TITLE

The Relevance of Jürgen Moltmann’s Trinitarian Theological Anthropology to the

Problem of the Behavioural Custom of Masking (the true self)

1. INTRODUCTION

The problem of the behavioural custom of masking the true self is the research problem
in this thesis. In order to show the relevance of Jürgen Moltmann’s trinitarian
theological anthropology to, the summary of this research problem and the formation of
its research questions are to be presented first in this introduction section for readers to
grasp the background of this paper.

1.1 The Relevance of This Paper

The following three sections are presented for showing the relevance of this paper to my
research title and research questions by way of the provisional research abstract.

1.1.1 Research Title

My research title is The Implications of Trinitarian Theological Anthropology for the
Problem of the Behavioural Custom of Masking among the Confucianism-affected
Chinese: With special reference to Jürgen Moltmann and Tu Weiming.

1.1.2 Research Abstract

My intension is to examine Protestant Evangelical Christianity and modern
NewContemporary New Confucianism through the lens of the problem of the
behavioural custom of masking the true self. This is a new area of research in the field
of Protestant Christian theology (especially involving apologetics and ethics), engaging
modern NewContemporary New Confucianism, and the religious dialogue between
Confucianism and Protestant Evangelical Christianity. This research attempts to answer
some of the big questions asked in the depths of the hearts of many contemporary
Chinese people: ‘How do Chinese people unmask their true self?’, ‘How do Chinese
people live out their true self?’ or ‘Where and how can the personage and the person of
Chinese people meet?’ 1
1
‘The true self’ is described by Stanley Grenz (2001:100–102) as ‘the unique self within’ which is found
‘in thoughts’ instead of ‘in deeds’. William James (1901:292) identified it as the ‘spiritual self’, in
contrasting to the ‘material self’, i.e. the bodily self (Moseley, Romney M 1991:23), and the ‘social self’.
The ‘spiritual self’ is to ‘think of subjectivity’ － ‘ to think ourselves as thinkers’ by discarding
recognition of others (James 1901:296, emphasis original) and is the ‘self of all other selves’ (Moseley,
Romney M 1991:23, emphasis original) or ‘the innermost citadel of selfhood’, which ‘can never be
1
 The behavioural custom of masking the true self is a fact accepted with tacit
consent by contemporary Chinese persons, adding to the impression of the ‘inscrutable’
(Lin, Yi 林藝 n.d.) Chinese perceived by foreigners (Lin, Yi 林藝 n.d.) 只引用一個字，
卻好像引用整個概念？？. Although the behavioural custom of masking can be found
more or less in any people group in the world, it would be enhanced strongly in a
Confucian-affected society. As presented in 1.1.4 and 1.3, not a few psychological and
sociological studies produced after 1980s have disclosed this problem. They have
proved it as a product of the relational and social structure and ideology influenced by
Confucianism, although very scarce, if any (I have not yet found any until now),
Confucianists have ever recognized, addressed, or dealt with it. This fundamental
problem prevents many Chinese persons from experiencing a true liberated inner
transformation of character and virtue, even while they are striving by means of outer
performance to achieve the moral cultivation upheld by Confucianism.
From my literature review, three main research questions have emerged, italicized
as follows,
1. To what extent is the problem of the behavioural custom of masking (the true self) a
fundamental and common problem (or symptom) amongst Chinese people
influenced by Confucianism? (This question has been answered in Chapter One)
2. To what extent is the behavioural custom of masking (the true self) among the
Confucian-affected Chinese related to Confucian social structure, ideology,
selfhood and lack of belief in a divine transcendental being, mainly based on Tu
Weiming’s interpretation on Confucianism? (This question is to be answered in
Chapter Three)
3. To what extent does Jürgen Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology have
implications for the problem of the behavioural custom of masking (the true self)

objectified’ (Wild, John 1969:83). Therefore, in this sense, having no self or loss of the self denotes that
the spiritual self is hidden, suppressed, denied, or even forgotten under the mask of the social self while
these two selves become inconsistent. Noteworthily, the immoral or illegal behaviour which should be
conditioned by society is excluded from this range of discussion in this research. (In answering a common
concerning question ‘Does it imply being evil?’ asked in the context of being or living out one’s true self
as it is, Rogers (1961:177) relieves such worry by explaining that one’s true ‘feelings, when he lives
closely and acceptingly with their complexity, operate in a constructive harmony rather than sweeping
him into some uncontrollably evil path’.) Therefore in this research, whenever we speak of having no self,
the absence of a self, loss of self or lacking of self, we are focusing on a behavioural custom of masking
(the true self). This means that one hides the true self as it is, not as it was or will be, hardly living it out,
not disclosing oneself or allowing the expression of his true self to be realized. For defining the true self
used in this research, Søren Kierkegaard’s ‘to be that self which one truly is’ (Kierkegaard 1941:18),
Shakespeare’s ‘“To thine own self be true”’ (Shakespeare in Rogers 1961:170), and Carl Rogers’ ‘to be
all of oneself in each moment’ (Rogers 1961:172, emphasis original) can help catching its proper
meaning in my research.be its proper definition.
2
 amongst Confucian-influenced Chinese people? (This question is to be answered in
Chapter Four and Five)
My main hypothesis is that a trinitarian theological anthropology as promoted by
Jürgen Moltmann, based on the social doctrine of the Trinity in Christian theology,
rather than the teaching of relationality in Confucianism, can authentically lead to a true
liberated inner transformation of character and virtue of for Chinese people. In other
words, any masking of the true self by an outer moral performance cannot achieve a true
inner development and transformation. Only through grace-filled relationships with
God, others and within the self can those masks be removed promisingly. Through
comparing the doctrines and presuppositions of sociality both in Tu Weiming’s New-
Confucianism and in Jürgen Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology of
Christianity, I am seeking to suggest theologically if Protestant Evangelical Christianity
can provide an alternative solution for this problem. My hope is that this study may help
to liberate Chinese people from performing good acts in order to seek a sense of self
security by winning recognition from God, others and even themselves.

1.1.3 Chapter Outline for the Thesis

Abbreviations
Abstract
1. Introduction: Research Motivation and Problem
2. The Main Research Question and its Related Methodology
3. Tu Weiming’s ‘Relational Self’ Anthropology in Modern Contemporary New
Confucianism and its Relevance to the Problem of the Behavioural Custom of
Masking
4. Jürgen Moltmann’s Trinitarian Theological Anthropology and its Relevance to
the Problem of the Behavioural Custom of Masking
5. Jürgen Moltmann’s Trinitarian Theological Anthropology and its Implications
for the Problem of the Behavioural Custom of Masking Among Confucian-
influenced Chinese People: With Special Reference to Tu Weiming
6. Conclusions
7. Appendices
8. Glossary
9. Bibliography

3
1.1.4 The Relevance of this Paper to the Research Title and its Research Questions
The above provisional chapter outline is found as an Appendix. The first main research
question will be discussed in Chapters One and Two, the second one in Chapters Three
to Five and the third one in Chapters Four and Five. This paper is the main part of
Chapter Four.

1.2 Summary of Research Problem

1.2.1 True Self and the Problem of the Behavioural Custom of Masking
In his book The Meaning of Persons (1957) (an English version of his La personage et
la personne), the Swiss physician and pastoral counsellor, Paul Tournier, 2
contrasts
personage with person. He defines ‘the person’ (or true self , ‘true nature’, ‘real self’,
‘real nature’ or ‘spontaneous nature’) as one’s ‘intimate and deeper being’ (Tournier
1962:9, 46, 79), and views it as ‘the original creation’ (Tournier 1957:39). The
importance and meaning of the person or true self depends on two fundamental
interrelated characteristics: ‘the free disposition of oneself’ (Tournier 1957:39) and
‘freedom’ (Rogers, Carl 1961:171) － That is one’s ‘autonomy’, one’s ‘free choice’, or
one’s ‘right of self-determination’ (Tournier 1957:39)－ and ‘responsibility’. (Tournier
1957:39; Rogers 1961:171) As Rogers indicates (1961:171), since complete freedom
demands that one take full responsibility for his/herone’s choices and their
consequences, he or sheone would definitely evade being one’shis/her true self if
he/sheone refuses to or cannot handle the pressure caused by one’shis/her free choice.
(Bai, Chongliang 白崇亮 2007:25) Inasmuch as Since responsibility must involve the
other － ‘ the second person, the thou’, ‘true personal relationship’ which is between
two true selves － it therefore may become a ‘responsible dialogue’. (Tournier
1957:129, emphasis original) This ‘responsible dialogue’ cannot avoid ‘risk’ while
making choices because it lets one ‘open to a reply’, requires him/her one to reply ‘in
turn’. It also makes a ‘person’ completely different from an ‘individual’ because ‘the
individual associates’, touching only externally, but ‘the person communicates’,
communing ‘inwardly’. (Tournier 1957:129)

2
As a Protestant Evangelical Christian theological researcher, I found that Paul Tournier is one of very
few persons who expresses and discusses comprehensively the issues of true self and the problem of the
behavioural custom of masking. But he is also the one of few who discuss it from the perspective of
biblical orthodoxy that is consonant with much that is now typified as Evangelical Christianity in our 21st
century. Therefore after comparing Tournier with Jung (1966) and Rogers (1961) both of who are the
psychologists engaging in unmasking one’s true self, Tournier’s accounts in these issues fit my purpose to
find theoretical bases to articulate them in this research.
4
 Yet can one identify easily what one’s ‘own real nature’/true self is? Can we
easily find one’s ‘true person’? (Tournier 1957:21, 46) The answer is negative,Yet can
one identify easily ‘what his/her own real nature’/true self is? Can we easily find one’s
‘true person’? (Tournier 1957:21, 46) The answer is negative, because what we can see
is only the ‘distorted and varied images’ of the true person due to its natural and
inevitable sociality. (Tournier 1957:21) Since childhood, ‘[T]he whole of our education,
our titles, honours and decorations, our daily experience of life, our relationships,
friendships, relatives, possessions’, all have begun to ‘make up our personage’, or
‘social masks’, so that we become ‘role players’. 3
This is what Daniel Goleman
(1996:166) calls the ‘shared self’ and ‘group self’. We employ these facets of ourselves
in order to hide our true self ‘behind a mask’ (Jung, Carl 1966:174) or which can ‘either
consolidate or compromise our relations with everyone we meet’ (Tournier 1957:33 &
1962:9) . To some extent, the personage, the social mask, which becomes our
‘automatic routine’ (Tournier 1957:39), indeed represents a kind of compromise
between the individual person and his/her society, family tradition, ‘social conventions’,
and so on (Zhuang, Huiqiu 莊 慧 秋 1987:176). This is because ‘the personage is an
external appearance which touches the personage of others from outside’, while it is
only the person who ‘communicates inwardly with the second person’ (Tournier
1957:129). However in his effort to differentiate persons from individuals, Tournier
asserts the concept of the person is tied together with ‘the human community, a spiritual
solidarity, a common patrimony’, and consequentially in order to follow ‘a certain
conventional’ manner of locution he/sheone cannot but ‘partake[s] of the nature of the
personage’. Still he (Tournier 1957:75) also indicates the inevitability of the emergence
of the personage resulting from the ‘personal contact’ we are seeking, because one of
the conditions of personal contact is ‘a certain mutual intelligibility in our modes of
expression which is of the order of the personage’. Tournier (1957:131) indicates that
the person ‘could not have existed without’ the personage, ‘but the personage ‘ha[d] no
value except as an expression of’ the person. 4
Speaking simply, the personage acts
according to ‘yīnggāi (應該)’ (what one should do) (Zhuang, Huiqiu 莊慧秋 1987:176)

3
‘[w]e are not only one personage throughout our lives; we are innumerable personages … We are even
many personages at once.’ (Tournier 1957:73)
4
Tournier (1957:131) explains the possibility of a true dialogue in spite of the inseparability of the person
and the personage as follows,
If then there is … only one language, that of our words, gestures and signs, in fact of the whole
movement of our being, that language has two meanings: one nourishes and satisfies the personage,
while the other, more 'intrinsic', always immanent, is always expressed and perceived by the person.
And there … is the element of security which permits us to believe in the person in spite of the
evidence of the personage; the key-element which makes dialogue always possible.

5
or ‘[O]ughts’ (Rogers, Carl 1961:168, 170, emphasis original) in the context of social
relationships and the person according to ‘xiǎng ( 想 )’ (what one would like to do)
(Zhuang, Huiqiu 莊慧秋 1987:176) or wants (Rogers, Carl 1961:170) in the context of
personal communion (Tournier 1957:130).
Since the personone cannot live alone all the time, he/sheone never exists in the
confinement of ‘an atomic self or substance’, but thrives within the groups he/sheone
interacts with as an ‘entire organic being’. (Wild, John 1969:86, emphasis original)
Therefore, for Tournier the problem of personage and person is complicated because of
‘the way in which the personage is inextricably bound up with the person, in spite of the
fact that we always tend to think of the role we play as different from what we are in
reality’. (Tournier 1957:13) He finds the ‘pure and unvarnished’ person will all the time
evade us. He admits (??) that ‘I can never grasp the true reality, of myself or of anybody
else, but only an image; a fragmentary and deformed image, an appearance: the
personage’, only through ‘which at one and the same time allows me glimpses of the
person and also tends to hide it from me, reveals as well as conceals it’. (Tournier
1957:15, emphasis original) Therefore ‘the person is unveiled’ only ‘in the genuine
responsible act’ when we cannot but take up a true stand in a ‘true dialogue’, namelyviz.
‘inner personal communion’ (Tournier 1957:130). 5
(Law: where and when can this
happen? Under what circumstances?) In such a true dialogue, one can boldly share
genuinely what one really thinks and feels in one’s heart or disclose truly one’s reality
in every aspects, instead of what is expected by oneself and others, even it might offend,
hurt and fail others, shame oneself, or cause trouble and bad result.

1.2.2 The Cause of the Formed Behavioural Custom of Masking the True Self
From literature found mainly in psychology and sociology, the factors, described mainly
by Tournier and supported by other literature found in psychology and sociology,
causing the behavioural custom of masking the true self can be classified in five
categories. Due to limited space, only the titles of these five categories are numerated
here as reference in this chapter to show simply how the behavioural custom masking is
shaped. the main categories of the factors causing the Chinese behavioural custom of
masking the true self are summarized briefly as follows:

5
For example, in a true dialogue, one can boldly share genuinely what he/sheone really thinks and feels
in oshis/her heart or disclose truly his/heros reality in every aspects, instead of what is expected by
himself/heroelf and the others even it might offend, hurt and fail the others shame himself/heroeelf, or
cause trouble and bad result.
6
1. The motivation to pursue one’s ‘own altruistic or egotistical ends’ (Tournier
1957:30f., 51)
2. The motivation to adorn and preserve one’s expected and ‘imaginary self’ (Pascal in
Tournier 1957:32) (Tournier 1957:28, 32, 35–6)
3. The motivation to survive in a society (Tournier 1957:33, 39–40)
4. The motivation to hide inadequacies because of a lack of ‘self-confidence’ (Doi,
Takeo 1981:152) and ‘internal doubts’ (Tournier 1957:31, 36, 46, 50).
5. The motivation to interact with others effectively (Tournier 1957:34–6, ,38, 46, 50,
63, 137, 212)
A behavioural custom of masking the true self is motivated evidently to varying
degrees by many factors displayed in five categories listed above which combine and
interact with each other; it leads to the establishing of what is primarily an imaginary
self based on self-expectations, an expected self based on others’ expectations, or even a
civil but false self which seeks to hide or avoid circumstances where the undesired self
would be seen. ‘Uneasiness’ and ‘repression’ are caused by a ‘discord’, separation and
even conflict between the personage － namely the imaginary self, the expected self and
the pretended self － and the person, namely the true self or actual self (Tournier
1957:76, 82). However, this problem of uneasiness is not caused by ‘the mask, [or] the
personage in itself, but [by] its artificial and deceptive character’. I believe that is the
reason why this kind of uneasiness might be expressed in ‘psychical symptoms such as
anxiety, depression, obsessions and inhibitions’ (Tournier 1957:81–2). And in denying
the existed reality of the true self behind a mask, the root problem of it will not be faced,
dealt with and healed, let alone the psychical symptoms relieved and the conflicted or
even broken relationships with others reconciled and restored.

1.2.3 Suggested Direction for Dealing with the Problem of the Behavioural Custom
of Masking
Tournier (1957:213) maintains that one must ‘rediscover his natural spontaneity’ in
order to disclose ‘the true colour of the person underneath’ the varnish of the personage.
Still, Tournier clarifies that the ‘natural self’ driven by ‘natural spontaneity’ is different
from the true self. One’s ‘natural spontaneity’ can only ‘make him an animal’ rather
than ‘a person’. The true self appears when one ‘must make a personal choice’ about
‘the line of conduct’ he[/she]one is to follow’ observe and the ways he one is to use
one’shis/her ‘liberty’, so that ‘in some respects the conquering of the instincts of’ one’s
natural self comes about.

7
 Table 1.1 summarizes Tournier’s two ‘diametrically opposite paths’ to the person
and the personage in the ‘search for liberty’. (Tournier 1957:224) I realize by this means
that the behavioural customs among Confucian-influenced Chinese people reflect much
more the characteristics of the path to the personage rather than the path to the person.

The features of the path The Person The Personage

The trust in a ‘personal
From ‘[t]he effort’ of one’s ‘own will’
encounter’ (with Jesus Christ)
‘[a]rtificially making up a
By way of Boldly revealing the person
personage’
Acknowledging the ‘deepest ‘[a]chieving a certain skill
For problems’ in the fellowship 6 through a task’
Resulting in Easing tensions Exciting tensions
A ‘self-abandonment’ (to The ‘[g]lorification of will-
Through Jesus Christ) power’
(Christianity) ‘[m]odern
The principles of Stoicism
psychology’ (Christianity) 7
Table 1.1 Summary of Tournier’s Paths to the Person and the Personage (Tournier 1957:224)

Does this mean that stripping off the personage is the only way to get rid of the
behavioural custom of masking? Tournier’s answer is no. The Japanese critic Hideo
Kobayashi (1902-1983) and the Japanese psychiatrist Takeo Doi have the same answer
(Doi 1986:77) (The detail needs to be checked). (Goffman_Erving 1956 有另一種說法,
p.12) HeTournier (1957:81) quotes Pindar’s adage, ‘Become what you are’ (Pindar n.d.
cited in Tournier 1957:81), to suggest ‘an entirely new direction’ to ‘bring the
personage into harmony with the person’ and ‘to form it in accordance with our
sincerest convictions’. This is what Tournier refers to in biblical terms as expressing
truth in love or living out the truth in love .(NRSV Ephesians 4:15 But speaking the
truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Chris). The
goal is that ‘the personage will express and show forth the person’ genuinely (Tournier

6
Tournier (1957:224) defines this fellowship specifically as the ‘personal fellowship with God and with
our neighbour’ and explains how it works toward the path to the person by saying that in this fellowship
life is renewed and the person is revealed … we become conscious of our deepest problems … the
breath of the Spirit comes to sweep away like dust the automatisms we had thought to be a part of our
person, when they were in reality only a deposit from the past.
7
For Tournier (1957:224), in terms of ‘the discovery of the person’, all the schools of psychotherapy and
Christian faith take the path of ’trusting relaxation of tension’ towards ‘abdication of self-constraint’. Of
course, they are not the same. Even if he (1957:223) believes that modern psychology has found
discovered the futility and even the harm of depending on ‘our own efforts’ and headed toward the path to
the person, Tournier (1957:23) argues that all of its schools involve ‘only mechanisms of the mind’
psychologically which are ‘of the order of the personage, and not of the person’, similarly as the studies
of ‘all the physiological mechanisms of the body’ do. For dealing with the compatibility between
Christian faith and psychology (psychoanalysis), Tournier (1968) wrote another book entitled, A Place
for You: Psychology and religion.
8
1957:81) because of the reality that our personage also ‘moulds our person’ and ‘the
external role[s] we play transform[s] us constantly, exerting’ their ‘influence[s] even on
the deepest and most intimate recesses of the person’ (Tournier 1957:80). In other
words, when the value of the true self conflicts with expectations from within and
without, one cannot or dare not express his/herone’s true self; not only is the true self
then repressed, but also its inherent value is harmed. For Uunder this masking, the true
self is not empty, but suffering from incompetency. Therefore in spite of the
aforementioned problems of the personage, the true self can be restored by committing
the personage to act according to the values of the true self.
What Tournier (1957:220) suggests is ‘the true solution of grace’ instead of ‘the
the pseudo-solution of pathological reactions’, because through the latter the personage
is blocked and repressed but through the former liberated and liquidated to conform to
the person. The effect of the former will last but of the latter relapse. Confessing the
problem of the personage, which is the first step, can only happen in gracious ‘personal
fellowship with God and with our neighbour’ (Tournier 1957:224). Why such a
fellowship of grace is so important? It is because in it ‘the liberation’ of confession is
‘contagious’ as well as ‘the reserve’ of it in other relationships, where the development
of a confessing intimate relationship is hindered. (Tournier 1957:158) The second step
is to wait for the Holy Spirit to reveal the person and renew the personage which can
show forth the person. This process cannot be forced by one’s resolution and will-
power. Just as one was not born by one’s own resolution, this new life cannot be reborn
by it, either. Our whole efforts and wills are to be put into seeking the safe and healthy
conditions for this new life to be reborn, nurtured and welled up, namely, ‘that personal
fellowship with God and with our neighbour’ (Tournier 1957:224). 8
(Law: not clear
what constitute Tournier’s solution.)
For Tournier (1993:218–20) (English version to be checked), the person is not
static but dynamic so that it cannot be hold. Its perfection is not attainable so that it is
not complete for us. There is no dead absoluteness for the person because it is alive. In
the moment when the person communicates creatively with God and another person,
one can experience two-fold facts: finding one’s own self and at the same time one’s
own self being in changing. One finds that one’s own self is different from the self one
8
Tournier (1957:223) uses a metaphor of an ‘apple-tree’ bearing no fruit to explain where one’s
resolution and will-power are to be exerted for renewing the personage. We do not blame an ‘apple-tree’
bearing no fruit on ‘having a false attitude’, nor try to manufacture apples. What we can do is to engage
our ‘energies into … providing the conditions favourable to its life’, for example, tending it, fertilizing
the soil, and killing parasites and bugs. Then ‘[t]he natural sap, the current of life, must be set in motion
again.’ The person unmasking (or the personage expresses the person) is a ‘life’s natural fruit so that it
has to grow of itself just as an apple does.
9
has been assuming to be. From that moment on, one is different from the old one but
one can still tell the current one and the old one are the same person. It is the same life
that has been just advanced. The person is not what we have but what we are. It is a
quality instead of quantity so that it cannot be measured, tested and limited. If one
thinks that s/he has already grasped his/her true self, it leads unescapably to the
misunderstanding of his/her self.

1.2.4 Conclusion

Transforming the personage into a real and vital person However this is a process of
transforming the personage into the person, rather than a surgery to taking it cut off
once and for all. Since the path to the personage is entirely the opposite direction to the
path toward the discovery ofto the person in Tournier’s account, when the direction is
changed, i.e. one decides to learn how to commit his/herone’s personage to act
according to the values of one’shis/her true self, one’shis/her person begins to be
revealedfade in gradually (or show up more and more often) even asand one’shis/her
personage fade out gradually (or show up less and less frequently). In other words, the
personage in this transforming process will begin to ‘express and show forth the person’
more and more ‘genuinely’ (Tournier 1957:81) and gradually one’s oughts becomes
one’s wants. Notably,But noteworthily, for Tournier, all of these matters for Tournier
can only happen in personal fellowship with God and with our neighbour, accomplished
by the grace of God instead by one’s own efforts as mentioned above. Although
Tournier (1957:76) insists that the person is dynamic and cannot be reached without
being renewed by the salvation and grace of God, he does not seem to engage more
deeperly in discussing the transforming process of the reborn person in terms of an
already-and-not-yet process of present realization as well as the eschatological
realization of the true selfalready and not yet. As can be seen from this perspective, the
The dynamics of the person and its eschatologically promised futurity in this process
emphasized by Moltmann (1967:91–2, 94) is are very important dimensions that cannot
be overlooked in dealing with the problem of the behavioural custom of masking. This
is to be discussed in Chapter Four and Fivelater.
The above suggested direction will serve as reference point and basic concept for
discussing and dealing with the problem of the behavioural custom of masking in
interacting with the primary sources of Tu Weiming and Jürgen Moltmann.

10
1.2.5 Confucianism-influencedConfucian-influenced Culture and the Problem of
the Behavioural Custom of Masking
Research into relevant literature has also revealed the problem of the behavioural
custom of masking as a fundamental and common problem or symptom of persons who
promote of or being enculturated into a imposed relational relationized self, a
performance-emphasized self, as well as those supporting or being indoctrinated with
the value of moral self cultivation 9 within the context of a hierarchical social structure
which is regularly found in Confucianism. as a fundamental and common problem or
symptom of persons who promote of a relationalized self, a performance-emphasized
self, as well as those supporting moral self-cultivation within the context of a
hierarchical social structure which is regularly found in Confucianism. Notably, the
wordterm imposed relationalrelationized in this thesis is used for differentiation from
the word relational, that is of natural or spontaneous relationality, in this thesis to
describe the relationality that is socially imposed heavily other than to depict simply
general relationality. The correlations between Confucian-influenced culture and the

problem of the behavioural custom of masking can beare summarized briefly as

reference in this chapter as follows:
1. The behavioural custom of masking the true self is formed because one tends to
wear a social mask when he/sheone cannot freely express and assume
responsibilities for his/herone’s true self for varieties of reasons.
2. In a hyper-hierarchical social structure, a relationalizedrelationizedimposed
relational self nurtured by more law in the structure would lead to the problem of the
behavioural custom of masking.
3. In a culture of moral self-cultivation that highly emphasizes performance and
demands one to perform only to the satisfaction of others, especially one’s seniors
and superiors, the problem of the behavioural custom of masking consequentially
becomes manifestly worse.
4. The loss of self (the behavioural custom of masking) in a father causes him not to
express his true feelings as a father directly toward his children, and easily make
them feel fatherless. Fatherless male children tend to lose of their sense of true self
and later become fathers suffering from a loss of self. This becomes a vicious cycle
from generation to generation. 10What of mothers?
9
Moral self cultivation in Confucianism means that ‘learning to be human’, especially in morality or
dé(德) , ‘involves’ a lifetime engagement in ‘self-education’ (Tu 1984:379).
10
What of mothers? Such kind of fatherlessness is a by-product of patriarchical society. Patriarchy is far
more dominant in the whole world than matriarchy. Therefore, I guess this is the reason why I have not
found significant discussions about the issue caused by such kind of motherlessness due to loss of self.
11
5. All the issues relevant to the problem of the behavioural custom of masking are
seemingly related to the absence of a belief in God. Since all these ethics-related
issues signify the reality of ethical immaturity of humanity, the root of ethical
problems will not be traced back only to the self of humanity but to what, if there is
one, ultimate being it believes and is based on.
The problem of the behavioural custom of masking and the phenomenon of
fatherlessness among some Chinese people, as well as their related issues (root and
consequence) are worthy to be studied. Their correlation to theories of the
relationizedimposed relational self, performance-oriented moral self-cultivation, and
any form of hyper-hierarchical society deserve attention and further exploration.

1.3 Summary of the Formation of the Key Research Questions

Since the relationalizedrelationizedimposed relational self in Confucianism is one of the

main factors causing the problem of the behavioural custom of masking, is
individualism (which has been prevalent in modern world in the twentieth century)
better than collectivism in coping with it? Even if individualism is generally viewed as
the product of Christianity, ‘initiated’ by ‘Augustine’ and ‘augmented’ by
‘Enlightenment thinkers such as Descartes and Locke’, (Grenz, Stanley 2001:76)
However according to my review of Christian writers, when there is no communion
with God and His people, Christian writersthey argue that, when there is no communion
with God and His people, both collectivism and individualism lead to a loss of self in
human beings (Montaigne, Michel de 1935 cited in Grenz 2001:103; Boff, Leonardo
1988:148; Grenz 2001:16f., 58, 105f., 117f., 134; Gunton, Colin E 2003:87; Carkner,
Gordon 2006:6; Postman, Neil 2006; Bellinger, Charles K 2010; Ess, Charles 2010:114)
(Grenz 2001:16f., 58, 105f., 117f., 134; Bellinger, Charles K 2010; Carkner, Gordon
2006:6; Ess, Charles 2010:114; Gunton, Colin E 2003:87; Montaigne, Michel de 1935
cited in Grenz 2001:103; Postman, Neil 2006). In other words, the problem of the loss
of self might occur regardless of collectivism or individualism. R. Neville and J.
Berthrong as founders of Boston Confucianism claim the issue of selfhood is one of the
three important issues New-Confucianism should deal with. But they have completely
different concepts, or the possibility of immanent transcendence (of self) from the
concept of D. Hall and R. Ames as founders of Hawaii Confucianism (Cai, Degui 蔡德
貴 2004:80)(Cai, Degui 蔡德貴 2004:80)(Cai 2004: 80). Some questions Thereforethen
can be asked here. Is Christian biblical and theological anthropology a collectivistic or
individualistic one? Or none of both. Is there any sameness and difference relevant to

12
the behavioural custom of masking between Confucianism and Christianity? What are
the presuppositons for their own concepts on them? Therefore, the issue of the
behavioural custom of masking is one of the ethics-related problems through which the
distinction between the gospel and Confucianism can be manifestedinvestigated.
The doctrine of the imago Dei in trinitarian theological anthropology establishes
‘human persons being and becoming in relationship’ on the basis of ‘the unique
trinitarian Persons in relationship’ and conduces to understand ‘the human being as [a]
reciprocating self’ (Balswick et al. 2005:30). F. LeRon Shults (2003:1–2) emphasizes
further that the doctrine of the imago Dei is ‘not simply about me and God’ but also
about me and the human ‘other’ because ‘[M]y sense of self is called in to being and
formed through interaction with other persons within my particular set of overlapping
communities’. Therefore the self in trinitarian theological anthropology is indeed also a
‘relational self’ (Grenz 2001)(Grenz, Stanley J 2001). In order to explain the reciprocal
relationship between the three persons of the Triune triune God further, and so
distinguish from the concept of the Trinity of the identical subject (God as Absolute
Subject), which will be discussed later, Dumitru Staniloae (1998:260–78) proposes the
concept of ‘divine intersubjectivity’ and emphasizes that in divine perfect love the
‘persons do not merely engage in a reciprocal exchange of self; they also affirm
themselves reciprocally and personally, and establish themselves in existence through
giving and receiving’ (Staniloae 1998:257). What does ‘divine intersubjectivity’ mean?
In a nutshell, it means there is no object and passive act in the tTriune relationship,
namely, all persons are subjects and all their acts are active while describing their
relationship and acts among them. Moltmann (2009:299, emphasis original)(2009:299)
also pinpoints a similar concept in ‘the eucharistic form of Trinity’ he presents, in which
‘activity proceeds from the Spirit and with the Son in the direction of the Father’. In
differentiating this form from the ‘monarchical’ one, he (Moltmann 2009:300)
highlights the role of the Spirit ‘as the real subject’, i.e. ‘the Spirit glorifies the Son and
the Father’, instead in a ‘subordinate’ position to them. But I think Saniloae’s term
‘divine intersubjectivity’ is much better clearer and more informative in a more succinct
way, than the eucharistic form of Trinity, to explain the uniqueness of the reciprocal
relationship between Trinity. Notably, Moltmann himself does not use this term, but
Richard Bauckham (2005:155) uses ‘intersubjective relationship’ to introduce
Moltmann’s concept of the ‘relationship between the divine persons’.
Stanley J. Grenz (2001:312) and Leonardo Boff (1988:149) both affirms that the
meaning to be a person ‘the new humanity in communion with the triune God’ in
13
trinitarian theological anthropology cannot be without is relationships, both in
‘communion’ with the tritarian God, and with one’s own self and others, too. Stanley
Grenz (2001:312) calls this trinitarian a ‘relational self’, a ‘person in relationship’ as
well as the ‘ecclesial self’. But I believe that this kind of relational self is different in
kind from the one supported by the collectivism in post-traditional Confucianism
(Pfister: which kind of Confucianism, post-traditional, or 20th century…), in which the
individual would disappear, or an individual’s identity would be simply the sum of his
or her social relations. Moltmann (1992b:256)(1992:256), through his trinitarian
theological anthropology, not only presents the possibility of a relational self (although
he has does not used this term) without losing its distinctiveness, but also maintains its
necessity for expounding such a relationality between human beings. 11
Boff
(1988:151, emphasis original) echos this similar concept of trinitarian theological
anthropology in his book Trinity and Society (1988) and calls such arelationality
‘Differents in communion’.
Therefore my main research question is: ‘What are the implications of Trinitarian
theological anthropology for the problem of the Behavioural Custom of Masking in
contemporary Chinese culture, which is highly Confucian-influenced?’ Related
questions involve the following: How is the concept of the so-called relational self
formed in Moltmann's trinitarian anthropology? What are the features of his trinitarian
anthropology? Is Jürgen Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology truly relevant
to the problem of the Chinese behavioural custom of masking (the true self)’? These are
the questions this paper will seek to answer. (Law: 參 考 Boff: Trinity and Society
(1988) esp. pp.148 ff.)

2. MOLTMANN AND HIS TRINITARIAN THEOLOGICAL

ANTHROPOLOGY

2.1 Who is Jürgen Moltmann? (Law: Read: A Broad Place (2007) 自傳)

Jürgen Moltmann has been recognized as one of the most influential of contemporary
German Protestant theologians, born in 1926, and since 1967 professor of systematic
theology at Tübingen University from 1967 to 1994. His influence is has been seen not
only in the Western contexts but also in the non-Western world. He became a Christian
when he was a prisoner of war during 1945-8. Because of ‘his sense of involvement,

11
Joy Ann McDougall (2003:197) summaries Moltmann’s argument on it pithily as ‘[A] person neither
appropriates nor possesses another, nor do the two become subject to one another. Rather each creates the
space for the other person's freedom to emerge’.
14
during and after the war, in the collective suffering and guilt of the German nation’, his
later theological engagements arehave involved many in public and political issues.
(Bauckham, Richard 2005:147) (Bauckham 2005:147) Although he has tried to
precipitate necessary dialogues between Christian theology and other disciplines, he has
never tried to do Christian theology from the viewpoints of religious studies or Cultural
Studies. (Moltmann 2002:2–3) However, he does not limit his theological research and
written works in the area of Protestant theology even if he is always recognized as a
Protestant theologian. From his works, we can see that he is open to ‘Roman Catholic
theology, Orthodox thcology, … the liberation theologies of the Third World, the
charismatic worship, and the political commitment of churches’ (Bauckham 2005:148).
Notably, he has had at least seven academic visits in Taiwan and China totally and has
had not a few encounters and dialogues with Chinese theologians, philosophers and
scholars in other disciplines. (Lin, Honghsin 林鴻 信 2002; Hong, Liang 洪亮 2011)
(Lin, Honghsin 林鴻信2002; Hong, Liang 洪亮2011)
Moltmann’s Theology of Hope (1964) is expresses his some thirty-year long
struggling to formulate a description of God ‘with future as his essential nature’, in
dialogue with the Neo Marxist Ernst Bloch (Moltmann 1967:16, 30)(Moltmann
1967:30). In Beyond the same theological development in emphasizing historicity, he
wrote God in Creation (1983) in which ‘he lays more emphasis on the relationship
between God and creation’. (Jansen, Henry 1994:106–107) The Crucified God (1973)
might beis his second major influential work ‘in which he engaged in the questions of
suffering and God's impassibility’, and interpreting the event of the cross as a trinitarian
event and God as the Trinity open to the world (Moltmann 1974:247–9). Following this
trinitarian emphasis, after his The Church in the Power of the Spirit published in 1977
(the third one of his Trilogy, the first and second are Theology of Hope and The
Crucified God respectively), he developed a social view of the Trinity in The Trinity
and the Kingdom of God (1981) and with Wolfhart Pannenberg inaugurate the
momentous step in the development of ‘relational’ Trinitarian trinitarian theology
(Grenz 2001:16). Such a trinitarian form turn to be ‘the overarching theological’ framework of
Moltmann’s writings from then on. (Bauckham 2005:148)

15
2.2 Moltmann’s Concern Relevant to the Problem of the Behavioural
Custom of Masking (the True Self) in the Confucianism-
influencedConfucian-influenced Chinese contextContext

2.2.1 The Inevitability of Masking in Human Being

In his book Man: Christian anthropology Anthropology in the conflicts Conflicts of the
presentPresent, Moltmann (1976:2–3, emphasis original) indicates the inevitability of
masking in human beings and traces the root of such behaviour to an embarrassed and
naturally shamed ‘self-encounter’. ‘Naked’ honestness honesty’ to the self is itself
‘painful’, and men so that human beings inclines to hold their ‘consciousness’ of the
equivocalness’ of their self-awareness, i.e. to evade to face their true selves
intentionally, because losing ‘their secret’ is equivalent to giving up ‘their future’.
Furthermore men also tend to ‘make himselfthemselves ‘recognizable’ to others. But
how can one ‘be’ better than ‘appear to be’ so (Moltmann 1976:2–3, emphasis
original)? Therefore Moltmann argues that everyone demands a ‘mask’ as long as
he/shes/he is finds it hard to accept to ‘being ‘identical with’ his/her inner true self.
Now a ‘dilemma’ comes up: on the one hand, he/shes/he is neither able to ‘completely
identify [himself] with [his] mask’, or accept the ‘appearance’ shown to others, on the
other hand, nor s/he cannot he/shes/he ‘get right down’ to himself/herself if he/shes/he
desires to expose himself/herself unreservedly. Although Moltmann pinpoints
humans’s limitations in of living out ‘authenticcally’, he does not at this point explain
its radicalthe basci reason here from the perspective of Christian anthropology.
However Nevertheless, I believe that the doctrine of original sin in Christian
anthropology would explain rightly the root cause of such behaviour of masking or
hiding one’s true self. One should do so first to himself/heroneself and then to others.
From the very beginning of the history of humankind, Tthe first thing the first
man and woman ever did after the Fall fall of human beings was to hide their
nakedness. (Gen 3:7) (Law 要解釋解經的立場：是當史實？還是比喻？ ) From
Wwhom did they hide from? From Themselves themselves or their own eyes, because
there were was nobody else other than they there two. The second thing they did was to
hide from the Lord God. (Gen 3:8) The reality of fallen human beings is just as like
what Apostle Paul depicted in Romans 7: 18b-19: ‘I can will what is right, but I cannot
do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.’ (NRSV)
Moltmann (1976:3) defines the mask presented to others as ‘the external face’ that
is given by both traditional and contemporary ‘culture’. (Pfister: not coherent, check! 不
懂 )He thinks that one cannot be satisfied with a mask acquired externally and would
16
eventually become stagnated by it,the mask acquired externally (1976:3) because with
only ‘[A]n external appearance of conformity’ to the unsought ‘social compulsions’
outside his/herone’s ‘real self’ might not be ‘involved’ (1976:39, 41). Undoubtedly the
behaviour of masking can develop into a form of ‘inward emigration’ to some extent,
through which one seeks to preserve and hide intentionally his ‘true inward nature’ （Is
this inward self knowable and secure here?）with only a passive ‘external appearance
of conformity’ to evade conflicts and stresses (Moltmann 1976:39, 41). When ‘inward
emigration’ seeks only for ‘freedom in privacy’, ‘self-protection from social pressures’
or the ‘inward cultivation of the beautiful soul’, Moltmann (1976:41) calls this passive
‘attitude of resistance’ a ‘tragedy’ because Christians holding such an attitude will not
influence their ‘inhuman circumstances’ by denying themselves.
Noteworthily, self-denial taught and valued in Christianity (e.g. Matthew 16.24-6;
Luke 9.23-5) has been always mistaken gravely as ‘forcing oneself to put on a self-
effacing personage, repressing one's real convictions and pretending to have others
which one has not got’. On the contrary, it ‘means … refusing to invent for oneself a
conventional personage’. Its real meaning is to entrust one’s life and its direction into
God’s control so that so that He may wake up one’s person in accord with ‘His
purpose’. When one desires to ‘‘seek’ [H]iGod’s will, he/sheone will certainly dare to
‘assert it’. the real person within them (Tournier 1957:226) because at this stage one’s
oughts becomes one’s wants.(Tournier 1957:226) because at this stage one’s oughts
becomes one’s wants..
Moltmann first admits indicates (??) the inevitability of masking in among human
beings and then discusses the problem of inward emigration. Although his concerns and
criticisms on inward emigration originates from the context of European ‘industrial
society’ (Moltmann 1976:22–45) and the ‘Third Reich’ (Moltmann 1976:16), the
phenomenon of inward emigration can be evidently applied to describe rightly the
problem of the behavioural custom of masking (the true self) in the Confucianism-
influencedConfucian-influenced Chinese context. This will be discussed in the next
section.

2.2.2 Moltmann’s Criticism on of Patriarchy

Moltmann (1985b; 1994:8–19 & 26–9; 2007b:8; 2008:3–16)(2008:3–16; 2007b:8;
1994:8–19 & 26–9) demonstrates himself as to be a person who is concerned with and
advocates ‘freedom’ and justice for the oppressed and criticizes ‘totalitarianism’ in
many aspects. He has not yet discussed or mentioned directly the problem of the

17
behavioural custom of masking (the true self) in such contexts, but has been concerned
with the results of self-contempt and the insurmountable hindrances from self-liberation
due to the imposition of the mainstream value systems. and Consequently, he has
proposed the way to find one’s self through finding the Kingdom of God and
experiencing reconciliation with God in Christ (English version needed to be checked)
(Moltmann 1994:8–19, 29, & 135)(Moltmann 1994:8–19, 28–9, & 135). Some of his
attentions paid is focused on the issues issue- of ‘Patriarchy’ patriarchy’ discussed in his
concern on for ‘the deformation of woman’ (Moltmann 1985b:57) and a ‘feminist
theology for men’ (Moltmann 2000:268–92); these are in fact closely related to the
problem of the behavioural custom of masking (the true self) in the Confucianism-
influencedConfucian-influenced Chinese contexts. (Moltmann 2000:268–92) For him,
the main question in feminist theology is nothing but ‘the fundamental challenge to the
age-old patriarchal and androcentric male rule’, which influences and predominates
‘everything: religious ideas, the picture of the human being, … [and even] the structure
of the family’, and so on. (Moltmann 2000:272)
Moltmann (2000:274)(2000:274, emphasis original) identifies two essential
elements in ‘patriarchy’: ‘an institutionalized system of sexual hierarchy and a
psychological mechanism for its justification’ in both ‘family and society’. In such a
patriarchal society, the mastership of the man over the woman is acquired by birth, and
the Chinese father assumes the responsibility as the ‘family priest’ in the familial
ancestral worship and passes it down to the oldest sons of every generation. Although
the external ‘forms and appearances’ of the ‘patriarchal sexual hierarchy’ are indeed
transmuted through thousands of years, ‘the supremacy of the man over against the
woman’ has remained alive and visible in the three aspects of man: ‘sexually active
role[s]’, ‘supposed potency’, and ‘life-long narcissism’. (Moltmann 2000:275) (cite
Chinese sources confirming this) This kind of public danger (patriarchal sexual
hierarchy) is made from masculine ‘self-hatred’, (Moltmann 2000:278) because of the
impossibility of unreachableing the goal ‘to be a man’ as demanded by others who
brought him up. He had to ‘suppress’ some of his ‘feelings’, ‘master’ some ‘drives’, and
play some ‘roles’ in order to be a man and to ‘make something of himself’: ‘the winner,
conqueror, ruler, … head of the family, [and] manager’, and so on. (Moltmann
2000:289, emphasis original) In Chinese, the goal ‘to be a man’can be usually
summarized with an idiom, ‘chūrén tóudì (出人頭地)’, namely, to become honored and
distinguished among others. (He, Youhui 何友暉 2006:18; Hu, Hsienchin 1944:45, 64)
The constant fear of ‘not being anything’ makes him fragmented into two parts. One is

18
to ‘identify himself’ with:- an untrue image of being a pretended ‘subject of
understanding and will’. ; The the other is to escape from:- becoming a true ‘object of
heart, feeling and needs’. (Moltmann 2000:289)
From the psychological perspective, Moltmann (2000:275) comprehends the
‘patriarchal sexual hierarchy’ as a ‘masculine sexism’ and a male ‘egocentricism’,
which is a derivative of the never ‘digested’ detachment from ‘the mother’ and also a
cause of for oppressing the feminine part in ‘his feelings, senses and inner needs’.
Moltmann (2000:273, 275) notices especially the ‘depreciation of the woman in
Confucianism’ dated dating back to the ancient time in China. It is when Mmen’s reality
is not strong enough to meet the high expectation and acceptation from his society,
especially influenced by Confucianism, the only way for them to survive is to hide and
deny their weakness to everyone and even to themselves. It is Bb-ecause also when the
man’s identity and self-value are based on his ‘sex’, he views ‘femininity’ equally as
‘weakness’ and does not allow himself ‘get soft’. (Moltmann 2000:277, emphasis
original) Consequentially, in order to maintain the split ‘conscious self’, the male is
hunting endlessly for ‘security’ to relieve ‘his inner anxieties’ through dominating and
repressing women. (Moltmann 2000:277) Moltmann’s observations and explanations
are consistent with Juzo Itami’s observation among Japanese: even if Japanese society is
traditionally a male-dominant hierarchical one (Payne, Chris 2003:18) and man is
expected to be a stronger figure (Doi 1981:155), but the reality is totally reversed
because ‘Japanese men have always been weak … Japanese culture is not one in which
men are strong.’ (Itami 1999, cited in Payne, Chris 2003:18)
According to Moltmann’s analysis on of patriarchy, there is expectable thea
strong tendency to form a behaviour custom of masking one’s true self in such a
patriarchal society. What it is a paradoxical relation and tension exists between the
pretended putative strong and dominant external appearance and the hidden weak and
oppressed internal reality! I argue that the patriarchal rulership develops naturally
similarly by the same logic of ‘male sexism’, so that into it supports hierarchical
society, racism, and nationalism. (Moltmann 2000:275) and it It is even more difficult
for male rulership to give away the acquired power to a female when it they
predominates in the kinship, society, ethnicity, or nation. Consequentially, its the
masking behavioural custom becomes much stronger in order to hide and oppress its
contrasting weaker internal reality. This might turn into a vicious cycle: . imposing
Imposing the status of the ‘master in the house’ (Moltmann 2000:289, emphasis
original) and with its power can be a way for oppressing suppressing one’s weakness,

19
but it might be even worse to expose one’s own weaknesses at as a higher rulership
ruler. with more power so thatConsequently, it is more necessary to oppress it all the
harder.
Therefore, the appeal of feminist theology to liberate wouldwemen is not only
beneficial tot the woman to who would be set free from ‘her subordinate’, ‘oppressed
and exploited’ place, but also bless the man to be released from his predominate
position and his ‘delusion of supremacy’, because patriarchy and its complications have
plundered men’s ‘humanity’ too. (Moltmann 2000:273, 277–8) And wWhat it would
change among human beings are is not merely in their ‘socio-political’
aspectrelationship, but also in their ‘psycho-social’ aspect roles as welltoo. (Moltmann
2000:273)
Although Moltmann’s discussion on of patriarchy is not addressed in the general
context of Confucianism or Chinese people, he addresses this it in at other places in
such context and feels personally more distant to from Confucianism than Taoism.
(Moltmann 2008:ix)(Moltmann 2008:IX) (Moltmann 1989:87–101) In his eyes,
Confucianism-influencedConfucian-influenced society is a typical patriarchal one, even
if he does not use the same terms describing Confucianism in the previous chapters of
this thesis to describe the features of Chinese patriarchy. The patriarchal sex hierarchy
Moltmann points out is the basic type or archetype of within a Confucian hierarchical
society. The patriarchy society demands the male to perform to be a man as strong as
expected a dominator to be and suppress his inner feelings and weaknesses that are not
accepted by both other related men and other related women due toby way of a kind
ofoverwhelming collectivistic ideology (Law: explain how does this relate to the
relationizedimposed relational self) (though Moltmann does not address this ideologya
explicitly), just as the relationalizedrelationizedimposed relational self in Confucianism
Confucian collectivism is demanded by such a overwhelming collectivistic ideology to
excel in moral self-cultivation. Moltmann (2000:289–90) also argues the against
correspondence between ‘the God of the patriarchy’ and use of the an earthly patriarchy.
Therefore such this God is of ‘monotheism’ 1
and ‘reflects the misery’ of the split
human. This is the oldest universal ‘patriarchal legitimation of rule’ seen everywhere,
‘from China to Rome’. This The basic formula of this rule is this: there is only ‘one
emperor’ on who is the only ‘single earthly universal monarchy’, because there is only
‘one God in heaven’. (Moltmann 2000:290) He especially remarks notes how
Confucianism had been always playing the role of upholding the justification of such

1
Moltmann (2000:290) defines the monotheism he uses here as ‘cosmic and political monarchism’.
20
monarchical supreme power, until the Chinese communist regime was established in the
twentieth century. (Moltmann 1989:90) He (2000:292; 1981:165) concludes the issues
of patriarchy by stating that ‘the tri-une God … in sociality’ within the ‘Christian
doctrine of the Trinity’ can overcome or avoid the problem of patriarchal monotheism,
and with its earthly patriarchy and problematic sexism. How will this effect a change? It
will be discussed later.

2.2.3 The Inseparability Relation between God and and the Self Selves of
ManHumans n
Moltmann (1967:91, 285) indicates the predominant question in the biblical
anthropology – ‘wWho or what is man? who Who am I?’ – does is not based on
‘comparing [hu]man[s] with’ the other myriad things in the world but on the ‘revelation
of God’. Wolfhart Pannenberg also has the same view about this quest (Lo, Pilgrim W
K 2009:168) （英文版頁數待查）But Moltmann (1967:89, 91) does deny the reality
of existing problem about who I am and specify ‘the revelation of God … in the
promised future of Christ’ as the light illuminating the reality of human beings, who I
am, and the world, and who Iam andand the hope of who I will be. Through ‘the
revelation of God in promise’, I come to myself ‘in spe’, but find ‘disharmony’ with
myself ‘in re’. For Moltmann (1967:285), the quest for the true selfIt is bases based not
simply on being ‘coram Deo’ (in the presence of God), but rather on facing ‘a
transcendental divine ‘mission, charge and appointment’ from God which transcend are
beyond the bounds of the humanly possibilityle’. Furthermore, in repudiating Rudolf
Bultmann’s ‘theology of the transcendental subjectivity of man’, a proof ‘of God’
attained through authentic existence of humans, he (1967:58–69, 84–94) clarifies and
emphasizes that it is from God theto demonstrateing from God the reality and existence
of the humanity and the world, but not in the other way. He (1967:89) also states that ‘If
God is not spoken of in relation to man's experience of himself and his world, then
theology withdraws into a ghetto and the reality with which man has to do is abandoned
to godlessness.’ And most importantly, for Moltmann (2007b:63), to understand human
beings through the revelation of God it is can be only done through indirect and
‘mediated’ way, namely, He also states that ‘If God is not spoken of in relation to man's
experience of himself and his world, then theology withdraws into a ghetto and the
reality with which man has to do is abandoned to godlessness.’ (Moltmann 1967:89)
Moltmann (1967:65) doubts that solo self-reflection without the world in terms of ‘self-
understanding’.Therefore on following the steps of W. Herrmann and Rudolf Bultmann,
Moltmann (1967:60f., emphasis original) maintains the inseparability between ‘God and

21
the self of man’ because the self of man ‘is appointed’ to exist by God’s creation. Since
the ‘quest’ of the self is natural to man, ‘the question of God’ inevitably comes up in the
quest because only in God can man come to himself, truly understand himself
(1967:65), Wolfhart Pannenberg also has the same view about this quest (Lo, Pilgrim W
K 2009:168), and only in reaching himself can man come to God, understand God or
God’s revelation. Furthermore this is not only applied to explain and argue ‘the hidden
correlation of God and self’ 2
by Bultmann but also applied to the ‘non-objectified
verification’ of God. It is where ‘the authenticity 3 or selfhood 4 of man’ is unmasked
that ‘the self-revelation of God’ ascertains its ‘measure and development’. (167:61)
It is to ‘the believing self’ that ‘God proves [h]imself’. This proof is ‘of God’ through
authentically existing of man instead the proof ‘of the existence of God’. Therefore
although ‘the subjectivity of God’ is ‘non-objectifiable’ and unprovable ‘because
transcendental’ 5 , our statements on ‘God's action, God's revelation, God's future’ are
by no means ‘arbitrary’ but reasonable to ascertain ‘non-objectified verification’ in
man's attaining to himself. Upon the correlation of understanding God or God’s
revelation and ‘self-understanding’ (Moltmann 1967:65),

Moltmann (1967:63) shows his preference on the indirect and ‘mediated’ reciprocal
relation between understanding God and ‘self-understanding’ (1967:65) claimed by the
Reformers and Pascal than the ‘immediate and unmediated’ one by ‘Augustinian
mysticism’. For him, Tthis mediation is done only by recognizing the ‘crucified Christ’
as ‘the mirror of God and the mirror of oursel[f]’ (or [ves]?? , ); the this concept idea
andof the word ‘“mirror”’ of which is borrowed and quoted by Moltmann from John
Calvin (n.d. cited in Moltmann 1976:18). It can be found that the imago Dei (image of
God) plays a very important role in Moltmann’s understanding of the this close
relationship between God and the self selves of humans, which will be discussed later.
It is noteworthy that Moltmann (1976:18) emphasizes the reality of the misery of
human beings and the crucified Christ as the only hope of for the miserable men
humans being accepted by God. He quotes by Pascal’s sayings (1660:No. 527) :
2
Barth disagrees with Herrmann and Bultmann about this and separates ‘the non-objectifiable
subjectivity of God … from the subjectivity of [an[, namely, ‘God's self from [an's self’. (Moltmann
1967:61, emphasis original)
3
Eigentlichkeit, in German.
4
Selbstsein, in German.
5
For Bultmann, the subjectivity of man is also non-objectifiable and transcendental. (Moltmann 1967:60
& 61, n.2)

22
 The knowledge of God without that of [hu]man’s’ misery causes pride. The knowledge of
[hu]man’s’ misery without that of God causes despair. The knowledge of Jesus Christ
constitutes the middle course, because in Him we find both God and our misery.

From this perspective, it is evident that Confucianism tends to knowing Heaven without
knowing man humans’ being’s misery, so that humans’ beingman’s true self on theas
revealed in that miserable side is inevitable inevitably to be suppressed or masked. This
will be discussed right further in the next section. (Demonstration will be done later) In
Confucianism, everyone is expected and demanded to become a sage as a goal of life
and knowing Heaven is one of the criteria for being a sage. Human being’s misery is
never a problem but lack of efforts on moral self-cultivation that prevents human being
from becoming a sage.
In his Theology of Hope (1967), while discussing the self selves of humans,
Moltmann (1967:58–69) focuses fully on its the self’s ‘authenticity’. From his an
eschatological perspective, he equates the authenticity of any human’s self with
salvation, and understands it as both ‘the restoring of man's [hu]mans’ original being in
the sense of creatureliness and the attaining of finality in the sense of eschatology’.
(Moltmann 1967:66) In referring to God’s creation from eschatological perspective,
Moltmann’s saying (2003:189) ‘the final is greater than [the] original’ not only is faced
with human being’s misery but also points to his/her transformed futurity promised by
God. indicated by Moltmann (2003:189) in referring to God’s creation,This saying can
be also understood reasonably as that the this final authenticity true self is more perfect
than the original.. Here Moltmann goes furtherer than Tournier does, who only talks
about the true self as ‘the original creation’ ontologically (Tournier 1957:39). Moltmann
(1967:66) does not only presupposes that hu‘mans cannot by themselvesof himself
‘attain to his their ‘authenticity’ without seeking for revelation, but also that he isthey
are inevitably doomed to do itso. This authenticity of any human’s self indicates the
absoluteness of the self selves of humans. Although the true self in my research
problem of masking the true self focuses more on just as it is (or how it is??) in every
moment of its existingexistence, which is dynamic instead of absolute, the source and
knowledge of the one’s authenticity of any human’strue self are still relevant and
important in dealing with the problem. Furthermore Moltmann (1976:19) even directly
points out that in the crucified Christ and as well as in ‘his solidarity with’ men’s
humans’ misery, they can abandon ‘their illusions about themselves’ and ‘their well-
justified despair about themselves’ and then subsequently their ‘shame, anxiety, and
self-accusation’ can be removed in hisby means of Christ’s humiliated slaughter. and In

23
this way their ‘wounds’ and ‘loneliness’ are healed, because they areand comforted in
his sufferedthrough Christ’s ‘wounds’ and ‘loneliness’. Because Jesus’ ‘true humanity’
comes through the incarnation, ‘true humanity, authentic life, inner identity and
liberation’ for men humans can be demanded, expected and fulfilled (Moltmann
1974:93). When such a liberation happens in a community or ‘society which erects its
idols and taboos in order to make itself safe’, it is leads to an ‘iconoclasm of liberation’,
because men humans do not need to ‘deceive themselves and others about the truth’
anymore in their ‘beautiful and pious pretence’. (Moltmann 1976:20f.) That is To to
say, in other words, what Moltmann means here is that the behavioural custom of
masking the true self in terms of both any individual and of (??) society at large can be
abolished only in through the love of the crucified Christ. The final authenticity of
man’s humans’ true self selfves in the promised future of Christ that Moltmann
highlights provides a concrete and definite biblical description for the hoped for goal,
which Tournier submits supports, that ‘the personage will express and show forth the
person’ genuinely (Tournier 1957:81). Since the true self as it is in every moment of its
existing existence is dynamic and time cannot go back and evenor stop, the final
authenticity of any human’s selfone, and alsoas well as the ‘eschatological hope’ of
‘divine ‘mission and call’ (Moltmann 1967:285), becomes the ultimate destination of
the congruence of the personage and the person.
It seems that Moltmann himself have has not yet criticized or pointed out directly
and manifestly the ontological differences in nature between Heaven in Confucianism
and the trinitarian God in Christianity, even though he once had an academic dialogue
in person with Tu Weiming 杜 維 明 (also as Dù Wéimíng), the famous
NewContemporary New Confucianist, on Tiān ( 天 )‧Rén ( 人 )‧Dì ( 地 ) (Heaven,
HumansMan and Earth) in Beijing in 2010 (Hong, Liang 洪亮 2011). But from his tacit
responses, without oppositive opinion, to Tu’s ontological differentiating Heaven in
Confucianism from the Creator in Christianity, it is clear that Moltmann indirectly
agrees with Tu’s concept of Heaven in Confucianism as not as being an ‘creator’ (Tu
1989:9) who is not only the omnipotent and omnipresent but also personal ‘creator’ (Tu
1989:9) as in Christianity. (Hong 2011:389–90) (Law: what is the evidence?) Moltmann
himself also pinpoints the importance of the future dimension of the creator God’s
creation in Christian biblical thought, pointing toward a new heaven and new earth, by
saying, ‘The real creation is God’s future creation and humankind and cosmos are now
in the process of this all all-new new-creation’. (Hong, Liang 洪 亮 2011:390)(Hong
Liang 洪亮 2011:390)
24
 Although Moltmann has never directly applied the inseparability above
discussions about between the revelation of God (in promise) and the true self selfves of
humans or and the concept of the eschatological creation to the sphere where my
research problem lies, in the masking of the true self as it appears, (Law: the above is
not Moltmann’s position) especially in the context of and in the dialogue with
Confucianism, they are logically meaningful and relevant to it. Not only, as As I already
mentioned above, not only will the congruence of the personage and the person not find
its concrete and definite ultimate destination without the final authenticity of any
human’s self, which cannot be attained without the omnipotent and omnipresent
personal creator God and His revelation, but also the hope for the promised
eschatological authenticity of a human’strue self in the promised future of Christ plays a
very important and significant role in facing the present true self as it is, and the
imperfect past true self as it was. both Both of them has/hadve been damaged by sin and
therefore are ugly. No matter what the causal reasons of for the problem of masking the
true self are, the common phenomenon and its purpose of it is to hide the undesired self,
which is not good or perfect enough, to be accepted by others or even not by oneself.
Therefore with the hope for the promised eschatological authenticity of any
human’strue self and the ‘eschatological hope’ of the ‘divine ‘mission and call’
(Moltmann 1967:285), one can then never bear up therefore resist with the reality of
his/herone’s masking custom, so that it and will be easier to face, admit, suffer under,
and contradict the reality of the imperfect and ugly past and present self as it was/is, and
has no need to mask his/herone’s true self anymore.

2.2.4 The Selvesf of Man Humans and His/HThere Social Relationship to the
World (重讀及重寫)

2.2.5 Based on the concept of demonstrating the human beings and the world from
God,
He also states that ‘If God is not spoken of in relation to man's experience of himself
and his world, then theology withdraws into a ghetto and the reality with which man has
to do is abandoned to godlessness.’ (Moltmann 1967:89) Moltmann (1967:65) also
doubts that solo self-reflection without the world in terms of ‘self-understanding’.

While arguing for the inseparability between ‘God and the self selves of humans’
because of their ‘transcendental’ ‘non-objectifiable’ ‘subjectivity’ (這三 個字在原文不
是連續在一起), which is ‘the incomprehensible immediacy of our existing’ (Moltmann

25
1967:60f.)(Moltmann 1967:60f., emphasis original), Moltmann (1967:64) then
discusses the necessity of differentiation between the self of man and the ‘non-self’. He
defines the ‘non-self’ as ‘the world of observable, calculable and disposable things and
of our own objectifications’ (Moltmann 1967:64) and includes ‘social’ aspect together
with ‘corporeal and historic’ aspects and discusses them altogether as the relations of
the self of man to the world (Moltmann 1967:67). As described above, inasmuch as the
‘transcendental’ non-objectification of the ‘subjectivity’ of ‘God and the self of man’
(Moltmann 1967:60f.)(Moltmann 1967:60f., emphasis original), though only in God can
man come to himself, truly understand himself (Moltmann 1967:65), the self of man
must differentiate himself/herself ‘radically’ from his/her ‘external world’ (Moltmann
1967:67). (Law: sounds very 笛卡爾式) in order to attain his/her authenticity, namely
‘to be a person in the proper sense’ or ‘selfhood’ (Moltmann 1967:67). and all accounts
on ‘the relation of the person to God’ can be ‘definable’ only though ‘the opposite,
relation to the world’ (Moltmann 1967:64). For Moltmann (1967:67, 89–94), the self of
any human can only find his/her authenticity in God, but needs the external social,
material and historical world and the oppositehis/her relation (relation to the world) as a
mediating reference to objectify, ‘experience’ (Moltmann 1967:67), ‘understand’
(Moltmann 1967:65), and express his/her authenticity and its relation to God. When one
can come to one’s true self only in the promised future of Christ, namely, in the new
creation found in Christ, one not only restores to one true self but also reunites with
others and the world. ‘The promised identity’ of human beings is acquired by ‘self-
emptying’. (Moltmann 1967:91–2) The self-emptying Moltmann uses here closely
relates to what Jesus teaches in Matthew 16:25, 6 Mark 8:35, 7 and Luke 9:25. 8
The
Greek etymon for ‘life’ translated in English in Matthew 16:25 and Mark 8:35 is ,,
which means ‘self, inner life, one's inmost being’ besides ‘(physical) life’ (The United
Bible Societies 1987). In Luke 9:25, Jesus uses directly the simple reflexive to warn
from losing one’s ‘very self’ (NIV). The ‘experience’ of this promised true self through
self-emptying in ‘the event of promise in the resurrection’ of Christ has a very direct
and close connection with a commensurate ‘experience of the world’. One attains his

6
NRSV Matthew 16:25: ‘For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life
for my sake will find it.’
7
NRSV Mark 8:35 ‘For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my
sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.’
8
Compare the mild difference of English translation for the simple reflexive in the following two English
versions:
NRSV Luke 9:25: ‘What does it profit them if they gain the whole world, but lose or forfeit themselves?’
NIV Luke 9:25: ‘What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very self?’
26
true self ‘by emptying himself into’ the world, rather than by differentiating oneself
from it. (Moltmann 1967:92) However, unlike in Confucianism in which ‘Man and
heaven and earth are one thing’ quoted by Tu Weiming 杜維明 from Cheng Hao 程顥
(also as Chéng Hào) (Chan, Wingtsit 1969 cited in Tu 1985:46), the world in
Moltmann’s eyes is not on the same plane, as in Confucianism, with the self of man and
God in understanding them and their relation because he remarks that (Christian) ‘faith
cannot suffer the world to become a picture of God, nor a picture of man’ (Moltmann
1967:69).
(再重新比較) Even if Moltmann has not had a dialogue dealing directly with this
theme with Tu Weiming 杜 維 明 (also as Dù Wéimíng) or in the context of
Confucianism, the differences between on it of Tu Weiming’s understanding according
to Chapter three and above or Confucianism from and Moltmann’s are evident. Firstly,
as presented in the previous passage, The world in and human beings are on the same
plane in Confucianism but not in Moltmann’s eyes is not on the same plane, as in
Confucianism, with the self of man and God in understanding them and their relation
because he remarks that (Christian) ‘faith cannot suffer the world to become a picture of
God, nor a picture of man’ (Moltmann 1967:69). But the selves of humans in this
modern conception of Confucianism do not essentially attain their authenticity in
Heaven, because Heaven in Tu’s understandingConfucianism is not a being, let alone
the an omnipotent and omnipresent personal ‘creator’ (Tu 1989:9) (Hong, Liang 洪亮
2011:390)(Hong Liang 洪 亮 2011:390), and never deliver any actual revelation, let
alone one with a promised future. Although Tu (1985:125) believes says,
‘Ontologically, ‘selfhood, our original nature’, is ‘divine, … and transcendent’ because
it, is endowedcome from by Heaven ‘ontologically’’, he also indicates that Heaven can
be displayed only by means of the performance of humans the coming out of Heaven is
by means of the help of man (Hong, Liang 洪 亮 2011:390).(Hong Liang 洪 亮
2011:390) and He even highlights that ‘the only way for man to know Heaven is only
throughto penetrate penetrating profoundlydeeply into his one’s ‘own ground of being’
one is able to ‘know Heaven’(Tu 1989:9) , that is the similar as Bultmann’s theology of
the transcendental subjectivity of man. For Tu Weiming (1985:29), ‘Heaven, Earth and
the [M]yriad [T]hings’ are on the same plane because they are as ‘one body’ and there
are no the differences, as in Christianity, of ‘creator and creature’ (Tu 1989:10) and the
‘subject-object dichotomy’ (Tu 1985:46) among between them. Although admitting (??)
the ‘limits of one’s existential self’, Tu (1985a: 137) optimistically presents ‘a
transcendent vision that ontologically we are infinitely better and therefore more worthy
27
than we actually are’ and a ‘Confucian trinity’ which is formed by human beings with
Heaven and Earth. Secondly, the self in Confucianism is ‘a centre of relationships’ (Tu
1985:12, 14, 61, 113f., 125, 127–8, 133). In Jess Fleming’s interpretation (2002:184),
the self in Confucianism invariably subsists ‘in defining relationships with others’. For
Chinese influenced by Confucianism, there are only ‘terms for duty’, ‘an obligation
required by others, such as zérèn (責任) or yìwù (義務)’, but none for ‘responsibility’,
9
‘a spontaneous response from one’s own will’ (Lin, Hong-Hsin 2010:42, emphasis
original). Therefore even though the pursuing of the authenticity of the self without
being imposed on by ‘social values’ is valued (Tu 1973:193) , the self defined, decided,
or formed by the relationships to others is inevitable in reality.

2.3 Moltmann’s Basic Concept of Trinitarian tTheological Anthropology

As described above, Moltmann himself advocates freedom for the oppressed in many
aspects and criticizes patriarchy, but he (Moltmann 1989:89; 1967:304–28) values
‘communalism’ more than ‘individualism’ and argues (2008:72) that the identity of
individuals comes from the collective continuity of ‘the contract between the
generations’ (1989:90) handed down from generation to generation. It is reasonable to
infer that he understands and explains the nature of true human community based on the
divine community, and so the true human fellowship asis based on the image of the
triune God oninvolved with the earth. He (Moltmann 1981:129–222) presents the imago
Dei as an ‘analogia relationis’ (Moltmann 1985a:77)(Moltmann 1985:77) (analogy of
relations), seeking to in differentiatinge it mainly from an ‘analogy of substance’
(Moltmann 1985a:219)(Moltmann 1985:219). 10
andMoltmann explains theis image as
the mirror of the trinitarian life from the aspect of relationships. Therefore, in his social
trinitarian anthropology (Moltmann 1981:134–200), following the thought of the
Eastern Orthodox Church, he affirms that ‘personal identity’ (McDougall 2003:192) and
‘sociality’ are inseparable and the social relations isare not prioritized over personal
identity, just as the unity and the distinction among the trinitarian persons are equally
preserved without sacrificing any of them. From the concept on the imago Dei (the
image of God) in terms of relationships and community, Moltmann has developed the
concept of an ‘open fellowship’ and ‘open church’ (Moltmann 1977), which are offered
and accessed by God’s grace instead of the merits of human beings. Is this kind of
9
Zérèngǎn (責任感) might be the Chinese translation for responsibility here in differentiating from zérèn
(責任) translated for duty.
10
‘An analogy of substance’, by McDougall’s explanation (2003:191), ‘focuses on a singular attribute
inherent in human beings, such as the rational soul or the will’ and ‘fixes the likeness to God in the
individual's possession of such a capacity’.
28
relational self, developed infrom his concept of the relationship, community and
fellowship based on the imago Dei, and based onespecially as it deals with what it can
be built up and developed, relevant to the problem of the behavioural custom of
masking (the true self) in theNew Confucian collectivism?
Thuserefore, in order to answer the main question in this paper – To what extent is
does Jürgen Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology relevant tohave
implications for the problem of ‘the behavioural custom of masking (the true self)
amonsgst Confucian-influenced Chinese people ( 在這一章，還不和儒家做主要的比
較)? – several subsidiary questions are going to be investigated:
1. What are the meanings of the imago Dei (the image of God) and ‘gracious moral
cultivation’ disclosed in Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology?
2. What is the ‘community’ in Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology and
what are its implications for the unmasking of the true self as understood as the
imago Dei?
3. To what extent doesWhat are the presuppositions for Moltmann’s trinitarian
theological anthropology show the relevance toin terms of the problem of the
behavioural custom of masking (the true self)?

2.4 Moltmann’s Historical Doctrine of the Trinity: tThe Triune God

Moltmann (1981:19) first developed a ‘historical doctrine of the Trinity’ (or trinitarian
history of God) starting with ‘the history of Jesus the Son’, and then he developed ‘a
social doctrine of the Trinity’ in distinction to the Trinity of a ‘homogenous substance’
and to the Trinity of an ‘identical subject’. Instead of following the ‘Western tradition’,
which started from ‘God's unity’ (‘God as Supreme Substance; God as Absolute
Subject’) (1981:2) to discuss His ‘trinity’, Moltmann (1981:19) begins ‘with [the]
trinity of the Persons’ to discuss their ‘unity’, ’a concept of the divine unity as the union
of the tri-unity’ (‘the triune God’). For him (Moltmann 1981:16–18) ‘the representation
of the trinitarian Persons’ either in ‘a homogeneous divine substance’ or in ‘the one
identical divine subject’ (God as Supreme Substance), results unwittingly but
inevitably in the decomposition of the trinitarian doctrine into ‘abstract monotheism’.
The formerwhich is derived from Tertullian’s ‘general concept of the divine substance’:
(‘una substantia － tres personae’, (or one substance － three persons), or in ‘the one
identical divine subject’, which while the latteris derived from Hegel’s ‘general concept
of the Absolute Subject’: (‘one subject － three modes of being’), results unwittingly
but inevitably in the decomposition of the trinitarian doctrine into ‘abstract
29
monotheism’. In the former, God’s existence and uniqueness are to be proved and
assured first, based onby means of the ‘cosmological’ premise, namely ‘there is an
ordered cosmos’, and then by the doctrine of the Trinity is as developed to explain the
three persons of this existing God. ‘Consequently, not only is there undue stress on the
unity of the triune God, but there is also a reduction of the triunity to the One God.’
(Moltmann 1981:13–17) In the latter, where God is presented as the Absolute Subject
－ ‘the Father is assigned to the I, the Son to the self, and the Spirit to the identity of
the divine I-self’, based on the ‘anthropological reasons’ (‘God as person’) (Moltmann
1981:4, emphasis original)(Moltmann 1981:4),. This is all done presented to assure
confirm God's sovereignty and liberty, in order to prevent God from being changeable
passively as an object. However, this identical divine subject cannot but give way
toyield ‘the plural concept of persons to ‘the one, identical God-subject, and choose for
the trinitarian Persons another, non-subjective expression’. (Moltmann 1981:15–18, 63)
(Moltmann 1981:15–18, 63, emphasis original) Therefore ‘the unity of the Absolute
Subject’ is easy easily to be reduced into mere three aspects of the one subject, three
modes of being. (Moltmann 1981:18) To sum up, even if the orthodox Western
Christian churches in the history all reached a consensus of confessing trinitarianism, in
Moltmann’s eyes, a tendency to abstract monotheism had appeared for preventing from
falling into the trap of tritheism. But how to we balance between the distinctiveness of
the three persons from falling monotheism and their unity of them as one substance
from falling tritheism is still a problem. Can in reality ‘an absolute balance’ between the
distinctiveness of the three persons and their unity be maintained? Lin Hong-Hsin does
not consider the possibility in reality of maintaining ‘an absolute balance between
both’think so. (Lin, Hong-Hsin 2010:30) This might be true because even the definition
or demarcation for such a balance is difficult to mark concretely. However Moltmann’s
social doctrine of the Trinity is in fact his efforts and attempts to build a dialectical
synthesis, as demonstrated in Figure 4.1 between the thesis of God as the Supreme
Substance (emphasizing the objectiveness of the doctrine of God) and the antithesis of
God as the Absolute Subject (emphasizing the subjectiveness of the doctrine of God).

30
 G o d a s t h e S u p r e m e

S u b s t a n c e

M o l t m a n n ’ s s o c i a l

d o c t r i n e o f t h e T r i n i t y

i n t h e T r i n i t a r i a n

H i s t o r y o f G o d

Figure 4.1 Moltmann’s dialectical synthesis between God as the Supreme

o d a s t h e A b s o l u t e

Substance and God as the Absolute Subject S u b j e c t

The aforementionedPreviously we mentioned Staniloae’s concept of ‘divine

intersubjectivity’ (Staniloae 1998:260–78) construct as a strong case option for
constructing as an antithesis toward in which God is presented as the Absolute Subject.
Moltmann (1981:64)(1981:64, emphasis original) also argues in athe similar way that
the Son and Father reveal each other (Matt. 11:27; Gal. 1:16) rather than ‘God reveals’
himself’God-self. It is not of himself given by God the Father or His own, but by his
His own Son, as subject, who has been given up for us (Rom. 8:32). Therefore although,
Jesus as the Son incarnated into the history of human being, its is ‘not consummated and
fulfilled by a single subject’, but emerges from ‘the co-efficacy’ of all the three Persons
of the triune God. This history is of ‘the reciprocal, changing, and living relationship’
among them. In the New Testament itself, the history of Jesus Christ is already narrated
‘in trinitarian terms’. How about in Old Testament? For Moltmann (1985a:94)(1985:94)
‘the Christian understanding’ of the God-created world is ‘moulded by’ his redemptive
revelation ‘in the history of Jesus Christ’, just as in the same way that ‘the Israelite
understanding’ of it the world is shaped by God's redemptive revelation ‘in the exodus,
the covenant, and the promise of the land’. Therefore Christian theology develops and
describes ‘Old Testament monotheism in a trinitarian sense: the Father created heaven
and earth through the Son in the Spirit’. This conclusion (Moltmann 1985a:94–6,
emphasis original)(Moltmann 1985:94–6, emphasis original) was derived from two
main concepts: 1. ‘The Cosmic Christ’ － Since since Christ is the foundation of
‘salvation for the whole creation’ including ‘sinful’ humankind and ‘enslaved

31
nonhuman creatures, he is then also’ the foundation for their ‘existence’. In other words,
only Christ as creator can save ‘the whole creation’ from God’s cursejudgement. 2. ‘The
Spirit as Creator’ － The the wonderful and awesome ‘operation and indwelling’ of the
Holy Spirit the which Christians encountered in the testimonies of New Testament is the
‘eschatological experience of salvation’. Both the Father’s creation ‘through the Son’
and ‘the reconciliation’ between ‘the world’ and ‘God through Christ’ are achieved in
‘the presence and the efficacy’ of the Holy Spirit, which is therefore the ‘eschatological
goal of creation and reconciliation’. This kind of eschatological experience of the Holy
Spirit draws to out the conclude conclusion ‘that this is the same Spirit in whose power
the Father, through the Son, has created the world, and preserves it against annihilating
[N]othingness… (Ps. 104.29-30)’.
Moltmann’s trinitarian concept of creation is from an eschatological panentheistic
perspective, that ‘creation exists in the Spirit, is moulded by the Son and is created by
the Father’ and therefore not only the creator God ‘dwells in’ creation but also creation
is ‘from God, through God and in God’. (Moltmann 1985a:98)(Moltmann 1985:98)
(more needs to be said here)This concept binds brings into together the two
essentialelements of truth about God: ‘transcendence’ and ‘immanence’. Stressing on
only one of them leads to either ‘deism’ (lack of ‘God’s immanence’) or ‘pantheism’
(lack of ‘God’s transcendence’). (Moltmann 1985a:98) By the explanation of Heinrich
Heine, Moltmann (1985a:103) makes distinction between pantheism and panentheism:
panentheism differentiates God from the world and recognizes ‘future transcendence,
evolution and intentionality’, but pantheism sees ‘merely eternal, divine presence’ and
everything the same without difference. But he (1985a:103) does not think that
panentheism can bind together ‘God’s immanence’ and ‘his transcendence’ without ‘the
trinitarian doctrine of creation’ that ‘the creator Spirit’ creates the world and ‘indwells’
in it. in monotheism stressing on God’s transcendence and pantheism stressing on God’s
immanence. In this sense, the Spirit not only sustains His creation and its ‘communities’
but also guides them ‘beyond themselves’ and the world becomes a ‘divine
environment’ that shelter and nurture for every ‘living’ creatures. Moltmann quotes
Acts 18:20 to supports his ‘panentheistic understanding of the world’: ‘In him we live
and move and have our being’ (NRSV). (Moltmann 1985a:103, 300) Although Since
panentheism is not a popular normal Christian theological term, it would is evident that
be necessary to evaluate further Moltmann’s purpose uses it to apply and extend the
relationships of the perichōrēsis among trinitarian persons to explain the relationships

32
between the triune God and the world in the perspective of his social doctrine of the
Trinity, that we will discuss in the next section. to use it and its necessity.

2.5 Moltmann’s Social Doctrine of the Trinity Based on the Perichōorēesis

From his understanding of ‘the history of the Trinity's relations of fellowship’ which the
scriptures testify to, Moltmann (1981:19) develops his ‘social doctrine of the Trinity’, .
This is based on a form of ‘trinitarian hermeneutics’, which directs us to the aspects of
‘relationships and communities’: , first among the trinitarian Persons, and then as it
becomes ‘open to men and women’, and furthermore extending the Trinity’s relation to
the whole creation in the world. In his viewpoint, this trinitarian hermeneutics take the
place of ‘the subjective thinking’ which can function only in the ‘separation and
isolation’ from its objects. Moltmann practically applies this social doctrine of Trinity to
thinking ‘ecologically about God, man and the world in their relationships and
indwellings’. For him (1981:19) this applicationit is from drawing upon ‘panentheistic
ideas’ which are rooted in ‘from the Jewish and the Christian traditions’. While For
expounding the concept of person in trinitarian terms, Moltmann (1981:174–5) follows
‘John Damascene's profound doctrine of the eternal ’(perichōorēesis). 11
The
concept of perichōorēesis appreciates highlights the ‘circulatory character’ 12
of the
triune God. and Moltmann (1981:174–5) explains it as a process of ‘the exchange of
energies’ occurring in the triune God, and reachingbecoming ‘perfect[ion] through the
fellowship and unity of the three different Persons in the eternal love’. In other words,
through the eternal love of the triune God, they live and ‘dwell in one another and
communicate eternal life to one another’, and ‘to such an extent, … that they are one’.
(Moltmann 1981:175) (Put too brief here) Moltmann (1981:175) (1981:13–19, 175)
convincingly presents his dialectical synthesis, as demonstrated in Figure 4.2, as the
Trinity of perichōrēsis between the thesis as both the abstract monotheism as he
criticizes the Trinity of a homogenous substance and the Trinity of an identical subject
as and the antithesis as ‘tritheism’ as he is criticized as (Bauckham 2005:160; Jeroncic,
Ante 2008:193, n.282; Kärkkäinen, Veli-Matti 2011:236–7; Kim, Byunghoon 2002;

11
indicates ‘circumincessio of the trinitarian Persons’ (Moltmann 1981:174) and is
transliterated to perichoresis as an English word. The concept of perichōrēsisperichoresis was first used to
explain ‘the intimate communion of the two natures of Christ’ by Gregory Nazianzen, in the fourth
century, and Pseudo-Cyril was probably the first to apply its usage extendedly further to ‘the trinitarian
relationships, around 650’. (Otto, Randall E 2009:368–9)
12
Moltmann (1981:178) discloses the meaning of this ‘circulatory character’ later when he states ‘To
throw open the circulatory movement of the divine light and the divine relationships, and to take men and
women, with the whole of creation, into the life-stream of the triune God: that is the meaning of creation,
reconciliation and glorification’. This seems to be his application of the panentheistic ideas.
33
O’donnell, John J 1982:13; Williams, Stephen N 2003:99). by sayingHe (Moltmann
1981:175) summarizes the kernel of ‘[I]n the perichōrēsisperichoresis as, ‘the very thing
that divides them becomes that which binds them together’, namely to refuse the
persons in the Trinity neither as ‘three different individuals, who only subsequently
enter into relationship with one another’, nor ‘three modes of being or three repetitions
of the One God’. The former is reproached usually as ‘tritheism’ and the latter as
modalism. (Moltmann 1981:175, emphasis original) The trinitarian ‘doctrine of the
perichōrēsis’ integrates ‘the threeness and the unity’ in a perfect way that the threeness
will not disappear in the unity and the unity will not collapse in the threeness.
(Moltmann 1981:175)

A b s t r a c t M o n o t h e i s m

( G o d a s t h e S u p r e m e S u b s t a n c e

a n d G o d a s t h e A b s o l u t e S u b j e c t )

M o l t m a n n ’ s T r i n i t a r i a n

D o c t r i n e o f t h e

P e r i c h ō r ē s i s

Figure 4.2 Moltmann’s dialectical synthesis between the abstract Monotheism

and tritheism T r i t h e i s m

The concept of the Trinity is beyondtranscends human reason to understand and

describe it concretely and fully. Although the term of perichōrēsisperichoresis is useful
and helpful to in explaining more deeper deeply the features of threeness and the unity
of the triune God, and partly particularly in a negative theological way, 13
it is still an
abstract or metaphysical term. Is the term energies energy which Moltmann uses to
explain the meaning of perichōrēsisperichoresis among within the threeness, more
understandable than it? It seems that he does not explain this term energy,it and use it
in other places. Although this word ‘energy’ or ‘energeia’, which, usually is translated
as ‘actuality or activity’ (Zavershinsky, George 2011:101, emphasis original) is taken to

13
Negative theology, or Apophatic theology, is a theological approach to describe God only in terms of
what He is not, instead of presumptuously attempting to describing describe what God is presumptuously.

34
be the opposite to ‘dynamis or potentiality’, was originally used by ‘Aristotle’ to
identify with the ‘form or determinate structure’ and to indicate God as ‘pure form
without … any potentiality’ (Zavershinsky, George 2011:101, emphasis original),
Moltmann undoubtedly follows the meaning of it given by the Orthodox theologians, .
He does so because ‘St. Gregory Palamas and his followers’ because overcome the
problem caused by the fact that there is no difference for Aristotle ‘between the essence’
and the energy of God, which Palamas makes distinct. In differentiation differentiating
between them, Palamas, unlike the western Western philosophical and theological
tradition which went after Aristotle’s view of the inconceivability of both God’s essence
and energies, followed ‘the Fathers such as Denis the Areopagite, Basil the Great and
Gregory the Theologian’ and averred that ‘God’s uncreated, eternal energies’ can be
understood as ‘ineffable, suprasensible light’ that is graspable and participable and felt
as ‘Divine grace’. (Zavershinsky 2011:101)(Zavershinsky, George 2011:101, emphasis
original) Palamas found that Orthodox theologians referred to the uncreated energy of
God ‘as one and as many, as being divisible indivisibly’ but never mentioned the
essence of God ‘in the plural form’ because it means would contrast with God ‘being
one and altogether indivisible’. Unlike the essence of God that is beyond human reason
and hence unfathomable, the uncreated energy of God is ‘like the rays of the sun’
through which God’s existence is knowable, even if what He is is not knowable.
(Zavershinsky 2011:102, emphasis original) Palamas asserted that ‘light’ is used to call
name God ‘according to His energy’, instead of ‘His essence’. (Palamas n.d. cited in
Zavershinsky 2011:109) Zavershinsky (2011:109, emphasis original) explains how ‘the
active energies … characterize the Three Persons in their perichoral relationship’ as
follows:
The divine essence with its energies is enhypostasized in the three divine Persons; hence, a
hypostatic principle or mode of the relational being of God the Trinity is to be considered
as the most important means of approaching the knowledge of God. Enhypostasized energy
should not be understood as belonging to a particular hypostasis and separate from the other
ones[,] but as revealing the unity of the Three.

It looks like that the term energies energy and its differentiation from essence according
to the view of Orthodox tradition does help in to crystallizing crystallize the meaning of
the threeness in the unity and the unity of the threeness, even although we admit (??)
here again our the human finitude in knowing and describing God.
A long time ago, ‘patristic theologians’ understood such a concept of the
perichōrēsisperichoresis ‘as the sociality of the three divine Persons’. (Moltmann
1981:198, emphasis original) Orthodox theologians following ‘Cappadocian Fathers’,

35
down to the present day, engage in the analogical ‘category of community’ applied to
‘the eternal life of the Trinity’, while the Western church has employed the other
analogical ‘category of the individual person’ which Augustine developed into ‘the
psychological doctrine of the Trinity’. Orthodox theologians hold ‘an emphatically
social doctrine of the Trinity’ and disagree with ‘the modalistic tendencies in the
personal trinitarian doctrine of the Western church’. (Moltmann 1981:198–9, emphasis
original) It is perichōrēsisperichoresis that keeps Moltmann’s social triune God
distinctive and distinguishable from either ‘a general concept of divine substance’ or
‘three modes of being of one and the same divine subject’ because ‘the unity of the
trinitarian Persons lies in the circulation of the divine life which they fulfil in their
relations to one another’. In this way so that the personal differences are not ever
abolished, and ‘the very difference of the three Persons lies in their relational,
perichoretically consummated life process’ (Moltmann 1981:175). (Check Douglas
Kelly’s discussion on perichoresis) Does Moltmann indeed deny the fundamental,
ontological, substantial, objective, nature of God’s reality by distinguishing his social
triune God from a general concept of divine substance? It seems that he does so and
overlooks the ontic identity of God. For Jesus is the Son of God as the second Person of
the Trinity. The Son is indeed a relational term, albeit eternal in relationship. But He
also as God – YHWH – I AM –possesses ontic identity. God is something distinct.
Jesus has both. (It will be discussed deeper.)

2.6 The Imago Dei in Moltmann’s Trinitarian Theological Anthropology

Grenz (2001:304) presents the imago Dei (the image of God) as a concrete and
pragmatic basis for the self to be grounded in God. In the theological history, there are
three different views to understand the imago Dei: (1) the substantial view—that is, ‘the
imago dei as consisting of certain attributes or capabilities lodged within the person’
(Grenz 2001:17; Staniloae 1994 cited in Bates, Dana 2012); (2) the relational view—
that is, ‘the divine image as referring to a fundamental relationship between the human
creature and the Creator’ (Grenz 2001:142; Staniloae 1994 cited in Bates 2012;
Moltmann 2009:289) and (3) the telic view—that is, ‘the imago dei as humankind's
divinely given goal or destiny, which lies in the eschatological future and toward which
humans are directed’ (Grenz 2001:177; Staniloae 1994 cited in Bates 2012; Moltmann
2009:227). Are these three views exclusive of each other? In terms of the self, it seems
that they altogether disclose the comprehensive meanings of the imago Dei in their
functionally logical correlation, and can be seen as its three aspects. Moltmann indeed

36
displays the pivotal role of his historical doctrine of Trinity to include all the above
three views of the imago Dei as ‘nature’ (‘in the first creation’), ‘grace’ (‘in the
continuous creation’) and ‘glory’ (‘in the new creation’) in his God in Creation
(Moltmann 1985a:1–19)(Moltmann 1985:1–19), while when he seeks to understand and
explain the imago Dei as an element of the doctrine of Trinity. We are now following
his three lenses to look at human beings as the image of God in the history of God’s
creation: ‘imago Dei’, ‘imago Christi’ (‘the image of Christ’), and ‘gloria Dei est homo’
(the glory of God is man) (Moltmann 1985a:215–43)(Moltmann 1985:215–43).

2.6.1 Nature: , Imago Dei,: and The the Original Designation of Human Beings
Firstly, Moltmann (1985a:216–25) follows the traditional Christian hermeneutics in
explaining the imago Dei as the source of original designation and superiority of
humankind. (reference??) He (Moltmann 1998a:30) states admits that human beings are
granted the commission of ‘dominum terrae’ (being lord of the land) because,
theologically speaking, it comes from ‘the imago Dei structure of what it means to be
human’. (要不要加底線) Based on ‘the biblical traditions’, he also maintains that ‘the
dignity of human beings’ as in their superiority above other creatures originates in ‘their
being created in the image of God’. It grants them more freedom and ‘a special
commission in the name of that transcendent God’ which includes ‘special
responsibility for other living creatures’. (Moltmann 1998a:30)
But Yet with regard toon the question about the constituents of the human
beings’s likeness to God, Moltmann (1985a:219–20)(1985:219–20) rejects all of the
answers given by ‘theological tradition[s]’ in the history as ‘a false inference’, . These
include such as ‘the soul’ — based on ‘the analogy of substance’, ; ‘the human being's
upright walk and upward glance’ — based on ‘the analogy of form’, ; ‘man's lordship
over the earth’ — based on ‘the analogy of proportionality’, ; and ‘the community of
man and wife’ — based on ‘the analogy of relation’, ‘ This is because in his viewpoint
all of them have reduced the meaning of the ‘likeness to God’ to ‘the human beings’
general relationship to God’, . which while this distinguishes them from animals by
their distinctive characteristics, but it still is just being a reduced form of relationship
described ‘in religious terms’. He argues that before ‘the human being's likeness to
God’ becomes an ‘anthropological’ term — because saying that the human being is
‘created in this form’ it should be ‘a theological term’ — there is the saying that God
‘creates his image for himself’ and ‘enters into a particular relationship with that
image’. (Moltmann 1985a:220) This means that God actively means to have an

37
extraordinary relationship with His image for His own sake, so that He creates His
image as humankind. Accordingly the nature of human beings comes from being
created in the imago Dei and their relationship to God. As a result human nature should
be defined by this relationship, instead of by some distinctive characteristics from other
living things. It is human beings’ ‘whole existence’, ‘whole person’ (‘not merely his
soul’) and ‘the true human community’ (‘not only the individual’) that makes them
God’s image. (Moltmann 1985a:221, emphasis original)(Moltmann 1985:221, emphasis
original) Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1997:41) had also pointed out this a similar insight in the
following explanation:
The likeness, the analogy of man to God, is not analogia entis but analogia relationis. This
means that even the relation between man and God is not a part of man; it is not a capacity,
a possibility, or a structure of his being[,] but a given, set relationship … And in this given
relation freedom is given.14

Although Karl Barth (1963:382), following Hegel, holds mainly the concept of ‘one
essence’ and ‘three modes of existence’ of God to explain his ‘doctrine of the Trinity’,
he accepted Bonhoeffer’s interpretation of analogia relationis, so as to develop his idea
of ‘analogia fidei’ in arguing against the analogia entis of the ‘natural theology’ in
‘Roman Catholic’ tradition and ‘in his christocentric interpretation of the imago dei’ (de
Gruchy, John W. 1997:11).
It is insightful to define human nature first in aby means of theological
theologyterm , and then by means of in an anthropological anthropologyone. But the
question is, by Moltmann’s definition, whether or not God possesses attributes that are
fundamental to his the divine nature and which make community possible (even
necessary)? Moltmann seems to want to avoid this question, yet community
presupposes, for example, intelligence. In other words, can the relationship alone define
human nature, without any reference to the ontological nature from of the imago Dei?
This will berequires further discussed discussion, which we will pick up deeper later.
Nevertheless, for Moltmann the this anthropology derived from ‘the human
being’s likeness to God’ is manifested in ‘the sexual differentiation and community of
human beings’ who are designed, in God’s image, to ‘be to a common, shared
humanity’ (Moltmann 1985a:222)(Moltmann 1985:222). The evidence of for this kind
of arguments comeis from his exegesis of Genesis 1:26-27: In Genesis 1:26, a ‘singular’
human being, Adam, ‘corresponds to a divine plural’. But in Genesis 1:27, 15
a human
being ‘plural’, men and women, ‘corresponds to a divine singular’. (Moltmann
14
Analogia entis is analogy of being.
15
Cf. different English versions of Genesis 1:26-7 (especially the different translation s of ‘humankind’ in
NRSV and ‘man’ in NKJV)
38
1985a:222)(Moltmann 1985:222) Moltmann (1985a:218, 222)(1985:218, 222) believes
the ‘interplay’ or ‘grammatical shift’(German?) of the ‘singular and plural’ between of
the divine and human being here is ‘deliberate’, ‘intentional and important’. Therefore,
the shift from singular human being to plural human beings is intended evidently to
disclose that ‘to be human means being sexually differentiated and sharing a common
humanity; both are equally primary’. For him it also obviously invalidates the argument
that ‘being human is the generic term for which man and woman are simply sub-
divisions, or that man and woman are two different creatures’ (Moltmann 1985a:222)
(Moltmann 1985:222). Although Moltmann (1985a:224)(1985:224) admits agrees the
commission to ‘rule over the animals’ and the charge to ‘subdue the earth’ are granted
to human beings following ‘the creation of God’'s image on earth’ according to Genesis
1:28 and 29, 16
he views these commissions as ‘a specific addition’ to ‘the likeness to
God’, instead of being ‘identical with’ it. However ‘the two different charges evidently
complement one another, and the second limits the first;’ because ‘Genesis 1 reveals the
beginning teaches ‘that human lordship over the animals has to be distinguished from
human subjection of the earth for the purposes of nourishment’ of humans and animals
(Genesis 1:29-30). He criticizes and blames the traditional theological doctrine of the
dominium terrae for ‘throwing the two together and intermixes intermix[ing] them’ and
bringing forth ‘disastrous consequences for the world’. Therefore Moltmann
(1985a:224)(1985:224) also maintains that these specific commissions by designation to
rule must ‘follow from the essential being of men and women as God's image on earth’
and that ‘this sequence’ is notcannot be reversedible’. He warns that ‘[P]eoples, races
and nations which set themselves up to be masters of the world by no means become
God’s image in the process, or his representative, or God present on earth’, but ‘become
at most a monster’ (1985a:224–5, emphasis original)(1985:224–5, emphasis original).
By insisting on God’s image as the only divinely legitimated source of human beings’
rule, Moltmann (1985a:225)(1985:225) concludes that human beings in the context of

NRSV Then God said, ‘Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them
have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the
wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.’ So God created
humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.
NKJV Then God said, ‘Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have
dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over
every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’ So God created man in His own image; in the image of God
He created him; male and female He created them.
16
Moltmann’s explanation (1985a:224) of the sequence of the charges of ‘rule over the animals’ and
‘subdue the earth’ from God in the text of his God in Creation has an obvious error of transposing verses
about the references to Genesis 1. The charge of ‘rule over the animals’ from God appears actually for the
first time in verse 26, instead in verse 28, and then the second time in verse 28.
39
creation must rule ‘only as whole human beings, only as equal human beings, and only
in the community of human beings’, not at the price of ‘dividing the human person into
spirit and body’, or ‘dividing human beings into ruler and ruled’, and so ‘dividing
mankind into different classes’. (why better Moltmann’s alternatives)Moltmann’s
explanations of hermeneutics on Genesis 1:26-9 and his applications of them to human
relationships and ecology provide a convincing insight and argument. From the nuance
of the interplay of plural and singular grammatical forms of the Creator triune God and
the creation humanity, he demonstrates how the relationship of the perichōrēsis can be
an element of the triune God’s image and the triune God’s likeness in which He made
mankind. Through this element, the triune God not only set a template of interpersonal
relationships but also endowed them to mankind through His creation. Such
interpersonal relationships integrate and maintain the unity of the community, the
equality among individuals, and the diversity of each individual with different functions.
All of that are echoed in the metaphor of one body with many members used by Apostle
Paul to explain how Christian relationships should be in Christ in 1 Corinthians 12 ,
where unity, equality and diversity are highlighted balancedly. Based on this image dei,
mankind wih superiority are not to abuse the world, especially other living creation but
take a special commission and responsibility to rule and nourish the world.
In Moltmann’s concept of the imago Dei, even though it involves his seemingly
questionable denial of the fundamental, ontological, substantial, objective, nature of
God’s reality, the relational self is developed from God’s image as a community with
the nature of perichōrēsisperichoresis. It will absolutely not be the self developed in
individualism, nor be similar as the relational self developed in collectivism. In the
same dialectic structure, we find this relational self can also be his dialectic synthesis
drawn from between individualism as the thesis and collectivism as the antithesis.

2.6.2 Grace: , Imago Christi: , The and the Messianic Calling of Human Beings
Moltmann (1985a:215)(1985:215) disagrees with a ‘the one-sided viewpoint’ of
theological anthropology. For This is because it limits the consideration of ‘the human
being's likeness to God only in the context of the doctrine of creation’, namely, the
image of God that first was blurred or ruined through the Fall and then is recovered
through God's grace. This approach was only used to describe an ‘ideal picture of
human beings in their primal condition’. He reinterprets such a classical notion of the
imago Dei along ‘the messianic alignment and trend of human history’. For him
(Moltmann 1985a:225–7)(Moltmann 1985:225–7), the true imago Dei will be

40
‘consummate[d]’ and is to be obtainedgot rather at the ‘end of God’s history with
mankind’ rather than at its beginning before the ‘lost origin’ (McDougall, Joy Ann
2003:190); but ‘and as goal’ it is indeed exists present in that beginning and during
throughout ‘every moment of that history’ from its beginning to its end: Christ. To
sayPut in other words, Moltmann (1985a:227)(1985:227) views the imago Dei as ‘a
historical process with an eschatological termination’, or ‘eschatological destiny’ or
‘messianic destiny’ (McDougall 2003:190); ‘Being human means becoming human in
this process.’ According to Moltmann’s interpretation, it is a dynamic and tensive
tensional process of already already-and and-not not-yet instead of a static one.
Moltmann (1985a:94–5)(1985:94–5) follows the Apostle Paul’s concept of the likeness
to God as being applied to indicate the raised and transfigured Messiah, Jesus Christ, as
‘God’s true image’ (II Corinthians 4:4), ‘the glory of God’ (II Corinthians 4:6), ‘the
first-born of all creation’ (Colossians 1:15), ‘the first-born from the dead’ (Colossians
1:18), ‘the image of the invisible God’ (Colossians 1:15). Since Jesus Christ is the
image of the invisible God who mediating in creation, reconciling the world to God, and
ruling as the divine Lord, Moltmann (1985a:226)(1985:226) assumes argues that ‘God
appears in his perfect image, God rules through his image, God reconciles and redeems
through his image on earth’. and So he argues that ‘Christ must already be the mystery
of creation in the beginning. The earlier is understood in the light of the later, and the
beginning is comprehended in the light of the consummation’. (Moltmann 1985a:226)
Upon his understanding (Moltmann 1985:225–7) of the true imago Dei ‘consummate’
and is to be got rather at the ‘end of God’s history with mankind’ than at its beginning
before ‘lost origin’(McDougall 2003:190), We can see here that Moltmann strongly
emphasizes his argument in terms of a dichotomy. Some people might ask ‘Why not
both?’ or ‘Are not both to be understood in the light of each other?’ The questions
depends on whether or not humankind before the Fall is exactly the same as they will be
after ‘a new heaven and a new earth’ are established (NRSV Revelation 21:1). (needs
more defence) I believe they are not the same, because there will be no curse, resulted
from sin, for they will be found in a new heaven and a new earth, so that men cannot sin
and fall again there (cf. Genesis 3:17 & and Revelation 22:3).
Moltmann cannot understand imago Christi apart from his social doctrine of the
Trinity. It is in the ‘fellowship of believers with Christ’ and through the grace of God
that the recovery or ‘new creation’ of the imago Dei happens. It is because Christ is the
‘messianic imago Dei’, so that believers can be ‘accepted and promised, wholly, bodily
and socially’ into the ‘imago Christi’ (Moltmann 1985a:215, 227)(Moltmann 1985:215,

41
227) and enter upon the path towards ‘gloria Dei on earth’ through the ‘imago Christi’
(Romans 8:29-30) (Moltmann 1985a:226)(Moltmann 1985:226). To sayPut in other
words, the holistically ‘embodied and social human beings’ can only be fulfilled in the
‘messianic fellowship of Jesus’, and then death can never separates ‘them from God and
from one another, or [separate them] into soul and body’. (Moltmann 1985a:227)
(Moltmann 1985:227) Although ‘in history’, in contrast to ‘an open history’, (Moltmann
1985a:350, n.22) the process of ‘the messianic becoming-human of the human being’ in
history will be neither complete and nor completable, it is in ‘the process of
resurrection’ the that believers already live as a fellowship with Christ, here and now,
that they can ‘experience themselves as accepted and promised, wholly, bodily and
socially’. (Moltmann 1985a:227)(Moltmann 1985:227) According to Moltmann’s
expounding the this likeness to God through the messianic imago Dei, believers are not
only imago Christi socially but also imago Christi wholly and bodily. He seems here not
to exclude the ontic nature of humankind in the likeness to God of his social Trinity.

2.6.3 Glory: , Gloria Dei est Homo: , The and the Eschatological Glorification of
Human Beings
Based on the biblical traditions that ‘human beings are created as the image of God for
the divine glory’ and based on his imago Christi that human beings are redeemed to
become the imago Christi for the ‘eschatological glorification’, Moltmann (1985a:228)
(1985:228, emphasis original) emphasizes that human beings are not only
‘commissioned by God’, but also made ‘the mode of his appearance in his creation’
because through Jesus the Messiah human beings are called to enter into ‘the
eschatological history of the new creation’ accorded to the form of the likeness to Him.
— They move from justification, through ‘sanctification’ and onto glorification. —
eEven as ‘the coming glory of God’ shines upon the face of the resurrected Messiah, ‘so
believers, filled with the Spirit, even here, and even now, also reflect the glory of God
with unveiled face’. It is obvious that Moltmann’s interpretation of Gloria Dei est Homo
here is drawn from his hermeneutics explanation mainly on of Romans 8:30 and 2
Corinthians 3:12-18; and 4:6. Although the veil of the unveiled face here in the context
of 2 Corinthians 3:12-18 refers to the relational barrier or problem between God’s
people and God, it can be also be extended to indicate the relational barrier or problem
between human beings, even the relational barrier or problem between the personage
and person in a man. This is because in trinitarian theological anthropology the
relationship between man and God is the first step to basegrounding all the other
relationships, including both social relation and self relation, on the triune God as their

42
source and archetype, including both social relations and the self relation. If the veil
between human beings and God disappears, the veils between them will also disappear,
and their masks can be also taken off.
Through summing up from the biblical clues (I Cor. 13:12; I John 3:2)
systematically, Moltmann (1985a:228–9)(1985:228–9) pithily discloses his concept on
of gloria Dei est homo by saying that ‘as God’s image human beings conform to the
presence of the Creator in his creation, and as God's children they conform to the
presence of God's grace; but when the glory of God itself enters creation, they will
become like God, and be transfigured into his appearance’. In his opinion, ‘theosis’ —
‘the eschatological becoming-one-with-God of human beings’ — is ‘the mark of this
promised glorification of human beings’ through ‘perfect resemblance’. In reality, this
promised glorification can be fulfilled when ‘the imago per conformitatem gratiae’ (the
image of the conformity of grace) is transfigured into ‘the imago per similitudinem
gloriae’ (the image of the likeness of glory). He stresses very much on the
differentiation ‘between grace and glory, between reconciliation and redemption’, and
between ‘the historicizing of nature’ and ‘the eschatological naturalizing of history’.
(Moltmann 1992a:129–30, emphasis original)(Moltmann 1992:129–30, emphasis
original) For describing the concept of ‘theosis’, besides using ‘[P]articipation in the
divine nature’ from 2 Peter 1:4, Moltmann (1985a:229; 1974:93, 277; 1992a:130;
1999:140)(1985:229; 1974:93, 277; 1992:130; 1999:140) also uses, in different places,
the following phrases: ‘becoming-one-with-God’, ‘to participate in the divine life and
beauty’, ‘conformity to God’, ‘flowering into perfect resemblance’, ‘a realistic
divinization’, ’the deification of man’, and ‘the visible indwelling of God in his new
Creation’. Does he mean that human beings will acquire the divine nature and become a
being as God? Moltmann (1981:107) absolutely disagrees that humanity can be
indentified with God or the Son of God. He (1981:68) unequivocally contrasts the
likeness between ‘the Father and the Son’ with the unlikeness between humanity and
God by referring to Matthew 11.27: ‘All things have been handed over to me by my
Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father
except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.’ He (1981:107) also
argues that the world and God’s ‘only begotten Son’ are not identical, and maintains
emphatically the differentiation of ‘the world process’ 17
from ‘the inner-trinitarian

17
Moltmann seems to have not defined precisely the meaning of ‘world process’ in this book but from its
context I believe it means ‘the existence of the world and its history’ (Moltmann 1981:42).
43
process’. 18
Only in one place, while he explains explaining the relationship of
Christology and eschatology, he uses theosis to indicate Jesus’ ‘becoming God’
(Moltmann 2007a:86) . But does it means the same thing for him in using it on for
human beings as on for Jesus Christ? Seemingly not, even though he does not define
and explain it directly of much deeper in detail. The concept of ‘theosis’ he presents
here to explain the ‘perfect resemblance’ of humankind with God is worthy to be
compared to the ‘unity between humanity and Heaven’ (Tu 1985:60-1) and discussed in
the context of Confucianism.

2.6.4 Imago Trinitatis (The image of the Trinity): Eternal Fellowship with the
Open Trinity
Nonetheless Moltmann’s (1981:199) concept of imago Dei is never of ‘the individual’
— ‘people being made in the image of God’, which is presented by ‘Augustine’
(Moltmann 1985a:235), but that of ‘person with person’ — ‘Adam and Eve and Seth’ as
a family being made in the image of ‘the unity of the Triunity: three Persons － one
family’, which is proposed by ‘Gregory of Nazianzus’ (Moltmann 1985a:235). Though
they are ‘dissimilar’, they are ‘an earthly image and parable of the Trinity, since they
are consubstantial persons’. Through this term of ‘the imago Trinitati’s’ and ‘the first
human family as a trinitarian analogy’, Moltmann again underlines the importance of
‘harmonizing personality and sociality in the community of men and women, without
sacrificing the one to the other’.
Moltmann (1985a:241)(1985:241) here indicates what is the ‘true human
community’, but not ‘a religious family ideology’: . ‘[t]he simultaneous community of
the sexes in space’ (that is － ‘ man and wife’) － and ‘the community of the
generations in time’ － (that is ‘parents and children’) are basic units within humanity,
because for him the former one just indicate indicating an ‘inextinguishable sociality’,
and the latter, an ‘equally unalterable generativity’. From On the basis of his
observations, Moltmann (1981:199, emphasis original) feels that in the development of
the doctrine of the Trinity in the Western church
‘the concept of perichoresis － the unity and fellowship of the Persons’ － was not stressed so
equivalently as the concept of Person that have been affecting Western anthropology strongly. The lack of
the development of the social doctrine of the Trinity in the Western world has fostered ‘the development
of individualism, and especially possessive individualism’. 19

18
‘Inner-trinitarian process’ means that ‘the Son to whom the Father has subjected everything will then
subject himself to the Father and will give the kingdom (basileia) over to him’. (Moltmann 1981:92)
19
‘Possessive individualism’ is the idea that ‘everyone is a self-possessing, self-disposing centre of action
which sets itself apart from other persons’. (Grenz, Stanley J 2001:11)
44
 Hence Therefore, Moltmann raises such a furtherquestion: ‘everyone is supposed
to fulfil himself but who fulfils the community?’ And aAccordingly he (1985a:223–4)
(1985:223–4) argues that ‘the trinitarian concept of community’ as is the solution to this
problem, because it is to surmount both ‘the ego-solitariness of the narcissist’ and ‘the
egoism of the couple － man and wife’.
For Moltmann (1985a:234)(1985:234) ‘the triune God’ is the source and the
‘archetype of true human community’ and ‘[Human] beings are imago Trinitatis’.
Hence Therefore, he (1985a:216)(1985:216) maintains that they can ‘correspond to the
triune God’ only when they are ‘united’ as a community. Based on his hermeneutics
commentary on John 17:21, he (1985a:241, emphasis original)(1985:241, emphasis
original) defines his social Trinity as the ‘the community within the Trinity’, instead of
‘the Fatherhood or the Sonship’. Therefore ‘through the imago Trinitatis’ what is
‘represented on earth’ are the levels of ‘the relations in the Trinity’ instead of ‘of the
trinitarian constitution’. It is by way of the concept of perichōrēsisperichoresis that
Moltmann presents ‘the trinitarian concept of community’ as a solution for the
development of ‘possessive individualism’ in the Western world. But since
perichōrēsisperichoresis and Trinity are the terms used to describe the trinitarian
mystery of God, can the concept of perichōrēsisperichoresis be applied rightly to the
relationships among between human beings? What does ‘the trinitarian concept of
community’ mean? Does the unity within the Trinity have the same meaning of the
unity among human beings? Does the relationships in the Trinity have the same
meaning of the relationships among human beings, even when they are united with one
another? These questions must be dealt withconsidered at a later point in our work..
He (Moltmann 1985a:242)(Moltmann 1985:242) uses the primal fundamental
human community to interpret the whole of human beings as imago trinitatis, and
further explains that after the Fall fall of human beings they ‘through the messianic
fellowship with the Son’ are not only recovered to this divine image from their sinful
natures ‘through the messianic fellowship with the Son’ but are also ‘gathered into the
open Trinity’. But what is this ‘open Trinity’? Based on John 17:21 (NRSV): ‘NRSV …
that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in
us’, Moltmann (1981:90f., 95–6) uses it to disclose the openness of the union of the
Trinity, instead of a closed unity, because the fellowship of disciples is not only ‘a
fellowship with God’ but also, ‘beyond that, a fellowship in God’. There are three main
aspects of Moltmann’s open Trinity through sending ‘the creative Spirit’. FirstlyFirst of
all, it is open for believers to participate in ‘the trinitarian history of God himself’, in

45
addition to ‘the eschatological history of the new creation’. SecondarySecondly, it is
open to a ‘forward-looking’ future. Thirdly, it is ‘open for unification with believers,
with mankind, and with the whole creation’. Therefore, in his viewpoint, the unity of
the Trinity is also a ‘soteriological’ term as well besides a ‘theological’ one.
Noticeably, by way of the imago Christi, Moltmann (1985a:242–3, emphasis
original)(1985:242–3, emphasis original), is following the Orthodox theologians after
Gregory of Nazianzus, differentiates differentiating his ‘open Trinity’, as manifesting
‘itself outwardly in differentiated form’, from ‘a closed and self-contained Trinity’, and
manifesting ‘itself outwardly without differentiation’. In the latter case, according to
Augustine, ‘the Trinity itself is whole’, so that the imago Dei ‘in the unity of the Tri-
unity’ indicates ‘the image of the whole Trinity’. However On the contrary, in the open
Trinity the restoration of sinful men is through and according to ‘a single Person of the
Trinity’. Thus Consequently, human beings as the imago Christi are assembled ‘into his
relationship of sonship’ and call the Father of Jesus Christ, ‘Abba, Father’ (Galatians
4:6) ‘in the brotherhood of Christ’. I can apparently see that the imago Christi of the
open Trinity is the key to understanding the meanings of the imago Dei and the imago
Trinitatis in Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology. Through the Son, not only
‘the divine Trinity throws itself open for human beings’, but also ‘human beings as
God's image on earth therefore acquire access to the Father’. To say this in other words,
‘the Father creates, redeems and perfects human beings through the Spirit in the image
of the Son’. (Moltmann 1985:243) Apparently only an open Trinity makes possible to
interweave the imago Dei, the imago Christi, gloria Dei est homo, and the imago
Trinitatis and interweaves and connects them togetherinto a harmonious whole. But
does Moltmann discard the necessity of salvation for reaching all, of them while since
he mentions the openness of the open Trinity for uniting ‘with mankind, and with the
whole creation’? This issue will also be discussed later in this work.

2.7 The Open Friendship in Moltmann’s Trinitarian Theological

Anthropology: Grace and the Community of Grace

Jesus’ relationship with his Father and the relationships amongst his believers have can
be explored much more in order to inform us about the imago Dei (imago Trinitatis) and
the significance of this trinitarian theological anthropology. For Moltmann (1977:119–
20) (1978:50–63), Jesus’ ministry exemplifies and characterizes perfectly the so-called
‘open friendship’. Because of his concept of the open Trinity, Moltmann develops his
trinitarian concept of fellowship. Fellowship is ascribed to ‘the special gift of the Spirit’

46
(Moltmann 1992b:217)(Jürgen Moltmann 1992:217). In his trinitarian concept of
fellowship, ‘the Spirit evidently gives himself. He himself enters into the fellowship
with believers, and draws them into his fellowship’ (Moltmann 1992b:217)(Jürgen
Moltmann 1992:217). He quoted Karl Rahner’s words to emphasize that God’s
relationship toand us is a ‘free and unmerited’ (free grace) relationshipone (Rahner,
1966 in Moltmann 1974:240). In his understanding (Moltmann 1992b:217–18)(Jürgen
Moltmann 1992:217–18), fellowship ‘liberates, and draws others into the relationships
that are essentially its own’ instead of taking ‘by force and possess’. In a true
fellowship, people can open themselves and with ‘respect for one another’, so that they
‘give one another a share in themselves’, and participate in each other’s lives
reciprocally frombecause of ‘mutual recognition’. Therefore fellowship or community is
formed ‘when what is in common is shared’ by different, dissimilar people. Through
this trinitarian perspective of community, Moltmann (1992b:220)(1992:220)
emphasized repeatedly ‘diversity in unity’ existing from the very outset of Christian
faith. Community or fellowship in the trinitarian term sense does not only ‘unite the
differences’ — instead of ‘standardization’ — but also ‘differentiate[s] the One’,
because ‘differentiation’ is indispensable to a ‘true community’ so thatwhere ‘individual
potentialities’ can be developed in ‘the greatest given diversity’. But tThis community
or fellowship is not a general one, but ‘the trinitarian fellowship of the Spirit’ with ‘the
love’ that ties together the things in common and ‘the freedom’ which develops the
‘scope’ and uniqueness of the things ‘individual and singular’. God can be experienced
both individually and socially — within the interaction with others in this community.
Moltmann (1981:216 and 252, n.49, emphasis original)(1981:216 & 252, n.49)
interprets such freedom as ‘freedom in the relationship of subjects to a project’, . in He
differentiating differentiates it from being ‘in the relationship between subject and
object, as lordship’ and ‘in the relationship between subject and subject, as community,
fellowship’, with the because it is also a project of filled with hope.

Moltmann then consequently presents his theology of ‘open friendship’

(1977:119–20) (1978:50–63) to embody such a community involving reciprocal self-
giving and acceptance of another persons which can be practiced only in grace, so that
‘diversity in unity’ is realized and may abound. (Moltmann 1992b:219–20, emphasis
original)(Jürgen Moltmann 1992:219–20, emphasis original) The archetype of this open
friendship is demonstrated by Jesus Christ, as cited in the New Testament: ‘“[h]e is
called the friend of tax collectors and sinners.” (Luke 7:34)’ (Moltmann 1992b:258,
emphasis original)(Jürgen Moltmann 1992:258, emphasis original) Through ‘the law of
47
grace’ (Moltmann 1977:117), Jesus gives this open fellowship to other people who are
not only different, but even had have been cast out of their community. In his joy of
inviting them, he ‘celebrated the messianic feast with’ them, ‘recognized’ them as
human beings with ‘dignity’, and ‘respected’ them ‘as the first children of the divine
grace that creates everything afresh’, so that the ‘social prejudice’ and their ‘self-
isolation’ which they suffered under could be done away with. (Moltmann 1992b:258)
(Jürgen Moltmann 1992:258)
Jesus manifests a core truth of Christian theology distinctive to from other
religions in that God himself through Christ ‘creates the conditions’ of participating in
the relationship to with the open Trinity for ‘the sinners, the godless and those forsaken
by God’, etc. who are not able to ‘satisfy these conditions’. Only through God’s ‘self-
humiliation’ in Christ’s death on the cross and ‘through his exaltation of [hu]man[s]’ in
Christ’s resurrection from death’, i.e.that is only through ‘this person and his history’,
God himself provides the ‘conditions for communion with God’. Therefore through ‘the
covenant founded one-sidedly by God and opened to all’ by way of Christ on the cross,
this true community and fellowship turns out to be a ‘gracious, presuppositionless and
universal community of God’, where all commonly miserable men are welcome. For the
sake of this kind of God’s community of grace, Christian theology must not separate
christocentric thought from trinitarian thought’. (Moltmann 1974:275–6)
Can only a ‘new being’, demanded by the divine calling, enter into this covenant
relationship to the open Trinity. ? Without Christ, human beings are kept
insurmountablye space apart from God. Therefore, ‘Christian baptism … as a form of
grace’ marks and displays an identity alteration by the burial of the old and the rebirth
of the new (Moltmann 1976:16). Therefore although ‘moral cultivation’ is not the term
used in Christian theology, a theology of life transformation developed from imago
Christi, explained and summed up as above, can be understood and named in the
context of moral cultivation as gracious moral cultivation and is evidently displayed in
the imago Dei in Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology. (work expanding out
the difference here) Nonetheless, Moltmann (1992b:259, emphasis original)(1992:259,
emphasis original) does not consider ‘the moral purpose of changing the world’ as ‘the
motive’ for the imago Christi. It is instead a festal joy over the kingdom of God which
… has thrown itself wide open for the others’. This open friendship is passed down
through the community of his people: ‘Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted

48
you, in order to bring praise to God.’ (NIV Rom. 15:7) 20
Therefore I can see that
Moltmann’s social Trinity provides a healthier relational self, which can be built up in
such a community of Christ because its basic law is ‘acceptance of others in their
difference’ without surrendering one’s identity, but mutually revealing what each other
is. (Moltmann 1992b:258–9)(Jürgen Moltmann 1992:258–9)
Moltmann’s open friendship is ‘a non-hierarchical fellowship of equals in the
Holy Spirit’ that in which everyone in this community ‘contributes what is his or hers’.
(Moltmann 1992b:224)(Jürgen Moltmann 1992:224) It is neither collectivism nor
individualism because Moltmann (1992b:224) states:
The true unity of the church is an image of the perichoretic unity of the Trinity, so it can
neither be a collective consciousness which represses the individuality of the persons, nor
an individual consciousness which neglects what is in common. (Moltmann 1992a:224)

This open friendship provides the positive aspect of a non-hierarchical society in which
people are not being controlled and suppressed. Nobody has a special prerogative. It is
the a kind of relationship where ‘what is truly human emerges and remains’ when the
relationships of other types — , the ‘parent-child’, ‘master-servant’, superior-inferior,
and man-woman relation or connection — , cease or are exterminated or taken away.
When ‘receptivity’ is united with ‘permanence’ by this open friendship, ‘it preserves
freedom’ and then ‘existence with others, in unexacting friendliness … , is free from
necessity and compulsion’. In this relationship in the grace of the triune God, ‘the new
man, the true man, the free man is the friend’. The more people begin to trust one
another as friends, ‘the more privileges and claims to domination become superfluous,
… the less they need to control one another’. (Moltmann 1977:116) Therefore in this
fellowship of grace, people are not necessary there to please others and God, or to
pretend to be good before them anymore, so that they can live out their authentic self
without wearing a mask to hide their weakness, ugliness and sinful nature.
(What is this paragraph seeking to argue)On a condition thatSince the rational
part of humans does exists exist, at least as a fundamental part of human nature, the
imago Dei, that makes communication possible and enables this sort of relationship. as
As Carl Henry argues (1999:136), I believe this is the pragmatic meaning of the imago
Dei as the goal in trinitarian theological anthropology, and also the way to such a goal.
Such an open friendship, based on Moltmann’s ‘analogy of relations’ (Moltmann
20
Cf. ‘accept’ (NIV), ‘welcome’ (NRSV) and ‘receive’ (NKJV) as different English translations for
 in different English versions of Rom. 15:7:
NRSV Romans 15:7 Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of
God.
NKJV Romans 15:7 Therefore receive one another, just as Christ also received us, to the glory of God.
49
1985a:77)(Moltmann 1985:77), relies exclusively on a free present of grace that God
offers, but not on a born nature and or the capacity of menhumans. It also assures a
‘social or interpersonal reality’ (McDougall 2003:192) the imago Dei bestows. To say
in other words, only through the relationships in community, men can utterly recognize
and experience ‘their messianic destiny as imago Trinitatis’ (McDougall 2003:192). It is
through his divine grace that ‘God pours the supernatural virtue of caritas (charity) into
a person’s heart’, so that his ‘natural yearning for God will be properly guided and
fulfilled in the friendship with God which God confers’ (Moltmann 1992a:249).
Consequently, his will will be one with God’s; he will love everything which God loves
for God’s sake. And this is where ‘the personage will express and show forth the
person’ genuinely (Tournier 1957:81)

3. EVALUATION ON OF MOLTMANN’S TRINITARIAN THEOLOGICAL

ANTHROPOLOGY AND ITS RELEVANCE TO THE PROBLEM OF ‘THE
BEHAVIOURAL CUSTOM OF MASKING (THE TRUE SELF)’

3.1 Evaluation on of Moltmann’s Trinitarian Theological Anthropology

Moltmann’s open Trinity and open friendship together construct a strong case for
rejecting the a non-trinitarian theist conception of God (without trinitarian theology),
and as well as the other two main Christian theologies of the Trinity: God as supreme
substance and God as absolute subject. But Henry Jansen (1994:129) criticizes
Moltmann’s exclusive dichotomy (is this really Moltmann’s position?) on the issues of
‘God quoad nos’ (to us) — the ‘personal’ doctrine of God: ‘related to the world’ (Jansen
1994:228) — v.s.versus ‘God in se’ (in himselfGod-self) — the ‘(impersonal)
ontological’ one: ‘independent of the world’ (Jansen 1994:228). Jansen (1994:228)
insists to maintain both ‘complementary’ ‘aspects of God as person and God as Being’
in a ‘paradoxical’ tension with each other. Must these two be exclusive with from each
other? Although the conflict between these two aspects might not be utterly ‘resolved’,
they ‘cannot be separated from nor reduced to each other[s]’; — otherwise we end up
either losing ‘the notion of God as Being Itself’ or missing ‘the understanding of God as
person’ (Jansen 1994:228). I would like to suggest here that the ontological issue
dimension of God is toshould be discussed in transcending the context where historical
time is transcended, in time (timeless) ness, and the personal one dimension of in the
divine within the context of historical time, because it is in the this discussion in of the
history of human beings when where Moltmann (Jeremy: This is the question of the

50
relationship between the economic and immanant Trinity --- and Moltmann has a bold
solution to this!)mentions brings in his social Trinity, that where the triune God opens
himself God-self to the world and enters into the history through Christ’s incarnation
and crucifixion. (Any secondary support)They are not to conflict with each other, but
the two descriptions and understandings about God should be addressed in two different
dimensions. Without the understanding of God as Being Itself, the incarnation and
crucifixion of Jesus Christ, the gift of grace and the relationship even with a personal
God become vague, abstract, metaphysical, and problematic. Therefore both aspects are
indispensable in establishing a foundation, relationships in grace with God, within the
self, and with others, for encouraging people in searching for liberty on the path to the
person rather than the personage. (Tournier 1957:224)
Karen Kilby’s (2000) main criticisms on of the social doctrines of the Trinity, and
with Moltmann taken as their main contributor and representative, are not directly
against the doctrines themselves, either. What she criticizes is are social trinitarian
theologians’ motivation — because they develop their theology based on their
‘projection’ (Kilby 2000:439) of their inner expectation and own experiences and logic,
— and so lead to their exclusively authoritative claims. Although her criticisms on theis
motivation might beis a good reminder, they are based on her understanding of and
presuppositions on about the doctrines of the Trinity. She does not think the any
doctrines of the Trinity can be understood and explained correctly. ; instead She she
views almost all the understandings or explanations about them as speculations, and
does not think that Christians’ spiritual life and their relationship with God can be
furthered and transformed through a deeper understanding of the doctrines of the
Trinity. Kilby may probably not sense that she is contradicting herself in the same way
of hershe criticizingcriticizes the social doctrines of the Trinity. While she supposes that
the social doctrines of the Trinity is based on those theologians’ ‘projection’, does she
consider Do all of that her criticisms on the social doctrines of the Trinitycould be based
come from on her own projections of her expectation on the role and development of
the trinitarian theology in Christian lives?
Wáng Wang Wénjī Wenji ( 王 文 基 , also as Wáng Wénjī) (2005) is basically
positive towards Moltmann’s concept of open friendship, but is concerned with his its
obscurity. on tThe boundary boundaries of such an open community due to hiswork
under the colour and shadow of ‘onesm’ (Wang 2005:20), which are is criticized by
evangelicals. He (2005:19) criticizes Moltmann’s ‘over-optimistic’ attitude about
‘human nature’, and its ability to enter into this open community and paying lesser

51
attention on the problem of ‘sin’. and aAccordingly, Wang worries that human beings
can enter into this open relationship with God without the Cross or messianic salvation
(Jeremy: but this is hardly Moltmann’s position! .
Wáng’s Wang’s concerns are reasonable. Actually Moltmann (1976:20, emphasis
original) not only shows his universalism universalistic tendency tendencies in one of
his earlier works by saying that ‘[T]he deepest grounds for Christian universalism do
not lie in monotheism, one God, so one humanity, but in belief in the crucified Lord: the
crucified God accepts men in their shared lack of full humanness’ (less than 40 words,
indent, ??). but He also spends quite a lengthadmits and explains at length and
unequivocally in another two of his later works (1994:138–44; 1996:235–55)(Moltmann
1996:235–55) to argue his universalism stand, unequivocally especially in refuting
‘double predestination’. after indirect admitting it in his Jesus Christ for Today's World
(Moltmann 1994:138–44). Therefore Nicholas Wolterstorff (1998:70–72) is not the
only one who criticizes his Christian theology as ‘syncretism’, while he (Moltmann
1998b:62) defends himself his theology ‘as the charismatic adoption of other religions
and as an engagement of their life forms in the service of the kingdom of God’. But
Undoubtedly, Moltmann indeed values pluralistic religions and cultures, affirming and
guarding ‘life’ more than ‘the doctrines of original sin’ and ‘the revelation of the divine
truth’ as found exclusively in Christian theology, let aloneand so does not focus on the
exclusiveness the imago Christi. Although the imago Christi is the a key in presenting
his concept of the imago Dei, and Moltmann (1974:275) insists that God himself
through Christ ‘creates the conditions’ for ‘the sinners, the godless and those forsaken
by God’of to participating participate in the relationship to with the open Trinity. for
‘the sinners, the godless and those forsaken by God’, etc. who are not able to ‘satisfy
these conditions’, Moltmann (1985:233) conflicts contradicts himself by arguing that
‘the image is in no way a diminished one’, even in the fallen human beings, as long as
the presence of God is abiding in them; while atyet in the same page place he also
writes that ‘[T]he completion of the imago Dei is therefore to be found at the end of
God's history with human beings’. It sounds that he is just trying to keep both of his
imago Christi and his doctrine of sin in his discussion of the social Trinity, without
resolving the conflicts between them (Jeremy: not sure this is entirely fair). 對照盼望神
學的導論：絕望的罪）
Furthermore, Moltmann (1981:199; 1985:17) tends to obscure the differences
between the triune God creator triune God and the created human beings by applying
perichōrēsis boldly, perichoresis and even using consubstantiation at times to explain

52
how human beings as bear the imago Dei and experience their relationship with God.
Such terminology is normally adopted to describe in an exclusive manner the
mysterious attributes of God, which are beyond human beings’ reason and experience.
Since human beings are the image Dei, they are only like God, and will not ever be,
equal to the triune God, even at the end of God's history with human beings.

3.2 The relevance Relevance of Moltmann’s Trinitarian Theological

Anthropology to the Problem of the Behavioural Custom of Masking (the
True Self)

3.2.1 From a Theological Perspective

In response to Moltmann’s ‘Christianity and the Revaluation of the Values of
Modernity and of the Western World’, Ellen T. Charry (1998:102) indicates that ‘the
modern worldview lacks not only a doctrine of sin, but also a doctrine of grace’. She
worries about that the ‘self-esteem’ supported and strengthened by unrelenting winning
effort or straining for success ‘in a competitive, accomplishment-driven society’, even
‘accompanied by the decline of reliance on guilt and shame as instruments of moral
formation’, . Ultimately she is convinced such a self-understanding would be damaged
eventuallyby these values and priorities. (Too compressed) Therefore she (Charry
1998:91) agrees with Moltmann that the only way to attain our ‘true personhood’ is
through our ‘relationship to God’ rather than ‘with one another’, because the Christian
self should be grounded in God. Charry (1998:101) points out that if the self ‘dignity’
relies on ‘the respect accorded one by others’, it will cause ‘an insecurity in the self’.
The ‘insecurity in the self’ which Charry pinpoints can be understood as a sign of the
problem of the Behavioural Custom of Masking (the true self) as discussed and
disclosed in Chapter one??. However, humans cannot live without getting along with
others. Moltmann’s relational trinitarian theological anthropology not only emphasizes
the restoration of individual personal relationships to God, moving from the imago Dei
through imago Christi so as to attain our true personhood, but also retrieves the
trinitarian perichoral relationship as a prototype. That prototype is obtained through the
imago Trinitatis for interpersonal relationship in a community of grace, and the human-
divine relationship in a collective sense, which is the relationship in a community of
‘subject and subject’between subjects built upon to the project of hope (Moltmann
1981:216 & 253, n.49).
The ‘community’ in Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology is a
community of grace, a fellowship of open friendship, and an imago trinitatis of the open

53
Trinity as described above. The self in such a community of grace is based on the imago
Dei, especially on the imago Christi, get his/herand so each human’s identity comes
from the imago Christi by free and unmerited grace only. Only when the self and the
community can be transformed in God’s grace, the true self, the unique self within, can
be experienced and become unveiled, and does not need to be masked or hidden any
more. (Grenz 1997:139; Moseley, Romney M 1991:17, 78; Bellinger 2010:151)(Grenz,
Stanley Grenz 1997:139; Moseley, Romney M 1991:17, 78; Bellinger, Charles
Bellinger 2010:151) because One’s ‘the intimacy with God’, indicated referred to by
Moltmann in terms of the Eastern Orthodox emphasis onas theosis, forms the ground
for liberation from ‘the pressure of the world’ (Charry 1998:106) .
As indicated above, that both collectivism and individualism lead to the loss of
self in human beings, Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology is not only is
thean open friendship (appealing to neither collectivism nor individualism) , but also
locates the imago Christi as the source of the self, . It is the free and unmerited grace as
thewhich shows how to attain the gloria Dei est homo (the future of self) and the
community of grace as the context of selfin which the true self is contextualized. While
there is no insecurity of failing to winning recognition from God, and bothas well as
from others and even one’s self, there is no need for theany self needing to pretend to
perform good enough to acquire his/herone’s self security of self. This corresponds to
Touriner’s understanding of the person as a ‘true self’ in Christ.

3.2.2 From a Psychological Perspective

Evidently Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology reflects much more the
characteristics of the path to the person rather to those of the personage in terms of
Tournier’s two ‘diametrically opposite paths’ to the person and the personage in ‘search
for liberty’. (Tournier 1957:224) Table 4.1 compares the features of the path to the
person displayed in Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology with the summary
of Tournier’s Paths to the Person and the Personage (Tournier 1957:224) displayed in
Table 2.1.

54
 The features The Person The Personage
of the path Moltmann Tournier Tournier
The trust in a ‘personal
Being reconciled to God in ‘[t]he effort’ of
From encounter’ (with Jesus
the crucified Christ one’s ‘own will’
Christ)
Abandoning ‘illusion’ about
Boldly revealing the ‘[a]rtificially making
By way of oneself and ‘well-justified
person up a personage’
despair’ about oneself’
An ‘iconoclasm of Acknowledging the ‘[a]chieving a
For liberation’ 1 in an open ‘deepest problems’ in certain skill at the
friendship of grace the fellowship task’
Removing ‘shame, anxiety,
Resulting in Easing tensions Exciting tensions
and self-accusation’
Reflecting ‘the glory of God A ‘[s]elf-abandonment’ The ‘[g]lorification
through with unveiled face’ (to Jesus Christ) of will-power’
The Trinitarian theological ‘[m]odern psychology’
Stoicism
anthropology (Christianity) 2
principles of
Table 4.1 The comparison of the features Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology with the
summary of Tournier’s Paths to the Person and the Personage (Tournier 1957:224)

As mentioned in Chapter one??, Jung’s approach of to individuation, in pursuing

true self, to engages in protruding highlighting the uniqueness of the individual’s
natures in ways that which are the collective qualities of the human being displays to
some extent the similar features of perichoresis being applied to describe human
relationships to some extent like as an imago trinitatis or similar features of
perichōrēsis: . He diversifying diversifies the individual’s unique peculiarity in the
universal collective solidarity, and fulfilling fulfills the collective qualities of the human
being in the fulfilment realization of the distinguishing characteristics of the individual.
(Any revelant secondary literature?)It seems that Moltmann’s relational trinitarian
theological anthropology provides a more concrete theological/theoretical foundation
for Jung’s individuation. At the same time, Jung’s individuation in psychology and
psychoanalytic therapy might substantiate indirectly the implications of Moltmann’s
relational trinitarian theological anthropology on in regard to the problem of the
behavioural custom of masking (the true self).

1
Men do not need to ‘deceive themselves and others about the truth’ anymore in their ‘beautiful and
pious pretence’. (Moltmann 1976:20f.)
2
For Tournier, in terms of ‘the discovery of the person’, all the school of psychotherapy and Christian
faith take the path of ’trusting relaxation of tension’ towards ‘abdication of self-constraint’. (Tournier
1957:224) Of course, they are not the same. For dealing with the compatibility between Christian faith
and psychology (psychoanalysis), Tournier (1968) wrote another book A Place for You: Psychology and
religion.
55
3.2.3 Conclusion
Accordingly, except mainlydespite his equivocal stand on the sin doctrine of sin in the
imago Dei and his questionable exclusiveness of ontic human nature (Jeremy: ??),
Moltmann’s trinitarian theological anthropology can be suggested as a possible positive
solution for the problem of the behavioural custom of masking (the true self). This is
according to Moltmann because one’s identity obtains confidences in that he/shes/he is
the imago Christi. The relational self developed in the open Trinity, the imago Trinitatis
(especially the imago Christi and messianic grace), strengthened by gloria Dei est homo,
and the open friendship (community of grace), displays the relevancepoints of great
revelance to the problem of the behavioural custom of masking (the true self).

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Bellinger, Charles K 2010 The Trinitarian Self: The Key to the Puzzle of Violence
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Bonhoeffer, Dietrich 1997 Creation and Fall; Temptation: Two biblical studies New
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Cai, Degui 蔡德貴, also as Cài Déguì 2004 'On American Confucianism 《試論美國儒
家學派》' Journal of Renmin University of China /5:79–85

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Fleming, Jess 2002 'Self and (In)finitude: Embodiment and the other' Journal of
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Lin, Honghsin 林鴻信, also as Lín Hóngxìn 2002 Mòtèmàn Shénxué 《莫特曼神學》
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culture/understanding-chinese-mind/confucius/

Lo, Pilgrim WK 2009 'Human Dignity—A theological and Confucian discussion'

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McDougall, Joy Ann 2003 'The Return of Trinitarian Praxis? Moltmann on the Trinity
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Moltmann, Jürgen 1967 Theology of Hope 1st U.S. edn London: SCM

Moltmann, Jürgen 1974 The Crucified God: The cross of Christ as the foundation and
criticism of Christian theology New York: Harper & Row

Moltmann, Jürgen 1976 Man: Christian anthropology in the conflicts of the present
Philadelphia: Fortress

Moltmann, Jürgen 1977 The Church in the Power of the Spirit: A contribution to
messianic ecclesiology London: SCM

Moltmann, Jürgen 1978 The Open Church: Invitation to a messianic life-style London:
SCM

58
Moltmann, Jürgen 1981 The Trinity and the Kingdom of God: The doctrine of God
London: SCM

Moltmann, Jürgen 1985a God in Creation: A new theology of creation and the Spirit of
God London: SCM

Moltmann, Jürgen 1985b 'The Inviting Unity of the Triune God' Concilium 177:50–58

Moltmann, Jürgen 1989 Creating a Just Future: The politics of peace and the ethics of
creation in a threatened world London: SCM

Moltmann, Jürgen 1992a History and the Triune God: Contributions to trinitarian
theology New York: Crossroad

Moltmann, Jürgen 1992b The Spirit of Life: A universal affirmation Minneapolis:

Fortress

Moltmann, Jürgen 1994 Jesus Christ for Today’s World 1st Fortress Press edn
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Moltmann, Jürgen 1996 The Coming of God: Christian eschatology London: SCM

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Eerdmans pp. 23–43

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Modern Society' In M Volf ed. 1998 A Passion for God’s Reign: Theology,
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64

Moltmann, Jürgen 1999 God for a Secular Society: The public relevance of theology
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Moltmann, Jürgen 2002 'Mòtèmàn Xù 〈莫特曼序〉 ' In H Lin 林鴻信, also as Lín
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Moltmann, Jürgen 2007a The Future of Creation: Collected essays Philadelphia:

Fortress

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Ethereal Library

Payne, Chris 2003 'Burying the Past: Nihonjinron and the representation of Japanese
society in Itami’s “The Funeral”' Graduate Journal of Asia-Pacific Studies
1/1:13–20

Postman, Neil 2006 Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show
Business London: Penguin

Rogers, Carl R 1961 On Becoming a Person: A therapist’s view of psychotherapy

Boston: Houghton Mifflin

Shults, F LeRon 2003 Reforming Theological Anthropology: After the philosophical

turn to relationality Grand Rapids: Eerdmans

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London: SCM

Tournier, Paul 1962 Escape from Loneliness Translated from French by JS Gilmour
London: SCM

Tournier, Paul 1968 A Place for You: Psychology and religion Translated from French
by E Hudson London: SCM

Tournier, Paul 1993 The Meaning of Persons Chinese 6th edn Translated by CY Wu 胡
Hong Kong: Chinese Christian Literature Council

Tu, Weiming 1973 'Subjectivity and Ontological Reality: An interpretation of Wang

Yang-ming’s mode of thinking' Philosophy East and West 23/1/2:187–205

Tu, Weiming 1984 'Pain and Suffering in Confucian Self-Cultivation' Philosophy East
and West 34/4:379–388

Tu, Weiming 1985 Confucian Thought: Selfhood as creative transformation Albany,

NY: State Univ of New York

Tu, Weiming 1989 Centrality and Commonality: An essay on Confucian religiousness

Revised and Enlarged edn Albany, NY: State Univ of New York

60
Wang, Wenji 王 文 基 , also as Wáng Wénjī 2005 'Kāifàng Yǒuyìshì Jiāohuì —Lùn
Mòtèmàn duì jiāohuì shēnfèn zhī shénxué guānhuái 《開放友誼式教會—論莫
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Doubleday & Company

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Strange, & D Mcleod eds. 2003 Getting Your Bearings: Engaging with
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1998 A Passion for God’s Reign: Theology, Christian learning and the
Christian self Grand Rapids: Eerdmans pp. 65–87

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International Journal of Orthodox Theology 2/2:97–111

Zhuang, Huiqiu 莊慧秋, also as Zhuāng Huìqiū 1987 'Zhōngguórén de Miànjù Xìnggé:
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Bai, Chongliang 白崇亮, also as Bái Chóngliàng 2007 Yǒngyú Zhēnshí : Àoměi Jítuán
Dǒngshìzhǎng Bái Chóngliàng de Nàzài Shìjiè 《勇於真實 : 奧美集團董事長
白崇亮的內在視界》 Taipei: Tiānxià Yuǎnjiàn (天下遠見)

Balswick, Jack O; King, Pamela Ebstyne & Reimer, Kevin S 2005 The Reciprocating
Self: Human Development in Theological Perspective Downers Grove: IVP
Academic

Barth, Karl 1963 The Doctrine of the Word of God : (Prolegomena to Church
Dogmatics, being vol. I, part I) Edinburgh: T & T Clark

Bates, Dana 2012 'Introducing Staniloae’s Trinitarian Theology [E-mail] (Personal

communication, 6 November 2012)'

Bauckham, Richard 2005 'Jürgen Moltmann' In FD Ford & R Muers eds. 2005 The
Modern Theologians: An introduction to Christian theology since 1918 Malden:
Blackwell pp. 147–162

Bellinger, Charles K 2010 The Trinitarian Self: The Key to the Puzzle of Violence
Cambridge: James Clarke & Co

Boff, Leonardo 1988 Trinity and Society Tunbridge Wells: Burns & Oates

Bonhoeffer, Dietrich 1997 Creation and Fall; Temptation: Two biblical studies New
York: Touchstone

Cai, Degui 蔡德貴, also as Cài Déguì 2004 'On American Confucianism 《試論美國儒
家學派》' Journal of Renmin University of China /5:79–85

61
Carkner, Gordon 2006 'A Critical Examination of Michel Foucault’s Concept of Moral
Self-Constitution in Dialogue with Charles Taylor' D.Phil, Oxford: University of
Wales

Charry, Ellen T 1998 'The Crisis of Modernity and the Christian Self' In M Volf ed.
1998 A Passion for God’s Reign: Theology, Christian learning and the
Christian self Grand Rapids: Eerdmans pp. 89–112

Doi, Takeo 1981 The Anatomy of Dependence New edn Tokyo: Kodansha International

Doi, Takeo 1986 The Anatomy of Self: The Individual Versus Society Tokyo: Kodansha
International

Ess, Charles 2010 'The Embodied Self in a Digital Age: Possibilities, risks, and
prospects for a pluralistic (democratic/liberal) future?' Nordicom Information
32/2-3:105–118

Fleming, Jess 2002 'Self and (In)finitude: Embodiment and the other' Journal of
Chinese Philosophy 29/2:171–191

Goleman, Daniel 1996 Vital Lies, Simple Truths: The psychology of self-deception New
York ; London: Simon & Schuster

Grenz, Stanley 1997 The Moral Quest: Foundations of Christian Ethics Leicster:
Apollos

Grenz, Stanley 2001 The Social God and the Relational Self: A Trinitarian Theology of
the Imago Dei Louisville: Westminster John Knox

Gruchy, John W de 1997 'Editor’s Introduction to the English Edition' In D Bonhoeffer,

1997 Creation and Fall: A theological exposition of Genesis 1-3 Minneapolis,
MN: Fortress pp. 1–17

Gunton, Colin E 2003 The Promise of Trinitarian Theology 2nd edn Edinburgh: T&T
Clark Int’l

He, Youhui 何友暉, also as Hé Yǒuhuī 2006 'Lùn Miànzǐ 〈論面子〉' In X Zhai 翟學
偉 ed. 2006 Zhōngguó Shèhuì Xīnlǐxué Pínglùn 2nd Vol: Miànzǐ yǔ wénhuà《中
國社會心理學評論　第二輯：面子與文化》 Beijing: Shèhuì Kēxué Wénxiàn
(社會科學文獻) pp. 18–33

Henry, Carl FH 1999 God, Revelation, and Authority, Volume II Wheaton, IL:
Crossway

Hong, Liang 洪亮, also as Hóng Liàng 2011 'Chàyìzhōng de Lǐjiě —— Mòěrtèmàn yǔ
Dù Wéimíng Duìtán Cèjì (差異中的理解 —— 莫爾特曼與杜維明對談側記)'
Dào Fēng : Jīdūjiāo Wénhuà Pínglùn (道風: 基督教文化評論) 35:389–96

Hu, Hsienchin 1944 'The Chinese Concepts of “Face”' American Anthropologist

46/1:45–64

James, William 1901 The Principles of Psychology Vol.1 London: Macmillan and Co.

62
Jansen, Henry 1994 Relationality and the Concept of God Amsterdam; Atlanta: Editions
Rodopi B.V.

Jung, Carl G 1966 Two Essays on Analytical Psychology 2nd edn New York: Bollingen
Foundation

Kierkegaard, Søren 1941 The Sickness Unto Death HV Hong & EH Hong eds.
Princeton: Princeton University

Kilby, Karen 2000 'Perichoresis and Projection: Problems with social doctrines of the
Trinity' New Blackfriars 81/957:432–445

Lin, Hong-Hsin 2010 'Point and Line: Uniqueness and relationality applied in “self” and
“others” in the cross-cultural dialogue' Taiwan Journal of East Asian Studies
7/2/14:25–47

Lin, Honghsin 林鴻信, also as Lín Hóngxìn 2002 Mòtèmàn Shénxué 《莫特曼神學》
Taipei City: Lǐjì （禮記）

Lin, Yi 林藝, also as Lín Yì 'Confucius 101: A key to understanding the Chinese mind'
China Mike [Online] Available at: http://www.china-mike.com/chinese-
culture/understanding-chinese-mind/confucius/

Lo, Pilgrim WK 2009 'Human Dignity—A theological and Confucian discussion'

Dialog 48/2:168–178

McDougall, Joy Ann 2003 'The Return of Trinitarian Praxis? Moltmann on the Trinity
and the Christian Life' The Journal of Religion 83/2:177–203

Moltmann, Jürgen 1967 Theology of Hope 1st U.S. edn London: SCM

Moltmann, Jürgen 1974 The Crucified God: The cross of Christ as the foundation and
criticism of Christian theology New York: Harper & Row

Moltmann, Jürgen 1976 Man: Christian anthropology in the conflicts of the present
Philadelphia: Fortress

Moltmann, Jürgen 1977 The Church in the Power of the Spirit: A contribution to
messianic ecclesiology London: SCM

Moltmann, Jürgen 1978 The Open Church: Invitation to a messianic life-style London:
SCM

Moltmann, Jürgen 1981 The Trinity and the Kingdom of God: The doctrine of God
London: SCM

Moltmann, Jürgen 1985a God in Creation: A new theology of creation and the Spirit of
God London: SCM

Moltmann, Jürgen 1985b 'The Inviting Unity of the Triune God' Concilium 177:50–58

Moltmann, Jürgen 1989 Creating a Just Future: The politics of peace and the ethics of
creation in a threatened world London: SCM

63
Moltmann, Jürgen 1992a History and the Triune God: Contributions to trinitarian
theology New York: Crossroad

Moltmann, Jürgen 1992b The Spirit of Life: A universal affirmation Minneapolis:

Fortress

Moltmann, Jürgen 1994 Jesus Christ for Today’s World 1st Fortress Press edn
Minneapolis: Fortress

Moltmann, Jürgen 1996 The Coming of God: Christian eschatology London: SCM

Moltmann, Jürgen 1998a 'Christianity and the Revaluation of the Values of Modernity
and of the Western World' In M Volf ed. 1998 A Passion for God’s Reign:
Theology, Christian learning and the Christian self Grand Rapids, MI:
Eerdmans pp. 23–43

Moltmann, Jürgen 1998b 'Theology for Christ’s Church and the Kingdom of God in
Modern Society' In M Volf ed. 1998 A Passion for God’s Reign: Theology,
Christian learning and the Christian self Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans pp. 45–
64

Moltmann, Jürgen 1999 God for a Secular Society: The public relevance of theology
London: SCM

Moltmann, Jürgen 2000 Experiences in Theology Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress

Moltmann, Jürgen 2002 'Mòtèmàn Xù 〈莫特曼序〉 ' In H Lin 林鴻信, also as Lín
Hóngxìn, 2002 Mòtèmàn Shénxué 《莫特曼神學》 Taipei City: Lǐjì （禮記）

Moltmann, Jürgen 2003 Science and Wisdom Fortress

Moltmann, Jürgen 2007a The Future of Creation: Collected essays Philadelphia:

Fortress

Moltmann, Jürgen 2007b Theology of Hope Chinese edn Translated from German by
NY Ceng 曾 Hong Kong: Dàofēng (道風)

Moltmann, Jürgen 2008 Mòtèmàn Lùn Zhōngguó Wénhuà 《 莫 特 曼 論 中 國 文 化 》

Hong Kong: 基道

Moltmann, Jürgen 2009 'The Fellowship of the Holy Spirit: Trinitarian Pneumatology'
Scottish Journal of Theology 37/03:287

Moseley, Romney M 1991 Becoming a Self Before God: Critical transformations

Nashville: Abingdon

Otto, Randall E 2009 'The Use and Abuse of Perichoresis in Recent Theology' Scottish
Journal of Theology 54/03:366–84

Pascal, Blaise 1660 Pensées (English Version, 1944) Grand Rapids: Christian Classics
Ethereal Library

64
Payne, Chris 2003 'Burying the Past: Nihonjinron and the representation of Japanese
society in Itami’s “The Funeral”' Graduate Journal of Asia-Pacific Studies
1/1:13–20

Postman, Neil 2006 Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show
Business London: Penguin

Rogers, Carl R 1961 On Becoming a Person: A therapist’s view of psychotherapy

Boston: Houghton Mifflin

Shults, F LeRon 2003 Reforming Theological Anthropology: After the philosophical

turn to relationality Grand Rapids: Eerdmans

Staniloae, Dumitru 1998 Orthodox Dogmatic Theology: The Experience of God, Vol. 1:
Revelation and Knowledge of the Triune God Brookline: Holy Cross Orthodox

Tournier, Paul 1957 The Meaning of Persons Translated from French by E Hudson
London: SCM

Tournier, Paul 1962 Escape from Loneliness Translated from French by JS Gilmour
London: SCM

Tournier, Paul 1968 A Place for You: Psychology and religion Translated from French
by E Hudson London: SCM

Tournier, Paul 1993 The Meaning of Persons Chinese 6th edn Translated by CY Wu 胡
Hong Kong: Chinese Christian Literature Council

Tu, Weiming 1973 'Subjectivity and Ontological Reality: An interpretation of Wang

Yang-ming’s mode of thinking' Philosophy East and West 23/1/2:187–205

Tu, Weiming 1984 'Pain and Suffering in Confucian Self-Cultivation' Philosophy East
and West 34/4:379–388

Tu, Weiming 1985 Confucian Thought: Selfhood as creative transformation Albany,

NY: State Univ of New York

Tu, Weiming 1989 Centrality and Commonality: An essay on Confucian religiousness

Revised and Enlarged edn Albany, NY: State Univ of New York

Wang, Wenji 王 文 基 , also as Wáng Wénjī 2005 'Kāifàng Yǒuyìshì Jiāohuì —Lùn
Mòtèmàn duì jiāohuì shēnfèn zhī shénxué guānhuái 《開放友誼式教會—論莫
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