A Study on the meaning of language in Gerhard Ebelings theology

Language is a clue to understand Gerhard Ebelings theology. The language, with that he dealt in his theological studies, was neither a particular language nor the religious language, rather language in general. Ebeling observes the language primarily in theological perspective, namely in relation with God, his Word and our faith. He considered the language remarkably as a fundamental-theological theme, that he did not confine it to a certain field, but expended it to his own hermeneutical and dogmatical conceptions. He coined the term “Wordevent” (Wortgeschehen) and put it in the centre, because his thought focused on the continuous and dynamic performance or event, that God brings through his Word in our life. Language is first closely related to his hermeneutics, which characterizes his theology. The language-oriented hermeneutics could already be found in Schleiermacher, Dilthey, Heidegger und Gadamer. Ebeling defined hermeneutics especially as the theory of “understanding through language” (Verstehen durch Sprache). Language is not an object of understanding but its medium. The task of theological hermeneutics is to remove hinderances, which obscure the self-interpretation und self-verification of the Word. In >Dogmatic of the Christian faith< plays his concept of languages a major role in imaging God as the creator, Jesus Christus as the reconciler and the Holy Spirit as the completer etc. The believe in God can be experienced and proclaimed only by means of language. Ebeling makes us think about the relevance of the language for the Christian faith, which is revealed as wordlikeness (Worthaftigkeit), reality and personality