NTT Journal for Theology and the Study of Religion - Volume 38, Issue 1, 1984

The Christian attitude towards the sources of Judaism has always been one of self-interest. In our century the ideals of critical scholarship and the diminishing role of Christianity have changed this to some extent. Modern interest mainly comes from New Testament scholars, but the question of the relation between the Church and the Jews is also a living issue, in which, however, the Hebrew sources are neglected. Christian interests tend to rashness in the application of the results of the study of the sources, as is shown by the example of Targum studies, Talmud and Midrash, and Jewish exegesis. Theology first has to make clear that the study of Judaism matters at all. Knowledge of the sources is a vital condition for an answer on this question, which is too often answered in the positive without sufficient reflection.

Lutheran Orthodoxy had created and sustained an image of Luther as a hero and a man of God, whose word could not be disputed. It is remarkable that to the adherents of the ideas of the Enlightenment in the 18th century the Reformer was the principal originator of modern scientific, spiritual and political emancipation from popish oppression. Luther’s theology was not explored; on the contrary, the Augustinian tradition in which he stood was rigorously rejected. German modernist theologians (the so-called Neologen) found their position in regard to Luther equivocal: On the one hand they were at war with orthodox ideas on Man and Nature and propagated rational analysis on these subjects; on the other hand they wished to be reckoned loyal Lutheran believers Lessing used the image of Luther, as seen by radical adherents of the Enlightenment, as a weapon against Lutheran orthodoxy.

The article investigates the factors which led to the Réveil in Geneva and finally to the separation from the State Church in the autumn of 1817. Leading figures were students in theology who, from circa 1810, found an alternative to the prevailing spirit of Rationalism in Moravian-type gatherings, in Freemasonry and in circles influenced by the pietistic minister Moulinié. They rejected the type of Revivalism which was represented by Juliane von Krüdener who aimed at a general revival also by political means. They were powerfully affected by the private lectures of the Scottish laypreacher Robert Haldane who stayed in Geneva from November 1816 till June 1817.

Modern systematic theology, as it is taught in state-universities on the Continent and elsewhere, is worried by two closely interrelated philosophical questions: Is it possible for theology to be scientific in some minimal sense of the word?, and: Does theology rightly occupy a place within our universities? In the present article, written on the occasion of the inaugural lectures of Prof. Adriaanse and Prof. Van de Beek and of the valedictory lecture of Prof. Berkhof, all from Leiden University, the dilemma evoked by these fundamental questions is analysed from a logical point of view, and the respective escapes from it are critically discussed.