p. 22). Can blasphemy go farther? It was Algernon Charles Swinburne, English poet (1837-1909), who gave the other side o f the coin. He sang, “ Glory to man in the highest; he is the measure of all things.” The American novelist and Nobel Prize winner John E. Steinbeck (1902--) paraphrased and mis quoted the first verse o f the Gospel of John. He declared, “ Fearful and unprepared, we have as sumed lordship over life and death o f the whole world of all living things.” Elaborating on the man ner in which man is seeking to deify himself, he went on, “We have usurped many of the powers we once ascribed to God. Having taken God-like power, we must seek in ourselves for the repsonsi- bility and the wisdom we once prayed some deity might have. So that today, St. John the Apostle may well be paraphrased. ‘In the end is the word, and the word is man, and the word is with men.’ God is dead, and man is all in fill.” At this point someone is sure to say that we are misunderstanding the erudite theologians. They actually mean that the old categories and formula tions are no longer meaningful in speaking of God. That type of God is non-existent. But no, they are explicit in insisting that God is actually and truly dead, as dead as any human being could be. If God fares so ill, it is no surprise that the church is accorded the title of God’s tombstone. Even the secular press is not hesitant in labeling the view
“ a radical new brand of Christian thinking” (Time, October 22, 1965, p. 61). The starting point is un deniably Nietzsche’s cry of the last century, “God is dead!” But who has outlived whom? In treating so basic a question as the existence or non-existence of God, it is imperative that we know the chief present exponents o f the view as well as the details of that position. It must be un derstood at the outset that these theologians are not caviling at the portrayal of God as being obso lete. It is just an insurmountable fact that Chris tianity will just have to get along without God. Borrowing from Buddhism in his eclectic sys tem, Altizer holds that opposites are finally sus ceptible of reconciliation and harmonization. The Christian’s path of duty is clear: strive for the complete secularization of the modem world (as if the unregenerate are not already doing a tre mendously successful job of it without “ Christian” help), so that by a rebound process man may again recapture the full import of the sacred. Altizer thinks the death of God is basically a redemptive act. But how? And, pray tell, for whom? Van Buren’s main thesis is that nothing is truth which cannot be verified and substantiated empiri cally. He has tasted deeply at the philosophical fount of Comte. With Hamilton the matter of love is all-deter mining rather than the concepts o f faith or hope. Since God is dead, this is the opportune time to follow the example and conduct of Jesus in serv ing our fellowman. Hamilton speaks of Christ, not as a person, but as “ a place to be,” that is, wher ever there is struggle or strife for equality in the world, as well as in the arts and sciences. Vahanian is sure that if there is a God, only God knows Him. Man, in seeking to find God, in variably fashions Him according to his own cul tural pattern, finally winding up in making God an idol. Dr. Thomas J. J. Altizer of Emory University says bluntly: “ . . . the death of God is a historical event. God has died in our time, in our history, in our existence.” If the professor means that our age has become painfully secularized, even pagan- ized, that God is taken into account in world affairs either little or not at all, that most men act and live as though God were a nonentity, he is eminent ly correct. But this is poles apart from postulating the demise, the abdication, or the dismissal of the
Charles Lee
Feinberg, TK.D.
Ph.D., is Dean
of Talbot
Theological
Seminary,
La Mirada,
California.
NOVEMBER, 1966
IS
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