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Clive Marsh, Der Mensch und seine Seele: Bildung – Frömmigkeit – Ästhetik. Akten des Internationalen Kongresses der Schleiermacher-Gesellschaft in Münster, September 2015. Edited by Arnulf von Scheliha and Jörg Dierken, The Journal of Theological Studies, Volume 71, Issue 1, April 2020, Pages 397–398, https://doi.org/10.1093/jts/flaa010
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Extract
De Gruyter have provided a major service in bringing to print this vast collection of forty essays resulting from the 2015 Münster Schleiermacher conference. Even if it is likely that only theological libraries will be able to buy the book, the fact that the essays are ‘out there’ is valuable and important, and not just for Schleiermacher scholarship. In times when such collections are usually only ‘cherry-picked’ for individual essays which are already known from reading-lists and from ‘for further exploration’ PowerPoint slides (then to be called up in e-form), the value of hard-copy collections remains that they can be browsed and flicked through more easily—beyond a quick glance at a table of contents—and surprising serendipitous theological moments can result.
After an essay by Klaas Huizing reflecting on theology’s literary forms, and Schleiermacher’s creativity and innovations in this regard, the work is divided into the three themes of the book’s subtitle: formation/education, piety, and aesthetics, with 10, 15, and 13 essays addressing the themes respectively. The range of topics is vast, the means by which the topics are addressed diverse, and the extent to which details of Schleiermacher’s life or writings are engaged with varies too. Yet this becomes a rich, informative, and provocative collection as a result, with plenty of connection to current debates, whether or not one is a Schleiermacher fan. Hartmut Kreß on Schleiermacher and childhood addresses children’s rights today. Christiane Erhardt digs into Schleiermacher’s contribution to Prussian school reform. Constantin Plaul’s exploration of what it means, and meant to Schleiermacher, to be an individual is an especially timely discussion when confusion reigns as to what attention can be paid to any sense of the Universal or universals. Georg Hardecker offers a new contribution to the well-mined ground of what Schleiermacher meant by ‘feeling’, and is able to conclude with a comment on the limitations of Karl Barth’s approach to truth due to the weight of what Schleiermacher’s understanding of Gefühl carries theologically. Kelly Brotzman, in one of the four English essays in the collection, provides a welcome exploration of Schleiermacher’s contribution to current approaches to experiential learning.
