page_title: Karl Barth
section_title: Church Dogmatics
hierarchical_section_title: Karl Barth / Church Dogmatics
caption_attribution_description: English: Karl Barth's Church Dogmatics in his office in Basil, Switzerland.
context_page_description: Karl Barth was a Swiss Reformed theologian who is most well known for his landmark commentary The Epistle to the Romans, his involvement in the Confessing Church, and authorship of the Barmen Declaration, and especially his unfinished five volume theological summa the Church Dogmatics. Barth's influence expanded well beyond the academic realm to mainstream culture, leading him to be featured on the cover of Time on 20 April 1962 and Pope Pius XII said Barth was "the greatest theologian since Thomas Aquinas."
  Barth's theological career began while he was known as the "Red Pastor from Safenwil" when he wrote his first edition of his The Epistle to the Romans. Beginning with his second edition of The Epistle to the Romans, Barth began to depart from his former training – and began to garner substantial worldwide acclaim – with a liberal theology he inherited from Adolf von Harnack, Friedrich Schleiermacher and others. Barth influenced many significant theologians such as Dietrich Bonhoeffer who supported the Confessing Church, and Jürgen Moltmann, Helmut Gollwitzer, James H. Cone, Wolfhart Pannenberg, Rudolf Bultmann, Thomas F.
context_section_description: Barth's theology found its most sustained and compelling expression in his five-volume magnum opus, the Church Dogmatics (Ger. "Kirchliche Dogmatik"). Widely regarded as an important theological work, the Church Dogmatics represents the pinnacle of Barth's achievement as a theologian. Church Dogmatics runs to over six million words and 9,000 pages – one of the longest works of systematic theology ever written. The Church Dogmatics is in five volumes: the Doctrine of the Word of God, the Doctrine of God, the Doctrine of Creation, the Doctrine of Reconciliation and the Doctrine of Redemption. Barth's planned fifth volume was never written and the fourth volume's final part-volume was unfinished.
caption: Karl Barth's Kirchliche Dogmatik: The original 'white whale' edition of the Church Dogmatics from Barth's study that features a custom binding from the publisher.[29]
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