Wolfhart Pannenberg's Theory Of Christology Theory

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The early church fathers regarded Jesus as fully divine first, and then worked their way ‘down’ to his humanity. Their approach is considered to be Christology ‘from above’; wherein they presuppose the divinity of Jesus, seemingly disregarding the historical life and context of Jesus of Nazareth. Wolfhart Pannenberg was not comfortable with this interpretation of Jesus, thus he created his own theology, holding to the ‘from below’ approach. He argues that Christology must begin with the historical Jesus and center upon his resurrection, not his incarnation, as proof of his deity. It is through his resurrection that he is the Second Adam and is able to bring salvation to the world. Yet his argument is incorrect as he inadvertently leaves room for the possibility of Jesus failing and for someone else whom God elected to have been the Messiah.
Pannenberg finds support for the ‘from below’ Christology in his interpretation of Scripture. He rightfully acknowledges, “if [one is] to speak in a biblically well-founded way of Jesus Christ as the revelation of God, this has to be done on the basis of the Old Testament,” which the church Fathers would not have disagreed with. He goes further in asserting that the New Testament cannot be fully trusted as the true revelation of Jesus: “the diversity of the New Testament witness to Jesus …show more content…

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