John Webster

Jordan Senner is the Rector of Holy Trinity Anglican Church, Costa Mesa, USA. He received a PhD in Theology from the University of St Andrews, UK.

Jordan Senner’s clearly structured and elegantly written study on the development of John Webster’s theology carefully reconstructs the shaping of a dogmatic theology. From the interpreter of Eberhard Jüngel and the student of Karl Barth to John Webster’s mature dogmatic outlook, inspired by Aquinas and increasingly shaped by engagement with Reformed scholasticism, Senner portrays a ‘theological theology’ that is kept in motion by theology’s subject-matter. Continuities and discontinuities are elucidated from the fundamental questions with which this theology engages. As John Webster frequently emphasised, our theology is a theology of pilgrims still on the way to full knowledge of God in the beatific vision. It is therefore always provisional and fragmentary and may not be identified with a theological school. Jordan Senner’s study captures the dynamics of John Webster’s theology with precision and theological empathy. It encourages readers to follow John Webster’s theological itinerary and continue their own ways of theologising in constructive conversation with a theologian for whom being ‘dogmatic’ was always a compliment.

• IntroductionChapter 1Ordering and Grounding the God-Creature RelationChapter 2ChristologyChapter 3EcclesiologyChapter 4BibliologyChapter 5Theological TheologyConclusionBibliographyIndex