Abstract

The dissertation examines the significance of Jesus' resurrection in the theologies of Pannenberg and Schillebeeckx and the extent to which it is used as a criterion for theological assertions. The context of the study is the issue of whether the use of the Christian faith for such assertions is proper, as posed in Tertullian's query, "What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?" The dissertation concludes: "Whatever the Resurrection allows." ;The exogeneous character of the criteriology of Pannenberg and Schillebeeckx is exhibited using internal criticism, and the implications for both the internal coherence of their theologies and their conceptions of the Resurrection is explored. For Pannenberg, the study indicates that there is a threat of atheism latent in his theology resulting from his conception of all theological assertions as contingent and doxological, and his ontic conception of the radical, eschatological retroactivity of history. Schillebeeckx's method of inculturation of the Christian message is found lacking the required protection against the dissolution of that message in its cross-cultural translation, as one consequence of his phenomenological methodology. Their respective treatments of sin are also questioned. In Pannenberg, the persistence of sin constitutes a threat to the existence and eschatological Rule of God which is His nature. In Schillebeeckx, sin and its relation to the "contrast experience" and the "experience-with-experiences" is undefined and this puts his soteriology in doubt. These theological limitations, and others, are seen to result from using criteria exogeneous to the Christian faith instead of using the Resurrection as a theological criterion. ;A detailed, constructive proposal for using the Resurrection as theological criterion and hermeneutic given is presented. As the sine qua non of the Christian faith, Jesus' resurrection is both presupposition and criterion of that faith and its theological assertions. The differences between "axiom" "criterion," and "presuppposition" are defined in the context of a contemporary theological debate, and the logic and some constraints of the Resurrection as criterion are developed