Becoming and Being: The Doctrine of God in Charles Hartshorne and Karl Barth

by Colin E. Gunton

Becoming and Being presents an analysis and comparison of two influential modern approaches to the doctrine of God. Though they are in many respects diametrically opposed, the one finding its basis in biblical revelation and steeped in the tradition of trinitarian reflection, the other relying on pure speculative reason, there are numerous and surprising points of contact.

Genres: Theology

280 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1978

About the author

Colin Ewart Gunton (1941-2003) was a British systematic theologian. As a theologian he made contributions to the doctrine of Creation and the doctrine of the trinity. He was Professor of Christian Doctrine at King's College London from 1984 and co-founder with Christoph Schwoebel of the Research Institute for Systematic Theology in 1988. Gunton was actively involved in the United Reformed Church in the United Kingdom where he had been a minister since 1972. He was arguably the most important British theologian of his generation.

Gunton's most influential work was on the doctrines of Creation and the Trinity. One of his most important books is The One, the Three and the Many: God, Creation and the Culture of Modernity" (1993), and is "a profound analysis of the paradoxes and contradictions of Modernity." The One, the Three and the Many remains a "majestical survey of the western intellectual tradition and a penetrating analysis of the modern condition."