What Are You Reading and Why?

        Most of the essays in Evangelicals and Nicene Faith were presented at Beeson Divinity School, Samford University, Birmingham, Ala., holding to the confessional and unifying purpose of the creeds as experiences of Christian belief and identity; the book is dedicated to the memory of Jaroslav Pelikan, one of whose memorable statements was ‘tradition is the living faith of the dead; traditionalism is the dead faith of the living.’

        This volume deals with the historical and theological basis for a robust confession of faith today. Some of the papers have questionable perspectives, and this present exercise is an attempt to sharpen the debate by seeing interpretational problems. Eg its critique of the emerging church movement as embodying patterns of ‘Protestant liberalism’ (p 184).

        Pluralism is dismissed out of hand, and the church is said to have suffered by the shift from Christendom to pluralism (p 171)! Strange picture of the faithful, early church! ‘The creeds were dominated by the NT expression of the historical facts of Jesus Christ’ (p 173). How can this be held seriously when the creeds have virtually no biographical details of Jesus. An astounding claim is made: ‘The Trinity was taught after being revealed by Jesus himself’ (p 177). The theory of substitutionary atonement becomes the only atonement theory acceptable (p 191).

        Hall challenges us ‘Christians’ to take seriously the theology of the cross, a theology we have ignored in favour of seeking power. ‘It is the theological triumphalism of Christendom that must be altered if the Christian faith is to exist in the world of today and tomorrow as a force for life and not death’ (p 5).

        Historical Christianity—Christendom—has steadfastly avoided the ‘theology of the cross’ because such a theology could only call into question the whole imperialistic bent of Christendom’ (p 6). Christendom has opted for triumphalism, not for a theology of glory (theologia gloriae); the tendency in worldviews to present themselves as full and complete accounts of reality; this temptation infects every genre of human thinking, not only religious thought (p 17).

        ‘The ‘birth’ of Christendom brought about a species of Christianity that could be practised without any threat or hint of its being a process of identification with the one who was ‘despised and rejected’’ (p 141).

        It’s an old book but it remains relevant and readable on the origins of Judaism and on the Jewish world in New Testament times. The book begins at the Babylonian exile (586 BCE) at which time characteristics of Judaism emerge, and concludes with the destruction of Jerusalem in 135 CE.

        Foerster reiterates the factors common to all Jews, but sketches the various parties in Judaism (Zealots, Essenes, Pharisees, etc). The Babylonian exile is key to understanding Judaism: the waning of prophecy, the stress on the Law, circumcision and the Sabbath, and the emerging of ‘the three pillars’ (canon, synagogue, rabbis). The exile and the history of the next several centuries subjected the Jewish people to significant presses politically, culturally, socially and geographically.

        The multiplicity of political forces on the Jewish community is staggering; they were in exile in, or occupied by—in the 400 years period—by the Babylonians, Persians, Syrians, Hasmoneans, Greeks and Romans, each emphasizing different social and cultural forces. New groups emerged: zealots, Sadducees, Essenes, Pharisees. New historical paradigms and theological perspectives developed. Of special note are the ‘three pillars’: the canon of scripture, the synagogue, and the rabbis (teachers); there was a corresponding drop in the importance of the priests.

        Boyd invites evangelical Christians to look carefully at how they make political choices and invites us to return to the love of Calvary and the way of the cross for life in our pluralistic society. ‘If we are to take our society back for G-d, it must have once belonged to G-d, but it’s not all clear where this golden Christian age was’ (p 98). ‘America as a nation has never looked remotely like Jesus’ (p 90).

        The way this nation was discovered, conquered and governed was a rather typical barbarian, violent, kingdom of the world affair. The Doctrine of Discovery and its applications had its origin in the Enlightenment, not in scripture.

        The concept of power is key to understand the political options; ‘power over’ marks the kingdom of the world, and ‘power under’ marks the kingdom of G-d (lion power versus lamb power).

        Wright takes a fresh look at Paul, based on his Jewish roots, his Hellenistic environment, his attitude to the Roman empire and his reinterpretation of Jewish symbols and theology. The two major topics of this interpretation are Paul and the empire, and Paul’s eschatology.

        The traditional approach to apocalypticism held to G-d’s action in the demolition of this world and the establishment of something totally different. Eg the created order is divided into two, earth and heaven, in which the present wicked world is left to stew in its own juice while the saints are snatched to heaven to watch Armageddon from a ringside seat (p 141).

        In opposition to ‘rapture theology’, Wright carefully explicates 1 Thessalonians 4. The parousia is a court term. ‘It is what happens when a king is making a state visit to a city and he is thus ‘present’. As he approaches, the citizens come out to meet him, not to hold a meeting there but to escort him into the city (p 55). And the citizens welcome the king into their city—‘rapture theology’ has the people leaving the city, Wright’s exegesis sees a continuum of heaven and earth, not a dualism.

        State and church! Two entities in which we seek security. But Kavanagh is not so confident of that trust. The state has colonized the political imagination of Christians; we find it easy to assume that the nation-state promotes the common good, expecting salvation from that perspective and resorting to violence to defend them, thereby obscuring our identities as members of a different body, the body of Christ. The nation state is but relatively recent way of organizing bodies in space. What we need is a radical pluralism that allows for a plurality of states.

        And to keep our resources identifiable. The easiest option, eg in dealing with poverty, is for the church to mobilize new lobbying initiatives in the state legislature, rather than modeling Christians in a program of involvement, bypassing the people of G-d. The common good could mean the creation by the church itself of relationship in the community as opposed to advising the state on technocratic solutions to poverty.

        Cavanagh develops powerful metaphors to focus in the contribution of individuals: migrant, tourist, pilgrim, monk, and points out how easily we write people off as illegals; ‘the identity of the universal Christ is found in the one lonely migrant who knocks at the door, looking for rest (p 87).

        The Judaeo-Christian bible has wonderful material: G-d as caring shepherd, erotic love poems. But it also has blessing for those who would seize Babylonian children and smash their skulls against the rocks (Psalm 137).

        The Qur'an, sacred scripture of Islam, urges believers to kill non-believers, but also commands that enemies should be shown mercy if they surrender. In contrast, some portions of the bible order the total extermination of enemies—of men, women and children and even the livestock, with no survivors. Or lauds a suicide attack by Samson (Judges 26).

        The problem of G-d and the presence of suffering asks, ‘how could G-d let such terrible things take place eg the holocaust. But the virtuous listing of ethnic cleansing demanded by G-d is not an example of ‘why do bad things happen to good people?’ but rather ‘why does G-d drive his people to do worse and worse things to selected groups?’ (p 8)

        ‘The ecological crisis is a spiritual crisis. It comes as a result of our alienation from nature…. Most of us no longer have a sense belonging to the earth, an experience of solidarity with plants and animals…. We have reduced nature to things’ (xiv).

        From this perspective comes Rhoads publication, with contributors writing from a spirituality rooted in creation. Eg the seminary where he teaches is designated a ‘green zone’, that attempts to identify what it means for his community and space to be ‘earth friendly in worship life, the educational program, the care for property, the personal commitment of the community members, and the responsibility to bring this concern before the wider public (xvii).

        Earth and Word contains 36 sermons on ‘Saving the Planet’. All of these are eminently worth reading (as they were worth listening to initially) and are faithfully exegetical (drawing heavily on Genesis, Psalms, the gospels, John. Far too large a range to deal with in a review, but a range that will provide resources for the pastor to be read as devotional literature, theological reflection, sermon projection, building worship material, and citing further resources.

        Crossan starts by talking nicely and safely about parables, sharing little stories telling us to be nice. He identifies riddle parables (allegories) (Mark 4:23-27), example parables (practical, moral, religious)(Luke 15), and challenge parables. Challenge parables reverse the expectation and judgements, the presuppositions and prejudices of conventional hierarchically driven society, where ‘best people’ act badly and ‘worst people; act well.

        Crossan examines how the gospel writers often changed the material presented by Jesus, so that challenge parables become example parables (eg the Good Samaritan, Luke 10). A challenge parable challenges the normalcy of audience expectations, hierarchical prejudices and ethnic presuppositions (p 59).

        We find it difficult to hear the challenge. Eg the phrase ‘good Samaritan’ has become a redundant cliché, a simple term for somebody who helps another. We do not hear it as first century Jewish ears would have—as a cultural paradox, a social contradiction (p 60). ‘It is a story that challenges its listeners to think long and hard about their social prejudices, their cultural presumptions and even their most sacred religious traditions (p 62).

        I find this older book continually useful in my current seminary teaching as we look at biblical themes in the 21st century. Grant sketches early Christianity and provides historical data about other religions and their theological ideas. This results in a lively summary of what the concept of G-d was in the first two centuries of the church, the concept of G-d and of Jesus as the early church sought to articulate the defining elements of G-d and of the nature of Jesus.

        Acts provides a wide geographical range of the material and the process that throughout the eastern Mediterranean world dealt with the picture of paganism in conflict with Christianity. (Grant could have given a little more detail of the conversation of faith in terms of the content of the sermons.)

        Grant writes clearly of the attraction Paul’s readers have of the gods of paganism, and sketches what ordinary people thought the gods did to humans (p 57). Gods had specialized functions (Athena taught the arts, Apollo taught divination (in fact, divination) predicting the future, was a key characteristic of the gods.