The Gospel of Jesus Christ as a Story to Be Told: The “Narrative” Theologies of Eberhard Jüngel and Hans Frei

Abstract

This article explores how Eberhard Jüngel and Hans Frei employ the category of “narrative” in Christian theology. Although Jüngel and Frei receive inspiration from different quarters, they end up drawing some similar conclusions. At the same time, their approaches to narrative theology reveal deep and striking differences between their programs for theology. My comments focus on the problem of language’s referential character, that is, the capacity of words and discourses to signify external objects and states of affairs. As I demonstrate, both Jüngel and Frei seize upon the “problem” (as they both deem it) of the structure of referential language. And yet, how Jüngel and Frei frame this issue and what they do in order to resolve it are conspicuously different in the arguments they unfurl. This difference, I show, folds back upon their distinct agendas for recovering narrative in theological discourse.