N.T. Wright, "Paul and the Faithfulness of God" (Vol 4) - Jesus, Beheld As Messiah-God From the First

From the Very Beginning: NT Wright

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2013/11/12/from-the-very-beginning-nt-wright/

by Scot McKnight

November 12, 2013

Comments

The issue for historians of earliest Christianity is how this stuff all came about: How did Jesus of Nazareth come to be explained or confessed as he was? How did that christology develop? NT Wright, in Paul and the Faithfulness of God, proposes a breathtaking scheme that high christology, seeing Jesus as part of divine identity, was there from the very beginning:

We must note carefully how this argument actually works. I am not saying that there was a pre-Christian Jewish belief that the Messiah, if and when he turned up, would be in any sense ‘divine’. There are indeed texts which, with hindsight, could be taken to point that way, but despite the best efforts of scholars such as Horbury and Boyarin I remain unconvinced that anyone before Jesus’ first followers read them in this sense. Nor am I saying that anyone prior to Jesus’ first followers had read 2 Samuel 7.12 as predicting a resurrected Messiah (this is hardly surprising since there is no pre-Christian evidence for a dying Messiah,221). What I am suggesting is that the resurrection, demonstrating the truth of Jesus’s pre-crucifixion messianic claim, joined up with the expectation of YHWH’s return on the one hand and the presence of the spirit of Jesus on the other to generate a fresh reading of ‘messianic’ texts which enabled a full christological awareness to dawn on the disciples.

I do not think that pre-Christian Jews had read 2 Samuel 7; or Psalm 110 (‘YHWH says to my lord, “sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool”’), or Daniel 7 (‘one like a son of man’ being exalted to sit on a throne beside that of the ‘ancient of days’) in ways that anticipated, or could be said to be an antecedent cause of, the very early christology. What I propose is that the combination of (a) the widely held expectation of the divine return to defeat Israel’s enemies and rescue his people and (b) Jesus’ resurrection, compelling the conclusion that he really was Messiah, created exactly the conditions within which, in a context of (c) worship and an awareness of the presence and power of the same Jesus, texts which had been there all along but never seen in this way (except, perhaps, in sayings of Jesus himself!) sprang into life, 222 The earliest christol ogy was thus firmly anchored in scripture, but the reading of scripture in question was highly innovatory, and did not, in itself, generate the belief (692).

From 697, NT Wright proposes an unfolding-of-christology scheme:

So why does Paul stress the sending of the son? Quite possibly because he has already developed, or has even inherited from earlier tradition, ways of speaking and praying which belong with a christological monotheism (and, as Bauckham rightly suggests, an eschatological and cultic, as well as creational and covenantal, christological monotheism). These ways of speaking, as we already seen, identify ‘God’ as the source and goal of all things by designating him ‘father’, even while Jesus is designated ‘lord’, kyrios. We might then hypothesize a development in several stages, though as always with such things there is no way we can plot these chronologically. One might imagine the very early Christians, under the impact of the resurrection of Jesus and the fresh scriptural study which it precipitated, doing a variety of interlocking things very early on:

1. using theos for God the source and goal of all things, and kyrios for Jesus, as in 1 Corinthians 8.6, aware that these corresponded to the Hebrew elohim and YHWH, and intending to stress both the unity and the differentiation between the two of them;

2. using the biblical term ‘father’ to denote God/theos/elohim;

3. drawing in the originally messianic title ‘son of God’, already in use for Jesus because of its Davidic overtones and because of Jesus’ own way of speaking, as the natural corollary of this ‘father’. The one denoted as theos is thus seen as ‘father’ specifically of this ‘son’, andthe one denoted as kyrios is seen as ‘son’ specifically of this ‘father’,

even when that connection is not made explicitly;

4. speaking of ‘father and son’ in parallel to speaking of ‘God and lord’;

5. drawing on the ‘wisdom’ traditions, which were already in use in

terms of both the return of YHWH to Zion (Sirach 24) and the equip- ping of David’s son for his royal task (Wisdom 7—9), to speak of the father ‘sending’ the son (Romans 8.3; Galatians 4.4), and of the father transferring people into ‘the kingdom of the son of his love’ (Colos- sians 1.12–13, with the great ‘wisdom’-poem of 1.15–20 to follow), and of the kyrios as the one through whom all things were made (1 Corinthians 8.6;Colossians 1.16);

6. understanding the whole sequence in terms of the climactic and deci- sive rescuing act of the one God, the new Exodus in which this God had revealed himself fully and finally precisely in fulfilling his ancient promises, saving his people and coming to dwell in their midst.

All this, I stress, is necessarily hypothetical. Unless fresh evidence from the first twenty years of the Jesus-movement were to turn up (the age-old dream of a Christian archaeologist!) it remains impossible to demonstrate that any such sequence of thought actually took place. And ‘a sequence of thought’ has nothing to do with chronological extension. A mind well stocked with scripture, allied to a heart understanding itself to be trans- formed by the spirit and attuned to the worship of Jesus, could grasp in an instant what we are forced to reconstruct slowly and carefully. But I submit that this does seem to reflect some aspects of the data we actually possess. Interestingly, though move (4) seems somewhat obvious, Paul seldom uses the word ‘father’ in direct connection to a designation of Jesus as ‘son’. The closest we come in the passages already discussed is where believers cry ‘Abba, father’, because the spirit of the son has been sent into their hearts, and in Colossians 1.12–14, where ‘the father’ has ‘transferred us into the kingdom of the son of his love’ (697-698).

But this may be the biggest thing many need to hear today:

This brings us back to a point we have made already and which can now be reiterated with renewed force. None of this seems to have been a matter of controversy within the earliest church. This indicates, against the drift of studies of early christology for most of the twentieth century, that what we think of as a ‘high’ christology was thoroughly established within, at the most, twenty years of Jesus’ resurrection. In fact, to employ the kind of argument that used to be popular when it ran in the opposite direction, we might suggest that this christology must have been well established even sooner, since if it had only been accepted, say, in the late 40s we might have expected to catch some trace of anxiety or controversy on this point in Paul’s early letters at least. And we do not. The identification of Jesus with YHWH seems to have been part of (what later came to be called) Christianity from more or less the very beginning. Paul can refer to it, and weave it into arguments, poems, prayers and throwaway remarks, as common coin. Recognizing Jesus within the identity of Israel’s One God, and following through that recognition in worship (where monotheism really counts), seems to have been part of ‘the way’ from the start (709).

 Continue to Index -

Index to the "New(er) Perspective(s) of Paul"

The Why of Narrative Theology, Its Necessity, and Usefulness

A year and half ago I ran a piece titled, "An Unnecessary Division between Narrative and Literary Theology" which basically questioned Fields and CT's misuse of narrative theology. It's understanding of narrative theology was narrow, and selectively preferential towards systematic doctrinal expressions. It refused emergent, postmodern Christian interpretation (based upon sound biblical exegesis) as the more helpful activity in a plethora of traditional voices decrying this activity. My feeling since then has not changed and John Frye, in his article today, shares a more appropriate, conventional understanding of narrative theology when reflecting upon its helpfulness in doctrinal and theological thinking. Enjoy.

R.E. Slater
November 25, 2013

Once Upon a Time in a Text Far, Far Away

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2013/11/08/once-upon-a-text/

by John Frye

November 8, 2013

I was raised and trained in a social network that prized doctrinal intelligence. A person’s ability to learn and repeat precise “biblical” ideas was rewarded with praise, affirmation and advancement. The particular lives of some of the people and a few of the communities who valued doctrinal intelligence were factious, argumentative, judgmental, petty, gossipy and blinkered. The world of these otherwise fine people was limited to those who accepted and affirmed the prevailing doctrinal expressions. It was a ghetto of Bible-based ideas.

I have been discovering another perception for reality: narrative intelligence. Narrative intelligence emphasizes the power of story. Narrative intelligence, from a Christian point of view, does not minimize doctrinal intelligence, as many evangelicals think who get real jumpy about “story.” Narrative intelligence gives doctrinal intelligence a home, a place where the energies of doctrine may flourish into actual life. No one lives a systematic life. Everyone lives in stories and connects to others who are living in stories. Reality is a story construct, not a technical, scientific or doctrinal construct. I think many believers have low narrative intelligence when it comes to the faith, and it is not their fault. They check their stories at the door when they walk into church. In that antiseptic evangelical environment they are treated to “principles,” “bullet points,” “definitions” (of this Greek or that Hebrew word), and the consequential “applications.” A high octane story of Jesus’ “the Good Samaritan” is simmered down to a few clear principles and convenient moralisms and is just another little piece of the puzzle labeled “the whole counsel of God.”

Think about it: Many films have been made about the life of Jesus, some mediocre and some compelling. To my knowledge no one has made a movie of Hendrik Berkhof’s or Wayne Grudem’s systematic theologies or Calvin’s Institutes. I wonder why. Even the Apostle Paul’s alleged “doctrinal” books (e.g., Romans) were created within the passionate context of his powerful, missional life and ministry. Paul’s writings are conversations with others about the Jesus he was serving and the Story he was living and gospelling.

Following Jesus is a way of life. His followers are attracted to and swept up into Jesus’ story. The last thing we need is to be smothered in words, words, words…more and more doctrinal words. Definition-making is not the essence of the faith. Life-making, story-making is.

Once upon a time in a text far, far away…

The Evangelical Theological Society's (ETS) Dispute of Evolution: "A Crisis of Bible and Faith"

A furious - and political - debate about the origins of mankind

Lexington

All About Adam

From the Economist

November 23, 2013 (from the print edition)

[*additions by R.E. Slater]

THAT old-time religion is strong in America. To take just one measure, for decades more than 40% of all Americans have consistently told Gallup pollsters that God created humans in pretty much their current form, less than 10,000 years ago. They are embracing an account of man’s origins promoted by Young Earth Creationists who lean on a painstakingly literal reading of the Scriptures, swatting aside the counter-claims of science (fossils are a relic of Noah’s flood, they argue, and evolution is a myth peddled by atheists). In a recent poll 58% of Republicans and 41% of Democrats backed [literal] creationism. The glue that underpins such faith is the principle of Biblical inerrancy—a certainty that the Scriptures are infallibly and unchangingly true [*as versus an authoritative and infallible Bible that is true in all matters as regarding God's redemption and salvation for mankind and creation. - res].

A quest for certainty is an American tradition. Old World believers often inherit religion passively, like a cultural artefact. Americans, an individualistic bunch, are more likely to switch churches or preachers until they find a creed that makes sense to them. They admire fundamental texts (the constitution, for example) that plain citizens may parse for immutable truths.

At the same time, the literalist faith is in crisis. Young Americans are walking away from the stern denominations that have held such sway over post-war American life, from Billy Graham’s crusades to the rise of the religious right. After they hit 18, half of evangelical youngsters lose their faith; entering a public university is especially perilous. As a generation, millennials (those born between the early 1980s and 2000s), are unimpressed by organised anything, let alone organised religion. Many young adults told the Barna Group, an evangelical research outfit, that they felt stifled by elders who demonised secular America. Young Christians are more accepting of gay rights than their elders. In a challenge to creationists, a quarter of young adults told Barna’s study that their churches were “anti-science”.

The seeming paradox of a strong faith in crisis is explained by rigidity: that which cannot bend may break instead. The danger is keenly felt in conservative Christian circles, where a debate has broken out over the long-term outlook for the movement. That debate took Lexington this week to unfamiliar territory: the annual meeting, in Baltimore, of America’s largest society for evangelical theologians, where Biblical inerrancy topped the agenda. Some discussions were a trifle arcane, it is true, with sharp exchanges about ancient Hebrew cosmology and the degree to which the Book of Genesis draws on Mesopotamian creation and flood motifs. But a bang-up-to-date, and distinctly political, dispute hummed along underneath the scholarly sparring: what to do about core principles threatened by new facts. Evangelical Christianity is being shaken not only by the irreverence of the young but also by new discoveries flowing from genetic science.

Some discoveries mostly serve to inject fresh evidence into long-running disputes. It is nearly 90 years since the “Monkey Trial” of John Scopes, a young schoolmaster accused of teaching evolution to Tennessee children. Recent research (notably cross-species comparisons of gene sequences rendered non-functional by mutations) has greatly strengthened the case that humans and chimpanzees share a common ancestor. A creationist speaker in Baltimore shrugged such discoveries off, declaring that “science changes, but the word of God never changes.”

A trickier controversy has been triggered by findings from the genome that modern humans, in their genetic diversity, cannot be descended from a single pair of individuals. Rather, there were at least several thousand “first humans”. That challenges the historical existence of Adam and Eve, and has sparked a crisis of conscience among evangelical Christians persuaded by genetic science. This is not an esoteric point, says Michael Cromartie, an evangelical expert at the Ethics and Public Policy Centre, a Washington think-tank: many conservative theologians hold that without a historical Adam, whose sin descended directly to all humanity, there would be no reason for Jesus to come to Earth to redeem man’s Fall. [*please refer to the posts below for additional reading. - res]

Academics have lost jobs over the Adam controversy. Many Christian universities, among them Wheaton (a sort of evangelical Harvard and Yale, rolled into one), oblige faculty members to sign faith statements declaring that God directly created Adam and Eve, the “historical parents of the entire human race”. John Walton, an Old Testament scholar at Wheaton, suggested that Adam and Eve are presented in Genesis as archetypes, though he called them historical individuals too.

Would you Adam and Eve it?

In a breach with orthodoxy that would have been unthinkable a few years ago, the Baltimore meeting was also addressed by a Canadian, Denis Lamoureux, who sees no evidence for a historical Adam. The Bible, he argues, is “ancient science” filled with archaisms and metaphors. Mr. Lamoureux is a prominent member of the “evolutionary creation” movement, which credits God with creating Darwinian evolution and overseeing its workings (a view shared by, among others, the pope). A prime mover, Francis Collins, is an atheist-turned-Christian who directs the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the American government’s biomedical research agency. Biologos, an evolutionary creation group that Mr. Collins set up in 2007, calls this a moment to match Galileo’s trial for insisting that the Earth circles the sun.

Academic papers on Adam are flying. Perhaps a dozen Adam books are out or due out soon. Baltimore’s packed Adam session turned professors away at the door. This is a dispute between conservative Christians, not an outbreak of soggy, believe-what-you-like European deism. Much is at stake. Denying science is a bad habit among conservatives of all stripes: Paul Broun, a Georgia Republican who sits on the House science committee (and who wants to run for the Senate), says evolution is a lie “straight from the pit of hell”. That’s pandering, not piety.

How God Created by Evolution: A Proposed Theory of Man's Evolutionary Development

Evolution and The Problem of Sin and Death: A Look at Evolutionary Theodicy

Parts 1-3

"What is Evolutionary Creationism?"

A PowerPoint Presentation by Denis Lamoureux

Index to past discussions -

Index to past articles on "Science & Religion"





Additional Resources -
cf. sidebar columns to the right of this website

[Sidebar] Science and Faith - Biologos Articles

[Sidebar] Science and Faith - Biologos Vids

[Sidebar] All Science Sidebars

The Life of Poverty as Seen Through the Eyes of an Impoverished...

This Is Why Poor People's Bad Decisions Make Perfect Sense

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/linda-tirado/why-poor-peoples-bad-decisions-make-perfect-sense_b_4326233.html?utm_hp_ref=tw

Linda Tirado, Night Cook, Essayist, Activist

November 22, 2013

There's no way to structure this coherently. They are random observations that might help explain the mental processes. But often, I think that we look at the academic problems of poverty and have no idea of the why. We know the what and the how, and we can see systemic problems, but it's rare to have a poor person actually explain it on their own behalf. So this is me doing that, sort of.

Rest is a luxury for the rich. I get up at 6AM, go to school (I have a full course load, but I only have to go to two in-person classes) then work, then I get the kids, then I pick up my husband, then I have half an hour to change and go to Job 2. I get home from that at around 12:30AM, then I have the rest of my classes and work to tend to. I'm in bed by 3. This isn't every day, I have two days off a week from each of my obligations. I use that time to clean the house and soothe Mr. Martini and see the kids for longer than an hour and catch up on schoolwork. Those nights I'm in bed by midnight, but if I go to bed too early I won't be able to stay up the other nights because I'll fuck my pattern up, and I drive an hour home from Job 2 so I can't afford to be sleepy. I never get a day off from work unless I am fairly sick. It doesn't leave you much room to think about what you are doing, only to attend to the next thing and the next. Planning isn't in the mix.

When I got pregnant the first time, I was living in a weekly motel. I had a minifridge with no freezer and a microwave. I was on WIC. I ate peanut butter from the jar and frozen burritos because they were 12/$2. Had I had a stove, I couldn't have made beef burritos that cheaply. And I needed the meat, I was pregnant. I might not have had any prenatal care, but I am intelligent enough to eat protein and iron whilst knocked up.

I know how to cook. I had to take Home Ec to graduate high school. Most people on my level didn't. Broccoli is intimidating. You have to have a working stove, and pots, and spices, and you'll have to do the dishes no matter how tired you are or they'll attract bugs. It is a huge new skill for a lot of people. That's not great, but it's true. And if you fuck it up, you could make your family sick. We have learned not to try too hard to be middle-class. It never works out well and always makes you feel worse for having tried and failed yet again. Better not to try. It makes more sense to get food that you know will be palatable and cheap and that keeps well. Junk food is a pleasure that we are allowed to have; why would we give that up? We have very few of them.

The closest Planned Parenthood to me is three hours. That's a lot of money in gas. Lots of women can't afford that, and even if you live near one you probably don't want to be seen coming in, and out, in a lot of areas. We're aware that we are not "having kids," we're "breeding." We have kids for much the same reasons that I imagine rich people do. Urge to propagate and all. Nobody likes poor people procreating, but they judge abortion even harder.

Convenience food is just that. And we are not allowed many conveniences. Especially since the Patriot Act passed, it's hard to get a bank account. But without one, you spend a lot of time figuring out where to cash a check and get money orders to pay bills. Most motels now have a no-credit-card-no-room policy. I wandered around SF for five hours in the rain once with nearly a thousand dollars on me and could not rent a room even if I gave them a $500 cash deposit and surrendered my cell phone to the desk to hold as surety.

Nobody gives enough thought to depression. You have to understand that we know that we will never not feel tired. We will never feel hopeful. We will never get a vacation. Ever. We know that the very act of being poor guarantees that we will never not be poor. It doesn't give us much reason to improve ourselves. We don't apply for jobs because we know we can't afford to look nice enough to hold them. I would make a super legal secretary, but I've been turned down more than once because I "don't fit the image of the firm," which is a nice way of saying "gtfooh, pov." I am good enough to cook the food, hidden away in the kitchen, but my boss won't make me a server because I don't "fit the corporate image." I am not beautiful. I have missing teeth and skin that looks like it will when you live on B12 and coffee and nicotine and no sleep. Beauty is a thing you get when you can afford it, and that's how you get the job that you need in order to be beautiful. There isn't much point trying.

Cooking attracts roaches. Nobody realizes that. I've spent a lot of hours impaling roach bodies and leaving them out on toothpick pikes to discourage others from entering. It doesn't work, but is amusing.

"Free" only exists for rich people. It's great that there's a bowl of condoms at my school, but most poor people will never set foot on a college campus. We don't belong there. There's a clinic? Great! There's still a copay. We're not going. Besides, all they'll tell you at the clinic is that you need to see a specialist, which  - seriously?  - might as well be located on Mars for how accessible it is. "Low-cost" and "sliding scale" sounds like "money you have to spend" to me, and they can't actually help you anyway.

I smoke. It's expensive. It's also the best option. You see, I am always, always exhausted. It's a stimulant. When I am too tired to walk one more step, I can smoke and go for another hour. When I am enraged and beaten down and incapable of accomplishing one more thing, I can smoke and I feel a little better, just for a minute. It is the only relaxation I am allowed. It is not a good decision, but it is the only one that I have access to. It is the only thing I have found that keeps me from collapsing or exploding.

I make a lot of poor financial decisions. None of them matter, in the long term. I will never not be poor, so what does it matter if I don't pay a thing and a half this week instead of just one thing? It's not like the sacrifice will result in improved circumstances; the thing holding me back isn't that I blow five bucks at Wendy's. It's that now that I have proven that I am a Poor Person that is all that I am or ever will be. It is not worth it to me to live a bleak life devoid of small pleasures so that one day I can make a single large purchase. I will never have large pleasures to hold on to. There's a certain pull to live what bits of life you can while there's money in your pocket, because no matter how responsible you are you will be broke in three days anyway. When you never have enough money it ceases to have meaning. I imagine having a lot of it is the same thing.

Poverty is bleak and cuts off your long-term brain. It's why you see people with four different babydaddies instead of one. You grab a bit of connection wherever you can to survive. You have no idea how strong the pull to feel worthwhile is. It's more basic than food. You go to these people who make you feel lovely for an hour that one time, and that's all you get. You're probably not compatible with them for anything long-term, but right this minute they can make you feel powerful and valuable. It does not matter what will happen in a month. Whatever happens in a month is probably going to be just about as indifferent as whatever happened today or last week. None of it matters. We don't plan long-term because if we do we'll just get our hearts broken. It's best not to hope. You just take what you can get as you spot it.

I am not asking for sympathy. I am just trying to explain, on a human level, how it is that people make what look from the outside like awful decisions. This is what our lives are like, and here are our defense mechanisms, and here is why we think differently. It's certainly self-defeating, but it's safer. That's all. I hope it helps make sense of it.

Additions have been made to the update below to reflect the responses received.

UPDATE: The response to this piece is overwhelming. I have had a lot of people ask to use my work. Please do. Share it with the world if you found value in it. Please link back if you can. If you are teaching, I am happy to discuss this with or clarify for you, and you can freely use this piece in your classes. Please do let me know where you teach. You can reach me on Twitter, @killermartinis. I set up an email at killermartinisbook@gmail as well.

This piece has gone fully viral. People have been asking me to write, and how they can help. After enough people tried to send me paypal money, I set up a gofundme. Find it here. It promptly went insane. I have raised my typical yearly income as of this update. I have no idea what to say except thank you. I am going to speak with some money people who will make sure that I can't fuck this up, and I will use it to do good things with.

I've also set up a blog, which I hope you will find here. And my blog postings here.

Understand that I wrote this as an example of the thought process that we struggle with. Most of us are clinically depressed, and we do not get therapy and medication and support. We get told to get over it. And we find ways to cope. I am not saying that people live without hope entirely; that is not human nature. But these are the thoughts that are never too far away, that creep up on us every chance they get, that prey on our better judgement when we are tired and stressed and weakened. We maintain a constant vigil against these thoughts, because we are afraid that if we speak them aloud or even articulate them in our heads they will become unmanageably real.

Thank you for reading. I am glad people find value in it. Because I am getting tired of people not reading this and then commenting anyway, I am making a few things clear: not all of this piece is about me. That is why I said that they were observations. And this piece is not all of me: that is why I said that they were random observations rather than complete ones. If you really have to urge me to abort, or keep my knees closed, or wonder whether I can fax you my citizenship documents, or if I really in fact have been poor because I know multisyllabic words, I would like to ask that you read the comments and see whether anyone has made your point in the particular fashion you intend to. It is not that I mind [web] trolls so much, it's that they're getting repetitive, and if you have to say nothing I hope you can at least do it in an entertaining fashion.

If, however, you simply are curious about something and actually want to have a conversation, I do not mind repeating myself because those conversations are valuable and not actually repetitive. They tend to be very specific to the asker, and I am happy to shed any light I can. I do not mind honest questions. They are why I wrote this piece.

Thank you all, so much. I don't know what life will look like next week, and for once that's a good thing. And I have you to thank.

This post first appeared on killermartinis.kinja.com

Follow Linda Tirado on Twitter: www.twitter.com/killermartinis

God and Time: What Is Time? And How Does Time Relate to God?

"Has God no attraction for what is new? Has he no capacity of the delightful

experiences of wonder and surprise and variety? We ought never to lose

sight of what God has explicitly revealed of himself when he declares

that we are made in his image and likeness."

- An 1882 quote by Lorenzo Dow McCabe, a Methodist who was one of the

first well-known advocates of Open theology to insist God experiences

time in a way analogous to how we experience time.

Today's article on "God and Time" should be considered a standard introduction written from both a theological, and philosophical, perspective as you would any premier to the subject. But not as a scientific one. It will introduce the novice reader to the several ideas of the church in consideration to those presented in Greek philosophy; and later, to the ideas of early, rudimentary, science as it was initially being laid out during the 17th century enlightenment period. As such, I would consider today's presentation as a series of "classic Christian arguments" on the subject itself.

Herein, does the author present a step-wise case for the topic at hand, but even as he did so I found myself asking more questions than were being answered. Moreover, as each conclusion was being made, even so were they understated and jumbled together in a tumbleweed of observations. Hence, my regard for this piece as an introduction to the topic on hand, and a beginning loci for discussion centered around the "classic" mindset of Christian theology. However, the newer, more postmodern discussions occurring in science, theology, and philosophy, are not addressed.

For additional help, I would suggest referring to the index at the bottom of this article under the subtitles of "The Origin of Time and Space," and "Discussions Ex Nihilo," along with reviewing the many articles found in the sidebars of this website, perhaps under the wider themes of "God, creation, sovereignty, sin, science, philosophy," and so forth. Thank you.

R.E. Slater
November 20, 2013

Today's entry was written by Ryan Mullins. Please note the views expressed here

are those of the author, not necessarily of The BioLogos Foundation. You can

read more about what we believe here.

*Of note, I have arranged Mullins article topically to help make it a bit more

comprehensible while interjecting a thought or two as I think it relates to other parts

of the theological discussions we have held here on this website. Where this is done

you will observe [brackets]. Thank you. - RE Slater

From Time Back to Eternity, Part I

http://biologos.org/blog/questions-on-time-and-eternity-part-1

What is time? What is eternity? Will humans always be asking these questions? Reflection on time and eternity has brought up all sorts of philosophical and theological conundrums. For instance, there is the ancient question, “What was God doing before he created the world?” There were two popular answers in the past. First, God was creating hell for people who ask such questions. This was usually seen as a joke response, though in some instances it was not. The second response was that God was creating time itself. As such, there is no "before creation". Whether or not this is a good response is something I will set aside for the moment.

To say that these topics are bedeviling would be an understatement. Time is such a fundamental feature of reality and human experience. We are constantly thinking about time in various ways and have multiple metaphors for capturing some of its more comprehensible aspects. We wear time on our wrists and use it to decorate our rooms. We experience the ebb and flow of time’s passage every conscious moment of our existence. We thank God for time when a horrible event ends, or when an anticipated event arrives. We mourn when great moments in our lives pass us by or cease to be. Time is a fundamental feature of our lives and we can’t help but think about it.

But perhaps we could think about time and eternity more clearly than we presently do. In this post I will introduce you to some of the types of questions that need to be asked in order to understand the nature of time and God’s eternity. In the process of discussing these questions, some possible answers will begin to emerge. The hope is that we can begin to think more clearly about time and eternity.

The Fundamental Questions

I’ll begin by sorting out some of the questions that people typically ask about time and the types of responses that are often given. Once a better understanding of these questions and responses are grasped, one can begin to understand the nature of eternity. What types of questions will help us achieve this understanding?

There are two types of fundamental questions about time. How one answers these questions will shape how s/he answers questions about the nature of eternity. The first question is the metaphysical question. The second is the ontological question:

I - The Metaphysics of Time

Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the basic fundamental features of reality. The metaphysical question is asking about the fundamental nature of time. What is time?

Time As Relational

Historically, there have been two broad answers. The first is sometimes called the “relational theory of time.” It can also be called the “reductive theory of time.” On this position, time is change. If there is a change, there is a time. If there is no change, there is no time. This is because change creates a before and after relationship.

For example: previously, you were not reading this blog post. Then you began to read this blog post. You changed from the state of not reading, to a state of reading. You have a before and an after in your life.

Imagine a somewhat different scenario. Imagine that the universe never existed. Perhaps after reading this blog post you wished that the universe never existed, but don’t think about it in that way. Instead, ask yourself a different question. If there were no universe, would time exist? Someone who holds to the relational theory would most likely say no. There needs to be something that exists that undergoes change in order to generate time.

Time As Non-Relational (or, Absolute)

Perhaps your gut is telling you something different. Maybe you think that time could exist even if the universe does not exist. If you feel this way, you are not alone, because there are thinkers who reject the relational theory of time. This brings us to the second position, which is called the “absolute theory of time.” It can also be called Platonism or substantivalism.

In this understanding of time, time can exist without change. This is because time is duration, or the possibility of change. When changes take place, time takes place, but time could exist without change.

During the 17th century, this view became quite popular. Along with its rise in popularity was a move away from the claim that God is timeless. Instead, various philosophers, theologians, and scientists came to equate time with God’s eternity. The idea was that time exists because God exists. Time necessarily flows from the divine nature. God has the perfect capacity to bring about any changes he so desires, and this capacity is all that is needed to generate time.

The claim from thinkers within this camp is that God exists regardless of whether or not he decides to create anything. Further, since time necessarily flows from the nature of God, time exists regardless of the contingent things that exist within it. So time would exist even if God did not create a universe.

Comparing Relational Time with Non-Relational Time

Of course, Christian theology claims that God has created this universe, and possibly others as well. To get a better grasp on the differences between the relational and absolute theory of time, focus your attention on our universe. Imagine that one day God paused the movements of the planets and everything else such that nothing within the universe continued to move until God unpaused it. Would time exist during this pause? The absolute theorist would say yes because time can exist without change. S/he might say that we could not measure the amount of time that passed during this pause, but s/he would still maintain that there was time during this pause. There was the moment when God paused the universe, then the pause, then the moment when God unpaused the universe. The relational theorist will most likely have none of this. If God pauses the universe such that there is no movement or change at all, she will say that there is no time occurring until God unpauses everything.

II - The Ontology of Time

To recap, these two possibilities—relational versus absolute time—respond to the first fundamental question on time: the metaphysical question. The second fundamental question is called the ontological question. Ontology is the branch of philosophy that studies existence [(or, composition)].

Time as Presentism

The ontological question on time asks about what moments of time exist. There are three basic positions one can take. The first is called presentism. This is often said to be the “common sense view,” and it has been the most widespread view throughout history. In presentism, only the present moment of time exists. The past no longer exists, and the future does not yet exist.

Time as Both Past and Present, but Not Future

The second position is called the “growing block view.” It holds that the past and present both exist. Time is like an ever-growing block where the leading edge is the present moment.

Time as Past, Present, and Future (or, Eternalism)

The third position is called “eternalism” and it says that the past, present, and future all exist.

In order to get a better grasp on the ontological question, consider another thought experiment. Imagine that you are sitting in your living room watching TV. All of a sudden a blue police box appears in your room, and a man in a sharp suit and wild hair bursts out of it calling himself “the Doctor.” With mad gestures and unnerving but exciting facial expressions, the Doctor tells you that he has a machine. If you come with him in this machine, he says that he can take you anywhere in space and to any “when” in time. All you have to do is say when and where, and he will take you there. Say you want to go back to the 17th century to hear Samuel Clarke and G.W. Leibniz debate the absolute and relational theory of time. Or maybe you want to go back and chat up Caroline, the Princess of Wales, whilst the debate is going on. Is this possible? That depends on several things, one of which is the ontology of time.

Comparing the Three Ontologies of Time

If presentism is true, the good Doctor may be able to take you anywhere, but he cannot take you to any when. In presentism, this is impossible since the past no longer exists. There is no moment in the past to go back to in order to flirt with the Princess of Wales.

However, if the growing block theory is true, the Doctor could take you there, since the past does exist in this theory. But perhaps you decide you want to see the future instead of chatting up some 17th Century Welsh princess. Say you want to know who will win the 2016 United States presidential election. If presentism or the growing block theory is true, the Doctor cannot take you to the future because the future does not exist in either theory.

But if eternalism is true, he can, since the past, present, and future all exist. (Of course, this is assuming that time travel is even a possibility. Many philosophers argue that time travel is not logically possible since it always involves a paradox of some sort, but that issue will have to wait for another day.)

Conclusion

Throughout this first post, I have alluded to the fact that how one answers these fundamental questions will shape how one understands God’s relation to time. In the next post, I’ll discuss how these questions of time come to bear on God’s eternal nature and his relationship with our temporal universe.

From Time Back to Eternity, Part II

http://biologos.org/blog/questions-on-time-and-eternity-part-2

Now that we have a somewhat better understanding of the different positions on the fundamental nature of time, we can ask about the fundamental nature of eternity [(sic, from time to eternity)]. Theologians and religious philosophers in the past have made a distinction between God’s eternity, and the eternal life that God has granted humans. Historically, most theologians have said that God’s eternity is timeless whereas the eternal life that is granted to humans is not. To say that humans will have eternal life is to say that they will enjoy blissful lives without end.

How Is God Eternal?

Beginning in the 17th century, theologians and philosophers began to reject the claim that God’s eternity is timeless. Instead, they said God’s eternity is temporal. Today, there is a serious debate over the nature of God’s eternity [sic, Process vs. Classical Thought - RE Slater)]. All of this brings up a very important set of questions. What is timeless eternity? What is temporal eternity? How one answers these questions will depend upon how she answered the above questions on time.

Time as a Timeless Eternity

When it comes to the task of articulating divine timelessness, theologians and philosophers have historically supported both presentism and the relational theory. To say that God is timeless is to say that God exists without beginning, without end, and without succession.

God lacks succession because he does not undergo any changes of any sort. Since time is change in the relational theory, and God does not change, God does not exist in time. Further, God exists in a timeless present that lacks a before and after.

Our present is fleeting in that it has a before, and after. Humans endure through time by existing in the present, but they have moments of their lives that no longer exist and other anticipated moments that do not yet exist.

These theologians would say that, unlike humans, God does not lose moments of his life, nor does he have moments that do not yet exist.

Time as Temporal Eternity

Other theologians and religious philosophers reject timeless eternity and instead hold to a temporal eternity. To say that God’s eternity is temporal is to say that God exists without beginning and without end. Yet they will say that God does have succession in his life.

1 - First Reason

One reason for rejecting timeless eternity is that a timeless God cannot create a temporal universe. A standard claim among believers of monotheistic religions is that God created the universe ex nihilo—out of nothing. The universe has not always existed because God was not always creating it. The universe is not co-eternal with God [because it was created by God at some point in time]. [The process theologian will additionally say that the God is continually creating (or, re-creating) the cosmos. - re slater].

So the picture we have of creation is one where God exists without the universe, and then God creates and exists with the universe. Creation marks a new moment in the life of God. God was not always the creator, but became the creator.

2 - Second Reason

A second reason for rejecting divine timelessness is from the doctrine of divine sustaining. Once God has created the universe, he sustains it in existence moment by moment. The universe would not exist at any given moment without God actively sustaining it in existence.

Given presentism, God would sustain one moment of time, and then cease to sustain it in existence as he sustains the next moment. Since the present is constantly moving forward, God would be continually sustaining new moments of time in existence and ceasing to sustain previous moments of time. As such, God’s life would involve succession and change as he sustains the universe in existence and providentially guides history to his desired goal.

Comparison of Time as Timeless or Temporal

Contemporary defenders of divine timelessness (view 1) have a reply to these objections. The objections assume presentism. However, as noted above, presentism is not the only position one could hold.

Today, most defenders of divine timelessness hold to eternalism whereby the past, present, and future all equally exist. In this picture of time, God is creating and sustaining all of time at once. There is a sense in which the universe is co-eternal with God because God never exists without the universe [(the idea of "pan-en-theism," which is part of process thought - re slater)]. So the problem of God beginning to create a universe does not arise because God never exists without the universe. God is eternally the creator.

Further, the contemporary defender will say that the problem of God sustaining the universe goes away too. The picture of God sustaining a moment of time in existence, and then ceasing to sustain it, does not arise on eternalism, for all moments of time are co-eternal with God.

What Time Is It? What Eternity Is It?

At this point, one might wonder which understanding of God and time is correct. Unfortunately, such an answer would make this blog post far too long. I can, however, note some of the issues that arise from each picture of God and time.

Comparison of View 1

First, consider the view that God is timeless and that eternalism is the right understanding of time [(sic, the classical position - re slater)]. All moments of time are co-eternal with God. One worry that this raises is with regard to the problem of evil and suffering. If all moments of time equally exist, and are co-eternal with God, then evil and suffering are co-eternal with God.

Think of yesterday morning when you got up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom. Recall how you stubbed your toe while stumbling through the dark corridors of your home. In that moment of pain you cursed God with a loud voice of anguish. As the pain subsided, you might have thought it rather silly to have been so upset. Perhaps you asked for forgiveness for your swearing, or maybe you offered up praise thanking God that the moment of pain had now passed.

On eternalism, that moment of time when you stubbed your toe exists. The you that exists at this moment is not experiencing that pain because you are experiencing the bliss of reading this blogpost. However, the you of yesterday morning is experiencing that pain because the you of yesterday exists just as much as the current you does, albeit at a different moment of time. The suffering you and the blissfully blog-reading you are both co-eternal with God.

For some Christians, it might be difficult to believe that God and suffering are co-eternal in this way. Instead, some Christians might ask how this view of God and time can be reconciled with the promise that one day God will remove all suffering from the universe (Revelation 21:4). If the moments of suffering never cease to exist because they are co-eternal with God, how can God truly rid the world of evil?

Comparison of View 2

Now consider the other view on which God is in time and presentism is the correct understanding of time. The temporal God is constantly changing as new moments of time come into existence. Consider again your unfortunate toe-stubbing incident from the night before. On presentism, that moment did not always exist, but it began to exist, then ceased to exist. God began to perceive that you were stubbing your toe. Then God began to perceive that you were cursing his name. Once you calmed down and asked for forgiveness, God began to forgive you.

This certainly fits with certain biblical themes about God’s responsiveness to human prayer, his interaction with history, and the claim that God was not always incarnate but became incarnate at one point in history for the sake of salvation.

However, some Christians might worry that this does not fit with the biblical theme of God’s [divine] immutability. Certain biblical passages seem to suggest that God is immutable or unchanging (e.g. Numbers 23:19; Malachi 3:6; James 1:17). As such, Christians might wonder how a temporal understanding of God can be reconciled with God’s immutability. How can a God who is constantly changing as he interacts with creatures truly be immutable?

Conclusion

Each position on God and time has its own answers to these worries, as well as other concerns that arise from the respective pictures of God and time. What those answers look like, and whether or not those answers are satisfying, will have to wait for another day. This is just the beginning of the discussion on God, time, and eternity. Hopefully, having a better sense of the fundamental questions will help us think more clearly about the God we worship, and help us come to appreciate his gift of eternal life.

continue to -

Index to past articles on "Particle Physics, Quantum Science, and the Universe"






* * * * * * *

God Is Not Outside of Time
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/tonyjones/2014/01/23/god-is-not-outside-of-time/

by Tony Jones
January 23, 2014
Comments

One of the things I hear assumed by Christians all the time is that God is outside of time. It’s odd, I think, to make this assumption, because it’s not biblical, it’s Platonic. There’s a verse in 2 Peter that often gets cited — “But do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like one day.” — but that is a reflection on God’s experience of time, not God’s independence from time.

As human beings, we are hedged in on all sides by time, completely circumscribed by it. Our impending deaths remind us daily of this reality. Try as we might, we simply cannot conceive of being free from time.

That’s not to say that time isn’t fluid. In the 20th century, we became aware that time can be slightly bent, and in the 21st century, we’re starting to hear that maybe time can take place more complexly than we’ve previously known.

Nevertheless, time is a condition of our existence, and it’s inescapable.

In the book I’m currently writing, the questions I’m trying to answer have to do with where was God on Good Friday? What is God’s relationship to the cross? And what is God’s culpability in the death of Jesus? God’s relationship to time is implicated in all of these questions. And I’m coming to rest with the idea that God is voluntarily bound to time. That part of God’s longstanding story of humility and self-limitation is that God abdicated timelessness in order to have an authentic relationship with timebound beings. Because if God were outside of time, relationship [as we know and experience it] with those of us inside of time would be impossible.