THERE is reason to believe that an English translation of Ritschl’s greatest work is not inopportune at the present moment. The attention paid in Britain to this theologian’s doctrinal system has been steadily deepening for some years. Such works as Denney’s Studies in Theology, Orr’s The Ritschlian Theology and the Evangelical Faith, and Garvie’s The Ritschlian Theology, are enough to prove how profound is the interest felt here in the methods and conclusions of a movement which has had so remarkable an influence in Germany. Of this movement the primary source was Ritschl’s monumental work, The Christian Doctrine of Justification and Reconciliation (1870–1874). Not since Schleiermacher published his Christliche Glaube in 1821 has any dogmatic treatise left its mark so deeply upon theological thought in Germany and throughout the world. Schleiermacher’s masterpiece, unfortunately, is inaccessible to the English reader; and it was felt that were the magnum opus of his most notable successor also to remain untranslated, the loss to English students of theology would be doubly regrettable. The first volume of the German work, containing the history of the doctrine, was published in an English rendering as far back as 1872. The third volume, of which a translation is now furnished for the first time, has the supreme interest of presenting us with Ritschl’s own theological system.
The translation has been executed by several hands. Chap. V. and part of Chap. I. were translated by the Rev. A. B. Macaulay, M.A., of Forfar; Chap. II. by the Rev. A. R. Gordon, M.A., of Monikie; Chap. VI. by the Rev. R. A. Lendrum, M.A., of Kirkliston; Chap. VIII. by the Rev. Jas. Strachan, M.A., of St. Fergus; and the Introduction, Chaps. III. IV. VII. IX. and part of Chap. I. by the Rev. H. R. Mackintosh, D.Phil., of Tayport. Dr. Mackintosh, however, is responsible in every case for the rendering finally adopted. The thanks of the Editors are due to the Rev. A. Grieve, Ph.D., for valuable advice, and especially to the Rev. A. R. Gordon, who read most of the work both in manuscript and in proof, and to whose ungrudging help and accurate scholarship it owes much.
The translation of the hymns on pp. 186, 187 is by Mr. Macaulay.
The references to Vols. I. and II. are to the paging of the second German edition.