Barth's Doctrine of Creation

Book excerpt: Theologians working on the doctrine of creation are compelled to wrestle with Karl Barth's explication of this doctrine. And yet, studies on Barth have not paid a significant amount of attention to this aspect of his theology. To help fill this gap, Gabriel introduces and clarifies Barth's doctrine of creation by outlining its contours and evaluating three prominent critiques of Barth--critiques that focus on questions regarding the place of nature, the Trinity, Jesus, and history in his doctrine. Gabriel finds value in these critiques, while also identifying ways in which Barth's theology sometimes adequately addresses them. Through this, Gabriel mines insights from Barth that can contribute to a theology of nature or ecological theology and a Trinitarian theology of creation.