Latin text in Mozart: 1969, 54–67: “Tremendum ac vivificium Sacramentum, miserere nobis. Panis omnipotentia verbi caro factus, miserere nobis. Incruentum sacrificium, miserere nobis. Cibus et conviva, miserere nobis.”

 

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The Notion of an Imaginary Space in Music: Music and Visibility

I shall now return to the question, raised briefly at the beginning of this paper, of invisibility and music. In his Skabelse og Tilintetgørelse (Creation and Annihilation, 1978), the Danish philosopher and theologian K.E. Løgstrup (1905–81) who usually paid little attention to things musical, launched an idea concerning what he termed the “fictional space of music” (a notion that I have explored further in another article – Petersen: 2015). I would like now to pursue this particular hare of Løgstrup’s, with specific reference to the reception history of Mozart’s Requiem, a work which, as we have seen, came to have significance in more than one sense, and beyond its strictly musical content. In a discussion of the notion of time, Løgstrup takes his point of departure in Augustine’s philosophy of time as set out in the Confessions, book XI (xxvii). Augustine imagines singing a song from the point at which all of the song is still fully contained in the future, i. e. he has not yet started singing, through the song as it moves through the singer until finally – as he has finished singing – all of it belongs to the past. Drawing also on Heidegger and Husserl, Løgstrup arrives at a somewhat revised version of their philosophies of time, with one particular new additional element. He agrees that time is measured subjectively in our minds, but also claims that there must be an objective part of time, although we cannot arrive at it, because, in his view, we know time only through the retention: we try to hold back what is escaping from us in an attempt to rebel against a fundamental human condition. Memory is a tool against the looming void of annihilation. We can only experience time as a product of our rebellion against it. We cannot get behind our rebellion. We can, however, say something about time prior to our rebellion, indeed that it is the irreversibility of annihilation. But we are cut off from experiencing the irreversibility in the annihilation as time. We can only experience time as it results from our fight against the irreversibility in the annihilation, a fight that consists in holding back and reproducing what has been irrevocably annihilated as past, a fight that we lead in retention and memory (my translation, N.H.P.).4

Since it is possible to minimize infinitely the moment experienced as “present time” in Augustine’s procedure of cutting time intervals ever shorter and shorter, one 4 Original Danish text, Løgstrup: 1978, 31f: “Vi kan kun erfare den tid, der er et produkt af vor opstand imod den. Bagom vor opstand kan vi ikke komme. Noget kan vi nok sige om tiden før opstanden, så meget at den er irreversibiliteten i tilintetgørelsen. Men erfare irreversibiliteten i tilintetgørelsen som tid er vi afskåret fra. Erfare kan vi kun den tid, der kommer ud af vor kamp imod irreversibiliteten i tilintetgørelsen, en kamp der består i at holde igen på og reproducere det uigenkaldeligt tilintetgjorte som fortid, en kamp som vi fører i retention og erindring.”

 

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result of his discussion seems to be a deconstruction of the notion of the “present moment”. Løgstrup, however, emphasizes that there is a connection between future and past and that it is possible to stretch time out – psychologically, one might suggest – precisely through the retention. Objects, as they take up space, appear – at least seemingly and for a while – unchanged, and thereby may help us, by contrast, to experience how time changes. The question, on the other hand, is how we experience that there is such a thing as “the present”, since it necessitates extension in order to be perceived. But then the question is: how can my present time be extended? Augustine’s answer is to refer to the relation of the present time to the present time; that relation consists in stretching out the present time, holding back what has passed. It does so with the help of perception; to put it more exactly: with the help of the perceived. […] The perceived is not only present in the present perception; it is also present outside of the present perception, and therefore the perceived is able to stretch out the present. The perceived is present in a timeless way outside of the present perception as far as it is unchangeable. But this means that what is, the perceived in its timeless changelessness, is a condition − to use Augustine’s vocabulary − for the present to be able to relate to the present (my translation, N.H.P.).5

For Løgstrup, the example of the melody is but an example. The overall object is to give a phenomenological analysis of the interrelationship between space and time. But the melody still provides him with an important argument: if we hold back something unchangeable (at least unchangeable for a while), it can help extend the moment. In the example of a melody, however, this is purely a phenomenon of time and not unchangeable at all. Even so, Løgstrup maintains that We are, however, able to retain a pure object of time, something which is as pure and simple a progress in time as a melody, and yet there seems to be nothing unchangeable here, nothing timeless, nothing spatial. But there is; there is the shape of the melody; there is the fictional changelessness and fictional timelessness of the structure, the character, the entity and the unity of the melody which both belong to a fictional space. […] For a melody it is necessary not only that its parts follow in the right order; also its

5 Original Danish text, Løgstrup: 1978, 34f: “Men så er spørgsmålet, hvordan det går til, at min nutid får udstrækning. Augustins svar er, at nutidens relation til nutiden må til; den består i at udstrække nutiden, holde igen på det passerede. Og det gør den med anskuelsens hjælp, nøj­ agtigere sagt med det anskuedes hjælp. […] Det anskuede er ikke kun til stede i den nutidige anskuelse, men det er også til stede uden for den nutidige anskuelse, og af den grund kan det anskuede strække nutiden ud. Udenfor den nutidige anskuelse er det anskuede tidløst til stede så langt som det er uforanderligt. Men det vil sige, at det værende, det anskuede i dets tidløse uforanderlighed er en betingelse for, med Augustins vokabular, at nutid kan forholde sig til nutid.”

 

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character is necessary. But time cannot grant character to a progress in time; only space can do that (my translation, N.H.P.).6

Here the question must be raised as to how to define the notion of a melody. What exactly are these particular conditions that Løgstrup sets up to identify this notion? Largely, in a Western cultural context, it is easy to understand that he refers to some normal idea of what constitutes a “real” melody, something, precisely, that we can remember, some sequence of tones that have a character. But is such a contemporary melodic sensibility at the same time a stable, a-historical and supra-cultural phenomenon? Hardly: and this is something that can be looked into and where knowledge exists, pointing to great caution here (see further Petersen: 2015). This is not to blame Løgstrup, his point relating to a general philosophy of time; he does not claim to make historical statements in the field of music. But if we choose to borrow his idea of the fictional space for a melody – or even more for a piece of music, a musical work of art, we will indeed have to historicize. In the context of this paper, I am guilty – heuristically – of borrowing an idea from Løgstrup and forthwith leaving his philosophical discussion to go on with my own historical discourse (for more discussion on the relationship between Løgstrup’s philosophical idea and a historical discussion of the notion of melody, see Petersen: 2015). Here we are in pursuit of the notion of a fictional, or let us say rather imaginary, space for a musical work in a tradition and cultural context where it makes sense to speak of such notions as character, structure, overall form and so on. Such notions increasingly came to be accepted analytical tools for musicology in the course of Western musical history in the main era of the so-called classical music, however far we are willing to stretch that notion, but at least for music from the 18th century onwards. For many, such notions have appeared meaningful even much further back in time (cf. Petersen: 2004, 26–28). The idea of imaginary spaces for musical works is a tool to help categorize music by way of classes of characteristics as we know them, partly from genre history, partly from the traditional kinds of analysis that have become part of music education. Included here might be genre, musical form, sound scape, and texture, notions which each have their historical problematic and still seem valid in categorizing the music of the last few hundred years. To this, however, we should add context. Mozart’s Requiem, as already suggested, is not the “same” work when performed as a fully-fledged mass in remembrance of a deceased person that it is 6 Original Danish text, Løgstrup: 1978, 38f: “Et rent tidsobjekt, noget der er så rent og skært et forløb som en melodi, er vi i stand til at holde igen på, og her er dog intet uforanderligt, intet tidløst, intet rumligt. Men det er der, der er formen, der er strukturens, skikkelsens, helhedens og enhedens fiktive uforanderlighed og fiktive tidløshed, der hører hjemme i et fiktivt rum. […] Til en melodi hører ikke kun, at leddene kommer i den rigtige rækkefølge. Til en melodi hører også skikkelse. Skikkelse kan imidlertid ikke tiden, kun rummet give et forløb.”

 

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when we hear it in a concert hall, detached from a liturgical context. Nor is it the same piece when we listen to it with attention to the setting of the words, what they mean and how Mozart has emphasized or expressed them, or when we listen to the music as simply beautiful music without noticing what is actually being sung, as doubtless a great many will be doing when playing the music from an MP3, listening to a CD or the radio, or, as was common in bourgeois circles in the 19th and early 20th centuries, playing it on the piano from a published instrumental reduction without text (see the piano reduction from Peters in Leipzig, Mozart: n.d., fig. 1).

Fig. 1: W.A. Mozart (n.d.), Requiem. Klavierauszug zu 2 Händen, Leipzig: C.F. ­Peters [no. 7242], p. 1.

Much as one might deplore the lack of general interest in the relationship between music and words in this and many other classical compositions, not least a general lack of consciousness concerning the liturgical and also broader religious context

 

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in modern musical culture, it is not our concern here; in a sense the point is the opposite. Had Mozart’s music for his Requiem not been torn loose from its denominational and liturgical context, it is very likely that it would not have become as well-known as in fact it has. The de-contextualization of the piece from its background, its liturgical Sitz im Leben as it were – although, as already pointed out, it was never in view of the biographical circumstances very secure – has to a high extent been an important reason for its early universal reception. In each case, the de-contextualization has of course also been a re-contextualization. From which it follows that, just as much as musical works of a different genre, would be open to categorization as musical works of different imaginary spaces, in a similar way the same work, here Mozart’s Requiem, will be not one but several works, works belonging to different imaginary spaces dependent on how much of the context of the work (the words, the liturgical context or even the wider religious context) is activated in listening to it. The notion of different imaginary spaces for musical works, and even for what in traditional terminology is presented as one composition, Mozart’s Requiem, may make us aware of different categories of works, themselves cutting across various genres and forms, dependent, for instance, on different denominational cultures, or on secularized music cultures, and certainly connected to modern individualized consumer culture as it impacts on music. The notion of the imaginary space for music changes nothing. It is mainly a tool of perception, to “see” this complexity in musical works placed in a context involving other media than simply music. To construct an inner visual image of music, especially concerning such pieces or rather complexes as Mozart’s Requiem might also help us appreciate cultural transmissions, re-contextualizations and re-significations of (for instance) musical liturgy. Even if this does not answer a question as to whether music is visible or not, the idea of an imaginary visuality, of a spatial quality of musical works (within the historical domain drawn on here) is helpful in establishing an idea of the complexity of a potential typology of music.

4.

The Reception of Mozart’s Requiem

I will conclude by emphasizing some few selected instances of reception in various connections, which illustrate some of the aforementioned points. First, then, Georg Nikolaus v. Nissen (1761–1826), Constanze’s second husband, a Danish diplomat who wrote one of the first biographies of Mozart, left it unfinished at his death to be edited by Constanze and friends; it was published in 1828. In the Anhang he writes about several Mozart works, and for instance has the following to say of the Requiem:

 

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This deep, exuberantly magnificent Requiem by Mozart is the masterpiece that combines the strength, the holy dignity of the old music with the rich jewel of the new […]. The Tuba mirum may perhaps be the only movement which falls into the oratorio-like; otherwise the music remains pure worship, and only in such a way do the wonderful chords sound that speak from the beyond, indeed that are the beyond themselves, in their particular dignity and strength. This Requiem in the concert hall, however, is never the same music; there it is the appearance of a holy person at a ball − a sermon in the theatre. For the music which has been designed for worship is worship itself (my translation, N.H.P.).7

Apart from his seeming experience of two different imaginary spaces to each of which the Requiem in the concert hall “version” and the solemn mass belong, respectively, Nissen also takes part in the mythic construction around the work, a process in which Constanze herself seems to have played an important role, as many scholars have pointed out (Keefe: 2012, 22f). Next let us consider Rachel Cowgill’s recent and on-going work on the English reception of the Requiem. She points out how problematic it seems to have been in a number of incidents to have a Catholic mass for the dead performed in England, not only in churches, but even in the theatre. The first performance took place as part of the Lenten oratorio series at the Theatre Royal Covent Garden, and John Ashley, the arranger and conductor of the concert, made an effort to cover up the work’s background as a Catholic mass. His announcement of the first performance of Mozart’s Requiem in London (20 February 1801) gave the following title: “The Requiem, Or Grand Funeral Anthem”. For the Latin requiem text was substituted an English paraphrase, which also obscured the liturgical background, and the programme was heavily supplemented with excerpts from well-known Handel oratorios which were mostly emphasized in the advertisements (Cowgill: 2006, 13). Cowgill contextualizes this with contemporary Ireland crises and the general hostility toward all things Catholic. In her view, the fairly cool critical response seems also to have been influenced by such anti-Catholic attitudes; here is just one of her examples: According to the Oracle on 21 February 1801, Mozart’s Requiem, “being in a style of musical composition to which English ears are less accustomed than to that of Handel, did not, though well performed, give very high satisfaction” (Cowgill: 2006, 18).

7 Original German text, Nissen: 1984, Anhang, 171: “Dieses tiefe, überschwänglich herrliche Requiem Mozart’s ist das Meisterwerk, das die Kraft, die heilige Würde der alten Musik mit dem reichen Schmucke der neuern verbindet […]. Das Tuba mirum mag vielleicht der einzige Satz seyn, der in das Oratorienartige fällt: sonst bleibt aber die Musik reiner Cultus, und nur als solcher ertönen die wunderbaren Accorde, die von dem Jenseits sprechen, ja, die das Jenseits selber sind, in ihrer eigenthümlichen Würde und Kraft. Dieses Requiem aber im Concertsaale ist nie dieselbe Musik, da ist sie die Erscheinung eines Heiligen auf dem Balle – eine Predigt im Theater. Denn die für den Cultus bestimmte Musik ist selbst Cultus.”

 

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An interesting parallel to Cowgill’s observations can be found in Copenhagen, where the Requiem was first performed in 1803 at court under its proper title, but to a Danish paraphrase (written in a light Romantic style) of the requiem text which for most listeners would have obscured both its original medieval and contemporary Catholic context (Hatting: 1991, 51; Mozart: 1803). Even more obscure, with the very same textual version of the Requiem, was the announcement in the programme for the 1818 performance in the university church of Copenhagen, the Trinitatis Kirke, promising the audience a “Spiritual Cantata by R. Frankenau set to music by Mozart” (“Geistlig Cantate til Mozarts Musik af Dr. Frankenau”; Frankenau: 1818; see fig. 2). A likely reason behind such a change of title would have been ecclesiastical cautions against a Catholic piece of music in a Lutheran church, especially perhaps in a church affiliated with the then staunchly Lutheran Faculty of Theology.

Fig. 2: Front page of text booklet from a performance of Mozart’s Requiem in Trinitatis Church, Copenhagen, during Lent 1818. Printed 1818 in Copenhagen: Møller & Søn.

 

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In a final glimpse of the reception history, underlining what has been said as to the relation of the music to the text, I shall cite the well-known philologist and writer Otto Jahn (1813–69) whose life of Mozart of 1856–59, revised twice (and here we quote from the posthume 1889–91 edition) counts among the most renowned Mozart biographies of the 19th century. He comments on the conclusion of the Confutatis movement: And here the voices unite very quietly in a sequence of harmonies as no mortal ear had ever heard them before.

Fig. 3: Piano reduction of the second stanza of the Confutatis-movement of Mozart’s Requiem in Otto Jahn (1889–91), W.A. Mozart, 3 vol. (orig. 1856–59, rev. 1867), Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel, vol. 2, p. 671.

Spontaneously one bows, deeply moved by this proclamation of a mystery which the mouth has no ability to pronounce; one experiences without resistance, given over to the undreamt-of changes in the stream of harmonies, how that which had been frozen

 

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in the foundation of one’s nature is melting in quiet shivers and changes into rebirth; one feels enshrouded by the breath of eternity, the vibrations of which whistled round the head of the master, already touched by death (my translation, N.H.P.; orig. German text, Jahn: 1889–91, II, 671).8

It is quite a different thing when listening with the text which I quote below. However, I should point out that Jahn did quote several of the keywords before the passage I have given. The point to emphasize is that without the words, Jahn’s description merely points to a beautiful musical fragment, but with them his highly emotional account can be seen to refer to the notions to which the music relates. Here follow the two stanzas set in the Confutatis movement: After the accursed have been silenced, Given up to the bitter flames, Call me with the blest. Kneeling and bowed down I pray, My heart contrite as ashes: Do Thou care for my end (attributed Thomas de Celano: n.d.).9

As suggested above, Mozart’ Requiem without words has a different imaginary space from Mozart’s Requiem with them; the self-same piece heard or understood in its liturgical context (as claimed by Nissen) has yet another imaginary space. In the end, of course, there seems to be no end to the potential refining of imaginary spaces for different versions or receptions of musical works, or depending on different listening practices. Clearly there is no dogmatic solution to determining what is correct in categorizations of Mozart’s Requiem or any other musical work. In the end it is a question of a heightened consciousness of the distinctions that can be made between musical works, or perhaps the plurality of works traditionally seen as one. The notion of spatiality, I would suggest, is helpful in suggesting a relative stability, relative to a particular cultural sensibility, of such categoriza8 Original German text, Jahn: 1889–91, II, 671: “Und hier vereinigen sich die Singstimmen ganz leise in einer Folge von Harmonien, wie sie kein sterbliches Ohr gehört hatte. Cf. Fig. 3. Unwillkürlich beugt man sich tief ergriffen bei der Verkündigung eines Mysteriums, das der Mund nicht auszusprechen vermag; widerstandslos den ungeahnten Wandlungen des Harmonienstroms hingegeben, empfindet man, wie auch im Grunde des Gemüthes sich in leisen Schauern löst, was gebunden war und umwandelt in innerer Wiedergeburt, man fühlt sich umwittert vom Hauch der Ewigkeit, deren Schwingen das Haupt des schon vom Tode berührten Meisters umrauschten.” 9 Orig. Latin text, Mozart: 1965, 100–110: “Confutatis maledictis, / flammis acribus addictis, / voca me cum benedictis. / Oro supplex et acclinis, / cor contritum quasi cinis, / Gere curam mei finis.”

 

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tions. Even if it is “only” by way of imaginary vision, distinctions between relevant categories of Mozart’s Requiem, and thus also of other musical works, can be seen to be perceived.

Bibliography Bauer, Wilhelm A./Deutsch, Otto Erich/Eibl, Joseph Heinz/Konrad, Ulrich (ed.) (2005), Mozart: Briefe und Aufzeichnungen. Gesamtausgabe, 7 vol. (extended edition), Kassel: Bärenreiter. Burke, Edmund ([1757/1759] 1990), A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Celano, Thomas de (attributed) (n.d.), Dies Irae, English literal translation, in The Franciscan Archive (available at: http://www.franciscan-archive.org/de_celano/opera/diesirae.html) [08.05.2014 March]. Cook, Nicholas (2003), Music as Performance, in Martin Clayton/Trevor Herbert/Richard Middleton (ed.), The Cultural Study of Music: A critical introduction, New York/London: Routledge. Cowgill, Rachel (2006), “Hence, base intruder, hence”: Rejection and Assimilation in the Early English Reception of Mozart’s Requiem, in Rachel Cowgill/Julian Rushton (ed.), Europe, Empire, and Spectacle in Nineteenth-Century British Music, Aldershot: Ashgate, 9–27. Deutsch, Otto Erich (ed.) (1961), Mozart: Die Dokumente seines Lebens, Kassel: Bärenreiter. Eibl, Joseph Heinz (ed.) (1978), Mozart: Die Dokumente seines Lebens. Addenda und Corrigenda, Kassel: Bärenreiter. Eisen, Cliff (ed.) (1997), Mozart: Die Dokumente seines Lebens. Addenda, Neue Folge. Kassel: Bärenreiter. Frankenau, Rasmus (1818), Geistlig Cantate til Mozarts Musik (programme booklet with Dr. Frankenau’s Danish rendering of the Requiem text), Copenhagen: Møller. Hatting, Carsten (1991), Mozart og Danmark, Copenhagen: Engstrøm & Sødring. Hiley, David (1993), Western Plainchant: A Handbook, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Jahn, Otto (1889–91), W.A. Mozart, 3 vol. (orig. 1856–59, rev. 1867), Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel. Kant, Immanuel (2001), Kritik der Urteilskraft, Hamburg: Felix Meiner Verlag. Karp, Theodore et al. (n.d.), Art. Requiem Mass, Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online, Oxford: Oxford University Press (available at: http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/ article/grove/music/43221) [08.05.2014]. Keefe, Simon P. (2012), Mozart’s Requiem: Reception, Work, Completion, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Küng, Hans (1991), Mozart: Spuren der Transzendenz, München: Piper. Longinus (1975), On the Sublime: The Peri Hupsous in Translations by Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux (1674) and William Smith (1739). Facsimile Reproductions with an Introduction by William Bruce Johnson, Delmar, New York: Scholars’ Facsimiles and Reprints. “Longinus” (1982), On the Sublime. Text and Translation (Loeb Classical Library), Cambridge Mass: Harvard University Press.

 

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Løgstrup, Knud Ejler (1978), Skabelse og tilintetgørelse: Religionsfilosofiske betragtninger. Metafysik IV, København: Gyldendal. Marx-Weber, Magda (2006), Litaneien, in Thomas Hochradner/Günther Massenkeil (ed.), Mozarts Kirchenmusik, Lieder und Chormusik. Das Handbuch, Laaber: Laaber Verlag, 201− 220. Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus (1803), Missa pro Defunctis: Requiem (programme booklet with Dr. Frankenau’s Danish rendering of the Requiem text), Copenhagen: Møller og Søn. Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus (n.d.), Requiem von W.A. Mozart: Klavierauszug zu 2 Händen. Leipzig: C.F. Peters. Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus (1965), Requiem K. 626, in Leopold Nowak (ed.), Neue Mozart Ausgabe (NMA), Work Group 1, Part 2, 2 vol. Kassel: Bärenreiter. Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus (1969), Litaniae de venerabili altaris Sacramento KV 243, in Hellmut Federhofer/Renate Federhofer-Königs (ed.), Urtext of the Neue Mozart Ausgabe, Kassel: Bärenreiter. Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus (1992), Requiem K. 626: 200th Anniversary Performance Commemorating Mozart’s Death, conducted by Sir George Solti (DVD), London: Decca Music Group Ltd. Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus (2006), Requiem K. 626, online digitized version of the Neue Mozart Ausgabe, Internationale Stiftung Mozarteum, Online Publications (available at: http:// dme.mozarteum.at/DME/nma/start.php?l=2) [08.05.2014]. Niemetschek, Franz Xaver (2005), Ich kannte Mozart: Die einzige Biografie von einem Augenzeugen, herausgegeben und kommentiert von Jost Perfahl, Munich: Langen Müller. Nissen, Georg Nikolaus v. ([1828] 1984), Biographie W.A. Mozarts, Hildesheim: Georg Olms Verlag. Petersen, Nils Holger (2004), Carolingian Music, Ritual, and Theology, in Nils Holger Petersen/Mette Birkedal Bruun/Jeremy Llewellyn/Eyolf Østrem (ed.), The Appearances of Medieval Rituals. The Play of Construction and Modification, Turnhout: Brepols, 13–31. Petersen, Nils Holger (2006), Opbyggelige koncerter i Trinitatis kirke omkring år 1800 [Devotional concerts in the Church of the Trinity around 1800], in Inger Wiene/Kirsten Sandholt/Jesper Vang Hansen (ed.), Runde Kirke, Taarn og Sogn, Copenhagen: Nyt Nordisk Forlag, 159–168. Petersen, Nils Holger (2011), Introduction, in Nils Holger Petersen/Eyolf Østrem/Andreas Bücker (ed.), Resonances: Historical Essays on Continuity and Change. Turnhout: Brepols, 1–19. Petersen, Nils Holger (2012 a), Art. Classical Music, Encyclopedia of the Bible and its Reception, vol. 5, col. 391–397. Petersen, Nils Holger (2012 b), The Quarant’Ore: Early Modern Ritual and Performativity, in Peter Gillgren/Mårten Snickare (ed.), Performativity and Performance in Baroque Rome, Farnham/London: Ashgate, 115–133. Petersen, Nils Holger (2012 c), Sacred Space and Sublime Sacramental Piety: The Devotion of the Forty Hours and W.A. Mozart’s two Sacramental Litanies (Salzburg 1772 and 1776), in Diana Mite Colceriu (ed.), Heterotopos: Espaces sacrés I, Bucharest: Editura universitãtii din bucuresti, 2012, 171–2011. Petersen, Nils Holger (2015), Time and Space in W.A. Mozart’s Ave verum corpus (1791): Transcendence and the Fictive Space of the Musical Work, in Svein Aage Christoffersen et al. (ed.), Transcendence and Sensoriness: Perception, Revelation, and the Arts, Leiden: Brill, 287–325.

 

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Rankin, Susan (1994), Carolingian Music, in Rosamond McKitterick (ed.), Carolingian Culture: Emulation and innovation, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 274–316. Rochlitz, Friedrich (1801), Noch einige Kleinigkeiten aus Mozarts Leben, Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung, 15. April, Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel, col. 493–497. Schmid, Manfred Hermann (2006), Mozart in Salzburg: Ein Ort für sein Talent, Salzburg: Anton Pustet. Solomon, Maynard (1991), The Rochlitz Anecdotes: Issues of Authenticity in early Mozart Biography, in Cliff Eisen (ed.), Mozart Studies, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1–59. Wolff, Christoph (1991), Mozarts Requiem: Geschichte, Musik, Dokumente, Kassel: Bärenreiter. Wolff, Christoph (2012), Mozart at the Gateway: Serving the Emperor, 1788–1791, New York/ London: Norton & Co.

 

 

Konrad Küster

Wann spielt die Orgel im Gottesdienst? Liturgische Beobachtungen zwischen Spätmittelalter und Früher Neuzeit

So unumstritten die Orgel als Inventarstück westlicher Kirchen ist, so schwer ist es, ihre Rolle im Gottesdienst zu verstehen – vor allem in der Zeit bis etwa 1700. Damals wurde für die Orgel allmählich die Begleitung des Gemeindeliedes als neue Kernaufgabe etabliert, die dem Instrument fortan eine eigene, neue Existenzberechtigung gab; doch die grundlegenden Weichenstellungen für die kirchliche und musikhistorische Bedeutung der Orgel waren in der Zeit zuvor getroffen worden. Will man diese älteren Verhältnisse verstehen, genügt es nicht, das in den Blick zu nehmen, was fortan noch neben der Liedbegleitung üblich war: die zeremoniellen Aspekte, Tempo und Tonlage des Gemeindeliedes vorzubereiten oder nonverbale Vorgänge zu begleiten (Einzug des Pfarrers, dessen Weg von der Kanzel zurück zum Altar, Austeilung des Abendmahls). Das hätte nicht ausgereicht, um der Orgel in der frühen nachreformatorischen Zeit den Rang des kirchlichen Musikinstruments schlechthin zukommen zu lassen. Also ist danach zu fragen, welche essentielle liturgische Rolle bei der Orgel lag. Bilder können auf kirchliche Texte verweisen: Auch wenn ihre Botschaften nicht hörbar sind, lassen sie sich in Worte übersetzen, sofern man die Bildsprache zu deuten gelernt hat – Grundlage schon der Biblia pauperum des Mittelalters. Orgelmusik hingegen ist zwar hörbar, aber nicht als Wortbotschaft; von ihr ist sie prinzipiell ähnlich entfernt wie ein Bild. Anders als der Vokalmusik haftet ihr auch kein Text an; auf einen solchen kann sie sich nur dann explizit beziehen, wenn die Orgel Musik vorträgt, die auf eine Melodie mit liturgischem Text zurückführbar ist. Doch auch dann verbleiben in ihr Anteile, die für die Liturgie unerheblich scheinen können, etwa freie Zwischenspiele oder fugische Aufarbeitungen im Begleitsatz der Melodie. Da der Text in keinem Fall wirklich erklingt, steigern sich hier zudem sämtliche Vorbehalte, die sich auch gegen mehrstimmige Bearbeitungen liturgischer Melodien in der Vokalmusik richten konnten.1 Schon im 17. Jahrhundert mündete dies in den verbreiteten Vorwurf, Orgelmusik sei nicht ver-

1 Seit der Bulle Docta sanctorum (1324/25), vgl. Fellerer: 1956, 5.

 

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ständlich, oder anders: Eine Grundlage dafür, in ihr die liturgisch so essentielle Wortbotschaft zu entschlüsseln, war dann nicht mehr gegeben, zumindest nicht in ausreichender Form. Was also rechtfertigt die Orgelmusik im Gottesdienst: Gibt es eine Botschaft, die von ihr ausgeht, ohne dass sie sich direkt im Wort äußern oder indirekt auf das Wort beziehen kann? Die Frage nach dem Unsichtbaren, Transzendentalen in der Liturgie erreicht damit eine Dimension ganz eigener Art. Für die frühe postreformatorische Kultur lässt sich die Frage zuspitzen. Wie weit war Orgelmusik in ihr überhaupt akzeptabel? Musste sie nicht als negatives Erbe eines katholisch-spätmittelalterlichen Gottesdienstpraxis bezeichnet werden? Um hierfür eine Grundlage zu erhalten, ist also zunächst zu betrachten, was das vorreformatorische Orgelspiel ausmachte.

1.

Terminologische Probleme: Vorreformatorisches Orgelspiel

Hierbei entstehen kaum überwindliche terminologische Probleme.2 Organum ist nicht allein Name eines Instruments, sondern war vor allem eine Bezeichnung für mehrstimmige Komposition. Allein darauf bezieht sich Guido von Arezzo als wegweisender mittelalterlicher Musiktheoretiker, wenn er um 1024 schreibt: „Diaphonia vocum disiunctio sonat, quam nos organum vocamus“ (Guido: 1955, 196); „organum“ ergibt sich somit aus dem Nebeneinander von mindestens zwei auf unterschiedliche Weise geführten Stimmen. In diesem Sinne heißt die große Mehrstimmigkeit an der Kathedrale Notre Dame de Paris um 1200 gleichfalls Organum. Wenn 1336 für den Hamburger Dom berichtet wird, dass die acht scolares chorales auch in organis oder organaliter sangen (Pietsch: 1957, 86ff), kann das zwar bedeuten, dass die Sänger von einem Instrument begleitet wurden; ebenso kann damit Mehrstimmigkeit umschrieben worden sein, also als Gegensatz zum Gregorianischen Choral, der dann von der Sängergruppe teils einstimmig (chorus), teils mehrstimmig gesungen wurde. Nur dann, wenn organum konkretisiert wird, etwa mit einem technischen Begriff (z. B. pulsare in organis, „die Orgel schlagen“), ist Orgelspiel eindeutig belegt. Zudem ist ein Bewusstsein für die Quellentypen erforderlich, von denen die Arbeit ausgeht: Musiktheoretiker lösten sich zwar seit dem späteren 13. Jahrhundert davon, Mehrstimmigkeit mit organum zu umschreiben; doch blieb der Begriff im Gebrauch, so dass vor allem in liturgischen Argumentationen weiterhin auch mit dem Gegensatzpaar aus choraliter (Vortrag des Gregorianischen Chorals) und organaliter (Mehrstimmigkeit) zu rechnen ist (vgl. Reckow: 1971, 8). Dies gilt sogar für Dokumente, die als Schlüsselbelege für mittelalterliche Orgelpraxis gel-

2 Zum Folgenden im Überblick Reckow: 1971.

 

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ten, so für eine Ausgabenliste, die im Kirchenjahr 1366/67 am Dom von Halberstadt geführt wurde.3 Die dort protokollierten Zahlungen erfolgten ad hoc, nach einzelnen Festen; als Zweck wird jeweils ad organa genannt. Dass damit das Honorar dessen gemeint war, der die 1361 fertig gestellte Orgel spielte, ist eine von zwei möglichen Interpretationen; ebenso denkbar ist, dass die Sänger mehrstimmiger Gesänge bezahlt wurden – obgleich außerdem die Orgel vorhanden war. Einmal ist die Formulierung ausführlicher: 1 Mark wird bezahlt „domino Arnoldo cantori […] per regimine organorum“ (Schmidt: 1889, 15; „dem Kantor Arnold für das regimen der Organa“). Doch regimen ist gerade nicht der erforderliche technische Begriff; er kann sich auf ein Gerät beziehen, ebenso aber erneut auf die Leitung einer Sängergruppe. Deshalb lässt sich in diesen Rechnungen nur die typische Rangordnung der Feste erkennen: Nur für die größeren wurden organa erwartet – gleichviel, ob es sich um mehrstimmige Vokalmusik oder um die Mitwirkung einer Orgel handelte.

2.

St. Gallen: Spätmittelalterlicher Gottesdienst als Ausgangspunkt

In dieser diffusen Situation gibt es zumindest eine ideale Ausnahme. Kurz nach 1500, noch eben unberührt von reformatorischem Denken, wurde in St. Gallen ein neuer Klosterorganist angestellt, Melchior Högger (Nef: 1938, 147ff). Im Anstellungsvertrag sind seine Dienstpflichten äußerst detailliert beschrieben: nicht nur die Feste, zu denen Orgelspiel erwartet wurde, sondern auch die konkreten Musikanteile. Somit wurde Orgelmusik an 54 Festen im Jahr erwartet, zunächst an den drei Hochfesten (1. Weihnachtstag, vier Ostertage, drei Pfingsttage), ferner mit unterschiedlicher Bewertung am Fest der Unschuldigen Kindlein, an Neujahr, Dreikönigstag, Christi Himmelfahrt und Trinitatis, außerdem an 41 ausgesprochenen Heiligenfesten. Zusätzlich zur Messfeier wurden auch Vesper und Complet am Vorabend mit Orgelmusik ausgestattet. Es ist also konkret von den Pflichten des Organisten die Rede, anders als in den offeneren Halberstädter Formulierungen. Nach der liturgischen Bedeutung richtete sich sowohl die Anzahl der von der Orgel mitgestalteten Gesänge als auch die Registerwahl. An den höchsten Festen war der Gebrauch sämtlicher Register zugelassen, an den nächstkleineren sollte auf einige verzichtet werden; an Festen dritter Klasse sollte Högger nur „das mindst register brůchen“. An gewöhnlichen Sonntagen dagegen schwieg die Orgel; nur auf besondere Anweisung erklang sie, und zwar mit schlichten Registern. Gespielt

3 Einzeldaten bei Schmidt: 1889, 9–17; von Bormann (1966: 74f) stets als Orgelspiel gedeutet.

 

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wurde dann „für das Gloria ein Stück“ und „für den Sequenz ein Stück“ – wobei die sprachliche Bedeutung von „für“ unklar bleibt (Vorspiel, Einlage, Ersatz?). Wie Högger diese Aufgaben musikalisch ausfüllte, weiß man nicht; auch das umfangreiche Notenbuch seines Nachfolgers Fridolin Sicher (vgl. Marx: 1992) hilft nicht weiter. Denn abgesehen von einem „Patrem omnipotentem“ und zwei „Et incarnatus est“ ist dort keine Musik enthalten, die auf die Messfeier verweist. Darin unterscheidet sich diese Orgelmusik-Sammlung nicht von Partnerquellen der Zeit um 1500; auch sie enthalten viel eher Tänze und Lieder als geistliche Musik. So findet sich unter den 256 Stücken des Buxheimer Orgelbuches (um 1460/70) neben einem Kyrie-Zyklus und ganz wenigen Propriumsmusiken nichts Verwertbares (vgl. auch noch den Inhalt der Ammerbach-Tabulatur, 1571/83; Ammerbach: 1984). Und Fragmente weiterer Quellen konkretisieren das Bild kaum: Erkennbar ist nur, dass jeweils Teile der liturgischen Melodien in orgelmusikalischer Aufarbeitung erklingen sollten, andere in der Reinform des Gregorianischen Chorals, beide also im Wechsel miteinander.4 Der Wechsel zwischen Chorus und Organum bezog sich also stets auf eine liturgische fortlaufende Melodie, so dass dauernd der Textbezug gewährleistet erscheint; das Decodieren der Orgelmusik warf insofern also keine größeren Probleme auf – zumindest für diejenigen, die den Cantus firmus kannten und auf sein Erklingen vorbereitet waren. Immerhin erfährt man in St. Gallen, wie sich die Orgelmusik in den Festkalender und die Gottesdienstabläufe einfügte. Dies erklärt zugleich die Haltung der Reformatoren: Die Orgelmusik war so eng mit dem liturgischen Rang der Gottesdienste verknüpft, so stark also vom Heiligenkalender abhängig, dass sie allein deshalb als Mittel der Heiligenverehrung erscheinen musste; ein Bruch mit dieser stellte daher auch die Orgelmusik in Frage.

3.

Vorreformatorische Minimalformen als nachreformatorische Normalität?

Terminologische Schwierigkeiten bestehen auch in nachreformatorischer Zeit. Zwar ist in dieser klar, wann vom Instrument Orgel die Rede ist; Kernproblem ist aber weiterhin, wie sich musikalische Sachverhalte liturgisch benennen lassen. Kirchenordnungen sind nicht von Musikern geschrieben worden, und ihre Verfasser hatten oft nicht verstanden, welchen inneren Gesetzen die Musik-Anteile der Liturgie folgten; zudem ist unklar, ob in liturgischen Ordnungen auch all das 4 Credo im Tabulaturfragment des Oldenburger Mönchs Ludolph Bödeker von 1445, in: Staehelin (1996: 183f, 218–221); zu weiteren Stücken Apel: 1963. Hinweise auf diesen Wechsel ebenso bei Eizenhöfer und Knaus (1968, 52), zu Eintragungen im Graduale Hs 845 aus Fürstenberg/ Xanten.

 

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erwähnt wird, was für selbstverständlich gehalten wurde. Denn bisweilen wird in Kirchenordnungen eine Orgelbeteiligung überhaupt nicht erwähnt, etwa 1573 in der Grafschaft Oldenburg und 1606 im Domstift Verden. Da in diesen Regionen gleichzeitig die Orgelmusik blühte,5 kann daraus nicht geschlossen werden, dass die Orgel im Sonntagsgottesdienst dort wirklich schwieg. Für andere Orte und Regionen finden sich zwar konkrete Orgel-Mitteilungen für Vespergottesdienste oder für die Mette, doch sobald die Messfeier erreicht ist, breitet sich in Orgelfragen Schweigen aus: Dies charakterisiert die Wittenberger Schlosskirchen-Agenda von 1525, ebenso die Bedingungen in Territorien vor allem Thüringens.6 Dennoch muss die Betrachtung zunächst auf den lutherischen Hauptgottesdienst ausgerichtet werden; für andere Gottesdienste sind die historischen Mitteilungen weitaus weniger standardisierbar. Einige aussagekräftige Vorgaben sind in Tabelle 1 zusammengestellt: Stets werden nur die Anteile des Organisten erwähnt, die in den jeweiligen Quellen ausdrücklich erwähnt sind; vielleicht also fielen der Orgel weitere Funktionen zu, die (als etwas Selbstverständliches) unerwähnt blieben. Zum leichteren Handhabung der Angaben lassen diese sich vier Kategorien zuordnen: Tabelle 1: Orgel im Gottesdienst – Entwicklungen des 16. Jahrhunderts Ordinarium Missae Proprium Missae lutherische Zusätze

vor 1506 St. Gallen Festtage

vor 1506 St. Gallen Sonntag

1544 Hildes­ heim (1601 Oldenswort)

1556 Hamburg

1–2 Mal im Lied („manck her“)

Eingangsgebete, Lied Introitus

Introitus

Kyrie eleison

Kyrie

Gloria in excelsis Deo

Gloria

„ein Stück“

alternatim bzw. Solo-Einlage

Mitwirkung

Priestergebet Epistel Graduale

Graduale

Alleluja

5 Verden: Zum Domorganisten Nicolaus Lindemann († 1597) und seinem Nachfolger (?) Justus von der Hude vgl. Staatsarchiv Stade, Rep. 8 Nr. 794. Zu Johann Gloye, Organist der Kirche St. Lamberti in Oldenburg zwischen 1581 und 1624, vgl. Staatsarchiv Oldenburg, Bestand 20–19 Nr. 259. Der Text der Kirchenordnung für Verden bei Sehling: 1963, für Oldenburg bei Sehling: 1980. Ähnliches gilt für Wolfenbüttel und die Kirchenordnung von 1569 (Sehling: 1955). 6 Kirchenordnungen der Grafschaften Schwarzburg (1574) und Henneberg (1582) sowie der Stadt Meiningen (1566) bei Sehling (1904); dort ebenso die gleichzeitigen Ordnungen für Zerbst.

 

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Ordinarium Missae Proprium Missae lutherische Zusätze

vor 1506 St. Gallen Festtage

vor 1506 St. Gallen Sonntag

1544 Hildes­ heim (1601 Oldenswort)

1556 Hamburg

Sequenz/ Textgesang

Sequenz

„ein Stück“

Nachspiel

„manckher“; Nachspiel

Evangelium Credo in unum Deum

Credo (nur zu größten Festen)

Hauptmusik Predigt Fürbitten Nachspiel

Vaterunser Offertorium/ Hauptmusik II

Offertorium

Oratio secreta Präfation Sanctus/ Benedictus

[alternatim?]

Sanctus, Benedictus (nur große Feste)

Pater noster Libera nos Agnus Dei

Agnus Dei „manck“; Chor singt alle Strophen

Communio/Lieder

Postcommunio Ite missa est Nachspiel

a) Vorspiel: In jüngeren Liturgien bekannt als Liedvorspiel oder Gottesdienst-Einleitung; doch auch andere Teile des Gottesdienstes können ein Vorspiel erhalten. b) Nachspiel: Analog zu Vorspielen gibt es Nachspiele, jedoch nicht nur am Gottesdienst-Ende. c) Alternatim: Mit dieser Vorschrift wird etwa der antiphonale Psalmengesang des Offiziums bezeichnet, in dem zwei Chorhälften für den Vortrag eines Psalms (oder des Magnificat) Vers für Vers miteinander abwechseln. Alternatim-Praxis kennzeichnet auch den Orgel-Einsatz im frühen lutherischen Hauptgottesdienst, jedoch ohne dass klar wäre, was damit genau gemeint ist – dies ist näher zu betrachten. d) Musik-Vorspiel: Zweck dieser Sonderform des Vorspiels war offenkundig, eine Klangfassade zu errichten, hinter der ein Musiker-Ensemble unauffällig Instru-

 

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mente für die Mitwirkung in der „Hauptmusik“ stimmen konnte (Schneider: 2014, 132–134). In der Folge der Reformation Luthers hätte es also nahe gelegen, das „papistische“ Orgelspiel zwar einzuschränken, aber nicht völlig zu verbieten. Standard hätte etwa die Orgelmusik eines normalen St. Galler Sonntagsgottesdienstes sein können: Die anscheinend überflüssige Prachtentfaltung der Heiligenfeste wäre auf je ein „Stück“ im Bereich von Gloria und Sequenz reduziert worden. Tatsächlich muss dieses Modell als Keim weiterer Entwicklungen gesehen werden, die schließlich völlig neue Perspektiven ermöglichten. Schon für St. Gallen stellt sich die Frage, auf welche Weise diese Orgel-Einlage mit der jeweils benachbarten liturgischen Einheit verbunden war; in der Folgezeit konnte sich das Orgelspiel von liturgischen Melodien und deren Wortbezug schließlich völlig ablösen. Anhaltspunkte für eine Praxis, die derjenigen aus St. Gallen ähnelt, ergeben sich in der Kirchenordnung für Hildesheim von 1544: Hier ist nur von Orgelmusik im Gloria die Rede, und zwar nach der Intonation und dem deutschen Gloria-Lied, aber vor der lateinischen Fortsetzung mit „Laudamus te“. Das präzisiert die Musikanteile und zeigt die neuen Perspektiven: Denn die liturgisch notwendigen Texte sind komplett vorhanden; die Orgelmusik tritt nicht anstelle des Textvortrags ein. Ähnlich wird 1601 im Missale der Kirche von Oldenswort (Schleswig-Holstein) Orgelspiel tatsächlich für Gloria und Sequenz gefordert, also wie in St. Galler Sonntagsgottesdiensten, allerdings auch hier mit einer klaren Positionierung: Die Orgel spielt nach diesen Gesängen (vgl. Jensen: s.d.).7 Ob diese Gestaltung sich konkret auf vorreformatorisches Erbe bezog, ist nicht restlos zu klären, weil man ja nicht weiß, wo genau die normalen Sonntags-Beiträge etwa der St. Galler Messfeier erklangen; doch den Verhältnissen in Hildesheim und Oldenswort ist gemeinsam, dass sie Orgelspiel nicht daraus ableiten, dass in ihm Teile liturgischer Gesänge enthalten sein müssten, die anderweitig im Gottesdienst nicht vorkommen. Es war also ein Quantensprung, einen Raum für freies Orgelspiel (als Zwischen- oder Nachspiel mitten im Gottesdienst) zu schaffen; damit rückt zugleich die Frage nach der Verständlichkeit von Orgelmusik erstmals ins Blickfeld, weil diese Musik gefordert wird, ohne dass für sie ein konkreter Wortbezug definiert ist. Zugleich gab es Alternativen zu solchen minimalistisch anmutenden Konzepten; mit ihnen wurde im mittleren 16. Jahrhundert an normalen Sonntagen ein Musizieren üblich, das nach den St. Galler Vorstellungen nur den Feiertagen vorbehalten gewesen war. In diesen Fällen kam es also durch die Reformation auch quantitativ zu einer Aufwertung des Orgelspiels. Diese Entwicklungen spielten sich im Raum nördlich des Harzes ab; für die Geschichte der lutherischen Musikkultur ist es eine zentrale Feststellung, dass diese Aufwertung der Orgel gerade nicht von 7 Das Original in: Landeskirchliches Archiv der Evangelisch-Lutherischen Kirche in Norddeutschland, Bestand Oldenswort (Kirchenkreis Nordfriesland), ohne Signatur.

 

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den reformatorischen Kernlanden ausging. Allerdings fällt es anschließend nicht leicht, die musikalischen Potentiale dieser Idee zu fassen. Einen relativ weit reichenden Zugang ermöglicht die Hamburger Kirchenordnung von 1556. Für die Frage nach der Orgelmitwirkung lassen sich die Vorschriften auf drei Detailkomplexe konzentrieren: Zu betrachten sind die „freien“ orgelmusikalischen Anteile am liturgischen Ablauf, die Beteiligung der Orgel an der frühen lutherischen Sequenz und die Orgelfunktion beim Liedgesang.

4.

Freie Orgelbeiträge zum Hauptgottesdienst

Der sonntägliche Hauptgottesdienst begann in Hamburg mit einem lateinischen Introitus; ob die Orgel mitwirkte, wird nicht gesagt. An Werktagen wurde dagegen mit „Komm, heiliger Geist“ oder einem vergleichbaren Lied begonnen, gesungen von Chor und Gemeinde. Hierzu heißt es: „De organiste mag ein edder twe mal manck her spelen (Sehling: 1913: 552).“8 Manck her heißt „dazwischen“. Für die Formulierung ein edder twe mal gibt es folglich zwei Auflösungen, die allerdings weit auseinander liegen. Zweimal spielt der Organist, wenn die insgesamt drei Strophen dieses Liedes jeweils voneinander abgesetzt werden sollen; die Musik muss dann zwar in Tonart und Charakter dem Lied nahestehen, braucht aber keine Liedbearbeitung zu sein, weil sämtliche Strophen ja gesungen dargeboten werden. Dann handelt es sich um freie Orgelmusik, die nicht durch liturgische Texte und Melodien definiert ist: Sie ersetzt nichts, sondern ist einfach da – als quasi konzertantes, abstrakt musikalisches Bindeglied zwischen den Strophen. Spielt der Organist nur einmal, ist kaum mit einem analogen Einschub zwischen nur zweien der Strophen zu rechnen; eher erklingt Musik als Ersatz für die mittlere Strophe. Dies wäre der traditionelle Fall des Alternatim-Musizierens: Die Orgelmusik würde aus einem konkreten Wortbezug heraus verständlich, weil erwartet würde, dass die Zuhörer den Text der zweiten Strophe mitdenken könnten. Beide Varianten werden in der Kirchenordnung eigens erwähnt; damit sind sie zugleich liturgisch verankert, wenn auch nur fakultativ: Der Organist „mag“ (also: kann) spielen oder eben auch nicht. Leistet er musikalische Bindeglieder zwischen den Strophen, wird sein Musizieren nur als Meditationsraum auch liturgisch verständlich: als Zeitabschnitt, in dem ein individuelles Nachdenken der Zuhörer erwünscht ist. Damit wächst der Orgelmusik eine exegetische Funktion zu, die sich aber relativ einfach hörpsychologisch herleiten lässt. Beim Musikhören können Gedanken

8 Hochdeutsch: „Der Organist kann ein oder zwei Mal dazwischen spielen.“

 

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abschweifen, also weg vom konkreten Erleben des Klangs; liturgisch erwartet wird demnach, dass die Gedanken der Hörer bei den liturgischen Inhalten der jeweils zuvor erreichten Gottesdienst-Station verharren. Tatsächlich gibt es einen Beleg für diese Sicht (Küster: 2010, 26ff). 1704 wurde der Organist in Møgeltønder (Süddänemark) während des gottesdienstlichen Orgelspiels vom Schlag getroffen; wenig später verstarb er. Als konkreter Zeitpunkt dieses Schlaganfalls wird im Sterbebuch angegeben „som hand udlagte paa Orgelwercket Fadervor“ – als er auf der Orgel das Vaterunser auslegte. Liturgisch-musikhistorisch gefasst, spielte er also nach dem Gebet (am Ende der Predigt) entweder eine Choralfantasie (über Luthers „Vater unser im Himmelreich“ oder die liturgische Vaterunser-Melodie) oder eine freie Orgeleinlage, die allgemein das Nachdenken über das Gebet ermöglichte. In jedem Fall sind damit die liturgischen Erwartungen an Exegese mit Hilfe der nicht wortgebundenen Musik auf einzigartig klare Weise gefasst. Der Liturgiebeitrag der Orgel in Møgeltønder lässt sich wiederum mit den Hamburger Vorschriften von 1556 korrelieren. Die Situation am Ende der Predigt wird damit gekennzeichnet, dass der Pastor auf der Kanzel das Vaterunser zu singen beginnt (so beschrieben zweifellos die liturgische Melodie, nicht das Lied) und die Gemeinde einstimmt; dann heißt es: „De organiste schall naher spelen wenn idt utgesungen is (Sehling: 1913, 552).“9 Zwar entsteht damit zugleich eine Begleitmusik für den liturgisch leeren Zeitabschnitt, in dem der Pastor von der Kanzel steigt; doch eine Auffüllung wird liturgisch nur dann plausibel, wenn das individuell exegetische Nachdenken sich in den Vordergrund vor das Beobachten der äußerlichen Vorgänge schiebt. Dieses Nachdenken ist nicht zwangsläufig (und in jedem Gottesdienst gleich) ans Vaterunser gebunden, sondern kann ebenso sehr auf die vorausgegangene Predigt bezogen werden, für die das Gebet lediglich als Bekräftigung dient. Deshalb handelt es sich um Orgelmusik, die keinen Bezug zu liturgischen Melodien und ihren Texten zu haben braucht – abgesehen von der einen Möglichkeit, dass sie sich auf Vaterunser-Melodien bezieht.

5.

Orgelbeiträge zur lutherischen Sequenz

Eine zentrale Rolle erwuchs der Orgel auch in der Sequenz, also dem auf das Alleluja folgenden, in strophischer Form angelegten Text-Musik-Komplex der spätmittelalterlichen Messfeier; die Hamburger Kirchenordnung bezeichnet ein Übergangsstadium, in dem sich bereits abzeichnet, dass die Position der Sequenz

9 Hochdeutsch: „Der Organist soll nachher spielen, wenn es [das Vaterunser] fertig gesungen ist.“

 

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(und des vorausgehenden Alleluja) einmal von einem lutherischen Lied („Hauptgesang“) eingenommen werden würde: […] underwilen mag man das alleluia und sequentien laten anstan, und singen darvör einen christlicken düdeschen psalm, dar de organiste schicklich mankher mag spelen, wo sünst gewonlick, edder na gelegenheit der tidt den gesank mit den orgeln besluten (Sehling: 1913, 552).10

Wiederum wird die Orgel mankher gespielt, also nicht zur Begleitung der Liedmelodien herangezogen. Wie zu Beginn des Gottesdienstes ist aber unklar, ob der Organist mit seinem Spiel Liedstrophen ersetzen oder freie Beiträge leisten soll. Erklärungen werden mit Hilfe anderer Kirchenordnungen möglich. In der Gottesdienstordnung für Wittenberg von 1533 war der Bestand katholischer Sequenzen so weit reduziert worden, dass mit ihnen nur noch die kirchlichen Hochfeste charakterisiert wurden; dabei sollten die lateinischen Ur-Versionen strophenweise abwechselnd mit den deutschen Liedfassungen erklingen. In der Zeit nach Weihnachten war dies die Kombination aus „Grates nunc omnes“ und „Gelobet seist du, Jesu Christ“, nach Ostern aus „Victimae paschali laudes“ und „Christ lag in Todes Banden“; nach Pfingsten wird „Veni, sancte spiritus“ im Wechsel mit „Nun bitten wir den heiligen Geist“ gesungen. Wie das Abwechseln genau funktionieren sollte, wird in der Wittenberger Ordnung offen gelassen (Sehling: 1902, 704).11 In der mecklenburgischen Kirchenordnung von 1540/45 wird zudem auch die Orgelbeteiligung detailliert beschrieben.12 Prinzip ist, dass der Organist mehrfach die Sequenz spielt; dazwischen trägt der Kantor nicht nur die Strophen des deutschen Liedversion vor, sondern leitet jeweils mit einer Sequenzstrophe auch zum nächsten Orgelbeitrag über. Um dieses Prinzip vollends deutlich zu machen, lassen sich weitere Quellen des Hamburger Umkreises heranziehen und die Ergebnisse in einer Synopse zusammenführen (vgl. Tabelle 2): das lutherische Graduale Cantica sacra des Hamburger Lehrers Franciscus Elerus (1588), parallel dazu (und aus der10 Hochdeutsch: „Zuweilen kann man das Alleluja und Sequenzen ausfallen lassen und stattdessen einen christlichen deutschen Psalm singen, zu dem der Organist schicklich dazwischen spielen, wie auch sonst üblich, oder je nach Zeit den Gesang mit der Orgel beschließen kann.“ 11 Sinngemäß ist die Weihnachts-Anweisung anzuwenden: Zu „Grates nunc omnes“ sollte man die Strophen des deutschen Liedes „darunter ordenlich mit einteilen […], dass sie gleich zusamen auskommen“ (Sehling: 1902, 704). 12 Konkretisierungen ergeben sich für auch für weitere Feste. Je zwei deutsche Lieder werden genannt für Marienfeste (Nun freut euch, lieben Christen gmein; Herr Christ, der einig Gottes Sohn) und für Johanni („Frölick wille wi alleluia singen“ und „Help Gott, wie geit dat jümmer tho“). – Laut Elerus (1588, 149–152) kommen hingegen für Pfingsten „Sancti Spiritus adsit nobis gratia“ oder „Veni Sancte Spiritus“ in Betracht; Angaben zu korrespondierenden Liedversionen finden sich nicht.

 

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selben Zeit) die Cantiones sacrae als liturgische Handschrift des Hamburger Jacobi-Organisten Hieronymus Praetorius (Praetorius: 1599) sowie die Orgeltabulatur des in Hamburg ausgebildeten Organisten Berendt Petri (1611) (vgl. Kite-Powell: 1979). Ideale Vergleichsmöglichkeiten ergeben sich für die Zeit nach Ostern; denn für sie findet sich auch bei Elerus eine Verbindung aus lateinischer Sequenz und deutschem Lied, und in der Petri-Tabulatur liegt eine Orgelbearbeitung genau dieser Sequenz vor, in der die einzelnen Teile sogar ausdrücklich mit dem jeweiligen Textincipit versehen sind. Tabelle 2: Alternatim-Praxis für den Vortrag der Sequenz Fest

a) Weihnachten bis Purificatonis

a) nach Ostern

b) Elerus Victimæ

c) Petri-Tabulatur: Victimae paschali

Orgel

Grates nunc omnes

Victime

Victimæ paschali laudes

Victimæ paschali laudes

Cantor: Liedstrophe 1

Gelavet sistu

Christ lach in dodes banden

Christ lag

Cantor: Liedstrophe 2

Des ewgen vaders

Den dodt

Cantor: Sequenz

Grates nunc omnes

Victime

Orgel

Grates nunc omnes

Agnus redemit

Agnus redemit

Cantor: Liedstrophe 3

Den aller werlt kreis nu beslot

twe düdesche versche

Den dodt

Cantor: Liedstrophe 4

Dat ewige licht

Cantor: Sequenz

Grates nunc omnes

Mors et vita

Mors et vita

Mors et vita duello

Jesus Chri: Orgel

Grates nunc omnes

Dic nobis Maria

Dic nobis Maria

Cantor: Liedstrophe 5

De söne des vaders

twe düdesche versche

Idt was ein wunderlicher

Cantor: Liedstrophe 6

He is op erden kamen arm

Cantor: Sequenz

Grates nunc omnes

Angelicos testes

Angelicos testes

Angelicos testes

Hyr ys dat rechte Orgel

Huic oportet [= Schluss]

Credendum est magis

Credendum est magis

 

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Cantor: Liedstrophe x/y

Dat hefft he alle uns gedan.

dat lateste düdesche versch: Wi eren unde leven wol

So vyren wy

Cantor: Sequenz

Huic oportet

Scimus Christum surrexisse

Scimus Christum surrexisse Wy eren

a) Kirchenordnung Mecklenburg 1545 (nach der Kirchenordnung der Stadt Wittenberg 1533) b) Franciscus Elerus, Cantica sacra, Hamburg 1588 c) Berendt Petri, Tabulaturbuch Freiburg/Elbe 1611 (Visby tablature)

Bei Elerus ist (ähnlich wie in Wittenberg) das Abwechseln nur darauf ausgerichtet, dass die beiden Texte miteinander verschränkt werden; von einer Orgelmitwirkung wird nicht gesprochen13 – obwohl sie im Wechselspiel zwischen der Mecklenburger Kirchenordnung und der Petri-Tabulatur sicher anzunehmen ist. Dieser zufolge werden nach der einleitenden Strophe der Sequenz gerade zwei weitere bearbeitet, die nach den mecklenburgischen Vorschriften allein dem Cantor zufallen sollten; auch sonst zeigen sich strukturelle Unterschiede, da in Mecklenburg nach Weihnachten die Orgel immer auf dieselbe Textstrophe Bezug nehmen sollte, nach Ostern aber auf wechselnde. Insgesamt jedoch spiegelt sich in allen Quellen ein konsistentes, nur im Detail variables System. In ihm nahm die Orgelmusik eine herausragende Rolle ein: auf gleicher Höhe mit den lateinischen und deutschen Versionen der Gesänge, aber eindeutig mit einer Verweisung auf den Text, der ohnehin in diesem gottesdienstlichen Abschnitt omnipräsent war.

6.

Orgel und Liedgesang

Sowohl in der Gottesdiensteröffnung als auch in der Sequenz kann der Organist also mit Beiträgen hervortreten, die sich auf die jeweilige Melodie und zugleich einen konkreten Text beziehen (da dieser anderweitig im Gottesdienst nicht vorkommt). In beiden Fällen geht es um solistisch-eigenständige Beiträge, nie also um eine Liedbegleitung. Dieses zentrale Element jüngerer liturgischer Praxis kommt somit im Gottesdienst nicht vor, erst recht in seiner Ausprägung, Gemeindelied zu begleiten; denn für den Liedgesang ist nochmals zu unterscheiden zwischen demjenigen der Schüler und der Gemeinde. Wie gesehen, wird für die Hamburger Gottesdienst-Eröffnung an Werktagen tatsächlich davon gesprochen, dass beide Gruppen zusammenwirken; doch noch 1604 ist in der Vorrede zum Melodeyen-­ 13 Aus Hieronymus Praetorius’ Cantiones sacrae (Praetorius: 1599) lässt sich keine zusätzliche Klarheit gewinnen; dort ist der entsprechende Anteil nicht ausgeschrieben.

 

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Gesangbuch die Rede nur von einer Orgelbegleitung des Liedersingens durch den Schülerchor (Praetorius/Decker/Praetorius/Scheidemann: 1604, 3–15).14 Die Orgelbeteiligung an diesem traditionellen Liedersingen lässt sich weiter konkretisieren: anhand der Hamburger Vorschrift, welche Lieder während des Abendmahls gesungen werden sollen. Hierzu heißt es: Wenn nu de communicanten gan tom altare schollen de gesänge vom sacramente gesungen werden: Jesus Christus etc., Godt sie gelavet etc., efte na gelegenheit der feste süss ein gude gesang, doch also, dat de organiste stedes mank her spele, und dat de chore gelickwoll alle verse singe (Sehling: 1913, 553).15

Hier wird also ausdrücklich gefordert, dass keinerlei Text zugunsten von Orgelmusik entfallen dürfe. Und wiederum wird mank her gespielt, und zwar stedes, zudem im Wechsel mit dem Chor, nicht mit der Gemeinde. Noch mehr als in der Vorschrift, die für das Eingangslied formuliert wird, zeigt dies also, dass sich die Orgelmusik ausdrücklich vom konkreten Wortbezug lösen kann. Von hier aus sind sowohl das Gemeindelied als auch dessen Orgelbegleitung noch weit entfernt.

7.

Resümee: Hamburger Orgelspiel um 1550/1600

Die Hamburger Regeln sind durchaus mit der Praxis verwandt, die rund 50 Jahre zuvor in St. Gallen protokolliert sind, und zwar für die Feste dritten Ranges: Gespielt wird beim Introitus, ferner (hier nicht weiter diskutiert, weil nicht präzise genug fassbar16) im Gloria, in dem neu gestalteten Gesangs-Block zwischen Graduale und Sequenz sowie an der Stelle des Offertoriums. Unterschiede ergeben sich an zwei Stellen: Nur in St. Gallen war Musik für das Kyrie gefordert; nur in Hamburg fällt der Orgel auch eine Aufgabe während des Abendmahls zu. Schließlich treten für Hamburg die eigenständigen Orgelbeiträge hervor: die Nachspiele zur Sequenz und zum Vaterunser sowie die Beiträge zum Eingangslied und zu den Kommunionliedern. Schließlich muss in Hamburg auch Orgelmusik im Sanctus erklungen sein, obgleich dies in der Kirchenordnung nicht ausdrücklich 14 Es wird hier also nicht von orgelbegleitetem Gemeindegesang gesprochen, der seit Leichsenring (1922/82, 87) a priori als Zweckbestimmung angenommen wird. 15 Hochdeutsch: „Wenn nun die Kommunikanten zum Altar gehen, sollen die Gesänge vom Sakrament gesungen werden: Jesus Christus etc., Gott sei gelobet etc., oder nach Gelegenheit der Feste sonst ein guter Gesang, doch so, dass der Organist immer dazwischen spiele, und dass der Chor gleichwohl alle Verse singe.“ 16 Sehling: 1913, 552: „[…] dat et in terra underwilen schall düdesch gesungen werden, wenn nicht vel tidt aver is lange tho singende, wat averst vom chore angefangen wert, darna schall sick de organista schicken, und eindrechtig und gelickförmich demsülven spelen.“

 

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beschrieben wird. Detailliert fassbar wird diese Praxis in den Cantiones sacrae von Hieronymus Praetorius: Eingerahmt und gegliedert von der Orgel, wird der niederdeutsche Sanctus-Text vorgetragen (Praetorius: 1599, fol. 14).17 Diese differenzierte gottesdienstliche Orgelpraxis lässt sich bedauerlicherweise nicht ausreichend mit überlieferter Musik in Beziehung setzen. Die einzige umfangreichere Quelle wäre die erwähnte Tabulatur des Organisten Berendt Petri, des Organisten aus Freiburg (Elbe) (Kite-Powell: 1979); tatsächlich enthält sie ein komplettes liturgisches Repertoire für die damalige Hamburger Orgelkunst, doch bietet sie für Vergleichszwecke hier kaum Anhaltspunkte. Mit ihren Magnificat-Bearbeitungen und Hymnen verweist sie auf die Vesper, und mit einem umfangreichen Kyriale (neun Kyrie sowie je ein Gloria, Sanctus und Agnus Dei sowie ein Kyrie dominicale minus), in dessen Teilen jeweils die gesamte liturgische Melodie aufgearbeitet ist, überschneidet sie sich mit den Hamburger Kirchenordnung nicht: weder mit einem „Et in terra“, das vom Chor angefangen werden müsste, noch mit einem lateinischen Sanctus. Die Kyrie-Sätze für die Orgel müssten im Wechsel mit Gesängen des Chors vorgetragen worden sein; eine Kyrie-Mitwirkung der Orgel kommt ohnehin allenfalls in der Rostocker Kirchenordnung (um 1560/76) vor (Sehling: 1913, 288). Wie gesehen, lässt sich somit nur der Sequenz-Anteil konkret mit liturgischen Vorschriften für Hauptgottesdienste des 16. Jahrhunderts in Verbindung bringen. Vielleicht wird die Beziehung der Petri-Handschrift zu Hamburg auch überbewertet: Dort muss ihr Schreiber zwar den Zugang zu den Werken erhalten haben;18 sein Wirkungsort lag jedoch im Erzbistum Bremen, das sich zwar zum Luthertum bekannte, aber etwa 1555 bei der Unterzeichnung des Augsburger Religionsfriedens nicht beteiligt war. Vielleicht hatten sich einzelne katholische Traditionen hier stärker gehalten als in anderen Regionen; dann hätte Petri sich viel eher für eine eigene, lokale Praxis mit Musik versorgt, als dass er die Hamburger Verhältnisse kopieren wollte. Somit lässt sich die frühlutherische Hamburger Orgelpraxis zwar im Detail theoretisch fassen, aber musikalisch nicht konkretisieren. Wie aus den Dokumenten somit ausreichend klar hervorgeht, führte die Reformation in nördlichen lutherischen Regionen zu einer Aufwertung der Orgel: sowohl quantitativ, weil ältere Festtagsstandards nun zur sonntäglichen Normalität wurden, als auch qualitativ, weil Orgelmusik ohne jede Textbindung in eine zentrale liturgische Position gerückt wurde. Hierbei griff offenkundig eine vorreformatorische Sonderrolle, die sich für Orgelspiel an normalen Sonntagen (in Gloria und Sequenz) 17 Nach demselben Prinzip ist (fol. 51v; auch bei Elerus: 1588, 106f) die Antiphon „Haec dies quam fecit dominus“ gestaltet, die als Introitus an Mariä Verkündigung gesungen werden sollte; so erfährt man hier an einem Einzelfall, wie die Festtags-Eröffnung des Gottesdienstes angelegt war. 18 Während Petri die Magnificat-Bearbeitungen als Werke von Hieronymus Praetorius ausweist (ferner eine Sequenz als Werk von Jacob Praetorius), nennt er für die übrigen keine Komponistennamen (vgl. im Überblick Kite-Powell: 1979, 124–127); die Werke weisen daher nicht zwangsläufig nach Hamburg.

 

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andeutet, auf andere gottesdienstliche Bestandteile über und führte so zu einer neuen, eigenständigen Legitimation der Orgel im Gottesdienst: Mit ihrem Spiel wurde ein individuelles Nachdenken über geistliche Inhalte ermöglicht; Orgelmusik galt also nicht mehr dem Zweck, stellvertretend für Texte, die im liturgischen Ablauf vorgeschrieben waren, kunstvolle musikalische Aufarbeitungen erklingen zu lassen. Diese nonverbale und trotzdem exegetische Rolle der Orgelmusik ergab sich nicht in Mitteldeutschland, sondern weiter im Norden – in den Hansestädten und ihrem Umfeld. Der mitteldeutsche Raum hat mehrfach direkt auf diese Entwicklungen Bezug genommen, sei es nach den sächsischen Calvinistenaufständen des späten 16. Jahrhunderts, nach dem 30-jährigen Krieg oder in der Zeit Johann Sebastian Bachs;19 diese Rahmendaten erhalten ein inhaltliches Profil, weil die eigenständigen Entwicklungen des norddeutschen (vielleicht auch südskandinavischen) Raumes benennbar werden, wenn man sie auf ihre Wurzeln zurückführt. Demnach liegen die Schlüssel-Entscheidungen für die Orgelkunst im Gottesdienst zumindest des Luthertums im Raum nördlich des Harzes und dort dabei, trotz aller Wortbezogenheit des Gottesdienstes gerade auf die tatsächlich transzendentalen Wirkungen der Instrumentalmusik zu setzen.

8.

Zur Situation um 1700

Im weiteren Verlauf des 17. Jahrhunderts erscheint die gottesdienstliche Funktion der Orgel daraufhin konsolidiert. Deren Existenzberechtigung muss also wesentlich mit jener „Öffnung ins Transzendentale“ in Verbindung gebracht werden; gleichzeitig aber ist diese wiederum nicht notwendig, um die jüngere Rolle der Orgel in der Begleitung des Liedgesangs zu verstehen – eine zeremonielle Aufgabe, die die eigenständige Funktion des Instruments in eine dienende verändert. Wie also wuchsen der Orgel tatsächlich Aufgaben in der Liedbegleitung zu? Musikalisch ertragreiche Zugänge ermöglichen auf der einen Seite zwei norddeutsche Ordnungen: für Osterbruch (nahe der Elbmündung) von 1667 und, als Visitationsbericht, für die Domkirche zu Verden von 1718. Für den mitteldeutschen Raum lassen sich die liturgischen Übersichten Bachs heranziehen, die sich auf den Partituren seiner Adventskantaten für 1723 und 1724 finden, zudem eine Ordnung für Bischofswerda (Sachsen) von 1676.20 Die Vorschriften für Verden und Leipzig sind einander verwandt, weil in den Gottesdiensten beider Kirchen/Städte Figuralmusik vorgesehen wird (vgl. Tabelle 3). 19 Wustmann: 1909, 144–148 (Orgelbau vor 1600); Küster: 2000, 37–40 (im Überblick zu Werner Fabricius und zur Orgelmusik vor 1680); zu Bach vgl. seine Studieneindrücke in Lüneburg, Hamburg und Lübeck. 20 Zu Osterbruch und Verden Küster: 2007, 39–43, 87f, 90f; zu Osterbruch ferner Mahrenholz: 1959. Dürr/Neumann: 1955, 9.

 

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Tabelle 3: Orgelanteile am lutherischen Gottesdienst, um 1680/1720 Ordinarium Missae Proprium Missae lutherische Zusätze

1667 Osterbruch

Eingangsgebete, Lied

Liedvorspiel

1676 Bischofswerda

1718 Verden (nur bis zur Predigt)

1723 Leipzig (nur 1. Advent)

Liednachspiel

Vorspiel

Introitus Kyrie eleison

Vorspiel

Gloria in excelsis Deo

nach Intonation alternatim

(MUSIK-) Vorspiel

MUSIK-Vorspiel nach Intona­tion [alternatim?]

Priestergebet Nachspiel …

Epistel Graduale Alleluja Sequenz/ Textgesang

Liedvorspiel alternatim

Liedvorspiel

… = Liedvorspiel [alternatim?]

Liedvorspiel

MUSIK-Vorspiel

MUSIK-Vorspiel

MUSIK-Vorspiel

Evangelium Credo in unum Deum

alternatim

Hauptmusik Predigt Fürbitten Vaterunser

MUSIK-Vorspiel

Offertorium/ Hauptmusik II Oratio secreta Präfation Sanctus/ Benedictus Pater noster Libera nos Agnus Dei Communio/Lieder

alternatim

Nachspiel

alternatim

Postcommunio Ite missa est Nachspiel

Nachspiel

[?]

 

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In Bischofswerda soll der Organist an vier Stellen des Gottesdienstes spielen:21 zwischen Introitus und Kyrie (auch wenn dieses figuriert wird), zwischen Epistel und Textgesang, zwischen Evangelium und Hauptmusik (als „Musik-Vorspiel“, denn „es wird eine moteta allezeit gesungen“) sowie – hier als Sonderfall – vor dem Segen. Diese Ordnung repräsentiert damit die Praxis, den Gottesdienst mit Gesang ohne Orgel zu beginnen;22 in den drei übrigen Ordnungen ist zu Beginn ein Orgelvorspiel vorgesehen, allerdings gezielt für den nachfolgenden Gesang. In Bischofswerda spielte die Orgel also erstmals vor dem Kyrie; dort war Orgelmusik ebenso in Osterbruch üblich, zudem in Leipzig, wo es in den Adventsgottesdiensten daraufhin mit Sängern und Instrumenten „figurirt“ wurde. Daraufhin intonierte die Orgel in Verden und Osterbruch das Gloria, das zumindest in Osterbruch alternatim musiziert wurde; ob dies – abweichend von Bischofswerda – in Leipzig ebenso der Fall war, lässt sich anhand der Übersicht Bachs nur deshalb nicht feststellen, weil die Adventszeit als Bußzeit galt und deshalb auf das Gloria verzichtet wurde. Überall erwähnt wird dann die Orgel-Einleitung für den Haupt- bzw. Textgesang. Daraufhin gehen die Ordnungen eigene Wege: In Osterbruch und Leipzig (aber nicht in Bischofswerda) war es üblich, während des Abendmahls Lieder alternatim singen und spielen zu lassen. Im Vergleich zum 16. Jahrhundert scheint das freie Orgelspiel somit komplett aus der Kirche verdrängt worden zu sein. Dennoch bestanden darin, was ein Organist an den ihm zugewiesenen Stellen spielte, weit reichende künstlerische Freiheiten: Dort, wo Alternatim-Spiel gefordert war, konnte er die Liedmelodie musikalisch kunstvoll aufarbeiten; dabei konnten sich auch eigengesetzliche Entwicklungen der Musik so auswirken, dass die Orgelanteile eine große Ausdehnung erhielten. Und dort, wo Lied-Einleitungen verlangt waren, trat die Musik nicht mehr ersatzweise für Text ein; sie konnte sich deshalb von den Liedmelodien auch weit ablösen – eine Situation, die sich im weiten Raum um 1680/1850 in der Unterscheidung von völlig freiem „Präludium“ und anschließenden, melodiegebundenen „Vorspielen“ des nachfolgenden Liedes durch die Orgel zeigt.23 Die komfortable Position der Orgel in der Kirche war also, den „nördlichen“ Weichenstellungen folgend, verallgemeinert worden; das Transzendentale rückt in den Hintergrund, im Brennpunkt steht die klare, aber potentiell außerordentlich kunstvolle Bindung des Orgelspiels an den Liedgesang. Hierbei verweisen die Intonationen (zu Kyrie und Gloria) weiterhin zurück auf eine schon vorreformatorische Praxis; der Liedbezug ist bald konkret an den Melodieverlauf gebunden (in der Alternatim-Praxis), bald freier gehalten (in der neuen zeremoniellen Funktion des Liedvorspiels). Liedbegleitung jedoch, wie für 21 Schematisch wird davon gesprochen, er „präambuliere“. Sehling: 1904, 106. 22 So auch noch in Buxtehude 1749, vgl. Küster: 2010, 24 f. 23 Küster: 2010, 24f (mit Verweisung auf das Orgelschaffen Johann Pachelbels (Erfurt).

 

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Pachelbel schon 1678 in seinem Erfurter Anstellungsvertrag erwähnt,24 wird an keinem der betrachteten Orte gefordert und hat noch im mittleren 18. Jahrhundert bisweilen nur manche Lieder des Gottesdienstes erfasst.25 Außerdem wächst der Orgel die didaktische Funktion zu, den Gemeinden das seit dem mittleren 17. Jahrhundert sprunghaft anwachsende Liedgut nahe zu bringen. Ein relativ junger Beleg hierfür findet sich in einem Visitationsbericht der Gemeinde Süderau (Schleswig-Holstein) von 1752: So viele schöne Lieder müßen ungesungen bleiben, und der Prediger, der sie verordnet, erhält von dem Vorsänger die Antwort, die Melodie sey ihm unbekant. Ich hoffe nicht die Warheit zu beleidigen, wenn ich behaupte, daß der dritte Theil des GesangBuches bey Ermangelung der Orgel unbrauchbahr sey (Visitationsprotokoll 1752).

Auch hier ging es nicht speziell um die Liedbegleitung, die nach wie vor als Aufgabe des Vorsängers gilt.

9.

Ökumenische Perspektiven

So muss klar konstatiert werden, wo für diese aufs Lied ausgerichteten Entwicklungen der Ausgangspunkt lag: bei der Reformierten Kirche – der ansonsten eine weitreichende Abneigung gegenüber der Orgel nachgesagt wird. Das öffnet den Blick für die ökumenischen Perspektiven, die im 17. Jahrhundert die Funktion der liturgischen Orgelmusik beeinflussen. Diese calvinistischen Entwicklungen gingen von den nördlichen Niederlanden aus, und zwar zwischen den beiden Dordrechter Synoden von 1567 und 1618/19: Ein ausdrückliches Verbot des gottesdienstlichen Orgelspiels von 1567 wurde 1618/19 aufgeweicht; die Entscheidung, ob es zugelassen werden sollte, lag fortan bei den Gemeinden. Ausgangspunkt zur Bewertung muss ferner sein, dass im vorreformatorischen und reformationszeitlichen Gottesdienst Gemeindegesang nicht vorgesehen war; da dieser (als Psalmengesang) an prominenter Stelle in die calvinistische Liturgie aufgenommen wurde, wurden die Gemeinden also mit einer zuvor unbekannten Aufgabe konfrontiert und mussten zudem die Melodien des Genfer Psalters auf einen Schlag neu lernen.26 In den nördlichen Niederlanden (in Städten wie in Dörfern) richtete sich der Ikonoklasmus zumeist nicht auch gegen die Orgel; wenn sie außerhalb des Gottes24 Pachelbel (1901), VIIf: „[Soll er …] die Choralgesänge, welche Er … vorhero thematice praeambulando zu tractiren sich befleissigen wird, durchgehends mitspielen.“ 25 Z. B. Stadt Buxtehude, Küster: 2010, 24 f. 26 Rahmendaten Wassenbergh (1943, Anm. 2) zur Synode 1618/19, Luth: 1986, besonders 214f; ferner Jongepier: 1996, 34 f.

 

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dienstes gespielt wurde, widersprach dies nicht den herrschenden Regeln, und wenn Organisten auf ihr Bearbeitungen der neuen Psalmenmelodien spielten, trug dies sogar noch zu deren Bekanntwerden bei. Von hier aus war es vor allem in den Provinzen Friesland und Groningen vermutlich nur ein kleiner Schritt dazu, den Psalmengesang von der Orgel im Gottesdienst selbst stützen zu lassen. 1628 wurde in Groningen und Leeuwarden das gottesdienstliche Orgelspiel erlaubt, nachdem dies offensichtlich schon eine Zeitlang zuvor üblich gewesen war. Ungeachtet dessen, dass über Detailvorgänge (in örtlicher Praxis, die sich auch unter Umgehung offizieller Vorschriften ergeben haben mag) keine genauen Angaben möglich sind, muss Liedbegleitung als ökumenisches Erbe des niederländischen Calvinismus gelten. Auch in anderen Punkten trat die lutherische Orgelpraxis das Erbe dieser reformierten Verhältnisse an. Wenn außerhalb des Gottesdienstes Orgelmusik gespielt werden sollte und hierfür das Erlernen der Psalmenmelodien im Fokus stand, ermöglichte dies die Verschmelzung der Liedpräsentation mit den zeitgenössischen Variationstechniken. Die Liedmelodie erklang dabei außerordentlich einprägsam: mehrfach als komplette Melodie, zudem in unterschiedlichen Konkretisierungen. Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck in Amsterdam wurde hierfür zahlreichen Organisten ein prägendes Vorbild; Werke nach seinen Mustern finden sich nicht nur bei Heinrich Scheidemann und Jacob Praetorius in Hamburg, sondern ebenso bei Samuel Scheidt in Halle – und daraufhin bei all ihren künstlerischen Nachfolgern. Diese Variationen (strophisch wirkend wie in der lutherischen Alternatim-Praxis, aber nicht an konkrete Textstrophen gebunden)27 hatten im niederländischen Calvinismus ihren Platz entweder in eigenen Orgelkonzerten am Samstagnachmittag oder vor bzw. nach den Gottesdiensten. Die beiden zuletzt genannten Punkte bezeichnen jedoch Stellen, an denen in katholischer Praxis gerade nicht mit festtäglicher Orgelmusik zu rechnen war – diese entfaltete sich ja gezielt im Inneren der Messfeier. Somit sind Vor- und Nachspiele eines Gottesdienstes letztlich ebenfalls der nordniederländischen Orgelpraxis verpflichtet. In keiner anderen Gegend hätten sie als etwas liturgisch Fixiertes entstehen können; Voraussetzung hierfür war, dass die bisherige Orgelkunst aus dem eigentlichen Gottesdienst herausgedrängt wurde, dass aber dennoch die Orgeln vorhanden blieben. Die Einstellung des Luthertums zur Orgel wurde also im späteren 17. Jahrhundert wesentlich von der calvinistischen Orgelpraxis des Jahrhundertbeginns geprägt. Berendt Petris Manuskript von 1611 enthält diese Einflüsse eben noch nicht, obwohl sein Hamburger Mentor Jacob Praetorius drei Jahre zuvor aus Amsterdam vom Unterricht bei Sweelinck zurückgekehrt war.

27 Küster: 2010, 32 (zu Jacob Praetorius).

 

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Gleichzeitig löste sich aber auch die katholische Praxis weitgehend von den mittelalterlichen Traditionen. Dies zeigt sich in den Fiori musicali von Girolamo Frescobaldi (1635) in Rom (vgl. Frescobaldi: 1954). Die Werke dieser Drucksammlung sind in drei Zyklen zusammengefasst und jeweils standardisiert mit liturgischen Funktionen bezeichnet. Manche der Stücke gehen bestimmten liturgischen Einheiten voraus, andere folgen ihnen. a) Als Vorspiel der Messe und während der Kommunion kommen Toccaten vor: mehrteilige Kompositionen, die streckenweise auch sehr frei gehalten sein können. b) Nach dem Credo setzt Frescobaldi ein Ricercar ein, die strengst mögliche Fugengestaltung der Zeit. c) Analog dazu arbeitet Frescobaldi auch nach der Epistel und nach der Kommunion mit Fugen, allerdings in der leichteren, beschwingten Gestaltung der Canzona. Diese drei Charaktere lassen sich überhaupt nicht mit den Orgel-Anforderungen korrelieren, die 130 Jahre zuvor in St. Gallen formuliert worden waren; die Profile überschneiden sich nur in der Gestaltung des Kyrie – für die allerdings Frescobaldis Kompositionsansatz unmittelbar auch den Stücken verwandt ist, die Berendt Petri 1611 aufgezeichnet hat. Nach den Änderungen, die sich für die katholische Orgelmusik nach dem Tridentinum ergeben hatten, wurde Orgelmusik ebenso wie im Luthertum so eingesetzt, dass ein Nachdenken über die jeweils vorausgegangene liturgische Einheit ermöglicht wurde – auch wenn dies vielleicht nicht die primäre Absicht war: Eine „Canzona dopo l’epistola“ nimmt zwar auf die Epistel Bezug, ersetzt an dieser Stelle des Gottesdienstes aber konkret das traditionelle Alleluja. Auf der Grundlage, die Frescobaldi damit geschaffen hat, konnte er somit wiederum zum Vorbild auch für lutherische Organisten werden, etwa Jacob Lorentz aus Kopenhagen – der zugleich (als Schüler und Schwiegersohn von Jacob Praetorius in Hamburg) in der Tradition Sweelincks steht.

10. Zusammenfassung In manchen lutherischen Territorien basiert die Einstellung dazu, welche Rolle die Orgel einnehmen solle, anfangs auf einer nur sparsam mit Orgelmusik ausgestatteten vorreformatorischen Gottesdienstform für gewöhnliche Sonntage. Eine besondere Bedeutung hat dabei, dass die Orgelbeiträge dieser Sonntagsgottesdienste am wenigsten durch liturgische Melodien bestimmt waren. Andernteils kam es zur quantitativen Aufwertung des normalen Sonntags: Der Gottesdienst (vor allem in den nördlichen lutherischen Gebieten) konnte ebenso reich ausgestattet werden, wie es nur an großen (oder sogar größten) Festen der vor-

 

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reformatorischen Zeit der Fall war. Auch in ihnen aber konnte sich Orgelkunst „frei“ ausbreiten, also ohne Bindung an liturgisch vorgegebene Melodien. Für die lutherische Orgelkunst (bis hin zu Bach) ist dies eine der wichtigsten Wurzeln. Spätestens mit der Reformation kam – wiederum vor allem in den nördlichen lutherischen Gebieten – die Idee auf, dass jene „freie“ Orgelmusik einen Raum zum Nachdenken bietet. Das brachte eine Verantwortung für den Organisten mit sich, in seinem Spiel auf die Glaubensinhalte Bezug zu nehmen, von denen im Gottesdienst vor dem jeweiligen musikalischen Beitrag die Rede war; erstaunlicherweise prägte das gleiche später auch den Kunstansatz Frescobaldis. Im Laufe des späteren 17. Jahrhunderts schwand jedoch das Verständnis für den liturgischen Wert freier Orgelmusik; dies spiegelt sich in sämtlichen jüngeren Äußerungen dazu, dass Orgelmusik unverständlich sei – seit der Wächterstimme Auß dem verwüsteten Zion des Rostocker Theologen Theophil Großgebauer (1661) (zu Details vgl. Bunners: 1966, insbes. 107–110). Erst im mittleren 17. Jahrhundert rückte dann das Liedvorspiel des Organisten in den Fokus. Diesem Vorgang war der calvinistische Paradigmenwechsel in Orgelfragen bereits vorausgegangen: Letztlich ging es nicht nur darum, Lieder instrumental zu begleiten, sondern die Orgelmusik wurde umfassend auf den Liedgesang bezogen. Denn auch ein Vorspiel ist letztlich eine zeremonielle Dienstleistung für das Gemeindelied, die aber weiterhin im engeren Sinne künstlerische Freiheiten bot. Eine ältere, freie Orgelstrophe in der Sequenz dagegen hatte die essentielle Liturgie erweitert, und wenn die Orgel im Alternatim-Spiel einen eigenen Beitrag leistete, der gerade nicht als Ersatz für eine Textstrophe angelegt sein durfte, handelte es sich auch hier um eine Erweiterung. In den mitteldeutschen Gottesdienst-Ordnungen des 16. Jahrhunderts wird die Orgel jedoch viel seltener erwähnt als in den norddeutschen. So erscheint es gerade im Hinblick auf die Orgel wichtig, die Einschätzung der lutherischen Musikliebe zu perspektivieren: Für das mitteldeutsche Luthertum ist zuallererst gottesdienstliche Figuralmusik wichtig,28 nicht die jeweils nur am Rande berührte gottesdienstliche Orgelmusik. Die Initiativkräfte für diese lagen folglich zunächst an Nord- und Ostsee.

28 Vgl. schon für die hier ins Zentrum gestellte Frühzeit die gegebenen Hinweise auf den Gesang (Lieder, Anteile an der Sequenz, aber auch Motetten) der Schüler im Gottesdienst; vgl. hierzu auch den Bericht Wolfgang Musculus’ über den Wittenberger Gottesdienst am 28. Mai 1536 (in dem die Orgel vor dem Kyrie, vor „Herr Gott Vater, wohn uns bei“ und vor dem deutschen Credo spielte): Sämtliche Gesänge, die nicht der minister sang, sangen pueri oder chorus; vgl. Kolde: 1883, 227 f.

 

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Bibliographie Ammerbach, Elias Nicolaus (1984), Orgel oder Instrument Tabulaturbuch (1571/83), Oxford: Clarendon Press. Apel, Willi (ed.) (1963), Keyboard music of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, Rome: American Institute of Musicology. Bormann, Karl (1966), Die gotische Orgel zu Halberstadt: Eine Studie über mittelalterlichen Orgelbau, Berlin: Merseburger. Bunners, Christian (1966), Kirchenmusik und Seelenmusik: Studien zu Frömmigkeit und Musik im Luthertum des 17. Jahrhunderts, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Dürr, Alfred/Neumann, Werner (1955), Kritischer Bericht zu: Johann Sebastian Bach, Adventskantaten (Johann Sebastian Bach, Neue Ausgabe sämtlicher Werke, I/1), Kassel: Bärenreiter. Eizenhöfer, Leo/Knaus, Hermann (1968), Die liturgischen Handschriften der Hessischen Landes- und Hochschulbibliothek Darmstadt (Die Handschriften der Hessischen Landesund Hochschulbibliothek Darmstadt, 2), Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. [Elerus, Franciscus] Eler, Franz ([1588] 2002), Cantica sacra (Reprint, ed. Klaus Beckmann), Hildesheim/Zürich/New York: Olms). Fellerer, Karl Gustav (1956), Kirchenmusikalische Vorschriften im Mittelalter, Kirchenmusikalisches Jahrbuch 40, 1–11. Frescobaldi, Girolamo (1954), Fiori musicali (Girolamo Frescobaldi, Orgel- und Klavierwerke, 5, ed. Pierre Pidoux), Kassel: Bärenreiter. Guido von Arezzo (1955), Micrologus (Corpus Scriptorum de musica, 4, ed. Joseph Smits van Waesberghe), Rome: American Institute for Musicology. Jensen, Christoph (s. d.; ca. 1985), Der sonntägliche Hauptgottesdienst nach dem „Missale der Kerke Oldenswort 1601“ (Examensarbeit, Typoskript), Herford: Hochschule für Kirchenmusik. Jongepier, Jan (1996), Orgels in Noord-Holland: Historie, bouw en gebruik van de Noordhollandse kerkorgels, Schoorl: Pirola. Kite-Powell, Jeffery T. (1979), The Visby (Petri) Organ Tablature: Investigation and Critical Edition (Quellen-Kataloge zur Musikgeschichte, 14–15), Wilhelmshaven: Heinrichshofen. Kolde, Theodor (1883), Analecta Lutherana: Briefe und Actenstücke zur Geschichte Luthers, Gotha: Perthes. Küster, Konrad (2000), Leipzig und die norddeutsche Orgelkultur des 17. Jahrhunderts: Zu Werner Fabricius, Jacob Weckmann und ihrem Umkreis, in Wilhelm Seidel (ed.), Ständige Konferenz Mitteldeutsche Barockmusik, Jahrbuch 2000, Eisenach: Karl Dieter ­Wagner, 22–41. Küster, Konrad (2007), Im Umfeld der Orgel: Musik und Musiker zwischen Elbe und Weser, Stade: Orgelakademie. Küster, Konrad (2010), Choralfantasie als Exegese: Konflikte zwischen musikalischer Realität um 1700 und jüngeren Gattungsbegriffen, Kirchenmusikalisches Jahrbuch 94, 23–34. Leichsenring, Hugo ([1922] 1982), Hamburgische Kirchenmusik im Reformationszeitalter (Dissertation Berlin, ed. Jeffery T. Kite Powell), Hamburg: Wagner. Luth, Jan Roelof (1986), „Daer wert om’t seerste uytgekreten…“: Bijdragen tot een geschiedenis van de gemeentezang in het Nederlandse Gereformeerde protestantisme 1550–1852, Kampen: van den Berg.

 

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Mahrenholz, Christhard (1959), Liturgiegeschichtliches aus dem Lande Hadeln, in Georg Hoffmann/Karl Heinrich Rengstorf (ed.), Stat crux dum volvitur orbis: Festschrift Hanns Lilje, Berlin: Lutherisches Verlagshaus, 220–237. Marx, Hans-Joachim (1992), St. Galler Orgelbuch: Die Orgeltabulatur des Fridolin Sicher (Schweizerische Musikdenkmäler, 8), Winterthur: Amadeus. Nef, Walter Robert (1938), Der St. Galler Organist Fridolin Sicher und seine Orgeltabulatur (Schweizerisches Jahrbuch für Musikwissenschaft, 7), Basel: Majer. Pachelbel, Johann (1901), 94 Kompositionen: Fugen über das Magnificat für Orgel oder Klavier (Denkmäler der Tonkunst in Österreich, vol. VIII/2, nr. 17, ed. Hugo Botstiber/Max Seiffert), Wien: Artaria. Pietsch, Gerhard (1957), Übersehene Quellen zur mittelalterlichen Orgelgeschichte, Anuario musical 12, 83–96. Praetorius, Hieronymus (1599), Cantiones sacrae, in Staatsarchiv Hamburg, 512–5 St. Jacobi A VI a 12 (benutzt 741–4, Bestand Fotoarchiv, Signatur L 35 D). Praetorius, Hieronymus/Decker, Joachim/Praetorius, Jacobus/Scheidemann, David (1604), Melodeyen Gesangbuch (available at http://resolver.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ purl?PPN647647958) [16.04.2014]. Reckow, Fritz (1971), Artikel „Organum“, Handwörterbuch der musikalischen Terminologie, Einzellieferung, Wiesbaden: Steiner. Schmidt, Gustav (1889), Baurechnung des Halberstädter Doms von 1367 (Programm des Königlichen Dom-Gymnasiums zu Halberstadt, Ostern 1888 bis 1889), Halberstadt: Doelle. Schneider, Matthias (2014), Mit Harfen und mit Zimbeln schön: Zur Orgelmusik im nachreformatorischen Gottesdienst, in Jochen Arnold/Konrad Küster/Hans Otte (ed.), Singen, Beten, Musizieren: Theologische Grundlagen der Kirchenmusik in Nord- und Mitteldeutschland zwischen Reformation und Pietismus (Studien zur Kirchengeschichte Niedersachsens, 47), Göttingen: V & R unipress, 125–138. Sehling, Emil (1902), Sachsen und Thüringen, nebst angrenzenden Gebieten: Erste Hälfte (Die evangelischen Kirchenordnungen des XVI. Jahrhunderts, I/1), Leipzig: Reisland. Sehling, Emil (1904), Sachsen und Thüringen, nebst angrenzenden Gebieten: Zweite Hälfte (Die evangelischen Kirchenordnungen des XVI. Jahrhunderts, I/2), Leipzig: Reisland. Sehling, Emil (1913), Livland – Estland – Kurland – Mecklenburg – Freie Reichsstadt Lübeck mit Landgebiet und Gemeinschaftsamt Bergedorf – Das Herzogthum Lauenburg mit dem Lande Hadeln – Hamburg mit Landgebiet (Die evangelischen Kirchenordnungen des XVI. Jahrhunderts, V), Leipzig: Reisland. Sehling, Emil (1955), Niedersachsen: Die Welfischen Lande, 1. Halbband: Die Fürstentümer Wolfenbüttel und Lüneburg mit den Städten Braunschweig und Lüneburg (Die evangelischen Kirchenordnungen des XVI. Jahrhunderts, VI/1), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Sehling, Emil (1963), Niedersachsen: Die außerwelfischen Lande, 1. Halbband: Erzstift Bremen, Stadt Stade, Stift Verden, Stift Osnabrück, Grafschaft Ostfriesland und Harlingerland (Die evangelischen Kirchenordnungen des XVI. Jahrhunderts, VII/2–1), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Sehling, Emil (1980), Niedersachsen: Die außerwelfischen Lande, 2. Halbband, 1. Teil: Stift Hildesheim, Stadt Hildesheim, Grafschaft Oldenburg und Herrschaft Jever (Die evangelischen Kirchenordnungen des XVI. Jahrhunderts, VII/2), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Staehelin, Martin (1996), Die Orgeltabulatur des Ludolf Bödeker: Eine unbekannte Quelle zur

 

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Orgelmusik des mittleren 15. Jahrhunderts (Nachrichten der Akademie der Wissenschaften in Göttingen, Philologisch-Historische Klasse, 5), Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Visitationsprotokoll (1752), in: Landeskirchliches Archiv der Evangelisch-Lutherischen Kirche in Norddeutschland, Bestand Süderau (Kirchenkreis Rantzau-Münsterdorf). Wallner, Bertha Antonia (ed.) (1958), Das Buxheimer Orgelbuch, Teil I (Das Erbe deutscher Musik, 37), Kassel: Bärenreiter. Wassenbergh, Abraham (1943), Reisindrukken van den Franschen Gezantschapssecretaris Charles Ogier uit Friesland en Groningen in het jaar 1636, De Vrije Fries 37, 162–171 (available at http://www.friesgenootschap.nl/artikelen/ogier.htm) [16.04.2014]. Wustmann, Rudolf (1909), Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, Erster Band: Bis zur Mitte des 17. Jahrhunderts, Leipzig/Berlin: Teubner.

 

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The Properties of Style Allusions to the Invisible in 19th-Century Church Art and Architecture

This article addresses the theme of the visible/invisible through discernible developments in church architecture and art employed in churches. Chronologically the focus will rest on the 19th century – a period which can be seen as the last century in which it is possible to identify strong, general trends in taste when it came to both church art and architecture. The specific theme will consist of reflections on how the interplay of the visible and supposed invisible qualities, understood as a sense of transcendence, was believed to exist in churches erected during the century, and particularly how the choice of style was an all-important feature in this. The historicisms of the 19th century have led later generations to an oft-­expressed disregard for the religious artistic production of the period, deeming it banal pastiche or replication, devoid of any artistic ambitions of its own. However, here we are to disregard the dismissive attitude to artistic merit, and instead focus on the common agenda behind a large share of the 19th-century church art and architecture, and examine it as an expression of a particular religious sentiment. The examination is split into two parts. The first part will address the architecture and introduce some general reflections on 19th-century styles. The second part examines the role that especially altar images played in the churches of the period and how they – the images – continued or amplified the trends and ideas expressed in the choices made concerning the shape and disposition of the churches that housed the art. However, before turning to the subject of church architecture, it should be stressed that the point of departure in what follows is in a Danish context, and revolves around a 19th-century Danish discussion. While a large part of what is touched upon here is of relevance outside Denmark, some trends – such as a, to a certain extent, conservative attitude towards art, for instance, by the late 1800s – should be taken into account as specific national attitudes arising from specific developments in the Danish history of the period.1 1 Denmark’s losing role in the The Second Schleswig War in 1864 is traditionally identified as a turning point in Danish history, giving rise to a stronger awareness of national identity and

 

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Architecture

Let us begin with a little background information. During the Middle Ages Denmark along with most parts of Europe was caught up by several waves of church-building activity, leaving even remote regions well provided for in the matter of ecclesiastical architecture.2 Thus by the time of the Reformation, when radical voices questioned the very need for church buildings, there was only a limited need of or indeed interest in new church buildings as such, especially within the Lutheran sphere. The existing network of churches served the needs of the Lutherans and it became a pressing question how to adapt what was already standing rather than formulate new architectural principles, as for instance was the case among Calvinists (Jürgensen: 2011). Hence only a limited number of churches were built in Denmark after the Reformation in 1536, and this more or less remained the case until the middle of the 19th century. The few churches that in fact were built after 1536 and through the following centuries, disregarding a few scattered examples in the countryside, were primarily erected on the outskirts of the large cities – especially the rapidly expanding Copenhagen (Johannsen/ Smidt: 1981, 136–75; Kjær/Grinder Hansen: 1989). However from roughly the middle of the 19th century the growing industrialization and the enlargement of the railway system gave substance to new communities and settlements, which changed the parochial network and thus sparked the first new wave of church building in Denmark since the Middle Ages. By the middle of the 19th century it had accordingly become relevant to reflect upon the nature of a church building and formulate ideas as to what an ‘appropriate’ church, built from scratch, should look like.

The ideals of Classicism At the beginning of the 1800s the new churches which had been built were all more or less influenced by the ideals of Classicism; a stylistic choice supported strongly by the Danish monarch Frederik VI (1768–1839) and with him the upper strata of society (Johannsen/Smidt: 1981; 137–62; Kjær/Grinder Hansen: 1989). It was a style which, drawing from Ancient and Renaissance models, stressed order and strong symmetry, drenched in pearly colours of white, grey and pink used on

self-perception. The literature on the subject is huge, but among recent publications on the subject are Adriansen: 2010; Jahnke/Møller: 2011; Vammen: 2011; Hagelstein: 2012 should be consulted. 2 Concerning the first wave of parish church building, see Hiscock: 2003. Concerning the late Medieval development, see Kümin: 1996.

 

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the interior as well as the exterior. Ornament was employed on a limited scale, and with a strong attention to symmetry, positioned to achieve maximum effect. Perhaps the most prominent promoter of this style, whose churches may serve here as convenient examples of early 19th century taste, is the architect Christian Frederik Hansen (1756–1845) – one of the most famous Danish architects in general (Rubow: 1936; Langberg: 1950; Lund/Thygesen: 1995; Lund: 2006; Roland: 2010). The type of churches he envisioned and designed were conceived as well-ordered temples characterized by stern restraint and clarity of form. Most famous is the Church of Our Lady in Copenhagen, consecrated in 1829. Perhaps more interesting in our context is the parish church of Vonsild in Jutland, finished in 1824 (fig. 1). Here, at Vonsild, an ornate tunnel vault covers the nave, while the comparatively small chancel is terminated in an apse. Like the church of Our Lady in Copenhagen, the general style is the Italo-French Neo-Classical, only lacking the sculptures which feature so prominently in Copenhagen. At Vonsild one encounters a church that is cleansed of all decoration not strictly part of the the architecture itself (fig. 2). The pulpit was originally positioned behind the altar, and the pastor was thus facing the congregation directly while preaching, thereby enhancing the strong sense of direct line-of-sight from one end of the interior to the other, as well as the strict symmetry in the church. If ornament is lacking, all features in the building are nevertheless fashioned with a loving care for delicate detail, which also goes for the only original image in the church – a rendering of the Carrying of the Cross, in mosaic, which served as a backdrop for the altar upon which a cross rested. Except for the small, fine details and the mosaic, nothing in this space seems to draw attention; the sole lively element of this church interior – that which stirs the stately calm of Hansen’s temple space – is the churchgoer and the pastor preaching, baptizing and celebrating the service. Despite the clear artistic merit of a building such as that at Vonsild, the aesthetic ideals of Neo-Classicism had a difficult time finding broad appeal in the Danish population, and when taken to its uttermost limits, as in the hands of C. F. Hansen, it remained an almost elitist phenomenon.

 

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Fig. 1: Parish church of Vonsild in Jutland, finished in 1824. Photo: The National Museum in Copenhagen.

Fig. 2: The interior of Vonsild Church in Jutland. Photo: The National Museum in Copenhagen.

 

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The ideal church Facing the question as to how a new parish church should look, artists and scholars in the middle of the 19th century engaged in a fierce debate, led by prominent figures such as Niels Laurits Høyen (1798–1870), the nestor of Danish art history, and the industrious architect Frits Uldall (1839–1921). These two formulated a very clear set of ideals, which more or less summed up the general attitude to the question and, what is more, satisfied both scholars and the general public. Both agreed that a church was to reflect its institutional roots in the past and its dependence on Christian tradition. Authenticity was in other words a key concept around which the discussion revolved. The white temples of Neo-Classicism did not, according to Høyen, have this authenticity (Høyen: 1853). An opinion also voiced by Christian Molbech (1783–1857), a well esteemed antiquarian and scholar of the period, who famously wrote in a commentary on contemporary church architecture in 1855: “One cannot in this day and age, either in the North or the South, worship God in Greek temples or live in Pompeian houses” (Molbech: 1855, 15; my trans., MWJ). To Molbech, the idea of a Christian service in a building shaped like the pagan temples of Antiquity was an absurdity, especially in the North. Instead of turning to Greek and Roman styles the Christians of the day should look at the architecture of their ancestors and emulate how they had built and handled their houses of worship. In a paradigmatic article written in 1867 Frits Uldall stressed the importance of building and following the original style of the Medieval architecture when restoring old churches or building new, something the Classicist churches evidently could not achieve (Uldall: 1867, 134). In other words it was the belief that to be in touch with local or national tradition created a special condition for devotion, which channelled certain qualities that were absent in churches outside this tradition. Stated clearly, certain forms or settings were believed to enable a sense of contact, or what we perhaps could call a sense of transcendence, which others could not. According to such figures as Høyen and Uldall, church architecture had to be shaped after the ancient styles of the national past: but it went deeper. A building had to be in touch with the land, to be rooted in the materials natural to the nation and character of the people. This line of thinking was even sanctioned by high authority when the Ministry of Culture, headed by minister Ditlev Gothard Monrad, on February 19 1861 passed the so-called “Law of Church Inspection”:3 a law which stated that old churches should be protected, kept in their original condition and, if possible, be restored to their first form. This law, which in all likelihood was drafted in close dialogue with Høyen, had a tremendous effect on Danish

3 Kirkesynsloven in Danish.

 

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churches and the preservation of historical furnishings and decorations. However, in our context it is noteworthy that the spirit of the law meant that materials had to be visible – a granite church should have the granite visible and, for instance, wood should be left unpainted (Uldall: 1867). Where materials of inferior quality had been used or where authentic materials were not available, those used should be painted to achieve a desirable finish. Thus the cheap pinewood often employed for panels and furnishings in the churches was painted in the dark browns of oak, including imitation of the grain, since oak was the traditional, ‘authentic’ material of a church (Kristiansen: 2014, 361–448). And the same with stone – it was better to have painted granite than visible bricks. Materials were thus part of this ideal of authenticity. Form and matter had to be in accordance with tradition if the church were to serve as a proper house of worship, which is to say a house that stimulated the senses and attuned the mind to the invisible qualities of faith (Høyen: 1853). Frits Uldall wrote in 1867 how appalling it was that some architects and local communities put windows intended for stables and pigsties into their churches, and thereby actively counteracted the potential atmosphere of the building (Uldall: 1867, 46). When reading the statements from the learned debaters of the period it also becomes apparent that the quest for authenticity had little to do with age or even genuineness. To be in accordance with tradition and authenticity was a visual or visible act, and did not depend on the inherent core of the materials and forms.4 Pinewood painted to resemble oak served the same purpose as oak itself. The feelings evoked by a traditional style thus grew out of the visual experience of the church space, not out of qualities engrained in the materials as such. It was believed, then, that the congregation saw their church, and that this act of seeing impressed on them feelings of belonging and pious commitment thanks to the way their house of worship was shaped. The styles which were deemed authentic were those of the Middle Ages, with the occasional use of Viking Age ornament as well. When Niels Laurits Høyen in the 1830s grew preoccupied with the attempt to discern the different phases of Medieval architecture in Denmark, identifying two categories, the style of the ‘rounded arch’ and the ‘pointed arch style’ – that is, Romanesque and Gothic, it was not merely an attempt to catalogue and describe the artistic merits of the Medie­ val past (Høyen: 1874):5 it was also a way to work up a direct source of inspiration for contemporary church architecture and an attempt at revitalization. And

4 Such thoughts about the inherent spiritual qualities in shapes and materials were commonplace during the Middle Ages but had disappeared from Lutheran thinking during the late sixteenth century, only to return again in a distinctly Protestant form during the 17th century. See Jürgensen 2012/13. 5 The formal identification and definition of the two styles was performed by C. C. Rafn (1841, 43).

 

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to men such as Høyen style was not simply an appearance to be chosen for the sake of amenity – style was a means to access lost or forgotten spiritual values and insights. This is well worth keeping in mind when reflecting upon the 19th-century Neo-Romanesque and Neo-Gothic achievements. They were not merely acts of pastiche, but expressions of specific choices, selected because they were believed to impress certain moods and atmospheres on the churchgoer.

Examples of churches in ‘authentic style’ Let us turn to some examples of the actual churches built in accordance with the style sentiment discussed here. The most influential, perhaps, was the new town church at Hobro, located in Jutland, and designed by the architect Gottlieb Bindes­ bøll (1800–1856) between 1850 and 1852 (fig. 3) (Kristensen: 2013). The church is composed entirely of late-Gothic style elements, amongst others borrowed from one of the chapels at Roskilde Cathedral on the island of Zealand. The church is extremely ornate on the outside, employing bricks in two colours, placed on a foundation of granite ashlars, pinnacles on all gables and reliefs above the entrance in the west end of the building. The only somewhat unconventional choice was to place the tower above the chancel and thus in the east end of the church. For all its ornamentation, Bindesbøll’s church at Hobro has a squatness to it which gives it a distinctly un-Gothic appearance, but comes very close to the look of a common rural Danish parish church from the Middle Ages – so that the building both delivers an extremely elaborate architecture, inspired by the finest Gothic example in the country, and at the same time that architecture is framed by a certain humbleness or modesty, which renders it accessible and makes it a logical continuation of the Medieval parish church. On the inside of the church at Hobro, the stern Gothic features are fused with a peculiar mixture of Byzantine or Romanesque elements (fig. 4). A wooden tunnel vault covers the interior, truncated by the openings for the pointed windows. In Hobro Bindesbøll thus created a church for which he took what he could from the best examples of style and created a model parish church, which was if not in complete allegiance then at least closely aligned with the predominant ideas or ideals concerning tradition. However, while the church can be understood as paradigmatic for the architecture of the period, it is also unique in the choice of decoration and the execution, which lift it above much of that which was to be built later in the century. While the ideals and ambitions concerning form and materials were lofty in the 19th century, the actual architecture often came to be executed with an industrial rationality, which although copying the Medieval inspiration closely, did so to a level of perfection that has led later times to judge these architectural achievements rather harshly, for instance by employing such terms as “machine Gothic”, a phrase

 

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Fig. 3: The town church at Hobro, located in Jutland, and designed by the architect Gott­ lieb Bindesbøll (1800–1856) between 1850 and 1852. Photo: The National Museum in Copenhagen.

Martin Wangsgaard Jürgensen

Fig. 4: The interior of Hobro Church in Jutland. Photo: The National Museum in Copenhagen.

already coined around 1910, and indicating the “soullessness” of the buildings – the exact opposite of what these buildings were believed to be full of in their day.6 An example of this rationality is the church of Vorup, also in Jutland, built by Frits Uldall in 1876 (fig. 5) (Nielsen/Vellev: 1985). This rural parish church in NeoGothic style, based on a Romanesque ground plan, is built in red brick on a foundation of hewn granite. The small church consequently features pointed arches, but in general lacks all other Gothic characteristics. The nave is fashioned with a flat, wooden ceiling as is the chancel area, which is terminated in a three-sided apse. The architecture is decorated with several ornate features, such as the pilasters for instance, breaking the long stretches of even wall or, on the inside, the corbels inserted into the chancel-arch. Nevertheless the church at Vorup is an expression of exactly what became the target of intense disapproval during the 20th century as an example of mass-produced, industrialized architecture. To get a glimpse of the type of furnishing which accompanied these churches, and also became popular replacements in churches in general, we could take the Neo-Gothic pulpit from Tåning as an example, dating to 1880 (fig. 6). Here the dark oakwood chair is decorated with Gothic tracery and exactly this type of ornamentation can be found on baptismal fonts, church benches and altar pieces of the period.

6 See the term Maskingotik explained in Ordbog over det Danske Sprog.

 

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Fig. 5: The church of Vorup in Jutland, built by Frits Uldall in 1876. Photo: The National Museum in Copenhagen.

Fig. 6: The Neo-Gothic pulpit from Tåning, c. 1880. Photo: Martin W. Jürgensen.

Fig. 7: The vaults of Ulse Church painted light blue in 1867. Photo: Martin W. Jürgensen.

 

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As stated above, the materials should be apparent to the beholder and not hidden by too much paint. Nevertheless one decorative feature went against this trend. It became popular to paint the church vaults in a light blue colour (fig. 7) instead of leaving them bare or simply whitewashed (Jørgensen: 2009, 96–97). By this means the vaults were literally interpreted as heavenly domes,7 and painted in a colour that made their nature apparent without actually showing Heaven or Paradise, but clearly alluding to it, and thereby furthering the urge to prayer and devotion, which should fill the churchgoer upon seeing, and particularly on entering, the church.

The power of the style The style of the building, then, comprised of form and materials, was believed to imbue the churchgoer or congregation with devotion and a sense of contact with the divine. Taking a step back from these church buildings, we may ask what more specifically it was that these structures were believed to convey. In the industrial and mercantile communities that grew up around railroad stations and the suburbs of the larger towns, such new churches came to constitute points in the landscape, that can be construed as a means to remain in contact with a vision of a rural society which was rapidly being transformed: a dream of a lost, simpler age more closely in touch with pious ideals, which were thought to be declining. In building and seeing daily a church which looked like the medieval parish churches scattered all over the land, the new communities could assure themselves that they indeed were as much part of the whole as those living in the old parishes. Nothing new was invented, and everything was according to the traditions of old. When seen the churches reminded the congregation that they were part of the same community and Christian fellowship as had always existed. They thus established an emotional bond to their ancestors and assured themselves that one day the building would be passed on to their children in turn. In that sense the Neo-Romanesque and Neo-Gothic church buildings are expressions of a romantic nostalgia or yearning rooted in a fear of loss and isolation.8 Apparently a style such as Neo-Classicism could not satisfy this yearning, being perceived as a foreign expression in much the same way that technological advance was seen as an alienating, foreign element – however, while the latter served clear beneficial purposes, the church should go free of change and remain untouched by time. 7 This, of course, is a classic interpretation of vaults and in itself nothing new. See, for instance, Bandmann: 1978, or a Scandinavian discussion of the theme in Sundquist: 1950. 8 The Danish theologian Jørgen I. Jensen has eloquently dealt with aspects of this yearning (Jensen: 1996).

 

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But it is possible to come even closer to the notions of what a church building represented. In the correspondence column of the journal Kirkebladet (‘The Church Journal’) a born-again Christian in 1892 mourns the fact that some churches are kept locked except on Sundays (Otto Sommer: 1892, 301). As he states, the church is a house of prayer and the place to encounter Christ, and by locking the door the pious Christian is deprived of this encounter. His letter sparked a response the same year from Valdemar Bille, pastor in Mårslet in eastern Jutland, who agrees with the correspondent and continues the argument by stating that “When you wish to pray,” the Lord says, “go to your chamber.” Certainly, but for most of the friends of the Lord this becomes the solitude of nature, to which they go, and not the chamber which no longer exists in the small home! I believe that the chamber should be so understood that it is extended in such a way that the friends of the Lord would be joyous to have the possibility to go into God’s house, because this is also their home, and here seek out a small spot, where they can open their hearts […] (Valdemar Bille: 1892, 359; my trans., MWJ).

When mentioning the chamber, Pastor Bille is referring to the Kämmerlein of which Martin Luther wrote, when in his instruction of 1535 on how to pray he stated that when the need to pray overcame him, “Neme ich mein Pselterlein, lauffe jnn die kamer oder, so es der tag und zeit ist, jnn die kirchen zum hauffen” and then “knie [ich] nider oder stehe mit gefaltenen henden und augen gen himel” (WA 38, 358,7– 359,1; 360,2–3). Luther’s first choice was to hasten to his private chamber to pray, but if it was a church day, the church was also an option, although not necessarily the first choice. Luther’s attitude is in accordance with Christ’s biblical instruction in the Sermon on the Mount (Matt 6:5–8), but, as Pastor Bille points out, the basic premise for this had been lost or changed over the centuries. A private chamber was no longer available to the modern Christian, but rather than replacing the chamber with the open fields, according to Bille, the church building should now fulfil the role as the space for prayer and private meditation. The theologically trained Niels Laurits Høyen underscored exactly the same interpretation in 1853, when he stated that the church ‘is the true or new chamber’, the Kämmerlein, where an atmosphere of devotion and calm lifts the prayer and enables a sense of contact. As he writes: When we go to service, we would like nothing more than to bring our own chamber with us, we would like to be at the same time in the church and in our home, to be with the congregation and yet be separated from it so that our devotion is not disturbed […] (Høyen: 1853, 65–66; my trans., MWJ)

In the 19th-century attitudes to architecture mentioned above, the act of seeing and entering the church was believed to stimulate and spur a particular devotional

 

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frame of mind. Once inside the building the architecture gained support from other artistic expressions, such as the vaults painted as heavenly skies, as well as and in particular the great paintings on the altar which came to dominate many church interiors. In order to close in further on the alleged qualities of the church so far discussed, we shall now turn to the furnishing of the interior.

2.

Pictorial art

The choice of Medieval styles and forms in the 19th-century churches was intended to attune the churchgoer to a certain mood and create a spiritual atmosphere. These notions we are now to follow somewhat more closely and see how they came to be crystallized, or were more clearly addressed, inside the church. In order to do so it is especially relevant to take a closer look at Niels Laurits Høyen’s article of 1853, which very clearly voices the concerns of the period. It thus was a firm belief of Høyen that religious images could inspire an emotional response which excited the beholder into fervent prayer. “Art, when it is to be for the Church,” he writes, “must not only please our senses, but also with authority, speak to our heart”, (Høyen: 1853, 53; my trans., MWJ). Yet such images were hard to come by in Danish churches. To Høyen and indeed many contemporary scholars, the Lutherans had failed miserably in establishing an artistic tradition that lifted the inheritance from the great works of art of previous centuries, produced among the Catholics. The Lutheran Church had simply not succeeded in creating anything but moralizing images and empty decorations, which did not engage the beholder in any way. In other words, the entire artistic production from the period of so-called Lutheran orthodoxy and afterwards was rejected (Høyen: 1853). Actually Høyen characterizes most Lutheran works of art – meaning especially altarpieces and epitaphs – as mere decoration, lacking atmosphere and the all-important sense of style. As he puts it, “A church art can only shoot up and thrive in a church community that needs it, and the past of Lutheranism does not lead one to have too high expectations in this direction” (Høyen: 1853, 71; my trans., MWJ). However he sensed a change in the air, which despite his pessimistic outlook on the art of previous centuries, led him to speak of a path that was gradually paving the way for a greater aesthetic and religious understanding of church art. And indeed things were changing around the middle of the 19th century. What Høyen called for was works of art that demanded the attention of the beholder and conveyed a certain devotional atmosphere, which he could or would not specify further. He required images in the churches that inspired a personal response, images that sparked a subjective encounter with what was depicted in the image. That is, an image which both met the churchgoer as a member of the flock and as an individual seeking the solitude of the church in the wish to pray. This

 

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ambition became nowhere so relevant as in the images on the altar. During the late 18th century, it had become fashionable to take down the altarpieces, and leave altars supporting only candles and a cross (Nyborg/Johannsen: 2005, 269–289; Jørgensen: 2009, 52–69). This trend of stripping down the altar had run its course by the middle of the 19th century, when a new belief in the power of the image to arouse fervent religious emotions in the beholder led to a creative flowering of new altarpieces. In accordance however with Høyen’s harsh critique of the Lutheran altarpieces of past centuries, a new style and iconography was introduced. Traditionally motifs on the altar had been the Crucifixion and the Last Supper, with the emphasis resting firmly on the illustration of biblical scenes or situations – that is, the commemorative representation of the biblical event, such as the mosaic showing the Carrying of the Cross at Vonsild, mentioned earlier (Hoffman: 1983; Poscharsky: 1998; Jürgensen: 2013). These scenes continued to be popular, and for instance copies of Leonardo da Vinci’s Last Supper became a fashionable motif on new altarpieces. Nonetheless the truly inventive pieces of the second half of the 19th century were those taking up the challenge of showing images speaking directly to the beholder on a personal level (Linnet: 2004). And the way to do so was by a firm emphasis on Jesus and Jesus’ meeting with men and women seeking him. In the composition of these images the biblical narrative and scenic elements were reduced down to a bare minimum, leaving Jesus and the encounter with him in person as the sole focus. Thus large representations of Jesus in full figure came to adorn the altars. Motifs such as this had begun to appear already during the late 18th century, but these new altarpieces took the motif further and rendered Jesus in an evocative, sentimental fashion of which we shall now discuss some examples.

Cult images Perhaps the three best examples of artists promoting this new trend in altar decorations were Carl Bloch (1834–1890), Anton Dorph (1831–1914) and Lucie Marie Ingemann (1792–1868) – all three of them drawing from the same influences, although the latter did her work with a somewhat different stroke than the two first painters. The first altarpiece which can serve as an illustration of our theme, is the retable done by Carl Bloch in 1873 for the church of St Nicolas at Holbæk on Zealand (fig. 8) (Pheysey/Holzapfel: 2010; Søndergaard: 2012). We here find an illustration of Luke 18:17 (“Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it”). Jesus is depicted as a fully robed figure, at the same time pointing towards and shielding a boy clad in rags. Jesus is staring directly at the beholder, whereas the child is avoiding our gaze by looking away. Except for the Lily of Innocence carried by the child, the image is devoid of any symbolic complexity. Jesus in his white robe and haloed head constitutes the strongest visual

 

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Fig. 8: Retable by Carl Bloch for the church of St Nicolas at Holbæk on Zealand, finished 1873. Photo: The National Museum in Copenhagen.

feature in the image, standing out as a highlighted area, with the boy competing for attention and at the same time being almost absorbed into the triangular composition that he and Christ together form. Carl Bloch was one of the most famous and popular painters of his time, and one with whose style Høyen, among others, was in total agreement (Høyen: 1853). In a eulogy dedicated to Bloch, written in the journal Højskolebladet in 1894, Sigurd Müller wrote concerning his painting at Holbæk that the image takes up a special place as one of the painter’s most astounding. He describes it as a group of rare majesty and noble lines, with a stirring, forceful mood in the relation between the towering, sombre shape of the Saviour and the little, somewhat shy, yet animated child (Müller: 1894, 291; my trans., MWJ).

Bloch’s large altar image is placed in a frame drawn by architect Christian Hansen, who also drew the plans for the Neo-Romanesque church itself, built in 1869. The image, its frame and the building thus constitute a planned whole, which

 

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was to impress upon the churchgoer a sense of devotion and religious stirring. Upon entering the church, the congregation is confronted directly with the spiritual atmosphere so often alluded to in contemporary theory (fig. 9). From the altar, the life-size Jesus is looking directly at the beholder. And it is exactly this direct gaze, this eye contact with Jesus, which was one of the keys to Bloch’s success as a religious painter. The feature is a recurring element, a conscious strategy on Bloch’s part, to sharpen the awareness and presence in the picture. Just as the style and materials of the building (at Holbæk red brick) were believed to set the tone and atmosphere of the church, so the images were believed to do the same – embedding the viewer in the “stirring, forceful mood”, as Sigurd Müller puts it, of the picture (Müller: 1894, 291; my trans., MWJ). Walking up towards the altar, one does so under the auspices of Jesus, whose questioning gaze and pose seem to prompt a self-reflection and meditation: ‘Why or how do I approach Christ?’

Fig. 9: The interior of Holbæk Church with the retable of Carl Bloch. Photo: The National Museum in Copenhagen.

An altarpiece with a different tone, but with the same visual strategy, is found in the rural parish church of Hörup in Scania, in southern Sweden and thus close to Denmark and Copenhagen (fig. 10). The east end of the church was rebuilt and enlarged in 1848, and in 1875 the altarpiece was renewed by Carl Bloch. Here he painted a life-size rendering of a Christus Consolator – an embracing Christ surrounded by devotees seeking consolation, not only from his presence, but

 

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Fig. 10: Altarpiece in the rural parish church of Hörup in Scania, in southern Sweden, painted by Carl Bloch in 1875. Photo: The ­National Museum in Copenhagen.

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Fig. 11: Bertel Thorvaldsen’s embracing Christ sculpture of 1839. Photo: Martin W. Jürgensen.

by actually touching and leaning against him. The physicality, the tangibility or materiality presented in the image is highlighted again by Christ’s white, velvety robes upon which the leaning figures press themselves. The image seems almost like a response to one of the great inspirations of the period, Bertel Thorvaldsen (1770–1844), and his embracing Christ sculpture of 1839 (fig. 11), placed in the church of Our Lady in Copenhagen. However, the people in Bloch’s painting do what is not possible with Thorvaldsen’s marble figure – they seek comfort in the softness of the material. The meaning is nevertheless the same. The congregation is invited on entering the church, to kneel down by the altar and remain or rest at the foot of Christ – meditating on and in his presence, much as the Medieval parishioner was invited to reflect on the presence and sacrifice of Christ in front of such pieces as the one in Mariager Abbey Church, a Man of Sorrows carved c. 1525 (fig. 12). Bloch’s motif at Hörup seems to echo such medieval devotional art, intended to fulfil the need for a physical presence to gaze upon in order to meditate upon the intangible, invisible objects of faith. Among those seeking the Christus Consolator of Bloch, we would certainly find the friends of the Lord of whom Pastor Bille was writing above, when he reflected upon why we seek the church.

 

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Karl Madsen, a Danish painter and art historian, wrote shortly after Carl Bloch’s death in 1890 that he had been a master at revealing the inner and outer man, through the use of light and darkness (Magnussen: 1931, 92–94). And indeed this characteristic does seem fitting when applied to Bloch’s altar paintings. Christ is revealed, made present through the stark highlighting of his figure  – a highlighting which makes him much more present than everything else in the scene – completely revealed and present. One could almost speak of Christ being depicted in a form of super-presence, something supernatural. Bloch not only Fig. 12: The Man of Sorrows carved c. 1525, shows Christ, he gives the figure Mariager Abbey Church in Jutland. Photo: in his painting a materiality and The National Museum in Copenhagen. tangibility which goes beyond the earthly and seems to allude to ethereality, and this gives it an un-presence – an unworldly corporeality – hinting that what is depicted after all is more than a man of flesh and blood. Carl Bloch painted only eight altarpieces, but these eight were freely copied and placed in churches all over the country (Pheysey/Holzapfel: 2010; Søndergaard: 2012). However the second example to which we now shall turn, the painter and close friend of Carl Bloch, Anton Dorph, was much more productive within the genre of church decorations. In fact Anton Dorph is probably the Danish painter that has produced most altarpieces (Burmeister/Jürgensen: 2015). If slightly less skilled, he worked to more or less the same ideals as those of Bloch. Thus both of them drew inspiration from Italian Renaissance and Baroque painting, but especially from the works of the French painter Horace Vernet (1789–1863). And both shared a deep admiration for Rembrandt (1606–1669) as well as, of course, for Bertel Thorvaldsen. As a representative example of Dorph’s altar paintings we can take a look at the retable from Nors in northern Jutland, painted in 1883 (fig. 13). Here an image of Christ resurrected is placed in a Neo-Romanesque, gilded frame. We recognize the emphasis on the sole figure of Christ from Bloch, here depicted in full body, stepping out of the dark tomb, emerging as a haloed, light figure against the opaque background. Coming out of the darkness Christ has lifted his arms

 

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in a gesture of thankfulness and is, unlike the figures of Bloch, not looking at the beholder, but has lifted his gaze towards heaven. Nevertheless on entering the church, the figure of Christ on the altar at Nors appears to hold out the same kind of invitation and embracing pose as those of Bloch and of course Thorvaldsen’s sculpture. The figure seems to invite the beholder to join the act of thanks. Like Carl Bloch’s images, Anton Dorph’s retables were immensely popular and were copied and inserted in altarpieces all over the country. They struck a chord in the religious sentiments of a large share of the Danish population at a time when spiritual awakenings and religious revivals were gaining momentum (Schjørring: 2012, 385–506). However, the altarpieces only remained popular a few decades into the 1900s, whereafter they soon came to be treated almost with disgust, were banished from the altars and relegated Fig. 13: The retable from Nors in northto the back spaces of the churches. ern Jutland, painted in 1883 by Anton Their vaunted capability to grasp the Dorph. Photo: The National Museum in beholder and show the intangible qualCopenhagen. ities of both the church and Christ was no longer credited, and the images were swept away as sentimental dross. A last example, somewhat earlier than the works of Bloch and Dorph, and perhaps not of the same importance in art history, is the immensely productive Lucie Marie Ingemann. Her altarpieces too enable valuable insights when one tries to understand the altar decorations of the 19th century. Ingemann, like the two previous painters, drew inspiration from Italian art, but worked with less emphasis on composition and depth in colour, focusing on a Fig. 14: The altarpiece from Ørum in straightforward expression of emotion North Jutland, painted in 1851 by L ­ ucie and religious fervour. These features are Marie Ingemann. Photo: The National Museum in Copenhagen. also present in the productions of the

 

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two previous painters, but the motifs received a raw immediacy at the hand of Ingemann not present in the images of Bloch and Dorph, due to her stripped-down style. As an example, we can take a look at the altarpiece from Ørum in North Jutland, painted in 1851 (fig. 14); an image painted onto a retable dating from the middle of the 17th century. We here find a depiction of Jesus among the disciples, painted as gazing at and presenting himself directly to the beholder. Jesus is the only person shown in frontal, whereas the remainder of the figures encircle him and seem to underscore his offering of himself to the viewer. Lucie Marie Ingemann’s images became popular, undoubtedly because they offered a version of the same ideals outlined above, in a somewhat unpretentious or humble style, invested with the same ideas, but in a rural version which lacked what was perhaps, to some, the alienating perfection of Bloch and Dorph.9

Style channelling spirituality To return to the question of style, we may note something of a paradox in the fact that all three popular painters were influenced by ideals of the Classicism which was otherwise rejected as a credible face for a Danish parish church. The images were, though, inserted into Medieval-style frames, not the ancient temple micro-­ architecture which we perhaps might expect. The answer to this must be that the images show Christ as he was believed to look. While church and furnishing were thus shaped by Medieval styles tied to the local expression, the persons depicted in the altar images were perceived through Classical ideals of beauty, and hence as something foreign entering from the outside. The altarpieces were thereby serving as a window or rather gateway through which Christ could appear to the beholder. Image and frame are accordingly closely connected and in fact inseparable, because the juxtaposition of ‘local Medieval’ and ‘foreign’ is a way of mediating the fact that Christ was believed to be present in the church. As is noted in a bishop’s visitation report from 1859 concerning an altarpiece at Dåstrup on Zealand dated to 1843, the old altarpiece should be replaced by “something appropriate to the contemporary tasks of the Church and the more developed sense of art, and placed in a frame in church style” (Jørgensen: 2009, 75; my trans., MWJ).10 What is meant by ‘church style’ is either Neo-Romanesque or NeoGothic, which one being of little importance, because both styles possessed the 9 One could also raise the question of cost. Altarpieces were a lucrative business for a painter such as Anton Dorph and a lower cost could also make the retables/work of a painter such as Lucie Marie Ingemann more popular. 10 The result was that the church at Dåstrup bought an altar painting by Lucie Marie Ingemann. This is rather ironic as exactly Ingemann has been placed by art history among the less artistically skilled painters of the period.

 

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qualities coveted by the spiritually inclined during the period: a style that Høyen described as “the wish for the church to emerge in its most festive garment, such as is appropriate for the bride of Christ” (Høyen: 1853, 76; my trans., MWJ). What the altarpieces shown here have in common with a large proportion of all new retables produced during the second part of the 19th century is the depiction of Christ and the firm focus on him as man in the flesh. Again, as we have seen, altarpieces had been removed from the altars during the late 18th century, and when interest in retables was renewed during the 19th, it was because images were believed to offer something to the churchgoer which neither the Bible illustrations from the period of Lutheran orthodoxy nor the imageless or even empty altar, only adorned by candles and a cross, could offer. The altar with a life-size rendering of Christ offered a focal point for the personal encounter – offered a chance for those attuned to this encounter – as a way to sense and understand how Christ worked in man. It is the establishing of such a deep bond between Christ and the individual members of the congregation that these altarpieces were believed to offer. They gave space for the churchgoer to kneel down and pray, knowing and seeing that Christ was present. The process towards the acknowledgement of this, as we have seen, had already begun through the imprint of the architecture, which framed the liturgical and devotional heart of the church, the altar. The style of the architecture attuned the experience of the act of going to church, and opened the consciousness of the congregation towards the encounter with Christ. As Niels Laurits Høyen put it in 1853: This art, which gathers all hearts into one mood, which enables each individual to lose himself in the congregation and at the same time, enables him to feel as if its entire strength and fullness, in this moment rested within him alone (Høyen: 1853, 52; my trans., MWJ).

By the 19th century the possibilities in church design were in principle wide open: however, it was also at a point where tradition and the impact of the familiar and recognisable had become of the utmost importance. Rather than experimenting with new types of buildings, churches were to have a clearly identifiable style rooted in medieval architecture as a mark of authenticity.11 In Denmark this style first became the Neo-Gothic, soon to be followed by the Neo-Romanesque. The churchgoer was to be able to see that the church building and its furniture were in touch with the past. The style was not only an aesthetic choice but also a con11 Lutherans gradually had become more adventurous during the late 17th century and particularly during the 18th century when new church designs were proposed and built. In Denmark this trend did not last long into the 19th century. Concerning Protestant church design prior to the 1800s, see Hamberg: 2002.

 

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scious decision to pay allegiance to a past spiritual climate. By attuning the interior to the past, an atmosphere of history was evoked, which invested the church with a meaning or purpose that could not be found elsewhere. But perhaps more importantly, these styles were believed to possess special properties which opened the mind of the churchgoer and facilitated an awareness of something which seems to be bordering on the notion of transcendence.

3.

Conclusion

During the 1700s the first systematic campaigns of clearing the church interiors of old furnishings and unwanted images had already begun, and this continued into the 1800’s, despite the fact that a veneration of Medieval art and inventory was growing rapidly. The ideal which was encountered in the new churches of the 19th century, primarily built in the towns that developed around railway junctions, led to the selection of few images, mostly placed on and next to the altar, in a plain interior with heavy pews and a solid pulpit. The character of the images also changed during the century. From being representations which spoke to the community as a whole, the later preferred motifs were painted and framed in order to accommodate the beholder as an individual. A sentimental yearning thus fused with the church decoration and transformed the biblical narratives hitherto depicted on the altars into an intimate appeal to the beholder, resting on the full figure of Christ. An evocative, pivotal example of the changes which took place in church decoration during the 19th century can be illustrated through Thorvaldsens’s Embracing Christ in the Church of Our Lady in Copenhagen (fig. 11). The huge figure which dwarfs the gathering congregation certainly is rooted in the tradition of majestic decoration of the previous century, but somehow the giant Christ is invested with a gentle, sentimental quality which belongs only to the 19th century. How greatly the figure appealed to the congregations of the period becomes apparent, when we note that next to the many new retables which found their way into the churches, small copies of Thorvaldsen’s statue were one of the most popular altar decorations in Lutheran parish churches. And of course this trend is only underscored through the altar decorations detailed here, painted by Bloch, Dorph and Ingemann – taking their cue from Thorvaldsen and developing his visualization of Christ further through the possibilities in the medium of painting. The 19th century thereby also became the point at which the understanding and interpretation of the church interior was finally pushed completely away from the Church as an institution and onto the beholder. Thus the church art of the period spoke to the congregation as individuals and emphasized an individual, emotional response to the service and its setting. It is precisely this feature which has only

 

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been reinforced through the following century, and continues in our own time. The 19th-century church proposed a space for grand feelings aroused by the invisible presence to which the church space alluded: but how, and what the individual felt, was beyond the reach or control of the Church institution. The new churches built in the shape of their ancient predecessors were believed to be beacons of faith, showing and offering the beholder a place in a timeless religious community. The church had always been there and would always remain there, untouched by the whims of fashion. The church offered itself as the place of true solitude and personal religious experience. Upon entering it, Christ stood in full figure on the altar, looking directly at the churchgoer, visible and present, yet still only painted and hinted at. The church interior thus offered a formless, ungraspable presence, evoked through the appeal to nostalgia, awe and compassion. By these means, that which cannot be seen, was believed to become manifest in the community.

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Jürgensen, Martin Wangsgaard (2013), The Arts and Lutheran Church Decoration: The myth of Lutheran images and iconography, in Peter Opitz (ed.), The Myth of the Reformation Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 356–380. Jürgensen, Martin Wangsgaard (2012/13), The rhetoric of splendour: Matter and the invisible in seventeenth-century church art, Transfiguration. Nordic Journal of Religion and the Arts, 163–187. Jørgensen, Marie-Louise (2009), Kirkerummets Forvandling. Sjællandske landsbykirkers indretning fra reformationen til slutningen af 1800-tallet, Copenhagen: The National Museum. Kjær, Ulla, and Poul Grinder-Hansen (1989), Kirkerne i Danmark, vol. II, Copenhagen: Boghandlerforlaget. Kristensen, Peter Thule (2013), Gottlieb Bindesbøll – Denmark’s First Modern Architect, Copenhagen: Arkitektens Forlag. Kristiansen, Karin Vestergaard (2014), Dansk kirkeinventars farvehistorie. En kronologisk og kontekstuel undersøgelse med Nationalmuseets Antikvarisk-Topografiske Arkiv som indsamlingskilde, Copenhagen: The National Museum in Copenhagen and The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts. Kümin, Beat (1996), The Shaping of a Community: The Rise & Reformation of the English Parish c. 1400–1560. St Andrews Studies in Reformation History, Brookfield/Vermont: Scolar Press. Langberg, Harald (1950), Omkring C. F. Hansen, Copenhagen: Foreningen til Gamle Bygningers Bevaring. Linnet, Ragni (2004), Imitatio Christi. Søren Kierkegaards forhold til den religiøse kunst, Transfiguration. Nordic Journal of Religion and the Arts, 73–102. Lund, Hakon, and Anne Lise Thygesen (1995), C. F. Hansen I-II, Copenhagen: Bergiafonden and Arkitektens Forlag. Lund, Hakon (2006), De Byggede Danmark: C. F. Hansen, Copenhagen: Arkitektens forlag. Roland, Thomas (2010), C. F. Hansen i Danamrk og Tyskland. En billedguide, Copenhagen: Frydenlund. Luther, Martin (1535), Eine einfältige Weise zu beten für einen guten Freund, 1535, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 38, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, 351–375. Magnussen, Rikard (1931), Carl Bloch 1834–1890, Copenhagen: Gads Forlag. Molbech, Christian (1855), Anmærkninger over nyere Tiders Architectur særdeles i Danmark og i Kiøbenhavn, med nogle Ord om Fornyelsen af gammel Bygningsstil i Sverige, Copenhagen: Det Kgl. danske Videnskabernes Selskab. Müller, Sigurd (1894), Carl Bloch, Højskolebladet 19:10, 289–294. Nielsen, Allan Berg and Jens Vellev (1985), Arkitekt Frits Uldall – arkæolog i Jylland, Højbjerg: Forlaget Hikuin. Nyborg, Ebbe/Johannsen, Birgitte Bøggild (2005), Herregård og kirke, in John Erichsen/ Mikkel Venborg Pedersen (ed.), Herregården: Menneske, samfund, landskab, bygninger, vol. 3, Copenhagen: The National Museum, 241–289. Ordbog over det Danske Sprog (1919–1956), Copenhagen: Gyldendalske Boghandel. Pheysey, Dawn C./Holzapfel, Richard Neitel (ed.) (2010), The Master’s Hand: The Art of Carl Heinrich Bloch, Brigham Young University Museum of Art, Provo. Poscharsky, Peter (ed.) (1998), Die Bilder in den Lutherischen Kirchen, München: Scaneg Verlag.

 

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Rafn, C. C (1841), Bemærkninger om en gammel bygning i NewPort paa Rhode-Island, Nordboernes Vinland, Annaler for Nordisk Oldkyndighed, 37–51. Rubow, Jørn (1936), C. F. Hansens Arkitektur, Copenhagen: Gads Forlag. Schjørring, Jens Holger (2012), 1800 til i dag, in Carsten Bach-Nielsen, Per Ingesman (ed.), Kirkens historie, bd. 2, Copenhagen: Hans Reitzels Forlag, 385–746. Sommer, Otto (1892), Brev og Opfordring, Kirkebladet 16:9/10, 300–302. Sundquist, Nils (1950), Kyrkvalvet och himlavalvet, Upplands Fornminnesförenings Årsbok, 47–60. Søndergaard, Sidsel Maria et al. (ed.) (2012): Carl Bloch 1834–1890, Øregaard Museum & Museet for Religiøs Kunst. Uldall, Frits (1867), Om de danske Landsbykirker og deres Istandsættelse, Ny Kirkehistoriske Samlinger IV, 99–146. Vammen, Hans (2011), Den tomme stat - Angst og ansvar i dansk politik 1848–1864, Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanums Forlag.Visible Community and Invisible Transcendence

 

Visible Community and Invisible Transcendence

 

 

Heinrich Assel

„Im innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit … erblickt so der Mensch nichts andres als ein Antlitz gleich dem eigenen“ (Franz Rosenzweig)1 Gottes Angesicht sehen

1.

„Mich sieht nicht der Mensch und lebt“ – Ex 33:20 als Grenzsatz

Die eindringlichste, deutschsprachige Studie zur mentalen Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit des göttlichen Angesichts in den Theophanien des Psalters und in den Sinai-Theophanien im Buch Exodus und Deuteronomium ist Friedhelm Hartensteins Studie Das Angesicht JHWHs.2 Sie schließt mit einer Schlusspointe über Ex 33:20, den Gottesspruch, der auf das Sehbegehren Moses antwortet: „Mich sieht nicht der Mensch und lebt“ (übersetzt nach Benno Jacob). Dieser Satz enthalte, so Hartenstein, in nuce das Urteil über Ex 33:18–23 und die verschiedenen Theophanie-Konzepte der sog. hinteren Sinai-Perikope. Ja, sie fordere als ‚Gegenprobe‘ auf die mental-ikonische Angesicht-Audienz-Theophanie JHWHs im Psalter zu deren relecture auf. Versetzt sie doch diese mental-ikonische Sichtbarkeit und soziomorphe Körperlichkeit JHWHs als König im regulären Kult in Spannung zu seiner Unsichtbarkeit in Ex 33:20 und in den Theophanie-Konzepten von Ex 32–34 angesichts der Ausnahmesituation des gebrochenen Bundes: Sollte also in dem […] Vers Ex 33:20 weniger ein „Grundsatz“ des alttestamentlichen Glaubens als vielmehr ein „Grenzsatz“ dieses Glaubens formuliert worden sein? Die vorliegenden Studien zum Bedeutungshintergrund des „Angesicht JHWHs“ in den Psalmen deuten in diese Richtung (Hartenstein: 2008, 291).

1 Der Aufsatz geht auf einen Vortrag zurück, der am 10. November 2012 in München im Rahmen des DFG-Projekts Bild und Zeit während der Tagung Entzogene Bilder. Die Sinaitheophanie zwischen Bilderverbot und Bilderstiftung (Ex 19–24 und Ex 32–34) vorgetragen wurde. Er wird in wesentlich erweiterter Form im Tagungsband dieser Tagung erscheinen (geplant 2014). Ich danke F. Hartenstein für die Zustimmung zum Vorabdruck. 2 Hartenstein: 2008. Folgende weitere Studien des Autors im Umfeld dieses Buchs setze ich voraus, Hartenstein: 2001; 2003; 2010; Hartenstein/Moxter: 2013.

 

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Heinrich Assel

Diesen Bedeutungshintergrund des ‚Angesichts JHWHs‘ analysiert Hartenstein, indem er der neueren Diskussion um ein anthropomorphes Kultbild JHWHs im Jerusalemer Tempel in Anlehnung an J.-P. Vernants bildpsychologische und bildhistorische Analysen zum nicht-anthropomorphen Kult-Bild, zum Imaginären und zur Imagination (Vernant: 1997, 177–224) eine differenzierende Variante anbietet: Der offenbar von vornherein ohne entsprechendes Kultbild konzipierte Jerusalemer Tempelkult war […] nicht defizitär, sondern fügt sich […] in entsprechende westsemitische Konzepte ein, in denen Gottheiten auch durch nichtbildhafte Kultsymbole […] repräsentiert wurden […]. Gemeinsam ist nun den um nichtbildhafte Kultsymbole und den um die Kultbilder zentrierten Riten, dass sie auf die hintergründige Sphäre der Gottheiten verwiesen und an deren Wirkungen Anteil gaben. Das Gotteskonzept unterscheidet sich dabei bei beiden Symbolformen nicht. […] Gelegentlich wurde die metaphorische Struktur der Kultbilder zwar nicht als solche bewusst […], sie kam aber doch zum Ausdruck, insofern die normalerweise ikonographisch nicht von ihren Bildern zu unterscheidenden Gottheiten in ihrer hintergründigen Existenz in der ‚Tiefe‘ der Welt eigenständig thematisch wurden […] (es gibt hier keine Transzendenz, die den kosmischen Hintergrund noch übersteigt, prägend war vielmehr die symbolische Doppelung der Wirklichkeit in Oberfläche und Tiefe, Nähe und Ferne, Menschen- und Götterwelt, als den eng aufeinander bezogenen und doch asymmetrischen Bereichen des Weltzusammenhangs) (Hartenstein: 2008, 286f).3

Hartenstein exemplifiziert dies an Ps 27 („Das ‚Angesicht JHWHs‘ in den Psalmen: Psalm 27 – eine Tiefenexegese“, Hartenstein: 2008, 65–209) und am gesamten Psalter (Hartenstein: 2008, 213–262). Im Ergebnis entwickelt er eine originäre Theorie für das Motiv vom Sehen Gottes oder des göttlichen Angesichts im Psalter: Was ist gemeint, wenn in Psalm 27 und verwandten Texten vom „Sehen“ Gottes gesprochen wird? […] Im Zuge des Versuchs einer Beantwortung wurde die implizite Szenerie um die Gottesgestalt erkennbar, in deren Mitte das „Angesicht JHWHs“ wie ein Brennpunkt alle Handlungen auf sich zieht (Hartenstein: 2008, 288). Die höfisch-kultische Audienz als Schlüssel zur Angesichts-Vorstellung zeige sich in der Bitte von Ps 27:4, der Bitte um die Schau der Schönheit bzw. Huld JHWHs in seinem Thronsaal. Durch komparative religionshistorische Text- und Bildquellen gestützt spricht Hartenstein von der soziomorphen und mentalen Ikonographie der Audienz vor JHWH und der Jerusalemer Kultsymbolik. Im Kult des Heiligtums, aber durch Text und Ritus vergegenwärtigt auch fern davon, werden „aufgrund der festliegenden Audienzvorstellung“ der „konkret-anschauliche mentale Zugang zu Gott und die heilvollen Auswirkungen des Aufenthalts in seiner Nähe“ vermittelt (Hartenstein: 2008, 288). Die mental sichtbaren Aspekte des Audienzgeschehens kann Hartenstein am Gesamtpsalter plastisch-idealtypisch darstellen und belegen als Zulassung zur Audienz, Huldigung/Proskynese, Bitte um Annahme und Errettung, 3 Zur Ausführung Hartenstein: 2008, 10–52.

 

413

Im innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit …

Audienzgewährung als Schutz und Rettung, Leben und Dienst vor dem Königsgott; Audienzgewährung als theophanes Eingreifen des königlichen Retters und Richters; Audienzverweigerung als verweigerte Gottesnähe; kühne metaphorische Erweiterungen der Audienz-Symbolik (Hartenstein: 2008, 256–262). Die Schlusspointe dieser wegweisenden Studie des Münchner Alttestamentlers zur soziomorphen und mentalen Ikonographie des Angesichts JHWHs im Psalter, also zum ‚Sehen Gottes‘ im Psalter, provoziert eine Gegenfrage des religionsphilosophischen Lesers: Gilt und wirkt der ‚Grenzsatz‘ aus Ex 33:20 nur als ‚Schranke‘, als skeptisches Ausnahmephänomen, das einen regelhaft anderen Zustand der ikonisch-mentalen Sichtbarkeit des göttlichen Angesichts bestätigt; oder gilt und wirkt der Grenzsatz als ‚Grenze‘ in jenem strengeren Sinn, wie er uns im Titel: Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der bloßen Vernunft begegnet?4 Grenzsätze sind seither Grundsätze zweiter, transzendentaler Ordnung, insbesondere der ‚natürlichen Theologie‘ und ihres symbolischen Anthropomorphismus. In Hermann Cohens Religion der Vernunft aus den Quellen des Judentums (posthum 1919) (Cohen: 1988)5 und in Franz Rosenzweigs Stern der Erlösung (1921; Rosenzweig: 1976) hat die Theorie der Grenzsätze bereits eine spezifische epistemische Geschichte hinter sich, die nur unzureichend als ‚neukantianisch‘ etikettiert ist. Cohen klassifiziert limitative Urteile als unendliche Urteile und damit als ‚Grundsätze‘ der Religion der Vernunft aus den Quellen des Judentums. Dazu beruft sich Cohen auf die jüdische religionsphilosophische Tradition, insbesondere auf Maimonides.6 Aus Grenzsätzen als Grundsätzen zweiter Ordnung erzeugt Cohen in seiner posthumen Religionsphilosophie Einzigkeit, Namentlichkeit und Bildlosigkeit Gottes.7 Aus Grenzsätzen als dialogischen, vermeintlich sprachphänomenologischen 4 An Kants Unterscheidung von Schranke und Grenze, sofern sie einen Ausgangspunkt der folgenden Überlegungen zum limitativen oder unendlichen Urteil bei Cohen bildet, sei erinnert: „in allen Grenzen ist auch etwas Positives […], dahingegen Schranken bloße Negationen enthalten. Denn nun frägt sich: wie verhält sich unsere Vernunft bei dieser Verknüpfung dessen, was wir kennen, mit dem, was wir nicht kennen und niemals kennen werden? Hier ist eine wirkliche Verknüpfung des Bekannten mit einem völlig Unbekannten […], und wenn dabei das Unbekannte auch nicht im Mindesten bekannter werden sollte […], so muß doch der Begriff von dieser Verknüpfung bestimmt und zur Deutlichkeit gebracht werden können.“ (Prolegomena zu einer jeden künftigen Metaphysik, die als Wissenschaft wird auftreten können, § 57; Kant: 1903, 354). „Die natürliche Theologie ist ein solcher Begriff auf der Grenze der menschlichen Vernunft […]“ (§ 59; Kant: 1903, 361). 5 Die wichtigsten Voraussetzungen: Hermann Cohen, Logik der reinen Erkenntnis (Cohen: 1977); Hermann Cohen, Das Prinzip der Infinitesimalmethode und seine Geschichte (Cohen: 1984). 6 Die epistemische Voraussetzung des unendlichen Urteils von Kant über Cohen bis Rosenzweig sucht zu analysieren Assel: 2005, 338–350. 7 Die Erzeugung von Einzigkeit und Namentlichkeit in Cohens Religionsphilosophie ist Thema in Assel: 2012. Die Frage nach dem Sehen Gottes bzw. der Bildlosigkeit Gottes bei Cohen ist ein kaum untersuchter Topos. Der Versuch einer Antwort verlangt, wie ich hier zeigen möchte, Cohens Religionsphilosophie und Ästhetik synoptisch zu interpretieren.

 

414

Heinrich Assel

Grundworten ‚Ich-Du, Er-Es, Wir-Es‘ erzeugt Rosenzweig in seinem System der ‚Offenbarung‘ des göttlichen Namens den Übergang von der mythischen Lebendigkeit der Götter und der plastischen Welt des tragischen Menschen zum unendlich lebendigen ‚Offenbarungsaugenblick‘ in den Zeitekstasen von Offenbarung, Schöpfung und Erlösung.8 „Mich sieht nicht der Mensch und lebt“ – es gilt wohl beides: Einerseits ist dies, bezogen auf die Geschichte JHWHs in seiner imaginären Audienz-Präsenz und Angesichtigkeit ein Grenzsatz, literarisch durch Ex:32–34 in der Ausnahmesituation zwischen Bundesbruch und Bundeserneuerung verortet. Andererseits, bezogen auf die moderne jüdisch-religionsphilosophische Rezeption des Topos von der Angesichtigkeit und auf die (wie immer bildästhetisch zu präzisierende) Bildkritik, ist es ein Grenzsatz, der zu einem Grundsatz zweiter Ordnung wird. In Rosenzweigs Stern der Erlösung sieht sich symbolisierende Vernunft an dieser Grenze veranlasst, von der mythischen Theophanie und der plastischen Welt zur Selbstoffenbarung des göttlichen Namens und zum dialogisch-poetischen Nennen überzugehen. Bereits zuvor statuiert Cohens Religionsphilosophie in ihrem Kapitel über den Bilderdienst: Auch der Begriff des Menschen, wie der Monotheismus ihn erzeugen muß, forderte die Unabhängigkeit ebenso vom plastischen Menschenbegriffe, wie vom plastischen Gottesbegriff. Andere Quellen des Bewußtseins mußten eröffnet […] werden, wenn dem einzigen Gott gemäß der Mensch zur Entdeckung kommen sollte. […] Diese Eigenart [sc. der anderen Quellen] besteht in der Lyrik der Psalmen: welche weder Gott allein, noch die Menschen allein besingt. Die Plastik dagegen kann beide Gestalten nur zu isolierter Darstellung bringen. So hätte sie die Lyrik hemmen müssen, für welche das Verhältnis von Gott und Mensch zum Problem ihres monotheistischen Zwecks wird (Cohen: 1988, 67).9

In Cohens wie Rosenzweigs Religionsphilosophie ist der Übergang vom Plastischen des Bilderdiensts zur monotheistischen Korrelation von Gott und Mensch und zur Poetik des göttlichen Namens und Nennens10 bezeichnenderweise erst in ihren 8 Zur Relation von System und ‚Offenbarung‘ immer noch grundlegend: Mosès (1985); sprachphänomenologisch rekonstruiert I.U. Dalferth Rosenzweigs Offenbarungsbegriff (Dalferth: 2003); zur Frage der möglichen Rezeption von Rosenzweigs Stern der Erlösung zwischen Trinität und Tetragramm, Assel: 2008. Für die Figur des Offenbarungsaugenblicks (Ex 3) und der Prägnanz des tetragrammatischen Namens ist Rosenzweigs später Aufsatz „Der Ewige“ einschlägig; zur Interpretation Schmahl: 2009. 9 Cohen scheint mit der Kategorie des Plastischen für das Bildliche eine bestimmte Epoche griechischer Bildlichkeit (nach dem archaischen xoanon und vor der neuplatonischen Bildtheologie) zur Kategorie des Bildlichen überhaupt zu generalisieren – wogegen die kultbildhistorischen und imaginationspsychologischen Analysen von Vernant (1997, 177–198) und Hartenstein plausibel argumentieren. Diese Diagnose, die für die Religionsphilosophie Cohens zutrifft, differenziert sich, wenn wir, wie unten, seine Ästhetik des reinen Gefühls hinzuziehen. 10 Die Entgegensetzung von Plastik und Poetik hat am voranstehenden Zitat Cohens Anhalt. Sie ist, wie sich unten zeigen wird, für den Ansatz von Cohens später Religionsphilosophie seit 1914 grundlegend. Der zugrundeliegende Poetik-Begriff wird jetzt werkgenetisch präzise und

 

415

Im innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit …

jeweiligen Kapiteln über den Versöhnungstag (jom kippur) vollständig exponiert.11 Die Exposition der ‚Selbstoffenbarung‘ des göttlichen Namens ist vollständig, wo sie als Vergebung (selicha) und als Versöhnung (kappara) exponiert ist. In den sog. 13 middot (Attributen Gottes) von Ex 34:6f,12 in ihrer Reinterpretation und Modifikation in bestimmten rabbinischen Strata des Talmuds und in der kultischen Rezitation der modifizierten middot wird je neu Bundeserneuerung als Vergebung und Versöhnung vollzogen.13 Der Grenzsatz von Ex 33:20f und der Grenzsatz von Ex 34:6f scheinen sich also zu erfordern und wechselseitig auszudifferenzieren. Während Cohens und Rosenzweigs Poetik göttlicher Namen und lyrischen Nennens neuerdings vielfach analysiert wurden, sehe ich meine Aufgabe darin, nach der Ikonik (mit einer Kategorie von Max Imdahl; vgl. Imdahl: 1994)14 von ‚Sehen und Angesicht Gottes‘ bei beiden zu fragen. Die These ist, dass in diesen jüdischen erhellend analysiert durch den Editor der Werke Cohens, Wiedebach: 2011, 303: „das entscheidende Brückenglied zwischen System und Glaube ist Cohens Poetologie […]“. Eine sprachtheologisch profunde Rezeption und Diskussion jetzt in Bader: 2009, 319–354, „§ 8 Poetik der Sprache“, dort zur Gattung des Psalters als Lyrik und zum lyrischen Ich, 347–354. 11 Cohen: 1988, 252–275 (Kapitel XII); Rosenzweig: 1976, 359–364 (im Kontext von: 331–372). 12 In der Übersetzung von Jacob: 1997, 965: „Er zog an seinem Angesicht vorüber und rief: Er ist Er, ein barmherziger und gnädiger Gott, langmütig und reich an Huld und Treue. Bewahrend Huld den Tausenden, wegnehmend Schuld, Verfehlung und Sünde, ohne gänzlich frei zu machen, ahndend die Schuld der Väter an Kindern und Kindeskindern, am dritten und am vierten Geschlecht.“ Zur Rekonstruktion der 13 middot, Jabob: 1997, 969 f. Als Gnadenformel und als mögliches Zentrum alttestamentlicher Traditionen interpretiert bei Spieckermann: 1990. 13 Im Talmud und der kultischen Rezitation wird durch Änderung im Wortbestand aus „ohne gänzlich frei zu machen“ das Attribut: „er macht rein“. Dazu Cohen: „Diese Änderung darf man ohne Übertreibung wohl als eine Tat der tiefsten Frömmigkeit und der innigsten Menschenliebe bezeichnen, die vor keiner Verletzung des Buchstabens an den heiligsten Worten der Offenbarung zurückschrickt“ (1988, 259). Den Terminus ‚Offenbarung‘ meidet Cohen in der Regel – wie umgekehrt Wilhelm Herrmann, der Marburger Kollege Cohens, je länger je dezidierter seinen Offenbarungsbegriff gegen Cohens vermeintlich vormodernen Offenbarungsbegriff wandte. Tatsächlich wird Cohens spätes Verständnis der monotheistischen Korrelation von Gott und Mensch als Versöhnung der zeitgenössischen protestantischen Theologie zunehmend inkommensurabel. Auch sein Verständnis des unabgeschlossenen Kanons der ‚Quellen des Judentums‘ ist erst jüngst präziser analysiert: Matthias Morgenstern arbeitet die „besondere Relevanz des Gebetbuches als eines bis in die Gegenwart hineinreichenden liturgischen und wirkungsgeschichtlichen Textes“ heraus. „Weit davon entfernt, despektierlich zu sein, wäre die Bezeichnung ‚Siddurlamdan‘, auf Cohen angewandt, Ausdruck für ein geradezu philosophisches Beten“ (Morgenstern: 2012, 20). 14 Imdahl geht von der Interpretationslehre Panofskys aus und unterscheidet an einem Bild vorikonographische, ikonographische und ikonologische Sinnebenen. Der Begriff Ikonik präzisiert die ikonologische Sinnebene: „Thema der Ikonik ist das Bild als eine solche Vermittlung von Sinn, die durch nichts anderes zu ersetzen ist […]. Um sie [sc. die Unersetzbarkeit] zu gewahren und sich ihrer bewußt zu werden, bedarf es der konkreten Anschauung eines Bildes, und zwar ist eine spezifisch ikonische Anschauungsweise unerläßlich“ (Imdahl: 1994, 300). Die konkrete Anschauung eines Bildes, welche ein solches sehendes Sehen (die ikonologische Sinnebene) provoziert, muss diesem Bild als Bild doch wohl Einzigkeit lassen, deren Sinn ebenso unersetzlich wie unvergleichlich ist. Zur Diskussion von Imdahl, s. Bader: 2009, 129–131.

 

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Heinrich Assel

Religionsphilosophien die (allzu) manifeste Bildkritik im Dienst eines Sehens des göttlichen Angesichts steht, deren Ort und Status näher zu bestimmen ist. Ein Grenzsatz aus dem Stern der Erlösung, der theophanes und anthropophanes Angesicht irritierend überblendet, deute die Perspektive an, in der diese Ausgangsthese steht: „Im innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit […] erblickt so der Mensch nichts andres als ein Antlitz gleich dem eigenen“ (Rosenzweig: 1976, 471).15

2.

Ex 33:17–23: ‚Gott sehen‘

Bevor genauer nach dem architektonischen Rang von Ex 33:20 (und Ex 34:6f) in der Religionsphilosophie Cohens und Rosenzweigs zu fragen ist, lenke ich den Blick zunächst auf den Text von Ex 33:17–23, genauer auf jene Kommentierung von Ex 33:17–23 im Kontext von Ex 32–34, die Cohen und Rosenzweig nächstverwandt und kongenial ist – auf den Exodus-Kommentar Benno Jacobs (Jacob: 1997, 923–991, zu Ex 32–34). In Jacobs Kommentar entfaltet sich nämlich der angedeutete systematische Zusammenhang von bildtheologischem Grenzsatz und namenstheologischem Grundsatz aus dem Textkommentar. Jacob kommentiert Ex 33:17–23 im Kontext von Ex 33:13–34:3. Die mosaische Bitte V. 18b: „O, laß mich deine Herrlichkeit sehen!“ (‫ת־ּכב ֶ ֹֽדָך‬ ְ ‫)ה ְר ֵ ֥אנִ י ָנ֖א ֶא‬ ַ bestehe aus zwei Worten, „einem Verbum und einem Objekt“ (Jacob: 1997, 959). (1) Die auf das Objekt kabod, nicht auf das Angesicht gerichtete Bitte enthalte überhaupt kein Problem des Sehens, denn Gottes „Herrlichkeit kann und soll der Mensch sehen. Dazu erscheint sie in der Welt, und es ist eine Anklage, dass die Menschen sie nicht sehen und daraus lernen wollen […], obgleich die ganze Erde voll ist seiner Herrlichkeit […] und erst recht sein Heiligtum“ (Jacob: 1997, 958, mit vielen Belegen). Was erwartet Mose, nachdem er und das Volk bereits den Herrlichkeitserweis von Exodus und Sinaioffenbarung sahen, eigentlich darüber hinaus als noch nicht gesehene Herrlichkeit? fragt Jacob. Seine Antwort: „daß Er in unserer Mitte weilen wird, nämlich auf dem ferneren Zuge, und daß wir ihm trotz allem ein Heiligtum errichten sollen, mitten unter uns zu wohnen und zu wandeln“ (Jacob: 1997, 959). Die noch nicht gesehene, ersehnte Herrlichkeit ist die Vergebung. Bei Jacob ist es Reue und Umkehr Gottes aus Zorn und vernichtender Gegenwart in der Mitte des Volks (Ex 32:7–14; Jacob: 1997, 929–933): über den gerichtssuspensiven Rückzug aus der Mitte des Nicht-mehr-Volkes (Ex 33,1–3; Jacob: 1997, 944f) und über die interimistische Verschonungsweise des Dabeiseins im Boten (Ex 32:30–34; Jacob: 1997, 942–944) hinaus, wird dies zur Vergebung; Vergebung, die es erst ermöglicht, im aufgeschobenen Gericht die ‚ekzentrische

15 Kontext und Interpretation s. u. S. 421–425.

 

417

Im innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit …

Mitte‘ eines Zelts der Begegnung zu schaffen. Bei Jacob ist dieses Zelt draußen vor dem Lager das Zelt des Mose selbst (Ex 33:4–11).16 Die mosaische Bitte werde mit V. 19 erfüllt, indem JHWH ankündigt, „all mein Bestes“ (V. 19b Übersetzung Jacob), seine Herrlichkeit und darin „Gottes Person“ selbst (Jacob: 1997, 960) an Moses Angesicht vorüberziehen zu lassen. Dies weise auf Ex 34:6–7 voraus, welchen Passus Jacob im eben skizzierten Sinn als Selbstoffenbarung des einzigen Namens, doch nun als Vergebung und als Versöhnung in den 13 middot interpretiert.17 Dies ist die Bundeserneuerung: „Ich werde selbst den Namen J-h-w-h ausrufen […]“ (Jacob: 1997, 959). Diese Theophanie, das Vorüberziehen, geschieht weder am Ort des Mose, im Zelt der Begegnung, noch auf dem Berg, dem Ort der Worte des erneuerten Bundes (Ex 34:10–28), sondern ‚bei Gott‘, am (atopischen) Ort entfesselter theophaner Naturgewalten, geschützt in der Felsspalte von Gottes schützender Hand (Ex 33:21, dazu Jacob: 1997, 962). (2) Der andere Teil der Bitte des Mose aus Ex 33:18 richte sich auf das Verb Sehen/Sehenlassen. Jacob kommentiert: „Das Wort sehen oder sehen lassen hatte Gott [sc. in seiner Antwort von V. 19] noch vermieden, wohl aber zwei Mal von Moses Angesicht gesprochen […]. Zu einem Sehen wird dein Auge nicht kommen, und anstatt zu sehen wirst du etwas hören“ (Jacob: 1997, 959). Also die sattsam bekannte, schlichte Entgegensetzung von Sehen und Hören? Das wäre kurzschlüssig! Lesen wir weiter zur Interpretation von V. 20! Sondern (‫)ל ֹא־יִ ְר ַ ֥אנִ י ָה ָא ָ ֖דם וָ ָ ֽחי‬ ֽ 18 heißt: der Mensch, dieweil, d. h. insofern, weil und während er lebt, ist nicht dazu geschaffen, seine Fähigkeit zu „sehen“, ist dem göttlichen „Angesicht“ inadäquat. Zwar wird für das Verhältnis von Gott gerade zu Mose eben der Ausdruck „von Angesicht zu Angesicht“ (panim el panim) gebraucht (33,11 Dt 34,10), aber das Verbum ist dabei nicht sehen, sondern reden, verkehren. Wie außerordentlich empfindlich die Tora in dieser Beziehung ist, sieht man an der grundsätzlichen und ausführlichsten Charakteristik Nu 12,619 […]. Mit „Gott sehen“ ist immer nur die innere Schau eines den Menschen vergönnten oder von ihnen ersehnten Abglanzes gemeint. Voller wird er Sein Angesicht erst sehen, wenn er nicht mehr „sieht“ (Jacob: 1997, 960f).

Dieser Kommentar zu Ex 33:20 hat es in sich. Offenbar ist Ex 33:20b bei Jacob ein schöpfungsanthropologischer Grundsatz. Zugleich ist es ein Grenzsatz über die imaginäre Grenze von Leben und Tod, durch die Sehen zur (1) ‚inneren‘ Schau 16 „Gott besucht Mose in dessen Zelt; das ist die höchste Auszeichnung, die ein Herr seinem Diener erweisen kann, und das soll das Volk sehen, darum bleibt die Wolkensäule am Eingang des Zeltes stehen: Er ist drinnen bei seinem Freunde!“ (Jacob: 1997, 952). 17 Zu Rekonstruktion und Interpretation, Jacob: 1997, 969 f. 18 Im Original unpunktiert und abgekürzt. 19 Mose habe nur um das Sehenlassen der Herrlichkeit gebeten: „Diese Zurückhaltung ist nur daraus zu verstehen, daß sich der Hebräer bewusst war, was alles in dem Angesicht des wahren Gottes liegt: eine nicht fassbare noch auszudenkende unermeßliche Fülle und ungeheure Gewalt des Lebens und unnahbare Heiligkeit“ (Jacob: 1997, 961).

 

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Heinrich Assel

eines schon dem lebenden Menschen ‚vergönnten‘ oder ‚ersehnten‘ Abglanzes wird. In diesem inneren Sehen, welches Jacob in der Regel durch Ps 36:10 erläutert,20 kündigt sich aber (2) ein hyperbolisch volleres Sehen an, welches dieses (1) ‚innere‘ Sehen parabolisch werden lässt, zum ‚Sehen‘ (in Apostrophen). In einem kurzen, bereits 1929 publizierten Text mit dem Titel ‚Gott sehen‘ entfaltet Jacob diese Topik von Gottes-Angesicht-Sehen in genau diesem Sinn – worauf der posthum publizierte Kommentar explizit verweist (Jacob: 1929). Ich lese mithin Jacobs Kommentar zu Ex 33:20 gleichsam mit den Augen Cohens und Rosenzweigs. Ex 33:20 ist dann ein kritischer Grenzsatz, ein unendliches Urteil, welches durch Negation der gesamten Sphäre des Sehens und Sichtbaren durch ein schlechthin limitierendes, grenzwertiges Gottes-Angesicht-Sehen zwei positive Begriffe erzeugt: das parabolische innere Sehen der Herrlichkeit JHWHs und das hyperbolische vollere Sehen seines Angesichts. Exkurs. Im unendlichen Urteil gehören Subjekt und Prädikat verschiedenen Welten an, die sich berühren, ohne dass ein Übergang stattfindet. Die Beschränkung der Prädikat-Sphäre (hier: die gesamte Sphäre des Sichtbaren, beschränkt durch das limitierende ‚nicht-Sichtbare‘ des göttlichen Angesichts) erfolgt durch Angrenzung und Begrenzung der Subjekt-Sphäre (hier: ‚der Mensch, solange er lebt‘) im unendlichen Urteil. Obgleich nun diese Ausschließung die Form einer Negation hat (freilich in der Qualität eines unendlichen Urteils, nicht eines verneinenden Urteils), so ist nach Kants Logik „doch die Beschränkung eines Begriffs eine positive Handlung. Daher sind Grenzen positive Begriffe beschränkter Gegenstände“ (Logik § 22; Kant: 1923, 104, Anm.). Durch das ‚nicht-Sichtbare‘ Gottes, das an allen möglichen Weisen des menschlichen Sehens auszuüben der Grenzsatz anweist, entsteht der positive Begriff eines parabolischen und hyperbolischen Sehens. Daher die beiden positiven Begriffe: das innere parabolische Sehen und das vollere eschatische, hyperbolische Sehen oder Schauen. Im Kommentar faltet Jacob dies aus ins ‚innere‘ Sehen der Herrlichkeit J-H-W-Hs in der Selbstoffenbarung des Namens als Vergebung und Versöhnung; und ins vollere eschatische Sehen des Angesichts, das nur als Grenze erfahren wird.21 20 „Was die Sonne für das leibliche Auge, das ist Gott für unser zweites Gesicht, für das Auge des Geistes und der Seele. Gott sehen heißt, sich von ihm bescheinen und beglänzen lassen, in seinem Lichte wandeln und atmen. ‚Denn bei Dir ist die Quelle des Lebens, in Deinem Lichte sehen wir Licht.‘ Freilich ist Vergleichen nie Gleichheit. Die Sonne sieht man ohne Bemühung […]; Gott muß man sehen wollen […]. Nur ist im Judentum das Wesentliche immer die Wendung zum sittlichen Handeln gewesen: man sieht Gott, wenn man sich sagt, daß Gott sieht“ (Jacob: 1929, 391f). 21 Durch einen kalkulierten Kategorienfehler wird zwischen dem lebenden Menschen und seinem ‚Sehen‘ eine unabschließbare Negation wirksam gesetzt, die umschlägt in eine unmögliche, aber

 

419

Im innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit …

Jacob drückt diese Spannung in Oppositionspaaren aus, die stufenweise näher bestimmt werden: 1. ersehntes ‚Sehen‘ und volleres Sehen; 2. erhaben-inneres ‚Sehen‘ Seiner Herrlichkeit als Vergebung und eschatisch-­ volleres Sehen Seines Angesichts; 3. ‚Sehen‘ Seiner Herrlichkeit als Vergebung im Vorüberziehen und Nachher und eschatisch-imaginäres Sehen Seines Angesichts als Angesicht.

3.

„Im innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit … erblickt so der Mensch nichts andres als ein Antlitz gleich dem eigenen“ (Franz Rosenzweig)

Jacob publizierte seinen Aufsatz „Gott sehen“ 1929, im Todesjahr Franz Rosenzweigs. In Rosenzweigs Stern der Erlösung von 1921 findet sich ein systematisches Gegenstück dazu. Systematisch, weil an einer bezeichnenden System-Stelle des Sterns der Erlösung platziert. Das folgende Textstück mit dem Titel „Tor“ bildet den Schluss des Gesamtwerks. Genauer: Es bildet den Epilog schon nach dem Schluss oder – nach Rosenzweigs eigener Charakteristik – den Übergang vom Buch ‚ins Leben‘ (Rosenzweig: 1976, 472; s. u.). Exkurs. Hinter dem Leser liegt an dieser Stelle nicht nur der negativ-philosophische 1. Teil des Werks, sondern auch die Offenbarungsphänomenologie des göttlichen Namens (2. Teil); die dichte Beschreibung der beiden messianischen Lebenswelten des Christentums und Judentums in ihren Gottesdiensten und messianischen Festjahren, einander ausschließend und doch wahrheitsverwandt (des 3. Teils 1. und 2. Buch); die eigenartige „messianische Erkenntnistheorie“ und genuin jüdische Eschatologie22 der Selbsterniedrigung Gottes als schechina und der Selbsterlösung des Einzigen von seinen offenbaren Namen (des 3. Teils 3. Buch). Im Abschnitt „Tor“ findet sich der implizite Leser dieses einzigartigen Textes23 auf der Schwelle, vor dem Tor.

erfüllte Position zwischen dem ‚nicht-mehr-lebenden Menschen‘ und seinem Sehen! Der Sehende und sein ‚Sehen‘, der ‚Sehende‘ und sein Sehen! werden in parabolische und hyperbolische Spannung gebracht. 22 Zu dieser Selbsteinschätzung vgl. Rosenzweig: 1984, 159. 23 Mein Greifswalder philosophischer Kollege Wolfgang Stegmaier charakterisierte ihn (mündlich) als ‚messianischen Text‘.

 

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Heinrich Assel

Im innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit, wo ihm seiner Erwartung nach alle Welt und er selber sich zum Gleichnis herabsinken müßte für das, was er dort erblicken wird, erblickt so der Mensch nichts andres als ein Antlitz gleich dem eigenen. Der Stern der Erlösung ist Antlitz worden, das auf mich blickt und aus dem ich blicke. Nicht Gott, aber Gottes Wahrheit ward mir zum Spiegel. Gott, der der Letzte ist und der Erste, er schloß mir die Pforten des Heiligtums auf, das in der innersten Mitte erbaut ist. Er ließ sich schauen. Er führte mich an jene Grenze des Lebens, wo die Schau verstattet ist. Denn kein Mensch bleibt im Leben, der ihn schaut [Ex 33:20] […]. Aber was er mir in diesem Jenseits des Lebens zu schauen gab, das ist – nichts anderes als was ich schon in der Mitte des Lebens vernehmen durfte; nur dass ich es schaue, nicht mehr bloß höre ist der Unterschied. Denn die Schau auf der Höhe der erlösten Überwelt zeigt mir nichts andres, als was mich schon das Wort der Offenbarung mitten im Leben hieß; und im Lichte des göttlichen Antlitzes zu wandeln [vgl. Ps 89,16], wird nur dem, der den Worten des göttlichen Mundes folgt. Denn – „er hat dir gesagt, o Mensch, was gut ist, was verlangt der Ewige dein Gott von dir als Recht tun und von Herzen gut sein und einfältig wandeln mit deinem Gott“ [Mi 6:8] (Rosenzweig: 1976, 471; Hervorhebung von H.A.).

(1) Gottes Wahrheit als Antlitz Ist die Sprache im Schluss von Hegels Phänomenologie des Geistes gesättigt mit begrifflicher Prägnanz, weil dort das Wahre erst das Ganze ist, so ist der Schluss des Sterns der Erlösung gesättigt mit Sinnbezügen, weil hier das Wahre gerade nicht das Ganze ist. Wahrheit ist ausschließlich Gottes Wahrheit, während sie je sonst existierende Wahrheit ist, als notwendig zu begreifen, aber nicht als alternativlos notwendig, also zugleich kontingent, in sich plural, weil in konträren und sogar kontradiktorischen christlichen und jüdischen Wahrheiten zu bewähren, als je meine, je als Anteil zu bewähren. „Be-währt also muß die Wahrheit werden, und grade in der Weise, in der man sie gemeinhin verleugnet: nämlich indem man die ‚ganze‘ Wahrheit auf sich beruhen läßt und dennoch den Anteil, an den man sich hält, für die ewige Wahrheit erkennt“ (Rosenzweig: 1976, 437). Dieses Verständnis von ‚Wahrheit‘ hat existentiale und logische Implikationen, die hier nur anzudeuten sind: Exkurs. Rosenzweig versteht sich mit dieser Faktizität der Wahrheit als Erbe des ‚neuen, erfahrenden Denkens‘ Schellings. Er galt darum etwa Karl Löwith als der Zeitgenosse Heideggers. Die Rede von der Grenze des Lebens, an der Hören zu Sehen wird, hat diese existentiale Konnotation. Ich erinnere nur an den ersten Satz im Stern der Erlösung: „Vom Tode, von der Furcht des Todes, hebt alles Erkennen des All an. […] Der Mensch soll die Angst der Irdischen nicht von sich werfen; er soll in der Furcht des Todes – bleiben“ (1976: 3; 4). Rosenzweig ist allerdings auch Zeitgenosse der intuitionistischen Logik, die den Satz vom ausgeschlossenen Dritten als logisches Prinzip von Aussagen,

 

421

Im innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit …

aber nicht als logische Regel von Wahrheit gelten lässt. Der Begriff potentieller Unendlichkeit der Wahrheit erlaubt es, widersprechende theologische Aussagen als begründet nicht-widerlegbar und entscheidbar unentscheidbar stehen zu lassen, ohne diese Aussagen als sinnlos zu diskreditieren, eben weil Gottes Wahrheit unendlich ist (vgl. Assel: 2001, 264–266). So sehr Rosenzweigs Stern der Erlösung zu einem Anstoß für Emmanuel Lévinas’ Totalität und Unendlichkeit wurde, der aussageförmige Theologie kritisiert, weil sie die Unendlichkeit göttlicher Wahrheit, den göttlichen Namen und das Antlitz und Angesicht immer schon verrät, so wenig darf man Lévinas’ Ethik des Angesichts in dieses Textstück Rosenzweigs hineinlesen. Dass die unendliche Wahrheit Gottes im innersten Heiligtum Antlitz gleich dem eigenen wird, das auf mich blickt und aus dem ich blicke, hat genuinen Sinn.24 (2) Einfältig wandeln Der Titel ‚Tor‘ ist dafür ein Wink. ‚Einfältig wandeln mit deinem Gott‘ sei das ‚Tor‘ aus dem innersten Heiligtum ‚ins Leben‘.

Einfältig wandeln mit deinem Gott – die Worte stehen über dem Tor, dem Tor, das aus dem geheimnis-voll-wunderbaren Leuchten des göttlichen Heiligtums, darin kein Menschenleben bleiben kann, herausführt. Wohinaus aber öffnen sich die Flügel des Tors? Du weißt es nicht? Ins Leben.25

24 Der Stern der Erlösung, der zum Antlitz wird, ist der emblematische Stern Davids. Das Emblem des Sterns Davids steht für die drei Teile des Systems. Er repräsentiert die ‚Struktur‘ der systematischen Grundsätze und ‚Grundworte‘, die den Text Rosenzweigs, seine Argumente und seine Argumentation generieren. Das innerste Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit, wie immer tempelmetaphorisch formuliert, ist auch sublimer Logos, der Einzige als Wahrheit in den kontingenten, jüdischen und christlichen Wahrheiten des Nennens mit Namen: In der generativen Struktur des ‚Sterns der Erlösung‘ wird nicht Gott selbst, aber seine unendliche Wahrheit zum Spiegel. Die Struktur dieser Wahrheit wird gleichsam physiognomisch überblendet und zum physiognomischen Schema des Menschengesichts (vgl. Rosenzweig: 1976, 470, Nr. 457). Die Metamorphormose der architektonischen Struktur unendlicher Wahrheit und ihres Aussagezusammenhangs ins dialogisch-ikonische Angesicht unterscheidet Rosenzweig von Lévinas. 25 Rosenzweig: 1976, 472.

 

422

Heinrich Assel

Inwiefern ist der ‚einfältige Wandel‘ aus Mi 6:8 das Tor, das aus dem innersten Heiligtum, an der Grenze des Lebens, aus der volleren Schau des Angesichts, ins Leben führt, zum parabolischen Sehen im Licht des göttlichen Antlitzes und im Hören der Tora? Der Titel ‚Tor‘ spielt zunächst auf die liturgische Sequenz Ne`ila, das letzte Gebet des Versöhnungstages, an, das die zehn Tage von Neujahr bis zum Versöhnungstag abschließt. Es begeht „die Stunde der Sündenvergebung im eigentlichen Sinne“ (Elbogen: 1995, 152), bevor die Himmelstore mit dem Anbruch der Nacht geschlossen werden.26 Nach dem Eintritt der Nacht, gleichsam im Moment des Torschlusses, beten „bei geöffneter heiliger Lade“ Vorbeter und Gemeinde siebenmalig Jichud:27 Höre, Israel, Er, unser Gott, Er Einer! einmal Gelobt sei der Name der Herrlichkeit seines Reiches immer und ewig! dreimal Er, er allein ist Gott! siebenmal.28 Wie bekannt, war der Versöhnungstag und besonders diese Gebetssequenz für Rosenzweigs Rekonversion zum Judentum im Jahr 1913 bedeutsam. Im Stern der Erlösung, im 1. Buch des 3. Teils, wird dies zum Konzept ikonischen Hoffens, ausgeführt in einer dichten Beschreibung zentraler Gebetssequenzen, Zeichen und Gesten des Versöhnungstages, die Rosenzweig selbst messianisch nennt. Die semiotischen Innovationen, die Rosenzweig für diese dichte messianische Beschreibung z. B. der Ne`ila-Sequenz ausbildet, habe ich anderwärts analysiert (Assel: 2001, 211– 214, 346–354). Ich möchte diese Analyse ikonischer Hoffnung in der Beschreibung liturgischer Zeichen nicht wiederholen, sondern jetzt nur festhalten: Jacobs These vom ‚inneren‘ Sehen der Herrlichkeit JHWHs als Vergebung ist von Rosenzweig in dieser dichten messianischen Beschreibung durchgeführt. Ich konzentriere mich in diesem Aufsatz auf das Surplus, das im jetzt infrage stehenden Textstück hinzukommt: Der Mensch erblickt im „innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit“ „nichts andres als ein Antlitz gleich dem eigenen“, „das auf mich blickt und aus dem ich blicke“. Diese eigentümlich vexierende Spiegel-Figur, das Antlitz gleich dem eigenen, ist das Surplus, das in der dichten Beschreibung jüdischer Liturgie fehlt. In dieser Figur finde ich, was ich das eschatisch-imaginäre Sehen seines Angesichts nannte. Pünktlich stellt sich daher bei Rosenzweig auch der Bezug auf Ex 33:20 ein. Doch welche Gestalt nimmt bei Rosenzweig die exegetische Intuition Jacobs an? In Rosenzweigs „Tor“ (1921) möchte ich eine ‚anti-mystische‘ Replik auf Franz Kafkas Parabel „Vor dem Gesetz“ (geschrieben Herbst 1914, publiziert Ende 1915) 26 Historisch erwuchs Ne`ila aus dem Gebet zur Stunde des Torschlusses im Tempel (Elbogen: 1995, 152f). 27 Jichud bittet um Versiegelung im Buch der Vergebung und des Lebens. 28 Dann wird die Lade geschlossen, das Schofar geblasen (Machsor, 361; Leo Trepp: 1992, 150, hebt den zahlenmystischen Sinn der siebenmaligen Wiederholung hervor (sieben Himmelssphären führen bis vor Gottes Thron).

 

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Im innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit …

sehen (Kafka: 1996).29 Kafkas ‚Mann vom Lande‘ verharrt bekanntlich ein Leben lang beim ersten Türhüter vor der ersten Tür, also vor dem Gesetz, hinter der weitere Türen und unerträglich gewaltige Türhüter zu ahnen sind. Er erkennt, Jahr für Jahr wartend, am Ende erblindend „jetzt im Dunkel einen Glanz, der unverlöschlich aus der Türe des Gesetzes bricht“. Am Ende brüllt sein Türhüter ihm, dem Sterbenden, in sein „vergehendes Gehör“: „Hier konnte niemand sonst Einlaß erhalten, denn dieser Eingang war nur für dich bestimmt. Ich gehe jetzt und schließe ihn (Kafka: 1996, 269).“ Wer ist das ‚Antlitz gleich dem eigenen‘, ‚das auf mich blickt und aus dem ich blicke‘, ‚der Spiegel des göttlichen Angesichts‘ im ‚innersten Heiligtum‘, wo ‚der Mensch sich selbst zum Gleichnis herabsinken müsste‘? Ich vermute als Antwort: Es ist der Arme, der schlechthin Arme, als Parabel des Menschen vor Gott und ‚vor dem Gesetz‘. – Ich benötige zwei Anläufe für diese Antwort.

4.

Erhabene Unvergleichlichkeit JHWHs

4.1

Die unvergleichliche ‚Gestalt‘ JHWHs und das Erhabene

Friedhelm Hartenstein prägt in einer eindringenden Analyse von Dtn 4:1–40 den paradoxen Begriff der unvergleichlichen Gestalt JHWHs (Hartenstein: 2003). Unvergleichlichkeit JHWHs in Dtn 4 markiere ein Stadium in der Lerngeschichte Israels mit der Angesichts-Audienz-Ikonik des Jerusalemer Kults und Psalters. Die ‚ikonische Differenz‘ (Hartenstein: 2008, 39 u. ö.) in der Angesichts-Audienz-Ikonik und ihre ‚Hintergründigkeit‘ werden via eminentiae, durch Steigerung ihres symbolischen Potentials bis an die Grenze des mentalen Vorstellungsexzesses, ausgelotet und transformiert. Die Erhabenheit und ikonische Transzendenz JHWHs werden – in der nachexilischen Situation einer Polemik gegen Astraltheologie – an der Angesichts-Soziomorphie bewusst, nicht gegen sie. 29 Franz Kafka hörte die ersten Vorträge Martin Bubers über das Gesetz, die später in den Reden über das Judentum zusammengefasst wurden, im Verein Bar Kochba in Prag 1909/10, vgl. dazu Gianfranco Bonola: 1988, 238. Die vorgetragene Interpretation wird zudem gestützt durch Rosenzweig: 1979, 762: „Das Judentum ist nicht Gesetz. Es schafft Gesetz. Aber es ist es nicht. Es ‚ist‘ Jude sein. So habe ich es im Stern dargestellt und weiß, daß es richtig ist. Aber nun wirst du verstehn, daß nach Abschluß dieses Buchs (vgl. sein letztes Wort) das Leben erst anfängt, die Bewährung durch das Leben und nach der Θεωρία. Und nun unterstreich ‚Leben‘. Die Bewährung durch das Leben“ (Brief Rosenzweigs aus Frankfurt an Rudolf Hallo vom 27.03.1922, Nr. 719; Rosenzweig: 1979, 761–768). Vgl. Rosenzweig: 1979, 735: „Das ‚Leben‘ in dem letzten Wort ist doch kein Gegensatz zu ‚Philosophie‘. Davon ist doch da gar nicht mehr die Rede. In diesem Leben kann durchaus auch philosophiert werden; warum denn nicht? (ich tue es ja). Was nicht mehr geschieht, ist nur das ‚Schauen‘. Die Schau, nicht die Philosophie ist hier der Gegensatz, aus dem das Leben herausspringt“ (Brief Rosenzweigs aus Kassel an Hans Ehrenberg von Ende Dezember 1921, Nr. 693; Rosenzweig: 1979, 735f).

 

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Heinrich Assel

Die unvergleichliche ‚Gestalt‘ JHWHs in Dtn 4:1–40 verstehe ich als Beispiel des Erhabenen. Erhaben ist diese ‚bild-theologische‘ Bewusstwerdung, weil sie durch den imaginativen Exzess erfolgt, wie in Dtn 4:11: „Und ihr tratet näher und standet unten am Berg, wobei der Berg im Feuer brannte bis zum Herz/Inneren des Himmels (unter) Finsternis, Wolken und Wolkendunkel.“ Dazu kommentiert Hartenstein: Es ist also wohl nicht mehr gemeint, dass der Berg bis an den sichtbaren Himmel reicht […], sondern dass er einen Übergang in innere himmlische Bereiche jenseits des sichtbaren Himmels darstellt, der durch die Wolken und das brennende Feuer abgeschirmt wird (Hartenstein: 2003, 60).

Dtn 4:11 nehme das Theophanie-Konzept der vorderen Sinai-Perikope auf: Was in dem […] exilisch-frühnachexilisch anzusetzenden Text Ex 24,9–11 nach dem Bundesschluss am Sinai geschildert wird, ist somit keineswegs eine unmittelbare Gottesschau, sondern betont die himmlische Transzendenz und Erhabenheit JHWHs: Er wird am Gottesberg als der im inneren Himmelsraum thronende König erfahren. Er selbst wird nicht beschrieben, allein die unter seinen Füßen befindliche Postamentplatte aus Lapislazuli-Ziegeln wird als konkreter Inhalt der Schau genannt (Hartenstein: 2003, 62; Hervorhebung von HA).30

Ich möchte fragen: In welchem Sinn greift der Kommentator von Dtn 4 (wie zuvor bereits Jacob zu Ex 33) zur Topik des Erhabenen und Sublimen, um die ikonische Transzendenz JHWHs zu beschreiben? Also zu einer Topik, deren Karriere – Epochenbrüche später – in der frühmodernen Psalter-Poetik beginnt,31 und die in die moderne Ästhetik des Erhabenen mündet? Inwiefern dürfen wir Texte, die Epochen vor der Epoche der Ästhetik und ihrer Ausdifferenzierung von Ikonik und Poetik liegen, mit ästhetischen Kategorien interpretieren? Meine Antwort ist: Wenn wir uns dazu entschließen, es zu tun, dann sollten wir das Erhabene imaginationsästhetisch als Exerzitium der ‚Verarmung‘ exponieren.

30 Die (religionshistorisch) neue himmlische Transzendenz, welche die mythische Hintergründigkeit des thronenden Gottes kategorial alteriert, wird doch aus der ikonischen Differenz des Angesichts-Komplexes erzeugt. Der Fortschritt zur Transzendenz Gottes in der Sinai-Offenbarung, der Übergang in diesen ‚neuen‘ Symbolisationshorizont, rekurriert auf jene ‚Tiefe‘ und ‚Prägnanz‘ der mythisch-ikonischen Differenz und Hintergründigkeit, die sich jetzt als ihr damals weithin undurchschauter Grund erweist. Am ikonisch-mentalen Bilderdienst wird diese Version des Bilderverbots erlernt. 31 Zur poetologischen Geschichte des Sublimen Bader: 2009, 332–344.

 

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Im innersten Heiligtum der göttlichen Wahrheit …

4.2

Erhabene Transzendenz und ästhetische Verarmung

Ich interpretiere dieses Erhabene, Unvergleichliche der ‚Gestalt‘ JHWHs versuchsweise mit einer Basisunterscheidung der Erhabenheitsanalyse Kants aus der Dritten Kritik, dem mathematisch-Erhabenen und dem dynamisch-Erhabenen: Erhaben ist das Unvergleichliche der Gestalt JHWHs, weil an ihr das mathematisch-Erhabene wirksam wird. Sie treibt das mentale Vorstellen räumlicher Größe des Gottesbergs über Ex 24 bis Dtn 4 ins Übergroße; das ikonische Exzessive der Gestalt des Gottkönigs treibt in den Exzess der Imagination, an deren Grenze das unvorstellbar Große zum Unvergleichlichen wird. Das mathematisch-Erhabene wird ‚gefühlt‘ und insofern ‚erfahren‘ (z. B. als Ehrfurcht vor dem „bestirnten Himmel über mir“), freilich ohne je verfügbares Erfahren zu werden; vielmehr widerfährt der Imagination wie dem Seh-Begehren ein Regress, der demütigend und bedrohlich ist, weil das Vermögen zu repräsentieren an dieser Grenze auf die ‚ästhetische Idee‘ absoluter Präsenz eines Einzigen stößt. Das mathematisch-Erhabene treibt das räumliche Anschauungsvermögen an seine Grenze: die unvergleichliche Gestalt JHWHs am Gottesberg, dessen Größe ins Herz des Himmels übergeht, demütigt und entmächtigt das imaginative Seh-Begehren und sein Grund-Maß der sukzessiven, aspektuellen GestaltImagination. Das dynamisch-Erhabene ist das existenzbedrohende Erhabene. In der Theophanie-Topik (vgl. Dtn 4:24.12.15.33.36; 5:24f und Ex 24:17) symbolisiert dies das ‚fressende Feuer‘.32 An der imaginativ-mentalen Gestalt JHWHs widerfährt in der Sinai-Theopanie erhabene Transzendenz, bis mentales Seh-Begehren (Ex 24:10f) zum ‚reinen Sehen‘ der unvergleichbaren Gestalt JHWHs und zum ‚reinen Hören‘ der absolut gegenwärtigen Stimme aus Finsternis, Wolkendunkel und fressendem Feuer werden muss. Das Gefühl des Erhabenen, so sagt Kant, sei zwar niemals anders als bloß negative Darstellung, die aber doch die Seele erweitert. Vielleicht gibt es keine erhabenere Stelle im Gesetzbuche der Juden, als das Gebot: Du sollst dir kein Bildnis machen, noch irgend ein Gleichnis […]. Dieses Gebot allein kann den Enthusiasm erklären, den das jüdische Volk […] für seine Religion fühlte […] (KdU, B 124; Kant: 1908, 274).33

32 Tempeltheologisch als Herrlichkeitsmanifestation grundiert, wird es in der singulären Offenbarungssituation am Sinai zum dynamisch-erhabenen Feuer, ‚fressend‘, vgl. Dtn 5:24f; Ex 24:17: „die Herrlichkeit ist wie fressendes Feuer“ (Hartenstein: 2003, 63, Anm. 4). 33 Vgl. Gottfried Boehm: 1994, v. a. 342 f.

 

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Jean-François Lyotard hat in der Erhabenheitsästhetik Kants die Momente der exzessiven Entleerung des ‚Seh-Subjekts‘ und des Enthusiasm sorgfältig analysiert und postmodern dramatisiert: Der Geschmack versprach ihm [sc. dem ‚Subjekt‘] ein schönes Leben, das Erhabene droht ihm mit dem Tod. […] Es entzieht sich den grundlegenden Synthesen der Anschauung, der Einbildungskraft und des Verstandes, bzw. der Form, dem Schema und dem Axiom der Zeit als einer Größe, die sich aufreihen läßt. Bemerkenswert am erhabenen Gefühl ist also die doppelte Entkräftung des Prinzips der Sukzession: zum einen eine Entkräftung im eigentlichen Sinne, die sich dem „Regressus“ der Einbildungskraft verdankt, zum anderen eine Entkräftung oder besser gesagt Entzeitlichung, die sich der „Präsenz“ der Idee der Vernunft verdankt. […] Das erste „Zeit-Nichts“ bedroht das Erkenntnisvermögen, das zweite „Zeit-Nichts“ begründet das reine Begehrungsvermögen (Lyotard: 1994, 163–165).

Das Reine und auch Gesunde dieses Begehrens besteht darin, „an der Sehnsucht nach dem Absoluten erkrankt zu sein“ (Lyotard: 1994, 176). Das erhabene Gefühl ist Enthusiasmus bis an die Grenze des Wahns.34 Die „negative Darstellung“ ist das Zeichen der Präsenz des Absoluten, und sie ist oder gibt das Zeichen nur dadurch, daß sie den Formen des Darstellbaren entzogen ist. Das Absolute bleibt also undarstellbar […]. Aber die Einbildungskraft kann in der Leere, die sie jenseits ihrer „Zusammenfassungs“kapazität entdeckt, seine „Präsenz“, fast wie eine Wahnvorstellung, signalisieren (Lyotard: 1994, 172).

Kants und Lyotards Erhabenheitsanalysen markieren eine Hauptlinie negativer Ästhetik des Einzigen als Absolutes: Der ‚Grenzsatz‘ aus Ex 33:20 oder die ‚Grenzvorstellung‘ der unvergleichlichen Gestalt aus Dtn 4 werden zum mathematischund dynamisch-Erhabenen. Ich möchte fragen: Dürfen wir die Entleerung des Vorstellens, die Bedrohung des Seh-Subjekts im Enthusiasmus als Weise ästhetischer Verarmung am erhabenen Bild interpretieren? Generiert das Erhabene als Bildstrategie durch imaginative Entleerung und Verarmung das reine Begehren, das den Einzigen als unvergleichliche Gestalt zu sehen sich sehnt, ohne ihn zum blickverfügbaren Bild, zum Idol zu machen? Führt das enthusiastische Gefühl im Imaginieren des Absoluten bis an die Grenze, aber nur um das Begehren, den Einzigen zu sehen, originär zu enttäuschen?

34 „Es ist nur dann in einem ‚guten Zustand‘, wenn dieser ‚Zustand‘ ihm seine eigentliche Bestimmung, das Absolute zu denken, signalisiert, dies allerdings durch den Widerstand, den das ‚Grundmaß‘ jeder Darstellung dessen Aktualisierung entgegensetzt“ (Lyotard: 1994, 176).

 

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Mit dem Begriff ‚Verarmung‘ als Weise ikonischer Öffnung des Sichtbaren schließe ich mich an Jean-Luc Marion an: Die Strategie [der Verarmung] […] beabsichtigt es […], den Blick vom Bild zu befreien (die Enttäuschung wirft ihn auf den Betrachter zurück) und ebenso das Bild vom Blick (die sichtbare Nichtigkeit entzieht es dem voyeuristischen Begehren), kurz: sie beabsichtigt es, die gegenseitige Schließung des Blicks und des Bildes eines durch das andere zu trennen (Marion: 2005, 81).

Fragte ich also am Ende des letzten Abschnitts: Wer ist das ‚Antlitz gleich dem eigenen‘, ‚das auf mich blickt und aus dem ich blicke‘, ‚der Spiegel des göttlichen Angesichts‘ im ‚innersten Heiligtum‘, wo ‚der Mensch sich selbst zum Gleichnis herabsinken müsste‘?, so dürfte die Antwort: Es ist der Arme, der schlechthin Arme, als Parabel des Menschen vor Gott und ‚vor dem Gesetz‘, jetzt insoweit erläutert sein, als der Blick des Antlitzes, das auf mich blickt und aus dem ich blicke, als ästhetische ‚Verarmung‘ zu beschreiben ist. Es bedarf eines letzten Schritts, um die religiöse Valenz der ästhetischen Kategorie zu exponieren; oder genauer: um nach dem Grund ihrer Ausdifferenzierung zu fragen.

5.

Tod Jesu als erhabenes Gebild (H. Cohen)

Ich halte die Ästhetik des Erhabenen Kants und Lyotards keineswegs für das letzte Wort. Eher für eine kritische Vorschule, wenn wir uns entschließen, Erhabenheitstopoi interpretativ einzusetzen. Hermann Cohens Ästhetik des Erhabenen ist wenig bekannt, obgleich ein veritabler Gegenentwurf zu Kant und Lyotard. Unbekannt ist daher, dass die Analyse des Erhabenen der einzige Ort ist, an dem der späte Cohen das Leiden und den Tod Jesu als Herausforderung seiner Religionsphilosophie anerkennt. Leiden und Tod Jesu sind das für die Vernunftreligion Nicht-Eliminierbare der christlichen Religion, die sonst restlos mythologisch wäre. (‚Mythologie‘ ist bei Cohen Chiffre für jede Form der Logos-Christologie.) Leiden und Tod Jesu bilden zugleich und überraschenderweise für den Juden Cohen den Grenzpunkt, an dem das Erhabene der Ästhetik zum Erhabenen der Religion wird. Genauer: Sie markieren jene Grenze, an dem sich bei ihm das ästhetisch Erhabene vom Erhabenen der Religion ausdifferenziert. In seiner Schrift Der Begriff der Religion im System der Philosophie (1915; Cohen: 1996) findet sich diese für Cohens Judentum singuläre Passage: Die religiöse Liebe […] hat einen Ernst, der über dieses erhabene Spiel [sc. des ästhetischen eros] selbst erhaben ist. […] In diesem Übertreffen, dieser Entwertung aller Kunst besteht die Erhabenheit der christlichen Religion. Das Leiden des Menschen ist ihr Gegen-

 

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stand, und dieses Gegenstandes wegen ist sie Religion. Dagegen bildet es keinen Einspruch, daß […] der religiöse Grundgedanke selbst [sc. das ‚unschuldige‘ Leiden Jesu], als der Grundgedanke der Tragödie, der Kunst entlehnt scheint. Indessen erweist sich darin der Unterschied, daß die Tragödie ihren leidenden Helden gerade nicht als Individuum denkt, sondern vielmehr als den Sproß seiner Ahnen. Christus dagegen wird deshalb als Individuum gedacht, und man besteht auf dem Gedanken, daß er durchaus nur als ein solches einziges Individuum gedacht werden müsse: weil er in seinem Leide, als Individuum, den Menschen darstellen soll; den Menschen, dessen Individualität mit Gott allein verknüpft ist. Das ist der tiefste Sinn der christlichen Mythologie, der sie in Religion verwandelt. […] Er wird als der einzige Mensch gedacht, der die Korrelation mit Gott erschlossen hat. Sein Leiden bezeugt das Leiden des Menschen, des Menschen, nicht des Juden oder des Samariters; des Menschen, als der einsamen, isolierten Menschenseele […] (Cohen: 1996, 92f).

Dieser Passus setzt Neueinsichten Cohens voraus, die zur späten Religionsphilosophie führen.35 Die Liebe zum leidenden Jesus und seinem ‚Bild‘ ist das reine, erhabene Gefühl, das genuin religiös ist, der Grenzpunkt, an dem sich das religiöse vom ästhetisch reinen Gefühl des Erhabenen differenziert. Für Cohen das nicht zu Eliminierende christlicher Religion als Religion der Vernunft. Christus, den leidenden Jesus zu sehen, und in ihm den Leidenden, den Armen schlechthin; das Leiden des Menschen als das Leiden des einzigen Menschen vor Gott zu sehen – ist das ästhetisch Unmögliche. Es ist der Gegenstand christlicher Religion, um dessentwillen sie Religion ist. Den leidenden Jesus zu sehen als den einzigen Leidenden, der die Korrelation mit Gott erschließt, heißt nicht: Jesus als Typus des Armen zu sehen. ‚Typus‘ ist die ästhetische Kategorie, ‚Individuum‘ die religiöse. 35 Der Passus steht systematisch im (iv.) Kapitel über „Das Verhältnis der Religion zur Ästhetik“ (Cohen: 1996, 85ff): Die ästhetische Analyse des Schönen und Erhabenen steht formell in der Tradition Kants. Cohens Ästhetik des reinen Gefühls erweitert und verwandelt sie aber fundamental. An der Ästhetik arbeitete Cohen seit 1908, sie erschien 1912. Während dieser Arbeit erkannte Cohen den logischen Anschlusspunkt Gottes an sein System. Das „entscheidende Brückenglied zwischen System und Glaube ist Cohens Poetologie […]. Am wichtigsten werden zum einen die Dramaturgie als Basis für den religiösen Mitleidsbegriff, zum andern und vor allem die Theorie der Lyrik als einem bekennenden Sprechen im Modus der Sehnsucht“ (Wiedebach: 2011, 303). Seine Mitleidstheorie entwickelte Cohen seit seiner Russlandreise im Mai 1914, ihre erste Durchführung findet sich im Aufsatz zur Lyrik der Psalmen von 1914, dann in der Theorie der Versöhnungsliturgie in Religion der Vernunft (Cohen: 1988, 303f). Die Wende Cohens beginnt 1908 (Charakteristik der Ethik Maimunis) und ist 1915 in Begriff der Religion im System der Philosophie erstmals komprehensiv greifbar. Dies bereitet den Boden zur „Metamorphose des Erkenntnisbegriff, nämlich für die Ineinssetzung von […] Erkenntnis und Liebe“ (Wiedebach: 2011, 305). Das Verbot des Bilderdienstes spielt in Begriff der Religion keine entscheidende Rolle, anders als in Ästhetik des reinen Gefühls (dort im Rahmen der Ästhetik des Erhabenen) und in Religion der Vernunft („Der Bilderdienst“, Kapitel II, Cohen: 1988, 58–67). Das Verbot des Bilderdienstes wird hier, wie am Begriff des Plastischen gezeigt, im Rahmen einer platonischen Bildtheorie und ihrem Ähnlichkeits- und Abbild-Theorem diskutiert.

 

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Dass der leidende Jesus als Typus des Armen, des Leidenden ästhetisch ‚bild‘-fähig und betrachtbar ist, das ist allzu konventionell. Susan Sontags berühmter Essay Das Leiden anderer betrachten (Sontag: 2003) zeigt meisterhaft ästhetische Typen, das Leiden des anderen zu betrachten, die aus christlicher Leidenskontemplation hervorgehen, allerdings nur, um diese hinter sich zu lassen: Von Goyas 83 Radierungen über die Schrecken des Krieges bis hin zu Jeff Walls Dead Troops Talk von 1992. Sontag analysiert das von Goya ästhetisch evozierte Mitleiden, den Protest gegen die Schrecken des Krieges als Bild-Appell. In den massenmedialen Bild-Strategien, etwa der Vietnam-Kriegsphotographie, wird dieser Protest teils zitiert, teils simuliert, teils manipuliert. Sontags kritische Auseinandersetzung mit dieser modernen Sehkonvention zielt daher auf Jeff Walls Installation, welche ästhetisch die Unmöglichkeit des Mitleidens im Betrachten des Leidens anderer evoziert. Diese ästhetische Unmöglichkeit des Mitleidens sollten wir, wie anachronistisch immer, bei Cohen voraussetzen: Als der Arme ist Jesus Individuum, jener Einzige, ‚Gebild‘ – wie Cohen katachrestisch formuliert, bildlos, aber parabolisch zu ‚sehen‘, Gesicht gleich dem eigenen: das religiöse Mitleid entbehrt aller Bildlichkeit und verzichtet auf sie: sein Gebild dagegen ist das lebendige Wesen der menschlichen Seele, der Mensch, nicht als ein Typus, nicht als ein Begriff, weder der Mehrheit, noch der Allheit, sondern eben das Individuum, das keine Zuordnung, sondern lediglich Korrelation mit dem anderen Begriffe, mit dem Gottes hat (Cohen: 1996, 98).

Mitleid, das ästhetisch unmöglich geworden ist, ‚sieht‘ das unvergleichliche Gebild der menschlichen Seele im Armen; dies ist das religiöse Gefühl des Mitleids, der Menschenliebe. Das Gebild der Seele Jesu, das Angesicht des Armen, hat keine Zuordnung, ist kein ‚Fall von‘, sondern erfordert Korrelation mit Gott, dem Einzigen, der nur insofern ‚Angesicht‘ ist, als im Licht seines Angesichts das parabolische ‚Sehen‘ des Armen ‚möglich‘ wird.36 Rosenzweigs Vexier-Figur vom ‚Antlitz gleich dem eigenen, das auf mich blickt und aus dem ich blicke‘, darin Spiegel der Wahrheit Gottes, möchte ich nun von daher interpretieren. In der spröderen Diktion Cohens formuliert:

36 Die Rede vom ‚Möglichen‘ ist explikationsbedürftig, wozu ich auf Wolfgang Isers Konzept des Imaginären als sprachlich unübersetzbares Mögliches verweise: „Konkretisiert sich der Spielraum des Selektionsaktes als Möglichkeitshorizont vor den zur Inaktualität verschobenen Bezugsrealitäten, so konkretisiert sich derjenige des Kombinationsaktes als das Anderswerden von Gegebenem. Das aber ist zugleich die Bedingung für die Entstehung von Möglichkeiten schlechthin, die – statt aus einer Gegebenheit extrapoliert zu werden – deren Zerspielen zu ihrer Voraussetzung haben“ (Iser: 1991, 396f; Hervorhebung z. T. von H.A.). Weiter: Dalferth/Stoellger/Hunziker: 2009.

 

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Die Identität der Person, man möchte sagen, es gäbe für sie kein anderes Erkennungszeichen als diese untrügliche Liebe, die nur dadurch scheinbar unklar, vielmehr aber nur um so prägnanter wird, dass mit diesem einzigen Individuum das eigene Selbst im Gefühl des Mitleids, mithin im Mitgefühl identisch wird (Cohen: 1996, 87).

Den leidenden Jesus als den schlechthin Armen, dieses ‚Gebild‘ sieht, wer sich als Armen in diesem ‚Gebild‘ vor Gott sieht. Religiöse Liebe wird deshalb erhabenheitstopisch kodiert, als reines Begehren, als ‚Verarmung‘: Nicht die Liebe zu Gott ist das Ursprüngliche des religiösen Bewusstseins, sondern die Liebe zum leidenden Menschen; und die Liebe zu Gott tritt erst ein unter mehrfachen Deutungen, wenn Gott als der Schutz der Leidenden erkannt wird. So unterscheiden sich am Amte Gottes für den leidenden Menschen Religion und Mystik (Cohen: 1996, 89f).

Der von Rosenzweig apostrophierte ‚einfältige Wandel‘ als Tor aus der Schau ins Leben hat bei Cohen diese doppelte Gestalt: die Liebe zum leidenden Menschen als erhabenes Gebild; und die lyrische Sehnsucht als Kern einer Poetik des Psalters. Das ikonisch Erhabene des Mitleids und die lyrische Sehnsucht des Psalters37 sind das Exerzitium reinen Gefühls: So führt das Mitleid mit dem Menschen zu dem anderen Gliede der Korrelation, zu Gott. Denn was Mitleid ist dem Menschen gegenüber, dieselbe Leidenschaft zu Gott nennen wir […] mit dem Terminus der Lyrik: Sehnsucht. Das Mitleid mit dem Menschen ist andrerseits die Sehnsucht nach Gott. In dieser Urkraft der Religion sind die Psalmendichter ihre Schöpfer. […] Die Sehnsucht nach Gott ist erst die Antwort auf das Mitleid; ist das Zeugnis von ihm (Cohen: 1996, 98f).

Die Ikonik der Passion und die Lyrik des ‚Psalmisten‘ in ihrer ästhetischen Differenz sind „der eigentliche Grenzpunkt“ von Religion und ästhetischem Gefühl (Cohen: 1996, 100). Die ‚erhabene Liebe‘ zum Armen im Gebild Jesu; die ‚Sehnsucht‘ des Einzigen und seines einzigen Namens im Psalter-Ich und seinem Nennen, sie nähern sich je diesem Grenzpunkt. 37 Hervorragend analysiert dies Wiedebach: 2011, 307f: „Von Gott lässt sich – eben wegen seiner Un-Vergleichlichkeit – überhaupt nur in Vergleichung, sprich in Metaphern sprechen, obwohl sie notwendig ‚uneigentlich‘, ja geradezu ‚missbräuchlich‘ (katachrestisch) sind. ‚Einzigkeit Gottes so zu denken, wie sie gefühlt werden muß‘, wird zur Methode der Glaubensphilosophie. […] Der Gefühlsstoff, an dem diese Art Denken ansetzt, kommt aus der religiösen Tradition, bei Cohen in einem hohen Maß aus dem täglichen Gebet […]. Theologische Metaphern sind Begriffsspiele, in denen der, der sie gebraucht, seine eigene Kontur erkennt, Gottes ‚Zorn‘, seine ‚13 Eigenschaften der Güte‘, ja seine Gesten werden Momente in einer Hermeneutik des vernünftigen Menschseins.“

 

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Vielleicht darf man es mit der ersten und sechsten Seligpreisung Jesu über die geistliche Armut und die Reinheit des Herzens zusammenfassen: Das parabolische Mitleid, die erhabene Liebe zum Menschen, erweckt die Sehnsucht nach dem Einzigen, die hyperbolisch Gott im Menschen Jesus zu sehen selig ist; doch nur, wo sie im Gebild dieses Armen den Armen erblickt, ein Angesicht gleich dem eigenen (Mt 5:3.8; vgl. Mt 25:37b.38a.39a).38

38 Nach Abschluss des Vortrags stieß ich auf Louis Marins faszinierende ‚Glosse‘ zu Raffaels letztem Bild, der Verklärung Christi (1516–1520, Vatikanische Museen, Öltempera auf Holz) (Marin: 2007). Ich finde in dieser Glosse zu Raffaels Bild in dichtester Folge eine analoge Argumentation wie bei Cohen. Bereits Giorgio Vasaris berühmte ekphrasis (zitiert Marin: 2007, 278f) pointiere – so Marin – die Bildkomposition von Verklärung Christi (Mt 17:1–13) und Besessenheit des Knaben (Mt 17:14–21): „Der verklärte Christus ist auf dem Berg Tabor, an dessen Fuße die elf Apostel ihn erwarten. Man hat einen besessenen Jungen dahin gebracht, damit Christus herabsteigt, ihn zu befreien. Seine gewundene Haltung, seine Schreie, sein verzerrtes Gesicht mit den verdrehten Augen zeugen von der Gegenwart des Geistes des Bösen in seinem Fleisch, seinem Blut, seinem Atem; blaß vollführt er eine angsterfüllte Geste. Ein Greis stützt ihn, hält ihn in seinen Armen und spricht ihm Mut zu; seine weitaufgerissenen Augen, seine hochgezogenen Brauen, seine gerunzelte Stirn zeigen eine Mischung aus Entschlossenheit und Angst. Fest blickt er die Apostel an, darauf hoffend, in ihrem Antlitz Stärkung zu finden. Eine knieende Frau, die Hauptfigur des Gemäldes, wendet sich ihnen zu, die Arme des Besessenen entgegengestreckt, um ihre Aufmerksamkeit auf sein Elend zu lenken. Die stehenden, sitzenden oder knieenden Apostel bezeugen in Anbetracht eines solchen Leidens ein unendliches Mitgefühl. Körper und Seelen sind wahrscheinlich von einer so außergewöhnlichen Vollkommenheit und in ihrer Schönheit von einer so neuartigen Mannigfaltigkeit, daß die Künstler darin übereinkommen, dieses Werk als das meistgerühmte, vollendetste und göttlichste anzusehen, das Raffael jemals gemacht hat! Wer wissen will, wie die Malerei die göttlichste Verklärung repräsentieren kann, braucht nur dieses Gemälde anzuschauen.“ Marin glossiert: „Transfiguration-Defiguration, Verklärung-Entstellung. Zwischen den beiden der schwarze Zwischenraum der Figurabilität, der figuralen Instanz unmittelbar vor dem Exzeß oder dem Fehlen, doppelte Erhabenheit, die herrliche des Verklärten, die nachtfinstere des Entstellten; dunkler Zwischenraum der erschreckenden Potenz der imaginalen Täuschung, Ort des Neutralen, fehlender oder vielmehr potentieller Platz einer Figur, einer doppelten […]“ (Marin: 2007, 287f). Viel schärfer als Cohen arbeitet Marin aber die Schwebe zwischen dem ästhetisch Armen und der geistlichen Armut heraus, und zwar in der Doppelgestalt der maskenhaften, rätselhaft neutralen Figur in Raffaels Bild, die der Gestalt der ‚Schwester‘ des Besessenen als Figur reinen Herzens gegenüber steht: „In der Schwebe gehaltener Augenblick, der die spezifische Zeit der gemalten Repräsentation ist: Der Verklärte hört nicht auf, zum Himmel emporzusteigen, dem Vater entgegen; der Entstellte hört nicht auf, dem Schatten entgegenzustürzen. Zwischen den beiden, in der Nacht, die sie trennt und von der aus die Figuren Konsistenz annehmen, in der Nacht der Figurabilität, lese ich in der Versenkung die Figur, die den Zwischenraum verlassen hat und die, hier unten abwesend, dort oben im Licht ist; aber auch jene, die aus dem dunklen Graben des Gemäldes heraufgestiegen, hier unten präsent, herbeikommen wird, den Zwischenraum einzunehmen. An diesem neutralen, nachtfinsteren Ort, in diesem Zwischenraum der Potenz der Figurabilität, läßt sich neben dem Gesicht der ‚Schwester‘ des Besessenen eine Art unzuschreibbare, unlesbare Maske ausmachen, das leere Haupt des Fehlens: die furchterregende Maske des Neutralen, worin sich, um wie Nietzsche zu sprechen, alles ‚Depotenzieren des Scheins zum Schein‘ vollziehen würde, Übertragungen, durch die sich das Kunstwerk als erhabene Befriedigung des ursprünglichen Begehrens nach Schein vollendet“ (288f).

 

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Bibliographie Assel, Heinrich (2001), Geheimnis und Sakrament. Die Theologie des göttlichen Namens bei Kant, Cohen und Rosenzweig, FSÖTh 98, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Assel, Heinrich (2005), Name und Negativität. Der göttliche Name als selbstbezügliches Zeichen bei Franz Rosenzweig, in Ingolf U. Dalferth/Philipp Stoellger (Hg.), Krisen der Subjektivität. Problemfelder eines strittigen Paradigmas (Religion in Philosophy and Theology 18), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 333–359. Assel, Heinrich (2008), Eliminierter Name. Unendlichkeit Gottes zwischen Trinität und Tetragramm, in Ingolf U. Dalferth/Philipp Stoellger (Hg.), Gott Nennen. Gottes Namen und Gott als Name (Religion in Philosophy and Theology 35), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 209– 248. Assel, Heinrich (2012), Name und Idee des einzigen Gottes – Cohen und die Theologie, in Hans Martin Dober/Matthias Morgenstern (Hg.), Religion aus den Quellen der Vernunft. Hermann Cohen und das evangelische Christentum (Religion in Philosophy and Theology 65), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 162–175. Bader, Günter (2009), Psalterspiel. Skizze einer Theologie des Psalters, HUTh 54, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Boehm, Gottfried (1994), Die Bilderfrage, in Gottfried Boehm (Hg.), Was ist ein Bild?, München: Fink, 324–343. Bonola, Gianfranco (1988), Franz Rosenzweig und Martin Buber. Die Auseinandersetzung über das Gesetz, in Wolfdietrich Schmied-Kowarzik (Hg.), Der Philosoph Franz Rosenzweig (1886–1929). Internationaler Kongress Kassel 1986, Bd. I: Die Herausforderung jüdischen Lernens, Freiburg: Alber, 225–238. Cohen, Hermann (1977), Logik der reinen Erkenntnis (4. Aufl.), Werke, Bd. 6,1, Hildesheim: Georg Olms. Cohen, Hermann (1984), Das Prinzip der Infinitesimalmethode und seine Geschichte (4. Aufl.), Werke, Bd. 5, Hildesheim: Georg Olms. Cohen, Hermann (1988), Religion der Vernunft aus den Quellen des Judentums (Nachdruck der 2. Aufl. 1928), Wiesbaden: Fourier. Cohen, Hermann ([1915] 1996), Der Begriff der Religion im System der Philosophie, Werke, Bd. 10, Hildesheim: Georg Olms. Dalferth, Ingolf U. (2003), Die Wirklichkeit des Möglichen. Hermeneutische Religionsphilosophie, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Dalferth, Ingolf U./Stoellger, Philipp/Hunziker, Andreas (Hg.) (2009), Unmöglichkeiten. Zur Phänomenologie und Hermeneutik eines modalen Grenzbegriffs (Religion in Philosophy and Theology 38), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Dober, Hans Martin/Morgenstern, Matthias (Hg.) (2012), Religion aus den Quellen der Vernunft. Hermann Cohen und das evangelische Christentum (Religion in Philosophy and Theology 65), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Elbogen, Ismar (1995), Der jüdische Gottesdienst in seiner geschichtlichen Entwicklung (Nachdruck der 3. Aufl. 1931), Hildesheim: Georg Olms. Hartenstein, Friedhelm (2001), Das „Angesicht Gottes“ in Exodus 32–34, in Matthias Köckert/ Erhard Blum (Hg.), Gottes Volk am Sinai. Untersuchungen zu Ex 32–34 und Dtn 9–10, VWGTh 18, Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 157–183.

 

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Hartenstein, Friedhelm (2003), Die unvergleichliche „Gestalt“ JHWHs. Israels Geschichte mit den Bildern im Licht von Dtn 4,1–40, in Bernd Janowski/Nino Zchomelidse (Hg.), Die Sichtbarkeit des Unsichtbaren. Zur Korrelation von Text und Bild im Wirkungskreis der Bibel, AGWB 3, Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 49–77. Hartenstein, Friedhelm (2008), Das Angesicht JHWHs. Studien zu seinem höfischen und kultischen Bedeutungshintergrund in den Psalmen und in Exodus 32–34, FAT 55, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Hartenstein, Friedhelm (2010), Vom Sehen und Schauen Gottes. Überlegungen zu einer theologischen Ästhetik aus der Sicht des Alten Testaments, in Elisabeth Gräb-Schmidt/Reiner Preul (Hg.), Ästhetik, MJTh 22, Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 15–37. Hartenstein, Friedhelm/Moxter, Michael (2013), Hermeneutik des Bilderverbots. Exegetische und systematisch-theologische Annäherungen, ThLZ.F 26, Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Imdahl, Max (1994), Ikonik. Bilder und ihre Anschauung, in Gottfried Boehm (Hg.), Was ist ein Bild?, München: Fink, 300–324. Iser, Wolfgang (1991), Das Fiktive und das Imaginäre. Perspektiven literarischer Anthropologie, Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp. Jacob, Benno (1929), Gott sehen. Eine Skizze, Der Morgen, 4. Heft, 386–392. Jacob, Benno (1997), Das Buch Exodus (hg. von Shlomo Mayer unter Mitwirkung von Joachim Hahn und Almuth Jürgensen), Stuttgart: Calwer. Kafka, Franz (1996), Vor dem Gesetz, in: Franz Kafka, Drucke zu Lebzeiten (hg. v. Wolf Kittler/Hans-Gerd Koch/Gerhard Neumann), Frankfurt: Fischer, 267–269. Kant, Immanuel (1903), Prolegomena zu einer jeden künftigen Metaphysik, die als Wissenschaft wird auftreten können, in Kants gesammelte Schriften, hg. von der Königlich Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Bd. IV, Berlin: G. Reimer, 255–383. Kant, Immanuel (1908), Kritik der Urteilskraft, in Kants gesammelte Schriften, hg. von der Königlich Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Bd. V, Berlin: G. Reimer, 167–485. Kant, Immanuel (1923), Immanuel Kant’s Logik. Ein Handbuch zu Vorlesungen, in Kants gesammelte Schriften, hg. von der Königlich Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Bd. IX, Berlin: G. Reimer, 1–150. Lyotard, Jean-François (1994), Die Analytik des Erhabenen. Kant-Lektionen, München: Fink. Machsor, Gebetbuch für den Versöhnungstag (1953), Bd. 7, hg. v. Wolf Heidenheim, übers. v. Selig Bamberger, Basel: Goldschmidt. Marin, Louis (2007), Transfiguration – Defiguration, in Louis Marin, Von den Mächten des Bildes. Glossen, Zürich: diaphanes, 278–289. Marion, Jean-Luc (2005), Die Öffnung des Sichtbaren. Paderborn: Schöningh. Morgenstern, Matthias (2012), Hermann Cohen und seine Quellen des Judentums, in Hans Martin Dober/Matthias Morgenstern (Hg.), Religion aus den Quellen der Vernunft. Hermann Cohen und das evangelische Christentum (Religion in Philosophy and Theology 65), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 3–27. Mosès, Stéphane (1985), System und Offenbarung. Die Philosophie Franz Rosenzweigs, München: Fink. Rosenzweig, Franz (1979), Der Mensch und sein Werk, Bd. I/2: Briefe und Tagebücher 1918– 1929, Haag: Martinus Nijhoff. Rosenzweig, Franz (1976), Der Stern der Erlösung, in Franz Rosenzweig, Der Mensch und sein Werk. Gesammelte Schriften, Bd. II, Haag: Martinus Nijhoff.

 

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Rosenzweig, Franz (1984), Das Neue Denken, in Franz Rosenzweig, Der Mensch und sein Werk, Bd. III: Zweistromland. Kleinere Schriften zu Glauben und Denken, Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 139–161. Sontag, Susan (2003), Das Leiden anderer betrachten, München: Hanser. Spieckermann, Hermann (1990), „Barmherzig und gnädig ist der Herr …“, ZAW 102, 1–18. Trepp, Leo (1992), Der jüdische Gottesdienst. Gestalt und Entwicklung, Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Vernant, Jean-Pierre (1997), Zwischen Mythos und Politik. Eine intellektuelle Autobiographie, Berlin: Wagenbach. Wiedebach, Hartwig (2011), Stufen zu einer religiösen Metaphorik. Der ‚andere‘ Cohen in Skizzen eines Editors, DZPhil 59, 295–309.

 

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We See, While We Are Hearing

1.

The Church and the Book of Psalms

I propose here to examine some of the words that Luther uses in describing the Church. My title, however, is no quotation from Luther. It stems from quite another context. Originally it is an attempt to describe a prime characteristic of Dostoevsky’s novels compared to the works of others (Hansen: 1973, 14).1 In Dostoevsky’s world there are no real portraits, drawn at a distance. Instead we are immediately thrown into an ongoing conversation of many voices in constantly changing tone. This, however, is the very reason why we see his characters with such clarity. We see, while we are hearing. This insight may well be useful in trying to elucidate what is typical of Luther’s ecclesiology, because it is consistent with his understanding of the Psalter as an ecclesiological text. Not in the sense that the psalms contain important words about the Church (which they certainly do), but in the sense of being words by the Church. In the psalms we hear the many voices of the Church, and therefore we see. This is the crucial point in Luther’s prefaces to the Psalter (1528 and 1545), and he develops it further by comparing it to the many legends of the saints. So what is the difference? Aber uber das alles, ist des Psalters edle tugent und art, Das andere Bücher wol viel von wercken der heiligen rumpeln, Aber gar wenig von jren worten sagen. Da ist der Psalter ein ausbund, Darin er auch so wol und süsse reucht, wenn man darinne lieset. Das er nicht allein die werck der heiligen erzelet, Sondern auch jre wort, Wie sie mit Gott geredt und gebetet haben, und noch reden und beten (WA DB 10/I, 101,4–9).

Furthermore, the psalms are not just words. They are words of high import revealing different affections of the human heart: 1 Hansen refers to Dmitri Mereskovsy and his great work on Dostoevsky and Tolstoy for this characteristic.

 

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Was ist aber das meiste im Psalter, denn solch ernstlich reden, in allerley solchen Sturmwinden? Wo findet man feiner wort von freuden, denn die Lobpsalmen oder Danckpsalmen haben? Da sihestu allen Heiligen ins hertze wie in schöne lüstige Garten, ja wie in den Himel, Wie feine hertzliche lüstige Blumen darinnen auffgehen von allerley schönen frölichen Gedancken gegen Gott, unb seine Wolthat. Wjderumb, wo findestu tieffer, kleglicher, jemerlicher wort, von Trawrigkeit, denn die Klagepsalmen haben? Da siehestu aber mal allen heiligen ins hertze, wie in den Tod, ja wie in die Helle (WA DB 10/I, 103,7–15).

The Church reveals itself through its prayers as an ecclesia orans inviting us to join the chorus of voices. Therefore Luther sums up: Willtu die heiligen Christlichen Kirchen gemalet sehen mit lebendiger Farbe und gestalt, in einem kleinen Bilde gefasset, So nim den Psalter fur dich, so hastu einen feinen, hellen, reinen, Spiegel, der dir zeigen wird, was die Christenheit sey. Ja du wirst auch dich selbs drinnen, und das rechte Gnotiseauton finden, Da zu Gott selbs und alle Creaturen (WA DB 10/I, 105,5–9).

2.

The invisible Church

Luther speaks of the Church as spiritual (spiritualis), invisible (invisibilis) and hidden (abscondita). As always with Luther’s use of language, the terms he chooses are not philosophical but biblical. In the following I will examine some texts which show the biblical background of the terms and reveal some of their meaning. When Luther uses the word invisibilis of the Church he normally quotes Heb 11:1: “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” Furthermore he normally refers to the fact that the Church is mentioned in the Creed. It means that the Church is as much an object of faith as everything else in the Creed. He argues in this way for example in his preface to the Book of Revelation in the German edition (1530) 1545: ES ist dis stücke (Jch gleube eine heilige Christliche Kirche) eben so wol ein Artickel des glaubens als die andern. Darumb kan sie keine Vernunfft, wenn sie gleich alle Brillen auff setzt, erkennen, der Teufel kan sie wol zudecken, mit ergernissen vnd Rotten, das du dich müssest dran ergern. So kan sie Gott auch mit gebrechen vnd allerley mangel verbergen, das du must darüber zum Narren werden, vnd ein falsch vrteil vber sie fassen. Sie wil nicht ersehen, sondern erglaubt sein, Glaube aber ist von dem, das man nicht sihet, Ebre. xj. Vnd sie singet mit jrem HErrn auch das Lied, Selig ist, der sich nicht ergert an mir. Es ist ein Christ auch wol jm selbs verborgen, das er seine heiligkeit vnd tugent nicht sihet, sondern eitel vntugent vnd vnheiligkeit sihet er an sich. Vnd du grober Klügling, woltest die Christenheit mit deiner blinden vernunfft vnd vnsaubern augen sehen.

 

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SVmma, vnser heiligkeit ist im Himel, da Christus ist, vnd nicht in der welt fur den augen, wie ein kram auff dem marckt. Darumb las Ergernis, Rotten, Ketzerey, vnd gebrechen sein vnd schaffen, was sie mögen. So allein das wort des Euangelij bey vns rein bleibt, vnd wirs lieb vnd werd haben, So sollen wir nicht zweiueln, Christus sey bey vnd mit vns, wens gleich auff ergeste gehet. Wie wir sehen in diesem Buch, das Christus durch vnd vber alle Plagen, Thiere, böse Engel, dennoch bey vnd mit seinen Heiligen ist, vnd endlich obligt (WA, DB 7,419,36–421,17).

Invisibility does not necessarily mean that nothing at all is to be seen. What you see, however, might be in total opposition to that which you hear. The Creed says “one, holy, catholic Church”, but you see only unholiness – even in yourself. Our holiness is due to the presence of Christ, even in the midst of our misery. As long as the Gospel remains pure (cf. CA VII) we shall not doubt that he is present among us just as he has promised, and that he will be victorious. As we can see, there is a significant pastoral concern in Luther’s approach to theology. It is not a detail to be added at the end. It is rather present from the very beginning, like a key telling us how a piece of music shall be played. This pastoral Ansatz by Luther is such a key and leaves a stamp on the whole exposition. The horizon of understanding is the dualism between God and Evil. The invisibility can proceed from both sides, but with contrary aims. The Devil conceals the holiness of the Church in order to make man draw wrong conclusions and despair. God conceals the holiness of both the Church and the individual. His aim, however, is to ensure that we continue to put our trust in no one, or nothing other than Christ alone and his sacrifice for us. In other words, the desire to see is in no way consonant with justification by grace through faith. The preface to the Book of Revelation gives us a hint of another characteristic of Luther’s ecclesiology. He uses the word Christenheit instead of Kirche, which underlines the oneness of this ecclesia magna and its total dependence of Christ.

3.

The Church as a matter of pastoral care

Let us leave this late text and turn to earlier texts starting with Luther’s Ein Sermon von der Bereitung zum Sterben from 1519. Here he puts the whole question of visible/ invisible within the framework of man’s anxiety. The sermon consists of 20 paragraphs. The 18th paragraph states that a Christian shall know that he is not alone on his death bed, although he might feel quite abandoned by God and man. Through the sacrament of the altar he shall firmly believe that many eyes rest upon him: Zum ersten gottis selber und Christi, darumb das er seynem wort gleubt, und seynem sacrament anhangt, darnach die lieben engel, die heyligen und alle Christenn, dann da

 

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ist keyn zweyffell, wie das sacrament des altaris weytzet, das die allesampt als eyn gantz corper zu seynem glidmas zu lauffen, helffen yhm den tod, die sund, die hell ubirwinden und tragen alle mit yhm (WA 2, 695,18–23).

Luther refers to the story about Elisha and his servant who are surrounded by enemies in Dothan (2 Kings 6). When the servant becomes aware of the dangerous situation, he is frightened and asks Elisha what to do. The story continues: […] ‘furcht dich nit, yhr ist mehr mit uns, dan mit yhnen’, so doch die feind sie umbringt hetten, und niemant anders sahen. Aber gott thet dem knecht die Augen auff, do war umb sie eyn grosser hauff feuriger pfert und wagen (WA 2, 695,35–38).

Luther’s example turns the question of visibility into a question of prayer and the overcoming of anxiety (die Überwindung der Anfechtung).

4.

Different perspectives

If we overlook the pastoral concern in Luther’s way of arguing it might sometimes seem that he is indulging in bad philosophy, and that is exactly what his opponents say. His words were misinterpreted, more or less intentionally, as if he was musing philosophically about a civitas platonica which is nowhere to be found in this world.2 For Luther’s critics it made sense to speak of an invisible church when referring to the heavenly Church. This had already become clear during the Leipzig debate in 1519 between Luther and the Ingolstadt professor Johannes Eck.3 The latter distinguished between the Church triumphant (ecclesia triumphans) in heaven from the Church militant (ecclesia militans) on earth. He argued that the visible Church corresponds with the invisible Church, since it is shaped according to a heavenly form. To prove his point Eck referred to lines of argument by Dionysios Areopagita and Bernard of Clairvaux, and quoted a number of Biblical verses supporting their view. He assembled this case in order to prove the authority of the Pope as caput ecclesiae and vicarius Christi. In short, he argues as follows: Christ can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing (John 5:19). Under the name of Moses Christ has been told to do things according to the pattern shown to him on the mountain (Exod 25:40). Christ has seen the Holy City

2 This is one of the arguments by Thomas Murner in Ein christliche und briederliche ermanung zu dem hochgelerten doctor Martino Luter Augustiner Orden zu Wittenberg: “Du beschreibest dir eben […] ein kirchen, wie im Plato selbs ein stat beschrieb, vnd ein ebenbild formiert wy ein iede stat sein solt” (Murner: 1520, a H). 3 For the debate between Luther and Eck, see Aurelius: 1983, 26–32.

 

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(Rev 21:2). Summa summarum: the visible Church on earth is shaped according to its heavenly, invisible pattern. The hierarchy of the Church on earth, where power is bestowed upon a single head, reflects by God’s will the heavenly order. Luther regards the way in which Eck and other opponents use the Bible as arbitrary. Their quotations are simply of no relevance to a debate on the Church, regardless of the authorities who have used them for that purpose. One could say that Eck elaborates a “spatial” concept of the Church, which justifies the existing order, whereas Luther uses eschatological terms. The Church, now being invisible, will one day come forth in the full sight of all. This explains why Luther often refers to passages in the Bible about the kingdom of God, when he is speaking of the Church. Preferably he quotes Luke 17:20f: “The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say, here it is, or there it is, because the kingdom of God is within you.”

5.

The hidden Church

Let us remain in the early years of the Reformation, the decisive years from the Leipzig Debate to the Diet of Worms. We choose yet another type of text by Luther, this time neither polemical nor pastoral but exegetical, namely his second great Commentary on the Psalter, Operationes in psalmos. Here, in his exploration of the 9th psalm, we find the reason for his use of the term abscondita for the Church. Luther pays special interest to the heading of the psalm. According to the traditional view the heading is the key to a true understanding of the meaning of a psalm. In Hebrew the heading of this particular psalm runs as follows: Lamnazeah almuth laben, mizmor ledavid. Lamnazeah means “to victory” and mizmor ledavid “a song of David”. The words in between are more problematic and the commentators of the past have given different interpretations: Si almuth cum Hieronymo dividas in duas dictiones (quod Lyra negat), sonat “super mortem” seu “ad mortem”. […] Si unam dictionem serves, est nomen abstractivum a verbo “alam”, quod “abscondit” significat, a quo verbo “adolescens” et “adolescuntula” vocantur: “elem” [‫ ]עלם‬et “alma” [‫]עלםה‬, quod in tabernaculis et abscondito educarentur, cum periculosissimum sit teneram aetatem vagari in mundo et illecebris exponi. Inde et almuth iuventutem, adolescentiam et eam scilicet aetatem significant, quae hac ratione absconditur et in occultis religiose educator (AWA 2, 509,9–18).4 4 Luther: 1826, 451–452: “If, with Hieronymus you divide ALMUTH LABEN into two words, (which Lyra says cannot be done,) it will signify ‘Upon death,’ or ‘To death.’ And hence, some here understand the death of Goliah, and others the death of Absalom. But if you make it one word, it is a noun derived from the verb ALAM, which signifies, ‘has hidden:’ from which verb,

 

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Laben is no problem. It refers to the Son, who is Christ. The interpretations of almuth, however, seem to point in different directions. Either it consists of two words, meaning “to death”, or it is to be understood as one word speaking of someone “hidden”. According to Luther that could be those young boys and girls, who, for the sake of their safety, were brought up religiously and in secret. So which does Luther choose? He chooses both: Quare vero similius est almoth utroque significatu in unum coacto significare novam creaturam euangelii, prolem gratiae, iuventutem baptismi, populum novi testamenti ac vere absconditas filii, id est, fideles et obedientes Christi, quorum vita sub morte, salus sub cruce, gloria sub ignominia latet. Sic enim abscondit eos mundo […] (AWA 2, 510,12–16).5

Luther’s interpretation of the title of the 9th psalm reminds us of his Heidelberg theses and develops into a kind of ecclesiology of the cross.

6.

The spiritual Church

Luther’s lectures on the Psalter for the students coincided with the debate at Leipzig and its aftermath. The contexts are truly different, but there are express references between the different texts. One reference to the 9th psalm is to be found in Luther’s answer to one of his many critics after Leipzig, Ambrosius Catharinus (Ad Librum Eximii Magistri Nostri Magistri Ambrosii Catharini, Defensoris Silvestri Prieratis Acerrimi, Responsio Martini Lutheri; WA 7, 705–778). Let us look at this text, since it sums up much of what we have dealt with so far. In addition, Luther adds one or two new insights. As well as “invisible” and “hidden”, the term spiritualis is used of the Church. As we shall see, it has somewhat more divergent biblical references than the other terms. One of many questions raised by Ambrosius Catharinus concerns the loca-

a young man and a young woman are called ELEM and ALMA: because they are educated and brought up in tents, as it is dangerous for them, being of that tender age, to wander abroad in the world, and so be exposed to all its enticements. And hence ALMUTH will signify ‘a youth,’ or ‘the state of youth;’ that age, which, on account of its tender state is hidden, and brought up religiously in secret.” 5 Luther: 1826, 452: “Wherefore it is most likely that Almoth, (uniting both significations in one) signifies the new creature of the Gospel, the offspring of grace, the youth of baptism, the people of the New Testament, and the truly ‘hidden’ ones of the Son; that is the faithful, the obedient ones of Christ, whose life lies hidden under death, their salvation under the cross, and their glory under shame; for thus does Christ hide them in the world.”

 

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tion of this ecclesia spiritualis. Where is such a Church to be found? Luther gives his account of the argument with Ambrosius in the following way: Dices autem: Si Ecclesia tota est in spiritu et res omnino spiritualis, Nemo ergo nosse poterit, ubi sit ulla eius pars in toto orbe, quod vehementer absurdum est. Nam ideo Papam asserimus, ut certo loco Ecclesiam inveniri liceat. Alioquin, quid docet Christus, oves pascere, et Paulus Ecclesiam regere, et Petrus gregem Christi pascere si nusquam in orbis certis poterunt locis inveniri habitantes corporaliter fidelis? (WA 7, 719,26–31).6

Luther’s response consists of two parts. First of all he confirms that the Church cannot be located in the way Ambrosius says by referring, inter alia, to the words of Jesus in Luke 17:20f, and the words of Paul in Rom 2:11: Christus enim omnem locum tollit dum dicit. Regnum dei non venit cum observatione, neque dicent ‘hic aut hic est’. Et ‘ecce Regnum dei intra vos est’. Et Paulus omne corpus tollit dum dicit: ‘Non est personarum acceptio apud deum’ (WA 7, 719,36–720,1).7

Secondly Luther turns to the matter of finding the Church. If the Church is spiritual, invisible and hidden, what are the reliable signs by which we can find her? Quo ergo signo agnoscam Ecclesiam? oportet enim aliquod visibile signum dari, quo congregamur in unum ad audiendum verbum dei. Resondeo: Signum necessarium est, quod et habemus, Baptisma scilicet, panem et omnium potissimum Euangelium: tria haec sunt Christianorum symbola, tesserae et caracteres. Ubi enim Bapisma et panem et Euangelium esse videris, quocumque loco, quibuscumque personis ibi Ecclesiam esse non dubites. In his enim signis vult nos Christus concordare, ut Ephe. iiii [Eph 4:5] dicit: ‘Una fides, unum Baptisma, unus dominus’ (WA 7, 720,32–721,1).8 6 LDStA 3, 417: “Du wirst aber sagen: Wenn die Kirche ingesamt nur im Geist besteht und also ein vollkommen geistlicher Gegenstand ist, dann wird ja niemand wissen können, wo überhaupt auf Erden ein Stück von ihr sein soll, was ja vollkommen absurd ist. Gerade deswegen erklären wir ja die Berechtigung des Papstes, damit man an einem ganz bestimmten Ort die Kirche auch finden kann. Was hätte es sonst für einen Sinn, wenn Chrisus uns einschärft, die ‘Schafe zu weiden’, Paulus, die ‘Kirche zu regieren’ und Petrus, ‘die Herde Christi zu weiden’, wenn man nirgendwo Gläubige finden kann, die an bestimmten Orten der Erde leibhaftig wohnen?” 7 LDStA 3, 417: “Christus hebt nämlich jeden Ort auf, wenn er sagt: ‘Das Reich Gottes kommt nicht so, das man es beobachten kann; man wird auch nicht sagen: Siehe, hier ist es! Oder: Da ist es! Denn siehe, das Reich Gottes ist mitten unter euch.’ Und Paulus hebt jeden Leib auf, wenn er sagt: ‘Es ist kein Ansehen der Person vor Gott.’” 8 LDStA 3, 419 (cf. CA VII): “An welchem Zeichen soll ich also die Kirche erkennen? Es muss doch irgenein sichtbares Zeichen angegeben werden, unter dem wir gemeinschaftlich zusammenkommen, um das Wort Gottes zu hören. Ich antworte: Ein Zeichen ist notwendig – und wir haben auch eines nämlich die Taufe, das Brot und vor allem das Evangelium! Diese drei, das sind die Symbole, die Losungen und Wahrzeichen der Christen. Wo du nämlich siehst, dass

 

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When Luther speaks about Evangelium, it is not to be understood in a narrow sense. Beside the proclamation of the gospel it includes baptism and the Lord’s Supper, which explains his reference to signs in the plural. They are means of grace constituting the Church. Luther refers to 1 Kings 8:8 and the account of the ark and its carrying poles as a prefiguration of the gospel as the sure sign: Ista signa praesertim Euangelii figurate esse videntur olim in templo Salomonis, ubi duo capita vectium, quibus arca portabatur, foris promenibant ante oraculum, significante spiritu, Non nisi vocali et publica voce Euangelii sciri, ubi sit Ecclesia et mysterium regni caelorum. Ut enim vectium capitibus velut indiciis arca etiam abscondita in sancto sanctorum credebatur praesens adesse, ita Ecclesiam nemo videt, sed solum credit per signum verbi, quod impossibile est sonare, nisi in Ecclesia per spiritum sanctum (WA 7, 722,1–7).9

Here we have the embryo of Luther’s teaching on the notae ecclesiae which he develops later on, especially in Von den Konziliis und Kirchen (1539) and Wider Hans Worst (1541). Luther’s teaching of the signs of the Church (unlike many later interpretations) is not part of some theology of controversy between different confessions, neither in his early nor in his later writings. It is rather the contrary. The signs help people to find the true Communion of Saints. In the first of these two treatises the one who asks for this communion is ein armer jrriger Mensch, i. e. a man close to despair (WA 50, 628,19). Therefore these signs have to be right and pure (cf. CA VII). This pastoral concern prevents him from elaborating a self-legitimizing doctrine on the signs, trying to prove that we – unlike you – are the true Church. On the contrary, his way of dealing with the notae ecclesiae inevitably raises self-critical questions (e. g.: Are the signs as clear and pure as they ought to be among us?). There is also an ecumenical potential in Luther’s way of dealing with the notae ecclesiae. They can help us to discover the Church, where we did not expect it to be. Taufe, Brot und Evangelium vorhanden sind, gleich an welchem Ort und bei welchen Personen, da darfst du nicht zweifeln, dass dort die Kirche ist. In diesen Zeichen sollen wir nämlich nach Christi Willen übereinstimmen, wie es Eph 4 heisst: ‘Ein Glaube, eine Taufe, ein Herr!’” 9 LDStA 3, 423: “Diese Zeichen, besonders das des Evangeliums, sind offenbar einst im Tempel Salomos angedeutet worden, wo die beiden Knäufe der Stangen, mit denen die Lade getragen wurde, aussen vor dem Gottesraum herausragten, womit der Geist andeuten wollte, dass man nur durch die öffentlich erklingende Stimme des Evangeliums wissen kann, wo die Kirche und das Mysterium des Himmelreichs ist. Wie man nämlich anhand der Stangenknäufe, gleichsam als Anzeiger, darauf vertrauen durfte, dass die Lade, auch wenn sie selbst verborgen war, im Allerheiligsten präsent war, so sieht auch niemand die Kirche, dennoch glaubt man an sie allein durch das Zeichen des Wortes, das unmöglich anderswo erklingen kann als in der Kirche durch den Heiligen Geist.”

 

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In his answer to Ambrosius Catharinus Luther continues by summing up the arguments that we have already met before and exploring them somewhat further: Inde Ecclesia psal. ix. vocatur Almuth, abscondita, et articulus fidei, credens Ecclesiam sanctam Catholicam confitetur, eum nusquam numquam apparere, aufertque ab ea omnem locum et personam, sicut et Paulus Gal. v. dicit: ‘In Christo Iesu non est masculus aut femina, barbarus aut graecus, liber aut servus, judaeus aut gentilis. Sed omnes vos unum estis in Christo Iesu’ [Gal 3:28; 5:6]. Sic rhete Apostolorum trahit pisces in aquis [Joh 21:1ff], non ad aquas, sed ad littus ex aquis, cum non agat piscator, ut pisces in aqua sint (hoc enim natura eorum iam fecit), sed ut ex aqua trahantur. Ita Christus per vocale verbum e rebus, locis et corporibus trahit Christianos, non in res, loca et corpora, in quibus iam sua natura consistent. Credo istis argumentis iam satis fidem factam pio cordi et Papistarum insaniam satis notam, qua Ecclesiam dei de intus rapere, et in locis ac personis prostituere moliuntur (WA 7, 722,8–19).10

Let us come to an end. Luther speaks of the Church as a unity in Christ. This is the result of the work of the Spirit through the means of Grace. Or perhaps one should say: it is the not yet completed, still hidden result of Christ’s presence among us, gathering and recreating a people that he eventually will hand over to his Father in all visibility at the end of times. Neither special places nor special people can prove that this goes on or grant the existence of this hidden reality. The signs, however, can make it visible even for the one close to despair.

10 LDStA 3, 423: “Daher wird die Kirche in Psalm 9 ‘Almuth’, das heisst ‘Verborgene’, genannt, und der Artikel im Credo bekennt bei dem ‘Ich glaube an die heilige katholische Kirche’, dass diese nirgendwo und niemals sichtbar erscheint, und hebt jeglichen Orts- und Personenbezug an ihr auf; vergleiche Paulus in Gal 3: ‘In Christus Jesus ist weder Mann noch Weib, weder Barbar noch Grieche, weder Freier noch Knecht, weder Jude noch Heide! Sondern ihr seid alle eins in Christus Jesus.’” So zieht das Netz der Apostel die Fische im Wasser nicht ins Wasser hinein, sondern aus dem Wasser heraus ans Ufer; denn der Fischer hat kein Interesse daran, dass die Fische im Wasser sind (das hat ihre Natur schon besorgt), sondern das sie aus dem Wasser herausgezogen werden. So auch Christus: Durch das mündlich erklingende Wort zieht er die Christen von Dingen, Orten und Körpern hinweg und nicht in Dinge, Orte und Körper hinein, worin sie sich ja schon ihrer Natur nach befinden. Ich nehme an, dass durch diese Argumente einem frommen Gemüt schon genug Vertrauen vermittelt und die Wahnsinn der Papisten hinreichend vor Augen geführt ist: der Wahnsinn, dass sich alle Mühe geben, die Kirche Gottes aus dem Herzen der Menschen herauszureissen, um sie in Gestalt von Orten und Personen zu prostituieren.”

 

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Bibliography Aurelius, Carl Axel (1983), Luthers Kirchenverständnis aufgrund seiner Streitschriften und Exegese 1519–1521 (Arbeiten zur Geschichte und Theologie des Luthertums, Neue Folge 4), Hannover: Lutherisches Verlagshaus. Hansen, Knud (1973), Dostojevskij, København: Gyldendal. Luther, Martin (1519), Ein Sermon von der Bereitung zum Sterben, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 2, 685–697. Luther, Martin (1519–1521), Operationes in psalmos, 1519–1521, Teil 2: Psalm 1 bis 10 (Vulgata), Köln/Wien: Archiv zur Weimarer Ausgabe der Werke Martin Luthers, AWA 2. Luther, Martin (1521), Ad Librum Eximii Magistri Nostri Magistri Ambrosii Catharini, Defensoris Silvestri Prieratis Acerrimi, Responsio Martini Lutheri, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 7, 705–778. Luther, Martin (2009), Antwort Martin Luthers auf das Buch des trefflichen ‘Magister Noster’, Mag. Ambrosius Catharinus, der den überaus scharfsinnigen Sylvester Prierias verteidigt, in Martin Luther, Lateinisch-Deutsche Studienausgabe, Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, LDStA 3, 377–573. Luther, Martin (1528/1545), Luthers Vorrede auf den Psalter 1528/1545, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA DB 10/I, 98–105. Luther, Martin (1530), Vorrede auf die Offenbarung S. Johannis von 1530, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA DB 7, 407–421. Luther, Martin (1536/1539), Von den Konziliis und Kirchen, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009,WA 50, 509–653. Luther, Martin (1826), The Pious and Learned Commentary of Martin Luther on the First Twenty-Two Psalms, in Henry Cole (ed.), Select Works of Martin Luther, vol. 3, London: T. Bensley. Murner, Thomas (1520), Ein christliche und briederliche ermanung zu dem hochgelerten doctor Martino luter Augustiner Orden zu Wittemburg, Strassburg: Grüninger (available at http://www.mdz-nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn=urn:nbn:de:bvb:12-bsb10167574-2) [09.07.2014].

 

Hans-Peter Großhans

The Divine Mystery Becoming Visible in Human Communities

Our public world – at least our Western world – dislikes mysteries, but at the same time is fascinated by them. On the one hand, everything has to be made public. Nothing can be withheld from the dazzling and harsh light of publicity – especially after the “iconic turn”. But on the other hand this effort is based on the awareness that there are or may be mysteries everywhere. A whole industry and a whole branch of our society lives on that: to reveal mysteries; and in revealing them to make them profane. Mysteries always are sacred in a way: they impart their own social space to those who know the mystery. The sacred is per definitionem a marked-off space. Those who share a mystery are marked off from those who do not. Therefore it is of universal interest to get to know the mysteries of others. In societies which, like Denmark, are constitutional monarchies, justifying power and representing the people via the ballot box, it is most interesting to know the mysteries of these royal people, who are marked off from the rest of us by the political system – and so to integrate them nevertheless into the profanity of common life. But it is typical of monarchies, that royalty must ever and again supply its subjects with further mysteries. It is often remarked that real mysteries retain their mysterious quality even if more and more people know them. This is the difference between mysteries and, for example, puzzles. If we know a puzzle, it will lose its attraction. But a true mystery will still attract the mind and emotions even when known. It may be a mystery that Peter loves Mary. More and more people discover it, but it does not cease to be a mystery. And then perhaps Mary herself gets to know it. But still it remains a mystery – for Mary and even for Peter – not losing, but augmenting its attraction.

1.

The concept of mystery in Christian faith and in Protestant theology

In Christianity there has always been an emphasis on mystery. In the liturgies of most Christian denominations there is an explicit reference to the “mystery of faith”. The word “sacrament” was adopted early to render the Greek μυστήριον. At

 

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the centre of their religious practice Christians refer to a mystery. It is formulated, for example, in Eph 1:9f: “He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His kind intention which He purposed in Him with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things on the earth.” Therefore Paul can state in 1 Cor 4:1: “Think of us in this way, as servants of Christ and stewards of God’s mysteries” (οἰκονόμους μυστήριων ϑεοῦ). These two quotations make it very clear that the mystery at the centre of Christian religious practice is not the believing or the faith of Christians. When referring to the mystery of faith, Christians do not express that they are to themselves a mystery; that they cannot penetrate themselves and do not understand their faith and believing. The two biblical quotations make clear that these words indicate the mystery of God. “Faith knows God to be the final and real mystery of the world.”1

1.1

The category of mystery in recent Protestant theology

In Protestant theology the category of “mystery” has long been ignored, or at least has not been used constructively. In modern times theology for the most part has seemed rather to follow the famous motto of John Toland’s Christianity not Mysterious of 1696 (cf. Toland: 1995) – one of numerous attempts to explain Christian faith as something “normal”, as fitting into the profane world, as realizing certain important functions in the civil life of society. It is one of the contradictions of certain areas of our present-day theology, that on the one hand religion is conceived in functional terms, so as to avoid a substantial definition of the subject of theology, but on the other hand it has to be acknowledged that in religious practice the “mystery of faith” is in common usage. And in referring to the mystery of faith believers do not express any fundamental epistemological problem with their religion, but operate with ontological presumptions. So, on the one hand, there are attempts to “normalize” the fundamental object of religion, to integrate all its activities and its basic problems into a “normal” understanding of life and into an ordering of our world that we can grasp empirically. But those who practise Christianity use the category of “mystery” and in so doing necessarily go beyond the empirical limits of our spatial and temporal world.2 In recent times there has been a new awareness of the category of “mystery” in some quarters, especially in what is called “hermeneutical theology”. Two of its 1 Jüngel: 2010, 334: “Der Glaube kennt Gott als das letzte und eigentliche Geheimnis der Welt.” 2 How the concept of transcendence, in which the mystery of every human life is grounded, was translated during modern times into the idea of human subjectivity is discussed in Grøn et al. (eds.): 2007.

 

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main representatives, Gerhard Ebeling and Eberhard Jüngel, use this category for their definition of God. “God as the mystery of the world” is the programmatic title of a book by Eberhard Jüngel (cf. Jüngel 2010; 1st ed. 1977). Gerhard Ebeling gives us the definition: “‘God’ – this is the mystery of reality” (Ebeling: 1969, 419). Both Ebeling and Jüngel emphasize that the mode of God’s presence is the word or – generally – is language. With God-talk or even when God himself communicates, reality and the world come together into view, but in a different way than is the case without God-talk. With God-talk, the deity appears to be the mystery of reality or the mystery of the world. What is remarkable is that this presupposes that our reality and our world may hide a mystery – a mystery quite outside the ambit of physics.

1.2

Sacramental theology

The category of “mystery” becomes even more important with the reflections of Ebeling and Jüngel on the question of “sacrament”.3 They use the category of mystery to explain the difference between a Protestant and a Roman Catholic understanding of the sacraments. According to Ebeling the terms μυστήριον and sacramentum, “which have come to denote the sacred actions in the narrowest sense in the Eastern churches and the Western church” represent “the different spirit of Greek and Latin Christianity” (Ebeling: 1979, 302). According to his analysis, the word μυστήριον used in the Eastern churches still retains elements of its original meaning in ancient religion. The Western adoption of the word sacramentum, which derives from legal and military terminology, was an effort to get away from this ancient understanding and therefore to emphasize the bond and the obligation to the God who communicates himself, imposed on the believers who took part in the sacred rites. But in the Western church this emphasis on the obligatory character of the sacraments obscured what the word μυστήριον really expressed: the self-communication of the triune God in manifold ways, be it in words, symbols and rites, or even in persons and communities. During the Reformation dissatisfaction with the Latin term sacramentum was articulated by Protestants, who pointed out that it was an inadequate translation of the New Testament’s μυστήριον. Thus Zwingli complained that sacramentum did not rightly express the meaning of μυστήριον4 and regretted that the Ger3 For the following considerations see my more extensive reflections on the sacrament of “baptism”, cf. Großhans: 2008; compare also Jüngel: 1990 and 2003. 4 Zwingli writes in De vera et falsa religione (1525): “[…] neque ei, ubi antiqua novi testamenti translatio pro: mysterio ‘sacramentum’ habet. Nam haec vox istam non exprimit” (“[…] nor do I follow the old translation of the New Testament, which reads ‘sacrament’ for mysterion. This word does not express it” (Zwingli: 1914, 758f; translation by HPG).

 

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mans had ever accepted the word “sacrament” into their vocabulary – a point that Friedrich Schleiermacher then expressly took up in his dogmatic Der christliche Glaube (cf. Schleiermacher: 2008, Vol. 2, 404). As early as 1520 Luther pointed out that biblical terminology does not justify the use of “sacrament” for the rites of the church (cf. De captivitate Babylonicae ecclesiae praeludium, WA 6, 501, 37f). Philipp Melanchthon in his Loci Communes (1521) therefore wants to call “signs or sacramental signs […] what the others call sacraments” (Melanchthon: 1993, 328 f.; translation by HPG). He emphasizes that according to biblical terminology only Jesus Christ can be called a sacrament. Many other examples might be quoted in which a dissatisfaction with the Latin expression is articulated. It is interesting that long before the ecumenical age, already in the first decades of the 19th century Friedrich Schleiermacher expressed the hope that the problems of the word sacramentum could be removed “by coming closer to the Eastern church, to which this nomenclature has remained alien, and which instead uses the expression mysteries” (Schleiermacher: 2008, vol. 2, 404; translation by HPG). However he thought that such an approach would be possible only with time. Therefore in Der christliche Glaube he attempted to treat baptism and the eucharist without reference to the word sacrament. Protestant theology for the most part followed him here, and therefore often had a highly contradictory understanding of the sacraments in general. His point that the sacraments are to be understood in the light of the New Testament expression mystery, as preserved in the Orthodox churches, has largely been overlooked.5 In recent times the matter has been reconsidered, and an evangelical understanding of the sacraments has been regained. Renewed attention has been given to the New Testament occurrences of μυστήριον (cf., e. g., Col 1:27; 2:2; Eph 1:9; 3:5, et passim). According to New Testament usage, the word points to God’s saving will in favour of sinful humankind, a boon which Paul in particular claimed to preach: For God “has made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure that he set forth in Christ, as a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth” (Eph 1:9f). In Eberhard Jüngel’s view, “sacramentum in the New Testament is nothing other than the eschatological mystery of God’s saving will in favour of sinful human beings […] which has been set to work in the history of Jesus Christ” (Jüngel: 1990, 313; translation by HPG). 5 However, time and again in the Protestant churches and in their theology there have been complaints about a blind spot in respect of the sacraments. Even the great German poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe complained about this 200 years ago. In his view “the sacraments […] are the highest thing in religion, the tangible symbol of an extraordinarily divine favour and grace”. But with great regret the Protestant Goethe had to note that in his church the “truly spiritual connection” between divine grace and favour and the whole of human life from birth to death had been “splintered” (Goethe: 1994, 289).

 

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If that is the case, then in the strict sense only Jesus Christ himself can be called a sacrament, as Philipp Melanchthon has already emphasized. It follows from this that rites performed in church, such as baptism and the eucharist, are sacraments only in the light of Jesus Christ, since they attempt to convey to the participants the same μυστήριον that is communicated to all the world in Jesus Christ. To this extent the mystery of baptism and the mystery of the eucharist, hidden in the public performance, is nothing other than the mystery of the death and re­surrection of Christ.

2.

The church being the body of Christ

The sacraments share this character of mystery with the church as a whole, in so far as the church is the body of Christ. That the church is not only a human religious community but the body of Christ comprises its own mystery. This especially calls forth a reflection on the true understanding of the church. Traditionally this is done with the distinction between the visible and the invisible church. As this distinction has been explained, recently and at length, in respect of its history, its various aspects and its present significance (cf. Großhans: 2003, 59–138), it may be sufficient, and appropriate to the limited space in a collection of essays, to call to mind the most fundamental aspects of it, in a less argumentative and more thetical style, in order to concentrate on the understanding of invisibility – as the subject of this volume – in ecclesiology. To understand the ecclesiological concept of invisibility in the visible, it may be helpful to relive its theological construction in its dogmatical terms and its mythical narratives. The starting point for such a reconstruction may be 1 Cor 12:12, declaring Jesus Christ to be one body, and indeed one in many. Eph 5:30 sums it up: “We are members of his body.” When it is said shortly before (Eph 5:23) that Christ is the head of the community and redeemer of the body, i. e. of the church which is his body, the redemption consists precisely in the believers’ being part of the body of Christ. Identifying the church with the body of Christ emphasizes the incorporation of men and women, gathered together as a community, into the suffering of the body of Christ. The men and women gathered together as the church are then to be understood wholly in terms of what the body of Christ has experienced in death and resurrection.6 Therefore “You are the body of Christ”

6 What is true of the body of Christ is true of the church. For the church stands in continuity with the crucified and risen body of Jesus Christ, and is what it is theologically only by virtue of that fact. This is strikingly expressed in the resurrection of Christ from the dead: according to Karl Barth, in the risen body of Jesus Christ “humankind has been raised to exist in a new law and life” (Barth: 1953, 741; translation of HPG).

 

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(1 Cor 12:27).7 To this extent the church, being the congregation of all believers, already realizes, provisionally and under earthly conditions, what is reality in Jesus Christ himself: the recapitulation of the human being, made by God in his image, and the archetype of reconciled life in the world. The fundamental new determination of human beings for reconciled fellowship with God and one another is thought of, soteriologically and ecclesiologically, as incorporation into the body of Christ, and thus into the church. In its commission and claim, the church is nothing less than the visible earthly realization of the fellowship of men and women who believe in reconciled life with God and one another, and hope for its consummation. That is the consequence of the church’s being the body of Christ, who is the only sacrament and thus the true communication of God’s grace to his creatures. For example, baptism gives a share in the μυστήριον of Jesus Christ, in that the purification of the carnal and mortal individual from his sins, and his or her acceptance into the church and thus into the body of Christ, are brought about in a visible way. Summarizing these observations on the understanding of mystery in Protestant theology, I would suggest that the present activity, or work, of the triune God within his church, and through that church in the world, defines the mystery of the church – that is to say, the mystery that inheres in the church. That activity or work is what is hidden in the outer appearance and form of the church. The mystery of the church is not the church itself, but Jesus Christ. Therefore the mystery that is inseparable from and embodied by the church is the mysterium paschale, the mystery of the passion of Christ. This mystery, then, inherent in the church, is that God has given himself to be once and for all the sacrifice to reconcile all human beings living without God and in sin, and so to purify and sanctify a world of injustice, which is doomed to die. There is no way of knowing this mystery through our analysis of and reflection on the natural world. It remains a mystery: the mystery that God reconciled himself with all humankind, took away the sin of the world, purified all mortal beings and a world deformed by suffering, injustice and death – and in so doing started to reconcile all people among themselves. It is a mystery – to formulate the same thing in terms of creation theology – that the natural world is God’s creation and that God, the creator of all, loves his creatures and is not indifferent. This mystery – which may be formulated differently and about which much more might be said – is at the centre of the church. It is a true mystery of faith, because it does not result from the reality of the world and it cannot be explained 7 This, in short, is the message of Easter, to quote Karl Barth once again, the consequence of the “appearance of the body of Jesus Christ which includes their [sc. human beings] death in his death, their life in his life, their past and future in itself, and thus embraces them all in itself ” (Barth: 1953, 742; translation of HPG).

 

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with the possibilities offered by our world. Its character as mystery consists precisely in the fact that it brings its own possibility, and thus also gives new possibilities, to human beings and their world, possibilities which are initially alien to the context of the world. The mystery of faith gives new possibilities to the worldly life of people. These new possibilities put the reality of the world and its own possibilities in question, but not fundamentally. Grace does not destroy nature, nor does it perfect it. The new possibilities which grace offers to worldly life mean, rather, a renewal and intensification of the possibilities of the world, and thus also of its reality.

3.

Conceiving the church in her relation to God

What do the reflections on the mystery of faith imply for our understanding of the church? How are we to understand the church’s embodying the mystery of faith? If we are to answer these questions we must consider the relation of the church with the triune God, and try to understand the church in the context of her God, and of that God’s story with humankind. What kind of understandings do we have in that respect, and what models can we use to conceive the specific dimension of invisibility in the reality of the church?

3.1

An image of the Trinity – the perspective of Orthodox Christianity

An interesting model to conceive the church in her relation to God can be found in the ecclesiology of the Orthodox churches. Timothy Ware, in the introduction to his Orthodox Church, writes that every understanding of the church starts with the specific relation between church and God. This relation, in his understanding, has three dimensions: “The church is (1) the Image of the Holy Trinity, (2) the Body of Christ, (3) a continued Pentecost. The Orthodox doctrine of the Church is Trinitarian, Christological and ‘pneumatological’” (Ware: 1993, 244). In the Orthodox model the church in its entirety is an image of the Trinity, because she reproduces on earth the mystery of the unity in diversity that characterizes the triune God. As is well known and often discussed, this formula, “unity in reconciled diversity”, is equally the programmatic formula of the Community of Protestant Churches in Europe (CPCE).8 In the Trinity three persons are the one God. In ancient times the Trinitarian formula was a revolution in the concept of unity. In the past almost necessarily, and still usually in our own time, unity is 8 Bünker/Friedrich (eds.): 2012, 144: “The ecumenical term for this form of church fellowship is ‘unity in reconciled diversity’. This is the unity in which the churches united by the Leuenberg Agreement live.”

 

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conceived in terms of homogeneity. The Trinitarian dogma introduced a concept of unity on the basis of plurality and diversity, without reducing that plurality or diminishing that diversity by any imperial assimilation to the leading power in politics, ethnicity, language and culture. Because God is the unity of three diverse persons, the church brings a plurality of people into a unity – preserving the peculiarity of every single one of them. Further, the one true church unites a plurality of churches. According to Orthodox teaching the earthly (liturgical) worship of the church is an image (and reflection) of the heavenly worship. We find now in Orthodox theology the same model in the relation of the church and the triune God: the church in its entirety is an image (and reflection) of the Trinity. But in what respect in Orthodox theology is the church an image of the Trinity? The need for clarification of such a relationship in the category of “image” is particularly pressing in our time: a time of photographic reproduction of pictures, a time of copy shops. In the context of Orthodox theology one way to understand the relation of church and Trinity in the form of an image looms large: the church could be an image of the Trinity in the sense of an icon. Since that which is imaged and depicted is present in the image, the Trinity could then be understood as being present in the church. In the church a real contact, a haptic perception with the triune God, could happen. But then we are confronted with the question as to what exactly characterizes the holy Trinity. Otherwise we would have no sense of, and would not know what had to be depicted in the church as image of the Trinity. According to Orthodox teaching, the essence of the Trinity is its perichoresis: the mutual communication and participation of the three divine persons. In this eternal process of common communication each is participating fully with the other, God thus manifesting himself to be love (cf. 1 John 4:16). If the church is conceived as the image of the triune God, then she has to image and depict the triune perichoresis. It is not enough, then, to formulate that the church unites a plurality of diverse people. She unites globally the diverse human individuals into a perichoretic community: a community of full participation, a community of full mutual communication of all participants. In short, the church unites a plurality of individuals in a community of love. In being a community of love, in the sense of the mutual participation and communication of all participants, the church is an image of the triune God. A problem with formulations of this sort is that Western ears hear them as normative, whereas in Orthodox ears they are received as describing a reality. In Orthodox understanding the existing church – if she exists in correspondence and in continuity with her beginnings – is an image of the Trinity in the same way that every human being is an image of God. It may help to understand this Orthodox perception of the existing church, if we take into account that the church is understood to be the body of Christ.

 

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Given that the church is the body of Christ, God and man are united, just as in Jesus Christ divine and human nature are united. Orthodox theology makes further use of the concept of perichoresis in Christology. In Christ divine and human nature mutually participate in each other. If the church is the body of Christ, then God and man mutually do the same in her also. This shows that by definition the church is the image of the Trinity. If we follow these considerations, then we arrive at an image of the church as a process of mutual participation and communication of God and man, and of all the participants in the church with each other.

3.2

A work of the triune God – Protestant and Catholic perspectives

Western theology – be it Protestant or Roman Catholic – has a different approach from the Orthodox and uses a different model for the church’s specific relation to God. It emphasizes that the church is the creation and work of the triune God, the result especially of the activity of the Holy Spirit.9 If the church is understood to be a work of God, then the relation of God and church can perhaps be described along the lines of a face-to-face encounter. The idea then becomes more plausible that the triune God confronts the church. The respective concepts of God’s facing his church are of ecumenical significance. In the Roman Catholic Church the office of priest or bishop represents God facing the congregation. In Protestant understanding Holy Scripture represents God facing the church; or to formulate it more exactly, Christ, who is witnessed to in Holy Scripture, faces his church. In the New Testament this is expressed in the idea that Jesus Christ is the head of the church (see, e. g., Col 1:18: “He is the head of the body, the church”; cf. Eph 4:15f). The church’s being a work of the Holy Spirit, and face to face with God, puts forward an understanding distinct from the Orthodox one. In the one understanding, the church, existing in heaven and on earth, is an image of the triune God. She represents the triune God himself. In the other understanding, the church represents not only the triune God, but additionally and more importantly she is the gathering of all believers, all the sanctified and all those sent by God. The church then primarily does not represent the triune God, but the congregation of salvation – which is nothing other than mankind reconciled with God and with his neighbour. Protestant theology has thrown up much suspicion of any theological use of the concept of representation (repraesentatio). Representation is another model 9 Cf. Lumen gentium: 2001, nr. 4104, 1174 f. In Lumen gentium we can also find some assertions that could be taken in the sense of the Orthodox understanding of the Church as an image of the Trinity, see, e. g., ibid., quoting Cyprian, De dominica oratione 23, PL 4, 553.

 

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by which to grasp the invisible: the invisible is represented within reality by signs, symbols, performances, persons and even organizations. The cause of the Protestant suspicion of the concept of representation is mainly an anti-Catholic attitude, because the Catholic Church claimed from the Council of Trent onwards to represent salvation on earth, especially to represent Christ’s sacrifice in the Eucharist. Nowadays, in postmodern times, the concept of representation is received with much more sympathy in Protestant theology. Performance is everything! But Protestant churches struggle with the question of what their specific performance is, and what they should depict and represent. Because Protestant churches do not claim to represent the triune God, or the salvation brought by the triune God, or Jesus Christ and his sacrifice, they seem to have lost a clear definition of what they are and what they stand for. Often enough they try to represent humanity and the humane in general. Surely this is admirable and unexceptionable – as it is with many humanitarian organizations, which are trying to do the same thing – but nevertheless it shows that those churches have lost their mission. If churches want to realize the church, then they have to offer a space for God’s presence in their performances and representations. The church is about the concrete presence of the triune God in our world; she is about the performance of God’s salvation – and that is a life in God’s presence, a life with the triune God. But what does the church represent and depict, when she is the earthly space of God’s presence? Is this really the triune God? Or is there an alternative understanding? If God’s salvation – the salvation God wills for mankind, the salvation that corresponds to God – is the reconciled gathering of God with all people, and if this salvation is performed on earth in the shape of the church, then the church could be representing and depicting those with whom God wants to get together and be together, that is, the people he has elected to be together with him. Then the church as the gathering of all believers on earth would represent the partner God is encountering face to face. In this understanding the concept of representation was employed by Karl Barth.10 In his ecclesiology (in part 4 of the Church Dogmatics; §§ 62, 67, 72) we find a positive Protestant use of the concept of representation. The church however does not here represent the triune God or the heavenly polis, but the human beings qualified in God’s saving action. The church then is the preliminary representation of the reconciled human world in its entirety, justified, sanctified and called in Jesus Christ (cf. Großhans: 2006). The church, in this understanding, does not represent humanity in general, but humanity in a peculiar quality: it is humanity qualified eschatologically in the saving work of Jesus Christ.

10 We also find a positive use of the concept of representation (or depiction [Darstellung]) in Protestant theology in the writings of Friedrich Schleiermacher.

 

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So the church anticipates the eschatological relation of all human beings to the triune God, she depicts and represents this eschatological situation of mankind. To see the church as the representation and image of the triune God, or as representing God on earth, is – according to Protestant theology – not ambitious enough. On the one hand, the triune God may and can be represented only by himself; on the other hand, such an understanding nullifies the true belief in the church. If the church is a performance of God’s salvation, then she can and must represent not only the triune God and “the greatest drama ever staged” (Dorothy Sayers), but the other side of this encounter too: the eschatologically qualified human being and his world. Here we might reflect on the phenomenology of encountering God and performing God’s salvation in the church. In an interdenominational perspective this would bring us to the difference between “seeing” and “listening”. In the Orthodox churches and theologies of Eastern Europe there is a strong emphasis on seeing and vision – and consequently on the visual sense. It is noteworthy that this is combined with the phenomenon of touching (and the tactile sense). We are reminded of the healing miracle in Mark 5:28: “For she said, ‘If I just touch His garments, I will get well’.” In kissing the icon, there happens a saving contact, e. g. with (the invisible) Christ who is imagined in the icon. And in watching the holy liturgy and the holy story that is represented in it, the spectator is drawn into the saving story. In Protestant spirituality, as is well known, the sense of hearing dominates. In the salvatory encounter with the triune God in the church, it is important to give the word to God himself. This illustrates again the Protestant reservation towards the concept of representation. A mere representation of the triune God would not be enough: because the church is about an encounter of (the invisible) God himself – who addresses his people – with the people who are gathered as his people, and who answer to his word in giving thanks and in living accordingly.

4.

Conclusion

With close reference to Orthodox theology, I have shown that the church, if she is understood as the image of the triune God, is a community of love. Now, the same follows from an understanding of the church as a work of the Holy Spirit: the church in this sense is again a community of love. It is God’s (invisible) spirit that gathers those who are to form the community of Jesus Christ. He unites here and now those who diverge by nature and by their historical status, or indeed are hostile: Jew and gentile, poor and rich, master and servant, all those who respond to him and his approach. This work of gathering and uniting shows the Holy Spirit to be a spirit of love. Love unites without overriding and suspending differences and peculiarities. This applies equally for the communion of God and man, which

 

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is effected in the shape of the church in the world. Really being together is possible only when it does not mean dissolution into an indistinctive and undifferentiated unity, and does not mean that one is usurped by the other (cf. Großhans: 2005). True communion presupposes and constantly regenerates the differentiation of those who are together. The church brings together the Holy and the sinful. In this, she is a community of mutual otherness – like the triune God. In this community of God and man the Holy Spirit of love lets the sinner participate in the Holy, with the effect that the sinner is sanctified. The church, caused and created by the Holy Spirit, is at the same time a reconciled community of human beings. This is the case because no one can be united with Jesus Christ without being united with his neighbour in a community of love. In this the invisible – and, in the face of so many desperate lives here on earth, and the so often spiritless performance of the churches, barely credible – hope of Christians in the reconciling work of the triune God, and in a reconciled humanity, is made visible (cf. Großhans: 2007).

Bibliography Barth, Karl (1953), Die kirchliche Dogmatik, vol. IV: Die Lehre von der Versöhnung, vol. 1, Zollikon/Zürich: Evangelischer Verlag. Bünker, Michael/Friedrich, Martin (eds.) (2012), Die Kirche Jesu Christi. Der reformatorische Beitrag zum ökumenischen Dialog über die kirchliche Einheit/The Church of Jesus Christ. The Contribution of the Reformation towards Ecumenical Dialogue on Church Unity (Leuenberger Texte 1/Leuenberg Documents 1), 4th rev. ed., Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Ebeling, Gerhard (1969), Gott und Wort, in: Gerhard Ebeling, Wort und Glaube, vol. 2, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 396–432. Ebeling, Gerhard (1979), Dogmatik des christlichen Glaubens, vol. 3, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Goethe, Johann W. von (1994), Dichtung und Wahrheit, in: Johann W. von Goethe, Werke. Hamburger Ausgabe, vol. 9, 12th ed., München: C.H. Beck. Grøn, Arne/Iben Damgaard/Søren Overgaard (eds.) (2007), Subjectivity and Transcendence, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Grosshans, Hans-Peter (2003), Die Kirche – Irdischer Raum der Wahrheit des Evangeliums, Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Grosshans, Hans-Peter (2005), Article “Wahrheit V. Dogmatisch und ethisch”, RGG 4, vol. 8, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1252–1254. Grosshans, Hans-Peter (2006), Universale Versöhnung im geschichtlichen Vollzug. Zur Ekklesiologie in Karl Barths Versöhnunglehre, Zeitschrift für Dialektische Theologie 22:2, 95–119. Grosshans, Hans-Peter (2007), Das Geheimnis der Kirche: Verborgen im Sichtbaren. Überlegungen zur interkonfessionellen Verständigung über das evangelische, orthodoxe und römisch-katholische Verständnis der Kirche, Hermeneutische Blätter 1:2: Unsichtbar, 121–138.

 

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Grosshans, Hans-Peter (2008), Baptism – A Sacramental Bond of Church Unity, in: Michael Beintker/Martin Friedrich/Viorel Ionita (eds.), Konsultationen zwischen der Konferenz Europäischer Kirchen (KEK) und der Gemeinschaft Evangelischer Kirchen in Europa (GEKE)/ Consultations between the Conference of European Churches (CEC) and the Community of Protestant Churches in Europe (CPCE) (Leuenberger Texte 11/Leuenberg Documents 11), Frankfurt a.M.: Otto Lembeck, 242–267. Holy Bible. New Revised Standard Version (2005), Peabody: Hendrickson Publishers/Oxford: Oxford University Press. Jüngel, Eberhard (1990), Die Kirche als Sakrament? in: Eberhard Jüngel, Wertlose Wahrheit. Zur Identität und Relevanz des christlichen Glaubens. Theologische Erörterungen III, München: Kaiser, 311–334. Jüngel, Eberhard (2003), Sakrament und Repräsentation. Wesen und Funktion der sakramentalen Handlung, in: Eberhard Jüngel, Ganz werden. Theologische Erörterungen V, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 274–287. Jüngel, Eberhard (2010), Gott als Geheimnis der Welt. Zur Begründung der Theologie des Gekreuzigten im Streit zwischen Theismus und Atheismus, 8th ed., Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Lumen Gentium (2001), Caput I: De Ecclesiae mysterio, in: Heinrich Denzinger/Peter Hünermann, Enchiridion symbolorum, 39th ed., nr. 4101–4121, Freiburg i.B./Basel/Rom/Wien: Herder, 1173–1182. Luther, Martin ([1520] 1888), De captivitate Babylonicae ecclesiae praeludium, in: Martin Luther, Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe, vol. 6, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger, 484–573. Melanchthon, Philipp ([1521] 1993), Loci communes, Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Schleiermacher, Friedrich D.E. ([1830/31] 2008), Der christliche Glaube nach den Grundsätzen der evangelischen Kirche im Zusammenhange dargestellt. Zweite Auflage (1830/31), ed. by R. Schäfer, Berlin: deGruyter. Toland, John (1995), Christianity not Mysterious, reprint of the edition of 1696, London: Routledge-Thoemmes Press. Ware, Timothy (1993), The Orthodox Church. New Edition, London et al.: Penguin. Zwingli, Huldrych (1914), De vera et falsa religione commentarius, in: Huldreich Zwinglis Sämtliche Werke (Corpus Reformatorum 90), ed. by E. Egli et al., Vol. 3, Leipzig: Heinsius, 590–912.

 

 

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Invisible Church? An Ecclesiological Idea Reconsidered

Christian faith has from its outset included a notion of relating to transcendent reality, to that which is beyond human experience. As sight plays a prominent role in human experience, the transcendent reality has typically been referred to as invisible – in contrast to the visible realities of this world. The center of this transcendent reality is God – invisible and still (paradoxically enough) associated with the phenomenon of light: he “dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see” (1 Tim 6:16).1 This notion also constitutes the concept of faith as the human ability to have knowledge about and relate to the transcendent, invisible reality: “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Heb 11:1). The knowledge of faith is not limited to the invisible, however, but is also a tool for understanding the visible world. In Hebrews 11, the statement of the relation of faith to “things not seen” is followed by a statement of faith as a key to the interpretation of the world, an interpretation that includes a relation between the visible and the invisible: “By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are not visible” (Heb 11:3). In the Letter to the Colossians this relation is understood in Christological terms, describing the historical figure Jesus as “the image of the invisible God” (Col 1:15). In the same passage he is also characterized as “the head of the body, the church” (Col 1:18), thus pointing to the ecclesiological relevance of this theme. Nothing in this text sanctions the later idea that the relation of the church to the invisible God through Christ should imply that the church itself can claim a similar invisibility. It rather seems to be part of those earthly realities that point beyond themselves to realities not seen. When the concept church (ekklesia) is mentioned in New Testament texts it simply refers to the fellowship of Christians. This fellowship is primarily understood as local groups of believers (e. g. 1 Cor 1:2; Gal 1:2), even if it is combined with the idea of the unity, and thus the singularity

1 All Bible references are taken from the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

 

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of the church (cf. the reference to the “church of God” in 1 Cor 15:9 and Gal 1:13) (Hans Küng: 1981, 79–87). This rather basic meaning of the church as the fellowship of Christians related to God in Christ was soon supplemented by a more advanced and complex understanding of the concept. As the church grew to include the teeming millions of the Roman Empire its identification became more ambiguous. In the doctrinal development the church not only continued to be the social context of Christian faith, but was also included in the content of this faith – as we find for instance in the Nicene Creed: “We believe in […] one holy, catholic, and apostolic church” (Robert Kolb/Timothy J. Wengert: 2000, 22f). As faith according to Hebrews 11:1 is “the conviction of things not seen”, the inclusion of the church among the objects of faith may draw the church in the direction of the invisible. A contribution in this direction is also the apparent mismatch between the qualities attributed to the church in the creed (e. g., one and holy) and the church in its actual state. This raises the question of whether the church in which belief is confessed is the actual empirical church, or some invisible reality beyond the empirical and visible. And if the church confessed is the invisible church, what then is the relationship between that church and the church we experience? The idea of an invisible church thus leads to a certain duality in the understanding of the concept church, between a visible and an invisible church, connected but still in some respects distinct from each other. Throughout the history of Christian theology the notion of the invisible church has played a prominent role as an ecclesiological idea. Although the concept has hardly any support in the New Testament, it has provided a conceptual framework for expressing important ecclesiological insights. Only in a strictly Biblicist thinking would such a concept be a priori illegitimate. In the context of systematic theology it should rather be judged by its function in a general ecclesiological framework. In spite of (or maybe rather because of) its prominent role, the notion of the invisible church is no unified concept, and it has been used with rather different meanings and given different functions within ecclesiology. Any discussion of the concept therefore has to take into account the different versions of the idea of the invisibility of the church. In the next section of this article I will present two examples of how the idea has been interpreted and utilized, as well as the theological concerns that lie behind the concept in each case. This should not be mistaken for a comprehensive overview of the different meanings of the concept, but only as a presentation of important examples. To my knowledge, the full “history of the invisible church” has yet to be written. I will then turn to some sociological perspectives on the question of the “invisibility” of social groups, before returning to the question as to whether the theological concerns behind the idea of the invisible church could be accommodated without recourse to so problematic a concept.

 

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1.

Two types of the invisible church

The following two examples of how the invisibility of the church has been articulated are not to be understood as covering all versions of the concept. They are intended as examples, albeit important and influential ones. Another important version of the idea of the invisible church which will not be treated here is that of the heavenly church as an invisible counterpart to the human church on earth (cf. Hegstad: 2013, 45–49).

1.1

Type 1: Its true members are unknown and thus the true church is invisible

The transformation of the church from a sect-like grouping to a religious institution for the populace at large posed serious challenges for ecclesiology. The mixture of committed and not-so-committed members in the same church organization raised the question of the true church in a new manner. Who were the true believers, and where was the true church? For Augustine this issue primarily plays upon the difference between the empirical church and the future “City of God”. While the present church includes both good and bad, the future church will be perfected and without any trace of evil. In the present church there are those who will not be part of the church in its perfected state. At the same time there are those who do not believe now but are destined to become part of the perfected church: She must bear in mind that among these very enemies are hidden her future citizens; and when confronted with them she must not think it a fruitless task to bear with their hostility until she finds them confessing the faith. In the same way, while the City of God is on pilgrimage in this world, she has in her midst some who are united with her in participation in the sacraments, but who will not join with her in the eternal destiny of the saints (Augustine: 1984, 45).

While the difference for Augustine between the two forms of church is based on divine predestination, for the Lutheran reformers the main question is where to find true faith as opposed to dead or false faith. While the real church consists of the real believers, the empirical church includes also those who only appear to believe and do not have true faith in their hearts. The notion of the true church “hidden” in the visible was developed as a response to two challenges. In the face of the Roman Catholic understanding of the church as an outward institution, the reformers held up the church as a fellowship of believers and of true faith. To the agitation of the radical reformers who wanted to establish a pure church, the

 

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reformers responded by stressing the indissoluble unity of the true church and the external community. Although distinguishing between the hidden church that cannot be seen, on the one hand, and the outer, visible church, on the other, Luther does not make any absolute distinction between the two, but regards them as qualities of the same church (Paul Althaus: 1966, 287–293; Werner Elert: 1965, 226–229; Gudrun Neebe: 1997, 215–44). The classic expression of this distinction is to be found in article VIII of the Augsburg Confession: Although the church is, properly speaking, the assembly of saints and those who truly believe, nevertheless, because in this life many hypocrites and evil people are mixed in with them, a person may use the sacraments even when they are administered by evil people. […] Both the sacraments and the Word are efficacious because of the ordinance and command of Christ, even when offered by evil people (Kolb/Wengert: 2000, 43).

The article accepts the validity of the church as a visible community, since the means of grace are administered in this context. As a fellowship gathered around Word and sacrament, this church consists of both those who have true faith in their hearts and those who do not. As such it hosts but is still not identical with the church “properly speaking” that includes only the saints and true believers. Melanchthon’s comments on this question in the Apology of the Augsburg Confession reveal that this distinction can be interpreted in various ways. Here he refers to the allegation made against the reformers that they understood the church as a “platonic republic” rather than as a reality. He ripostes that the reformers believe “this church truly exists, consisting of true believers and righteous people scattered through the entire world” (article VII–VIII, here VII–VIII, 20; Kolb/Wengert: 2000, 174–183, here 177). The church consists of specific people. In reality, however, these people do not constitute a distinct group, as the church is “principally an association of faith and the Holy Spirit in the hearts of persons”. At the same time it “has its external marks so that it can be recognized, namely, the pure teaching of the gospel and the administration of the sacraments in harmony with the gospel of Christ” (article VII–VII, 5; Kolb/Wengert: 2000, 174). Melanchthon thus tries to secure the connection between the two forms of church, at the same time confirming the inner and hidden church as church in the truest sense. Identifying the hidden church by reference to the invisible faith is widely represented in later Lutheran theology. An example of such an ecclesiological approach can be found in the dogmatics of the Danish theologian Regin Prenter. Prenter takes his point of departure in the Augsburg Confession’s understanding of the church to be a gathering of true believers as constituted by the Word and faith. While the Word is outward and visible, a believer’s faith remains invisible. This duality between the visible Word and invisible faith makes the church

 

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simultaneously visible and hidden: visible because the church is constituted by the Word, and hidden because the church is a community of the faithful (Prenter: 1967, 515–545). As regards the church as a communion, this to a large extent belongs in Prenter’s perspective to its hidden reality. The church’s visibility is primarily associated with the Word and sacrament as the visible sign of God’s grace: “It is manifest through the preaching of the word and the administration of the sacraments” (Prenter: 1967, 527). Thus the church becomes primarily visible through the administration of Word and sacrament by the ordained ministry. Prenter’s ecclesiology is a clear example of the potential of the idea of the invisibility of the church in legitimizing the institutional church, including the role of the pastor as the one responsible for preaching the Word and administering the sacraments. While the church as a community remains in the sphere of the inner and hidden, the church’s outer reality is primarily understood as an institutionally embedded facilitator of grace. While Prenter’s adoption of the reformer’s idea of the hidden church is brought forward to support the legitimacy of the institutional church, the notion has recently also been adduced in the debate on the so-called “folk church” in a Nordic setting, i. e. the role of the former Lutheran state churches in continuing to facilitate the religious life of the majority of the population (cf. Anne-Louise Eriksson/ Göran Gunner/Niclas Blåder: 2013). In an article on the future of the folk church, the Norwegian theologian Trygve Wyller identifies the invisible, hidden church as those who have received religious citizenship in baptism, and thus remain part of the church even if they do not participate in its activities or profess their faith. The visible church is valid only insofar as it supports and confirms this invisible church, and according to Wyller this should be an important criterion in the ongoing debate on the structure of the Church of Norway. An identification of the visible church as the real church would imply that it was becoming a sect rather than remaining a Lutheran church (Wyller: 2011). Even if Wyller refers to the traditional Lutheran understanding of the hidden church, he clearly turns it on its head. While the hidden church in the Augsburg Confession is a more restricted entity than the visible church (since not everyone in the visible church has true faith and does not belong to the hidden church), for Wyller the hidden church is a much wider entity than the visible church, including as it does those that do not (or very seldom) reveal their affiliation to it. While the notion of the invisible church in Prenter’s perspective serves as a legitimization for the institution of the church, Wyller’s understanding serves as an argument for the continued importance of the folk-church model, even when the empirical basis for this model is weakened. By resorting to the concept of the invisible church, the missing empirical basis serves rather as an argument for the superior theological value of the hidden reality.

 

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Type 2: The church is invisible as the body of Christ

An understanding of the invisible church based on the invisibility of (true) faith is not the only option for understanding the concept. In the 20th century an understanding of the church based on the New Testament image of the church as the body of Christ (cf. e. g. 1 Cor 12:27; Eph 1:23f; Col 1:18.24) has come to be rather influential in both Roman Catholic and Protestant theology. In Catholicism, this idea has served to counterbalance a fairly institutional understanding of the church (Dulles: 1987, 47–62). In Protestantism this ecclesiological motif has been advocated by such influential figures as Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth. Common to these approaches is an understanding of the church in analogy to the incarnation: as the body of Christ the church includes both the human and the divine. In his early work on ecclesiology Sanctorum Communio Bonhoeffer interprets the church Christologically, on the basis of the idea of it as the body of Christ. For him this means that the church is a form of existence for Christ himself, the church is Christus als Gemeinde existierend (“Christ existing as church-community”, Bonhoeffer: 1998, 141, 199, 214).2 This does not exclude an interest in describing the church as an empirical reality in the world, available for sociological investigation. At the same time, his understanding of the church as a form of Christ himself leads him to a certain duality in his understanding of the real church and the empirical church, between the church as Christ himself and the church as a fellowship of people. As the body of Christ, the church is invisible, as a social entity, it is visible: “The church is visible as a corporate social body in worship and in working-for-each-other. It is invisible as an eschatological entity, as the ‘body of Christ’” (Bonhoeffer: 1998, 141). In spite of this duality Bonhoeffer attempts to show how there is still a close connection between the two, and how the sociology of the church is of theological significance. The distinction is necessary owing to the sinfulness and imperfection of the visible church, which makes it necessary to distinguish between “the empirical and the essential church” (empirische und wesentliche Kirche; Bonhoeffer: 1998, 217). While holiness is an attribute of the invisible church, sinfulness is a mark of the visible: “Here we still walk in faith, which means we can see nothing but our sin, and accept our holiness in faith” (Bonhoeffer: 1998, 212). Not unlike Bonhoeffer, Karl Barth in his discussion of ecclesiology in Volume IV of Church Dogmatics is concerned to say something about the visible and empirical church.3 He argues against an ecclesiological docetism that does not 2 For more on Bonhoeffer’s understanding of the church in other works than Sanctorum Communio, see Green: 1999, and Nielsen: 1989. 3 The passages on ecclesiology can be found in § 62 (Barth: 1956), § 67 (Barth: 1958), and § 72 (Barth: 1965). Cf. the critical analysis in Healy: 1994.

 

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take seriously the visibility of the church. Just as the individual Christian lives his or her life in space and time, the church too exists, not as an abstract entity, but as a concrete fellowship of human beings in space and time, visible to all, he asserts (Barth: 1956, 653; Barth: 1965, 723f). Because of the church’s Christological foundation, this is not all that is to be said about its visibility. As the body of Christ, the church is Jesus’ earthly-historical form of existence (Barth: 1956, 661). This means that the church is not only visible, but at the same time invisible, just as the glorified Christ is visible only to the eyes of faith (Barth: 1956, 660f). Ecclesiology and Christology are thus analogous: just as Jesus as Son of God has assumed a human nature and entered the visible world, so has the church a visible and an invisible dimension, even if Barth admits that the analogy has its limitations (Barth: 1965, 722–730). In contrast to the understanding deriving from Augustine and Luther, this way of understanding the invisibility of the church shows little interest in the distinction between true and false members of the flock. The invisible church is thus not the invisible community of the true believers among the visible fellowship of the baptized, but rather the church in a certain abstraction from the people that belong to it. As the body of Christ, the church in this perspective seems to have a certain independent existence beyond its manifestations in the empirical world. The theological basis for this understanding is primarily the Christological analogy drawn from the New Testament image of the church as the body of Christ. We may certainly ask whether this image is taken too far when what originally seems to be a metaphor describing the concrete fellowship of the church is taken as a description of an invisible reality beyond any such fellowship. The sociological basis for such an understanding, at least as regards Bonhoeffer, is to be found in a way of thinking that allows social entities to be reified, i. e. given an ontological basis independent of the people that belong to them. Bonhoeffer explicitly subscribes to such an understanding when he introduces the notion of the “collective person” applied to social groups in general, and the church in particular. A collective person is a group entity that functions as an individual and is therefore ontologically independent. In this case Christ himself is the collective person of the church, which complicates any identification with the empirical church (Bonhoeffer: 1998, 76–80, 97–106). A Christological identification of the church as exemplified by Bonhoeffer and Barth might from one point of view be understood as a rather “high ecclesiology”: the church is not only human, but also has a divine aspect. However, by attributing all the weighty theological characteristics to the invisible church, little is left to be said about the visible. A high ecclesiology afforded to the invisible church leaves only a “low ecclesiology” for the visible church (cf. Nicholas M. Healy: 1994, 265).

 

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Harald Hegstad

A sociological perspective on the invisibility of the church

In the case of Bonhoeffer the understanding of the invisible church based on the analogy with Christology meant a reification of the church, i. e. an understanding of the church as an entity with an ontological status abstracted from the individuals that belong to it. In Bonhoeffer’s thinking this is a theological usage supported by a type of sociology that allows for such an understanding of social entities. In an article discussing the possibilities and limitations of Bonhoeffer’s early work, sociologist Peter L. Berger takes him to task for resorting to this type of abstract and non-empirical sociology. Bonhoeffer’s concept of social reality in Sanctorum Communio leads, according to Berger, to an extreme sociological realism, assigning social institutions a strange character of independent being. In contrast, Berger contends that such institutions only exist by virtue of human actions and human meaning, and have no separate and independent existence (Berger: 1963, in particular 76–78). Berger also raises an ethical argument against this kind of social ontology. To understand institutions as analogous to persons attributes to them a value in their own right. According to Berger, however, “no institutions can be of ethical significance in and of themselves, but only insofar as they serve and protect real persons – that is, real and individual human beings”. In Berger’s perspective, this also applies to the church (Berger: 1963, 78). His warning against assigning an independent ontological status to social institutions abstracted from real people (i. e. a reification) does not amount to a denial of the objectivity of social reality as such. Groups, institutions and societies do exist in the real world, not only the people who belong to them. As pointed out in the classical study on the sociology of knowledge which Berger wrote with Thomas Luckmann (Berger/Luckmann: 1971), the objectivity of human society is experienced in a variety of ways, e. g. when challenging social norms. In such a situation the reality of society is encountered through a wide range of measures, from mild forms of social control, to law enforcement through the police and penal system. Society’s objective reality does not, however, imply that it is accessible for direct observation in its totality. Human actions, individually or as a whole, are observable, as are material aspects of society, such as buildings, objects and documents. Society as such, however, is not accessible to direct observation – it remains in a certain sense “invisible”. According to Berger and Luckmann, the reality of society is constituted by the shared knowledge of society, knowledge broadly understood as including all forms of explicit and implicit, descriptive and normative ideas. Such knowledge is of societal significance to the extent that we share it with others. It is in fact shared knowledge that makes society possible. Society exists only because people share the idea that it exists. Being part of society means sharing in the knowledge of society (Berger/Luckmann: 1971).

 

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This understanding of the objective reality of society may very well be applied to the church as a social entity. From a social scientific perspective the church cannot be observed in its totality. In this sense the church is “invisible”, even if it still is an empirical reality. This “invisibility” is not special to the church, but applies to other groups and institutions as well as to society. There is thus no need to apply a special ontological or theological type of invisibility to the church in order to take this into account. This observation might also serve as a comment on Wyller’s attempt to utilize the idea of the invisible church to interpret and defend the folk-church model (cf. above; Wyller: 2011). Wyller’s concern is to include all the baptized in the understanding of the church, including those who seldom express their relation to it through word or practice. These church members are not as “visible” as those who might gather frequently for worship or are involved in church activities. Yet this does not make them “invisible” in any ontological sense. This group of church members is available for empirical investigation, quantitative or qualitative, as is frequently done by various studies within sociology of religion and other disciplines. Even if there is a genuine theological question as to how this group of church members should be evaluated and interpreted in an ecclesiological context, assigning them a specific ontological status different from other groups available for empirical research seems baseless and unnecessary. The “invisibility” of this group of church members is not ontologically different from the “invisible” aspects of other social formations. Like all social phenomena they are available for empirical, sociological investigation, even if no such research is able to cover all aspects of a phenomenon. As in all phenomena there will always remain a certain hiddenness – a hiddenness that belongs to the empirical world itself and does not imply a special theological category of hiddenness or invisibility.

3.

An ecclesiology of the visible: A constructive proposal

In its different versions the notion of the invisible church has played an important ecclesiological role. It has served important theological concerns, at the same time having the negative consequence of drawing theological attention away from the church as a concrete fellowship of people. Not surprisingly, the notion of the invisible church has been formed by the dominant thought forms of the time. In the philosophical frameworks utilized by theology over the centuries, including a heavy Platonic influence, distinctions between visible and invisible, the immanent and the transcendent, below and above, outer and inner, earthly and heavenly have quite naturally played an important role. In contemporary theology such thought forms have lost out to historical and empirical ways of thinking. A common trait among such influential theologi-

 

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ans as Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jürgen Moltmann and Robert Jenson is the focus of attention on God’s work in the world in history. In this line of thinking God’s relationship to the world is interpreted through the lens of eschatology, anchoring the salvation of the world in the future, not primarily in the transcendent. As the eschaton is anticipated in the acts of God in Christ, eschatology is a tool for interpreting the present. This historical-eschatological approach has served as a tool for renewed interpretation of various theological topics, such as the Trinity, soteriology, political theology and ecclesiology. In The Real Church (Hegstad: 2013), I have made use of the insights gained by this type of theological thinking for ecclesiology. The main thesis of the book is that the church in the theological sense is the church as it is experienced in the world, as a fellowship of people. The church as it exists in the world is the only church and the real church. This does not mean that a theological understanding of the church collapses into a subset of sociology. Theology has more to say about the church than what can be said from a purely empirical point of view. The difference between a sociological and a theological understanding of the church is not that they refer to different objects, sociology to the visible fellowship of people, theology to the invisible object of faith. Rather, the theological perspective means that the same (visible and empirical) object is understood in its relation to God in Christ, to his presence now, and his coming in the eschaton. The framework of this article does not allow a full elaboration of this thesis. I will therefore limit myself to relating it to the two understandings of the invisibility of the church presented above. Although I do not subscribe to either of them, they both represent important theological concerns that have to be taken into account in any ecclesiology. In the following I will try to identify these concerns and show how they can be accommodated within a framework that does not make use of the notion of the invisible church. Starting with the second model (represented by Bonhoeffer and Barth), its concern is to secure the close relationship between the church and God in Christ. This relationship is establishedby using the New Testament image of the church as the body of Christ, interpreted as a sort of identification of Christ and the Church. As Christ himself is not available for empirical observation, this means that the church as the body of Christ has to be an invisible reality. It is doubtful, however, whether the New Testament texts really justify this type of ontological identification. The concept “body of Christ” is clearly a metaphor and should not be interpreted literally. The meaning of the metaphor is to point to the intimate relationship between Christ and the church, defining the identity of the church and commissioning it as a tool for Christ’s work in the world. In the New Testament texts this image is used alongside other images such as the “temple of God” (2 Cor 6:14; Eph 2:20ff) (Jürgen Roloff: 1993, 100–110, 227–231; Robert J. Banks: 1980, 62–70; Hegstad: 2013, 25–30).

 

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Even though the concept of the body of Christ has a distinctive metaphorical aspect associated with it, it is important to stress that Paul undoubtedly wishes to say something about the reality to which the metaphor refers. In other words, it is more than just an illustration. What it seeks to illustrate is not some sort of divine (and invisible) quality of the church itself, but rather the intimate relationship between the human (and visible) church and the reality of the divine. This divine reality itself can of course not be located as an object in the empirical world. Even if God is present and at work in the world, the divine in itself is not available for observation. If the church has some sort of divine nature as well (as the Christological analogy suggests), this implies some sort of invisibility. If, however, we understand the church as fully human, and the relationship to the divine as the factor that makes it church in a theological sense, then the church itself remains fully visible while maintaining a relationship to the hidden reality of God himself. In Christian ecclesiology this relationship to the divine has been found in the presence of God when the church gathers for worship. A key text is the promise of Jesus in Matt 18:20: “For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them” (cf. Miroslav Volf: 1998, 135–137; Hegstad: 2013, 17–20). This text is of special interest for our inquiry, as it combines the concrete and empirical (“For where two or three are gathered in my name”) with a statement about the divine presence in the world (“I am there among them”). This perspective qualifies the church in a fundamental Christological way: it is the presence of Christ in the fellowship of believers that makes the church a theological reality. This Christological qualification is at the same time a Trinitarian qualification: in Jesus, God the Father is present. After Pentecost the presence of Jesus happens through the Holy Spirit. A similar understanding of the church as a human fellowship constituted by the presence of Jesus is expressed in article VII of the Augsburg Confession: “The church is the assembly of saints (congregatio sanctorum) in which the gospel is taught purely and the sacraments are administered rightly” (Kolb/Wengert: 2000, 43). The reference to Word and sacrament serves as a qualifier to the understanding of the presence of Jesus: it does not happen unmediated, but through certain core practices among those gathered, namely the reading and preaching of the gospel and the sacramental acts of baptism and eucharist. Related to the question of in-visibility, this leads to an understanding of the church as a visible fellowship, engaging in visible practices, pointing to an invisible reality beyond itself. This reality is not the church itself, not even an aspect of the church, but rather the divine reality that – in the perspective of faith – makes the church the body of Christ and the people of God. In this perspective, to believe in the church (as confessed in the creeds) does not imply a belief in the church as an invisible reality; it rather implies trust in the promise of divine presence in the visible fellowship. To believe in the church is to believe in the promise that Jesus is present among those who are gathered in his name.

 

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In the first model (Luther, Melanchthon, Prenter) the basic concern was to distinguish between true and false in the church, between those who are genuine believers and those who only have the outward appearance. Rather than establishing this distinction in the visible church through attempts at creating a “pure” church, the distinction is located in the “hearts” of the believers, thus making the true church the hidden fellowship of these true believers. Within a theological framework based on a historical-eschatological perspective, this concern may be met in a different manner. Rather than locating a church free from falsehood in the hearts of the believers, it may be understood in an eschatological perspective as an expression of the church’s relationship to the coming kingdom of God. In such a perspective, the difference and the relationship between the church and the kingdom of God serves as an important ecclesiological key (Wolfhart Pannenberg: 1998, 27–38; Küng: 1981, 54–55, 88–104). As an eschatological reality the kingdom of God is both a future and a present reality. It is already present in the world, though not yet fully realized. Ecclesiology too should be seen through the eschatological, already-and-not-yet interpretative lens. On the one hand, Jesus is already present in the church, on the other hand, the full fellowship between God and humanity in the kingdom is not yet here. A fellowship that gathers in Jesus’ name is thus an anticipation and a foretaste of the perfected human fellowship that is to be realized in the forthcoming kingdom of God (Hegstad: 2013, 30–34). The relationship between the church and the kingdom of God can be characterized by the two terms sign and anticipation. As a sign, the church points beyond itself to something else, something greater. In the church, the reality of the kingdom of God is anticipated. The fellowship with God in which humanity will participate at the final consummation is anticipated in the church, through the presence of Jesus among those who are gathered in his name. Pannenberg sums this up in the following manner: The church, then, is not identical with the kingdom of God. It is a sign of the kingdom’s future of salvation. It is so in such a way that this future of God is already present in it and is accessible to people through the church, through its proclamation and its liturgical life (Pannenberg: 1998, 37).

This anticipation of the fellowship of the kingdom of God within the church is typified by contradiction and ambivalence. The church manifests by its fellowship not only the fellowship of the kingdom, but also the fellowship of sinful humanity. Holiness and unholiness, belief and disbelief, will all exist side by side in the church until the final consummation. This shows the necessity of endorsing a fundamental eschatological reservation when it comes to the church as it exists now: not everything or everyone in the church will be part of that consumma-

 

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tion. Between the church and its final destination is the inevitability of judgment day. This judgment is not only an indicative of the world – of everything not being church – but also indicative of the church itself (cf. Matt 7:21ff; Luke 13:24–30; 1 Pet 4:17). In this perspective the distinction and tension between truth and falsehood, between holy and unholy, between unity and division, exists within the church as it is present here and now in the empirical world. These two sides of the church’s existence are presently inseparable, and what the church really is must therefore be understood from the eschatological point of view. Rather than understanding the notion of the church “properly speaking” (proprie, cf. the Augsburg Confession, article VIII; Kolb/Wengert: 2000, 43) as referring to a dichotomy between outer and inner, visible and invisible, it should be understood as the tension between the church in its present reality and as an anticipation of the fellowship of God’s kingdom. The point is not the difference between the idealized fellowship and the real fellowship, but that between the fellowship of the church as it is experienced here and now, and the fellowship that will one day be experienced in the perfect kingdom of God.

4.

Final remarks

The idea of the invisible church has played an important role throughout history. In this article I have presented two versions of the concept. Ideas of the invisibility of the church have served to secure important theological concerns, but have also had consequences for the understanding of the empirical, visible church. On the one hand, it has made theology less relevant in the understanding of the empirical church. When the real church is relegated to the invisible sphere, the visible church becomes the arena of pragmatic concerns. On the other hand, the empirical church has become less relevant for the theological understanding of the church, for ecclesiology in a dogmatic sense. Instead, ecclesiology has become a discussion of various ideas of the church – not the church itself. Overcoming this split would make ecclesiology more relevant for the understanding and practice of the empirical church, and the empirical church more relevant for ecclesiology. In order to bring this about, the basic question of the visibility versus the invisibility of the church has to be furnished with a satisfactory solution. In this article I have indicated a possible direction in this quest.

 

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Bibliography Althaus, Paul (1966), The Theology of Martin Luther, Philadelphia: Fortress Press. Augustine, Aurelius (1984), Concerning the City of God against the Pagans, trans. by H. Bettenson, London: Penguin Books. Banks, Robert J. (1980), Paul’s Idea of Community: The Early House Churches in Their Historical Setting, Exeter: The Paternoster Press. Barth, Karl (1956), Church Dogmatics IV/1, Edinburgh: T&T Clark. Barth, Karl (1958), Church Dogmatics IV/2, Edinburgh: T&T Clark. Barth, Karl (1965), Church Dogmatics IV/3.2, Edinburgh: T&T Clark. Berger, Peter L. (1963), Sociology and Ecclesiology, in Martin E. Marty (ed.), The Place of Bonhoeffer, London: SCM, 53–79. Berger, Peter L./Luckmann, Thomas (1971), The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge, London: Penguin Books. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1998), Sanctorum Communio: A Theological Study of the Sociology of the Church, Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works, vol. 1, Minneapolis: Fortress Press. Dulles, Avery (1987), Models of the Church, 2nd, ext. ed., New York: Doubleday. Elert, Werner (1965), Morphologie des Luthertums, 3rd ed., vol. 1, München: Beck. Eriksson, Anne-Louise/Gunner, Göran/Blåder, Niclas (ed.) (2012), Exploring a Heritage: Evangelical Lutheran Churches in the North, Eugene: Pickwick Publications. Green, Clifford J. (1999), Bonhoeffer: A Theology of Sociality, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Healy, Nicholas M. (1994), The Logic of Karl Barth’s Ecclesiology: Analysis, Assessment and Proposed Modifications, Modern Theology 10, 253–270. Hegstad, Harald (2013), The Real Church: An Ecclesiology of the Visible, Eugene: Pickwick Publications. Kolb, Robert/Wengert, Timothy J. (2000), The Book of Concord: The Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, Minneapolis: Fortress Press. Küng, Hans (1981), The Church, London: Search Press. Neebe, Gudrun (1997), Apostolische Kirche: Grundunterscheidungen an Luthers Kirchenbegriff unter besonderer Berücksichtigung seiner Lehre von den Notae Ecclesiae, Berlin: W. de Gruyter. Nielsen, Kirsten Busch (1989), Kirken, fællesskabet og teologien: Dietrich Bonhoeffers ekklesiologi, Frederiksberg: ANIS. Pannenberg, Wolfhart (1998), Systematic Theology, vol. III, Edinburgh: T&T Clark. Prenter, Regin (1967), Creation and Redemption, Philadelphia: Fortress Press. Roloff, Jürgen (1993), Die Kirche im Neuen Testament, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Volf, Miroslav (1998), After Our Likeness: The Church as the Image of the Trinity, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Wyller, Trygve (2011), Den skjulte og den synlige folkekirke: En aktuell ekklesiologisk og politisk utfordring, Norsk teologisk tidsskrift 112, 283–293.

 

Karina Juhl Kande

Die unsichtbare Kirche Eine Hauptspur in der Ekklesiologie Dietrich Bonhoeffers?

1.

Einleitung

Aktuelle europäische Diskussionen über die Möglichkeit einer Trennung von Kirche und Staat in säkularisierten Ländern, die bisher – oder bis vor kurzem – den verfassungsrechtlichen Schutz einer staatlich privilegierten Religion beibehalten haben, erfordern neue Überlegungen zum Konzept und zur Praxis der Kirche.1 Solche Überlegungen können in einem Dialog mit Dietrich Bonhoeffers (1906– 1945) Ekklesiologie Anregung und Bereicherung erfahren. Zwischen den beiden Weltkriegen hat man in Deutschland besonders intensiv über Rolle und Bedeutung der kirchlichen Gemeinschaft nachgedacht, was auch deutlich im zunehmend kritischen Zugang zum Kirchenbegriff in der evangelischen Theologie zum Ausdruck kam (Nielsen: 2012, 140f). In diesem Zusammenhang profiliert sich Bonhoeffer mit einem Kirchenverständnis, das einerseits das systematisch-theologische Denken vom Wesen der Kirche unlösbar mit der empirischen Kirche seiner Gegenwart verknüpft – und dieser somit eine immense Bedeutung zuspricht –, anderseits die kritische Dimension der theologischen Ekklesiologie keineswegs vernachlässigt (vgl. Nielsen: 2009, 323). Die Unterscheidung zwischen Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit in Bezug auf die Kirche ist ein Grundthema protestantischer Theologie.2 Zwar sind die historischen und politischen Kontexte der Reformation, des Kirchenkampfes im Dritten Reich und des heutigen Europa nicht vergleichbar, aber völlig unabhängig vom 1 Die dänische Volkskirche, d.h. die evangelisch-lutherische Kirche Dänemarks, genießt nach verfassungsrechtlicher Bestimmung staatliche Unterstützung. In Norwegen wurde Mai 2012 eine Änderung des Grundgesetzes beschlossen, die bisher offizielle Religion des Landes aufhob und die norwegische Kirche mit anderen Glaubensgemeinschaften rechtlich gleichstellte. In Schweden wurden Staat und Kirche im Jahre 2000 getrennt. 2 Weiterhin unübertroffen ist Albrecht Ritschls Untersuchung der Geschichte dieser Unterscheidung von 1859 (Ritschl: 1893; vgl. Großhans: 2007). Bonhoeffer weist in Sanctorum Communio zwar auf diese Untersuchung hin, ohne jedoch selbst näher auf sie einzugehen (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 150, Anm. 92).

 

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geschichtlichen Zusammenhang geht es bei dieser Differenzierung ganz grundsätzlich darum, die Freiheit der Kirche zu erhalten. Luther bestreitet, kurz gesagt, dass die Kirche von äußeren Dingen bestimmt oder bedingt sein könne und betont entsprechend ihre Unsichtbarkeit (WA 6, 296f). Bonhoeffer möchte seinerseits die Historizität der Kirche, und damit die konkrete Wirklichkeit der Inkarnation, wahren und hebt demgemäß die empirische Sichtbarkeit der Kirche hervor. Im gegenwärtigen Europa führt wiederum die Tendenz, aus der Unsichtbarkeit auf Nichtexistenz und Wirkungslosigkeit zu schließen, die kirchlichen Gemeinschaften dazu, sich entschlossen – und sichtbar – zu profilieren. Nicht zuletzt vor dem aktuellen Hintergrund einer Kultur der ausdrücklich geforderten Sichtbarkeit ist die Frage nach dem Selbstverständnis der Kirche auch heute noch mit der klassischen Unterscheidung zwischen sichtbarer und unsichtbarer Kirche eng verbunden. Der vorliegende Artikel untersucht Dietrich Bonhoeffers ekklesiologische Schriften im Hinblick auf die Sichtbar/Unsichtbar-Dichotomie in der Absicht festzustellen, inwiefern diese reformatorische Unterscheidung auch in seinem Werk zur Geltung kommt. Dass Bonhoeffer stets auf der entscheidenden Bedeutung der geschichtlich-empirischen Kirche beharrte, hat seiner Theologie nicht zuletzt auch in kirchentheoretischer Hinsicht bleibenden Wert gesichert. In seinen frühen ekklesiologischen Schriften3 vertritt Bonhoeffer den Grundsatz, dass die Kirche nur von innen verstanden werden könne. Die Wirklichkeit der Kirche ist hier Kern seines theologischen Denkens, und er definiert die Kirche gar als „Christus als Gemeinde existierend“ (z.B. Bonhoeffer: 1994b, 269, 271f; Bonhoeffer: 2005, 139, 142, 159). Diese Position ist als Bonhoeffers „ekklesiologischer Maximalismus“ beschrieben worden (Nielsen: 2009, 323ff; Nielsen: 2012, 146; vgl. Lange: 1967, 520, 523, 541). Im Gegensatz zu seinen universitätstheologischen Schriften, die, trotz ihres ekklesiologischen Maximalismus, ein eher theoretisches Verhältnis zur Kirche aufweisen, sind die Schriften seiner mittleren Periode von einer gewissen Innerlichkeit und Spiritualität geprägt. Bonhoeffer liest nun die Bibel mit anderen Augen, in seinen Schriften ruft er zum Gehorsam auf und fordert von der kirchlichen Gemeinschaft die Nachfolge Christi, eine Nachfolge, die letztlich zur Absage an die Welt führen würde (Bonhoeffer: 1994a).4 3 In der Forschung wird Bonhoeffers Schaffen üblicherweise in drei Perioden eingeteilt: in den ‚frühen‘ (bis 1932/33), den ‚mittleren‘ (bis 1939) und den ‚späten‘ Bonhoeffer (u.a. Bethge: 1967, 761f; Nielsen: 2010, 21); diese Einteilung ist auch in Bezug auf seine Ekklesiologie durchaus sinnvoll. 4 In der Forschung ist gar von Bonhoeffers „Wendung“ vom Theologen zum Christen (z.B. Bethge: 1967, 246ff; vgl. Pfeifer (2008) die Rede. Für eine sorgfältige Untersuchung von dem Verhältnis von Kirche und Welt in Bonhoeffers ekklesiologischen Schriften in den Jahren 1935–1945, vgl. Gütter (2000).

 

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Im Zuge des Kirchenkampfes verschiebt sich jedoch das Interesse. In den späten Schriften verschärft sich zusehends die kirchenkritische Position, und Bonhoeffer formuliert seinen berühmten Begriff der „Kirche für andere“, demzufolge die Kirche nur Kirche ist, wenn sie für andere da ist (Bonhoeffer: 1998b, 560). Jetzt steht die Wirklichkeit Christi im Zentrum seiner theologischen Überlegungen, und die Nachfolge führt nun nicht mehr die Christen aus der Welt hinaus, sondern zu vollem diesseitigem Engagement. Trotz offensichtlichen und entscheidenden Akzentverschiebungen und Wandlungen in Bonhoeffers Kirchenverständnis behält die Ekklesiologie stets einen zentralen Platz in seinem theologischen Denken. Auch als sein Verständnis von Kirche als Raum der Offenbarung Gottes sich immer mehr auf das Kreuz als Ort der Offenbarung in der Welt verlagert, verliert Bonhoeffer die Kirche nicht aus dem Blick (siehe dazu Harasta: 2011, 243–276). Meine These lautet nun, dass die Kirche in ihrer Unsichtbarkeit bei Bonhoeffer ebenso konkret zu verstehen ist wie in ihrer Sichtbarkeit, und zwar in dem Sinne, dass die Dialektik zwischen sichtbar und unsichtbar das simul der Kirche konstituiert.5

2.

Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit der Kirche beim frühen Bonhoeffer

Bonhoeffer versteht sich in erster Linie als lutherischer Theologe – das zeigt sich nicht zuletzt an seinem Kirchenverständnis: Die Kirche ist Geschöpf des Wortes Gottes, creatura verbi divini. Die Kirche hat, so Bonhoeffer, ihre Einheit von Zeit und Ewigkeit, Möglichkeit und Wirklichkeit, Göttlichem und Menschlichem in Christus – also im Wort Gottes, so wie es in der Geschichte wirksam ist, und deswegen kann Bonhoeffer unter Berufung auf Luther erklären, dass das Wort „die Brücke von der unsichtbaren zur sichtbaren Kirche hinüber“ schlage (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 277). Das Wort Gottes ist sozusagen die tragende Mitte von sichtbarer und unsichtbarer Kirche. Bei Bonhoeffer sind Christologie und Ekklesiologie unlösbar miteinander verwoben, in seinen frühsten Schriften identifiziert Bonhoeffer nahezu Christus und Gemeinde, insofern er – wie bereits erwähnt – Kirche wiederholt als „Christus als Gemeinde existierend“ definiert (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 139, 142, 159). Diese Formulierung gründet in Bonhoeffers Verständnis der Kirche als Offenbarungs5 Mit diesem Bezug auf eine aus Luthers Rechtfertigungslehre stammenden Formel möchte ich keineswegs ekklesiologische Begriffe mit soteriologischen Begriffen vermengen, sondern allein die paradoxe Einheit beschreiben, die Bonhoeffer durch seine doppelte Perspektive auf die konkrete Kirche seiner Gegenwart darstellt: „Was Kirche ‚ist‘, lässt sich nur sagen, wenn man zugleich sagt, was sie vom Menschen her ist und was sie von Gott her ist“ (Bonhoeffer: 1997, 235). Darauf werde ich später noch zurückkommen.

 

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realität. Ganz essentiell für seinen Kirchenbegriff ist die Kirche ein für alle Mal in Christus realisiert worden und alle, die zur Kirche gehören, sind von Ewigkeit her in Christus auserwählt. Diese Realisierung der Kirche geschieht in dem stellvertretenden Handeln, das Gott in Christus vollzieht, in Menschwerdung, Kreuzigung und Auferstehung. Dabei entsteht die Kirche als die neue Menschheit, die in Christus erschaffen ist – oder anders formuliert: die Menschheit wird nicht nur durch Christi Handeln, sondern in Christus selbst mit Gott versöhnt – und weil die Versöhnung ein für alle Mal geschehen ist, ist auch die in Christus offenbarte Kirche in ihrem Wesen vollkommen. Sie ist Leib Christi, und in ihr ist Christus in seinem Geist in der Welt anwesend. Mit seiner engen Verknüpfung von Christologie und Ekklesiologie betont Bonhoeffer, dass die Kirche von Gott in die Welt „gesetzt“ worden ist, und rückt damit die Frage nach der Kirche als Glaubensgegenstand und Kirche als konkrete, sichtbare Gemeinschaft ganz in den Vordergrund. Weil Gottes Wille sich nun an den konkreten, historischen Menschen richtet, müsse, so Bonhoeffer, die wesentliche, bereits in Christus realisierte Kirche auch an einem geschichtlichen Ort tatsächlich sichtbar und so in der Geschichte als empirische Kirche verwirklicht und aktualisiert werden. Offenbarung ist Anfang und Vollendung zugleich, und so sprengt Gottes Offenbarung für Bonhoeffer die rein geschichtliche Zeitform (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 88f). Obgleich die Kirche zwar eine geschichtliche Entwicklung durchläuft, lässt sie sich nicht auf die bloße Möglichkeit zukünftiger Gottesgemeinschaft reduzieren, sondern muss gleichfalls als eine (sich durch den heiligen Geist durchsetzende) Realität verstanden werden, wenn ernst genommen wird, dass Gottes Wort wirklich in die Geschichte eingetreten ist. Dies ist ein Punkt, mit dem Bonhoeffer sich als lutherischer Theologe vom reformierten Karl Barth abhebt, mag er ansonsten auch noch so stark von ihm beeinflusst sein (Pangritz: 2008, 219). Barth besteht auf dem so genannten extra calvinisticum, insofern er der Ansicht ist, dass das Endliche nicht das Unendliche beinhalten könne. Dahingegen vertritt Bonhoeffer mit Luther die Auffassung, dass das Endliche, also die menschliche Natur, sehr wohl das Unendliche, also das Wort Gottes, in sich fassen könne – nur nicht aus eigener Kraft, sondern Kraft des Unendlichen.6 Vor diesem Hintergrund wird deutlich, dass Bonhoeffer die Kirche als unsichtbar-realisiert und sichtbar-aktualisiert zugleich versteht, wenngleich er selbst eher von wesentlicher und empirischer Kirche spricht. Obwohl Bonhoeffer stets um ein konkretes und empirisches Verständnis der Kirche bemüht ist, bleibt die Spannung zwischen ‚sichtbar‘ und ‚unsichtbar‘ in seinen ekklesiologischen Schriften bestehen, und man möchte vermuten, dass Bonhoeffer ein ganz bestimmtes Ver-

6 „Finitum capax infiniti non per se sed per infinitum“ (Bonhoeffer: 1997, 332).

 

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ständnis von der Unsichtbarkeit der Kirche ausschließen möchte. In Sanctorum Communio, seiner Doktorarbeit von 1927/30, geht Bonhoeffer folgendermaßen auf die Unterscheidung von Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit der Kirche ein: Die Gefahr des Begriffs der Unsichtbarkeit der Kirche liegt besonders darin, dass die sichtbare, d. h. empirische Kirche nicht für Kirche gehalten wird, während unsichtbar hier gar nicht im Gegensatz zum optisch Sichtbaren gebraucht ist, vielmehr als Bezeichnung des Wesens eines Gegenstandes, sei es des Denkens oder der optischen Anschaulichkeit. Die ‚wesentliche‘ Kirche wird optisch in der empirischen sichtbar, man sieht ihre Glieder ganz konkret. In der Eigenschaft als solche Glieder aber sieht sie nur der Glaube […]. Die ‚unsichtbare‘ Kirche ist von vornherein sichtbar. Nur von einer dem Wesen mehr oder weniger entsprechenden Gestaltung der empirischen Form kann gesprochen werden. Unsichtbare und sichtbare Kirche sind Eine Kirche (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 150, Anm. 92).

Die Unsichtbarkeit der Kirche hervorzuheben, birgt für Bonhoeffer mit anderen Worten die Gefahr, dass man zwei Aspekte der Kirche als Gegensätze auffasst und gegeneinander ausspielt und so schließlich die empirische Kirche nicht mehr als wirkliche Kirche anzuerkennen vermag. Bonhoeffer ist im Allgemeinen skeptisch gegenüber aller abstrakten oder philosophischen Theologie, und so betont er, dass gerade die empirische Kirche die wirkliche Kirche sei, da die Unterscheidung zwischen sichtbar und unsichtbar nur dem Wesen und der Gestalt einer und derselben Kirche gelten kann.7 Entscheidend am angeführten Zitat ist jedoch die Bemerkung zur Funktion des Glaubens. Der Glaube sieht etwas, was für das natürliche Sehvermögen nicht sichtbar ist. Der Glaube sieht die Angehörigen der Kirche in ihrer Eigenschaft als Glieder des Leibes Christi, und diese Sehweise des Glaubens konstituiert damit ein neues Sein.

2.1

Die Sehweise des Glaubens

Nicht selten setzt Bonhoeffer den Glauben in Gegensatz zu dem, was sich sehen lässt. So heißt es zum Beispiel in den Hörernachschriften einer Vorlesungsreihe, die Bonhoeffer in 1932 über das Wesen der Kirche gehalten hat: „Die geglaubte Gestalt der Kirche ist die echte Gestalt. Sie kann nur geglaubt werden, [sie] ist nie

7 Bonhoeffer bezieht sich hier auf Luther, der laut Bonhoeffer die sichtbare und die unsichtbare Kirche so miteinander verbindet, „wie Leib und Seele zusammen sind“ (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 150, Anm. 92; Luther: WA 6, 296f). Streng genommen ist seine Verwendung des Luther-Zitats etwas unpräzise, da Luther mit seinem Vergleich darstellen wollte, wie die christliche Gemeinde in ihrem Inneren in einem Glauben, aber nicht unbedingt an einem Ort versammelt ist (vgl. Nielsen: 2012, 150).

 

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sichtbar […]. Christus als Gemeinde existierend ist nicht anschaubar, sondern [nur] glaubbar!“ (Bonhoeffer: 1994b, 262. 272 [Hervorhebung im Original]). Was hier Bonhoeffers Betonung der konkreten sichtbaren Kirche zu widersprechen scheint, kann nur durch die, bereits erwähnte, vom Wort Gottes gestiftete Einheit der Kirche erklärt werden. Der Glaube richtet sich nicht auf irgendeine unsichtbare Kirche, eine civitas platonica, sondern darauf, dass die empirische Kirche, in der Wort und Sakrament verwaltet werden, wirklich Christi Kirche ist und Gottes Geist in ihr als solcher aktiv wirkt (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 191f). Der Glaube an das Wort Gottes ist der Schlüssel zur Einheit. Was optisch sichtbar in Erscheinung tritt, ist tatsächlich die wesentliche Kirche, so wie sie sich in der Geschichte verkörpert. Aber um wissen zu können, dass dem so ist, bedarf es des Glaubens. Ohne Glauben ist das, was wir erblicken – Kirchengebäude, Gemeinde, Rituale – nichts anderes als ein Gemenge soziologischer und kultureller Gebilde und Größen; eine religiöse Gemeinschaft, die sich von verschiedenen wissenschaftlichen Disziplinen beschreiben lässt. Das heißt, dass die Kirche Gottes nur sichtbar ist, wenn die Forderung der Kirche, Gottes Kirche zu sein, ernst genommen wird. Wenn man die Kirche als Kirche des Staates, des Volkes, des Pfarrers oder der Gemeinde betrachtet, hat man diejenige Kategorie verlassen, unter der sich, laut Bonhoeffer, das Wesen der Kirche allein verstehen lässt, nämlich die theologische Kategorie des Glaubens. Deswegen gilt der Glaube auch der sichtbaren, empirischen Kirche, eben diese muss als Kirche Gottes geglaubt werden – oder mit anderen Worten: Glaubensgegenstand ist nach Bonhoeffer die eine sichtbare und unsichtbare Kirche, nicht eine inmitten der sichtbaren Kirche angesiedelte unsichtbare Kirche. Der Mensch vermag nicht von sich aus die empirische Kirche als die wesentliche Kirche Christi zu erkennen, diese Fähigkeit oder Eigenschaft verleiht der Glaube allein. Mit der engen Verknüpfung von Christologie und Ekklesiologie betont Bonhoeffer, dass die Kirche keine zweitrangige Offenbarung bildet, sondern genau das ist, was in Christus offenbart ward.8 Was von der konkreten Anwesenheit und Erkennbarkeit Gottes im Menschen Jesus gesagt werden kann, lässt sich auch von der Kirche sagen – nämlich dass die Erkenntnis trotz der Sichtbarkeit eine Glaubensaussage bleibt (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 192). Die Kirche kann nur von innen erkannt werden, da der Glaubende als solcher in Christus, d.h. in der Kirche steht. Der Glaube ist bei Bonhoeffer einerseits, was im Gegensatz zum Sichtbaren steht, anderseits ist der Glaube jedoch auch, was den Menschen sehend macht. Der Glaube bildet eine andere Kategorie, ein anderes Koordinatensystem, und er besitzt eine eigene Erschließungskompetenz – eine besondere Fähigkeit, die Wirklichkeit aufzuschließen. In seiner Habilitationsschrift Akt und Sein von 1930/31 8 Zur Diskussion von Stärken und Schwächen in Bonhoeffers Verbindung von Christologie und Ekklesiologie, siehe Huber: 1983, 173f, 202 f.

 

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benutzt Bonhoeffer die altprotestantische Unterscheidung von actus directus und actus reflexus bzw. fides directa und fides reflexa, um die Problematik von konkretem Glauben und Theologie zu entfalten (Bonhoeffer: 1988, 23, 158ff).9 Wo der actus directus den Glaubensakt bezeichnet, der eine unvermittelte und intentionale Ausrichtung auf Christus darstellt, meint der actus reflexus einen Glaubensakt, auf den reflektiert wird und der sich als solcher nicht vom religiösen Akt – wie zum Beispiel die Rituale des geregelten Gottesdienstes – unterscheidet. Der große Unterschied liegt darin, dass Gott selbst souverän den actus directus im Menschen schafft, wohingegen der actus reflexus auch vom Menschen hervorgerufen werden kann und somit an sich keinen rechtfertigenden Glauben darstellt. Im gottgewirkten Glaubensakt glaubt der Mensch an Christus, und das Ich des Glaubens – das nicht allein das Ich des Menschen, sondern auch Gottes ist – ist nur in diesem Akt, doch niemals als etwas Vorfindliches, das sich reflektieren ließe. Das heißt, in der Reflexion über den Glauben wird nicht geglaubt, denn hier ist das Ich des Glaubens nicht, es entzieht sich der Objektivierung. Bonhoeffer schreibt: „So weiß ich nur im Glauben an Christus, dass ich glaube (bezw. hier weiß ich es nicht), und auf diesen reflektierend weiß ich nichts“ (Bonhoeffer: 1988, 88 [Bonhoeffers Rechtschreibung]). Bonhoeffer operiert also mit einem aktiv partizipierenden Glaubensbegriff: Der Mensch befindet sich als Glaubender immer schon in der Kirche, in Christus, und der Glaube bildet sozusagen die ontologische Gegebenheit des gemeinschaftlichen Seins in Christus. Glaube bezieht sich auf Sein, und Sein ist nur im Glauben, so Bonhoeffer, und somit ist der Glaube als „Seinsweise“ des Seins in Christus zu verstehen (Bonhoeffer: 1988, 113–121, hier 119).10 Wie das Auge sich selbst nicht sieht, so sieht auch der Glaube nicht sich selbst, sondern schaut allein auf Christus.

3.

Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit der Kirche beim mittleren Bonhoeffer

In einem Aufsatz über die kirchliche Gemeinschaft schreibt Bonhoeffer 1936: „Aber der Glaube, der seines Heils in der sichtbaren Kirche allein gewiss geworden ist, preist die Wunderbarkeit dieses Heils gerade darin, dass er nun auch noch von einem Sein der Kirche jenseits der offenbaren Heilskirche zu reden wagt“ 9 Die Unterscheidung zwischen actus directus und actus reflexus (bzw. fides directa und fides reflexa) ist in Bonhoeffers gesamten Schaffen nachweisbar, beim mittleren Bonhoeffer wird der Glaube als actus directus jedoch gern mit Nachfolge identifiziert (Feil: 2005, 39, 83). 10 Es sollte erwähnt werden, dass Bonhoeffer in Akt und Sein ganz grundliegende philosophische und theologische Themen berührt, deren vielschichtige Probleme – z.B. ontologischer Art – Bonhoeffers knappe und gezielte Ausführungen nicht immer gerecht zu werden vermag (vgl. Nielsen 2010, 252).

 

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(Bonhoeffer: 1996a, 679). Steht der Mensch in der empirischen Kirche, kann er es wagen, von der Kirche als von etwas zu sprechen, das auch jenseits der sichtbaren Kirche existiert. Die Existenz der Kirche jenseits der sichtbaren ist die Kirche in eschatologischer Perspektive, in der die Gemeinschaft zwischen Gott und Kirche ihre Vollendung erlangt hat. Diese Perspektive ist für Gott in jedem Stadium der Heilsgeschichte sichtbar, für den endlichen Menschen in Zeit und Welt bleibt diese Perspektive jedoch etwas, das von einer Position innerhalb der empirischen Kirche her geglaubt werden muss (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 190). Nach Bonhoeffers Darstellung in Sanctorum Communio ist die Kirche durch Christi stellvertretendes Handeln für den Menschen „realisiert“, d.h. sie ist in Christus schon vollendet, von Gott „gesetzt“, obwohl sie in der Geschichte erst aktualisiert werden muss – was durch den heiligen Geist erfolgt (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 88f, 96). Damit wird die Stellvertretung zum Kriterium der kirchlichen Gemeinschaft. Die Glieder der Kirche sind als solche in Christus, und tragen als sein Leib miteinander die Struktur der Stellvertretung. Das heißt, dass sie nur zusammen als Leib Christi eine Einheit bilden: „Die Einheit der Kirche als Struktur ist hergestellt ‚vor‘ allem Wissen und Wollen der Glieder, sie ist nicht Ideal, sondern Wirklichkeit“ (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 133). Durch das Wirken des Heiligen Geistes leben die Gemeindeglieder ein Leben, das innerhalb der Struktur der Stellvertretung ein Leben füreinander bedeutet, ein Leben, das sie durch Taten der Liebe verwirklichen. Obwohl der Glaube, dass Christus den Menschen mit Gott versöhnt hat, der Glaube des einzelnen Menschen ist, richtet sich der Glaube als actus directus nach außen, auf Gott und den Nächsten. Das ist nicht zuletzt insofern schlüssig, als Individualität verstanden als Isolation für Bonhoeffer unter die Kategorie der Sünde fällt, also jene Verkrümmtheit in sich ausmacht, die für Luther (mit Augustinus) das Wesen der Sünde bildet. Die Struktur der Kirche als stellvertretendes Handeln wird in den Taten der Liebe unter den Gemeindegliedern sichtbar, und das gemeinsame Leben der Gemeinde in der Nachfolge Christi ist sichtbares Zeugnis der unsichtbaren Kirche, so wie Verkündigung des Wortes und die Sakramente sichtbare Zeichen der unsichtbaren Wirklichkeit der Kirche darstellen. Eben weil das Leben der Kirche für Bonhoeffer kein idealistisches Konzept darstellt, sondern konkrete Wirklichkeit, ist es ihm auch so wichtig, dass das Leben im Glauben eine konkrete und sichtbare Ausgestaltung erhält. Dies betont er bereits 1927 in Sanctorum Communio; 1937, in Nachfolge, rückt diese Hervorhebung in den Vordergrund wie auch in Gemeinsames Leben von 1939, mit seiner Beschreibung des gemeinschaftlichen Lebens im Predigerseminar, das Bonhoeffer für die Bekennende Kirche in Finkenwalde leitete. In Nachfolge heißt es von Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit der Gemeinde:

 

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Die Nachfolgenden sind die sichtbare Gemeinde, ihre Nachfolge ist ein sichtbares Tun, durch das sie sich aus der Welt herausheben – oder es ist eben nicht Nachfolge. Und zwar ist die Nachfolge so sichtbar wie Licht in der Nacht, wie ein Berg in der Ebene. Flucht in die Unsichtbarkeit ist Verleugnung des Rufes [Jesu Christi]. Gemeinde Jesu, die unsichtbare Gemeinde sein will, ist keine nachfolgende Gemeinde mehr (Bonhoeffer: 2008, 113).

Die Kirche oder Gemeinde, die sich in Unsichtbarkeit zurückzieht, also kein Leben führt, das sich als Zeugnis vom verborgenen Wesen der Kirche verstehen lässt, folgt nicht ihrem Ruf.

3.1

Die Blickrichtung von oben

Wie bereits erwähnt ist Offenbarung für Bonhoeffer stets Anfang und Vollendung zugleich. Die vollendete Kirche ist für den endlichen Menschen nicht sichtbar, sondern nur glaubbar. Für Gott jedoch ist die Kirche in Vollendungsperpektive in jedem geschichtlichen Stadium sichtbar, so wie sie schließlich, am Ende aller Zeiten, auch für die Glaubenden sichtbar werden soll: „Wir wandeln im Glauben. Aber wir werden schauen – nicht nur Gott, sondern auch seine Gemeinde […], nicht mehr nur glauben, sondern schauen“ (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 198). Hier löst sich der Gegensatz von Glauben und Schauen. Der Glaube wird in eschalogischer Perspektive im Schauen aufgenommen, wenn die Kirche, die für Bonhoeffer Reich Christi ist, in das Reich Gottes aufgenommen wird. Wenn nun aber Bonhoeffer von der fides directa behauptet, dass sie sich nur auf Christus richtet, und zugleich, dass der Glaubende sein Sein in der Kirche, als Glied des Leibes Christi, hat, dann richtet sich der Blick des Glaubens freilich auch auf die Gemeinschaft der Glaubenden. So wird verständlich, dass der Glaube die empirische Kirche als wesentliche Kirche und die Angehörigen der sichtbaren Kirche in ihrer Eigenschaft als Mitglieder der unsichtbaren Kirche, des Leibes Christi, sehen kann. Der aktiv partizipierende Glaube des Menschen ist fähig, Zusammenhänge zu sehen, die „eigentlich nur für Gott sichtbar“ sind und, wie Bonhoeffer schreibt, einzig „in der Blickrichtung von oben“ festgestellt werden können (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 138f). Trotzdem gibt es Dinge, in die Menschen in der Geschichte – theologisch gesehen – keine Einsicht haben können, die nur aus der Perspektive Gottes sichtbar sind, wie zum Beispiel, wer tatsächlich zur wesentlichen Kirche gehört und wer nicht. Das ist die Kirche coram deo. Deswegen erwägt Bonhoeffer auch die Möglichkeit, dass „Gott christliche Kirche auch dort sieht, wo wir sie nicht sehen“ (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 148). Dass die Kirche für Bonhoeffer zugleich sichtbar und unsichtbar ist, hat, wie wir gesehen haben, mit dem eschatologischen Vorbehalt der Kirche zu tun (Bon-

 

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hoeffer: 2005, 87). Sie ist, wie Bonhoeffer es formuliert, ein für alle Mal in Christus realisiert, muss aber in der Geschichte durch das Wirken des Heiligen Geistes aktualisiert werden und wird schließlich erst eschatologisch vollendet sein. Hierin ist, mit einem eingestandenermaßen etwas schiefem Vergleich, der Total- und Partialaspekt des Lutherischen simul justus et peccator wiederzuerkennen. In der Rechtfertigungslehre Luthers ist der Mensch als Glaubender ganz gerechtfertigt und als Mensch in der Welt ganz Sünder; er lebt in dem Spannungsfeld zwischen „schon jetzt“ und „noch nicht“, und die Heiligung folgt der Rechtfertigung als zeitlicher Prozess. So verstanden bildet die Heiligung keinen Zusatz zur Rechtfertigung, sondern ihre dynamische Entfaltung, die sich durch das Wirken des Heiligen Geistes im Menschen vollzieht. In Bonhoeffers Kirchenverständnis ist die Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit der Kirche auch eine Totalbestimmung; die Kirche ist sichtbar als religiöse Gemeinschaft, und sie ist unsichtbar als Leib Christi (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 87). Die Kirche ist Offenbarungsgestalt und als solche keine zusätzliche Offenbarung; die Aktualisierung in der Geschichte folgt als dynamische Entfaltung der einmaligen Realisierung in Christus. So lässt sich, wie einleitend thesenhaft dargestellt wurde, die Dialektik zwischen sichtbar und unsichtbar als das simul der Kirche beschreiben, insofern der Lutherische simul-Gedanke eine klare Unterscheidung in einer vollkommenen Einheit darstellt. Da die Kirche in der Zeit existiert, leben auch ihre Glieder weiterhin unter der Sünde. Es gibt, laut Bonhoeffer, eine sündige Gemeinschaft, peccatorum communio, die in der Gemeinschaft der Gläubigen, sanctorum communio, weiterlebt (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 77, 140ff). Die Kirche lebt inkognito in der Zeit, sie ist nur rein in eschatologischer Perspektive, und deswegen können ihre Glieder auch nicht selber feststellen, wer tatsächlich und wer nur scheinbar zur Kirche gehört. Die Erfahrungen, die man in der religiösen Gemeinschaft macht, werden im Glauben als Erfahrungen mit dem Leib Christi gedeutet. Nur im Glauben sieht man den anderen Menschen als Mitglied des Leibes Christi: Denn jeder Mensch, für den das Evangelium gepredigt wird, ist potentiell ein von Christus in Ewigkeit Auserwählter, was jedoch erst im Jenseits sichtbar werden wird (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 190ff). Deswegen laufen Möglichkeit und Wirklichkeit im Glauben an das Wort Gottes zusammen, genau wie sichtbare und unsichtbare Kirche ihre Einheit und tragende Mitte in Christus haben.

4.

Sichtbarkeit und Unsichtbarkeit der Kirche beim späten Bonhoeffer

Bonhoeffers kirchenkritische Position verschärft sich, wie eingangs erwähnt, zusehends in seinen späteren Schriften, während die konkrete Kirche seiner Zeit

 

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in den Hintergrund seines ekklesiologischen Denkens rückt. Damit sagt sich Bonhoeffer aber nicht von der Kirche los, ganz im Gegenteil muss gerade seine Kritik als Ausdruck tiefster Verbundenheit mit der Kirche verstanden werden. Dieser Umstand tritt nicht zuletzt in den persönlichen Schriften und Rundbriefen deutlich zutage, die Bonhoeffer während des Krieges im Kirchenkampf schreibt, als sich die Bekennende Kirche intra muros unabwendbar zersplittert (vgl. Bonhoeffer: 1996b). Hier erklärt Bonhoeffer unter anderem, dass es nicht Aufgabe der Kirchenmitglieder sein könne, die Kirche zu reformieren oder zu erneuern, sondern lediglich zu vermeiden, der genuinen Erneuerung der Kirche im Wege zu stehen, wenn sie sich aus eigener Kraft zum Durchbruch einer Erneuerung verhilft, die „aus einer ganz anderen Dimension kommt und uns ganz anders und neu in Anspruch nimmt, nicht mehr wünschend, sondern mithelfend“ (Bonhoeffer: 1996b, 18–25, hier 19, Anm. 2). Wenn die Gemeinde ihre eigene Visionen von der Kirche verfolgt, d.h. zu viel Neues von außen an die Kirche heranträgt, verfehlt sie, so Bonhoeffer, es gar zu leicht, wenn Gott selbst seine Kirche erneuern will und sie dafür mithelfend in Anspruch nimmt. Bonhoeffer gestattet nicht, dass in der Kirche für irgendetwas neben Christus Platz gemacht wird. Deswegen geht es für den späten Bonhoeffer bei seinen Gedanken von der „Diesseitigkeit des Lebens“ auch nicht um Christus und die Welt, sondern um die Welt in Christus (Bonhoeffer: 1998b, 541f). Obwohl Bonhoeffer bitter enttäuscht ist, dass die Bekennende Kirche, wie er in seiner Ethik von 1940–43 schreibt, „stumm [war], wo sie hätte schreien müssen“, also unsichtbar gewesen ist, wo sie hätte sichtbar sein sollen, dann steht er dazu, dass sie seine Kirche ist, indem er sich selbst an ihrer Schuld schuldig bekennt und auch darin noch „ein Zeichen der lebendigen Gegenwart Christi“ sieht (Bonhoeffer: 1998a, 129. 126). Später schreibt er aus dem Gefängnis: „Unsere Kirche, die in diesen Jahren nur um ihre Selbsterhaltung gekämpft hat, als wäre sie ein Selbstzweck, ist unfähig, Träger des versöhnenden und erlösenden Wortes für die Menschen und für die Welt zu sein […]. [U]nser Christsein wird heute nur in zweierlei bestehen: im Beten und Tun des Gerechten unter den Menschen“ (Bonhoeffer: 1998b, 435). An solchen Stellen wird ganz deutlich, dass Bonhoeffer es vorzieht, dass die empirische Kirche eine unansehnliche Rolle in der Gesellschaft spielt, als dass sie ihr Wesen kompromittiert. Eine bescheidene Kirche bleibt nämlich sehenswert aus der Blickrichtung von oben. Die einleitend aufgestellte These lässt sich nun näher präzisieren: Die Kirche in ihrer Unsichtbarkeit ist für Bonhoeffer ebenso konkret zu verstehen wie in ihrer Sichtbarkeit, eben weil die Unsichtbarkeit in der Geschichte stets in der doppelten Perspektive zu betrachten ist, in der Bonhoeffer die weltliche Kirche sieht: „Kirche ‚ist‘ immer beides zugleich; wer nur eines von beiden sieht, sieht nicht die ‚Kirche‘ […]. Es ist ein und dieselbe Kirche, ihre sichtbare Gestalt und ihre verborgene

 

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Göttlichkeit.11 Wie es ein und derselbe Herr ist, der Zimmermannssohn von Nazareth und der Sohn Gottes“ (Bonhoeffer 1997, 237, meine Hervorhebung). Die Theologie kennt keine unparteiische Perspektive, keine Blickrichtung von nirgendwo, sondern muss als Funktion der Kirche die Sehweise des Glaubens anlegen, um die Kirche zu sehen – wie sie sich für den Menschen darstellt und zugleich als was sie von Gott her ist. Dass die Frage nach der unsichtbaren Kirche eine Hauptspur in der Ekklesiologie Dietrich Bonhoeffers ausmacht, mag auf ersten Blick etwas übertrieben wirken.12 Selber findet Bonhoeffer das Begriffspaar sichtbare/unsichtbare Kirche unzureichend und sucht es daher zu vermeiden (Bonhoeffer: 2005, 192, Anm. 141). Nichtsdestoweniger taucht die Unterscheidung in seinem facettenreichen und komplexen ekklesiologischen Denken immer wieder auf: möglicherweise, weil Bonhoeffer „[…] an dem Begriff der Kirche als der sichtbaren Kirche fest[hält]“ (Gerlach: 2003, 247f), und die konsequente Rede von der Sichtbarkeit gewissermaßen die Unsichtbarkeit als Korrelat fordert. Der fragmentarische Charakter von Bonhoeffers literarischem Nachlasses bedeutet, dass manche seiner Begriffe nicht allzu präzise definiert sind und deswegen in der Forschung bisweilen recht unterschiedlich ausgelegt werden. Ohne jedoch auch nur im Entferntesten Bonhoeffers Werk Gewalt anzutun, kann jedoch auf das Aktualitätspotential seiner Ekklesiologie hingewiesen werden. Besonders in seinen kritischen Aussagen über die Frage, was Kirche ist – und vor allem nicht ist –, erweist sich Bonhoeffer auch heute noch als geeigneter Gesprächspartner in Fragen des kirchlichen Selbstverständnisses. Selbst wenn Veränderungen der juristischen und politischen Lage der Kirche abrupt eintreten können, braucht die Suche nach einer neuen Identität als nicht-Staatskirche aus mentaler Sicht gern längere Zeit, wie auch die kulturell bedingte Position der Kirche in der Gesellschaft sich nur langsam verändert. Gesprächspartner aus der evangelisch-lutherischen Tradition, die wie Bonhoeffer fähig sind, die Bedeutung des Konkreten in die normative Reflexion miteinzubeziehen, sind hierbei unentbehrlich. Die kirchlichen Gemeinschaften der Gegenwart müssen ebenso wie Bonhoeffer aus Verbundenheit mit der Kirche die Kirche kritisieren können und es gegebenenfalls wagen, als religiöse Gemeinschaft etwas in der Unsichtbarkeit zu versinken, gerade um als Kirche Christi umso sichtbarer dastehen zu können. 11 Bonhoeffer benutzt hier nicht das Wort „unsichtbar“, sondern „verborgen“. Zum Vergleich verwendet er an anderem Ort den Ausdruck „Nicht-Sichtbar-Werden“ als Synonym zu „Verhüllung“ (Bonhoeffer: 1997, 333). 12 Forschungsgeschichtlich herrschte des längeren im Allgemeinen die Ansicht, dass Bonhoeffer sich von der theologischen Tradition abgrenzt, die das Kirchenverständnis unter Verwendung der Begriffe sichtbare und unsichtbare Kirche formuliert (Lange: 1967, 519; Huber: 1983, 179; vgl. Soosten: 1992, 32; Gerlach: 2003, 247f). In dem ich mich in Bezug auf Bonhoeffers Ekklesiologie an der Sichtbar/Unsichtbar-Dichotomie orientiere, greife ich – mit Kirsten Busch Nielsen (Nielsen: 2012) sowie Martino Dotta (Dotta: 2004) – dieses scheinbar obsolete Thema erneut auf.

 

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Bibliographie Bethge, Eberhard (1967), Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Theologe. Christ. Zeitgenosse, München: Chr. Kaiser Verlag. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (2005), Sanctorum Communio. Eine dogmatische Untersuchung zur Soziologie der Kirche [1927/30], in: Joachim von Soosten (Hg.), Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke 1, Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser/Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1994a), Nachfolge [1937], in: Martin Kuske/Ilse Tödt (Hg.), Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke 4, Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser/Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1994b), Vorlesung: Das Wesen der Kirche [1932], in: Eberhard Amelung/Christoph Strohm (Hrsg.), Ökumene, Universität, Pfarramt 1931–1932. Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke 11, Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser/Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 239–303. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1996a), Zur Frage nach der Kirchengemeinschaft [1936], in: Otto Dudzus/Jürgen Henkys (Hg.), Illegale Theologenausbildung: Finkenwalde 1935–1937. Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke 14, Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser/Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 655–680. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1996b), in: Jørgen Glenthøj/Ulrich Kabitz/Wolfgang Krötke (Hg.). Konspiration und Haft 1940–1945. Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke 16, Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser/ Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1997), Was ist Kirche [1932/33]. Christologie [1933]. Die Kirche vor der Judenfrage [1933]. Betheler Bekenntnis (Entwurf und August-Fassung) [1933]. Thesen „Der Arier-Paragraph in der Kirche“ [1933], in: Carsten Nicolaisen/Ernst-Albert Scharffenorth (Hg.), Berlin 1932–1933. Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke 12, Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser/Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 235–239, 279–348, 349–358, 362–407, 408–415. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1998a), Ethik [1940–43], in: Ilse Tödt/Heinz Eduard Tödt/Ernst Feil/ Clifford Green (Hg.), Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke 6, Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser/Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1998b), in: Christian Gremmels/Eberhard Bethge/Renate Bethge in Zusammenarbeit mit Ilse Tödt (Hrg.), Widerstand und Ergebung. Briefe und Aufzeichnungen aus der Haft [1942–45]. Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke 8, Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser/Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (2008), Gemeinsames Leben [1939]. Das Gebetbuch der Bibel [1940], in: Gerhard Ludwig Müller/Albrecht Schönherr (Hg.), Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke 5, Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser/Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Dotta, Martino (2004), Eglise visible et Eglise invisible chez Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in: Henry Mottu/Janique Perrin (Hg.), Actualité de Dietrich Bonhoeffer en Europe Latine. Actes du Colloque International de Genève (23–25 Septembre 2002), Genf: Labor et Fides, 151– 165. Gerlach, Gernot (2003), „Bekenntnis und Bekennen der Kirche“ bei Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Entscheidungen für sein Leitbild von Kirche in den Jahren 1935–36 (Studien zur systematischen Theologie und Ethik 39), Münster/Hamburg/London: Lit Verlag. Grosshans, Hans-Peter (2007), Das Geheimnis der Kirche: verborgen im Sichtbaren. Überlegungen zur interkonfessionellen Verständigung über das evangelische, orthodoxe und römisch-katholische Verständnis der Kirche, in: Philipp Stoellger (Hg.), Unsichtbar. Hermeneutische Blätter 1/2. Institut für Hermeneutik & Religionsphilosophie, Theologische Fakultät Universität Zürich, 121–138.

 

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Gütter, Ruth (2000), Innerste Konzentration für den Dienst nach außen. Grundlinien der mittleren und späten Ekklesiologie Bonhoeffers in ihre systematischen Bedeutung für die ökumenische Bewegung heute (Europäische Hochschulschriften 23/703), Frankfurt: Peter Lang. Harasta, Eva (2011), Die Bewahrheitung der Kirche durch Jesus Christus: Eine christologische Ekklesiologie. Arbeiten zur Systematischen Theologie, Band 3, Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Huber, Wolfgang (1983), Wahrheit und Existenzform. Anregung zu einer Theorie der Kirche bei Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in: Folgen christlicher Freiheit. Ethik und Theorie der Kirche im Horizont der Barmer Theologischen Erklärung, Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 169–204. Lange, Ernst (1967), Kirche für andere, in: Evangelische Theologie, 27. Jahrgang, München: Chr. Kaiser Verlag, 513–546. Nielsen, Kirsten Busch (2012), Die unsichtbare Kirche des Einzelnen, die sichtbare Kirche der Gemeinschaft – oder?, in: Hermann Deuser/Saskia Wendel (Hg.), Dialektik der Freiheit. Religiöse Individualisierung und theologische Dogmatik (Religion in Philosophy and Theology, vol. 63), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 139–156. Nielsen, Kirsten Busch (2010), Die gebrochene Macht der Sünde: Der Beitrag Dietrich Bonhoeffers zur Hamartiologie, Arbeiten zur Systematischen Theologie, Band 2, Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Nielsen, Kirsten Busch (2009), Critique of Church and Critique of Religion in Bonhoeffer’s Late Writings, in: John W. de Gruchy/Stephen Plant/Christiane Tietz (Hg.), Dietrich Bonhoeffers Theologie heute/Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Theology Today: Ein Weg zwischen Fundamentalismus und Säkularismus? – A Way between Fundamentalism and Secularism?, Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 319–334. Pangritz, Andreas (2008), Vom „sichtbaren Kommen Gottes auf diese Welt“. Zu Dietrich Bonhoeffers Rezeption von Karl Barths Römerbrief-Auslegung, in: Clifford J. Green/Kirsten Busch Nielsen/Hans Pfeifer/Christiane Tietz (Hrsg.), Dietrich Bonhoeffer Jahrbuch 3, Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 219–250. Pfeifer, Hans (2008), Learning Faith and Ethical Commitment in the Context of Spiritual Training Groups. Consequences of Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Post Doctoral Year in New York City 1930/31, in: Clifford J. Green/Kirsten Busch Nielsen/Hans Pfeifer/Christiane Tietz (Hg.), Dietrich Bonhoeffer Jahrbuch 3/Yearbook 3, 2007/2008, Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 251–279. Ritschl, Albrecht ([1859] 1893), Ueber die Begriffe: sichtbare und unsichtbare Kirche, in: Albrecht Ritschl, Gesammelte Aufsätze, Freiburg i. Br./Leipzig: Akademische Verlagsbuchhandlung, 68–99. Soosten, Joachim von (1992), Die Sozialität der Kirche. Theologie und Theorie der Kirche in Dietrich Bonhoeffers ‚Sanctorum Communio‘, Öffentliche Theologie 2, München: Chr. Kaiser Verlag.

 

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Last but not least – Church, Community and tà éschata Reconsidering the Relation between Ecclesiology and Eschatology

This article takes up an issue which has not been dealt with in other contributions to this book. Nor has it been at the centre of the fields covered by the research project In-Visibilis. Visibility and Transcendence in Religion, Art and Ethics. Ecclesiology, i. e. theological reflection on the identity of the church or, to put it simply, on the meaning of the word “church”, is one element of the problem here. A good number of the investigations undertaken during the project have in different ways come across ecclesiology. Under the heading Visible Community and Invisible Transcendence some contributions have focussed particularly on ecclesiology. Special emphasis has been given to the understanding of church in Reformation theology. Key figures have been the theologians Martin Luther, Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth, whose writings have been studied both with an eye to the tradition and history of theology, and from a more systematic point of view. The other element of the problem addressed by this article is eschatology, i. e. theological reflection on tà éschata, the last things, which are “last” both in the temporal and in the qualitative sense. None of the sub-projects of In-Visibilis has worked with eschatology as such. But evidently, not a few contributions have perforce taken up questions related to the last things. Thus as this article deals with both ecclesiology and eschatology, it does not stray far from the centre of the project. Yet since its special aim is to reconsider the relation between ecclesiology and eschatology, the article can only be located at the periphery of the project. Making a virtue of this, it will hopefully not only identify the limit of the research project, but also give some glimpses into what might be beyond that limit.

1.

Ecclesiology: visibility – invisibility

The question which the ecclesiological investigations of the project have in common concerns the notion of the invisible and the hidden church. For the sake of brevity, a short terminological remark on invisibility and hiddenness will have to suffice: in the following, I shall use “the notion” (of the invisible

 

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or the hidden church) in the singular. Of course “invisibility” and “hiddenness” do not mean exactly the same, and when applied to ecclesiology they retain different meanings. At the same time ecclesiological reflection often links “invisibility” and “hiddenness” to each other in a thematic cluster. This justifies considering this cluster “a notion” and speaking of it in the singular. The notion, then, of the invisible and the hidden church is both historically and systematically to be found at the roots of Reformation ecclesiology. As has been shown by Carl-Axel Aurelius, Luther’s early ecclesiology circles around what he considers an indispensable dimension of the church, namely its invisibility and hiddenness and its non-institutionality (Aurelius: 1983). The notion plays a role both when Luther aims at negatively chastising the church and when his discourse is positive or “up-building”/constructive. The history of the notion during the epochs of Orthodoxy, Pietism, Enlightenment and through the 19th century has still to be written in detail. Thus the account given, as early as 1859, by Albrecht Ritschl of the problem of the church as visible and invisible according to Reformation theology still at least to some degree must be considered the present state of our knowledge: although Ritschl’s theology itself must also be seen in his 19th-century context (cf. Härle: 1990, 245–248; Großhans: 2007, 121–128). According to Ritschl, Luther only stresses the “Unsichtbarkeit oder Unerkennbarkeit der an sich sichtbaren Gemeinschaft der Heiligen”, when he writes as “Apologet und Polemiker” (Ritschl: 1893, 84). On the other hand, Ritschl admits that such an apologetic-polemical gesture is well justified as a critical reaction against all kinds of political or donatistic manipulations of the notion of the church (ibid., 94; cf. Reuter 2009: 3f). At the beginning of the 20th century, Lutheran theologians such as Karl Holl and Reinhold Seeberg discussed the problems related to the notion of the visibi­ lity and hiddenness of the church, and did so with anxious care not to separate the two aspects (cf. Holl: 1927, 296f, 310f; Seeberg: 1925, 346f). Not a few theologians of the 20th century followed the caveat of Ritschl, Holl and Seeberg and more or less avoided speaking of the church as invisible and hidden. But not all. As Karina Kande has shown, Dietrich Bonhoeffer never discarded the notion of invisibility and hiddenness (Kande: 2017; cf. Nielsen: 2011; 2012). Although in his early writings he shared the sceptical posture of his theological fathers, and in both his early and his later work was eager to deal theologically with the visible church, i. e. the church as an empirical, social and historical phenomenon, he never gave up the terminology of visibility and hiddenness. Nolens volens, due to this notion Bonhoeffer was able to nuance and differentiate his ecclesiology. Thus he may be said to demonstrate the de facto indispensability for Lutheran theology of the notion of invisibility and hiddenness. Karl Barth’s contribution to the discussion of this issue in the 20th century has also been reflected in the project. In his Kirchliche Dogmatik, Barth understands

 

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the church as the body of Christ, and as such considers it to be Christ’s “eigene irdisch-geschichtliche Existenzform” (1953, 718; 1955, 695; 1959, 780). He furthermore claims that the church is “die vorläufige Darstellung der ganzen in ihm [i. e. in Christ] gerechtfertigten Menschenwelt” (1953, 718). Barth strongly stresses the connection between the church’s visibility and its invisibility. To neglect the visibility of the church, he says, will be simply to make ourselves guilty of a theological heresy. We will be committing “ekklesiastischen Doketismus” (ibid., 729). But one must ask how strong Barth’s interests are in the visibility of the church, when he in a certain context speaks of the Christian community as “das Phänomen der Scheinkirche” (1955, 698). It seems as if he is perilously close to giving up his own attempt to connect the visibility and the invisibility of the church in favour of a distinction between the church as the “irdisch-geschichtlich[e]” body of Christ, and Christ as the heavenly head of this church (cf. Nielsen: 2011).

2.

From ecclesiology to eschatology

There is, however, another reason why Karl Barth should be mentioned here. His Kirchliche Dogmatik reminds us that ecclesiology certainly has an eschatological dimension. Tà éschata in themselves are among what undeniably belongs to the invisibilia of Christian belief, since “we fix our eyes not on what is seen (tà blepómena), but on what is unseen (tà mè blepómena). For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal” (2 Cor 4:18). Of course the link between church and last things was at no point absent from the main Christian traditions. The belief in the una sancta, catholica (et apostolica) ecclesia in both the Apostles’ and the Nicene Creed is closely linked with belief in tà éschata, the resurrection of the body and life everlasting (AC) or the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come (NC 381). But how are they related? For Barth, the Christological focus of ecclesiology has to do with eschatology in the sense that the church as the body of Christ is the “vorläufige Darstellung der ganzen in ihm gerechtfertigten Menschenwelt” (1953, 718; my italics). But what does it mean that it is “vorläufig”? What else could it be? In what follows, when questions of this kind, which arise at the limit between ecclesiology and eschatology, are taken up two aspects especially will concern us: the understanding of the church as invisible, and the understanding of the church as a community. Ecclesiology inevitably presupposes what Christoph Schwöbel calls a structure of discontinuity and continuity (2003, 380). This structure, which has its basis in the death and resurrection of Christ, makes itself evident in theological discourse on the Kingdom of God. The church is not the Kingdom, the basileía toũ theoũ. Nor is it only the church in its empirical, visible form that is not identical with the Kingdom. The same must be said of the church in the the-

 

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ological sense – the church as believed in or confessed as in the Third Article of both the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed, which in my understanding is the church as invisible or hidden. This church is no more identical with the Kingdom than that. Thus one could say that ecclesiological reflection takes place within a double structure of continuity and discontinuity. How is it possible to “think” the two interrelated issues of the church as invisible and as a community “through” this structure? How are we, dogmatically, to think about it? Where should the limit between ecclesiology and eschatology be drawn?

3.

Material and outline

What I propose is to focus on the relationship between Martin Luther and Dietrich Bonhoeffer. After the New Testament, Luther is the most oft-quoted authority in the writings of Bonhoeffer. It is hardly possible to find a corner of Bonhoeffer’s theo­ logy that is not influenced by Luther. He simply considered his theology a bringing up to date of Luther’s, and he meant to achieve this through a critical dialogue with Karl Barth as well as with contemporary Lutherans. Thus studying his reception of Luther is a wise enough place to start. A number of studies have been undertaken of Bonhoeffer’s interpretation of Luther (cf. e. g. Krötke: 2009, 453–495). Common features in their ecclesiologies have been identified (Abraham: 2006). But a joint study of Luther’s and Bonhoeffer’s understandings of eschatology has yet to be made. One very early text by Bonhoeffer is especially interesting in regard to the connection between church and eschatology: his Sanctorum Communio. Eine dogmatische Untersuchung zur Soziologie der Kirche of 1927/1930. Throughout that book, he explores the meaning of community or communio, the sanctorum communio, “Gemeinschaft”, as perhaps the strongest aspect of what he considers the word “church” to mean theologically. Here we shall focus on one chapter only. In that chapter, Bonhoeffer develops his understanding of community as an interpretation of Luther’s thinking, and demonstrates what happens to a community ecclesiology when it is reflected eschatologically. What has inspired him is one of Luther’s early texts, the sermon Von dem hochwürdigen Sakrament des heiligen wahren Leichnams Christi of 1519. This text also focuses strongly on community, and points towards tà éschata. The questions we shall deal with then are, first, how Bonhoeffer allows his understanding of church as community to be influenced by Luther’s understanding of communio, secondly, how Luther and Bonhoeffer, each in his way, understand the relation between the church or the community and eschatology, and thirdly, more comparatively, where their two approaches to the church-and-eschatology question are similar to or differ from each other. As will become clear, they approach communio in different ways, Bonhoeffer in an academic, ecclesiological text, Luther

 

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in a sermon on the Eucharist. But they understand communio in ways that are not markedly different. Furthermore they both open an eschatological perspective through their reflection on community. But the ways in which they do so are not at all identical. After my discussion of the two texts in their interrelatedness, I shall proceed in the final part to sketch a possible systematic discussion of ecclesiology and eschatology which – hopefully – will serve to give a glimpse of what lies beyond mere ecclesiology.

4.

Communio in Bonhoeffer’s Sanctorum Communio

Sanctorum Communio falls into five main chapters: 1. “Begriffsbestimmungen”, 2.  “Personbegriff ”, 3. “Urstand  – Gemeinschaft”, 4. “Sünde  – die gebrochene Gemeinschaft” and 5. “Sanctorum Communio”. There is much to be said about the structure and the aim of the book. But for now it is enough simply to mention that the book is built around the notion of “Gemeinschaft”. Bonhoeffer indeed constructs salvation history as a history of communio. The state of creation is, he claims, a state of community. In this light, a state of sin entails an isolation of the indivi­ dual: whereupon, related to the church, community is once again the focus. In the argument of Sanctorum Communio, the church more or less simply stands where salvation is traditionally placed in salvation history. Thus chapter 5, “Sanctorum Communio”, first deals with the “Realisierung” (in Christ) and then with the “Aktualisierung” (in the Spirit) of the church. In the third part of chapter 5, which I shall not consider here, Bonhoeffer expounds the empirical dimension of the church.1 In chapter 5, Bonhoeffer explains “die sozialen Akte, die die Liebesgemeinschaft konstituieren und die über Struktur und Art der christlichen Gemeinde nähere Auskunft geben” (1986b, 117). These social acts are, Bonhoeffer says, of two different kinds. There is a “gottgesetzte[s] strukturelle[s] Miteinander von Gemeinde und Gemeindeglied” and a “tätige[s] Füreinander der Glieder und das Prinzip der Stellvertretung”, a “with each other” and a “for each other” (ibid.). Concerning the “with each other”, Bonhoeffer claims that the Gemeinde […] derartig strukturiert [ist], dass dort, wo eins ihrer Glieder ist, sie in ihrer Kraft, d.h. aber in der Kraft Christi und des heiligen Geistes auch ist. Sie ist derart als Ein Leben gedacht, dass keines ihrer Glieder von ihr getrennt vorgestellt werden könnte (ibid.). 1 The historical background of Bonhoeffer’s ecclesiological maximalism, which is to be found not only in Luther, but also in Karl Holl, Karl Barth and G.W.F. Hegel and in the sociology, the social philosophy and the dialogical personalism of that time, must also be left out of consi­ deration. Suffice it to say that Bonhoeffer’s Luther is strongly inspired by Holl’s book on Luther (Holl: 1927).

 

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Continuing his line of argument, Bonhoeffer says that “der in der Liebe stehende Mensch […] in bezug auf den Nächsten – freilich immer nur so – Christus [ist]” (ibid.), and that “ein solcher kann und soll handeln wie Christus. Er soll die Lasten und Leiden des Nächsten tragen” (ibid.). Further, he stresses that “die Mög­ lichkeit dieses ‘Miteinander’ […] keine menschlich gewollte, sondern nur in der Gemeinde der Heiligen gegeben [ist] […]” (ibid., 118). He underlines the strength of the community. “Und selbst, wenns zum Sterben kommt”, he says, “soll ich gewiss sein, dass nicht ich oder doch nicht ich allein sterbe […]” (ibid., 118f). This, however, does not mean that the individual personhood is eliminated. “Der ganze Ernst des Gottesverhältnisses wird dem Einzelnen nicht von der Schulter genommen. Aber er bleibt trotz allem in der Gemeinde, […] die Gemeinde ist mit ihm” (ibid., 119; italics in the original). Concerning the “for each other”, he claims that Christus Maß und Norm unseres Handelns (Joh. 13,15.34 f.; 1. Joh. 3,10), und unser Tun ein Tun eines Glieds am Leibe Christi [ist], d.h. ausgerüstet mit der Kraft der Liebe Christi, in der jeder dem anderen ein Christus werden darf und soll (1. Kor. 12,12; Röm. 12,4 ff.; Eph. 4,4.12 ff.; Kol. 3,15) (ibid., 120f).

He goes so far as to say that “[die Verdienste des Einzelnen] auch […] nicht mehr sein eigen [sind], sondern […] der Gemeinde [gehören]” (ibid., 121). This leads him to propose that the notion of a thesaurus meritorum should be reconsidered: Gewiss, wir nähern uns ganz bewusst, wir wollen den guten Kern, der uns verloren zu gehen droht, mit Luther in der evangelischen Dogmatik erhalten wissen. Der einschneidende Unterschied besteht darin, dass wir keine überfließende Verdienste eines Menschen […] anerkennen. Der ‘Schatz der Verdienste’ ist Gottes Liebe, die in Christus die Gemeinde stiftet, und nichts anderes (ibid., 121).

It is under the heading of the “for each other” that Bonhoeffer introduces his discussion of love. The “for each other” is actualized love. Three aspects of it are mentioned: first, the active work for the other; second, the intercession; third, the forgiving of sins for each other (ibid., 122–127). Again he stresses the Christological basis: [D]as gegenseitige Spenden der Sündenvergebung im Namen Gottes. […] Sünden vergeben kann niemand, als der sie selbst auf sich nimmt, trägt und tilgt, kann also nur Christus, d.h. aber für uns seine Gemeinde als die sanctorum communio. Der Einzelne nimmt dem anderen seine Schuld vom Gewissen und legt sie auf sich, kann das aber doch nur, indem er sie wieder auf Christus legt (ibid., 121, 126).

 

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It should be noticed that at this stage of the argument Bonhoeffer with G.W.F. Hegel speaks of the church as “Christus als Gemeinde existierend” (ibid., 127). Picking up this key notion of his, which has been mentioned only twice before in the book (cf. ibid., 76, 87) Bonhoeffer shows that he has reached the culmination of his argument.

5.

Communio in Luther’s sermon

Introducing Martin Luther’s sermon Von dem hochwürdigen Sakrament des heiligen wahren Leichnams Christi, I shall only briefly describe the structure of the text, which mirrors the structure of the argument about the sacrament. The relevant part of the text falls into three sections: one about the sign (i. e. bread and wine and the eating thereof), one concerning the meaning or the gift of the sacrament (i. e. the communio with Christ and among members), and the third about the use of the sacrament of the Eucharist (i. e. the faith). (In this outline the second part, on the “Bruderschaften”, is left out.) Again, the most important steps of the argument can be described through a series of central passages. Luther says that Die bedeutung odder das werck dißes sacraments ist gemeynschafft aller heyligen: drumb nennet man es auch mit seynem teglichen namen Synaxis oder Comunio, das ist gemeynschafft, und Comunicare auff latein heyst diß gemeynschafft empfahen, wilchs wir auff deutsch sagen zum sacrament gehen, und kumpt daher, das Christus mit allen heyligen ist eyn geystlicher corper […] (WA 2, 743,7–13).

Luther further stresses that “alßo warhafftig werden auch wir yn den geystlichen leyp, das ist yn die gemeynschafft Christi und aller heyligenn getzogen und vorwandelt […]” (WA 2, 749,12–14). Concerning the effect of the sacrament he says that it is nit gnug, das man wysse, was das sacrament sey und bedeute. Es ist nit gnug, das du wissest, es sey eyn gemeynschafft und gnediger wechsell odder vormischung unßer sund und leyden mit Christus gerechtickeit und seyner heyligen, Sondern du must seyn auch begeren und festiglich glauben, du habst es erlangt (WA 2, 749,31–35).

Thus for Luther faith is the confidence that “Christus und alle heyligen treten zu dir mit allen yhren tugenden, leyden und gnaden, mit dir tzu leben, thun, lassen, leyden und sterben, und wollen gantz deyn sein, alle dingk mit dir gemeyn haben” (WA 2, 750,8–11). This is, he concludes, what it means to be transformed into each other. This transformation, the outcome of which is the community, is

 

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the meaning of the sacrament: “[E]s [ist] woll auß gericht, So doch Christus seynen leyb darumb geben hatt, das des sacraments bedeutung, die gemeynschafft und der lieb wandell geubt wurde” (WA 2, 751,3–5).

6.

Luther’s understanding of communio in Bonhoeffer’s Sanctorum Communio

Bonhoeffer’s argumentation in chapter 5 of Sanctorum Communio, including his central idea of “Christus als Gemeinde existierend”, is based on a series of central quotations from the sermon where “Luther herrliche und tiefe Gedanken zu der Frage [bringt]”, or again simply on “Luther” (Bonhoeffer: 1986b, 117).2 What Bonhoeffer harvests here from Luther’s 1519 sermon are a number of ideas and phrases which all have to do with the very idea of Christian community. Thus concerning the “with each other” of the members of the community, Bonhoeffer refers to Luther’s exhortation that “[d]u must der andernn geprechen und durfft dyr zu hertzen lassen gehen, als weren sie deyn eygen, und deyn vormugen dar bieten, als were es yhr eygen, gleych wie dir Christus ym sacrament thut” (Bonhoeffer: 1986b, 117; WA 2, 750,30–32). He further says that Luther calls this “durch Liebe ineinander verwandelt werden” (Bonhoeffer: 1986b, 118; cf. WA 2,750,32f). It is also Luther that prompts Bonhoeffer to say that the indivi­ dual is “angefechtet” by the problems and sin of the others: “Also fechten yhn an unsser sund, widerumb unss beschirmet seyne gerechtickeit” (Bonhoeffer: 1986b, 118). Bonhoeffer concludes that “was Luther […] mit dem Gemeindegedanken will […]” is to see “die Gemeinde der Heiligen als den Grund und die Kraft alles christlichen Einzellebens” (Bonhoeffer: 1986b, 119). Thus “in welcher Lage und Not seines Lebens er [i. e. der Einzelne] sich befindet, die Gemeinde ist mit ihm; denn dort, wo er ist, ist eben, sofern er ihr Glied ist, die Gemeinde auch, weil dort, wo die Gemeinde ist, auch er ist” (ibid.). Again, the “for each other” draws heavily on Luther. With him, Bonhoeffer says that God “in der Gemeinde […] jeden den anderen ‘genießen’ lässt” (Bonhoeffer: 1986b, 121; cf. WA 2, 754,12). The notion of the forgiving of sins among the members of the community is, in Bonhoeffer’s understanding, also informed by Luther. Bonhoeffer says that it is Luther’s understanding of St Augustine which leads him to claim that “die sanctorum communio die Schuld ihrer Glieder trägt.

2 Bonhoeffer also draws upon a few quotations from other early writings by Luther (Tesseradecas consolatoria of 1520, and the Sermon von den guten Werken). – We know from Bonhoeffer’s handwritten notes in his copy of Albrecth Ritschl’s Rechtfertigung und Heiligung that he simply commented on Ritschl’s criticism of Luther with a reference to the sermon (cf. Bonhoeffer: 1986b, 276, editor’s note 272).

 

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Aber er [i. e. Luther] sagt dann im selben Satze noch, dass Christus dieselbe trage” (Bonhoeffer: 1986b, 127; cf. WA 2, 745,7–16). To what uses does Bonhoeffer put Luther’s sermon – besides simply strengthening his own argumentative power in citing him as an authority? With Luther, Bonhoeffer forms the idea of the spiritual community of believers.3 What we have seen is that Bonhoeffer’s understanding of community in Sanctorum Communio is built upon Luther’s in the 1519 sermon, and that this is also how he himself sees his relation to Luther in this matter. It must be mentioned that both Luther’s sermon and Bonhoeffer’s book are disputed. Does this early text by Luther express “good” Lutheran theology? And does this early text by Bonhoeffer express “good” Bonhoeffer theology? And does the latter represent Luther fairly? If he does, with Joachim von Soosten we might ask: Bestätigt die Lutherrezeption Bonhoeffers nicht den oft geäußerten Verdacht, in “Sanctorum Communio” sei die Christologie gegenüber der Ekklesiologie nur unzureichend zur Geltung gebracht? Steht Bonhoeffer der Tendenz nach nicht in der Gefahr einer schon bei Luther zu beobachtenden Ethisierung der Ekklesiologie? Bewegt sich Bonhoeffer schließlich nicht auf dem Boden einer vorreformatorischen, noch katholisch eingefärbten Theologie, wenn er sich die Einsichten aus Luthers früher Sakramentsschrift aneignet? (von Soosten: 1992, 186).4

This bundle of critical questions represents an appropriate warning which on the other hand should not keep us away from the actual utterances of the two texts themselves. Hier irren sich Luther und Bonhoeffer nicht!

7.

Church and eschatology in Luther’s sermon and in Bonhoeffer’s Sanctorum Communio

Now we shall turn ourselves to the question of how the community ecclesiology in these texts is related to eschatology. It is most explicit in Luther’s text, so let us begin there.

3 More specifically, Bonhoeffer’s argument becomes vivid and gains concrete substance with the references to Christ as exemplum and to the notion of a certain solidarity in love among the members of the community. 4 Concerning the possible “schon bei Luther zu beobachtende Ethisierung der Ekklesiologie”, von Soosten is hinting at Oswald Bayer’s critical interpretation of the sermon (cf. Bayer: 1971, esp. 232ff) which has been countered by Ursula Stock (Stock: 1982, 306–319, 357f). “[Der] oft geäusserte[] Verdacht” that Bonhoeffer’s ecclesiology neglects Christology has been put forward by Gerhard Krause (Krause: 1981, 60f; von Soosten: 1992, 186).

 

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Towards the end of the sermon, Luther assures his reader of the eschatological value of the sacrament. He says that [a]lßo ist unß das sacrament eyn furt, eyn bruck, eyn thur, eyn schiff und tragbar, yn wilcher und durch wilch wir von disser welt faren ynß ewige leben. Darumb ligt es gar am glauben: dan wer nit glaubt, der ist gleych dem menschen, der ubirß wasser faren soll und ßo vortzagt ist, das er nit trawet dem schyff, und muß alßo bleyben und nymmer mehr seligk werden, die weyl er nit auff sitzt und ubir faren will, das macht die synlickeit und der ungeubte glaub, dem die fart sawr wirt ubir des todts Jordan, und der teuffell auch grawsamlich dazu hilfft (WA 2, 753,17–24).

As in earlier parts of the text, Luther is concerned to comfort his reader. For the believer the sacrament is a given sign by which he or she can keep faith. Death takes away “alls sichtlich ding und scheyd unß von den menschen und zeytlichen dingen” (WA 2, 753,12f). In the sacrament, there is given a sign of the “unsicht­ lichen und ewigen” to which the believer can cling, until such time as the “unsichtlichen und ewigen” shall be given “empfindlich und offentlich” (WA 2, 753,13–16). With the metaphors of ferry, bridge, door, ship and stretcher, Luther describes the sa­cra­ment – or more precisely, the faith related to the sacrament – as a medium for obtaining eternal life. The eschatological dimension of the community to which the sacrament is related and which subsists in the sacrament could hardly be underlined more strongly than that. In Bonhoeffer’s Sanctorum Communio, eschatology is not associated with the “unsichtlichen und ewigen” which believers will receive “empfindlich und offent­ lich”. What Bonhoeffer takes up (in the very last chapter of the book), is the Kingdom of God. The chapter is called “Kirche und Eschatologie”, but Bonhoeffer stresses that even though “[c]hristliche Eschatologie […] wesentlich Gemeinde­ eschatologie [ist]” and has to do with the fulfilment (“Vollendung”) of the church and the individuals in it, the notion of the Kingdom of God additionally/on top of that encompasses an eschatology of culture and nature (Bonhoeffer: 1986b, 193f; italics in the original; cf. 1986a). Eschatology as “Gemeindeeschatologie” is a highly interesting notion. It is the medium by which Bonhoeffer turns/commutes ecclesiology into eschatology. Bonhoeffer in other words is quite specific about the relation between the church (as community) and tà éschata. More than that. The way in which he thinks about the church, the being and the structure of the notion of the church, is repeated in eschatology. It structures his eschatology. Bonhoeffer constructs the chapter on eschatology according to the classical topoi of God’s judgment and eternal life. What he has argued/advanced in the previous chapters, namely that there is a circularity between the individual person and the community (or, as he says, the “Kollektivperson”, cf. Bonhoeffer: 1986b, passim), plays a role equally in this chapter. Of God’s judgment he accordingly says that

 

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“Gericht vollzieht sich an Personen; d.h. aber offenbar nicht nur an Individual-, sondern auch an Kollektivpersonen” (ibid., 194).5 In God’s judgment both the individual and the church as a community, “als d[ie] Gegenwart Christi in der Welt, die auf Entscheidung drängt” (ibid., 196) and which in that sense includes the peccatorum communio, will be present. “So kann”, says Bonhoeffer, “die Gemeinschaft als Gesamtperson ewiges Leben gewärtigen” (ibid., 194). He stresses that it remains “im Dunkeln”, “[w]ie im einzelnen der Gedanke vollziehbar ist, dass eine Kollektivperson verworfen oder angenommen und doch der Einzelne in ihr angenommen oder verworfen wird” (ibid.). What should interest us here is the very idea that judgment and eternal life both concern community as well as individuality. Bonhoeffer’s insistence on the importance of the notion of community in Christian theology is not given up in his eschatological reflection, “denn nur in der Gemeinschaft mit anderen Menschen und mit Gott lebt der Mensch” (ibid., 196). This assurance of the importance of “Gemeinschaft” in its circularity with individual personhood accordingly also makes its presence felt in eschatology. Thus he can speak of an eternal community. In God’s gracious judgment “[wird] die Einsamkeit völlig überwunden in der Gemeinde” and “[gibt] es individuelle Personalität nur in der Wirklichkeit der Gemeinde ” (ibid.). Such eschatological concerns as the double exit or apokatástasis he also deals with in a way which encompasses community as the counterpart to individuality. His way of thinking thus lies precisely in line with the premises on which he has been working in Sanctorum Communio. At the same time, Bonhoeffer transcends the previous argumentation of the book in a manner both bold and provocative. He refers to the “by faith, not by sight” of 2 Cor 5:7. This principle also lies behind a passage which summarizes the whole: Wie es geschehen soll, dass sie alle Einer werden und jeder er selbst bleibt, dass sie alle in Gott sind, und doch jeder von ihm geschieden, dass sie alle ineinander, und doch jeder für sich sein wird, dass jeder Gott allein und ganz hat in der gnadenvollen Zwei­ einsamkeit des Schauens und Dienens der Wahrheit und der Liebe, und doch nie einsam, sondern immer nur in der Gemeinde – das auszudenken, ist uns nicht mehr gegeben. Wir wandeln im Glauben. Aber wir werden schauen – nicht nur Gott, sondern auch seine Gemeinde (ibid., 198).

5 Cf. also the otherwise important distinction between “Gemeinschaft” and “Gesellschaft”, which I shall not take into account here.

 

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Bonhoeffer’s and Luther’s approaches to the question of church-and-eschatology

Pointing beyond ecclesiology – to eschatology, we have now seen “where” and how eschatology begins or is related to ecclesiology in Luther’s sermon of 1519 and in Bonhoeffer’s volume(s) on the church. Only very short outlines of their different understandings of church, community and last things have been possible. Not a few reservations might be made in order to underline the possible one-sidedness and distortedness of the study arising from the different character, context and aims of the two texts. But even against this background, it is fair to notice the different ways in which Luther and Bonhoeffer link ecclesiology and eschatology to each other. They handle the given structure of continuity and discontinuity differently. Luther’s “problem” – a word which must be put between quotation marks, and which can have both an existential and a theological meaning – seems to be death, death as a consequence of sin. For him, in the 1519 sermon, Christian community, centred upon the Eucharist and consisting of the triangle Christ, the individual believer and the community, has the role of comforting the believer who is troubled and tempted by the fear of death. To him or her Luther says that the sacrament in its community context is “eyn furt, eyn bruck, eyn thur, eyn schiff und tragbar, yn wilcher und durch wilch wir von disser welt faren ynß ewige leben” (WA 2, 753,17–19). When pointing to eternal life, Luther comforts the individual, but he does so with the Christian community cohering around the sacrament. Yet community is not in the foreground. It rather plays the role of an argument in the background. Bonhoeffer has another “problem”. Not death, but loneliness and isolation, both consequences of sin, constitute his – be it existential or theological – difficulty. What he writes on Christian community in Sanctorum Communio is an interpretation of Luther’s understanding of community in the sermon of 1519. The sanctorum communio in Bonhoeffer is again a triangle consisting of Christ, the individual believer and the community. But now the notion of community and of the church is placed decisively in the forefront as he reflects on the relation between church, community and tà éschata. The church is not in the background of his eschatology, but rather the notion of the church and the polar structure of individuality and community as the dominant figure in his ecclesiology in Sanctorum Communio is eschatologized. One could equally, however, reverse it: the eschatology is ecclesiologized.

 

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9.

Beyond

Even a short study of the two texts by Luther and Bonhoeffer leads to a reopening of the question of the theological understanding of the meaning and role of community, the sanctorum communio. The two texts actualize the question as to the connection between the community of believers now and the community of believers then (to keep eschatology, in this context, simply within a time frame, which may of course be questioned). The community now must be considered both visible and invisible: visible in its empirical form, i. e. in the word and the sacraments and in acts of love, invisible as an object of faith. The community then is the invisible community of faith becoming – becoming: what does that mean? – visible not only as something which can be seen, but also as something which is actually seen, something of which there is an act of seeing (the tò eĩdos in 2 Cor 5:7; cf. Kittel: 1935). To explain theologically this continuity-discontinuity, i. e. to explain how the becoming-seen of the invisible communio takes place, is, as Bonhoeffer says, “uns nicht mehr gegeben” (1986b, 198). This is one limit to be observed in theolo­ gical reflection on both ecclesiology and eschatology. Transgressing that limit is not possible, and any attempt to do so would be theological pride and arrogance. There is absolutely nothing new in this. Eschatology functions as (but cannot be reduced to) a criticism of any political or religious or triumphalist ideologization of the church, a rebuttal of any violation of the freedom of the church. The notion of the invisibility of the church which is connected with eschatology exerts the same function. Does eschatology then only exert a critical function? No: it is also present in a constructive sense in ecclesiology. The church and the community of believers are not only a matter of faith and of love, but also of hope. Hope is nurtured in community. Community is the subject of hope, but community can also be said to be the very content of hope. Conversely, ecclesiology also should be dealt with as the theological locus which is on “this side” of the limit of eschatology and which, because of its penultimate nature, leads to the ultimate, to tà éschata, on the level of theological reflection. There is, so to speak, something to learn about the last things through the nextto-last things. I consider Bonhoeffer’s way of transforming the unus christianus, nullus christianus principle into the vision I have just quoted to be an interesting example of such eschatological learning from ecclesiology: [D]ass sie alle Einer werden und jeder er selbst bleibt, dass sie alle in Gott sind, und doch jeder von ihm geschieden, dass sie alle ineinander, und doch jeder für sich sein wird, dass jeder Gott allein und ganz hat in der gnadenvollen Zweieinsamkeit des Schauens und Dienens der Wahrheit und der Liebe, und doch nie einsam, sondern immer nur in der Gemeinde […] lebt […] (1986b, 198).

 

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The reciprocity of ecclesiology and eschatology, which informs both the understanding of in-visibility and the notion of community, still demands exploration. Theology needs to develop adequate concepts to reflect on and formulate this reci­ procity – a task which, however, lies beyond this article and beyond the research project In-Visibilis. Visibility and Transcendence in Religion, Art and Ethics.

Bibliography Abraham, Martin (2006), Wort und Sakrament – Oder: Wovon die Kirche lebt, in: Klaus Gründwaldt/Christiane Tietz/Udo Hahn (ed.), Bonhoeffer und Luther. Zentrale Themen ihrer Theologie, Hannover: velkd, 123–154. Aurelius, Carl-Axel (1983), Verborgene Kirche: Luthers Kirchenverständnis in Streitschriften und Exegese 1519–1521, Hannover: Lutherisches Verlagshaus, 437–446. Aurelius, Carl-Axel (2017), We See, While We Are Hearing, in Anna Vind (ed.), (In)Visibilis. Reflections upon Theology, Philosophy and the Arts, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Barth, Karl (1953), Kirchliche Dogmatik IV/1, Zürich: Evangelischer Verlag. Barth, Karl (1955), Kirchliche Dogmatik IV/2, Zürich: Evangelischer Verlag. Barth, Karl (1959), Kirchliche Dogmatik IV/3, Zürich: Evangelischer Verlag. Bayer, Oswald (1971), Promissio. Geschichte der reformatorischen Wende in Luthers Theologie, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1986a), Kirche und Eschatologie (1926), in Hans Pfeifer et al. (ed.), Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke 9, München: Chr. Kaiser Verlag, 336–354. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1986b), Sanctorum Communio. Eine dogmatische Untersuchung zur Soziologie der Kirche (1927/1930), in Joachim von Soosten (ed.), Dietrich Bonhoeffer Werke 1, München: Chr. Kaiser Verlag. Grosshans, Hans-Peter (2007), Das Geheimnis der Kirche: verborgen im Sichtbaren. Überlegungen zur interkonfessionellen Verständigung über das evangelische, orthodoxe und römisch-katholische Verständnis der Kirche, in Philipp Stoellger (ed.), Unsichtbar, Hermeneutische Blätter 1/2, 2007, Zürich: Institut für Hermeneutik und Religionsphilosophie, 121–138. Härle, Wilfried (1990), Sichtbare und verborgene Kirche, in Frithard Scholz/Horst Dickel (ed.), Vernünftiger Gottesdienst. Kirche nach der Barmer Theologischen Erklärung, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 243–255. Holl, Karl (1927), Luther. Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Kirchengeschichte I (5th ed.), Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck). Kande, Karina (2017), Die unsichtbare Kirche: Eine Hauptspur in der Ekklesiologie Dietrich Bonhoeffers?, in Anna Vind (ed.), (In)visibilis. Reflections upon Theology, Philosophy and the Arts, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 476–488. Kittel, Gerhard (1935), Article “eĩdos”, ThWNT, vol. 2, 371–372. Krause, Gerhard (1981), Article “Dietrich Bonhoeffer”, TRE 7, vol. 2, 55–66. Krötke, Wolf (2009), Barmen – Barth – Bonhoeffer. Beiträge zu einer zeitgemässen christo­ zentrischen Theologie, Hannover: Luther-Verlag, 453–495. Luther, Martin (1519), Ein Sermon vom Sakrament des Leichnams Christi und von den Brüder-

 

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schaften 1519, in D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), Bd. 1–80, Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger 1883–2009, WA 2, 685–758. Nielsen, Kirsten Busch (2009), Critique of Church and Critique of Religion in Bonhoeffer’s Late Writings, in John W. de Gruchy/Stephen Plant/Christiane Tietz (ed.), Dietrich Bonhoeffers Theologie heute. Ein Weg zwischen Fundamentalismus und Säkularismus?, Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 319–334. Nielsen, Kirsten Busch (2010), Community Turned Inside Out: Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Concept of the Church and of Humanity Reconsidered, in Jens Zimmermann/Brian Gregor (ed.), Being Human, Becoming Human, Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock Publishers, 91–101. Nielsen, Kirsten Busch (2011), Et usynligt legeme: Om et grundproblem i reformatorisk kirkeforståelse, in Kirsten Busch Nielsen/Johanne Stubbe Teglbjærg (ed.), Kroppens teologi – teologiens krop, Copenhagen: Anis, 315–332. Nielsen, Kirsten Busch (2012), Die unsichtbare Kirche des Einzelnen, die sichtbare Kirche der Gemeinschaft – oder?, in Hermann Deuser/Saskia Wendel, Dialektik der Freiheit. Religiöse Individualisierung und theologische Dogmatik, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 139–156. Reuter, Hans-Richard (2009), Botschaft und Ordnung. Beiträge zur Kirchentheorie, Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Ritschl, Albrecht (1893), Ueber die Begriffe: sichtbare und unsichtbare Kirche (1859), in Gesammelte Aufsätze, Freiburg/Leipzig: Akademische Verlagsbuchhandlung, 68–99. Schwöbel, Christoph (2003), Christlicher Glaube im Pluralismus, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 361–388. Seeberg, Reinhold (1925), Christliche Dogmatik II. Die spezielle christliche Dogmatik, Erlangen/Leipzig: A. Deichertsche Verlagsbuchhandlung Dr. Werner Scholl. Stock, Ursula (1982), Die Bedeutung der Sakramente in Luthers Sermonen von 1519, Leiden: E.J. Brill. von Soosten, Joachim (1992), Die Sozialität der Kirche. Theologie und Theorie der Kirche in Dietrich Bonhoeffers “Sanctorum Communio”, München: Chr. Kaiser Verlag.

 

 

Contributors

Heinrich Assel, Professor, University of Greifswald, Germany Carl Axel Aurelius, Bishop emeritus, Malmø, Sweden Jonna Bornemark, Professor, Södertörns Högskola, Stockholm, Sweden Olivier Boulnois, Director, École pratique des hautes études, Paris, France Pierre Bühler, Professor emeritus, University of Zürich, Switzerland Svein Aage Christoffersen, Professor emeritus, University of Oslo, Norway Iben Damgaard, Associate Professor, University of Copenhagen, Denmark Gavin Flood, Professor, University of Oxford, UK Hans-Peter Großhans, Professor, University of Münster, Germany Arne Grøn, Professor emeritus, University of Copenhagen, Denmark Sven Rune Havsteen, Associate Professor, University of Copenhagen, Denmark Harald Hegstad, Professor, MF Norwegian School of Theology, Religion and Society, Oslo, Norway Christine Helmer, Professor, Northwestern University, Evanston/Illinois, USA, Dr. h. c. in theology from the University of Helsinki, Finland Martin Wangsgaard Jürgensen, Editor, Danish National Museum, Copenhagen, Denmark Karina Juhl Kande, Pastor, Nivå, Denmark Dietrich Korsch, Professor emeritus, University of Marburg, Germany Konrad Küster, Professor, University of Freiburg, Germany Kirsten Busch Nielsen, Professor and Dean, University of Copenhagen, Denmark George Pattison, Professor, University of Glasgow, UK Nils Holger Petersen, Associate Professor emeritus, University of Copenhagen, Denmark Antti Raunio, Professor, University of Eastern Finland, Joensuu, Finland Therese Bering Solten, PhD and Pastor, Ribe, Denmark Johann Anselm Steiger, Professor, University of Hamburg, Germany Anna Vind, Associate Professor, University of Copenhagen, Denmark Claudia Welz, Professor, Aarhus University, Denmark