Bultmann

Rudolf Bultmann (1884–1976) appears in the depth-psychology and allied religious-studies corpus primarily as a figure of methodological and theological controversy rather than as a direct interlocutor with analytical psychology. His presence is most sustained in works addressing New Testament theology, the History of Religions School, and the question of myth versus history in early Christianity. Karen L. King's critical examination of Gnosticism reveals Bultmann as a scholar who simultaneously deployed the syncretic findings of Reitzenstein and Bousset and yet sought to exempt Christianity from the charge of syncretism itself — a contradiction King judges structurally significant. Frank Thielman's New Testament theology situates Bultmann at the center of the demythologization controversy: Bultmann's claim that Paul's resurrection discourse is wrapped in 'oriental salvation myth' and must be penetrated to reach an existential core represents for Thielman a watershed moment in the discipline's history, one whose radicalism his student Käsemann extended. A quieter reference in the Evagrius Ponticus Praktikos footnotes finds Bultmann's exegetical voice enlisted in support of contemplative practice. Jung's indexed correspondence acknowledges him only nominally. Throughout, Bultmann marks the fault line between historical-critical reductionism and theological retrieval — a tension of direct relevance to depth psychology's own negotiations with myth, symbol, and religious experience.

In the library 10 passages

Bultmann believed that when Paul spoke of the resurrection of the dead in 1 Corinthians 15, he inevitably wrapped the real content of what he intended to say in 'the oriental salvation myth of the Original Man.'

Thielman identifies Bultmann's demythologization program as the pivotal claim that Paul's resurrection language is mythological wrapping over an existential core, a move Käsemann radicalized into assertions of irreconcilable theological contradiction within the New Testament.

Frank S. Thielman, Theology of the New Testament: A Canonical and Synthetic Approach, 2005thesis

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by juxtaposing syncretism with uniqueness and simultaneously proving that Christianity offered something entirely new, Bultmann could deny its essentially syncretic character. His construction of Gnosticism, however, could not pass that test.

King argues that Bultmann's scholarly construction of Gnosticism as a distinct, inferior religious type served to protect Christianity's claim to uniqueness while relying on the same syncretic evidence he attributed only to Gnosticism.

Karen L. King, What Is Gnosticism?, 2003thesis

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Bultmann concluded that the Johannine prologue must have... the Johannine words uios tou anthropou are based in this [mythological] view.

Bultmann's appropriation of Reitzenstein's 'saved Savior' myth to interpret the Johannine Son of Man is presented by King as a key instance of his willingness to employ History of Religions frameworks selectively to explicate the Fourth Gospel.

Karen L. King, What Is Gnosticism?, 2003thesis

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Bultmann had a solid appreciation for the complexity of the material with which he was dealing. Although he was clearly willing to follow Bousset and Reitzenstein in their search through the wider literature of the ancient world in order to establish the history of religions background of the New Testament passages

King's footnote acknowledges Bultmann's methodological sophistication even as it traces his dependence on Bousset and Reitzenstein's comparative religion apparatus, complicating the picture of him as a naive syncretism-denier.

Karen L. King, What Is Gnosticism?, 2003supporting

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Käsemann's comment also implies, however, an important similarity between Baur's reading of early Christian history and more recent readings, such as those of Käsemann's teacher, Bultmann.

Thielman situates Bultmann within the long arc from Tübingen School Hegelianism to twentieth-century developmental schemas, showing that Käsemann's eschatological paradigm inherits Bultmann's sequential model of early Christian history.

Frank S. Thielman, Theology of the New Testament: A Canonical and Synthetic Approach, 2005supporting

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Rudolf Bultmann agreed with Schlatter that the New Testament theologian cannot be expected to separate thinking from living. He sided with the history-of-religions school against Schlatter, however, on the issue

Thielman uses Bultmann to map the fault line between theologically committed exegesis and history-of-religions objectivism, noting that Bultmann occupied an unstable middle position that acknowledged presuppositions while aligning with the secular-historical school.

Frank S. Thielman, Theology of the New Testament: A Canonical and Synthetic Approach, 2005supporting

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Modern scriptural exegesis provides an interesting parallel to this thought of Evagrius when Ruldolph Bultmann, in his exegesis of 1 Jn. 5:15, remarks that 'prayer itself is already its own answer.'

A footnote in the Praktikos edition recruits Bultmann's exegetical observation about prayer as confirming the contemplative-psychological insight of Evagrius, marking an unexpected convergence between critical New Testament scholarship and patristic spirituality.

Evagrius Ponticus, Praktikos, 2009supporting

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Bultmann, New Testament Theology, 2:163... 2:175... See Bultmann, New Testament Theology, 2:3–14, 70–92; Harnack, Marcion, 131, 139.

Thielman's footnote apparatus pairs Bultmann's Theology of the New Testament with Harnack's Marcion scholarship, signalling that Bultmann's exegetical conclusions on John and Paul belong to a tradition of liberal Protestant historiography stretching from Harnack onward.

Frank S. Thielman, Theology of the New Testament: A Canonical and Synthetic Approach, 2005supporting

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Bultmann, Rudolf. Faith and Understanding... The History of the Synoptic Tradition... Theology of the New Testament. 2 vols. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1951–1955.

The bibliography lists Bultmann's major works — Faith and Understanding, History of the Synoptic Tradition, Theology of the New Testament — as primary scholarly sources for Thielman's engagement throughout the volume.

Frank S. Thielman, Theology of the New Testament: A Canonical and Synthetic Approach, 2005aside

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Bultmann, Rudolf, 32, 35–37, 113, 150, 157–58, 165–68, 170, 175–76, 269, 282, 303, 319, 325, 327, 329, 358, 404, 433, 461–62, 465, 487–88, 559, 676, 694

The name index records the extensive and distributed engagement with Bultmann across Thielman's New Testament theology, from introductory methodological discussions to specific exegetical points in the Johannine, Pauline, and deutero-Pauline chapters.

Frank S. Thielman, Theology of the New Testament: A Canonical and Synthetic Approach, 2005aside

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