Never seen Luther placed in such a context. My western theological history is quite limited and perfunctory compared to my understanding of the east, but reading this post I find that so much difficulty arose in the west with the late recovery of Aristotle and then much later recovery of much of the rest of Greek philosophy. Humanism, moreover, appears to display simply a reaction against the Augustinian and then later scholastic difficulty with perceiving nature as the eastern church has. The post made me think of Gregory of Nyssa’s On the Making of the human image—which John behr rightly sees as his rewriting of the timaeus. Question: how would you place this commentary in relation to the overall development of Luther’s thought.
Thanks so much for reading it. Yes, I am placing Luther in a context vastly different than popular contemporary Luther scholarship. My reading is inspired by 20th c. Roman Catholic readings of Luther, especially by Jared Wicks, Finnish Readings of Luther, especially by Tuomo Mannerma and Olli-Pekka Vainio, and Post-liberal readings of Luther, especially by George Lindbeck, Christine Helmer, and David Yeago. All of these readings have in some way questioned the dominant narrative of Luther being the precursor and foundation of Western Modernity, which tends to be found in German Lutheran scholarship and places that have been effected by it. The problem with Luther is it’s so hard to read him in his context, because he has become mythologized by modernity as the theologian of the modern world—we tend to read him through deeply anachronistic eyes, and so foreclose the possibilities inherent in his theology before we even look at his texts.
As to the development of his writings, the Genesis Commentary comes fairly late (1535-1545). Which is very important. This is not a case of an immature, pre-Reformation discovery Luther being too influenced by medievalism; this is mature Luther, who has already written on justification by grace through faith, who still situates himself in this medieval and humanist context, while at the same time utilizing eastern patristic and western monastic ways of thinking about the theological life. This implies that the major narrative in Luther studies, that Luther is most comfortable in existential Protestantism, that he is a fundamental break with medieval worldview, and that he must be fundamentally at odds with—among other things—an eastern understanding of participation, simply does not hold up to a close reading of Luther’s texts.
Yeah. He might have indirectly helped develop modernity, as I wrote in another post, at least when I was grow up he was both the ideal rogue protestant and the ideal citizen who stood up to hierarchy, etc… This whole view doesn’t take into consideration the fact that he couldn’t help, but continue much more in the tradition handed over to him than we want to think. Especially when protestants think of him as if he’d be able to understand the idea of not even having the Eucharist as some form of sacrament—the real presence, etc… But it’s definitely enlightening to see his understanding of scripture’s plain sense would shock the heck out of how evangelicals and fundamentalist protestants tend to take that today.
Never seen Luther placed in such a context. My western theological history is quite limited and perfunctory compared to my understanding of the east, but reading this post I find that so much difficulty arose in the west with the late recovery of Aristotle and then much later recovery of much of the rest of Greek philosophy. Humanism, moreover, appears to display simply a reaction against the Augustinian and then later scholastic difficulty with perceiving nature as the eastern church has. The post made me think of Gregory of Nyssa’s On the Making of the human image—which John behr rightly sees as his rewriting of the timaeus. Question: how would you place this commentary in relation to the overall development of Luther’s thought.
Thanks so much for reading it. Yes, I am placing Luther in a context vastly different than popular contemporary Luther scholarship. My reading is inspired by 20th c. Roman Catholic readings of Luther, especially by Jared Wicks, Finnish Readings of Luther, especially by Tuomo Mannerma and Olli-Pekka Vainio, and Post-liberal readings of Luther, especially by George Lindbeck, Christine Helmer, and David Yeago. All of these readings have in some way questioned the dominant narrative of Luther being the precursor and foundation of Western Modernity, which tends to be found in German Lutheran scholarship and places that have been effected by it. The problem with Luther is it’s so hard to read him in his context, because he has become mythologized by modernity as the theologian of the modern world—we tend to read him through deeply anachronistic eyes, and so foreclose the possibilities inherent in his theology before we even look at his texts.
As to the development of his writings, the Genesis Commentary comes fairly late (1535-1545). Which is very important. This is not a case of an immature, pre-Reformation discovery Luther being too influenced by medievalism; this is mature Luther, who has already written on justification by grace through faith, who still situates himself in this medieval and humanist context, while at the same time utilizing eastern patristic and western monastic ways of thinking about the theological life. This implies that the major narrative in Luther studies, that Luther is most comfortable in existential Protestantism, that he is a fundamental break with medieval worldview, and that he must be fundamentally at odds with—among other things—an eastern understanding of participation, simply does not hold up to a close reading of Luther’s texts.
Yeah. He might have indirectly helped develop modernity, as I wrote in another post, at least when I was grow up he was both the ideal rogue protestant and the ideal citizen who stood up to hierarchy, etc… This whole view doesn’t take into consideration the fact that he couldn’t help, but continue much more in the tradition handed over to him than we want to think. Especially when protestants think of him as if he’d be able to understand the idea of not even having the Eucharist as some form of sacrament—the real presence, etc… But it’s definitely enlightening to see his understanding of scripture’s plain sense would shock the heck out of how evangelicals and fundamentalist protestants tend to take that today.