ABSTRACT
Karl Earth's doctrine of the church is rich and complex, resisting facile analysis or simple classification. It weaves together multiple strands of thought into an elegant tapestry that, upon careful inspection, reveals deep Christological patterns that govern the whole, patterns that bear witness both to the consistency of Earth's central theological convictions across time, as well as to the remarkable innovation in his mature thought. The development and logic of these patterns disclose Barth's attempt to articulate a particular Chalcedonian ecclesiological solution to what he believed were mistaken positions on both the left and the right, against both docetic and ebionitic ecclesiologies, and against both synergistic and heteronomous understandings of ecclesial agency. Close examination of this tapestry reveals that many criticisms of it either present a distortion, or at best a one-sided presentation, of the fabric itself. Such misrepresentations are most often due to a failure to discern its controlling Christological logic. This logic provides the tight organization of the tapestry's weave, a weave that attempts to integrate both dogmatic and ethical threads, as well as what may appear at first sight to be mutually exclusive motifs. Earth's ecclesiology demonstrates a remarkable accomplishment, foremost for its careful and strict articulation of the theological character of the church, as well as for its preservation of the freedom, initiative, and Lordship of Christ and the Spirit over the church in an irreversible relationship. Furthermore, it does this while providing a real and true place for the church in the economy of salvation through the notions of witness and correspondence. This unique conception of the Lordship of Christ mirrored in the witness of the church is the enduring legacy of Earth's achievement. Yet, this real achievement does not entail that Earth's ecclesiology is immune from all criticism.1 There are a few frayed areas.
