Confluences of the Islamic in Hans Urs von Balthasar's Theological Aesthetics: Toward a Comparative Theo-Poetics with Islam

Abstract

This essay is an excavation of Islamic theological confluences in Hans Urs von Balthasar's theological aesthetics. It likewise demonstrates how comparative theology facilitates the de-essentialization of religious traditions. This essay uses the Swiss theologian as a case study in exposing how someone apparently closed off from interreligious learning is still inadvertently shaped by non-Christian traditions. Being adjacent to the work of Anne Carpenter, who seeks to save his theological project from Eurocentrism, this essay seeks to save it from theological exclusivism and Orientalism. It will argue that in the case of Christian theology, confluences of the Islamic in the past offer possibilities for future exercises in comparative theology. It looks back to look ahead by suggesting theo-poetics as a new direction for Christian comparative theology with Islam.