J. P. Gabler’s Distinction between Biblical Theology and Dogmatic Theology : An Evaluation from Reformed Perspective

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

J. P. Gabler’s proposal is a good example of scholarship which attempted to work for the church in engaging with the issues of his own era. He was influenced by neologians such as J. Semler, but at the same time he was concerned with ecclesiastical goal of which influence can be attributed to his conservative predecessors like G. T. Zacharia. Gabler’s proposal, unlike the wide-spread understanding of it as being historial-critical oriented, was set to defend the usefulness of Scripture for dogmatic theology, and unfortunately was heavily attacked by Immanuel Kant’s separation of theology from philosophy which lead biblical scholarship into the way of purely historicalcritical investigations of the text. Therefore, in one sense, Gabler can be called the father of biblical theology when considering that his distinction between the two eventually was of help for the establishment of biblical theology as an independent area of theological studies. In another sense, to Gabler is also possible to attribute a different name, defender of dogmatic theology. Gabler wanted to maintain both of these aspects, but the history of criticism did not allow him to do so. His ecclesiastical concern was abandoned by scholarship and only his influence on the historical-critical aspect remains remembered. This sheds significant light upon what reformed scholars need to pursue in the current situation. In spite of the fact that biblical theology and dogmatic theology are now two different areas in theology, they constitute one theological entity and are ultimately interconnected and dependent upon each other. To take a good care of our ecclesiastical concerns in the Korean context today, biblical theologians should delve into not only particular subject matters of biblical theology per se but also the universal, theological questions that the current contexts ask us to answer. Then biblical theology and dogmatic theology will be able to function in proper and fruitful directions.