What are the Grundrids? Sources for Gisle's Systematic Theology

What are the Grundrids? This is a question that has arisen in my own contemplation of Gisle's seminal volume in tandem with two other sources for his theology: the earlier Swedish edition, Föreläsningar öfver Systematiska Theologien (1878), from the lecture note of August Weenaas, along with the 1850 Den Kristelige Dogmatik from the lecture notes of Gjermunde Hoyme. In the latter two instances, more elaboration is clearly present, with more direct engagement with prominent thinkers, contemporary literature, and even biblical exposition. The Grundrids af den Systematiske Theologi, however, in its final 1897 edition, is clearly more abbreviated: about a third of the length, it contains little elaboration and copious footnoting, being almost scholastic in its conciseness and efficiency. The material ordering of topics in the Grundrids is also different from earlier versions, most notably the location of angelology, along with a longer version of his fideistic introduction, the Pistik. So what happened between the lecture manuscripts and the published editions?

The Grundrids themselves leave no introductory notes explaining the editorial process as would be common today. In conversations with Brian Lunn, I had initially hypothesized that the Grundrids was editorially redacted, altered, and perhaps even named, the designation Grundrids being mildly difficult to translate (I prefer rendering it Foundations for various reasons). It wasn't until I stumbled across a very pertinent section in Godvin Ousland's biography of Gisle that I finally found something concrete:

Only after Gisle Johnson had finished lecturing on systematic theology did he modestly publish a greatly abbreviated version of his lectures: Grundrids af den systematisk Theologi, printed from manuscript. The title page of the first edition even lacks Johnson's name. The title page has in various instances the date 1878 and 1879, 1880, and 1881. This is because the book was printed in the years 1879-81. Of the first edition of the work, only the first two volumes were published in 1879; 3 volumes came in 1880, and printing continued this and the following year, with 15,000 pages of the work first coming in October 1881. Johnson must have labored on the work gradually during these years. Grundrids is a very abridged edition of Johnson’s lectures on ethics and dogmatics. It took at least 3-4 years for Gisle Johnson to produce this abridgement. The date 1878 on the title page indicates that he must have expected to have the first part of the work printed by then, and the work must therefore have been underway that year. Gisle Johnson having taken such a long time to publish it, it shows that he must have considered very carefully what should be included and considered most important. We must therefore assume that this work gives the main lines that Johnson wanted to be available for posterity. As regards composition, it stands stronger than the lectures as we find them in the contemporary reports. But when it comes to specifics and deeper insight into the various points of doctrine, we are dependent on the lecture notes. Grundrids was the only book Gisle Johnson received in his time, apart from his small writing Nogle Ord om Barnedaaben and a speech or two. Gisle Johnson’s lectures on ethics and dogma history were only published posthumously.[1]

So, according to Ousland, the Grundrids are the Reader's Digest version of Gisle's larger theological project: an abridgment meant to provide a brief outline of the most basic foundational concepts for teaching theology—hence the work's subtitle, til Brug ved Forlæsninger, or for Use in Lectures. It is notably also that the most commonly available edition, preserved digitally in the Norkse Nationsbibliot, is the third edition: the first two were directly a product of Gisle's own.

It is, however, important to note what Ousland says about attaining a full sense of Gisle's theology: lecture notes should be references. Here we enter into the difficulty of fidelity: how do we know that Hoyme or Weenaas have preserved accurately the content of Gisle's lectures? Indeed, this issue is a common one in historical scholarship, a notable example being Immanuel Kant's Lectures on Ethics, which are transcribed and translated from lecture notes taken by three of his students. Whether or not Kant's lectures are recorded with precision and without elaboration is a matter of debate. In the instance of Gisle, however, we have strong historical records indicating that his students were able to achieve near for word-for-word transcription—indeed, even gaining quite a reputation for it, as can be seen in Hertzberg's memoir, which I have translated here: https://www.gislejohnson.com/post/gisle-as-lecturer. It is from Hertzberg and others that we learn that Gisle spoke slowly and precisely, which helps understand the value of the 1850 and 1878 editions.

Considering this, the critical translation work proceeds with the third edition of the Grundrids as the textual basis, with the absent portions supplied from the Swedish edition as appropriate, and carefully denoted as such.

[1]Godvin Ousland, En kirkehøvding: Professor Gisle Johnson som Theolog og Kirkemann (Oslo: Lutherstiftelsens Forglag, 1950), 53.