WELCHEN JESUS PREDIGEN WIR? ÜBERLEGUNGEN IM ANSCHLUSS AN MARTIN KÄHLER
Which Jesus are We Preaching? Remarks on the Margin of Martin Kähler's Thought

Summary/Abstract: The article discusses the relationship between the preaching of the one gospel of Jesus Christ and the different images of Jesus in the New Testament. After briefly reviewing recent debates about the ‚historical Jesus’ and referring to methodological challenges in current historical and theological approaches to Jesus, the article points to the concept of ‚Übergeschichte’ developed by the German biblical and systematic theologian Martin Kähler (1832-1912). His well known distinction between the ‚historische Jesus’ and the ‚geschichtliche, biblische Christus’ was an attempt to hold together the earthly life of Jesus and the transcendental significance of the ‚Jesus-Christus-Geschichte’ as a whole. With his concept of ‚Übergeschichte’ Kähler did not want to dismiss any historical research on Jesus. Rather, he intended to interconnect the universal and time-independent truth of Christian faith as part of God’s revelation with the historical singularity of the revelation of God in Jesus Christ ascertainable by historical methods. The second half of the article applies this approach to several parts of the Sermon on the Mount.

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