Quotes & Sayings


We, and creation itself, actualize the possibilities of the God who sustains the world, towards becoming in the world in a fuller, more deeper way. - R.E. Slater

There is urgency in coming to see the world as a web of interrelated processes of which we are integral parts, so that all of our choices and actions have [consequential effects upon] the world around us. - Process Metaphysician Alfred North Whitehead

Kurt Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem says (i) all closed systems are unprovable within themselves and, that (ii) all open systems are rightly understood as incomplete. - R.E. Slater

The most true thing about you is what God has said to you in Christ, "You are My Beloved." - Tripp Fuller

The God among us is the God who refuses to be God without us, so great is God's Love. - Tripp Fuller

According to some Christian outlooks we were made for another world. Perhaps, rather, we were made for this world to recreate, reclaim, redeem, and renew unto God's future aspiration by the power of His Spirit. - R.E. Slater

Our eschatological ethos is to love. To stand with those who are oppressed. To stand against those who are oppressing. It is that simple. Love is our only calling and Christian Hope. - R.E. Slater

Secularization theory has been massively falsified. We don't live in an age of secularity. We live in an age of explosive, pervasive religiosity... an age of religious pluralism. - Peter L. Berger

Exploring the edge of life and faith in a post-everything world. - Todd Littleton

I don't need another reason to believe, your love is all around for me to see. – Anon

Thou art our need; and in giving us more of thyself thou givest us all. - Khalil Gibran, Prayer XXIII

Be careful what you pretend to be. You become what you pretend to be. - Kurt Vonnegut

Religious beliefs, far from being primary, are often shaped and adjusted by our social goals. - Jim Forest

We become who we are by what we believe and can justify. - R.E. Slater

People, even more than things, need to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anyone. – Anon

Certainly, God's love has made fools of us all. - R.E. Slater

An apocalyptic Christian faith doesn't wait for Jesus to come, but for Jesus to become in our midst. - R.E. Slater

Christian belief in God begins with the cross and resurrection of Jesus, not with rational apologetics. - Eberhard Jüngel, Jürgen Moltmann

Our knowledge of God is through the 'I-Thou' encounter, not in finding God at the end of a syllogism or argument. There is a grave danger in any Christian treatment of God as an object. The God of Jesus Christ and Scripture is irreducibly subject and never made as an object, a force, a power, or a principle that can be manipulated. - Emil Brunner

“Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh” means "I will be that who I have yet to become." - God (Ex 3.14) or, conversely, “I AM who I AM Becoming.”

Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy. - Thomas Merton

The church is God's world-changing social experiment of bringing unlikes and differents to the Eucharist/Communion table to share life with one another as a new kind of family. When this happens, we show to the world what love, justice, peace, reconciliation, and life together is designed by God to be. The church is God's show-and-tell for the world to see how God wants us to live as a blended, global, polypluralistic family united with one will, by one Lord, and baptized by one Spirit. – Anon

The cross that is planted at the heart of the history of the world cannot be uprooted. - Jacques Ellul

The Unity in whose loving presence the universe unfolds is inside each person as a call to welcome the stranger, protect animals and the earth, respect the dignity of each person, think new thoughts, and help bring about ecological civilizations. - John Cobb & Farhan A. Shah

If you board the wrong train it is of no use running along the corridors of the train in the other direction. - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

God's justice is restorative rather than punitive; His discipline is merciful rather than punishing; His power is made perfect in weakness; and His grace is sufficient for all. – Anon

Our little [biblical] systems have their day; they have their day and cease to be. They are but broken lights of Thee, and Thou, O God art more than they. - Alfred Lord Tennyson

We can’t control God; God is uncontrollable. God can’t control us; God’s love is uncontrolling! - Thomas Jay Oord

Life in perspective but always in process... as we are relational beings in process to one another, so life events are in process in relation to each event... as God is to Self, is to world, is to us... like Father, like sons and daughters, like events... life in process yet always in perspective. - R.E. Slater

To promote societal transition to sustainable ways of living and a global society founded on a shared ethical framework which includes respect and care for the community of life, ecological integrity, universal human rights, respect for diversity, economic justice, democracy, and a culture of peace. - The Earth Charter Mission Statement

Christian humanism is the belief that human freedom, individual conscience, and unencumbered rational inquiry are compatible with the practice of Christianity or even intrinsic in its doctrine. It represents a philosophical union of Christian faith and classical humanist principles. - Scott Postma

It is never wise to have a self-appointed religious institution determine a nation's moral code. The opportunities for moral compromise and failure are high; the moral codes and creeds assuredly racist, discriminatory, or subjectively and religiously defined; and the pronouncement of inhumanitarian political objectives quite predictable. - R.E. Slater

God's love must both center and define the Christian faith and all religious or human faiths seeking human and ecological balance in worlds of subtraction, harm, tragedy, and evil. - R.E. Slater

In Whitehead’s process ontology, we can think of the experiential ground of reality as an eternal pulse whereby what is objectively public in one moment becomes subjectively prehended in the next, and whereby the subject that emerges from its feelings then perishes into public expression as an object (or “superject”) aiming for novelty. There is a rhythm of Being between object and subject, not an ontological division. This rhythm powers the creative growth of the universe from one occasion of experience to the next. This is the Whiteheadian mantra: “The many become one and are increased by one.” - Matthew Segall

Without Love there is no Truth. And True Truth is always Loving. There is no dichotomy between these terms but only seamless integration. This is the premier centering focus of a Processual Theology of Love. - R.E. Slater

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Note: Generally I do not respond to commentary. I may read the comments but wish to reserve my time to write (or write from the comments I read). Instead, I'd like to see our community help one another and in the helping encourage and exhort each of us towards Christian love in Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior. - re slater

Sunday, December 29, 2013

Pre-Columbian America: The (Epistemological) Lands that Time Forgot


Fleet Foxes - Helplessness Blues (with lyrics)




I was raised up believing
I was somehow unique
Like a snowflake distinct among snowflakes
Unique in each way you can see

And now after some thinking
I'd say I'd rather be
A functioning cog in some great machinery
Serving something beyond me

But I don't, I don't know what that will be
I'll get back to you someday soon you will see

What's my name, what's my station
Oh just tell me what I should do
I don't need to be kind to the armies of night
That would do such injustice to you

Or bow down and be grateful
And say "Sure take all that you see"
To the men who move only in dimly-lit halls
And determine my future for me

And I don't, I don't know who to believe
I'll get back to you someday soon you will see

If I know only one thing
It's that every thing that I see
Of the world outside is so inconceivable
Often I barely can speak

Yeah I'm tongue tied and dizzy
And I can't keep it to myself
What good is it to sing helplessness blues?
Why should I wait for anyone else?

And I know, I know you will keep me on the shelf
I'll come back to you someday soon myself

If I had an orchard
I'd work till I'm raw
If I had an orchard
I'd work till I'm sore

And you would wait tables
And soon run the store

Gold hair in the sunlight
My light in the dawn
If I had an orchard
I'd work till I'm sore

If I had an orchard
I'd work till I'm sore

Someday I'll be
Like the man on the screen


As Christians, we tend to be very Bible-myopic... that is, focused on all things "in-and-around" the Bible, when in fact we should be as sympathetic to all things "non-biblical" lest we find ourselves out-of-touch, and out-of-date, with world events, people, movements, and ideas.

For instance, in today's article, how much can we say that we actually know about the ancient peoples of the ancient New World? You know, the ancient tribes and peoples of North and South America during the biblical times of the Akkadians and Sumerians, the Egyptians, Assyrians and Babylonians?

But, you say, that's not important because they aren't in the Bible! Oh, really? Are you sure about that? Because if you are, than apparently your Bible is going to be limited by your personal views of who (or what) you think God is, His mission and agenda, and redemptive timeline for this world that we live in.

Put another way, how flexible, adaptive, and open is a biblical theology that only sees theology in transition for a regional section of the ancient world without considering its ramifications for other, more ancient, peoples and societies?

If what Jesus said to the ancient Jews is true for them, how then was it true for other tribes and events in other parts of the ancient world? And just how did God intend to get His message of salvation to those Indian tribes and "heathen" societies beyond the boundary lands of Israel's self-centeredness? Especially when separated by a trans-Atlantic, or trans-Pacific ocean, time and space?

Oh, you say, God will "dumb down" His expectations and adjust His mission to those less fortunate than the Jews (re "biblical knowledge and information"). He'll understand that the Laplanders in Finland, and the Eskimos in Siberia, Alaska, and Canada, or the Indonesian and Aborigine tribes of the South Pacific, shouldn't be as culpable as His own people (Israel), or the people that Israel traded with in the Middle East.

Which is all well-and-good until the subject of evolution comes along causing us as Christians to do "a head-spin" making us incapable of adjusting to this wildly "unbiblical" scientific viewpoint because we have had tunnel-vision for so long in our "bible-lands" imaginations and theologies.

Or when radical theology comes along to rethink the German Idealism of existentialism and phenomenology and we can't "get with it" because we are still stuck in the Greek Hellenistic mindset of Medievalism and all the classical theology that comes with it (Thomism, Catholicism, Protestantism, etc).

Or when group social theory and game theory comes along to tell us that there are certain things people can do better together in society than apart from one-another isolated from society. And when done, that the basic rules and metaphors for behavior and societal outcome will naturally adjust with it as distinctly different from past, more ancient, societies which were less bound with one another. Less dependent upon one another. Less interrelated, interchangeable, and integrated with one another.

And so it seems, that for any Christian to be sufficiently informed will require a broader worldview than the regionally minded, biblical one, that we grew up with. And no, Facebooking or Twittering each other doesn't make us more worldly-wise. In fact, it may make us more cynical; more protective of our old world views; perhaps more biased in our world opinions of one another (stereotypes, etc)....

Even so, for some involved in social media this may not be true, but for many - most grand ideas begin-and-end with one's Facebook pictures of weekend get-togethers with friends at the bars. Or the music concerts we've attended. Or the girl, or boy, that we thought was cute and went on a disaster date with. Or a meaningful motto or slogan we saw and passed along hoping to give ourselves further definition, expression, and connectedness in a technology driven society increasingly becoming disconnected to itself and community.

Hence, though today's article might be meaningful to some few of us who like to think about a less pedantic, more pervasive, series of world history and events. Or, perhaps, like to adventure and explore foreign lands unlike our own lands of familiarity. For most of us, it will not hold much relevancy except that it was a time that God seemed to have forgotten or abandoned while shifting His attention to a region of this earth (the Middle East) become a hotbed of upheaval and civil war. Where religious ideologies, faiths, and dissimilar cultures, crashed against one another in a turmoil of hatred and confusion, and became choked upon its on failures and dissents.

The sad fact is, what we see in the Middle East is no different than what we see in the rest of the world except that the rest of the world isn't bound by our religious conventions and mundane mindsets. And perhaps, in studying many other world civilizations and cultures we might actually see the hand of God there too irrespective of the Bible with its laser-like focus on Israel. That God is a God of all peoples, cultures, and nations, and not limited like our mortal selves by time and circumstance, thoughts and feelings to one region or locality on this good earth.

And if so, then this God is a God whom we should try to understand beyond the simplicities of our traditional faith traditions, allowing Him a broader expanse of wonder and mystery than we think we have known of Him held in the grip of our own disbelief and doubt, our Europeanisms and Westernized thoughts. At least I hope so....

R.E. Slater
December 29, 2013


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8 very old sites in the New World
http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/25/travel/archaeological-marvels-in-new-world/index.html?sr=fb122913oldsitesnewworld12a

by Leslie Gilbert Elman, Special to CNN
December 25, 2013

(CNN) -- When European explorers were planting their flags all over North and South America, they referred to the territory as the "New World." That was a misnomer. For while the Americas might have been "new" to the Europeans, they weren't new on the world timeline.

Things were happening in the Western Hemisphere a long, long time ago, as the sites on this list (a very small sampling) demonstrate. Some you might know already; others might come as a surprise. Many of them are sites of active archaeological research that continues to unearth new examples of very interesting old stuff.


The archaeological site of Tiwanaku was built at 13,000 feet above sea level in the Altiplano of the Bolivian Andes. 

Tiwanaku, Bolivia

Theorists have explained Tiwanaku as everything from a temple complex built by nomads to the work of an extraterrestrial society. Its truth is only slightly less extraordinary, and it tantalizes with questions of why and how a city of temples, public buildings, homes, streets and irrigation systems was built at 13,000 feet above sea level in the Altiplano of the Bolivian Andes.

Between 500 and 900 A.D., the Tiwanaku civilization numbered in the hundreds of thousands. By 1200, they were gone. Archaeologists continue to study the site, even constructing reed boats to demonstrate how stones weighing several tons might have been transported from one shore of nearby Lake Titicaca to the other. You'll need imagination to picture Tiwanaku as it was; a visit during the winter or summer solstice celebrations can enhance its mystical qualities.

Changing light creates spectacular effects across the landscape of Dinosaur Provincial Park.

Dinosaur Provincial Park, Alberta, Canada

About 75 million years ago, western Canada was part of an island continent called Laramidia, and this 30-square-mile expanse of badlands was populated by creatures great and small. Sounds like the start of a fantasy novel, but it's a dream come true for anyone fascinated by dinosaurs.


Since the turn of the last century, when paleontologists began working here in earnest, the park has yielded thousands of prehistoric remains, including hundreds of complete dinosaur skeletons from the Late Cretaceous Period.

At the park you can join in or observe current fieldwork. There are activities for families and kids, guided and self-guided tours, and sunset excursions for photographers. To see more specimens recovered from the park, visit the Royal Tyrrell Museum in Drumheller, two hours away.

The Mayan temples at Tikal poke above the treeline in the Petén department of Guatemala.

Tikal, Petén, Guatemala

With its five towering pyramids, probably built between 250 and 900 A.D. (ongoing research regularly revises the dates) and situated to correspond with the position of the sun, Tikal is the site by which other Mayan archaeological sites are measured, both in scope and significance. Tikal National Park also encompasses Uaxactún -- once a separate city -- as well as nearly 55,000 acres of rainforest that add to its beauty and mystery.

The Petén Region in northern Guatemala continually yields archaeological discoveries from the Maya, such as the stunning frieze found in Holmul earlier this year. The murals at San Bartolo are under consideration for UNESCO World Heritage site status. In neighboring Honduras, is the Mayan site of Copán -- founded by a splinter group from Tikal.

Monte Albán in Oaxaca, Mexico, is a marvel of urban planning, especially when you consider that the Olmecs -- and later the Zapotecs -- who built it did so by carving its terraced landscape out of the mountainside.

Monte Albán, Oaxaca, Mexico

Monte Albán is a marvel of urban planning, especially when you consider that the Olmecs -- and later the Zapotecs -- who built it did so by carving its terraced landscape out of the mountainside. And they began construction sometime around 500 B.C. It was built to be grand, from the ceremonial pyramids to the stadium surrounding the ball court, and because it's so impressive Monte Albán tends to be heavily visited today.

The Olmec civilization is known for colossal stone heads like this one seen at Parque Museo La Venta in Villahermosa, Mexico.

The most famous artifacts are the series of Olmec carved stone slabs known as Los Danzantes (The Dancers) because it was originally assumed they depicted dancing men. Current scholarship says they depict disemboweled prisoners of war, which would be strange, yet in keeping with the unusual artistic sensibilities of the Olmecs.

Visitors will find more than 30 Olmec sculptures, including three 20-ton heads, at Parque Museo La Venta in Villahermosa.

Parque Museo La Venta, Villahermosa, Tabasco, Mexico

It's hard to know what to think about the Olmecs. They practiced ritual human bloodletting and raised dogs that they subsequently ate as part of their regular diet. On the other hand, they're probably responsible for introducing chocolate to the world. They also left a wondrous legacy of carved stone sculptures, especially the enormous stone heads for which they're known.

Many Olmec sculptures discovered at San Lorenzo Tenochtitlán in Veracruz and at La Venta in Tabasco -- Olmec settlements dating back to 1200 B.C. -- have been relocated to museums where they're more accessible for public viewing. You'll find more than 30, including three 20-ton heads, at Parque Museo La Venta in Villahermosa. The 16-acre park is known for its tropical foliage and for the dramatic sound and light show that illuminates the sculptures at night.

The capital of the Chimú culture, Chan Chan in Peru, probably dates back to before 850 A.D. This is a ceremonial hall known as Tschudi Palace.

Chan Chan, Peru

Machu Picchu is the most widely known archaeological site in Peru, the Nazca Lines are arguably the most mysterious, but Chan Chan, located about three miles from Trujillo, deserves mention because while its past is documented, its future is uncertain.

The capital of the Chimú culture, Chan Chan probably dates back to before 850 A.D. At its peak in the early 1400s it had a population of 30,000 before the Inca came and wiped it all out. What remains of the huge earthwork city is still astounding -- networks of beautifully carved and sculpted adobe walls delineate enclaves devoted to work, worship and family life.

About five square miles of the Chan Chan site is on the UNESCO World Heritage list, but even UNESCO can't stop the wind and weather from slowly eroding Chan Chan.

Cahokia Mounds looks like a grouping of giant lumps in the earth built by the Mississippian culture more than 1,000 years ago near what is now Collinsville, Illinois.

Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site, Collinsville, Illinois, United States

Cahokia Mounds looks like a grouping of giant lumps in the earth -- hills where no hills should be, built by the Mississippian culture more than 1,000 years ago. The largest is 100 feet high and bigger than the Great Pyramid of Giza at its base.

Around it once stood wooden houses and plazas where people gathered for ceremonies that involved a potent concoction called Black Drink and competitions in a vigorous sport called chunkey. Inside the mounds, archaeologists have found a wealth of objects including unexpected specimens like shark's teeth carried from the Gulf of Mexico to western Illinois in some way yet to be determined. In fact, much of what went on at Cahokia is still undetermined, including why this thriving community -- the oldest pre-Columbian settlement north of Mexico -- disappeared in the early 14th century.

This is a pictograph found at Seminole State Historical Park.

Rock Art of the Lower Pecos Canyonlands, Texas, United States

Around Comstock, Texas, where the Pecos River meets the Rio Grande, acres of unremarkable terrain hold a remarkable surprise: cave paintings (pictographs) and carvings (petroglyphs) made by the prehistoric hunter-gatherers who lived here thousands of years ago. They're not especially easy to reach, which has been their salvation, having left them largely unmolested throughout the centuries.

Recently archaeologists have been working to raise awareness of the sites in order to catalog, preserve and protect them. Guided tours at Seminole Canyon State Park take you on a rigorous 1.5-mile hike to the Fate Bell Shelter. Other tours conducted by members of the nonprofit Rock Art Foundation visit sites located on private land. Panther Cave and Parida Cave in the Amistad National Recreation Area near Del Rio are accessible by boat.

This is a pictograph found at Seminole State Historical Park.



Thursday, December 26, 2013

Is the Risen Christ Still Human? - How the Nicean Incarnation of Orthodox Christianity differs from Gnostic "Docetic Christianity"


Is the Son of God Still a Human Being?
A Meditation on the Incarnation
Part I

First, it flies in the face of Scripture. 1 Timothy 2:5—”one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus.” The tense is present. The Gospels clearly present the crucified and risen Lord Jesus Christ as human. He ate food. He had scars. And yet the angel told the disciples at his ascension that this same Jesus Christ would come back just as they saw him go. A glorified human, yes, but still human. And according to Paul in 1 Corinthians 15 we will be like him in that glorious state of resurrected humanity.

I fear that much American Christianity is very weak on the incarnation. We celebrate Jesus’ birth, but do we really understand what this event was? I doubt it. It was, according to Scripture, and the Great Tradition of Christian orthodoxy, God taking on our humanity forever. It was God adopting our lowly existence as his own in order to bridge the gap between himself and us [(as creature and created)]. It was the beginning of the dying of death, the conquering of sin and death, the union of God with creation. It was the “great exchange” in which, as the ancient church fathers put it, God became what we are so that we might become what he is (theosis)—that we might share in his divine nature (2 Peter 1:4) [and that he share our human nature].

This is classical Christianity. Sure, it includes mystery. The incarnation is, in some ways, the ultimate mystery. It raises many unanswerable questions—at least unanswerable for us now (e.g., What does Jesus eat now?). One is sometimes tempted to go Augustine’s route when skeptics raise these questions and insist on answers. To the Manicheans who asked what God was doing before he created the world the North African bishop said “He was creating hell for those who peer into his mysteries.”

Somehow American Christianity (and I suspect Christianity in many places) needs to rediscover the Bible and basic Christian orthodoxy. The great irony is that we fight a “war” over Christmas with secularists while neglecting our own Christian belief about the incarnation, allowing it to slowly fade away into a bland, overly spiritualized, modern Gnosticism.

- Roger


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Follow up Comments

Commentor 1 - The flesh and blood body of the Lord Jesus was resurrected from the grave. Now the Lord has a glorified body, the same as we will have one day after our physical body has been resurrected from the grave or simply transformed if the Lord returns prior to our passing away. I do believe that Jesus is the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The trinitarian doctrine is correct (as opposed to the oneness explanation of the Trinity), but the name above all names is Jesus, thus the name of the Father is also Lord Jesus. The name of the Son is not above the name of the Father. Jesus the Son is the image of the invisible God, therefore His name is the image of the name of the Father, or simply the same name. The oneness and the trinitarians would disagree with me for different reasons. Everyone should simply pray for revelation of truth.

Reply by Dr. Olson - When did "Jesus" become the name of God the Father and of the Holy Spirit? Why did Jesus not teach his disciples (and us) to pray "Our Jesus who art in heaven?"

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Commentor 2 - Jesus exists now as "glorified" "spiritual" body (that which Paul refers to), in "heavenly" space and time (localized in some fashion, but according to different or "finer" laws than we experience on earth), but as such "interpenetrates" with the grosser existence we (his church) are conditioned by in our present state, and in whose life as such we can all participate somehow through the agency of the Holy Spirit. Do I have things right?

Reply by Dr. Olson - Yes, "through the agency of the Holy Spirit" is the key. I don't know if you're aware of the debate between Lutherans and Reformed Protestants about the post-resurrection body of Jesus. I side with Calvin and the Reformed party here. Luther and Lutherans thought/think the glorified body of Jesus is ubiquitous. That seems to me to create problems for his ongoing humanity and for the Holy Spirit as playing a crucial role in bringing Jesus to us, in us and among us. The Holy Spirit can then be forgotten--which many Protestants have done. The one point distinctive theme of Calvin I strongly agree with is his doctrine of the Holy Spirit.

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Commenter 3 - Though this has always seemed clear to me, more probably its time to revisit all the gnosticisms of Christology by revisiting each of the church councils one-by-one to show the movement in theology from the early church into today's Lutheran-Reformed debate.

This topic would touch all the issues: the nature of the Trinity; the nature of sin in relation to Jesus; the nature of Jesus' divinity and humanity; the nature of His death, resurrection, and ascension; the nature of His ongoing ministry through the church; the nature of Jesus' Kingdom/NHNE rule; etc.

Once the classic arguments are laid out it would be interesting to compare it to the ongoing debates in Open Theism and Process Thought.

Good stuff. Thanks.


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Gnostic Flowchart 
(Orthodox Christianity follows the straight, vertical line)
Click on Image for a larger, clearer Image


Christological Flowchart
Click on Image for a larger, clearer Image


Christian Schisms and their Related Church Councils
Click on Image for a larger, clearer Image

Wikipedia - Docetism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Docetism

In Christian terminology, docetism (from the Greek δοκεῖν/δόκησις dokein (to seem) /dókēsis (apparition, phantom),[1][2] according to Norbert Brox, is defined narrowly as "the doctrine according to which the phenomenon of Christ, his historical and bodily existence, and thus above all the human form of Jesus, was altogether mere semblance without any true reality." [3][4] Broadly it is taken as the belief that Jesus only seemed to be human, and that his human form was an illusion. The word docetai (illusionists) referring to early groups who denied Jesus' humanity, first occurred in a letter by Bishop Serapion of Antioch (197-203),[5] who discovered the doctrine in the Gospel of Peter, during a pastoral visit to a Christian community using it in Rhosus, and later condemned it as a forgery.[6][7] It appears to have arisen over theological contentions concerning the meaning, figurative or literal, of a sentence from the Gospel of John: "the Word was made Flesh".[8]

Docetism was unequivocally rejected at the First Council of Nicaea in 325[9] and is regarded as heretical by the Catholic Church, Orthodox Church, and many others.[10]

Definitions

Docetism is broadly defined as any teaching that claims that Jesus' body was either absent or illusory.[11] The term ‘docetic’ should be used with caution, since its use is rather nebulous.[12][13] For Robert Price "docetism", together with "encratism", "Gnosticism", and "adoptionism" has been employed "far beyond what historically descriptive usage would allow".[14] Two varieties were widely known. In one version as in Marcionism - "Christ was so divine he could not have been human, since God lacked a material body, which therefore could not physically suffer. Jesus only appeared to be a flesh-and-blood man, his body was a phantasm." Other groups who were accused of Docetism held that - "Jesus was a man in the flesh, but Christ was a separate entity, who entered Jesus’s body in the form of a dove at his baptism, empowered him to perform miracles, and abandoned him on his death on the cross."[15]

Christology and theological implications

Docetism's origin within Christianity is obscure. Ernst Käsemann controversially defined the Christology of St John’s Gospel as “naïve docetism” in 1968.[16] The ensuing debate reached an impasse as awareness grew that the very term ‘docetism’ like ‘gnosticism’ was difficult to define within the religio-historical framework of the debate.[17] It has occasionally been argued that its origins were in heterodox Judaism or Oriental and Grecian philosophies.[18] The alleged connection with Jewish Christianity would have reflected Jewish Christian concerns with the inviolability of (Jewish) monotheism.[19][20] Docetic opinions seem to have circulated from very early times, 1 John 4:2 appearing explicitly to reject them.[21] Some 1st century Christian groups developed docetic interpretations partly as a way to make Christian teachings more acceptable to pagan ways of thinking of divinity.[18]

In his critique of the theology of Clement of Alexandria, Photius in his Myriobiblon held that Clement’s views reflected a quasi-docetic view of the nature of Christ, writing that Clement "He hallucinates that the Word was not incarnate but only seems to be." (ὀνειροπολεῖ καὶ μὴ σαρκωθῆναι τὸν λόγον ἀλλὰ δόξαι.) In Clement’s time some disputes contended over whether Christ assumed the ‘psychic’ flesh of mankind as heirs to Adam, or the ‘spiritual’ flesh of the resurrection.[22] Docetism largely died out during the first millennium AD.

The opponents against whom Ignatius of Antioch inveighs are often taken to be Monophysite docetists.[23] In his letter to the Smyrnaeans, 7:1, written around 110 C.E., he writes:

They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they confess not the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, and which the Father, of His goodness, raised up again. They who deny the gift of God are perishing in their disputes".

While these characteristics fit a Monophysite framework, a slight majority of scholars consider that Ignatius was waging a polemic on two distinct fronts, one Jewish, the other docetic, while a distinct minority holds that he is concerned with a group that commingled Judaism and docetism. Other possibilities are that he was merely opposed to Christians who lived Jewishly, or deny that docetism threatened the church, or that his critical remarks were directed at an Ebionite or Cerinthianpossessionist Christology, where God descended and took possession of Jesus' body. [24]

Islam and docetism

The Qur'an has a docetic or gnostic Christology, viewing Jesus as a divine illuminator rather than the redeemer (as he is viewed in Christianity).[9] Sura 4:157–158 reads:

And because of their saying: We slew the Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, Allah's messenger — they slew him not nor crucified him, but it appeared so unto them; and lo! those who disagree concerning it are in doubt thereof; they have no knowledge thereof save pursuit of a conjecture; they slew him not for certain. But Allah took him up unto Himself. Allah was ever Mighty, Wise.[25]

The Qur'an was compiled in the mid-seventh century AD (around 650 CE), corresponding to the period when docetism was still commonly accepted and taught among some Christian sects.

Docetism and the Christ as Myth theory

Since Arthur Drews published his The Christ Myth (Die Christusmythe) in 1909, occasional connections have been drawn between the modern idea that Christ was a myth and docetist theories. Shailer Mathews called Drews' theory a "modern docetism".[26] Frederick Cornwallis Conybeare thought any connection to be based on a misunderstanding of docetism.[27] The idea recurred in Classicist Michael Grant's 1977 review of the evidence for Jesus, who compared modern scepticism about an historical Jesus to the ancient docetic idea that Jesus only seemed to come into the world "in the flesh". Modern theories did away with "seeming".[28]

Texts believed to include docetism

Non-canonical Christian texts: 
  1. Jump up^ González 2005, pp. 46–47:"A term derived from the Greek dokein, to seem, or to appear."
  2. Jump up^ Strecker 2000, p. 438.
  3. Jump up^ Brox 1984, p. 306.
  4. Jump up^ Schneemelcher Maurer, p. 220.
  5. Jump up^ Breidenbaugh 2008, pp. 179–181
  6. Jump up^ Ehrman 2005, p. 16.
  7. Jump up^ Foster 2009, p. 79.Serapion first approved its use, and only reversed his opinion on returning to his bishopric in Antioch, after being informed of its contents. He wrote a "Concerning the So-Called Gospel of St Peter" which is alluded to in Eusebius of Caesarea's Historia Ecclesiastica 6.12-3-6.
  8. Jump up^ Smith & Wace 1877, pp. 867–870.
  9. Jump up to:a b Ridgeon 2001, p. xv.
  10. Jump up^ Arendzen 2012.
  11. Jump up^ Gonzalez, Justo (2005). Essential Theologial Terms. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press. pp. 46–47. ISBN 0-664-22810-0. "Docetism is the claim that Jesus did no thave a physical human body, but only the appearance of such."
  12. Jump up^ Brox 1984, pp. 301–314.
  13. Jump up^ Schneemelcher Maurer, p. 220:"N Brox has expressed himself emphatically against a widespread nebulous use of the term, and has sought an exact definition which links up with the original usage (e.g. in Clement of Alexandria). Docetism is ‘the doctrine according to which the phenomenon of Christ, his historical and bodily existence, and thus above all the human form of Jesus, was altogether mere semblance without any true reality.'
  14. Jump up^ Price 2009.
  15. Jump up^ Ehrman 2005, p. 16
  16. Jump up^ Ehrman 1996, p. 197.
  17. Jump up^ Larsen 2008, p. 347
  18. Jump up to:a b Gavrilyuk 2004, p. 80.
  19. Jump up^ Schneemelcher Maurer, p. 220
  20. Jump up^ Brox 1984, p. 314.
  21. Jump up^ González 2005, pp. 46–7
  22. Jump up^ Ashwin-Siejkowski 2010, p. 95, n.2 citing Edwards 2002, p. 25.
  23. Jump up^ Street 2011, p. 40.
  24. Jump up^ Streett 2011, pp. 42–43.
  25. Jump up^ Pickthall 2001, p. 86
  26. Jump up^ Shailer 1917, p. 37.
  27. Jump up^ Conybeare 1914, p. 104.
  28. Jump up^ Grant 2004, pp. 199–200:"This skeptical way of thinking reached its culmination in the argument that Jesus as a human being never existed at all and is a myth. In ancient times, this extreme view was named the heresy of docetism (seeming) because it maintained that Jesus never came into the world "in the flesh", but only seemed to; (I John 4:2) and it was given some encouragement by Paul's lack of interest in his fleshly existence. Subsequently, from the eighteenth century onwards, there have been attempts to insist that Jesus did not even "seem" to exist, and that all tales of his appearance upon the earth were pure fiction. In particular, his story was compared to the pagan mythologies inventing fictitious dying and rising gods."


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Following Up My Last Post Regarding the Incarnation:
The Line between Orthodoxy and Speculation
Part II
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/rogereolson/2013/12/following-up-my-last-post-regarding-the-incarnation-the-line-between-orthodoxy-and-speculation/

by Roger Olson
editorial comments by R.E. Slater [ ... ]
December 27, 2013

My latest post regarding the ongoing reality of the incarnation provoked many good questions about underlying assumptions, which, in turn, have led me to respond about the Reformation debates about Christology (which led to debates about the Lord’s Supper).

I want to make clear that I hope to draw a line, however indistinct it may seem at times, between “basic Christian orthodoxy” and “theological speculation.” This is one reason I wrote The Mosaic of Christian Belief - to pare Christian doctrine down to what ought to be considered “basic Christian belief”  (orthodoxy) while excluding from defending matters of orthodoxy that [seem orthodox but remain] speculative - however reverent they may [appear to] be.

I think this is one of the main tasks of Christian theologians–to identify what doctrines are basic to Christian faith and what interpretations of the Bible and doctrines are speculation without clear warrant in Scripture itself and the church’s historic belief about revelation.

Example 1

Here’s my illustration, that:

  • "the incarnation of God in Jesus Christ is permanent" and,
  • "the Son of God is still the human person Jesus Christ" (he did not “drop his humanity”),

is basic Christian belief." To deny it is to deny a basic tenet of Christian belief rooted firmly in Scripture and to open the door to Gnosticism.

HOW the continuing humanity of Jesus exists presently, whether and to what extent it is dependent on the Holy Spirit for power, etc., invites speculation.

Both the ancient Christians and the Reformers confused speculation with orthodoxy–leading to unnecessary divisions among Christians.

Both Luther and Zwingli (and later Calvin) were, in my opinion, faithful to basic Christian orthodoxy–including their Christologies. Both also, to some extent, went beyond what Scripture really warrants us to believe and confused their own interpretations of the finite and the infinite (e.g., whether the finite can “contain” the infinite) with orthodoxy. Luther especially was wrong to accuse Zwingli of being a heretic for denying the “real presence” of Christ “in, with, and under” the break and wine. The Reformed branch of Protestantism contributed to the division by returning the favor (at times).

The Church of England was right to permit different interpretations of this issue. (Here I’m speaking about Christology, not the Lord’s Supper.) What Christians ALL ought to believe is that the Son of God is still the human being Jesus Christ. Beyond that, whether one adopts the “finitus non capax infiniti” or the “finitus capax infiniti” is secondary and largely speculative.

Reverent speculation, labeled as such, is inevitable and there is nothing wrong with it. It becomes wrong when it is allowed to divide Christians over against each other so that they cannot even have fellowship because of it.

Example 2

Another example of speculation in Christian theology is the “order” of being within the immanent Trinity which leads into the “filoque” controversy between East and West. It’s all well and good for Christians to argue over whether the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father AND THE SON or whether the Holy Spirit only proceeds from the Father (and NOT “from the Son”), but it is impossible to prove either point of view from what has been revealed (unless you extend “revelation” into the later stages of Christian thought). This should not divide Christians.

What a disaster it was that in the Reformation Lutherans and Reformed could not get together. Martin Bucer was right; both sides should have listened more intently to him. (I’ll leave aside the name of Philipp of Hesse for now!) But, in the end, it was the Anabaptists who got it mostly right. (I speak here of Balthasar Hubmaier especially!)

- Roger

Wikipedia Summary to the Question:

According to Bishop Kallistos Ware, many Orthodox (whatever may be the doctrine and practice of the Eastern Orthodox Church itself) hold that, in broad outline, to say the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son amounts to the same thing as to say that the Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son, a view accepted also by the Greeks who signed the act of union at the Council of Florence.[274] 

For others, such as Vasily Bolotov and his disciples, the Filioque can be considered a Western theologoumenon, a theological opinion (or speculation) of Church Fathers that falls short of being a dogma.[210][275] Sergei Bulgakov also stated: "There is no dogma of the relation of the Holy Spirit to the Son and therefore particular opinions on this subject are not heresies but merely dogmatic hypotheses, which have been transformed into heresies by the schismatic spirit that has established itself in the Church and that eagerly exploits all sorts of liturgical and even cultural differences."[212]


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Follow up Comments

Commentor 1 - Would it be fair to say that committing actual theological error will inevitably manifest in one's behavior such that it becomes un-Christlike, while engaging in the theological speculation you describe doesn't have to end badly? So many people seem to think that one has to think about things 'a certain way', and yet reality shows us that oftentimes, different people can come to the same end result through shockingly different paths. This isn't to say that there is no 'structure' or 'lawfulness' in the realm of thoughts, but that it has much greater variety than some would like to think.

It's almost as if people are afraid of losing control—even though we're supposed to be ok with this (e.g. John 3:8)—and thus want to exert control over not just actions, but thoughts as well. This insistence of control over thoughts seems like a direct rejection of Romans 14 and a refusal to judge a tree by its fruit and let the wheat grow up with the tares. It really seems like an insistence on the evil desire to control and dominate, hidden under the façade of 'right doctrine'.

Reply by Dr. Olson - Agreed.
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Commentor 1 - Dear Dr. Olson, I appreciate your two posts on the Incarnation and it has caused me to begin rereading the chapter on the Incarnation in your book entitled the Mosaic of Christian Belief. Thank you so much for keeping this retired business professor and Lutheran active mentally and spiritually. Your blog has been a real blessing to me. May God bless you and your family.


Reply by Dr. Olson - Thank you! Affirmations like yours (even from people who don't always agree with me) keep me going.


My Father...





'Enough said.