Content area
Full text
Barth's Moral Theology: Human Action in Barth's Thought
By John Webster
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998. 223 pp. $30.00.
John Webster, in this well-executed study of Barth's writings, displays the vital place that meaningful human action had in Barth's thought throughout his theological career, arguing this in opposition to what he calls the "conventional" understanding of Barth's moral thought.
How conventional those "conventional" views are now, however, is a live question, for Webster's work is part of a growing, if still minor, voice in Barth studies that emphasizes this kind of continuity in Barth; the convention may be changing. The "conventional" understanding of Barth's moral thought emphasized the seeming lack of space for meaningful human action in it due to the overwhelming sovereignty of grace; and, if there was any space, it would be found in Barth's later writings when Barth mellowed into his "theanthropology" stage. In contrast, Webster's work has centered on showing how Barth's concern about meaningful human action is a crucial aspect of Barth's overall vision of God, and emphasizes the continuities of the shape of that vision from 1919 on.
In Webster's earlier book, Barth's Ethics of Reconciliation, Webster argued Barth's little considered later works, Church Dogmatics 4/4 and The Christian Life, clearly show Barth's emphasis...