Hungarian Church Press, 1968 (20. évfolyam, 2. szám)
1968-06-01 / 2. szám
HOP Vól XX Special Number 1968 No 2- 70., (07774) gave no guidance* Our churches were certainly in the possession of some abiding experiences as to the true contents, historioal realism and courage of prophetic preaching* Yet it was in an entirely new situation that these prophetic gifts had to be used in order that we, too, with God who is creating new things and is marching forward, in history, may make a new start and, in our march towards the future, may remain God's fellaw-workers3 d) Two Temptations of the Prophet \ The prophetic preaching of Hungarian Protestantism has had to face, from the beginning, the challenge of two temptations* The first arose from pietism, specifically from the pietistic revival and theolcgy of the post-war years and essentially meant the belief that the only task of the Church and cf the Christian was to rescue individual souls for eternal salvation«, The areas of political, social and international life did not concern the Christian as these areas are air ays beset by the danger cf idolatry* The danger óf this attitude is that it virtually exempts certain areas of life from the governing and redeeming rule cf God, giving' up in advance the effort to form and serve these areas and thus abandoning then; to demonic forces* This has beer/nn acute temptation in our congregations in the past two decades0 V ' , I \ ' f-The second temptation In customarily called, in ihe language cf the theologians, the typical temptation of Anglo-Saxon Puritanism*, It is essentially the tendency to discover, Quite indiscriminately, the will and act of God in every historical event* It is therefore between passinism and enthusiasm, the Scylla of otherworldly mysticism and the Charybdis of the philosophical interpretation of history that we must negotiate our passage in order ,yo arrive at the right conception of prophetic preaching about the actual will of God and to obey,in our decisions on social ethical is,sues and in our service, this váll cf Gcd0 e) Prophecy or Criticism? The preaching which had the hope, mission ard claim to be indeed "timely prophecy" had at first to face a very serious theological objectiona This objection was made by the so-called critical theology with its appeal to the example of the Old Testament prophets who had never hesitated to level 'their courageous criticism at the conduct of Israel's kings and political leaders, In line with this example, so was maintained,truly prophetic preaching, also in our time, had the primary and almost only task to criticize the civil, magistrate, the conduct of the secular authority in power« Had the Hungarian Protestant churches accepted this view they would have been no helpers but unsympathetic spectators and opponents of the historic changes and social transformations on a world scale viách are talcing place in our age« Moreover,their
