the Crucified God

This book is Jürgen Moltmann's 1974 classic work of cross-central liberation theology. I had been reading through it with my dad, at his suggestion, our last book being John Stott's The Cross of Christ & this obviously continuing a similar theme from a different set of angles (as both very much tread orthodox biblical doctrine around the crucifixion event & its implications, Stott's focus is more familiarly pastoral while Moltmann is more philosophically exploratory); however my dad was finding it hard going* so, despite being about two-thirds of the way through, we abandoned it today, so I finished reading it alone in a couple of big sittings this afternoon. And wow.

   I have previously read Moltmann's later works on historical Christology & overall eschatology, but here the two strands are brought together in a very fruitful analysis of the central motif of Christianity - the death of the incarnate God on a cross. Were I to attempt to summarise the core theme of this book in a single sentence it would be something like: the incarnation, death & resurrection of Christ himself as the Son of God forms the essential nexus between history & eschatology, the bridge between humanity & hope. The book's contents are loosely as follows:

1. on the identity & relevance of faith: the twin crises of identity & relevance, and how we are to understand revelation in contradiction & dialectic knowledge
2. the resistance of the cross against its interpretations: how it has ossified into an unreligious symbol in much of the church, the implications of truly following it, and how it manifests in the contexts of cult, mysticism & theology
3. questions about Jesus: is He truly God? was He truly man? If we answer "yes" to both of these - does that make Him the messiah, and how do we react to that reality if so?
4. the historical trial of Jesus: after a thorough examination of the core questions around the origins of Christology, we look at the historical ways that led Him to the cross - condemned as a "blasphemer" by the religious law-keeping authorities, a "rebel" by the political authorities, and "godforsaken" by the God He claimed Sonship of
5. the eschatological trial of Jesus: a brief rumination of the relationship between eschatology & history, then considerations of His resurrection from the dead, the significance given this that the risen Lord had been crucified, and what these tangles signify about God's future
6. "the crucified God": in this longest titular chapter we first consider whether the notion of God's death constitutes the origin of Christian theology, then dig into the implications of these intellectual currents for both theism & atheism** & possible dialectical transcendence of the argument between the two, the question of how Christ's suffering relates to his double-nature as the God-man, how the cross & its implied eschatology can be best understood in trinitarian terms, and finally the experience of human life in the light of God's suffering pathos
7. ways toward the psychological liberation of humankind: how we are to understand psychological hermeneutics in relation to liberation & how this has previously been worked through in dialogue between psychoanalysis & theology, then the specific issues of repression, parricide & illusion (admittedly I was left wanting more from this chapter, as he only really deals with Freud when there is so much other psychological theory out there, but I guess it's not really Moltmann's field of expertise)
8. ways toward the political liberation of humankind: how we are to understand political hermeneutics in relation to liberation, the contrast between "political religion" as a civic unifying phenomenon quite distinct from true knowledge of God & a political theology rooted in the cross, then a remarkably astute analysis of social/political/economic vicious circles of death & the means of liberation from them*** & how God is transformatively active in these means

   So yes, this book covers an awful lot of ground, and makes its arguments in a way that is complex & often hard to read (the translation from the German is excellent but that leaves it a difficult text nonetheless), but immensely rewarding once you get to the conclusions. It's one of the most influential theological works of the 20th century****, so people interested in the development of modern thought around these themes simply cannot rightly ignore it. I would warn casual readers of theology that this a fairly academic text, but if you stick with it I'm sure any Christian reader would find much meat upon which to ponder the mysteries of our salvation, and even non-Christian readers may find it a refreshingly left-field portrayal of the event doctrinally central to the faith. Who knows? It might even change your mind about that man hanging in shame on a Roman cross...

* Which I thought was a bit strange, as we've previously read Moltmann's The Trinity and the Kingdom of God together and he managed to handle that, though in my opinion it's a much more academically-difficult text than this one.

** Interestingly, Moltmann cites Camus's notion of metaphysical rebellion as being "the only serious atheism".

*** This section alone is worth the cover price of the whole book: Moltmann pulls no punches, and I find myself desperate to get stuck into the wider written corpus of liberation theology that originated in Latin America. Without wanting to spoil it too much, Moltmann's proposed holistic means of comprehensive liberation in the spheres dealt with essentially constitute an intersectional (obviously this book pre-dates the coining of this term by a couple of decades, but had it been in parlance I am sure he would have employed it here) democratic eco-socialism***** rooted in authentic faith.

**** My version is the 40th anniversary re-release featuring a new preface by Moltmann in which he reflects with gratitude & humility on its global impact.

***** I think he largely would have supported the proposals put forth in the holistic manifesto Feminism for the 99%. And I've said this in a previous post about Moltmann but I'll say it again - it's affirming as anything to have a serious Christian thinker using the term "ecological crisis" all of 52 years ago. How much has really changed, eh?