¹ ‘Perichoresis,’ Dictionary of Theology (2nd edn; ed. Rahner, Karl, Vorgrimler, Herbert; New York: Crossroad, 1987), 377.Google Scholar

² John of Damascus, De fide orthodoxa 1.8, PG 94.829A.

³ Barth, Karl, Church Dogmatics I/1 (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1936), 425–426.Google Scholar

⁴ Moltmann, , The Trinity and the Kingdom (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1981), 175Google Scholar. So also Colin E. Gunton, who maintains that God should not be understood as ‘in some sense “substance”’ while yet advocating the import of perichoresis to the unity of God's inter-relations and actions (The Promise of Trinitarian Theology [2nd edn; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1997], 198).Google Scholar

⁵ Moltmann, , The Coming of God (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1996), 295, 301, 327, respectively.Google Scholar

⁶ In history (Historie) the past is observable, self-contained, and reproducible, terminating the promised horizon of the historic (Geschichte), which as eschatological is noetic and phenomenological. ‘Facts are never experienced as self-enclosed events, which have had their time, but as moments in the process of the history of promise. That is, they are not experienced as “facts” or “matters of fact,” because in these expressions a Greek concept of being is employed, against which the thinking of the history of promise rages. Only in the “horizon” of promise and fulfillment are historic events dealt with. Abstracted from that, they become a collection of dead facts’ (Moltmann, , ‘Verkündigung als Problem der Exegeses,’ Perspeckliven der Theologie: Gesammelte Aufsätze [Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1968], 114)Google Scholar. ‘The very use of the term “fact” … implies a concept of being, of absoluteness, of immutability and finality, which refuses to be combined with promise, hope, and future, and therefore also with “history”’ (Theology of Hope [New York: Harper & Row, 1967], 110)Google Scholar. Promise, on the other hand, ‘keeps the hoping mind in a “not yet” which transcends all experience and history’ (ibid., 102). On Moltmann‘s view of history and eschatology, see Otto, Randall E., The God of Hope: The Trinitarian Vision of jürgen Moltmann (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1991), 63–117 and passim.Google Scholar

⁷ Moltmann, , The Coming of God, 285–287.Google Scholar

⁸ August Deneffe, ‘Perichoresis, circumincessio, circuminsessio. Eine terminologische Untersuchung,’ Zeitschrift für katholische Theologie 47 (1923), 497–532. Deneffe also distinguishes a static view of perichoresis as ‘coinherence’ or ‘mutual in-dwelling,’ from a dynamic ‘interpenetration,’ a view reflected in the medieval West in the Latin terms, the static circuminsessio and the dynamic circumincessio; Michael Schmaus, however, admits no difference between the terms. According to him, circumincessio was found in Bonaventura in the thirteenth century, with the spelling changed by the Dominicans to circuminsessio after the Frankish empire (Katholische Dogmatik [Munich: Max Heuber, 1960], 1:496).Google Scholar

⁹ Stemmer, Peter, ‘Perichorese. Zur Geschichte eines Begriffs,’ Archiv für Begriffsgeschichte 27 (1983), 9–55.Google Scholar

¹⁰ PG 37.181C.

¹¹ Harrison, Verna, ‘Perichoresis in the Greek Fathers,’ St. Vladimir's Theological Quarterly 35 (1991), 55. Harrison's article has provided the basis for the patristics portion of this discussion.Google Scholar

¹² Ambiguorum Liter 112b, PG 91.1053.

¹³ Capitum Quinquies Centenorum Centuria 4.19, PG 90.1312A–B.

¹⁴ Harrison, ‘Perichoresis in the Greek Fathers,’ 58.

¹⁵ Ambiguorum Liber 190a, PG 91.1228C–D.

¹⁶ Harrison, ‘Perichoresis in the Greek Fathers,’ 58–9.

¹⁷ Egan, John P., ‘Toward Trinitarian Perichoresis: Saint Gregory the Theologian, (Oration) 31.14,’ Greek Orthodox Theological Review 39 (1994), 83–93Google Scholar, contends that Gregory Nazianzen's allusion there to three interconnected suns in which there is a single intermingling of light anticipates Pseudo-Cyril's trinitarian perichoresis. On Athanasius and Hilary; cf. Prestige, G. L., God in Patristic Thought (London: William Heinemann, 1936), 284–285Google Scholar and the fine classical foundation in Torrance, Thomas F., The Christian Doctrine of God, One Being Three Persons (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1996), 168–202.Google Scholar

¹⁸ Prestige, , God in Patristic Thought, 284.Google Scholar

¹⁹ Ps.-Cyril, De Trinitate. 10, PG 77.1144B.

²⁰ Harrison, ‘Perichoresis in the Greek Fathers,’ 60.

²¹ ‘Person-al’ is used here advisedly, since ‘person’ is required for the unity of the two natures in Jesus Christ, whereas ‘person’ is less fortunate for the unity of the three persons in God, since it sets up the awkward assertion of ‘three persons in one person.’ ‘In view of the fact that there are three persons in God, it is better to say that God is personal than to speak of Him as a Person’ (Berkhof, L., Systematic Theology [Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1941], 85).Google Scholar

²² Ibid., 89.

²³ Torrance suggests that ‘without qualification,’ the christological appropriation of perichoresis ‘has resulted in some form of docetic rationalising and depreciating of the humanity of Christ’ (Christian Doctrine of God, 102), ‘a Eutychian conception of Christ's humanity’ (170n.) in which the humanity coalesces into the divine. Perichoresis, however, functions in christology as well as in trinitarianism to maintain distinctions without such intermingling; thus Torrance can rightly speak of the inter-relations of the two natures in Christ and of the three Persons in the Trinity in terms of subsistence within union, i.e., enhypostasis (160, 171), which is ensured by perichoresis.

²⁴ While the christological use remains a part of the dogmatic traditions of the Roman Catholic and Reformed churches (cf. Schmaus, , Katholische Dogmatik 2/2, 246–247Google Scholar; Heppe, Heinrich, Reformed Dogmatics [Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1978 rep.], 429)Google Scholar, it is particularly within the Lutheran Church, with its unique view of the communicated omnipresence of Christ, that perichoresis retains a special christological centrality. Cf., e.g., Pieper, Francis, Christian Dogmatics (St Louis, MO: Concordia, 1951), 2:123–214.Google Scholar

²⁵ Barth, , Church Dogmatics I/1, 456.Google Scholar

²⁶ Moltmann, and Moltmann-Wendel, Elisabeth, Humanity in God (London: SCM Press, 1984), 88.Google Scholar

²⁷ Hart, , Understanding our World: An Integral Ontology (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1984), 209–210.Google Scholar

²⁸ Guarino, Thomas, ‘Postmodernity and Five Fundamental Theological Issues,’ Theological Studies 57 (1996), 656.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

²⁹ Gunton, , Promise of Trinitarian Theology, 137–157 (quote on p. 151).Google Scholar

³⁰ Schroeder, , The Science of God (New York: Broadway, 1997), 177.Google Scholar

³¹ Peacocke, , ‘Science and God the Creator,’ Zygon 28 (1993), 473.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³² Ibid., 477.

³³ Torrance, , Christian Doctrine of God, 157, 149.Google Scholar

³⁴ Moltmann, , Trinity and Kingdom, 173–176, 198.Google Scholar

³⁵ Solomon, Robert C., In the Spirit of Hegel: A Study of G. W. F. Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit (New York: Oxford University Press, 1983), 8–9.Google Scholar

³⁶ Cf. Otto, , God of Hope, 93–117Google Scholar; idem, ‘The Eschatological Nature of Moltmann's Theology,’ Westminster Theological Journal 54 (1992), 115–133.Google Scholar

³⁷ Thompson, John, Modern Trinitarian Perspectives (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), 34, 51.Google Scholar

³⁸ Ibid., 51.

³⁹ Moltmann, The Coming of God, 287. The phrase ‘Gott-möglich’ derives from Moltmann, ‘Die Kategorie Novum'm der christlichen Theologie,’ Perspecktiven, 186.

⁴⁰ Van Steenberghen, Fernand, Ontology (Louvain: Publications Universitaires, 1970), 50.Google Scholar

⁴¹ Ibid., 64–5.

⁴² In her fine study of Bloch, the Marxist atheist from whom Moltmann ‘learned theology’ (Moltmann, , Im Gesprach mit Ernst Bloch [Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1976] 90)Google Scholar, Geetruida M. van Asperen says, ‘By transcending us in time, the non-existent goal becomes the tendency of the process, thus exerting its directive influence on the course of the process. That the non-existent can exert an enduring attraction is due precisely to its absence. The goal's failure to appear causes the process to continue. In other words, the insufficiency of what has been realized at the very front of the process, an insufficiency which becomes apparent only when measured by the standards of the not-yet existing goal, acts as the motor of the ongoing movement’ (Hope and History: A Critical Inquiry into the Philosophy of Ernst Bloch [Utrecht: Free University Press, 1973), 41.Google Scholar

⁴³ Van Steenberghen, , Ontology, 86.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ Moltmann, , God in Creation (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1985), 227.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ Moltmann, , Trinity and Kingdom, 120.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Moltmann, , The Crucified God (New York: Harper & Row, 1974), 256.Google Scholar

⁴⁷ Moltmann, , ‘Antwort auf die Kritik der Theologie der Hoffnung,’ Diskussion über die ‘Theologie der Hoffnung’ von Jürgen Moltmann (ed. Marsch, Wolf-Dieter; Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1967), 225.Google Scholar

⁴⁸ Moltmann, , Crucified God, 173.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ Ibid., 182.

⁵⁰ Moltmann, , The Way of Jesus Christ (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1990), 223.Google Scholar

⁵¹ Thomas, John H., ‘Trinity, Logic and Ontology,’ Trinitarian Theology Today: Essays on Divine Being and Act (ed. Schwöbel, Christoph; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1995), 78.Google Scholar

⁵² Moltmann, , Coming God, 333.Google Scholar

⁵³ Boff, Leonardo, Trinity and Society (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1988), 5–8, and 65–99, where he demonstrates his coherence with classical dogmatics.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ Buber, Martin, I and Thou (2nd edn; New York: Scribner's, 1958), 4.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ Anderson, Ray S., On Being Human (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1982), 76.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ Berkouwer, G. C., Man: The Image of God (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1962), 100–101Google Scholar. The tensions in Barth's theology of relations may be seen in Deddo, Gary, ‘The Grammar of Barth's Theology of Personal Relations,’ Scottish Journal of Theology 47 (1994), 183–222CrossRefGoogle Scholar. While Barth sees'a unity of humanity in Jesus Christ’ (217) by virtue of his being the elect Man, humanity's ‘being in becoming’ (205–12) requires personal recognition of God's love which elicits human love for God in return. Thus, ‘Barth offers us a theologically grounded (i.e. trinitarian and christological) relational (non-substantial) ontology of personal being’ (220), albeit with many of the tensions that persist within his doctrine of election and his implicit universalism.

⁵⁷ Otto, Randall E., ‘The Imago Dei as Familitas,’ Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 35 (1992), 510.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ Ibid., 511, with allusion to Moltmann and criticism as above.

⁵⁹ Thomas, Gordon J., ‘A Holy God among a Holy People in a Holy Place: The Enduring Eschatological Hope,’ Eschatology in Bible & Theology (eds Brower, Kent E. and Elliott, Mark W.; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1997), 59Google Scholar; Lawler, ‘Perichoresis: New Theological Wine in an Old Theological Wineskin,’ 54–64, applies the term to marriage and the church; as applied to the church; cf., e.g., Volf, Miroslav, After Our Likeness: The Church as the Image of the Trinity (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1998)Google Scholar who follows Moltmann in neglecting the necessary ontological basis; so also Gunton, , Promise of Trinitarian Theology, 56–82Google Scholar; Speidell, Todd H., ‘A Trinitarian Ontology of Persons in Society,’ Scottish Journal of Theology 47 (1994), 283–300.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁶⁰ Moltmann, , Coming of God, 318.Google Scholar

⁶¹ Moltmann, Coming of God, 295, 310, 327, respectively. Discussion is found particularly in Bauckham, Richard, ed., God Will Be All in All: The Eschalology of Jürgen Moltmann (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1999).Google Scholar

⁶² Moltmann, , Coming of God, 326–327.Google Scholar

⁶³ The sociological use of Christian terminology is found in Moltmann, , The Experiment Hope (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1975), 173Google Scholar; on Moltmann's use of phenomenology, see Otto, , God of Hope, 199–233.Google Scholar

⁶⁴ Moltmann, , ‘Vershrānkte Zeiten der Geschichte: Notwendige Differenzierungen und Begrenzungen des Geschichtsbegriffs,’ Evangelische Theologie 44 (1984), 217.Google Scholar

⁶⁵ Moltmann, , God in Creation, 55.Google Scholar

⁶⁶ Moltmann, , ‘Gott und Freiheit,’ Heute von Gott reden (eds Hengel, Martin and Reinhardt, Rudolf; Grūnewald: Chr. Kaiser, 1977), 77.Google Scholar

⁶⁷ Moltmann, ‘The Bible, the Exegete, and the Theologian,’ God Will Be All in All, 228.

⁶⁸ Moltmann, , Coming of God, 299–301.Google Scholar

⁶⁹ Ibid., 298.

⁷⁰ Richard Bauckham, ‘Eschatology in The Coming of God,’ God Will Be All in All, 15–16.

⁷¹ Moltmann, ‘The World in God or God in the World?,’ ibid., 41.

⁷² Moltmann, , Coming of God, 294.Google Scholar

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⁷⁴ Bauckham, ‘Time and Eternity,’ God Will Be All in All, 193.

⁷⁵ Morse, , The Logic of Promise in Moltmann's Theology (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1979), 54.Google Scholar

⁷⁶ Barrow, John and Tipler, Frank, The Anthropic Cosmological Principle (Oxford: Clarendon, 1986), 676f.Google Scholar, cited in Worthing, Mark W., God, Creation and Contemporary Physics (Minneapolis: Augsburg/Fortress, 1996), 171.Google Scholar

⁷⁷ Worthing, God, Creation and Contemporary Physics, 172.