The Epistle to the Ephesians

KARL BARTH

edited by R. DAVID NELSON

translated by ROSS M. WRIGHT

Baker Academic

a division of Baker Publishing Group

Grand Rapids, Michigan

English edition © 2017 by Baker Publishing Group

Originally published in German as Karl Barth, «Erklärung des Epheserbriefes W.S. 1921/22», Erklärungen des Epheser- und des Jakobusbriefes, 1919–1929, hg. Jörg-Michael Bohnet, Karl Barth Gesamtausgabe 46.

German edition © 2009 by Theologischer Verlag Zürich

Published by Baker Academic

a division of Baker Publishing Group

PO Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287

www.bakeracademic.com

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Barth, Karl, 1886–1968, author.

Title: The Epistle to the Ephesians / Karl Barth ; edited by R. David Nelson ; translated by Ross M. Wright.

Description: Grand Rapid : Baker Academic, 2017. | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2016047869 | ISBN 9780801030918 (cloth)

Subjects: LCSH: Bible. Ephesians—Criticism, interpretation, etc.

Classification: LCC BS2695.52 .B3713 2017 | DDC 227/.506—dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016047869

Contents

Editor’s Introduction

R. David Nelson

Translating Barth’s Ephesians Lectures

Ross M. Wright

Barth, Ephesians, and the Practice of Theological Exegesis

Francis Watson

“A Relation beyond All Relations”: God and Creatures in Barth’s Lectures on Ephesians, 1921–22

John Webster

Exposition of Ephesians, Winter Semester 1921–22

Karl Barth

Ephesians 1:1–2

Ephesians 1:3–14

Ephesians 1:15–23

Ephesians 2–6

For Further Reading

Index

Editor’s Introduction

R. David Nelson

Karl Barth’s lectures on Ephesians from 1921–22 are published for the first time in English in this little volume. The lectures provide a window into Barth’s developing theology during the critical period of the early 1920s and right around the publication of the second edition of Der Römerbrief (1922).1 Barth’s interest in exegetical work in the New Testament emerged in the preceding decade in the context of his pastoral duties in the Swiss village of Safenwil. It was in Safenwil that Barth’s study of Paul’s Epistle to the Romans led to his well-known commentary, appearing in two very different published editions.2 There he also preached serially through several other New Testament texts—including Acts, the Epistles to the Corinthians, Ephesians, Colossians, and the Epistle to the Hebrews—and taught through various portions of the Bible in study groups and confirmation classes.3 Soon after his appointment to a professorship in Reformed theology at the University of Göttingen in 1921, he took on a lecture load that had him teaching exegesis through focused series on New ...