Dalferth's Der auferweckte Gekreuzigte
I discovered Ingolf Dalferth a while ago, through his book, Radikale Theologie. I since purchased his book Der auferweckte Gekreuzigte and am trying to wrestle with a few questions I have about Christology, objectivity and subjectivity, the theological location of early Christian confession and such like. In one passage he writes:
Die Festlegung des Bezugs eines Bekenntnisses ist aber etwas anderes als die Beschreibung und begriffliche Bestimmung des Bezugsgegenstandes
Which roughly translated is:
The definition of the reference of a confession is something other than the description and conceptual definition of the reference object
He references Kripke and H. Putnam at this point, but my question pertains to the present philosophical veracity of such a claim. Does not language "go all the way down" (to loosely echo Derrida's engagement with phenomenology)? If so, can we neatly distinguish matters as he does?
If any specialists out there could help me - a humble NT teacher - on this, I would be most grateful as I am out of my depth!
posted by Chris Tilling @ 6:42 PM
9 comments
9 Comments:
Chris, I assume the "aber" ("however") implies a contrast with what just came before in the quote. Could you give us a little more contaxt? I too enjoy such questions of theology.
Thanks Dave, here are the previous sentences
"Die Rede von der Auferweckung Jesu ist also keine intrinsische Bestimmung des Bekenntnisthemas, so daß dieses nicht wahrheitsgemäß zur Sprache gebracht werden könnte, ohne von der Auferweckung Jesu zu reden. Diese Rede legt vielmehr das Bekenntnisthema ursprünglich fest, indem es in einer für Christen verbindlichen Weise klarstellet, worauf sich christliche Bekenntnisse beziehen. Die ..."
Enough to help out? Perhaps I'll just scan the page in! Hang on, maybe it is on Google books, I'll go check
Ha!
http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=yfuq-3X9BiQC&lpg=PA52&dq=die%20auferweckung%20der%20gekreuzigte%20dalferth&pg=PA29#v=onepage&q=die%20auferweckung%20der%20gekreuzigte%20dalferth&f=false
Bottom of page 29 here
I'm afraid I'm no specialist; I've found (the beginning of) Radikale Theologie incredibly dense.
In order to clarify your question: It seems to me that Dalferth is saying there's an important difference between people talking about things (Gottes Heilshandeln) and the things themselves.
Are you saying something like: Hang on Dalferth, how can you even talk of the thing itself? Surely that is also "talk of the resurrection"...
Have I understood Dalferth and your question?
But is he indeed saying that the reference object in and of itself can still be seperately defined? Wish I knew German.
Boring!!!
Thanks, Sam - yes on teh description of Dalferth. I think. But i was wondering whether a problem with this is that a pre-textual thingness is tricky to maintain in light of continental philosophy. Language is not secondary to consciousness but intertwined with it - so goes all the way down.
Not sure I understand your question, Emerson.
Thanks, Petteri, honesty is always a breath of fresh air!
As far as I have got a grip on the whole hermeneutic theology thing (scarcely!) it's like "ontology" is being redefined. Everything around us is not so much understood as a "thing" but as a "Sprachereignis" - thus the whole physical/metaphysical divide is transcended.
In that case, like you say, it would follow that there are no "pre-textual things" to be distinguished.
However, even if everything is a Sprachereignis ("a cow licking its newly born calf" is a Sprachereignis; RT p.84), there might still be a difference between the "Sprachereignis: resurrection" and the "Sprachereignis: description of the resurrection".
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