BOOK REVIEW:
Barth on the Descent into Hell: God Atonement and the Christian Life. David Lauber. Barth Studies. Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing Company, 2004. 186 pp. (hardcover). ISBN 978-0754633419. 

Of the second article in the Apostles’ Creed, “I believe . . . in Jesus Christ, [God’s] only son, our Lord,” Karl Barth wrote: “With these words we step into the great centre of the Christian creed” (Karl Barth. Credo. New York. Charles Scribner’s Sons. 1962. p. 39). Before these words become our confession, they announce a decision that has been made about us, from beyond us, to which our affirmation (or denial) can only be a response. If the second article is the creed’s center, the clauses that deal with Christ’s death and resurrection are, Barth wrote, “the centre within this centre” (p. 83).

David Lauber takes his readers on a journey into Barth’s exposition of the descent into hell. Jesus’ death in God-abandonment is, says Lauber, “the culmination of his life and passion . . . lived and endured pro nobis—on our behalf and in our place” (p. 1).

The study is enriched by bringing Barth’s Basel colleague Hans urs von Balthasar into the conversation with his perspective on Holy Saturday. Lauber also engages, with commendation and critique, the late Alan Lewis’ Between Cross and Resurrection.

There are more reasons to appreciate and commend this book than space will allow here. From my perspective as a pastor, I mention but two.

First, Lauber’s study clarifies, deepens and, for some, perhaps redeems the doctrine of “substitutionary atonement.” Far from being an abstract legal transaction subject to mechanistic demands and obligations, atonement is the profoundest act of God’s sovereign love and omnipotent grace. For us, in Jesus Christ, God becomes the Substitute, taking our place and enduring the fullness of his own wrath and judgment. The crucifixion, death, burial, and descent into hell happen within God’s own triune life. Christ’s passion is neither a symbol of nor a theory about God’s way with the world. The passion is itself the very enacted reality of God’s reconciling love. The depth of God’s love is beyond the capacity of any doctrine to grasp or express. In God’s own self-surrender to the human condition and fate—the death of the Son in God-abandonment for us—just so does God love the world and reconcile us to himself.

Second, because God alone is “the Substitute”—because God becomes the “Rejected One”—the work of salvation is complete, perfect, and accomplished once, for all, and forever. Lauber’s study exposes the flaw in that recurring protestant heresy which makes of faith the condition/ “work” necessary to our salvation, as if God’s sovereign purpose for us in Jesus Christ is impotent apart from our agreeing to it. In Christ’s life and passion God has taken into his triune life the estrangement, the punishment, and the ultimate consequence of evil, has borne them to the fullest extent, and has borne them away. Separation from God can no longer be our destiny. God has not merely offered us a deal, or increased our options. God has determined to give us life—God’s own life—with or without our consent, desire or cooperation. Refusing to be without us, God has gathered us into the reconciliation accomplished in Jesus Christ. There is truly now “no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 8:1). We have no life now, nor have we a future destiny as anything other than God’s redeemed children.

This book is filled with grist for the mills of preaching, teaching, pastoral care, and Christian witness in the local congregation. It is a marvelous study in the theological interpretation of scripture, wherein scripture remains paramount, but invites a holistic reading that results in deeper understanding (Chapter 3). It shows how Trinitarian theology nourishes the life of faith (Chapter 4). The descent into hell offers insights into the depth of God’s love for the world and for each human being that are nothing less than life-changing, especially for those who live in fear of a wrathful God and do not know that their Judge is their Redeemer. This study also helps us see how God’s self-giving love informs our understanding of Christian witness and discipleship in our day (Chapter 5).

Lauber’s book is a gift to both church and academy, and a reminder that as the faith of the church seeks understanding, Karl Barth still has much to offer us in our quest. 

John B. Rogers, Jr.
Montreat, NC 

PUBLISHED IN THE BULLETIN OF THE INSTITUTE FOR REFORMED THEOLOGY, SPRING 2008, VOL. 8, #1.