Echoes of Paul in the Ethics of Barth: Pauline Themes in Karl Barth's Ethics of Creation

Abstract

This article examines the biblical echoes of the apostle Paul in the moral reflection of Karl Barth in his ethics of creation. Specifically, it seeks to demonstrate that Pauline themes inform how Barth constructs certain arguments within his special ethics on the protection of life within the third volume of the Church Dogmatics. A consideration of these biblical themes reframes how Barth's ethics might be understood and places them in a different discourse than one solely dominated by a comparison of Barth's ethics to other moral philosophies. It is in these specific accounts on the protection of life that Pauline themes are echoed in Barth's ethical reflection, and attention to the use of these themes within Barth's special ethics calls into question the perduring charges of occasionalism, intuitionism, and voluntarism against his moral theology, as well as modifies those that stress his actualism to the neglect of Barth's actual practice of analogical biblical argumentation. The focus of this investigation is not to examine in detail the merits or weaknesses of Barth's specific arguments regarding the protection of life, but to identify their biblical and specifically Pauline elements.