We have seen in a previous issue of The Presbyterian Guardian (Jan. 9, 1937), that though Karl Barth calls men back to the Word of God, he does not call men back to the Bible as Protestants are wont to think of the Bible. In the present article we shall see that Barth cannot believe in the Bible as the completed revelation of God because he cannot fully believe the doctrine of creation.
The story has frequently been told how the philosophy of Hegel and the theology of Schleiermacher has largely controlled the modern church. The sovereign God of the Reformers was eclipsed by a God who is necessarily instead of freely related to the universe. God was well-nigh identified with. ideal principles in the universe. The immanence Of God within the universe was stressed at the expense of His transcendence above the universe.
Now Barth launched a fearless attack on this immanentistic theology which we usually speak of as Modernism. He set fire to the whole structure of modern theology. He called upon men to return to the transcendent God, to the sovereign Lord, to God as the “absolutely Other.” He called upon men to forget their pride, to cast away their schemes of interpretation, and to fall prostrate before the face of the “Lord of life and death."
Shall we not rejoice in this work of Barth? We certainly shall. We do not seek to save even the least bit of the house of Modernism. Yet we are once more afraid that Barth thinks he cannot burn down the house of Modernism unless he also burns down the house of orthodoxy.
The Importance of the Creation Doctrine
It requires little argument to show that without such a doctrine as creation the house of Protestant theology falls to the ground. Man is dependent upon and responsible to God just because God has created all things and by His providence controls all things. If there is any ultimate power or principle beside God, man’s final responsibility is no longer to God alone. If there is any ultimate power or principle beside God, the definition of sin can no longer be “any want of conformity unto, or transgression of, the law of God.” If there is any ultimate power or principle beside God, Christ cannot execute His office as a prophet because in that case He does not know all things; He cannot execute His office of a priest because, even if He reconciled us to God, there would be other powers to be reconciled; and He cannot perform His office of a King because He does not control all things. In short, historic Christianity falls to the ground without the doctrine of creation.
What Barth Says About Creation
Yet Barth virtually rejects the Biblical doctrine of creation. In saying this we are aware of the fact that it is quite possible to quote Barth to the effect that he believes in creation. If we should go to Barth, notebook in hand, and ask him whether he believes in creation he might say, “Certainly I do.” He could quote from one of his latest books saying: “Again heaven and earth are not God’s work in the sense that God created them according to some ideas in themselves given and true, or out of some material already existing, or by means of some instrument apt in itself for that purpose. Creation in the Bible sense means: Creation solely on the basis of God’s own wisdom. It means, creatio ex nihilo (Rom. 4:17).” Or again: “The world having once been created by God (apart from sin!) cannot obviously cease to be determined by this decisive act” (Credo, pp. 32, 33).
Limitations on the Doctrine of Creation
Now these quotations would seem to indicate plainly that Barth is thoroughly Biblical, as far as the creation doctrine is concerned. How then dare we say that Barth has virtually rejected the Biblical doctrine of creation? The answer is that we are compelled to do so because Barth, by certain qualifications that he makes, in effect takes back everything that we have just heard him say. '“But,” says Barth, “the doctrine of Creation has its definite limits which have got to be known if that doctrine is to be rightly understood” (Credo, p. 35). A little further he adds: “There are definite and necessary questions of faith which are not to be answered from the doctrine of creation, or at least not unequivocally and completely” (Credo, p. 36). These “questions of faith” include “the possibility of” sin, evil and death. Barth concludes this section by saying: “In order to keep true to the facts, Dogmatics has here, as in other places, to be logically inconsequent. Therefore in spite of the omnipotence of God—or rather on the score of rightly understood omnipotence of God, Dogmatics must not at this place carry the Creation-thought right to the end of the line. It must rather explain these possibilities as being such that we have indeed to reckon most definitely with their reality, but are unable better to describe their real nature and character than by forbearing to ask for their raison d’étre either in the will of God the Creator or even with Marcion and the Manicheans in the will of a wicked Anti-God. These possibilities are to be taken seriously as the mysterium iniquitatis” (Credo, p. 37). To this we must add Barth’s words: “Projecting our thought ‘consequently’ along the line of the creation dogma, we should have in one way or another to deny the Incarnation, Miracle, prayer, the Church” (Credo, p. 38).
The Significance of These Limitations
From these quotations it appears that Barth, in order to protect God from being the author of sin, thinks it necessary to limit the creation doctrine. He says not merely that we, as human beings, cannot understand how a creature of God, wholly dependent upon God, can become a sinner, without God being involved in sin, but he says definitely that the idea of sin is in reality inconsistent with the idea of creation. So too he does not hesitate to say that the Incarnation is inconsistent with the idea of creation. Orthodox theology says that a creature became a sinner, without God becoming involved in sin. Barth says, in effect, that this is not possible and therefore we must hold that there is an original evil independent of God.
The Paradox-concept
At this point some one may object by saying that though Barth considers “creation” and “incarnation” inconsistent with one another, he can and does believe both because he thinks it quite possible to believe the inconsistent as the “paradoxical.” But this escape, granted it were an escape, is not open to Earth since he himself says we must limit the creation doctrine in order to believe in the Incarnation. Often enough Barth says you can both have your cake and eat it, but at this point he says you cannot have your cake and eat it. If you wish to believe in the Incarnation, says Barth, you must limit your creation doctrine. We are compelled to affirm therefore that Earth has virtually rejected the doctrine of creation.
Other Emphases in Barth
This interpretation of Barth is in accord with, the fact that Barth constantly connects the “Lordship” of God with redemption. Apparently Barth thinks that God was not “Lord” of man by virtue of creation.
In accord with this interpretation, too, is Barth’s constant insistence, particularly in Romans, that the world as such is inherently evil. Barth refuses to take the Genesis account of an originally perfect creation and of the fall of man as being simple narration of fact (Credo, p. 190). Orthodox theology holds that man as such, and the whole of the universe as such, was originally made perfect but that sin entered as the willful disobedience of man. In opposition to this Barth holds that no one historical event can be of basic importance for all following historical events, and therefore, in effect, denies the fall. For the fall he substitutes some original “mystery of iniquity.”
It will readily be seen now why Barth cannot accept the Protestant doctrine of Scripture. According to his philosophy man was not originally created perfect. Man and the universe that surrounds him are, for Barth, inherently evil. Accordingly, even God Himself, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, could not use the human mind as a medium for the expression of His truth. The “human factor” in the Bible must always and of necessity indicate error and sin. There could never be a completed revelation of God to man.
And this leads us in conclusion to observe that with all of Barth’s best intentions to call men back to the sovereign God of the Reformers he has in reality no “sovereign” God to offer us. Barth’s “sovereign” God is severely limited by an original something that exists independently of Him, and works independently of Him. Barth frequently appeals to the Reformers and to such Reformation documents as the Heidelberg Catechism. But Barth could not preach, for example, on the first question of the Lord’s day of that catechism without twisting it completely out of its natural and historical meaning. If his sermons do not flagrantly depart from the Reformed Faith, it is because, by a happy inconsistency, they do not reflect and apply Barth’s theological principles fully. Only Reformed theology, based upon the doctrine of a really sovereign God, creator of heaven and earth, whose decrees include “whatsoever comes to pass,” can bring men to a real Entschedung (decision). Against Barth, as against modern theology which he seeks to oppose, we must once more raise the banner of a sovereign God and of His complete revelation in Scripture.