Faith, Freedom and the Spirit: The Economic Trinity in Barth, Torrance and Contemporary Theology

Distinguished scholar Paul Molnar adds to his previous work, Divine Freedom and the Doctrine of the Immanent Trinity, to help us think more accurately about the economic Trinity, about divine and human interaction in the sphere of faith and knowledge within history. Exploring why it is imperative to begin and end theology from within faith, Molnar relies on the thinking of Karl Barth and of Thomas F. Torrance in dialogue with other contemporary theologians (Catholic and Protestant) about divine and human freedom. Powerfully argued and meticulously documented, Molnar's magisterial study begins with an extensive discussion of the role of faith in knowing God and in relating to God in and through his incarnate Word and thus through the Holy Spirit. From there he proceeds to consider the divine freedom once again as the basis for true human freedom, discussing how and why a properly functioning pneumatology will lead to an appropriately theological understanding of God?s actions within the economy. He considers perils of embracing a historicized Christology, proposing an alternative way of understanding the connection between time and eternity that is christologically focused and pneumatologically informed. And finally, he discusses at length how the doctrine of justification by faith relates to living the Christian life in the power of the Holy Spirit and the economy of grace.

Paul D. Molnar (Ph.D., Fordham University) is Professor of Systematic Theology in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at St. John?s University in Queens, New York. He is author of Divine Freedom and the Doctrine of the Immanent Trinity, Incarnation and Resurrection and Karl Barth and the Theology of the Lord?s Supper and Thomas F. Torrance: Theologian of the Trinity.