LE3 .A278 1998

1998

Williams, Roy

Acadia University

Master of Arts

Masters

Theology

Acadia Divinity College

This thesis examines Karl Barth's understanding of the Lord's Prayer, both as a model prayer and as a model for the Christian life. For Barth, and much of the Christian tradition, the Lord's Prayer is the model of all Christian prayer, and his exposition of the prayer in Prayer as a model is examined particularly against his Reformation influences. Christian prayer cannot be separated from the Christian life; the two are inextricably interwoven in Barthian terms. Barth's (ultimately unfinished) exposition of the Lord's Prayer as a theological description of the ground and nature of Christian action in The Christian Life is also analysed. Through this study it is evident that Barth's understanding of the Lord's Prayer provides a more biblically faithful and theologically sound approach to Christian prayer than many other interpretations of prayer given in recent decades. It is also clear that Barth's presentation lends the church a more substantive account of the relation between prayer and ethics without collapsing the former into the latter. Thus, Barth's understanding of the Lord's Prayer has both theoretical and practical significance for the individual Christian believer and the church at large.

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