34. The Future as the Presence of Shared Hope

Posted by T. T. and P. R. in January 2020.

On one occasion, my wife suggested to me that we should drop into a small Christian bookstore, near a mission school where she attended and taught. In the store, I found a used book entitled “The Future as the Presence of Shared Hope” published in 1968. I bought it, on impulse, just by being attracted by its title. On thumbing through its content I found it to be entirely on theology, which is a completely  unfamiliar field for me. Nevertheless, I decided to  read it, because I was attracted by the fact that both Christian and Judaic theologians had contributed to it  and that they had tried to seek a shared hope in the future even though their individual hopes towards the future were different.

Both Christianity and Judaism have a belief of the past in that is common with The Old Testament. However, Christianity emerged as the belief of The New Testament, which tells us that Jesus Christ mediates everything toward the future in contrast with Judaism where God alone intervenes into everything throughout, from the whole of the past to the whole of the future. These kinds of differences in hopes for the future may exist between different beliefs or between theisms and atheisms in the present world. Thus, to realize peaceful coexistence of people having different hopes for the future, seeking “The Presence of Shared Hope” will have to be an essential postulate.

A German theologian, Jürgen Moltmann, has played a major role In this book,. I could learn some facts about him in Wikipedia; he was born in 1926, became a soldier in the German army, captured by the British army at the front line, sent to camps as a prisoner of war, and met Christians in prison. He once lost all hope to live, but recovered hope to live in the Christian faith. He became a theologian, and wrote “Theology of Hope” in 1967, and many other books of theology thereafter.

Recently, Moltmann wrote “The Spirit of Hope  - Theology for a World in Peril”, which was published at the end of 2019. Although its contents remain in the sphere of Christian theology, his arguments will be acceptable to those in wider fields. For example, he wrote that “In Christian hope, future is more important than the past and awaiting is greater than remembering”. The latter part of this statement may be acceptable among other beliefs or in atheistic views. If that is true, it could be a “shared hope” among almost all people in common in the future, so that the statement “The Future as the Presence of Shared Hope” could become a reality.

This whole episode was started just from a casual event of dropping into a small book store, but then, the final destination was the  shared hope. At a glance, the  future is indefinite because it can be affected even by a tiny occasional event. But, there may exist another force which allows a fluctuating future to converge into a rigid shape. The force may be assumed as the intervention of a fundamental existence. Theist will regard it as the deity. Atheist will regard it as the humanity. If the force can be rephrased as the spirit, the title of Maltmann’s book “The Spirit of Hope” will be suggestive for both; theists and atheists.