Announced in the Church Times:
THE German theologian Professor Jürgen Moltmann, who was widely read in English translation, died on Monday, aged 98.
A member of the Evangelical Church in Germany, he was Professor Emeritus of Systematic Theology in the University of Tübingen. But his serious theological reading first began in the UK, to which he was brought as a prisoner-of-war at the end of the Second World War.
As is my custom, I don’t say things about the dead I wouldn’t say while they were living. This is my assessment of the man from my post My “Journey” with Jürgen Moltmann:
One place where Moltmann should read his own stuff is the issue of theodicy. On the one hand, he sighs that the terrible wars of the last century have put the issue of theodicy out of reach. That’s been a common sentiment of Europeans who went through these wars; it has been a big push in the decline of Christianity in Europe. In the 1980’s my mother had an English S.O. who became an atheist because of his experience in World War II; the effect was different over here. On the other hand, Moltmann points out that modern man is now the master of his own destiny. Then why did he allow these wars to happen? Why were humans out to lunch on this? This may not answer the theodicy issue to Moltmann’s satisfaction, but it should (usually doesn’t) give humanists pause as to the superiority of their idea…
Overall, I found going through his talks an education. It made me look at liberal theology in a different way, if not in a more favourable one. As far as Göttingen people are concerned, I’ll stick with the list I gave at the start and leave Moltmann to the liberal seminary academics.
I’m glad that Giles Fraser “closed the loop” on the theodicy issue the way he did; we’d all be better off if that were more frequent.
Positive Infinity 
I met Moltmann several years ago at a Society for Pentecostal Studies conference. He was a keynote speaker, but was also attempting to connect with with him dialogue with Pentecostals. His own work in pneumatology had led him, he said, to reconsider and reevaluate the importance of Pentecostalism for, contemporary theology. I teach a course at PTS on contemporary theology, which includes a significant section on Moltmann. I certainly don’t always agree with his conclusions, but I find it fascinating and informative that he has dealt with Pentecostalism such an in-depth way.
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I think it’s fair to say that most twentieth century theologians were blindsided by the rise of modern Pentecost. I don’t think they were expecting the return of the supernatural in a world where such was supposedly banished to more primitive times. I remember reading Sabatier’s Religions of Authority and Religions of the Spirit. He envisioned a new form of Christianity where much of the Gospels were left behind and the need for authority along with it. He wasn’t expecting a group of people who took the whole thing literally and still upended the whole concept of Christian authority!
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