Apart from The One, the Three and the Many (1993), it is perhaps, A Brief Theology of Revelation (1995) that is Colin’s most important work. This short 134pp – it really is brief – book examines the doctrine of revelation, which in Barth is so strongly employed – and according to Gunton ‘overemployed’ – and establishes its proper place in theology. The main thrust of Gunton’s argument is that ‘revelation in Christian theology is mediated’ (18) and revelation can be mediated in different ways and so the reverse there is no unmediated revelation.
He makes the claim that all kinds of things are revelatory and this is ‘not necessarily revelatory of God – we must not try to reach that place too soon – but of themselves, or of the order of things in world’ (106). He argues for a general theology of revelation, that ‘revelation is necessary to what we call knowledge,’ that is, if we are to know anything, or anyone, they must in some respect be revealed to us’ (106). However, in order to be able to say this, the tacit operation of a number of theological doctrines need to be employed. Firstly, a doctrine of creation is required, which ‘holds that that the created world is the kind of world within whose structures there can be revelation’ (33). Gunton is claiming that there can be revelation, because the world is so made that it can be known – there is a reality that I can investigate and know. Secondly, a doctrine of anthropology, which claims that ‘we are able to appropriate the revealedness of nature because we are the kind of beings we are: a part of nature, yet also such as we are able to transcend and understand that of which we are a part’ (34). And thirdly, a doctrine of pneumatology, which holds that all revelation is a gift of the Spirit, who ‘brings it about that human rationality is able, within the limits set to it, to encompass the truth of creation’ (34-35).
Gunton next discusses a theology of general revelation, the issue of what can we know of God from creation. He rejects natural theology, because it stems from a failure to adequately articulate a Christian doctrine of creation. Instead, Gunton argues for what he calls a theology of nature. This allows for a general revelation, but that ‘we are unable to recognise [it] for what it is’ (61). General revelation, for Gunton, is not something that ‘operates in parallel with biblical revelation, but is derived from it’ (61). A theology of nature can claim ‘that the world reveals the glory of God because it is creation’ (61); ‘the world reveals the being of God by virtue of its capacity to be a framework for culture’ (62) – good culture (art, music, etc) reveals the goodness of the creator he created a good world; and ‘the world reveals the hand that made it in the remarkable combination of unity and diversity, of relationality and particularity, that it manifests, marks that can be recognised by their analogy to the unity and diversity of the triune God’ (62).
Gunton’s description of a theology of nature lays considerable weight on scripture, as the mediator of revelation, which is the subject of his next discussion. Gunton affirms the inspiration of scripture, but denies that scripture is revelation; rather, scripture is a medium of revelation. He writes, ‘scripture is revelatory … by virtue of the fact that it participates in those things – persons and events – that we call revelation’ (108). Therefore, according to Gunton, ‘the unique character and authority of scripture as revelation is that it claims to be more than the provider of unique information, but also to be the bearer of saving knowledge’ (73). Scripture mediates to us the revelation of the uniqueness of Jesus Christ and so ‘it’s uniqueness derives from the uniqueness of the Christ who is mediated and of that which is mediated by Christ (74).
In The Christian Faith Gunton argues that ‘the inspiration of scripture refers to the Spirit’s enabling those recipients of divine speech and action to compose the books which are, in response to revelation, in their own human way divine revelation to those generations who come after’ (53). (See John Webster’s Holy Scripture: A Dogmatic Sketch and Maggi Dawn’s series of helpful posts here).
Gunton’s final discussion is the place of tradition within a theology of revelation. Gunton believes tradition to be important ‘because even though Jesus is, as risen and ascended, not in the past … that Lord cannot be identified apart from the Jesus of scriptural description mediated through the tradition of interpretation which is theology’ (103). ‘Tradition in the church, then, is a process of gift and reception in which the deposit of faith - the teaching and ethics of the Christian community – is received, interpreted and handed on in time' (103). Despite this positive affirmation of tradition, Gunton warns against the authority of the content of tradition being replaced by forms of ecclesiastical authority (97).
Gunton’s concluding chapter which is subtitled ‘Towards a theology of revelation’ argues against reducing Christianity to revelation (which Barth is not adverse from doing) and ensuring that the Christian faith ‘is not to be reduced to knowledge’ (110). He goes on to claim that ‘the doctrine of revelation should be understood to be a function of the doctrine of salvation’ (111) because ‘the centre [of scripture] is not divine self-identification but divine saving action’ (111, italics Gunton’s). Thus, ‘while [Gnosticism] speaks of salvation by knowledge, [John’s gospel] speaks of salvation by incarnation, the cross, resurrection and ascension, and the subsequent sending of the Paraclete … what is revealed is primarily not knowledge, but salvation in Christ, though that includes epistemic dimensions’ (117).
Lastly, in Gunton’s (trinitarian) theology of revelation, we find the key to be pneumatology. He writes, ‘wherever there is revelation of any kind, there is the work of the creator and redeemer Spirit’ (121); ‘The Spirit reveals Jesus as the truth: as the revelation of God the Father’ (121); ‘the mediatory office of the Spirit is to point to, and in that sense, reveal the Son; that of the Son to reveal the Father’ (122); and ‘without the revealing action of the Spirit, we shall not know Jesus as the way to God’ (122).
He ends with:
‘When we speak of revelation, we are speaking first of all of Jesus Christ, who thus forms the focus of all that we have to say. The centre of our attention is the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, and that glory is mediated in all kinds of ways: through the Bible, church traditions and confessions, through the creation that is from and to Christ; and even sometimes through the propositions of theologians, those scribes of the kingdom whose calling is to bring forth from their treasures things both old and new’ (125).
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