Jon Levenson on God and evil

A while back I posted on various Ancient Near Eastern sensitivities relating to “creation,” temple, “salvation,” etc., talking about the ways Jon Levenson‘s Creation and the Persistence of Evil. had both radically impacted my understanding of the Bible and had jump-started a new subset of my interests in ANE studies and contextualizing our Bible within its ancient worlds. Though this will probably sound arrogant, I recommend reading the earlier related post if you lack familiarity with what Levenson does in this excellent book…

For now, I want to share one of my favorite quotes from Levenson’s Creation and the Persistence of Evil: The Jewish Drama of Divine Omnipotence. In part of the 1994 Preface, which itself warrants the price of the book, Levenson explains how and why he conceives of creation-thought, the persistence of evil, and the drama of divine omnipotence together in this exploration of the Hebrew Bible—how he conceives of these as “theodicy” (redefined) issues within the Hebrew Bible. In the midst of this discussion, on p. xvii, Levenson writes,

My failure to address the problem of evil in the philosophical sense, however, rests on more than my own obvious inadequacies. It rests also on a point usually overlooked in discussions of theodicy in a biblical context: the overwhelming tendency of biblical writers as they confront undeserved evil is not to explain it away but to call upon God to blast it away.

 

Daniel Kirk’s New Book: Unlocking Romans

This is a re-post, of sorts…

Daniel Kirk’s new book, Unlocking Romans: Resurrection and the Justification of God, is now available.

Many of the contributors of this blog, and certainly some of its readers, know Daniel Kirk. Daniel is a MDiv graduate of Westminster Theological Seminary (2000). He subsequently completed a PhD in New Testament from Duke University’s Department of Religion, studying under Richard Hays, E.P. Sanders, and Joel Marcus, among others. He wrote a fascinating dissertation on Resurrection in Romans, how Paul re-understood and re-told the significance of Israel in the light of Christ. His advisor was none other than Richard Hays, whose writings certainly molded my thought on Paul and the communal significance of Paul for the church more than anyone else’s writings. Daniel started his job as a professor of New Testament at Fuller Theological Seminary this Fall.

During and since his time at Duke Daniel has written a fair amount concerning Paul and the significance of recent scholarship on Paul for the contemporary church. He penned a helpful response to Doug Kelly (Professor of Systematic Theology at RTS-Charlotte) on the New Perspective and Reformed Theology for the PCA’s online news site. He also published a two-part article in the Scottish Bulletin of Evangelical Theology (24 [2006]: 36-64, 133-54) arguing for a passive-obedience-only position both as Scriptural and within the bounds of the Westminster Standards. A shorter version of these articles is available online, as are google-documents versions of the original articles (1 & 2), which require some cleaning-up. Many of you have read, and probably frequent, Daniel’s blog. There, when he has time, he has continued to post refreshing communally and missionally-oriented reflections on Christ, the Bible, hermeneutics, and contemporary scholarship. His reputation as a cutting-edge but church-oriented scholar apparently grew enough that he was asked to present a paper on the New Perspective on Paul at last year’s meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society. Daniel has written and published other reviews, essays, and articles in more academically oriented contexts as well.

 

Peter Enns on His Mentor Harvie Conn

(Dr. Peter Enns has posted a personal reflection about his growing realization of the significance of his teacher Harvie Conn, the namesake of this blog. He plans to follow up on the home page (the “blog” portion of the site) with a series of quotations from Conn’s most important book, Eternal Word & Changing Worlds.

About that book, Enns says

There are numerous literary high-water marks in the WTS tradition, and EWCW is one of them. In my opinion it is the single most penetrating and insightful theological work the WTS tradition has ever produced. One of the things that distinguishes this book from any other written by a WTS professor is the book’s missional (or as Harvie called it in the lingo of the day, “missiological”) focus, and how missional concerns should and in fact invariably do affect our theological constructs and how, as a result, we need to rethink the task of theological education.

 

The Church of State?

It’s no secret on this blog that I’m a McCain supporter.  I believe that he has an appropriate understanding of the benefits of public policy on behalf of the common good, and its limits as a tool to re-engineer society.  He has personally sacrificed for the United States, is demonstrably competent, and knows how to work with those who see things differently to accomplish important goals.  I don’t agree with everything he says, but I think Sen. McCain is right for the challenges of the presidency – domestic and international – and I will vote for him.  But I’m not his disciple. 

 

Perhaps that is why I’m struggling so much as I watch Sen. Obama’s approach to attaining elected office.  Much of the time, it’s unclear to me whether he’s running for president or messiah.  When I listen to Barack Obama speak, I hear a sermon.  Healthcare benefits and entitlement checks will flow like milk and honey.  The lion and the lamb will lie down together and we’ll be a people of peace, respected around the world.  We’ll power our land with earth, wind, and sun.  We’ll all pay less and get more (well, most of us).  We’ll all come together in unity, and he will lead us. 

 

I find this rhetoric deeply unsettling.  It is working (well) in ways that go way beyond political differences and move into the realm of faith.  I clearly recognize that some Obama supporters are thoughtful people who weigh issues and prefer his approach (including some of my fellow bloggers with whom I heartily disagree but nonetheless respect and love).  But, if he wins the election, it will be because he has deeply stirred the religious passions of a staggering number people who view him not as a politician, but as a savior.  For a nation that has clung so tenaciously to the concept that church and state are separate, we seem to be teetering on the edge of a remarkable remake of state into a form of church, with Sen. Obama as its charismatic leader.

 

Authentic church is built on authentic community.  Its members come together in a common commitment to the gospel, and seek to serve their Lord and one another in love.  Christianity calls for death to self in favor of following Jesus, with the sure knowledge that it will require sacrifice.  Service is expected of everyone, and giving flows from redeemed hearts.  Although faith in Jesus affords believers tastes of the fruits of redemption in the here and now, the fullness of his promises is reserved for the age to come.     

 

As envisioned by Obama, however, the church of state offers benefits without sacrifice.  There is no personal repentance, no call to service.  The prayer of the church of state is “what’s in it for me?”  Tax “cuts” for just about everyone, including the great numbers who pay no taxes.  The so-called “rich” – the new unclean out group if ever there was one – are the appointed scapegoats.  Omitted from the narrative is that they already pay most of the taxes.  The top five percent of taxpayers (those making adjusted gross income of $154,000 and up) pay sixty percent of the total federal tax dollars collected from individuals.  The group in the next five percent pays an additional eleven percent of the total.  By contrast, the bottom fifty percent – those earning $32,000 or less – pay only three percent of the total.     

 

It’s worth noting that the senator is not setting his proposed requirements for massive additional revenue (because like it or not, someone has to pay for all this) as a challenge before redeemed hearts.  Rather, his plan is to simply take more from those who have it because he wants it for his purposes.  It matters not that they may have gotten it through hard work, personal sacrifice, and careful planning, and that they may have their own plans.  It also matters not that even if he takes it all, it will never be enough.  In the church of state, the gospel call to give freely is replaced with a legal mandate to take, and the gospel call to sacrifice is replaced with a secular decree of entitlement.    

 

He also brings of promises peace, unity, and green.  But the gospel call in all these areas presupposes life-giving unity with Christ.  Part of the Christian hope is that as these benefits well up in the hearts of believers in community, they will spill over into our spheres of influence, and move us towards provisional acts of redemption in creation.

 

But in the church of state, Christ is not the center of these promises, Sen. Obama is.  He is expected to raise our international stature by pitting talk against action as if they are somehow mutually exclusive.  He is portrayed as the great red and blue unifier, as if our polarized society will somehow disappear with his Robin Hood-like redistribution of the wealth.  He is also the great green-earther, as if solar, wind, and geothermal power are simply waiting to be harnessed for our clean and economical use at his say-so.   

 

All the while, he is attracting impressive numbers of acolytes.  I recently asked an Obama follower why he was so enthusiastic.  He replied that Obama makes him feel calm.  He also told me that he didn’t mind paying yet more in taxes – he felt that it was somehow a way for him to give back.  When I pointed out that he could not only give back on his own, but direct it to his causes, he shrugged.  Michael Smerconish, a popular conservative talk radio host, recently declared his support for Sen. Obama.  Amid a string of surprisingly vague reasons for his choice, he indicated that Sen. Obama, if victorious, will give us hope.  In support of that, here’s what he said:  “Wednesday morning will come and an Obama presidency holds the greatest chance for unifying us here at home and restoring our prestige around the globe.”    

 

Am I the only one bothered by this?  I hear these things, and the category they trigger isn’t politics, it’s religion.

 

Why does Sen. Obama engender such hope among so many?  Could it be that even though rampant secularism has taken hold in the United States, it cannot quash the human need to worship?  Could it be that although Christian faith is on the wane, religious impulses are alive and well and still seeking haven in a gospel, albeit a secular one that requires nothing from them?  For, there is no “ask not what your country can do for you” here, there is only follow me and I will give you _____.  The problem is that – at least for now – the United States of America is not the church, and Sen. Obama is not the messiah. 

 

 

 

Silver, Gold, and Suffering

After I picked my son up from football practice yesterday, he asked me how things were.  I let him know that the stock market had dropped 777 points.  “Wow, Mom,” he replied, “that’s God’s number.”  I had to chuckle – at least he’s paid attention to a few things he’s heard me explain – but that’s about the only chuckle I had yesterday.  If God is using this economic crisis to get our attention, he certainly has mine.  I’ve been studying Zephaniah, and his words are reverberating:  “Neither their silver nor their gold will be able to save them on the day of Yahweh’s fury.”  (1:18)  It’s a stern warning.  

In the context of the risen Christ, however, it’s not only a call to repentance and reevaluation, it’s also a call to do what we can to alleviate looming human suffering.  I’m deeply concerned about our immediate future, and the failure of our legislature to have acted in our best interest yesterday.  The no-voters are flirting with the disaster of all Americans - and indeed, all citizens of the interconnected world.  Here’s why:

The primary provision of the economic rescue legislation is to permit the government to purchase the written down mortgage assets now creating such weight on bank portfolios.  That’s purchase assets, not hand over cash.  The problem is not that there is no value in the assets, but that it is impossible to determine with accuracy how much value there is.  As mortgages were bundled, sliced, and sold off as CDOs (collateralized debt obligations), they were traded, and when the music stopped, landed as assets on the balance sheets of banks and investment houses many steps removed from the original real estate and the mortgage borrowers that gave rise to them.  The problem now is a combination of uncertainty about their real underlying value and conservative accounting regulations requiring “marking to market.”  Since today’s holders don’t have a quick, reliable way to accurately determine what they’re worth, “market value” is a very low number.  But note:  there are properties and mortgage cash flow behind these assets.  Not knowing what they’re worth is very different from worthlessness.  

So if the government, which won’t be trying to make money on trades as the private sector had been doing, purchases these very marked down mortgages at fire sale prices with tax dollars and holds them, there are plenty of scenarios which have not only most of its investment money coming back, but even a substantial profit if and as the economy settles down.

Why is this necessary for what many believe is properly a free market economy?  That’s for another post – or better – another blog.  The conditions that have given rise to this particular moment are unique, but the problem is that we are here.  As trust evaporates from the financial system, no one is willing to  lend money.  That means businesses can’t get their working capital loans to smooth out cash flow.  That means that educational institutions will not be able to borrow to cover cash flow needs between tuition and gift inflows.  That means that banks can’t do their normal business because they are unwilling to work with one another for fear of another failure.  In short, that means that the economy has seized. 

What are the implications?  It’s like a set of dominoes.  Let’s assume a trucking company is responsible for moving produce from the farms to the local grocery chain.  It gets paid monthly.  The grocer borrows mid cycle to pay the trucker, but this month, it can’t get the working capital loan it always gets because the bank isn’t lending.  The trucking company doesn’t get paid.  It can’t buy gas and give out paychecks, so it lays off drivers, and its business halts.   The produce doesn’t move.  It rots in the warehouse, and the farmers don’t get paid . . . You can see where this is going.  It’s a small example, but when capital can’t move, things collapse in very short order.  It’s the 21st century version of massive destruction. 

This bill is essential for restoring some order to the markets so that they can move.  The more days that go by without a bill, the more urgent the situation will become.

This isn’t about politics and theoretical free markets.  It’s about keeping our country from falling apart to the extent that we could be looking at riots, food shortages, massive unemployment, and a collapse of our savings and investments (which has already begun; $1.2 TRILLION of market capital was wiped out yesterday).  To borrow from Zephaniah again, we ought to be very concerned about our streets being laid to waste. 

I’m a Republican.  I learned yesterday that my Democratic congressman voted for the bill.  For that reason alone, I’m voting for him in November; he gets it.  This goes way beyond the things that concerned me last week.

It is true that silver and gold won’t save us.  As Christians, we must grab hold of the righteousness of Christ, and remember that our trust is not in the assets of this world, but in him.  He and he alone is our salvation.  That said, as those called to speak and work redemptively in a sin-cursed world, doing we must do what we can to head off the kind of suffering we might never have imagined possible. 

 

Death and The Savages

I think the movie The Savages, starring Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman, exposes our tendency to avoid the reality of death.  Linney and Hoffman play siblings who are forced to take care of their father (who is battling dementia) after his ‘girlfriend’ dies.  Outside of a care facility Hoffman lays into his sister for being so choosy about assisted living centers saying,

“…the landscaping, the neighborhoods of care, they’re not for the residents. They are for the relatives; people like you and me who don’t want to admit what is really going on here. People are dying, Wendy. Right inside that beautiful building, right now, its a f-ing horror show. And all this wellness propaganda and the landscaping is just there to obscure the miserable fact that people die. And death is gaseous and gruesome and its filled with s*** and p*** and rotten stink.”

[This film is a great one for examining the human condition and coping mechanisms and living up to expectations, etc.]

 

Do “Texts” Control Their Own Interpretation?

I greatly enjoy studying how we understand things—whether texts, another person in conversation, etc. I thought I would share some thoughts about such understanding-theory (hermeneutics, if you will), specifically focused on texts and meaning. Does a text control its own interpretation?

 

Was Paul a Misogynist? Some Thoughts from Daniel Kirk

Daniel Kirk, Professor of New Testament at Fuller Theological Seminary, has posted some thoughts on whether or not Paul was a misogynist. I commend his reflections to all, even those who may disagree with him. I especially appreciate him framing his comments by questions of what the Bible is, what we should expect from it, and how we live out its authority. What does everyone think?

 

Enacting Kingdom Mercy: Imitating God for The Epistle to Diognetus & Excelling in “Grace” for Paul in 2 Corinthians 8

Yesterday I posted on The Epistle to Diognetus and the striking passage within it articulating the significance of what God did in/as Christ—especially in terms of the “…sweet exchange…that the sinfulness of many should be hidden in one righteous man, while the righteousness of one should justify many sinners!”

 

 Today I thought I would post part of the following passage from the same writing, one discussing what it means to be an imitator of God.

 

…By loving him you will be an imitator of his goodness. And do not be surprised that a person can become an imitator of God; he can, if God is willing. For happiness is not a matter of lording it over one’s neighbors, or desiring to have more than weaker man, or possessing wealth and using force against one’s inferiors. No one is able to imitate God in these matters; on the contrary, these things are alien to his greatness. But whoever takes upon himself his neighbor’s burden, whoever wishes to benefit another who is worse off in something in which he himself is better off, whoever provides to those in need things that he has received from God, and thus becomes a god to those who receive them, this one is an imitator of God. Then you will see that though your lot is on earth, God lives in heaven, then you will begin to declare the mysteries of God, then you will both love and admire those who are punished because they refuse to deny God, then you will condemn the deceit and the error of the world, when you realize what the true life in heaven is… (Epistle to Diognetus 10.4-7a)

 

The Gospel According to The Epistle to Diognetus?

I read through the Epistle to Diognetus again today and thought I would post a passage from it. This is an early Christian writing in a collection known as the Apostolic Fathers. Most of these writings stem from possibly the mid 1^st century CE into the 2^nd century (and beyond?). This particular writing is more of a tract, claiming to be written as an apologetic writing to one Diognetus. Whether it was actually written to an outsider originally or was written with the purpose of addressing a group of Christians through the form of a letter ostensibly written to an outsider, it gives us a glimpse at how some Christians of the 2^nd century articulated (forged) their identity in their sector of the Greco-Roman world.

 

Toward the middle of the writing the author is, it seems, addressing why God waited so long to bring about true religion and worship of him (Christianity) and how. At this point we encounter a striking passage…