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51 ChAPter 2 The Aesthetic in Theology hans Urs von Balthasar in view of the general importance of the discipline of aesthetics in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, as well as of its universalization by such thinkers as nietzsche, it seems only logical for contemporary theology to take the aesthetic seriously. yet the most obvious observation is that this is precisely what does not happen. Perhaps the most notable figure in contemporary thought who noticed and lamented the loss of the aesthetic dimension in theology, as well as realized the need to restore it, is hans Urs von Balthasar.1 As was mentioned above, von Balthasar’s project to restore the aesthetic element in theology includes retrieving foundational aesthetic insights from ancient and medieval texts—the focus of the present study. his strategy, as will become more clear from what follows, is based on his observation that the “fundamental presupposition, common to Antiquity and christianity” (and, we can add, to modern philosophical aesthetics) is that reality and being are revelatory in nature and are capable of revealing certain higher principles (GL4 324). According to von Balthasar, modern “speculative aesthetics,” from kant on, “still for the most part appeals” to the ancient view of the revelatory nature of reality (GL4 323). This is precisely where he sees the convergence be1 . For a bibliography on von Balthasar’s theological aesthetics, see appendix to this chapter . it is clear (cf. GL1 50) that von Balthasar is aware of the overall importance and radicalization of aesthetics, in particular in nietzsche, although he would most probably disagree with the idea that his own theological aesthetics is a reaction to this radicalization. however, when one puts his thought in a historical perspective, it appears that his return to aesthetics in theology can be plausibly interpreted as—perhaps a subconscious—reaction to the importance of the aesthetic point of view in modern intellectual history. 52 -The contemporary horizon tween philosophical aesthetics (such as that of kant), or philosophy in general (such as that of heidegger) and theology. now if aesthetics loses its focus on the revelatory capacity of reality, as most academic aesthetics does in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, von Balthasar asks, “what can such an aesthetics have to say?” (GL4 324). if this revelatory capacity is removed from beauty and the world is “stripped of its radiance and worth,” why is being better than non-being? (GL4 324) Forgetful of what initially set it in motion, “aesthetics then becomes an epiphenomenon of psychology and relinquishes any claim to being a philosophical discipline” (GL4 324). however, just as the loss of its revelatory or “transcendental” (or, one can even say, theological) dimension is detrimental to aesthetics, so is the loss of theology’s aesthetic dimension detrimental to theology. Thus both disciplines can benefit from going to the roots of the revelatory understanding of aesthetics in Antiquity and the Middle Ages, which, as von Balthasar attempts to show later, can still be clearly seen in eighteenth- and nineteenthcentury aesthetic theories. Before moving on to von Balthasar’s effort to retrieve the original aesthetic insight through a dialogue with ancient and medieval texts, it is important to understand exactly what he means by ‘theological aesthetics .’ in an interesting twist, his inspiration for theological aesthetics comes from the most unlikely source: the Protestant tradition which, according to his own words, almost completely eliminated the aesthetic element from its theology. in the late 1940s von Balthasar became a close friend of karl Barth, who shared the former’s love for Mozart and was inspired by his musical talent. The influence was mutual: von Balthasar, in his turn, was inspired by the section on the beauty of god from Barth’s Church Dogmatics ii, 1. in his introduction to The Glory of the Lord (GL1 53ff.) von Balthasar himself acknowledges that the very idea of contemplating the divine glory and of reconceiving christian theology in the light of beauty comes from Barth.2 Barth acknowledges (p. 651) that the Reformation and Protestant orthodoxy completely ignored the 2. cf. F. kerr, “Foreword: Assessing this ‘giddy synthesis,’” in Balthasar at the End of Modernity (henceforth BEM), edited by l. gardner, D. Moss, B. Quash, and g. Ward (edinburgh : t&t clark, 1999), 6: “the basic perspective of Herrlichkeit surely owes far more to Barth.” on the relationship between Barth and von Balthasar see also R. viladesau, Theological Aesthetics, 26–29. some Dutch neo-calvinists, in particular kuyper, anticipated Barth in his theology of divine glory...

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