Denominational theology

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The term denominational theology generally and thus historically denotes denominational self-assertion and defense in relation to other denominations . This was evident, for example, in the post-Reformation controversial theology on the evangelical side ( Sartorius ) and on the Catholic side ( Petrus Canisius ), in the 19th-century repristination theology ( Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg ), in the neo-Lutheran Erlangen theology .

Today, however, the term mostly refers to the denominational theological faculties at state universities. In terms of the self-understanding of the respective denomination, however, value is placed on bringing denominational theology into a healthy, mutually fruitful tension with contextual theology .

Arguments

However, this connection of university theology to the respective churches is not without controversy:

If, for example, the Protestant Theology Department at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt writes of itself that it researches and teaches “denominational theology in the horizon of contemporary culture (s) in a globalized world”, and as a “denominational perspective” the “specific The term “contribution of Protestant theology” to the “cultural formation of societies” has a positive connotation.

When, on the other hand, the theologian Gerd Lüdemann speaks of the fact that "many denominational theologians have achieved and achieved outstanding philological and historical achievements", but because of their "ties to the Church" no "really free science" can arise and therefore "denominational theology as science .. "corresponds to the squaring of the circle", it gets a negative mark.

Heinz-Werner Kubitza considers denominational theology to be a "presumptuous science".

See also

literature

  • Gunther Wenz : Denominational Theology? Ecumenical notes from a Protestant perspective , in: Ders .: Basic questions of ecumenical theology. Collected Essays , Volume 1, Göttingen 1999.
  • Josef Lössl: Denominational theology and humanistic heritage: for the edition of St. Jerome by Petrus Canisius . In Petrus Canisius SJ (1521-1597): Humanist and European , ed. Rainer Berndt. Akademie Verlag, Berlin 2000, pp. 121–150.
  • Holsten Fagerberg: Confession, Church and Office in German Confessional Theology of the 19th Century . Uppsala 1952.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Heinz-Werner Kubitza, Der Dogmenwahn. Sham problems of theology. Wood ways of a measured science, Tectum Verlag Marburg, 1st edition, Marburg 2015