Edwin Chr. van Driel
Edwin Chr. van Driel is the Directors’ Bicentennial Professor of Theology at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
A native of the Netherlands, Van Driel earned his B.Div., M.Div., and M.Phil. in philosophy from Utrecht University. In 2000 he came to the United States for further graduate work in theology, and received an M.A., M.Phil., and Ph.D. in religious studies from Yale University, as well as a diploma in Anglican studies from Berkeley Divinity School at Yale.
Van Driel is the author of Incarnation Anyway: Arguments for Supralapsarian Christology (Oxford University Press, 2008) and Rethinking Paul: Protestant Theology and Contemporary Exegesis (Cambridge University Press, 2021), which won the 2021 Senior Alberigo Award of the European Academy of Religion. He also edited What Is Jesus Doing? Divine Agency in the Life of the Church and the Work of the pastor (IVP Academic, 2020) and the T&T Clark Handbook of Election (forthcoming from Continuum). His work has been published in academic journals such as Modern Theology, The International Journal of Systematic Theology, Worship, and The Scottish Journal of Theology, but also in popular magazines like Christian Century, Call to Worship, and The Presbyterian Outlook.
Van Driel’s main theological interest are in Christology, ecclesiology, and the interaction between Biblical studies and theology. His first book dealt with the divine motivation for the incarnation: is it contingent upon sin, or does God have deeper motives to become human? Van Driel suggests the latter, arguing that in friendship and love God wants to come as close to creation as God can – by coming among us as a human being. His second book, Rethinking Paul, offers a theological reading of contemporary Pauline exegesis (New Perspective on Paul, apocalyptic interpretation) and juxtaposes it with traditional Protestant understandings of the apostle. Van Driel argues that the crucial difference between these two readings lies not in how one understands isolated Pauline notions but in different assumed narrative substructures of the apostle's writings. He explores how new exegetical proposals deepen, broaden, enrich, and challenge traditional Protestant theological paradigms, as well as how they are situated alongside current contextual conversations on theological anthropology, social imagination, and the church's mission. Van Driel is currently researching an "ecclesiology for a post-Christian world" and a multi-volume supralapsarian Christology.
Van Driel is deeply invested in helping the church think about its existence and calling as it moves into an increasingly post-Christian world. He is an ordained Minister of Word and Sacrament in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and served on the church’s committee that produced the denomination’s new hymnal, Glory to God. He was the primary writer of the committee’s “Theological Vision Statement” and “A Statement on Language,” and also served on the Editorial Advisory Board of the Book of Common Worship. He is the chair of the International Consultation on Ecclesial Futures, which researches missional congregations.
Phone: 412-924-1425
Address: Pittsburgh Theological Seminary
616 N Highland Ave
Pittsburgh, PA 15206
USA
A native of the Netherlands, Van Driel earned his B.Div., M.Div., and M.Phil. in philosophy from Utrecht University. In 2000 he came to the United States for further graduate work in theology, and received an M.A., M.Phil., and Ph.D. in religious studies from Yale University, as well as a diploma in Anglican studies from Berkeley Divinity School at Yale.
Van Driel is the author of Incarnation Anyway: Arguments for Supralapsarian Christology (Oxford University Press, 2008) and Rethinking Paul: Protestant Theology and Contemporary Exegesis (Cambridge University Press, 2021), which won the 2021 Senior Alberigo Award of the European Academy of Religion. He also edited What Is Jesus Doing? Divine Agency in the Life of the Church and the Work of the pastor (IVP Academic, 2020) and the T&T Clark Handbook of Election (forthcoming from Continuum). His work has been published in academic journals such as Modern Theology, The International Journal of Systematic Theology, Worship, and The Scottish Journal of Theology, but also in popular magazines like Christian Century, Call to Worship, and The Presbyterian Outlook.
Van Driel’s main theological interest are in Christology, ecclesiology, and the interaction between Biblical studies and theology. His first book dealt with the divine motivation for the incarnation: is it contingent upon sin, or does God have deeper motives to become human? Van Driel suggests the latter, arguing that in friendship and love God wants to come as close to creation as God can – by coming among us as a human being. His second book, Rethinking Paul, offers a theological reading of contemporary Pauline exegesis (New Perspective on Paul, apocalyptic interpretation) and juxtaposes it with traditional Protestant understandings of the apostle. Van Driel argues that the crucial difference between these two readings lies not in how one understands isolated Pauline notions but in different assumed narrative substructures of the apostle's writings. He explores how new exegetical proposals deepen, broaden, enrich, and challenge traditional Protestant theological paradigms, as well as how they are situated alongside current contextual conversations on theological anthropology, social imagination, and the church's mission. Van Driel is currently researching an "ecclesiology for a post-Christian world" and a multi-volume supralapsarian Christology.
Van Driel is deeply invested in helping the church think about its existence and calling as it moves into an increasingly post-Christian world. He is an ordained Minister of Word and Sacrament in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and served on the church’s committee that produced the denomination’s new hymnal, Glory to God. He was the primary writer of the committee’s “Theological Vision Statement” and “A Statement on Language,” and also served on the Editorial Advisory Board of the Book of Common Worship. He is the chair of the International Consultation on Ecclesial Futures, which researches missional congregations.
Phone: 412-924-1425
Address: Pittsburgh Theological Seminary
616 N Highland Ave
Pittsburgh, PA 15206
USA
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Books by Edwin Chr. van Driel
This book raises in a new way a central question of Christology: what is the divine motive for the incarnation? Throughout Christian history a majority of Western theologians have agreed that God's decision to become incarnate in the person of Jesus Christ was made necessary by "the Fall": if humans had not sinned, the incarnation would not have happened. This position is known as "infralapsarian." A minority of theologians however, including some major 19th- and 20th-century theological figures, championed a "supralapsarian" Christology, arguing that God has always intended the incarnation, independent of "the Fall."
Edwin Chr. van Driel offers the first scholarly monograph to map and analyze the full range of supralapsarian arguments. He gives a thick description of each argument and its theological consequences, and evaluates the theological gains and losses inherent in each approach. Van Driel shows that each of the three ways in which God is thought to relate to all that is not God -- in creation, in redemption, and in eschatological consummation -- can serve as the basis for a supralapsarian argument. He illustrates this thesis with detailed case studies of the Christologies of Schleiermacher, Dorner, and Barth. He concludes that the most fruitful supralapsarian strategy is rooted in the notion of eschatological consummation, taking interpersonal interaction with God to be the goal of the incarnation. He goes on to develop his own argument along these lines, concluding in an eschatological vision in which God is visually, audibly, and tangibly present in the midst of God's people.
Published Papers by Edwin Chr. van Driel
The article is based on my own oversight of the worship program at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary
This book raises in a new way a central question of Christology: what is the divine motive for the incarnation? Throughout Christian history a majority of Western theologians have agreed that God's decision to become incarnate in the person of Jesus Christ was made necessary by "the Fall": if humans had not sinned, the incarnation would not have happened. This position is known as "infralapsarian." A minority of theologians however, including some major 19th- and 20th-century theological figures, championed a "supralapsarian" Christology, arguing that God has always intended the incarnation, independent of "the Fall."
Edwin Chr. van Driel offers the first scholarly monograph to map and analyze the full range of supralapsarian arguments. He gives a thick description of each argument and its theological consequences, and evaluates the theological gains and losses inherent in each approach. Van Driel shows that each of the three ways in which God is thought to relate to all that is not God -- in creation, in redemption, and in eschatological consummation -- can serve as the basis for a supralapsarian argument. He illustrates this thesis with detailed case studies of the Christologies of Schleiermacher, Dorner, and Barth. He concludes that the most fruitful supralapsarian strategy is rooted in the notion of eschatological consummation, taking interpersonal interaction with God to be the goal of the incarnation. He goes on to develop his own argument along these lines, concluding in an eschatological vision in which God is visually, audibly, and tangibly present in the midst of God's people.
The article is based on my own oversight of the worship program at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary
While this article reflects my personal observations, I wrote it have chaired the Taskforce on Formation and Online Learning at the seminary where I teach.
https://www.academia.edu/9035282/Gospeling_Paul_Protestant_Theologians_and_Pittsburgh_Theological_Seminary