Balthasar in Light of Early Confucianism

By Joshua R. Brown

In this original study, Joshua Brown seeks to demonstrate the fruitfulness of Chinese philosophy for Christian theology by using Confucianism to reread, reassess, and ultimately expand the Christology of the twentieth-century Catholic theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar. Taking up the critically important Confucian idea of xiao (filial piety), Brown argues that this concept can be used to engage anew Balthasar’s treatment of the doctrine of Christ’s filial obedience, thus leading us to new Christological insights. To this end, Brown first offers in-depth studies of the early Confucian idea of xiao and of Balthasar’s Christology on their own terms and in their own contexts. He then proposes that Confucianism affirms certain aspects of Balthasar’s insights into Christ’s filial obedience. Brown also shows how the Confucian understanding of xiao provides reasons to criticize some of Balthasar’s controversial claims, such as his account of intra-Trinitarian obedience. Ultimately, by rereading Balthasar’s Christology through the lens of xiao, Balthasar in Light of Early Confucianism employs Confucian and Balthasarian resources to push the Christological conversation forward. Students and scholars of systematic theology, theologically educated readers interested in the encounter between Christianity and Chinese culture, and comparative theologians will all want to read this exceptional book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: University of Notre Dame Press
• Release date: Apr 30, 2020
• ISBN: 9780268107116

Joshua R. Brown

Joshua R. Brown is assistant professor of theology at Mount St. Mary's University.

Book preview

BALTHASAR IN LIGHT OF

EARLY CONFUCIANISM

JOSHUA R. BROWN

Balthasar in Light of

Early Confucianism

University of Notre Dame Press

Notre Dame, Indiana

University of Notre Dame Press

Notre Dame, Indiana 46556

undpress.nd.edu

All Rights Reserved

Copyright © 2020 by the University of Notre Dame

Published in the United States of America

Library of Congress Control Number: 2020932823

ISBN: 978-0-268-10709-3 (hardback)

ISBN: 978-0-268-10712-3 (WebPDF)

ISBN: 978-0-268-10711-6 (Epub)

This e-Book was converted from the original source file by a third-party vendor. Readers who notice any formatting, textual, or readability issues are encouraged to contact the publisher at [e-mail].

TO MY WIFE, JAMIE, WHO HAS MADE THIS WORK

POSSIBLE IN INNUMERABLE WAYS

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

Abbreviations

Note on Translations and Conventions

Introduction

ONE The Conceptual Structure and Context of

Xiao in Early Confucianism

TWO "While Living, Serve Them with Li ":

Xiao as Care for Parents

THREE Serve the Dead with Li : Filial Love and

Obedience in Ceremonial Xiao

FOUR The Spiritual Context and Structure of

Christological Love and Obedience for

Hans Urs von Balthasar

FIVE Archetypal Obedience: Balthasar’s

Conception of Christ’s Filial

Obedience as Archetypal Experience

SIX Mission, History, and Obedience: Christ’s

Filial Obedience in Theo-Drama

SEVEN A Confucian Rereading of Balthasar

Notes

Bibliography

Index

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This book began as a doctoral dissertation at the University of Dayton. Consequently, I have incurred much debt in writing it, particularly among those who helped me to prepare and complete the original study. My dissertation advisor, William L. Portier, provided excellent scholarly formation, helping me to inject a historical sensitivity into a predominantly systematic effort. G. Alexus McLeod was simply invaluable to this book, serving as my formal and later informal teacher in classical Chinese language and the textual traditions of Chinese philosophical schools. Additionally, Jana M. Bennett, Dennis Doyle, and Peter J. Casarella each provided tremendous feedback for the project and gave inspiration through their support for the endeavor.

In addition to teachers, I am grateful to several friends and colleagues who supported the book in prayer and strengthened it through often informal conversation. Cameron Jorgenson was my initial teacher in theology, and he has been a constant supporter and champion of my work and a gracious sounding board ever since. My fellow students at the University of Dayton and colleagues at both Loyola University Maryland and Mount St. Mary’s University have been constant sources of inspiration and solace. In particular, I must single out for gratitude R. Trent Pomplun, with whom I shared many illuminating and formative conversations on the nature of comparative theology, and many things we discussed appear in this book. Also, I initially struggled mightily to find the right path for the last chapter of the book, and through conversation with Reid B. Locklin everything fell into place. I thank him for his generosity and insight.

The most substantial intellectual debt of gratitude for this book is owed to Matthew Levering, who has had a share in this project since its clumsy inception during my second year at Dayton. In addition to reading the entire finished dissertation and subsequent drafts, Levering provided much needed support and advice, including doses of frank and needed criticism. I do not think this book would exist without his advice, assistance, and copious prayers.

Many thanks also to the editorial team at University of Notre Dame Press, including Stephen Little, who guided the book through the review process. A special note of thanks is owed to Dawn Eden Goldstein, who copyedited the manuscript before its final submission to the press for adjudication. I also would like to thank the peer reviewers—from UNDP and from journals that published articles drawn from this book’s material—for their very helpful critiques and suggestions. Any errors that remain are my responsibility, but there would be many more without the help of these wonderful readers and editors.

Without the support and love of my family, I could never have gone about this project. I must thank my parents, Darrell and Brenda Brown, and my sister, Charity, and her family for their support and prayers. Likewise, my parents-in-law, William Chong and Kim Wan Woo, have shown extraordinary love and grace in support of my family and this project. However, the greatest debt for this book was incurred in 2008, when I met Jamie, now my wife, and she completely changed my world. Born in Malaysia and fiercely committed to her Chinese culture, Jamie proved the impetus for my entire scholarly efforts. I had no idea when we met or married that our relationship would have so much influence on my academic interests. I dedicate this book to her for all her love and support, and especially her graciousness and willingness to help me find a place in a now Catholic and intercultural home. I also must thank my sons, Elliott and Emmett, who often did me the great favor of demanding I put down the book and play. Moreover, they are the true audience for this book. All I have done here is a striving to find a way to help my children embrace their Catholic identity and Chinese heritage.

Most importantly, I offer gratitude to the Triune God, to whom I offer this book as a sacrifice of praise. It has been a privilege to reflect on the mysteries of the Incarnation in light of human culture, and I hope I have honored and depicted the beauty of divine truth in this book, even if only in the merest semblance. May we all learn to be obedient sons and daughters in imitation of Christ. Thank you to all the saints who have accompanied me in this process, particularly my patron saint, Augustine of Hippo, and the patron saint of the original dissertation, Maria Goretti.

Finally, I am grateful to Pro Ecclesia and The Heythrop Journal for allowing me to include in this book heavily revised material from articles published there. An earlier version of chapter 5 was previously published as Christ’s ‘Symphonic’ Obedience: Exploring Balthasar’s Archetypal Experience through Han Confucianism, Pro Ecclesia 25, no. 4 (2016): 439–58. Material reflecting modest parts of chapters 2, 3, and 7 was previously published as Towards Filial Love: Reconsidering Hans Urs von Balthasar’s Theme of Christological Obedience in Light of Early Confucian Philosophy, The Heythrop Journal 58, no. 1 (2017): 132–48.

ABBREVIATIONS

Works by Hans Urs von Balthasar

"Catholic

Philosophy" On the Tasks of Catholic Philosophy

CSL The Christian State of Life

Ep Epilogue

FG First Glance at Adrienne von Speyr

GL (vols. 1–7) The Glory of the Lord: A Theological Aesthetics

Heart Heart of the World

KB A Theology of Karl Barth: Exposition and

Interpretation

LAC Love Alone Is Credible

MP Mysterium Paschale

My Work My Work in Retrospect

Our Task Our Task: A Report on the Community of St. John

TD (vols. 1–5) Theo-Drama: Theological Dramatic Theory

Test Everything Test Everything: Hold Fast to What Is Good

TH A Theology of History

TIS Truth Is Symphonic: Aspects of Christian

Pluralism

TL (vols. 1–3) Theo-Logic

Journals in Chinese Philosophy

AP Asian Philosophy

Dao Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy

JCP Journal of Chinese Philosophy

PEW Philosophy East and West

NOTE ON TRANSLATIONS AND CONVENTIONS

This book draws on many sources atypical in theological studies, particularly texts of the Confucian tradition originally composed in classical Chinese. I have elected for the most part to retain conventions of Sinological scholarship in this book, erring on the side of options that can better accommodate a theological audience. For example, I have rendered Chinese terms in transliteration using the Pinyin romanization system, providing the appropriate Chinese character on the first instance of the term and on subsequent instances needing clarification. In Chinese, many characters are represented by similar sounds and tones (such as in maˉ 媽, meaning mother, and maˇ 馬, meaning horse). Consequently, I provide characters in situations where the Chinese term may be ambiguous without the character clarification. Additionally, I have not included tone markings in romanization. This is because readers with Chinese background can typically discern the correct tone without much assistance, and tone markings are not particularly helpful for those not familiar with Chinese. For similar reasons, I have not provided characters for standard texts, figures, and time periods of Chinese history.

All translations of Chinese texts are my own, unless otherwise stated. I have primarily utilized the online database of texts from the Chinese Text Project, checking these against more standard manuscripts. Particularly in the cases of Han-era texts without standard text divisions, I have used divisions according to the Chinese Text Project. The book also includes modest engagement with Chinese scholarship on these texts, which I have cited according to field conventions. In Chinese culture, the family name typically precedes the given name(s), the latter of which is often composed of two words joined to form one. For example, for Tu Weiming, Tu is the family name, whereas Wei and Ming are given names presented as a pair. For all texts in Chinese originally, I have retained the Chinese naming conventions. For sources written by Chinese authors but published in English, I have retained the conventions used by the source material unless there is compelling evidence of an author’s preference of naming conventions.

Regarding Hans Urs von Balthasar, I have mostly cited the readily available English translations of his major works. However, I also cite heavily from European scholarship on Balthasar’s thought, in the appropriate languages. When quoting these sources, I have offered my own translation in the main body of the text, often with the original in the accompanying endnote.

Introduction

According to the Synoptic Gospels, at the baptism of Jesus a voice from heaven proclaimed, This is my beloved son, in him I am well pleased.¹ This scene attests to the central Christian mystery: the eternal Son of God assumed human nature—in an indivisible and unconfused union—in the divine person of Jesus of Nazareth for the sake of humanity’s salvation. More specifically, Christ’s baptism testifies to a paradox at the heart of this mystery. Not only did the eternal Son assume flesh for us, he assumed flesh in weakness through a life of pleasing obedience. The Letter to the Hebrews captures the tension nicely: Son of God though he was, he learned obedience in the school of suffering.²

The fact that the Triune God revealed himself through Christ’s life of obedience unto death, even death on a cross (Phil. 2:8), is not haphazard. As Thomas Aquinas observes in the Summa theologiae, it is supremely fitting that the Son, rather than the Father or Spirit, becomes flesh.³ Aquinas explains this fittingness by noting the resonance between the Son’s divine personhood, his perfection of human nature, and the salvific work he accomplished for his fallen creatures. But what can be said about the fittingness of Christ’s obedience in particular? How did his obedience resonate with his Trinitarian personhood as Son, his assumption of the perfections of human nature, and his salvific sacrifice for his beloved yet sinful people? What can be discovered, articulated, and adored about Christ’s filial obedience?

The unique claim of this book is that those who wish to reflect on the fittingness of Christ’s filial obedience can find a rich and helpful resource in the early Confucian doctrine of xiao 孝, or filial piety.⁴ Specifically, I contend that the early Confucian xiao can be developed as a helpful lens for interpreting, clarifying, and developing theological accounts of Christ’s obedience as incarnate Son.

Initially, such a claim might seem to be an interesting idea, but no more than that. It might seem that the study of Christ’s filial obedience would benefit more by drawing on resources from cultures more similar to Christ’s own, such as the ancient Near East or Second Temple Judaism. Hence, the Confucian xiao may appear unlikely to provide a particularly fruitful area of study for Christology. I argue to the contrary that it is, in fact, quite fruitful. To demonstrate this will require quite a bit of spadework. First, it will require engaging with Confucian philosophy as a serious intellectual tradition worth studying in its own right. Second, it will involve developing the Christian understanding of Christ’s filial obedience as a way of discerning where and how Confucian insights might serve Christological science.

To facilitate this task, this book presents a Confucian rereading of Christ’s obedience as understood by the twentieth-century Catholic theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar.⁵ My aim is to analyze Balthasar’s articulation of Christ’s obedience using the early Confucian xiao as an interpretive lens. Specifically, I shall apply the early Confucian understanding of xiao to three purposes in rereading Balthasar’s Christology: (1) to affirm or confirm some of Balthasar’s interpretations of Christ’s obedience; (2) to challenge some of his positions on this theme; and (3) to expand the scope of his Christological vision, with which I have deep sympathies.

Rereading Balthasar’s account of Christ’s obedience in light of the Confucian xiao requires, however, a process of preparation and development. In order to ensure a rereading that does justice to the concerns and approaches of both interlocutors, a sound rereading first requires a firm grasp of both the conceptual framework of the Confucian xiao and Balthasar’s theology on their own terms. Thus, this study begins with the Confucian account of filial obedience and its complement, filial love, as articulated in the context of China from the pre-Qin through the Han dynasties.

The first part, chapters 1–3, describes the historical and conceptual contexts of the early Confucian xiao (chapter 1) and then presents early Confucian accounts of xiao as filial service to parents while they are living (chapter 2) and after they die (chapter 3). The second part, chapters 4–6, offers a parallel treatment of Balthasar. Beginning with the spiritual and biographical contexts of Balthasar’s theology of Christ’s obedience (chapter 4), I exposit his understanding of this doctrine in his theological aesthetics (chapter 5) and theological dramatics (chapter 6). Then, in chapter 7, I undertake the constructive task of rereading Balthasar’s theology in light of the Confucian xiao.

The remainder of this introduction prepares the reader for the work to follow in three steps. First, I provide an apologia for this book by identifying the ways in which it contributes to broader theological discourses. Second, I explain my rationale for structuring the book as two analytical prolegomena that enable the constructive proposals I present in chapter 7. And third, I offer brief introductions to the early Confucian texts that I analyze in this book and to my method of analyzing xiao in the first three chapters. The last of these three steps is needed because, whereas Balthasar’s corpus is straightforward and easily defined, early Confucianism is an imprecise term that requires explanation. But the first two steps are necessary because this book is written for three main audiences, each of which may question the logic or role of some aspect of the book.

The primary intended audience of this book are theologians, especially scholars of Balthasar’s work, to whom I aim to demonstrate the theological fruitfulness of Confucian philosophy and whom I hope to inspire to serious engagement with Confucian thought. Second are culturally Chinese Christians with theological interests and background, for whom I strive to provide an example of how the intellectual resources of Chinese philosophy may be fruitfully and faithfully used to articulate and develop Christian theology.⁶ And third are comparative theologians who are interested in the Christian theological appeal to Confucianism, which is a neglected subject of study in this field. Of course, I greatly hope that other readers will also find the book interesting, including systematic theologians interested in Christology, scholars of early Chinese thought or Confucianism, and anyone wishing to find resources for a dialogue between Christian faith and Chinese culture.

Among these audiences, scholars of Balthasar’s thought may ask why engaging Confucianism is helpful in the first place. Conversely, Chinese Christians or comparative theologians may intuit the value of Confucianism but question why Balthasar is a fitting interlocutor, or what warrants a study of Christ’s obedience. Finally, all these audiences may question why I am requesting a considerable amount of patience from readers as I lay out the Confucian xiao and Balthasar’s interpretation of Christ’s obedience on their own terms. Thus, addressing my reasons for requesting this patience will allow the reader to see that the investment of the work in chapters 1–6 is necessary in order to produce the fruitful results of the rereading in chapter 7.

Why Read This Book?

Although a book combining analyses of the Confucian xiao, the works of Hans Urs von Balthasar, and the doctrine of Christ’s obedience is unique in modern theological literature, uniqueness does not equal significance.⁷ What makes this book significant is what it offers to the discipline of academic Christian theology and Christian reflection in general. This book contributes to the theological discourse of the Christian community in three clear ways, by (1) addressing general concerns regarding the interaction of Christianity and Chinese culture; (2) adding to academic discourse in systematic theology on Christ’s obedience; and (3) contributing to the study of Balthasar’s thought.

Some theologians may find it odd that I attempt to cultivate a reading of Christ’s obedience here through a Chinese tradition’s appeal to filial obedience rather than through intellectual resources more culturally or historically relevant to Christianity or the person of Jesus Christ. But there are two reasons to undertake this project for the sake of articulating the harmony between Christian faith and Chinese culture, which one can distinguish as subjective and objective reasons.

Asian theologians such as K. K. Yeo illustrate the subjective significance of reading Christology in light of Confucianism. In his recent book, Musing with Confucius and Paul, Yeo attempts to unite Christian theology and Chinese ethics.⁸ Having a Malaysian Chinese background, Yeo partially justifies his approach as a means to unite his Christian and Chinese identities. Such an effort shows that for Chinese Christians and culturally Chinese Christians, it is often difficult to perceive the unity between the Christian faith and Chinese culture. Since the majority of Christian reflection justifiably comes from European and Mediterranean traditions, some culturally Chinese Christians may find that growing in Christian faith increases a feeling of liminality, out of which they feel a need to choose between being Christian or being culturally Chinese.⁹ By demonstrating how Chinese intellectual concepts can serve in interpreting and developing Christian theological reflection, this book can help culturally Chinese Christians to articulate the harmony between Chinese culture and the gospel proclaimed in orthodox Christianity. This, by extension, can ameliorate at least one source of liminality for culturally Chinese Christians.¹⁰

A more objective way this book contributes to the relationship between Christianity and Chinese culture concerns a type of theological task that will soon be needed. In 1961, the Tenth Annual Chinese Catholic Conference of San Francisco resolved to reconcile the tenets of Chinese philosophy with the doctrines of the Catholic Church.¹¹ This reconciliatory task has yet to be accomplished, and the time to undertake it is now. Some scholars estimate that China will soon become the largest Christian nation in the world in terms of population (though not in terms of percentage of the national population).¹² This is a weighty prognostication, particularly since there are many Christians in regions that are heavily influenced by Chinese culture or thought, such as Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, and Vietnam, to name just a few. In short, very soon, and possibly already, the majority of the world’s Christian population will face the need to understand the relationship between Christian doctrine and Chinese intellectual traditions.

Catholicism in China faces the particularly political struggle of defining itself as both Christian (which is traditionally seen as Western) and Chinese, a struggle that has played out formally in episcopal controversies and informally in the imprisonment and martyrdom of Christians.¹³ On the one hand, it is clear that such issues cannot be resolved for Chinese Catholics by outsiders, and I have great respect and admiration for the ecclesial leaders and theologians who have been addressing these issues for decades. Still, resources that demonstrate how Christian theology can appreciatively read and incorporate Chinese philosophy can aid Christians of Chinese heritage both in understanding how the Christian faith is harmonious with Chinese culture and in learning how to articulate this conviction to non-Christians.¹⁴ At the very least, offering a rereading of a Western theologian in terms of Confucian philosophy expresses solidarity with Chinese and culturally Chinese Christians, which in turn testifies to the catholicity of the church and Christian fraternity.

Apart from ecclesial demographics, academic Christian theology stands to be heavily affected by the probable shift of Christianity’s cultural center to Chinese and other non-Western cultures. Currently, many theologians are hard at work fighting the decay of the Christian faith in the contemporary West. Although that is an important task, it requires a complement if the discipline is to survive and flourish. Unless Christian theology shows a willingness to become acquainted with Chinese and other non-Western intellectual frameworks and to employ them in a genuine articulation of Christian doctrine, then the discipline will soon risk being unable to clearly communicate with or understand well the majority of Christians in the world.

Additionally, there is a risk that Christian theology will become a tribalized and nationalized discipline in which Western theology becomes divorced from other global theologies with little or no mutual exchange between them.¹⁵ To put it in terms of this book, unless Christian theology takes up a serious engagement with Chinese intellectual traditions and questions, I sense a considerable danger that theological works such as those of Balthasar will be seen as useful to only an increasingly small number of Western Christians. Thus, if it is true, as I believe it is, that Western theologians such as Balthasar or Aquinas have insights and wisdom that are relevant to all Christians regardless of culture or language, then there is a tremendous need to learn how to mediate these insights to non-Western cultures and languages.

A final contribution of this book regarding Chinese culture and Christianity follows upon various scriptural exhortations to take the gospel unto the ends of the earth, which are embodied in the catholicity of the church (Acts 1:8). One implication of this catholicity is that the faith of the church, although born from the Jewish history of salvation and nursed through Greek and Latin cultures, resonates in some manner with the intellectual traditions of all cultures, mutatis mutandis.

Throughout Christian history, theologians have noted how the Christian faith is catholic (that is, universal) in the sense of acknowledging, welcoming, and drawing upon all truth. Though the church is rightly beholden to divine revelation as communicated in sacred scripture and sacred tradition, all that is true, good, and beautiful outside of divine revelation is nonetheless in harmony with revelation.¹⁶ Thus, the harmony between Christian fides and aspects of non-Christian ratio testifies to the fullness of the gospel, which benefits all Christians in demonstrating the extent to which the gospel perfects and fulfills the exercise of human reason across the variety of human cultures and languages.¹⁷ Consequently, this study helps to indicate the breadth of the church’s catholicity by concretely demonstrating how Christian doctrine can accommodate and draw upon philosophical insights from various cultures.¹⁸

Regarding this book’s relationship to contemporary academic systematic theology, the doctrine of Christ’s obedience has become increasingly important over the last few decades in Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox theology.¹⁹ These developments are largely the culmination of trends begun in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries by German kenotic theologians, who attempted to discern the theological foundations for God’s kenosis (the self-limiting of Phil. 2:6–11). These theologians focused on how the Son humbled himself and took the form of obedience in the Incarnation and asked what this kenosis might mean about God. Gottfried Thomasius set a trajectory for kenotic discourse when he argued that in the Incarnation, the Son divests himself of the divine mode of being in favor of the humanly creaturely form of existence.²⁰ Or, as he also put it, the Incarnation requires a renunciation of the divine glory on the part of the Son.²¹

At the very least, Thomasius and sympathetic theologians were willing to reimagine traditional language about the Trinity and the predicates of God, such as divine impassibility, in light of Christ’s kenosis.²² Inevitably, kenotic theses evoked responses from those who wanted to retain a commitment to traditional orthodoxy without avoiding these new questions. Perhaps the two greatest examples of such theologians were the two masters of Basel: Karl Barth and Balthasar. Both men imaginatively sought to connect the mystery of Christ’s obedience on earth to a Trinitarian principle of kenosis within God’s life in a manner that makes Christ’s obedience as Son harmonious with God’s perfections.²³ Both Barth and Balthasar held that obedience can be predicated of the Son eternally (that is, in the immanent Trinitarian life), and that this is the foundation for his obedient words and deeds in the economy of redemption.

These proposals of obedience as an eternal predicate of God have been received in three main ways. Some theologians have rejected the Barth and Balthasar position, as in the Thomistic criticisms levied by Thomas Joseph White and Guy Mansini.²⁴ Others have accepted the Barth and Balthasar position as correct and attempted to fortify this approach. With respect to Balthasar, one can see this in various appeals to the metaphysics of W. Norris Clarke and the active receptivity of being thesis, for example.²⁵ Finally, theologians such as Wayne Grudem and Bruce A. Ware have used a broadly construed theory of obedience within God to provide a Trinitarian ground for a patriarchal anthropology.²⁶

Christ’s obedience is an urgent topic today, touching on the link between God’s immanent Trinitarian life, the economic Trinity, and divine predication. What value does Confucianism bring to a consideration of this doctrine? Most of the current literature provides excellent metaphysical and theological analyses of Christ’s obedience from several angles, but none has asked what seems to be the vital question: What is filial obedience? If we accept that Christ is obedient as the incarnate Son, then it would seem that all the questions about the proper foundation of his obedience or about how we might predicate obedience to him in the economy depend on the specific quality in which his obedience is presented to us: as filial, as an act of his Sonship. And this requires some account of what filial obedience is in the first place.

I admit that it would be perfectly legitimate, and likely fruitful, to cobble together a theory of filial obedience from more traditional Western sources, such as Plato or Aristotle or theologians such as St. Maximus the Confessor or St. Ignatius of Loyola—or, of course, from scripture itself. However, one who has even the barest awareness of Chinese Confucianism can hardly deny that this tradition has a robust conception of the family and obedience within it that, at the very least, should be investigated for its possible contributions to the theological study of Christ’s obedience.

In chapter 7, I draw on the Confucian logic of filial obedience to argue that Balthasar’s account of Christ’s obedience is a profoundly reasonable account that identifies essential insights regarding what filial obedience must involve. At the same time, however, I contend that the Confucian xiao can clarify moments at which Balthasar’s account of Christ’s obedience does not accord with the logic of filial obedience. And most constructively, I argue that the Confucian xiao expands Balthasar’s interpretation of Christ’s obedience by introducing a concept of ritual sonship that is profoundly helpful for articulating the specific ritual character of Christ’s obedience. In each of these steps, I hope to demonstrate, by offering a specific account of the natural bond of father and son, and the filial virtues of obedience and love within that bond, that the Confucian xiao constitutes a rich but neglected resource for articulating the Christian doctrine of the obedient incarnate Son.

This leads to this book’s contributions to scholarship on Balthasar’s theology. Balthasar’s corpus is vast, staggering in its size, depth, and variety of sources. Interpreting his theology requires us to follow one who was not an academic theologian but a spiritual director who engaged with the modern world. Balthasar’s Christology is especially indebted to trends in German philosophy, theology, and literature, such as the trajectories of G. W. F. Hegel and Friedrich Schleiermacher, and developments in twentieth-century Catholicism, such as la nouvelle théologie. However, the most important contexts for Balthasar’s Christology are his formation in Ignatian spirituality and his relationship with the mystic Adrienne von Speyr, both of whom I discuss at greater length in chapter 4.

As a spiritual director, Balthasar felt that his theological purpose was to enliven devotion rather than offer meticulous clarifications and distinctions. Unlike Aquinas, Balthasar did not teach others how to theologize, and, unlike John Chrysostom, he did not offer instruction for the faithful. Rather, Balthasar was attempting to initiate a theological renewal by fostering the encounter with divine love and glory.²⁷ This feature of Balthasar’s work enables a rereading that is both charitable and fruitful, for his systematic theology provides an opportunity for greater clarification and definition even as it possesses a solid and compelling spiritual core.

Given the robust Ignatian context of Balthasar’s spiritual background, it is unsurprising that obedience would become a central theme in his works.²⁸ Indeed, scholars have noted the crucial function of obedience in Balthasar’s Christology for several decades. Arno Schilson and Walter Kasper observed as early as 1974 that Balthasar possessed a Gehorsamschristologie (obedience-Christology).²⁹ More recently, Philippe Barbarin noted that Christ’s filial obedience is the central node in Balthasar’s sweeping theology of revelation: It is the obedience of the Son which reveals Trinitarian love.³⁰

Barbarin’s description touches on the real contribution, and the challenge, that Balthasar offers Christian theology. The Christian tradition has always had accounts of Christ’s obedience, but Balthasar makes this mystery absolutely central to understanding the entire narrative of salvation history and God himself. Michel Beaudin’s study shows how foundational Christ’s obedience is to Balthasar’s entire theological worldview. Beaudin argues that Balthasar sees obedience as the véritable étoffe (the true matter) of the figure of Christ, wherein obedience is the means through which Christ reveals God’s love.³¹ The Trinitarian and soteriological love of Jesus is shown through his entering into solidarity with humanity through a life of obedience.³² According to Beaudin, the obedience of Christ is how Balthasar defines God’s opening up his perspective for human participation: God reveals his glory through the idiom of obedience so that we may perceive and adore the glorious one. Jesus’s obedience is, above all, the locus of the return to the center (exitus-reditus) wherein God is not unknowable; he is incomparably manifest to humanity.³³

Those previously unfamiliar with Balthasar’s work can now readily see why he makes an ideal subject for this book. Simply put, Balthasar is one of the few theologians to give the theme of Christ’s obedience a truly central role in his thought, interpreting Christ’s obedience as the heart of the dramatic encounter between the Triune God and the fallen creature. To Balthasar, obedience is the fundamental idiom of the Incarnation as a work of revelation and redemption. The great benefit of this is that rereading Balthasar’s Christology in light of the Confucian xiao invites Confucian philosophy to encounter the heart of the gospel, and it ushers Confucian concepts and framework into the service of explaining and adoring the salvific work wrought by the incarnate Son of God.

At the same time, drawing on the Confucian xiao introduces into Balthasar’s thought a more thoroughly developed understanding of filial obedience than what Balthasar himself possessed. For Balthasar, Christ’s obedience was a filial translation of Ignatian spiritual and religious obedience, and he did not emphasize the natural father–son bond as a ground upon which to build his account of Christ’s obedience. At several points, including the Trinitarian aspects of his theology of Christ’s obedience, I argue that the Confucian xiao can both identify weaknesses in Balthasar’s approach and offer means for improvement.

A final contribution of this book to studies of Balthasar concerns the relationship between Balthasar and Asian thought. To date, the only major study to examine Balthasar’s relationship to Asian traditions has been Raymond Gawronski’s Word and Silence.³⁴ Gawronski examines how Balthasar interprets Asian traditions such as Hinduism and Buddhism, but he does not assess how such traditions might be fruitful for assessing and expanding Balthasar’s theology. This latter task, taken up in this book, finds splendid justification in Balthasar’s own words: "The overall scope of the present work [ The Glory of the Lord] naturally remains all too Mediterranean. The inclusion of other cultures, especially that of Asia, would have been important and fruitful. But the author’s education has not allowed for such an expansion, and a superficial presentation of such material would have been dilettantism. May those qualified come to complete the present fragment."³⁵

One would not be wrong to think that Balthasar—who was deeply conscious of the nature of his own intellectual formation and its possible shortcomings—would extend this comment to his entire corpus, not just to The Glory