A sensitive approach

Rachel Barenblat has written beautifully about our human condition - friends, and differences. How difficult it is to learn, to teach, and to accept each other when we have so many differences. The power, I think, for accepting others comes from accepting who you are in yourself. Lest this be too self-absorbed or self-centered, you must of course find yourself acceptable in a social context.

Of necessity, our individual social context includes a plethora of accumulated concepts in ourself representing entities outside ourself: our place as a child, or a man, or a woman, our abilities as we and others perceive them in school and work, the ways in which we receive approbation or criticism, the mistakes we make and how we react to them, our families whether nuclear or extended, the churches, local organizations, and political parties of our land, and the relationship to the wider world. In Biblical terms, these are the thrones, dominations, and principalities, the angels of the entities we are known in.

What is acceptable and what is rejected? That word rejected hurt my sensibility recently. Not because I was rejected, but because someone implied that the Father rejected Christ. Peter Kirk has accurately mediated in the discussion. There are things that are absolutely not true - and this is one of them. The essence of the Gospel is that Christ Jesus is a full perfect and sufficient sacrifice for the sins of the whole world. It is wholly acceptable and wholly accepted. Christ is Abel הָבֶל (vapour, breath, vanity - think James). More than empty (Eccl 1:2 הֲבֵל הֲבָלִים, havel havelim) he is the acceptable offering and the source of the true breath of God (רוּחַ ruach - so much punning in the imagery in Scripture - here is part of the source imagery of the creed concerning the Spirit, the Lord and giver of life - such breath as gives us substance - 'as makes his guest' George Herbert).

This is my Beloved Son in whom I am well-pleased (Hebrew ratson, used all over the place e.g. Psalm 85:1. Think also the year of Jubilee, the acceptable year of the Lord.) Such a statement is not rejection. God bears all things (check out Suzanne's lovely translation 1 Cor 13) in us through the work of Christ so that God who created heaven and earth may having created us, draw us, re-image us, and enjoying us fully, be all in all to us in the Beloved.

God in Christ has entered our social context and the principalities and powers have known that they have met their match as a source of identity for us. The struggle to find ourselves acceptable ends when we read that we are accepted in the Beloved. This absolute is something we can grow into fully and the consumation promised is one which Christ by the Spirit will confirm in us as we walk together.

Life without God

In yesterday's Globe and Mail, in the book section, is a little thought by Michael Ruse, professor of philosophy at Florida State University. Citing Russell (Why I am not a Christian) and Hume (Dialogues concerning Natural Religion) and Edward O. Wilson (On Human Nature), he argues that our scepticism justified, we can move forward without religion.

I have not read Hume or Wilson, but I found my old copy of Russell who I loved when I first read him, and I love still as I reread some of it, for Russell was right in many things about sexual repression and lies, particularly the immorality of telling people things you know are not true about your own desire or history. In this sense, the Church is often the place of the lie. This is as true today as it was when Russell wrote. It is very clear in Romans 2:1: Therefore you [singular] have no excuse, O human, whoever you are, when you judge another; for in passing judgment upon another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, are doing the very same things. Bibliobloggers - take note.

Russell has two criticisms of Jesus and Paul that are unmediated for him except through the Church's teaching. If the Church has already been found to be prone to error, perhaps a better mediator is required for the traditional interpretations of the 'failure of Christ's second coming' (Mark 13 and others) and the 'better to marry than burn' in Paul (1 Corinthians 7). Russell is likewise condemning of the Church's claim that it has bettered the lot of slaves or of women. Again, the Church may claim more for herself than is righteous, but that's the point of John 5, isn't it: that the witness to your truth is the act that God gave you to do.

The issue - and perhaps Russell and other philosophers get there (but not by philosophy), is that power is abused. Where is it not abused? By anyone who refuses to use it by whatever power that one can invoke to effect the refusal. I know of one such person who demonstrated that power in himself and by that very means shares such power with as many as receive him. (This answers both
1. realization - the question to me from Mark Nanos: why is the Messianic age not evident?
and
2. failure - why did he not come with power and glory in that generation?
but it does not justify for a moment acts of political self-protection.)

I read Russell and marvel at his accuracy but eventually, he is not satisfying alone. Such satisfaction, the completion of the work, and the word of salvation, do not come from human reason, marvellous and necessary gift though it is. I intend to find a way to mediate some of these understandings, for there is a right understanding, but it does not and cannot come from within human reason alone. It is there in the non-rational: poetry, music, dance, story, and the singers and the profane (three cheers for the choir וְשָׁרִים כְּחֹלְלִים Psalm 87:7) and other unspeakable gifts. [Hebraists - what do you make of the profane in Psalm 87?]

The story's the thing in which we'll draw the salvation of the king.

כִּי רוֹצֶה יְהוָה בְּעַמּוֹ יְפָאֵר עֲנָוִים בִּישׁוּעָה For the LORD takes pleasure in his people, he will beautify the poor with salvation. (Psalm 149:4) .

A Reasonable Faith

Doug, at Metacatholic writes on a reasonable faith. I largely agree with his fourfold statement - read and ponder. I do not dare summarize such a carefully worded paragraph.

His thoughts resonate with my thinking over the turnings of my life these past 60+ years. Let me assure anyone who reads that I too do not wish to abandon the field of reason. In the NT reason is logos (1 Peter 3:15) and reasonable, logikos (Romans 12:1) so it would seem folly indeed to abandon the field of reason.

Paul has the most comprehensive argument in Romans: 55 questions in 10 sections. One might imagine for a moment that this is Paul responding to Peter's request for the reason for the hope that is in him. Paul's struggle is not a cool argumentation through which he proves his 'position' as if it would have been reasonable to know this proof without the assumed relationship to his Judaism and the risen Christ.

Paul does not prove that God is and that God is good. He argues reasonably and with anguish that God is good because of his relationship already established as a Jew and subsequently further understood through the risen Christ. No human reasoning operates without pre-suppositions. Paul's 'axioms' are stated in his opening, and only then does his personal response begin. Even when he describes his response for those who hold the truth in unrighteousness - he places them under wrath because God has already shown them the truth. In both cases, the confrontation is first, reasoning second.

Doug writes: we can affirm, in God, that the universe is indeed a rational one, and that an attitude of trust in that God is an act of reasonable faith. [my italics]

I agree. We see the reason after the apprehension of grace. So if someone says to me: I don't believe your God, or in God, I have no need for God, or I left the Church since there was no reason to stay, then there is no reason by which I can prove to that person that God is true. In fact, I expect I am sometimes a stumbing block to others - and it informs my perpetual prayer much as enemies inform the Psalmists' prayers.

I don't write, in fact, for the unbeliever. I write for the believer who in words appears to cut me off from the living God - to put me with their favorite sons of Korah and have the earth swallow me up. I write to undermine uncritiqued assumptions and too quickly formed conclusions. For God is good - much better than reasoned by many. And much better than supposed by some of the reasons put forward for correcting my 'beliefs' by those who are for example against the teaching of women, or historical-critical study, or love between persons who are oriented differently.

The problem with reason is that we can use it to shore up our positions and by doing so, dismiss the humanity and salvation of others.

But I, like Paul, have a serious problem. I believe in the efficacy of the death of Christ for all flesh, and that creates a barrier or potential barrier between me and others if only because of historical contingency and the errors of Christendom. Also like Paul, I believe in the first covenant and the efficacy of its primal word¹. If my Lord is servant to the circumcision (Romans 15:8) - what must be my reasonable response?

There was a time, to return to Peter (and Hosea), when I knew the out side of mercy. I know the difference between knowing mercy and not. I know that to be matured in this secure position is not without rebuke. I note that one word for reason in TNK appears to be translated mostly as rebuke! Lord do not rebuke me in your wrath. ... Come, let us reason together ... (Psalm 6, Isaiah 1.) Such a rebuke is love. (Skip Eccl 7:25) Perhaps later I will know enough Hebrew to read a word study on 'reason' in TNK. Perhaps someone can point me to one.

So my thesis is that reason is a response to God. We are found here living, and we find that God also has allowed himself to be found. Responding is what relationship is about - and it is very good. (I suppose anything else is not reasonable.)

(1) See for example Hebrews 2:1-3 and the eccentric juxtaposition of word and salvation. It is in an image here. I also did a structural diagram of Romans - long jpg. Not in Greek.

Inerrancy - Believing your own judgment

The truth is errant, going to and fro, a random walk on the earth to see if there were any that seek after God, and to hide from them that know the answer in advance.

Michael Bird responds quickly: "If I have to choose between inerrancy and errancy, I will always choose inerrancy. Otherwise you are faced with the problem of why should I believe anything the Bible says about, for instance, homosexuality."

'I' have to chose why 'you' should believe something. Here is the power trip of all those who take power by knowledge. Belief morphs into judgment, exposing the secret fault.

Is the Bible clear or unclear - sometimes one, sometimes the other, if it can be said to speak or not. Is the whole Bible inerrant? Errant is not a binary decision. (I can hear the logic of those who believe everything - Can we ascribe to God error? What a slippery slope! Can I trust him? Who! - not Bird but God.) Let your judgment of God be dropped. She will not be moved for God is in the midst of her.

I am God's error - I am love. Mercy and truth met together. Judge me not lest you be judged. Enjoy the loving fire of judgment and the judging fire of love for God is love. Kiss the son. Find healing from your careless comments. Why am I so heavy, O my soul. God's heaviness is in me. Longing fills my heart for those who have nothing but words.

It's not that we can't read. It's that our reading gets in the way of our love. We do not need to choose between errant and inerrant. We do not need to use force to make our point. Not even the force of abomination.

Did I use force to save you, my love?

Meditation on the Psalms

Yes, you support me
You support me through these words
It is not just for one David or one Ethan or one unknown author
But for me, your one

So I knew in all my error
The error shows my faltering
My feet you teach to walk in love
My feet you reach to teach me love

Is it too little too late?
Did our beloved enemies push me too far too soon?
Is your hand too short to support their error or my recalcitrance?

What answer is possible!
Only One answers the call of those who stumble
Even if they scarcely know your name
Shema, Israel, Adonai Elohenu, Adonai, Echad.

The word of salvation

Do I have to be able to hear to know a word? If I am deaf, then I will use my eyes. Do I need to be able to think to reason? Perhaps someone else will have to anticipate consequences and remember obligations. Even if deaf, blind, and unable to think, I still may know life more fully than the able-bodied.

A man called his father, whom he had never met. The only word he said to him was "I am glad you did not have me aborted". The man is on the street, a product of European colonialism in the 10th generation, mentally disabled by alcohol from his birth. Can he take part in the word of salvation spoken through Israel from the past 3 millennia?

Salvation is not a 'Christian' concept. Salvation is older and is present in the psalter. Even in the New Testament, it is a word in a context that transcends adjectives and is not owned by understanding. It is from the Jews but cannot be monopolized by any one moniker. It is beyond description, law or science. But it is not unheard of, or invisible, or unavailable. Scholars, scribes, and able-bodied sceptics and servants are at a potential disadvantage, for they construct boxes (theologies, sects, equations, statistics) and other explanations to hold their patterns, but they may be deaf and blind and irrational in the very constructions they create.

Goethe: Everyone sees the material before them, but only someone who has something to do with it sees the contents, and the form is a secret to most. (Quoted in Gunkel: An Introduction to the Psalms)

We are the material of salvation, if we pay attention, we will see our contents, but the form of salvation, the messianic secret, is Christ, the word of God to us and our dialogue partner. We may or may not see the form, but the salvation is real nonetheless.