The Living God and the Fullness of Life
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Modern humanity has accepted a truncated, impoverished definition of life. Focusing solely on material realities, we have forgotten that joy, purpose, and meaning come from a life that is both immersed in the temporal and alive to the transcendent. We have, in other words, ceased to live in God. In this book, renowned theologian Jürgen Moltmann shows us what that life of joy and purpose looks like. Describing how we came to live in a world devoid of the ultimate, he charts a way back to an intimate connection with the biblical God. He counsels that we adopt a "theology of life," an orientation that sees God at work in both the mundane and the extraordinary and that pushes us to work for a world that fully reflects the life of its Creator. Moltmann offers a telling critique of the shallow values of consumerist society and provides a compelling rationale for why spiritual sensibilities and encounter with God must lie at the heart of any life that seeks to be authentically human.
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256 pages, Published in 2015; theological anthropology
Moltmann's writing is dense, not for the faint of heart. But that doesn't mean it's not worth reading, (You just might need to be a bit of a theology nerd). In this book, he elaborates on earlier works on the doctrine of God and Spirit. But this means he assumes you've already read his earlier work and are familiar with his theology.
Here is the chapter breakdown and outline:
PART ONE: The Living God
Chapter 1. The Living God
- How Can God Be Both Living and Eternal?
- The Eternal God
- The Living God
Chapter 2. God's Attributes: The Living God and Attributes of Divinity
- Is God Immovable?
- Is God Impassible?
- Is God Almighty?
- Is God Omnipresent?
- The Prohibition of Images: The Living God
Chapter 3. The Living God in the History of Christ
- The One God: What Unity?
- The Living Space of the Triune God
- The History of God in Christ
PART TWO: The Fullness of Life
Chapter 4: This Eternal Life
- In the Fellowship of the Divine Life
- In the Fellowship of the Living and the Dead
- In the Fellowship of the Earth
Chapter 5: Life in the Wide Space of God`s Joy
- God's Joy
- The Birth of Religion Out of the Festival of Life
- Christianity: Religion of Joy
- The Joy of the God Who Seeks and Finds
- Human Joy: Joy and Fun
- Joy and Human Pain: Schiller and Dostoevsky
- Nietzsche's “Deep, Deep Eternity”
Chapter 6: Freedom Lived in Solidarity
- Freedom or God? Michael Bakunin and Carl Schmitt
- The God of the Exodus and the Resurrection
- God's Freedom
- Human Freedom in God
Chapter 7: Freedom Experienced in Open Friendship
- What Is Friendship?
- In the Friendship of Jesus
- God's Friends
- Open Friendship for a Friendlier World
Chapter 8. The Loved and Loving life
- The Doctrine of Suffering (Buddha) and the Doctrine of Love (Paul)
- God's Love and Human Love for God
- Love for Life
- Maximus Confessor and the Erotic Universe
Chapter 9: A Spirituality of the Senses
- The Spirituality of the Soul—The Spirituality of the Senses
- The Human Senses
- The Diminution and Attrition of the Senses
- The Waking and Awakening of the Senses
- Praying and Watching
Chapter 10: Hoping and Thinking
- Thinking Means Transcending
- Hoping and Perceiving: Hegel and “Minerva´s Owl” and Aurora's Lark
- Hoping and Thinking: The Productive Power of the Imagination
Chapter 11. Life: A Never-Ending Festival
- The Risen Christ Makes of Human Life a Never-Ending Festival
- The Festive Life
- Truth as Prayer
Moltmann's focus here seems to be on the Unity or unifying activity of God/God's spirit in bringing creation into union with God.
