To continue...
As best I can tell, the book of Acts, especially Acts 2, provides one of the most important "centers" or controlling elements in the way this group reads Scripture. Thus Acts 2:38 says, "Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins, and you will receive the Holy Spirit."
The group correctly reads the verse to say:
1. Peter associates the forgiveness of his audience's sins with baptism.
2. This baptism is "in the name of Jesus Christ"--nothing is said of God the Father or the Holy Spirit.
3. A person receives the Holy Spirit in association with such repentance and baptism.
Let's see how the group relates these three aspects of the verse to their key beliefs.
First let's look at their insistence that such baptism be in the name of Jesus [only] and their rejection of the idea of the Trinity.
They have correctly noticed that the book of Acts consistently involves a baptism in the name of Jesus. Nothing is said in Acts about baptism in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Indeed, I suspect they are right to think that the earliest Christians baptized in the name of Jesus (cf. Rom. 6:3).
But as pre-modern readers, they cannot allow other segments of the early church to baptize in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit (e.g., Matt. 28:19). They view the Bible as a single text written by God, so the historical tensions that almost certainly existed in the early church are mowed down by the lawn mower called "harmonization."
At first glance, harmonization looks like it is the most godly approach to Scripture--finding ways to reinterpret passages of the Bible so that their meaning is no longer in tension with the meaning of other passages. When the Holy Spirit is truly behind such harmonization (that is, leading the reader to truth through it, even though the truth is different from the original meaning) or when a person is either consciously or subconsciously doing it with orthodox faith setting the boundaries, I don't have a problem with it.
But I have two problems with it when it is used to support unorthodox views or when individuals (I am not referring to this group now) use harmonization to dismiss sincere Bible scholars as unspiritual because they don't harmonize. The first problem I have is that harmonizing ultimately rejects the voices of Scripture and substitutes itself for Scripture.
For example, Matthew and Mark record Jesus' healing of a leper and his healing of Peter's mother-in-law in opposite order. A harmonizer might suggest Jesus healed two lepers: one before Peter's mother-in-law and one afterwards. This example is harmless enough, but you have created a senario that neither of the gospels present. You have invented your own scheme and, in a sense, rejected both what Matthew and Mark actually say.
Again, in this case the result is really not that big of a deal. But the Jesus only group actually rejects Matthew's baptism in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit in favor of Acts. A clever rationalization ensues--and such splicing is often ingenious. They might argue that "name" is singular and invoke some interpretation that says these three are really all Jesus, just in three phases of his existence. What might seem to be a baptism in the names of three different persons is really just baptism in the one name of Jesus.
This leads me to the second problem I ultimately have with harmonization when it becomes unorthodox or is used to support a condescending attitude toward Bible scholars (again, I am not referring to the group with this last comment). The resultant interpretations are simply wrong in terms of what the text originally meant. It's playing a game with the text. A Bible scholar who genuinely sees tensions in the biblical text may have a much greater respect for the text of the Bible than a harmonizer. That's because such a person is willing to let each part mean whatever it seems to mean. In other words, such a person doesn't shove harmonizations down the Bible's throat. Some people's "idea" of the Bible is far more important to them than the text of the Bible itself.
So in the case of the leper and Peter's mother in law, the wording of the leper story is extremely similar in both gospels. Indeed, it is overwhelmingly likely that Matthew and Mark stand in some literary relationship to one another--that one is either copying its basic text from the other or that they are both drawing on a common source of some type. As such it is overwhelmingly likely that the leper story is the same story placed in different locations by the two authors. Harmonization in this instance is not only not important for faith but it is simply an incorrect interpretation.
Similarly, while Matthew uses the singular for "name," one can only support the idea that this is simply naming Jesus three times if one brings this pre-conception to the text. There is certainly nothing in the text that would lead us in this direction. The resultant interpretation may preserve the "idea" of harmony, but it does so by raping the biblical text of its actual meaning. It ignores what the text wants to say in order to preserve what the interpreter wants the text to say.
Indeed, if anything the New Testament itself pushes us to distinguish Jesus from God, not to identify them. Thus Jesus says he does not know things that the Father does (Mark 13:32). The Father speaks while Jesus prays (e.g., Matt. 3:17). Jesus is the firstborn of creation (Col. 1:15), which seems to place him on the creation side of the equation in Paul's mind (a situation those of us who believe in the Trinity also need to explain). The group no doubt has ingenious ways of reinterpreting these passages, as Christians in general have great "coping strategies" to explain away "naughty verses" that don't fit with our Wesleyan or Baptist or Presbyterian paradigms.
But when we really value the text (and are looking for the original meaning rather than a "spiritual" one), we don't find possible ways to interpret it so it fits with our theology, we try to go with the most probable reading of the text. Inevitably, we begin to see the Bible in context as a chorus of voices that basically are in harmony with each other, but we also see tensions between real people. From my perspective, you simply cannot let the Bible set the agenda without reaching some conclusion of this sort. To do otherwise is to foist on the Bible a view it does not "want" you to have. It would be like trying to honor me for being such an incredible war hero despite my continued protests that I have never been in a war or even in the armed forces. What I really want you to do is to listen to what I'm actually trying to say to you.
Now in saying such things I do not mean to negate my view that it is ultimately great to hear the Spirit speaking in the words apart from what they meant originally. What is important to me is that we don't confuse such spiritual meanings with the original meaning. And even more important to me is that we don't mistake the splicings of our own making with the authoritative voice of God.
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6 comments:
Personally, I think most people are so stuck in their own traditions that, without relying on the Holy Spirit, it is impossible to get to the "real" meaning of some scripture passages. Not only because I don't believe Biblical criticism neccesarily gets us any closer to the original meaning, but because I believe people simply won't accept certain teachings in the scripture unless the Holy Spirit moves in them to do so. Like you mentioned with the "naughty verses," everyone does this. For instance, Calvinists tend to obscure passages about God's good will, whilst Arminians tend to obscure passages like Romans 9. (A friend and I were just having this discussion the other night.)
I would agree that no one is completely objective and that we lack enough evidence to be completely certain of the meaning of many, many things in the Bible. But I would word things a little differently and say that only the Holy Spirit helps us know how to apply Scripture appropriately. This is what the New Testament models as it consistently does not read the Old Testament for what it originally meant but infuses OT words with new, "spiritual" meanings.
But in terms of original meaning, this is really a science that follows the same rules of determining the original meaning of any words. I would actually say that a secular or atheistic scholar is more likely to be objective about the original meaning (if no atheistic presuppositions are involved), since such a person has nothing to gain or lose theologically in what the text comes to mean.
In other words, such a person has nothing to lose in whether Paul turns out to believe in straightforward predestination, straightforward free will, or if Paul would actually contradict himself on the issue.
I don't want to take up too much more of your time or comment space because I know I'm not saying anything you haven't encountered a million times before, but I wanted to add something real quick. I think it is precisely because an atheist has no real ties to belief that they are unable to understand the real meaning of scripture. I believe there are objective meanings to scripture, sure, but each theological word we create a definition for is dependent upon other words which we have invented definitions for, which are dependent on other words which we have invented definitions for. All these definitions may end up making sentences coherent, but when it gets down to the details, who decides what is coherent and what isn't? For example, when the Bible says "We are saved by grace through faith," I see grace as being the basis of salvation and faith merely being the means of application, whereas someone else might see grace as the means by which we recieve faith which is the basis of the salvation. I guess in my mind this is the benefit of the Calvinist system which doesn't expect an unregenerate person to understand what Paul's getting at; I know this is circular, but I'm ok with that right now.
Hey Scott, I'm really happy to have the discussion! Keep the comments coming.
In my mind, you really help illustrate my point of view. A pre-modern/spiritual approach is circular in terms of the text. The key to such interpretation are the definitions we bring with us to the text (e.g. of grace or faith).
It is not that the text plays no role in the paradigm, just that the key to the paradigm enters the text at a key passage (e.g., Eph. 2:8) by way of a traditional or spiritual definition. Like Keith, if such definitions are informed by the church or the Spirit, I have no problem with them.
However, in terms of the original meaning, the determinative question is "Given the range of meanings these words had at the time and places Paul wrote, how would an ancient audience have understood them." This is a historical question that has nothing to do with my faith.
Here I would claim that both Arminian and Calvinist paradigms bring anachronistic historical discussions to Paul's words. Our debates are not the debates of Paul's world, therefore, Reformation options are not the most likely precise meanings to Paul's words.
To me, the most likely paradigmatic framework by which Paul or his audiences would understand "grace" language is that of ancient patron-client relationships. I will not find the exact terms of Arminian or Calvinist conceptions of grace in the extant background literature of Paul's day. These are much later discussions read back into Paul's words.
In other words, the original meaning of Paul will certainly take its departure from the range of meanings in use by ancient people of his day. Otherwise his audiences could not have understood his words, and the Bible itself tells us it was written to them.
While we do not have exhaustive evidence to be absolutely certain of the original meaning, we can approach this question by looking at how all the ancient authors of Paul's day used the word grace. An atheist can do this as well as I can, for this is a question of history, not of faith.
I see the difference now, I think; we can get close to the historical meaning of the words Paul used. Maybe if I changed my position to make a distinction between how a general audience of that time period would have understood Paul's words and how (I think) a audience of believers only would have taken his words. Of course I can't justify this without making a leap from "the cross is foolishness" and "the sinful mind is hostile to God," to the belief that no one "gets it" unless the Spirit enlightens them. I think it's true, but I'll have to work on it. Anyway, I suppose I'd rather say that not only are we in need of the Spirit to "get it right," but so was the original audience.
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