The Fire and the Rose

Hegel against Glenn Beck

2009-09-21T10:10:00.002-04:00

“Since the man of common sense makes his appeal to feeling, to an oracle within his breast, he is finished and done with anyone who does not agree; he only has to explain that he has nothing more to say to anyone who does not find and feel the same in himself. In other words, he tramples underfoot the roots of humanity. For it is the nature of humanity to press onward to agreement with others; human nature only really exists in an achieved community of minds. The anti-human, the merely animal, consists in staying within the sphere of feeling, and being able to communicate only at that level.”

—Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, trans. A. V. Miller (Oxford: Oxford UP, 1977), 43.

Barth Blog Conference: The No-God and God’s No

2009-08-19T15:47:00.002-04:00

Over at Der Evangelische Theologe, my own contribution is now available to read. My essay is entitled, “The No-God and God’s No: Barth’s Exegesis of Romans 1 in Romans II.” There is also a response by Halden Doerge.

Theosis and Mission: A Dialogue with Michael Gorman

2009-08-16T18:45:00.002-04:00

I am presently working on a book review of Prof. Michael Gorman’s new book, Inhabiting the Cruciform God, which is an excellent analysis of Paul’s theology. While I have questions regarding his argument for theosis in Paul’s epistles, I recently pressed him on what I see to be a lack of mission in his interpretation. Michael has now posted our conversation for others to see and comment on. These are still inchoate thoughts that, if I have more time later, I might flesh out into a full post. For now, though, I welcome your feedback.

2009 Karl Barth Blog Conference

2009-08-14T22:32:00.002-04:00

The 2009 Karl Barth Blog Conference will begin this Sunday, Aug. 16 on Der Evangelische Theologe. The topic is Barth’s interpretation of Romans 1. Be sure to check back for updates.

Where have I been?: a brief update

2009-07-31T08:04:00.004-04:00

Things have been rather quiet around Fire & Rose as of late. There are many reasons for this, but here are the most important:

1. I’ve been taking care of this guy.

2. I have been studying French for a reading exam that I have to take in September.

3. I have been working on many book reviews—six or seven, I think. Despite my best efforts, I have resigned myself to the fact that I won’t get them all done before classes start in the fall. Some of the books I am reviewing include Paul D. Jones’s The Humanity of Christ, Michael Gorman’s Inhabiting the Cruciform God, and Daniel Treier’s Introducing Theological Interpretation of Scripture.

4. I am also working on a semi-top-secret project of my own, which has now reached 130,000 words. The book-length essay examines the God-world relationship in all its facets.

5. I hope to switch, yes, to a new site, with my own URL. This will happen at an undetermined time, so don’t worry about changing links quite yet.

6. Did I mention I am watching my son, Aidyn, full time while my wife works? Everything changes in that scenario, and blogging was just the first thing to go. Sorry.

Album Review: So Elated, So Elated

2009-05-17T09:10:00.010-04:00

So Elated, So Elated
Joyful Rice; 2009

The era of CCM (Contemporary Christian Music) as we once knew it is over. If the world of Christian music in the 1990s was marked by a not-so-subtle attempt to “outdo” the “secular” world (e.g., Newsboys, OC Supertones, DC Talk), the new millennium has brought a radically different attitude. The new generation is tired of kitsch and ostentation, sentimentality and super-piety, the Religious Right and social subcultures. And musical tastes have changed as well. Instead of punk and ska and post-Nirvana alternative rock, American youth today enjoy the subdued folk-rock of Iron & Wine and Fleet Foxes and the brainy indie rock of Arcade Fire and the Decemberists.

Moreover, young Christian artists are no longer interested in maintaining the artificial distinction between so-called “Christian music” and “secular music.” These evangelical labels have (thankfully) been given a quiet burial, and in their place young Christians today are interested simply in making and hearing good music. Certainly there have always been groups of Christian artists with this attitude: Pedro the Lion, Starflyer 59, and Joy Electric quickly come to mind. But what distinguishes the current musical climate is the fact that this former minority-niche view has gone “mainstream.” As a result, the doors have opened wide for young independent artists to explore their ideas and musical sensibilities without the straitjacket of what Walter Kirn once called the “evangelical alternaculture,” in which “everything gets cloned in mainstream culture and then leached of ‘sinful’ content.”

Into this new situation, artists from the ’90s, such as David Bazan (Pedro the Lion, Headphones) and Derek Webb (Caedmon’s Call), have adapted their music to fit the times. And while it is interesting to see how established artists have changed over the years, we are seeing the proliferation of young Christian artists whose musical sensibilities have clearly been shaped by the fall of CCM and the rise of a new generation. These artists are taking advantage of the digital era, making the most of a worldwide web that enables the quick spread of music around the globe. One such group is So Elated, the latest effort by Chicago-based singer-songwriter, Ben Thomas, who is joined here by fellow band members Luke Harris (upright bass, mandolin), John Dudich (guitar, vocals) and Matt Brennan (percussion).

Released back in January, the debut self-titled release by So Elated is a perfect example of this new era in so-called “Christian music.” For starters, they do not call themselves a “Christian band,” nor is their music “Christian music.” The adjective “Christian” is dropped altogether—and for good reason. In Walking on Water, Madeleine L’Engle famously quipped, “Christian art? Art is art; painting is painting; music is music; a story is a story. If it’s bad art, it’s bad religion, no matter how pious the subject.” And later, after writing the term “Christian art,” she adds, “by which I mean all true art.” This is the perspective of So Elated. Instead of using artificial labels to distinguish themselves, So Elated lets the music speak for itself.

On first listen, it is immediately apparent that Ben Thomas and company were influenced heavily by Bazan and Webb—both of whom are cited as influences on their website and in press releases. (That’s not to suggest that these are the only two influences, since there are clearly many others, but these two have a special significance.) The opening track, “The Ache of Going Without” (which you can hear on their website) is the most obviously influenced by Bazan’s oeuvre. The steady, simple guitar chords and an uncannily Bazan-like vocal delivery indicate very clearly where Ben Thomas was finding his musical inspiration. In a way, for those with ears to hear, the song serves to indicate the kind of album the listener should expect: if you identify with the music found on records like Achilles Heel and Mockingbird, then keep listening—you’ll feel right at home.

If the opening track hearkens back to Pedro the Lion, a number of the other tracks are more clearly influenced by Derek Webb. Two, in particular, are worth focusing on in depth: “Redemption” and “Open My Heart With Knives.” Where Bazan tries to avoid speaking directly and didactically about issues of faith and religion—opting instead for the posture of the rebel on songs like “Foregone Conclusions”—Webb tackles these topics head-on. And most of the songs on So Elated follow in Webb’s footsteps, both musically and lyrically. To further the comparison just a bit, Webb tends to write two kinds of songs: those that say something positive about the version of faith which he envisions and seeks to practice (e.g., “My Enemies Are Men Like Me”), and those that sarcastically criticize the version of faith he has left behind or wants others to leave behind (e.g., “A Savior On Capitol Hill” and “A King & A Kingdom”). So Elated have both kinds of songs: “Redemption” represents the affirmative aspect, and “Open My Heart With Knives” the critical. What makes So Elated such a promising band is that they do both kinds of songs with more subtlety and simplicity. Webb is often far too didactic, and So Elated seem to have struck a more healthy and musically satisfying balance between him and Bazan.

In “Redemption,” So Elated present a message of Christian universalism—a topic that has received a fair amount of attention on this blog. The opening verse speaks about how every aspect of creaturely life has been changed by Christ: “the blood I bleed was transfused by you” and “everything I need was redeemed by you.” The second verse is more reminiscent of Webb’s penchant for controversial lyrics. In it, Thomas sings:

Every war-torn state, every child born with AIDS
Every broke-down mixed-up place is being fixed by you
Every political view
Every Christian, Muslim, Jew
Is being recreated new and fixed by Jesus

Finally, in the chorus, we hear that this redemption “blankets every fear we know” and, most importantly, “carries everybody home.”

The homiletic nature of these lyrics is hard to miss. Thomas & co. are preaching a sermon in song, and this can be both enriching and off-putting, much like Webb. In fact, the only difference between songs like “Redemption” and some of the old CCM tracks is the message being preached. Where a Steven Curtis Chapman or a Twila Paris would sing about the return of Jesus and the need to repent, here we have a song about Christ’s redemption bringing everybody home to be with God. Formally, the didacticism remains, but materially the message is quite different. That’s no small change, of course, and as a Christian theologian, I am quite happy to say a clear “Yes” and “Amen” to the sermon that So Elated is preaching. But I do wonder sometimes whether a little more Bazan and a little less Webb might do So Elated some good.

One other critique is worth mentioning. Songs like “Redemption” have their place, and I certainly want to encourage the theological content. But at the same time I am concerned about the all-too-easy treatment of death and brokenness in songs (and stories and films) of this nature. In this song, for example, war and AIDS are treated in a single line, with the conclusion that these are being “fixed by Jesus.” Yes, I agree—but this feels too flippant, too comfortable. I am reminded of a recent article in Atlantic Monthly about Flannery O’Connor. The author summarizes the key to O’Connor’s works in the following way: “(1) from the Christian viewpoint, the modern human condition is filled with a peculiar horror; (2) therefore, to fictionally depict humans in their peculiarly horrifying aspect is necessary in order to explore the mysteries of redemption and grace.” Redemption and grace are essential elements of human existence, but we have to pass through the way of the cross. While this is partly a criticism of So Elated, it is more of a suggestion that, in the future, they might want to explore the darker, more horrifying aspects of human life, without rushing towards the end of the story. Let the horror sit with us as listeners. And simply pointing out the many horrors of hypocritical American Christians is not sufficient (see below). We need to grapple with the human condition more broadly.

The other song most obviously influenced by Webb is “Open My Heart With Knives.” Here the artistic paradigm is the disenchanted post-evangelicalism prominent in a number of Webb’s more critical songs. Again, So Elated improve upon the model, while also showing off their ability to match penetrating lyrics with catchy melodies. “Open My Heart” is a reductio ad absurdum in the form of prayers to God. Like any good rhetorician, the song begins with an innocuous and quite common prayer: “God of truth open my eyes.” This could be the start of some typical, cliché worship song. But already by the end of the first verse, we hear a moment of honesty: “Open my heart with knives / But please don’t make it hurt.”

Those of us who grew up in the church know exactly what is being addressed here—viz. the hyper-piety of the typical American evangelical who prays for God to do some drastic act which will make us truly love and follow God. And so we hear prayers for God to “humble me” and “break my pride” and “destroy my false desires,” etc. The prayer is always for some extreme divine intervention into our religious complacency that will finally—once and for all—make us into the ideal Christians. “Open my heart with knives” captures this tendency toward pious exaggeration perfectly. The final line, “But please don’t make it hurt,” indicates that all is not right with this picture. Our hyper-piety is a mask hiding our secret desire for everything to remain exactly the way it is. We want others to see our love for God without the inconvenience of actually having this love ourselves. In short, the opening verse exposes us as hypocrites. We are Pharisees.

But that is only the beginning of this reductio ad absurdum. The next verse starts off with: “God of good give me some love.” The prayer goes on to ask God for “green grass upon my lawn” and no rain during the baseball game. The attack has gone beyond moral hypocrisy and now extends to the use of prayer as magic for selfish gain. All too often, prayer becomes a kind of divine manipulation, in which God is supposed to act like a cosmic genie who grants our personal wishes. Then comes the third verse:

God of business pedigrees
Take my hands and make them free
But make sure they both get paid
Two or three times above the working wage

No one’s laughing anymore. The joke’s over, and now it’s just painful—painfully true. And if this weren’t enough, the climax of the song’s argument—and the turn of the knife in the backs of religious people everywhere—comes in verses five and six:

God of love give me some peace
Please destroy my enemies
Help the rest of the world to learn to live like me
And tear down the temples that worship differently

Hold my hand and make me yours
Grant me sex, power, money, and a brand new car
I know I shouldn’t worship all my stuff
So I ask that you please do it in the name of love

With this song, “Open My Heart With Knives,” So Elated officially assume the mantle of Bazan and Webb at their self-critical, post-evangelical, anti-religious best. The same spirit heard in the Bazan who famously sings, “You were too busy steering the conversation toward the Lord to hear the voice of the Spirit, begging you to shut the fuck up”—and in the Webb who sings sarcastically, “Jesus Christ was a white, middle-class Republican, and if you wanna be saved you have to learn to be like Him”—is heard again, alive and well, here in So Elated. For that, we have much for which to be grateful.

On the whole, however, the album is a mixed-bag. There are a number of very strong tracks, including “Why I Need You,” “Open My Heart With Knives,” “Strangers,” and “Lucky Ones.” These are hopefully a promising sign of what is still yet to come. However, the influence of Bazan and (most of all) Webb is often so strong that we fail at times to get a sense of what makes So Elated original and fresh. We don’t always get a coherent and compelling impression of So Elated as musical artists.

Most disappointing of all, the album turns the clocks of so-called “Christian music” backwards by ending with “Exit Door,” a song about “going home” to be with Jesus in heaven. The song is full of the typical CCM clichés. In the chorus, Ben sings:

You’re my reason, my completion,
You’re my exit door, you’re my ticket home
You’re my family and my mystery
You’re my walking dead and my desire to be
And I’m ready for you to take me home

In the press release, the song is described as a “classic apocalyptic, death-ward gazing, tombstone printable epilogue.” Having sung about the redemption of all things, I would have expected So Elated to be more “life-ward gazing.” A theology of redemption should lead us back into the world, not away from it. On this point, we always need the reminder of Dietrich Bonhoeffer: “The difference between the Christian hope of resurrection and the mythological hope is that the former sends a man back to his life on earth in a wholly new way.” Christianity is a “this-worldly” faith, not an “other-worldly” religion. So while for the most part, the album is on par with or better than your average Derek Webb release, this final song reverts back to the type of theology that Webb and Bazan, among others, have sought to counteract. Ending an album with this kind of song feels very paint-by-number. It reverts back to a formula that most Christian artists have left behind (no pun intended).

These criticisms notwithstanding, So Elated are still a very young band with a lot of room for growth. Their debut already shows a great amount of musical and lyrical, including theological, maturity. This is one group to keep your eyes on in the coming years.

[My sincere thanks to So Elated for the review copy of the album. You can purchase So Elated here. Click here for the So Elated online store, which includes the previous albums by Ben Thomas. You can follow So Elated on Twitter @soelated.]

Ten Theses on Prayer

2009-04-03T12:15:00.001-04:00

1. Prayer is an act of faithful obedience to God. We pray as part of our discipleship to Jesus Christ. We are not compelled to pray; there is no law that demands prayer. Instead, prayer is an act of love which follows from our acknowledgment of the fact that God first loved us.

2. Prayer must conform to the two primary models of prayer in the New Testament: the Lord’s Prayer and Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane. The so-called “Lord’s Prayer” (Matt. 6:9-13; Luke 11:2-4) is a template for all prayer in that it encapsulates the basic elements of prayer: the glorification of God’s name, the submission of our lives to God’s Kingdom, the humble request for our basic provisions, the penitential asking of forgiveness, and the petition for protection and deliverance from sin. The prayer in Gethsemane provides an even more fundamental picture of prayer in the total submission of our wills to the will of God. Seen from this perspective, prayer is not “getting something from God,” but an acknowledgment that God alone can act on our behalf. Prayer is an act of faithful submission to the sovereignty of God’s love. We must interpret all other passages about prayer in Scripture in the light of these two paradigmatic prayers.

3. Prayer is not magic. We do not pray because we think our words compel God to act differently. Prayer is not divine manipulation. The strict opposition to witchcraft and sorcery in Judaism and Christianity should extend to include those forms of prayer in which we expect our words to control or influence God to perform miracles.

4. The efficacy or worth of prayer is not dependent upon the result of a prayer. A prayer is not efficacious because it achieved some empirical “result”—a quantifiable answer. For example, the prayer for the health of a sick person is not worthwhile only because that person became well again, nor should it be deemed worthless because the person did not become well. We must expunge all notions of “success” from our concept of prayer. Prayer does not conform to our modern capitalistic ideas of what is successful; rather, the faith out of which prayer flows defines what is truly successful.

5. Prayer is a primarily an act of listening to God, rather than speaking to God. While prayer takes the form of speaking to God, it is properly a mode of receptivity toward God. Of course, we must take not the idea of “listening” literally. Prayer is not a form of information-gathering. Instead, prayer is a form of listening in that we attend to the Word of God as proclaimed in Scripture and preaching.

6. Prayer is a political act in that prayer acknowledges a Lord who stands over against Caesar. Prayer challenges all earthly claims to lordship—whether social, economic, political, or religious. In prayer we seek the face of the triune God and submit to this Lord alone. Prayer is implicitly the denial of lordship to any creature. Positively, prayer acknowledges the sole lordship of the triune YHWH—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

7. Prayer is the proper mode of all Christian worship. Prayer is definitive for what counts as true worship, since in prayer we are concerned with a concrete relationship between an I and a Thou, between the worshipping community and the worshipped God. Worship should not be about God. Instead, worship is a living relationship in which we commune with God. Prayer is therefore the concrete form that all worship should take.

8. Prayer is the living bond between the covenantal community and the God of the covenant. Prayer is not primarily an individual act, but rather a communal act between the people and God. The God who brings the covenantal community into being through the covenant of grace in Jesus Christ calls forth our faithful, loving response as a community through prayer and supplication.

9. Prayer is a groaning in the Spirit with all creation. According to Romans 8:18-27, all creation “waits with eager longing” for God’s apocalyptic in-breaking, which will free the creation from its bondage. Creation groans as in labor for the coming of God. As part of this creation, we “groan inwardly” in the power of the Spirit, “for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.”

10. Prayer is the cry of faith, “Abba! Father!” The Spirit of Jesus Christ bears witness that we are indeed children of God by bringing forth the primal cry of faith: “Abba! Father!” (Rom. 8:15; Gal. 4:6-7). All true prayer begins and ends with this cry. It is the mark of our identity as God’s covenantal people. It is the cry that defines us as God’s children, “and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ” (Rom. 8:17).

I’m on Twitter!

2009-03-20T17:49:00.001-04:00

After avoiding it for a long time, I’ve finally joined Twitter, the insanely popular micro-blogging site. You can follow my “tweets” at dwcongdon.

Observations on working at a major book retailer

2009-03-20T17:16:00.002-04:00

Some of you know that I work part-time as a bookseller at Barnes & Noble. I enjoy bookstores. I like to browse the shelves, see what’s new, smell the freshly printed pages, feel the different kinds of paper. Working at the store helps me maintain contact with the world of fiction, which I have missed ever since leaving behind my English major as an undergraduate to pursue graduate studies in theology.

And the discount doesn’t hurt, either.

As part of my job as the opening bookseller on Saturday mornings, I have to scan the new fiction and romance titles into the computer. I use this fancy laser device that reads the barcodes and creates lists which are then accessible to booksellers throughout the week, so that they know what titles are on the "new fiction" and "new romance" shelves.

Suffice it to say, I come across some hilarious titles. Primarily in the romance section, of course. Back during the Christmas shopping season, I took a couple minutes out of my day to record the best titles currently on display. (I could put together a whole new list for the titles up now, but this will do nicely.)

The Mane Attraction
A Knight Well Spent
Tall, Dark, and Texan
Lord of the Forest
Single White Vampire
All I Want For Christmas Is a Vampire
Have Yourself a Naughty Little Santa

It’s hard to maintain your composure when handling books with titles like this.

Despite the amount of junk published every week, in an age of iPhones and Kindles, I am glad to be in a place where tangible books are made available for people to peruse and purchase. As much as I love technology, nothing beats the feel and smell of a new book (whether actually new or a used book newly acquired).

Perhaps at a future date I will post some thoughts about the moral-ethical side of working at a bookstore. I don’t mean the whole capitalist-industrial complex bit. Rather, I mean the things you learn as a worker having to handle customers who are often difficult and abrasive. It can be a real lesson in patience. But that’s for another day.

Pietism Conference at Bethel University

2009-03-20T16:17:00.002-04:00

Currently, Bethel University is hosting a conference on pietism with the theme: “The Pietist Impulse in Christianity.” The conference began yesterday and ends tomorrow. The plenary lectures are:

Donald Dayton
“Why Study Pietism?: The Significance of the Pietist Impulse in Christianity”

Emilie Griffin
"We of the Broken Body: Toward a Piety of Hope and Reconciliation”

Shirley Mullen
“The ‘Strangely Warmed’ Mind: John Wesley, Piety, and Higher Education”

Roger Olson
“Pietism: Myths and Realities”

Jonathan Strom
“The Challenge of Pietism for the Ministry and the Laity”

Tonight at 7:30, Roger Olson will give his plenary lecture. For the full schedule of events, click here.

... and all the people rejoiced!

2009-03-20T14:37:00.003-04:00

From an email sent out today:

“The Board of Trustees of Wheaton College has announced that President Duane Litfin will retire from his position in mid-2010. As Wheaton's seventh president since its founding in 1860, Dr. Litfin has served the College for almost 17 years. ...

The Board of Trustees has appointed a Presidential Selection Committee to conduct the search and selection process for Wheaton's eighth president. They invite nominations, expressions of interest, and applications for the position of President.

Please visit www.wheaton.edu/presidentialselection for more information including selection procedure, presidential profile, committee members, prayer guide, and frequently asked questions.”

In all fairness to Pres. Litfin, he did a half-way decent job. He is certainly a brilliant fundraiser. It’s just too bad that his fundamentalist and dispensational theological views led to some really poor decision-making on his part and a culture at Wheaton that was largely inhospitable to progressive political and theological work. Let’s pray that the trustees can find a suitable replacement that will bring Wheaton College back into the vanguard of evangelical scholarship.

Evolution and Original Sin

2009-03-20T12:55:00.000-04:00

Evolution and Original Sin Evolution and Original Sin steve martin A discussion on Evolution and the Christian theology of Original Sin.

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Essays Academic Work Theology Evolution

Interview with Alex Rivera, director of Sleep Dealer

2009-02-07T20:50:00.001-05:00

Welcome home, Aidyn Eliot!

2009-02-02T04:25:00.005-05:00

My wife gave birth to our first child, Aidyn Eliot Congdon, on February 2, 2009, at 2:31 am EST. He weighed 5 lbs. 15 oz. He came out with eyes wide open and a head full of dark hair. A beautiful, glorious day! (And Groundhog Day, too, though hopefully that doesn’t mean she has to repeat the labor over and over again!)

Funniest (and harshest) album review of 2009 (so far)

2009-01-20T13:51:00.003-05:00

“I've been scouring the book of Revelation for some mention of this album, figuring it had to be the soundtrack to the Four Horsemen's scourge or maybe the eight-track in the seven-headed beast's '66 Camaro. But no, Johnny Cash Remixed is nothing quite so earth shattering or notable. It's more like a small, remote geyser through which a little bit of hell bubbles up into our world.”

—Review by Stephen M. Deusner of the new compilation album, Johnny Cash Remixed

Evolution and Original Sin: index of posts

2009-01-19T16:36:00.004-05:00

Last month, Steve Martin held an online symposium on the question of evolution and original sin. The series was a discussion of George Murphy’s paper Roads to Paradise and Perdition: Christ, Evolution, and Original Sin. George is a physicist, theologian, and pastor, and has authored numerous articles and books including The Cosmos in the Light of the Cross. In addition to Steve, George, and yours truly, there were guests posts by Denis Lamoureux and Terry Gray. After the position papers were presented, George responded to the guest essays. He then responded to questions that were submitted to Steve directly from readers of the blog. All in all, it was an excellent conversation which raised important issues for the dialogue between theology and science.

Index of Posts:

Series Introduction (Martin)
Christ, Evolution, and Original Sin: A Brief Survey (Murphy)
That Old Time Theology Revisited: Guest Response #1 (Gray)
Challenging and Reshaping Historical Approaches to Original Sin: Guest Response #2 (Lamoureux)
Further Reflections on Genesis 1-3 and the Nature of Sin: Guest Response #3 (Congdon)
George Murphy Replies, Part 1 (Murphy)
George Murphy Replies, Part 2 (Murphy)
The Historicity of Adam: Q&A, Part 1 (Murphy)
Pastoral Implications of Original Sin and Evolution: Q&A, Part 2 (Murphy)
Evolution and Original Sin: Conclusion (Martin)
Index for the Series (Martin)

Praise to Jesus in the kitchen: a hymn

2009-01-14T11:55:00.004-05:00

Kim Fabricius—a minister in Wales and brilliant guest blogger at Faith & Theology—has composed a new hymn that he kindly sent to me. The context for the hymn, as he shared it with me, goes as follows:

I was reading John Bell’s new book Thinking Out Loud: Collected Scripts from Radio 4’s ‘Thought for the Day’ (2008). It concludes with an auto-biographical reflection on “Politics, Passion and the Human Soul” in which, commenting on the “heresy of dualism”, John observes: “Undoubtedly religious vocabulary exacerbates the situation... I mean when did anyone ever sing: ‘Praise to Jesus in the kitchen’?”

Kim decided to rectify this situation with—what else?—a hymn! I post it here now for your reading (and, hopefully, singing) pleasure. Also, you’ll notice that the hymn is especially suited for this blog, The Fire & the Rose. My sincere thanks to Kim for this fine hymn.

Praise to Jesus in the kitchen
(Tune: Oh My Darling, Clementine)

By Kim Fabricius

Praise to Jesus in the kitchen,
in a mansion or a flat,
pitch or pub or children’s playpen –
where we are is where he’s at.

In the boardroom and the City,
on the dole and in the slums,
here in judgement, there in pity,
suddenly the Saviour comes.

With the sick, and sad, and lonely,
in the hospice, on the street,
Servant Son, the one and only,
kneels and washes weary feet.

Concentration camps and prisons,
scenes of torture and despair,
sickening sights on television:
pick a place – the Lord is there!

Into death and hell descending,
Christ the fellow-sufferer goes,
purges pain that seems unending,
knots the fire and the rose.*

High in heaven, Christ ascended,
far beyond the farthest stars,
no one, nowhere, unbefriended –
where he’s at is where we are!

*All manner of thing shall be well
When the tongues of flame are in-folded
Into the crowned knot of fire
And the fire and the rose are one
– T. S. Eliot, “Little Gidding”

F&R named one of the top 100 theology blogs

2009-01-13T12:00:00.005-05:00

The Fire and the Rose was selected by Christian Colleges.com as one of the top 100 theology blogs. The list is not a ranking from best to worst; rather, the list is divided into various categories, including “general theology,” “politics,” “history,” “clergy,” and others. Fire & Rose was selected for the category of “academic” theology blogs, referring to “academic theologists [sic], including professors, researchers, and students.” I suppose that’s sort of a miscellaneous category for all those blogs that don’t seem to fit very well in the other ones. Or perhaps it’s a kind way of saying people don’t know what I’m talking about, but it sounds smart.

In any case, a number of other well-known theoblogs were chosen, including (of course) Faith & Theology. A notable omission, however, is Halden’s very fine blog, Inhabitatio Dei.

A syllogism

2009-01-08T19:28:00.003-05:00

1. Interpretation is translation—specifically, translation from one culture to another, from one time and place to another time and place.

2. The Bible is a document written within a particular cultural location, a specific time and place.

3. We live in a cultural location that is radically different from that of the Bible.

4. In order to interpret the Bible, we need to engage in cultural translation.

5. Ergo, something like Bultmann’s program of demythologization is a crucial necessity for the church if we are going to understand the biblical text.

Why I am uncomfortable with the label “pacifist”: a missiological-messianic critique of universal ethical theories

2009-01-06T16:34:00.002-05:00

For all practical purposes, I am indeed a pacifist: I do not believe Christians can or should serve in the military; I reject war and the use of harmful force as sinful, etc. And yet over the course of recent months, I have become more and more uncomfortable with the idea of pacifism or being a pacifist. The reason for my lack of comfort is analogous to Karl Barth’s concerns about universalism, namely, that a system (whether of salvation or of ethics) is erected in place of a person (Jesus Christ). This is a serious problem. The Bible does not present us with a system of doctrine or of ethics. What it presents is Jesus as Lord.

Now, of course, certain things follow from the confession that Jesus is Lord. Systematic theology has a necessary place within the life of the church (hence my pursuit of a PhD in systematic theology). But we have to be careful that our theological formulations are always a matter of intellectual fidelity to the Messiah. For this reason, in theology, we begin with the event of God’s self-revelation, and our theology is a matter of “thinking-after” this event. Once we establish the revelatory norm, our theology becomes an interpretation of this normative reality for our particular contexts here and now under the guidance of Holy Scripture. Certain things, of course, will remain unshakeable, e.g., the fact that Jesus is the Messiah, or the fact that reconciliation with God is purely an event of divine grace. But the overall interpretation of this divine revelation will take on distinctly different forms within particular cultural locations. My conception of what God did and does cannot simply be transposed into an alien cultural environment without being reinterpreted. Missiologists are keenly aware of this issue, as are biblical translators. The conservative polemic against “dynamic equivalent” translations is quite idiotic, since all translation, by the very nature of being a translation, includes dynamic equivalency. The question is not whether dynamic equivalency is involved, but rather whether this dynamism is faithful to the event of revelation within the cultural context of the translators.

I would say something similar is the case for Christian ethical action. The temptation into which the church throughout history has fallen prey is that we will construct a system of morals (often proof-texting the Bible along the way) that we can then apply to any situation in any culture within any time and place. This is substantially analogous to the situation with systematic theology. Fidelity to the Messiah is replaced with replication of an event. The whole thing can be compared (albeit over-simplistically) to Catholic vs. Protestant ecclesiologies. In Catholic ecclesiology, mission involves the extension of an ecclesial structure which is already fixed and established apart from any cultural particularity. In Protestant ecclesiology, in its modern missiologically informed variants, mission involves the translation of the church into a unique cultural situation. The gospel is reinterpreted for a new community.

The problem with “pacifism” is the problem with any ideological system: one becomes faithful to a system that is defined in abstraction from one’s cultural location. For those familiar with the terminology, the problem with pacifism is that it is anti-missional. The same problem is involved in the traditional ecumenical creeds of the church. Mere repetition of these creeds without theological translation is doctrinally equivalent to a Catholic ecclesiology of structural extension.

What I am advocating is fidelity to the messianic event of reconciliation in Jesus of Nazareth—in both noetic and ethical terms. This act of messianic fidelity will take the form of cultural translation/interpretation under the normative guidance of Scripture, always within the obedience of faith in response to God’s self-attestation and illumination through Word and Spirit. Such fidelity will certainly mean that particular actions are, for the most part, ruled out from the beginning. Committing violent and exploitative acts falls within that scope, as does taking an oath of obedience to anyone apart from Christ (which precludes participation in the government and military, for example). Thus, for all practical purposes, fidelity to Christ will look and smell like pacifism. But what we cannot do is construct some moral-ethical system that says what can or cannot be done in every possible situation. We cannot substitute some rule—“all violence is always wrong”—in place of what Paul calls the “law of Christ” (Gal. 6:2).

I take it that my position is in basic conformity with Paul’s overall theology within the (undisputed) NT letters, in which he rejects the erection of some new law in place of the old law. Paul instead engages in a radical annihilation of ethical systems of law, replacing the entirety of the old ethical codes with the one rule “love your neighbor as yourself,” since “love is the fulfillment of the law” (Rom. 10:9-10). What does this look like in each unique context? Well, that’s where the difficult work of translation becomes necessary.

Paul’s concern is not with figuring out a list of new laws and rules that conform to the gospel; instead, his concern (which should be ours as well) is with the new human person, the new creation, which is ontologically constituted in Jesus and becomes an existential reality for us in the Spirit’s gift of faith. This new creature lives within the power of the Spirit, who bestows the gifts of the Spirit so that we might live in correspondence to the life of Jesus. These gifts are not new laws; rather, they are the elements which constitute life under the eschatological reign of God. They define what it means to be a new creature. Here and now, then, we are to live as a new creation within our particular cultural context. In ourselves we are still part of the old creation which surrounds us. But insofar as we submit ourselves in obedience to Jesus, insofar as we become servants of the Messiah, our old existence is actualized in the Spirit as a moment of the new creation’s in-breaking.

In conclusion, I propose a messianic-pneumatic theology of evangelical fidelity to the apocalyptic event of the eschatologically new creation. Our life of messianic fidelity will take the existential form of “ad hoc” correspondence to Jesus. In other words, in place of an ethical-moral system, I propose that we respond in each new moment in obedience to the Messiah; in each new time and place, we are to hear and respond in faith to Word and Spirit. This fidelity to the gospel will establish a form of life that has certain basic contours—including, e.g., life in community, self-donating love for both neighbor and enemy, rejection of violence, giving and sharing of material property, etc. This is messianic and pneumatic because, as Paul says, “For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with the Messiah; and it is no longer I who live, but it is the Messiah who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:19-20). And this life is a life in the new creation, because as Paul says elsewhere, “If anyone is in the Messiah, there is a new creation” (2 Cor. 5:17), “for neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is anything; but a new creation is everything!” (Gal. 6:15).

The 25 Best Albums of 2008

2008-12-29T09:31:00.015-05:00

1. TV on the Radio, Dear Science
The latest release from TV on the Radio is a sonic and lyrical masterpiece, one of the truly great rock albums of this decade. While I thought 2006’s Return to Cookie Mountain was their high-point, here in Dear Science this New York-based group has refined their post-rock songcraft even further. Where their previous album died out somewhat in the last half, their latest grips you from beginning to end. Moreover, their two closing songs, “DLZ” and “Lover’s Day,” are perhaps their greatest achievements—a haunting and beautiful duo that solidifies TV on the Radio as one of the best bands creating music today.

2. Cut Copy, In Ghost Colours
Hailing from Melbourne, Australia, Cut Copy exploded seemingly out of nowhere this year with In Ghost Colours. For me, this is without question the catchiest pop album of the year, and unlike Santogold’s justly popular album, Cut Copy is able to sustain this catchiness from start to finish. Whereas Santogold is all about singles, Cut Copy has created a true album that refuses to be divided into individual songs.

3. Spiritualized, Songs in A&E
The return of Spiritualized after a five-year silence is a joyous occasion indeed. While Songs in A&E doesn’t break much new ground, J. Spaceman has proved once again that he is a consummate composer, capable of making songs that strike at the heart while overwhelming the ears in waves of orchestral rock. The notable feature of this latest album is the use of six instrumental interludes, called “harmonies,” which connect the album together and create a seamless listening experience.

4. Deerhunter, Microcastle
Deerhunter really broke onto the music scene with last year’s Cryptograms, but Microcastle (and its bonus disc, Weird Era Cont.) is their first truly great album. Singles like “Never Stops” and “Nothing Ever Happened” are deserving of their praise, but even the more mellow middle section of the album sparkles with moments of genius. Microcastle is proof that we can expect a lot of great things from this young band.

5. Fleet Foxes, Fleet Foxes
With their beautifully simple combination of art pop and folk rock, Fleet Foxes have been the talk of the town all year, and justifiably so. After releasing the Sun Giant EP early in the year to critical acclaim, they firmly established their mark on the American indie scene with their self-titled debut and its musical centerpiece, “White Winter Hymnal.”

6. Hercules and Love Affair, Hercules and Love Affair
Everyone knows that Antony Hegarty (of Antony and the Johnsons) can sing, but no could have guessed that his voice, when combined with the “euphoric disco” of DJ Andy Butler, would be pure magic. Hercules and Love Affair, one of the many surprising debuts of 2008, has given new life to disco music. And while the band is really just Butler, Hegarty’s vocals almost steal the show, particularly on the brilliant single, “Blind.”

7. Bon Iver, For Emma, Forever Ago
Bon Iver is my number one pick for music to listen to while studying. Justin Vernon’s latest project is the third debut album to make my top 10 list, and I can only hope he continues producing albums as poignant as For Emma, Forever Ago. Vernon has made his voice into an instrument all its own, more evocative than any guitar. If there’s one album I could have playing during a cold winter’s night, this would be it.

8. Kanye West, 808s and Heartbreak
Critics may think I’m backwards, but this is the first Kanye album that has made it into my top 10. I certainly enjoy his other albums, which have marked him as our generation’s greatest hip-hop artist. But this latest album—which is more like an electro-pop album infused with elements of hip-hop (rather than the converse)—is completely different from his other records. Unlike past hits like “Gold Digger” and “Stronger,” the songs on 808s and Heartbreak are darker, colder, subdued. You almost wouldn’t know this was a Kanye West album. And while West has been criticized for using Auto-Tune for the whole album, he has transformed this gimmick into an instrument all its own.

9. Los Campesinos!, Hold On Now, Youngster…
Los Campesinos!, an indie pop band from Wales, is the fourth and final debut band in the top 10, and like Fleet Foxes, they have been very busy in 2008. In February they released their debut album, Hold On Now, Youngster…, and then in October they released their second album, We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed. Los Campesinos! combine infectious pop-punk melodies with a large, almost anthemic, rock sound. While the second album is somewhat disappointing in comparison to the debut, the debut is so strong and so enjoyable that you end up forgetting whatever missteps they made in the follow-up.

10. Department of Eagles, In Ear Park
Department of Eagles is the side-project of Daniel Rossen, better known as the lead member in Grizzly Bear. Not surprisingly, then, Department of Eagles sounds a lot like Grizzly Bear, but there are distinct differences: more folk influences, electronica beats and samples, and a more experimental feel. The result is one of the most unique albums of the year. If you’re a fan of Grizzly Bear (which you should be), then this album will come as a welcome addition to your musical catalog.

11. Vampire Weekend, Vampire Weekend

12. Santogold, Santogold

13. Girl Talk, Feed the Animals

14. No Age, Nouns

15. Grand Archives, The Grand Archives

16. DJ/rupture, Uproot

17. The Hold Steady, Stay Positive

18. Lykke Li, Youth Novels

19. Portishead, Third

20. Love Is All, A Hundred Things Keep Me Up At Night

21. M83, Saturdays = Youth

22. School of Seven Bells, Alpinisms

23. Beach House, Devotion

24. The Bug, London Zoo

25. Subtle, ExitingARM

Honorable Mentions:

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Dig Lazarus Dig
Sigur Rós, Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust
Health, HEALTH//DISCO
Hot Chip, Made in the Dark
Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Lie Down in the Light
James Blackshaw, Liturgy of Echoes
Marnie Stern, This Is It and I Am It and You Are It and So Is That and He Is It and She Is It and It Is It and That Is That
High Places, High Places
Elbow, The Seldom Seen Kid
Mates of State, Re-Arrange Us
Dr. Dog, Fate
Plants and Animals, Parc Avenue

Most Disappointing Albums of 2008:

Death Cab for Cutie, Narrow Stairs
Ben Folds, Way to Normal

New blog: mental health and Christianity

2008-11-25T09:07:00.002-05:00

My friend, Mark Licitra, has started a new blog that I commend to readers. As a social worker in the field of mental health, Mark will write about mental health issues and their relationship to Christianity and the church. As he writes in his introductory post, the purpose of this blog “is to start people talking about mental illness, and to re-introduce an ignored (intentionally or unintentionally) group of people to a Church who is called to care for the broken.”

Creation, Original Sin, and Genesis 1-3: A Response to George Murphy

2008-11-12T08:30:00.002-05:00

This essay is the “extended edition” of my abbreviated contribution to the conversation regarding evolution and original sin at Steve Martin’s blog, An Evangelical Dialogue on Evolution.

Response to George L. Murphy, “Roads to Paradise and Perdition: Christ, Evolution, and Original Sin,” in Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith 58, no. 2 (2006): 109-118.

I would like to begin by thanking Steve Martin for inviting me to participate in this dialogue. I would also like to thank George Murphy for writing such a compelling and interesting article. Let me begin by introducing myself and the perspective I bring to this conversation. I am a doctoral student in systematic theology at Princeton Theological Seminary. While my work focuses on issues in the doctrine of God, christology, soteriology, theological exegesis, and cultural exegesis, I have long harbored a personal interest in the interaction between science and theology. I grew up in a home that emphasized the physical sciences above other disciplines, with a father who teaches high school chemistry and biology. At the same time, my parents are products of a particular era in American evangelicalism, and so I was schooled from an early age in the tenets of young-earth creationism. Even as a college freshman, I defended creationism on the first day of my geology class. My views on the matter did not change until I read Mark Noll’s The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, which marked the beginning of a radical turn in my intellectual life. Today, while I am neither an expert in evolutionary biology or in the dialogue between theology and science, I approach the matter with great personal interest. And as readers of my blog will know, I am a passionate opponent of Intelligent Design.

Enough by way of introduction, it is time to turn to Murphy’s article. I have to start by confessing up front that I basically agree with what Murphy says in his paper. What I would like to do is pursue some of the points raised by the essay in more detail and attempt to offer some further theological reflection on the nature of sin and the narrative of Genesis 3. My comments will proceed by briefly addressing the following questions: (1) what is original sin?; (2) what is the relation between creation and the fall?; and (3) how ought we to read Genesis 1-3?

1. What is original sin?

While it’s not stated as clearly as I would like, I think one could summarize Murphy’s thesis in the following way: instead of a doctrine of “original sin” with a corresponding doctrine of “original righteousness,” we should reconceive these concepts in light of the biblical witness by speaking of a “sin of origin” that affects each person from birth and a corresponding progression, by the grace of God, toward maturity, righteousness, and fellowship with God. Based on what we have learned from science, Murphy rightly rejects the idea of an original human pair that spawned the rest of the human race as well as a state of “original righteousness” in which death was not yet operative in nature. Instead of longing for some mythical past, Murphy argues that we should construct a teleological anthropology, in which the goal of humanity is not a recovery of a perfect Eden but the redemption of the new creation, in which “the tree of life is found not in a garden but in the middle of a city” (117).

Murphy’s insights are important, but some further theological development is necessary. First, we need to explore Augustine’s contribution a little further. Murphy discusses Augustine in the context of the debate with Pelagius. He says that Augustine argued “that all are sinners from the beginning of life,” whereas Pelagius turned Adam into a bad moral example. While certainly correct, this does not account for the true innovation in Augustine’s doctrine—viz. the idea of “original guilt.” It’s not just that all people “are born not only with a tendency to sin but actually as sinners”; rather, it’s that all people are born guilty of the original sin. That is, each person is born as if he or she actually committed the sin of Adam and Eve. We are all co-responsible for that sin, because in a sense we were there. This doctrine of “original guilt” constitutes a central divide between Western and Eastern hamartiologies. Jean-Claude Larchet (“Ancestral Guilt according to St Maximus the Confessor: a Bridge between Eastern and Western Conceptions,” Sobornost 20 [1998], 26-27) thus locates the distinction between Eastern and Western doctrines of original sin in the fact that the West connects guilt with the transmission of human corruption, while the East separates guilt from corruption so that only the latter is transmitted. Maximus the Confessor speaks of Adam’s “two sins”: the first and culpable sin was the free choice to disobey God, while the second and non-culpable sin was the “transformation of human nature from incorruption into corruption.” Those who come after Adam participate in the second “sin,” which is the corruption of our human nature, but not in the first. Adam’s descendents are not guilty of his original act of disobedience.

The Eastern doctrine of original sin is, in my estimation, an improvement over the Western doctrine, simply because of the absence of “original guilt.” Augustine’s construction of that doctrine on the basis of Romans 5 and Psalm 51 is deeply problematic, in part due to the very poor Latin translation of Romans with which he was working. However, both the East and the West remain far too mythical in their respective views on the transmission of this sinful corruption. On this point, the two sides essentially agree: the act of sexual intercourse is the agent by which the corruption of the parents is transferred to the child. In this, they were assisted by ancient views on sexuality, in which it was assumed that all the “material” necessary for the creation of a new human person is located in the male sperm. The woman is simply the passive recipient, the “oven” in which the “bread” bakes, so to speak. And so Adam’s guilt is passed from one person to another through sexual reproduction.

All of this is connected to the ancient debate over the origin of the soul. Very briefly, Origen proposed a Platonic doctrine of the pre-existence of souls—souls which God implants into the human fetus as a unique moment in the creative process. This theory is known as creationism, not to be confused with the fundamentalist theory about the origins of the cosmos based on a literal reading of Gen. 1-2. Tertullian countered Origen by arguing for what is called traducianism, in which the soul is a material object replicated in the act of sexual reproduction. Obviously, Augustine adopted traducianism to explain his doctrine of original guilt and inherited depravity, whereas Pelagius sided with Origen, so that each person is a kind of tabula rasa, unaffected by the corruption of the past. While I do not have time to discuss later Protestant developments, I will simply mention that the covenant theology of Reformed Orthodoxy introduced the doctrine of “imputed guilt,” in which God imputes Adam’s guilt to us, not unlike the way the creationist position had God implanting souls into human bodies. This erased the difficulty over the sexual transmission of the soul, but only by introducing numerous other problems. It was an advance that was actually no advance at all.

As modern Christians, we no longer hold to this notion of sexual transmission of corruption, at least not in the ancient form presupposed by Augustine and Maximus. Moreover, as a theologian shaped by the later Barth’s actualistic ontology, I have serious problems with the traditional priority of nature over act. Whereas the tradition says that we inherit a sin nature first before we commit any actual sin, I would argue instead that in our entrance into history with birth, we intrinsically act as individuals “curved in upon ourselves” because of our social environment. “By nature” we act in opposition to those around us. And in this “original” act of sin, we actualize our “sin nature.” Sin as act precedes sin as nature. We do not participate in Adam’s guilt, nor do we receive a corrupt essence from Adam by virtue of reproduction. On the contrary, we enter into a corrupt environment in which sin as incurvatus in se is inescapable. We are born into corrupt social relations that make it impossible for us to achieve perfection through the force of will. Augustine and Pelagius were both right in their own ways: Augustine was correct to argue that we are slaves to sin who depend upon grace alone, but Pelagius was right to argue that sin is primarily an act before it is nature. Against Pelagius, though, I would say that such acts are inevitable by virtue of our historical situatedness. In a very real sense, therefore, history began with the fall, and history as we know it is the continuation of “fallen” acts.

(It’s worth noting, I think, that Maximus the Confessor leans in this very direction. He has no period of “original righteousness.” For him, the instant that Adam entered the world, he sinned. For Maximus, the corruption of humanity is located in human passibility—an attribute that we would identify as constitutive of what it means to be human. The moment that Adam did anything in the world of time and space, he became a passible human being—i.e., he sinned, and thus fell.)

To sum up this section, an actualistic ontology means that being is determined by act. This goes for both sin and salvation. As sinners, we are what we do, viz. “sin.” As those saved by God’s grace, we are what Christ did, viz. reconcile us to God through his life of faithful obedience, his death in God-abandonment, and his resurrection to new life in the power of the Spirit. Theological anthropology is grounded not in substances or essences which precede human action. Rather, theological anthropology is defined by human acts: the individual act of sin that defines us as those “curved in upon ourselves,” and the christological act of reconciliation which defines us as adopted children of God. Here and now, we are dialectical creatures: simul iustus et peccator. At the same time, however, we are in Christ what we will be in eternity. Eschatologically, the old humanity defined by sin will be revealed for what it is, namely, dead and destroyed in the cross of Christ. In its place, the new humanity defined by the life of Jesus will be revealed for what it is: the hope and destiny of every person in accordance with the gracious will of the triune God. The tree of life that thrives in the New Jerusalem thus represents the fact that while we presently live in the antinomy of life and death, of sin and righteousness, God has resolved this antinomy in favor of life. Our telos is clear: God has elected us in Jesus Christ to share in his resurrection, to reign as co-heirs with Christ, and to enjoy life everlasting in the glorious kingdom of God.

2. What is the relation between creation and the fall?

Murphy’s opening section on the “christological context” of creation is perhaps the strongest of the entire article. With Barth, he defines creation in relation to election, reconciliation, and redemption: “creation [exists] for the sake of this election [in Christ]” (110). This is an important insight with far-reaching implications. For starters, if creation exists for the sake of redemption, then sin and the fall do not take God by surprise. As Murphy notes, the incarnation is not “Plan B.” For this reason, he rightly locates his position in proximity to supralapsarianism. A word on that Reformed debate is in order.

The polemical debate between supralapsarianism and infralapsarianism concerns two different orders of divine decrees. Infralapsarians adopted a more historical order: (1) creation and fall, (2) election and reprobation, and (3) the provision of a mediator (Christ). In this case, human sin catches God “off guard,” so to speak, and thus reprobation is contingent upon human actions, even if only foreseen by God. Supralapsarians, by contrast, adopted a logical order of decrees: (1) election and reprobation, (2) creation and fall, and (3) the provision of a mediator. For this position, the fall is a necessary corollary of God’s eternal decree of election and reprobation. The infralapsarians charged the supralapsarians with making God the author of sin; the supralapsarians responded by charging the infralapsarians with creating an arbitrary disjunction between election and reprobation, so that election is a purely divine decision while reprobation is based on God’s foreknowledge of human sinfulness. Supralapsarianism makes both election and reprobation solely dependent upon God’s eternal decision. From Barth’s perspective, if one had to choose between these two positions, supralapsarianism would be preferable, because it is better to make election the central act of God and leave sin a mystery than to make election a secondary decision. Of course, Barth’s own position is a radical departure from both, in that his central critique of supralapsarianism and infralapsarianism is that both separate election from the provision of a mediator. Jesus Christ is just an afterthought. In contrast, Barth’s new order of decrees is: (1) the provision of a mediator, Jesus Christ, in whom all are elected, and (2) creation and fall. Election and reprobation are located in the decision to become incarnate in Jesus.

Now, Murphy’s position on the relation between creation and fall is mostly Barthian, except for a few key differences. First, he rejects the necessity of the fall, speaking instead of its “inevitability.” Similarly, he refers to “the decrees of creation and permission to fall” (110). While this is technically correct—God did not command sin—it still gives the impression that humanity might have acted otherwise and so prevented the need for a savior. While Murphy explicitly rejects the notion that “God was the creator of sin” (111), there is a certain (albeit mysterious) sense in which this is required by a supralapsarian position. If God created for redemption, then God created a world bound to sin; there really is no way to get God “off the hook” for this—nor should we look for one.

In his most Barthian statement, Murphy writes: “The emphasis, however, should be on God’s election first of Christ, and then of others in Christ, of creation for the sake of this election” (ibid.). The problem here is that there are now two elections, “first of Christ” and then “others in Christ.” Maybe he simply means there are two sides to the one election, but it’s unclear from the article. Barth rightly had only one elected person, Jesus Christ, in whom all humanity is elect. This follows from the fact that Christ is the one mediator between God and all humankind. Moreover, if the created cosmos is grounded in the act of election, then any secondary election would be superfluous. The telos of humanity is determined by God’s eternal decision, and what happens in time and space is simply the historical manifestation of that decision. The history of creation, inclusive of the fall, is necessary as a constitutive element of God’s mission of reconciliation. Creation thus has its ground of being in protology (election) and eschatology (redemption), both of which are located in the one person, Jesus Christ, the electing God and elected human, in whom God reconciled the world to Godself (2 Cor. 5.19).

3. How should we read Genesis 1-3?

Barth argues in Church Dogmatics III/1 that the “history-like” Genesis story should be read in the genre of “saga” as a “third way” beyond the binary opposition of myth and history. Against myth, Genesis recounts a truly historical event: the event of creation. Against history, Genesis recounts an event which, as the editors of CD III/1 state in their preface, “cannot be historiographically expressed.” The event of creation is not unlike the event of the resurrection, in the sense that science cannot penetrate what is a divine occurrence, an event in the historical life of God that cannot be read off the face of creation itself. As Barth himself says,

I am using saga in the sense of an intuitive and poetic picture of a pre-historical reality of history which is enacted once and for all within the confines of time and space. … It is to be noted at this point that the idea that the Bible declares the Word of God only when it speaks historically is one which must be abandoned, especially in the Christian Church. … We have to realise that … the presumed equation of the Word of God with a “historical” record is an inadmissable postulate which does not itself originate in the Bible at all but in the unfortunate habit of Western thought which assumes that the reality of a history stands or falls by whether it is “history.” … Both Liberalism and orthodoxy are children of the same insipid spirit, and it is useless to follow them. For after all, there seems no good reason why the Bible as the true witness of the Word of God should always have to speak “historically” and not be allowed also to speak in the form of saga. On the contrary, we have to recognise that as holy and inspired Scripture, as the true witness of God’s true Word, the Bible is forced to speak also in the form of saga precisely because its object and origin are what they are, i.e., not just “historical” but also frankly “non-historical.” (CD III/1, 81-82)

While I have no disagreement with Barth regarding the theological interpretation of Genesis as saga, I do not have the same aversion to the word “myth.” As C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien rightly argued, myth expresses the truth in a culturally specific form. The story of Jesus Christ is thus the true myth, i.e., the myth that penetrated human existence. At the same time, I think Bultmann was correct to describe these stories as mythological, in that they presume certain ancient conceptions of the world that we now know to be scientifically incorrect. There is nothing theologically necessary about the ancient understanding of the blue sky as water over our heads, so I have no compulsion to protect such narrative details by using the word “saga.” And, of course, some of Barth’s polemic against the category of “myth” is really a polemic aimed at Bultmann himself. At the end of the day, Bultmann was right to see that the two of them have almost no disagreement about how to interpret the Genesis story. The difference is really a theological one which could just as easily be upheld using Bultmann’s terminology.

Having said all this, I tend to speak of Genesis 1-3 (though not only these chapters) as an “etiological myth” (or “etiological saga,” if you prefer). “Etiology” refers to the study of origins or causes, and here I think the opening of Genesis was crafted by the Israelites over a lengthy period of time—in contradistinction to Babylonian cosmology—for the purpose of narrating the nature of created existence and the cause of human sin and suffering in the context of their covenantal relationship with Yahweh. The creation narrative serves the Israelite self-understanding as those brought into a covenantal relationship with God, which includes the self-understanding as those distinct from other cultures. Since these texts were most likely compiled and redacted during the Babylonian exile, there is an important polemical dimension to the Genesis story. What all this means on an exegetical level is the Genesis story has to be read as the mythological introduction to Exodus. This doesn’t mean that Exodus is not also mythological in nature, but Exodus would be the primary myth while Genesis the secondary one. The creation account provides the necessary prelude to the account of Israel’s deliverance and establishment as God’s chosen people. Historically, then, I would argue, following other biblical scholars, that the canonical Exodus narrative came first in the minds of the Israelites, with the Genesis narrative taking shape only in relation to Exodus. While various parts of Genesis might have pre-existed the Exodus story—hence the two creation accounts, two flood accounts, etc.—overall the final form of Genesis is an etiological myth which provides the background context for the story of Israel’s liberation.

What this means is that we need to read Gen. 1-3 with Exodus firmly in mind. The story of creation has to be read in relationship with the story of God’s de-construction of Egypt and re-construction of Israel. The story of Adam’s sin has to be read in relationship with Israel’s confession of sin, their promise of covenant fidelity, and their continual failures as a people before God. The story of Eden and “original righteousness” should be read as the mythological acknowledgement of creation’s disruption through human sin and the need for a covenant with God. The covenant is thus the restoration of humanity’s relation with God. The myth of humanity’s fall in the Garden of Eden serves as the narratival introduction to the story of humanity’s redemption in the exodus from Egypt. Egypt is the literary foil to Eden, just as Pharaoh is the literary foil to Yahweh: Egypt is a place of enslavement and Pharaoh the one who enslaves; by contrast, Eden (and later Sinai) is a place of freedom, and Yahweh is the one who liberates. Moreover, the affirmation of “original righteousness” is similar to our affirmation of the soul: both are logically necessary in a sense, though not historically or scientifically true, because each affirms that there is “more than meets the eye.” Just as creation is more than sin, suffering, and death, so too we are more than the sum total of bodily matter. Though we do not have access to this “something more,” the mythological accounts of “original righteousness” and a human “soul” testify to this theological truth.

My observations here are assisted by the fact that the Jewish canon identifies the Pentateuch as the Torah, the Law. There is no independent historical record here; rather, every aspect of the Genesis narrative serves the elaboration of God’s law. Just as I remarked above how the doctrine of creation serves the doctrine of redemption, so too the text of creation serves the text of redemption. Genesis serves Exodus; creation serves the covenant. When we read Genesis, then, we have to interpret the text in a threefold context: (1) the theological context of the doctrines of creation, sin, and redemption (the first two serving the third); (2) the literary/textual context of the Torah as the history-like narrative of God’s covenant; and (3) the historical-cultural context of Israel as a people living in exile from the land promised to them by God.

Finally, while these three contexts are primary, as a Christian interpreter of Genesis, we have a fourth and determinative context: the self-revelation of God in Jesus Christ. The creation account must be read with the prophetic and New Testament witness to the new creation, and the exodus story must be read together with the story of the cross as the final and definitive event of our liberation. Christians have long interpreted Gen. 3.15 as the “protoevangelium,” the first annunciation of the gospel. Whether this is a good reading of the text is certainly debatable. Where a specifically Christian interpretation of Genesis is quite helpful is in the interpretation of Gen. 2.17: the promise of “death” upon the eating of the fruit of one particular tree. As Murphy correctly notes, this has long been understood as the threat of “spiritual death” resulting from alienation from God (117). Christians then connect this to the cry of dereliction in the Synoptics (Matt. 27.46; Mark 15.34) and the “second death” described in Revelation (Rev. 2.11, 20.6, 20.14, 21.8). The conclusion one reaches from this kind of canonical-theological exegesis is that in his death on the cross, Jesus dies the second death destined for all people because of our sinfulness, the death in which we are definitively separated from God for eternity. Jesus enters into solidarity with humanity by throwing himself into the lake of fire, so to speak, so that we might receive new life instead of eternal death. In Christ, God takes upon Godself the punishment promised Adam as a result of his disobedience, and so freeing us for the enjoyment of communion with the triune God.

4. Conclusion

I have sought to reflect on the ideas and insights touched upon by George Murphy in his fascinating article. My disagreements are all rather minor and mainly have to do with theological consistency. Further exploration of this topic could be pursued many different lines, but two in particular stand out. The first is the account proffered by Daryl P. Domning and Monika K. Hellwig in their work on Original Selfishness: Original Sin and Evil in the Light of Evolution. While I have not yet read this work, it seems to me that their project has the possibility of being a very interesting theological proposal, one that retains continuity with the tradition while incorporating the scientific insights of evolutionary biology. I would like to see future discussion of this topic engage this particular study. The second is a theological reappropriation of Schleiermacher’s theology. Though he is often dismissed as a 19^th century liberal who is no longer worth reading, such an attitude is greatly mistaken. Schleiermacher is a profound thinker of the highest quality, and his theology, particular his doctrine of creation, offers substantial room for incorporating the insights of evolutionary science. It would be exciting to see what a post-Barthian appropriation of Schleiermacher and contemporary science might look like for a doctrine of creation.

This concludes my essay. I wish to thank Steve and George again for the invitation and the article, respectively. I look forward to reading the dialogue that follows.

David W. Congdon

Princeton Theological Seminary

Princeton, NJ

Evolution and Original Sin: Update

2008-11-11T17:12:00.002-05:00

I mentioned earlier that Steve Martin is hosting a conversation regarding evolution and original sin on his blog, An Evangelical Dialogue on Evolution. The debate focuses on George Murphy’s paper, which is available online. My contribution to this debate has now been posted. Because of space limitations, I submitted an abbreviated version of my response to Murphy’s essay. The full version will appear tomorrow here on my blog.

Creston Davis: universality of Christian politics

2008-11-08T10:40:00.004-05:00

One of the other highlights about AAR was the chance to talk with Creston Davis over pints. It was actually a rather random meeting. While talking with Ry Siggelkow, Creston came over to our table. We started talking and pretty soon we were deeply engaged in discussing liberalism, Barthianism, Milbank, liturgical theology, and Christian politics. I really enjoyed the meeting, and I look forward to reading his future works.

Davis has edited the forthcoming volume by Slavoj Žižek and John Milbank, The Monstrosity of Christ. (According to my discussion with him that night, a volume will come out next year by Brazos, with essays by Žižek, Milbank, Davis himself, and a special guest chapter by Antonio Negri.) Davis will also be coming out with his dissertation at some point here, which connects issues of liturgy and politics.

In an article with The Other Journal, Davis writes about “the politics of Christian nihilism.” He narrates his own personal journey from Republican politics to Christian theopolitics. He then discusses his vision of a universal Christian materialist politics. In addition to talking about Nietzsche and Hegel, he provides a robust vision of an ecclesial theopolitics rooted in the cross of Christ and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. It is a cruciform and pentecostal theopolitics. He writes:

Christian politics must be universal: it announces the bright light of liberation for the poor and the oppressed. Creation order is not removed from this universal Christian liberation wrought in the Incarnation and the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit; to the contrary, as St. Paul tells us, ALL creation moans for its full restoration. We are living out this universal politics of liberation for the entire world and all material history. Yet, because the fullness of time has yet to arrive, this universal cannot be employed as a totality or an epistemological foundationalism, rather, as we shall see the Christian universal is always eschatologically constituted—always here, but not yet.

If Christian politics is universal, then politics, as God’s act of liberating the earth from sin through the Church is grounded in the very foundations of creation itself: Politics is infinitely more than the delimiting power of legislating, executing and maintaining law and order in a human-made polity. Yet because politics is universal it is inescapably intertwined to the particular, and so it has something to say on all levels of existence, not only in the “invented” politics of the United States of America, but also on the level of a cultural and economic logic of the world. ...

A Christian materialist politics is the persistent faithfulness of the Church in the sanctification of the Spirit bearing witness to the depths of the love of God all the way down to the deepest depths of the cosmos, Hell, to the point where nothing can be out of reach of God’s outstretched arms on the cross. . . . The poor become the real witnesses of Christ suffering in the world that the Church (as the community of the Spirit) must side with in order to be in tune with eschatological time. Christian politics must therefore be a universal politics of absolute love requiring us to reside on the threshold of nothingness as the mending work of the Spirit. We must infinitely reside between the Crucified Christ and the Holy Spirit.