Bertold Klappert

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Bertold Klappert (born July 21, 1939 in Balige on Sumatra , Indonesia ) is a German Protestant theologian and from 1974 to 2004 professor of systematic theology at the Wuppertal Church University .

Life

Bertold Klappert was born in Sumatra as the son of a Protestant missionary . From 1959 to 1965 he studied Protestant theology , philosophy and religious history in Wuppertal , Göttingen , Tübingen and Bonn as a scholarship holder of the German National Academic Foundation . From 1965 to 1969 he was assistant to Walter Kreck at the University of Bonn and from 1968 to 1970 chairman of the Bonn drug work. He received his doctorate in 1969/1970 at the Protestant Faculty of the University of Bonn on the Christology of Karl Barth .

Klappert was then from 1970 to 1974 assistant at the University of Göttingen and completed his habilitation in 1974 in the department of systematic theology on "Law and Gospel with Martin Luther and Karl Barth". From 1974 until his retirement in 2004 he was professor for systematic theology at the Church University of Wuppertal. From 1978 to 1984 Klappert also headed the biblical-social working group of the reformed community in Wuppertal-Elberfeld-Ost .

Research priorities

Klappert was active in various theological fields:

plant

Bertold Klappert is known as a connoisseur and independent interpreter of the theologians of the Confessing Church : Karl Barth , Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Hans Joachim Iwand . He interprets their legacy contextually and relates it to his own present.

Like Helmut Gollwitzer, Friedrich-Wilhelm Marquardt and Jürgen Moltmann, he was involved in the German student movement of the 1960s and linked his theology with his university-political and socially critical activities. He kept in touch with his own origins from Pietism , YMCA and today's United Evangelical Mission and combined his personal confession of Christ with his biblically based decision for democratic socialism . He made contributions to the understanding of the Barmer Theological Declaration of 1934 as well as to the Darmstädter Wort of 1947. Based on this tradition, he advocated the anti-racism and anti-militarism program of the World Council of Churches . In the 1980s, like his teacher Hans-Joachim Kraus , he took a firm stand against the NATO double resolution and his ecclesiastical approval: For him, this “no without any yes” to the inclusion of weapons of mass destruction in the self-defense arsenal of the rule of law was not a purely political one Confession Question.

His theological work is devoted on the one hand to imparting biblical exegesis and systematics, and on the other hand to determining the relationship between theologians of the Reformation and Karl Barth.

Klappert's dissertation is entitled The Resurrection of the Crucified. In this work, Klappert traced Barth's theology of the cross in conversation with Friedrich Gogarten , Rudolf Bultmann and other theologians who were oriented towards the human understanding of existence. In the anthology Discussion about the Cross and Resurrection , he brought together important essays from the theological debate from 1945 to 1965 in annotated form. He also sought a conversation with Gerd Lüdemann about understanding the resurrection.

Klappert is best known for his commitment to renewing the relationship between Christians and Jews. Friendships with Heinz Kremers and Rabbi Yehuda Aschkenasy were also essential . This was reflected in the Rhenish Synodal Resolution of 1980 . He is editor of the writings of Leo Baeck and a member of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation . Klappert sees himself as a “theologian after Auschwitz ”, but in contrast to American Holocaust theology, he does not represent a reinterpretation of the entire Bible from the Shoah , but sticks to the primacy of God's self-revelation in Israel's biblical salvation history.

More recently, Klappert has also been involved in the trialogue of the three Abrahamic religions Judaism , Christianity and Islam , however not in the sense of a common " global ethic " as Hans Küng , but in the sense of a unity of different identities that find their inexorable roots in the biblical story of promise .

Memberships

Bertold Klappert was or is a member of the following working groups, committees and initiatives:

  • 1969–1971: Chairman of the first drug advice center in Germany based at the YMCA Bonn;
  • 1978–2017: Committee on Jews and Christians of the Evangelical Church in the Rhineland;
  • since 1979: Working group Jews and Christians at the German Evangelical Church Congress ;
  • since 1980: Board member of Studium in Israel e. V.
  • since 1980: Christian-Jewish Society in Wuppertal;
  • 1980–1986: Rhenish Initiative Freedom for South Africa and Namibia ;
  • 1991–2000: Commission Jews and Christians of the Evangelical Church in Germany;
  • since 2015: Hans-Joachim Iwand-Gesellschaft based in Beienrode;
  • Society for Protestant Theology;
  • until 2016: Scientific Advisory Board of the Archive and Museum Foundation of the United Evangelical Mission in Wuppertal (VEM / UIM)

Honors

Publications

  • 2001: Living from repentance (co-author)
  • 2000: co-heirs of the promise
  • 1996 to 2003: Leo Baeck Werke (editor; 6 volumes)
  • 1994: Reconciliation and Liberation. Try to understand Karl Barth contextually
  • 1992: Confession of Jesus and following Christ (co-author)
  • 1989: For God's sake do something brave! Karl Immer Im Kirchenkampf (co-author)
  • 1988: Confessing Church in Ecumenical Responsibility
  • 1983: Steps to Peace. Theological texts on peace and disarmament (co-editor)
  • 1980: conversion and renewal. Explanations of the Synodal Resolution of the Rhenish Synod in 1980. "On the Renewal of the Relationship between Christians and Jews" (editor)
  • 1979: Right to work, meaning of work (co-author)
  • 1976: Promissio and Bund. Law and Gospel with Luther and Barth
  • 1974: The raising of the crucified one. The approach of the Christology of Karl Barth in the context of the Christology of the present
  • 1969: The Unusual - Miracles in the View of Science, Theology and the Congregation (co-author)
  • 1967: Discussion about the cross and resurrection. On the current debate in theology and the congregation (editor)

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Prof. em. Dr. Bertold Klappert: Research priorities. In: Church University of Wuppertal / Bethel. Retrieved October 27, 2018 .
  2. ↑ Bertold Klappert: The opening of the Israel League for the peoples. Karl Barth's Israel theology and the federal theology of the Reformed Reformation , in: reformiert-info.de
  3. ↑ Award: Golden Menorah in the Bergische Synagoge in Wuppertal October 6, 2016 to Professor Bertold Klappert
  4. ↑ Prof. em. Dr. Bertold Klappert: Membership. In: Church University of Wuppertal / Bethel. Retrieved October 27, 2018 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Rattles, Bertold
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German Protestant theologian and professor of systematic theology
DATE OF BIRTH July 21, 1939
PLACE OF BIRTH Balige in Sumatra , Indonesia