1483-1546
1813-1855
A01=David Lawrence Coe
anfechtung
anxiety
Author_David Lawrence Coe
Category=QD
Category=QRAX
Category=QRM
christian suffering
dialectic
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
homiletics
Kierkegaard
Luther
Martin
preaching
sermons
sighing
Soren
Product details
- ISBN 9781978710832
- Weight: 590g
- Dimensions: 160 x 228mm
- Publication Date: 09 Jul 2020
- Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
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Søren Kierkegaard denounced nineteenth-century Danish Lutheranism for exploiting Martin Luther's doctrine of justification "without works" as justification for an antinomian easy life. Kierkegaard saw his own writing as a corrective: “I have wanted to prevent people in ‘Christendom’ from existentially taking in vain Luther and the significance of Luther's life.” In 1847, Kierkegaard began an eight-year reading of Luther’s sermons, forking through them for extracts to confirm his theological corrective rather than to comprehend the breadth of Luther’s thought. While he found much to laud, Kierkegaard also found much to lance, privately commenting that Luther was partially responsible for what he considered the problematic Lutheranism of his own day. Furthermore, David Coe argues, Kierkegaard was unaware that his copy of Luther's church and house postils was a heavily abridged edition of extracts from those postils. Therefore, his appraisal of Luther begs to be investigated. Kierkegaard and Luther examines the Luther sermons Kierkegaard read, what he praised and criticized, missed, and misjudged of Luther, and spotlights the concord these two Lutheran giants actually shared, namely, the negative yet necessary role that Christian suffering (Anfechtung/Anfægtelse) plays in Christian faith and life.
David Lawrence Coe is assistant professor of theology and philosophy at Concordia University, Nebraska.
