Wolfhart Pannenberg

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Wolfhart Pannenberg (born on 2 October 1928 in Stettin (Szczecin, Poland)) is a German Christian theologian.

[edit] Life and views

Pannenberg was baptized as an infant into the Evangelical (Lutheran) Church, but otherwise had virtually no contact with the church in his early years. At about the age of sixteen, however, he had an intensely religious experience he later called his "light experience." Seeking to understand this experience, he began to search through the works of great philosophers and religious thinkers. A high school literature teacher who had been a part of the Confessing Church during World War II encouraged him to take a hard look at Christianity, which resulted in Pannenberg's "intellectual conversion," in which he concluded that Christianity was the best available religious option. This propelled him into his vocation as a theologian.

Central to Pannenberg's theological career has been his defense of theology as a rigorous academic discipline, one capable of critical interaction with philosophy, history, and the natural sciences.

Pannenberg is perhaps best known for Jesus: God and Man in which he constructs a Christology "from below," deriving his dogmatic claims from a critical examination of the life of Jesus of Nazareth. He correspondingly rejects traditional Chalcedonian "two-natures" Christology, preferring to view the person of Christ in light of the resurrection. This focus on the resurrection as the key to Christ's identity has led Pannenberg to defend its historicity.

[edit] Books by Pannenberg in English

  • 1968. Revelation As History edited by Pannenberg. New York: The Macmillan Company.
  • 1968. Jesus: God and Man. Philadelphia: Westminster Press.
  • 1969. Basic Questions in Theology. Westminster Press
  • 1969. Theology and the Kingdom of God. Westminster Press.
  • 1970. What Is Man? Philadelphia: Fortress Press.
  • 1972. The Apostles' Creed in Light of Today's Questions. Westminster Press.
  • 1977. Faith and Reality. Westminster Press.
  • 1988-1994. Systematic Theology. T & T Clark

[edit] Secondary Literature

  • Stanley J. Grenz, 1990. Reason for Hope: The Systematic Theology of Wolfhart Pannenberg. New York: Oxford.
  • F. LeRon Shults, 1999, The Postfoundationalist Task of Theology: Wolfhart Pannenberg and the New Theological Rationality. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans.
  • Timothy Bradshaw, 1988. Trinity and ontology: a comparative study of the theologies of Karl Barth and Wolfhart Pannenberg Edinburgh: Rutherford House Books.
  • James S. Page, 2003. "Critical Realism and the Theological Science of Wolfhart Pannenberg: Exploring the Commonalities". Bridges: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy, Theology, History and Science. 10(1/2): 71-84; available on-line at http://eprints.qut.edu.au/archive/00003612/.
  • Frank Tipler, 1989. "The Omega Point as Eschaton: Answers to Pannenberg's Questions for Scientists," Zygon 24: 217-53. Followed by Pannenberg's comments, 255-71.
  • --------, 1994. The Physics of Immortality: Modern Cosmology, God and the Resurrection of the Dead. New York: Doubleday.
  • Tomoaki Fukai, 1996. Paradox und Prolepsis: Geschichtstheologie bei Reinhold Niebuhr und Wolfhart Pannenberg. Marburg
  • Don H. Olive,1973. "Wolfhart Pannenberg-Makers of the Modern Mind". Word Incorporated, Waco, Texas. 　
  • E. Frank Tupper, 1973. The Theology of Wolfhart Pannenberg. Philadelphia: Westminster press.