Thursday, April 02, 2009
Wednesday, April 01, 2009
The anti-fundamentalist
“Lwt me briefly consider a second individual, the late Robert Funk, the principal organizer of the much-loved and much-hated Jesus Seminar. Funk’s theological orientation is manifest from his last book, Honest to Jesus, which is wholly candid about ‘the aim of the quest,’ which is, to Funk’s mind, ‘to set Jesus free.’ Free him from what? From the ecclesiastical creeds and especially from the beliefs of the conservative churches of North America. Funk turned the historical Jesus into a wrecking ball with which to bash the walls of institutional, creedal Christianity.”
“Whatever the biographical impulses may have been, Funk was a well-known type–the anti-fundamentalist. With this in mind, it is fascinating to follow him as he strolls with us through the Jesus tradition, pointing out what represents Jesus and what does not. The tradition, it goes without saying, often depicts Jesus as an apocalyptic prophet, and it regularly presents him as speaking about himself in exalted fashion. The tradition further purports that Jesus thought in terms of the saved and the unsaved, and it frequently has him quoting from and alluding to the Bible. Funk’s historical Jesus, however, is emancipated from all of this. He has no eschatology to speak of, no christology to speak of, and no soteriology (in the traditional sense) to speak of, and he shows little interest in the Bible. Funk exports to the post-Easter period all the sayings and stories that might indicate otherwise.”
“Although I may be entirely mistaken in the matter, I cannot but wonder about the relationship between Funk’s theological preferences and his historical conclusions. Eschatology, christology, soteriology, and the Bible, while at the heart of American fundamentalism, are no part of Funk’s personal theology. Jesus is coming again, the fundamentalist says. Funk denies this. Jesus is Lord, the fundamentalist says. Funk thinks otherwise. Jesus saves, the fundamentalist says. Funk has other roles for Jesus. The Bible tells me so, the fundamentalist says. Funk retorts: Well, maybe it does, but it ‘is a highly uneven and biased record’.”
“Whereas the fundamentalist cites the Bible, Funk instead appeals to the Jesus he has reconstructed, a Jesus who functions to replace the canonical texts, and who in each instance turns out to be Funk’s precursor, not the helpmeet of Funk’s religious opponents. Those elements in the tradition most beloved of conservatives conveniently happen to be, without exception, post-Easter fictions. Funk’s Jesus is on Funk’s side. It seems, a cynic might muse, almost too good to be true.”
“Now I do not contend here that the utility of Funk’s Jesus means that Funk must b e wrong about everything (although, as it happens, I heartily disagree with much that he has to say)…Still, the ease with which Funk’s historical Jesus comes to Funk’s theological assistance inexorably precipitates within me some cynicism.”
“John Dominic Crossan has worried about this matter of personal predilection a great deal because he has been accused of overlaying his own Irish history onto the Jesus tradition. According to some of his critics, Crossan’s ‘interpretation of Jesus as a first-century Galilean peasant resisting Roman imperial injustice in the name of Jewish tradition’ represents the ‘nineteenth-century Irish peasant resisting British imperial injustice in the name of Catholic (or Celtic) tradition.”
“Consider the fact that Funk has labeled Jesus a ‘secular sage’ who was ‘irreligious, irreverent, and impious.’ This novel evaluation, which could arise only in the modern academy, is not very shrewd. It is about as compelling as the legend that Jesus died in Kashmir, or the occasional attempt to turn Jesus into a revolutionary zealot bent on taking up the sword against Caesar. I cannot but surmise that an ideological program–Funk’s desire to use the historical Jesus against institutionalized religion–has distorted perception here,” D. Allison, The Historical Christ and the Theological Jesus (Eerdmans 2009), 17-20.
“Whatever the biographical impulses may have been, Funk was a well-known type–the anti-fundamentalist. With this in mind, it is fascinating to follow him as he strolls with us through the Jesus tradition, pointing out what represents Jesus and what does not. The tradition, it goes without saying, often depicts Jesus as an apocalyptic prophet, and it regularly presents him as speaking about himself in exalted fashion. The tradition further purports that Jesus thought in terms of the saved and the unsaved, and it frequently has him quoting from and alluding to the Bible. Funk’s historical Jesus, however, is emancipated from all of this. He has no eschatology to speak of, no christology to speak of, and no soteriology (in the traditional sense) to speak of, and he shows little interest in the Bible. Funk exports to the post-Easter period all the sayings and stories that might indicate otherwise.”
“Although I may be entirely mistaken in the matter, I cannot but wonder about the relationship between Funk’s theological preferences and his historical conclusions. Eschatology, christology, soteriology, and the Bible, while at the heart of American fundamentalism, are no part of Funk’s personal theology. Jesus is coming again, the fundamentalist says. Funk denies this. Jesus is Lord, the fundamentalist says. Funk thinks otherwise. Jesus saves, the fundamentalist says. Funk has other roles for Jesus. The Bible tells me so, the fundamentalist says. Funk retorts: Well, maybe it does, but it ‘is a highly uneven and biased record’.”
“Whereas the fundamentalist cites the Bible, Funk instead appeals to the Jesus he has reconstructed, a Jesus who functions to replace the canonical texts, and who in each instance turns out to be Funk’s precursor, not the helpmeet of Funk’s religious opponents. Those elements in the tradition most beloved of conservatives conveniently happen to be, without exception, post-Easter fictions. Funk’s Jesus is on Funk’s side. It seems, a cynic might muse, almost too good to be true.”
“Now I do not contend here that the utility of Funk’s Jesus means that Funk must b e wrong about everything (although, as it happens, I heartily disagree with much that he has to say)…Still, the ease with which Funk’s historical Jesus comes to Funk’s theological assistance inexorably precipitates within me some cynicism.”
“John Dominic Crossan has worried about this matter of personal predilection a great deal because he has been accused of overlaying his own Irish history onto the Jesus tradition. According to some of his critics, Crossan’s ‘interpretation of Jesus as a first-century Galilean peasant resisting Roman imperial injustice in the name of Jewish tradition’ represents the ‘nineteenth-century Irish peasant resisting British imperial injustice in the name of Catholic (or Celtic) tradition.”
“Consider the fact that Funk has labeled Jesus a ‘secular sage’ who was ‘irreligious, irreverent, and impious.’ This novel evaluation, which could arise only in the modern academy, is not very shrewd. It is about as compelling as the legend that Jesus died in Kashmir, or the occasional attempt to turn Jesus into a revolutionary zealot bent on taking up the sword against Caesar. I cannot but surmise that an ideological program–Funk’s desire to use the historical Jesus against institutionalized religion–has distorted perception here,” D. Allison, The Historical Christ and the Theological Jesus (Eerdmans 2009), 17-20.
Darkness Visible
In a season 2 episode (“Darkness Visible”) of La Femme Nikita, Michael and Nikita are dispatched to a war-torn area of the Balkans. In the course of their mission they run across a couple orphaned children–a young boy and his younger sister.
Nikita’s maternal instinct kicks in. She tells Michael they can’t leave the children behind to fend for themselves. Nikita functions as Michael’s conscience. He’s the realist, she’s the idealist.
He’s not hard-hearted. But, to survive in Section One, he’s learned to suppress his feelings. He’s more ruthless than Nikita, but less ruthless than Operations or Madeline. Nikita revives and accentuates his emotional and moral conflict.
From both a Christian standpoint and a Darwinian standpoint, how we feel about children is programmed. The feeling is involuntary and irrepressible. We see them as cute, helpless, defenseless. They need us, and we have a felt need to protect them and provide for them.
Yet our feelings, while involuntary, do not compel us to act accordingly. That makes a logical, and sometimes practical, difference, in how we act. A Christian believes that God programmed these feelings. A Darwinian believes that natural selection programmed these feelings.
Should we act on these feelings or not? Believing you know the source of your feelings makes a difference in whether or not you choose to act on your feelings.
There’s a reason Michael is prepared to leave the children behind, to suffer and die–as the case may be. Left to his own devices, Michael’s survival instinct trump’s Nikita’s maternal instinct.
If he lets his feelings jeopardize the success of the mission, then his superiors (Operations, Madeline) will put him in “abeyance” and have him “canceled.”
From a Darwinian standpoint, Michael can say to himself, “I want to save these children. I can’t help myself. I can’t control how I feel. But I know I was conditioned to feel this way by natural selection. While natural selection can make me feel a certain way, it can’t oblige me to act accordingly. Natural selection is amoral. My paternal instinct is like a phobia: I can’t change it, but I can ignore it. Why should I risk my own skin for their sake? Although it pains me to leave them behind, I must steel myself against the illusion.”
From a Darwinian standpoint, our instincts lack the force of moral imperatives. We can override them. And nothing constrains us to obey our feelings–except the misguided sense that we should care. It’s a trick of the mind. Evolutionary brainwashing.
Now, just as our feelings are predetermined from a Darwinian standpoint, our feelings are predetermined from a Christian standpoint.
Up to a point, Michael, if he were a Christian, could say much the same thing: “I want to save these children. I can’t help myself. I can’t control how I feel. But I know I was conditioned to feel this way by God.”
Yet here is where the two positions part company. Both are deterministic, but they have opposing consequences.
If my protective feelings for children were programmed into me by God, then I should honor my feelings. These feelings are the moral result of a moral agent.
These are feelings I ought to have. It’s built into the way in which God designed the human race. These feelings have an obligatory force.
Both the Christian and the Darwinian are aware of their preconditioning. For the Darwinian, consciousness of his programming is an opportunity to disaffirm his programming; for the Christian, consciousness of his programming is an opportunity to reaffirm his programming.
Both the Christian and the Darwinian can resist their paternal (or maternal) instincts. But the Christian has no motivation to do so. To the contrary, the realization that his paternal feelings are God-given is a ratification of his feelings. An incentive to embrace his duty–in the confidence that supreme wisdom is the architect of his parental instinct.
For the Darwinian, enlightenment logically leads to amorality. For the Christian, enlightenment logically leads to virtue. For the Darwinian, lucidity is the foe of morality; for the Christian, lucidity is the friend of morality.
In secular ethics, parents sacrifice their children (abortion, infanticide) for the parents’ welfare. In Christian ethics, parents sacrifice themselves for their children’s welfare.
Nietzsche was right about the respective moral consequences of Christian ethics and secular ethics.
Nikita’s maternal instinct kicks in. She tells Michael they can’t leave the children behind to fend for themselves. Nikita functions as Michael’s conscience. He’s the realist, she’s the idealist.
He’s not hard-hearted. But, to survive in Section One, he’s learned to suppress his feelings. He’s more ruthless than Nikita, but less ruthless than Operations or Madeline. Nikita revives and accentuates his emotional and moral conflict.
From both a Christian standpoint and a Darwinian standpoint, how we feel about children is programmed. The feeling is involuntary and irrepressible. We see them as cute, helpless, defenseless. They need us, and we have a felt need to protect them and provide for them.
Yet our feelings, while involuntary, do not compel us to act accordingly. That makes a logical, and sometimes practical, difference, in how we act. A Christian believes that God programmed these feelings. A Darwinian believes that natural selection programmed these feelings.
Should we act on these feelings or not? Believing you know the source of your feelings makes a difference in whether or not you choose to act on your feelings.
There’s a reason Michael is prepared to leave the children behind, to suffer and die–as the case may be. Left to his own devices, Michael’s survival instinct trump’s Nikita’s maternal instinct.
If he lets his feelings jeopardize the success of the mission, then his superiors (Operations, Madeline) will put him in “abeyance” and have him “canceled.”
From a Darwinian standpoint, Michael can say to himself, “I want to save these children. I can’t help myself. I can’t control how I feel. But I know I was conditioned to feel this way by natural selection. While natural selection can make me feel a certain way, it can’t oblige me to act accordingly. Natural selection is amoral. My paternal instinct is like a phobia: I can’t change it, but I can ignore it. Why should I risk my own skin for their sake? Although it pains me to leave them behind, I must steel myself against the illusion.”
From a Darwinian standpoint, our instincts lack the force of moral imperatives. We can override them. And nothing constrains us to obey our feelings–except the misguided sense that we should care. It’s a trick of the mind. Evolutionary brainwashing.
Now, just as our feelings are predetermined from a Darwinian standpoint, our feelings are predetermined from a Christian standpoint.
Up to a point, Michael, if he were a Christian, could say much the same thing: “I want to save these children. I can’t help myself. I can’t control how I feel. But I know I was conditioned to feel this way by God.”
Yet here is where the two positions part company. Both are deterministic, but they have opposing consequences.
If my protective feelings for children were programmed into me by God, then I should honor my feelings. These feelings are the moral result of a moral agent.
These are feelings I ought to have. It’s built into the way in which God designed the human race. These feelings have an obligatory force.
Both the Christian and the Darwinian are aware of their preconditioning. For the Darwinian, consciousness of his programming is an opportunity to disaffirm his programming; for the Christian, consciousness of his programming is an opportunity to reaffirm his programming.
Both the Christian and the Darwinian can resist their paternal (or maternal) instincts. But the Christian has no motivation to do so. To the contrary, the realization that his paternal feelings are God-given is a ratification of his feelings. An incentive to embrace his duty–in the confidence that supreme wisdom is the architect of his parental instinct.
For the Darwinian, enlightenment logically leads to amorality. For the Christian, enlightenment logically leads to virtue. For the Darwinian, lucidity is the foe of morality; for the Christian, lucidity is the friend of morality.
In secular ethics, parents sacrifice their children (abortion, infanticide) for the parents’ welfare. In Christian ethics, parents sacrifice themselves for their children’s welfare.
Nietzsche was right about the respective moral consequences of Christian ethics and secular ethics.
It's Not About You
From Jeremy Pierce:
I had a friend who used to conclude from his conviction of God's sovereignty and the fact that a young woman he was attracted to happened to cross his path that day that God was sending him a message about his future with that young woman. It was hard to convince him that just because it was part of God's plan that he run across her path that doesn't mean it was for the reason he might think God had them cross paths. It could be because his running into her reminded her of something she needed to be reminded of that day. It could have been because of something unrelated to the two of them, though, for instance maybe because God wanted them each to be at separate locations shortly after that, and the best way to achieve that at the precise times he wanted them to arrive was for them to walk right by each other. It could have even been so that he could have this conversation with me and be reminded that it's not always about him and what he wants. (keep reading)
In search of the criterion of truth
Fr. Maximus Says:
March 30, 2009 at 2:38 pm
Notice the ecclesiological implications of this passage. A local council is just as capable of defining the Orthodox faith as an Ecumenical council: the criterion of truth is not how many bishops agree to it, but whether it accords with the Apostolic teaching of the Church. Consequently, a local council is also competent to anathematize heretics. This is because the plenitude of the Church is found in each local Church.
http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2009/03/29/st-maximus-on-caesaropapism/#comment-8446
Doesn't that merely push the question back a step? By what criterion does he identify the Apostolic teaching of the Church?
NeoChalcedonian Says:
March 30, 2009 at 5:20 pm
“It is ____________ that gives authority to a council.”
Let’s survey some of the most well-known answers:
1. the Emperor
2. Universal reception by local churches
3. Papal approval
4. Incorporation into Liturgy
5. Orthodoxy of its teaching
(1) might be true in a strictly legal sense (Roman law), but (5) is the only correct answer with respect to dogmatic authority, (2)-(4) are at best noteworthy potential signs/effects of (5). How (5) is identified/proven is a separate question.
http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2009/03/29/st-maximus-on-caesaropapism/#comment-8450
Doesn't this amount to saying the criterion of truth is true teaching? Does that make the content its own criterion? Do you determine true teaching by a criterion of truth, or by true content?
photios Says:
March 30, 2009 at 5:43 pm
Yep, brings us back to the question of how we identify Orthodoxy, especially when institutions have been co-opted.
http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2009/03/29/st-maximus-on-caesaropapism/#comment-8451
And how does he propose to answer that question?
Fr. Maximus Says:
March 30, 2009 at 5:59 pm
(5) Precisely. I think the solution is not formulaic, but involves looking to see whether there is fidelity to the entirety of tradition. This does not mean that it devolves in a Protestant sense onto the judgment of the individual, however. The consensus patrum is generally pretty clear, and whenever a heresy arises it involves either rejecting part of tradition or exaggerating one element or one father over the rest. So nestorianism is based on Theodore of Mopsuestia to the exclusion of the others; monophysitism is based on St. Cyril to the exclusion of the other Fathers; Papism is based on St. Augustine to the exclusion of the other Fathers. Iconoclasm and Protestantism simply reject tradition or part of it. Exclusion could also mean that the other Fathers are read through the lenses of or subordinated to the favorite authority.
http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2009/03/29/st-maximus-on-caesaropapism/#comment-8452
i) By what criterion does he identify this or that individual as a church father?
ii) By what criterion does he identify the entirely of tradition?
iii) By what criterion does he distinguish orthodox tradition from heterodox tradition?
NeoChalcedonian Says:
March 30, 2009 at 8:33 pm
The words of Scripture presuppose a knowledge of and participation in the original Apostolic community’s shared paradigmatic structure of worship, thought and new life in Christ (the rest of Holy Tradition) that is made possible and preserved by Church alone. Bishops, Synods and the Holy Fathers have the potential to speak infallibly singly and collectively concerning the original content of the Apostles’ written and oral teaching insofar as members of God’s body; the living Head of which is Christ. No one formulaic procedural action or mechanism signals or necessitates the activation of this divine power.
http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2009/03/29/st-maximus-on-caesaropapism/#comment-8453
i) So Jews like Ezra, Nehemiah, and Zecharias didn't have or grasp the words of Scripture?
ii) How does he identify the structure of worship of the original Apostolic community?
iii) Since all Christians are members of the body of Christ, under the headship of Christ, how does that single out bishops, synods, and holy fathers to the exclusion of other members of the body?
iv) Isn't his denial of a "formulaic procedure or mechanism" just a euphemistic admission that he has no objective criterion of truth?
Fr. Maximus Says:
March 30, 2009 at 10:48 pm
It is not a tautology. What he means is that there is no external factor which can garrantee that a council is valid. In this case he is referring to approval by an emperor, but the logic applies equally well to say the Pope: pace the Roman apologists, if St. Maximus had really believed in Papal supremecy as is claimed he simply would have stated here that papal approval is the litmus test for a council’s Orthodoxy. But instead he says that the only thing that garrantees a council’s orthodoxy is whether or not it has expressed what the Church has always believed. So… the faith of the Church never changes at all.
http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2009/03/29/st-maximus-on-caesaropapism/#comment-8456
What the church always believes. Would that be a historical criterion? What about various controversies like iconoclasm or hesychasm? What did the church always believe?
Thus far I haven't' seen any of the Orthodox commenters offer a criterion that isn't viciously circular or viciously regressive.
March 30, 2009 at 2:38 pm
Notice the ecclesiological implications of this passage. A local council is just as capable of defining the Orthodox faith as an Ecumenical council: the criterion of truth is not how many bishops agree to it, but whether it accords with the Apostolic teaching of the Church. Consequently, a local council is also competent to anathematize heretics. This is because the plenitude of the Church is found in each local Church.
http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2009/03/29/st-maximus-on-caesaropapism/#comment-8446
Doesn't that merely push the question back a step? By what criterion does he identify the Apostolic teaching of the Church?
NeoChalcedonian Says:
March 30, 2009 at 5:20 pm
“It is ____________ that gives authority to a council.”
Let’s survey some of the most well-known answers:
1. the Emperor
2. Universal reception by local churches
3. Papal approval
4. Incorporation into Liturgy
5. Orthodoxy of its teaching
(1) might be true in a strictly legal sense (Roman law), but (5) is the only correct answer with respect to dogmatic authority, (2)-(4) are at best noteworthy potential signs/effects of (5). How (5) is identified/proven is a separate question.
http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2009/03/29/st-maximus-on-caesaropapism/#comment-8450
Doesn't this amount to saying the criterion of truth is true teaching? Does that make the content its own criterion? Do you determine true teaching by a criterion of truth, or by true content?
photios Says:
March 30, 2009 at 5:43 pm
Yep, brings us back to the question of how we identify Orthodoxy, especially when institutions have been co-opted.
http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2009/03/29/st-maximus-on-caesaropapism/#comment-8451
And how does he propose to answer that question?
Fr. Maximus Says:
March 30, 2009 at 5:59 pm
(5) Precisely. I think the solution is not formulaic, but involves looking to see whether there is fidelity to the entirety of tradition. This does not mean that it devolves in a Protestant sense onto the judgment of the individual, however. The consensus patrum is generally pretty clear, and whenever a heresy arises it involves either rejecting part of tradition or exaggerating one element or one father over the rest. So nestorianism is based on Theodore of Mopsuestia to the exclusion of the others; monophysitism is based on St. Cyril to the exclusion of the other Fathers; Papism is based on St. Augustine to the exclusion of the other Fathers. Iconoclasm and Protestantism simply reject tradition or part of it. Exclusion could also mean that the other Fathers are read through the lenses of or subordinated to the favorite authority.
http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2009/03/29/st-maximus-on-caesaropapism/#comment-8452
i) By what criterion does he identify this or that individual as a church father?
ii) By what criterion does he identify the entirely of tradition?
iii) By what criterion does he distinguish orthodox tradition from heterodox tradition?
NeoChalcedonian Says:
March 30, 2009 at 8:33 pm
The words of Scripture presuppose a knowledge of and participation in the original Apostolic community’s shared paradigmatic structure of worship, thought and new life in Christ (the rest of Holy Tradition) that is made possible and preserved by Church alone. Bishops, Synods and the Holy Fathers have the potential to speak infallibly singly and collectively concerning the original content of the Apostles’ written and oral teaching insofar as members of God’s body; the living Head of which is Christ. No one formulaic procedural action or mechanism signals or necessitates the activation of this divine power.
http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2009/03/29/st-maximus-on-caesaropapism/#comment-8453
i) So Jews like Ezra, Nehemiah, and Zecharias didn't have or grasp the words of Scripture?
ii) How does he identify the structure of worship of the original Apostolic community?
iii) Since all Christians are members of the body of Christ, under the headship of Christ, how does that single out bishops, synods, and holy fathers to the exclusion of other members of the body?
iv) Isn't his denial of a "formulaic procedure or mechanism" just a euphemistic admission that he has no objective criterion of truth?
Fr. Maximus Says:
March 30, 2009 at 10:48 pm
It is not a tautology. What he means is that there is no external factor which can garrantee that a council is valid. In this case he is referring to approval by an emperor, but the logic applies equally well to say the Pope: pace the Roman apologists, if St. Maximus had really believed in Papal supremecy as is claimed he simply would have stated here that papal approval is the litmus test for a council’s Orthodoxy. But instead he says that the only thing that garrantees a council’s orthodoxy is whether or not it has expressed what the Church has always believed. So… the faith of the Church never changes at all.
http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2009/03/29/st-maximus-on-caesaropapism/#comment-8456
What the church always believes. Would that be a historical criterion? What about various controversies like iconoclasm or hesychasm? What did the church always believe?
Thus far I haven't' seen any of the Orthodox commenters offer a criterion that isn't viciously circular or viciously regressive.
Degrees of liternalness in Bible translation
Here's a helpful post from Kenny Pearce on Bible translation.
Speaking for myself, I'd add that I tend to enjoy translations which aim for literary excellence as well. In this regard, I think the KJV or AV is, even today, nonpareil. The NEB (or REB) probably comes closest for a modern English translation which isn't in the Tyndale-KJV lineage. But it's far too theologically liberal for me -- owing, at least from what I understand, primarily to the influence of C.H. Dodd (e.g. "expiation" rather than "propitiation"). Still, there's an audible stylistic beauty to the language of the KJV and, to a lesser extent, the NEB. Many passages all but sing with a melodious note which is quite pleasing to hear.
On the other hand, as C.S. Lewis wrote in his preface to J.B. Phillips' translation of the NT:
Speaking for myself, I'd add that I tend to enjoy translations which aim for literary excellence as well. In this regard, I think the KJV or AV is, even today, nonpareil. The NEB (or REB) probably comes closest for a modern English translation which isn't in the Tyndale-KJV lineage. But it's far too theologically liberal for me -- owing, at least from what I understand, primarily to the influence of C.H. Dodd (e.g. "expiation" rather than "propitiation"). Still, there's an audible stylistic beauty to the language of the KJV and, to a lesser extent, the NEB. Many passages all but sing with a melodious note which is quite pleasing to hear.
On the other hand, as C.S. Lewis wrote in his preface to J.B. Phillips' translation of the NT:
The New Testament in the original Greek is not a work of literary art: it is not written in a solemn, ecclesiastical language, it is written in the sort of Greek which was spoken over the Eastern Mediterranean after Greek had become an international language and therefore lost its real beauty and subtlety. In it we see Greek used by people who have no real feeling for Greek words because Greek words are not the words they spoke when they were children. It is a sort of 'basic' Greek; a language without roots in the soil, a utilitarian, commercial and administrative language. . . . When we expect that it should have come before the World in all the beauty that we now feel in the Authorised Version we are . . . wide of the mark . . . The real sanctity, the real beauty and sublimity of the New Testament (as of Christ's life) are of a different sort: miles deeper or further in.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
"To be deep in history"
“A second problem has to do with our ‘reading’ of church history. Often we speak of our unity during the first millennium. But such appeals to history can be misleading or even dangerous. We all know the old adage, that you can prove anything by Scripture. Much the same could be said of church history. Both the 19th-century papal initiatives vis-à-vis the East and the Eastern responses to these initiatives appealed to the undivided Church of the first millennium, or the Church of the seven ecumenical councils, but they drew from the historical record very different conclusions. We still face the same problem today. Should more weight be given to Leo the Great’s legates at the Council of Chalcedon, who referred to him as universalis papa, or to Gregory the Great, who pointedly objected when Eulogius of Alexandria referred to him as universalis papa? Should we regard as particularly significant the fact that St. John Chrysostom appealed to Pope Innocent of Rome after his deposition from the see of Constantinople, or should we also take into account the fact that he appealed as well to Venerius of Milan and Chromatius of Aquilea?”
http://www.svots.edu/Faculty/John-Erickson/articles/canon-28-english.html/
http://www.svots.edu/Faculty/John-Erickson/articles/canon-28-english.html/
Eastern Orthodox hermeneutics
Swinburne on Interpretation of the Old Testament
“The modern world… has become very conscious of the fact that some passages of the Old Testament cannot be treated [in a literal or straightly historical way]; for they state (and not merely presuppose) scientific and historical falsities, or they represent God as commanding immoral conduct (not merely conduct which might seem less than the best), or otherwise behaving immorally. It has therefore tended to say that the Old Testament contains a mixture of truth and falsity, revelation and misunderstanding; and that attitude of course leads to a fairly low view of the sacredness of Scripture. And if one reads the books of the Old Testament on their own, either straight or historically, one must certainly say that, if God was inspiring the development of Israel and its recording in the Old Testament, his inspiration got mixed with much error. But what the modern world has forgotten is that the Church, which followed Irenaeus and subsequent Fathers in proclaiming the Old Testament to be Scripture, also followed the way which he initiated in interpreting in metaphorical senses many passages of that Testament which were not edifying if taken in straight or historical senses. As noted above, Irenaeus himself tends to assume that all such passages are to be understood in straight or historical ways, even if they had also a more important metaphorical meaning. But his successors took the logical step of maintaining that these passages had only a metaphorical meaning (or more than one metaphorical meaning). This metaphorical meaning is a meaning forced on the passage, not by considerations of the need to make sense of that passage as a passage of the biblical book taken on its own, but by the need to make sense of it as part of a Christian Scripture.”
Revelation: From Metaphor to Analogy p 265
8. MG - January 23, 2009
I am likewise fascinated by Swinburne’s solution to the issue of OT immorality, and the fact that it isn’t overwhelmingly implausible (once we jettison Protestant assumptions about the Bible–which are not themselves plausible).
http://wellofquestions.wordpress.com/2009/01/10/swinburne-on-interpretation-of-the-old-testament/
The Antiochian School of Biblical Exegesis
Besides the great names you already know about and you will hear in the Church from time to time, Antioch became known in the fourth and fifth centuries for its tradition of biblical exegesis represented in Diodor of Tarsus, the city of the Apostle Paul, his students Theodore of Mopsuestia and St John Chrysostom, as well as later Theodoret of Cyrus. Unlike the biblical approach prevailing in Alexandria at that time which made much use of allegory in its interpretation of Scripture, the Antiochian school stressed the primacy of historical exegesis.
The Alexandrian Allegory
Allegory tends to find different meanings in the one text, the premise being that men undergo three different stages in their seeking after God and union with Him: the lowest being the 'physical', then the 'psychological', and the highest being the 'spiritual.' At each of these levels, the allegorists say, man is capable of a different understanding of the same text, which thus offers different levels of meanings, the deepest being the 'spiritual.' From there it was only a tiny step to saying: the text itself has three different meanings! Now the fallacy as well as danger of such an approach lies in that its premise was rooted in a philosophical system that was alien to the Bible. This system conceived of creation as being essentially evil and thus of man's salvation as an 'inward' discovery, as well as growth in the knowledge of God, with whom eventually man becomes one. Consequently, history -- which is interaction between man and his fellow within the setting of creation -- is discredited as irrelevant. Furthermore, the text itself of the Bible becomes, as it were, at the mercy of the individual interpreter who could thus stretch it as far as his own interests dictate. In other words, the Bible becomes a mere crutch to prop our own preset ideas and preferences instead of the challenging and -- why not? -- upsetting Word of God.
The Antiochian Approach to the Bible
The Antiochian school reacted against such an approach and underscored the historicity of the Bible, namely that the latter consists of texts written by individuals to others at a given time of human history in the specific language as well as mindset of that time. Consequently, a given text can have only the one meaning intended by its author.
http://www.svots.edu/Faculty/Very_Rev_Paul_Nadim_Tarazi_Category/The_Antiochian_School_of_Biblical_Exegesis/
“The modern world… has become very conscious of the fact that some passages of the Old Testament cannot be treated [in a literal or straightly historical way]; for they state (and not merely presuppose) scientific and historical falsities, or they represent God as commanding immoral conduct (not merely conduct which might seem less than the best), or otherwise behaving immorally. It has therefore tended to say that the Old Testament contains a mixture of truth and falsity, revelation and misunderstanding; and that attitude of course leads to a fairly low view of the sacredness of Scripture. And if one reads the books of the Old Testament on their own, either straight or historically, one must certainly say that, if God was inspiring the development of Israel and its recording in the Old Testament, his inspiration got mixed with much error. But what the modern world has forgotten is that the Church, which followed Irenaeus and subsequent Fathers in proclaiming the Old Testament to be Scripture, also followed the way which he initiated in interpreting in metaphorical senses many passages of that Testament which were not edifying if taken in straight or historical senses. As noted above, Irenaeus himself tends to assume that all such passages are to be understood in straight or historical ways, even if they had also a more important metaphorical meaning. But his successors took the logical step of maintaining that these passages had only a metaphorical meaning (or more than one metaphorical meaning). This metaphorical meaning is a meaning forced on the passage, not by considerations of the need to make sense of that passage as a passage of the biblical book taken on its own, but by the need to make sense of it as part of a Christian Scripture.”
Revelation: From Metaphor to Analogy p 265
8. MG - January 23, 2009
I am likewise fascinated by Swinburne’s solution to the issue of OT immorality, and the fact that it isn’t overwhelmingly implausible (once we jettison Protestant assumptions about the Bible–which are not themselves plausible).
http://wellofquestions.wordpress.com/2009/01/10/swinburne-on-interpretation-of-the-old-testament/
The Antiochian School of Biblical Exegesis
Besides the great names you already know about and you will hear in the Church from time to time, Antioch became known in the fourth and fifth centuries for its tradition of biblical exegesis represented in Diodor of Tarsus, the city of the Apostle Paul, his students Theodore of Mopsuestia and St John Chrysostom, as well as later Theodoret of Cyrus. Unlike the biblical approach prevailing in Alexandria at that time which made much use of allegory in its interpretation of Scripture, the Antiochian school stressed the primacy of historical exegesis.
The Alexandrian Allegory
Allegory tends to find different meanings in the one text, the premise being that men undergo three different stages in their seeking after God and union with Him: the lowest being the 'physical', then the 'psychological', and the highest being the 'spiritual.' At each of these levels, the allegorists say, man is capable of a different understanding of the same text, which thus offers different levels of meanings, the deepest being the 'spiritual.' From there it was only a tiny step to saying: the text itself has three different meanings! Now the fallacy as well as danger of such an approach lies in that its premise was rooted in a philosophical system that was alien to the Bible. This system conceived of creation as being essentially evil and thus of man's salvation as an 'inward' discovery, as well as growth in the knowledge of God, with whom eventually man becomes one. Consequently, history -- which is interaction between man and his fellow within the setting of creation -- is discredited as irrelevant. Furthermore, the text itself of the Bible becomes, as it were, at the mercy of the individual interpreter who could thus stretch it as far as his own interests dictate. In other words, the Bible becomes a mere crutch to prop our own preset ideas and preferences instead of the challenging and -- why not? -- upsetting Word of God.
The Antiochian Approach to the Bible
The Antiochian school reacted against such an approach and underscored the historicity of the Bible, namely that the latter consists of texts written by individuals to others at a given time of human history in the specific language as well as mindset of that time. Consequently, a given text can have only the one meaning intended by its author.
http://www.svots.edu/Faculty/Very_Rev_Paul_Nadim_Tarazi_Category/The_Antiochian_School_of_Biblical_Exegesis/
Encyclopedia of Christian Civilization
“At primary issue is the text's 40-page introduction, which Kurian authored. The language of that opening salvo pricked the sensibilities of two editorial board members, Duke religion professor David Morgan and Bernard McGinn, professor emeritus of historical theology and the history of Christianity at the University of Chicago Divinity School. According to Kurian, the pair of scholars raised questions about balance and tone, setting off alarm bells at Wiley-Blackwell and triggering an order to re-edit the entire encyclopedia with such issues in mind…But a reading of the text indicates the issue may be more complicated. Much of the language in Kurian's introduction borders on the inflammatory, such as when he compares Mongols and Turks to ‘locusts’ who ‘wiped out the church in Asia.’ Elsewhere in the text, the successes of Christianity and Christians are recounted at length with no mention of shortcomings or violence. Wiley-Blackwell executives dubbed that presentation propagandistic. Kurian, who is Eastern Orthodox, defends it…”
http://www.worldmag.com/articles/15191
Assuming that Kurian’s religious identity is the motivation behind the “inflammatory” tone of the introduction, I can’t say I blame him. Historically, the Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox have borne the brunt of the Islamic onslaught.
http://www.worldmag.com/articles/15191
Assuming that Kurian’s religious identity is the motivation behind the “inflammatory” tone of the introduction, I can’t say I blame him. Historically, the Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox have borne the brunt of the Islamic onslaught.
Sola credo
John Frame has posted a provocative little book review:
http://www.frame-poythress.org/frame_articles/2008Jones.htm
For the record, I’m not as bothered by denominations as he is. This is naturally an issue that crops up quite often in debates with Catholics and Orthodoxy, so I won’t repeat myself here.
But I agree with him on the dangers of theological chauvinism. And when I read his little review, examples come to mind.
For instance, there’s a Reformed blog that’s done some very useful work defending sola fide against the onslaught of the New Perspective on Paul. Kudos!
At the same time, there's a very inward-looking quality to this blog. I can't help noticing that, at last count, it has 304 posts on the Federal Vision, 66 on the Westminster standards, 7 on prayer, 1 on abortion, and 1 on Jesus! Isn’t there something more than slightly askew about the priorities?
Overemphasis on Reformed creeds is the mirror-image of Eastern Orthodoxy.
I judge a theologian by how faithful he was in making the best of the circumstances God put him in. In general, I think the church fathers, as well as theologians like Aquinas, were faithful stewards of the opportunities, as well as limitations, which their historical setting afforded them. They made mistakes, some serious–but because I make allowance for their situation, I’m prepared to cut them some slack.
However, that’s a two-way street. We have some different challenges than they had. We have some different resources than they had. Our calling is not to be faithful to them, or reproduce their problem-solving strategies.
Our calling is to be faithful in the situation God has put us, which varies in time and place, for individuals and generations.
To be sure, there are cultural universals as well as cultural particulars. We can learn from our forebears. But, by the same token, there's a sense in which they can also learn from us.
We're not living in the 5C or the 17C. We must apply the word of God to the world of God in which God has placed us. The answers are not always the same. Even in the Bible itself, we see some adaptation to the demands of the moment (e.g. Num 27:1-11).
There's a faction within contemporary Calvinism that's beginning to act like the Quakers and the Amish–who used to judge fidelity to God by wearing quaint clothes and using quaint speech. It's the same mindset.
There are some factions within contemporary Calvinism which seems to treat the Bible like a forest. At one time the forest was helpful to have around. It supplied the raw lumber, but now that we’ve built our edifice, the forest is mainly scenic. From here on out we can live inside our creeds and confessions. We don’t even need windows. Mirrors will do nicely!
Who needs the Bible when we can immerse ourselves in The Practice of Confessional Subscription or Recovering the Reformed Confession?
On this view, the Bible is like a ladder or a bridge. Once you climb the ladder or cross the bridge, you don’t need it anymore. You can put it behind you.
We already know what the Bible says before we open it, because we already know, before we open the Bible, that our creed is biblical. So we don’t need to open our Bible; we only need to open our creed. We no longer need to compare the creed with the Bible. That’s been settled. End of story. Time to stop writing commentaries on the Bible and start writing commentaries on the creed.
If that’s the attitude, then why hire an OT prof. or NT prof.? Why not have your seminary staffed exclusively by church historians?
In fact, that’s more than a rhetorical question. Recently a well-known Reformed seminary hired a NT prof. Only one thing: he received his doctorate, not in NT studies, but in church history!
There are also a number of unaccredited Reformed seminaries that don’t feel the need to have both an OT prof. or NT prof. It’s enough to teach Reformed historical theology.
Make note: I’m not knocking these seminaries for being unaccredited. A seminary can have legitimate reasons for avoiding the accreditation process. My problem is with the notion that we can dispense with Bible studies and jump right into our creeds and confessions and historical theology.
There’s a name for that mentality: cult.
On a related note, it’s tiresome to read all these apocalyptic obituaries on the gloomy future of the evangelical movement. The Christian generation just ahead of you and me is always going to hell in a handbasket. Just ask your parents. Or grandparents. Or great-grandparents.
Frankly, I don’t seem much evidence that Christians are all that different from one generation to the next. It’s easy to idealize the past–because we didn’t live back then. We need to stop slandering the next generation. We’re entitled to give the younger generation some advice. But members of the younger generation must be faithful to the situation wherein God has placed them. They don’t have a duty to us. They have a duty to God.
Let’s at least wait until the patient is good and dead before we publish the obituary. For the would-be decedent has a way of falsifying a premature obituary.
http://www.frame-poythress.org/frame_articles/2008Jones.htm
For the record, I’m not as bothered by denominations as he is. This is naturally an issue that crops up quite often in debates with Catholics and Orthodoxy, so I won’t repeat myself here.
But I agree with him on the dangers of theological chauvinism. And when I read his little review, examples come to mind.
For instance, there’s a Reformed blog that’s done some very useful work defending sola fide against the onslaught of the New Perspective on Paul. Kudos!
At the same time, there's a very inward-looking quality to this blog. I can't help noticing that, at last count, it has 304 posts on the Federal Vision, 66 on the Westminster standards, 7 on prayer, 1 on abortion, and 1 on Jesus! Isn’t there something more than slightly askew about the priorities?
Overemphasis on Reformed creeds is the mirror-image of Eastern Orthodoxy.
I judge a theologian by how faithful he was in making the best of the circumstances God put him in. In general, I think the church fathers, as well as theologians like Aquinas, were faithful stewards of the opportunities, as well as limitations, which their historical setting afforded them. They made mistakes, some serious–but because I make allowance for their situation, I’m prepared to cut them some slack.
However, that’s a two-way street. We have some different challenges than they had. We have some different resources than they had. Our calling is not to be faithful to them, or reproduce their problem-solving strategies.
Our calling is to be faithful in the situation God has put us, which varies in time and place, for individuals and generations.
To be sure, there are cultural universals as well as cultural particulars. We can learn from our forebears. But, by the same token, there's a sense in which they can also learn from us.
We're not living in the 5C or the 17C. We must apply the word of God to the world of God in which God has placed us. The answers are not always the same. Even in the Bible itself, we see some adaptation to the demands of the moment (e.g. Num 27:1-11).
There's a faction within contemporary Calvinism that's beginning to act like the Quakers and the Amish–who used to judge fidelity to God by wearing quaint clothes and using quaint speech. It's the same mindset.
There are some factions within contemporary Calvinism which seems to treat the Bible like a forest. At one time the forest was helpful to have around. It supplied the raw lumber, but now that we’ve built our edifice, the forest is mainly scenic. From here on out we can live inside our creeds and confessions. We don’t even need windows. Mirrors will do nicely!
Who needs the Bible when we can immerse ourselves in The Practice of Confessional Subscription or Recovering the Reformed Confession?
On this view, the Bible is like a ladder or a bridge. Once you climb the ladder or cross the bridge, you don’t need it anymore. You can put it behind you.
We already know what the Bible says before we open it, because we already know, before we open the Bible, that our creed is biblical. So we don’t need to open our Bible; we only need to open our creed. We no longer need to compare the creed with the Bible. That’s been settled. End of story. Time to stop writing commentaries on the Bible and start writing commentaries on the creed.
If that’s the attitude, then why hire an OT prof. or NT prof.? Why not have your seminary staffed exclusively by church historians?
In fact, that’s more than a rhetorical question. Recently a well-known Reformed seminary hired a NT prof. Only one thing: he received his doctorate, not in NT studies, but in church history!
There are also a number of unaccredited Reformed seminaries that don’t feel the need to have both an OT prof. or NT prof. It’s enough to teach Reformed historical theology.
Make note: I’m not knocking these seminaries for being unaccredited. A seminary can have legitimate reasons for avoiding the accreditation process. My problem is with the notion that we can dispense with Bible studies and jump right into our creeds and confessions and historical theology.
There’s a name for that mentality: cult.
On a related note, it’s tiresome to read all these apocalyptic obituaries on the gloomy future of the evangelical movement. The Christian generation just ahead of you and me is always going to hell in a handbasket. Just ask your parents. Or grandparents. Or great-grandparents.
Frankly, I don’t seem much evidence that Christians are all that different from one generation to the next. It’s easy to idealize the past–because we didn’t live back then. We need to stop slandering the next generation. We’re entitled to give the younger generation some advice. But members of the younger generation must be faithful to the situation wherein God has placed them. They don’t have a duty to us. They have a duty to God.
Let’s at least wait until the patient is good and dead before we publish the obituary. For the would-be decedent has a way of falsifying a premature obituary.
Monday, March 30, 2009
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Online resources regarding homosexuality
A tale of two singers
Jerome Hines died in 2003 while Regine Crespin died in 2007. Both of them sang at the Met. Both of them were outstanding opera singers.
Hines was arguably the greatest American bass, while Crespin was arguably the greatest French soprano.
Hines sang into his 70s, and there are YouTube clips which reveal a still imposing instrument. Crespin suffered a mid-career vocal crisis from which she never entirely recovered.
Hines had a huge voice. He was a force of nature. And he had excellent vocal technique.
His timber is a bit thick for my taste. I prefer the timber of Nicolai Ghiaurov. Hines’ favorite bass was Jose Mardones.
A number of sopranos have been blessed with gorgeous, womanly voices, viz. Sutherland, Price, Ponselle, Caballé, Milanov.
On rare occasion, a beautiful voice is situated in a beautiful woman, viz. Kiri Te Kanawa.
Visual beauty is a stereotypical feature of the feminine ideal. Yet aural beauty is no less a distinctive mark of the feminine ideal. Simply having a voice like Price or Sutherland or Caballé involves the projection of a feminine ideal.
Crespin also had a lovely, womanly timber. Yet she brought something extra to her singing. She could also project a very feminine persona. She had that feminine capacity to beautiful her surroundings by her radiant presence. To illuminate the text from within, like a candle inside colored glass.
She distinguished herself in the German and Italian repertoire. However, the competition in that repertoire is ferocious, so while she held her own with the best, she was not unrivaled. It’s in the French repertoire that she is peerless.
Mind you, I also enjoy some of Sutherland’s French recordings. But there’s a difference. With Sutherland, it’s a beautiful voice singing French; with Crespin, it’s a voice singing French beautifully.
However, my favorite recording by Crespin is Poulenc’s Stabat Mater–which is, of course, in Latin.
There are a number of lovely musical settings of the Stabat Mater. Scarlatti, Vivaldi, Pergolesi, Haydn and Schubert come to mind. Each setting is a period piece.
Crespin doesn’t have a lot to do on this recording, but she’s one of those singers who makes every phrase unforgettable.
There’s a triste quality to her timber which, I expect, reflects her own life. Her mother was an alcoholic, and that left its mark on Crespin.
Poulenc’s Stabat Mater is very much the sort of work you’d expect from a 20C Frenchmen. Full of yearning and disillusionment. And Crespin perfectly complements the mood of the piece.
I generally prefer Poulenc in the slower, quieter movements.
It’s a powerful piece of music, both emotionally and spiritually. Yet I listen to the recording with a sense of irony. For I know a little too much about the principals.
Poulenc was bisexual–if not homosexual. Crespin was a very worldly woman who had her share of affairs, with an abortion along the way, and pinned her hopes of immortality on reincarnation. Truly a lost soul. There was always a striking disjunction between the feminine ideal she projected onstage, and the offstage reality.
It’s odd to hear two unbelievers, two worldlings, express such intense religious longing. Worldly men and women with an otherworldly yearning.
That’s not surprising. God has planted eternity in the human heart (Eccl. 3:14), so even unbelievers feel the pull of something greater than the sensible world and something better than the fallen world.
There’s a sense in which great music is a religious experience. That’s because it utilizes the natural media which God has created and put at our disposal.
But it’s not, of itself, a redemptive experience. It’s a manufactured experience.
And the religious dimension doesn’t depend on the text or the creed. For one thing, instrumental music can have the same effect.
For another thing, great religious music transcends any particular denomination. I have a magnificent recording of Boris Christoff singing Orthodox chants.
Although it lacks the uniquely feminine appeal of Crespin, it is, in its own way, just as powerful. But in a completely different way. Poulenc’s Stabat Mater is the unmistakable expression of French Catholic piety while Strumski’s “Veliko slavoslovie” is the unmistakable expression of Slavonic Orthodoxy piety. They inhabit different worlds, each with a self-contained spirituality.
We could also compare this with Bach’s St. Matthew Passion. Or Negro spirituals. Or Wesleyan hymnody. While music can express a distinctive religious tradition, cannot attest a distinctive religious tradition.
For his part, Hines charted a very different course. A scientist by training, he was an unbeliever until God moved in his life in many miraculous ways.
I’ll conclude with one or two personal anecdotes. I once heard Hines sing at a soup kitchen in Seattle. He would have been in his mid-60’s at the time. He practically blew out the windows from the sheer volume. Here was a man who sang at all the world’s great opera houses, but took time to share his Christian witness with some bums in a no-account soup kitchen.
My late Aunt Dorothy was a long-time resident of Oklahoma City. She was also an opera buff. For some reason, Jerome Hines was in town. For some reason, my Aunt Dorothy and her brother were chauffeuring him around town.
Anyway, Hines asked if they were Christian. Her brother said no, or at least he wasn’t sure.
After hearing that answer, Hines spent the entire night in the car with her brother, persuading him to become a Christian.
Hines was arguably the greatest American bass, while Crespin was arguably the greatest French soprano.
Hines sang into his 70s, and there are YouTube clips which reveal a still imposing instrument. Crespin suffered a mid-career vocal crisis from which she never entirely recovered.
Hines had a huge voice. He was a force of nature. And he had excellent vocal technique.
His timber is a bit thick for my taste. I prefer the timber of Nicolai Ghiaurov. Hines’ favorite bass was Jose Mardones.
A number of sopranos have been blessed with gorgeous, womanly voices, viz. Sutherland, Price, Ponselle, Caballé, Milanov.
On rare occasion, a beautiful voice is situated in a beautiful woman, viz. Kiri Te Kanawa.
Visual beauty is a stereotypical feature of the feminine ideal. Yet aural beauty is no less a distinctive mark of the feminine ideal. Simply having a voice like Price or Sutherland or Caballé involves the projection of a feminine ideal.
Crespin also had a lovely, womanly timber. Yet she brought something extra to her singing. She could also project a very feminine persona. She had that feminine capacity to beautiful her surroundings by her radiant presence. To illuminate the text from within, like a candle inside colored glass.
She distinguished herself in the German and Italian repertoire. However, the competition in that repertoire is ferocious, so while she held her own with the best, she was not unrivaled. It’s in the French repertoire that she is peerless.
Mind you, I also enjoy some of Sutherland’s French recordings. But there’s a difference. With Sutherland, it’s a beautiful voice singing French; with Crespin, it’s a voice singing French beautifully.
However, my favorite recording by Crespin is Poulenc’s Stabat Mater–which is, of course, in Latin.
There are a number of lovely musical settings of the Stabat Mater. Scarlatti, Vivaldi, Pergolesi, Haydn and Schubert come to mind. Each setting is a period piece.
Crespin doesn’t have a lot to do on this recording, but she’s one of those singers who makes every phrase unforgettable.
There’s a triste quality to her timber which, I expect, reflects her own life. Her mother was an alcoholic, and that left its mark on Crespin.
Poulenc’s Stabat Mater is very much the sort of work you’d expect from a 20C Frenchmen. Full of yearning and disillusionment. And Crespin perfectly complements the mood of the piece.
I generally prefer Poulenc in the slower, quieter movements.
It’s a powerful piece of music, both emotionally and spiritually. Yet I listen to the recording with a sense of irony. For I know a little too much about the principals.
Poulenc was bisexual–if not homosexual. Crespin was a very worldly woman who had her share of affairs, with an abortion along the way, and pinned her hopes of immortality on reincarnation. Truly a lost soul. There was always a striking disjunction between the feminine ideal she projected onstage, and the offstage reality.
It’s odd to hear two unbelievers, two worldlings, express such intense religious longing. Worldly men and women with an otherworldly yearning.
That’s not surprising. God has planted eternity in the human heart (Eccl. 3:14), so even unbelievers feel the pull of something greater than the sensible world and something better than the fallen world.
There’s a sense in which great music is a religious experience. That’s because it utilizes the natural media which God has created and put at our disposal.
But it’s not, of itself, a redemptive experience. It’s a manufactured experience.
And the religious dimension doesn’t depend on the text or the creed. For one thing, instrumental music can have the same effect.
For another thing, great religious music transcends any particular denomination. I have a magnificent recording of Boris Christoff singing Orthodox chants.
Although it lacks the uniquely feminine appeal of Crespin, it is, in its own way, just as powerful. But in a completely different way. Poulenc’s Stabat Mater is the unmistakable expression of French Catholic piety while Strumski’s “Veliko slavoslovie” is the unmistakable expression of Slavonic Orthodoxy piety. They inhabit different worlds, each with a self-contained spirituality.
We could also compare this with Bach’s St. Matthew Passion. Or Negro spirituals. Or Wesleyan hymnody. While music can express a distinctive religious tradition, cannot attest a distinctive religious tradition.
For his part, Hines charted a very different course. A scientist by training, he was an unbeliever until God moved in his life in many miraculous ways.
I’ll conclude with one or two personal anecdotes. I once heard Hines sing at a soup kitchen in Seattle. He would have been in his mid-60’s at the time. He practically blew out the windows from the sheer volume. Here was a man who sang at all the world’s great opera houses, but took time to share his Christian witness with some bums in a no-account soup kitchen.
My late Aunt Dorothy was a long-time resident of Oklahoma City. She was also an opera buff. For some reason, Jerome Hines was in town. For some reason, my Aunt Dorothy and her brother were chauffeuring him around town.
Anyway, Hines asked if they were Christian. Her brother said no, or at least he wasn’t sure.
After hearing that answer, Hines spent the entire night in the car with her brother, persuading him to become a Christian.
Why my doctrine of doctrinal development is better than your doctrine of doctrinal development is better than your doctrine of doctrinal development!
“On February 5, I posted a piece called ‘The authority question restated.’ I argued that the uncommitted inquirer, seeking the full and true presentation of the deposit of Christian faith (DF) as an object of faith rather than just of opinion, faces a choice between three mutually incommensurable ‘hermeneutical circles’: the Protestant, the Orthodox, and the Catholic. Each such circle can be viewed as a set of criteria for identifying the objective content of the DF precisely as an object of faith not opinion; as such and necessarily, each HC identifies an authority of ultimate appeal for distinguishing between true and false doctrine.”
http://mliccione.blogspot.com/2009/02/picking-your-hermeneutical-circle.html
One of the problems with this claim is that Catholic Bible scholars like Joseph Fitzmyer and Luke Timothy Johnson don’t go about interpreting Scripture in a way that’s fundamentally different from how we see Evangelical Bible scholars interpret Scripture. It’s not just that both sides often arrive at the same interpretations: it’s that both sides employ the same methodology. So far from being incommensurable, they are quite comparable.
Now, Liccione might say that this misses the point since he’s not limiting the hermeneutical circle to the narrow issue of Biblical interpretation, but to the broader issue of authority and criteria.
The problem, though, is that as long as the broad and narrow circles intersect at some point, then he can’t treat these two domains as if they were self-contained circles. If there’s a fair amount of common ground on both the interpretation of Scripture as well as the methodology by which we arrive at our interpretation of Scripture, then that, in turn, functions as a criterion or authority for judging rival claims about ecclesiology.
Liccione did a follow-up post:
http://perennis.wordpress.com/2009/03/14/development-of-doctrine-iv/
But the comparison and contrast between his position and that of his fellow Catholics is unintentionally deleterious to the Catholic rule of faith. Consider the spectacle of four high-level Catholic epologists (Carson, Prejean, Watson, Liccinone) who offer four divergent versions of the doctrine of development. Each Catholic epologist has to formulate his own doctrine of the doctrine of the development. They can't agree with each other on the correct interpretation of the doctrine of development. So each Catholic epologist comes an idiosyncratic, do-it-yourself version of what the doctrine of development really amounts to. This illustrates the unavoidable recourse to private interpretation.
http://mliccione.blogspot.com/2009/02/picking-your-hermeneutical-circle.html
One of the problems with this claim is that Catholic Bible scholars like Joseph Fitzmyer and Luke Timothy Johnson don’t go about interpreting Scripture in a way that’s fundamentally different from how we see Evangelical Bible scholars interpret Scripture. It’s not just that both sides often arrive at the same interpretations: it’s that both sides employ the same methodology. So far from being incommensurable, they are quite comparable.
Now, Liccione might say that this misses the point since he’s not limiting the hermeneutical circle to the narrow issue of Biblical interpretation, but to the broader issue of authority and criteria.
The problem, though, is that as long as the broad and narrow circles intersect at some point, then he can’t treat these two domains as if they were self-contained circles. If there’s a fair amount of common ground on both the interpretation of Scripture as well as the methodology by which we arrive at our interpretation of Scripture, then that, in turn, functions as a criterion or authority for judging rival claims about ecclesiology.
Liccione did a follow-up post:
http://perennis.wordpress.com/2009/03/14/development-of-doctrine-iv/
But the comparison and contrast between his position and that of his fellow Catholics is unintentionally deleterious to the Catholic rule of faith. Consider the spectacle of four high-level Catholic epologists (Carson, Prejean, Watson, Liccinone) who offer four divergent versions of the doctrine of development. Each Catholic epologist has to formulate his own doctrine of the doctrine of the development. They can't agree with each other on the correct interpretation of the doctrine of development. So each Catholic epologist comes an idiosyncratic, do-it-yourself version of what the doctrine of development really amounts to. This illustrates the unavoidable recourse to private interpretation.
Resources For Easter
Here’s an archive of our articles on issues related to the resurrection. Steve Hays has written an e-book on the resurrection, titled This Joyful Eastertide. It has hundreds of pages of searchable text and covers a large variety of topics. Gary Habermas, William Lane Craig, Michael Licona, Glenn Miller, J.P. Holding, David Wood, Christian CADRE, and Apologetics 315 have a lot of helpful material.
See, for example, Christian CADRE’s resource page on the resurrection. Chris Price and John Sabatino have a page featuring reviews of Christian and non-Christian books on the resurrection. J.P. Holding has an article on the early Christians’ belief in a physical resurrection. A contributor to his web site has an article on the subjective visions hypothesis. See, also, Gary Habermas’ article on the subject. On harmonization of the resurrection narratives, see here and here. These are just several examples of what you’ll find at these sites.
Triablogue’s Reviews Of Some Resurrection Debates
Steve Hays’ Review Of The 2006 Debate Between Bart Ehrman And William Lane Craig
My Review Of The 2006 Debate Between Bart Ehrman And William Lane Craig
The 2008 Debate Between Bart Ehrman And Michael Licona
The 2008 Debate Between Arif Ahmed And Gary Habermas
The 2009 Debate Between Richard Carrier And William Lane Craig
Triablogue’s Responses To Some Easter Objections
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
The principle of dwindling probabilities renders the resurrection historically unlikely.
The early Christians were biased, and they may have distorted the historical record, so we can’t trust the evidence we have for Jesus’ resurrection.
Ancient people were too gullible for the resurrection accounts to be credible.
Since miracles don't occur today, it's difficult to believe that one occurred two thousand years ago. We've moved beyond the superstitious, pre-scientific worldview of the ancients.
Sometimes eyewitnesses are wrong.
The gospels initially circulated as anonymous documents.
The early enemies of Christianity may have been too apathetic about the religion to refute it, even when they were in a position to do so.
The empty tomb account is late and only comes from Christian sources.
The resurrection witnesses may not have had any physical evidence for their belief in the resurrection. Accounts of physical evidence may not have arisen until around the time when the gospels were written, much later.
The apostle Paul didn’t believe in a physical resurrection.
The resurrection accounts developed over time, as we’d expect with an unhistorical legend.
The resurrection accounts contradict each other.
Harmonization is an invalid practice that’s rejected by mainstream scholarship.
What about miracle claims in other religions?
The gospels were written in a non-historical genre.
Matthew 27:52-53 demonstrates that the gospel writers either weren’t writing in a historical genre or were willing to believe unlikely resurrection accounts or make them up.
The resurrection witnesses experienced naturalistic visions rather than hallucinations.
The risen Christ didn’t appear to enough people.
We don’t have good evidence that witnesses of the resurrection died for their belief in Jesus’ resurrection.
Christian claims about scholarly support for the evidence relevant to the resurrection are insignificant, since so many of those scholars are conservative Christians.
Arguments for the resurrection don’t serve much of a purpose. They don’t change anybody’s mind. They’re only appealing to people who are already Christians, because the arguments make them more confident in their faith.
Easter is a pagan and commercialized holiday, so Christians shouldn’t celebrate it.
See, for example, Christian CADRE’s resource page on the resurrection. Chris Price and John Sabatino have a page featuring reviews of Christian and non-Christian books on the resurrection. J.P. Holding has an article on the early Christians’ belief in a physical resurrection. A contributor to his web site has an article on the subjective visions hypothesis. See, also, Gary Habermas’ article on the subject. On harmonization of the resurrection narratives, see here and here. These are just several examples of what you’ll find at these sites.
Triablogue’s Reviews Of Some Resurrection Debates
Steve Hays’ Review Of The 2006 Debate Between Bart Ehrman And William Lane Craig
My Review Of The 2006 Debate Between Bart Ehrman And William Lane Craig
The 2008 Debate Between Bart Ehrman And Michael Licona
The 2008 Debate Between Arif Ahmed And Gary Habermas
The 2009 Debate Between Richard Carrier And William Lane Craig
Triablogue’s Responses To Some Easter Objections
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
The principle of dwindling probabilities renders the resurrection historically unlikely.
The early Christians were biased, and they may have distorted the historical record, so we can’t trust the evidence we have for Jesus’ resurrection.
Ancient people were too gullible for the resurrection accounts to be credible.
Since miracles don't occur today, it's difficult to believe that one occurred two thousand years ago. We've moved beyond the superstitious, pre-scientific worldview of the ancients.
Sometimes eyewitnesses are wrong.
The gospels initially circulated as anonymous documents.
The early enemies of Christianity may have been too apathetic about the religion to refute it, even when they were in a position to do so.
The empty tomb account is late and only comes from Christian sources.
The resurrection witnesses may not have had any physical evidence for their belief in the resurrection. Accounts of physical evidence may not have arisen until around the time when the gospels were written, much later.
The apostle Paul didn’t believe in a physical resurrection.
The resurrection accounts developed over time, as we’d expect with an unhistorical legend.
The resurrection accounts contradict each other.
Harmonization is an invalid practice that’s rejected by mainstream scholarship.
What about miracle claims in other religions?
The gospels were written in a non-historical genre.
Matthew 27:52-53 demonstrates that the gospel writers either weren’t writing in a historical genre or were willing to believe unlikely resurrection accounts or make them up.
The resurrection witnesses experienced naturalistic visions rather than hallucinations.
The risen Christ didn’t appear to enough people.
We don’t have good evidence that witnesses of the resurrection died for their belief in Jesus’ resurrection.
Christian claims about scholarly support for the evidence relevant to the resurrection are insignificant, since so many of those scholars are conservative Christians.
Arguments for the resurrection don’t serve much of a purpose. They don’t change anybody’s mind. They’re only appealing to people who are already Christians, because the arguments make them more confident in their faith.
Easter is a pagan and commercialized holiday, so Christians shouldn’t celebrate it.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Gay pride
I wrote most of this up some time ago, and my memory being what it is(n't), have unfortunately forgotten to whom and how much I'm indebted for many if not most of these points. My apologies in advance. But please feel free to give proper attribution if you recognize something.
Here are some (preliminary) thoughts on a few things pertaining to homosexuals such as the sin of engaging in homosexual sex:
1. To start with, this should probably be obvious but homosexuals are sinners, not just homosexuals. They're no different from other people with respect to being sinners and sinful. Quite apart from whether or not they've engaged in homosexual acts, they've sinned in other ways such as by lying, hating, stealing, coveting, etc. Homosexuals are by nature sinners like heterosexuals and all people.
2. At least from what I understand, few homosexuals -- particularly male homosexuals -- are monogamous. In fact, many are quite promiscuous. This is itself sinful. That is, let's put aside whether homosexuals are having sex with other homosexuals. And let's simply ask whether they're having sex outside of marriage. If they are, then they're sinning.
However, for some this might raise the related question of whether homosexuals who are in a committed, monogamous relationship would be sinning if they were legally allowed to marry and were married. My immediate response is that I'm not talking about what's legal but rather what's moral. Sin is still sin even if it's legal. In other words, this would be sinful on the grounds that engaging in homosexual acts are in and of themselves sinful, or that homosexual "marriage" perverts the God-established creation ordinance of marriage between a man and a woman.
3. Some people argue that homosexuality is genetic.
Here are some (preliminary) thoughts on a few things pertaining to homosexuals such as the sin of engaging in homosexual sex:
1. To start with, this should probably be obvious but homosexuals are sinners, not just homosexuals. They're no different from other people with respect to being sinners and sinful. Quite apart from whether or not they've engaged in homosexual acts, they've sinned in other ways such as by lying, hating, stealing, coveting, etc. Homosexuals are by nature sinners like heterosexuals and all people.
2. At least from what I understand, few homosexuals -- particularly male homosexuals -- are monogamous. In fact, many are quite promiscuous. This is itself sinful. That is, let's put aside whether homosexuals are having sex with other homosexuals. And let's simply ask whether they're having sex outside of marriage. If they are, then they're sinning.
However, for some this might raise the related question of whether homosexuals who are in a committed, monogamous relationship would be sinning if they were legally allowed to marry and were married. My immediate response is that I'm not talking about what's legal but rather what's moral. Sin is still sin even if it's legal. In other words, this would be sinful on the grounds that engaging in homosexual acts are in and of themselves sinful, or that homosexual "marriage" perverts the God-established creation ordinance of marriage between a man and a woman.
3. Some people argue that homosexuality is genetic.
- First off, even if homosexuality is genetic, does this then make it acceptable to engage in homosexual acts? No. Anger or perhaps the predisposition toward anger might be genetic, for example, but it doesn't make it right to murder someone.
- Some people have argued that there is a significant difference in the size of a particular region of a homosexual's brain relative to a heterosexual's brain. Even if this is true, how do we know that this is the cause of homosexuality rather than its result?
- Even if homosexuality is genetic, why should homosexuality be considered permissible on these grounds? Or even considered "normal"? There are many diseases such as certain forms of cancer which are genetic. But these diseases are not therefore "normal." In fact, that's why they are "diseases," because they are not normal; they are not markers of health.
- Even if homosexuality is genetic, it's not as if everyone with a gay gene is necessarily controlled by it. Even if there is a gay gene, it doesn't then follow that one is therefore compelled into homosexuality.
- At best, the existence of a gay gene might mitigate sin in some sense, but it would never excuse let alone condone sin.
- Now, if homosexuality is genetic, and if this in some way excuses homosexuality, then wouldn't the "inheritance" of our sinful nature from Adam excuse all sin -- which would be patently false?
- We've been talking about genetic factors (nature), but let's not forget about environmental factors (nurture). If we were raised in a home with physically and emotionally abusive parents, would this excuse our being physically and emotionally abusive towards our own children? No.
- Male-on-male and female-on-female sex is blatantly against how we were physically created. It overturns our sexuality. As John MacArthur once asked, with a touch of humor, "Do I need to draw you a picture of how a man and a man or a woman and a woman cannot possibly physically 'fit' together?"
- Homosexuality cuts against God's purpose for humanity as "male and female," as part of a family, as part of society. Men and women were created with distinctive roles. This is not a sexist statement; this is how God created us. This recognizes who we are as males and females, as husbands and wives, etc. And the family is the most fundamental building block of society. Note, for instance, that Eve was given her name because she was "the mother of all living" (Gen. 3:20). Her name is tied to her role as mother. Homosexuality does away with our God-given roles as men and women and as families.
There's also the related danger of homosexual couples adopting children. Imagine the possible affect on little Johnny or Jane growing up with two dads but no mom or two moms but no dad, to say nothing of the affect on others. I'm not saying it's a foregone conclusion but from what I've read and seen there does seem to be a high degree of deleterious effects in exposing and raising children within the context of a homosexual lifestyle. - According to the Bible, there's a sense in which homosexuality demonstrates the height of sinful, rebellious man (à la Romans 1).
- We ought to reach out and love homosexuals (as we do others) by telling them the truth about their sins and their need for the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior, just as Christ reached out to us and loved us. Homosexuals are no better or worse than other sinners in regard to the need for redemption. And we were once sinners like them, without hope and without God in this world.
- Also, some of us might want to keep in mind how emotionally and psychologically difficult it must be for the struggling homosexual (to say nothing of other difficulties). Is the homosexual destined to lead a life of unrequited love? Is he or she called to lifelong celibacy? And so on.
- Of course, there's much more to say. So I'd highly recommend reading stuff by someone like Robert Gagnon. There are some very good websites and weblogs under our "Culture Wars" category on the right sidebar too.
Coming home to Mother Kirk
Ben Douglass is the most reasonable and congenial Catholic epologist I’ve had occasion to deal with. That may have something to do with the company he keeps.
As I look over his blog, it's revealing to see how often he must raid the pantry of Protestant scholarship to restock his Catholic cupboard (see below). For a traditionalist Catholic, the irony must be acute.
Mind you, I don’t say this as a criticism. Indeed, I think his taste in reading material is often impeccable. Given his fondness for, and dependence on, so many conservative Evangelical scholars, to bolster his high view of Scripture, it would represent a failure of hospitality on my part if I didn’t invite him to return to Mother Kirk.
Ben, the door is ajar. There’s a candle in the window. And we have a fatted calf roasting on the rotisserie. Come inside and join us!
*****************************************************************************************
He alleges a consensus of Bible scholars. But no such consensus exists. The field of Biblical scholarship is far from monolithic; Bible scholars span the entire theological spectrum and as such believe a myriad of contradictory ideas. Does Kersten include, within his supposed consensus of Bible scholars, Bauckham, Bruce, Carson, Metzger, Miguens, Wallace, or the Opus Dei scholars at Navarre?
Keil lists, as concrete examples, changes in the use of pronouns, the spelling of the demonstrative pronoun, the construction of infinitive verbs, the conjugation of third person plural verbs, and vocabulary.79 Most conclusively, Keil notes that the name "the Lord of hosts," Yahweh Sabaoth, is absent from the Pentateuch, even though it "was current as early as the time of Samuel and David, and so favourite a name with all the prophets."80 This datum is inconsistent with the supposition, required by the Documentary Hypothesis, that the Pentateuch was written concurrently with the prophets.
Reformed Evangelical scholar John Currid summarizes the refutation of this rationalist critical argument...81
Indeed, I may, with slight interpolation, make my own the words of the Protestant scholar C. F. Keil...86
[64] Protestants have often alleged that (a) the teachings of the Catholic Church cannot be infallible because they are not consistent over time, and (b) the Church's claim to be under the authority of the Word of God is disingenuous. If Kersten's description of Catholicism were accurate, both of these criticisms would be true, for in his view, (a) the Church's teaching on Scripture has changed, and (b) the Church can correct what is erroneous in Scripture.
[71] Cf. Umberto Cassuto, The Documentary Hypothesis (Jerusalem, Israel: Shalem Press, 2006); Duane Garrett, Rethinking Genesis: The Sources and Authorship of the First Book of the Pentateuch (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1991); Gleason Archer, A Survery of Old Testament Introduction (Chicago, IL: Moody, 1996).
[78] C. F. Keil and F. Delitzsch, Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 1, Pentateuch (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2006) p. 11.
[79] Ibid., pp. 11-12.
[80] Ibid., pp. 10.
[81] John D. Currid, A Study Commentary on Genesis, Volume 1 (Darlington, England: Evangelical Press, 2003) pp. 29-30.
http://www.pugiofidei.com/NAB.htm#3
As I look over his blog, it's revealing to see how often he must raid the pantry of Protestant scholarship to restock his Catholic cupboard (see below). For a traditionalist Catholic, the irony must be acute.
Mind you, I don’t say this as a criticism. Indeed, I think his taste in reading material is often impeccable. Given his fondness for, and dependence on, so many conservative Evangelical scholars, to bolster his high view of Scripture, it would represent a failure of hospitality on my part if I didn’t invite him to return to Mother Kirk.
Ben, the door is ajar. There’s a candle in the window. And we have a fatted calf roasting on the rotisserie. Come inside and join us!
*****************************************************************************************
He alleges a consensus of Bible scholars. But no such consensus exists. The field of Biblical scholarship is far from monolithic; Bible scholars span the entire theological spectrum and as such believe a myriad of contradictory ideas. Does Kersten include, within his supposed consensus of Bible scholars, Bauckham, Bruce, Carson, Metzger, Miguens, Wallace, or the Opus Dei scholars at Navarre?
Keil lists, as concrete examples, changes in the use of pronouns, the spelling of the demonstrative pronoun, the construction of infinitive verbs, the conjugation of third person plural verbs, and vocabulary.79 Most conclusively, Keil notes that the name "the Lord of hosts," Yahweh Sabaoth, is absent from the Pentateuch, even though it "was current as early as the time of Samuel and David, and so favourite a name with all the prophets."80 This datum is inconsistent with the supposition, required by the Documentary Hypothesis, that the Pentateuch was written concurrently with the prophets.
Reformed Evangelical scholar John Currid summarizes the refutation of this rationalist critical argument...81
Indeed, I may, with slight interpolation, make my own the words of the Protestant scholar C. F. Keil...86
[64] Protestants have often alleged that (a) the teachings of the Catholic Church cannot be infallible because they are not consistent over time, and (b) the Church's claim to be under the authority of the Word of God is disingenuous. If Kersten's description of Catholicism were accurate, both of these criticisms would be true, for in his view, (a) the Church's teaching on Scripture has changed, and (b) the Church can correct what is erroneous in Scripture.
[71] Cf. Umberto Cassuto, The Documentary Hypothesis (Jerusalem, Israel: Shalem Press, 2006); Duane Garrett, Rethinking Genesis: The Sources and Authorship of the First Book of the Pentateuch (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1991); Gleason Archer, A Survery of Old Testament Introduction (Chicago, IL: Moody, 1996).
[78] C. F. Keil and F. Delitzsch, Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 1, Pentateuch (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2006) p. 11.
[79] Ibid., pp. 11-12.
[80] Ibid., pp. 10.
[81] John D. Currid, A Study Commentary on Genesis, Volume 1 (Darlington, England: Evangelical Press, 2003) pp. 29-30.
http://www.pugiofidei.com/NAB.htm#3
The end of Superman
It’s my sad duty to inform you that, after fighting crime since FDR, Superman has hung up his cape for good. He was forced into early retirement, not by Lex Luther, but by the cellphone. With more and more cellphones, there were fewer and fewer telephone booths for Clark Kent to duck into.
From here on out, you and I will have to fend off the criminal element, from muggers to megalomaniacs, without the man of steel by our side. Prepare for the worst!
From here on out, you and I will have to fend off the criminal element, from muggers to megalomaniacs, without the man of steel by our side. Prepare for the worst!
Ehrman's conundrum
I’ve decided that I need to expand my review of Bart Ehrman’s new book, Jesus Interrupted. In previous installments, I skipped over chapters 6 & 7.
In these chapters he talks about NT textual criticism, the formation of the NT canon, and the establishment of Christian orthodoxy, viz., the deity of Christ, messiahship of Jesus, as well as heaven and hell. They’re a rehash of stuff he’s already said in books like Misquoting Jesus and Lost Christianities.
I skipped over these chapters for the following reasons:
1.I’ve discussed the canon on many occasions, so I don’t feel the need to repeat myself here. I’d note in passing that Ehrman disregards textual evidence for the early formation of the NT canon (e.g. David Trobisch) as well as intertextual evidence for the NT canon.
2.Misquoting Jesus was subjected to a number of scathing reviews, some of which are available online.
3.There are many fine treatments of Messianic prophecy by scholars like T. D. Alexander, Derek Motyer, O. P. Robertson, and John Sailhamer–not to mention commentaries on specific passage (e.g. Waltke on Micah). Erhman ignores this material and simply regurgitates the standard liberal line.
4. Likewise, there are fine exegetical treatments of the afterlife in Scripture and extrascriptural tradition, viz. Richard Bauckham, The Fate of the Dead, or Christopher Morgan & Robert Peterson, Hell Under Fire.
5.There are a number of books on the market, some scholarly and some popular, which expound the high Christology of the NT and target the conspiratorial views of Ehrman, Dan Brown, and the Jesus Seminar. I don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Ehrman has a habit of ignoring his critics. To take a few examples:
Darrell Bock, The Missing Gospels
Darrell Bock & Dan Wallace, Dethroning Jesus
Robert Bowman et al, Putting Jesus in His Place
Craig Evans, Fabricating Jesus
Gordon Fee, Pauline Christology
Simon Gathercole, The Preexistent Son
Murray Harris, Jesus as God
Larry Hurtado, Lord Jesus Christ
Timothy Jones, Misquoting Truth
Ed Komoszewski et al, Reinventing Jesus
Nicholas Perrin, Lost in Translation?
Now I want to move onto to my major point:
1.Ehrman’s attack on the Christian faith utilizes the fashionable cliché that history is written by the winners. Therefore, you’re only getting one side of the story.
But this line of attack generates a dilemma for Ehrman. On the one hand, his conspiracy theory would only be impressive if the winners destroyed or effectively repressed the incriminating evidence. If the cover-up was successful, then we’d be in no position to know where the truth lies–since any evidence to the contrary was eliminated by the winners.
On the other hand, Ehrman can only prove his conspiracy theory by reconstructing what “really” happened. But his historical reconstruction presupposes that enough evidence survives from the losing side that we can, in fact, evaluate both sides of the argument.
In order to prove his theory, Ehrman must disprove his theory. He can only document his conspiracy theory if documentary evidence attesting his conspiracy theory is available. But, in that event, the winners didn’t succeed in writing the final chapter on early church history.
Since, by his own admission, contemporary Christians are in a position to evaluate both sides of the story, the cover-up failed.
2.At this point, Ehrman’s attack would only remain effective if you think the winners made the wrong call.
i) Ehrman’s attack might carry some weight with Christians (e.g. Catholics, Orthodox) for whom tradition is decisive. Since, however, Protestants are in the habit of sifting tradition, Ehrman’s attack, even if valid against high churchmen, would not be valid against Protestant theology, per se.
ii) Ehrman’s attack might carry some weight with Protestants if he could show that a high Christology is unscriptural, or that Jesus was not the prophesied Messiah, or that heaven and hell are post-biblical developments, or that our canon was wrongly decided.
However, Protestant scholars have defended all of these propositions. Hence, we don’t depend on the “winners” to underwrite our theology.
We can exegete a high Christology from the NT. We can exegete Messianic prophecy from the OT. We can exegete heaven and hell from both Testaments.
As a matter of fact, there are some differences between the Protestant canon, the Catholic canon, the Eastern Orthodox canon, and the Oriental Orthodox canon.
But ecclesiastical tradition is not the only line of evidence for the Protestant canon. We include Jewish evidence, text-critical evidence, and intertextual evidence.
3.Ironically, Ehrman the conspiracy-theorist is identical with Ehrman the conspirator. Ehrman has become the very thing he accuses the “winners” of being. For Ehrman presents the reader with a very one-sided version of the evidence. Ehrman withholds evidence that is damaging to his own position. Ehrman is knee-deep in his own cover-up.
In these chapters he talks about NT textual criticism, the formation of the NT canon, and the establishment of Christian orthodoxy, viz., the deity of Christ, messiahship of Jesus, as well as heaven and hell. They’re a rehash of stuff he’s already said in books like Misquoting Jesus and Lost Christianities.
I skipped over these chapters for the following reasons:
1.I’ve discussed the canon on many occasions, so I don’t feel the need to repeat myself here. I’d note in passing that Ehrman disregards textual evidence for the early formation of the NT canon (e.g. David Trobisch) as well as intertextual evidence for the NT canon.
2.Misquoting Jesus was subjected to a number of scathing reviews, some of which are available online.
3.There are many fine treatments of Messianic prophecy by scholars like T. D. Alexander, Derek Motyer, O. P. Robertson, and John Sailhamer–not to mention commentaries on specific passage (e.g. Waltke on Micah). Erhman ignores this material and simply regurgitates the standard liberal line.
4. Likewise, there are fine exegetical treatments of the afterlife in Scripture and extrascriptural tradition, viz. Richard Bauckham, The Fate of the Dead, or Christopher Morgan & Robert Peterson, Hell Under Fire.
5.There are a number of books on the market, some scholarly and some popular, which expound the high Christology of the NT and target the conspiratorial views of Ehrman, Dan Brown, and the Jesus Seminar. I don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Ehrman has a habit of ignoring his critics. To take a few examples:
Darrell Bock, The Missing Gospels
Darrell Bock & Dan Wallace, Dethroning Jesus
Robert Bowman et al, Putting Jesus in His Place
Craig Evans, Fabricating Jesus
Gordon Fee, Pauline Christology
Simon Gathercole, The Preexistent Son
Murray Harris, Jesus as God
Larry Hurtado, Lord Jesus Christ
Timothy Jones, Misquoting Truth
Ed Komoszewski et al, Reinventing Jesus
Nicholas Perrin, Lost in Translation?
Now I want to move onto to my major point:
1.Ehrman’s attack on the Christian faith utilizes the fashionable cliché that history is written by the winners. Therefore, you’re only getting one side of the story.
But this line of attack generates a dilemma for Ehrman. On the one hand, his conspiracy theory would only be impressive if the winners destroyed or effectively repressed the incriminating evidence. If the cover-up was successful, then we’d be in no position to know where the truth lies–since any evidence to the contrary was eliminated by the winners.
On the other hand, Ehrman can only prove his conspiracy theory by reconstructing what “really” happened. But his historical reconstruction presupposes that enough evidence survives from the losing side that we can, in fact, evaluate both sides of the argument.
In order to prove his theory, Ehrman must disprove his theory. He can only document his conspiracy theory if documentary evidence attesting his conspiracy theory is available. But, in that event, the winners didn’t succeed in writing the final chapter on early church history.
Since, by his own admission, contemporary Christians are in a position to evaluate both sides of the story, the cover-up failed.
2.At this point, Ehrman’s attack would only remain effective if you think the winners made the wrong call.
i) Ehrman’s attack might carry some weight with Christians (e.g. Catholics, Orthodox) for whom tradition is decisive. Since, however, Protestants are in the habit of sifting tradition, Ehrman’s attack, even if valid against high churchmen, would not be valid against Protestant theology, per se.
ii) Ehrman’s attack might carry some weight with Protestants if he could show that a high Christology is unscriptural, or that Jesus was not the prophesied Messiah, or that heaven and hell are post-biblical developments, or that our canon was wrongly decided.
However, Protestant scholars have defended all of these propositions. Hence, we don’t depend on the “winners” to underwrite our theology.
We can exegete a high Christology from the NT. We can exegete Messianic prophecy from the OT. We can exegete heaven and hell from both Testaments.
As a matter of fact, there are some differences between the Protestant canon, the Catholic canon, the Eastern Orthodox canon, and the Oriental Orthodox canon.
But ecclesiastical tradition is not the only line of evidence for the Protestant canon. We include Jewish evidence, text-critical evidence, and intertextual evidence.
3.Ironically, Ehrman the conspiracy-theorist is identical with Ehrman the conspirator. Ehrman has become the very thing he accuses the “winners” of being. For Ehrman presents the reader with a very one-sided version of the evidence. Ehrman withholds evidence that is damaging to his own position. Ehrman is knee-deep in his own cover-up.
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