A Divergence in Metz and Moltmann

So far, we have covered the common elements in the political theologies of Metz and Moltmann. In their recent development, there is a clear divergence in their orientations. The criterion used in this analysis is based on M. Lamb's division of the different modes of theological methods in the course of the history of the development of theology.(13) Of the five modes mentioned by Lamb, which we have translated into graphic form below (Figure 1, page 87), it is the criticomorphic and the politicomorphic modes that will concern us here. Both seek to arrive at a unity between the identity and non-identity of faith and culture. Unlike the neomorphic mode which favours an identification of faith and culture (e.g. H. Cox's The Secular City) or the fideomorphic which insists on the non-identity of faith and culture (as with Barth), the criticomorphic and the politicomorphic recognise the tension between the transcendent dimension of faith and the historico-political reality of its manifestation. The crucial difference between the two, according to Lamb, which correspondingly distinguishes the 'political' theologies of Moltmann and Metz, lies in the capacity of each to mediate the Christian message from the present into the future. The criticomorphic mode, relying on Scriptures and on a rational conception of the human situation, can only hold a dialogue between faith and an intellectual perception of the reality of man and thus be able to mediate the Christian message from the past to the present. Political theology, as a typical example of the politicomorphic mode of theologizing, takes the present reality, captured in the form of narratives and memories, as its starting point to create a future in and through the critique of faith on human history. As such, the paradigm-shift advocated by Metz in the construction of a praxical fundamental theology puts him one stage beyond the criticomorphic, according to Lamb; whereas the return of Moltmann to a speculative theology of the Trinitarian history of God represents a regress even to that of a more sophisticated form of fideomorphism.

To be fair to Moltmann, we have to point out that he does not confine himself to the realm of political theology. In fact, he has criticised the tendency to reduce political theology to a theology of politics, and of Christian praxis to social activism. He warns: "The modern world's devotion to what is ethical and pragmatic has led to the distintegration of the doctrine of the Trinity in moral monotheism. The reduction of faith to practice has not enriched faith; it has impoverished it.(14) The remedy, says Moltmann, is to take into practice adoration, to liberate practice from activism. This requires us to return to the notion of "knowing In wonder" which is found in the new theology of the Trinity. This new theology includes two histories. The history of God sending forth the Son and the Spirit in the act of self-propagating love reveals to man a God who suffers with his forsaken creation, who suffers because of it and for it. Yet this suffering of God is relativized and measured against the final freedom and perfect liberation of God at the end of history. Thus political theology as a tool to reveal this history of the sending-forth leads to a second history of gathering up and has to be interpreted in and by it. Soteriology, for Moltmann, is never far from doxology. The result of political theology seems to lead to a need to speculate (though not the same as empty abstraction) on the trinitarian nature of the history of God. This new understanding of the Trinity leads us further to the insight that in God, and therefore in man, there is no domination but only participation.

The new emphasis in Moltmann's theology leads him away from praxis to gnosis. In terms of the theory-praxis nexus, his theology is still very much based on that of the Kantian ethical model of theory guiding practice, reason directing action. The fideomorphic model of Barth, which focuses itself primarily on the sovereignty of God and the lordship of Christ in history, is advanced to a compassionate God and the forsaken Son, a shift from lordship to fellowship. The wholly Other of God in Barth and the comparative contingent man is modified into a panentheistic movement of God in human history. This tendency in Moltmann, according to his critics, and Metz in particular, runs the risk of reducing the reality of human history to man’s conception of it. Metz even accuses Moltmann of exonerating the burden of the history of suffering in claiming that the suffering in this world has already been overcome in Christ’s passion. For Metz, the reality of the suffering in society and in history, their non-identity character, is not and cannot be identified with any meaning other than its subversive power as a dangerous memory. Metz feels that Moltmann has confused the negativity of the history of suffering with the “negativity of the dislectically mediated concept of suffering”. (15)

While Metz and Moltmann are both concerned with the offering of a theodicy in face of suffering in the world, Metz feels that an adequate apology of suffering can only be met on its own level, namely in praxis. Thus he criticises Moltmann's attempt as merely giving a rational explanation of suffering and meeting his problem on the level of speculative theology. If Moltmann's political theology of the cross is the beginning of a dialogue between theology and the 'critical theory' of Adorno and Horkhelmer, Metz's political theology as practical fundamental theology is the product of taking this same theme of the cross to its logical (praxical) conclusion.(16) The speculative turn in Moltmann's political theology means that a certain timelessness is unconsciously introduced when suffering is ontologised in the being of God. The in-breaking of eschatology into history, of the future into the present, somehow loses its crisis element because the present so conceived and history thus qualified remain within the realm of what A. Fierro called a "first-stage" theological discourse, i.e. a discourse acceptable only to members of a believing community.(17) The result is a 'Christianization' of the conception of history and of the present, with the subsequent danger of taking lightly the ambiguity of human history.

In the political theology of Metz, the "negative" character of critical theory is clearly manifested. Despite the accusations of Schillebeeckx, Metz is not making a simple identification of Christian liberation with the emancipation of the Critical School.(18) Methodologically speaking, Metz does pattern his own on those of the early critical theorists. However in terms of content, he is at pains to note the non-identity of faith with the emancipation of the Frankfurt School, which F. Fiorenza, on the other hand, sees as a close parallel to a reinterpretation of atonement and redemption in Christology.(19) Metz's strong reliance on memory as a category of his narrative-practical theology shows his debt to Marcuse. His persistent denial of any attempt to ontologize suffering can be traced to Benjamin's understanding of the history of suffering and to Adorno's immanent critique of ontology.(20) But that is as far as any direct parallel between Metz's political theology and the critical school goes. He is fully aware of the Christian character of any political theology. Yet, unlike Moltmann, he does not want to interpret political society in terms of the political dimension of the cross. Rather he concentrates on the critical function of political theology and directs it at the crisis of Christianity in its institutions and subjects.

For Metz, the Church Is the institutionalization of the dangerous memory of Christ. This dangerous memory, to be truly Christian, is more than a mere recalling of the history of suffering. It is at the same time the very expression of the eschatological hope of faith. Nevertheless, it is not simply an eschatology that only lends meaning to history. Rather its principal task is to remove any sense of timelessness from our understanding of history by providing an "apocalyptic ‘sting’" of the "not-yet" of the Eschaton. With Moltmann, Metz asserts that political theology relativizes all ideology and political system in that none of them is or can be identified with the subject of faith, the believing subject. This is not to say that Metz too is reverting to a fideomorphic dichotomy of faith and history. Rather the basis of non-identity of the subject with any socio-political class is rooted in the critical nature of faith. To identify the believing subject with any social class will simultaneously marginalize other classes and return to a form of Christendom-type political theology. The negative content of political theology is to highlight the urgency of the Christian message to thwart any false security arising from a complacent and misguided view of pluralism. Metz is not claiming that the believing subject exists in a social vacuum. Quite the opposite, Metz believes that political theology can only be practised in an institutionalised form. The Church is or should be this vehicle whereby the critical function of faith is exercised. Even the very notion of the "imitation of Christ" is to be institutionalized and is exemplified in the religious orders within the Roman Catholic Church. (21)

By institutionalization, Metz is not advocating a simple view of building a 'superstructure' for faith. Rather it is the recognition of the socio-political reality of the believing subjects that the community of the Church is inseparable from the praxis of faith. Political theology can only be practised within the Church if it is to be Christian at all. It provides the hermeneutical horizon for the believing community to justify their faith by exercising that critical function in face of any structure that prevents persons from becoming subjects. It is not a political ethics, so it does not provide concrete guidelines for action. Rather its function is theological, which includes the critique of any theology that incorrectly identifies faith with any ideology or philosophy, the keeping alive and relevant that original truth intention of the biblical testimony to the memory of the raising of Christ from the dead, and the pursuing of the task of solidarity in hope with all men who are called to be subjects in the presence of God. All these Metz sees as the reasons for a continuous dialogue and exchange between theology and the other sciences and philosophies in the development of a "praxical" form of theology, and thus his commitment to the inter-disciplinary project at the Institute of Theological Research in Bielefeld.

13)See M. Lamb, History, Method, and Theology: A dialectical comparison of Wilhem Dilthey’s critique of Historical Reason and Bernard Lonergan’s Meta-Methodology, Scholar Press, Montana, 1978. And also his article in CTSA Proceedings, vol. 31, 1976, “The Theory-Praxis Relationship in Contemporary Christian Theologies”.

14)Moltmann, The Trinity and the Kingdom of God, SCM Press, London, 1981, p.8.

15)Metz, 1980, p.l32. The term "non-identity" is used in this paper to denote both, following the method adopted by Metz and Moltmann. See Metz, 1980, Chapter 7, and also Moltmann, The Crucified God, SCM Press, 1974, Chapter 1.

16)On Critical Theory, see D. Held, Introduction to Critical Theory: Horkheimer to Habermas, Hutchinson, London, 1980.

17)A. Fierro, The Militant Gospel: A Critical Introduction to Political Theologies, Orbis, Maryknoll, 1977.

18)E. Schillebeeckx, The Understanding of Faith, S. & W., London, 1974, Chs. 6 & 7.

19)F. P. Fiorenza, "Critical Social Theory and Christology: Toward an Understanding of Atonement and Redemption as Emancipatory Solidarity", CTSA Proceedings, 1975.

20)See T. W. Adorno, Negative Dialectics, RKP, London, 1973, Part One, II., and W. Benjamin, "Theses on the Philosophy of History", 1940.

21)See Metz, Followers of Christ, Burns & Oates, London, 1978.