Search

1. General Features P. Melanchthon (1497–1560; Reformers) described the Epistle to the Romans as a compendium of Christian doctrine. In view of the historical circumstances in which Paul wrote it, this judgment has been contested in our day. Paul, it is argued, had a specific historical situation in mind, and his theological argument is thus situational. Paul himself, though, was also in a specific historical situation, which dictated the strategy he used in argument. Attention has also been drawn …

In 1941 Rudolf Bultmann (1884–1976) wrote a programmatic essay “Neues Testament und Mythologie. Das Problem der Entmythologisierung der neutestamentlichen Verkündigung” (NT and mythology. The problem of demythologizing the NT proclamation). Only after World War II, however, did a full-scale discussion—often embittered—of demythologizing take place. Other themes have replaced it now; it is no longer a main subject of ecclesiastical and theological debate. For the foreseeable future, however, it will undoubtedly be recognized as an important theological issue. According to…

[German Version] Pulpit rights are part of the authority granted with appointment to preach the gospel, administer the sacraments, and provide pastoral care for a congregation. This authorization is thus a derivative of parish law. It gives the incumbent the exclusive right to preach from the pulpit of the parish church and – because he or she is responsible for scriptural and orthodox preaching of the gospel within the congregation – also regularly to decide who else may lead worship and officiat…

[German Version] Together with old-age pension and survivors’ benefits, the ministerial stipend is the heart of the adequate livelihood the churches owe their clergy, who can then devote themselves totally to their pastoral ministry as a full-time vocation and be financially independent to fulfill the duties assigned to them at ordination. This obligation to support the clergy follows from the decision made by the Early Church and consciously ratified by the churches of the Reformation that minist…

[German Version] An “immediate parish” (Ger. Immediatgemeinde) is a congregation outside the geographical parochial (Parish/diocese) structure that reports directly to the governing body of the church (Church governance) – formerly mostly palace and court congregations, since abolished, today only the cathedral parish in Berlin. Two factors make it unique: Protestants living anywhere in Berlin can be enrolled as members, and, despite its geographical association with the Evangelische Kirche in Berlin-…

[German Version] Today the church registration system in Germany has its legal basis in the federal civil registration law and the supplemental registration laws of the several Länder. Originally it served only the interests of the security police, making sure that the state could reach any citizen at any time; as the modern social state developed, it became primarily a tool for collecting and recording general personal information. As in the case of the civil registration system, the constitutional right of negative free…

[German Version] Land holdings as part of the property of the church can be traced back to the dotations of the Carolingian period. According to the Capitulatio de partibus Saxoniae (775-790), every newly erected church was to be endowed with two hides of land (= 7.6 hectacres); in the 819 ecclesiastical capitulary of Louis the Pious, the dotations were augmented by one so-called imperial hide. The lands were intended to serve the needs of the local church, i.e. its worship and maintenance (church lands) as well as to suppo…

Words from both the Lat. iustitia (justice, justification, justify) and the Anglo-Saxon rightwise(n) (righteousness, declare or make righteous) are available in English to render terms from the single root ṣdq in Hebrew and the dikaio- word family in Greek. Accordingly, in English there are often separate treatments of “justification” and “righteousness” (e.g., R. B. Hays, J. Reumann). In German, as in many languages, the relevant terms Rechtfertigung and Gerechtigkeit are more closely related. This article treats the theology and proclamation of the doctrine …

[German Version] I. Catholic Main Churches – II. Protestant Main Churches (Evangelical Church in Germany) I. Catholic Main Churches The expression “main church” or “principal church” is not found in the manual of canon law ( CIC 1983). It is used in two senses: 1. As a general expression for a church that stands out from a group of churches in a particular way. This position of prime importance is ¶ attributed particularly to episcopal churches (Cathedrals), and also to quasi-diocesan regional churches of equal ranking (cf. CIC 1983 c. 368 ). In the cathedral the bishop assumes his office ( C…

1. OT 1.1. Using anthropomorphic or anthropopathic language, many religions described their gods in human terms; they could thus see them as wrathful. Fear of divine wrath was undoubtedly one of the main motivations behind the development of religion and also of the cult. Israel was close to its neighbors in this regard, as may be seen from an inscription of King Mesha of Moab (mid-9th cent. b.c.), who, speaking of the long-standing oppression of Moab by King Omri of Israel (§1.5), attributes it to the wrath of Chemosh, the Moabite god (KAI 181.5; TUAT 1.647; cf. 2 Kgs. 3:27). 1.2. Mention of …

1. OT 1.1. Term The idea of law has many nuances in the OT, which we see from the different words used for it. Thus we have mišpāṭı̂m (ordinances), huqqı̂m (statutes), miṣwôt (commandments), dĕbārı̂m (words), and others. These terms cover civil and criminal law and both the ethical and the cultic sphere. More comprehensively after Deuteronomy we find tôrâ, which originally denoted only the direction of the priest in cultic, legal, and moral questions (Deut. 33:10; Hos. 4:6; Mic. 4:2; Jer. 18:18; Ezek. 7:26; Mal. 2:6–7) but in Deuteronomy is used for the whole revelati…

[German Version] I. Catholicism – II. Orthodoxy – III. Protestantism The term parish comes from the Greek παροικία/ paroikía (“resident alien’s dwelling”), which in early Christianity expressed the foreignness of Christians in society. Resulting from this basic feeling, individual congregations were called παροικίαι/ paroikíai from the 2nd century. Until Late Antiquity, paroikía remained a technical term for a bishop’s congregation. Only after the rise of pastoral subcenters in large towns and rural areas, which became the main point of reference for ¶ believers’ religious li…

1. OT 1.1. Translation and Usage The Hebrew word bĕrît, “covenant,” occurs 287 times in the OT, only in the singular. Even the latest attempts (e.g., by E. Kutsch) have not convincingly clarified its etymology. Showing a derivation from a Semitic root, however, would not necessarily throw light on its semantic function (J. Barr), which can and must be understood in terms of its semantic field and the relevant context. In translation, the LXX does not use synthēkē (agreement, contract) but almost always diathēkē (last will and testament). The Vg (Jerome [ca. 345–420]), howeve…

[German Version] I. Religious Studies – II. Old Testament. – III. New Testament – IV. Philosophy of Religion – V. Dogmatics I. Religious Studies Monotheistic ideas of God, which take as their starting point the existence and activity of a single God, have long dominated the understanding of religion in historically Christian Europe. The term monotheism itself is a modern coinage, first appearing in 1660 in the work of the English philosopher Henry More. As a contrast ¶ to the term polytheism, which goes back originally to Philo of Alexandria and was rediscovered for the…

1. OT To understand the meaning of “sin,” a powerful theological concept in the OT, the interpreter first needs to study the terms in the Hebrew Bible that translators have rendered into English as “sin.” The meaning of these terms can often be approximated by studying the nontheological passages in which they appear. How the words describe interactions among humans provides clues about the interaction between humans and God. (G. von Rad, K. Koch, and K. D. Sakenfeld have demonstrated in some deta…

[German Version] I. Religious Studies – II. Christianity – III. Judaism – IV. Buddhism – V. Islam I. Religious Studies 1. Overview. Mission is not a fundamentally universal phenomenon in the history of religions; neither is every form in which religion is passed on eo ipso mission. “Primary,” tribal religions are not missionary religions. Their domain is coterminous with their society and its way of life; they are handed down from one generation to the next in the course of natural life. The question of truth does not arise. An indivi…