“You Are Responsible to No One and to Nothing”: Barth, Berdyaev, and Artistic Freedom

This paper will compare two theologies of human freedom in relation to artistic creativity: Nicolas Berdyaev’s theology of creativity, which contends that human agency is characterized by freedom such that humans extend, and even eclipse, God’s creative act through their creativity as a means to their own salvation; and Karl Barth’s theological anthropology, which emphasizes that human action should be understood in relation to the freedom of the triune God, who alone is truly free and yet who graciously upholds and enables creaturely activity through Jesus Christ. Although Barth never developed a theology of artistic creativity and had deep reservations about the arts, his construal of human freedom provides not only a needed corrective to theologies of creativity, like Berdyaev’s, that overemphasize human agency but can provide a firmer foundation for humanity’s artistic activity: the freedom and grace of the triune God.