Popular in Arts and Humanities

Arts and Humanities

Freedom’s Dominion

Vanderbilt University Jefferson Cowie

Arts and Humanities

Titus Quinctius Flamininus’ “Italian triumph”

McGill University Michael Fronda

Arts and Humanities

Lincoln and the Jews

Brandeis University Jonathan Sarna

Arts and Humanities

Amputations and Convalescence

University of Western Australia Emily Brink

Art

Drawing on the past: Palladio, his precursors and knowledge of ancient architecture

University of Birmingham David Hemsoll

Art

Language, Sound, and Image in Wallace Berman’s Aleph, 1956–1966

University of San Diego Chelsea Behle Fralick

Walter Brueggemann’s Prophetic Imagination: A Theological Biography

View more insights in Arts and Humanities - Religion

View more figures from Elizabethtown College

View the page of Conrad Kanagy

Read the Study

Next in Arts and Humanities

The Spear, the Scroll, and the Pebble

Richard Billows | Columbia University

Election Integrity in a One-Party Dictatorship

David Brandenberger | University of Richmond

Conrad Kanagy discusses Walter Brueggemann within the historical and cultural landscape of his formation.

Image courtesy of interviewee. November 29, 2023

Log-in or Sign-up to Faculti
Currently viewing this subject insight as a guest. You have insight(s) remaining for this month. Login to view 8000+ figures on the platform.

Generating Workspace...

Export as PDF

This video video discusses the life and work of Walter Brueggemann, a prominent theologian and scholar, as presented by a pastor and college professor who faced challenges while preaching on racism during COVID-19. Diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, the speaker emphasizes the importance of authenticity in his teaching. The narrative details Brueggemann's early life, including his German Evangelical pietist background that shaped his progressive yet Bible-centered faith. It explores his sociological approach to theology, particularly his concept of "prophetic imagination," defined as the ability to see alternative realities beyond the superficial.

Brueggemann's influential work, including the pivotal book "The Prophetic Imagination," emerged during a tumultuous period marked by events such as the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement. His writings resonated with the struggles of the church to respond to these social changes and have had a lasting impact over the decades. The speaker highlights Brueggemann's commitment to social justice, inclusivity, and his rejection of rigid labels like "progressive." He attributes Brueggemann's intellectual depth to influences from multiple disciplines and key figures in theology, sociology, and Jewish thought.

As Brueggemann reflects on his life at 90 years old, he expresses newfound clarity and appreciation for his journey, emphasizing that his life's narrative is interconnected with his spirituality and the divine teachers he encountered. This video video concludes with the assertion that Brueggemann's prayers, alongside his theological contributions, encapsulate his profound connection to God and illustrate his enduring legacy.

Language:

Export as PDF

X-TIMESTAMP-MAP:LOCAL=00:00:00.000,MPEGTS=900000

00:00.385 --> 00:02.025
I, was in trouble as a pastor

00:02.025 --> 00:03.545
because I was preaching messages

00:03.545 --> 00:05.785
during covid, about racism.

00:06.285 --> 00:08.985
Um, I'm a college professor and also a pastor,

00:09.685 --> 00:10.865
and, also diagnosed

00:10.865 --> 00:12.745
with Parkinson's disease seven years ago,

00:12.745 --> 00:15.425
and decided at that point I better become authentic,

00:15.865 --> 00:16.985
speaking the same things from the

00:17.145 --> 00:18.385
pulpit that I say in the classroom.

00:18.885 --> 00:21.585
And, so I was interviewing Brueggeman for our webinar,

00:22.445 --> 00:24.545
and, I asked him if he had a biography

00:24.575 --> 00:27.825
that I really needed his story, and he said, no, I don't.

00:27.825 --> 00:29.585
And so I emailed him right afterwards

00:29.585 --> 00:30.865
and said, can I write it?

00:31.125 --> 00:33.865
And he said, you may. So I knew about Bru Goodman's work

00:33.865 --> 00:35.425
from my own sociological research

00:35.425 --> 00:37.025
and surveys of religion in America.

00:37.245 --> 00:40.945
My church, my research interest is really re religion in

00:40.945 --> 00:42.225
America and global Christianity.

00:43.165 --> 00:46.305
And so I had used his work to outline some of my

00:47.265 --> 00:49.205
own sociological work.

00:49.545 --> 00:51.485
He was a sociology undergraduate at

00:51.485 --> 00:52.525
Elmhurst College in Chicago.

00:53.345 --> 00:56.685
And I, we had this kinship when I would read his material

00:56.685 --> 00:58.445
that I knew I was connecting with someone

00:58.465 --> 01:00.845
who understood the sociological perspective.

01:01.505 --> 01:04.815
Now, he calls it the prophetic imagination.

01:05.355 --> 01:07.695
And he always describes it very simply this way.

01:07.695 --> 01:09.895
And I heard him over and over again in our interviews.

01:10.585 --> 01:14.885
It is the capacity to see an alternative reality to the one

01:14.885 --> 01:16.085
that lies in front of us.

01:17.035 --> 01:19.805
That is a, that is a sociological statement, meaning

01:20.505 --> 01:22.765
the sociological perspective consistently

01:23.485 --> 01:25.365
challenges the taken for granted reality

01:25.395 --> 01:26.605
that appears in front of us.

01:27.145 --> 01:29.765
We are always saying, what is, what, what appears in front

01:29.765 --> 01:30.965
of us is only the surface.

01:31.575 --> 01:32.965
There must be more to the surface.

01:33.105 --> 01:35.325
And so when I ask Walter if I could write his story,

01:35.785 --> 01:37.845
he said, there's nothing very interesting about my life.

01:37.845 --> 01:39.205
Someone who has written a hundred

01:39.205 --> 01:40.485
books sold millions of copies.

01:41.335 --> 01:43.005
There was something interesting about his life.

01:43.625 --> 01:46.005
And so I went in as a sociologist saying,

01:46.145 --> 01:48.365
what's in the basement of Walter Brueggeman?

01:48.475 --> 01:50.045
What is at the core of this individual?

01:50.585 --> 01:53.405
And everybody I asked, including family and friends

01:53.405 --> 01:55.045
and colleagues would say to me, we don't know.

01:55.045 --> 01:57.485
We don't have a clue. He's bright. He works hard.

01:57.505 --> 01:59.205
He, he reads across disciplines.

01:59.265 --> 02:02.085
He has a photographic memory, all of which are true,

02:02.265 --> 02:03.645
but don't account for

02:04.265 --> 02:06.925
the success he has had over six decades.

02:07.105 --> 02:08.765
The man has been writing for 60 years.

02:09.465 --> 02:12.445
And, and his work today is as relevant as is

02:12.465 --> 02:13.765
as it was 60 years ago.

02:14.105 --> 02:15.845
Uh, incredibly unusual individual.

02:15.945 --> 02:19.325
And so the sociologist in me wanted to get into the basement

02:19.425 --> 02:23.195
of Walter's, life to find out what was it

02:23.195 --> 02:25.675
that had caused this explosion In 1978,

02:25.675 --> 02:28.355
in the prophetic imagination, he had been teaching

02:28.375 --> 02:32.915
as a seminary professor from 1961 to 1978, had written four

02:32.915 --> 02:34.875
or five books, nothing, nothing big.

02:35.215 --> 02:37.395
And then in 78, this explosion happened.

02:37.415 --> 02:38.995
And so my question was, why?

02:39.345 --> 02:41.755
What was happening in the church in America and globally?

02:41.755 --> 02:43.315
Because he's very popular in Great Britain,

02:43.505 --> 02:46.035
what was happening in the church in the Western church

02:46.035 --> 02:47.715
that this book took off the way it did?

02:48.215 --> 02:49.395
So he grew up,

02:49.695 --> 02:51.915
his grandfather migrated from Germany along

02:51.915 --> 02:53.835
with 8 million other Germans,

02:53.935 --> 02:57.075
in the 18 hundreds up the Mississippi River, up

02:57.075 --> 02:59.325
to Missouri River and into Missouri.

02:59.665 --> 03:00.845
And they settled this land

03:00.845 --> 03:02.285
that they called the New Rhineland.

03:02.705 --> 03:05.205
And he had brought, they brought with him this German,

03:05.205 --> 03:07.405
what was called German Evangelical pietism,

03:07.815 --> 03:10.645
which was a result of the Prussian Union,

03:10.995 --> 03:12.725
that brought together reform folks

03:12.865 --> 03:14.925
and Lutherans, in an effort

03:14.925 --> 03:16.965
to end the quarrels in the conflict.

03:16.965 --> 03:18.525
That along with famine

03:18.525 --> 03:21.245
and disease, had wiped out half of the German population.

03:21.825 --> 03:24.525
So they came here, committed Sam to not quarrel.

03:24.635 --> 03:27.965
They came here with a very irenic kind of theology

03:28.075 --> 03:29.645
that said, love God and neighbor.

03:29.855 --> 03:31.325
Those are the two great commandments.

03:31.905 --> 03:32.965
And they also agreed

03:32.965 --> 03:35.005
that they would accept three catechisms,

03:35.005 --> 03:39.405
the Westminster Catechism, the, the Lutheran Catechism

03:39.585 --> 03:41.805
and, Heidelberg.

03:42.225 --> 03:43.925
And if they disagreed on those, they'd,

03:43.925 --> 03:45.685
they'd accept the Bible as an alternative.

03:45.825 --> 03:47.205
It was just this kind of neat little,

03:47.655 --> 03:49.965
we're gonna be ecumenical, we're gonna be irenic,

03:49.965 --> 03:53.245
we're gonna be peace loving, have a simple faith.

03:54.025 --> 03:55.565
And they were very uneducated.

03:55.745 --> 03:57.765
And so, the, the German

03:57.865 --> 04:01.805
and Sw Swiss mission houses, which were separate from the,

04:02.025 --> 04:04.205
church hierarchy, they were kind

04:04.205 --> 04:07.005
of their own independent mission houses that trained folks

04:07.005 --> 04:08.725
to be missionaries and pastors without a,

04:08.725 --> 04:10.285
without a high degree of education.

04:10.285 --> 04:13.845
They were a reaction to the scholasticism of Lutheran,

04:13.845 --> 04:15.525
of Lutheran Church and Reform Church.

04:16.265 --> 04:18.165
And they, they cranked out these pastors

04:18.185 --> 04:20.365
who had very little levels of education,

04:20.745 --> 04:22.085
and they sent them to Missouri.

04:22.425 --> 04:24.285
And those became about 150.

04:24.285 --> 04:26.165
Those folks became the first pastors

04:26.705 --> 04:28.245
of these German immigrants.

04:28.705 --> 04:31.685
And again, the focus was really on this kind of pietism

04:31.845 --> 04:33.005
that came out of these German

04:33.105 --> 04:35.565
and Swiss mission houses that, that said,

04:36.325 --> 04:38.085
religion is this heartfelt,

04:38.715 --> 04:41.125
it's almost like the Wesleys, John Wesley.

04:41.125 --> 04:43.205
It's this heartfelt experience with God

04:43.395 --> 04:44.885
that is more than just ahead.

04:45.145 --> 04:47.645
And it's also a very simple, tolerant faith.

04:48.105 --> 04:52.045
That's the soil, the stew that Walter grew up in.

04:52.625 --> 04:55.925
Um, and it still explains his progressiveness.

04:56.225 --> 04:58.445
Um, but he would say he is not a progressive.

04:59.005 --> 05:01.845
I heard over and over again from him how disappointed he is

05:01.845 --> 05:03.485
with progressives because he

05:03.485 --> 05:04.565
says they've given up on the Bible.

05:04.625 --> 05:06.365
He does not see himself as a progressive,

05:07.145 --> 05:10.565
but he sees himself as one who has this simple,

05:10.845 --> 05:14.535
tolerant faith that was combined with growing up

05:14.535 --> 05:17.095
as a really poor pastor's child,

05:17.275 --> 05:19.135
who saw the church abuse his father.

05:19.275 --> 05:21.935
His father would work for 50 weeks each year as a pastor,

05:22.035 --> 05:24.135
and then for two weeks would go to Nebraska

05:25.035 --> 05:27.175
and would work on the wheat harvest

05:27.475 --> 05:30.655
and would earn more money in two weeks than he earned all

05:30.655 --> 05:31.695
50 weeks as a pastor.

05:32.395 --> 05:34.495
And he just watched his father grow up in this,

05:34.645 --> 05:35.895
with this kind of experience.

05:36.595 --> 05:38.615
Uh, he watched his family being marginalized,

05:38.715 --> 05:41.335
and even he tells the story of going to,

05:41.415 --> 05:44.335
a little black church, group of African Americans

05:44.335 --> 05:46.815
who had a church in Blackburn, Missouri where he grew up,

05:47.115 --> 05:48.175
and he would sneak off

05:48.175 --> 05:49.575
with his brother to go to this church.

05:49.635 --> 05:53.695
So very early on, he was sensitized to those on the margins.

05:53.835 --> 05:57.965
And he would say that that formed his, concern

05:57.985 --> 05:59.325
for the poor and marginalized.

05:59.465 --> 06:00.805
And, and,

06:01.025 --> 06:04.685
and lgbtq plus he was supporting gay pastors by the 1970s.

06:05.105 --> 06:06.605
He says that's what formed him.

06:07.345 --> 06:09.285
Uh, and he sees evidence for that support

06:09.425 --> 06:12.685
and support for that formation in the scripture where God,

06:12.705 --> 06:13.965
and then in the Old Testament,

06:13.965 --> 06:16.645
Jesus in the New Testament was always reaching out

06:16.645 --> 06:18.725
to the marginalized, always reaching out to the poor.

06:19.145 --> 06:20.245
Uh, and that's, so that's,

06:20.245 --> 06:22.365
that's a really important part of this formation.

06:22.455 --> 06:25.485
James Milberg at Union Theological Seminary was the,

06:25.505 --> 06:27.125
was the greatest influence on him,

06:27.275 --> 06:30.005
because at that point, historical criticism in both Europe

06:30.025 --> 06:32.085
and the United States was, was

06:32.115 --> 06:35.405
what was driving the interpretation of the biblical text.

06:35.865 --> 06:38.365
It was about the language. It was about the people.

06:38.585 --> 06:40.165
It was about the geography.

06:40.185 --> 06:41.725
It was about the facts of the text.

06:42.065 --> 06:43.925
Uh, but it was not about the God of the text.

06:43.985 --> 06:46.845
And I've heard over and over again from folks that brigman,

06:46.845 --> 06:51.125
almost single-handedly changed the direction of biblical,

06:51.305 --> 06:52.645
the interpretation

06:52.945 --> 06:56.485
and ex Jesus by his focus on the God of the text.

06:57.225 --> 07:00.125
And so when I would ask Walter, how do you do your exegesis?

07:00.145 --> 07:03.125
He said, I do the historical, I do the historical work.

07:03.245 --> 07:04.405
I look at what was happening.

07:05.265 --> 07:06.685
But then I add to that sociology.

07:06.925 --> 07:08.925
I look at how God was interacting with the people

07:09.385 --> 07:11.205
and how the people were interacting with God.

07:11.625 --> 07:13.685
And then he said, I add theology to that.

07:13.905 --> 07:15.885
How was, how was what was happening then

07:16.545 --> 07:19.165
and what God was up to then relevant

07:19.165 --> 07:20.845
to what's happening in the world today.

07:21.275 --> 07:23.845
It's this neat little model of history, sociology

07:23.865 --> 07:26.125
and theology that he has worked with.

07:26.545 --> 07:27.805
In fact, in 1968,

07:27.845 --> 07:30.085
I found a little essay in his archives written

07:30.085 --> 07:31.085
to Sunday school teachers

07:31.275 --> 07:33.165
that essentially describes the same thing.

07:33.345 --> 07:36.045
He said, when we teach children about the Bible,

07:36.225 --> 07:38.125
we should not teach them about the biblical

07:38.125 --> 07:39.205
characters as heroes.

07:39.585 --> 07:41.525
We should teach them about how they responded

07:41.525 --> 07:43.085
to God's call in the midst of crisis.

07:43.625 --> 07:46.085
So for him, it's all about what God is up to,

07:46.115 --> 07:49.085
what God was up to then and what God is up to now,

07:49.145 --> 07:50.925
and how those two relate to each other.

07:52.045 --> 07:54.175
What was going on in the church in the

07:54.485 --> 07:55.895
sixties, seventies and eighties?

07:55.895 --> 08:00.095
That was so that Walter says the things were swirling in the

08:00.095 --> 08:02.295
church and world, what was going on in the church,

08:02.295 --> 08:05.295
that this message, which he did not anticipate, would take,

08:05.345 --> 08:06.375
would get traction.

08:07.115 --> 08:08.255
Why did it get traction?

08:08.805 --> 08:10.575
This book called The Prophetic Imagination,

08:10.575 --> 08:14.135
published in 1978 by Fortress Press in Min in Minneapolis.

08:14.795 --> 08:15.855
Why did it take traction?

08:16.895 --> 08:20.755
And the reason it took off, I think, was that the church

08:21.015 --> 08:23.355
and its pastors in the white church

08:23.415 --> 08:27.115
and the white pastor, white pastors did not know how

08:27.115 --> 08:30.445
to handle the turmoil that was coming about

08:30.445 --> 08:31.485
because of Vietnam.

08:31.585 --> 08:35.245
The Vietnam War, Watergate, the Civil Rights Movement.

08:35.745 --> 08:38.245
Uh, they were at different pastors were always at different

08:38.245 --> 08:40.205
places than their members in terms of civil rights

08:40.205 --> 08:41.485
and advocacy for civil rights.

08:41.705 --> 08:45.085
The women's movement, the Gay Liberation Movement, all

08:45.085 --> 08:48.845
of this was creating change in the American scene

08:48.985 --> 08:52.645
and globally, that pastors trained in seminaries

08:52.645 --> 08:55.340
that were looking at historical criticism as the, the model

08:55.340 --> 08:57.765
for theology didn't know what to do with

08:58.305 --> 09:01.405
Walter says historical criticism was more abundant.

09:01.425 --> 09:03.605
It was dead. He said, it offers nothing.

09:03.745 --> 09:05.125
It offered nothing to pastors.

09:05.125 --> 09:07.525
In the midst of this change, we should not discount

09:07.525 --> 09:10.245
what God is up to now, that God is able to do something

09:10.475 --> 09:14.205
that is an alternative to what was what seems to be into us.

09:14.665 --> 09:18.565
And that took hold because it offered hope to pastors,

09:18.585 --> 09:22.495
and, and leaders, and became really the fundamental,

09:23.275 --> 09:24.695
it became the fundamental message

09:24.695 --> 09:27.335
that Walter would write a hundred more books out of that is

09:27.485 --> 09:31.695
that God is offering an alternative to what is in front

09:31.695 --> 09:33.975
of us to the turmoil that seems to be in front of us.

09:34.395 --> 09:36.175
He wrote an interesting essay recently.

09:36.335 --> 09:38.855
I I say he's writing some of the best work he's ever done,

09:38.955 --> 09:41.945
yet he still writes a blog post a week.

09:42.325 --> 09:43.865
He reads seven to eight books a week.

09:43.895 --> 09:46.705
He's writing four books a week, a year, now his editor

09:46.705 --> 09:48.465
for the next three books, he is,

09:49.485 --> 09:51.905
he is tremendously interdisciplinary.

09:53.015 --> 09:56.275
And so one of the things that was happening to, in this,

09:56.335 --> 10:00.355
in sociology in the 1960s was sociologists didn't know where

10:00.355 --> 10:03.315
to turn either to explain the inequality

10:03.455 --> 10:04.755
and conflict that was happening.

10:05.135 --> 10:06.675
So they turned to Karl Marx

10:07.175 --> 10:09.075
and they turned to liberation theology.

10:09.385 --> 10:11.395
Well, not theology, but to sociology.

10:11.955 --> 10:15.155
Brugmann was so connected to what was happening in sociology

10:15.665 --> 10:19.315
that he early on as a theologian, also turns to mark,

10:19.695 --> 10:22.115
to Karl Marx and to Liberation theology.

10:22.925 --> 10:25.905
And that makes him relevant on the theological scene

10:26.565 --> 10:28.545
in a way that no other theologian was.

10:28.925 --> 10:31.025
So he was influenced by Miranda.

10:31.245 --> 10:32.865
He was influenced by Karl Marx.

10:33.125 --> 10:35.145
He was influenced by James Milberg,

10:35.165 --> 10:37.145
who was using rhetorical analysis rather

10:37.145 --> 10:38.225
than historical criticism.

10:38.725 --> 10:40.465
He was influenced by Abram Hessel.

10:40.995 --> 10:43.425
Abram Hessel was the Jewish theologian who was at,

10:43.425 --> 10:45.865
across the street at the Jewish Seminary

10:45.935 --> 10:47.305
from Union Theological.

10:48.065 --> 10:49.425
Len Bergen Hessel were good friends.

10:49.525 --> 10:52.185
Hessel influences Brueggeman introduces him

10:52.185 --> 10:55.185
to Jewish theology, and that those were some

10:55.185 --> 10:57.585
of the major influences on Bru Goodman's life at that point.

10:57.895 --> 11:00.345
He's much less of a ma, he still is a mystery

11:01.095 --> 11:02.945
because he doesn't like to be reduced.

11:03.895 --> 11:06.315
But he said to me when I wrote the book,

11:06.315 --> 11:08.675
when it was finished, he said, this has given me a sense

11:08.675 --> 11:11.355
of my life as a whole that I never had before.

11:12.095 --> 11:14.595
He said, anything anyone else writes about me

11:14.825 --> 11:15.875
will be a footnote.

11:16.655 --> 11:18.075
He, he also said one other thing.

11:18.075 --> 11:19.235
He said, it's clear to me now

11:19.235 --> 11:21.155
that every teacher God brought into my life was

11:21.155 --> 11:22.435
given to me by Providence.

11:23.495 --> 11:26.955
It provided a sense of clarity and wholeness for him.

11:27.415 --> 11:30.395
And so if the subject at 90 years of age says it,

11:30.415 --> 11:32.675
it gave him a sense that his life was no longer

11:32.825 --> 11:34.195
just a black box either.

11:34.505 --> 11:35.875
That there really was something

11:35.875 --> 11:37.235
very interesting about his life.

11:37.775 --> 11:39.715
And so, I think I would say two things.

11:41.115 --> 11:43.135
The answers that this book provides are connected

11:43.335 --> 11:45.695
to the formation in the first 20 years of his life

11:46.435 --> 11:47.855
and also his life with God.

11:48.355 --> 11:50.015
So the prayers in the book, he,

11:50.085 --> 11:51.295
he's written tremendous number

11:51.295 --> 11:52.895
of prayers that have gotten less

11:53.010 --> 11:54.010
Play than his theology.

11:54.505 --> 11:56.845
But I have said if the only thing we had left at Brigham

11:56.845 --> 11:59.725
and were his prayers, he'd still be on the front pages

12:00.035 --> 12:02.725
because prayers represent his theology

12:03.385 --> 12:04.445
and his life with God.

12:04.505 --> 12:07.525
So the book includes nine new prayers that he wrote for,

12:07.625 --> 12:09.605
for me at my request, which are just rich.

12:10.065 --> 12:11.845
And I think help us to understand

12:11.905 --> 12:13.405
who Walter Brigman really is.

Faculti AI can make mistakes

Research

Policy

Analysis