"[...]we can have a True, though not an adequate knowledge of the nature of God."

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"[...]we can have a True, though not an adequate knowledge of the nature of God. We cannot have an adequate knowledge of God, that is, a knowledge co-extensive in every feature with its subject. Such a knowledge would be that vision of Him face to face, which cannot be ours till the last change is accomplished and everything partial shall have ceased. We can, however, have a true knowledge, that is, a knowledge true in principle, true in its tendency, and true in the goal at which it aims;—true because it goes out from and leads to God. This distinction between a true and an adequate knowledge of God hovered before the minds of our elder theologians when they distinguished between a “theologia viatorum et beatorum.” (Martensen, Christian Dogmatics, p. 82)

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Nein!(?) A negative "point of contact" in the Epistle to Diognetus?

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Billede
Still working on The Epistle to Diognetus , which keeps making associations to modern theology pop up. This time it's Karl Barth's debate with Emil Brunner. Consider the epistle's claim that, “[...]being convicted in the past time by our own deeds as unworthy of life, we might now be made deserving by the goodness of God, and having made clear our inability to enter into the kingdom of God of ourselves, might be enabled by the ability of God.” (9.1, Lightfoot) and “Having then in the former time demonstrated the inability of our nature to obtain life, and having now revealed a Saviour able to save even creatures which have no ability, He willed that for both reasons we should believe in His goodness[...]” (9.6, Lightfoot) If by 'dialectical theology' we mean that God's 'yes' and 'no' are inseparable (Tillich), this is certainly a specimen of such. The two elements, negative and positive, come together in faith (in an Aufhebung! ), or? A
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