Fallen Into Knowledge

In 1774, the French chemist, Antoine Lavoisier, was racing to discover the properties of a substance Henry Cavendish called “inflammable air.” Lavoisier believed, as did the two other scientists who were also bent on beating him to the discovery, that this “inflammable air” might be created by de-phlogisticating otherwise ordinary air. See, the going theory was that in addition to the 4 Greek elements of air, fire, water, and earth there was this fifth element (and, no, its not love!), this fifth element was contained in combustible substances and was released during combustion. They needed something to explain the processes of rust and oxidation, and phlogiston was it. At any rate, Lavoisier was trying to remove all of the phlogiston from the air to isolate this “inflammable air” - or, aether, as it was sometimes called.
As you might expect, he didn’t succeed. (more…)

From here and here:

I confess: that while I think that theology should attend to its own concerns, I often use the language of critical theory in theological discussions

I confess: that even though I know I should be conversant in the concerns of my reformed tradition, whenever the words Calvin, Justification, Election, etc.., are used my mind hazes over.

I confess: whenever I am in school for theology, I wish I were studying philosophy, and whenever I am studying philosophy, I wish I were in a theology class.

I confess: I periodically consider giving it all up and joining a monastery

More additions, as they come to me…

I confess: That while I don’t doubt the existence of God, I doubt His goodness more often than I care to admit

I confess: I often worry that technology use (like this blog) has been detrimental to my being a theologian. But I haven’t done anything about it.

I confess: That while I got my Heidegger, Kant, Neitzsche, Shopenhauer, and Hegel first hand I understood only a small fraction of it.

I confess: I enjoy reading Marx more than I enjoy reading most theologians.

I have begun retiring certain theologically loaded terms from my vocabulary. I am sad to see them sitting on the bench, for they ought to take a central role an any theological discussion. But, it seems, some words lose their power from over-use. People use them without having a clear idea as to what is meant - or signified - by them. Or, alternatively, because these words can be used in different (and sometimes mutually exclusive) ways, people find themselves talking past each other - conversations never quite connect. Of course, since these words are central to any theological conversation, they have to be replaced with something.

Here are a couple words that I have temporarily retired from my speech, and the words I have exchanged for them:

1. Faith: I am using the word “Fidelity,” or word “Allegiance” in the cases where faithfulness to God’s Kingdom is meant.

2. Grace: I am mostly using “generosity,” or the adjective “graciously”

Are there other theological words that need temporary relief?

Several years ago, while in the midst of preaching through Ruth, a gentleman from the congregation came up to me and declared, “I know what you’re doing: you aren’t just teaching us about Ruth, but also how to read the Bible.” While I hadn’t thought about it that concisely, that is exactly what I was doing.
In fact, perhaps all sermons are both about the passage at hand and also a demonstration of hermeneutics - or, a lesson in “how to read the Bible.” Just a thought.

So this week I am preaching again, and I thought that instead of spending all week alone preparing in hopes of delivering a masterpiece of oratory at on Sunday I would post the outline here so others (you!) could give input.

Over the last year or so, we have moved steadily toward a more communal sermon preparation process: at this point the person who preaches gets at least some outside input - input which they aren’t obligated to make use of, but may also freely use. It seems to us that the image of the preach retreating into (usually but not necessarily) his study only to pass the word down - Moses-like - on Sunday runs counter to the New Testament. We have been trying to change that at the Pearl Church. Usually this process takes place among a small group of people, and it will probably continue to do so. But today I would like to throw it open a bit.

So, here is my outline thus far: its rough because its still Monday. That also means that now is when input can be really helpful (as opposed to after I am wedded to to details). There are huge gaps, moves that I haven’t decided upon. But, here it is:

Introduction: “prayer as manifesto”

I would like to start by highlighting a speech that really rallies people together, but all the illustrations (movies, mostly) that come to mind are of a general-figure rallying the troops for battle. I wish to avoid the violent connotations. Perhaps one of Murrow’s speeches in “Good Night and Good Luck.” Words are powerful.

1. Not “how to pray,” but “pray toward this end:”

We have become accustomed to reading The Lord’s Prayer as if it were a “How to” manual, as if it set out the parts one should include in prayer - first this, and then that, and so on. This would be fine (as, having a guide in prayer is also fine), except that formulas run the danger of devolving into “meaningless words” - words without signification - words emptied of their content. If anything, this is precisely what Jesus was talking about in the passage right before The Lord’s prayer.

2. Manna from heaven and jubilee: the kingdom refracted through the torah

A. “Our Father, Hallowed be your Name, Your Kingdom Come, On earth as it is in Heaven”

Much in the same way as the Shema, or the Decalogue, this prayer begins with an affirmation of God’s exclusive reign. Of interest is the proclamation / request that, just as god reigns in / over heaven, he might also reign here.
This is not a “pie-in-the-sky” hope that we might hasten to heaven, but that God’s righteousness would pervade our world and community as it does His own realm.

In this sense, the “our Father” echoes Miriam, Hannah, and Mary’s prayers that God would come with justice to His people.
This “Kingdom Come” also bears echoes of Isaiah – the Day of the Lord.

B. “Give us today our daily bread.”

Two Scriptural echoes here: First, this harkens back to the time when Israel was fed manna, daily, from heaven.

Second, and in lone with our Jubilee theme, A people who are not sowing and reaping have to trust the Lord to provide.

C. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And do not bring us to the time of trial, but deliver us from the evil one.”

The significance of Debt forgiveness: Some might say that by forgiving debts, we open ourselves up to be trampled upon - and indeed we are. We have to be “wise as serpents, innocent as doves:” yet we are clearly called to embody Christ’s sacrifice by not maintaining hold of our “rights.”

D. “For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly father will also forgive you. If you do not forgive others, neither will your Heavenly Father forgive your trespasses.”

The author of Matthew broadens the scope of the Jubilee language above: not only are we to forgive debts, but we are also to forgive any grievances: You are no longer indebted to me: you are free of the burden. Our freeing of others is directly tied to God’s freeing of us (an inescapable point Matthew makes, however uncomfortable that makes us feel)

3. Prayer as community-orienting activity

The death and resurrection gives shape to life and community for us: it also points toward God’s and our future:

The Raising of Christ is not merely a consolation to him in a life that is full of distress and doomed to die, but it is also God’s contradiction of suffering and death, of humiliation and offense, and of the wickedness of evil. Hope finds in Christ not only a consolation in suffering, but also the protest of the divine promise against suffering. -Moltmann

Here is a synopsis of yesterday’s sermon on Matthew 6:1-18, which was completed at the last minute and at great expense. For the full (audio-ized) monty, check the Pearl Church’s site.

“AMERICAN JESUS.”
Last summer a few of us got together and watched some Jesus movies: we did this as a way to help us think about how Jesus and the church shows up in popular culture. In the American films that we watched, the message Jesus preached was about inward transformation: that was to be the essence of Christianity. How are we to be “set apart?” How are we to be seen as distinctive?
On Easter, Mike preached that we, as a people, as a church, are not only to be characterized by the Cross, but also by the Resurrection. Preaching from 1 Corinthians 15, Mike proclaimed that in light of Jesus’ resurrection, we are to be a People of Resurrection, a people characterized - not by sin - but by life.
That’s all well and good, but…what do we do now? How do we live as those who are “alive in Christ?”

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Post-Critical: (the exciting conclusion to the hermeneutical saga)

Okay, so not a conclusion: I most certainly have reached such an end. In fact, it seems that every answer won begets, hydra-like, even more prickly questions. By the time I had finished three years at Multnomah, I was ready to move on: while it would take a few more years to get across town, I needed to go back to PSU. I needed to go back to PSU because they had the resources (classes, faculty, etc) that would allow me to further explore the hermeneutical questions I was pursuing.
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Critical: (a continuation of my hermeneutic story)

Having wetted my appetite for things hermeneutical during my first year at PSU, for unrelated reasons I left there for Multnomah Bible College: having read Homer and Plato, I wanted to learn greek and at that time PSU did not offer the language. While I wasted no time jumping into my greek studies, all Multnomah students take Bible and Theology classes, and so I soon found myself in a class called, “Bible Study Methods.” Bible Study Methods was, and is, an embodiment of the New Critical approach to texts which I had been attracted to at PSU. While the class was chiefly directed at teaching students specific tools, I particularly relished the times when the class discussion turned philosophical - having been pre-prepared for such discussions at PSU. I soon found out that the New Critical approach was not the only hermeneutical approach represented on campus: in fact, there seemed to be two factions. There were those who followed the ‘cutting edge’ (sic) “text-centered” approach” and those who retained the more traditional “authorial intent” (hisorical/literal/grammatical) approach. Functionally, at Multnomah, this meant that those who favored the “text-centered” approach eschewed any “historical background” material or research, which the “authorial intent” folks embraced it.
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Having been inspired by Dave’s (rather lengthy) post on hermeneutics, I would like to tell a story. So gather round, grab a cup of cocoa, because I, too, am going to tell a story of Hermeneutics.
Specifically, mine.
See, I have been driven by primarily hermeneutical questions: the directions I have taken theologically and, even the educational roads that I have traveled have been - mostly - dictated by questions that are hermeneutical in nature. So, this is hermeneutics as story. There are three parts to this story - as there must be - and three posts, starting now.

Pre-Critical: (Yes, I know. But really, did I have any choice?)

My awareness of hermeneutical questions began in high school, and while I had already spent some time teaching and even preaching, I had not considered that process between my reading of the text and understanding or “applying” it at all - let alone considering it to be fraught with problems. And so, I left for college, to study English.

During my first year at Portland State I took an upper division class entitled, “Critical Approaches to Literature,” or LitCrit. I was introduced to a plethora of reading strategies: author centered, New Critical, feminist, marxist, freudian, reader-response, deconstruction, and so on. Some of these struck me then, as now, as not having much at all with the text in question.
I came out of that class pretty confident that the New Critics (W.H. Auden, T.S. Eliot, and company) had it right: by analyzing the text itself, rather than the the author’s psychology or historical situation on the one hand, or trying to make the text about my pet cause on the other, I thought that by focusing on the words on the page I might avoid “reading into the text” As it turns out, at the ripe old age of 19, I was somewhat naïve.

On Easter Sunday we celebrated Jesus’ Resurrection as both a vindication of his victory over death and as inaugurating the Kingdom which he spent his ministry announcing. The Church is that Kingdom.
So, the next, and logical question is this: How do we then live? What is this people to look like? We seem very clear that the church should be markedly different in form and action than the world out of which it is supposedly called, We aren’t so clear about the details. At least, that is my perception of from the proverbial pews: We have succeeded in convincing people of the first thing, but given no real direction to follow. Call it a failure of imagining.
I know that I am supposed to be living differently, but all of my time is still spent providing shelter for myself and filling that shelter with stuff. We speak of “God’s economy” but give me the details.
Why are the leaders of the church hazy about the details? A couple of thoughts:
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