1919–1968

Karl Barth and neo-orthodoxy

The Swiss pastor Karl Barth became disillusioned with the liberal theology of his teachers when in 1914 they supported the Kaiser's war policy. His commentary The Epistle to the Romans (1919) began "dialectical theology," which he developed together with Thurneysen, Gogarten, and Bultmann in the journal Zwischen den Zeiten (1922–1933).

Barth taught at Göttingen, Münster, and Bonn. In 1934–1935 he carried on a principled dispute with Emil Brunner over natural theology. In 1935, for refusing to swear an oath to Hitler, he was removed from teaching at Bonn and returned to Basel. There he wrote the multivolume Church Dogmatics (1932–1968), which remained unfinished. Barth died in 1968; he had been invited to the Second Vatican Council as an observer.