Emil Brunner

Emil Brunner (December 23, 1889 – April 6, 1966) was an eminent and highly influential Swiss theologian. Along with Karl Barth (see Relationship with Karl Barth), he is commonly associated with the neo-orthodoxy or dialectical theology movement.

Biography

Emil Brunner was born near Zurich in 1889. He studied at both the universities of Zurich and Berlin, receiving his doctorate in theology from Zurich in 1913. The title of his doctoral dissertation was: The Symbolic Element in Religious Knowledge. Brunner served as pastor from 1916 to 1917 in the mountain village of Obstalden in the Canton of Glarus. He spent a year in New York, at Union Theological Seminary studying (1919–1920), where he was the seminary's first exchange student after WWI.

In 1921 Brunner wrote what he considered a second dissertation: Experience, Knowledge and Faith. Soon, another book followed: Mysticism and the Word. This work was a devastating critique of the liberal theology of Friedrich Schleiermacher. Brunner was rewarded for his literary efforts with the appointment as the professor of Systematic and Practical Theology at the University of Zurich from 1924-1955. In the next few years his reputation continued to increase, particularly with the publication of two more books, the first The Philosophy of Religion from the Standpoint of Protestant Theology, and second The Mediator.

In 1932, following a few years of receiving invitations to visit and lecture across Europe and the United States, and accepting them, Brunner wrote God and Man and The Divine Imperative. Brunner continued his theological output with Man in Revolt and Truth as Encounter in 1937. In 1938–1939 he again visited the US when he agreed to a visiting professorship at Princeton Theological Seminary.

He returned to Europe prior to World War II along with a young Scottish theologian T. F. Torrance (a student of Karl Barth's in Basel), who was teaching at Auburn Theological Seminary. Torrance would later distinguish himself at the University of Edinburgh. Following the war, Brunner was invited to give the distinguished Gifford Lectures at the University of St. Andrews, (1946–1947) in Scotland, the title of his lectures being Christianity and Civilization.

His teaching career concluded in 1953–1955 at what was then the new International Christian University in Tokyo, Japan, but not before the publication of his three volume Dogmatics. Volume One was titled: The Christian Doctrine of God. Volume Two was titled: The Christian Doctrine of Creation and Redemption, and the final volume was titled: The Christian Doctrine of the Church, Faith, and Consummation. On the return journey from Japan to Europe, Brunner suffered a cerebral hemorrhage and was physically impaired weakening his ability to work productively. Though there were times when he felt better during the next nine years, he suffered further strokes off and on, finally succumbing to death in 1966.

Brunner holds a place of prominence in Protestant theology in the twentieth century.

Theology

Brunner rejected liberal theology's portrait of Jesus Christ as anything less than God incarnate, insisting that both the incarnation and Jesus' atoning death and resurrection were central to salvation. He thus opposed the proposition of both Schleiermacher and Ritschl, while joining with Karl Barth in the promotion of Neo-orthodoxy. He broke with Barth, however, on the question of grace, affirming that humans were totally totally depraved by the Fall, and that a "point of contact" remained between God and humans even without the grace of salvation through Jesus.

Some observers see Brunner's theology of grace as attempting to find a middle position within the ongoing Arminian and Calvinist debate, holding that Christ stood between God's sovereign approach to humankind and our free acceptance of God's gift of salvation.

After 1937, Brunner's theology was strongly influenced by the theology of Jewish theologian Martin Buber, stressing the Christian revelation as a type of personal encounter with God. The Divine-Human Encounter (1937), Man in Revolt (1938) and Revelation and Reason (1941) all show Buber's influence.

While Brunner insisted on the unique salvific value of the Christian faith, he was also strongly interested in a dialog between Christianity and secular life. He thus strongly opposed both Nazism and Communism as threats both to religious freedom and western civilization.

Brunner's outline of Neo-orthodoxy

Brunner's 1928 lecture series published as The Theology of Crisis is widely considered to be one of the best expressions of Neo-orthodox theology. Here, Brunner identified give main themes of the Barthian protest against Protestant liberalism.

• The Theology of Crisis. This refers to the early twentieth century as a crucial turning point, in which the West, including Christian theology itself was in a rapid state of dissolution. Christianity is not a system of ethics, nor can it be understood with reference to science and historical criticism. It is either faith in God's revelation, or it is nothing. It substituting belief in Jesus as Savior for belief in Jesus as the model of an ideal man, liberals rob Christianity of its uniqueness, truth, and power. Nevertheless, Christians do not need to choose between modernism and fundamentalism: they may refine their understanding of the Bible in light of rationalism and critical thought, without compromising on the essential truth of God's revelation through Jesus.

• Revelation. Neither science nor metaphysics reveals the ultimate truth, which is found only through a passionate search in which one's whole life is at stake. Moreover, God cannot be directly encountered in the world, for the essence of God is transcendent. God's immanent nature may be encountered fully only through Jesus Christ, who is God incarnate.

• Salvation. Human life is dialectical an paradoxical. No one can escape death, no matter how hard he ties. Furthermore, evil is a collective reality, in which all humans share a common guilt. Man does evil because he isevil, because our original fellowship with God is broken. Only repentance and reconciliation with the living God can heal this. Even though Christians remain sinners after being saved, they receive a new strength to live more perfectly by faith, after determining to put God's will before their own.

• Ethics. Faith in God's Word is the only true foundation for ethics, as faith alone produces the energy necessary for true moral renewal. Modern ethical system based on self-esteem and self-realization are useless, because they fail to deal with the problem of sin. Each of us is hopeless broken and in need of salvation, a situation that requires confession and repentance to God before we can hope to reform ourselves. Yet this reformation is not only an act of God, but requires human cooperation in the form of the courageous act of turning away from sin back toward God's will.

• Progress. While science is not to be dismissed, evolutionary theories do not account adequately for progress. The art of Michelangelo, the music of Bach, or even the religion of Zoroaster cannot be explained by science alone, but must admit to the inspiration of a higher power. God's kingdom is thus a matter of the dramatic inbreaking of God's spirit, rather than of evolution. It is not a movement of man's gradual progress toward God, but of God's revelation to man. Ultimately, however, Christianity is the most optimistic of religions, affirming that, in the end, humans will see God face to face.

Relationship with Karl Barth

Brunner and Barth, though originally friends and colleagues, came to differ dramatically over their theological views. Barth once described their relationship as similar to that of a whale and an elephant.

After 1934, their friendship dissolved, as Barth wrote an emphatic article declaring "Nein!" to what he characterized as Brunner's "natural theology." Brunner responded with his own strongly worded attack on Barth, and the two former friends did not meet for 30 years after these incidents.

Long before Barth's name was known in the US, Brunner was considered to be the chief proponent of the new "dialectical theology," better known as Neo-orthodoxy. In the US, Brunner's books were translated much more quickly than Barth's works.

Considered by many to be the minor partner in the uneasy relationship, Brunner once acknowledged that the only theological genius of the 20th century was Barth.

Legacy

Although Brunner re-emphasized the centrality of Christ, evangelical and fundamentalist theologians have usually rejected Brunner's other teachings, including his dismissal of certain "miraculous" elements within the Scriptures and his questioning of the usefulness of the doctrine of the inspiration of the Bible.

Nevertheless, he and Bath effectively challenged nineteenth-century liberal theology by exposing it as ultimately a human effort to live a Godly life by emulating Jesus, rather than as God's effort to reach humans through his own self-revelation in Christ.

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