An Interview with N.T. Wright: The New Ecology, the God of the OT v. NT, Open Theism, Sexuality, Biblical Interpretation, and More

Ask N.T. Wright... (response)

http://rachelheldevans.com/blog/ask-nt-wright-response

 

by Rachael Held Evans

June 11, 2013

 

This afternoon I am thrilled to host one of today’s best known and respected New Testament scholars, N.T. Wright, as a guest in our ongoing reader-conducted interview series.  Last week you submitted over 300 questions for Wright, but we could only pick 6 as our esteemed guest is busy wrapping up work on the much-anticipated Paul and the Faithfulness of God and its two companion volumes, Pauline Perspectives and Paul and His Recent Interpreters. (You can pre-order all on Amazon.)

 

Wright is the author of over 100 books, including the popular Surprised by Hope and Simply Christian. His full-scale works—The New Testament and the People of God, Jesus and the Victory of God,  The Resurrection of the Son of God, and the forthcoming Paul and the Faithfulness of God—are part of a projected six-volume series entitled Christian Origins and the Question of God. He is also the author of multiple articles, essays, and sermons, many of which you can access here. (Wright usually publishes as N.T. Wright when writing academic work, or Tom Wright when writing for a more popular readership.) Wright was the Bishop of Durham in the Church of England from 2003 until his retirement in 2010. He is currently Research Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at St. Mary’s College, University of St. Andrews in Scotland.

 

Like a lot of you, I’ve been hugely impacted by Wright’s work and am so grateful for the ways in which he has helped me love Scripture, and the Christ to whom it points, better. One thing I have always appreciated about him is his commitment to teaching God's people, not just the intellectual elite, but all who want to know and follow Jesus.

 

Thank you for your many excellent questions.

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From S. Kyle: Dr. Wright: You have argued, particularly in Surprised by Hope, that the bodily resurrection and the physical nature of the coming consummation of the Kingdom opens up to us a legitimate basis for physical action in the world: the things we do in the body and on this planet for good, really do matter. How exactly do these things 'last' into the eschaton? How seamless is the relationship between the now and the not-yet? What seems especially tricky to me here is doing things that have implications outside of the Church. Do the parts of the physical world we preserve through our ecological work literally remain into the eschaton? What about securing justice for non-believers who will ultimately, we would posit, be judged eternally? Most fundamentally: how exactly do your eschatological views, particularly in teasing out these details, provide a well-supported basis for a Christian social ethic?

 

The continuity between our present now/not yet time and the ultimate eschaton is deeply mysterious, since the only model we have for it is the resurrection of Jesus himself – with the wounds of the nails and the spear evidence of that continuity.

 

There is much about which we must say we do not know and we quite possibly cannot know at the moment. What we can know and do know is that we are called to do justice and love mercy and walk humbly with God, and I don’t see that as e.g. doing something wrong if those for whom we do justice and mercy turn out to spurn God’s love for themselves. The point of justice and mercy anyway is not ‘they deserve it’ but ‘this is the way God’s world should be’, and we are called to do those things that truly anticipate the way God’s world WILL be.

 

The fact that God has promised to put the world right in the end, the fact that he has raised Jesus from the dead having defeated the power of evil on the cross, and the fact that he has called us to participate in that death and resurrection and, by the spirit, to be agents of his blessing in the world (see the Beatitudes!) indicates clearly enough that our ‘social ethic’ (what a lot of muddles are contained in the background to that truncated phrase!) is rooted in God’s act in Jesus, aiming for his final completion of his restorative justice, implemented in part by us here and now. Part of gospel obedience is precisely that we do NOT know in the present the answer to questions like this. See Matthew 25: “‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you…?”

 

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From Jessica: A struggle of mine recently has been reconciling (or rather trying to reconcile), the seemingly violent and vindictive God of the Old Testament with the non-violent, "love your enemies," Jesus. How would you put those two radically different views of God, together?

 

An old question but best answered by a fresh reading of Isaiah 40-55 on the one hand – the greatest outpouring of divine love and mercy you can imagine – and of, say, John’s gospel on the other, in which when the spirit comes he will convict the world of sin in righteousness and judgment.

 

Beware of false either/or divisions. Of course there is a problem in, for example, the book of Judges. My view is that when God called Abraham he knew he was going to work through flawed human beings to bring about redemption . . . and that the fault lines run forward then all the way to the cross, the most wicked thing humans ever did and the most loving thing God ever did. Once we figure out how all that works (probably never!) we will understand the rest. Part of the problem the way the question is posed is by assuming that we can abstract an ethical ideal from one part of scripture and use it to judge the actions of God in another part of scripture, as though scripture were given us so we could form such dehistoricized abstract ethical judgments! Life just isn’t like that.

 

For more, see my response to a similar question posed by Andrew Wilson.

 

 

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From Kurt: Hi Dr. Wright, First, allow me to admit that your writing and speaking has been the most influential thing in my theological, missional, and spiritual journey in the last 10 years. Before I was introduced to your work, I was convinced that Christianity was all about pie in the sky and leaving this world - not redeeming it. Discovering Romans 8 and a God who groans with creation for its ultimate redemption - [re]new[ed] creation - changes everything! For showing me this - along with various other things about the historical Jesus, the apostle Paul, and theology in general - I am truly grateful.

 

I do have a question for you: I am wondering if you would be willing to "show your cards" when it comes to open theism? Most of my friends who are open theists, Greg Boyd and others, are very influenced by your work. Certainly, nothing you have said seems to contradict such a God of possibilities. In fact, your reading of Abraham and Israel as God's "plan B" actually helps give us a framework for thinking about such things. Even so, what would your thoughts be on open theism? I realize that you may not agree with this position of mine, but I would be intrigued to hear some your observations. Thanks for your continued ministry to the church!

 

Open theism is not something I have done a lot with and to be honest (and it’s late at night and I’m busy). I strongly suspect this is one of those classic American either/or questions that is forcing theology into a box. I never use the language of ‘Plan B’, certainly not about Abraham and Israel; in fact I often quote the Rabbi who envisaged God having Abraham in mind from the start. I don’t want to sign a blank check (or cheque as we spell it), especially when it’s written in dollars not pounds. Go figure!

 

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From Steve: What is sexuality like in the kingdom of God? Is everyone in Heaven going to be heterosexual? And if NOT, what are the implications of that for how we live here and now?

 

Freud said sex was laughing in the face of death. Jesus said that in the new world, people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; having passed beyond death into resurrection, with no prospect of death, there will be no need for reproduction and hence we may assume no desire for it, just as now as a 64-year old I no longer have a desire to play rugby though there was a time when I lived for it. (Not a good analogy but never mind.) Also, be careful of equating ‘kingdom of God’ with ‘in Heaven.’ Read 1 Corinthians 13 and figure out what Paul is saying about that which lasts into the resurrection life and that which doesn’t.

 

The key thing of course is that throughout the New Testament it is assumed that what God has done in Jesus is new CREATION in which the original plan of Genesis 1 and 2 is gloriously fulfilled. (See Mark 10 and elsewhere.) And beware of language that assumes categories like ‘heterosexual’ and similar terms are now solid and fixed entities which are somehow established. They are modernist constructs which already many postmoderns are rapidly deconstructing. Don’t build houses on sand. ["I assume Wright is referring to modernistic sand." - r.e. slater]

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From Heidi: Because Rachel is such a voice for women in the blogosphere, I would love for you to address gender inequality in the church and bring a better reading to the passages that have been used as weapons on women for generations.

 

I’ve done this in various writings some of which are available on the web. The best place to start is with this article, “Women’s Service in the Church: The Biblical Basis.”

 

An excerpt, regarding Mary of Bethany:

"I think in particular of the woman who anointed Jesus (without here going in to the question of who it was and whether it happened more than once); as some have pointed out, this was a priestly action which Jesus accepted as such. And I think, too, of the remarkable story of Mary and Martha in Luke 10."

"Most of us grew up with the line that Martha was the active type and Mary the passive or contemplative type, and that Jesus is simply affirming the importance of both and even the priority of devotion to him. That devotion is undoubtedly part of the importance of the story, but far more obvious to any first-century reader, and to many readers in Turkey, the Middle East and many other parts of the world to this day would be the fact that Mary was sitting at Jesus’ feet within the male part of the house rather than being kept in the back rooms with the other women. This, I am pretty sure, is what really bothered Martha; no doubt she was cross at being left to do all the work, but the real problem behind that was that Mary had cut clean across one of the most basic social conventions. It is as though, in today’s world, you were to invite me to stay in your house and, when it came to bedtime, I were to put up a camp bed in your bedroom. We have our own clear but unstated rules about whose space is which; so did they. And Mary has just flouted them. And Jesus declares that she is right to do so. 

She is ‘sitting at his feet’; a phrase which doesn’t mean what it would mean today, the adoring student gazing up in admiration and love at the wonderful teacher. As is clear from the use of the phrase elsewhere in the NT (for instance, Paul with Gamaliel), to sit at the teacher’s feet is a way of saying you are being a student, picking up the teacher’s wisdom and learning; and in that very practical world you wouldn’t do this just for the sake of informing your own mind and heart, but in order to be a teacher, a rabbi, yourself. Like much in the gospels, this story is left cryptic as far as we at least are concerned, but I doubt if any first-century reader would have missed the point. That, no doubt, is part at least of the reason why we find so many women in positions of leadership, initiative and responsibility in the early church; I used to think Romans 16 was the most boring chapter in the letter, and now, as I study the names and think about them, I am struck by how powerfully they indicate the way in which the teaching both of Jesus and of Paul was being worked out in practice…."

An excerpt, regarding 1 Timothy 2

“When people say that the Bible enshrines patriarchal ideas and attitudes, this passage, particularly verse 12, is often held up as the prime example. Women mustn’t be teachers, the verse seems to say; they mustn’t hold any authority over men; they must keep silent. That, at least, is how many translations put it. This, as I say, is the main passage that people quote when they want to suggest that the New Testament forbids the ordination of women. I was once reading these verses in a church service and a woman near the front exploded in anger, to the consternation of the rest of the congregation (even though some agreed with her). The whole passage seems to be saying that women are second-class citizens at every level. They aren’t even allowed to dress prettily. They are the daughters of Eve, and she was the original troublemaker. The best thing for them to do is to get on and have children, and to behave themselves and keep quiet."

"Well, that’s how most people read the passage in our culture until quite recently. I fully acknowledge that the very different reading I’m going to suggest may sound to begin with as though I’m simply trying to make things easier, to tailor this bit of Paul to fit our culture. But there is good, solid scholarship behind what I’m going to say, and I genuinely believe it may be the right interpretation."

"When you look at strip cartoons, ‘B’ grade movies, and ‘Z’ grade novels and [classical] poems, you pick up a standard view of how ‘everyone imagines’ men and women behave. Men are macho, loud-mouthed, arrogant thugs, always fighting and wanting their own way. Women are simpering, empty-headed creatures, with nothing to think about except clothes and jewelry. There are ‘Christian’ versions of this, too: the men must make the decisions, run the show, always be in the lead, telling everyone what to do; women must stay at home and bring up the children. If you start looking for a biblical back-up for this view, well, what about Genesis 3? Adam would never have sinned if Eve hadn’t given in first. Eve has her punishment, and it’s pain in childbearing (Genesis 3.16)."

"Well, you don’t have to embrace every aspect of the women’s liberation movement to find that interpretation hard to swallow. Not only does it stick in our throat as a way of treating half the human race; it doesn’t fit with what we see in the rest of the New Testament, in the passages we’ve already glanced at."

"The key to the present passage, then, is to recognise that it is commanding that women, too, should be allowed to study and learn, and should not be restrained from doing so (verse 11). They are to be ‘in full submission’; this is often taken to mean ‘to the men’, or ‘to their husbands’, but it is equally likely that it refers to their attitude, as learners, of submission to God or to the gospel – which of course would be true for men as well. Then the crucial verse 12 need not be read as ‘I do not allow a woman to teach or hold authority over a man’ – the translation which has caused so much difficulty in recent years. It can equally mean (and in context this makes much more sense): ‘I don’t mean to imply that I’m now setting up women as the new authority over men in the same way that previously men held authority over women.’ Why might Paul need to say this?"

"There are some signs in the letter that it was originally sent to Timothy while he was in Ephesus. And one of the main things we know about religion in Ephesus is that the main religion – the biggest Temple, the most famous shrine – was a female-only cult. The Temple of Artemis (that’s her Greek name; the Romans called her Diana) was a massive structure which dominated the area; and, as befitted worshippers of a female deity, the priests were all women. They ruled the show and kept the men in their place."

"Now if you were writing a letter to someone in a small, new religious movement with a base in Ephesus, and wanted to say that because of the gospel of Jesus the old ways of organising male and female roles had to be rethought from top to bottom, with one feature of that being that the women were to be encouraged to study and learn and take a leadership role, you might well want to avoid giving the wrong impression. Was the apostle saying, people might wonder, that women should be trained up so that Christianity would gradually become a cult like that of Artemis, where women did the leading and kept the men in line? That, it seems to me, is what verse 12 is denying. The word I’ve translated ‘try to dictate to them’ is unusual, but seems to have the overtones of ‘being bossy’ or ‘seizing control’. Paul is saying, like Jesus in Luke 10, that women must have the space and leisure to study and learn in their own way, not in order that they may muscle in and take over the leadership as in the Artemis-cult, but so that men and women alike can develop whatever gifts of learning, teaching and leadership God is giving them."

"What’s the point of the other bits of the passage, then? The first verse (8) is clear: the men must give themselves to devout prayer, and must not follow the normal stereotypes of ‘male’ behaviour: no anger or arguing. Then verses 9 and 10 follow, making the same point about the women. They must be set free from their stereotype, that of fussing all the time about hair-dos, jewellry, and fancy clothes – but they must be set free, not in order that they can be dowdy, unobtrusive little mice, but so that they can make a creative contribution to the wider society. The phrase ‘good works’ in verse 10 sounds pretty bland to us, but it’s one of the regular ways people used to refer to the social obligation to spend time and money on people less fortunate than oneself, to be a benefactor of the town through helping public works, the arts, and so on."

Read the rest here, and see also this video related to Romans 16: 

 

N.T. Wright on Women in Ministry 5

 

 

 

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From Mark: In these theological/political times, where it seems so important to be in the right "camp" lest we be cast out from fellowship with others because we do not hold the "correct" views, how do you suggest moving forward toward greater unity, rather than greater division?

 

Beware of ‘camps’.

 

In the U.S. especially these are usually and worryingly tied in to the various political either/or positions WHICH THE REST OF THE WORLD DOES NOT RECOGNISE. Anyone with their wits about them who reads scripture and prays and is genuinely humble will see that many of the issues which push people into ‘camps’ - especially but not only in the U.S. - are distortions in both directions caused by trying to get a quick fix on a doctrinal or ethical issue, squashing it into the small categories of one particular culture. Read Philippians 2.1-11 again and again. And Ephesians 4.1-16 as well.

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From Laura: Can you and Francis Collins write more awesome songs together? Pretty please!

 

You never know!  The two we’ve written so far happened more or less by accident.

 

 

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Thanks for the questions and sorry these answers are brief! Good wishes to one and all. And say a prayer for all the final editing and production of the big book on Paul!

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Thanks again for your questions! You can check out every installment of our interview series—which includes “Ask an atheist,” “Ask a nun,” “Ask a pacifist,” “Ask a Calvinist,” “Ask a Muslim,” “Ask a gay Christian,” “Ask a Pentecostal” “Ask an environmentalist,” “Ask a funeral director,” "Ask a Liberation Theologian,"  "Ask Shane Claiborne," "Ask Jennifer Knapp," and  many more— here.

 

Voices of Dissent - Unfolding God's Love Within the Heart and Conscience of Humanity

We have oftentimes spoken to the issues of God's sovereignty as it relates to human free will and to the indeterminacy of nature. It is one of those privileges that God has given to us when intricately creating our world and ourselves. But whenever thinking of this subject we must also remember to speak to (i) the "weakness of such a God" who gave to us our free will. As well as to (ii) the immediate consequence of sin that human freewill presented when used apart from God's heart of love and justice; His plans, purposes, and prerogatives. Or to (iii) creation's indeterminacy that was immediately set in motion to act out its natural beat of randomness and chaos (giving to us quantum physics, evolution, and human birth). Nor should we neglect (iv) sin's corrupting influence upon God's indeterminate design at the very onset of His holy fies of freedom. Nor even (v) God's willful sovereign-partnership initiated between humanity and Himself presented in a non-coercive manner which leaves the future as open to us today as it is to God Himself in His timeful, incarnate eternity. Even as our dear Lord guides all His creation through time and space towards renewal and recreation (as previously discussed under the several theological categories of relational theism, process theism, and open theism, amongst other topics here discussed).

Now perhaps I haven't summarize these concepts as eloquently above as I've stated them in my past articles under the banners of postmodern, post-evangelic (or, emergent) Christianity, but in a nutshell when we speak of Calvinism's misuse of God's sovereignty we are saying that as a theology it has gone deeply astray from these many biblical ideas mentioned at the outset of this article. Certainly, we have more than adequately shown its  doctrinal abuses and misuses (sic, refer to the various sidebars under "Calvinism," "Love," "Love Wins," "Church," etc.) and have offset its verbiage with a more helpful understanding of "Arminianism" as its theological polar opposite.... Leaving us to sort through just what, if any, of Calvin's theology might be kept. However, in today's posting, Scot McKnight chooses to tamper down Calvinism's excesses without writing much more in the way of its pros and cons. His is a moderating position cautioning the reader to remember God's love is not austere, but in all ways perfect, fair, and equitable. And that it is we ourselves who are free to roam God's universe in determination of whether His love is exactly that or not.

And to those of us who doubt God. Who distrust God. Who don't understand why things work out in life as they do, be at peace.... God has made room for our disbelief, our  heated arguments, anger and questioning spirit. It's what God calls "free will." But in the end, one doesn't lose God's love for expressing the more honest human emotions and tempering attitudes of our questioning spirit, but rather we lose the love of the church for confronting its many false arguments and misperceptions that have been perpetrated in the name of God. Of one's Christian peers and teachers, family and friends, who proclaim the false non-sequiturs of God's holy love by unholy words and deeds. For the many misrepresentations of what a "biblical Christianity" supposedly "is" that has been willfully denied - and willfully reimaged - that is, "God's Good News of His Love" - into an assortment of austere, excluding, creedal confessions fraught amongst dithering Christian folklores and spurious religious ideologies purporting "goodness and light" where none can be found.

All of which has caused thinking postmodern, post-evangelic Christians to rightfully question how we, as free willed human beings, could be so gravely mistaken over such a simple concept as the love of God, choosing rather its unloving opposite of social exclusion and enculturated hate, as the church's more proper political platforms for the Gospel's outreach of Jesus. It isn't a recent phenomena. No it began long, long ago through the past expiring ages of the church until finally discovered lying amongst the many ruins of God's faithless people Israel. Even as God's person and being, His love and goodwill, was disseminated untruthfully amid the more ancient pagan worlds surrounding Israel by its own many essays and literatures, philosophies and assertions, of humanity's dithering freedoms, God's austerity and fickleness, and life's too-brief-beauties amid its present corruptions, lies and deceits.

As such, there must be made room for those of us who would rightfully question unjust, unloving church statements and ill-informed Christian perceptions, to play the role of the "apostate" in the eyes of some in order to help the church at large to better behave its voice and depictions of God's holy love. Without such voices of dissent and disruption we would remain within the unholy violence of our own sinful hearts as they play out our own misguided bigotries and vices, harms and injustices, upon the unempowered minorities of our cultural wars.

In the end, a true apostate is one who refuses God's love willingly, not its institutional portrayals as told to him or her by a well meaning priests or pastors. Even Jesus Himself was viewed as an apostate by the Jews of His own religion while ever being true to His knowledge of God's holy love. The cost He paid was at the expense of the hell held within our own apostate hearts that would reject God's love and nail it to a bloody tree beheld of spear and broken body. And the miracle - the mystery of it all - was that by Jesus' willing sacrifice He brought us nearer to God than any faith law or religious creed, rite or ritual, could ever have done. That is the miraculous strength of divine love. A faith that God has given to us that no ruling creed or dogma of man, by pulpit or by press, can ever remove.

For this is the depth of commitment that God's love gives to us in the re-discovery of His own love for the you-and-I over any church doctrine however meticulously laid out in the foolishness of mankind's heart. Misspending valuable energies attempting to distinguish who is "in" and who is "out" of God's kingdom (sic, predestination, election, hell, etc). Certainly God's love has made fools of us all. But to those truer theologians and wiser bible teachers who steadily work to apply God's love to all our doctrines of God and church, God bless you. May His Spirit give to you a wisdom and discernment little found in the vast majority of His sheepfolds yearning for great, and good, shepherds. Who would labor heart-and-soul in the vineyards of life's sufferings, pains, and injustices. For these good shepherds lie everywhere about us - and not simply within the folds of the church office, nor within the congregations of His grieving servants.

Nay, God has placed His faithful shepherds everywhere throughout the many societies we live within - from the overworked nurse at our local hospital, to the overwhelmed social worker serving on our city streets. From the black-robed justice behind the civil bench, to the listening governor behind his elective desk. From a patient business woman working steadily against male pride and hubris, to the policeman and fireman willing to protect and to serve, to care and defend. From a kindly neighbour or caring relative, to a weary school teacher and overspent friend. These are God's kingdom pieces whom He moves about the spiritual chessboard of His loving, all-gracious heart, who Himself is patient, kind, longsuffering and compassionate. Who is of immeasurable understanding and suffering heart. Who seeks to draw near to us even as we draw near to Him. Who is our reflection even as we look to be His. So then, may God's peace, wisdom, and love be ever yours, both now and always. Amen.

R.E. Slater
June 12, 2013

*as always, any comments made by myself to any following articles posted below, will be marked as mine own and highlighted as separate from the author's presented material, if only to help make that article's depictions of ourselves, God, and the church, clearer in content and character. Thank you.

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Scot McKnight vs. Those “Pesky Calvinists”:
What Does it Mean for God to be Sovereign?
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/peterenns/2013/06/scot-mcknight-vs-those-pesky-calvinists-what-does-that-mean-for-god-to-be-sovereign/#

by Peter Enns
June 12, 2013
Comments 

Kindle Edition only - $3.47

Last week I read a brief e-book that just came out by my friend Scot McKnight, A Long Faithfulness: The Case for Christian Perseverance. His point is a simple one and he gets to it in the very first paragraph: McKnight doesn’t like how “the resurgent Calvinism” talks about God’s sovereignty.

These “pesky Calvinists,” as McKnight calls them, promote “meticulous (or exhaustive) sovereignty,” where all things that come to pass are determined by God (weather, disasters, murders, sexual abuse, etc).

Though applicable to many issues, McKnight focuses his comments on personal salvation, namely whether someone can “choose for God and then later choose against God.” In other words, whether someone truly saved can lose that salvation.

McKnight makes it clear he is not arguing for Arminianism, nor is he critiquing all of Calvinism. He is just going for the “meticulous sovereignty sort,” such as John Piper, D. A. Carson, Mark Driscoll, and David Wells, as well as the institutions that “prop up these voices.”

McKnight says one can lose his/her salvation–it’s called being apostate. Calvinist theology, by contrast, includes “double predestination,” that God determines who will be saved and who will be damned. Though acknowledging that Calvin himself did not teach this, and many Calvinists do not adhere to it, for McKnight the two are necessarily linked if you adhere to “meticulous sovereignty”–for God to choose sovereignly one group means he is also choosing sovereignly the other no matter which way you slice it.

McKnight takes direct aim at this view by turning to the “warning passages” in Hebrews (2:1-4; 3:7-4:13; 5:11-6:12; 10:19-39; 12:1-29).

Here is a quote from the introduction to set up the book’s argument:

My aim is to defeat this view of meticulous sovereignty among resurgent Calvinists by showing that the biblical view of sovereignty–a robust version if ever there was one–means God has chosen–because he loves those whom he has created and grants them freedom–to limit his sovereignty by giving humans that freedom. My argument is not philosophical; my argument is biblical. I affirm what the Bible says about God’s sovereignty, and biblical sovereignty entails human freedom both to choose God and un-choose God. If that view of sovereignty can be demonstrated from the Bible, then resurgent Calvinism’s view of sovereignty is unbiblical, pastorally disastrous, and harmful to the church.

After an opening chapter outlining his own journey through Calvinism and relaying the story of Dan Barker–who went from preacher to atheist – McKnight spends most of the book in Hebrews. He interprets each of the warning passages through the lens of four questions: Who is the audience? What is the danger? What are they to do instead of the sin? What will happen if they don’t respond properly?

McKnight’s conclusion: According to Hebrews, “God gave us the freedom to choose, but if we choose to walk away we will be damned.” [( ... and I will add that we will be damned by ourselves alone if refusing Jesus atonement for our sins... - res)]. Hence, meticulous sovereignty in salvation is wrong. In the concluding two chapters, McKnight looks at the profound practical implications of these warnings and briefly how all this relates to another biblical theme, God’s faithfulness to us and the “assurance of salvation.”

For me, I am not so sure what place in the pecking order the “rhetoric of warning” in Hebrews should have in New Testament theology, but that is a huge issue that McKnight only touches on in this brief book. At the very least, interested readers will find McKnight’s exposition of Hebrews thoughtful and compelling, and one that “resurgent Calvinism” will not be able to answer easily.

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About the Book

Amazon.com (Kindle Edition only) - "A Long Faithfulness," by Scot McKnight

Publication Date: May 2013

Can we choose and un-choose God? Or does he choose and un-choose us? In The Long Faithfulness: The Case for Christian Perseverance, theologian Scot McKnight examines what the Bible says about human salvation. Inspired in part by a resurgent Calvinist movement and its particular emphasis on God's meticulous sovereignty, McKnight invites us to a clear and captivating discussion about securing the way to eternal life--the role God plays, the role we play, and the key Bible passages that illuminate the mystery of salvation.

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A Long Faithfulness: Preface
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2013/05/20/a-long-faithfulness-preface/

by Scot McKnight
May 20, 2013
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The following is from my new e-book, A Long Faithfulness: The Case for Christian Perseverance. The aim of this book is to present how the warning passages in Hebrews teach perseverance and the possibility of genuine apostasy of genuine believers, and this theme is applied to the notion so popular today called “meticulous sovereignty,” that God determines or brings about all things. If humans can resist God’s will, or undo their redemption, a case can be made that meticulous sovereignty overreaches the biblical evidence. As such, the e-book is not a direct challenge to Calvinism but to one kind of Calvinism, and neither is it a challenge to what I call the “architecture” of Calvinism. Now to the preface.

The aim of A Long Faithfulness is to cut the central nerve—the sovereignty of God—that informs a dominant theme in the resurgence of Calvinism in our time. Mind you, I affirm God’s sovereignty as the foundation of our faith, so my aim is to defeat one particular but pervasive conviction about God’s sovereignty in the resurgent Calvinism.

That particular but pervasive understanding of God’s sovereignty is what might be called “meticulous” (or “exhaustive”) sovereignty. In regards to this subject, there are only two real options: either God determines everything (meticulous sovereignty) or God does not determine everything. A well-known example of meticulous sovereignty can be found in various statements made by notable evangelical leaders in the wake of natural disasters, such as hurricanes from Katrina to Sandy. If one affirms meticulous sovereignty, then one must also believe God decided, desired, and carried out the weather conditions, the speed and direction of the winds, the deluges of water, and precisely which homes would be destroyed and which homes would escape.

If God determines everything (as in the meticulous sovereignty approach), then God not only permits but must determine that some young girls and boys will be abused while others will be spared, that some adults will suffer more in this life while others will suffer less.  For this essay’s purposes, it is not relevant how tragic situations are explained (e.g., that we are all sinners who deserve these tragedies and even worse; or that God wants to make an example of humans as depraved). What is relevant is that—in this understanding of divine sovereignty—God determines everything, that God can do otherwise but chooses to bring about awful conditions and events.

This essay takes direct aim at this belief.

But this essay is not about human tragedies, but about God’s sovereignty when it comes to personal salvation. My theme is whether or not humans can both choose for God and then later choose against God; whether or not saved humans can become unsaved humans; whether or not humans can choose to walk away from the grace they’ve experienced; and whether or not they would have entered into the eternal blessing of God had they remained fast in their faith.

For the meticulous sovereignty view, God determines—for whatever reasons—who gets saved, and that means—whether the resurgent Calvinist will admit it or not—who does not get saved. I’m aware that John Calvin himself did not always teach this theory—called double predestination—but that this was a development later in his theology.

I’m also aware that not all Calvinists—perhaps not even the majority—affirm double predestination. No wonder! It’s morally despicable for God to create humans only to send them to hell because he did not choose them, when they could do nothing about it, and that this somehow glorifies him.

It may be the case that many Calvinists do not believe in double predestination, but that will not for one moment undo the necessary logic of election as many Calvinists understand it. If God is the one who both awakens and creates faith in the human, and if the only ones who believe in Christ are the ones whom God has chosen, then anyone not chosen is un-chosen by not being chosen. Double predestination is not an option for those who believe in meticulous sovereignty because it is a necessary corollary—even if it is hidden in the corner or if alternative explanations are offered.

My aim is to defeat this view of meticulous sovereignty among resurgent Calvinists by showing that the biblical view of sovereignty—a robust version if ever there was one—means God has chosen—because he loves those whom he has created and grants them freedom—to limit his sovereignty by giving humans that freedom. My argument is not philosophical; my argument is biblical. I affirm what the Bible says about God’s sovereignty, and biblical sovereignty entails human freedom both to choose God and to un-choose God. If that view of sovereignty can be demonstrated from the Bible, then resurgent Calvinism’s view of sovereignty is unbiblical, pastorally disastrous, and harmful to the church.

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"The Church Doesn't Like the People to Grow Up."
- Bishop John Shelby Spong





Bellarive - "Love Has Found Us."

Critique of Aquinas' View of God's Activity in the World

Thomas Oord makes some excellent observations on Dodds' book reviewing God/Creation as Primary/Secondary Cause... basically, the answer isn't found in returning to the classical depictions of God, sin, man, and world, made under Aristotle and Aquinas. But in piecing together Relational-Process Thought with today's quantum/evolutionary sciences that put the word "M-O-R-E" into mechanistic scientism (e.g., God or world or creation as "efficient cause").

And what might that word "more" include? Words like "indeterminacy, free will, open, emergence, synchronicity, sovereignty, postmodern, epistemic humility, partnering, love, faith, weakness, teleology, mystery, renewal, incarnation, etc." Which may not be new concepts but when reconfigured away from classical theism into the lights of postmodern relational and open theism find enlivenment and hopeful approach.

Conceptual ideas that we have painstakingly been crafting within a framework of Emergence Theology and a Postmodern Christian faith these past two years since beginning this blog and become dissatisfied with arguments and theologies on both sides of the aisles. And what are those aisles? That of classic/enlightenment/modernism as conceived by fundamental and evangelical Christianity on the one side. As well as the sometimes irreverent cynicisms and shock theologies of progressive-evangelical / emergent Christianity on the other side (though we have ever leaned to this latter reawakening of the Jesus faith to our global world communities and responsibilities).

R.E. Slater
June 10, 2013

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Unsatisfactory Mystery of Divine Action

http://thomasjayoord.com/index.php/blog/archives/the_unsatisfactory_mystery_of_classic_theologys_theory_of_divine_action/#.UbTunZ-x4gE.facebook

by Thomas Jay Oord
June 9, 2013

I just finished a wonderfully accessible and clear book on God's activity in the world. It was written from an advocate of Thomas Aquinas's theology, and it addresses recent scientific theory and scholarship. I'll be recommending that serious scholars of science and theology read this book... even though I strongly disagree with its proposals!

I know of no finer, more accurate, or more accessible explanation of a Thomistic view of divine action than Michael Dodds’s recently published book, Unlocking Divine Action: Contemporary Science and Thomas Aquinas. This is an immensely important book, and those who care about issues of divine action would do well to read it. But this book only deepened my belief that the Thomistic approach to divine causation is unsatisfactory. We need alternatives.

Causal Categories

Dodds begins by rightly arguing that divine causation – the notion that God acts as a causal force in the world -- is a central concern for our time. Contemporary philosophy of science, however, has reduced the number of causal categories to just one: the category of efficient causes. We think today about causation in terms of the impact of one entity upon another.

Dodds uses Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas to argue for additional categories of causation. Early chapters in the book explain accessibly Aristotle’s four causes: material, formal, efficient, and final. Aquinas employed these four causes for his own theological work, believing them to give a full account of causality. We should use these four causes, says Dodds, to talk about causation amongst creatures and God’s own causal activity. The major contribution Thomas Aquinas makes to Aristotle’s scheme, however, is to argue that a result or outcome in the world can come through both a primary cause – associated with God – and a secondary cause – associated with creatures.

Because only efficient causality has remained in the contemporary scientific world, says Dodds, “the very success that science enjoyed by omitting causes that could not be measured eventually led to the conviction that such causes should not only be ignored methodologically but denied metaphysically” (50). This denial of additional causes led to philosophical reductionism: the basic parts of the world, which apparently persist via efficient causation, are the most real. Efficient causation consequently led to many scholars framing causality in terms of mechanism. The result of a mechanistic world led to scientism, says Dodds, which is the view that only science can give us truth about the world.

Causality and Recent Science

In recent years, however, change has been taking place in philosophy of science.  The theory of emergence now plays an important explanatory role, for instance. Emergence says that we should think of the natural world as comprised of multiple levels, and new features can arise at one level. These features cannot be explained simply by their parts or by what occurs at less complex levels. In addition, quantum mechanics suggests indeterminacy exists at the least complex levels of existence. This indeterminacy means not only that variance occurs at these levels of existence, but that we cannot be entirely certain about our observations. Dodds notes that evolutionary theory is becoming more influenced by notions of purpose and direction. This development places into question the rigid mechanism assumed by some philosophies of science. Perhaps most important to Dodds’s project is his claim that many now seek causal explanations that go beyond efficient causation. According to Dodds, science itself now cries out for causal explanations beyond efficient causality alone.

The reduction of causality to one category – efficient causation – led to the reduction of our ability to speak about God’s causal activity. Put simply: the scientific worldview seemed to allow no room for God to act. Many engaging science-and-religion scholarship today are searching for a theoretical and empirical space -- “a causal joint” -- at which God may work in the world. Dodd regards this search as the quest for a univocal cause, in which God actions are similar in kind to creaturely actions but do not interfere the laws of nature or creaturely causality.

Many theologians in the modern period, says Dodds, responded to science by accepting the philosophical limitation that causation comes only through efficient causes. Here, process theology and theologies espousing divine self-limitation come under Dodds’s scrutiny. Unfortunately, however, this section is one of the weakest in the book. The author misrepresents what the majority of process theologians have said (and the footnotes reveal a lack of research in this area). Perhaps more unfortunate, Dodds never addresses in this section the crucial question driving much of modern theology: Does or can God completely control others (act as sufficient cause)? This question not only drives quests to solve the problem of evil, it also plays an important role in philosophy of science questions about causal explanations.

A major segment of Unlocking Divine Action addresses new theories of contemporary science and how those engaging in science-and-theology research use these theories to speculate about how God acts in the world.  For instance, Dodds looks at how some scholars speculate that God might input information into the natural world to exert causal influence. He looks at the possibilities open to the science-and-religion scholars by the apparent phenomenon of quantum indeterminacy. Dodds explores the possibility of God’s influencing the emergence of new structures in the natural world. All of the proposals Dodds explores suggest non-interventionist types of divine action: God exerts causal influence without circumventing creaturely influence.

God is Not Like Us (at all!)

Dodds is not convinced, however, by recent science-and-religion proposals on non-interventionist divine action. His primary criticism is that most science-and-religion scholars think God’s activity is of the same general kind as creaturely activity. In other words, these theories presuppose a univocal understanding of divine and creaturely causality. Those who presuppose a theory of causality based on univocity, Dodds contends, inevitably wrestle with the question of God’s interference. “When divine action is conceived univocally with the action of creatures, divine being tends to be viewed univocally as well. A univocal God, however, is quite different than the God of the Christian tradition” (158).

Not only does Dodd think God’s being is altogether different from creaturely being, but by thinking of them as on the same metaphysical kind leads to worrying that God and creatures compete as causes. “When two men carry a table,” Dodds says by way of illustration, “the more weight one lifts, the less there is for the other to lift” (153). But “God is unlike all other things,” he Dodds. “Recognizing this, we should be cautious about trying to say anything about how God acts. God is totally other” (161). For this reason, Dodds says, “the mode or manner of divine activity will ever escape us” (169).

The alternative Dodds presents is a return to the past: the proposals of Thomas Aquinas. According to Aquinas, there are no real relations or mutual dependency between God and creation.  Creatures depend upon God and are related to God. But God has no corresponding relation to creatures, and God is not dependent in any way. With Aquinas, Dodds believes that “God’s action is fundamentally different from that of creatures” (171). “To predicate such a relation of God,” says Dodds, “would be to reduce God to the level of one creature existing beside another” (172). Instead, it is impossible to speak of divine action in any positive way: “our verbal and conceptual abilities should be utterly defeated if we try to speak of God, since God is utterly beyond the being of creatures” (174).

Primary and Secondary Causation

But if it’s impossible for us to speak of God, where does this leave the one who seeks to talk about God’s action in relation to science?

Dodds believes the primary/secondary theory of causation offers the best way to talk about divine action and creaturely causation. According to this view, every instance of creaturely causality necessarily requires God’s influence. But God acts as a primary cause and does not conflict with the secondary causes. After all, argues Dodds, “these causes do not belong to the same order” (191). God’s causality infinitely transcends creaturely causality. And this means that “when a primary and secondary cause act together, the effect belongs entirely to both. The influence of the primary cause does not diminish the action of the secondary cause, but enables it” (192).

It’s important for Dodds, however, to insist that “the use of secondary causes does not bespeak any divine limitation” (192). In fact, “God’s causality does not constitute a miraculous intervention; nor does it negate the real causality of all the natural agents involved in the evolutionary process” (202). Whenever an event occurs in the world, we can say both that God caused it and that creatures caused it.

Dodds admits that this proposal borders on incomprehensibility: “the notion of secondary causation is not an easy one to grasp” (207). But he agrees with Etienne Gilson that “we must hold firmly to two apparently contradictory truths. God does whatever creatures do; and that creatures themselves do whatever they do” (208). This double agency of the primary/secondary theory is a paradox. Both God and creatures can be the causes of what occurs in reality, because as the primary cause, God transcends all categories of creaturely causation.

The Mystery Card

This is where my dissatisfaction for the Dodds/Thomas Aquinas proposal comes out strongly. In essence, Dodds is proposing what Ian Barbour called the “independence” model for thinking about science and theology: science and theology are independent explanations, and the two have no overlapping commonalities. God’s action is independent from creaturely actions, and God’s action is in no way analogous to creaturely action. In fact, we cannot say anything positive about God’s causal activity or God’s being, because God is utterly beyond our language and categories of being.

In the end, then, it’s all about mystery for Dodds. It’s mystery in the unsatisfactory sense of our not even being able to offer any meaningful explanation for God’s causal activity in relation to creaturely causation. The primary/secondary theory of Dodds and Thomas Aquinas strikes me as an elaborate mystery card played to retain a role for both divine and creaturely causation – theology and science – without having to make difficult decisions about ancient questions – e.g., why does a loving and powerful God not prevent evil? – or contemporary scientific issues – e.g., how does God act as an efficient cause?

And as the book winds down, Dodds explores what his primary/secondary theme entails for providence, miracles, and theodicy [(vindication of the divine attributes, particularly holiness and justice, in establishing or allowing the existence of physical and moral evil) - dictionary]. He quickly appeals to mystery when confronted with the problem of evil: It is a problem “no theology can answer or ‘solve’” (240). Dodds is not willing to entertain any notion of divine limitations [sic, "process theology"], because he believes such limitations result in even greater theological difficulties. Dodds ultimately offers the unsatisfactory proposal that God allows evil without directly intending it [this is a very unsatisfying proposing and I address this here under several articles in the sidebars "Sin," "Suffering and Evil," and Sovereignty" - res]. He explores prayer and miracles near the end of the book as well, using the primary/secondary scheme [again, I address these here under the concept of "synchronicity" by tying it into our ideas of "Miracle" and the "Holy Spirit". - res]. Important questions about God’s ability to act as a sufficient cause to answer prayer or act miraculously are not addressed to this reviewer’s satisfaction. But this is expected after the previous and longer section on evil and Dodds’s repeated appeals to mystery.

The Causality of Love?

Dodds concludes the book with a short section he titles, “The Causality of Love.” As one who has published a great deal on the metaphysics of love, I was especially keen to see what he would write in this very brief segment. Dodds believes his primary/secondary approach allows us to say God acts lovingly and creatures can partner with God. But after reading earlier in the book that God’s causality and being are altogether different from creaturely causality and being, I wondered how words like “partnership” or “cooperation” or even “participation” make any sense when used in relation to God and creation. And what does “love” even mean when our language about God, according to Dodds, offers nothing positive about God’s being or relations. In short, the appeal to love fell flat.

Despite my strong criticism of Unlocking Divine Action, I think this is an important book. I will be recommending it often. To my mind, it illustrates why many today are seeking ways to talk about divine action other than what we find in Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, Michael Dodds, and those who think similarly.

Sometimes I need a lucid book - and carefully argued thesis - to see clearly the need for something better. [AMEN and AMEN! - res]