Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1913 edition. Excerpt: ...it cannot do without metaphysics. Schleiermacher's attitude is too subjective, both in his treatment of God and of the Christ of history. (c) Yet, though Schleiermacher failed himself to reach a historical Christ, he apprehended clearly the problem which lay before theology--a problem which, in its true import, neither rationalism nor orthodoxy had grasped. The growing interest in history, which was both parent and child of the historical method, could find no satisfaction in an uncritical orthodoxy which accepted in a lump the whole of traditional Christianity; in a rationalism which reduced Christianity to the level of a supposed religion of nature; or in the merely speculative interpretation of Christian doctrine current in Hegelianism. The demand was for facts, and in particular for a truly historical Christ, and it became more insistent as the century progressed. The central problem for theologians was to show how the traditional Christology had grown out of the historical facts relating to Christ; or, to put the matter somewhat differently, to justify the claim of Christianity to be at once the final and universal religion, and a historical phenomenon, the heart of which was the life and personality of a definite, historical figure. In two ways Schleiermacher helped to shape the future course of theology. He insisted that the Christian consciousness must be referred to Christ as its source, and so led inquiry back to an examination of that source. He showed that the study of religion must be approached through history, each religion being the historical expression of a distinct type of feeling, and thus promoted the use of the comparative method. By reviewing religion in this way he brought to the front the problem of the relation...
