What Is Christianity

Adolf von Harnack (1851-1930) was a German theologian and prominent church historian. This book contains Harnack's lectures that were originally given during the 1899-1900 winter semester at the University of Berlin. For Harnack, "the Christian religion is something simple and sublime; it means one thing and one thing only: Eternal life in the midst of time, by the strength and under the eyes of God." He suggests, "either the Gospel is in all respects identical with its earliest form, in which case it came with its time and has departed with it; or else it contains something which, under differing historical forms, is of permanent validity." Here are some representative quotations: "Religion gives us only a single experience, but one which presents the world in a new light: the Eternal appears; time becomes means to an end; man is seen to be on the side of the Eternal. There is no sadder spectacle than this transformation of the Christian religion from a worship of God in spirit and truth into a worship of God in signs, formulas, and idols. The Roman Church in this way privily pushed itself into the place of the Roman World-Empire, of which it is the actual continuation. It is religion, the love of God and neighbor, which gives life a meaning; knowledge cannot do it."