fbpx
Search
Close this search box.

Karl Barth and the “Word-of-Godness” of Scripture

I often receive questions about Barth’s views on the Bible, which admittedly is a challenging topic. According to Karl Barth, the Bible is not revelation. The Bible is one of three modes of Barth’s doctrine of the Word of God. While Barth can say that the Bible is the Word of God, he will not, however, affirm that it is the revelation of God. Only God’s act of grace in Jesus Christ is revelation. Scripture, like the church’s preaching, merely witnesses to the Word of God in revelation. Consequently, the Bible is not inerrant.

Barth is also clear that there is a kind of becoming to the Bible as the Word of God. “The Word-of-Godness” (that’s my expression, not Barth’s) of Scripture is not inherent in Scripture itself. Rather, its “Word-of-Godness” is actualized “from above,” as it were, through God’s act of grace and self-disclosure in Jesus Christ. In other words, the “Word-of-Godness” that Scripture becomes arises not from Scripture itself, but from God.

Share:

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Email
On Key

Related Posts

What Is the Deeper Modernist Conception?

You can contrast the deeper Modernist conception of Karl Barth to the deeper Protestant conception of Vos and the deeper Catholic conception of Aquinas. For Vos, Adam comes from God,

What Is the Organic Unity of the Scriptures?

At Reformed Forum we often speak about the organic unity of the Scriptures. This is the basic idea that the Old Testament is naturally related to the New Testament. I’m

Bavinck on the “Implanted” Knowledge of God

A listener of Christ the Center raised a useful question about Bavinck, noting that he denies the speculative conception of “innate ideas” in Reformed Dogmatics, vol. 2, pp. 69–73 and wondered what

2018 Theology Conference Reading List

We have compiled a list of suggested reading to help those coming to the 2018 Theology Conference. We realize people like have neither the time nor financial budget to work