Hamann on John 3:16

“In order first to dispose of the infinite disproportion, . . . one must either become a partaker of divine nature, or Deity must take on flesh and blood. The Jews sought to acquire parity through the Palladium of their divine law, and the naturalists through their divine reason: as a result, there remains for the Christians and Nicodemus no other mediating concept than to believe with one’s whole heart, with one’s whole soul, with one’s whole mind: And God so loved the world—This faith is the victory that has overcome the world.”

Johann Georg Hamann, as quoted by John R. Betz, “Hamann before Kierkegaard: a systematic theological oversight,” Pro ecclesia 16, no. 3 (Summer 2007): 326. “the difference between Hamann and [the] dialectical theology [of the early Barth] (and even [Hamann’s great admirer] Kierkegaard) is [this,] . . . that for him the infinite difference is not so much revealed by the Incarnation as traversed by it” (326). There is more on Kierkegaard’s docetism on pp. 332 and 333.