“God the Revealed: Christology” Michael Welker’s response to Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s question

Abstract

Almost twenty years after the publication of the German Systematic Theologian Michael Welker’s celebrated Gottes Geist: Theologie des Heiligen Geistes, comes his awaited Gottes Offenbarung. Christologie. In the light of this publication, recently translated by Douglas W. Stott into God the Revealed: Christology, the article attempts to analyse his theology of Jesus Christ. This theology has developed over the last decades out of his theology of the Holy Spirit. In the first part it will be shown how his theology of Jesus Christ can be seen as an answer to Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s question of who Jesus Christ is for us today. The second part then sketch the most important insights and impulses for future theologies concerned with the confession: “God revealed himself in Jesus Christ”. This is followed by a few remarks in the light of his realistic theological endeavour.