The Cross of Reality: Luther’s Theologia Crucis and Bonhoeffer’s Christology by H. Gaylon Barker (review)

This book follows in detail the development of Bonhoeffer’s theology from early to late and shows how at every turn it was shaped by two of Luther’s most important doctrines (1) the theology of the cross and (2) the communication of attributes between the divine and the human natures in Christ. For Barker, the two doctrines are fundamentally interrelated in that the content of the theology of the cross is none other than Christ; likewise, Christ is the way that God comes deep into the world and so experiences its disdain and rejection.

Barker notes that Bonhoeffer was deeply indebted to Karl Barth’s theological reform which countered Protestant liberalism’s grounding of truth in human experience. But, in contrast to Barth, who attempted to re-appropriate a “theology of glory” based on the fact that Jesus is now risen and glorified, Bonhoeffer countered that the resurrection does not trump the crucifixion. Instead, precisely as resurrected, Jesus Christ as the “man for others” continues his earthly ministry and presence (8). For Barker, Jürgen Moltmann’s designation of Jesus’ cross as the “cross of reality” (13) is an interpretive key for establishing a contemporary relevance for the theology of the cross as mediated by Bonhoeffer: Jesus’ ministry does not leave or bypass the violence or messiness of this world but instead engages it on behalf of the needy and oppressed.

Throughout, Barker establishes a rich interpretation of Bonhoeffer’s deeply Lutheran Christology offering numerous insights. Appropriating a theme from medieval music, Jesus Christ is the cantus firmus, or leading voice, from whom Christians can and should take their bearings (118). This is because Jesus’ ministry was for the sake of humans, a “vicarious representative action” (155). Hence, those united with Christ through baptism and faith share in Jesus’ ministry on behalf of others as the mark of their identity and continuity with Jesus. After all, Christ and his cross cannot be separated (164), and this means that Christians in seeking to live like Jesus will experience opposition, humiliation, and even defeat, just as Jesus experienced them.

In addition to Christological themes, Bonhoeffer develops Luther’s anthropology centered in the thought that the sinful human is constituted by a heart turned in on itself (72). Bonhoeffer strikingly states that humans so curved in on themselves when encountering Jesus as self-sacrificial must either “die” to their self-centeredness or “kill” Jesus (231). Echoing the theology of the cross, the world searches for glory in one way or another but Christ’s place is on the cross (283). Christians then are not to look for God in some beyond or eternity, but instead in the world, to which the church must then bear witness (289). The phrase frequently associated with Bonhoeffer, “cheap grace,” should, following Jonathan Sorum, not be seen as a critique of the generosity of the gospel but instead as an attack on “merciless legalism.” Grace is costly precisely because it is a free gift (306). Justification by faith alone through grace alone then is wholly defined Christologically (324). Likewise, Bonhoeffer’s claim that the modern world has become “religionless” is not to be understood to say that modern people live in a spiritual vacuum, devoid of God, but instead that they can be free of caricatures of God.

This is a well-written book, of interest and accessible not only to scholars but also to pastors and interested laity.