call for the "diastasis" of Christianity from modern thought also impacted some of his later writings. For example, in his Morphologie des Luthertums [the structure of Lutheranism], he presupposed a confessional "dynamism" of Lutheranism, "which, as a basic structural fact, is given to the historical changes themselves.” In his final, unfinished work on the christology of Theodore of Pharan, Elert highlighted the relationship between the dogma of the ancient church and the biblical image of Christ in order to show, contrary to the thesis of Adolph von Harnack, that Christian dogma is not the foreign intrusion of Greek metaphysics into the original gospel, but rather it is a necessary "given," grounded in the gospel and liturgical witness to Christ. The second period of Elert's scholarly work began with the research and writing of a brief outline of Lutheran teaching. Two years after the publication of the first edition, this little exercise in Lutheran systematic theology was revised and expanded. Part One of the book ("The Struggle with God") describes the human experience of freedom and fate [Schicksal], in which the latter concept refers to "the product of all the factors which shape our lives, other than the will to be free". Here, Elert stresses the fundamental opposition between God and humanity, which is experienced by human beings as a limitation to their knowledge, as an awareness of their moral failure before God (their guilt), and the fear of death. This first part of the book ends by summarizing biblical teaching about the law of God, the hidden God (deus absconditus), and God's wrath against sin. Part Two ("Reconciliation") sets forth the Christian teaching of the good news about Jesus Christ, the redeemer. While the law of God is experienced by all human beings, even apart from the Christian message, the gospel is received by hearing the biblical promise of God's forgiveness in Christ and by trusting it in faith. Part Three ("Freedom") offers a brief description of Lutheran ethics, in which the forgiven sinner lives out his or her "new life in Christ" in responsible freedom within the various "orders" in creation (i.e., in one's family, in civil society, through art/culture, through knowledge and education, and in business). Elert's most important and influential work was also produced in this period: his two-volume, 1000-page study of "the structure of Lutheranism." The first volume presents a historical trajectory of key Lutheran teachings,