To Know GOD!

James Merick has eloquently put what I have felt for a while now...

It says something terrible about the state of the discipline [contemporary theology] that it is utterly objective and scholarly, that one can be successful without ever having to pray, meditate upon Scripture, participate in the life of the church, serve the poor, counsel the downtrodden or just repent of one’s selfishness and become more loving. It is a blight against contemporary theology that the mark of success has to do with argumentation or even conformance to some tradition, intellectual or confessional, not holiness. That one can be considered a knowledgeable theologian without ever really having to be affected by the knowledge they have is at the very least curious for a discipline concerned with knowledge of the ultimate ontologically reality, God... Knowing God entails personal change, for one cannot truly know God without coming into active, transformative relationship to him. Theologians thus do not know various doctrines, even if they can argue compellingly for them, if their selves are not conformed, not taught by the content. Calvin thus recognized that theology is not only plagued by false gods or idolatry, but by false selves as well. For him, it is impossible to retain a false self and yet know God in truth. In this way, what makes for a successful theologian is not simply good intellectual traits, but, more fundamentally, virtue and piety. Theologians are those who do not simply pontificate and speculate about the truth for others, but above all those who have been personally taught by Truth, who have been grasped by the content of their task to the point of being conformed to it. True theologians do not fool themselves into thinking that theological problems are solved conceptually (in other words, enough babbling about the perils of capitalism and more getting on with providing relief to those who suffer from its oppression). True theologians don’t master their discipline, but are mastered by it, being moved not simply intellectually by thoughts, but personally by realities shorthanded by doctrines.

A God of Intolerable Violence?

There is an interesting discussion on the God of the First Testament vs. the God of the NT on the question of God's violence in the Hebrew scriptures. See Michael Whitenton, Daniel Kirk and Michael Gorman.

As someone who studies the New Testament writings, I value and appreciate the Hebrew Scriptures as the necessary story within which to locate the narratives of the first Christian writers. I love the Hebrew scriptures and both affirm their value and necessity for understanding Jesus and the first Christians. BUT!

I cannot reconcile the GOD revealed in Jesus of Nazareth with a few of the depictions of YHWH in the Hebrew scriptures. In fact, this is a significant problem for me. I'm currently wrestling through this issue, and I've tentatively arrived at some very uncomfortable positions. It appears that only a Christological reading of the Hebrew scriptures can solve this dilemma. But But I take a more radical position than Daniel Kirk appears to take.

If, as I believe, Jesus fully reveals to us the identity of God, and we are to live and decide what's right and wrong within the trajectory of Jesus' teachings, actions, ethics, life, etc. (the NT), why can't we read the Hebrew scriptures retrospectively, and through the lens of Jesus, assess whether or not Israel got it right when they heard God? I realise this sounds slightly like Marcion, but I have no desire to throw out the Hebrew Scriptures. However, I've got to question whether or not they (Israel or the particular writers of these traditions) heard right, or faithfully represented the intentions of YHWH when engaging in such horrific acts. I'm perfectly happy to concede that we are quite ignorant concerning the surrounding circumstances of these events and actions, and so our conclusions are tentative, but I think this Christological approach may help us.

Anthony Thiselton argues, concerning prophecy, that: The authentic is to be sifted from the inauthentic or spurious, in the light of the OT scriptures, the gospel of Christ, the traditions of all the churches, and critical reflections (Thiselton, 1 Corinthians, pg. 1140). Could a sifting perhaps apply to the writings of the Hebrew scriptures themselves? Could we, in light of other portraits within the Hebrew Scriptures, the Christ event, the teachings of the New Testament, and critical reflection, sift our teachings/traditions of these violent narratives which do not in fact accurately portray the intentions of YHWH? I'm almost convinced we instinctively do this anyway. We read 2 Sam 13 and affirm that the actions are heinous and evil. We read of a Elisha's cruel punishment of childish pranks (2 Kings 2:23-24), and we conclude what? That God really gave him the power to do this?

While I would not advocate deleting these traditions, it would then be possible to see them as instances where Israel or a prophet appealed to the authority or agency of God for these horrific events, but were in fact wrong to do so. AGAIN these are tentative thoughts which I find very uncomfortable because it challenges what I believe about the Bible. But I can't help but think this may be a better solution to the problem than just claiming we don't have enough information to make an informed decision. Or perhaps I'm wrong.

Does this make sense? Questions, comments and criticisms are all welcome.

What is GOD?

Chris Tilling has a thoughtful little blog-post on GOD IS LOVE. I would just like to supplement his post with two delightful quotes from C.H. Dodd's commentary on the Johannine Epistles.

1 John 4:8-10 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.

The great British scholar, C.H. Dodd notes the following about this verse:

To say “God is love” implies that all His activity is loving activity. If He creates, He creates in love; if He rules, He rules in love; if He judges, He judges in love. All that He does is the expression of His nature, which is – to love. The theological consequences of this principle are far-reaching. Verse 9 is a restatement of the great Johannine declaration of the love of God (Jn 3:16) in terms differing only slightly from the form give in the Fourth gospel. It reminds us once again that in speaking of the love of God we are thinking of loving action, definite, concrete and recognizable on the historical plane. Verse 10 underlines one point in this declaration which is of fundamental importance: the Christian religion starts not with man’s love for God, but with God’s love for man, and with God’s love expressed in specific action in history.[1]

The meaning of the word [agape] must in fact be understood from the Gospel itself; and the pit and marrow of the Gospel is this: God’s sending of His Son to be the propitiation for our sins… It means that the coming of Christ, and in particular His death ‘for our sins, according to the scripture’ (1 Cor 15:3), constitutes the means by which we are cleansed from the taint of sin, and enter into the sphere of divine forgiveness, with the newness of life that it brings. That God provided such means for us, at such a cost, indicates what is meant by the love of God.[2]

This is enhanced by Anthony Thiselton's discussion of love in his massive commentary on 1 Corinthians, where he writes: Love denotes above all a stance or attitude which shows itself in acts of will as regard, respect, and concern for the welfare of the other. It is therefore profoundly christological, for the cross is the paradigm case of the act of will and stance which places welfare of others above the interests of the self.[3]

While I'm not sure how to answer Chris' final question, I do take refuge in the love of GOD, and I do try and share that love with anyone who is interested.

[1] C. H. Dodd, The Johannine Epistles (Hodder & Stoughton, 1953) pg. 110 [2] Dodd, The Johannine Epistles, pg. 112

[3] A. Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians NIGTC (Eerdmans, ), pg. 1035

Will God Remember?

Still delving into a deep well of Hebrew theology, DanO has caused me to seriously think about some stuff. Dan has his own excellent blog: Poser or Prophet: On Journeying With Those in Exile. Be sure to check that out. He offers various thoughts, on some biblical topics as well as theological which have caused me to sit down and think deeply.

Back to God and Memory, Dan raises the interesting question of Exodus 2:23-25

After a long time the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned under their slavery, and cried out. Out of the slavery their cry for help rose up to God. God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God looked upon the Israelites, and God took notice of them.

This fascinating passage is followed by a tradition of questioning whether or not Yhwh will remember his covenant to Israel. Listening to Tom Wright's lectures on Romans, while driving into the city recently, I was reminded of his four-fold plan of studying and reading: Exegesis > Theology > History > Praxis. It's a very helpful model, but I find that I'm always mixing them up (in fact I think the biblical writers do this all the time, especially Paul), and actually struggling to separate them - I think because of my view that the Scriptures have authority over my life, that they speak beyond their intended audience and to me now, and that someone I must respond to them. But that's another story - Back to Yhwh.

Did Israel really think that GOD had forgotten them? Does God actually become unaware of situations? One can easily suggest the scenario of Gen 18. God has heard rumours of disaster on the earth, so he "comes down" to see if it's true. Is this all part and parcel of anthropomorphic language, or is this actually conveying something about how God has chosen to interact with humanity?

I'm getting Fretheim, Durham and Brueggemann's commentary on Exodus so that I can explore this further, but in my own life, I'm pondering about whether GOD has forgotten some. And is Jaques Ellull right that the task of the community is to remind GOD of his covenant with humanity? Have we succeeded in this task? Are we even aware of such a mandate? Does it even matter to us? SHA!

Much to think through...

Does God get Amnesia?

Still perusing the Hebrew narrative I find myself struck by an odd notion, repeated in the New Testament, of God declaring that He will forget the sins of Israel. This raises the fascinating theological and philosophical question as to whether or not God can actually forget. The scriptures seem quite adamant on this. In the words of Miroslav Volf, The “miracle of miracles, God doesn’t even remember our sins (Isa 43:25; Jer 31:34; Heb 8:12; 10:17 see also the psalms where God is asked to forget, which presupposes that God can forget: Psalm 79:8 & 25:7). They are just gone, gone from reality and gone from memory.” [Volf, Free of Charge, pg. 142-143]

Since Open Theism has taken us further in discussing and illuminating God’s relationship to humanity, I’m asking the question as to God and Memory. Does God’s mind erase information? (I realise that there are immediately problems with referring to God’s mind, but I can’t find another way to speak about this) Or is something else meant by the verses quoted above? What does this suggest about God’s omniscience? Does God have perfect past knowledge? Volf has explored some of this in his recent offering: The End of Memory. But to my knowledge, and please feel free to fill in the gaps, this has not been extensively discussed. The commentaries on the various passages noted above, either completely ignore this issue, fail to grasp the issue, or merely restate the issue. What I'm looking for is some clear and critical thinking on this topic - other than my own of course...

A tentative thought, is to suggest that God not remembering Israel's sin means that the issue that was affecting the relationship between YHWH and Israel has been decisively dealt with, so that when YHWH looks at Israel that is not the first thought that comes to mind - but rather, Israel is viewed through the lens of sins having been dealt with. The problem with this thought, is that it flatly ignores the literal statements of Scripture and offers rather an explanation, that appears to be based on an anthropomorphic understanding of these passages. Which seems unlikely in my own hermeneutical understanding.

So my final remark is to simply accept that God forgets sins. But this seems to counter-intuitive. Like my mind is being held captive to philosophy... Does God really forget my sins? Should we rejoice with Volf at this "miracle of miracles"? Indeed, if true, if would constitute a miracle of miracles...

Comments, questions, criticisms? All welcome...