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The Holy Spirit and Christian Experience
In The Holy Spirit and Christian Experience , Simeon Zahl presents a fresh vision for Christian theology that foregrounds the relationship between theological ideas and the experiences of Christians. He argues that theology is always operating in a vibrant landscape of feeling and desiring, and shows that contemporary theology has often operated in problematic isolation from these experiential dynamics. He then argues that a theologically serious doctrine of the Holy Spirit not only authorizes but requires attention to Christian experience.
Against this background, Zahl outlines a new methodological approach to Christian theology that attends to the emotional and experiential power of theological ideas. This methodology draws on recent interdisciplinary work on affect and emotion, which has shown that affects are powerful motivating realities that saturate all dimensions of human thinking and acting. In the process, Zahl also explains why contemporary theology has often been ambivalent about subjective experience, and demonstrates that current discourse about God's activity in the world is often artificially abstracted from experience and embodiment.
At the heart of the book, Zahl proposes a new account of the theology of grace from this experiential and pneumatological perspective. Focusing on the work of the Holy Spirit in salvation and sanctification, he retrieves insights from Augustine, Luther, and Philip Melanchthon to present an affective and Augustinian vision of salvation as a pedagogy of desire. In articulating this vision, Zahl engages critically with recent emphasis on participation and theosis in Christian soteriology, and charts a new path forward for Protestant theology in a landscape hitherto dominated by the theological visions of Barth and Aquinas.
Against this background, Zahl outlines a new methodological approach to Christian theology that attends to the emotional and experiential power of theological ideas. This methodology draws on recent interdisciplinary work on affect and emotion, which has shown that affects are powerful motivating realities that saturate all dimensions of human thinking and acting. In the process, Zahl also explains why contemporary theology has often been ambivalent about subjective experience, and demonstrates that current discourse about God's activity in the world is often artificially abstracted from experience and embodiment.
At the heart of the book, Zahl proposes a new account of the theology of grace from this experiential and pneumatological perspective. Focusing on the work of the Holy Spirit in salvation and sanctification, he retrieves insights from Augustine, Luther, and Philip Melanchthon to present an affective and Augustinian vision of salvation as a pedagogy of desire. In articulating this vision, Zahl engages critically with recent emphasis on participation and theosis in Christian soteriology, and charts a new path forward for Protestant theology in a landscape hitherto dominated by the theological visions of Barth and Aquinas.
- GenresTheologyPsychology
272 pages, Hardcover
Published July 30, 2020
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162 people want to read
About the author
Simeon Zahl
6 books3 followersJunior Research Fellow in Theology, Dr. Simeon Zahl is Junior Research Fellow in Theology at St. Johns College, Oxford.
His research interests are in the broad Protestant tradition, especially the doctrine of the Holy Spirit, Lutheran theology, theologies of emotion, and charismatic and Pentecostal theologies. My first book was on German Pietist theologian Christoph Blumhardt (1842-1919), a bridge figure between classical Reformation thought and contemporary Pentecostalism.
His research interests are in the broad Protestant tradition, especially the doctrine of the Holy Spirit, Lutheran theology, theologies of emotion, and charismatic and Pentecostal theologies. My first book was on German Pietist theologian Christoph Blumhardt (1842-1919), a bridge figure between classical Reformation thought and contemporary Pentecostalism.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
June 26, 2022
Zahl has done us all a favour here. With the help of affect theory he revisits the experiential aspects of Melanchthon-Augustinian theologies of salvation and sanctification and retrieves them from the reductiveness of individualist guilt-release and abstract anti-subjectivity.
It will be a shame if people only hear in this a vindication of one overdosed stream of music-manipulated emotion, but the book does help me appreciate the place of that experience - in God's hands - in some people's lives.
The bigger take-away from this book is an affirmation of manifold variations on that experience, which Zahl sums up as a pattern of plight-awareness and hopeful-consolation. One's awareness of the plight of sin is not boiled down to guilty feelings of culpability, but grows to include laments about personal and social conditions of sin that are felt in minds and bodies as well as so-called hearts.
This leads to the realization that transformations wrought by the Holy Spirit are felt to be affective in the shift of desire that comes out of this plight-consolation experience. This can be embedded in habits and communities, but ever remains a work of the free Spirit of Christ in a simul iustus et peccator world, which cannot simply be channelled into the self-satisfied piety of an individual or institutional nature.
All that to say, this is an illuminating, constructive, evocative, and important book.
It will be a shame if people only hear in this a vindication of one overdosed stream of music-manipulated emotion, but the book does help me appreciate the place of that experience - in God's hands - in some people's lives.
The bigger take-away from this book is an affirmation of manifold variations on that experience, which Zahl sums up as a pattern of plight-awareness and hopeful-consolation. One's awareness of the plight of sin is not boiled down to guilty feelings of culpability, but grows to include laments about personal and social conditions of sin that are felt in minds and bodies as well as so-called hearts.
This leads to the realization that transformations wrought by the Holy Spirit are felt to be affective in the shift of desire that comes out of this plight-consolation experience. This can be embedded in habits and communities, but ever remains a work of the free Spirit of Christ in a simul iustus et peccator world, which cannot simply be channelled into the self-satisfied piety of an individual or institutional nature.
All that to say, this is an illuminating, constructive, evocative, and important book.
June 19, 2024
Heavily academic, drawing on wide and various sources in theological study throughout history, the author builds foundations and concepts related to the Spirit’s work within a body, and all that means, rather than apart from it. I of course enjoyed the theological discussion supporting the importance of a person’s emotional experience of faith without making salvation dependent on the evidence of any emotional experience. Yet, the gem of this book to me is the clarity on the impact of social emotions in pneumatological experience and study. I’d like to see the author expand on this based on his concept of “practical recognizability.” I think the Greek Scriptures hold much support for the recognizability of the Spirit within relationship even more so than as evidenced internally. Hence, the “between-ness” we refer to as the Church. The author also very briefly drops play as a concept of grace and the Spirit’s work in the conclusion, which I wholeheartedly find support for in play research as well as Biblical study. All that is to say, this is a good beginning for hopefully more to come on practical recognizability.
January 26, 2021
Zahl seeks to the correct the tendency of Protestant theology, as seen in such figures as Karl Barth and Martin Luther, to eschew recognition of experience in theologically significant. Pushing against the extreme of Schleiermacher who made experience the criterion for theology, Zahl argues that experience is inescapable and, as such, is an unavoidable part of our theological efforts. Yet, despite this fact, many theologians fail to fully integrate experience into their theologies, resulting in an abstract and ambiguous theology that is not 'practically recognizable.'
Having established the methodological importance of experience, he moves on to offer an account which integrates experience in salvation and sanctification, vindicating on the way the classical understanding of justification by faith alone as expressed by Philip Melanchthon. Here, he draws from affect theory and persuasively argues that our affections are vital for and a necessary location for articulated a theology that recognizes our embodied reality. In my view, this is a very important work as it provides a sophisticated entrance into the much needed discussion of the role of Christian experience in theology and as such it is essential reading for anyone interested in the task of theology.
Having established the methodological importance of experience, he moves on to offer an account which integrates experience in salvation and sanctification, vindicating on the way the classical understanding of justification by faith alone as expressed by Philip Melanchthon. Here, he draws from affect theory and persuasively argues that our affections are vital for and a necessary location for articulated a theology that recognizes our embodied reality. In my view, this is a very important work as it provides a sophisticated entrance into the much needed discussion of the role of Christian experience in theology and as such it is essential reading for anyone interested in the task of theology.
May 19, 2023
Phenomenal book by Zahl.
His book is written from a Protestant perspective. Protestants are in a bit of a bind. Since our theology comes from the Bible alone, it is a great puzzle how we have such different ideas of what the Bible says. To attain ever more objective interpretations of Scripture, we distances ourselves from anything subjective - feeling and experience included.
Zahl reintroduces experience to Protestant theology. But experience is taken seriously. Our histories shape our ideas, and our stories shape our beliefs. What's more important is that God cares about our stories, and it's the Holy Spirit that shapes them.
In the text, Zahl offers a theologically strong account of Christian salvation, justification and sanctification included. It is a gracious view. It isn't we who work to be transformed, but the Spirit who works in us. There aren't "better" and "worse" Christians, because we are all in this together and God chooses the paths we take towards righteousness.
Especially as someone who has been poorly exposed to pneumatology, except perhaps that the Spirit gives you discernment, this book was incredibly informative, and I came away from it knowing much more about the Holy Spirit and its wonderful works than before.
His book is written from a Protestant perspective. Protestants are in a bit of a bind. Since our theology comes from the Bible alone, it is a great puzzle how we have such different ideas of what the Bible says. To attain ever more objective interpretations of Scripture, we distances ourselves from anything subjective - feeling and experience included.
Zahl reintroduces experience to Protestant theology. But experience is taken seriously. Our histories shape our ideas, and our stories shape our beliefs. What's more important is that God cares about our stories, and it's the Holy Spirit that shapes them.
In the text, Zahl offers a theologically strong account of Christian salvation, justification and sanctification included. It is a gracious view. It isn't we who work to be transformed, but the Spirit who works in us. There aren't "better" and "worse" Christians, because we are all in this together and God chooses the paths we take towards righteousness.
Especially as someone who has been poorly exposed to pneumatology, except perhaps that the Spirit gives you discernment, this book was incredibly informative, and I came away from it knowing much more about the Holy Spirit and its wonderful works than before.
November 18, 2025
Quite good. I really enjoyed his excavation of Augustine, Luther, and (especially) Melanchthon. His critique of neo-thomist accounts of the Spirit’s formation of Christian’s was helpful, as was his critiques of more “objectivist” theologies (Torrance, Barth).
As with Lutheran theology more generally, I find the accounts of the presence of sin and its psychological depths as useful as I find accounts of sanctification unsatisfying. This seems to me the book’s greatest weakness — if grace nonlinear and inscrutable, how do I grow?
Regardless, I really enjoyed it, especially the critiques of modern theology’s unfortunate disposition to use words that don’t actually mean anything to real, live human beings.
As with Lutheran theology more generally, I find the accounts of the presence of sin and its psychological depths as useful as I find accounts of sanctification unsatisfying. This seems to me the book’s greatest weakness — if grace nonlinear and inscrutable, how do I grow?
Regardless, I really enjoyed it, especially the critiques of modern theology’s unfortunate disposition to use words that don’t actually mean anything to real, live human beings.
March 7, 2021
An important reappraisal of the category of experience for systematic theology that helpfully locates the discussion within the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. Useful, though, perhaps of those, such as myself of a Wesleyan persuasion, doesn't say enough. Reviewed for the Wesleyan Theological Journal.
October 28, 2025
Thought provoking book on how the Spirit acts in people in tangible ways not just mysterious ways. Thought provoking on sin, experience, emotion, and sanctification. The 3 stars is only due to my dislike of the formatting that could have reduced 10,000 words.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews