Dale Ann Gray
Dr. T. Jennings
20th C. Theology
May 30, 2007
Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
Introduction
Atonement theories have been traditionally categorized in one of three types: Christus Victor/Classical (also with its Ransom Theory variant), Anselmian-Substitution-SatisfactionLatin Theory, or the Abelardian/Moral Influence Theory.1 A brief theological survey of Walter Rauschenbusch, Dorothee Sölle, Sallie McFague, Delores Williams and Chung Hyun
Kyung reveals that while these theologians may or may not deal explicitly with traditional atonement categories, their work does fall into the category I name as “The Moral Influence of Jesus’ Life.” An understanding of atonement which is not limited to “the theological significance of the death of Jesus”2 is required. For the purposes of this paper, atonement will be considered both in traditional terms and in consonance with and enlarged from Delores Williams’ explication of “at-one-ment”: God coming to be one with both the individual and humanity.3 I enlarge at-one-ment to include not only the God-individual-humanity connection, but also humanity with humanity, humanity with creation, and God with creation, in short, shalom for all. The nature of at-one-ment is continual. As creatio continuo is to creation, and as Eucharist is to Baptism, being repeated occurrences versus solitary events, it is also thus for at-one-ment and salvation. It may have both eschatological and here-and-now characteristics. At-one-ment opens up to a broad understanding of God working to bring about shalom for all creation.
Because four of the five theologians considered here can be classified as some type of feminist (Euro-feminist, eco-feminist, womanist, Korean feminist), and each has her own ap-
1 This brief paper does not offer the space to explicate each of the three theories. I will assume that the reader is already acquainted with them. For a very succinct explication see: Aulén, Gustaf. Christus Victor: An Historical Study of the Three Main Types of the Idea of Atonement. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2003.
2 Walter Rauschenbusch, A Theology for the Social Gospel (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1945), 240
3 This was explained to me by Linda Thomas of LSTC, and although I have begun to search for the Williams’ source, I have not yet found it.
Dale Ann Gray
Dr. T. Jennings Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
May 30, 2007
20th C. Theology TEC 605
praisal of traditional atonement theory, it is helpful to give a very brief general overview of feminist critique of atonement theory. All three of the traditional formulations of atonement have several major components in common.4
First, they depend on death and violence to effect atonement: Christus Victor by Satan killing Jesus, satisfaction by Jesus offering himself to be crucified according to God’s will, and moral influence by God expressing God’s love through Jesus’ suffering and death. Second, all three skew the character of God toward that of a child abuser.5 Christus Victor succumbs to this view in that God the Father offers his only son to die so that God’s other children (humanity) might be freed from Satan’s bondage. In the satisfaction theory it is the will of God the Father that Jesus, God the Son, offer himself willingly to bear God’s wrath and die in order to restore God’s honor. And in the Abelardian theory it is God the Father’s plan that the son suffer an excruciating death so that all might see how much God loves humanity. In all three models, God the Father abuses, or offers for abuse, God the Son. Third, all three create and require a divine, submissive, obedient victim in Jesus, which is a problematic theology and presents difficulty as an ethic to imitate, especially for victims of violence.6 Fourth, the skewing of God’s character toward both abusiveness and victimhood disrupts the divine trinitarian perichoresis. Trinitarian theology asserts one member would not violate the others’ character. Finally, the content of atonement should be in continuity with the method by which it is achieved.7 If love, peace, unity
4 All of the following critiques were summarized by J. Denny Weaver in his lectures given at the Ohio Council of Churches “Convocation of Ministries” in Columbus, OH January 24, 2005, which were based on his book The Nonviolent Atonement, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001). He gathered them from various feminist authors, but, other than those of Rita Nakashima Brock, did not cite them.
5 Rebecca Parker and Joanne Carlson, “For God So Loved the World,” Christianity, Patriarchy, and Abuse: A Feminist Critique, ed. Joanne Carlson Brown and Carole R. Bohn, (Cleveland: Pilgrim Press, 1989) 1-30.
6 Darby Kathleen Ray, Deceiving the Devil: Atonement, Abuse, and Ransom (Cleveland: Pilgrim Press, 1998), 77. and Rita Nakashima Brock lectures given at the Ohio Council of Churches “Convocation of Ministries” in Columbus, OH January 24, 2005.
7 Ray, 331
Dale Ann Gray
Dr. T. Jennings
20th C. Theology
Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
May 30, 2007
and life are the ends of at-one-ment between God and creation, then wrath, war, division and death should not be its means.
8
One might ask, “Why include WALTER RAUSCHENBUSCH (1861-1918) in a paper dealing primarily with feminists?” And one might suspect the answer to be “as a foil,” but that would be incorrect.
Although he does include in A Theology for the Social Gospel a chapter specifically titled “The Social Gospel and the Atonement,” which is indeed limited to a discussion of the theological significance of Jesus’ death, much of Rauschenbusch’s Social Gospel lies within the realm of at-one-ment as seen in the moral influence of Jesus’ life.
Born in Rochester, Rauschenbusch was raised in an environment of German Baptist pietism.
9 His first call was to Second German Baptist Church on the edge of Hell’s Kitchen in New York City, a depressed area, where he served for eleven years, and witnessed the unemployment, poverty, child labor, malnutrition, crime, ignorance and deplorable housing conditions rampant in the area. Land speculation had enriched a very few people, and the injustice of the situation made an indelible mark on his conscience. To Rauschenbusch, saving souls made no sense when people’s bodies were hungry.
8 http://www.etsu.edu/cas/history/resources/Private/Faculty/Fac_From1877ChapterDoc/ChapterImages/Ch20WalterR auschenbusch.jpg [02/22/2007].
9 Most info from Hans Schwarz. Theology in a Global Context: The Last 200 Years. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005).
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Dr. T. Jennings Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
20th C. Theology
Influenced by Schleiermacher, Ritschl and Harnack, Rauschenbusch, although not utopian, believed in the “immense latent perfectibility in human nature.”10 He grounded his theology in the Hebrew prophets, the life and ministry of Jesus, and the early church, especially “the social aims of Jesus and the social impetus of early Christianity.”11 According to Rauschenbusch, the Social Gospel is the Kingdom of God; it is the old message of salvation broadened from its individualistic confines to address the need for salvation in society, indeed for the salvation of nations as the Hebrew prophets preached.12
Before delving too much further into the understanding of Rauschenbusch’s social Gospel as at-one-ment, it is necessary too see what he actually says about atonement in traditional terms. Historically, “atonement” deals with the theological understanding of the death of Christ.13 Rauschenbusch reviews the Ransom Theory and Anselm’s Substitution theory, pointing out that these were contextually driven by belief in the rule of demons, and the priestly practice of assessing penalty and merit respectively.14 He then specifically addresses atonement, answering the following questions: How did Jesus bear our sins? How did his death affect God? How did it affect humanity? Jesus’ experience encompasses all of humanity and he therefore bore the public sin of organized society, which is causally connected to private sin. He bore it experientially, not symbolically, and the Kingdom of Evil killed him.15
Rauschenbusch enumerates six public and universal sins which converged to kill Jesus: religious bigotry, graft and political power, corruption of justice, mob spirit and mob action,
10 Walter Rauschenbusch, Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907; Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1991), 422. Quoted in Hans Schwarz, Theology in a Global Context: The Last 200 Years (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005), 145.
11 Schwarz, 145.
12 Ibid., 5
13 Ibid., 240.
14 Ibid., 240-244.
15 Ibid., 244-246.
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Dr. T. Jennings Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
20th C. Theology
May 30, 2007
militarism, and class contempt.16 These “sins” fall in categories resembling those used by Delores Williams in womanist theology: His contention that Jesus’ suffering was unique is not convincing, and his arguments are justly and roundly attacked and unmasked by feminists some ninety years later. The romanticism with which he characterizes the brutal and agonizing execution of Jesus is seen in his use of hyperbole: “He gathered all the radiance of his character and purpose in a focus-point of blazing light, and there he died.”17 Calling Jesus’ death the “most luminous point” of his life furthers this glorification of cruelty.18 To say that Jesus was in command of his own death minimizes Jesus’ pursuit of life, sweating blood in the garden, asking that this cup be removed, and the cry of dereliction.19
Rauschenbusch follows Schleiermacher with respect to reconciliation. Humanity learns to understand and love God, and God sees God’s life taken up by humanity.20 Rauschenbusch believes that Jesus’ death was the epitome of his life, and has no separate meaning apart from his life. Jesus’ death drew more people to God because of its horrific quality. This is indeed disturbing and dangerous theology. The violence of a woman horrifically slaughtered by her husband would be redemptive if it saves one woman from such a fate. He says, “In all reverence … the cross of Christ was the most tremendous publicity success in the history of mankind.”21 Rauschenbusch gives three effects of the death of Jesus on humanity. First, the cross convicts of sin. Second, the cross reveals the love of God. Here he leans heavily on the moral influence theory without naming it. Bordering on masochism, and not so unlike the early mar-
16 Rauschenbusch’s explication of these sins is full of religious bigotry (anti-semitism and anti-catholicism). His comments quite explicitly pre-figure the Holocaust. Here is a man who says in 1917 “Entire nations may come under the mob spirit, and abdicate their judgment” (254).
17 Ibid., 260.
18 Ibid., 261.
19 Ibid., 263.
20 Ibid., 265.
21 Ibid., 269. I find no reverence in that statement.
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Dr. T. Jennings Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians CTS 20th C. Theology TEC 605
tyrs, he posits that one should pray that he meet such a horrific end, so as to gain attention for the gospel.22 Third, Jesus’ death reinforces prophetic religion contra priestly religion.23 I kept asking myself, “What about Hebrews, where Christ is imaged as the perfect priest?”24
Focusing on the traditional definition of atonement, Rauschenbusch becomes fodder for feminist critique, and his important contribution of a theology for the social gospel can get lost.
But when broadened to an understanding of at-one-ment, Rauschenbusch’s explication of the Kingdom of God resembles what we today call shalom. “Religion wants wholeness of life.”25 The social gospel is relevant to daily life and suffering. “Heart religion is always a cry of need,”
Some of those cries were for a response to child labor practices, unsafe working conditions (“breathing fluff” in a cotton mill), and investing in companies that produce shrapnel.26 Rauschenbusch sincerely believed that the rich must awake to the sin of ill-gotten gain. These collective societal sins are not addressed by a Calvinistic appeal to an atoning sacrifice for the individual, but, as per the prophets of old, are addressed by the social gospel.27 This is certainly a call for atone-ment of humanity with both God and humanity.
With regard to sin and evil, Rauschenbusch believed that selfishness furnishes the best theological understanding of societal sin. God is identified with humanity, and therefore when we sin against humanity we sin against God.28 The church lacks an understanding that “despotic government…war and militarism… landlordism… and predatory industry and finance” are “large scale sins.”29 The social gospel points to the kingdom of God, where all are given the
22 Ibid., 270-271.
23 Ibid., 274.
24 Heb. chapters 2-10, and 13.
25 Rauschenbusch, SG, 9.
26 Ibid., 17-18.
27 Ibid., 19-20.
28 Ibid., 49.
29 Ibid., 53.
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Dr. T. Jennings Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
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benefits of education and labor.30 Again, here we see at-one-ment of humanity with humanity and God.
Super-personal organizations are the “most powerful forces in our communities,” and due to corruption, they become evil.31 Where Rauschenbusch’s optimism is revealed (“Today the church is practically free from graft and exploitation”32) we must not overlook the fact that he highlights how much more influence the church could have in public life. Not a complete pacifist, and even pre-figuring some liberation theologians, Rauschenbusch posits that “war is worth its cost if systems of domination fall.”
34
33 At-one-ment for Rauschenbusch, is not necessarily nonviolent, and we participate in the kingdom of evil by failing to fight evil.
“Salvation is the voluntary socializing of the soul.”35 “Sanctification is the process of spiritual education and transformation.”
36 Rauschenbusch maximizes the communal nature of salvation, or, as I posit, at-one-ment. It is much more important in the area of salvation to have a solidaristic experience than an individualistic one.
37 Just as an individual can be saved, so too can super-personal forces be transformed and redeemed.
38 Rauschenbusch refers to a consummation of Jesus’ teachings as salvation by loyalty.
39 “The saving power of the church…rests on the presence of the kingdom of God within her.”
40 This alone will bring salvation to the social order, or perhaps at-one-ment between God and humanity at large. He presents God as sover-
30 Ibid., 54, 55.
31 Ibid., 72.
32 Ibid., 74.
33 Ibid., 75.
34 Ibid., 91-92.
35 Ibid., 99.
36 Ibid., 102.
37 Ibid., 108.
38 Ibid., 110-117.
39 Ibid., 127
40 Ibid., 129.
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Dr. T. Jennings Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
20th C. Theology
May 30, 2007
eign and one who uses evil. “Social suffering serves social healing.”41 He attempts to explain unjust suffering, and defines God as the ground of social unity.42 Rauschenbusch proposes that baptism be the initiation into the kingdom of God, that realm of love where society is collectively transformed, or, again, made one with itself and with God. Rather than squabbling over the meaning of the Eucharist, he would instead have humanity draw near to the table fellowship of Jesus, where the real presence is evident. Again, at-one-ment is seen in action here.
Much of Rauschenbusch’s concern for social action, for the righting of social injustice, and what I call the moral influence of Jesus’ life in bringing about societal change, or at-one-ment, can be seen in the life and work of
DOROTHEE
SÖLLE, 1929-2003. A German theologian, feminist, and feisty activist engaged in reinterpreting Christianity within socialism and pacifism, Sölle was born in Cologne, West Germany. She learned from her protestant, middleclass father a disdain for material wealth, yet in spite of her father’s distance from all things religious and political, Sölle’s interest in theology grew through her studies of philology, philosophy, theology and German literature. She studied theology under Friedrich Gogarten and Ernst Käsemann. In 1975 she became the Harry Emerson Fosdick Visiting Professor at Union Theological Seminary in New York. Until her death in 2003, she remained a critic of capitalism and of oppressive regimes throughout the world.
In her first book, Christ the Representative, a very careful dismantling of the three traditional atonement theories, all of which depend on substitution,43 Sölle responds to the then current “death of God” theology. She tried to achieve some sense of reconciliation between the ap-
41 Ibid., 183.
42 Ibid., 187.
43 Class Notes, “Twentieth Century Theology,” taught by Ted Jennings, Chicago Theological Seminary, Sprig 2007, 03/08/2007.
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Dr. T. Jennings Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
20th C. Theology
May 30, 2007
parent mutual exclusivity of the experience of the Holocaust and the idea that God is omnipotent, omniscient, and all beneficent. In place of a sovereign, controller-god, stands a God who is revealed as for us and with us through the life, suffering and death of Christ the Representative.
The extension of this representation is given as a responsibility to humanity, which then represents Christ to world. On this representational foundation, Sölle built a theology of social and political action, or what this paper refers to as at-one-ment of humanity with itself. Sölle, like Rauschenbusch, believed in the possibility that society could be made more just through Godinspired and God-directed action.
In Christ the representative, Sölle posits that Christ freed us to be responsible for the world, which I would add, makes visible at-one-ment between God and humanity and humanity with itself. There is a relation between redemption and responsibility entwined in the idea of representation.44 There are important differences between representation and substitution. Representation is temporary, provisional, counts as important the capacity to remember, never fully replaces, appears on behalf of the other, is not complete or perfect, and does not obliterate the original.45 Representation is deeply rooted in human relationships; it is this-worldly, historical.
A substitute “demands oblivion,” permanently replaces, views the other as “unavailable, useless or dead,” acts in his/her own name, “abstracts from being-in-time,” and by replacing a person “turns him into a thing.”46 Representation keeps memory alive. The dead can be represented. Representation safeguards a sense of history, and is rooted in time. Substitution is timeless, in-
44 Dorothee Sölle, Christ the Representative: An Essay in Theology after the Death of God (Philadelphia: Fortress press, 1967), translated by David Lewis, from Stellvertretung; ein Kapitel Theologie nach dem Tode Gottes (Stuttgart, GR: Kreuz-Verl, 1965), 15
45 Ibid., 20.
46 Ibid., 21.
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different to time.47 “…Substitution is a final exchange of dead impersonal or depersonalized being, whereas representation is the provisional intervention of persons on behalf of persons.”48
Sölle’s elegant deconstruction of substitution yields the following: God’s interest in humanity indicates the infinite value of the subject. Humanity has become depersonalized in work, and therefore a replaceable part, a cog in a machine. But, humanity is relational and irreplaceability requires an object, eliciting the question, “irreplaceable for whom?” The idealist says man is irreplaceable, the positivist says (through experience of depersonalization, division of labor etc.) man is replaceable. These two theses are held in dialectical tension by a third thesis involving representation (the original is never entirely replaced, which implies irreplaceability, and the original is temporarily, provisionally replaced, which implies replaceability): the human being is irreplaceable yet representable.49
According to Sölle, responsibility without dependence yields tyranny because representation is always temporary, conditional and thus personal.50 Redemption without responsibility (to be represented but not to represent) risks “renouncing responsible action... and … abandoning the world to itself.”51 Representation in the NT era was liberated from a magical interpretation.52 Representation rests on “an act of association that is personal and voluntary,” not some “magical universal solidarity.”53 Christ is the representative in that he provisionally surrendered himself to God, so that we can too.54 The Christian representative’s association with those represented is continuing and unfinished. In terms of at-one-ment, this implies that just as Jesus represented
47 Ibid., 22.
48 Ibid., 23.
49 Ibid., 48.
50 Ibid., 56.
51 Ibid..
52 Ibid., 67-68.
53 Ibid., 79.
54 Ibid., 77.
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Dr. T. Jennings Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
God to humanity, and now that Jesus is no longer physically present, Christians have the responsibility to represent God to humanity, to carry on the work of social justice in which Jesus was so heavily invested, thus continuing the at-one-ment of God and humanity, and of humanity with itself.
Sölle delves deeper into the inclusive nature of representation in both OT sacrifice and the work of Christ: God’s wrath is not appeased by some magical transference of guilt to an innocent victim, rather, all those represented by the sacrifice draw near to God through this representation, and God draws near to those represented.55 This is God’s own work in reconciliation, which through Christ’s representation “secures us time;”56 it gives us “time for living.”57 God makes Godself dependent, thus so are humans. Eschatology preserves the provisional, dependent relationship of the church to the world, a far greater action than simply serving, which is actually “a subtle form of domination.”
58
The problem of representation in post-theistic contemporary theology is one of Christology: that the man of God represents us before God and God before us, and the manner of that representation. Depersonalization loses sight of personality and temporality.59 The question is who represents me without replacing me? According to Hegel, identity lies between identity and non-identity, which leads to both dependence and responsibility. Christology answers the anthropological question: Christ represents us temporally, provisionally, conditionally, incompletely, not as a substitute. Sölle assumes satisfaction has already been made, but that God continues to “count on…look for…wait on” humanity.60 “Representation is a kind of restoration of the
55 Ibid., 84-85.
56 Ibid., 87.
57 Ibid., 91
58 Ibid., 97.
59 Ibid., 101.
60 Ibid., 103.
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Dr. T. Jennings Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
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damaged present.”61 The Christian life is learning to die, to become dependent on God, “acknowledging God’s wrath as the truth concerning” us, wrath and dependence being secularized.62 According to Sölle, alienation and estrangement are God’s way of being with us, as we understand identity in non-identity.
According to Sölle, a dialogue with Judaism, reveals the criticism that redemption is ahistorical, spiritual, not of this world. The provisionality of Christ shows not a once and for all event, but “an unceasing process.”
63 God is not appeased because love continues its search for relationship. The Christian concept of representation must do justice to this criticism from Judaism. Christ as representative allows the Christian to live in postponement, not so unlike the messianic idea in Judaism.64 As Christ represents humanity before God, so the Church represents the world before God, provisionally, temporally, incompletely.
Christ is not limited to a unique God consciousness, but also has a continuing identification with humanity.65 Our identity is dependent on another identifying with us, accepting us. It involves responsibility, risk, failure, punishment, pain and suffering as seen in the teacher.66 That Christ still awaits God implies that “suffering is always the surrender both of self and God.”67 Overemphasis on the resurrection minimizes Christ’s continuing suffering in the world today; it dehistoricizes Christ. Resurrection is a “sign of the dawn,” the parabon (down payment—Eph 1:14) in which we live.68 “We still hope in the resurrection… because the provision-
61 Ibid., 105.
62 Ibid., 106.
63 Ibid., 108.
64 Ibid., 110-111.
65 Ibid., 113.
66 Ibid., 115.
67 Ibid., 124.
68 Ibid., 126.
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Dr. T. Jennings Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
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al Christ hangs on the cross of reality even to the end of man’s days.”69 In the resurrection the historical Jesus became the Christ of faith, and Christians who identify with Christ now have hope, because another identified with them, or as this paper purports, was made one with them.70
A Christian’s real life is hidden safely in God, and we run ahead to God confident that Christ is holding our place. Christ “represents our irreplaceable uniqueness.”71 God is indirectly present to us as we make ourselves dependent on humanity, or one with humanity. Identification with the other rests on identification with God, which again, is a characteristic of at-one-ment. The only thing we can “do” for God is to be for others.72 Prayer that is faithful to the earth summons God to the world. “Prayer is ‘before God’ only when it is in the world.”73
The death of God (post-enlightenment, Nietzsche, etc.) allows us to see God’s “absence as a possible mode of his being for us.”74 That God is represented implies God’s immediate absence. The theistic God is dead, but not so for the “God who lives for us and with us.”75 Representation allows for both the absence of God and hope in the resurrection.76 We understand God’s love via negative. 77 Christ and Christ’s friends represent God in the world, thus securing time for God, time for at-one-ment to become visible.78
The God who died is the theistic God, the metaphysical God, the immediate and present God. This all may seem to imply that God is wholly transcendent, but quite to the contrary, for Sölle, God, through the representation of Christ, and through humanity, is incredibly, provision-
69 Ibid., 124.
70 Ibid.
71 IBid., 127-128.
72 Ibid., 128.
73 Ibid., 129.
74 Ibid., 131.
75 Ibid., 133.
76 Ibid., 134.
77 Ibid., 135.
78 IBid., 136.
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Dr. T. Jennings Atonement among Five 20th Century Theologians
20th C. Theology
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ally, temporally immanent. (We will see a similar comparison in McFague’s understanding of immanence.) Yet she still harbors vestiges of the theistic God “who feeds those whom God allows to go hungry.”79 (And again, there will be a similar problem with McFague’s monist view of God with respect to evil.) Beyond the incarnation, God’s kenosis into the world continues through humanity, with an eschatological horizon.80 Because Christ “played God” to the world, so can we.
The shadow of the cross abolishes the dichotomy of flight from and into the world, and the immediacy of both heaven and earth.81 “In the existence for others the search for identity becomes unnecessary.”82 God’s identity in the world is hidden, ambiguous, veiled and emergent with the world.83 God’s future is still in Christ. Sölle states,
[T]he God who is arraigned because of the suffering of the innocent is really the omnipotent God, the king, father and ruler, who is above the world. Modern man rightly indicts this God. And none of the theological devices used to silence this indictment can suppress the truth of this questioning of the almighty God.84
This is an excellent place to transition into Sallie McFague, since her critique of atonement begins and ends with her understanding of God as non-monarchical.
SALLIE MCFAGUE recently retired from the position of Carpenter Professor of Theology at Vanderbilt Divinity School.85 This paper will address her work as reflected in Models of God, in which she clearly states her thesis:
… [T]he models of God as mother, lover, and friend in the context of the world as God’s body is a credible, appropriate, and helpful imag-
79 Ibid., 137. Italics mine.
80 Ibid., 137-138.
81 Ibid., 146.
82 Ibid.
83 Ibid., 147.
84 Ibid., 150-151.
85 http://www.vst.edu/faculty/mcfague.php [03/20/2007].
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inative picture of the relationship between God and the world from a Christian perspective for our time, and … it is preferable in a number of ways to traditional alternatives.86
Christian theology for our time (1987) needs a new sensibility with respect to language about God and the world because the older images no longer work. 87 From Teilhard de Chardin to Jonathan Schell to Nietzsche, McFague invokes images of relationship, responsibility to prevent nuclear holocaust, and truth as the illusion of worn out metaphors.88 Christian theology needs an “holistic sensibility and a nuclear responsibility.”
89 A new way of conceptualizing the relationship between God and the world replaces the old images of God as a patriarchal, omnipotent king or provident, benevolent father and the world as his realm or household. She turns to evolutionary, relational, unified, holistic, interdependent images such as Buber’s “I-Thou,” but extends them to the entire world, even the cosmos, including human care for what is weaker than humanity. Not so unlike Sölle, McFague rejects power as domination in favor of power as love.90 Deconstruction (à la Derrida) calls Christian theology to adulthood, rejecting metaphysical presence and certitude. “As Erich Heller said, ‘Be careful how you interpret the world; it is like that.’”91
Christians, ever in a post-Christian world due to the fact of not carte blanche accepting as “Christian” what is “received from another time,” can use scripture as a model for constructing new metaphors, models and concepts.92 “Theology, as metaphorical and constructive does not
86 Sallie McFague, Models of God: Theology for an Ecological, Nuclear Age (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987), xiii
87 Ibid., 3.
88 Ibid., 8-9.
89 Ibid., 41.
90 Ibid., 16-17.
91 Ibid., 28.
92 Ibid., 30.
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20th C. Theology TEC 605
‘demythologize,’ but ‘remythologizes.’”93 Metaphors draw similarities, often in audacious ways, but also contrasts via negativa, and are a way of discovery; they are used as a heuristic as apposed to a hermeneutic.94 The focus of Christianity is the transformative power of God’s love, not worship of a sacred text.95 Scriptural terminology is 2000 years too old for today, and yet it gives theologians authority to experiment.96 Salvation must address today’s problems (“destructive, oppressive domination of some over others”97), and therefore cannot speak in terms of “dying and rising gods, personal guilt and sacrificial atonement, eternal life and so forth”98; rather, in consonance with at-one-ment, it involves a new way of being in the world as seen in Jesus’ table fellowship (the gospel’s inclusive character), in parables (the gospel’s destabilizing effect), and death on the cross (anti-hierarchical emphasis).99 Here, McFague resonates deeply with Sölle, and with Rauschenbusch when the topic is limited to his attempt to change society.
When theology answers the wrong questions, it obfuscates both the contemporary problem and the salvific answers.100 Again, in deep resonance with bothe Sölle and Rauschenbusch, McFague avers that sin is against people and the earth, and therefore salvation is a present and continuing activity of humanity working with the transformative power of God’s love to heal humanity and the world, not a single act by a single man 2000 years ago.101 This continual action holds echoes of Sölle.
Avoiding any sustained argument regarding a bodily resurrection, McFague remythologizes Jesus’ post-crucifixion “appearance stories” as God’s continuing presence in, care for, and
93 Ibid., 32.
94 Ibid., 33-36
95 Ibid., 43.
96 Ibid., 44.
97 Ibid., 48.
98 Ibid., 45.
99 Ibid., 48-49.
100 Ibid., 54.
101 Ibid., 55.
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relation to the world, as opposed to “our translation into God’s presence.”102 The world as God’s body, over and against the world as the king’s realm, further supports this interpretation, and coincides with Sölle’s rejection of the theistic God. McFague deconstructs the monarchical model of the God-world relationship: God, the king, is distant, untouchable, relates externally, extends benevolence only to humans, and controls through dominance and/or benevolence, which encourages human passivity, in turn threatening life; the model is hegemonic, anthropocentric, dualistic, hierarchical and excludes all other models.103 The model of the world as God’s body is not dualistic, but monist, “presuming the basic oneness of all reality, including the unity of God and the world.”104 It is also inclusive, panentheistic, “puts God at risk” (risk is also formative for Sölle’s theology), challenges the “antibody, anti-physical, antimatter tradition within Christianity,”105 is personal, reveals: God’s immanence, immediacy and concern for the world, and God’s willingness to suffer with and for the world.106 Reminiscent of Sölle’s understanding of suffering, McFague sees the world as God’s body remythologizing “the inclusive suffering love of the cross of Jesus of Nazareth.”107 Sin is “the refusal to be part of the body… the imago dei … the consciousness of the cosmos.”108 “Evil is… God’s responsibility, part of God’s being,” and in that evil is part of the earth’s processes, which are “God’s self-expression” then “God is involved in evil.”109 On the other hand, God suffers in, with and for the world. The personal model of God as mother, lover, friend: draws from the most intimate human relationships and involves life and death; is best
102 Ibid., 59-60.
103 Ibid., 63-69.
104 Ibid., 93.
105 Ibid., 74.
106 Ibid., 69-73.
107 Ibid., 72.
108 Ibid., 77.
109 Ibid., 75.
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known; highlights “the relatedness of all life, …the responsibility of human beings for the fate of the earth.”110 Through personal agency, this model shows God’s work in the world as “radically relational, immanental, interdependent and non-interventionist.”111 Here again, McFague agrees in spirit with Sölle’s immanent represented God.
McFague gives the functionality of mother, lover, friend to creator, savior, sustainer, relates these functions to agape, eros, and philos, and reveals her source as the Gospel of John (the monarchical view has source in Paul). The type of divine love revealed in God as mother is agape, God’s activity in the world as mother is creation, and the implication for existence in the world is justice.112 Agape has been traditionally defined as disinterested, but McFague intends it to be interested, caring for all creation, not just spiritual but involving the physical in all its aspects of birth, life, femaleness, blood, water, breath, sex, gestation and food. Agape is also impartial, “willing existence and fulfillment for all being.”113 In God, as mother creating the world, “God has come near,” dualism is undercut, both spirit and body are affirmed.114 God functions as judge, condemning all that distorts or thwarts life. Creating and justice are seen in WisdomSophia, the immanent presence of God, active in creation, which was subsumed into the Logos due to the tension between them.115 As mother, God creates, nourishes and leads to fulfillment all that is, including preserving potential for future generations.116 McFague suggests that this is a model for humanity as well: individually, nationally, universally.117 Sölle would add that humanity has the responsibility to represent this God to the world, to continues her work.
110 Ibid., 85.
111 Ibid., 83.
112 Ibid., 101.
113 Ibid., 103.
114 Ibid., 110-112.
115 Ibid., 114-15 citing Schussler Fiorenza
116 Ibid., 121.
117 Ibid., 122-123.
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The type of divine love revealed in God as lover is eros, God’s activity in the world as lover is saving, and the implication for existence in the world is healing.118 “Just as female sexuality had to be squarely faced with the proposal of God as mother, so eroticism must be openly considered with the model of God as lover.”119 McFague suggests lover/beloved as a possible God/world metaphor of love, especially since it may be the deepest human relationship.120 The crux of being in love is valuing the other for who they are.121 Eros “is the desire for union with… the valuable,” and salvation is “the making whole or uniting with what is attractive and valuable,” which “is most clearly seen in sexual desire.”122 Salvation as “making whole” and uniting with” certainly carry connotations of at-one-ment.
McFague offers three succinct definitions: “Agape, the love that gives with no thought of return; eros, the love that finds the beloved valuable; and philia, the love that shares and works for the vision of the good.”123 The world is of great value, and God needs the world, implying change as an attribute of God.124 God needs our love-response to “help save the world.”125 “…[W]e image God according to what we find most desirable in ourselves and what we find constitutive of our world…”126 “Sin is the turning away… from interdependence,” the refusal to be God’s beloved, and to “love all that God loves.”127 With respect to Rauschenbusch, this then leads to the corruption of God’s intended Kingdom on earth. For Sölle, it is not accepting the responsibility to represent God to the world.
118 Ibid., 125-155.
119 Ibid., 125.
120 Ibid., 126.
121 Ibid., 127-128.
122 Ibid., 130-131.
123 Ibid., 131.
124 Ibid., 134.
125 Ibid., 134-135.
126 Ibid., 134
127 Ibid., 139.
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In God as lover within the world as God’s body, God suffers with all suffering. We act to save the world by becoming agents of healing. In Rauschenbusch this is seen by recognizing, naming, and working to correct communal/social ills, and in Sölle by holding a place for God in the world. As evidenced in Jesus’ ministry and table fellowship, he also acted to save the world by becoming an agent of healing. Thus, we see the moral influence of his life as motivation for humanity to continue to heal the world, to continue the process of at-one-ment. We see God in many saviors working to heal the world’s wounds. God as lover undercuts both anthropocentrism and spirit/body dualism.128 Healing actively resists and passively identifies with pain and suffering; healing is in line with God as liberator.
129 “…[S]uffering is not salvific, but it is inevitable…”130 McFague offers examples of healers: Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Sojourner Truth, Dorothy Day, Mohandas Ghandi, not as saints but saviors.
131
The type of divine love revealed in God as friend is philia, God’s activity in the world as friend is sustaining, and the implication for existence in the world is companionship.
132 Philia or friendship is the freest human relationship, and is bound by a common vision. We as friends of the friend of the world are invited to work toward the fulfillment of God’s vision for the world’s well being.133 Equality in not a necessary characteristic of friendship. With respect to the activity of sustaining, McFague, strongly resonating with both Sölle and Rauschenbusch, says
Salvation is the reunification – the healing and liberation – of the torn, alienated, enslaved body of the world through the revelation of the depths of divine love for the world, which gives us the power both to work actively for reunification and to suffer with the victims of estrangement.
134
128 Ibid., 147.
129 Ibid., 149.
130 Ibid., 149-150.
131 Ibid., 150-154.
132 Ibid., 157-180.
133 Ibid., 165.
134 Ibid., 168.
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Preferring the image of God as friend, McFague highlights the shared meal and hospitality to the stranger, which imply the following for the community “formed by God as friend” the sustainer: it is joyful; its bond is “with and in divine presence”; it extends fellowship to the outsider; it shares life’s necessities.135 Companionship encompasses a common vision of solidarity in friendship, in which God and humanity are friends of the world. This companionship is seen in Jesus’ table fellowship.136 Xenophobia, symbolized ultimately by the possibility of a nuclear holocaust, is overcome by risking an encounter with, friendship with, table fellowship with the stranger.137 In the Christian community, companionable encounters are made possible by divine presence.
138
As a serendipity to creating new models of God, McFague has unseated the orthodox trinity as exclusionary and solitary, and she has intentionally introduced an alternate trinity by which to image the process of unity, separation and reunification, or as this paper suggests, atone-ment.139 McFague focuses on the immanence and transcendence of God as evidenced in the world as God’s body, rather than through political images of monarchy and patriarchy. From telescope to microscope, the world is “wondrously, awesomely, divinely mysterious.”140 We see God’s immanence when we “look at the world… revere it, find it special and precious…as the way God has chosen to be visible, present to us.”141 It is consecrated, thus “we tread on holy ground.”142 “…[W]hat we can know of God’s transcendence is neither above nor beneath but in
135 Ibid., 174.
136 Ibid., 175.
137 Ibid., 176-177.
138 Ibid., 179.
139 Ibid., 181-184.
140 Ibid., 185-186.
141 ibid., 185.
142 Ibid.
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and through the world.”143 Sölle might add here that we know of God’s immanence in and through both Christ’s and humanity’s representation of God.
144 Pioneering womanist theologian, DELORES WILLLIAMS, taught at Union theological Seminary in New York. The term “womanist” and its definition first appeared in Alice Walker’s In Search of our Mothers’ Gardens in 1983.145 In her poetic offering of this new term, Walker derives “womanist” from “womanish” (a female black child acting grown up, audacious) and further explains that a womanist “is committed to survival and wholeness of entire people, male and female,” loves women and individual men sexually or non-sexually, “[l]oves the Spirit. Loves love and food and roundness. Loves struggle.”
146
Delores Williams’ Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk is aptly titled.
147 A mini-exegesis of the title is revealing. “Sisters” addresses African American women and all oppressed women, “Wilderness” speaks to the context of survival as opposed to liberation, “Challenge” points both to the issues Williams raises (surrogacy, survival and quality of life) and to the groups she confronts (black theologians, white feminists and Black Church), “Womanist” indicates the inclusive nature of her discourse, and “God-Talk” denotes theology. Much like Hagar, African American women are sisters in the wilderness, who experience surrogacy and oppression on many levels, and must find paths of resistance in community in order to
143 Ibid., 186.
144 Photo by Leslie Starobin, http://www.hds.harvard.edu/wsrp/scholarship/rfmc/rfm_video4.htm [04/04/2007]
145 Alice Walker. In Search of our Mothers’ Gardens: Womanist Prose. (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1983).
146 Ibid., xi-xii, as quoted in: Stephanie Mitchem. Introducing Womanist Theology. (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2002), 55.
147 Delores Williams, Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2001).
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survive with a certain quality of life, especially when divine liberation is not an option. This communal activity entails aspects of at-one-ment: women and the community coming together, creatively in order to ensure survival and establish a quality of life.
Four key concepts for Williams are surrogacy, survival, resistance and quality of life.
While Black Theology and other liberation theologies focus on the story of the Exodus as liberative, Williams notes that liberation is not always an option, and thus seeks a biblical narrative more fitting to the situation of African American women. She finds this in the person of Hagar, who was a surrogate for Sarah in producing an heir for Abraham. She had no control over her reproductive capacities. Hagar was not liberated, but she survived and received the promises and blessing of God to produce kings and nations, which also alludes to a quality of life.
Traditional views of the atonement harm black women’s historical position of enforced surrogacy and deny their identity by lauding surrogacy as virtuous and even salvific. Hagar met God in the wilderness after she escaped servitude as Sarah’s maid and surrogate. In like manner, black women find God in the wilderness as they choose not to remain victims of racism, sexism, and classism. Their identity and value assured, and their invisibility obliterated, black women walk with Jesus because salvation is exemplified in Jesus’ life of resistance rather than in his death. This salvation is also seen in the survival strategies he employed to help others.
Historically and up to present day, African American women have been used as surrogates: by white slave holders for sexual gratification and in order to reproduce slaves; by white women to raise their children and do the work which was deemed too strenuous for a “lady,” both in the house and in the field. “[T]he masculinization of roles of female slaves erased gender boundaries in relation to work.”
148 Currently, poverty forces
148 Ibid., 66.
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some black women into surrogacy roles… [A]s domestics employed by white families, these women could still perform nurturing tasks for white children. In the black community, black women could still be pressured by social circumstances to step into the role of head of household in lieu of absent male energy and presence.149
Surrogacy has been a negative force in African American women’s lives. It has been used by both men and women of the ruling class, as well as by some black men, to keep black women in the service of other people’s needs and goals. By appropriating the biblical Hagar stories, African American people have kept the issue of surrogacy alive in the community’s memory.
150
Williams draws similarities between the Hagar stories and black women’s experience.
… Hagar must have been afraid in the wilderness, pregnant and alone…Hagar had a word with God, and radical obedience was her response to God’s will… Hagar suffered indignities and abuse from those who had more power than she did, but she defied them by resisting… Hagar had their wilderness experience of courage, fear, aloneness, meeting God and obeying God’s will for transformation in their lives.
151
Her theological method draws on the sources of black women’s lived experience, a reappropriation of scripture, and a re-interpretation of tradition in the black church.152 (Chung Hyun Kyung studied under Williams at Union Theological Seminary, and this methodology is quite apparent in her work.)
Controversial aspects of Williams’ theology center on atonement theory. An oft-quoted epithet hurled by Williams at any theory requiring the death of Jesus is: “There is nothing of God in the blood of the cross.” Comparing the surrogacy of Jesus to that of a black “mammy,” she states that African American women do not need a black mammy to save them. The ultimate
149 Ibid., 61.
150 Ibid., 81.
151 Ibid., 139.
152 Ibid., 144.
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surrogacy of Jesus’ “salvific” death reinforces the victimization of black women; it does not save them.153
Leaning heavily if not exclusively on human agency for salvation, Williams’ atonement theory can be categorized as the moral influence of Jesus’ life. “Hagar becomes the first female in the Bible to liberate herself from oppressive power structures.”154 “In Genesis 16 Hagar liberates herself… In Genesis 22 Sarah, her oppressor, initiates Hagar’s liberation. God merely agrees with Sarah.”155
CHUNG HYUN KYUNG is an Associate Professor of Ecumenical Theology at Union Theological Seminary. A lay theologian of the Presbyterian Church of Korea, she is also a founding member of the International Interfaith Peace Council, and is currently on sabbatical, doing research through an immersion experience with Muslim women who are involved in peacemaking work in 16 different Islamic countries. She was at one time a temporary Buddhist novice nun. A Korean eco-feminist, or salimist, she is preparing to become a dharma teacher at the Kwan Eum Zen School in New York City. and another quote from the same interview is:
I think in order to really heal the world we need the ‘wisdom of darkness.’ This can be the Third World, dark people, women, or our ‘shadows,’ ... all the things we do not want to confront within ourselves, so we project them onto others and call them terrorists. So, I think that we need ‘endarkenment’ for awhile, not enlightenment, to heal the world.156
153 Ibid., 161-167.
154 Ibid., 19.
155 Ibid., 198.
156 “(Chung) Hyun Kyung,” Zion’s Herald, v. 155 no.7 (Sept/Oct, 2003): 16.
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Drawing from many Asian women theologians,157 Chung presents an introduction to Asian women’s theologies as expositions on four theological themes: anthropology, Christology, Mariology and spirituality.
As second generation Asian theologians, Chung et al have built on the first generation’s confrontation of Western imperialism, in order to construct an authentic theology of liberation with Asian roots. By accessing the autochthonous traditions and theologies of Asian religions, especially amid the poor, Chung goes beyond the bounds of Christocentrism that hindered the first generation, and constructs a more life-based theology. Rather than engaging further in criticism of colonial oppression, Chung and other second generation Asian women theologians are occupied in the effort of constructing liberating theologies from their own life experience and in their own vernacular. With regard to criticism of her use of indigenous Asian religious concepts and practices, Chung retorts,
If they ask me, “Are you a syncretist?” I say, “You are right, I am a syncretist, but so are you.” My response is that I know I am a syncretist, but you don’t know you are a syncretist because you have hegemonic power ... non-Christian cultures, when they try to interpret the gospel out of their life experience, they are syncretists! But they are just being true to their identity, history and culture.158
In Struggle to be the Sun Again, using poetry and prose, Chung delineates the daily struggle for dignity and survival159 Asian women face, the first being survival to the point of birth, the second being survival immediately after birth.160 Patriarchy is taken to extreme in what
157 Kwok Pui Lan, formerly of Hong Kong; Virginia Fabellla and Elizabeth Dominguez from the Philippines; Elizabeth Tapia; Mary John Mananzan; Lee Sun Ai; Padma Gallup from Singapore; Lee Oo Chung of Korea, and many others
158 “(Chung) Hyun Kyung,” Zion’s Herald, v. 155 no.7 (Sept/Oct, 2003): 14.
159 Note here the similarity to Williams’idea of survival and quality of life.
160 Chung Hyun Kyung, Struggle to be the Sun Again: Introducing Asian Women’s Theology (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1990).
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she calls a “man-worshipping, woman-despising world.”161 “To be human is to suffer and to resist.”162 She defines the Korean concept of han as “unexpressed anger and resentment stemming from social powerlessness,” creating “a ‘lump’ in the spirit” which can lead to bodily disintegration.
163
Chung’s argument regarding homosexuality easily falls into the category of at-one-ment, as she struggles with and for the humanity of an entire segment of the population. She quotes Elizabeth Dominguez of the Philippines, who supports her position using II Samuel 1 (the song of David and Jonathan), and Ruth 1 (Ruth and Naomi’s “unreserved sharing of love”).
164 “To be human is to be created in God’s image.”
166
165 This image of God is: female and male, communal, creative in nature and history, of a life-giving Spirit, and a mother and a woman.
Chung addresses the question, “Who is Jesus for Asian Women?” Christology could be a mine field for Asian women, since traditional views of Jesus as the obedient, submissive, suffering servant reflect not liberation for Asian women, but their daily life. Jesus is envisioned as a companion of those without power, those who suffer as they engage in the struggle toward liberation and wholeness. Here we also find a similarity to Williams’ emphasis on the life and struggle of Jesus for others. Women in Korea find a semblance of agency as shamans, who heal, comfort, advise, and perform exorcisms. Rooted in this tradition, Korean women can relate to Jesus as Shaman, along with newer images of Jesus as mother, liberator, food and worker. These images reflect the importance of the moral influence of Jesus’ life with respect to bringing atone-ment to the world. As Jesus did, so do Asian women.
161 Ibid., 38.
162 Ibid., 41.
163 Ibid., 42.
164 Ibid., 46.
165 Ibid., 47.
166 Ibid., 48-52.
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Emerging Asian women’s spirituality includes characteristics that are: concrete and total (emerging from concrete reality); creative and flexible (secret use of contraceptives); prophetic and historical (radical vision, liberative feminist framework of caring, nurturing and cooperation); community oriented (the struggle is communal); pro-life (“oriented toward and sustaining life and love”167; ecumenical and all embracing (Christians make up less than 3% of the population in Asia); cosmic creation centered (holistic, includes all of creation, Philippine mother God Ina, the divine womb, source of life and nurture, immanent in nature, she is the world itself).
168
In short, Asian women’s emerging spirituality encompasses all that brings at-one-ment to the lives of Asian women with each other, with creation with God, and thus with all.
Asian Women’s Theology has made many contributions to theology in general. According to Chung, theology must be constructed in conjunction with poor people.169 Chung makes four suggestions for the future of Asian women’s theology. First, Asian women are the text, as opposed to the Bible, especially as interpreted by “Mother Church in the West.”170 As in other forms of liberation theology, the starting point is experience, not a written text. God is revealed in the lived experience of Asian women.171 Second, she hopes the focus of theology shifts from institutionalized religion to popular religiosity among women.”172 From Korean Shamanism, to Chinese Buddhist veneration of Kwan In, to the mother-God, Ina, of the Philippines, Asian women have long resisted patriarchal religions.173 Her third hope for the future is that Asian women’s theology would move from pluralism to a solidarity that celebrates “revolutionary
167 Ibid., 93.
168 Ibid., 91-96.
169 Ibid., 102.
170 Ibid., 111. This is very much what Williams also asserts.
171 Ibid.
172 Ibid.
173 Ibid., 112.
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praxis in the people’s struggle for liberation.”174 And finally, as we saw in the “syncretism” quote, Chung looks for a move from doctrinal purity in Christianity to a “survival-liberation centered syncretism.”175
Conclusion
With the exception of Rauschenbusch’s chapter on atonement proper, all five of the theologians discussed in this paper rely heavily on the life and ministry of Jesus as both motivation and model for creating a just world, for bringing God’s intended shalom to this world which God so loves, for making at-one-ment a reality. All five stressed the continual nature of the realization of social justice. All five, again with the exception of Rauschenbusch as previously mentioned, minimize the death of Jesus as carrying with it any (as Sölle might say) “magical” means of atonement. Four of them, excepting Chung, minimize the role of the Holy Spirit, and all five maximize the role of human effort in bringing about at-one-ment. While Sölle ventured into a dialog with Judaism, Chung goes much further embracing in solidarity all that leads to dignity and survival, no matter where it is found.
Having reviewed the deep and insightful work of these five renowned theologians, I appreciate the foresight and prophetic utterance of Rauschenbusch, the intellect and perseverance of Sölle, the creative audacity of McFague, the pioneering spirit and mentoring of Williams, and the courage and inclusiveness of Chung. Taken in a broad sweep, they point to God’s love for the world, humanity’s responsibility for it, Jesus’ as exemplar, and shalom, value and dignity of life as God intends it. I hope that the future of theology holds a greater role for the Spirit as Chung envisions in bringing about at-one-ment for all.
174 Ibid.
175 Ibid., 113.
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Bibliography
Chung Hyun Kyung. Struggle to be the Sun Again: Introducing Asian Women’s Theology. Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1990.
“(Chung) Hyun Kyung.” Zion’s Herald. Vol. 155 no.7 (Sept/Oct, 2003): 14-16.
“Dorothee Soelle.” Biographies. Answers Corporation, 2006. Answers.com. http://www.answers.com/topic/dorothee-soelle, [05/29/2007].
McFague, Sallie. Models of God: Theology for an Ecological, Nuclear Age. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987.
Rauschenbusch, Walter. Christianity and the Social Crisis. 1907; Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1991, 422. Quoted in Hans Schwarz. Theology in a Global Context: The Last 200 Years. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005, 145.
Rauschenbusch, Walter. A Theology for the Social Gospel. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1945.
Schwarz, Hans. Theology in a Global Context: The Last 200 Years. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005.
Sölle, Dorothee. Christ the Representative: An Essay in Theology after the Death of God. Philadelphia: Fortress press, 1967. Translated by David Lewis. From Stellvertretung; ein Kapitel Theologie nach dem Tode Gottes. Stuttgart, GR: Kreuz-Verl, 1965.
Williams, Delores. Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2001.