Freedom’s Engine is Kenosis: The Unity of Creational Freedom and Divine Self-Emptying in Moltmann’s Theology

The theology of the late Jürgen Moltmann is often thematized according to the motif of hope. Ryan Neal and GM Saaiman are representative of this sort of commentary, and it has proven fruitful across diverse applications of Moltmann’s work. This study argues, however, that Moltmann should also be considered a “theologian of freedom.” For hope, like faith, requires an object: hope for what? And when this question is pressed, across all of Moltmann’s major works, the result is the same: hope for freedom, for liberation, and for justice. Moltmann says that God is the author of hope through the divine promises. But far less recognized and understood is that Moltmann also considers God the author of freedom, and that God instantiates such freedom via divine kenosis. This study thus presents an original and holistic reading of Moltmann as a relational-kenotic theologian and of his deeply formative grammar of freedom.