Here, “being” reflects the unity of the self-being and self-giving of the three Persons of the Trinity. “Being,” most appropriately understood, is the likeness of the triune God.
In a transcendental explanation of “being,” that which goes beyond any one particular category of explanation, this starting point is also where Nichols describes Balthasar’s theology as “ontological realism.” Through the human powers and senses of seeing, touching, hearing, scenting and tasting, we are able to have “access to things as they really are: participations, varying in scope and intensity, in being itself the Ground and Source of such being is God” (2).
In the first chapter, Nichols also defines necessary background by, for example, defining the term “transcendental,” as well as summarising Balthasar’s influences on and views of the transcendental. The fourth and final chapter concerns the term “logic,” with an emphasis on Balthasar’s theology of truth in his third volume, Theo-Logic. The third chapter, defining “freedom,” helps to make the study of his Theo-drama accessible by explaining a theology of goodness through theological dramatics. Chapter two, defining “form,” lays the foundation for Balthasar’s theological aesthetics as found in The Glory of the Lord, explicating beauty. In the first chapter, he explains the fundamental key word “being,” which is necessary for understanding the whole of his theology. Nichols offers four different “keys” to understanding Balthasar’s theology.
The goal of Balthasar’s works, Nichols states, is to “encourage readers to holiness and to steady them in the praying life that flows from the theological virtues” (115). Offering novel accessibility to these works, the everyday reader is more easily able to approach and enter into the goal of Balthasar’s writings. With ambitious effort, Aidan Nichols’ publication A Key to Balthasar condenses into four chapters the major terms and definitions of Hans Urs von Balthasar’s prolific theological writings. A Key to Balthasar: Hans Urs von Balthasar on Beauty, Goodness, and Truth.
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