IV. Regarding the Relationship of Dogmatics to Christian Piety
§15. Propositions regarding Christian faith1 are conceptions of Christian religious states of mind and heart2 presented in the form of discourse.3
1. All religious stirrings, to whatever kind and level of piety they might also belong, have the following in common with all other modifications of self-consciousness when it is moved. Once they have reached a certain point and a certain distinct resolution, they also become manifest externally. They do this most primitively and directly in mime, by means of facial features and movements both of voice and gesture, which we regard to be their expression. Already at that early point, moreover, we definitely distinguish an expression of devoutness4 from that of a merely sensory mirth or sadness—this by analogy to that within oneself with which each person has some acquaintance. Indeed, we are able even to imagine that for the purpose of holding these religious states of mind and heart firm and—especially if they are shared among a number of people—of spreading them in some manner that can be repeated, the various features of that natural expression would be combined in the form of sacred signs and symbolic actions, without any perceptible interposition of thought whatsoever. However, we can scarcely imagine such a low point of development in the human spirit, such a deficient mode of formation, and such a parsimonious use of language that, at the same time, each person should not already, in accordance with the stage of mental functioning5 one had attained, have also been making oneself an object6 within one’s diverse states, so as to form some notion of these states and to hold them firm in the form of thought.
Now, from time immemorial this endeavor has also been directed, in particular, to religious stirrings of the mind and heart.7 Moreover, in its inner character, considered in and of itself, this endeavor is what our proposition means by one’s conception of religious states of mind and heart. However, although thinking never does proceed, even internally, without use of language, as long as thinking remains purely internal, certain wavering states of this procedure would exist in it nonetheless. To some extent, these wavering states do indeed designate some given object, yet only in such a way that neither the shaping nor the combining of concepts would be firm enough to permit their being communicated—even if the word “concept” were taken in its broadest meaning. Only a cultivation of this procedure so advanced that it could also be presented externally in well-defined discourse would bring forth an actual proposition regarding faith, by means of which the utterances of that religious consciousness referred to would come into circulation more securely and in greater compass than is possible by means of immediate expression. No matter whether the expression were actual or figurative, whether it would designate its construct immediately or only by means of comparison and delimitation, it would still be a proposition regarding faith, however.
2.8 Now, Christianity everywhere presupposes this developmental stage of consciousness. The entire efficacious action of the Redeemer himself was co-conditioned by the communicability of his self-consciousness by virtue of discourse. In the same fashion, moreover, Christianity has always and everywhere been spread by means of proclamation alone.9 Every statement that can be a feature of Christian proclamation (κήρυγμα) is also a statement regarding faith, because it bears witness to the definite resolution of religious self-consciousness, viewed as inner surety. Moreover, every statement regarding Christian faith is also a part of Christian proclamation, because every such statement also expresses as a surety the approach to a state of blessedness10 that is to be wrought by means of what Christ has founded. Very quickly, however, this proclamation split into three different domains of language, which proffer three correspondingly different formations of statements regarding faith: the poetic domain; the rhetorical domain—which, on the one hand, turns outward more by way of dispute and commendation, and, on the other hand, turns inward more by way of ascetic language and invitation; and finally, the presentational-didactic domain.11
The relationship of communication through discourse to that through symbolic action is already a very different one, however, according to time and place. The first kind of communication has increasingly receded in the Eastern church, for in its mode of operation adherence to a letter12 that has become firm and inalterable also comes much closer to symbolic action than to free discourse; and this first kind of communication, through discourse, has been ever more prevalent in the Western church. Thus, even in the domain of discourse itself, the situation is the same with respect to those three different modes of communication. The relationship that obtains among them, also how abundantly overall and in what vital interchange they are unfolded, and how they nourish each other and are multiply changed into each other—these characteristics testify not so much to the degree of piety as they do to the character of a society and to its readiness for more reflective mental functioning and contemplation.13 Thus, on the one hand, this communication is already something different from piety itself, though piety can no more be divorced from all communication than can anything else that is human. On the other hand, however, propositions regarding faith, in all their forms, are ultimately grounded so exclusively in the stirrings of religious self-consciousness that where the stirrings are not present, the propositions also cannot arise.
1. Christliche Glaubenssätze. Ed. note: In this work, doctrines, or statements regarding faith, are first presented as doctrinal propositions (Lehrsätze) and then explained in two or more numbered subsections. The doctrines themselves, however, are not about doctrines, or teachings, but are about “faith” (§14). That is, they are presented as “propositions regarding faith” (Glaubenssätze), faith that is itself distinctively Christian. The treatment as a whole Schleiermacher calls Glaubenslehre (faith-doctrine, or doctrina fidei).
Schleiermacher’s marginal note at the general heading above reads: “§§15 and 16: Dogmatic propositions [Dogmatische Sätze] developing out of doctrines regarding faith [Glaubenssätzen]. §§17 and 18: The value [Wert] to be assigned to dogmatic propositions and their being combined. §19: Definition” (Thönes, 1873). Cf. OG 59: “These propositions are something merely derivative, and the inner state of mind and heart is what is originative.”
2. Gemütszustände. Ed. note: To indicate how the terms used are translated and relate to each other: These states (Zustände) are, at base, affective, about one’s being affected in feeling (Gefühl) by God, attended by one’s equally internal perceptions (Anschauungen, which some interpreters have called “intuitions,” following Kant’s rather different usage) directed toward what is divine (“God”). Hence, the work in its entirety is about how human beings are reached by God in this way. The result is a body of doctrine (Lehrbegriff) containing conceptions or apprehensions (Auffassungen) of these states. The way in which God’s activity in Christ is to be apprehended in doctrinal concepts (Begriffe) and is to be ordered and displayed here is its “method” (Methode, §§20–31). The “definition” (Erklärung) that precedes it (§§2–19) could be described as comprising explanations regarding the focus and boundaries of its mode of apprehending, viewing, or conceptualizing (Auffasungsart) the presentation of Christian faith to be offered here. The focus, however, is God’s activity in Christ reaching human beings in our finite natural state, in our Gemutszustände, and then in our piety (Frömmigkeit), taken as a whole.
4. Andacht.
5. Besinnung. Ed. note: Since Schleiermacher uses other terms for sensibility (Sinn, Sinnlichkeit), consciousness (Bewußtsein), and mental disposition (Gesinnung), “mental functioning,” which rises toward higher stages of reflection, seems to be the preferable translation here. Nonetheless, in this context he is also referring to stages of consciousness, including those of self-consciousness.
6. Gegenstand. Ed. note: Or a subject for observation—that is, to view oneself as an “I” who takes notice and acts, also as a “me” to whom things happen, including things that one has initiated oneself—as an interactive, not a merely static, object.
7. Gemütserregungen. Ed. note: That is, to the affective domain, and within it in particular to stirrings, excitations, or what some refer to as emotions (alternatively, to Gemütsbewegungen). Affekt is the term Schleiermacher occasionally uses for stirrings chiefly determined sensorily.
8. Ed. note: Schleiermacher’s marginal heading for the preceding subsection reads: “The General Extension of Reflection [Allgemeinheit der Reflexion]” (Thönes, 1873). This “procedure”(Verfahrung) extends from the more primitive, unsteady sort of observation Betrachtung) to the most precisely conceptual. The heading for this second subsection is “The General Conditions of Christian Proclamation” (Verkündigung).
9. Verkündigung. Ed. note: “Proclamation” means communication by word and/or deed, in the same fashion as is reported of Jesus. In contrast, Schleiermacher generally restricts “preaching” (Predigten) to producing sermons and homilies. See his four 1821 sermons on the “seeds” of proclamation, translated by Tice and Lawler in a forthcoming volume.
11. Ed. note: The third, darstellend belehrende domain is explained in §16. The concept “presentational action” is the most important formal category in Schleiermacher’s Christian ethics, being an extension of Christ’s own self-presentation both in his discourse and in his other actions. “Didactic” refers most broadly and aptly, for present purposes, to a near synonym of instruction, though here it goes beyond the usual connotation of providing information to the fuller meaning of “education” or fostering personal growth (Bildung, Ausbildung, Erziehung) to be found in his various lectures and discourses on education. On matters “dogmatic” versus “ascetic,” see OR (1821) II, supplemental note 4; also OR index on “asceticism.” The characterization given here refers, in part, to various practices of inner religious devotional life and the figurative language used there. See also §§85.2, 87.2, 109.3, 112.4, and 124.2.
12. Buchstabe. Ed. note: English uses the same figurative expression in the phrase “the letter of the law.”
13. Besinnung und Betrachtung. Ed. note: Cf. §15n5. At their higher reaches, both of these characteristics represent higher levels and stages of development in self-consciousness, a greater receptivity to corresponding religious stimuli, and a cultural groundwork for both contemplative and intellectual “reflection.” Betrachtung, in Schleiermacher’s usage, especially betokens a more contemplative bent within the domain of religious discourse. In his sermons, therefore, he often invites his listeners to take notice, observe, or consider what is being proclaimed in Scripture in this more contemplative manner.
§16. Dogmatic propositions are statements regarding faith, propositions of the presentational-didactic kind in which the intention is to attain the highest possible degree of distinct resolution.1
1. Originally, poetic expression is always based on an element of life that is raised purely from within, on an element of inspiration; rhetorical expression is always based on an element of life raised from without, or an element of aroused interest that issues in some distinct, particular result. Poetic expression is purely presentational in character and, within broad contours, sets forth images and formations that its hearer fills out in one’s own distinctive fashion. Rhetorical expression is purely persuasive in character and, in accordance with its nature, has mostly to do with features of speech that, in taking up matters on a scale of more and less, can be conceived in greater or lesser compass. It is satisfied if, at the decisive instant, these features of speech can but lead the listener to its highest goal, given also that they might seem to bear less value subsequently, having exhausted themselves in the process. Thus, both modes of expression are suited to a kind of completion that is different from the logical or dialectical sort described in our proposition. Nevertheless, we can well imagine both of them to be originative in every religious community, thus also in the Christian church, to the extent that we attribute to everyone in such community some participation in the calling of proclamation. That is to say, on the one hand, when a person finds oneself in a state of unusually heightened religious self-consciousness, that person will feel called to exercise poetic presentation, viewed as that mode of expression which most immediately proceeds from that state. On the other hand, when a person finds oneself to be especially challenged by either oppressive or favorable external circumstances to undertake an act of proclamation, the rhetorical mode of expression will be the most natural one for the purpose of drawing the greatest possible benefit from those given circumstances. Suppose, however, that we also take what is apprehended and appropriated in what is originally given in these two modes of expression to be tied to language and communicable by means of language. Then this material, in turn, will not be able to have either a poetic or a rhetorical form. Rather, in becoming independent of what was the momentary feature in each of these forms, and yet expressive of a consciousness that remains the same and being less a matter of proclamation than of confession (ὁμολογία), it would then become precisely that third form, the didactic, or presentational and educative,2 form, which form both in being what remains from those other two forms and in combining certain features of the two, is to be viewed as a derivative and secondary form.
2.3 Suppose, however, that we restrict ourselves exclusively to Christianity and focus our thought on its most distinctive beginning—namely, the self-proclamation of Christ, who, as subject of divine revelation, could not carry within himself a distinction between stronger and weaker stirring but could participate in such a distinction only by virtue of his life in common with others.4 Given that condition, we can also posit neither poetic nor rhetorical expression as the predominant form of his self-proclamation nor even as the actually originative form of it. Rather, in parabolic and prophetic discourses these two forms are present only subordinately. In contrast, what was essential in his self-proclamation lay in the fact that he had to bear witness to his constantly steady, ever identical self-consciousness, issuing from its composed state. Consequently, he did this not in a poetic form but in a strictly calm and reflective5 form. Thus, his task was to present himself, in that at the same time he would thereby communicate his objective consciousness of the condition and constitution of human beings in general—a consciousness belonging properly to him alone. Thus, he would be didactic in this presentation. Moreover, he would, indeed, be didactic in such a way that sometimes the educating that he did was subordinate to the presentation and sometimes vice versa.
Our proposition, however, does not include this presentational-didactic expression of Christ; moreover, such utterances of the Redeemer will not readily be set forth as dogmatic propositions anywhere. Rather, they are handed over, as it were, only as text for such propositions. This is the case, for even in such essential components of Christ’s self-proclamation the distinct resolution6 contained in them was absolute. Moreover, only a completely reproducible apprehension and appropriation of that proclamation can be designated by the phrase “the endeavor to attain the greatest possible definiteness.” Meanwhile, in Christ’s own discourses dogmatic propositions proper are subordinately present as well—namely, where he had to start with partly erroneous and partly entangled notions at hand among his contemporaries.
3.7 With regard to poetic and rhetorical expression, it already ensues from what was said of them above that they can fall into seeming contradiction, both each of them within itself and the two of them with each other. This can happen even when the self-consciousness designated by diverse expressions is the same in its content. Moreover, a resolution of seeming contradictions would be possible only under two conditions. First, it would be possible to the extent that one could orient oneself, concerning a given set of seemingly contradictory statements, to Christ’s own original utterances. This situation, however, would exist very rarely in any direct fashion. Second, it would be possible to the extent that a given presentational-didactic expression that had coalesced from the three original forms of expression would be entirely, or in large part, free of those seeming contradictions. This situation, however, would not obtain so long as the given presentational-didactic expression were still wavering between a stirring and a didactic type of expression, as would occur in its being proffered to catechumens or to a congregation, thus repeatedly being sometimes more akin to rhetorical expression and sometimes more akin to figurative expression. Rather, this second situation would obtain only to the degree that the endeavor indicated in our proposition would underlie the further cultivation of the given presentational-didactic expression and its more distinct separation from rhetorical and poetic expressions. Both of these processes essentially cohere with the need to settle conflict.8
Now, to be sure, in language-formation it is undeniably in the interest of knowing that figurative expression either be substituted with a literal expression or be converted into such an expression by definition, also that what is boundless in rhetorical expressions obtain its well-defined measure. Moreover, here our concern is chiefly with the formation of religious language. Hence, even dogmatic propositions are significantly explicated and gain currency only in religious communities that belong to a cultural milieu in which science is organized as something divorced from art or occupation and only to the degree that persons friendly to the knowing process are present within a given religious9 community and bear influence within it, so that the dialectical function may operate upon the utterances of religious self-consciousness and guide the process of marking out their clear meaning.
Now, such an alliance with an organized process of knowing has found a place in Christianity ever since the earliest times of the church. For this reason, moreover, it is also true that in no other religious10 community has the form of dogmatic propositions also been developed in such a strict separation from the remaining forms of discourse and unfolded in such fullness.
Postscript. This presentation both of dogmatic propositions’ emergence and of the fact that they have sprung only from logically ordered reflection11 on the immediate utterances of religious self-consciousness finds its confirmation in the whole sweep of history. The earliest proclamations made available to us in the New Testament writings already contain such propositions. Moreover, on closer consideration one recognizes in each of them, in part, their stemming from Christ’s original self-proclamation and, in part, their affinity with figurative and rhetorical features that for their continuing circulation were to be brought nearer to the strict shape of a formulation. In the succeeding period, it is clear that figurative language, which is constantly poetic by its very nature, bore the most decisive influence on dogmatic language and always preceded its development. Likewise, most dogmatic definitions were called forth by contradictions that rhetorical language had occasioned.
However, if the transformation of original expressions into dogmatic propositions is ascribed to logical or dialectical interest,12 this transformation is to be understood as occurring only as to their form. This is the case, for a proposition that would turn out to have proceeded originally from speculative activity, however akin it might be to our own propositions in content, would no longer be a dogmatic proposition. If purely scientific effort that has the task of perceiving being13 is not to come to nothing, it must, in any case, either begin or end in Supreme Being. Thus, when considered in their details, forms of philosophizing that say something speculatively about Supreme Being, despite their having sprung from work of a purely scientific character, can hardly be distinguished from corresponding propositions that have simply arisen from reflection on religious stirrings of mind and heart but thereafter have been formed dialectically. If these are viewed in their respective contexts, however, the two kinds of propositions certainly do always diverge from each other in a most determinate fashion. That is to say, originally dogmatic propositions never arise except in trains of thought to which religious mentality has provided the impetus. In contrast, not only do speculative propositions concerning Supreme Being appear, for the most part, in purely logical or natural-scientific trains of thought, but it is also the case that even where they appear in ethical discourse, be it as fundamentals or as corollaries, a tendency toward taking the logical or the natural-scientific line of thought is unmistakably present.
Even in dogmatic formations within the first centuries, if one discounts the entirely nonecclesial gnostic schools, the influence of speculation on the content of dogmatic propositions amounts to nothing. Indeed, later on, after classical organization of the knowing process had disintegrated within the Christian church, as the conglomerate philosophy of the Middle Ages had been formed, and, at the same time, once the formal influence of that philosophy was supposed to be exercised in formation of dogmatic language, what was speculative was mistaken for what was dogmatic. Consequently, an admixture of the two came to be almost unavoidable. However, this process also spelled a deficient situation for both approaches. Worldly wisdom14 retracted itself from this situation by making the ever clearer confession that in earlier times it had been placed under the guardianship of ecclesial belief and, consequently, confessing that it had stood under an alien law. Yet, having begun all over again so often in its own distinctive development since then, it was also able to spare itself the trouble of inquiring into exactly what sorts of speculative propositions at the time had been taken to be dogmatic propositions, and vice versa. In contrast, for the Christian church, which is not in a position to make repeated fresh starts in the development of its doctrine, this separation is of greatest importance. The aim of this separation is to ensure, on a regular basis, against what is speculative—to which neither poetic or rhetorical expression of religious self-consciousness nor popular expression of religious self-consciousness can be oriented—being offered as something dogmatic.15
The Evangelical church, in particular, is of one mind in bearing within itself the consciousness that the shaping of dogmatic propositions that is distinctive to it does not depend on any philosophical form or school, or has not proceeded from any speculative interest in any respect. Rather, it has proceeded only from the interest of satisfying immediate self-consciousness, which is mediated by the genuine and unadulterated foundation endowed by Christ alone. Thus, in any consistent fashion, it also can accept as dogmatic propositions that belong to it only those that stem from that same source. However, our dogmatic theology will not so securely stand on its own foundation and its own soil, as worldly wisdom has already long stood on its own independent grounds, until the separation between the two kinds of proposition will have become so nearly complete that, for example, such an astonishing question as the question of whether the selfsame proposition could be true in philosophy and false in Christian theology, and vice versa, could not arise any more. This would be the case, because the positioning of a proposition in one of these fields could not find any place in the other field; rather, however similar a ring they might have, a differentiation between the two would always have to be presupposed. However, as long as people still take pains over dogmatic propositions for the purpose of grounding or deriving them in a speculative manner, or simply proceed to process the products of speculative activity and the results of reflecting on religious states of mind and heart so as to form them into a single whole, we will still be far from reaching such a high goal of separation.
1. Cf. §§3–5 and §13.1–2. Ed. note: See also OG 80–82. Here Bestimmtheit, which can also mean “definiteness,” is translated “distinct resolution,” to represent not only definiteness of statement but also a fine resolution of pertinent details and an exact resolution of difficulties to be faced. All three qualities are amply in evidence throughout CF, which has contributed to an impression of density that readers often have. This impression can be overcome only in part by stratagems adopted in this English edition. See OR (1821) I, section on “Emergence and Communication of Religion,” regarding limitations met with in ongoing development of full doctrine and formation of systems. His concept of revelation (cf. §46.P.S.) involves principled restrictions against substantive or system-borne contributions from philosophy into dogmatics, which are discussed elsewhere in both works, are briefly expressed here, and a more ample account of these matters is implied.
2. Ed. note: Here Schleiermacher uses the descriptors das Didaktische, darstellend Belehrende. Cf. §15n1 and n11.
3. Ed. note: Schleiermacher affixed a marginal note at this point: “Christ’s self-proclamation was presentational-didactic” (Thönes, 1873).
4. Ed. note: See §§93–105 for full explanation of these descriptions of Christ in his person and work. On the religious writings that ensued, see OR (1821) IV, supplemental note 1, which outlines differences between the Quran, the Judaic codex, the New Testament, and other forms.
5. Ed. note: The words “strictly calm and reflective” translate streng besonnener, the latter word alluding to a more composed meditative, contemplative, or reflective state of mind and heart.
6. Bestimmtheit. See §16n1 above.
7. Ed. note: Schleiermacher’s marginal note here reads: “3. Presentational-didactic expression is dogmatic in combination with a knowing [Wissen] that is organic” (Thönes, 1873). Entangled notions would have organic features in them. Schleiermacher then uses the expression “organized knowing,” with a different meaning, near the end of this subsection.
8. Ed. note: “Didactic” refers not simply to teaching but rather to rules that govern its terms and formulations in the service of precision, correlation, and cohesion in presentation, and in its use of dialectical method in the process. The doctrinal and ethical aspects of Christian dogmatics are to follow the same basic principles regarding their proper subject matter and didactic form. See also BO §§223–31. On didactic as a form of discourse (language usage) in particular social contexts, see BO §§213–14, 219, and 236n. See also OR (1821) IV, supplemental notes 3 and 4. There he compares conversation in free sociality with didactic discourse and religious poetry (the latter provides a standard for hymnody). He also contrasts the ideal of a “true church” with “the existing church” and states: “In the existing church all discourse, no matter what its subject, must bear a didactic character.” The main reason he offers is that the speaker’s aim must be to draw people’s attention to something that might not yet have developed in the form mentioned. This is “on the basis of an original equality for all,” priest or laity, preferably in “plain speech.”
9. Ed. note: In this context, frommen (used at this point and throughout the rest of this proposition) and religiösen could be viewed as virtually interchangeable. However, Schleiermacher consistently uses frommen for inner states and religiösen for the outward manifestations of a religious community and its identity as a religious institution. The status of “piety” (Frommigkeit) belonging to such an institution itself, as well as within and among its members, can vary greatly, though in identifying any of it one expects to find some notable degree of commonality.
10. Ed. note: frommen. After this point in the text, the modifier is never religiösen.
11. Reflexion.
12. Ed. note: Concerning “dialectical interest”: In his 1811 notes and subsequent lectures on dialectic, matters of logic are treated as an integral part of dialectic, itself conceived as “the art of doing philosophy” or of being philosophically minded in any inquiry or discourse that is pursued with the aim of knowing.
13. Anschauung des Seins. Ed. note: This level of perception is a rational, metaphysical, specifically ontological aim, not the nonrational experience in which authentic religion or piety is rooted.
14. Weltweisheit. Ed. note: In common usage, this term came to be used for “philosophy” freed from direct ecclesiastical influence or control.
15. Ed. note: The background in Schleiermacher’s scholarship for this short paragraph and the next can be ferreted out especially in his history of philosophy lectures (SW III.4.1, 1839) and in his material on church history. For a full account of the latter, see Boekels, Schleiermacher als Kirchengeschichtler (1994).
§17. Dogmatic propositions have a twofold value, an ecclesial one and a scientific one; their degree of completeness, moreover, is determined by both of these values and by their relationship to each other.
1.1 The ecclesial value of a dogmatic proposition consists in its relation to actual religious stirrings of mind and heart. To be sure, for purposes of description every such religious stirring is something infinite2 in its singularity. Moreover, all dogmatic concepts, as well as all psychological concepts, would have to be put to use to describe one single element3 of life. Yet, just as in any such element of life the religious disposition of a person’s mind and heart4 can be the dominant feature, so too, in each such religious disposition of one’s mind and heart, some relationship of a person’s higher self-consciousness stands out, in turn, as the determinative feature, and dogmatic propositions uniformly refer to this dominant religious disposition across all the analogous elements of a person’s religious stirrings. Thus, in all fully expressed dogmatic propositions, relation to Christ must also appear in the same measure as it is evidenced in religious consciousness itself. Naturally, this cannot occur with the same degree of emphasis in all the elements of a religious life, any more than what distinguishes the life of polity in any kind of state can appear with equal strength in every one of its elements.
Accordingly, the more weakly relation to Christ is expressed in a given dogmatic proposition—as, for example, would ordinarily occur in religious stirrings mediated by our relationship to the external world—the greater the likelihood that the proposition can resemble a doctrinal proposition of some other religious community, even if what is distinctive about that community might, in large part, have receded in its own proposition. The same thing then happens within the Christian church as well, in relation to distinctive modifications of Christian consciousness in various groups, larger and smaller, modifications that separate them from one another.
Now, suppose that a given dogmatic proposition has been constructed in such a way that it suffices to express Christian consciousness for all alike. Then it would actually have currency within a larger compass, yet that proposition would not be well suited to draw notice to differences that are thus indirectly designated thereby as insignificant or in process of disappearing. In contrast, suppose that a given dogmatic proposition relates only to one of these various modifications of Christian consciousness. Then it would also have currency only within this narrower compass. Occasionally, the first kind of dogmatic proposition can seem to be a matter of indifference, and the second kind can be viewed as in the right. Occasionally, the second kind can seem to be of a partisan nature or to be sectarian, and the first kind can be viewed as in the right. However, differences of these sorts, which are contained in dogmatic propositions that deal with the same subject matter but represent5 no differences at all in immediate religious self-consciousness, also bear no decisive weight whatsoever as to their ecclesial value.
2.6 The scientific value of a dogmatic proposition rests, on the one hand, on the definiteness of the concepts present within it and their conjoining. That is to say, the more this definiteness is achieved, the more a proposition will emerge from the indefinite domain of poetic and rhetorical discourse and the greater will also be the likelihood that it cannot run into apparent contradiction with other dogmatic propositions that belong to the same formation of religious consciousness. Yet, the forming of dogmatic concepts will not have succeeded—indeed, also on account of its subject matter one probably should say that it could not succeed—in substituting the proper expression for the figurative one in every instance. Moreover, in this respect the scientific value of dogmatic propositions thus rests, in large part, simply on providing the most exact and distinct possible definition of figurative expressions that present themselves. The matter can also be left at that, all the more readily since even if the proper expression could always be substituted for a figurative one, on account of the latter’s being the original expression, the identity of the two expressions with each other would have to be demonstrated, which would come down to the very same requirement in the end.
On the other hand, the scientific value of a dogmatic proposition consists in its fruitfulness7 –that is, in how versatile it is in alluding to kindred propositions. It does this not so much in a heuristic respect, in that no dogmatic proposition has its ground in any other proposition but each one can be founded only in the contemplation8 of Christian self-consciousness. Rather, it does this in a critical respect—namely, because using critical procedure makes it easier to test how well a given dogmatic expression harmonizes with other dogmatic expressions. That is to say, among a number of dogmatic expressions that are to refer to the selfsame fact of Christian consciousness, undeniably the one that throws light on the largest circle of others that refer to kindred facts and combines with them will deserve preferred status. Moreover, wherever we find a precisely combined and self-contained domain of dogmatic language, such a domain is where we will also find a conception of the facts of Christian consciousness that carries the presumption of correctness in and of itself.
A proposition that is lacking in the first attribute discussed here, so much so that it still belongs entirely to the poetic or rhetorical domain of language, is not yet a dogmatic proposition. As concerns the second attribute discussed here, a proposition that moves beyond the bounds set forth here and purports to ground anything in an objective fashion, not tracing it to higher self-consciousness, would no longer be a proposition regarding faith and would not belong within the domain that we are covering at all.
3. Now, since every proposition regarding faith, as such, already has ecclesial value and since propositions regarding faith become dogmatic in character in that they take on scientific value, dogmatic propositions are the more complete the more their scientific character affords them an outstanding ecclesial value and also the more their scientific contents bear traces of their having proceeded from an ecclesial interest.9
1. Ed. note: In a marginal note here, Schleiermacher wrote: “1. Ecclesial value. One could say that this is the actual value of propositions regarding faith. See subsection 3 below. However, in that they come to be dogmatic propositions regarding faith, they come to be more special in character, at the same time” (Thönes, 1873).
2. Ed. note: Here “something infinite” translates ein Unendliches, not strictly finite or merely bounded and discrete—thus, strictly speaking, not wholly describable.
3. Moment. Ed. note: This is the term also used for chemical elements. Although on occasion it might also refer to an instant in time, this does not seem to be the main reference here or elsewhere in CF.
4. Gemütsstimmung. Ed. note: Were it not for marked differences of meaning in the different language contexts, this word (“disposition of mind and heart”) could mean “mood” and the similarly combined word Gemütserregung could mean “emotion,” which in any case betokens a “stirring” within. A rendition closer to each word’s root has been chosen to convey Schleiermacher’s meaning more exactly.
5. Ed. note: In Schleiermacher’s usage, repräsentieren consistently means to re-present, ordinarily in some other mode or form. Two other verbs and their noun derivatives that could appropriately be translated as “represent” (then as “representation”) are darstellen (Darstellung) and vorstellen (Vorstellung), by which Schleiermacher consistently means “present” (“presentation”) and “have a notion of “ (“notion”), respectively.
6. Ed. note: In his marginal note here, Schleiermacher stated: “2. Scientific value—not for science but by means of it. (a) Providing definiteness [or distinct resolution among] various features [Elemente] and their conjoining.—Working in this way, the purpose is to ward against and make comparisons with particular propositions carrying apparent contradictions and consequences drawn from poetic and rhetorical discourse … ” (Thönes, 1873). For (b) see §17n7 just below.
7. Ed. note: In the marginal note that Schleiermacher began above (in §17n6), he here continued: “(b) Providing critical fruitfulness. This task already relates to the interconnected character of dogmatic discourse” (Thönes, 1873).
8. Betrachtung. Ed. note: In his sermons, using some form of this word, Schleiermacher often invites his listeners to contemplate a certain fact or story with him. In this meaning, “contemplation” means attentively to observe something told or proclaimed that is somewhat in accord with what is held within one’s own self-consciousness.
9. Ed. note: For more on ecclesial and scientific interest or spirit, see Brief Outline, esp. §§9–13, 193, 209–17, 247–48, 257–62, and 329–31.
§18. The interconnecting of dogmatic propositions, done for the purpose of conjoining them and relating them to each other, proceeds from the very same need that leads to the forming of such propositions themselves and is only a natural outcome of this effort.
1. We distinguish Christ’s actual proclamation, itself the starting point for everything else, from what is dogmatic in character. We do this chiefly because wherever he went into detail in his teaching, he also bordered on poetic and rhetorical discourse, but wherever he proclaimed himself in a nonfigurative, proper manner, the presentation of his existence1 and of his work remained quite summary in nature.2 Within each time frame in given contexts of life, however, every religious stirring that was the immediate effect of Christ’s presentation has become a particular stirring. Moreover, precisely on that account, the conception of that stirring in thought, when that conception is viewed in terms of and is appropriate to that original self-proclamation, has become simply a partial, incomplete conception of itself. As a result, the overall mass of thoughts that has arisen in this way and that has also formed to the point of a greatest possible definiteness, thus becomes a mass of dogmatic propositions regarding faith. When this mass is simply taken together, it comprises the development of that original proclamation, a development increasingly being replenished. Hence, with every particular proposition that has arisen in this fashion, a desire to include the rest, thus an endeavor to connect each proposition with the others, has to be posited. Moreover, the more distinctly particular each proposition is, the more it obtains its locus only on the presupposition that it has other more or less kindred propositions next to and around itself.
2. Let us begin with the rhetorical and poetic proclamation both of Christ and of his witnesses, proclamation that was already going into some detail. Thus, from that point on out, didactic expression has indeed arisen, to a great extent, from the task of resolving apparent conflict between particular images and figures. However, it has also arisen, in part, from the need to release didactic expression from the vagueness and ambiguity that attach to it outside a given context and to specify in it what is more independent than those other expressions, didactic expression itself viewed as meaning the same for all concerned. Lying in every apparent contradiction of that sort, however, is the disquieting thought that a number of others might show up. This is so, because as each contradiction arises, by means of that contradiction suspicion is cast on the entire domain of language to which it belongs. Thus, suppose that in a given case a more proper and instructive expression is set forth so as to orient oneself thereby in relation to seemingly opposing statements. Then assurance, nonetheless, does not lie simply in the expectation that within itself what is smoothed out will not stand in contradiction all over again. Rather, assurance lies in the thought that the entire domain of language is itself not wholly immune from such a danger. This situation, however, permits of being brought to a point of surety only by way of relating a number of such expressions to each other and, through repeated efforts, to conjoin them with each other.
Now, let us suppose that didactic expression is, at the same time, more distinct and more comprehensible in and of itself. Nevertheless, in every instance didactic expression would involve a combining of general notions that are completely defined only when thought of in conjunction with higher notions above them and with lower notions below them. Likewise, every such notion, viewed as a subject, would be completely perceived3 only in the totality of its predicates and would be perceived as a predicate only in the entire range over which it could be applied. As a result, every such proposition points to other propositions wherein, in part, kindred notions and, in part, the same notions having different connections would be present.
3. Thus, it is not possible to imagine that religious self-consciousness would be lively enough to express and communicate itself without the further forming of didactic expression, whether in the looser form used in the popular domain or in the stricter form used in the schools. It is no more possible, moreover, to conceive of the particular features of this didactic expression within a religious community without conceiving that they would have to be shaped into a richly arrayed series of thoughts. Such a series of thoughts, in turn, would, in part, look to the original purpose of describing religious stirrings of mind and heart themselves in an actual sequence or in their natural interconnectedness. It would also, in part, bear the aim of completing any didactic expression in and of itself to the point of greatest possible clarity.
Now, if by the expression “Christian proclamation” we chiefly designate immediately stirring utterance and presentation, then we understand “Christian doctrine” to mean more that communication which makes use of didactic expression. This is so, whether such communication then occurs also in order to stimulate people by means of notions that are brought to clear consciousness, as happens in homiletic usage, or whether, by means of achieving clarity in the notions used, it occurs in order to sort out immediate religious self-consciousness more distinctly and in order reliably to substantiate its independent character, which is the business of schooling in dogmatics. Patently, this latter task would be satisfactorily carried out only in bringing the structured body of doctrine to an integral whole, wherein a fully formed dogmatic expression would not be lacking for any essential element of Christian religious consciousness and wherein all dogmatic propositions would be brought into relation among themselves. Hence, it is not at all praiseworthy if respected theologians—perhaps confusing the very matter of dogmatics itself with its corruption—regard it to be a degeneration of Christian community or a consequence of such degeneration when doctrine is pursued in a scholarly manner. Rather, on the one hand, it is necessary for the office of proclamation itself—all the more so when modes of presentation multiply in a great variety of languages—that a body of doctrine be available that is worked out in dialectical precision. Moreover, it is natural, on the other hand, that the more Christian community expands, based on its own activities, and is renewed, the more proclamation itself also takes on the form of popular teaching. Then, in turn, this popular form of teaching, which itself requires scholarly doctrine to be its norm and limit, becomes the most significant means for promoting vital circulation of consciousness that is of a genuinely religious4 sort.
Postscript. If we now survey the overall procedure to be used with dogmatic propositions from this viewpoint, which effort is precisely the subject of dogmatic theology, it is obvious that this procedure can begin at any point, depending on where exigency calls for it most, here or there. At that juncture, what then ties the doctrinal propositions together is, in part, chiefly occasional propositions that are immediately positioned to serve primary communication of religious consciousness. Thereby, moreover, only the ecclesial value of the propositions is of concern—that is, these are doctrines that belong to the domain of proclamation and edification. In part, what ties doctrinal propositions together pertains more to the scientific value of the propositions and to the fact that they are situated entirely within the domain of dogmatic theology itself. This is the case, whether they are then (1) monographs—that is, each being an explication of a particular proposition in its various relations, which can be surveyed based on its own content—or (2) congeries of doctrinal propositions called loci theologici, which can be complete, to be sure, with the result that the totality of all propositions that can be tied to each other are included in it, but in which this process appears to be simply random in that the complete character of the work is not conditioned by the form it takes, or, (3) finally, a complete system of doctrine,5 just as has already been described. Yet, such a structured body of doctrine can be purely thetic6 and at that point be either purely aphoristic or provided with an apparatus of elucidations. At the same time, however, the thetic type can also be polemical,7 in that it takes notice of other modifications of Christian religious consciousness or of other utterances concerning those modifications. Finally, the thetic type can be historical at the same time, in that it offers an account concerning how the forming of a given dogmatic proposition has unfolded over time and concerning changes in the domain of dogmatic language.
1. Existenz. Ed. note: cf. §14n33.
2. Cf. John 3:17; 8:12; 10:30; and 12:45.
3. Ed. note: The verb is angeschaut, from anschauen. If it were referring to something already perceivable directly by the senses, without much further processing, Schleiermacher would use the verb wahrnehmen.
4. Ed. note: Whereas usually the word translated “religious” is fromm, referring to firmly rooted religious consciousness and community, here the word is religiösen, referring to the full scope of religious institutional life and mission.
5. Lehrgebäude. Ed. note: Actually a structured body of doctrine, roughly equivalent to what is regularly called a “system of doctrine” or a “constructive theology” in English usage. As Schleiermacher indicates in this postscript, such a structured presentation can be composed in a number of ways.
6. Ed. note: The word thetic refers to the use of positive assertions or theses (e.g., dogmatic propositions) or thematic statements.
7. Ed. note: Schleiermacher defines “polemical” activity, viewed as a major part of what philosophical theology would bring to dogmatics, as a discovery within Christianity of what does not correspond to its “idea”—thus, of whatever is “diseased” in it. See Brief Outline, esp. §§40–42, 54–64, 222, 247, and 253.
§19. Dogmatic theology is the science concerned with the interconnection of whatever doctrine has currency1 in a given social organization called a Christian church at a given time.
See Brief Outline, 1st ed. (1811), Part II, Section 3, §3,2 and compare Part II, Intro., §3,3 and §15,4 and §§18–19,5 and Part II, Section 3, §§26–27.6
1. This definition appears not to exclude the possibility that anyone could master dogmatics, thus could communicate it as well, without having a faith of one’s own in what one is expounding, just as one does indeed have scientific knowledge of the interconnection of propositions in philosophical systems, propositions that one does not oneself accept. However, procedures utilized in dogmatics refer entirely to proclamation7 and are there only for the sake of proclamation. Thus, we must also presuppose that same faith among all who pursue dogmatics if they are to proffer anything of benefit, because otherwise what is supposed to relate to each other in dogmatics would, nevertheless, not actually belong together. Furthermore, given this presupposition of faith, the subject matter itself could not even be conceived if one expounding it had no consciousness at all of any stirrings of a religious sort, not even of those differently modified. This would be the case, for otherwise no one could conceal the contradiction between what one expounds, viewed as interconnected in itself and as derived from the very nature of Christian consciousness, and what one actually accepts without doing violence to oneself; and in this way a dogmatic presentation that is purely historical, without itself taking sides, always adequately distinguishes itself from one that is simultaneously apologetic,8 which process is alone intended here. Even so, it would be difficult to deny that even in our own church are to be found, perhaps not rarely, dogmatic presentations that hold tight to what has ecclesial currency without conveying any firm conviction of the presenter’s own, thus either lacking in rigor with respect to how doctrines are interconnected and with respect to their internal congruity or, nevertheless, unwittingly betraying the presenter’s own divergent conviction.9
2. Limitation to the doctrine of a distinct ecclesial organization is not a criterion of currency to be applied generally, because Christendom has not always been divided into a number of communities definitively separated by difference in doctrine. This criterion is indispensable for the present time, however, since—to stick just with the Western church—a presentation of doctrine belonging to Protestantism cannot possibly be the same for Roman Catholics as well, in that no interconnection obtains between certain doctrines of the one party and those of the other party. A dogmatic presentation that wanted to set itself the task of eventually finding no contradiction between these two parties would end up deficient in what would be of ecclesial value for either party. This would be the case in almost every particular proposition.
Now, the proposal that every presentation of doctrine would do well to limit itself simply to doctrine that is at hand at a certain time is indeed seldom expressly acknowledged, yet it would appear to be self-evident; in large part, moreover, the great quantity of dogmatic presentations that follow upon each other can be explained only on this basis. It is quite obvious, for example, that today doctrinal treatises from the seventeenth century can no longer serve the same purpose as they did then but that much that was purveyed by them belongs now only to a presentation of the history of doctrine, and that only dogmatic presentations different from them can possess the same ecclesial value today that they had then. Likewise, such a time will come for presentations of our own day as well. The only proviso is that, to be sure, the greater alterations in doctrine proceed only from more general nodes of development. In contrast, alterations continually going on tend to be broadcast so little that it takes longer for them to be noticeable.
3. Now, “doctrine that has currency” is not at all to mean just statements contained in creedal and confessional symbols. Rather, it is meant to include all doctrinal propositions that are a dogmatic expression for what is heard, within the church’s public proceedings,10 to be a presentation of shared Christian piety, even if only in particular regions of the church—if, that is, such an expression is not giving rise to schism or division. Consequently, this criterion already allows for a significant diversification among dogmatic presentations. Yet, someone could still hold the definition to be too restricted on account of this criterion. This might be the case, in part, because it would appear as if no alteration at all among dogmatic presentations could ever enter in unless it were something not yet having currency that would already have been taken up in them at some point, also, in part, because on this basis everything that bears a distinctive character would also seem to be excluded. However, something may be noted, first of all, that everyone might well concede. That is, any body of doctrine, however interconnected it might be, composed of views and opinions that plainly bear an entirely distinctive character and that, though genuinely Christian, have not at all been tied to expressions used in communications of Christian piety within the church, would always be reserved only for some private confession. It would not be considered to be a dogmatic presentation, moreover, until such time as some like-minded social organization were attached to it, one that would find its norm to lie in that doctrine. Consequently, one could also say that, in general, the less publicly received content there is in such a presentation, the less it would correspond to the concept of a dogmatics.11 All the same, this observation would not get in the way of the presenter’s bearing a distinctly singular influence on the form of a presentation and on one’s mode of handling it, or even get in the way of one’s stepping forward in particular matters by way of deliberately correcting customary statements. Thus, already on this account, our definition in no way excludes improvements and new developments in Christian doctrine. This point becomes even clearer, however, if we add to it that such changes almost never come to the fore directly on the basis of dogmatic discussions themselves. Rather, in large part the occasion for such changes is, in one way or another, offered in observances contained in public worship or in popularly written religious communication.12
4. The correctness of the definition given here is also made clear based on the following considerations. First, if a presentation of Christian doctrine fails to meet one of the criteria set forth above, it also falls out of the actual domain of dogmatics. Likewise, the most materially significant mistakes that occur within the domain of dogmatics appear when any one of these requirements is torn from its natural context so as to be adopted as the sole guideline for treatment. Accordingly, popular presentations of doctrine in catechisms and in similar works for the purpose of common instruction in the church certainly require completeness and interconnectedness, but they make no claim to scholarship or to arrangement and connection of a systematic kind. For these reasons we separate even this doctrinal domain from the proper domain of dogmatics. Many religious writings that strive to reach mystical depths or rational clarity are also more descriptively didactic than directly stimulative; and, though they even treat doctrine with a certain completeness, they are lacking in historical bearing and in reference to the public understanding of the church. As a result, they tend to purvey only what is strictly individual in nature, consequently only some isolated fragment torn loose from the whole. For this reason, moreover, we do not call these writings dogmatic, however exactly everything they deal with may fit together. Finally, we may take note of certain determinations of doctrine that focus on the Scriptures of the canon or on the creedal and confessional symbols, determinations that have entered into dogmatic interchange from time to time. These determinations, to be sure, have always been supposed to presuppose scientific efforts to attain a complete interconnectedness of doctrine, and to that extent they do indeed belong to dogmatic theology. However, they do not bring this interconnected whole into a complete presentation but have to do only with particular points of doctrine.
Likewise, the most materially significant mistakes in the domain of dogmatics are themselves accounted for based on one-sided tendencies toward a particular criterion among those set forth here. Note, for example, that from time to time dogmatic presentations appear that predominately purvey a single tradition that has become stationary. This phenomenon occurs when people want to set forth doctrine that has already attained public currency, and that doctrine alone, and thus consider that doctrine to be an absolute given. Suppose, conversely, that there is also no lack of dogmatic presentations that in their own time enjoyed widespread currency but, when viewed from a distance and compared with earlier and later ones, appear wholly arbitrary. These are of a sort that, having sprung from a transitory, aberrant movement within the domain of the church, simply apprehended this movement one-sidedly. Thus, they stuck wholly with one isolated element whereby arbitrary and sophistical thinking could also quite easily take the place of scientific rigor. Finally, suppose that presentations come into existence that do indeed treat of Christian doctrine and want to be considered as dogmatic in nature but that do not refer back to religious states of mind and heart at all. These are of a sort that want simply to meet the requirement of scientific interconnectedness, as if having this interconnectedness could effect, at the same time, what a genuine dogmatics has to presuppose, namely faith. As a result, either even that which is most distinctively Christian is then supposed to be deduced and demonstrated, based directly on reason in general; or, viewed as something less complete, it is supposed to fade away within a purely reason-driven theory of religion that possesses only a general currency.
Postscript. Now, many theologians are fully in agreement with the definition of dogmatic theology set forth here, but they set this very dogmatic theology down to a rather low level, viewing it as having to do only with exposition of ecclesial opinions, and they claim that yet another, higher theology must stand over and above it. What is more, this higher theology, they say, would set aside those ecclesial opinions by ascertaining and elucidating the actual truths of religion.13
However, the Christian science regarding godliness14 cannot possibly acknowledge such a distinction between ecclesial doctrine and actual truths of religion. The latter truths are indeed supposed to be Christian as well, for the simple reason that otherwise there could be no mention of them at all in this connection, either as if these religious truths would have a different source or as if their content would be of a wholly different kind. This is so, for there is only one source from which all Christian doctrine is derived, namely, Christ’s self-proclamation, and there is only one way in which Christian doctrine is pursued, whether it is more complete or less complete, namely, based on religious consciousness itself and on the immediate expression of it. Suppose, therefore, that the ecclesial doctrine of any given time and place were to be termed “mere opinion” because it does not always remain self-consistent and is not unadmixed with error. Then it would still be true that in the knowledge domain of Christianity nothing stands over and above it except the more purely and completely framed ecclesial doctrine belonging to another time and contained in other presentations. This purification and improvement of doctrine, however, is precisely the work and the task of dogmatic theology.
Suppose, however, that we imagine even this task to be wholly fulfilled, so that dogmatic theology would have thus reached its consummation. Even in this case we could not agree with those other theologians who declare that dogmatics comprises the entirety of Christian theology, with the result that they would regard all the other theoretical disciplines of theology—including both interpretation of Scripture and church history in their broadest compass and all the disciplines accessory to them—simply as sciences auxiliary to that overall discipline. We could not agree with them, for although both of the disciplines just indicated are necessary to the work of dogmatics, their value is not exhausted in the service they provide it. Rather, each of these two disciplines also has its own distinctive value directly for the furtherance and leadership of the church, which is the final aim of all Christian theology, consequently that of dogmatic theology as well. We would rather wish to say the following, then. It is true that both interpretation of Scripture and church history, each in its own distinctive work, are at the same time dependent on the study of dogmatics. They suffer, moreover, when this study is neglected. As a result, these various branches of theology are collectively able to move toward consummation only by means of their mutual influence on each other. Nevertheless, it would be a very dubious thing if precisely dogmatics were primarily to set the tone in this advancement, because this discipline depends on wisdom concerning the world15 more than the others do, though only with respect to the form it takes. This search for wisdom often begins radically anew, and the most of these revolutions16 also produce new modes of connection and new terms for that sphere of inquiry, from which dogmatics is furnished with terminology of its own. Thus, most readily a multiplicity of language usage arises in this particular theological discipline, which multiplicity arouses controversy that does not belong to its own subject-matter. Then transformations occur there that do not exactly make for progress but impede rather than advance its theoretical17 development.
1. Ed. note: In theological contexts such as this one, geltend seems to bear neither the general meaning of “valid” (cf. Brief Outline [1830, 2011 ET], §210) nor the special meaning of being “current” or even “prevalent.” Instead it has the more neutral, historically, and critically oriented meaning of “having currency,” in ways that can readily be supplied in each context. To have currency, moreover, a doctrine need not be adjudged to be the best; its inclusion would normally rest on its being widely used or acknowledged within a range of doctrines. One task of dogmatics is to sort among such doctrines critically in order to find which ones are more supportable or more expendable on grounds that reflect faith experience. In this Evangelical dogmatics, every such result must be shown to refer to the redemption accomplished by God through Jesus of Nazareth (Christian Faith, §11). See also CF §27.P.S., 39.3, and 64.1.
2. Ed. note: ET: See footnotes containing these propositions from 1811 in Brief Outline (2011 ET) under §§195, 3, 5, 14, 18–19, 82, and 213–14, respectively. Notes 2–6 here begin with the successive quotations from the first edition, where numbering is by section, not consecutive throughout as in the second edition (1830). Information or a quotation is then given from the second edition (1830, 2011). Brief Outline (1811) Part 2, Section 3, §3, also under §195 (1830, 2011 ET) : “That theological discipline which is known under the name of thetic or dogmatic theology has to do with the systematic presentation of the whole body of doctrine that now has currency in the church [mit der zusammenhangenden Darstellung des in der Kirche jetzt grade geltende Lehrbegriffs].” Brief Outline §195: “Here we have to do with dogmatic theology (see §§94–97), as the knowledge of doctrine that now has currency in the Evangelical church, and with church statistics, as information regarding the existing social condition in all the different parts of the Christian church.” See Schleiermacher’s further explanation in place.
3. Ed. note: Brief Outline (1811) Part 2, Intro., §3 (under §3 in 2011 ET): “Theology is not the responsibility of everyone who is a church adherent, or to the degree that they are so, except as they are church leaders. The contrast between leaders and ordinary members [der Masse] and the rise to prominence of theology mutually condition each other.” Some ambiguity persists in this proposition, carried over almost unchanged in Brief Outline §3, though some explanation is added. That is, church leaders included some lay members, not only pastors, though normally from among more educated folk, princes, the aristocracy, and other social leaders. However, Schleiermacher also made no hard-and-fast distinction between clergy and laity in the church and pointed toward an egalitarian, communal conception of both leadership and ministry (e.g., cf. BO §§15–17, also §§267–70).
4. Ed. note: Brief Outline (1811) Part 2, Intro., §15 (under §82 in 1830, 2011 ET): “The present, however, can be understood only as a result of the past, and thus its presentation presupposes information concerning the past.” §82. “The present, however, can be understood only as a result of the past, and thus the information concerning the entire previous career of Christianity forms a second division of historical theology.—This statement is not to be understood as though the second division noted here were a kind of auxiliary science for the first. Rather, both are related to church leadership in the same way and are not in a subordinate relation but are in a coordinate relation to each other.”
5. Ed. note: Brief Outline (1811) Part 2, Intro., §18. “The final aim of all theology is to represent the nature of Christianity more authentically in every approaching instant of its history; thus it must give special prominence to that wherein this is to be most purely perceived [am reinsten anzuschauen ist].” §19. “Accordingly, historical theology is divided into information about the beginning of Christianity, information about its further career, and information about its state at the present time.” Compare §§84–85 in 1830: §84. “Now, since the Christian life has also become increasingly more variegated and complicated, while the final aim of its theology consists in presenting its distinctive nature more authentically in every approaching instant of its history, information concerning primitive Christianity therefore naturally arises as a third special division of historical theology.—Admittedly, primitive Christianity is also included within the total career of Christianity. It is one thing, however, to treat it as a series of elements, and another thing only to bring that material into consideration from which the pure concept of Christianity can be presented, even if the latter is done based on different elements of history.” Note that in his usage here, as in a few cases elsewhere, certain elements of life can be especially treated temporally, thus historically and in series. Other cases do not readily lend themselves to such treatment. See CF §30n7 for some types of cases. §85. “The whole of historical theology is included within these three divisions: information about primitive Christianity, information about the total career of Christianity, and information about the state of Christianity at the present time.—The proper order in which to study them, however, does not correspond to the order in which their derivation has been shown here. On the contrary, information about primitive Christianity, as most immediately connected with the work of philosophical theology, ought always to be the first stage in one’s study, and information about the present time, as constituting the direct transition to practical theology, ought to be the final stage.”
6. Ed. note: Brief Outline (1811) Part 2, Section 3, §§26–27: §26. “A rather different articulation of particular doctrines arises through their relation to various philosophical systems, without the identity of the original religious affection of mind and heart [die Identität der ursprünglichen religiösen Affektion des Gemütes], which is supposed to be represented [repräsentiert] by these doctrines, being abrogated [aufgehoben] thereby.” §27. “The presentation of the body of doctrine may join onto any philosophical system that has veracity [wahrhaft].” Compare the corresponding §§213–14 in 1830: §213. “The strictly didactic form of expression, which, by contributing toward showing how the individual doctrinal formulations belong together, gives the dogmatic procedure its scientific frame, is dependent at any given time on the existing condition of the philosophical disciplines.—This is partly on account of the logical relation of these formulations to each other and partly because many definitions of concepts refer to psychological and ethical factors.” §214. “The dialectical feature of the body of doctrine may join onto any philosophical system that does not exclude or deny the religious feature by its assertions, either in general or in that special form of it to which Christianity especially professes adherence.—Hence, regarding all decidedly materialistic and sensualistic systems, which, however, one could indeed hardly let pass as genuinely philosophical (and all genuinely atheistic systems will also have this character), none of them is to be employed in doing dogmatics. For general purposes, it is difficult to set limits any narrower than these.” See also Christian Faith §16 and §28 on these topics.
7. Verkündigung. Ed. note: Throughout Schleiermacher’s theological discourse, “proclamation,” beginning with Jesus’ own activities, occurs by word and deed. Proclamation is also a process in which the entire community of faith participates, not only its leaders and not only in preaching or other activities of a pastor.
8. Ed. note: Cf. §§11–14 above. Apologetics, as one of the two parts of philosophical theology, seeks an authentic differentiation of the distinctive nature of Christianity from any other mode of faith but does not seek either to defend or prove that finding to those who do not share in this mode of faith.
9. Ed. note: For Schleiermacher at the University of Berlin—and likely in his pastorates in Berlin from 1796 to his death in 1834, perhaps earlier—theology, its dogmatics discipline above all, was a positive ecclesial science. By 1811 he was referring to an “ecclesial spirit,” identified especially as held within specific, largely extended social sets, each congregation of which he called “communities of faith.” His primary orientation in doing theology was not that of doing merely individualized thought projects. In his view, dialectic, conceived as “the art of doing philosophy” (1811) and science conceived, in part, as its practical outcome, provide theology aspects of methodology tailored to its requirements, including those in its various disciplines, some of which are ancillary to the field. In turn, theology presents its own division of sciences and can draw judiciously from other sciences strictly to serve its own purposes—in dogmatics solely for introductory framing. For forming his investigations into Christianity and for applying responsible method to that task, theology shares with all the sciences the need to develop its own methods of rigorous inquiry and correspondingly precise definitions and presentation of findings, ways of capturing and analyzing real empirical experiences. All of these components are to be executed, wherever appropriate, by logic, heuristics, epistemology, and critical examination of metaphysical premises and presuppositions—all supplied by dialectic. Added to these are evaluations of what might well be termed multiply staged “pragmatic” processes. Such evaluations would leave behind or reconstruct what has been known, new knowing, and question-formation for future inquiry, technical and other practical applications, and the like. This is, of course, an incomplete list, but it includes the sorts of components that he deemed to be definitive of science. In dogmatics, as in some other fields of inquiry, the long-term efforts of scientific work are brought into systematic accounts of the whole harvest of learning among pertinent theological disciplines. This is what Schleiermacher attempts to do for Evangelical churches in his time and place. Thus, when he states, in OG 67, that he wishes to “free Christology itself “—the core of doctrines of faith to be presented—“from entanglements with science,” he is excluding only ill uses and performances of such for “science.” Not carefully to attend to them is to produce Verirrungen, to effect “entanglements” and (another meaning) confusion.
10. Ed. note: That is, presumably, all nonprivate meetings and observances of the church, most notably but not solely public worship, which is singled out in the first edition.
11. Ed. note: In Brief Outline Schleiermacher insists on taking individual responsibility in theology. See Brief Outline (1830), §§89, 179, 199, 201–2, 251, and 210n, also §17 and §19 (re: doing one’s own work); §§62, 97n, 138n, and 139 (re: exegesis); and §§323 and 332–34 (re: innovation and development). Nevertheless, even in these contexts he regularly inveighs against dogmatic presentations that are markedly individualistic in content, thus not properly reflecting the faith of a given Christian community or serving the task of leadership within it.
12. Ed. note: Thus, regarding the shorter-term effect of his own efforts, Schleiermacher placed greatest stock in his own immensely popular writings On Religion and Christmas Eve and in his hundreds of published sermons. See especially Brief Outline §210n and On the “Glaubenslehre” (1821, 1981 ET), at the close of the first letter to Lücke, on longer-term expectations regarding his work on dogmatics.
13. See, among other things, Karl Gottlieb Bretschneider’s (1776–1848) Versuch (1825) §25, 159ff., and his Handbuch der Dogmatik, Bd. 1 (1822) §5, 12–16, where one becomes doubtful in the end whether dogmatics belongs to Christian theology at all. Ed. note: In §5 of the latter work, Bretschneider does distinguish between Christian theology, which is the systematic presentation of biblical teaching, and dogmatics, which is “the subjective view of individual parties or teachers on biblical or Christian theology.”
14. Christliche Gottseligkeitswissenschaft. Ed. note: That is, regarding blessedness, or piety, that comes from God.
15. Weltweisheit. Ed. note: Or, less accurately, “worldly wisdom.” This term is sometimes used instead of “philosophy” to designate a broad characteristic of “philosophy,” which from early on was used, in turn, literally to designate that “love of wisdom” (both theoretical and practical wisdom) which impels the field. See §19n6 here.
16. Umwältzungen. Ed. note: Or “radical turns,” upheavals.
17. Ed. note: The word “theoretical” appears in the original and subsequent editions. Although Schäfer selects “theological” from the unedited original manuscript, it seemed to make less good sense in this context, where theoretical development and practical ends are distinguished.