When reading Colin Gunton's work you find several names who appear time after time in footnotes and indexes. Several theologians across history were theologians who shaped Gunton's theology in major ways.
Gunton on Irenaeus (c.130-c.200): 'the church's greatest theologian of creation' (The Christian Faith, 2002, 10). From The Promise of Trinitarian Theology (1991, 1st ed.) onwards, Colin finds Irenaeus' theology important and often quotes Irenaeus' analogy of the Son and Spirit being God's 'two hands'.
'the importance of Irenaeus in all this is considerable, for his straightforwardly trinitarian construction of the act of divine creation ... provides not the answers so much as the essential clues for the reshaping of the tradition that is necessary alike for Christian theology and culture ...' (The One, the Three and the Many, 1993, 2).
Gunton on the Cappadocian Fathers (Basil of Caesara (330-79), Gregory of Nyssa (331/40-c.395), Gregory of Nazianzus (c.330-90): 'to the Cappadocians are owed crucial steps in a process of conceptual development which, despite some parallels in the West, has for the most part been neglected. Many of the papers in this volume are intended to carry forward a programme of ontological exploration in the light of concepts which owe much of their shape to the Cappadocians' (preface to the first edition, The Promise of Trinitarian Theology, 1997, 2nd ed., xii). Towards the end of The Promise of Trinitarian Theology, Gunton remarks that at early stage of the book he was tempted to call it Homage to Cappadocia (p.204 [2nd ed.]) as a signal of how much their theology of the Trinity is behind Gunton's argument.
Gunton on John Calvin (1509-64: 'his is one of the great minds of the tradition, hugely underestimated almost everywhere for all kinds of bad reasons, some but by no means all due to that movement called 'Calvinism'' (preface to Intellect and Action, 2000, viii)
'where Calvin thinks trinitarianly - that is to say, with particular respect to the work of the Son and Spirit mediating the act and will of God the Father - he is unequalled; when not, he is often deeply problematic' (Intellect and Action, 2000, 121)
Gunton is a Reformed theologian and Calvin is the fountainhead of Reformed theology and therefore naturally Calvin is an important theological voice in Gunton's theology.
John Owen (1616-83) is an important theologian to Colin Gunton. You will find major references to him in Gunton's paper in On Being the Church (1989, reprinted in The Promise of Trinitarian Theology, 1991, 1997, chapter 4) and Theology through the Theologians (chapter 11, 1996) with regard to ecclesiology. In Father, Son & Holy Spirit, Gunton describes him as 'the great Puritan theologian of the Holy Spirit' (2003, 84-5).
Gunton on Edward Irving (1792-1834): 'It was his unerring grasp on the distinctive hypostasis of the eternal Son in relation to those fo the Father and Spirit that enabled Irving to risk the daring christology for which he was condemned, but which now has so much to teach us' (The Promise of Trinitarian Theology, 1997, 2nd ed., 98). For more see 'Two Dogmas Revisited - Edward Irving's Christology' in Theology Through the Theologians (1996) and also The Actuality of Atonement (1988, pp.128-135)
Gunton on Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834): 'that most comprehensive of Anglican minds and the presiding genius of this book ...' (The One, the Three and the Many, 1993, 15). As well as The One, the Three and the Many see also 'The Nature of Systematic Theology' in Theology Through the Theologians (1996), The Actuality of Atonement (1988) and Gunton's entry in The Dictionary of Historical Theology, ed. Trevor Hart, 2000.
Gunton on Karl Barth (1886-1968): 'As time passes, the oft-repeated judgement that he is the theologian of the twentieth century seems to be yet more securely established. At the same time, however, certain aspects of th content and structure of his Church Dogmatics have come to appear problematic' (preface to Theology through the Theologians, 1996, x)
'The greatness of Barth is first of all to be found in the content of his dogmatics, and above all in what he had to write about God ... Barth's perception and rejection of Enlightenment and Romantic doctrines which were almost axiomatic until he came upon the scene mark a unique and prophetic theological achievement. Moreover, none of the points made against him in this epilogue could have been made without him, for he is the pioneer of a way of doing theology whose day has still not yet fully come' (epilogue to Becoming and Being, 2001, 2nd ed., 244-245)
Gunton is a theologian after Barth. Gunton is a Barthian who increasingly become critical of Barth's theology as his own theology developed, but who always acknowledged Barth's influence on him.
John Zizioulas (1931-). References to Zizioulas and his book Being As Communion appear throughout Gunton's later work. Zizioulas' doctrine of the Trinity is very close in many places to Gunton's and it is from Zizioulas that it appears Gunton's trinitarian theology finds an important marker. It seems from reading Gunton that Barth takes him so far and then Zizioulas takes him in new directions, arguably away from Barth.
Other important philosophical and theological voices in Gunton's work are Michael Polanyi, Michael Foster, P. T. Forsyth, Robert Jenson, Daniel Hardy and Wolfhart Pannenberg.
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