Divine ‘Pastness’ and the Creation of Hope: The Significance of the <i>Sepultus est…</i>

• Main Author: Mark R. Lindsay
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2021-06-01
• Series: Religions
• Subjects: Karl Barth; Credo; Jesus Christ; burial; memory
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/12/6/439

This article explores Karl Barth’s exegesis of the ‘<i>sepultus est…</i>’ from the Apostles’ Creed, as articulated in his 1935 <i>Credo</i> lectures. I argue that Barth accords the <i>sepultus</i> a degree of theological significance that is against the grain, not only of the majority of western interpretations of Jesus’s burial, but also of his own later interpretation of it within his <i>Kirchliche Dogmatik</i>. Specifically, this article argues that in his 1935 lectures, Barth exegetes the <i>sepultus</i> in terms of a divine self-surrender to the ‘pure pastness’ that is the ‘state and fate’ of all humanity. As a consequence, the <i>sepultus</i> can then be used as the pivot to a different, and more hopeful, future.