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- Dr Paul T Nimmo
Dr Paul T Nimmo MA DipIA BD ThM PhD
A native of Edinburgh, Dr Paul Nimmo has a wide range of research interests in systematic theology in general and in Reformed theology in particular. His work embraces both the historical trajectories and the contemporary dimensions of Christian doctrine, and he is involved with a number of church projects in theology.
Dr Nimmo joined the staff of New College in June 2008, becoming the Meldrum Lecturer in Theology in April 2009. Prior to his return to Edinburgh, he was for three years a post-doctoral Research Assistant and Affiliated Lecturer in the Faculty of Divinity at the University of Cambridge. His own studies were undertaken in Cambridge, Edinburgh, Princeton, and Tübingen.
Research interests
In his doctoral work, Dr Nimmo investigated the relationship between the actualistic ontology and the theological ethics of Karl Barth's Church Dogmatics. This work was published as Being in Action: The Theological Shape of Barth’s Ethical Vision in 2007, and won a prestigious John Templeton Award for Theological Promise in 2009.
Subsequent research projects have in part built on this earlier work, with a number of articles published on Barth's covenantal ontology in relation to the doctrines of election, pneumatology, and ecclesiology. A textbook on the theology of Barth - Barth: A Guide for the Perplexed - is nearing completion and will be published by T&T Clark in 2012.
Beyond his work on Barth, Dr Nimmo has written on a number of different doctrines and figures in Reformed theology, and has published articles on Friedrich Schleiermacher, John McLeod Campbell, and T. F. Torrance. He is currently co-editing the Cambridge Companion to Reformed Theology with his colleague Professor David Fergusson.
The focus of his current research is a monograph offering a constructive understanding of the doctrine of the Lord's Supper in the Reformed tradition. This will be published by T&T Clark in 2013. The work attempts to think with and after Barth on the basis, goal, and meaning of the eucharist, in the hope of contributing towards ecumenical discussion.
Teaching activities
Dr Nimmo teaches across a range of courses in the School of Divinity at both undergraduate and postgraduate level. Among the courses on which he teaches (or has recently taught) are:
- Christian Theology 1
- God in Philosophy: Plato to Hume
- Systematic Theology 2B: Dogmatic Theology
- Christology in the Nineteenth Century
- Christology in the Twentieth Century
- The Theology of Friedrich Schleiermacher
- The Theology of Karl Barth
Having been nominated for a EUSA Teaching Award in both 2009 and 2010, Dr Nimmo won the EUSA Teaching Award for Best Feedback in 2011.
Other information
Dr Nimmo has been the Associate Editor of the International Journal of Systematic Theology since 2008, prior to which he was its Managing Editor from 2006.
He delivered the Kerr Lectures in Glasgow in February 2008 and a Block-Seminar on the Theology of Karl Barth at the Georg-August-Universität Göttingen in April 2008. He is a Member of the Committee of the Society for the Study of Theology and is a Fellow of the Center for Barth Studies at Princeton Theological Seminary.
He serves as a member of the Church of Scotland - Roman Catholic Joint Doctrine Commission, the Church of Scotland Working Group on Issues in Human Sexuality, and the inter-denominational 'Why Believe?' Group, a body supported by the Action of Churches Together in Scotland organisation.
Selected publications
‘Barth and the Election-Trinity Debate - A Pneumatological View’, in Trinity and Election in Contemporary Theology, ed. Michael T. Dempsey (Grand Rapids [MI]: Eerdmans, 2011): 162-181
‘Bavinck, Barth, and the Uniqueness of the Eucharist’, in Scottish Bulletin of Evangelical Theology 29.2 (2011): 108-126
‘Barth and the Christian as Ethical Agent: An Ontological Study of the Shape of Christian Ethics’, in Commanding Grace: Studies in Karl Barth’s Ethics, ed. Daniel L. Migliore (Grand Rapids [MI]: Eerdmans, 2010): 216-238
Being in Action: The Theological Shape of Barth’s Ethical Vision (London: T&T Clark Continuum, 2007), 212 pages
Additional publications
A list of additional publications is available in PDF format.
This article was published on Dec 13, 2011