chapter iii

Secondly, the doctrine of reconciliation is central because Jesus Christ is God the Reconciler. Without doubt, the whole revelation is centered in Jesus Christ, and His mission is the restoration of the covenant relationship by accomplishing the reconciliation between God and man in His act of atonement. [14] He is the actual reality of “God with us” [15] and the covenant of grace. [16] Barth therefore understood the whole of dogmatics, [17] and especially “the doctrine of reconciliation, as Christology,” [18] and actually integrated Christology into the doctrine of reconciliation, because Christology and soteriology were inseparable in his view. He also included hamartiology and ecclesiology within this doctrine, for sin is recognized only in Christ and the covenant community exists only for the realization of His reconciliation. This concentration and integration of Christology, hamartiology, soteriology and ecclesiology in one locus [19] makes the material centrality of the Versöhnungslehre indisputable.

Thirdly, the doctrine of reconciliation is central because the act of reconciliation occupies the historical center of the covenant history revealed in the biblical revelation. Because Barth understood theology as the critical self-examination of the Church proclamation in respect to its agreement with the biblical revelation, [20] he recognized three divisions of theology--biblical, practical and dogmatic theology. [21] The special function of dogmatics is the question of content as a whole. [22] To talk a whole necessarily requires a right order and this is none other than the revealed order of the covenant history in the Scripture, [23] if the absolute authority and source of dogmatics is biblical revelation. [24] There, creation is the first, reconciliation the center, and redemption the last. Therefore Barth regarded the Versöhnungslehre as the formal center of dogmatics.

The Method of the Loci

Contrary to his clear affirmation of its centrality, however, Barth strongly emphasized that “dogmatics cannot be a system of atonement,” [25] because it will necessarily produce a biased dogmatics. He fundamentally rejected the very idea of dogmatics as a system of Christian thought, [26] for the Word of God may not “be condensed and summarised in any view, or idea, or principle,” [27] whereas a system requires “a structure of principles and their consequences, founded on the presupposition of a basic view of thing.” [28] Such systematization, he said, would entail the end of theological freedom as well as the loss of the objectivity of dogmatics, [29] because it is “self-will.” [30] Theology, however, has to be an act of faith and obedience, [31] bound by its object [32] and balanced by its centre. [33] Of course, this does not mean that he completely rejected the dogmatic method [34] itself or the need of a well-ordered presentation of the content of the Word of God as a whole. Dogmatics is to be objective and scientific--not arbitrary. [35] Moreover, some kind of systematization is inevitable with respect to an effective presentation of the Word of God as a whole with definiteness and coherence. [36] The question of the order of presentation is particulary essential.

Therefore he preferred the method of the Loci, [37] which presents doctrines like chapters of history or articles of confession, i.e., “alongside and co-ordinate,” not principal and subordinate. [38] Because theology is Rede von Gott and God is triune, Barth understood that dogmatics has to talk about God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit and accordingly divided it into three loci on the basis of the trinitarian distinction and co-equality. [39] On the other hand, because dogmatics is based on the self-revelation of God in the Scripture which reveals the creation, reconciliation, and redemption of God, he formulated the subjects of the three loci as God the Creator, God the Reconciler, and God the Redeemer, per appropriationem. However, there are some aspects of the content of the Scripture which are not covered by those three, e.g., the common themes of the triune God and His election which is prior to those acts. So Barth added the doctrine of God proper as “the fourth point.” [40] Concerning the order of the four loci, he preferred to start with the doctrine of God, rather than the doctrine of creation, reconciliation, or redemption, because to begin with any particular act invites the danger of systematising dogmatics around that first idea. [41] The other three loci were then naturally arranged following the historical order of revelation. [42] The Prolegomena, of course, were written before the four loci of dogmatics, because a preliminary discussion about the dogmatic method, criterion, subject-matter and its task was necessary. [43] His Church Dogmatics was thus arranged in five volumes--the Prolegomena and the four loci, i.e., the doctrine of God, creation, reconciliation, and redemption.

However, has Barth successfully overcome the danger of systematization? The general response is quite negative, for his dogmatics has been appraised as “highly systematic.” [44] This problem is most seriously present in the doctrine of reconciliation, for it has the most complex construction in the whole dogmatics, as we have seen. As a matter of fact, it would be impossible to integrate four loci, i.e., Christology, hamartiology, soteriology and ecclesiology, into one locus without a forced systematisation. Moreover, a comparison of its three parts (IV/1, IV/2 and IV/3) in their tables of contents easily reveals its highly systematic construction, which is too neat and symmetrical to give the impression of arbitrariness. We will now proceed to the question of whether it is really arbitrary, especially in relation to the problematic doctrine of vocation and its relationship to that of sanctification.

3.1.2 Vocation and Sanctification

As the organizing principle of the Versöhnungslehre, Barth adopted Christology because he understood not only the doctrine of reconciliation but also the whole dogmatics as Christology. [45] Christology is the foundation and source of the whole doctrine of reconciliation, for Jesus Christ is God the Reconciler. Because salvation presupposes sin but our sinfulness is not recognised without the grace of Christ, he placed hamartiology between Christology and soteriology. [46] He then presented soteriology as the objective reality of reconciliation, and this was followed by the subjective application of reconciliation to the Christian community and to the individual Christian. [47] In the structure of his doctrine of reconciliation, therefore, the doctrine of sanctification is not limited to the soteriological discussion in §66, which is only its objective aspect, but it also includes its Christological foundation (§64), hamartiological presupposition (§65), and especially its subjective aspect applied to the community (§67) and to the individual (§68). Therefore, the doctrine of sanctification includes the whole volume of IV/2. [48]

The Problem of Barth's Christological Structure

However, we are confronted with some difficulty to agree with his Christological structure, as he attempted to fundamentally alter the structure of traditional Christology. [49] In general, Christology has traditionally discussed the person of Christ as God and man, and then the work of Christ, i.e., his three offices, two states, and atonement. But Barth raised a strong objection and insisted that it would be abstract and even dangerous to separate the person of Christ from His work. [50] So he attempted first to “organically relate” [51] the two natures and the two states of Christ and formulated the combination in terms of the humiliation of the Son of God and the exaltation of the Son of Man. [52] But, it is in the further combination of the two natures and three offices that makes general acceptance hardly possible, for it is an implausible combination of two and three. As pointed out earlier, he gave priority to the works and activities of God, and therefore the “three” offices of Christ actually forms the basic structure of his Christology. He resolved the problem of combining the three offices with the two natures by creating “the third christological aspect,” i.e., Jesus Christ as “the God-man” or “the Mediator.” [53] Of course, dividing the discussion about the person of Christ into three parts, i.e., the divinity, humanity, and unity of Christ, is quite understandable as a normal procedure. But to combine the three offices with the three aspects of the two natures is neither necessary nor plausible. It is problematic when we cannot find any necessity or justification for the third combination upon the internal identity between the third christological aspect of unity and the prophetic office. [54] In fact, all the three offices belong to Jesus Christ as a uni-person of two natures. Further, if the unity of the two natures makes a separate aspect, why should unity of the three offices not be accorded a separate discussion? But this problem is extended to all of the component doctrines of this locus, since the forced threefold structure of the unified Christology has been adopted as its organising principle. As a result, all sub-loci uniformly have a threefold structure--pride, sloth, and falsehood (hamartiology); justification, sanctification, and vocation (soteriology); gathering, upbuilding, and enlightening (ecclesiology); faith, love, and hope (individual appropriation).

Of these, the three-fold division of soteriology into the doctrine of justification, sanctification, and vocation raises the most serious problem, because it differs not only from traditional soteriology but also from his earlier soteriology, where he recognised only justification and sanctification, [55] whereas in his original plan for the Church Dogmatics, he listed four, i.e., “calling, justification, sanctification, and perseverance.” [56] Now it becomes three in accordance with the threefold division of Christology, and the new doctrine of vocation makes us wonder how it can be appropriated into Barth's theological system.

The Teleological Perspective

However, the theological aim is noble and worthy, for the strange and weighty introduction of the Berufungslehre (the doctrine of vocation) was sincerely intended to emphasize and complement the missing element in the traditional doctrine of reconciliation, that is, its eschatological, teleological, and universal aspects. When Barth understood reconciliation as the telos and eschaton of creation, he certainly included its eschatological aspect of future fulfilment in the concept of reconciliation. Therefore, this third discussion is essential, [57] not only for a natural transition to the doctrine of redemption, [58] but also for a proper view of our reconciliation from the eschatological perspective of its telos and eschaton, which is the reconciliation of the world. So his order of understanding is always backward and eschatological, and this perspective is crucial especially for the correct understanding of his doctrine of reconciliation. He clearly shows his basic approach to the doctrine of reconciliation in the following statement: “Our theme is the reconciliation of the world with God in Jesus Christ, and only in this greater context the reconciliation of the individual man.” [59]

Also, he found the Christological ground of its eschatological perspective in the prophetic office of Christ, [60] as he connected the prophetic function with “the revelatory character of reconciliation.” [61] With deep regret for the lack of this aspect in traditional theology, which accepted only the munus duplex, i.e., the kingly and priestly offices of Christ, [62] and therefore treated soteriology “only in two categories” of justification and sanctification, [63] Barth strongly advocated the “restoration of the doctrine of the munus Christi propheticum.” [64] He regarded it not only as a biblical necessity but also as the ultimate demand of the historical development in the post-Reformation Church history. [65] According to his detailed historical analysis, [66] the Church has continually endeavoured since the Reformation to recover the true Word of God and proclaim it to the world with a view to the teleological direction of mission and ecumenism as a positive reaction to the strong wind of secularization that happened in the European context. Further, he identified it as a task of a Reformed theologian, because it is an unfulfilled Reformed heritage, which Calvin first discovered but had been neglected to give a proper weight in the Reformed theology. [67]

Therefore, Barth accepted it as his own task and attempted to add the teleological, eschatological and universal perspective to traditional Reformed theology. It is thus the “eschatological orientation” or “teleological direction” [68] which is really distinctive in Barth's theology. In fact, the proper doctrine was already established in the theology of the Reformers, but it is eschatology that fundamentally differentiates Barth from the Reformers, since it is the post-Reformation discovery. [69] He was even tempted to attempt “a consistently eschatological systematisation of dogmatics,” though he refrained from it because of the perceived danger of system. [70] It is therefore to be deeply regretted that he could not write the eschatological volume of the Church Dogmatics. However, the eschatological, teleological and universal perspective has consistently and dominantly shaped his theology since the Römerbrief, perhaps even prior to it. Therefore, his whole theology, especially his doctrine of reconciliation, has to be seen from this perspective. For our study of sanctification this means that a preliminary understanding about the event of vocation for its proper view is required.

How and What

What is vocation and how is it related to sanctification (and justification) within the total structure of his doctrine of reconciliation? For Barth, while justification and sanctification is “the What” of reconciliation, vocation is “the How” of its application. [71] Our reconciliation, which consists of justification and sanctification, was already accomplished in the past event of the Cross, but vocation concerns the question of how it is revealed, declared, and realised to us. As “reconciliation is not a dark or dumb event, but a perspicuous and vocal,” [72] it has a revelatory character in itself. [73] So he could say that “the justification and sanctification of man include his vocation,” [74] though reconciliation and its revelation are different matters. [75] Defined as “the event in which the grace (charis) of God which justifies man before Him and sanctifies him for Him finds its counterpart in the gratitude (eucharistia) of man,” [76] vocation is “a temporal event” [77] and a “subjective experience” [78] in which “the living Jesus Christ encounters definite men at definite times in their lives.” [79] Therefore, vocation is temporally preceded and materially presupposed by justification and sanctification. [80] Further, as this event of encounter not only “makes Himself known to them” but also “claims” the justified and sanctified sinners as His covenant partner, [81] it is a call to participate actively in the history of His Kingdom. So, it is a concrete and historical event, which is “not merely spiritual but moral, social and political.” [82] Also, vocation is “a pneumatic reality,” as it is the direct call of Jesus Christ as the Contemporary of the called in the form of His Spirit, i.e., the Holy Spirit. [83] As a temporal and historical as well as subjective and pneumatic event, his doctrine of vocation generally includes all modes of subjective application, i.e., not only calling but also illumination, awakening, adoption, mystical union, conversion, regeneration, and even perseverance in the traditional soteriology. [84] In fact, his concept of vocation is a very profound and comprehensive idea: an extended “process” with its beginning, sequence, and goal, encompassing both ideas of vocatio unica and vocatio continua, i.e., “the event of vocation...as once-for-all (unica) and yet also as a sequence of new and further callings subsequent to the once-for-all commencement.” [85]

Further, it is not an empty and purely formal idea but has a specific direction and concrete content, as form and content can not be separated. The vocation of man, according to him, is primarily a call to be a Christian, [86] and it means a call to fellowship with Jesus. [87] However, because the biblical concept of koinonia presupposes “a definite order” between two free persons, [88] it is a call to the discipleship of Jesus Christ, [89] and not an undefined fellowship. Therefore it is a call to accept the Lordship of Christ [90] and serve the calling of a covenant partner for the common cause of His Kingdom, i.e., the reconciliation of the world. [91] So he concluded that it is a call to be a witness, as Verbi divini ministri, [92] “proclaimers of the reconciliation of the world accomplished in Him” and “heralds of His person and work,” [93] that is “the primary determination” of the Christian existence. [94] It necessarily involves “the secondary determinations” of Christian affliction and personal liberation, which are indispensable in being a witness of Christ. [95] As a whole, he conceives vocation as “an event which is just commencing and not in any sense complete,” [96] that is, always “in the process of accomplishment.” [97] In this context he could contend that the purpose and goal of the justification and sanctification of man is his vocation. [98]

However, this raises at least two complications for our study of sanctification. When Barth describes the relationship between justification/sanctification and vocation as the already accomplished reality of reconciliation and its subjective application or as commencement and goal, he restricts the idea of sanctification to its objective side, while vocation is understood only subjectively. As a principle, it contradicts his structural plan for the doctrine of reconciliation, in which soteriology is supposed to treat the objective aspect and its subjective application is to be discussed in the following sections. [99] Though this principle is not adhered to so faithfully in the soteriological sections due to the inseparability of both sides of one reality, confusion results when the objective side of the one is related or compared with the subjective side of the other, or vice versa. Another problem concerns the teleological character of vocation. Though the doctrine of vocation was specially designed to emphasize this aspect, the teleological perspective is not a matter of vocation only. As we shall see in our discussion of §66, and as we have already seen in the last chapter, his doctrine of sanctification is fundamentally grounded upon this teleological motif. If this telos-orientation of our sanctification is “not self-evident,” [100] what is the ground for the teleological discussions of sanctification which dominates the whole of §66? In fact, this problem has resulted in the correspondence of two sections, the doctrine of sanctification (§66) and vocation (§71): particulary §66.3 (the call to discipleship) with §71.3 (the goal of vocation), and §66.4 (the awakening to conversion) with §71.2 (the event of vocation), and §66.6 (the dignity of the cross) with §71.5 (the Christian in affliction). Therefore, the distinction between sanctification and vocation is quite ambiguous. However, we will proceed with our study of sanctification with the positive view [101] that the materials in the doctrine of vocation as well as the other sections in IV/3 will enrich our understanding of Barth's doctrine of sanctification when they are properly correlated and complemented. On the other hand, sanctification also has to be properly correlated with justification in the unity of the doctrine of reconciliation of Karl Barth. Moreover, if vocation deals with how reconciliation is applied while justification and sanctification are concerned with what it is, the correct knowledge of the relationship between justification and sanctification is more direct and crucial for the proper understanding of sanctification. §66 thus begins with this question.

3.1.3 Justification and Sanctification

There is a popular misunderstanding that Karl Barth is a theologian of justification rather than a theologian of sanctification. This is quite understandable, because he is well known as a theologian of grace who strongly emphasized the salvation sola fide in opposition to human attempts at self-sanctification. Also, Hans Küng's well-publicized study of Barth's doctrine of justification [102] may have strengthened the impression, given the lack of a popular study on his doctrine of sanctification. As a matter of fact, Küng has overstated as if justification is central in Barth's doctrine of reconciliation, as the Catholic theologians have so tended. [103] However, it is not true. Although Barth attached a great significance to justification, he gave no less importance to sanctification. Rather, he strongly criticized the idea of the centrality of the doctrine of justification. [104] After all, he was a Calvinist who emphasizes sanctification in balance with justification. What is his view, then, on the relationship between justification and sanctification?

Two Aspects of One Reconciliation

First of all, justification and sanctification are two aspects of the one event of reconciliation. Because Jesus Christ accomplished our reconciliation with his atoning death on the Cross once-for-all, there is only one event of reconciliation including both aspects, i.e., justification and sanctification. [105] Therefore, they are “inseparably” [106] and “indissolubly bound up” [107] in one and the same event. When he used the terms like “Aspekt (aspect),” [108] “Skopus (scope),” [109] “Tragweite (range),” [110] or even “Blick (look),” [111] they are the matter of viewpoint. The one reality of reconciliation as viewed from one side is justification and the same reality as viewed from the other side is sanctification. [112]

From the perspective of justification, the reconciliation of God is the unconditional pardon of sin [113] and the reinstatement of the new right [114] on the grounds of God's right of judgment. [115] Therefore, he understood justification not as a “state” but as a “history” or “transition” [116] from totus peccator to totus iustus. [117] As such it “has a terminus a quo and a terminus ad quem,” “a beginning and a completing,” [118] though “the divine judgment is a single act and therefore one which cannot be divided or separated, a strictly coherent history.” [119] But this dramatic history of transition is not perceptible to us, [120] because it happened in the history of Jesus Christ. Here the problem of “iustitia aliena” arises but the divine right of judgment effectively validates the imputation of our sins to Jesus and “iustitia Christi” to us as “nostra, mea iustitia.” [121] In virtue of “God's participation in man, His identification with him, His intervention for all men,” [122] His history replaces our history and therefore “the to-day of our true and actual transition from wrong to right, from death to life” is “the to-day of Jesus Christ.” [123] The gracious judgment of God and thus the justification of all sinners have already occurred in the atoning death of the Cross “as the central event of all human history, referring to all the men who live both before and after.” [124] When someone believes it, its “subjective realisation” [125] takes place in the particular man. However, because the justification already accomplished in the event of reconciliation is “total justification,” [126] “not partial but total, not relative but absolute,” [127] faith may not be misunderstood as a “way of salvation” [128] or “means” of self-justification. [129] On the contrary, faith is the “humility of obedience,” [130] the “abdication” of any vain-glory, including the “pride of faith,” [131] “opposition” to any works-righteousness [132] and creation of a “vacuum” in the sense of “emptying” of even “mystical self-emptying.” [133] It is nothing other than a recognition of his sinfulness, [134] the confession of “a bankrupt sinner,” [135] and the tearful appreciation of God's gracious pardon. Positively, faith is to “witness” “in the most profound thankfulness” [136] that Jesus Christ is our justification, as the “Selbstbeweis” (self-demonstration) of the justified man by Him. [137] Therefore, Barth concluded that sola fide means “solus Christus” and “sola iustitia Christi.” [138]

On the other hand, the reconciliation of man as viewed from the perspective of sanctification is the introduction of “a new man” and “the new Existenzform of a faithful covenant-partner.” [139] When Barth said that sanctificatio might just as well be described by regeneratio or renovatio, or by conversio, or by poenitentia, or comprehensively by Nachfolge Jesu, [140] he understood sanctification as a general description of whatever is related to the new existence of a reconciled man. Accordingly, between justification and sanctification there is a shift of perspective from God to man, i.e. from God's turning to man to man's turning to God. [141] However, it is not a voluntary turning of man by himself but God's gracious conversion of man to Himself. [142] To emphasize the fact that “God is the acting Subject” in the sanctification of man also, Barth kept the term “sanctification” as “normative,” for it immediately recalls the divine initiative in contrast to the other descriptions. [143] As clearly declared in Lev. 20.8, “I am the Lord who sanctifies you,” the Bible always says that it is God who sanctifies us and not we ourselves. [144] As stated above, sanctification does not happen as a separate event after justification, but both happen together in one and the same event of reconciliation accomplished on the Cross. Therefore, its subjective realisation happens also when one believes that his sanctification occurred already in Jesus Christ. In this sense, sola fide applies not only to justification but also to sanctification.

Before describing the relationship between justification and sanctification, Barth expressed his consent that “I am particulary happy to record my general agreement” with Alfred Göhler and especially G. C. Berkouwer. In his Faith and Sanctification, Berkouwer sharply pointed out that sola fide is the “foundation” and “superstructure” of sanctification [145] and therefore the bond between faith and sanctification is “our only safeguard,” [146] because there is no other sanctification but Jesus Christ. [147] Berkouwer thus correlated justification and sanctification in the unity of faith in Jesus Christ. Göhler also emphasized in his Calvins Lehre von der Heiligung that the formal principle of Calvin's theology is the Verbundenheit (connectedness) of all doctrines without any Zentrallehre (central teaching), [148] and that the doppelte Gnade (twofold grace) of justification and sanctification is an inseparable Einheit (unity) because they are grounded upon the justice and love in the Einheit Gottes (unity of God). [149] No doubt, Barth appreciated their emphasis on the idea of Einheit. So he definitely rejected the “dualism” that justification and sanctification happen as two separate events and that their objective accomplishment and subjective realization occur as two different events. [150] They are only different aspects of reconciliation in “the simul of the one event” [151] --“simply looking at it from a different angle.” [152] The one event of reconciliation includes the two aspects of justification and sanctification, and each aspect has “both an objective and a subjective side.” [153] The subjective realization applies not only to sanctification but also to justification, because it is not a transcendental concept or romantic hypothesis but an actual “reality” of the justified man [154] who has been “summoned to, and made able and ready for, the action of humility which corresponds to this recognition and confession.” [155] Both aspects are related and connected very closely--“more closely united than in a mathematical point” [156] --and very dynamically, like a strongly stretched “bow” which itself is and generates a powerful action. [157] And their dynamic unity is grounded in Jesus Christ, for He is our justification and sanctification, so that his humanity and divinity, or his humiliation and exaltation are to be distinguished but not to be separated or isolated. [158] Such a separation entails “unavoidable dangers” and he observed that it “has actually overwhelmed the Church and theology with very serious consequences,” since it either isolates God as working alone and results in the idea of His “cheap grace” and therefore an “indolent quietism,” or it isolates man as working alone and invites an “illusory activism.” [159] Following Calvin, he concluded that there is “no justification without sanctification” and “no sanctification without justification.” [160] Therefore, any discussion of justification or sanctification must be correlated to each other in the unity of the one event of reconciliation in Jesus Christ.

Distinction and Order

However, Barth also advocated their distinction upon several grounds. First, the Bible distinguishes sanctification from justification. [161] Secondly, the asunchutos and atreptos principle of “Chalcedonian Christology” requires their unconfused and unaltered distinction, because justification and sanctification are incorporated into the divinity and humanity of Jesus Christ respectively and the creed subscribes to the latter distinction. [162] Thirdly, our epistemological limitation demands their distinct treatment, for “we cannot see it all at once, or comprehend it in a single word.” Here again his principle of dialectical theology that the one truth for God inevitably becomes two for man due to the human limitation when it is revealed to man emerges. The one event of reconciliation appears as the twofold grace of justification and sanctification as well as objective reality and subjective realisation, and therefore one may not attempt to synthesize them. [163] Fourthly, the human response to the one divine act of reconciliation appears in two distinct forms, i.e., faith and obedience. [164] Therefore, he strongly criticised the “monism” that merges one into the other as an attempt to synthesize the two. [165] In his analysis, Roman Catholicism and Rudolf Bultmann tended to merge justification into sanctification so that they promoted sanctification-monism in which justification is merely “the beginning of sanctification.” [166] As a result, the sovereignty of the grace of God is significantly de-emphasized and it instead becomes self-sanctification of man. On the other hand, “the young Luther and Zinzendorf and H. F. Kohlbrügge” tended to merge sanctification into justification so that they promoted justification-monism [167] in which sanctification is merely “a paraphrase of justification.” [168] Of course, they were successful in emphasizing the pure grace of God, but such a monism failed not only to appreciate the twofold grace of God as revealed in the Word of God which offers the richness of reconciliation but also to admonish believers effectively to obey the sanctifying command of God. [169] Moreover, he criticized it for misleading Christians in the idea that there is no distinct Christian norm of life and therefore may be sought elsewhere, for it gave the wrong impression that the competence of Jesus Christ extends only to the forgiveness of sin. [170] Therefore, Barth emphasized their “nicht Identität (non-identity)”: [171] “justification is not sanctification” and “sanctification is not justification.” [172] This entails that they are not “interchangeable,” as the one cannot be deduced from, merged into, replaced by, or explained by the other. [173]

We are still left with the question of the ordo between justification and sanctification. Resenting the contemporary loss of leadership of theology to psychology, Barth fundamentally disapproved of the idea of ordo salutis, for it is “psychologistic” as it makes the human feeling and perception as normative. [174] But it does not mean that he absolutely denied the existence of ordo itself. Rather, he regarded it as “necessary” for the proper understanding of their mutual relationship. [175] Because Barth understood justification and sanctification as occurring simultaneously, he rejected the idea of the ordo salutis as a temporal sequence of several events for the fulfilment of total salvation. However, as they are “two genuinely different moments” of the one event, [176] the idea of a temporal order cannot be entirely excluded. The term “Moment” certainly implies a temporal idea and Barth himself recognised that justification is “the first” moment and sanctification “the second” [177] as far as their “execution” is concerned. [178] Because justification is God's turning to man while sanctification man's turning to God, there must be an executional order--God turns first to man and then turns man to Himself. Also, there is a certain temporal order in the event of Jesus Christ, i.e., first his humiliation and judgment and then exaltation and glorification. In fact, what he meant by the “simul” is “simul et coniunctim,” “inseparabilia,” [179] or “zugleich und miteinander (simultaneously and together),” [180] for justification and sanctification belong together conjunctively to one and the same event and therefore they may not be regarded as two separate and disconnected events. [181] But within the whole event of reconciliation, they are two different moments in its execution. To avoid the misunderstanding of temporal separation, however, Barth employed a new term “Sachordnung (order of substance).” [182]

The intentional order, however, is contrary to the executional order: sanctification is intended first in the gracious election of God and then justification to solve the problem of sin. [183] Also, because sanctification is concerned with the telos of reconciliation, [184] Barth held that “teleologically sanctification is superior to justification.” [185] Concerning the logical order, he maintained that justification is the “Grund (ground)” and “Voraussetzung (prerequisite),” while sanctification is the “Ziel (goal)” and “Folge (consequence).” [186] So he gave the structural “priority” to justification over sanctification. [187] He therefore concluded with “twofold answer” that “both are superior and both subordinate,” [188] “according to the different standpoints from which we look.” [189] To answer the question of their mutual relationship, he depended greatly on Calvin with reference to A. Göhler and G. C. Berkouwer. He called Calvin “the theologian of sanctification,” [190] with a deep appreciation of “the primacy of sanctification in Calvin.” [191] But he found that Calvin could correlate the justification and sanctification with such a free and balanced treatment when he started from the “basic act” of “participatio Christi.” [192] So Barth also started his doctrine of sanctification from Christology as its foundation in §64. We will now go back to the beginning of IV/2 and follow his order of treatment.

3.1.4 The Christological Foundation

In Barth's view, Christology is “the key” to the whole mystery of reconciliation. [193] Since Jesus Christ is not only our justification but also our sanctification (1Cor 1.30), he based the doctrine of sanctification also on Christology. [194] How did Barth then relate Christology to the doctrine of sanctification? It is doubtlessly a matter of crucial importance, because it deals with the question of “transition” from Him to us. However, such a transition has already happened to us as a “fact”--an “absolutely given” “actuality,” and therefore it demands “only development and explanation.” [195] He thus explained it in terms of the election, incarnation, crucifixion and resurrection of the Son of Man.

Exaltation of Humanity

Our participatio Christi is the gracious pre-determination of God in His election, in which God has primarily elected Jesus Christ for the reconciliation of His co-elected people. Because he was elected as the incarnated Reconciler, his true humanity was “the primary content of God's eternal election of grace.” [196] For it is in his exalted humanity that God determined for us “to participate in His own holiness and glory.” [197] Therefore, Barth laid the Christological foundation of sanctification upon the humanity of Jesus as the Son of Man and its exaltation, [198] whereas he found the Christological foundation for the doctrine of justification in the divinity of Jesus as the Son of God and its humiliation. For him, the Christological term for sanctification is the “Erhöhung” (exaltation) of the man Jesus, as “the type and dynamic basis” for the sanctification of man. [199] Due to the historical background of “theological humanism, moralism, psychologism, synergism, and ultimately an anthropocentric monism” in the modern liberal theology, the very concept of the exaltation of man might cause a negative feeling, [200] but Barth reproached a “reactionary” theology and stated that “there is no theology without risk.” [201] Moreover, the positive doctrine of sanctification is not only “inescapably posed by Holy Scripture,” “but very seriously by the history of the Church.” [202] In particular, it is “a powerful Reformation impulse,” given a special importance by John Calvin and the Reformed Church. [203] Besides, the exaltation of man does not even remotely imply some kind of “deification” or “divinization” of man, [204] because it happens in Jesus Christ, so that “man himself is exalted, not as God or like God, but to God,” [205] and it is essentially related to the humanity, not to the divinity of Jesus Christ.

The eternal election of grace, which presupposes the true humanity of the Reconciler as well as the participation of His people in His exaltation, is finally realized in the event of incarnation, as “the historical fulfilment of the concept of true man.” [206] In this majestic act, God becomes man and the Creator creature, though God “assumed” humanity into His divine being “as well,” rather than changing Himself into a mere man, “ceasing to be God.” [207] As God wills “to co-exist as the Creator with creature,” [208] this assumptio carnis opens “a completely new dimension” of world history for the actualization of new humanity. [209] It signifies the promise of a fundamental alteration and exaltation of “the humanum of all men” as such. [210] Therefore, he understood the incarnation as “the ratio essendi, the ground of being, of the true man, the man Jesus,” [211] as well as “the ratio cognoscendi, the ground of knowledge, of this man.” [212] The unio hypostatica that happened in the event of incarnation is unique and distinct, [213] i.e., “sui generis,” [214] but the exceptional relationship between Jesus and His community is “indirectly identical” with it, because He is one with them as the Head of His body. [215] In this unity of the “totus Christus--Christ and Christians,” “the community of Jesus Christ can be that which the human nature of its Lord and Head is.” [216] So this whole Christological discussion is for him an exposition of Eph 4.15: we “may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ.” [217]

Because He assumed our humanity, “He exalted human essence into Himself”; [218] because He united Himself with us, we are united with Christ. This unio cum Christo is the secret of our history, for “His history is our history of salvation which changes the whole situation.” [219] Further, “primarily and finally we ourselves are what we are in Him.” [220] A true knowledge of ourselves as such is, therefore, possible “only indirectly” in relation to our knowledge of Jesus Christ, as “in Him we are hidden from ourselves.” [221] So, Barth recommended “a liberating thinking” of renouncing our direct and independent self-knowledge, [222] concluding that “if we are to see ourselves we must not look at ourselves but look at Him,” [223]

However, a serious question arises in this context, because it seems that Barth mixed up two different identities--Christ and ourselves. As O. G. Otterness pointed out, as we are not Jesus Christ, His sanctification is “not our own.” [224] He also raised the criticism that, as a result, “Barth never seriously confronts the question of how sanctification takes place in the historical existence of the believer.” [225] However, Barth was not unaware of this identity problem but devoted the whole second half of §64 [226] to the problem of the transition from Christ to ourselves. While his discussions of the election and incarnation of the Son illuminated the aspect of our passive unio cum Christo in the grace of God, the following discussions of His cross and resurrection concentrate on the other aspect of our active participatio Christi as our response to His amazing grace, empowered by the Holy Spirit.

As stated above, Barth's Christological presupposition of our reconciled reality is that our true identity is “hidden” in Christ. Why is it hidden? Here he distances himself from his earlier position of dialectical theology. This hiddenness or concealment is neither “a kind of protective garment or cover,” [227] nor “the distortion of our perception and thinking which sin causes,” [228] nor “a metaphysical mishap.” [229] Because nothing or nobody could separate us from Jesus Christ (Rom 8), Barth concluded that it must be “a necessary, and perhaps even a decisive, element in the work of His grace.” [230] It doubtlessly exists now but it will be removed at His return in glory. [231] Nevertheless, the love of Jesus Christ “penetrates” this hiddenness as “a confirmation” of our hidden reality, [232] though “this penetration is not a state but an event” [233] while “its removal has not yet taken place.” [234] The mystery of hiddenness still demands “a correct answer” to our question why it is hidden, and Barth suggested the cross as the answer, [235] that “it rests on the mystery of His cross.” [236] Because “everything moved towards this cross” and “everything took place in this crucifixion--the whole reconciliation,” [237] His cross is “His true climax and glory,” [238] “the triumph,” [239] and “the coronation of the King,” who “inaugurated His kingdom as a historical actuality,” [240] rather than a tragic accident or misfortune. [241] For it is the ultimate “telos” of His humiliation as well as “the new beginning” of exaltation. [242] For a true understanding of the whole mystery of reconciliation, therefore, a correct understanding of the cross is quite indispensable, since the cross “controls and penetrates and determines this whole.” [243]

The Royal Man

Because the cross is the key to our hiddenness in Christ, it is also the solution to our sanctification in Him, for the cross is “the definitive form of the elevation and exaltation of this man.” [244] Since there must be “a counterpart which has an unmistakable likeness for all its inferiority” in the life of disciples, they would not be His disciples “if in their own way they did not stand under the law which determined and delimited His existence,” and “the Müssen of His passion extends to them also.” [245] As a matter of fact, “it is in this form that they accept and believe Jesus Himself.” [246] Our reconciliation has been achieved without any our assistance or co-operation, and therefore “the point at issue” now for us is “its attestation in a corresponding way of thought, direction of will, type of attitude and orientation and determination of our existence.” [247] This means our imitatio Christi in the form of the cross, which is a description of the whole existence and activity of the man Jesus. [248] For that purpose, we have to develop the knowledge of Jesus as the Son of Man, the true and new man Jesus, who is “the substance of the christological foundation” of the doctrine of sanctification. [249] Barth called this exalted Jesus “der königliche Mensch (the royal man),” and described his way of personal relationship, his attitude to the world, and his method of ministry from the New Testament, especially from the Synoptic Gospels.

First, Jesus was not a solitary man but a very active and aggressive social being. He encountered men and demanded a decision--“either a Yes or a No.” [250] Nobody could escape Him, though “they could turn from Him or even against Him.” [251] And “if the answer was Yes, it meant a resolute redirection and conversion of the whole man” to do the will of the Father. [252] Therefore, His presence among men meant the presence of the kingdom of God. [253] Once encountered by Him, they became a totally new kind of man and this conversion lasted forever. [254]

Secondly, Jesus had a very “revolutionary” attitude to the world orders and brought about an “Umwertung aller Werte” (transvaluation of all values). [255] Because the man Jesus had an absolute solidarity with God, He shared the strange destiny of God who was ignored, forgotten, despised, isolated, and discounted by men. [256] He therefore identified Himself with the ignored, isolated, and despised--the weak, poor, lowly, and meek, while “He ignored all those who are high and mighty and wealthy in the world.” [257] Moreover, He applied this transvaluation “even in the moral sphere” as well as “in the spiritual sphere.” [258] Further, He ignored the secular powers and systems, which have merely “a transitory validity.” [259] With “a remarkable freedom,” which is “the freedom of the kingdom of God,” “He set all programmes and principles in question.” [260] Rather than “a reformer championing new orders against the old ones,” [261] Jesus was “all the more revolutionary” for the fundamental coup d'état of the Kingdom of God. [262] Therefore, His conflict with the world orders was inevitable. [263] However, He loved this world so much, showing great compassion for those who suffer as sinners that He sacrificed Himself to redeem their sins, and gave “the Gospel, the good news of the end of their misery and the beginning of their redemption, the coming of His kingdom as the kingdom of peace on earth, the reconciliation of the world with Himself.” [264]

Thirdly, Jesus lived His life in the unity of word and work, speaking and action. While His Word was “His decisive and effective act,” [265] His act was “the kindling light of His speech--the light of the truth of His speech kindling into actuality.” [266] As His self-impartation, His Word was the Word of reconciliation for the world. Even though it was “a human Word” which used poor human vocabularies, grammar, and logic, and in spite of further obstacles like human authorship, cultural covering, and manuscript problems, “through all these prisms His Word still reached and touched and enlightened and instructed and convinced the community,” and “in this way it was constituted and edified and directed and maintained as His community.” [267] On the other hand, the activity of Jesus was “the demonstration of the coincidence, or identity, of His proclamation of the kingdom of God, the lordship of God, the divine coup d'état, with the event itself.” [268] His extraordinary and supernatural acts especially were unmistakably “signs of the kingdom of God drawn near.” [269] The miracles of Jesus are “the miracles of the kingdom of God,” [270] as “the cosmic actualization of His kerygma.” [271] As “an absolute miracle” and God's “acts of power,” the miracles of Jesus are fundamentally distinguished from all the seemingly “miraculous” phenomena based on some natural laws. [272] As a principle, Jesus performed the miracles of the kingdom for needy and suffering men, in solidarity with them as a faithful covenant-partner, in order to release them from the pain of their cosmic determination enslaved by the power of destruction, and He did it by “gloriously free grace,” demanding only their faith. [273]

So far, we have described three aspects of the royal man Jesus which Barth suggested as those to imitate Christ in a corresponding way of life, because the exaltation of the man Jesus is our sanctification. We have to learn from Him what a true man really is, in order “to do the same.” [274] The way of the Lord must be certainly the way of His disciples, as we are united with Him. But we need power to follow His life of the cross. In fact, our being hidden in the mystery of the cross is power, but if that is all, we are “left in the air--high and remote and alien--as far as we are concerned,” for it offers only “a kind of objectivity in which it is quite content to be closed to us, having no subjective form.” [275] Of course, the cross is not the end but it is followed by the powerful message of resurrection, which is “the self-declaration of Jesus Christ” as the exalted man. [276] Therefore, it is in the event of His resurrection that we receive “the power to keep us in this as a correspondence to our conversion as it is already accomplished in Jesus Christ, so that we live daily in a free fulfilment of this correspondence.” [277] Most of all, it is “der Kracht des Übergangs (the power of transition) from Christ to us Christians,” which remarkable outcome is “the creation of Christian subjectivity, the existence of Christians.” [278] Therefore, it is not satisfied with its pure objective form but also demands our “subjective” obedience, “summoning us to love in return the One who has first loved us.” [279] In fact, “it is the power of the inconceivably transcendent transition from what is true and actual in Jesus Christ to what is true for us.” [280] Further, this miraculous power is actively operative in the world, as the light which shines into the darkness of our lives and the world in every area of life. [281] It is also the power of liberation, knowledge, and peace, [282] “the power of humility, of hungering and thirsting after righteousness, of fellowship, of prayer and confession, of faith and hope and above all of love,” [283] and comprehensively the power of life, true and eternal. [284]

Transition of the Holy Spirit

In the New Testament, this mystical power of transition is none other than the power of the Holy Spirit, as the Spirit of Jesus. [285] It is He who makes the transition from Christ to us possible by the application of the objective reality of reconciliation to us for a subjective appropriation. It is He who executes all the works of the power which we have sketched above. [286] And, the manner of His working is quite personal that He gives a careful and personal “direction” to us. [287] To receive and have the Holy Spirit is to receive and have His personal direction, and vice versa. [288] As the Holy Scripture shows, He gives direction to us in three ways: indication, correction, and instruction. First, the Holy Spirit indicates our identity and belonging, as well as our determination and destination, reminding us that “we are in Him” and demanding for us to be what He is. [289] Whenever a Christian fails to use his freedom, He repeatedly “brings man [him] back to his own beginning.” [290] Secondly, the Holy Spirit warns and corrects our “non-use” of Christian freedom and any spiritual compromise, completely affirming the new man while totally negating the old. [291] Thirdly, the Holy Spirit instructs us in the will of God for our lives, and gives “a concrete assignment” which demands only our “most concrete obedience.” [292] As a whole, the Holy Spirit exercises the power of transition by “awakening and summoning us to participate in His exaltation,” [293] as His exaltation of humanity is the Christological foundation for the doctrine of sanctification. In fact, his pneumatological explanation of the "transition" certainly does complement and implement his Christo-centric and objectivistic understanding of sanctification for its concrete and subjective realization in our present lives.

Before we turn to the next discussion, we need to examine the validity of Barth's connection between the exaltation of Jesus Christ and our sanctification, because it is the core of his Christological foundation. It does not make sense, for exaltation is not sanctification. While sanctification primarily means a normalization of the fallen humanity, exaltation essentially deals with an elevation of position or glorification. The exaltation of Christ actually begins with the cross, but His authentic humanity has already taken place in the incarnation and He lived a whole life of obedience, which we have to learn and imitate, during the period of humiliation, i.e., before the cross and subsequent exaltation. It means that the main object of our imitatio Christi is His humiliated life as the authentic humanity, and Barth actually described "the royal man" as His way of life in the period of humiliation. Then, how is it possible to connect our sanctification with His exaltation rather than His humiliation? Further, is it possible to apply "sanctification" to the sinless man Jesus? But it is possible, since Jesus Himself referred to Himself in such a way in John 17.19. And if Jesus affirmed His sanctification, it must bear some relation to His exaltation, which was God's recognition of His authentic humanity as it was lived in His whole life of humiliation, the climax and character of which was the cross. Therefore, we may conclude that Barth's Christological groundwork for the doctrine of sanctification through relating His exaltation and our sanctification is valid, if we understand that His exaltation of humanity did not proceed from His crucifixion but was predetermined in the election, fulfilled in the incarnation, and lived in a whole life of the cross. Now, before taking us the issue of translating His authentic humanity of the cross into our discipleship, we will follow Barth's next step--the hamartiological presupposition for the doctrine of sanctification as presented in §65.

3.1.5 Hamartiological Presupposition

As a dogmatic procedure, it is natural and traditional to discuss about sin before salvation, and Barth follows it. But what he cannot follow is the order between Christology and hamartiology. In opposition to the traditional order of treating sin first and then Christ, he advocated its reversal, for “only when we know Jesus Christ do we really know that man is the man of sin, and what sin is, and what it means for man.” [294] This is generally agreed, but Barth wanted to make sure that a simple knowledge of the Law apart from Christ lacks the genuine capability to impart knowledge of sin, as the Gospel is the Law and personally Jesus Christ. [295] Besides, all human attempts to know our sinfulness outside of Christ have the nature of a monologue, as “a reflection of himself.” [296] A genuine knowledge of sin, therefore, is “enclosed” in the knowledge of Jesus Christ, [297] for He has taken our sins to Himself and the reality of our sins has been clearly revealed in God's judgment and verdict of death on the cross. [298]

The knowledge of the cross in this way generates a genuine and personal recognition of our serious sinfulness in the light of His death for our sins, with our emotional reaction of gratitude and shame. In particular, Barth emphasized the aspect of “Beschämung” (shaming) as the genuine proof of our knowledge of sin, for “the existence of the man Jesus and the event of the direction of the Holy Spirit involve the shaming of all other men” [299] and it happens when one has “a living encounter” with God in Jesus Christ. [300] When a sinful man is compared with the divine holiness as well as the authentic and normal humanity of Jesus, he is ashamed of himself, without any excuse. [301] In the mirror of Jesus' obedience, we see ourselves, our sins, and our abnormality. So Barth deals with “the negative presupposition” of sanctification in the light of positive Christology. [302]

Sloth as the Counter-movement of Sanctification

Strangely enough, Barth selected the sin of “Trägheit” (sloth) out of a whole list of sins, as the hamartiological presupposition of sanctification, i.e., that which demands sanctification to overcome in the human situation. [303] And it can be understood only in the light of his previous christological discussion that exaltation is sanctification. For it is the sin to refuse and resist to follow His upward movement of exaltation and elevation of humanity under the sign of Sursum!, because it is immobility, inaction and inertia--“the counter-movement to the elevation.” [304] It is sinful, because it is an evil "action" of disobedience, unbelief, and ingratitude. [305] It is sinful, because the man of sloth refuses and rejects the grace of God and personally the man Jesus. Simply stated, “he wants to be left alone,” [306] and “not to be illuminated by the existence and nature of God, not to have to accept Him, to be without God in the world,” [307] not to be disturbed by the divine exaltation but simply to be proud of his own work of religious sanctification. [308] So, the man of sloth becomes a man of “terrible paradox” and a “man in contradiction,” as “he also refuses to be himself, breaking free from his own reality, losing himself in his attempt to assert himself, and thus becoming his own pitiful shadow.” [309]

Now, we will describe the “four main aspects” of sloth, as man's “mortal refusal” in his relationship with God, other men, self, and time, [310] which Barth discusses in the main section (§65.2) as what is to be overcome in the sanctification of man, and therefore he always begins with the authentic humanity of the man Jesus. First, it is a refusal to recognize Jesus Christ as the Word of God revealed for us so that we can “be wise in virtue of His wisdom.” [311] It is the sin of ingratitude and irrationality that “we close our eyes and persist in the darkness,” though “the clear light of day has come,” and that “we harden ourselves in our unreason, our ignorance of God, our lack of wisdom, our folly and stupidity.” [312] But the so-called “wisdom of the world” or “wisdom of men” anxiously pretends to be wisdom in opposition to the wisdom of God. [313] Though there is “constant friction and collision between the different forms of worldly wisdom,” they are all united through “mutual understanding and mutual confirmation,” in that they attempt every kind of compromise and transformation. [314] So, even some “ill-advised” and “worldly-wise Christianity” is tempted to compromise with the disguised “wisdom of the world” and further to replace the wisdom of God by it, when it tends gradually to refuse the wisdom of God, which is “the cross of Christ” (1Cor 1.18), [315] and turns to be a “practical atheism.” [316]

Secondly, it is a refusal to recognize Jesus Christ as the fellow-man incarnated for us so that our authentic humanity as “fellow-humanity,” “bound and committed to other men,” can be restored [317] It is the sin of “inhumanity” to be alone, isolated and secluded so that one can be sovereign and arbitrary. [318] It is dangerous and destructive, because it begins with indifference to other men and becomes “the secret of blatant oppression and exploitation of one's fellow,” which leads to actual transgressions like robbery, murder, and finally global warfare, with “an endless series of aggression and reprisals.” [319] Such inhumanity is done often in the name of superhumanity or subhumanity, [320] and sometimes in the disguise of “philanthropy,” concealing its true intentions and projects, without any personal relations or genuine sympathy. [321]

Third, it is a refusal to recognize Jesus Christ as the normal man in the relationship between soul and body sent for us so that the “original unity in which the soul controls the body and the body serves the soul” can be restored. [322] But, the man of sloth lacks “discipline” and tolerates the “flesh” to live a separate and independent life uncontrolled by the soul, so that “his soul and body begin to go their separate ways.” [323] Therefore, it is the sin of dissipation, dissolution, and decomposition, which involves “waste or neglect, and a resultant disorder, discord and degeneration,” [324] and further it is “infectious” to others. [325] On the other hand, Jesus practised a severe and perfect discipline of the flesh by following the guidance of the Spirit, and thus “the normalization of our nature, the event of the glory of human life, has taken place once and for all in Jesus.” [326] It is interesting that here Barth defined sanctification in this aspect as “normalization.” [327] But the man of sloth attempts to protect the desire of the flesh in the name of “freedom and naturalness,” though he is in the process of denying, destroying, and dissipating himself as a man in unity and totality. [328]

Fourthly, it is a refusal to recognize Jesus Christ as the Crucified but Resurrected for us so that we can thankfully accept our existence of limitation in His gift of eternal life. But the man of sloth shuns His grace and resists his limitation, so that he becomes “a prisoner of the ceaseless movements of care,” which is the mixture of fear and desire against a threat. [329] To conceal the endless anxiety, it appears either in the active form of restless work and achievements or in the passive form of non-resistant contemplation and leisure. [330] But only the Gospel of Jesus' death and resurrection will be able to free man from his anxiety of limitation, as he participates in the exaltation of the man Jesus.

According to Barth, the characteristic sin against sanctification is sloth, because it refuses participation in the exaltation of Jesus Christ. Because it is free grace, there is nothing to do but to participate in the sanctification of Christ as His disciples. Besides, his designation of sloth in the context of sanctification implies his concept of sanctification as an active discipleship. Further, his discussion of its four aspects suggests four aspects of the sanctified life, i.e., an uncompromising life of the cross as the wisdom of God, fellow-humanity, discipline of the flesh, and the eschatological hope of resurrection and eternal life. As far as men persist in the sin of sloth by refusing Jesus Christ and His exaltation, they are in the state of “Elend” (misery) in the sense of exile and perversion. [331] However, Jesus came to the far country for the men of exile and therefore the men of misery are not outside of His grace. The mercy of God has already set a limit to the misery of man, and this “Begrenzung” (limitation) is his sanctification, which liberates him from the bondage of will for the active participatio Christi. [332]

So far we have discussed some introductory presuppositions for Barth's doctrine of sanctification within the total structure of the doctrine of reconciliation which may be divided into two parts. While the first part (1-3) deals with the position of the doctrine of sanctification in the total structure of Barth's doctrine of reconciliation, which consists of justification, sanctification, and vocation as three aspects of one reconciliation, the second part (4-5) explains the Christological ground and hamartiological presupposition of the doctrine of sanctification. We will now proceed to Barth's Heiligungslehre proper as presented in §66. As we have already discussed §66.1 in 3.1.3, our next section (3.2) deals with §66.2 and it will be the center and core of this dissertation, since it describes, in my opinion, the main structure of Barth's doctrine of sanctification.

3.2 The Structure of Barth's Doctrine of Sanctification

3.2.1 Teleological Cycle of Sanctification

Since the beginning of Christianity many theologians have attempted to formulate the doctrine of sanctification as revealed in the Holy Scripture, but their conflicting views have caused a series of confusion and embarrassment in the understanding of what it is and how we can achieve it, even though it should be taught as clear and precise as possible so that the Christian community could be effectively sanctified. Karl Barth, one of the great theologians in the post-Reformation era, also presented his understanding of sanctification, and it is quite distinctive, at least in three ways.

First, it is covenant-centered, since his doctrine suggests that the final aim of sanctification is not our individual sanctification itself, but the covenant of the Kingdom of God. Historically, its earliest formulation was the understanding of sanctification as “deification,” which was developed in the mythical context of Greek world under the philosophical influence of neo-Platonism and further enforced by appealing to the creedal concept of the hypostatic union, and it has been the view of the Eastern Christianity. [333] It naturally satisfied the strong impulse towards mysticism and even spreaded to the West. [334] On the other hand, the Western Christianity developed a disciplinary understanding of sanctification as “moral discipline” in the medieval context of asceticism and monasticism, and this tradition has dominated the West until today. [335] With the Imitatio Christi of Thomas à Kempis, the idea of moral imitation has become very popular among all confessions, including the Reformers, [336] and this volitional interpretation became strengthened in the post-Orthodoxy movements of a “holy life” in the forms of Continental Pietism, Anglo-American Puritanism, and Wesleyan Perfectionism. [337] Further, the modern humanism of the Enlightenment made it possible to incorporate the idea of deification into this moralistic system, as the way to attain “the moral perfection of God,” finding philosophical justification for this in Kantian moralism. It reduced the Gospel to morality in the ethical Christianity of the Liberal immanentism, though its failure called forth a resurgence of Pentecostal mysticism. [338] However, both views are humanistic, because they commonly aim at the elevation of the human nature per se as their ultimate purpose, without any true interest in the will of God and His Kingdom. Barth, on the other hand, understood the individual sanctification not as the telos but merely as a means to an end, for which he serves as a faithful covenant-partner of God.

Secondly, it is comprehensive, for his doctrine embraces every aspect of sanctification. In fact, the Scripture contains many direct and indirect descriptions of sanctification, some of which are quite contradictory. Some theologians have therefore controversially tended to emphasize one aspect of sanctification, while others emphasized exclusively its other aspect. But Barth gradually learned, after the initial struggles in his early theology, to accept seriously whatever the Word of God says, i.e., single and continual, objective and subjective, visible and invisible, eternal and temporal, divine and human aspects. [339] His free acceptance of the dual aspects of sanctification is based on his “dialectical” epistemology: one truth of God becomes two or even more to man, because we humans have a limited ability to see and understand only one aspect at one time. [340] Therefore, he resisted and criticized any attempt to synthesize such a duality or plurality of the divine revelation, for in his thinking this is to play God. Further, it is comprehensive, as he understood that God demands and claims “the sanctification of the whole,” i.e., the inner and outer, material and spiritual, physical and mental, individual and social, moral and political areas of humanity. [341] This comprehensive idea is quite Calvinistic and has a close affinity with the Neo-Calvinism, which similarly advocates the sovereignty of God in all areas of life.

Thirdly, it is teleological, since his doctrine consists of a series of telos-oriented sanctifications. As pointed out above, the humanistic interpretations of sanctification altogether pursue a spiritual or moral elevation of oneself as the final end of his religion, and thus they are quite individualistic and even egoistic. This is clearly contradictory to the Reformed teaching of soli Deo gloria. By virtue of his comprehensive reading and in-depth exegesis of the Scripture, Barth has discovered a cycle of sanctification within the Word of God which consists of three steps. First, God sanctifies His Son for the redeeming mission of the world. Second, Jesus Christ sanctifies His covenant community through His humiliating death on the cross and His exalting resurrection. Third, His covenant community becomes instrumental in the sanctification of the world so that the world would exalt God and sanctify His name, as the Christian community always pray. [342] This holy cycle is then perfected for the glory of God, and the covenant of the Kingdom is fulfilled by the consummation of His final redemption. For Barth, our sanctification has a definite mission and telos, which is the sanctification of the world, so that the will of God and His Kingdom can be fulfilled. His view is therefore distinctively teleological, eschatological, and mission-oriented. As this teleological cycle forms the main structure of Barth's doctrine of sanctification, we will discuss its three steps in the next three sub-sections.

3.2.2 The Sanctification of Christ

To begin with, Barth raised a fundamental question: Is there any “sanctification” and therefore “a sanctified man” or simply “a holy man”? [343] It is a perplexing and perennial but poignant question, for the Church is seemingly a community of sinners rather than of holy men. If every Christian is asked whether he is “a holy man,” most of them would certainly deny it, though a few might affirm it with an unholy spiritual pride. It is an embarrassing reality, because one has to prove his/her sanctification even to non-believers, whereas justification is primarily a matter of faith and personal conviction that he/she has been forgiven through the atoning death of Jesus Christ. Contrary to this general negative consciousness, however, the Bible and the Church usually call Christians the “saints,” rather than “the righteous” or “the just.” But where is the reality of a sanctified man? Though it is often true that people are profoundly impressed by moral change in a convert, the majority of both believers and non-believers do not seem to accept its extraordinary reality, so that some non-believers challenge and distrust the Christian Gospel of sanctification, while most Christians are themselves disappointed in their unholy reality and fallen to defeatism.

Where is a Holy Man?

It is strange that “a holy man” is found elsewhere, mostly in the ascetic religions like Hinduism, Buddhism, or Taoism. Within their respective religious communities, such “holy men” are respected and even worshipped for their high achievements in ascetic discipline and enlightenment of a truth, and their living away from the secular world. A similar exaltation occurs in Christianity, with the exception of Protestantism, through the canonization or “sanctification” procedure of a “saint.” Even outside of religion proper a man of exemplary humanity who has devoted his whole life to sacrificial service and deeply moved his fellow men is often called “a holy man.” Though Barth recognized such relative holiness, [344] he severely criticized the illusion and deception of such human holiness, especially that of pietistic holiness. [345] For the standard of such holiness is quite arbitrary, abstract, metaphysical, and most of all culturally conditioned. For example, the holy men or saints are mostly male due to their male-headed culture, with the relative exception of Roman Catholicism primarily due to their exaltation of Mary.

Of course, the normative statement of holiness in Christian theology is that “God alone is originally and properly holy.” [346] Because God is not subordinated to any human definition but rather all human “holiness” have to be measured by His holiness and not vice versa, [347] the absolute superiority of the divine holiness does not need any proof, as “no other holiness can be compared with His.” [348] As the final proof of its absolute superiority, however, Barth introduced a special feature of divine holiness in contrast to human holiness: God is capable to relate to an unholy being “without destroying or denying His own superiority” due to its originality and immutability. Human “holiness,” however, does lose or reverse its relative superiority easily, when it is “bridged” by a lower holiness, because it is alien, changeable, and compromised. [349] This term Überbrückung is definitely appropriate here, since it means not only “bridging” but also “reconciliation” in Germans. As discussed earlier (2.3.3), even in His gracious turning to men for the purpose of reconciliation, the holiness of God does not surrender or compromise itself but thoroughly breaks down and destroys any resistance within the sinful and unholy man, as “a consuming fire,” for He cannot allow us to go our own way. So, He makes us holy, rather than He compromises or downgrades His holiness to our lower standard. In the sanctification of men God intends to “make saints in reflection of His own holiness.” [350] Therefore, the holiness of a sanctified man is exceptionally superior and transcendent in comparison with all humanistic or religious holiness. [351]

But, we come back to the starting point. If sanctified holiness is so exceptional and superior, where is such a sanctified man, a holy man or saint? As Barth declared honestly, “Saint! We are not yet this by a long way.” [352] But, he saw, the Bible repeatedly confirms the existence of the “saints,” [353] who are none other than ourselves. So Barth inevitably concluded that we cannot take the word “literally,” and rejected the existence of a literal and direct sanctification for us. [354] In what sense of the term, then, are we “sanctified” and “holy”? In studying the biblical evidence, Barth found a strange but significant fact that “no individual Christian is ever called a saint” but “the saints of the New Testament exist only in plurality.” [355] To him, it was a clue for solving the problem of sanctification, because its possible meaning is that our holiness belongs to “common life” rather than individuality. [356] If it is true that an individual as a separable being is sanctified and holy, it is reasonable to suppose that a few Christians at least must have been called a “saint” in the New Testament. But such a usage never appears. In short, there is a deliberate “Zurückhaltung im Spiel (restraint at play),” [357] as Barth says, in order to emphasize its communal aspect. The principle of “all for one, one for all” and their common identity is emphasized as strongly as possible in both Testaments, which point us to “the same direction,” for “the hagioi are the men to whom hagiotes comes in a common history which constitutes then an ethnos hagion.” [358] To understand correctly and genuinely why we are “saints” and how we are sanctified, therefore, we have to study “the common history” of the Christian community throughout the biblical history, as it is possibly “die Heiligkeit der Gemeinde (the holiness of the community),” [359] and the common history is the covenant history as the Heilsgeschichte. [360] So Barth related sanctification and covenant inseparably, so that the essence of sanctification is for him the creation of a new Existenzform as “the loyal covenant-partner of God.” [361] As there are two partners to a covenant, one is God who is always faithful to the covenant, while the other is the human being, who has become a fallen, sinful, and unfaithful partner. Through His gracious determination, the faithful Partner intervenes to convert the human partner to the faithful, but this occurs once for all as a community in the Heilsgeschichte, not one by one individually.

Jesus Christ as the Mitte of Sanctification

Jesus Christ is the “Mitte (center)” in the whole Heilsgeschichte and therefore of our sanctification too. [362] In fact, our sanctification did not happen in one day but its history has an eternal “dimension,” so high and so deep, so magnificent and so dramatic. [363] It began from eternity: “From the beginning,” God chose us to “salvation through sanctification” (2Thess 2.13); “Before the foundation of the world,” He chose us in Jesus Christ, “that we should be holy” (Eph 1.4). In the eternal election Jesus Christ was predestined to leave the divine side of the covenant and join the other to assume the whole responsibility of their covenant unfaithfulness, represent them to God, and sanctify them to be faithful. The whole burden of this reconciliation has been laid upon this Lamb of God, as the center of the salvation history. Because He is not a solitary holy God, [364] the Son of God was not alone in the election but His people was co-elected with and in Him. [365] If He was ordained to be humiliated and crucified so that only He Himself could be justified and sanctified, it would be totally meaningless and even absurd. His predetermination in the mission of reconciliation was to be the “Stellvertreter (Representative) of all men,” [366] to take our place and act for us, i.e., our justification and sanctification.

As Barth correctly pointed out, “it has not always been taken with sufficient seriousness” that He took our place not only for justification but also for our sanctification, [367] though He was not only condemned for us but also exalted for us. It must be true that, just as we are crucified and resurrected in His crucifixion and resurrection, we are justified and sanctified when God justified and sanctified Jesus Christ as our Representative. Nevertheless, the biblical truth that Jesus Christ was sanctified has been either ignored or even dismissed for the reason that He did not need sanctification due to His holy divinity and sinless humanity. This is true, but He was sanctified in our place and for our sake. In this respect, as Barth demonstrates, [368] the New Testament is unequivocally clear. Particularly, the Fourth Gospel clearly states that “the Father has sanctified” Him (10.36), and Jesus Himself confirms that “I sanctify myself” (17.19). Also, the Scripture unmistakably reveals the reason and purpose for His sanctification: “For their sakes (hyper auton) I sanctify myself, that (hina) they also might be truly sanctified.” In addition, he listed 1Cor 6.9-11, Col 1.21f, Eph 5.27, and Heb 13.10 as proof of His sanctification for us.

In this context, Barth repeatedly used two ordinary words, i.e., “auch (also)” and “schon (already),” in order to emphasize two important aspects of our sanctification. First, he intended to clarify the inseparable unity and simultaneous event of our sanctification with His: “in and with His sanctification ours has been achieved as well.” [369] It would be a fatal mistake to suppose that our justification has been accomplished by Him but “our sanctification were left to us to be accomplished by us.” [370] For whom, then, was Jesus sanctified? We are asked for neither “Selbstrechtfertigung (self-justification)” nor “Selbstheiligung (self-sanctification).” [371] We look in vain if we look at ourselves for our sanctification without fixing our gaze on the Mitte of our whole salvation. [372] Of course, it is “originally and properly His and not theirs,” as it has taken place as “a direct event” only to Jesus alone. [373] Therefore, His sanctification is distinguished from ours as a “unmittelbare Gestalt” (direct form) to which all its other forms are “included.” [374] This means that our sanctification is an “indirect” sanctification, effective only in His sanctification: we are “saints in Christ Jesus” (1Cor 1.2, Phil 1.1). For our sanctity is “not propria, but aliena sanctitate, sanctitate Jesu Christi.” [375] However, this does not mean that our sanctification is less real than His. It is “the same reality” in the power of the reality of the center. [376] Our sanctification is so real that 1Cor 7.14 talks about the possibility of the sanctification of our “Umgebung (surrounding people)” through our instrumentality. [377] To His obedient Son God gave such an effective “Königsmacht” (royal authority), that He was made “the acting Subject” of all sanctification. [378] As the Head is sanctified and holy, His body is also sanctified and holy. As discussed earlier concerning the Christological foundation (3.1.4), Barth explained the sanctification of Christ as “laying the foundation” for our sanctification on the classical concept of unio cum Christo which is effective throughout the Heilsgeschichte from eternity to eternity.

Secondly, he attempted to clarify the irrevocable `past-ness' and completion of our sanctification by Him: “we are already sanctified, already saints, in this One.” [379] The New Testament generally assumes that our sanctification has already happened, since it calls us “saints” not because we will be sanctified in the future but because we have already been sanctified in Jesus Christ. It is most clearly declared in Heb 10.10: “we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” Here, the use of ephapax definitely emphasizes that our sanctification has been already accomplished, finished, done and over. This is reconfirmed in verse 14: “By one offering he has perfected for ever them that are sanctified.” Therefore, if we now attempt to do something for our own sanctification, it is “too late,” just as it is “far too late” to attempt to create heaven and earth. [380] It is definitely a past event. In fact, it had been decided even earlier, i.e., before the beginning of the world, and it has been completely accomplished a long time ago already. So we may not make any “prior or subsequent contribution” for our sanctification. [381] As a result, the world has been already affected, so conditioned and changed, so that a fresh re-interpretation of the world is in demand. [382]

Then what remains for us? According to Barth, it is to praise His love for us, as the praise is “the reason for the existence of His people.” [383] Of course, the praise presupposes our recognition, respect, and gratitude. [384] Further, it necessarily involves that our lives correspond to the grace of our sanctification. [385] As we are asked only for faith in our justification, Jesus as our Lord asks only for “our obedience, or supremely our love” in our sanctification. [386] It seems inappropriate to say simply “only” for obedience during our whole lives. It is certainly not a “cheap grace,” but our “obedience” too is a gift of God since it begins only from the moment when God freely gives us the genuine freedom to obey.

3.2.3 The Sanctification of the Covenant Community

According to Barth, the sanctification of Christ is the sanctification of His people too, since He was representatively sanctified as the Head of the covenant community. Therefore, a separate discussion is practically impossible, and our present discussion about the second step of the sanctification cycle does not actually deal with the objective sanctification of the covenant community in Jesus Christ, as we have already discussed it in the “Sanctification of Christ.” Rather, Barth turns to the other direction, i.e., the subjective sanctification of the covenant community and its individual members, which attests to the objective sanctification already accomplished in the sanctification of Christ, and he explains it by means of “Calvin's doctrine of the participatio Christi,” [387] to emphasize “our participation in His sanctification.” [388]

The Transition to Subjective Sanctification

Basically, it is a question of Übergang (transition), i.e., “how the transition is made” [389] from the objective to the subjective, de jure to de facto, the communal to the individual, the once-for-all to the one-by-one, the past to the present sanctification. For “as long as Christ remains outside of us (extra nos), and we are separated from him,” as Calvin emphatically expressed, “all that he has suffered and done for the salvation of the human race remains useless and no value for us.” [390] Therefore, Barth clearly stated that “the development of the answer to this question is the task of this whole section,” i.e, the whole Paragraph §66, [391] while this “grundlegenden (basic)” subsection (§66.2) attempts to visualise its “Grundriß und Umriß (ground plan and outline).” [392] Although it differs from his original plan in which he intended to deal with the “objective” sanctification in §66 and then its “subjective” application in §67 and §68, [393] Barth adjusts his procedure of treatment, as he already discussed objective sanctification in §64.

In his understanding there is “only one point of departure” [394] for initiating the process of subjective sanctification: the Ausgangspunkt (starting point) is the powerful direction of the Holy Spirit. The Holy One who accomplished His sanctification for us is no longer “hidden” but “revealed” [395] to us by giving us His direction in the revelation of the Holy Spirit. As “the living Lord Jesus Christ Himself in the work of the sanctification,” the Holy Spirit places us and our “whole being and thinking and action and inaction” under His direction. [396] When the Holy Spirit gives direction to a definite person, a personal encounter between His Spirit and the particular man takes place first of all. It is made in the effective calling, since calling is the subjective experience in which “the living Jesus Christ encounters definite men at definite times in their lives,” [397] in Barth's doctrine of vocation. [398] And His calling is given in the form of Anspruch: [399] the Lord “claims” an objectively justified and sanctified man at the Cross as “His,” demanding that he surrenders his ownership of his whole life as his joyful and grateful response to His grace of reconciliation. [400] When God claims and man surrenders in His calling, the initiation of personal conversion and subjective sanctification finally takes place. What is then the divine purpose in calling and claiming a man as “His”? In Barth's teleological perspective, it is not simply to possess him as His belonging, but to make him “the witness of His holiness” to the world as “Mitheiligen” (fellow-saints), [401] as “the essence of their vocation is that God makes them His witnesses.” [402] To witness His holiness does not simply mean to witness the divine holiness, but it is to witness the sanctification of Christ for us. Therefore, it is to witness his own sanctified holiness already accomplished in Jesus Christ, and this attestation is done in the active participatio Christi of the saints. [403] In this sense it is a matter of “Selbstzeugung (self-attestation)” of our objective sanctification. [404]

But, what happens in the initial encounter, that he would be willing to consent, surrender, and obey to be the witness of sanctification? According to Barth, when the Holy Spirit personally and powerfully reveals the fact that Jesus Christ has reconciled him by His atoning death at the Cross and therefore he “belongs to Him,” [405] he is illuminated so that he can recognize and accept himself as revealed in His revelation, and it generates a fundamental and revolutionary correction of his “Selbstverständnis (self-understanding)” in accordance with the revealed truth concerning himself. [406] This “Auseinandersetzung (debate)” within oneself, which naturally operates its profound and penetrating effect upon one's whole existence including intellect and emotion and will, or “thinking and action and inaction,” [407] then enables him to welcome Him as his Lord and thereby dedicate his whole existence to His calling to be His witness to the world, as well as to His direction to attest to his own sanctification as the reflection of His holiness. As a man receives His personal calling, which consists of revelation and claim, he recognizes its truth, re-interprets his self-understanding, surrender his ownership, and dedicate his whole life under the direction of the Holy Spirit. In short, the decisive event in this Übergang is the transition of the subject, from God to man, i.e., from objective to subjective, from passive to active, from claim to surrender, and from calling to obedience. We are now actively participating in the sanctification of Christ under the powerful direction of the Holy Spirit, so that we may become a faithful covenant-partner as His Mitheiligen and Zeugen to the world. However, he does not mean that God now becomes totally passive and only waits our independent and autonomous action. The Holy Spirit is still the Subject of our subjective sanctification, but He directs us to the active participatio Christi as free subjects of obedience.

The Direction of the Holy Spirit

So far we have discussed Barth's explanation of the “starting-point” of the transition to subjective sanctification by means of his concepts of calling and claim. We are now ready to get into “the most general features” of the transition process (Übergangsprozeß), [408] which are the three forms of His “direction,” as “He creates saints by giving direction.” [409] Barth attempts a word play here by employing the German word “Weisung” for “direction,” rather than Richtung, Leitung, or simply Direktion, as it has the same root with the German words “Weise” (way), and derivatively “weise” (wise) and “Weisheit” (wisdom). By means of this term, he claims that the direction of the Holy Spirit is the wisdom to whom this direction is given. [410] Further, it is “the Wisdom,” as he is attempting to relate it to the so-called Wisdom Christology and Logos Christology. [411] Of course, his main intention is to emphasize that this direction of the Holy Spirit is inseparably related to the Word of God, rather than given in an undefined arbitrary way. Though it is not “anonymous, amorphous” or “irrational,” because it is a communication “from man to man,” i.e., from the man Jesus to us, [412] it is also from God and therefore distinguished from all other human directions. [413] Further, the operation of the Holy Spirit has to be distinguished from the pseudo-mystical phenomena of all other spirits, however similar and enthusiastic it may be. [414] When he recognizes some similarity, Barth simply defines and delimits our spiritual or mystical experience rather than a total denial. What is the mark of distinction? As mentioned above, he understood that “the work of the Holy Spirit is always distinguished” by the unequivocal mark that His direction proceeds from the Word of God, Jesus Christ. [415] In short, it is given by the Weise of “speaking” and received by that of “hearing.” [416]

Disturbance, Limit, and Lifting-Up

As Barth discussed his idea of “direction” already in §64.4, he directs our reference to this Christological foundation (Grundlegung). [417] There he explained that the Weisung of the Holy Spirit is given in three ways, i.e., “Einweisung, Zurechtweisung und Unterweisung” (indication, correction and instruction). [418] However, recognizing that these expressions, which were selected from word play, are “too weak, external and therefore ineffective” to describe the dynamic operation of His powerful direction, [419] Barth substitutes a new set of terms, i.e., “Störung, Grenze und Sichauflichten” (disturbance, limit and lifting-up). Following this order, which begins “from the bottom upwards,” [420] he explains how the subjective sanctification actually takes place within our spiritual existence. Since he dealt with the “starting-point” and then the “mode” of the operation, he now proceeds to the discussion of the “effect”--what happens when His direction is given to a particular man.

First, when the Holy Spirit gives an indicative direction to someone, he is irresistibly disturbed. A down-to-earth description of converts is that “they are still sinners,” but it is also a solid truth that “they are saints.” [421] In what sense are they then saints and what differentiates them from those who are not saints? Barth's answer is the existence of Störung (disturbance): [422] they are sinners but quite distinctive sinners--“they are disturbed sinners.” [423] Until a man is called and encountered by the Holy Spirit, who discloses and reveals his reconciled reality in Jesus Christ, he has more or less enjoyed his fantasy of self-love and sweetness of sinning. However, the decisive event of His revelation and direction compels him to re-interpret fundamentally his self-understanding and thereby disturbs his whole existence in the total impact. When he is “confronted” by the coming of the Kingdom and his responsibility for the covenant, he is now aware of the truth about what he is and what he has to do or has not to do. [424] Therefore, even though he still does what he did, he does it as the one who knows that he is doing “wrong,” because he is spoken and heard it. [425] Of course, “it makes a tremendous difference” to his life as a whole. [426] As the Holy Spirit “continues effectively to disturb” him, he is continually disturbed by the “contradiction,” “opposition,” and “protest” [427] within his mind, so that there would be no “complacency,” “excuse,” or “confidence.” [428] The so-called “peace of mind” or “inner harmony,” which is the reconciliation with oneself, [429] actually contradicts the reconciliation with God. [430] As he is already placed at the side of God, he became “Gottes Parteigänger” (a partisan of God) against the world and even himself, “radically and definitely separated from the unholy.” [431] Upon their hearts and consciences is written “the divine contradiction of their sinning.” [432] Therefore, this divine disturbance is essentially distinguished from a natural disturbance, which man is able to master and overcome by “his conscious or unconscious, primitive or refined art of living,” while the direction of the Holy Spirit causes a genuine disturbance, “which cannot be overcome,” [433] as it is continually and irrepressibly disturbed during the whole life in this world.

Secondly, when the Holy Spirit gives a corrective direction to someone, he is overwhelmingly limited. As God “enters” his life, He pushes his “Sein als Sünder” (being as sinner) “into a corner,” however serious and strong its resistant self-assertion may be, and sets a definite “Grenze” (limit) against this old identity, within which He creates his new identity which reflects his objective reality already accomplished in Jesus Christ, i.e., his “Sein als Heilige” (being as saint). [434] Even though it is true that both forms of our existence, our “being as sinners” and “being as saints,” or “old man” and “new man,” co-exist and struggle within our existence, God “counts” only our new identity, so that our Sein als Heilige is a “göttliche Realität (divine reality),” while our Sein als Sünder is a “Nichtige” (Nothingness), [435] as “it belongs to the past,” though it may still project into the present. [436] Through the power of the direction, the Sein als Heilige unilaterally sets a question to the reality of the Sein als Sünder, not vice versa. [437] This direction of assault and influence reflects the decisive victory of our Lord and the growing expansion of His kingdom in the eschaton. For what limits us are “the revealed name of God, His imminent Kingdom, His will which is done for man,” and they negate our Sein als Sünder and destroy our violent sinful force, i.e., “Gewalt.” [438] In short, the divine establishment of this definite limit, by “pushing” our being as sinners and “creating” our being as saints, has a definite effect upon our existence as a whole, so that our sinfulness is significantly “relativized.” [439] We are now limited sinners as well as relative saints in virtue of the Grenze. Therefore, this Grenze and Begrenzung of the Holy Spirit is our sanctification. [440] In fact, the concepts of Störung and Grenze are inseparably related, since we are disturbed because He set the limit within our existence. [441] Further, it is the gift of “the knowledge” of our objective reality in Jesus Christ that causes the holy disturbance and sets the unassailable limit within us, as it is that which distinguishes the saints from the non-saints. [442]

Nevertheless, “limit” is a negative term, signifying a restrictive and prohibitive direction. So Barth complements it with one of his essential teachings in relation to the doctrine of sanctification, i.e., the concept of freedom as “the positive significance” of the Grenze, [443] The “empty space,” which was created by pushing one's “being as sinner” into the corner and setting the limit, is filled by the Spirit of the Lord, and thereby the new man is equipped with “freedom,” [444] as he needs “the capacity” to participate actively in the sanctification of Christ as a witness of His holiness. [445] If the capacity of freedom is not given to the saints, the biblical admonitions and the divine commands have been given in vain, and also “Christian ethics” would not be possible. [446] However, his idea of freedom is not “an empty and formal concept,” merely a capacity to do whatever one wants, i.e., servum arbitrium, but the genuine freedom given by the Holy Spirit is liberum arbitrium, which liberates us from sin and therefore “cannot” sin, non potest peccare. [447] It is distinguished from “all kinds of supposed freedoms and permissions,” which in fact are “illusory.” [448] Therefore, for Barth there is no “misuse” of freedom, for the use of the freedom is always right and good. The so-called “misuse of freedom” is actually “no use of his freedom.” [449] So this God-given freedom has to be always used and exercised. Further, it is the divine gift of “permission,” which grants “sovereignty” to act as a free beings “set in sovereign antithesis to his being as a sinner,” and to this use of freedom, “there is no limit.” [450] Once this “total, unlimited, sovereign freedom of the Spirit” has been given, [451] it is never taken away. [452] Therefore, “the imparting of this capacity is the liberation of man--his sanctification.” [453]

Thirdly, when the Holy Spirit gives an instructive direction to someone, he lifts up himself to the Lord above. While the phenomena of disturbance and limit explain our negative sanctification, Barth now turns to the “positive sanctification,” [454] as the freedom is given as the capability for it. We are not merely “called out” but also “called in” to the fellowship with our Lord, and because He is above, we are called to lift up our heads and look to Him above. [455] As this “Aufrichten” (lifting-up) and “Aufsehen” (looking-up) to Him is a participatio Christi, [456] which necessarily produces a movement of correspondence and conformability to the sanctification of Christ, [457] it is “their sanctification de facto.” [458] Of course, the resultant change is “only relative” and “penultimate,” because our subjective sanctification is not the ultimate redemption or glorification. [459] Because it takes place below, it has “the mark of sloth” as well as “the doubtful and questionable character.” [460] However, it is “a real alteration of their being,” since it is “from Him.” [461] It therefore has “its concrete consequence,” which is “visible” in his own life as well as his community life. [462]

The Parable of the Eddy

Barth used a parable, the parable of the eddy, in order to illustrate some important features of sanctification. His primary point is that our subjective sanctification takes place through the initiative and spontaneity of “an alien factor,” i.e., the powerful direction of the Holy Spirit, as an eddy appears when a powerful wind blows from above and stirs up the stream. [463] So he emphasized that our sanctification is “the gift of God” and “His work.” [464] Even though this is certainly true, there is a problem in this parable. A lifeless eddy without its sovereignty or freedom may not be compared with our sanctification, because we are free and sovereign beings to actively participate in Christ. In short, an “eddy” cannot be a proper metaphor for “obedience.” [465] Of course, we understand Barth's intention to emphasize that we may never forget the origin and Subject of our sanctification. But the comparison does not fit the context and this mistake is the very point of wide criticism: J. C. Lombard called it “a full-confident carelessness” due to his “grace-triumph” motif, O. G. Otterness described it as “a paradoxical constraint,” and M. den Dulk criticized it as “an inner contradiction” which results in “blocking the entrance.” [466] As a matter of fact, he further used this parable to describe our fundamental powerlessness in sanctification: “Is it really more than the eddy which may arise and be seen in a powerfully flowing stream but which cannot alter the course of the stream as a whole?” [467] No doubt, such a statement contradicts the general context of his positive teachings of sanctification like the sanctification of the whole, our being as sinner as non-existent, the sanctification of Christ as the Victor, and especially the sanctification of the world. Therefore, we should refrain from wholesale criticism of Barth's doctrine of sanctification on the basis of these minor comments and follow the main stream of his teaching.

3.2.4 The Sanctification of the World

As we have repeatedly stated above, the telos of our sanctification in Barth's teaching is the reconciliation of the world, which means “the sanctification of the world” [468] in our context. Barth understood that sanctification is the new creation of a faithful covenant-partner through the call to be a “witness” to the sanctification of Christ for us, but the call is not simply to be a witness but also to witness as His Mitheilige who subjectively reflects His holiness in correspondence. Therefore, our sanctification and “witnessing” are inseparable in his teleological thinking. According to the Bible, “God so loved the world” and as “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world,” Jesus Christ “died for all” and “committed the message of reconciliation” to us for the ultimate reconciliation of all creation with Himself. [469]

Mission and Sanctification

Barth therefore considered the reconciliation of the world to be of final importance, as it precedes the reconciliation of the individual and even of the covenant community in his theology of covenant and election. The final purpose of the eternal election of God is the reconciliation of the world in His Son as well as the Representative of all human beings, and God has elected His people of the covenant community to fulfil this final purpose. [470] Because they are elected to witness, he warns that it is incorrect to regard the existence of the covenant community as “accidental” or a ground for “the pride of religious self-seeking and self-sufficiency.” [471] To fulfil their divine call of active witness for the reconciliation of the world faithfully, Barth encourages them to expand their horizon to “the larger sphere of the creation of God” and develop “a solidarity” with the world, “even in its antithesis,” without simply enjoying and being satisfied with their own salvation. [472] For Barth, the covenant community is a missionary community: Mission and evangelism is the raison d'être of the covenant community as well as every individual member. So he reverses the traditional and natural order of thinking to consider individual first and then community: “Our theme is the reconciliation of the world with God in Jesus Christ, and only in this greater context the reconciliation of the individual man.” [473]

Therefore, Barth called this knowledge of mission the indispensable “presupposition” of the participatio Christi, [474] because the lack of this knowledge would inevitably lead to a misunderstanding the purpose of our calling and thus mislead our subjective sanctification. In fact, this knowledge of mission is “included” in the knowledge of Jesus Christ and His mission, which is the reconciliation of the world with God. [475] Because, as the second Adam, He was incarnated and crucified for all as the Representative and Lord of “all the men of every time and place,” Barth claims that the covenant community has to witness to “the universal action of God” happened at the cross and resurrection, without arbitrarily limiting the circle of reconciliation. [476] Indeed, a church-centered mentality would tend to inactivate the missionary action of witness because of its centripetal disposition, but a world-oriented consciousness of calling would actively cause a centrifugal movement of mission and evangelism. Barth therefore criticized the idea of covenant as “a private arrangement” between God and ourselves or a limited group of Christians on the basis that the sanctification of Christ is the execution of His Kingly office which attests His Kingship and Lordship over all men. [477] It means that the de jure sanctification has already been accomplished for the world, “effective and authoritative for all,” while the de facto sanctification takes place for “only those who are awakened to faith.” [478]

The Problem of Universalism

Barth's idea of the de jure sanctification for all is certainly in direct opposition to the doctrine of limited atonement, i.e., that Jesus died only for a limited people--only for the elect and not for the reprobate. [479] Further, Barth criticized Calvin's doctrine of double predestination in this context, because Calvin's doctrine of sanctification has no place for “a recognition of the universal relevance of the existence of the man Jesus, of the sanctification of all men as it has been achieved in Him” and therefore lacks its Christological foundation and teleological orientation towards the sanctification of all men. [480] Accordingly, he has been “labelled as a universalist,” and the charge has “some grounds.” [481] As a matter of fact, Barth maintained an ambivalent and indefinite position on the matter of universal reconciliation, leaving two possibilities “open”--a biblical prophecy of double predestination to glorification or condemnation, and a theological hope of universal reconciliation in some “unexpected” way. In two places [482] he both rejects and affirms universal reconciliation. According to Barth, “we must oppose or play down such an evil attempt and our participation in agreement” with “an apokatastasis or universal reconciliation as the goal and end of all things,” because “God does not owe eternal patience and salvation” to the persistently disobedient and rebellious men, and also it would be our arrogance to the free gift of God, even though it seems right for the sake of “theological consistency.” [483] Therefore, he clearly stated that “the church should not then preach an apokatastasis.” [484] On the other hand, however, “there is no good reason why we should not be open to this possibility,” i.e., “the supremely unexpected withdrawal of that final threat,” when we ponder positively on the unexpectedly abundant richness of the divine grace and His freedom together, with some biblical passages which imply the final reconciliation of the whole creation. [485]

To this “relative universalism,” [486] G. C. Berkouwer and Emil Brunner presented “the representative criticisms.” [487] The main point of Brunner's criticism is that Barth's “extreme Superlapsarian view” of universalism relativizes faith and leaves “no room for man to make a real decision” because “everything has already been decided beforehand.” But this does not constitute a real problem for us, because it also applies to any affirmation of election, including the doctrine of double predestination which Brunner rejects. [488] A serious charge comes from Berkouwer, who pointed out sharply that it imposes a “necessity” and a “must,” which was deduced from his theological system of grace, upon the free grace of the sovereign God and thus transgresses the boundary of revelation. [489] Certainly, as a “theologian of the Word,” Barth has no right to imagine or hope some unexpected and unrevealed change beyond the clearly revealed way of salvation sola fide, however consistent and logical it may be, since it violates the immutable faithfulness of God. Moreover, it contradicts his own principle that God transcends any human definition or “theological consistency” and therefore His eternal will may be found only in the Word of God. However, as both Berkouwer and Brunner pointed out, Barth “has not yet said his last word” on this matter, [490] and died without writing his eschatology. Therefore, though the charge of universalism is a stigmatic problem in his theology, this indefinite openness does not invalidate his theology as a whole, and particularly his idea of the sanctification of the world, if “Barth's point is to emphasize the distinction between what may be a valid theological proposition and what may be a real possibility for God.” [491]

The Universal Expansion of the Covenant Community

From Barth's teleological perspective, it is quite clear what he meant by the universal relevance of the Gospel. Whatever the ultimate telos of the divine will is, the covenant community of God has to do their best to fulfil it in this world. The so-called “Great Commission” of world mission has been given to the community of the saints, and the Lord “does not want anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance” (2Pet 3.9). Though he is convinced of unlimited atonement and therefore the de jure sanctification of all in Christ, Barth does not really believe or teach that all will be awakened to faith and sanctified de facto, as he clearly stated as follows: “Only God Himself knows the extent of this people, and its members. The invitation to belong to it is extended to all. Certainly it is not co-extensive (nicht identisch) with the human race as such.” [492] In Calvin's term, the “general” call of invitation is given to all through the outward preaching of the Word and thus “universal call,” but the “special” call is applied only to believers through the operation of the Holy Spirit. [493] But, “for as we know not who belongs to the number of the predestined or who does not belong,” Calvin quoted Augustine with complete approval, “we ought to be so minded as to wish that all men be saved.” [494] It is exactly what Barth had in mind, for he said that “it is not for him [witness] to know or to decide the result of his call,” for “the actual opening up and enlargement of that circle will always take place exactly in the area which corresponds to the eternal free will of God.” [495] Therefore, the covenant community is to be actively and faithfully engaged in the universal expansion of the covenant community to the end of the world, which is the telos of our sanctification, without making any arbitrary pre-judgment about the extent of the election, for that is God's concern. [496]

Finally, it is noteworthy that Barth's concept of the sanctification of the world was established and expanded through his personal development. According to his confession, Barth had never thought about the evangelization of the world, until he met John Mott, a leader of world mission movement, and “his universalism.” [497] To a man closed in the circle of individualism, sectarianism, and academism, this Mott-experience and “Mott-process” was a great shock and challenge to open Barth's eyes to the world and the universal relevance of Jesus Christ. Further, his experience of political struggle against Nazi imperialism opened his eyes to the political situation of the world and the problem of colonialism. [498] In the age of global secularization, Barth's discovery of the concept--“the sanctification of the world”--is very significant for the progress of world mission and world reconciliation in Jesus Christ.

So far we have discussed the structure of Barth's doctrine of sanctification, which can be viewed clearly only from a teleological perspective, as it is a teleological cycle of sanctification, consisting of three steps, i.e., the sanctification of Christ, the sanctification of the covenant community, and the sanctification of the world. Now we will proceed to the detailed study of what Barth called the “four forms” of sanctification, i.e., “discipleship, conversion, good works and the cross,” [499] which are discussed respectively in the sections 3-6 of §66.

3.3 Four Forms of Sanctification

3.3.1 The Call To Discipleship

When Barth states that there are “four forms” of our subjective sanctification, what does he mean by the word “form” (Gestalt)? In our context, it is a general term for explaining and describing how our sanctification takes place, since he suggested such forms like call, claim, demand, or direction, which consists of indication, correction, and instruction, or disturbance, limit/freedom, and lifting-up. However, he does not mean that there are several possible ways to achieve our sanctification, but all those forms should be taken together for the realization of subjective sanctification. Therefore, the four forms, i.e., “discipleship, conversion, good works, and the cross,” [500] are the four essential and indispensable aspects or steps of subjective sanctification. As all of them are concerned with individual sanctification, this whole section will be an extended discussion and detailed commentary of 3.2.3 “The Sanctification of the Covenant Community.”

To begin with the form of discipleship, rather than one of the other three, has two clear reasons. One is Barth's comprehensive definition of sanctification as “discipleship” in §66.1. [501] The other reason is because it is “the substance of the call,” and the call initiates our subjective sanctification as discussed in §66.2. [502] In the discussion of discipleship in §66.3, it is unmistakably clear that Barth depends heavily on Dietrich Bonhoeffer, for he is deeply convinced that Bonhoeffer's Nachfolge (1937) is the best work on the subject and Bonhoeffer tried to live it, even to the death. [503] In this section, we will first discuss the concept of “Following Jesus,” asking why it is “the substance of the call,” and then its two necessary steps which Barth suggests: self-denial and break with the world.

Following Jesus

The power of the call initiates our subjective sanctification, for the call has a definite content and direction that effects it. [504] It contains not only a call to depart from and break with our miserable condition of sin but also a call to a full range of positive directions. For example, the Bible teaches that we are called to freedom, love, holiness, fellowship, witness, and even suffering. [505] But Barth maintains that the call of the Holy Spirit, who is the Spirit of Jesus Himself, may be comprehensively described as a call to “nachvolgen” (follow after) Jesus, for it is a call to imitate and participate in Jesus Christ, in whom exists the whole reality of our sanctification. Besides, Barth objected basically to the traditional understanding of imitatio Christi, because it presupposes a humanistic view of Jesus as a moral “example” and therefore involves “a programme” of imitating his virtues. The New Testament, he contrasts, never uses the word “akolouthein” in the substantive form, which could support the idea of discipleship as a general concept or program for achieving it if it were used, [506] but the word is used exclusively in its verbal form, i.e., simply following Jesus. In reference to this usage, the English translation of Nachfolge as “discipleship” is problematic, because it is usually associated with some kind of special “discipleship” program and thus quite spoiled in the easy minds of contemporary pragmatic Christians. We thus prefer a simple translation--“Following Jesus.”

The call is directly and exclusively a simple call to follow Jesus, rather than a call to some ideal, virtue, or even a christological system, since none of these can issue a call to follow it. [507] Following Jesus is neither worshipping a hero nor following a great wisdom. [508] In practice, such programs, ideals, or systems of thought will inevitably conceal Jesus and replace our personal faith in Him with those impersonal ideas. Therefore, Barth strongly condemned such conceptualization or impersonalization. He emphasized that “the only possible content” of the call is the personal relationship between the Caller and the called created by the binding power of the call, and nothing else, even though it involves far-reaching effects of sanctification. [509] In fact, it is a widely open and quite risky commitment to follow Jesus, for the call is to follow Him “whithersoever He goes,” rather than to pursue one's own christological ideal regardless of Jesus' actual procession. [510] To do the latter is not to follow Jesus but to follow one's own idol, and Christianity without following Jesus is Christianity without Christ, which is “the end of discipleship.” [511] As a matter of fact, to follow Jesus without being called is impossible, because it lacks the grace and power of calling. [512] Barth's personal view of following Jesus can give a powerful directive to a genuine discipleship of personal relationship and further provide a pneumatological dynamics for following the guidance of the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of Jesus Christ.

In this context Barth develops the thesis that the call is a command, for the Caller is the Lord and the call is “a grace which commands.” [513] Accordingly, our fellowship with Him becomes a discipleship of unconditional obedience. [514] Because He claims and we surrender, His call to follow demands and enables our total commitment to Jesus the Caller. [515] Further, because we have been already ordained to follow and serve Him from the eternity, there could be “no legitimate opposition” or “no question of any presuppositions,” and it requires “no preparation” or “no qualifications.” [516] This transformation from call to command, from fellowship to discipleship could be misunderstood as a humiliation of man, but not if we recall that our sanctification is a kind of gracious normalization that heals our illusory pride to play God and restores our original status as a faithful covenant partner, and that the Caller is the Crucified for us [517] and the call signifies “the coming of grace.” [518] Therefore, to follow Jesus requires, “simply, but comprehensively,” our “true and serious and total” trust and faith in the gracious God, and “He demands faith in the form of obedience, obedience to Himself,” as faith and obedience are indissolubly united without any “interval,” “as do thunder and lightening in a thunderstorm.” [519] In short, only those who believe obey and only those who obey believe. [520] As soon as the effective call of the Holy Spirit is issued, it compels and empowers our unconditional obedience of faith for a total and exclusive commitment to Jesus.

Self-Denial

To follow Jesus is to follow Jesus exclusively, and this exclusiveness applies, first and most of all, to oneself, for it is one's ego to obstruct the very start of our following Jesus. Because every man who does not follow Jesus follow himself in fact as the subject of all his activities, the change of leader from himself to Jesus has to pass a critical moment of leadership transition. Barth therefore called it the “definite first step” in discipleship, without which it is not possible to follow Jesus. Since Jesus demands total obedience and therefore a complete break with “existing relationship of obedience and loyalty” which is primarily “covenant with ourselves [oneself],” it is necessary to “turn one's back upon oneself” and “leave oneself behind” in order to accomplish “a complete break and new beginning.” [521] To follow Jesus is to deny oneself. Barth does not mean that one should abandon social relationship or seek for either a mystical union with Jesus or a psychological denial of one's existence. Rather, to follow Jesus is a free and active participatio Christi in one's total existence, however and whatever He thinks, judges, feels, and wants. This is done when we radically and fundamentally deny our previous way of life and existence and thus start a new life to follow Jesus as the Lord and Leader of our lives, as we obediently satisfy the precondition to initiate following Jesus: “Whosoever will follow me, let him deny himself” (Mk 8.34). [522] In other words, it is self-surrender as an obedient response to His claim and demand, and one has to totally and joyfully surrender his ownership to Jesus for the sanctification of one's whole existence. [523]

However, our sinful ego is quite deceptive and disguises itself in many ways, so that we do not really deny ourselves. Therefore, Barth distinguishes self-denial from several forms of disguise. First, self-criticism is not self-denial. Rather, it is a way of strengthening one's ego through critical reflection for the sake of self-improvement. Secondly, a mental denial is not a genuine denial. In this case, it is emotional and theoretical, as one thinks, feels, believes and says that he has denied himself, though it is “a merely inward and mental movement.” [524] In fact, he is still ruled and led by his own ego. The mental game alone cannot dethrone the rebellious ego, for it is achieved only through self-surrender and the commitment in total obedience to Jesus. Thirdly, self-interpretation is not self-denial. This carries the pretence of obedience to His commands, but obedience to an arbitrary self-interpretation of the divine command is an act of self-assertion rather than self-denial which surrenders one's right of interpretation. In this case, they avoid to obey the divine command literally and instead take arbitrarily its spiritual “meaning” and practical “implication” only for one's own sake, so that they transform it even to “the very opposite.” [525] Fourthly, self-subjection is not self-denial. When we are commanded to follow Jesus, some attempt a kind of self-subjection as the last flight from self-surrender and self-denial. It is to subject oneself to the command itself rather than Jesus in order to avoid self-denial, and this form of disguise takes place in the case of legalists, who are deceived by themselves and deceive others as if they are totally committed to Jesus Himself. [526] In general, they are not following Jesus but their own ego, for they do not come the point of self-surrender and self-denial.

So Barth concluded that self-denial occurs in what Bonhoeffer called “einfältige Gehorsam” (simple obedience), for it is a self-evident proof of self-denial and one's following Jesus without any conditions or self-assertion. For “obedience is simple when we do just what we are told--nothing more, nothing less, and nothing different.” [527] Therefore, simple obedience is “literal obedience” without any self-interpretation or arbitrary modification. [528] As Barth understands it, the command of Jesus is “quite unambiguous” and requires to be obeyed “only as it is given.” [529] Also, simple obedience is “instant obedience,” without any arbitrary postponement until conditions are favourable, for the divine command creates the situation when it is given. [530] In short, when one simply obeys, he genuinely denies himself in order to follow Jesus alone, for self-denial is “a matter of doing,” [531] an act of obedience--simple, literal and instant. This act of self-denial is the first step in following Jesus, but it always has to be renewed with “a second or third or hundredth confirmation,” [532] since our sinful ego hardly dies.

Participating in the Revolution of God

However, Barth claims that self-denial is not an end in itself [533] but a preparatory step for the ultimate purpose of the call, which is our service to the Kingdom of God as His witness. The content of the witness is revealed in the call of Jesus Christ: the Gospel of the Kingdom of God is that “the coup d'état of God” [534] has been launched against the kingdoms of the world and has already been accomplished by “the Conqueror Jesus” [535] and therefore the liberation from such dictators is now taking place in order to fulfil the reconciliation of the world. All worldly powers and orders has claimed their “absolute validity,” obtruded between God and man as well as between man and his fellow men, and led the world to strive against God. [536] In fact, man has erected and worshipped these “gods” but he became finally to be dominated by them. Meantime, “the little revolutions and attacks” have been attempted by men but they could not succeed. [537] God now no longer tolerates such kingdoms of the world and “the revolution of God” [538] has already established the Kingdom of God.

Therefore, this Gospel has to be proclaimed to the whole world, and for this purpose He calls His people. In view of this wider perspective, our self-denial is the first attack and initial break with it in preparation of this “great attack,” “this great onslaught,” “the greatest, the only true and definitive break in the world and its history.” [539] Therefore, according to Barth, to follow Jesus is to participate in the Revolution of God as His witnesses and co-revolutionaries, who are to stand firm upon the revealed fact, correspond to it in their lives and acts, and attest to the coming of the Kingdom. If we are disciples who are freed from their rule and no longer believe in their eternity or divinity, he contends, we have to exercise our freedom and witness to it, so that “the world which sighs under these powers must hear and receive and rejoice that their lordship is broken.” [540] Our attitude to those worldly forces could not be same, but the difference has to be communicated in word and deed, as we are called to be a witness of the Kingdom. Therefore, “a quiet participant” in His Kingdom is “quite useless” as a witness, [541] as Jesus calls His people to witness for the fulfilment of the reconciliation of the world.

A disciple of Jesus assumes “public responsibility,” [542] without which his own salvation itself is not assured. [543] For that reason he has to take the serious step of self-denial and self-surrender, for what is involved here is the inevitable risk of public disturbance and all the painful consequences of suffering and persecution. [544] Nevertheless, he has to witness to the public, for it is the only way to fulfil the reconciliation of the world, for which he is called. However, Barth does not encourage any unnecessary courage in this act of public witness. The militia Christi, which this public participation in the Kingdom of God inevitably involves, does not require any hostility, violence, or crusade against our fellow men, to whom we are called to liberate rather than to attack. We may suffer, but we may not inflict any suffering on them. The battle has already been won, and we “fight only by indicating” the coming of the Conqueror and His Kingdom. [545] Therefore, our task is a “friendly and happy one,” [546] even though it is not easy or peaceful.

As we are called not only as a witness but also as a Mitheilige and both are inseparable in the unity of the divine call, our public witness has to show “externally and visibly” our own break with worldly attachments. [547] What are those attachments then with which we have to break today? In this context Barth deals with the problem of the divine command in its common and particular aspects. Because he holds that the divine command is personal and specific, unlike all other commands that are commanded by the command itself, [548] Barth contends that Jesus does not command “the same thing of everyone, or even of the same man in every time and situation.” [549] The command of Jesus consists of “the common element” that is “normative for all His disciples in every age and situation” and its “particular penetration” to a particular man in a particular situation. [550] Every command of Jesus given to the particular men in the New Testament may not be regarded as His direct and personal command to us living in a very different situation, since the living Jesus is not “confined” to His previous encounters with some people in New Testament times. [551] Barth suggests as a principle that the concrete and personal command of the living Jesus, who acts through the Holy Spirit, can be heard from the Scripture, for it has a permanent binding authority as mandatum evangelium, not merely consilium evangelium. But it has to do with one's particular context, as “the call of Jesus will be along the lines of the encounter between the kingdom of God and the kingdoms of the world.” [552] Therefore, the personal call and command to each of us will differ according to our different situations, even though we share some common commands due to our common context.

In the context of the contemporary West, Barth pointed to six common worldly forces, with which we are commanded to break as “concrete forms of discipleship.” [553] First, Jesus demands a break with mammonism, materialism, and possessiveness. Secondly, Jesus demands a break with social competition for honour and fame. Thirdly, Jesus demands a break with the fear or recognition of force and violence. Fourthly, Jesus demands a break with communal imprisonment, especially that of the absoluteness of family. Fifthly, Jesus demands a break with the absolute nomos of religion, piety, and morality. Sixthly, Jesus demands a break with the cultural rejection of the cross and suffering. [554] The western context has now changed considerately and therefore Barth might now switch the order and add some others, though all of them may still apply. In concluding this section, Barth states that the grace of His call becomes “even more costly” in this age of secularization, and the freedom of sanctification is “greater” than ever. [555]

3.3.2 The Awakening To Conversion

The call of Jesus commands us to follow Him and demands that we deny ourselves and break with worldly forces in order to participate actively and totally in the Kingdom of God. According to Barth, it is the first aspect of sanctification, for the effective call initiates our subjective sanctification. However, while it explains the nature and content of the call, it does not explain the process of how it is realized in our lives. Therefore, he now deals with the subject of conversion, “the inward movement” [556] of “a real happening,” [557] as the second aspect of sanctification.

What is the “source” [558] or cause of the spiritual movement toward sanctification? Barth found a biblical image of the transition from no movement to movement or downward to upward movement in that of “awakening” from the “sleep of death.” [559] But this “sleep of covenant-breaking humanity” is so deep that it cannot be awakened “except in the power of the mystery and miracle of God.” [560] So Barth understood the source of lifting-up to be the divine act of awakening, which is the calling of the Holy Spirit. For the powerful call of the Holy Spirit awakens a sleeping sinner and commands him to follow Jesus. The spiritually dead sinner then becomes alive and lift himself up toward his Lord, as he halts a lifeless falling-down and begins a “counter-movement” of sanctification. This two-fold movement is called “conversion.”

Conversion of the Whole Man

“Conversion” (Umkehr) is not merely “a vertical standing up,” but a “turning round and going in the opposite direction,” and therefore it is fundamentally different from a relative change like improvement or reformation. [561] In short, it is a “Lebenserneuerung (renewal of life)”--“the new life of a new man.” [562] And, this radical turn is made possible by an “axis,” which Barth identifies as the revealed truth that “God is for him and therefore that he is for God.” [563] This means that the revelation given with the call causes a turning movement of conversion to God.

Also, Barth understands conversio not simply as the moment of turning itself, but a whole sequence of turning movements, which includes regeneratio and renovatio. For the awakening call quickens a spiritually dead soul to be alive and make some movement, conversion and regeneration are practically inseparable. Moreover, Barth supplied a convincing biblical argument from the Old Testament that the prophetic call for Israel's return to God was made in the context of covenant, i.e., in the “developments of promise and summons” to the new covenant of the new creation of the new man. [564] By including regeneration within conversion, he follows the traditional understanding of conversion which includes both conversio activa and conversio passiva, i.e., regeneratio. [565] He also included renovation, for conversion consists of two indissoluble moments of “both to halt and to proceed,” negative and positive renovation. [566] As a whole, Barth's comprehensive concept of conversio begins from regeneratio, proceeds with poenitentia, and ends with renovatio. It is a quite broad definition, but this broadness has some merit, because all those are the inseparable moments of one occurrence. Further, he supported the concept of conversio continua: we are “at the very heart of the movement” of conversion “in the process,” not finished once for all. [567] We are in the constant need of “reawakening,” though the “first” awakening gives “a jolt” and “shock” to initiate the movement of conversion. [568]

Furthermore, Barth suggested “the conversion of the whole man,” for they could be “no neutral zones which are unaffected” by this total turn of conversion, and he listed four important dimensions of its totality. [569] First, conversion affects not only his relationship with God, but also his human relationship with his fellows in the community and society. [570] Secondly, conversion is not limited to some spheres of life, but extends to one's whole disposition and action, so that his thinking and emotion and will are fundamentally re-oriented. [571] Thirdly, conversion compels one to accept “öffentliche Antwortlichkeit” (public responsibility) in addition to private responsibility. God, as the origin and goal of conversion, automatically includes the concerns of His will and His Kingdom and therefore excludes an “egocentric Christianity,” in which one's private conversion is “an end in itself.” [572] Moreover, his conversion cannot be private, as he is thereby admitted to the communio sanctorum. [573] Fourthly, conversion is neither limited to a period of life nor interrupted, but extended over one's whole life as a “whole life-movement” “with increasing definiteness” and “growing sincerity, depth and precision.” [574] Even though God initiates and lead it, He co-operates with man as “His organ and instrument” in this movement of conversion and it takes place “on the earthly and creaturely level” here and now. Therefore, our conversion necessarily and inevitably involves a historical dimension as well as social interaction. [575]

The Old Man and the New Man

How does conversion affect the whole man? Barth now deals with the problem of relationship between the old man and the new man which is created by the divine act of conversion, particulary renovation, which involves the mortification of the old man, renovatio negativa, and the vivification of the new man, renovatio positiva. This “twofold determination” necessarily causes a kind of inner “warfare,” “quarrel,” or “Auseinandersetzung,” which is one of Barth favourite terms. [576] This means that the existing old man and the newly created new man stand opposite each other and are involved with a kind of debate over the identity problem. It is certainly a biblical idea that there is a tension and struggle between the old man and the new man, but the appropriateness of the term in this context is doubtful, because it implicitly promotes a psychological and existentialistic understanding of the inner struggle at the expense of its spiritual and historical dimension. [577] Rather, it is a spiritual warfare over the whole range, as he suggested above. In fact, our life-long struggle between the old man and the new man is not merely a matter of talk or mental projection.

As he pointed out, “conversion is the transition,” [578] with a definite order and direction from a terminus a quo to a terminus ad quem, not a circling movement or balanced co-existence. [579] Through the power of divine determination, the only possible destination is “the passing and death and definitive end and destruction of the one in favour of the development and life and exclusive, uncompromised and inviolable existence of the other.” [580] However, Barth understood the spiritual warfare to be between “two total men” rather than “two parts” of a man, for the latter view may not recognize the need for justification and forgiveness, as the superiores partes of the new man will always be victorious over the inferior old man. [581] But the same reasoning would apply also to the former view, since the determined destination toward the side of new man will inevitably break the balance of power and then the stronger will prevail, whether we call it “man” or “part.” Nevertheless, we are in need of forgiveness, not because the new man is weaker, but because God is determined to forgive us in Jesus Christ. What really matters is the positive destination and teleological hope for the victory of the new man.

Therefore, Barth criticized Calvin and Kohlbrügge for their negative overemphasis of the mortificatio of the old man at the expense of the vivificatio of the new man, and thus weakened the teleology of conversion, though it has to be stressed that “vivificatio is the meaning and intention of mortificatio.” [582] As a result, the doctrine of conversion became too stern and negative to promote “defeatism.” [583] It is quite true of the Reformed tradition, which has lacked the dynamism of a conversion movement towards the victory of the new man and has tended to be legalistic and static. In his analysis, [584] such a negative tendency developed “contrary to Calvin's true intention,” [585] because Christians in the Reformed tradition are overwhelmed before the unattainable standard of the divine holiness and fail to concentrate on “the basis and origin of conversion”--Jesus Christ in whom we are converted. [586] Though our mortificatio and vivificatio do not take place magically or automatically but are proceeded by the exercise of our God-given freedom, God initiates the movement of conversion through the power of the “axis,” i.e., the revelation of the Gospel. [587] An impersonal law or principle in the Scripture cannot lead a man to conversion, [588] but Jesus Christ alone is the origin and goal of our conversion and the only basis for its “unassailable objectivity.” [589] Therefore, he concludes his discussion about the second form of sanctification, i.e., conversion, with a plea for the Calvin's formula of participatio Christi as “the ultimate foundation of his whole doctrine of sanctification,” [590] for our conversion is our confession of His conversion for us. [591]

3.3.3 The Praise of Works

Because sanctification applies to the whole man, Barth now deals with its outward aspect as the third form of sanctification, in addition to its inward movement of conversion. Contrary to the overwhelming suspicion that Barth denies actual and visible sanctification, his starting-point is the definite emphasis that there are “good works.” [592] To live is to work, and the sequence of one's works consists of his “life” and “history.” [593] Barth defines work comprehensively as all human acts, including even “the things we refrain from doing.” [594] But is it possible to divide them into good works and bad works? Barth affirms this absolutely, for “Scripture so blatantly counts on the existence of good works,” [595] as it teaches the eschatological distinction of the good works from the bad in “the divine judgment,” the divine command and the promise of “reward” for the good works, [596] and the “real alteration” in our sanctification. [597] Moreover, Barth found a “praise of works” in a twofold way that God praises the works of men and their works praise God. On this basis he made a preliminary definition of good works as those which God would praise and therefore in turn would praise God, [598] since “praise” means “affirmation, acknowledgment, approval and applause.” [599]

However, Protestantism has found a positive discussion of “good work” to be offensive because of its distinctive doctrine of justification sola fide, excluding any merit of human works. This Reformation principle applies not only to justification but also to sanctification, for both are commonly grounded upon the doctrine of the reconciliation in Jesus Christ sola gratia and therefore our subjective appropriation sola fide. Accordingly, Barth understands that “certain delimitations” [600] are necessary for the discussion of good works even in the context of sanctification. Just as works have no power to justify us, they have no power to sanctify us, for the works done for the purpose of earning a merit and claiming as his own achievement as such disqualify themselves as “bad works,” since they are essentially the works of “pride.” Because the norm of distinction is not an external law of morality but the judgment of God Himself and before His holiness no human works as such can be claimed as good, our works are good only when they are done by faith in His grace. In fact, our sola fide justification is now “behind us” as “the frontier” which we have already crossed. [601] Therefore, he emphasized that the Reformation

principle is a sure ground for the good works of faith, not an offensive doctrine to discourage or confuse our obedience to His command to do good works which praise God and thus be praised by Him. [602]

Radical Claimlessness

What is the work that praises God and is praised by Him? It is “primarily and properly” the work of God Himself, as He approves His own works and they praise Him. [603] So Barth set the frame of discussion exclusively in the context of the divine work, which is “the norm and source of all goodness.” [604] Any good work on the part of man is possible “only in relation to this good work of God.” [605] And the revealed works of God take place primarily in His relationship with man--“the covenant of grace” as “the heart and center of God's work” [606] and “the proper work of God to which all His other works are subordinate.” [607] Because they are the whole covenant history of election, creation, [608] reconciliation, and redemption, the works of God necessarily involve the works of man as His covenant-partner in this world as well as the “aim and goal” of His works. [609]

What is left for man to do with respect to the covenant, however, if God works out and accomplishes the covenant history all by Himself, including atonement for the unfaithful covenant partner? Barth recognizes that there is one “special form” [610] of work that even sinful man can contribute to the covenant, in which God graciously calls our active participation. It is a call to witness and proclaim the wonderful and good works of God in this world. By hearing and obeying the call man truly takes “a real share” [611] in the covenant history, since he is called as “a co-worker (sunergos) of God.” [612] Barth emphasized that we participate in it “only as its witnesses” and therefore our echoing “correspondence” is demanded only in this work of witnessing “quite irrespective” of our sinfulness. [613] It seems limited and one-sided, but his concept of witnessing is quite comprehensive, including our whole life in word and deed. Because man is “elected and called and empowered to do good works,” there can be “no excuse” for not witnessing. [614] No claim can be made for these works either, because this call is given as “God's free gift” [615] and this “special form” of work is not for earning or achieving something for himself but simply declaring and confessing his sinfulness and God's gracious work of salvation. [616] Therefore, he suggested that the covenant community has to engage in the good works of witness calmly and resolutely as well as cheerfully and confidently. [617] Barth called this attitude a “radical claimlessness” (gründliche Anspruchslosigkeit). [618] Their work will then be good, as it is the “work of faith” (ergon pistews, 2Thess 1.11) as well as the “fruit of conversion” (karpon tes metanoias, Mt 3.8). [619]

Universal Integration

Our good works as participatio Christi have not only “a special form” of witnessing but also “a particular function” [620] in the covenant history. When a man is called to be “a participant in the work of God,” [621] he is commissioned to serve it in his own particular place and time. Barth means that every member of the covenant community has a distinct, unique, and particular commission in the whole history of the one and the same covenant, as “at his own place and time he is absolutely indispensable and responsible for the whole of its history.” [622] For the successful and effective service of “a part” to “the whole,” Barth insists, the process of “Sicheinfügen” (integration) [623] of one's work into the “one mighty declaration” of the great cloud of witnesses as portrayed in Heb 11 is indispensable. [624]

It is possible only when one recognizes that he is “a brother among brethren” who received their own particular commissions from the same God for the fulfilment of the same covenant. When he understands and interprets his own particular commission in the context of their commissions in other times and places, he will be able to witness in harmony with the other witnesses, avoiding the easily confused direction of “human tradition or his own heart or head,” or “of a collective or individual deamons.” [625] Barth therefore limited one's particularity “only in his togetherness with them, as one of the fellowship of the saints.” [626] As a whole cannot exist without its parts, he argued that a denial of “man's sanctification that already takes place here and now” in his participation in the covenant history is to deny the whole divine work of atonement and vice versa. [627] It involves necessarily a denial of God the Reconciler, as Jesus Christ is the Mitte of the covenant history. So Barth concluded that the witnesses will be proper and effective only when they are focused on Jesus Christ, who is “the end (telos) of the work of God.” [628] In this sense, Barth's exposition of good works is a consistent application of Calvin's and his own grand motif “participatio Christi” to the doctrine of sanctification.

3.3.4 The Dignity of the Cross

Cross-bearing may be the least preached and practised aspect of sanctification in our materially affluent society today, though it is repeatedly emphasized as the most decisive and imperative requirement for following Jesus in the Scripture. Therefore, Barth regards a passing discussion of the cross-bearing insufficient and devotes a full section (§66.6) to a special and separate treatment of this crucial subject. [629]

As a continued and separate discussion of Nachfolge Jesu (§66.3), it reflects the crisis-consciousness of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who cried out that the Western Christianity lost the Gospel of the Cross [630] despite the fact that suffering is “the badge of true discipleship.” [631] Bonhoeffer maintained that the decisive difference of Christianity from man-made religions is the recognition of God's suffering. [632] The concept of “the suffering God,” in place of the traditional concept of “the impassable God,” represents a new theological development in post-war German theology. Both Barth and Bonhoeffer contributed to the resurgence of Theopaschitism. According to A. van Egmond, it was inconceivable to their post-war consciousness that God does not feel any pain, suffering, or sympathy with the human suffering in His loving man. [633] So they related the suffering of man to the suffering of God, since this relation was “the original motive of Theopaschitism.” [634] For Barth who maintains consistently that our sanctification is a participatio in the sanctification of Christ, participation in His cross and suffering is indispensable to our sanctification. Therefore, Barth uses the Christological term “cross” rather than a general term “suffering” to describe “Christian” suffering. [635]

His Cross and Our Cross

When he states that “Without the cross of Christ the Master there is no cross of the disciples, Christians,” Barth recognizes “a material and historical connexion” between them. [636] His cross is the origin, basis, and goal of ours, because it authenticates and signifies ours in the Heilsgeschichte. As the cross is the end of his humiliation as well as the beginning of exaltation, it is the event for both justification and sanctification. In our context, however, Barth illuminates the cross as the initiation of the movement of exaltation, elevation, and sanctification. Both His cross and ours are related to sanctification, as His cross initiated the exaltation, which is the sanctification of Christ, and our cross is also an indispensable requirement for our sanctification in the scheme of participatio Christi. Because the sanctification of Christ was not for Himself but for us, Barth could say that “He bore and suffered His cross that they are sanctified.” As a whole, the cross is “integral” to the event of sanctification and our cross in particular is “essential” to the “Lebensbewegung” (life-movement) of our subjective sanctification in this world. [637] Therefore, to deny or escape the tolerantia crucis (Calvin) disqualifies and disables our sanctification and automatically place us “outside the movement.” [638] Further, His cross is the goal of ours, as our cross originates from His and is therefore “an awakening call and summons to look to Him” in following the steps of His cross. [639]

So there is “a great and strong and obvious similarity” between His cross and ours. [640] The cross is “the most concrete form of the fellowship (Gemeinschaft) between Christ and the Christians,” as it is the embodiment of both humiliation and exaltation, dishonour and honour, shame and dignity, or suffering and glory. Cross-bearing is a way to be rejected by the world as “disciples of the Rejected and Crucified,” while it is also a way to “distinction, glory and dignity” as participants in the exaltation and glorification of Christ. [641] Barth explained that “Christians are distinguished and honoured” simply by the fact that they are specially marked and elected by God as “a tree for felling” [642] to be used for a distinguished purpose. But it is honourable and glorious, for they are called to participate in the cross of Christ, whatever it involves. Further, he understood the cross as the form of koinonia between Christ and Christians in the sense that the Father uses the same rule for both His Son and sons in teaching obedience. To learn obedience in the same school of the Father under the same rule and discipline must be significant in the formation of common personality. Christ subjected Himself to this discipline for our sake, and it is applied also to us, as “the Father deals with all His children according to this rule.” [643]

However, Barth emphasizes that there is “great dissimilarity” [644] between His cross and ours, for similarity is not identity. [645] It is extremely clear that “The cross of Jesus is His own cross, carried and suffered for many, but by Him alone.” [646] In no way, we can claim that our cross make “even the tiniest contributions to the reconciliation of the world with God,” for we do not suffer like Him even to be rejected by God and most of all our suffering is not innocent like His. [647] As His exaltation is “not identical” with our elevation, so His cross is fundamentally different from ours. [648] As Barth clearly states, we “follow after” His cross, not “accompany” or “precede” His. [649] Our cross is to follow His cross “in correspondence to it; with the similarity proper to a disciple following His Master; but not in any sense in likeness, let alone identity.” [650] After all, our cross is “not a re-enactment of His crucifixion.” [651] Therefore, Barth strongly condemns “the ancient mystical notion” that we bear His cross [652] and insists that the biblical passages which seem to affirm the Christians' bearing of His cross actually means “their suffering, their cross, their death,” when they are interpreted by careful and precise exegesis. [653] Though our cross is often for others, it is true “only with serious qualifications.” [654] So Barth concludes that His cross and ours are genuinely connected but the connection is “only an indirect connexion” [655] which involves similarities as well as dissimilarities.

Cross and Sanctification

The cross is not only indispensable but also inevitable to our sanctification, because it is fulfilled in the coming of the cross. [656] Whether he wants or not, “it will come unasked and unsought,” for it is graciously predestined that “his cross inter-crosses his Christian life.” [657] As we have discussed above, Barth connected His cross and ours for the sake of our sanctification. It is only in this context that we may proceed to the further discussion of how the Christian cross-bearing can help to achieve “the fulfilment of his sanctification (die Vollendung seiner Heiligung),” [658] for it will avoid “dubious moralising” [659] of sanctification, which is quite prevalent in the modern Christianity. It can be effectively avoided, for cross-bearing always recalls the cross of Jesus Christ for us so that we can concentrate on participation in the sanctification of Christ and further continually reorient our egotistic sanctification for self-improvement to following Jesus for the sake of the Kingdom of God. Therefore, His cross has to be the “Ausgangspunkt” for our cross-bearing. [660]

How can cross-bearing help in our subjective sanctification? Barth is certain that it is “serviceable” and “helpful” to sanctification [661] and suggested four points of its indispensability and effectiveness: humility, punishment, discipline, and verification. First, the cross keeps us to be humble and not to be proud of ourselves. Without the cross and suffering, man is easily enslaved and develop “a proud confidence, not in God, but in his own Christianity” and “in his own feelings and thought and acts.” This will jeopardize everything in his sanctification, [662] for pride is the greatest sin of all, which disqualifies all his externally good works. When the cross comes, it reminds him of the reality that he is only a limited, insignificant and fragile being after all and thus summons him to seek his sanctification extra se, in Jesus Christ, as its “unshakable foundation,” both overcoming and preventing pride. [663] Further, it humiliates and breaks human feeling or recognition of achievements in “sanctification,” as it teaches “even officers of the highest rank to begin again at the beginning as privates.” [664]

Secondly, the cross makes us accept “punishment” and be convinced of the personal guidance of the Father in our sanctification. As Jesus Christ has borne “the great punishment” for us, it is “inevitable” in following Jesus to bear “little punishment,” which is “the rod of His fatherly love.” [665] It is often “only the work of an alien evil or cosmic destiny” but even such a punishment is indirectly related to the divine punishment of the sinful world and reminds us of “the great punishment” which Jesus bore for our sake. [666] Therefore, whether it is a natural or special punishment, it renews our “gratitude” to His cross-bearing and being punished for us and gives “the fresh impulse and seriousness” to the movement of conversion and sanctification. [667] In fact, our punishment cannot be a genuine punishment because Jesus was punished fully for our sake and therefore our “little punishment” is a sign of God's gracious and loving care for the fulfilment of our subjective sanctification.

Thirdly, the cross disciplines us powerfully and strengthens our faith and obedience and love. [668] Without the cross and suffering, man gradually falls into the fatal misunderstanding that “the impulsion of the Holy Spirit” is “the impulsion of his own spirit.” This inevitably causes “a spiritual roving and wandering and marauding and even plundering,” without any awareness of this misorientation. [669] When the cross comes, it disillusions him so that he can see himself clearly, wonder at his spiritual wandering, and proceed in his movement of sanctification with a renewed obedience and clear decisiveness to follow the direction of the Holy Spirit, not his own spirit. Barth called it an “Ultimatum,” [670] for it is a kind of last warning against disobedience, the ignorance of which will result in punishment. When it is appreciated and he returns to the right track, he will grow as a result of this spiritual “Krisis.” [671]

Fourthly, the cross provides an opportunity to verify, purify, intensify, and deepen the good works of sanctification. [672] Without the cross and suffering, man is naturally protective of his own works as genuine and superior, for they have not yet been tested and proved as good. When the cross comes, our works will be tested in “the fiery glow” and it will expose their hidden motives and intentions as well as their real process and achievements. Through this process of verification, our works and motives will be purified and therefore our works of sanctification will be made “better and greater.” [673] But Barth pointed out that these valuable opportunities are “often missed” [674] by many Christians, because they do not appreciate the true meaning of the cross. As he understands it, the cross comes in several different ways, i.e., humiliation, punishment, warning, and verification. So Christian discernment is demanded in order to appreciate properly and respond to the cross which God imposes on us for our sanctification.

The Meaning of the Cross

Barth inquires about the meaning of the cross, for in the New Testament the cross primarily means “persecution” but this meaning has significantly decreased in our time due to the universal recognition of the freedom of religion. [675] In the above discussion he dealt with the positive forms of the cross `from above' for the progress of our sanctification, but there are its negative forms `from below' as well. So Barth now deals with three negative forms of the cross: persecution, affliction, and temptation.

First, the cross means persecution which is still powerfully at work, even though it is decreased externally. External persecution of the Christians still exists in the countries which actually prohibit or discourage Christianity in spite of their constitutional recognition of the freedom of religion. Further, the social persecution of the Christians by means of cynicism, isolation, or rejection is prevalent in the whole world. Barth recognizes the existence of “isolation” and “restriction,” “mistrust and repudiation,” “suspicion and scorn, and even sometimes open indignation” even in “the supposedly Christian world” of the West. [676] According to the New Testament, such persecution and hate of the Christians by the world is natural and inevitable because they do not belong to the world, “however great may be the solidarity which Christians feel and practise in relation to the world.” [677] Barth is quite pessimistic, when he says that the Christians “will seldom find themselves in a majority” and “certainly they will never swim with the stream.” [678]

Secondly, the cross means natural afflictions of the world. In Barth's view, the New Testament does not restrict the cross to persecution but includes the sufferings of creation as a whole as implied in Rom. 8.19f. They are sufferings which afflict us simply because we live in this condemned world of suffering, even though they have “a painful connexion” [679] with our sin. While Bonhoeffer criticized the modern confusion of ordinary suffering with Christian suffering, [680] Barth is rather inclusive, for he found “its hidden divine basis” which is “infinitely outstanding and moving” only in “the whimper of a sick child” [681] and its hidden divine teaching of humility “only in an ordinary toothache.” [682] Though suffering per se has no meaning, it acquires profound meaning when its divine basis is appreciated. So he included within the category of the cross “the afflictions of creaturely life and being” such as:

“misfortunes, accidents, sickness and age; parting from those most dearly loved; disruption and even hostility in respect of the most important human relations and communications; anxiety concerning one's own bread, or what is regarded as such; intentional or unintentional humiliations and slights which have to be accepted from those immediately around; the inability freely to develop one's life and talents; the sense of a lack of worthwhileness in respect of particular tasks; participation in the general adversities of the age which none can escape; and finally the dying which awaits us all at the end.” [683]

Barth included these natural afflictions on the ground that Jesus Himself was “a suffering creature” in this suffering world. Therefore, he insisted that we are honoured and dignified in fellowship with Him by sharing these creaturely afflictions. But he added that genuine fellowship in this respect would be achieved when we not only suffer but also “command” all the human sufferings as He did.

Thirdly, the cross means temptation from which we suffer simply because we are still in the flesh. [684] Barth concentrated his discussion particularly on the temptation of “doubts.” He regarded “intellectual or theoretical doubts” as “the most harmless form of the cross” for they “can be answered in an ordinary induction by correct study and reflection.” [685] It is “practical doubt” that he called “the bitterest form of the cross,” [686] because it is the most invincible and prevalent form of temptation in modern Christianity. He described a Christian under the temptation of practical doubts as follows:

He may accept and repeat the creed. But does he really believe, at bottom, in the presence and action of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit in his own life? Has he really experienced His grace? Doe he know it? Can he live in and by it? Has it really been addressed to him? Can this really be the case when in the innermost place where as a Christian he would be satisfied with even a little he is so empty and dry, so helpless in his attempt to seize and exploit the help which he knows is there, so unable to pray a prayer which is worthy of the One to whom he prays, and certain to be heard by Him? Is he not always a fool before God, an unprofitable servant? Has not God long since removed His face from him--if it ever lighted on him at all? Would he not do better to be something other than a Christian? [687]

Practical doubt is not usually regarded as a form of the cross, but Barth recognized it as such for the reason that it is natural to be tempted. He further insisted that even Jesus was tempted to such doubt when He asked to the Father, “Why hast thou forsaken me?” [688] Therefore, Barth found it “comforting” that practical doubts could be seen in terms of “the deepest fellowship with Him.” [689] But Barth confused temptation per se with sin, which is committed by the failure to reject temptation. Temptation is an act of the evil spirit, while the sin of doubt is an act of man himself. So temptation may be regarded as suffering and even as the cross for us, but doubts themselves may not regarded as cross-bearing.

Barth concludes the discussion with “two observations” that emphatically criticize ascetic cross-bearing: (1) The cross is not something which we desire, seek, or create but it is simply given extra nos. Barth strongly states that “self-sought suffering” has nothing with our participatio Christi and therefore our sanctification, because it is to follow Jesus humbly, not suffering for the sake of suffering. [690] This is a criticism of the mystical and masochistic desire of painful experience. Even though our cross may include our dying because all parts of us are His possession, it is not proper for Christian to be “a lover of death” because life is “a gift of God” and we are responsible for its preservation. [691] The affirmation of life is the will of God and therefore this attitude has to be kept even in dying, whether it is natural or sacrificial, for it is impossible to genuinely negate life without its affirmation. [692] Our cross is a `passion' that we simply receive passively, but we accept and bear it actively to fulfil His will hidden in this cross. So Barth is concerned only with our active decision to accept and not to reject it, i.e.,avoid, refuse craftily, or give it up. [693] (2) Cross-bearing is “not an end in itself,” for its ultimate telos and goal is the sanctification of the world. [694] The cross is inevitable and indispensable for our obedience to the divine call to witness the Gospel to the world. Further, the cross has its temporal limit, as it is provisional in the gracious providence of God. As His cross ceased at the point of resurrection, so our cross will cease at the same point. The cross is the grace of God who sets a definite limit to it and gives hope for glorious future. So Barth recognized “a foretaste of joy” to be enjoyed “in the intermediate time of waiting, in the time of sanctification, and therefore in the time of the cross.” [695]

For Barth, the primary reason why the cross is “indispensable” for our sanctification is that “it marks the limit of sanctification.” [696] Beyond the limit of the cross, there are glorious things like “the second coming of Jesus Christ, the resurrection of the flesh and the last judgment.” [697] Without the cross, like overprotected children, we cannot reach the limit and beyond in our real experience and burning hope. The second reason is even more significant for a right movement toward sanctification: the cross is a kind of “barometer” that shows whether we are proceeding in a right or wrong direction with respect to sanctification. Barth thus criticized Kohlbrugge for not giving “any prominent position or role” to the cross. [698]

Among the four forms of sanctification that we have so far discussed, the form of the cross is the most distinctive mark of Barth's doctrine of sanctification. The first three forms deal with some common elements, i.e., calling, conversion, and good works, though he understood them in his own way, but as an indispensable element of the doctrine of sanctification the cross is rarely or only superficially treated in discussions of sanctification. In traditional dogmatics, the “means of sanctification” is discussed extensively: Scripture-reading, prayer, sacraments and the like. Barth mentioned those here and there, but he suggests emphatically that the cross is the best means of sanctification by adding a distinct section on this subject. Of course it reflects Dietrich Bonhoeffer. But Barth uses Bonhoeffer's discussions of the cross critically and selectively. In fact, Barth developed his own view of sanctification earlier than Bonhoeffer, and the event of the cross was crucially emphasized in the sanctification of Christ, which is our objective sanctification. Since Barth recognized our subjective sanctification in the later 1920's, he gradually shifted to the emphasis on this subjective side especially when he passed through the German church struggle in his active involvement. This final version of his doctrine of sanctification in §66 deals almost exclusively with our subjective sanctification within the consistent scheme of participatio Christi. Whether he deals with traditional subjects or Bonhoeffer's, all those materials are subjected to this principle and reformulated according to it. As it is our active and positive participation, Barth here clearly demonstrates his departure from his early doctrine of sanctification which was quite passive and negative in the reaction to the moralistic Liberalism and Pietism which were, in his view, pursuing self-sanctification practically apart from the sanctification of Christ for us.

3.4 The Effects of Sanctification

So far, we have discussed Barth's doctrine of sanctification according to his order of presentation. First, we attempted to place the doctrine of sanctification within the total structure of his doctrine of reconciliation (3.1.1) and this required discussion of the relationships between vocation and sanctification (3.1.2) and between justification and sanctification (3.1.3), since his Versöhnungslehre consists of those three doctrines. For this introduction §64.1 (“The Second Problem of the Doctrine of Reconciliation”) and §66.1 (“Justification and Sanctification”) were studied with reference to IV/1 and IV/3. §66.1 has been treated here as the only exception to our principle of following Barth's order, because it would be better to discuss the relationship between justification and sanctification in the context of a general introduction to the doctrine of reconciliation. This was followed by two preliminary and indispensable discussions on sanctification--its Christological foundation (3.1.4) and hamartiological presupposition (3.1.5), which Barth treated in §64 and §65 respectively. This in turn led to the main text of our study--§66 “The Sanctification of Man.” The structure of Barth's doctrine of sanctification (3.2) was analyzed first by the study of §66.2, because it was regarded as the key to the whole doctrine. Then we have discussed four forms of sanctification (3.3) as presented in §66.3-6.

We are now in the final part of IV/2 where Barth discusses the effects of sanctification: “we are now looking especially at what is effected, and therefore actual, in this divine work” (was in diesem Gotteswerk gewirkt und also wirklich wird). [699] In fact, he deals with what are usually treated under ecclesiology and Christian virtues in §67 and §68. It is usual in dogmatics to use the term “effect” in reference to soteriology, which deals with applicatio salutis through which the objective reconciliation accomplished by Jesus Christ becomes effective. But Barth presented soteriology already in §66 and the doctrine of the church or virtue is not usually categorized as the “effect” of sanctification. What then does he mean by the term “effect” (Wirkung)? When he distinguishes §66 from §67-68 as “objektiver Zueignung (objective ascription)” from “subjektiver Aneignung (subjective appropriation),” [700] or “objektive Tragweite (objective reach)” from “subjektive Realisierung und Aufnahme (subjective apprehension and reception),” [701] what he means by “effect” is not simply the objective offer or scope in absracto but its concrete realization through reception and appropriation de facto. When God sanctifies His people, the concrete effect of sanctification must be the existence of the community of the sanctified, the communio sanctorum--the Christian community in the world. Therefore, (a part of) ecclesiology is treated as the final part of the doctrine of sanctification. As the final discussion of sanctification, Barth now deals with its concrete effect on the church and its individual member on the basis of his discussion of sanctification per se in §66. As we shall see, his view of the sanctification of the church in §67 is quite illuminating and illustrative with respect to the effects of sanctification and his treatise on love in §68 is an excellent and inspirational conclusion to the doctrine of sanctification, as love is the primary effect of sanctification.

Barth notes a significant change here in the transition from the objective to subjective sanctification. The Sanctifier, the Subject of sanctification, changes from “from the second to the third article,” [702] i.e., from Jesus Christ to the Holy Spirit. Now the Holy Spirit is “the center of our attention” [703] as “the principle of sanctification.” [704] Because the objective sanctification of Jesus Christ cannot be “wirklich” or “de facto” to human perception, the Holy Spirit works out its “subjective realization” for human experience and action. [705] As Jesus Christ accomplished sanctification as His work, subjective sanctification can not be an independent operation of the Holy Spirit. Rather, it is an operation of Jesus Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit. But the actual Subject of subjective sanctification is doubtlessly the Holy Spirit who executes the operation instead of and in the name of Christ, as the Spirit is present in the world as “the authentic and effective self-attestation of the risen and living Lord Jesus.” [706] Because Christ is now “seated at the right hand of God the Father,” He is “separated from it by an abyss which cannot be bridged” and “remote from earthly history and the community which exists in it.” [707] Therefore, Barth called it Jesus' “operation at a distance” or “remote operation” through the Holy Spirit. [708]

Because Barth explains the effects of sanctification in two categories, we will deal first with the sanctification of the church and then with that of the individual Christian. This order is quite the reverse of the usual treatment, but he insists that community has to be considered first and then the individual member of the community, because “the individual man does not become a Christian, and live as such, in a vacuum, but in a definite context, i.e., in and with the upbuilding of the Christian community.” [709]

3.4.1 The Sanctification of the Church

Barth's ecclesiology is divided into three parts due to his structuring principle of the Versöhnungslehre, because he understands the church as the effect of reconciliation. The nature of the church is treated in §62, its task and ministry in §72, while he deals with the growth and preservation of the church here in §67. The complete treatment of his ecclesiology [710] would neither be necessary nor possible in our context and therefore we will limit our discussion to the problem of secularization and the sanctification of the church as the main question of §67 in view of our contemporary question of the growth and decline of the church.

Barth begins with the statement that the Holy Spirit builds up the Christian community in the world. The “upbuilding the Christian community” is the effect of sanctification in the comprehensive sense, as they are formed by the effect of the divine acts of calling and setting them apart from the world, i.e., sanctifying them. He explains the upbuilding of the community through the biblical metaphor of the church as “building”: the building “elements” are human beings and they are integrated into a definite order according to the design and purpose by the builder. The purpose and goal of the church is the witness of His wonderful grace of reconciliation, particulary “the revelation of the sanctification of all humanity and human life as it has already taken place de jure in Jesus Christ,” [711] for the church is elected to be “the saving operation of the living Lord Jesus” [712] in the world provisionally between His first and second coming. [713] The members of the community are given some “necessary qualities” for fitting together [714] and they are successfully integrated so as to make “a union in brotherhood” of freedom and love in order “to be one organism which can be used in the world in His service.” [715] Because it is significantly different from a material building, he uses here the term “Erbauung” (upbuilding) which also means “upbringing” and “edification.” [716] Who is the builder? Of course, it is the Holy Spirit as the self-attestation of Jesus Christ or Jesus Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit. But he argues that it is built together with the community itself which as the body of Christ “cannot be merely a passive object or spectator of its upbuilding.” [717] So the builder may be comprehensively called the totus Christus which includes both His body and its Head. This duality of the builder complicates the matter, for the obedience of the body is the necessary procedure of upbuilding but its disobedience results in the opposite effect, i.e., its dissolution and destruction. Barth defines the Christian community as communio sanctorum as well as communio peccatorum, for it is the communion of the saints who are still sinners. [718] In his analysis, the interaction between the Sanctifier and the sanctified sinners creates the dynamic of the growth and decline of the church.

The Holy Spirit makes the church grow for its upbuilding. Whether it is extensive, quantitative and horizontal growth or intensive, qualitative and vertical growth, the “growth” of the Christian community is the effect of sanctification of the Holy Spirit, for it is “the expression, fulfilment and mark of life” as the living body of the living Lord Jesus. [719] Though some human factors are involved within the divine plan, Barth emphasizes that the growth of the church is the built-in “secret” of the divine building [720] and “Jesus is the power of life immanent within it, the power by which it grows and therefore lives.” [721] It is sometimes interrupted by some “apparent retrogressions” but they cannot really stop the “ongoing processes of growth” (Wachstumsvorgängen), as they are surprisingly recovered by subsequent intensive growth and expansion. [722] The church is destructible but also indestructible, because the church is “His body, the earthly-historical form of His existence” and “He cannot deny Himself.” [723] So the totus Christus grows together with the expansion of the Kingdom of God in “the real identity,” even though its imperfect and historical form is the Christian community. [724]

What hinders the process of growth temporarily or partially is the disobedience of the church exclusively to its Lord and Head, resulting in its failure to respond properly to the inner and outer threats to its growth. In the Nachfolge, Bonhoeffer said that for the community of the saints “sanctification will be maintained by their being clearly separated from the world”: [725]

Because it is sanctified by the seal of the Spirit, the Church is always in the battlefield, waging a war to prevent the breaking of the seal, whether from within or from without, and struggling to prevent the world from becoming the Church and the Church from becoming the world. The sanctification of the Church is really a defensive war, for the place which has been given to the Body of Christ on earth. The separation of the Church and the world from one another is the crusade which the Church fights for the sanctuary of God on earth. [726]

Barth agrees with Bonhoeffer that the direct and indirect danger of threat and temptation for the Church to deny its sanctification, i.e., its setting apart and separation from the world and to be the world always exists. As a general description, he called the Church's becoming the world “Säkularisierung (secularization)”:

Secularization is the process at the end of which it will be only a part of the world among so much else of the world; one of the religious corners which the world may regard as necessary to its fullness but which do not have the slightest practical significance for its manner and way. Secularization is the process by which the salt loses its savour (Mt 5.13). [727]

As four possible forms in which the secularization of the church takes place, Barth suggested persecution and toleration as two threats from without, alienation or self-adaptation and self-glorification as two temptations from within. After all, it is the responsibility of the Christian community not to let it happen, for its secularization does not take place when those outer threats of direct or indirect, hostile or friendly pressure to be the same as the world are not accepted. According to Barth, therefore, the real danger exists within the church when “it hears the voice of the world,” instead of the Good Shepherd, “accommodating itself to it, being `conformed' (Rom 12.2) to its pattern, and therefore belonging to it,” [728] for “Where there is this respect, this listening, this hankering, this fear and unwillingness, it always means the secularization of the community.” [729]

Whether it is “alienation” (Fremdhörigkeit) or “self-glorification” (Selbst-verherrlichung), Barth understands that secularization begins with the self-deceptive but sincere motivation to bridge the gap (Brückenbauten) between the church and the world as “attempts to win the world for Christ.” [730] So a “translation of the Christian into the secular” or conversely “a translation of the secular to the Christian” is attempted, as well as “a kind of baptism of non-Christian ideas and customs and enterprises by new Christian interpretation and the giving of a new Christian content.” [731] Their intention seems holy but their leadership secularizes the church for they have a “secret respect for the fashion of the world.” [732] This may be regarded as Barth's criticism of Bultmann's demythologization [733] and secularization theology as a whole. Further, he points out that cultural Christianity causes secularization, for it occurs “when it want to be a Church only for the world, the nation, culture, or the state--a world Church, a national Church, a cultural Church, or a state Church.” [734] It seems to reflect the prophetic criticisms of Franz Overbeck and Dietrich Bonhoeffer on the Western Christianity. Furthermore, he warns against the lust of the church for the secular powers of the world as another source of secularization, as this self-exaltation for the glory of the church in the world inevitably jeopardizes its true life and growth by replacing the Holy Spirit with its own common spirit, obedience with pride. [735] It is a criticism not only of the Roman Catholic Church but of all forms of the “sacralization” of clergy and church authority as well as those of church politics and Christian political movements for the purpose of self-glorification. Secularization results only in the inner decomposition, disintegration and finally the outer decline of the church.

Another cause of secularization is the “disorder” (Unordnung) of the Christian community, when it is disobedient to the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit who gives “order” in upbuilding of the church. For the Christian community consists of its Head and His body, the church order is “what is right by the norm of this relationship” [736] and, because Jesus Christ is its Lord and Head, “He is their law.” [737] But the world misunderstands the church simply as one of the self-organized societies and the state applies its religious laws to the church on this social misunderstanding. It is inevitable and natural for the world or the state to misunderstand its true nature, but the church must not accept or recognize this misunderstanding and understand itself “in terms of the world's misunderstanding.” [738] When it does and adapts itself to all the legislation imposed or granted by the state, the secularization of the church takes place, for this is to adapt itself to the world. [739] This kind of secularization has often happened in totalitarian states which impose law unacceptable to the church. The only and exclusive law of the church is Jesus Christ and the church retains its holiness when it obeys His Spirit exclusively. Therefore, Barth insists that the church has to keep itself “a free Church” and “tirelessly give positive expression to its own understanding of itself” in the form of confession or declaration. [740] On the other hand, Barth pointed out that the church is secularized also when church law itself violates the Law of the church, which is the living Lord Jesus in the ordering of the Holy Spirit. As general presuppositions normative for every true Church law, he suggested that it must be “law of service,” “liturgical law,” “living law,” and “exemplary law.” [741] He meant that the church obedient to the ordering guidance of the Holy Spirit establishes its law to serve, centers it on the worship of God (confession, baptism, the Lord's Supper, and prayer), reforms it continuously with openness for the new ordering of its Lord (ecclesia semper reformanda), and witnesses to the world its obedience to the Lordship of Jesus Christ for the improvement of all human law. When the church does the opposite, i.e., makes a law for a few to rule fellow Christians, centers it in something else like church politics, administration, finance, or discipline, absolutizes its traditional law without any willingness to listen to the new ordering of the Lord in spite of the change of context or depends on the arbitrary legislation of its spiritual leader(s), or introduces the legal systems of the world into the church rather than improving them, the true order of the church is disordered and destroyed. Barth insists that this disorder causes the dissolution, disintegration and decline of the church.

However, the church is not destroyed since it is the body of the living Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit protects and preserves it. Though human weakness secularizes and disintegrates the church, the Holy Spirit preserves it in defiance of this weakness and makes it grow continually. [742] How does He make the transition from disintegration to preservation, from decline to growth, from secularization to sanctification? Barth holds that the Holy Spirit makes the Christian community overcome this problem by causing “a sudden or gradual counter-movement” among the remnant. This takes place not in the revival of tradition or conservatism but “a return to the Bible” and the fresh reading of the Word of God, which attests to Jesus Christ and reveals the guidance of the Holy Spirit concretely. [743] In this obedience the church revives and keeps its ongoing process of growth under the effects of sanctification of the Holy Spirit who upbuilds the Christian community by ordering and preserving.

3.4.2 The Sanctification of the Individual Christian

On the other hand, Barth suggests that the effect of sanctification on the individual Christian is “love.” It is a simple description but he means it as the comprehensive and ultimate principle of the Christian life which the Holy Spirit effects through the forms of sanctification such as discipleship, conversion, good works and cross-bearing. In the corresponding sections of IV/1-3, he deals with three principal virtues--faith (§63), love (§68), and hope (§73), as the individual appropriations of three aspects of reconciliation, i.e., justification, sanctification, and vocation. Why does he treat love in relation to sanctification? Of course, it is quite arbitrary, mainly due to his “Systemzwang (system pressure),” but there is some significant merit in connecting love and sanctification, as the “love” of God and neighbours is the summary of the command of God and sanctification is obedience to it.

For Barth, it is “inconceivable” and “incomprehensible” that sinful man can love God, for he is hostile to Him. So he calls it “the mystery of reconciliation.” [744] Because God is love and man cannot love Him, he states that the love of God is the “Grund” of Christian love. God's love is eternal and He is revealed Himself to us as “the loving God.” Thus he holds that the statements “God is” and “God loves” are synonymous. [745] God is free and He exercises the freedom to love. In the opus Deus ad intra as well as ad extra, He is the loving God. However, he emphasizes that God does not love automatically because it is his nature to do so but God's love is His act of freedom. It means that His love to us is the act of free decision and becomes the origin and basis of our love. By the power of the Holy Spirit, God reveals His love for us in Jesus Christ, empowers and impels us to love in return. This precedence of the divine love delimits our love as dependent, analogous, reflective, imitative, corresponding and secondary. [746] However, the human love is neither a prolongation of the overflowing love of God nor its mere imitation but a spontaneous, creative and responsible act of freedom. [747] Through the liberating power of the Holy Spirit he is free and the freedom is to love God as his own act of submission and obedience. [748] According to his definition, God's love is “electing love,” “purifying love,” and “creative,” in the sense that God elects an unworthy man to love, purifies him from the hostility of lovelessness, and creates a new man who can love God and other men. [749] As his hostility to God is replaced by this love and he has peace and reconciliation with Him, his love for God and Jesus Christ causes him to be definitely interested in Him and His Kingdom, to which he gives “precedence” over all others. [750] God has given Himself to man in Jesus Christ so that he could give himself to God.

So Barth defined love as “self-giving” (Hingabe), as love consists of two acts, i.e., turning away from himself (self-denial) and turning wholly to others without any claim or desire of benefit for himself. [751] It is opposed to the other kind of love which essence is “self-love,” “a grasping, taking, possessive love.” [752] Comparing those two kinds of love in terms of agape and eros, he recognizes no compromise, synthesis, or harmony between them but he found a common “base” for them in “man” who loves in both ways. Why then does the same man love in two different and antithetical ways? Barth insists that it does not involve “an alteration of human nature” but takes place “in a distinct relationship to it,” i.e., two different uses of the same human nature. [753] Human nature as created by God is “to be with God, who is his Creator and Lord” [754] as well as “to be with his fellow-men.” [755] In his analysis, agape arises when a man decides to correspond positively to his nature, while eros occurs when he decides to contradict it negatively. [756] Because they have this common basis these two kinds of love reflect each other in practice, but this does not mean that they are interdependent or can be measured by each other. Just as “When the sun arises, the shadows and mists in the valleys can only yield and disperse,” the rise of Christian love causes self-love to evaporate. [757] Self-giving love or agape liberates man from self-love or eros which ceaselessly chases the meaninglessness of self-seeking. Barth therefore calls this sanctifying process the “conquest of eros by agape.” [758]

Self-giving love of the Christian is only given by the Holy Spirit and it is “not given him privately” but “he is set in the community of Jesus Christ” [759] as the school of love. The individual man cannot become a Christian and live as such in a vacuum. [760] This was why he insisted on dealing with the effects of sanctification first in relation to the church (§67) and then that in relation to its individual member (§68).