Karl Rahners Writings on Literature, Music and the Visual Arts

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This book is made up of a collection of texts unavailable in one volume until now, including six previously untranslated essays, from a major theologian of the twentieth century. Rahners numerous writings focused on the revelation of God as mystery in the world and on the human being who has an essential openness towards the transcendent. His articles reveal an empathy and a depth of insight into the relationship between theology, faith and the arts which are remarkable and may take the reader by surprise. More recently, Rahners contribution to the growing field of theology and the arts has been recognised by leading theologians on this subject. He asserts that theology must integrate the verbal and non-verbal arts as they are authentic means of human self-expression, of religious experience, and of Gods self-communication; and therefore they are essential sources of theology. Rahner argues that theology, understood as a persons reflexive self-expression about him- or herself in the light of divine revelation, cannot be regarded as complete until the arts become an intrinsic moment of theology itself.

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If asked to name major twentieth century theologians who also wrote on aesthetics, mention would certainly need to be made of Hans Urs von Balthasar, Jack Maritain and Paul Tillich, and perhaps also of occasional pieces by Karl Barth and Hans Kng among others. But hitherto not even the latter minimum has been available in the case of Karl Rahner, and that despite the fact that of all theologians of the period he was the most open to the activity of the Spirit in the wider world. Gesa Thiessen has at last rectified this defect in her splendid collection and translation of occasional pieces by Rahner on the subject. While most of the extracts discuss how the words of poets can operate like gates into infinity, the other arts are not ignored. Much more than mere illustration, they confirm how the arts, like theology, are an experience of grace, opening individuals to the transcendent. -- David Brown, University of St Andrews, UK
Premiere theologians expand the traditional boundaries of theology with an eye to the human experiences as manifested in the arts. Gesa E. Thiessen highlights these elements in Karl Rahners oeuvre by collecting his commentaries on the visual arts, poetry, literature, and music even unto Stravinsky and the Beatles into this superb volume. -- Diane Apostolos-Cappadona, Georgetown University, USA
Gesa Thiessen has given us a wonderful gift in these remarkable but often overlooked works by Karl Rahner on the validity and importance of non-verbal modes of doing theology. Rahners trust in the capacity of the arts to be a means by which humans encounter and understand the divine is foundational and just as relevant to contemporary theological reflection as it was in his time. -- Robin Jensen, Notre Dame University, USA

Author Bio

Gesa E. Thiessen lectured for many years at Milltown Institute of Theology and Philosophy, Dublin. An Adjunct Assistant Professor at the School of Religion at Trinity College Dublin, Visiting Scholar at Sarum College, Salisbury, and a Research Fellow at the University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa, she has published widely on theology and the arts and on ecumenical ecclesiology. She is a non-stipendiary minister in the Lutheran Church in Ireland.