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Introductory Resources

The Center for Barth Studies has compiled a list of introductory resources for those new to the theology and life of Karl Barth. If you’d like to learn more about Karl Barth, start with the primary and secondary literature listed first. If you want to learn more about specific topics within Barth’s theology, the list continues with primary and secondary resources for certain loci and topics. We have also listed the library call numbers (based upon the Library of Congress Classification) next to each book for your convenience.
(* denotes works particularly recommended)

General Introductory Resources:

Primary:

  • *Dogmatics in Outline. London: SCM Press, 2001.
    • An early writing of Barth’s that serves as a commentary on the Creed.
    • Call Number: BT77. B3713
  • * Evangelical Theology: An Introduction. Grover Foley, trans. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1963.
    • This highly readable volume is based on the lectures that Barth delivered during his 1962 visit to the United States.
    • Call Number: BT65. B282 1963
  • The Goettingen Dogmatics: Instruction in the Christian Religion. Edited by Hannelotte Reiffen and translated by Geoffrey W. Bromiley. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991.
    • Call Number: BT 75.2 B3413 1991
  • The Humanity of God. Translated by John Newton Thomas and Thomas Wieser. Richmond: John Knox Press, 1960.
    • Call Number: BT28. B3 1960

Secondary:

  • Balthasar, Hans Urs von. The Theology of Karl Barth, Edward T. Oakes, trans. San Francisco: Ignatius, 1992.
    • Call Number: BX 4827.B3 B2616 1992
  • * Busch, Eberhard. Karl Barth: His Life from Letters and Autobiographical Texts. John Bowden, trans. Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 2005.
    • Call Number: BX 4827.B3 B86313
  • _________________. The Great Passion: An Introduction to Karl Barth’s Theology. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004
    • Call Number: BX 4827.B3 B87413
  • Mangina, Joseph. Karl Barth: Theologian of Christian Witness. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2004
    • Call Number: BX 4827.B3 M29
  • Morgan, D. Densil. The SPCK Introduction to Karl Barth. London: The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2010.
    • Call Number: BX 4827.B2 .M67
  • * Webster, John. Barth. 2nd ed. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2004.
    • Call Number: BX 4827.B3 W43 2004
  • _______________, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Barth. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
    • Call Number: BX 4827.B3 C35

 

Specialized Resources:

Doctrine of God

Primary:

  • The Word of God and Theology. Translated by Amy Marga. New York: T&T Clark International, 2011.
    • Call Number: BR 121.3 .B37813
    • “The Righteousness of God, 1916,” 1-14.
  • The Epistle to the Romans. Translated by Edwyn C. Hoskyns. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968. (77-114; 424-450)
    • Call Number: BS 2665 .B284
  • The Humanity of God. Translated by John Newton Thomas. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1960.
    • Call Number: BT 28 .B3
    • “The Humanity of God,” 37-68.
  • Church Dogmatics. Edited and Translated by G.W. Bromiley, T.F. Torrance et al.13 vols. Edinburgh, GB: T&T Clark, 1956-1975.
    • Call Number: BT 75.3 .B28
    • I/1: “Ch. II. The Revelation of God,” 295-490.
    • II/1: “§28. The Being of God as the One Who Loves in Freedom,” 257-321.
    • II/2: “Ch. VIII. The Command of God,” 509-782.

Secondary:

  • Flett, John. Witness of God: The Trinity, Missio Dei, Karl Barth, and the Nature of the Christian Community. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2010.
    • Call Number: BV 2063 .F58
  • Hunsinger, George. Disruptive Grace: Studies in the Theology of Karl Barth. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2000.
    • Call Number: BX 4827 .B3 H86
    • “Mysterium Trinitatis: Karl Barth’s Conception of Eternity,” 186-209.
  • Keating, James F. and White, Thomas Joseph. Divine Impassibility and the Mystery of Human Suffering. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2009.
    • Call Number: BT 153.S8 D58
    • Bruce McCormack, “Divine Impassibility or Simply Divine Constancy?: Implications of Karl Barth’s Later Christology for Debates over Divine Impassibility,” 150-187.
  • McCormack, Bruce, ed. Engaging the Doctrine of God: Contemporary Protestant Perspectives. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2008.
    • Call Number: BT 98 .E54
    • Bruce McCormack, “The Actuality of God: Karl Barth in Conversation with Open Theism,” 185-244.

Politics

Primary:

  • The Word of God and Theology. Translated by Amy Marga. New York: T&T Clark International, 2011.
    • Call Number: BR 121.3 .B37813
    • “The Christian in Society, 1919,” 31-69.
  • The Epistle to the Romans. Translated by Edwyn C. Hoskyns. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968. (475-502)
    • Call Number: BS 2665 .B284
  • Theological Existence To-day! A Plea for Theological Freedom. Translated by Richard B. Hoyle. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1933.
    • Call Number: BR 856 .B2813
  • Community, State, and Church: Three Essays. With a new introduction by David Haddorff. Translated by A.M. Hall, G. Ronald Howe, E.M. Delacour, Stanley Godman. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock Publishers, 2004.
    • Call Number: BX 9410 .B377
    • “Gospel and Law” (1935), 71-100.
    • “Church and State” (1938), 101-148.
    • “The Christian Community and the Civil Community” (1946), 149-189.
  • Church Dogmatics. Edited and Translated by G.W. Bromiley, T.F. Torrance et al.13 vols. Edinburgh, GB: T&T Clark, 1956-1975.
    • Call Number: BT 75.3 .B28
    • III/4: “§55. Freedom for Life,” 427-470.
    • IV/3.2: “§72. The Holy Spirit and the Sending of the Christian Community,” 890-901
  • The Christian Life: Church Dogmatics IV, 4 Lecture Fragments. Translated by G.W. Bromiley. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1981.
    • Call Number: BJ 1253 .B3413
    • “§ 78: The Struggle for Human Righteousness,” 205-271.

Secondary:

  • Hancock, Angela Deinhart. Karl Barth’s Emergency Homiletic 1932-33: A Summons to Prophetic Witness at the Dawn of the Third Reich. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2013.
    • Call Number: BV 4211.3 .H365
  • Hunsinger, George. Disruptive Grace: Studies in the Theology of Karl Barth. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2000.
    • Call Number: BX4827 .B3 H86
    • “The Politics of the Nonviolent God: Reflections on René Girard and Karl Barth,” 21-41.
  • Hunsinger, George, ed. Karl Barth and Radical Politics. Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press, 1976.
    • Call Number: BX 4827 .B3 K34
    • Dieter Schellong, “On Reading Karl Barth from the Left,” 139-157.
    • George Hunsinger, “Toward a Radical Barth,” 181-233.
  • Jehle, Frank. Ever against the Stream: The Politics of Karl Barth, 1906-1968.Translated by Richard and Martha Burnett. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2002.
    • Call Number: BX 4827 .B3 J3813
  • McCormack, Bruce. Karl Barth’s Critically Realistic Dialectical Theology: Its Genesis and Development 1909-1936. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1995. (78-203)
    • Call Number: BX 4827.B3 M321
  • Singgih, Emmanuel Gerrit. “Toward a Postcolonial Interpretation of Romans 13:1-7: Karl Barth, Robert Jewett, and the Context of Reformation in Present Day Indonesia.” Asia Theological Journal, 23, no.1 (2009): 111-122
  • Ziegler, Philip. “Christian Theology and Democratic Politics in Conversation with Jeffrey Stout.” Theology Today 63, no.4 (2006): 227-234

Racism and Nationalism

Primary

  • “Critical Response to the Rengsdorf Theses,” Karl Barth Society Newsletter 6 (1992): 4-5
    • Online: http://scdc.library.ptsem.edu/mets/mets.aspx?src=kbsn&div=6&img=4
  • Church Dogmatics. Edited and Translated by G.W. Bromiley, T.F. Torrance et al.13 vols. Edinburgh, GB: T&T Clark, 1956-1975.
    • Call Number: BT75.3 .B28
    • III/4: “§54. Freedom in Fellowship,” 285-323.

Secondary:

  • Moseley, Carys. Nations and Nationalism in the Theology of Karl Barth. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2013.
    • Call Number: BX 4827.B3 M68
  • Carter, J. Kameron. “An Unlikely Convergence: W.E.B. Du Bois, Karl Barth, and the Problem of the Imperial God-Man.” New Centennial Review, 11, no.3 (2012): 167-224.
  • Cone, James H. A Black Theology of Liberation: Fortieth Anniversary Edition. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2010.
    • Call Number: BT 82.7 .C666
  • ____________. Black Theology and Black Power. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1969.
    • Call Number: BT 734.2 .C6 1997
  • Villa-Vicencio, Charles. On Reading Karl Barth in South Africa. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1988.
    • Call Number: BX 4827 .B3 O52
    • John W. DeGruchy, “Racism, Reconciliation and Resistance,” 139-155.—Alan Brews, “Theology and Violence,” 75-89.
  • Lindsay, Mark R. Covenantal Solidarity: The Theological Basis of Karl Barth’s Opposition to Theological Antisemetism and the Holocaust. New York, NY: Peter Lang, 2001.
    • Call Number: BT 93 .L53

Christology

Primary:

  • Barth, Karl. Church Dogmatics. 4 vols. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1956-1975.
    • Call Number: BT 75.3 .B28
    • §57 – The Work of God the Reconciler
    • §59 – The Obedience of the Son of God
    • §64 – The Exaltation of the Son of Man

Secondary:

  • Jones, Paul Dafydd. “Barth and Anselm: God, Christ and the Atonement,” International Journal of Systematic Theology 12, No. 3 (July 2010): 257-282.
  • ________________. “Karl Barth on Gethsemane,” International Journal of Systematic Theology 9, No. 2 (April 2007): 148-171.
  • ________________. The Humanity of Christ in Karl Barth’s Church Dogmatics. London: T&T Clark, 2008.
    • Call Number: BT 203. J66
  • Jüngel, Eberhard. “God’s Being is in Becoming” in God’s Being is in Becoming: The Trinitarian Being of God in the Theology of Karl Barth. A Paraphrase. John Webster, trans. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001), 75-123.
    • Call Number: BT 101. B2718 J813
  • Hunsinger, George. “Karl Barth’s Christology: Its Basic Chalcedonian character” in Disruptive Grace: Studies in the Theology of Karl Barth. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000.
    • Call Number: BX 4827.B3 H86
  • McCormack, Bruce. “The Doctrine of the Trinity After Barth: An Attempt to Reconstruct Barth’s Doctrine in Light of His Later Christology” in Trinitarian Theology After Barth, Myk Habets and Phillip Tolliday, eds. Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 2011.
    • Call Number: BT 11.3 .T72

Gender

Primary:

  • Barth, Karl. Church Dogmatics. 4 vols. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1956-1975.§ 45 – Man in His Determination as the Covenant-Partner of God
    • Call Number: BT75.3 .B28
    • § 54 – Freedom in Fellowship

Secondary:

  • Fiddes, Paul. “The Status of Women in the Thought of Karl Barth” in After Eve. Janet Martin Soskice, ed. (London : Marshall Pickering, 1990), 138-155.
    • Call Number: BV639.W7 A47
  • Frykberg, Elizabeth Anne. Spiritual Transformation and the Creation of Humankind in the Image of God, Male and Female: a Study of Karl Barth’s Understanding of the “Analogial Relationis” Correlated with Psychosexual and Psychosocial Development Theory. Ann Arbor, Mich.: University Microfilms International, 1989.
    • Call Number: BF692.2 .F79
  • Köbler, Renate. In the Shadow of Karl Barth. Charlotte von Kirschbaum. Louisville: Westminster Press, 1989.
    • Call Number: BX4827 .K55 K6313
  • Selinger, Suzanne. Charlotte von Kirschbaum and Karl Barth: A Study in Biography and the History of Theology. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University, 1998.
    • Call Number: BX 4827. K55 S45
  • Sonderegger, Katherine. “Barth and Feminism” in The Cambridge Companion to Karl Barth. John Webster, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 258-273.
    • Call Number: BX4827. B3 C35
  • ___________________. “Suzanne Selinger, Charlotte von Kirschbaum and Karl Barth: A Study in Biography and the History of Theology, A Review Essay.” Princeton Seminary Bulletin, 2000, 220-225.

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