This paper was originally delivered on 6th May 1977 as the Presidential Address of the Cambridge Theological Society. It has been lightly edited and prepared for publication with the author's help by Dr William Horbury and Professor J. C. O'Neill, in honour of the author and in gratitude for his teaching and inspiration on his 80th birthday, 15th April 1992.

Abiblical scholar is sometimes asked, “What effect has the Bible had?” To my embarrassment, I have not been able to draw on solid results of research to answer this very reasonable question. It has been all but ignored by the exegetical guild.

Kierkegaard scholarship has, in the past twenty years, gone a long way toward clearing up issues both historical and interpretive that earlier interpreters had somehow overlooked. This essay is neither an attempt at historical reconstruction or a direct engagement with the Kierkegaard guild. This essay is a reflection on the spirituality of Soren Kierkegaard, a theme he would probably find somewhat inappropriate. He would rather want to challenge us, his readers, to consider the primary subject of theology itself, namely God. But if a consideration of his spirituality should lead the reader in such a pursuit, then it seems one is indirectly led to the ultimate goal ol the Kierkegaardiana.

Central to the whole of Thomas Forsyth Torrance's theology is the μοοΣιον between the incarnate Logos and the eternal God, or the consubstantiality of the Son with the Father. The immense significance of this Nicene μοοΣιον is best understood against the background of the axiomatic χωριΣμΣ which lies at the heart of Hellenism, Gnosticism and Arianism. Once such a radical separation between τ νοητ and τ αἰΣθητ is posited, there arise the inevitable questions: (a) How do we regard the biblical statements of the eternal God within the history of the Jewish people in the realm of τ αἰΣθητ (b) On which side of the demarcation does the Logos of the eternal God belong? For the dualist thinkers, the dilemma is — How can the eternal God who is impassible and changeless be thought of as actually entering the spatiotemporal history of this changing and decaying world, and alas, even living within our creaturely and contingent order? To be sure, the biblical notion of a Creator who actively and creatively interacts with his creation is incompatible with the prevailing Hellenic thought-form and secular culture of the early Church. It was as unthinkable and unintelligible to them as it is to Bultmann and the myth-of-God-incarnate theologians of our day.

The publication of The Politics of Jesus in 1972 established John Howard Voder as the most intellectually compelling, critical, and constructive Mennonite theologian of this generation. In that volume, Voder articulated an interpretive method and a substantive doctrinal position that affirmed his sectarian and ‘restoration’ theological vision but at the same time gained him a serious hearing in several corners of the North American Christian community. His recent tenure as President of the Society of Christian Ethics and appointment in the Department of Theology at Notre Dame University are only two examples of his standing among ecumenically-minded Christians.