The Myth of Value-Free Hermeneutics

 

(In Bangkok)

One of my doctoral qualifying exams was in hermeneutical theories. That was in 1980. I have not stopped studying such things.

I'm reading Craig Keener's The Historical Jesus of the Gospels: Jesus in Historical Context. In the Introduction Craig makes some methodological points, such as this: "no one is free from assumptions, and... the presuppositions of skeptics are no more value-free than those of believers." (xxxi)

I agree. Failure to recognize this is seen in fundamentalist hermeneutics as well as a skeptical fundamentalism that is often a reaction against one's fundamentalist Christian upbringing. The Jesus-skeptic who thinks he is unbiased is hermeneutically just as narrow-minded as the fundamentalist hermeneutic he criticizes. As one who was not discipled in such anachronistic ways I see "value-free" discussions as essentially misguided when it comes to interpretation theory.

More recently, Craig has published Spirit Hermeneutics: Reading Scripture in Light of Pentecost. 

N. T. Wright on The Lord's Prayer

 

in 1977 I taught an M. Div. course, at Northern Seminary, on prayer. Since then, for 49 years (!), I have done a deep dive into the praying life, practicing it, and studying it from all angles.

I have written two books on praying.

I have a collection of books that have assisted me in deepening my understanding of the praying life. Many of them have motivated me to pray. Here's one by N. T. Wright.

Wright has written a beautiful book on The Lord's Prayer. When Wright writes, every New Testament scholar is listening.

From the book's beginning...

"Where better to start [talking about prayer] than with the prayer that Jesus himself taught us? If we value and marvel at the fact that Christian worship has been offered in our Cathedral church for nearly thirteen hundred years - and it is indeed a wonderful thing - how much more ought we to cherish and marvel at the fact that for nearly two thousand years people have prayed this prayer. When you take these words on your lips you stand on hallowed ground."

(N. T. Wright. The Lord and His Prayer (Kindle Locations 28-31). Kindle Edition.)

Shall we pray...?

***

Praying: Reflections on 40 Years of Solitary Conversations with God

31 Letters to the Church on Praying

My Life-Command for Marriage

Linda and I will celebrate fifty-three years of marriage this coming August. 

Recently we talked together about the abundant life the Lord Jesus has blessed us with. 

This includes the many help-sessions we have had with premarital and marital couples

We talk with them about mutual submission. About serving one another. About putting the other before oneself.

I give the husband or husband-to-be my life marital verse. It is Ephesians 5:25.

Husbands, love your wives, 

just as Christ loved the church 

and gave himself up for her 

I often write this verse on a 3X5 card and carry it with me, pulling it out often to read it again. And again. And...  The Holy Spirit has led me to do this. Repetition (meditation) on God's instructions causes them to descend from my mind into my heart.

Ephesians 5:25 is not a suggestion. It's instruction for how to do marriage well. It is, as New Testament scholars agree, a command. An essential. Like all God-given commands, it is life-giving and abundance-producing, when accompanied by the Spirit's power. 

The analogy I use is this. I used to teach guitar in a guitar studio. All my students wanted to play better and more beautifully. I taught five-finger fingerstyle picking. I could produce a certain kind of sound. I taught this to my students. Yes, among skilled guitarists, there can be stylistic differences. But there are several basic techniques that all agree are needed. If you want to get this particular and wonderful sound, you must do it this way.

Ephesians chapter five, says New Testament scholar Klyne Snodgrass, gives us a series of Pauline commands about how to live in the Kingdom. (See Snodgrass, Ephesians, pp. 266 ff.) This includes Eph. 5:21-33.

Husbands, do you want abundance and flourishing and beauty in your marriage? If yes, then love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. 

You'll need the Holy Spirit's empowerment to do this. Ask for it, with all your heart.

EPHESIANS 5:21-33

21 Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

22 Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.

25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, 27 and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church— 30 for we are members of his body. 31 “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”[c] 32 This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. 33 However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.

The $20 Wedding

 

(Yes, I wore a tux...)

( I'm re-posting this, to keep it in play. Also, see THIS.)

In 55 years as a Jesus-follower and pastor I have officially performed one bazillion weddings. That is a lot of rehearsal dinners and wedding reception dinners.

1. I have done one bazillion weddings.
2. Therefore, I am overweight.

When I think of these weddings what I remember is not the food, but the people. The most beautiful weddings I have seen have to do with the marital couple, who they are, and what they can one day be. 

All the money in the world cannot cover over two clueless people. But a groom and bride who submit their lives to God and to the serving of the other shine like stars in this materialistic darkness of "happiness." I am thinking of some of them now. They loved, and still do. Their love influenced others, without trying to.

It's really about preparing for marriage and life together, not the wedding day. The more the former happens, the greater is that special day.

I present to you a wedding plan. Here are the costs, in my Monroe community.

• Wedding planner - $0. (I charge nothing for this advice.)
• Officiant - $0. (I charge nothing to officiate your wedding.)
• Building rental - $0. (We can have your wedding outdoors. We've had weddings in our backyard, on the river.)
• Groom's tuxedo - $0. (The groom wears nice clothing that can be worn again.)
• Bridal gown - $0. (The bride wears nice clothing that can be worn again.)
• Flowers - $0. (From your mother's garden.)
• Photographer - $0. (Because all your friends have phones.)
• Music - $0. You've got a musical friend who would love to play at your wedding. You've also got a friend with a cell phone and a small portable speaker.
• Food - cost per plate - $0. (Your friends bring finger foods. That's what Linda and I did, and we had 350 people at our wedding.)
• Miscellaneous costs - $0.
• Marriage license in Monroe County - $20.
• Pen to sign marriage license - $0. (I will lend you mine.)

Total costs - $20

Stress - less.

Relationship - more.

I have done weddings like this. I remember them for the inner beauty of the couple and the presence of God.

See also:

"Is Simplicity the Newest Wedding Trend?"

"Does a Big Wedding Equal an Unhappy Marriage?" (Wall Street Journal)

The Greatest New Testament Introduction

 

Craig Keener calls it "the New Testament introduction of all New Testament introductions! Not only is this a superb New Testament introduction from the keyboards of two of today's most prolific and balanced New Testament scholars, but more advanced students will find here an accessible and mature synthesis of and primer for N. T. Wright's voluminous work."

Craig Blomberg calls it "one of a kind."

Esau MccAulley (Wheaton College) says, "Wright and Bird have done a great service to the church and the academy with this volume."

The accolades are many.

What do I think?

•  A physically weighty and beautiful book. Bibliophiles will just want to look at it.
• And hold it.
• Brilliant in its conception.
• Exemplifies the necessity of contextual New Testament studies.
• A seminary education in my hands.
• For me, a cornerstone volume in the ongoing project of handling God's Word rightly.
• I have been slow-cooking in it, over months. 

 The New Testament in its World: An Introduction to the History, Literature, and Theology of the First Christians.

GET IT in hard cover, not as an ebook.

Dr. John Piippo - How God Changes the Human Heart

(Thank you, Carol, for helping with this!)

Eugene Peterson - This Video Restores Pastoral Sanity

Pastors and Christian leaders - I watch this video 4-5 times a year, to regain perspective. 

Pauline Studies - A Brief Bibliography

 

I am taking time this week to focus on Pauline studies.

Today I was reading from three sources.

N. T. Wright's commentary on Galatians.

Craig Keener's commentary on Galatians.

And Perspectives on Paul: Five Views, by Scot McKnight, B. J. Oropeza, eds. This excellent book is on what scholars call the New Perspective on Paul, launched by E. P. Sanders, James Dunn, and N. T. Wright. 

 From my bookshelf...

Pauline Christology: An Exegetical-Theological Study, by Gordon Fee.

Paul, the Spirit, and the People of God, by Gordon Fee.

The Mind of the Spirit: Paul's Approach to Transformed Thinking, by Craig Keener.

Paul: A Biography, by N. T. Wright.

Paul and the Faithfulness of God, by N. T. Wright.

Into the Heart of Romans: A Deep-Dive Into Paul's Greatest Letter, by N. T. Wright.

Justification: God's Plan and Paul's Vision, by N. T. Wright.

Paul's Letter to the Romans: A Socio-rhetorical Commentary, by Ben Witherington.

Paul and the Law: A Contextual Approach, by Frank Thielman. I have not read Thielman's recent Paul, Apostle of Grace. 

Justification: Five Views, by James Beilby and Paul Eddy, eds. 

Pastor Paul: Nurturing a Culture of Christoformity in the Church, by Scot McKnight.

Living in Union with Christ: Paul's Gospel and Christian Moral Identity, by Grant Macaskill. 

Paul: Apostle of the Heart Set Free, by F. F. Bruce.

AND...  many commentaries on the Pauline epistles.

Joy Is Deeper than Laughter

 

                                                      (In New York City)

Linda and I have innumerable times of joy together. We laugh, a lot.

If someone laughs, does that mean they are filled with the joy of the Lord? 

Not necessarily.

Laughter is not equivalent to the joy of the Lord.

A person may laugh when someone they despise fails. Or when someone does something stupid and hurts themselves. A person may laugh at a sexual joke. Surely such laughter, in cases like these, is not the joy of the Lord.

One might laugh when they mock someone.

Finding something funny, at the expense of someone else, is not the joy of the Lord. 

The joy of the Lord can produce laughter. The joy of the Lord can also produce tears. I have experienced both. I have experienced the joy of the Lord inwardly, with little outward expression. It's felt like an inner glow, a holy warmth, an existential sweeping gladness.

While the joy of the Lord can manifest in laughter or tears, outwardly or inwardly, heaven-sent joy transcends all of these. Anyone who has read C. S. Lewis's autobiography Surprised by Joy understands this. For Lewis, the experience of the joy of the Lord had this beyond-earth quality. So much so, that Lewis had to invent a word in his attempt to describe it: Sehnsucht. 

Sehnsucht, wrote Lewis, is “an unsatisfied desire which is itself more desirable than any other satisfaction. I call it Joy, which is here a technical term and must be sharply distinguished both from Happiness and from Pleasure. Joy (in my sense) has indeed one characteristic, and one only, in common with them; the fact that anyone who has experienced it will want it again.”

The very feeling of transcendent desire is itself a form of Joy. The longing for the satisfaction is itself a kind of satisfaction.

One excellent book on Lewis and Sehnsucht is Joe Puckett's The Apologetics of Joy. Here's a snippet.

"In his own autobiographical sketch of his journey toward Joy, Lewis explains that, “authentic Joy . . . is distinct not only from pleasure in general but even from aesthetic pleasure. It must have the stab, the pang, the inconsolable longing.”13 In this way, the Joy Lewis spoke of is not always expressed as a feeling of pleasure. “It might almost equally well be called a particular kind of unhappiness or grief.”14 But strangely it is a kind of grief that we want. It is a pain like we feel when we are separated from someone we have loved more than anything or anyone else. For Lewis, we “ache” in desire because we have a sense that there exists a love greater than anything in this world. It is a kind of unhappiness felt like one feels because of homesickness. The difference is that this feeling of homesickness is for a home we have never been to or seen before."

In John 15:11 Jesus says to his disciples, I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.

His joy is deep, right?

Metaethical Studies and Moral Nihilism

(Detroit)

Most atheists I know want to be moral. They make strong moral claims, saying "_______ is wrong," or "We ought to do ________." Indeed, atheists like Richard Dawkins claim religious beliefs are morally repulsive and just plain false, and ought to be discarded. 

It is questionable if the worldview of atheism can take us this far. Atheism can support utilitarianism, and emotivist ethics, but atheists overreach when they claim things like Theists are morally repulsive. The atheist cannot, on a physicalist worldview, call certain acts "good" or "evil."

This is a metaethical issue. 

Here are four books that contribute to my metaethical studies. 

Metaethics: A Short Companion, by David Horner and J. P. Morfeland. An excellent introduction to the subject.

Atheist Overreach: What Atheism Can't Deliver,  by University of Notre Dame sociologist Christian Smith. Smith argues that "the naturalistic cosmos that is the standard operating worldview of atheism cannot with rational warrant justify the received humanistic belief in universal benevolence and human rights." (P. 124)

Science and the Good: The Tragic Quest for the Foundations of Morality, by University of Virginia professors James Davison Hunter and Paul Nedelisky. They write:

"When it began, the quest for a moral science sought to discover the good. The new moral science has abandoned that quest and now, at best, tells us how to get what we want. With this turn, the new moral science, for all its recent fanfare, has produced a world picture that simply cannot bear the weight of the wide-ranging moral burdens of our time." (Kindle Location 112)

This, say Hunter and Nedelisky, is "moral nihilism."

Scientism and Secularism: Learning to Respond to a Dangerous Ideology, by theistic philosopher J. P. Moreland. Moreland writes: "Given scientism, moral knowledge is impossible. And the loss of moral knowledge has meant a shift from a view in which duty and virtue are central to the moral life, to a minimalist ethical perspective." (Kindle Location 422)

See also William Lane Craig, "The Indispensability of Theological Meta-Ethical Foundations for Morality."