Ulrich H. J. Kortner

Körtner's thorough scholarly treatment of the end of the world, which originally appeared in German in 1988, is made available here in a timely and accessible English translation. His theological analysis of "anxiety," "fear," and "sin" is sure to add a depth to theologically informed discussion at the end of the second Christian millennium that is conspicuously absent from fundamentalist dominated conversation in the United States. Proposing, as Körtner does, to "go beyond Kierkegaard" could put one in the uncomfortable position of being like the disciple of Heraclitus (made infamous by Kierkegaard) who went beyond his teacher's dictum that one cannot step in the same stream twice by insisting that one cannot do it even once. But Körtner succeeds to the extent that he moves readers from Kierkegaard's distinction between fear and anxiety toward a deeper understanding of the relationship between anxiety and faith. That movement affirms advent as an experience of future breaking into present and connects Kierkegaard's "moment" with Camus' embrace of absurdity. Faith, Körtner concludes, is "the courage for questionable existence," a courage that is surely needed at a time when existence itself is routinely called into question.… (more)