언어와 계시: 현실적 언어와 종말론적 언어

Abstract

It is generally acknowledged that man recently has the more precise knowledge about the universe and the human being than any other periods. In the face of technical possibilities and many risks there is a ambiguity between optimistic view and pessimistic view about the future. This ambiguity requires the emphasis of the human responsibility. In this situation the theological task can be achieved by carrying out the synthetic aspect which comprehends the relationship between the human responsibility for the changing world and the act of God in the world. What is concerned about at here is a possibility, whether the theological language as the belief’s word, can be, in any how, understood as a language of reality. In order to insist on this possibility, we need to look at the relationship between the language and reality. And, if language is able to designate the objective reality, in spite of the ambiguity of the language, it is to be asserted, in the most profound ways, that language is substantially connected with reality. The Derrida’s deconstructive understanding of language emphasizes the difference of the meaning of the word in every situation. But it does not reject that language basically tends to designate something ojective. And it is connected to the consequence that it requires the critical realistic aspect of the language that we can achieve the true understanding about the reality and arrive at the better comprehension about the reality through language. Under this circumstance it seems to be possible that the theological language that designates the word of God as the ground of the world is connected with the ordinary language which aims to make up the reality and represent it. There are at least three ways of the theological language understanding which bases on the critical realistic viewpoint and try to describe the interdependent relationship between the ultimate aspect of the reality and the revelation of God. 1) The Revisionist tries to the redefine the relationship between the theological language and the ordinary language by means of the existential interpretation of which man experiences ultimate being in the symbolic expression about reality. 2) The Postliberalist interprets the relationship between the theological language and the ordinary language on the socio-cultural perspective which sees language as the in the socio -c u l t u r a l background reflected and fixed reality. The meaning of the language is not founded on the ontological truth, but on the socio-c u l t u r a l regular that determines the correct use of the language. The theological language is regarded as the regular of ordinary language which uses to describe the reality. 3) The Critical realists contributes to the promotion of the mutual understanding between the theological language and the scientific language. On the one hand, as much as the theological language reveals the holistic viewpoint of the reality, it encompasses the function and the realm of the scientific language. On the other hand, in a certain point of view it can be asserted that the rationality and comprehensibility of reason does not come out of man’s cognitive structure, but is infered from the ultimate object itself, namely God himself. In this respect the theological language is nothing but the ground of the ordinary language and the most realistic language. But it still remains a problem how the theological language could coincide with the experience of the today’s reality. At this moment it is important to see that it is the eschatological character of the theological language that makes it possible, to interpret the reality and recreate it according to the God’s promising future. In this respect the theological language could justify itself in every day’s experience, only when it reveals the meaning of the reality in the horizon of the future of God and creates it responsibly. The eschatological meaning of theological language could be explained with the three following explorations. 1) The theological language as the eschatological language is not a predicate of the world. It puts the world in the totally different situation, in that God is the subject of the historical events. That means that the ground of the reality is regarded as the creation and the future of the reality is seen in the eschatological completion of the creation. The theological language plays a subjective role against and at the same time for the reality. The freedom and the change that come from this viewpoint are nothing but our responsibility for doing theology in the korean situation. 2) It is very important to see that the eschatological salvation is not the result of the theological consideration. The eschatological salvation is the only ground that makes itself to be known through the creeds and the tradition and the worships. Theology cannot control the eschatological salvation act of God. It has no other way to be critical to itself, whether it corresponds to the salvation of God. The eschatological theology must speak of the salvation of God a new from the very beginning of theology repeatedly. 3) The theological language as the eschatological language can show the creativity of our faith. Although it is acknowledged that the human language can designate something divine, it can not be identified as the word of God by itself. If we can speak God’s words in our language realistically, it dues to the act of God’s personal self revelation absolutely. God speaks himself through the history of Jesus Christus. It depends on the person of trinitarian God. Our theological language can open the reality to the future of God, in as much as it is constituted by the self revealing acts of God in Jesus Christ. And this God’s revelation is a historical event as well as a transcendental act that is contemporary with all human being. This self revealing wordevent is the trinitarian God’s self revealing act in the human language. In this event, human language becomes the place in that the trinitarian God’s self revealing act happens realistically.