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Karl Barth’s Doctrine of the Word of God in Threefold Form

Updated: May 15th, 2019

Is the Bible the Word of God? Karl Barth answered No! because "the Bible is not in itself and as such God’s past revelation" [1] and that "we thus do the Bible poor and unwelcome honour if we equate it directly with this other, with revelation itself." [2] and "the direct identification between revelation and the Bible which is in fact at issue is not one that we can presuppose or anticipate." [3] Barth did not believe that the Word of God was simply identical to the Holy Bible or any other printed book, and to believe a printed book collecting dust on a shelf is the Word of God is pure superstition. Hence, that old family bible laying dormant in an attic box among mothballs is not the Word of God. 

Barth then argues the Bible becomes the Word of God when it is proclaimed by the living human voice of the Church, and only in that event may the Bible be rightly called the Word of God. Barth explained "the Bible, then, becomes God’s Word in this event, and in the statement that the Bible is God’s Word the little word 'is' refers to its being in this becoming. It does not become God’s Word because we accord it faith but in the fact that it becomes revelation to us." [4] The Bible does not become the Word of God when it is read by a human voice, but only has a human voice proclaims it in the church. 

The Word of God therefore is in threefold form, consisting of the past revelation of Jesus, the written human witness in scripture, and the preaching of the Bible in the church's proclamation. The written form of the Word of God does not exist in the bible apart from revelation and proclamation, and likewise proclamation does not exist apart from the written and revealed forms, and lastly the revealed form does not exist apart from the written and proclaimed form. Karl Barth's doctrine of the Word of God in threefold form is not easy to understand, but I will attempt to explain it in simple terms.

Karl Barth believed that the Word of God is Jesus, not the Holy Bible (Martin Luther and many other theologians believed this as well) and the Word of God is in threefold form (as I mentioned before) of revelation, scripture and proclamation. Or in another way of speaking, in the appellation of 'Jesus', the father of Jesus and the spirit of Jesus are also included, such that in Jesus the entire Trinity is revealed. In Jesus, the fullness of God in threefold form of the Trinity is revealed (c.f. Colossians 2:9), and so Barth concludes that the Word of God is in threefold form likewise, specifically in the forms of revelation, scripture and proclamation, and these three forms are analogous to the Trinity of god the Father, Son and Holy Spirit respectively.  The written form of the Word of God is the witness of the scriptures (i.e. the Bible), and proclaimed form is the preaching of the Church, and the revealed form is the events and acts of God (in Jesus) to which the scriptures witness and the church proclaims, and these three forms of the Word of God are unified.

Barth explains the analogy of the Word of God in threefold form to the three modes of being of the Trinity as follows:

There is only one analogy to this doctrine of the Word of God. Or, more accurately, the doctrine of the Word of God is itself the only analogy to the doctrine which will be our fundamental concern as we develop the concept of revelation. This is the doctrine of the triunity of God. In the fact that we can substitute for revelation, Scripture and proclamation the names of the divine persons Father, Son and Holy Spirit and vice versa, that in the one case as in the other we shall encounter the same basic determinations and mutual relationships, and that the decisive difficulty and also the decisive clarity is the same in both—in all this one may see specific support for the inner necessity and correctness of our present exposition of the Word of God. [5]

The Word of God in threefold form is also unified in a similar way as the three modes of being of the Trinity are unified. For instance, the written form of the Word of God never exists apart from the proclamation form or revealed form, and this explains why the Word of God does not exist in an unread book collecting dust on a bookshelf. So the Bible becomes the written form of the Word of God as it witnesses to revelation and as it is preached in the Church. Barth provides three key statements for understanding the interrelatedness of the three forms of the Word of God: 

The revealed Word of God we know only from the Scripture adopted by Church proclamation or the proclamation of the Church based on Scripture.

The written Word of God we know only through the revelation which fulfills proclamation or through the proclamation fulfilled by revelation.

The preached Word of God we know only through the revelation attested in Scripture or the Scripture which attests revelation. [6]

I've unpacked these three statements into the following formulas to illustrate the trinitarian interrelation of the forms: 

#1. (Proclamation → Scripture) → Revelation

#2. (Scripture → Proclamation) → Revelation

#3. (Revelation → Proclamation) → Scripture

#4. (Proclamation → Revelation) → Scripture

#5. (Revelation → Scripture) → Proclamation

#6. (Scripture → Revelation) → Proclamation

Formulas #3 and #4 (derived from the second statement) show that Scripture never exists without Proclamation or Revelation, and likewise the other formulas demonstrate that Proclamation and Revelation do not exist apart from the Scripture as well. When these six formulas are combined, then their unity is shown. 

In the following quotation, Karl Barth explains that the threefold form of the Word of God does not mean there are three different forms of the Word of God, but the Word of God exists in three ways of being that are unified. 

We have been speaking of three different forms of the Word of God and not of three different Words of God. In this threefold form and not otherwise—but also as the one Word only in this threefold form—the Word of God is given to us and we must try to understand it conceptually. It is one and the same whether we understand it as revelation, Bible, or proclamation. There is no distinction of degree or value between the three forms. For to the extent that proclamation really rests on recollection of the revelation attested in the Bible and is thus obedient repetition of the biblical witness, it is no less the Word of God than the Bible. And to the extent that the Bible really attests revelation it is no less the Word of God than revelation itself. As the Bible and proclamation become God’s Word in virtue of the actuality of revelation they are God’s Word: the one Word of God within which there can be neither a more nor a less. Nor should we ever try to understand the three forms of God’s Word in isolation. The first, revelation, is the form that underlies the other two. But it is the very one that never meets us anywhere in abstract form. We know it only indirectly, from Scripture and proclamation. The direct Word of God meets us only in this twofold mediacy. But Scripture too, to become God’s Word for us, must be proclaimed in the Church. So, to give a survey of the whole, the following brief schedule of mutual relations may be drawn up. [7]

Karl Barth introduces his doctrine of the "threefold Word of God" in the first part of his Church Dogmatics (CD I/1) and I recommend reading it to learn more about Karl Barth's Doctrine of the Word of God. To learn more specifically about Barth's views of scripture, and how the Bible has an indirect identity with the Word of God, then I recommend read the Church Dogmatics Vol. I/2 §19-21.

Sources:

1. Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics: The Doctrine of the Word of God, Volume I, Part 1, trans. G. W. Bromiley, ed. G. W. Bromiley and T. F. Torrance. (London, New York: T&T Clark, 2004), pp. 111. 

2. Barth. Ibid. p. 112.

3. Barth. Ibid. p. 113.

4. Barth. Ibid. p. 110.

5. Barth. Ibid. pp. 120-1.

6. Barth. Ibid. pp. 120-1.

7. Barth. Ibid. pp. 120-1.

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  1. Donald W. Dayton
    August 20th, 2018 - 13:44

    It is an interesting discussion to pursue whether or not Barth revised this formulation later in the dogmatics. In IV Barth, following the exegesis of his son Markus, posits that there is only one intersetion of the human the divine, one “mystery” or “sacrament”–Jesus Christ. He moves from this to a “low” sacramentology. Neither baptism nor the Lord’s Supper is in any way an independent interesection of the human and divine. There is no analogy to the hypostatic union. Thus the sacraments, the church itself, scripture, and the sermon are not in any sense autonomous channels of acess to God–or the Word of God. They all point to JC, the one Word of God. Thus the bible itself is only a human witness. We cannot in Barth’s view interpret the Bible by analogy to the incarnation, emphasizing the union of the human and the divine–and seeing a parallel as evangelicals often do between the sinlessness of Christ and the inerrancy of Scripture. Indeed, Barth is led to reject several themes of Catholicism, most notably the immaculate conception of Mary, because he insists that Barth assumes sinful human nature in the incarnation, not some sort of artificial sanitized form of human nature. I have always thought that this formulation requires a revision of the three fold word of God in the early dogmatics. I have sometimes argued that this is the most important shift within the dogmatics. Am I right? If not, what am I missing?

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    • Wyatt
      August 20th, 2018 - 20:59

      I appreciate your comment, because I was thinking about Barth’s abandonment of sacramental theology in CD IV/4 the entire time I was writing this article. I thought it was too much of a digression to get into it, especially since CD IV/4 is an unfinished volume and its 30 years later. It’s an unfinished shift, and there’s open questions about his conclusions, so it is not my favorite part of the CD. Maybe I’m not the most loyal barthian, but I haven’t retreated to a low sacramentology like Barth (yet). In Barth’s letters from the 1960’s someone asked him why he wasnt rebaptized, since he was baptized as an infant, and Barth said that even a disorderly baptism was still a valid baptism. https://postbarthian.com/2017/11/29/karl-barth-disorder-re-baptism/ So he hadn’t totally abandoned sacramentology either.

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  2. Donald W. Dayton
    August 20th, 2018 - 14:15

    Oops. Two typos.

    (1) in line four the human AND the divine

    (2) toward the end I of course meant that Christ (not Barth!) became incarnate. Is this a Freudian slip?

    The latter reminds me of the joke that was circulating around Yale when I was in seminary. It seems that the final judgement is not like we often think. Jesus sits behind a big desk and examines all those desiring admission to heaven. By some quirk it happens that Paul Tillich, Rudolph Bultmann, and Karl Barth arrive at the same time. Tillich enters the examination room, confidant of his philosophical grasp of the faith while the others wait in the anteroom. The hours pass and finally after about five hours, the door opens and Tillich, sadly shaking his head, is led down the other way. This does not intimidate Bultmann. He is after all a NT scholar. His exam goes on, seven hours pass before the door opens and Bultmann, sadly shaking his head, is led down the other way. Finally Barth is called in and his exam goes on and on for fifteen hours! Finally the door opens and out comes Jesus, sadly shaking his head.

    Or as a candidate for a position in theology at Drew prefaced his response to a question, ” You have to remember that in college I accepted Barth into my heart as my personal lord and savior.”

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  3. Haig
    January 2nd, 2019 - 15:18

    “Finally, preachers must be flexible. The Bible is not God’s word in the sense of a state code that tells us precisely what the view of the state is. In reality, we ought to say that the Bible becomes God’s Word. Whenever it becomes God’s Word it becomes God’s Word.” Barth, Karl. Homiletics. Westminster/J. Knox Press, 1991. Pg. 78.

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  4. Grace
    January 24th, 2019 - 01:07

    thank you for the very informative sharing it is a big help to the personal life growing in Christ, may God bless you and your wonderful work.

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  5. howard diehl
    March 23rd, 2020 - 07:04

    Thanks for this. I’ve read Barth and others, but I always appreciate further considerations. Yours clicked

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