Jürgen Moltmann

A theological giant died this week, one who influenced me more than any other.

Interviewing Jürgen Moltmann with Tripp Fuller in 2015.

When I attended Fuller Theological Seminary in the early 1990s, M.Div. students were required to take three courses in systematic theology, named, naturally enough, Systematic Theology 1, Systematic Theology 2, and Systematic Theology 3. The first covered the doctrines of God and creation, the second Christ and salvation, and the third the Holy Spirit, ecclesiology, and eschatology. The first two I took from Colin Brown, a rather austere Englishman.

The third I took from a new professor, Miroslav Volf, a Croatian in his 30s. In addition to assigning us the manuscript to his own award-winning book, Exclusion and Embrace, Volf assigned us a book by his doctoral supervisor, Jürgen Moltmann: The Church in the Power of the Spirit.

As I recall, many of my classmates were put off by three hundred pages of German theology, but I loved it. I mean, I really loved it.

Professor Volf became a friend to me, and he encouraged me to pursue doctoral work. In fact, he told me I could do it in Germany, like he did, maybe even at Tübingen, where he had. Then he told me that I’d have to write my dissertation in German — yeah, that was not going to happen.

---

I graduated from Fuller in June, 1993, and headed back to Minnesota. That fall, I dropped my youngest brother, Ted, at college, and proceeded to drive down the East Coast — I wanted to get a Ph.D. in systematic theology, so I visited several schools for interviews: Yale, Duke, Vanderbilt, and the University of Chicago.

I have two distinct memories from that road trip. At Duke, I sat in the office of another proper, English theologian, Geoffrey Wainwright, who told me, “You may be able to get into a Ph.D. program, but you’ll never get a job as a professor.” (He meant as a white guy with an M.Div. from an evangelical seminary.)

And at Vanderbilt, my interview was with the eminent feminist theologian Sallie McFague. She asked me what I’d like to study, and what I thought my dissertation might be on. I said, “Jürgen Moltmann.” She laughed out loud — truly, I remember her sitting on a couch in her office and laughing out loud at me — and said, “Oh, we would never let someone write on Moltmann at Vanderbilt.”

---

I didn’t apply to Vanderbilt, but I did apply to four other schools, and then I flew to Europe to backpack around until Christmas. Among my stops was Croatia, wartorn at the time, to visit Miroslav Volf. (More on that another time.)

I also went to Tübingen, Germany. I visited the university, found the theology department, and found the office of Jürgen Moltmann. The door was closed, and I could hear rustling inside. He was in the office. I raised my hand to knock — but then thought, what if he’s busy? What if he can’t speak English well? What in the world am I going to talk to him about?

I panicked. Instead of knocking, I took a photo of the nameplate on his door (now in a slide carousel tray somewhere in my basement) and left. Thankfully, I would have several chances to meet him subsequently.

---

I went 0-for-4 in doctoral programs in 1993, so my readings of Moltmann over the next ten years took place on my own, as a missionary and pastor. And when Kenda Dean encouraged me to apply at Princeton in 2002, she was thrilled to hear that I wanted to study Moltmann.

My dissertation, which became the book The Church Is Flat, was an application of Moltmann’s ecclesiology — that is, his doctrine of the church — to the emerging church movement of which I was a part. A deep dive into his work was thrilling and rewarding.

And during that same time frame, as the national coordinator of Emergent Village, I wrote Moltmann a letter and asked if he’d be willing to join us at an Emergent Village Theological Conversation. He said yes — it was our biggest “get” in the many years that we ran that conference.

So in 2009, I sat on a stage with my theological hero and conversed with him for two days. (Here’s the audio from those sessions.)

Moltmann was funny and gracious and humble. He came with almost nothing: a thin briefcase with some papers and, possibly, a change of underwear. As I drove him back to the airport, we had the following conversation.

TJ: Dr. Moltmann, you have a long flight back to Germany. Will you read a book?

JM: Oh no, I cannot read on a plane.

TJ: Will you watch a movie?

JM: No, I cannot watch films on a plane.

TJ: Will you sleep?

JM: No. I cannot sleep on a plane.

TJ: Dr. Moltmann, what will you do for eight hours on your flight?

JM: I will close my eyes and read my memories.

It was then that I realized I would never be a world-class theologian. 😂

---

A couple years later, I wrote a series of blog posts on the death of Jesus — what theologians call the atonement — that were heavily influenced my Moltmann, and especially his most famous book, The Crucified God, which is a true masterpiece.

Then in 2015, a wonderful confluence of events:

• I used the momentum of those blog posts to write a book, Did God Kill Jesus?, which is heavily indebted to Moltmann.

• I secured Miroslav Volf to write a foreword to Fortress Press’s 40th anniversary edition of The Crucified God.

• And I got to celebrate that achievement and interview Moltmann at the American Academy of Religion for the Homebrewed Christianity podcast. (The photo at the top of this post of of that night, as is this photo of us toasting Moltmann with a beer that Tripp brewed in his honor:)

---

That’s a catalogue of my interactions with the man, Jürgen Moltmann. It is significantly more difficult for me to catalogue how his work has influenced me. I’ve read almost everything he’s written — at least everything that’s been translated into English — including his little known book, Theology of Play. I’ve written letters to him and received letters from him (always typed on a typewriter).

Several of his books I’ve read many times. And I assign his God in Creation to everyone who paddles with me in the Boundary Waters.

It might seem like the theological world has moved past Moltmann. Today, it’s more about contextual theologies — womanist, feminist, queer, black, etc. — than it is about systematic theology.

But Moltmann did something unique that I hope is not lost. In the preface to The Trinity and the Kingdom of God (1980), he explained why he did not consider his work a “systematic” theology, but instead used the phrase “contributions to theology.” (This is long, I know. I’ve put in bold some of the more poignant parts.)

Every consistent theological summing up, every theological system lays claim to totality, perfect organization, and entire competence for the whole area under survey. In principle one has to be able to say everything, and not to leave any point unconsidered. All the statements must fit in with one another without contradiction, and the whole architecture must be harmonious, an integrated whole. Every theoretical system, even a theological one, has therefore an aesthetic charm, at least to some degree. But this allurement can also be a dangerous seduction. Systems save some readers (and their admirers most of all) from thinking critically for themselves and from arriving at independent and responsible decision. For systems do not present themselves for discussion. For that reason I have resisted the temptation to develop a theological system, even an 'open' one. The common, tried and tested view of what dogmatics is also made me hesitate.

In the political language of the Emperor Augustus, dogma meant 'decree' (Luke 2.1). A decree is not supposed to be critically questioned; above all we are not supposed to reject it. The decree is imposed by force if necessary. Of course the theological concept of dogma is far removed from all this. But even here there is the odour - and often enough the attitude - of a judgment which is final and no longer open to appeal. Even if it is not 'dogmatic' in our everyday sense of the word, dogmatic thinking in theology likes to express itself in theses; not in theses for discussion, but in theses that are simply promulgated, which evoke agreement or rejection, but not independent thinking and responsible decision. They enforce their own ideas on the listener; they do not help him to formulate his own.

The expression 'contributions to theology', which I have chosen to indicate the content and style I have in mind, is intended to avoid the seductions of the theological system and the coercion of the dogmatic thesis; but it is not simply meant to be a rhetorical understatement. I have conceived and planned these 'contributions to theology' in a certain order, whose logic will emerge in the course of the series itself. They presuppose an intensive theological discussion, both past and present. They participate critically in this discussion, offering their own suggestions, their aim being to pre pare the way for a theological discussion in the future which will be both broader and more intensive.

By using the word 'contributions', the writer recognizes the conditions and limitations of his own position, and the relativity of his own particular environment. He makes no claim to say everything, or to cover the whole of theology. He rather understands his own 'whole' as part of a whole that is much greater. He cannot therefore aim to say what is valid for everyone, at all times and in all places. But he will set himself, with his own time and his own place, within the greater community of theology. For him this means a critical dissolution of naive, self-centered thinking. Of course he is a European, but European theology no longer has to be Eurocentric. Of course he is a man, but theology no longer has to be androcentric. Of course he is living in the 'first world', but the theology which he is developing does not have to reflect the ideas of the dominating nations. On the contrary, it will try to help to make the voice of the oppressed heard. We normally presuppose the absolute nature of our own standpoint in our own context. To abolish this tacit presupposition is the intention behind the phrase 'contributions to theology'.

Behind all this is the conviction that, humanly speaking, truth is to be found in unhindered dialogue. Fellowship and freedom are the human components for knowledge of the truth, the truth of God. And the fellowship I mean here is the fellowship of mutual participation and unifying sympathy. What is meant is the right to the liberty of one's own personal conviction and one's own free assent. This free community of men and women, without privilege and without discrimination, may be termed the earthly body of truth. And this of course means that the converse is true as well: that only truth can be the soul of a free community of men and women like this. Theological systems and assertive dogmatics can hardly bring out this aspect of truth. They exert coercion where free assent can be expected and given. They leave the individual mind little room for creative fantasy. They allow no time for individual decisions. But it is only in free dialogue that truth can be accepted for the only right and proper reason - namely, that it illuminates and convinces as truth. Truth brings about assent, it brings about change without exerting compulsion. In dialogue the truth frees men and women for their own conceptions and their own ideas. In liberating dialogue teachers withdraw into the circle of sisters and brothers. The pupil becomes the friend. Christian theology would wither and die if it did not continually stand in a dialogue like this, and if it were not bound up with a fellowship that seeks this dialogue, needs it and continually pursues it.

So we have to ask ourselves: in what fellowship did these contributions to theology develop? For what fellowship are they written? As we all know, the community of theologians can be a very narrow one; for every theologian also likes to be someone on his own, someone unique. But if we cease to take the special and fortuitous features of our own subjectivity too seriously, that community reaches far beyond particular periods and natural frontiers. The fellowship in which theological contributions are expected and offered, reaches back over the centuries to the biblical testimonies themselves; for these testimonies were the beginning of an unbro ken, still incomplete, and uncompletable dialogue in history. There are unsettled theological problems for which every new generation has to find its own solution if it is to be able to live with them at all. No concept within history is ever final and complete. Indeed in the history of Christian theology the openness of all knowledge and all explanations is actually constitutive; for it is their abiding openness that shows the power of their eschatological hope for the future. If we consider theology's task and its problems, then the historical intervals are unimportant, and Athanasius, Augustine, Luther or Schleiermacher enter into the theological discussion of the present day. We have to come to terms with them as we do with contemporaries. What we call 'tradition' is not a treasury of dead truths, which are simply at our disposal. It is the necessary and vitally continuing theological conversation with men and women of the past, across the ages, in the direction of our common future.

If you’re not schooled in German theology, if you don’t know the legacy of Bultmann and Barth and Pannenberg, which was Moltmann’s milieu, then you might not appreciate the epistemic humility of that passage. For a Reformed German theologian to write with such openness, such humility, was unheard of.

In 1990, in the preface to the paperback edition, he added:

These contributions are not offered in the form of a dogma or system; they are suggestions. They are not intended to conclude discussions; they are meant to open new conversations.

And so he did. For me and myriad other theologians and pastors and everyday Christians, Jürgen Moltmann opened new conversations. More than any book or theological concept, that is his legacy.

RIP.

---

Thanks for reading. This is my monthly free post. If you’d like to read something from me every week, click the button: