30/12/2018 Why Troeltsch? Why today?

Theology for the 21st Century – Religion Online

RELIGION ONLINE

Why Troeltsch? Why today? Theology for the 21st Century

by Garrett E. Paul

Garrett E. Paul was, in 1993, associate professor in the department of religion and director
of the Florence and Ray Sponberg Chair in Ethics at Gustavus Adolphus College in Saint
Peter, Minnesota.

This is the sixth in a series of articles on "rethinking religious classics." This article
appeared in The Christian Century, June 30-July 7 , 1993, pp. 676-681. Copyright by The
Christian Century Foundation; used by permission. Current articles and subscription
information can be found at www.christiancentury.org. This article prepared for Religion
Online by Ted & Winnie Brock.

SUMMARY

Troeltsch was very attracted to mysticism, but he knew that religion would die without
symbol, cult and myth, and that it would grow impotent without institutions.

Ernst Troeltsch died 70 years ago, and his theology was shortly thereafter declared dead
as well. Famous in his own generation as a theologian, philosopher, historian and politician,
he was soon forgotten, or remembered as the best example of what not to do. For Karl
Barth, Troeltsch was the last theologian of the 19th century; a man whose failure revealed
the true character of liberal theology. Barth’s judgment shaped an entire generation of
theologians.

But all that has changed. Interest in Troeltsch’s thought is greater today than ever before,
and also more widespread, attracting attention in Eastern and Western Europe, North
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America and Japan. What began about 20 years ago as a trickle of articles, dissertations,
books, translations and reprints in German, English, French, Italian and Japanese has
become a steady stream. Far from being the last theologian of the 19th century, Troeltsch
is coming to be seen as the rst theologian of the 20th century—or perhaps even the 21st.

But why do the life and thought of this early 20th-century man now seem so relevant?
Because Troeltsch, at the beginning of this century, was keenly aware of many trends that
became apparent to most observers only at its end: the collapse of Eurocentrism; the
perceived relativity of all historical events and knowledge (including scienti c knowledge);
an awareness that Christianity is relative to its Western, largely European history and
environment; the emergence of a profound global pluralism; the central role of practice in
theology; the growing impact of the social sciences on our view of the world and of
ourselves; and dramatic changes in the role of religious institutions and religious thought.
Moreover, he was a profoundly interdisciplinary thinker whose contributions embraced
philosophy, history, sociology, philosophy of history, ethics and politics.

Precisely because Troeltsch understood the forces that were and are shaping 20th-
century religion and society, he can provide us with needed perspective on contemporary
theological and religious movements. Furthermore, his willingness to confront some very
dif cult theological is-sues—issues that the intervening generation of theologians mostly
ignored or evaded—makes his insights uniquely instructive. The issues Troeltsch
confronted are many, but I will focus on three: 1) Christianity as a historical, relative
phenomenon, 2) Christianity as a social phenomenon, and 3) theology as a practical
discipline. Troeltsch’s contributions are far more complex than this division suggests, but
it provides a convenient format in which to summarize his chief insights. Then in light of
this summary, I will explore how a theology informed by his insights might differ from what
we see in theology today.

"Everything is tottering!" Troeltsch exclaimed at an 1896 conference, initiating an

exchange that ended with Troeltsch slamming the door as he left the room. Everything is
tottering, because Christianity was now known to be a historical phenomenon. From the
beginning, Troeltsch took a historical approach to the study of religion and theology. He
was convinced that there was no reason to exclude Christianity from the history of
religion as a whole. The Bible, Jesus and the church were all part of history; they were
neither exempt from historical investigation nor entitled to a privileged historical method.
This meant that almost all of late 19th-century theology was on shaky ground.

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The modern study of history had established that Christianity was not a supernatural
phenomenon that had just appeared in history without cause or antecedent. On the
contrary, Christianity was in uenced by a host of non-Christian and non-Jewish factors.
Christianity could not, therefore, on historical grounds be proven nal or absolute.
Troeltsch stated this conclusion in The Absoluteness of Christianity—tentatively in the
rst edition of 1902, emphatically in the second edition of 1912. Nor could Jesus be
exempted. He too was relative to his origins and history, in uenced by the spectrum of
opinions and practices of the Judaism of late antiquity.

But relativity is not the whole story for Troeltsch. The fact that Christianity and Jesus are
both historical also demonstrates their relatedness. And what is more, it demonstrates
our interrelatedness with them. We can dispense neither with the historical Jesus nor with
the revered Christ; he remains indispensable, for "we possess these religious powers of
the present only in association with the present and revered person of Christ."

The historical character of all religion that Troeltsch recognized still serves to check the
shallow individualism and subjectivism so characteristic of our age. Faced with the
awareness that everything historical is also relative, the individual is tempted to think
(with Kierkegaard and the early Barth) that history is without signi cance, or indeed that
nothing has any signi cance. But a study of history, on the contrary, demonstrates that
religion is not a purely subjective phenomenon; it is rather a historical phenomenon that
shapes and transcends individual experience. Individual belief is historical, relative and
related. The autonomous individual never—not even in the case of Jesus—spontaneously
produces faith within his or her isolated individuality. The individual needs the stimulus
and impetus of history—and of community. Troeltsch understood these relationships and
thus paid careful attention to religion’s social dimension.

Troeltsch began to address the social context of religion partly as a result of his friendship
with the sociologist Max Weber. He had already called attention to the historical relativity
—and relatedness—of Christianity; he now began to note its social and institutional
relativity—and relatedness—as well. The result of this interest was the nearly 1,000-page
work, The Social Teachings of the Christian Churches and Groups (1912), which remains a
classic of religious sociology, social history and ethics.

Christianity, Troeltsch taught, can assume any of three basic social forms or types: the
church, the sect and mysticism. The church, into which one is born (like the medieval
Catholic Church), is distinguished by an ethic of conservation and compromise in its
relationship with the surrounding society; the sect, which one must join as an adult (like
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the Anabaptists), rejects the surrounding society and has an ethic of rigor, perfection and
transformation; the mystic is primarily a subjectively religious person who is not linked to
any particular religious body (or, if linked to one, does not nd it very important). The
church emphasizes the sacraments and education; the sect emphasizes conversion and
commitment; the mystic emphasizes inner experience. All three types are authentically
Christian, each has roots in the New Testament, and all three have decided strengths as
well as weaknesses, according to Troeltsch.

But the most rapidly growing type, Troeltsch held, was mysticism—and studies of
contemporary American culture con rm his analysis. "Mysticism," in this sense, does not
refer to miraculous visions or signs or supernatural experiences. Instead, it signi es a
personal and subjective form of religion that is more internal than external, more
individual than institutional, more experiential than scriptural. For the mystic, Troeltsch
said, membership in church or sect is of no signi cance—it is the free personal experience
that matters.

This kind of mysticism abounds in all ages, in churches and in sects, and outside of any
formal religious body—from medieval mystics to modern Quakers to contemporary
college sophomores who talk about their personal "spirituality." But the modern era in
particular has seen a tremendous growth in Troeltsch’s mystical type, as the authority and
in uence of both churches and sects have declined. A noninstitutional mysticism was
already, according to Troeltsch, "the secret religion of the educated classes." Today we
must add: not so secret anymore.

Troeltsch himself was deeply attracted to mysticism. In part this attraction was rooted in
his antagonism to dogmatism and authoritarianism, and no doubt it also grew out of his
awareness of historical relativity. Yet Troeltsch was no simple individualist, which is what
makes him so very refreshing today. He knew that religion would die without symbol, cult,
and myth. And he knew that religion would grow socially and ethically impotent without
institutions. So despite his own attraction to mysticism, he knew that it was an inadequate
and unsustainable expression of religious faith. Troeltsch could never overcome this
contradiction between vital personal religious experience and its institutional mediation,
and it remains a problem for us today—one far more serious than that of relativism.

Following Schleiermacher, Troeltsch refused to call his theology "dogmatics." The whole
idea of dogma—timeless, nonhistorical facts about God, Jesus, the church and so forth—
had been completely undermined by the study of history. "We are no longer in the
business of xing permanent dogmas from an inspired Bible. Instead, we formulate
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teachings which express the essence of Christian piety," Troeltsch wrote. In other words,
theology is inextricably linked to practice.

Theological statements do not describe objective facts about God and salvation,
according to Troeltsch. Instead, they "express the preconditions and contents of the
Christian consciousness of faith, i.e., a living, practical-theoretical orientation to God, the
world, and humanity." It is a "theology of consciousness" instead of a "theology of facts,"
for God "can never be known apart from subjective experience." Troeltsch argued that
religion is primarily a matter of experience and subjectivity, not dogma and fact. "It comes
not from the desk, but from life." In his later writings he also came to emphasize the role of
decision in relation to the religious life.

But Troeltsch’s religious decision was not like that of Kierkegaard, which supposedly took
place apart from social-historical conditions. Troeltsch never capitulated to mere
subjectivism. Knowledge of God is never possible apart from subjective experience, but it
is always more than subjective experience. Troeltsch maintained that such knowledge is
"not a frivolous subjectivity but something that takes shape within us, overwhelming us
with an irresistible inner sovereignty." Or put another way, subjectivity "does not mean a
matter of arbitrary taste, but a subjectivity which is saturated with God." In other words,
Troeltsch believed that authentic subjectivity involves more than the mere subject alone.
Genuine faith "lifts the individual subject above its own limitations and brings it into full
and living contact with the divine life for the rst time."

This observation brings us back once more to Troeltsch’s emphasis on the indispensable
role that history and community play in Christian life. To re-emphasize a cardinal point of
Troeltsch’s thought, faith—even in the case of Jesus—is never spontaneously produced by
an autonomous subject. Faith needs the stimulus and impetus of history and community.
Any attempt to sever these ties that bind would result in the destruction of genuine
religion, and in "an utterly individual, personal, and emaciated mysticism." Troeltsch’s
theology is a highly sophisticated combination of personal experience and social history,
of subjectivity and historicity, of individual and community.

What do Troeltsch’s life and thought mean for today? His relevance can be indicated with
regard to three contemporary theological movements: postmodern theology, narrative
theology and liberation theology. All three movements share some of his interests, yet
each displays serious de ciencies that Troeltsch’s work can illuminate and help correct.
Not that Troeltsch has all the answers, or that his theology itself can be revived lock, stock
and barrel. For all his achievements, scarcely one stone of his theology can be left
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standing on top of another. But theology today will have to reckon with these very stones,
or else stumble over them.

Postmodern theology: The desire to be postmodern often outpaces the ability to

articulate just what postmodernity is all about. An enormous number of intellectual and
pseudo-intellectual movements now rally to the postmodern juggernaut, often with
contradictory agendas. Since pluralism is itself a hallmark of postmodernism, generalizing
about the movement is dangerous. But in most respects, postmodern theology as
represented by gures such as Thomas Altizer and Mark C.Taylor rejects any attempt to
formulate enduring principles and doctrines or to identify any ontological or foundational
reality. It also rejects Enlightenment beliefs that there are universal truths of reason, that
history is characterized by progress, and that rational science and technology are the
solution to our problems. Postmodernists tend to be particularly critical of the claim that
science knows the "real" world. This devaluation of science is usually coupled with the
rejection of all dualisms: mind/body, man/nature, man/woman, and so on. Finally,
postmodern theology declares that the modern era—that is, the one characterized by all
those Enlightenment beliefs—is now over.

Troeltsch has great af nities with many postmodern in-sights; indeed, he anticipated
many of them. He was aware that scienti c knowledge is relative to its time and culture,
just like religion. He knew that all values are in ux, and that true knowledge of value is
always a challenge and a process. Yet he was also aware, in a way that many post-
moderns are not, that no one can completely break with the past; any claim that one has
done so is illusory. Compared with Troeltsch, much of postmodernism can be seen as
more hypermodern than postmodern. It is largely another attempt to carry out the old
Enlightenment program of demolishing tradition, ritual, cult and historical narrative,
except now without the Enlightenment’s faith that reason and technology can assume
their place. At the same time, much postmodern thought perpetuates Romanticism’s
narcissistic glori cation of emotion and irrationality, except now without the romantics’
esteem for tradition and the people. Postmodernism is simply the Enlightenment once
more with feeling—combining the worst excesses of rationalism and romanticism.

In terms of Troeltsch’s writing, postmodernism is closely linked to what he called

mysticism—and it shares in that religious type’s contemporary inevitability and in its
inadequacy. Troeltsch does not provide us with a solution to the problems that
postmodernism both re ects and raises, but he can help puncture the pretensions of
those varieties (and they are many) that pretend to have left the Enlightenment behind

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while continuing to perpetuate some of its most unfortunate errors. History, community
and tradition are the true basis of autonomy and decision. As Troeltsch understood, these
features of human experience cannot be separated.

Narrative (or postliberal) theology: The major rival to postmodern theology in intellectual
circles is the narrative theology movement represented by such gures as Hans Frei,
George Lindbeck and (in a maverick version) Stanley Hauerwas. Narrative theology
accepts the premises of post-modernism at many points but draws a radically different
conclusion. Since we cannot survey history from some universal, purely rational point of
view, narrative theologians argue, we have no choice but to operate out of the historical
narrative in which we nd ourselves—and for the Christian theologian that means the
Christian narrative, shaped by the story(ies) of Jesus Christ as found in the Bible. The
Christian narrative embraces within itself the claim that the meaning of all history is to be
found in Christ, narrative theologians say, but they also hold that such a claim cannot be
demonstrated from a standpoint outside the narrative. In the cases of Hauerwas and
Lindbeck, at least, this line of reasoning is linked to a preference for the sect type of
Christian community.

Of all the theological options on the horizon today, narrative theology has the most direct
ties to Troeltsch, though they are not usually acknowledged. The narrative theology
movement itself may be traced back to H. Richard Niebuhr’s The Meaning of Revelation, a
book in which Troeltsch’s emphasis on history and subjectivity appears on nearly every
page. But contemporary narrative theologians seem to have forgotten two lessons from
Troeltsch that they should have remembered: that the narratives themselves are
historical and relative, and that we nd ourselves participating not in one but in many
different narratives.

For instance, Hauerwas lives not only within the Christian narrative but also (as he has
said) within the Texan narrative, and he shares in an academic narrative and a personal
narrative as well. These are all creditable stories, but how are they to be distinguished?
And, more important, what about the narratives that he excludes, such as the liberal
democratic narrative or the feminist narrative? Moreover, the Christian narrative itself
exists in a wide variety of versions, and it has never existed in such magni cent isolation
as narrative theology seemingly supposes. Starting from the time of Jesus, it has woven
together diverse narratives: Pharasaic, Zealot, Hellenistic, Stoic, Platonic, Catholic,
Russian, Anabaptist, African and so on throughout history. The Christian story has never

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been monolithic. Narrative theologians must come to terms with the relativity of the
Christian narrative.

Liberation theology: Liberation theology is multifarious and diverse. It embraces German

political theology, Latin American liberation movements, African-American theology,
feminist theology, womanist theology and many more varieties besides. Generalization is
dangerous here too, but it is safe to say that liberation theology is characterized by an
emphasis on the experience of oppression and a Marxist-inspired social analysis that
divides society into oppressor and oppressed. Practice (or praxis) is central to liberation
theology; such theology seeks to be part of the historical political project of liberating the
oppressed.

Troeltsch also has much in common with liberation theology. He emphasized theology as a
practice, and his own practice became increasingly political. He was one of the rst
theologians to make a positive (though also critical) use of Marxist thought. Yet he pointed
out both the limitations of Marxist tools and the hazards of simplistic appeals to
experience. Through these criticisms, Troeltsch can provide us with a needed sense of
perspective on the liberationist project. Any criticism of the liberationist program is
perilous, for it can quickly put the critic in the uncomfortable position of seeming to favor
the oppressor. How can one "criticize" the experience of the victim of domestic abuse or
incest, the child refugee who has seen his family slaughtered by the national police, or the
mother who must watch her children starve? We cannot. But although we dare not
criticize the experience, we can and must be willing to challenge some interpretations of
that experience. Much liberation theology exhibits a dangerous tendency to jump from
the experience of suffering to the assertion that some x must be the cause of that
suffering, whether that x be capitalism or patriarchy or Eurocentrism.

A ne example of such a short-circuit was the recent Presbyterian study document on

human sexuality that was justly excoriated by Camille Paglia for its exceptionally shallow
analysis. Overall, the entire eld of Christian social ethics—liberationist or not—pays
scandalously little attention to empirical data and social science, as when Karen Lebacqz
cites the Hite Report as though it were a statistically representative sample of sexual
attitudes and behaviors, or when Michael Novak draws simplistic comparisons between
Japanese and Latin American political economies. Troeltsch, by way of contrast, was well
versed in the social science of his time, and sought to make careful use of it in his
theological, political and moral judgments. In this respect, the contemporary practical

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theology movement (represented by Don Browning, among others) is much closer to

Troeltsch’s standard.

Why does the Troeltsch revival continue? Because the questions he raised are still worth
asking, because his attempts to deal with these questions are still instructive, and
because he can provide us with perspective on what is happening today and is about to
happen tomorrow. He is, indeed, only now coming into his own.

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