The Durability of the Gift

The so-called new hermeneutic of Ebeling and Fuchs was a synthesis of recent historical-critical studies of the Bible, the theology of Rudolf Bultmann, and the history of modern hermeneutical reflections, from Schleiermacher to Wilhelm Dilthey, and Martin Heidegger.  This new trend was being heralded as a lively new option that overcame the hiatus between the Barthian and Bultmannian schools of theology.  I saw it as an inferior alternative to that of Wolfhart Pannenberg, so I gave an address at the American Theological Society in Chicago entitled, “How New is the New Hermeneutic?”  I started out by saying that more important than whether the approach of Ebeling and Fuchs is new is whether it is true.  Publishers are looking for a profit so they need to market their goods to people with “itching ears,” for whom relevance to the new is more preferable than faithfulness to the old.  In fact, in my view the theologies that turn out to be the most relevant are those that intentionally eschew novelty in favor of renewing the faith “once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3b).

--Carl E. Braaten, Because of Christ: Memoirs of a Lutheran Theologian.  Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010, p.  61.

I doubt whether any theologian who thinks like this, and is willing, as Carl Braaten has characteristically been, to make it known among mainline Protestants, can fail to end up in the right place.  While Professor Braaten and I are not of a mind on what certain features of the renewal he mentions here might be, we certainly agree on the kind of spiritual and mental maintenance that must be done to think like a Christian--and upon the vigor with which what is not Christian must be opposed by those appointed to teach Christian doctrine.  Neither my Doctorvater nor I are by nature the snarling tigers, itching for a fight, that many think us to be, but peace-loving men with developed senses of humor.  Like all Christians who believe, however, that they have a responsibility before God and man to teach and defend the faith, we are obliged to make ourselves offensive to those we perceive to have declared war against it--and obviously we both believe that a clean shot between the eyes, whenever possible, is the best way to do it. 

My central reflection here, however, begins with the surprising similarity of Carl’s preaching to my own, particularly on how it can be that a man who is thoroughly and decisively non-fundamentalist, believing we cannot go back to a pre-critical approach to the scriptures, can end up teaching and preaching as though “the scriptures cannot be broken,” with (usually) very much the same interpretive results as (sorry, Carl), the average Touchstone editor.  And no, it is not a case of even a blind man’s hitting the target now and then, but the educated and deliberative intention of a Christian man--nothing like what we have all heard from theological liberals in whom Christian symbols, including the words of scripture, are used to represent a higher, progressive, truth under whose judgments they stand.

The conclusion I am reaching is something like this: belief in the truth of the gospel creates in the mind a pre-existing interpretational matrix from which one cannot depart without conscious (conscious, that is, until the mind is intentionally dulled and fogged) knowledge that a departure has taken place, a knowledge that creates an intolerable burden on the conscience until it is “dealt with” in some way.  This exculpatory dealing is known to be a sin, in fact, a departure from the faith with all that entails with regard to the apostasy of one’s own soul.  For many, the deal is made, the pottage purchased, ambiguity substituted for faith, and the call of the fallen teacher goes out for his Master’s debtors, who accordingly buy their own damnation in his reduction of their accounts.

For others, the conscience cannot bear this, and they reject the temptation for the “faith once for all delivered” which they heard at their Mother’s knee.  They are left in the evangelical matrix, will not willingly step outside it (and become susceptible to the Nietzschean accusation of backwardness, cowardice, and reaction by those who have made their exodus to the heresies du jour).  Their preaching and teaching, as worthless as they understand it to be apart from God’s use of it, intentionally stays within, as best they can manage it apart from their sin and fallibility. 

The effect of the fundamental gospel’s matrix upon preaching and teaching is seen in evidence of belief that all must depend on a narrative that follows its pattern from ground-principles forward.  The preacher may not believe everything that is in the Bible; he may have severe difficulties with certain traditional interpretations.  But, believing the maternal creed, there are large tracts of it he believes to be true as surely and profoundly as he hopes for salvation.  It is from those places he begins his narrative and attempts to develop it along lines that are true to the gospel, bringing in, as he begins to understand them and connect them to this line of thought, other passages of scripture he may once not have been able to believe, or which traditional interpretations made unpalatable, but now whose part in the whole he is beginning to understand--the whole of which is becoming more evident not as the restrictive canon it once appeared, but the appointed way forward into the unimaginable--the Narrow Way (shall we recognize it as the birth-canal?) of which the Lord spoke. 

This process must continue while life remains to him, and is in fact exactly what the declared conservative must undergo, mutatis mutandis, who, in his approach from ground in which all that is written is presumed to be without error, must still labor through ignorance, unbelief, and tribal misprision to discover what it means.

Comments

[Steve Nicoloso]

My central reflection here, however, begins with the surprising similarity of Carl’s preaching to my own, particularly on how it can be that a man who is thoroughly and decisively non-fundamentalist, believing we cannot go back to a pre-critical approach to the scriptures, can end up teaching and preaching as though “the scriptures cannot be broken,” with (usually) very much the same interpretive results as (sorry, Carl), the average Touchstone editor.

It is indeed surprising, but it ought not to be. I think Pope Benedict would agree that we cannot (and perhaps ought not) go back to a "pre-critical approach to the Scriptures." He is of course, called "fundamentalist" by progressive Catholics, but by it they mean merely fundamentalist. The Holy Father will go on great excursions in his various writings over all that has been said of late (last 150 years or so) about this or that, all the while giving credit, where possible, to various insights. But he always steers the conversation back to the consistent teaching of Scripture and the Church (as She has understood the former), and comes down squarely on its side. He is bound by that Tradition, an intricate tapestry that includes Scripture and authoritative commentary from all past ages. It ought not surprise us that folks as diverse as Carl Braaten or Steve Hutchens also find themselves bound by that Tradition, whatever name or formula they might give to it, as well.

[Deacon Michael D. Harmon]

I have two thoughts -- I'm no theologian, so perhaps instead they are questions for the people who post here who are far more learned than I -- about "not being able to go back to a pre-critical view of the Scriptures" and yet being able to read, study, and teach them within the bounds of Tradition.

1) Where do you draw the line? I once heard a Catholic priest give a sermon to a group of nuns while I was on a solitary retreat the guest house of their convent/retreat house that the book of Jonah was "fiction, but holy fiction." What then does Jesus mean when He says "this generation will only be given the sign of Jonah?" And then there are His references to Noah, another "fictional" story...

2) How do you preach honestly to ordinary Christians in the congregation if you doubt, on historical-critical grounds, the truth of Scripture? They do not look at the Bible that way, believe me. Do you want to tell them that certain learned academics think the first part of Chapter 2, verse 10 is false, but the second half is probably historical? I cannot think of a better way to empty a church. Oh, that's right, the Episcopalians already proved that...

So, I must say, I simply do not understand what is meant by that sort of statement. I am not a Biblical literalist, and as an English major and professional editor I understand all sorts of figures of speech and literary styples, and see the Bible is full of them, but the key question the person in the pew has, is "Is it true?" If we can't answer "yes," and mean it, and preach it, we are sounding brass and tinkling cymbals.

I am honestly seeking some help here.

[Rob G]

Deacon Michael, I'm not a theologian either, or a preacher for that matter, but one book that has been very helpful to me on this issue is Andrew Louth's "Discerning the Mystery." Louth encourages us to avoid being trapped by Enlightenment ways of thinking about truth when approaching theology, and instead to take what some Protestants call a "maximative hermeneutical" approach to holy Scripture, an approach which Louth finds supremely evident in the hermeneutic of the Church Fathers.

[smh]

A few rules and observations that may be helpful:

1. Those who have difficulty understanding the scriptures, as historically regarded by the Church, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, as true, and in a way that is ultimately beyond their understanding, should not be accredited in the churches as Christian teachers. This includes those who do not have, or cannot believe, an advanced--a "teaching elder's"--knowledge of the unity of scripture under the gospel of Christ. These are jobs for Christian men of mature understanding and conviction. A degree from Aberdeen or the imprimatur of the Pontifical Biblical Institute may be immensely helpful to such a person, but without the former qualities it is meaningless.

2. I doubt if anyone, if they are both thoughtful and honest, does not have trouble with something they find in scripture--the historicity, for example, of Jonah, or what St. Paul says about "vessels of wrath made for destruction." In cases like this, their duty is to study the history of interpretation among the saints and doctors (not just among post-Enlightenment Germans, or the Muddy River Brethren) and find one's own place therein. If one finds oneself outside a fairly firm catholic interpretational tradition, then one should admit it, and not treat the passage, reserving it for further thought and study. One does NOT present one's doubts from the pulpit or lectern, at least as something people need to need treat seriously. One says that one has not yet been able to come to grips with what one perceives as the faith of the Church on these matters, and leaves it at that. We are men under authority and may not do as we please! Our considered opinions, O seminary graduate, have no value whatever in themselves.

3. For a firm believer, there is much that is difficult in scripture, but fairly little that is or should be controversial. I have had no trouble at all preaching the scriptures from the pulpits of churches of many denominations--always provided the priest or minister in authority is a firm believer in the truth of the gospel--of the creed. How it can be, for example, that "the meek shall inherit the earth" is a hard question, but our Lord's declaration of this truth ramifies from and through scripture, so the possibilities for preaching it as truth are manifold, and not speculative. Anyone who knows the scriptures well enough to preach or teach them should have a fairly good idea of when he is preaching the church's gospel and when he is straying onto speculative ground. Like St. Paul, if he has his own opinion to give, he should identify it as such.

4. When one sticks to what one believes, and believes with the church of the ages, he is on the firmest ground. As he matures--if he matures--he will find his understanding, the scope of his mastery, and his sure-footedness, growing. Along with this will come enlightenment, at least partial enlightenment, about things one once found confusing or unbelievable.

One of the greatest problems in the churches has been that the tasks of preaching and teaching are entrusted to people who have simply undergone a course of study and training, with a denominational eye toward "soundness." These courses may (or may not) help the truly gifted, but they do nothing for those who are not, nor for the churches who receive them. And I dare say that "soundness" in many contexts means a guarantee that the pulpits and lecterns shall be supplied with the dull, the heretical, the obsequious, the political adept, and the skillful liar. It took truly extraordinary perception to discern the "soundness" of the Lord, or of St. Paul. Can this perennial problem be overcome? Most certainly, but only through the grace of God, for without this grace, the regular teaching services of the reliably weak, foolish, and heretical is what the power of the flesh will guarantee us.

5. "Criticism" is not as fearsome when looked in the eye, with one's own critical weapons at hand, as it is when considered backwards from a position of retreat. The most damaging kind is not based upon what is found in the text as what is brought to it by the critic in the way of dogmatic presuppositions that are easily discoverable and answerable in like form. What makes this difficult and painful is that at least since the Enlightenment the critic speaks with the powers of a sneering Zeitgeist fully behind him, and the Christian does not. In our world the critic is the progressive while the believer is the reactionary.

Once the ideological veil is penetrated, however, and the clearly unChristian has been discarded, one finds oneself by and large in fields of dispute that have been with us in the church from its beginnings, either actually or potentially. These are essentially matters of disagreement among Christians, often based on questions of fact--not of an attack on Christian doctrine from without. Jonah's historicity, or of the age of the earth, or (I believe) the identity of the "brothers of the Lord," while dispute may be encouraged or exacerbated by anti-Christian influences, are among these, and the critical problems associated with them are of a different sort than those based on dogmatic unbelief. It is not question in these matters of belief or unbelief in the Creed, but of critical difficulties on what one might identify as a lower level, or of a different sort.

So, briefly, in answer to your questions, Deacon Harmon, I would say, (1) Remain on firm ground, avoiding as a teacher, matters that appear speculative to you. The Jonah matter is a problem, and appears to have been this way for a long time, and as the lawyers say, "hard cases make bad law." The frame of mind that convulsively extrapolates from "Jonah=fiction" to "what keeps us from believing the same about the Resurrection?" seems to me morbid, something for which we are not bound as teachers to account. (2) Remember that the faith of the church is superior to historical criticism, and that as a teacher one is bound to believe and teach the first as truth, and not the second. I do not think that the theological liberal, that is, a person who approaches scripture exclusively on progressivist, historical-critical grounds, can preach or teach as a Christian. The work of a historical criticism which begins in a scientifically conceived agnosticism about the truth of scripture, is something one considers, and occasionally finds helpful, but if one cannot think or pray one's way past it to a believer's knowledge of the "faith once delivered," then an honest man must surrender his magisterial office.

Those who are examined for positions like this normally find themselves dealing with a threshold phenomenon: rarely is the question, "does he believe everything" but instead, "does he believe enough to preach or teach here?" Certain beliefs or lack thereof are an absolute bar, and others are treated individually. The standard of belief for a Christian teacher should be very high, firm, and clear, and the purely historical-critical approach to the scriptures which is the standard in most liberal schools, Protestant and Catholic, militates strongly against the faith of the Christian Tradition. As Karl Barth discovered in his Safenwil parish, one really must decide which to believe.

For me, the concept of "mere Christianity," which is only a restatement of the Lerintian canon, "What has been believed everywhere, always, and by all," has been an immensely helpful guide in areas of difficulty. What Rome, Orthodoxy, and traditional Protestantism agree upon I preach and teach with the highest possible level of confidence and conviction. This is a very, very wide field of fruitful labor, which no man can exhaust.

[Robert Espe]

I'm more than a little confused by this whole discussion, but I think I agree with Deacon Michael. If it is impossible for a man to be swallowed for three days by a fish and live, how is it more possible for a man to live after three days in the belly of the earth. Literary foreshadow is well and good, but it is meaningless if it is artificial. Is the story of Adam and Eve "Holy Fiction", with its talking snakes and magic fruit? If so, how can there be a second Adam if the first never was? I may not understand everything in the Bible, but if anything that seems impossible to a "post-enlightenment thinker" cannot be true, then we aren't left with much worth having.

[Bob Srigley]

Reading S.M. Hutchens reminds me of a comment Ken Kesey made about William Faulkner comparing the author to Wild Turkey bourbon, one of the few 100 proofs that won't burn you. I came to Christ in 1972 after a counter-cultural episode of more than a decade during which I helped start a commune in Montana, worked a light show for rock concerts, imbibed various psychedelics and taught Kundalini Yoga. I had absolutely no problem with the miraculous; in fact I expected it to characterize any valid spiritual path. The begininning of my downfall was in reading "Autobiography of a Yogi" by Yogananda in which the author descibed visiting a Christian mystic in Europe who manifested the stigmata. The respect and reverence he reported for what he had seen forced me to re-admit Christianity to my personal pantheon of possibly viable spiritual options. But then that left me face to face with the cross, the singular event utterly unfathomable and inexplicable in terms of the eastern religions I had been attracted to. Over a period of some months of agony of soul I was granted grace and repentence and entered in at the strait gate and began the journey familiar to every pilgrim--a path of failure and renewal and ever increasing dependence upon the grace of God. I have sometimes envied fellow pilgrims who have entered by more conventional routes, thinking that I might have been more servicable in the kingdom if less damaged. However, I have been continually baffled all these years at the degree of unbelief regarding scripture which is so often tolerated by those who have been spared the detours I wandered in. Implicit trust in the faithfulness of scripture is the sure epistemological foundation from which all the portals of true knowledge open. Every other path leads sooner or later into confusion and error. We are like Daniel and his friends, forced to learn the lore of the Babylonians, but tasked by God to retain the Truth once delivered. Many hold the wisdom of the world in authority over God's Word and I fear that when they presume to teach the innocent that they are fitting their necks for millstones.

[smh]

Thank you, Mr. Srigley, for what I think is a compliment in the first sentence of your response. Your remark, "Many hold the wisdom of the world in authority over God's Word and I fear that when they presume to teach the innocent that they are fitting their necks for millstones," coming directly as it does from the Lord's teaching, is something I have wondered about all my life.

False teaching sends false teachers to hell. Don't the people who decide to be creative or au courant, or in Carl Braaten's words, need "the latest poop from Germany" in their approach to scripture have any fear of God and his solicitude for his little ones? Why would they not wish above all things to stay on the safest possible path, to choose the best-attested guides, and seek for concord among them? Why would they wish to be teachers or preachers in the first place, especially when so many secular occupations present better opportunities to satisfy the flesh? The world at large regards the vocation of the minister as not far removed from that of the clown, or perhaps, at best, the masseur. Why would one bother to do these things--to risk 'greater condemnation'--unless a fire (and the fear of fire) had been put in his belly that he could not manage otherwise?

The only answer I can think of is that the false religious teacher, whatever deity he claims to believe in--even if he calls it "the Blessed Holy Trinity," is in fact an atheist who doesn't believe in the true God. If he did, he would be struck dumb by terror.

[smh]

Another little Carl Braaten story:

Once he was asked in a question-and-answer session whether a child who was baptized in the name of the Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer instead of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, would go to hell. Carl replied that the child would go to heaven, but the minister who baptized it would most certainly go to hell.

The audience greatly appreciated it--an immensely clever off-the-cuff repartee. I doubt Carl came to the epigram, however, by trying to be clever, but by a well-practiced theologian's quick consideration of the facts of the case.

[Steve Nicoloso]

Carl replied that the child would go to heaven, but the minister who baptized it would most certainly go to hell.

Any man who believes hell will not be empty can't be too much of a heretic...

[Bob Srigley]

"Why would they not wish above all things to stay on the safest possible path, to choose the best-attested guides, and seek for concord among them?"

I think these words by smh actually describe a path of high adventure. We are like defeated rebels brought into the court of the King without hope of mercy, but inexplicably receiving mercy. And more than mercy, we are commissioned, charged and trusted. How can such a one ever turn rebel again. Especially when called to be in such a band of brothers.

"For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their man-hoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day." Henry V, Shakespeare.

I too wonder at the mystery of iniquity and how treason is even possible when once the true King has been truly apprehended.

[S. M. Hutchens]

Years ago I took this passage from Shakespeare to title a Touchstone article on the promise and difficulty of ecumenical reconciliation. It's a great line.

[Bob Srigley]

Thank you for referencing the article. A good read and as contemporary now as 15 years ago. I'm not sure that your argument about the lack of a Mozart or a Bernini quite proves the barrenness of Protestantism. I'm not alone in thinking that the Lutheran, Bach, towers above them all. Yet perhaps even he ached with a passion for the unity of the Body. This may explain why one of his greatest works, is a Mass, the B minor with Latin text, never performed in his lifetime.
One of the most beautiful images I have of ecumenicity currently is the Bach Collegium of Japan presided over by Maazaki Suzuki a Japanese believer. As they are working through the entire Bach Cantatas, singing in German some of the most wonderful expressions of faith ever penned, set to gorgeous music, I can only marvel at the irrepressibility of the Spirit. And also at the delicious irony presented by some of the Western soloists who have been invited to join in the performances and recordings. For some of these surely, the Christian faith is only a cultural relic, but now they find themselves in the company of joyful musicians, mostly Japanese, for whom that very faith is fresh and vital.

[smh]

My wife bought me one of the Suzuki Bach motet recordings for my birthday. These are truly wonderful performances.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DoDDGFcUO8Q&feature=related

[Free Movies]

After reading the whole post I'm bit confused by this whole discussion, but I think I agree with Deacon Michael. If it is impossible for a man to be swallowed for three days by a fish and live, how is it more possible for a man to live after three days in the belly of the earth. Is the story of Adam and Eve "Holy Fiction", with its talking snakes and magic fruit? If so, how can there be a second Adam if the first never was? I may not understand everything in the Bible, but if anything that seems impossible to a "post-enlightenment thinker" cannot be true, then we aren't left with much worth having.

[smh]

Free Movies, let me put it this way: None of us is given a Christian mind wholly made, but every believer is given the Holy Spirit, who will lead him (through both innocent and guilty ignorance) into all truth. The "one mind" that believers share in Christ has discernable affinities no matter where they are in their pilgrimages--which will end at the same place and in perfect agreement. If we wish to be men of understanding, we will look for what unity we can find and respond to it properly--an exercise which takes attentiveness, good will, and humility.

Take Adam and Eve, for example. There is an elemental difference between the person who honestly and with the best tools at his disposal thinks this story conveys a truth in mythological rather than historical form--and would be perfectly happy to learn that here the myth is actually history--and the person who is using the myth-idea to deny the truth of the story and overthrow the faith. There is a spiritual affinity between those who believe Adam and Eve to be a "true myth" and those who believe the account to be veridical history that does not exist between either of them and the hostile mythologizer, whose problem is not evidence but will.

Those with the spiritual affinity, despite their present difference, will be reconciled in truth when in the continual ministry of God to them both, one is shown to be right and the other wrong--or perhaps both right and wrong in degrees.

Make no mistake: there are sad and unavoidable consequences to disagreements, which cannot and must not be swept under the Lord's Table as though the question of Truth could be set aside in favor of ill-gotten fellowship: God forbid, for the fellowship of believers is ONLY in the Truth. But there are also happy consequences of fundamental agreement, of reasoned discernment that we are being led by the same Spirit in the same direction, such as I found between Carl Braaten and myself. In spite of our agreements, I doubt whether we could properly take communion at the same table--yet. But I would be very surprised if we don't Someday.

[Bob Srigley]

I would like to express humble gratitude to all who have contributed to this remarkable discussion (do they call it a "thread?"), and especially to S. M. Hutchens who has been so generous to share his time and irenic wisdom.