Kerygma and Myth 4: Rudolf Bultmann, 'A Reply to the Theses of J. Schniewind'

Rudolf Bultmann, 'A Reply to the Theses of J. Schniewind', in Kerygma and Myth: A Theological Debate, ed. by Hans-Werner Bartsch, trans. by Reginald H. Fuller, (London: S.P.C.K., 1972). pp. 102-123.

An online version here.

On Thesis I

Bultmann is chuffed that Schniewind recognises that mythology in the New Testament represents a problem.

On Thesis II A

[Bultmann appears not to be in a cheery mood. Understandable after having had to make his way through Schniewind's essay.]

Straightaway, the definition of myth is the question again. Bultmann doesn't prefer Schniewind's 'By "mythological" we mean the expression of unobservable realities in terms of observable phenomena' (p. 47). Bultmann thinks that 'observable' is just as misleading as his own 'worldly'.

Can we dispense with mythology? We cannot dispense with the idea of transcendence but we must dispense with it in the New Testament.

Schniewind is wrong to argue that the natural sciences use mythological terms when the conceptualise observable phenomena. These concepts represent very 'this worldly' things (see. p. 49).

Faith and philosophy are to be distinguished. The questioning for ultimate meaning which the sciences drive us toward only leads towards the Greek Arché.

Bultmann insist that the criticism that he has not done justice to the ephapax of the New Testament is unjustified. He claims that Jesus is unique and historical (historisch (p. xiii)).

On Thesis II B

That Christianity is rejected even when demythologized because it speaks of God and sin is no reason to not demythologize.

It is not necessarily mythological to speak of an act of God. 'All these are phenomena subject to historical, sociological and psychological observation, yet for faith they are all of them eschatological phenomena. It is precisely its immunity from proof which secures the Christian proclamation against the charge of being mythological. The transcendence of God is not as in myth reduced to immanence. Instead, we have the paradox of a transcendent God present and active in history: "The Word became flesh".' (p. 44)

[My italics. This needs further clarification.]

'The Christian preacher can demand faith only when he has demonstrated sin and grace to be real possibilities of human life, and their denial and repudiation to be unbelief and guilt. It is the great merit of the existentialist interpretation that it makes this clear.' (p. 105) Without this interpretation we mythology which is incomprehensible to the modern person.

On Thesis III

'The only true interpretation of eschatology is one which makes it a real experience of human life. You say: "Our acquittal is Christ himself. He is the embodiment of the righteousness of God. " But surely that requires interpretation. And such a metaphorical statement as "He incorporates his own in himself as a king includes his people" serves only to darken counsel.' (p. 106)

'The whole gift of God is comprised in the forgiveness of sins. But I am quite sure that we will not understand this aright unless we insist that forgiveness is freedom from sin, not only from past guilt, but also from sinful behavior in the future. It is "access to God", certainly, but what do we mean by that? What does it mean in actual experience? Human life continues to be "historic" even when it is eschatological -- for that I take it is what you mean by "the eschatological judgment still lies in the future" -- and it issues forth in a new life. It is therefore controlled by the imperative. Through the gift of God "Thou shalt" becomes "I will". We are "led by the Spirit". The peculiar quality of the indicative is manifested in its inseparable unity with the imperative, and vice versa. It was Karl Barth, I believe, who first charged me with substituting anthropology for theology. This is an easy misunderstanding of the existentialist position. Anthropology is here being used rather as Feuerbach used it, and existence is identified with subjectivity. Using "anthropology" differently, I would heartily agree: I am trying to substitute anthropology for theology, for I am interpreting theological affirmations as assertions about human life. What I mean is that the God of the Christian revelation is the answer to the vital questions, the existential questions.' (p. 107)

Thesis IV A

'I still maintain that the underlying assumptions of sacrifice as practiced in the primitive cults and in the religions of classical antiquity (including the Old Testament) are incurably mythological. There may of course be nothing mythological in the belief that man must be ready to sacrifice to the deity what is dearest to him. But such a belief becomes mythological the moment it ceases to be controlled by a true conception of God. Take for instance the case of a child being sacrificed in order to insure the success of an enterprise or to avert misfortune. Such a practice implies a crude mythological conception of God. It cannot be denied that a similar belief underlies the practice of sacrifice in the Old Testament -- the belief that God will accept the life of a substitute when the offerer’s own life is forfeit. The modern use of sacrifice in connection with the mother or the soldier is entirely different. In these cases the offerer is himself the victim. He is not seeking to insure his own safety by offering a substitute, or to gain anything for himself.' (p. 108)

[The 'mythological' is based on an objectified understanding of metaphorical language.]
[Exlusive substitution: bad. mythological.]
[Self-substitution: good.]
[I still don't get it. Why is Christ - the incarnation - not mythological in Bultmann's terms? This is pure myth, in his terms, isn't it? Unless he is sitting light to ontological claims about Christ's deity? May have to return to first essay again ...]

'I must now confess -- and here perhaps the gulf between us is most obvious -- that the language of personal relationship with Christ is just as mythological as the other imagery you favor; that is, unless it is strictly conceived on the lines of John 14: 9 or of Herrmann’s "God is in Christ". You ask: "What do we mean when we say that Jesus has entered into our deprivation from God? What do we mean by a personal relation with the exalted Christ?" Your questions only go to show how mythological in form is the New Testament theology of the cross.' (p. 109)

'It seems that you are afraid to abandon mythology lest you should surrender the real skandalon with the preliminary stumbling-block.' (p. 109)

'The explanation [of the mythological language of the judgement of sin] I proposed was this: when we appropriate the judgment of God we have to take up the cross for ourselves and affirm the divine judgment in self-judgment. I think that here I have St. Paul and Luther on my side, and hope you agree too.' (p. 110)

[The question as to what is mythological may be decided too easily by our own lack of philosophical equipment. Bultmann can't seem to see out of his existentialist box which seems far too dismissive of a lot of biblical langauge. Of course, I could just be being too conservative by half.]

On Thesis IV B

'Nor, again, do I object to your speaking of a unique and final revelation of God in history, so long as the context puts the meaning beyond all doubt. It would, for instance, be quite legitimate to use such language in refuting a pantheistic conception of revelation. At the same time such language is dangerous, for it is liable to obscure the eschatological character of the Christian faith in revelation, and to make that revelation a revelatum, something which took place in the past and now an object of detached observation, and the kerygma a bare report about something now dead and done with. And that is to forget that "now is the day of salvation".' (p. 111)

'Behind your whole argument there lies the difficult problem of our relation to Jesus, though I would rather not embark upon that at this point.' [!!!]

On Thesis V

'I cannot accept 1 Cor. 15:3-8 as kerygma. I call that line of argument fatal because it tries to adduce a proof for the kerygma. Nor am I convinced that the legend of the Empty Tomb was part of the kerygma, or that St. Paul himself knew anything about it.' (p. 112)

'It is certainly wrong to interpret Christ "merely in terms of our existence as persons in history", if that existence is understood in a purely idealistic sense. That would be to reduce the great Christological events to bare symbols or stimuli to religious devotion. But, granted a true conception of historicity, granted that our "historic" self transcends our subjectivity, so that we are always extra nos as well as in ourselves, in good as well as in evil, then the above quotation is perfectly correct, and the word "merely" serves only to protect the Christological event from a mythological interpretation. For the fact is that we can apprehend invisible reality only in the light of a fact encountered in a concrete encounter in life. We cannot prove theoretically that this fact is Christ; we can only know it in faith.' (p. 113)

[How are we extra nos - how is this not mythological in Bultmann's own terms?]
[Plus, what is this knowledge which comes by faith ... ?]

On Thesis VI A

'On the other hand, I maintain that the "last day" is a mythological concept, which must be replaced by the language of death. To ignore with the Gnostics the certainty of death is to forget that our existence is and remains essentially "historic" and that the future, though apprehended, is never an assured possession so long as our earthly "historic" existence endures and so long as faith is still in via (Phil. 3:12-14). I am surprised how readily people conclude that my interpretation of the New Testament eschatology implies a timeless "now". To say that two ages or cosmic periods overlap is to my mind totally inadequate. If the point of the contrast between the two ages is that the present age is evil and that in the age to come there will be no more temptation or death, the age to come cannot be conceived as a further period in history or as overlapping the old age like two epochs in history. It would be better to say that in the new age the indispensable conditions of the time process come to an end. The overlapping is possible and the age to come a present reality only in virtue of certain events and responses to those events within the old age. Faith interprets these as the irruption of the new age. I refer of course to the event of Christ, the kerygma, the response of faith, and the church or community of believers. What happens in these phenomena now -- that is, at particular points along the time process -- has ceased to be an event in time. Therefore in the last analysis each particular Now is to the eyes of faith that one Now which is the fullness of time.' (p. 114)

[Confusing. He demythologizes 'the last' day to death. But, he envisages an age beyond the end of time which we experience a taste of through the kerygma.]

On Thesis VI B

'Eschatology tells us the meaning and goal of the time process, but that answer does not consist in a philosophy of history, like pantheism, where the meaning and goal of history are to be seen in each successive moment, or like the belief in progress, where the goal is realized in a future Utopia, or myth, which offers an elaborate picture of the end of the world. Indeed, eschatology is not at all concerned with the meaning and goal of secular history, for secular history belongs to the old aeon, and therefore can have neither meaning nor goal. It is concerned rather with the meaning and goal of the history of the individual and of the eschatological community. Moreover, the meaning is fulfilled and the goal attained in the fullness of time -- that is, wherever the word of the proclamation establishes an encounter (Rev. 12:10-13; John 12:31; 4:73; 5:25; 2 Cor. 6:2, etc.).' (p. 116)

'the study of those documents [the synoptic gospels] can bring us to an encounter with the historical phenomenon "Jesus" only on the basis of one phenomenon of past history. Yet we can hope, by means of this study, to recognize the historical phenomenon "Jesus" only on the basis of one’s own historic (geschichtlich) encounter.' (p. 117)

'The Jesus of history is not kerygma ... For in the kerygma Jesus encounters us as the Christ -- that is, as the eschatological phenomenon par excellence. Neither St. Paul nor St. John mediate an historic encounter with the historic Jesus. Even if the synoptic gospels appear to do so, that is only when they are read in the light of the historical problems which have arisen since their day, not when they are read in their original sense. '

'I still deny that historical research can ever encounter any traces of the epiphany of God in Christ; all it can do is to confront us with the Jesus of history. Only the Church’s proclamation can bring us face to face with Kyrios Christos.'

Daemonology gets short shrift. To claim that there is an organized rebellion against God implies an Organizer (yes...!) 'Satan is a mythological figure'.

'Everything turns upon how precisely we abandon natural causation in favor of supernatural explanations -- i.e. whether by the "nevertheless" of faith (cf. Glauben und Verstehen, pp. 214ff.), or by recourse to mythology. The real skandalon of faith in God vis-à-vis modern technology can become clear only when we have abandoned the false view of God which that technology has exploded.' (p. 120)

'This much, however, is clear: while modern man may be wrong in identifying his ego with his subjectivity, he is undoubtedly right in regarding it in its subjective aspect as a unity, and in refusing to allow any room for alien powers to interfere in his subjective life. The mythical thought of the New Testament on the other hand, does reckon with such interferences, and if such thought enshrines a profound and genuine insight into the nature of the human ego, it requires restatement to make it plain, and that means the complete abandonment of mythology.'

'The Spirit is not the prime cause behind the human will, but operates in that will. To be led by the Spirit means not only that we are called sons of God but that we can appropriate the sonship and discern the imperative in the indicative. The decision God pronounces over man takes effect in the resolve of the human will.'

'Modern man par excellence is technological man, and for that reason he is doubly enslaved to the modern scientific world view, even if in theory he disclaims all interest in and knowledge of it. If he is prepared to take seriously the question of God, he ought not to be burdened with the mythological element in Christianity. We must help him to come to grips with the real skandalon and make his decision accordingly.' (p. 122)

[Bultmann is speaking to the intellectual. He is aiming for modern man par excellence. It is fine to reiterate liturgy which contains mythology in Church.]

[No great advancement then. The question still in focus is what the referent of New Testament language is. One could take a more positive approach which recognised the limitations of all language of God, including the New Testament, and which still hoped that connection and limited comprehension with the referents was possible.]

[I suspect some of Barth's understanding of the divine appropriation of human language will be helpful.]