Threads from Henry's Web

Author: henry

  • Freedom to Insult

    . . . is a necessary part of free speech. Laura has it right:

    I don’t have much in common with Brigitte Bardot, an elderly French actress, or Pat Condell, a British atheist, or with Kathy Shaidle, Ezra Levant, and Mark Steyn, a partial list of Canadians whose free speech is endangered.

    Except this: a threat to their free speech is a threat to mine . . .

    Just so.

  • Jon Stewart on the Obama Gaffe

    While personally I think Obama got caught uttering a truth, or at least something he actually believes, I personally record it as a negative, because as president he needs to control his tongue. It doesn’t change the fact that I will vote for him. It’s just that in a very disciplined campaign, it’s disappointing.

    If he wanted to utter the actual truth, I think it would be that some people fall back on parts of their faith as a justification for existing bigotry. Faith doesn’t justify bigotry, it gets co-opted by bigotry. The partial truth results in a generalization that will certainly be false, which is again a problem. We try to distinguish moderate Muslims from radical Muslims; we need to also distinguish ignorant bigots from ordinary, hardworking people.

    But what Jon Stewart did about this on The Daily Show was more fun, and also showed Hillary Clinton as the suddenly faith-filled, spiritual, gun-toting gal that is wants to be perceived as.

  • Literary Types in Genesis 1-11

    Pardon me for using “types” where “genre” would be more precise, but I frequently do so in teaching in order to avoid having to explain details. Further, “genre” doesn’t maintain the same meaning across all critical disciplines.

    In my previous post on the historicity of Genesis 1-11, I wrote as though one could establish a single literary category that would cover all 11 chapters. But those who have studied this passage will realize this is not so. At a minimum, Genesis 5 and 11:10-32 (genealogies) differ from the remainder. Chapter 10 is also in a category of its own, and its relationship with the rest of the book could provide some interesting discussion.

    I personally accept the general outlines of source theory, and thus see a combination of multiple sources in both the stories of creation and the flood. But those fault lines, as interesting as they are, are not what I’m talking about now. Whatever one believes about the background, somebody, somewhere felt that the material fitted together.

    If we assume that the person who did so was not an idiot, then they probably had some idea how things connected. Assuming that blatant chronological issues are the result of oversight is questionable at best. The author or final redactor, whichever you prefer, probably understood the text in such a way that it didn’t blatantly contradict itself.

    Because of this, it would be worthwhile to see the difference between Genesis 1:1-4a, which I would see as liturgy, and Genesis 2:4b-25, which is much closer to myth in its literary character. Which of these is more likely to be concerned with chronology? Well, Genesis 1 seems to say more about it, but Genesis 2 is more likely to have that as a concern based on its form. Even myths are concerned with sequence.

    So we can identify at least four types of literature, liturgy, myth, genealogy, and a more generalized tribal genealogy along with some geography in Genesis 10. In deciding historicity we need to address each of these types. I do acknowledge that others might disagree on the categorization, which is precisely how it should be. Those are the questions of which good historical study of the Bible is made.

  • Corporate Identity and the Atonement

    I want to briefly point to something that we often miss in Bible study and theology in the western church–corporate identity. We are very individualistic, and that makes it hard to see when some form of corporate identity is in play.

    This turns up in certain views of the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. Many view the baptism as a single event for the church on Pentecost, into which the individual believer is incorporated when he or she becomes a part of God’s people, normally through baptism. The separate baptism is a more individual idea. (I think there can be some accommodation between these views; I simply want to point out the corporate identity inherent in at least one of them.)

    Paul says in Romans 6:3-4:

    Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. (NRSV, cf. 2 Corinthians 4:10-12)

    Again, our baptism incorporates us into God’s people, and by this means we have a part in the death and resurrection of Jesus.

    Applied to atonement theory, I would suggest that this means that there is a sense in which we have each paid the penalty, and that this element is often lost in discussions of the atonement. In particular, placing the reality of the atonement in the courtroom makes it essential an individual act, and an individual attributing [imputation] of Christ’s merits to us.

    I do not mean to suggest that this, by itself, is a theory of the atonement, but rather that we should take the corporate elements of scripture more seriously in forming our understanding of New Testament writing on the subject.

  • Reviewing an Clueless Reviewer

    Ed reviews a review of the Bible Literacy Project, by an apparently clueless Alabama state senator, which should explain it all. As readers will know, I prefer that Bible classes not be held in public school, though the Bible should be included where appropriate in other curricula (literature, social studies, history). If one does choose to do a public school Bible class, the Bible Literacy Project provides the best option.

    The BLP responds to clueless reviewers here.

  • Congratulating a Homeschooler on Science and Religion

    I write here frequently against teaching creationism of any variety in public schools. I do this, amongst other reasons to protect the integrity of science, to preserve the limited space in the science curriculum for actual science, and because I think religion in public schools is dangerous to both church and state. One major question is what religious doctrines would be taught, and who would teach them.

    But I also suggest that churches should teach about all of the various views on origins. They can easily emphasize and support their particular view, as is their right (and many would say duty). They are not charged with the integrity of science, and they are the best place to discuss various religious ideas. I think if churches took on the task in a serious way it would be done much better.

    Lingalinga blogged today that he is including a variety of materials in his homeschool program. As a homeschooled person, I can testify that one can cover a lot of ground in such a unit. I didn’t get to really learn about evolution in my homeschooling, but my experience isn’t normative. I think this is precisely how a homeschooler should go about it, presumably also including a good deal of the basic science (which I assume will happen) as well as the variety of interpretations.

    In homeschool you know who is going to do the teaching of religious ideas, you have much more freedom to move between topics and to look at things in an interdisciplinary way. This is where and how it can happen for the non-public school student.

  • Integrity is more than Not Lying Outright

    People often think that legalism is about trying very hard to be right, and that the main problem with it is that people can’t succeed at it. I would suggest that there’s something more characteristic of legalism, and that it results from trying to paste on the narrow letter of some “right” things to oneself without really taking it in.

    A legalist reads the commandment about “bearing false witness against one’s neighbor” and construes it very narrowly, either as lying under oath or as lying outright. Then he tries not to lie outright. If he can deceive people in some way other than lying directly, he doesn’t care. Similarly the legalist looks at a list of sexual commands and tries not to do those specific things, or perhaps not get caught doing them (note that he’s not lying outright, just deceiving).

    The alternative, one taught by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) is to take the right approach into one’s mind and heart and then live out that integrity. This person tries to live in a non-deceptive manner. If he finds he has deceived someone, that’s the time for confession and repentance. In sexual matters, he tries to live up to his promises and not to injure people through irresponsible activity. If he fails, he does his best to restore damaged relationships and to limit the hurt to others.

    Please note here that I’m not comparing Christianity and Judaism. If that were not inappropriately done so often I wouldn’t have to mention it. There’s no basic reason why a Jew must be a legalist and a Christian not. I personally know many examples of Christian legalists, and Jewish examples of a deeply internal faith and ethic. In fact, in speaking the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus was teaching within the range of Judaism of his time.

    That’s how long it takes me to get to my point, which is this: Those who fuss over gluing moths to tree trunks (a place where they would naturally rest, but not when it was convenient to photograph them) in order to take their pictures, should perhaps not stage scenes themselves. I normally have no problem with staging scenes in order to take photographs, as long as the staging is either true to life or appropriate to the genre involved.

    But integrity involves a consistent viewpoint. If you believe staging a scene is inappropriate, you shouldn’t do it. If you think it’s OK, it should be OK for your enemies as well.

    This goes a step further if the scene was staged to suggest that an event occurred in which more Pepperdine students attended than actually did. (HT: The Panda’s Thumb) But the whole thing would be nitpicking if we were not dealing with a standard already set. I would suggest dropping both, but I eagerly await a clear repudiation of the claim of fraud in the peppered moth case.

    I doubt that will happen, but it should.

  • Feeling Wonder, Wanting to Know

    This is one of those Sunday morning quick posts, because I’m feeling it right now. As a note to my critics, I’ll be off to church in a bit, and that’s partly what got me thinking about this topic. I have been gravitating more and more toward a service at a church downtown that offers weekly communion. Over the years I’ve migrated from a church that celebrated communion quarterly, to the standard United Methodist monthly, to the point now where I find that too rare. Once I found a church service that offered the Eucharist on a weekly basis, I felt the pull!

    Since I am often visiting other churches, I get to take advantage of this from time to time, and now it looks like I may be doing some teaching there, so that will be great. Why? As the incarnation has become more and more firmly placed at the center of my theology, the Eucharist has gravitated toward the center of my liturgy. I think most Christian theologians will understand that. It’s not that the incarnation was ever unimportant, but in my personal theological reflection it has become the antidote to more and more potential problems and the answer to more and more questions.

    There’s a mystery and a wonder in this celebration that becomes greater as one both reflects theologically and dives into the event spiritually. Even when the liturgy is badly done, an unfortunately frequent occurrence in Methodist churches, I feel the sense of mystery and wonder. There is nothing quite like trying to wrap one’s mind and spirit around the concept of infinite God combined with human flesh in that 1+1=2 event to open one’s spiritual awareness.

    Yesterday I blogged about an “unseemly glee”, and it appears that I may have been less clear that I would have wished. Commenter Larry B notes:

    I think you bring up a good point here, but I also think you overstated your case a bit here. Christians aren’t the only ones guilty of the type of feeling you describe here. I would postulate that all religions revel in the mystery of the unknown. Any encroachment on that pulls a little bit at a core sentiment for religion.

    First, I had no intention of suggesting that only Christians have such feelings. I comment on Christianity because I’m a Christian, and that’s what I know. While I have studied other faiths, particularly in the ancient near east, I cannot claim a similar level of knowledge. But to the best of the knowledge I have, Larry is quite correct here. The feeling is held in common over a broad range of religions. But there is a divide amongst adherents of religions, and here I want to comment on Christianity only again, between those who sense wonder and react negatively to exploration and discovery, and those who embrace both wonder and knowledge.

    Skipping a paragraph, let me quote again:

    I think you have just touched a little bit on common human nature hear where we have a yearning for mystery.

    True, but it is not the yearning for mystery that I deplore, but rather the sense of glee against those who seek knowledge. The seekers are often filled with just as much wonder as anyone else; they simply don’t let wonder and yearning for mystery stop the seeking.

    Larry posted a third paragraph between these two that provides an excellent illustration. Go back there and read his comment to get the full connection.

    Let me illustrate my feeling of wonder and desire for knowledge. Of all the sciences, I probably understand geology the best, followed by astronomy. This is purely amateur knowledge gotten by personal reading and “informal field study” (read, I had roadside geology guides and went and looked at the stuff they pointed out). So when I go to Niagara Falls, I have a pretty fair idea of the geological history and a great deal of the geological future of the formation. For some reason, that knowledge doesn’t prevent any of the feeling of awe and wonder that I get in looking at it.

    To try another example, I have a little Shih Tzu dog named Barnabas. He’s quite a character, and he often fills me with quite a sense of wonder. I believe on the one hand that he is the product of hundreds of millions of years of evolution, and many thousands of years of domestication and breeding culminating in the formation of the breed I have. Professional breeders matched his parents. But I do not have a moment of problem calling him a gift of God or wondering at the creator. Barnabas was our son’s companion throughout his illness, encouraging, entertaining. James used to comment that it was hard to stay sad or angry when that dog was around.

    The two things are not in any way incompatible. That’s why I believe that those who try to throw mystery up in the face of scientists are missing the point. Many of those same scientists feel a sense of mystery, but at the same time they keep right on investigating. I believe what I missed in my post yesterday was drawing the line between mystery and wonder, which is quite compatible with seeking knowledge, and either the fear that mystery will go away, or the glee in throwing mystery in the face of those who seek knowledge.

    There is plenty of mystery in the universe. We have learned many things, but we are in no danger of running out of mystery even if we assumed that all sense of wonder was drained from a topic when it was investigated. Both fear and glee are not indicated. Wonder and seeking are.

  • Unseemly Glee at the Unknown

    What is it that makes Christians frequently rejoice when told that something is unknown?

    I received an e-mail today from Breaking Christian News, which discusses odd coincidences or perhaps weird happenings amongst organ transplant recipients. Now bluntly I don’t see that there is enough here to get excited about. I think the writers grossly underestimate the potential for personality change when one undergoes a traumatic experience, such as a major surgery. The illness before, the concern, and then the effort of recovery all make a very large impact. If one assumes changes in the personality of recipients, it would then not be all that unlikely that in some cases these changes would find some connection to the organ donor.

    But all of that could be studied. My hunch that this isn’t outside of the range of reasonable probability could be proven right or wrong. If proven wrong, one could study the process and the potential exists to determine just what is going on and how it works. In other words, this set of observations might either prove not to be significant, or could provide the basis for further research.

    The BCN article cites Dr. Danny Penman:

    In his article entitled, Can We Really Transplant a Human Soul? Penman writes, “Virtually every doctor and scientist will tell you the heart is a mere pump.” But now, “A few brave scientists have started claiming that our memories and characters are encoded not just in our brain, but throughout our entire body. Consciousness, they claim, is created by every living cell in the body acting in concert…Our whole body, they believe, is the seat of the soul; not just the brain. (BCN source is this article in the Daily Mail

    Now my point is not my personal feeling about this, which is admittedly not an educated opinion. I know very little about this field. My secondary point is that a scientist with one of the proper specialties, when confronted by this information would either use his existing knowledge to dismiss it if that was proper (for example, he knows the broader statistical picture, and thus knows that this is not significant) or he would find it significant, and then ask, “How does this work?”

    My primary point, however, is that many Christians, represented here by Breaking Christian News, have quite a different reaction. They don’t seem to think of the possibility that this represents a question to be answered. Rather, they hope it’s a mystery that science cannot solve.

    While as Christians we know how God created man in His image, it is nevertheless fascinating to see the scientific world confront the mysteries of life in a way that points to the power of an Almighty God.

    But this article doesn’t describe science confronting anything. It reveals speculation. At best, it would reveal questions that research ought to answer. This is the attitude that lies behind the God-in-the-gaps argument. It puts spirituality and religion where our ignorance lies. There is little reason to complain when skeptics describe religion as anti-knowledge if we place our most important ideas in areas of ignorance.

    This particular case is only an example. I’m confronted regularly with claims that science cannot possibly discover some particular thing, such as a natural explanation for the origin of life. These claims are not made in a neutral tone, nor are they made with disappointment that there is a boundary to knowledge. They are made with glee. Those who make them are glad that they have found something that science cannot do.

    I think there is a ignorance, fear, and envy represented by this type of claim.

    Ignorance, because people don’t understand what science does. Science explores the natural world. As long as something is in the natural world, don’t put up a stop sign. It won’t work. But science is not the study of everything. Excluding the supernatural, science cannot, as such, tell us what our ethical goals and standards should be. It can enlighten us as to the side effects of our decisions, and thus help us make ethical decisions. Science is also not designed to study the supernatural.

    Fear, because people don’t understand science. Scientists constantly discover and explain things that appear to the uninformed to be things that ought to be true mysteries. Ignorance reacts to what it does not know with fear. This is a good example of the difference between “is” and “ought.” We ought to investigate the unknown rather than cower away from it with fear. The instinct of many people is to avoid the danger as long as possible, a course of action that often results is greater disaster later.

    Envy, in that science explains things that used to be in the field of religion. Now they appear to be the province of very intelligent people. I see this type of rejoicing whenever people perceive that religion has “gotten a point” against science.

    The bottom line here is that ignorance is, well, ignorance, and thus is in constant danger of being overthrown. If we, as people of faith, truly believe that God is the ultimate creator of everything, that reason behind all the reasons, the “uncaused cause,” then we ought to rejoice at those who use their divinely created brains to discover more and more about God’s creation.

    I’m certain that God isn’t threatened. If he’s big enough to be the final cause, he can handle people figuring out where the seat of consciousness is in one species of creature on one planet in one solar system in one rather unexceptional galaxy. So it must be that some people of faith feel threatened. That, I suspect, can only come from not trusting God to be God, in other words, from seeing God as less than the creator of everything, as someone who might be dethroned by the next discovery.

    Or perhaps it’s just personal envy that someone else knows more than we do. Could be!

  • Historicity of Genesis 1-11

    I think those of us who are not all that conservative, as in moderates and liberals, do everyone a disservice with the admonition, “Don’t take it so literally.” Unless, of course, we break down “not literally” a bit further. The word “literal” has gotten muddied in the public understanding, and is often taken to mean “true,” so “not taking it so literally” is “not taking it so truthfully.” But more importantly, literal is (or should be) a fairly narrow category and “not literal” involves quite a number of possible types of literature.

    But there’s another question that non-scholarly readers of the Bible have pretty regularly: Just what is it that I’m supposed to get out of this? I’ve heard this many times teaching groups of United Methodist laypeople, well educated folks, but not Bible scholars. They’re pretty well convinced they shouldn’t take it too literally, but they are often uncertain where to go from there. Then they hear anyone who doesn’t take it literally condemned as one who doesn’t believe the Bible at all.

    To narrow that down again, just what historical information might one get out of a non-historical passage of scripture? In the case of Genesis 1-11, I have frequently noted that it is not narrative history. But “narrative history” is not necessarily equivalent to “no historical value at all.” There is more of a continuum (one of my favorite words) of possibilities for historical values, and a number of twists and turns.

    For example, I could say that a book is a work of fiction. Does that mean that it has no historical value? Consider these examples:

    • A fantasy novel/series, not set in the real world, such as Lord of the Rings
      One might extract information on the time of the writer, but vanishingly little information about the real world. Even extrapolating to the time of the writer based on his themes would be a difficult proposition.
    • A generic novel set in the real world, Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged
      This book is intentionally set in an indefinite future (from the time of writing) with generic titles for government officials such as head of state rather than president, for example. There are incidental references to real historical figures, numerous references to real places, but also numerous references to things that don’t exist. One would get a very skewed view of the United States if this is one’s source. Yet one would find historical data embedded in it.
    • A novel set in a realistic historical period, Rand’s The Fountainhead, for example.
      I’m distinguishing this category from historical novel in that presenting historical information is not part of the author’s intent, yet the setting is intended to reflect a specific period.
    • A historical novel
      Often a fictional story intended to present a realistic view of a period of history. While the actual characters and character-specific events are fictional, the background and the major historical events are generally intended as accurate.
    • A biography
      Generally this is intended as true, yet dialog and information about the subject may limit the general historical value.
    • A history with a mission
      Portrayal of a period of history intended to present a particular philosophy of history, or the viewpoint of a particular group or something similar.
    • An objective (wishfully) history
      In this case, the author intends to write a sequence of events from an objective point of view in order to correctly portray those events, not accomplish some philosophical goal. Absolute objectivity is impossible, I believe. I’m speaking about the intent.

    That gives a kind of summary of some of the levels of historicity that one might find. Consider the gospels briefly. It is fairly common in a course in the gospels (or one particular gospel) to note that the gospel writers did not set out with the intent of writing history. They are presenting a picture of Jesus. Many things that an objective historian (remember: intention!) might present are subordinated to the picture the writer is trying to portray. Some people here this comment as a statement that the gospels contain no historical information, or no reliable historical information. That is certainly never my intent in making the statement. I’m simply pointing out that we should expect the needs of the historian to be thoroughly subordinated to the needs of the biographer and even more so to the theologian.

    So let’s briefly look at some historical options in Genesis 1-11 now that we have some loose collection of ideas to which to compare.

    The first option, of course, is to regard this portion of scripture as narrative history. Many Christians have done so. This assumption leaves a number of details to be discussed. How detailed is that history? Is it chronological? This latter question can come in two parts: 1) Is it intended as sequential or descriptive in another sense? and 2) Is it intended to portray the passage of time accurately?

    Young earth creationists (YEC) would answer that it is narrative history, that it is intended to be sequential, and that the passage of time is intended as an accurate portrayal. This involves two aspects of the text. First, we have the days of Genesis 1 & 2. In the YEC position, these are literal, 24 hours days. But secondly we have the years in the genealogies of Genesis 5 & 11. Here the YEC position is that the years are real years, are accurately portrayed, and that there are no gaps in the genealogies, in other words they are complete.

    That’s a substantial number of claims. I would simply note that if you start from level ground, looking at the story in the context of ancient near eastern literature, none of these things is obvious. Nonetheless it is not my purpose to evaluate, so much as to point out the possibilities.

    Old earth creationists (OEC), differ from this in that while most of them would hold that the sequence is intended as true, the flow of time in the narrative is not even. For example, between Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:6 there would be nine billion+ years, while between Genesis 1:6 and 1:11 there would be a bit less than 4 billion years, while starting with verse 14 we have some difficulties with sequence. The genealogies are assumed to contain gaps so as to provide a longer history following Adam and Eve.

    Some OECs read the passage more symbolically, i.e. it contains valid historical information, but this information is presented in the form of symbols. Thus sequence, consistency of timing, and referent can be adjusted substantially while still maintaining that there is historical content.

    Finally, Christians who accept evolution, but not all theistic evolutionists, most commonly see the passage as mythology, i.e. God presents truth through the medium of the cosmology and the way in which such information was presented in that culture. Now one might think this means there is no historical information in the passage, but again that is not the case. It will still present information about how the world was understood in its time, and how the authors understood themselves and their relationship to God. That is historical information, even though that is not what is intended.

    Note that there are some Christian theistic evolutionists who would also see these passages symbolically and find some sense of a presentation of the way it happened in the passage. Thus there are a variety of views on the historical content of the material, and those views don’t precisely match. I have been extremely brief here and probably have left some holes. Hopefully readers will quibble with me in the comments to some can get filled in.

    Two additional notes:

    1. I don’t regard any of this as an issue with inerrancy. I know folks who accept Biblical inerrancy who have no problem with the idea of regarding a passage as symbolic or as myth, provided that one is assuming that was the way God intended it to be presented. Then the portion that would be inerrant is whatever message God intended to present in that medium. I don’t accept inerrancy, but I like my debates over the topic to relate to actual disputes!
    2. I distinguish here Christian theistic evolutions as there are numerous other options for those who are theists but not Christians, including ignoring the Bible completely. Deistic views of evolution similarly have no need of discussing how Genesis is understood. This is strictly a Christian or Jewish enterprise, and is different in nature for each of those groups.