ABSTRACT
Gerhard Ebeling (1912-2001) was a prolific and highly esteemed Lutheran theologian. Born in Berlin to a family of teachers, Ebeling was educated at several universities throughout Germany and Switzerland during the tumultuous years of 1930-35. He was one of the most accomplished of the students of the “underground” seminary of the Confessing Church, headed by Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-45) in Finkenwalde. In fact, it was Bonhoeffer who urged Ebeling’s advanced study in theology before beginning ministerial work, and Ebeling earned his doctorate in 1938 from Zürich with a dissertation on Luther’s interpretation of the Gospels.1 Thus already in the earliest years of his career as a theologian, we see three themes and commitments that would preoccupy and animate all of Ebeling’s later work: there is, first, an abiding concern to uncover the principles that guide churchly hermeneutics, second, an especially keen interest in Luther’s example thereof, and third, a commitment to showing how theological and hermeneutical reflection matter to the life of the church and its proclamation. In all of these areas, Ebeling saw Kierkegaard as a resource and kindred spirit in the effort to renew the church and its thinking. His reception of Kierkegaard’s writings is evident primarily in a relatively unspoken way, particularly in the tacit but pronounced existentialist orientation of much of Ebeling’s dogmatic theology. Overtones of Kierkegaard’s self-involving hermeneutic can also be found in Ebeling’s theological oeuvre, and numerous other sporadic references to Kierkegaard evidence an awareness of, short of a reliance on, Kierkegaard’s philosophical and theological thought. Before moving to a more technical look at the kinds of Kierkegaard texts and themes Ebeling used, cited, and echoed, it will be helpful to have a general orientation to Ebeling’s theological project.
