Eberhard Jüngel on God, Truth, and History

Book excerpt: Recent English-language scholarship has largely passed over Eberhard Jungel's characteristic interest in the question of truth. In this work, David Bruner makes a major contribution to the reception of Jungel's thought by offering the first monograph to critically engage his account of truth and its vital connection to other doctrinal loci. Tracing Jungel's understanding of truth across several theological topoi, the author argues that Jungel's understanding of truth can best be characterized as 'historical' or 'eschatological historicism.' It shows how an understanding of truth as essentially historical or temporal is not incidental but essential to his thought. It also ties him to larger debates regarding the appropriation of philosophical historical consciousness within modern theology and alethiology.