~ Updated and Revised: February 21st, 2019 ~

Karl Barth and Emil Brunner is the greatest tragedy since Romeo and Juliet. The friendship between Barth and Brunner is nearly as famous as its tragic demise. Brunner's famous essay "Nature and Grace" was responded to with a loud "Nein!" by Karl Barth that was heard around the world. (Both essays are available in Natural Theology). It is as loud as it was surprising. Does there exist a stronger objection to natural revelation than Karl Barth's 'Nein'?

Before the letter, let me provide some context to the Karl Barth's debate with Emil Brunner on natural revelation (including natural theology that is established upon natural revelation) with this entry on Natural Theology in the Westminster Handbook to Karl Barth:

"Natural Theology is the doctrine of a union of humanity with God existing outside God's revelation in Jesus Christ" (CD II/1:168). It is "a theology which grounds itself on a knowability of God distinct from the grace of God, i.e., on a knowability of another God than Him knowable only in His grace" (143). It is "a science of God . . . constructed independently of all historical religions and religious bodies as a strict natural science like chemistry and astronomy 'without reference to or reliance upon any supposed special exceptional or so-called miraculous revelation" (KGSG, 3). Barth argued in his famous debate with Emil Brunner (1934) that, strictly speaking, it is "every (positive or negative) formulation of a system which claims to be theological, i.e. to interpret divine revelation, whose subject, however, differed fundamentally from the revelation in Jesus Christ and whose method therefore differs equally from the exposition of Holy Scripture" [1]

Karl Barth's rejection of natural revelation is thoroughly worked out in his Church Dogmatics II/1. It was a loud No! that left no doubt that Barth was firmly against natural revelation. Much of Barth's criticism of natural revelation was simutaneously a criticism of the German Christians and the Nazis during World War II. After the war ended when the danger had subsided, Barth developed his own natural theology at the end of the Church Dogmatics in CD IV/3.1's discussion of "secular parables of the truth", which was basically a commentary on Calvin's writings in the Institutes of the Christian Religion on this topic. In Barth's writings on "secular parables", many have believed that Barth had changed his mind on natural revelation and opened a door to a secret and hidden "Yes" behind the "Nein". (For some answers, read "Karl Barth’s No! to Natural Theology: Secular Parables of the Kingdom".)

This letter that I've quoted in entirely below is the last correspondence between Barth and Brunner. Barth sent the following letter to Brunner (who was on his death bed), and it may or may not have been received by Brunner before he died. This letter raises many provocative questions: Did Brunner receive Barth's letter? Was this a final reconciliation between two theological giants? Did Barth concede and open the door to natural revelation (or natural theology) in the end? Or were these merely kind words, admitting to the guilt of destroying a friendship? So many questions left unanswered.

Letter 207 [2],

To Pastor Peter Vogelsanger, Zurich

Basel, 4 April 1966

Dear Pastor,

Your letter of the second¹ touched me greatly--also because you wrote it.²

If I were more active after my two-year illness I would take the next train to press Emil Brunner's hand again.

If he is still alive and it is possible, tell him I commend him to our God. And tell him the time when I thought I should say No to him is long since past, and we all live only by the fact that a great and merciful God speaks hi gracious Yes to all of us.³

With sincere thanks and greetings,

Yours,

Karl Barth

P.S.  Please give my greetings to Mrs. Brunner too.

Notes:

1. Vogelsanger, after a visit to Emil Brunner's sick-bed, sent a long letter to Barth on his serious condition, 2 April 1966
2. According to Vogelsanger, his hitherto good relation with Barth had been disrupted after the founding of the paper Reformatio, which Vogelsanger edited and whose policy Barth did not approve of.
3. Vogelsanger received Barth's letter on the morning of 5 April, rushed to the hospital, where Brunner was weak but alive and conscious, and read the letter with Barth's greeting. A slight but beautiful smile came over Brunner's features and he quietly pressed Vogelsanger's hand. A few minutes later Brunner went into a coma from which he did not awake, dying peacefully near midday on 6 April. Barth's seems to have been his last earthly greeting.

Sources:

1. The Westminster Handbook to Karl Barth, ed. Richard E. Burnett, pg 152. (Nth, 74-75)

2. Karl Barth Letters: 1961-1968, ed. Geoffrey W. Bromiley, Letter #207