Douglas Moo Online and Bavinck Dogmatics (4 Vol.) Sale

Douglas Moo, an excellent evangelical NT scholar, has many of his articles/essays online here. This is a great resource; Moo is a “must read” on many NT themes.

Herman Bavinck’s 4 Vol. Dogmatics set is on sale at Reformation Heritage books for $100. Go here.

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sunnyside wa

Liturgy, Order, and Chaos

When considering liturgy, order is good. To be sure, are many excellent biblical arguments that advocate an orderly worship service. Walter Brueggemann opens our eyes to yet one more reason why order is good in worship.

“In such an arena of disorder [in which Israel/we live], which may indeed be large and deep and ominous, it is not surprising that one should look to Yahweh, the Creator of heaven and earth, to counter the chaos with a powerful ordering and continual reordering of creation. More specifically, it is plausible that the ordering activity of Yahweh, in the face of such a threat, should be activated in public worship, where life may be experienced in order, symmetry, coherence, and propriety.”

He emphasizes: “The enactment of such worship serves as a powerful counter-act to the threat of disorder. Thus much of the ‘command of order’ is given as an instrument to the priests, so that the priests can wisely and rightly order worship space, time, and activity, whereby worship becomes an environment for a God-given order available nowhere else. We may imagine that the depth, intensity, and specificity of order authorized in the text are commensurate to experienced disorder, even to a degree that we might regard as punctilious. It is crucial that the authorized enactment of order should fully match - or perhaps overmatch - the concrete threat of disorder.”

In other words, as a minister stands and calls the people of God to worship, he is reminding them that though the earth be moved, God is the ordered ruler yet. Or, still in other words, the Christian lives a whirlwind week, full of chaos, disorder, unexpected disturbances, and little rest. On Sunday, however, in the liturgy that same disoriented Christian is reordered, reoriented, and reminded that God calms the whirlwind and the chaos. Why would we want worship that reflects our busy & chaotic weekday lives?

Quotes taken from Walter Brueggemann, Theology of the Old Testament (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1997), 191.

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Robert Strimple on Gospels Criticism

I often find myself reflecting on the presuppositions at work in critical Biblical scholarship and in critical reconstructions of Biblical history.  In reading in this area, the name Ernst Troeltsch keeps coming up.  I came across this helpful summary in The Modern Search for the Real Jesus: An Introductory Survey of the Historical Roots of Gospel’s Criticism by Robert Strimple:

Ernst Troeltsch provided a definitive summary of the three primary principles that have guided the historical criticism spawned by the Enlightenment: (1) The principle of methodological doubt. All historical judgements (including those made concerning the events reported in the Bible) can only be statements of probability, which are always open to revision.  They can never be regarded as absolutely true.  (2) The principle of analogy. All historical events are, in principle (in “quality”) similar.  Thus, “present experience and occurrence become the criteria of probability in the past.”  The result with regard to our judgments regarding the factuality of miracles recorded in the Bible, when “Jewish and Christian history are thus made analogous to all other history,” is obvious.  In our present experience, ax heads do not float, nor do five loaves and two fish suffice to feed five thousand people.  (3) The principle of correlation.  All historical phenomena exist in a chain of cause and effect, and therefore are mutually interrelated and interdependent.  There is no effect without an adequate and sufficient cause.

The Modern Search, pg. 7

Strimple’s conclusion: “The Kantian philosophical roots of these basic methodological principles, and how they eliminate from consideration a priori the truth claims of Christianity and the possibility of revelation, miracles, or any direct divine activity in human history, should be clear” (pg. 12).

So the question is, are Christians fools to continue believing all this silly stuff about Jesus’ miracles, resurrection, and his second coming?  Are Christians fools to believe in the idea of “inspiration?”  Answer: Yes - at least in the way that the world uses the term “fool” (remember 1 Cor 1.25-27).  Since, however, Christ has called us not simply to a new way of living but also a new way of thinking (Rom 12.2), we can still hold to belief in the Bible on good philosophical grounds, albeit grounds that those committed to autonomy deny.

Strimple helps to show that critical gospels scholarship (and critical Biblical scholarship in general) doesn’t just happen in a vacuum.  It is informed by a number of epistemological commitments; commitments that are anything but self evident!

________________________
Andrew Compton
Upland, CA

Where did Daniel Go?

While teaching my Sunday school class a few weeks ago, I was suddenly struck by something I had missed in the story of the fiery furnace; Daniel isn’t there!  Where did he go?  Did he bow down to the statue?  Is that why he wasn’t in the furnace with the other three?  I found myself pausing mid-sentence while reading to the kids, wondering: “WHERE IS DANIEL?”

Well, I didn’t lose much sleep over this.  I figured that I’d find an answer when I had time to do some Daniel studies (something I’ve been itching to do).  But today I spent a little time skimming through a book I used in one of my seminary classes entitled Hope in the Midst of a Hostile World: The Gospel According to Daniel written by George M. Schwab.

He points out that Daniel is not written with the intention of informing readers about what happened back in the 6th century in Babylon.  Instead, it is intended to teach the saints “what believers should confess and believe in any century” (pg. 12).  Shwab then writes the following:

If the interpreter’s agenda is solely to defend - or to deny - Daniel as a historical source, then the point of the stories might be missed.  For example, in chapter 3 the three heroes are in mortal crisis due to their fidelity to God.  One might ask [as I did in my Sunday school class], “Where was Daniel?”  Various commentaries attempt to answer that by reconstructing possible scenarios.  Perhaps Daniel had been called away; perhaps Daniel was not present.  Some commentators wisely ignore the question altogether.  However, the only worthwhile answer does not reconstruct history, but reads the chapter as literature, as a religious romance.  The question becomes, “How does the absence of Daniel change the book?”  The other chapters all feature Daniel, his friends sometimes added as sidekicks.  By excluding Daniel from chapter 3, it is clear that others besides him were also faithful to God in the face of adversity.  The whole book is not therefore about one hero, and a possible misconception of the character of the exile is corrected.  This is why Daniel is absent from chapter 3.  The answer lies with the literary purpose of the story, not with any reconstructed history.

Hope in the Midst of a Hostile World, pg. 12

While perhaps Schwab may be accused of giving a somewhat speculative reason for an oddity in the narrative, he still offers an interesting approach; one that helps as we interpret Daniel as Christian scripture.  I haven’t read very many other approaches to the “problem” of Daniel’s absence, but I appreciate Schwab’s very much.  He is doing the hard work of reading the story with a “hermeneutic of trust” and in doing so, offers a way for readers to see that in exile there were many saints who fought hard to retain their faith in midst of the hostile Babylonian world.  He helps to make sense of an oddity in a way that does not run roughshod over the text itself nor does it offer “pat” apologetic-types of answers.  His more sophisticated literary approach helps to mine this book of some exciting exegetical nuggets and helps us to see how Daniel does a good job as apocalyptic literature; literature written for suffering saints in need of reassurance that God is indeed in control!

___________________________
Andrew Compton
Upland, CA

N.T. Wright on Romans 13: Civil Government

If you’ve been reading “The Reformed Reader” for quite a while, you know that I’m at major odds with N.T. Wright when it comes to justification, imputation, and faith alone. That is still the case; yet to be honest, I think that other things N.T. Wright has written are helpful and worth while. His brief comments on Romans 13.1-7 are one of those helpful things.

“…Christians, who were regarded as the scum of the earth in Rome at the time, must not get an additional reputation as trouble makers. No good will come to the cause of the gospel by followers of Jesus being regarded as crazy dissidents who won’t co-operate with the most basic social mechanisms. Paul is anxious, precisely because he believes that Jesus is the true Lord of the world, that his followers should not pick unnecessary quarrels with the lesser lords. They are indeed a revolutionary community, but if they go for the normal type of violent revolution they will just be playing the empire back at its own game. They will almost certainly lose, and, much worse, the gospel itself will lose with them.”

“The Old Testament had denounced pagan nations and their rulers - but some of the very prophets whose denunciations were the fiercest also told Israel that God was working through the pagan nations and their rulers for Israel’s long-term good (Assyria, in Isaiah 10; Cyrus, in Isaiah 45; Babylon itself, in Jeremiah 29).” Wright notes that there was much tension in the OT between Israel and the pagan nations - and this tension “came to its head when, in John’s story, Jesus stood before the Roman governor and declared that, even though he was about to execute him, the power by which he did it had come from God in the first place (John 19.11).”

See Wright’s Paul For Everyone, Romans: Part Two (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2004), 85-87.

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sunnyside wa

The Two Witnesses of Revelation 11

Just who are those two witnesses in Revelation 11? Who are those two “olive trees” and “lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth?” Well, some say literally there will be two specific men/witnesses at the end of the age. Others say similarly that these are two prophets who prophesy during the rapture. On the allegorical side, some have suggested that these two are the Law and the Prophets, or something like that.

I agree with the commentators who say that the witnesses symbolize the church (Beale, Mounce, Hendriksen, etc). This is a good quote from Hendriksen: “These witnesses symbolize the church militant bearing testimony through its ministers and missionaries throughout the present dispensation [age].” (More Than Conquerors [Grand Rapids: Baker, 1940], 155). Or shorter, Bauckham: “Two individuals here represent the church in its faithful witness to the world” (The Theology of the Book of Revelation [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993], 84).

Beale gives excellent reasons why this interpretation fits well:

1) The witnesses are called ‘two lampstands,’ similar to Rev 1.20, where John explicitly calls the churches lampstands.

2) By comparing Rev 11.7 and Dan 7.21 (clearly John alludes to Daniel here), Daniel notes that persecution is aimed not at a few individuals, but corporate Israel.

3) In Rev 11.9-13, the entire world will see the defeat and resurrection of the witnesses - this means that the witnesses are visible throughout the earth - around the globe.

4) The two witnesses prophesy for 3.5 years, the same length of time other followers of Christ are oppressed (11.2, 12.6, 14; 13.6). Especially relevant is chapter 12, where the woman fled persecution for the same amount of time. Beale notes that the woman and the two witnesses signify the same thing: the corporate people of God, the church.

5) Elsewhere in Revelation, the entire community of believers is identified as the source of the testimony to/of Jesus (6.9, 12.11, 17; 19.10, 20.4).

6) Finally, note that the powers of Moses and Elijah (11.6, for example) are attributed to both of the witnesses, not split between them. “They are identical prophetic twins.”

Beale quotes taken from his commentary on Revelation (Grand Rapid: Eerdmans, 1999), 574-5.

See also Dennis Johnson, Triumph of the Lamb, (Phillipsburg: P&R, 2001), 170-1; he compares 11.7 and 13.7 to make the same point as the above named authors.

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Bavinck on Justification Part II: Imputation and Legal Fiction

As surely as the sun rises and sets each day, Herman Bavinck vigorously defended the imputation of Christ’s obedience in justification. In nearly prophetic language, he speaks to present day deniers of imputation: “The opponents of imputed righteousness should not lodge their objection against Luther and Calvin but against Paul.”

He goes on, especially dealing with an older Roman Catholic theologian, R. Bellarmine, who said that imputation was a legal fiction (the same language used by some today who deny imputation): “That picture [of legal fiction], however, is completely mistaken. Justification is as real as sanctification, and imputation is no less real than infusion. The only difference is this: in justification righteousness is granted to us in a juridicial sense, while in sanctification it becomes ours in an ethical sense. Both are very real and very necessary. The judge must first validate someone’s claim to a piece of property before one can take possession of it.”

“This first act [imputation] is not a fiction or an illusion that cuts no ice and conflicts with reality. On the contrary: needed first is an imputation of righteousness, the recognition of a claim, and only then can the infusion of righteousness follow, the act of taking possession of that to which one is entitled…. If God justifies the ungodly, that is not a fiction, a putative imputation, but a present and future reality…. After the ungodly have become righteous in a legal sense, they will certainly also become righteous in an ethical sense.”

In another helpful illustration, Bavinck wrote that imputation is like when a wealthy man legally adopts a poor child. The child, “can, as a future heir be called rich even though at the moment he or she does not yet own a penny.” In theological terms, as Bavinck said, we are not declared righteous based on something in us, but on something credited to our account - the righteousness/obedience of Christ. And those who are justified, will certainly be sanctified, but the former does not depend upon the latter.

No one can wrest Bavinck out of the arms of Reformed orthodoxy - Luther, Calvin, Turretin, Brakel, Berkhof, and others of that list would have embraced Bavinck with passion. Speaking of passion, let me re-quote Bavinck on imputation, just so no one misses it: “The opponents of imputed righteousness should not lodge their objection against Luther and Calvin, but against Paul.” [Side note: Bavinck here is also noting clearly that Calvin taught imputation.]

All quotes taken from Herman Bavinck, Holy Spirit, Church, and New Creation ed. John Bolt, trans. John Vriend (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008), 213-4.

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The Church Order: Aren’t these just “man made” rules?

Nelson Kloosterman, in his chapter entitled “Office Bearers and Church Government” (in the book Called to Serve: Essays For Elders and Deacons), tackles the matter of an authoritative church order that is used in a church committed to sola scriptura. Though many Christian traditions speak disparagingly of church orders - as though they were simply a collection of churchly opinions that take away from fresh, scripture centered church practice - Kloosterman helpfully points out that “insofar as [the church order's] regulations faithfully reflect the Bible’s teaching and principles, and since they have been adopted by the churches together, the regulations of the Church Order have authority in the church” (pg. 170).

Regarding the authoritative character of the church order, Kloosterman deserves quoting at length:

Speaking of regulations encoded in the Church Order, it’s been said, “They hang on a sky hook… they’re pulled out of thin air… they’re man-made rules.” People often wonder what gives the Church Order its authority to regulate the life and activities of the church.

We may be tempted to answer: the church grants these regulations their authority. Some see the Church Order much like a contract, and view the common agreement as churches to live together voluntarily as being the source of the authority of the Church Order. This would mean, in effect, that the Church Order is as binding as the last majority vote, and that it functions as a corporation charter or a political treaty: the rules are sound, wise, and good until we decide otherwise!

A better answer can be give if we recall the Belgic Confession, Article 30, where we confess: “We believe that this true Church must be governed by that spiritual polity which our Lord has taught us in His Word; namely, that there must be . . .” office bearers chosen and appointed to govern Christ’s church. Then in Article 32, we confess that “we reject all human inventions, and all laws which man would introduce into the worship of God, thereby to bind and compel the conscience in any manner whatever. Therefore we admit only of that which tends to nourish and preserve concord and unity, and to keep all men in obedience to God. . .”

By acknowledging Christ as the only Head of his church, we confess that supreme authority in the church lies not in a set of rules or a book of order. It belongs to Jesus Christ himself. Christ has delegated his governing authority to office bearers in the church, so that our submission as church members to their leading constitutes obedience to Jesus Christ himself! Government by men, no matter how well-intentioned, can degenerate into either legalistic or arbitrary authority. Therefore, we must always keep in mind the Christ-centered aim, and source of church government.

The character of the Church Order, then, is that it provides the regulations that, on the basis of God’s Word and in agreement with the church’s Confessions, are needed for the sake of good order in the church.

(pgs. 179-180)

Kloosterman has some real gems in this chapter. What is key is that we not be tempted to think that adherence to a Church Order is somehow a man-centered practice. Though we believe that Christ rules his church via real men, we also believe it is no one less than Christ himself that is governing the church through these men.

This is a very worthwhile chapter as part of a very helpful collection of essays!

____________________________
Andrew Compton
Upland, CA

Bavinck on Justification Part I

Of course I knew volume four would keep me up late at night! Here are a few excellent words from section 472 (Justification Forensic, not Ethical):

“To correctly assess the benefit of justification, people must lift up their minds to the judgment seat of God and put themselves in his presence.” God “must descend from the height of his majesty, seek us out and come to us, take away our guilt and again open the way to his fatherly heart. If God were to wait until we - by our faith, our virtues, and good works of congruity or condignity - had made ourselves worthy, in part or in whole, to receive his favor, the restoration of communion between him and ourselves would never happen, and salvation would forever be out of reach for us.”

“This is why so much depends on the benefit of justification, and it is rightly denominated the article on which the church either stands or falls. For the fundamental question that arises in this connection is this: What is the way that leads to communion with God, to true religion, to salvation and eternal life: God’s grace or human merit, his forgiveness or our works, gospel or law, the covenant of grace or the covenant of works? If it is the latter, if our work, our virtue, our sanctification is primary, then the believers’ consolation ends, and they remain in doubt and uncertainty to their last breath. Then Christ is violated in his unique, all-encompassing, and all-sufficient mediatorial office, and he himself is put on a level with other humans, with ourselves. Then God is robbed of his honor, for if humans are justified on the basis of their works, they have reason to boast of themselves and are, partly or totally, the craftsman of their own salvation.”

Simply brilliant. Read that again. Bavinck is with Luther, Calvin, Turretin, and so forth: he understood that if you mess up justification, you mess up assurance, the person and work of Christ, and even theology proper. In sum, you mess up the Christian faith if you mess up justification!

Above quotes taken from Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics IV (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008), 204-5.

Stay tuned for more from Bavinck on justification.

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sunnyside wa

Kevin Vanhoozer on Epistemology: Do Biblical Scholars REALLY Need to Know Philosophy?

In the last couple of weeks, I’ve found myself in conversations with friends about the nature of Old Testament studies.  I’ve been amazed at how common it is for Biblical scholars to approach their task simply assuming the validity of their methodology.  When pressed on how it is that they can defend their particular epistemological or historical views, they look at me like I’ve got a 3rd eyeball!  “What do you mean, how do I know that the Bible means such and such?  I’m just reading the facts!  The data proves my position!”

It is interesting, however, to start talking about human reason and other things like proof and truth.  As Biblical scholars, we are trained in all the critical methods and taught that to read and interpret the Bible in these ways will bring about assured historical results.  But when I start asking many of my colleagues how they verify things like “truth” or (one of my favorites) how they know “what really happened,” they just don’t follow my questioning.  When I ask point blank for them to justify the thinking patters that give rise to their particular views, they can’t do it.  When I follow up by lumping ultra-conservative Christians and flaming-liberals together into the same epistemological camp, they get even more upset!  It is as though asking these sorts of questions is prying into their privacy!

I was reading some of Kevin Vanhoozer’s contribution to the book edited by Myron B. Penner, Christianity and the Postmodern Turn: Six Views, and was reminded of just how helpful is Vanhoozer’s approach for these very situations.  Vanhoozer helps to distinguish a proper Christian epistemology - one that wholeheartedly affirms the creator/creature distinction - over and against a naturalistic one.

Here are some great quotes.  By the way, if you’ve got fundementalistic tendencies lurking under the surface, some of these quotes may cause them to surface!

I agree with the postmodern insight that human reasoning is situated.  I also agree with Lesslie Newbigin that the postmodern critique of foundationalism has shown that human thinking always takes place within “fiduciary” frameworks.  Even the Enlightenment project began with a “faith” in the omnicompetence of reason, with a faith in a certain way of mapping the world and our way in it. The question, then, is not whether we can avoid subscribing to some fiduciary framework or another, but rather, which one enables us to make cognitive contact with reality?

All human thinking takes place within fiduciary frameworks, but only the biblical frameworks enable us rightly to interpret the nature of ultimate reality.

Christianity and the Postmodern Turn, pg. 86 (emphasis mine)

And later on the same page:

Reason does not stand over the gospel, deciding which map to accept and what to reject.  Here Christians and postmoderns agree: reason itself is always already situated.  Postmodern philosophy is never “from above.”  Christians are therefore entitled to assume the gospel as the ultimate interpretive framework with which to make sense of all other knowledge and experience. To reason Christianly is to negotiate the real world with the aid of biblical maps.  Reason here plays a ministerial role.  But are we rational in accepting just these maps?  I believe that rationality is less a matter of starting points or neutral ground than it is a matter of being willing to put one’s faith commitments to any number of critical, even existential, tests.

Finally, in Vanhoozer’s response to Douglas Geivett (interestingly enough, Vanhoozer and Geivett are both on the “side” of the debate that is critiquing postmodernity!), he makes the following comment about direct and indirect aquaintence and evidence:

Testimony seems to be indirect almost by definition.  Yet I would want to maintain that we are within our epistemic rights to believe something on the basis of testimony.  To be sure, testimony is as fallible a source as any other (including my own sense experience - why else would I need corrective lenses?). But rationality is not a matter of starting points but of being willing to submit one’s beliefs to critical testing.  I agree with Thomas Reid that we are rational in believing what we are told unless there is good reason to think that the source is untrustworthy.  Beliefs are innocent until proven guilty.  My impression is that, for the foundationalist, beliefs are considered guilty until proven innocent.  W.K. Clifford claimed that we are ethically wrong to believe anything except on the basis - foundation! - of sufficient evidence.  It is precisely such skeptical sentiments that have fueled two centuries and more of biblical criticism.

Christianity and the Postmodern Turn, pg.197

So what?  Where am I going with all this?  The answer is simple.  Christians who are embarking on the task of academic Biblical studies cannot simply reflect on the Biblical text itself; they must critically assess how they, their fellow students, and their professors reflect on the Biblical text.  (Note: I’m primarily referring to Biblical studies done in a secular academic setting; such as my own studies.)  Hermeneutics isn’t just something that preachers and conservatives do.  Everyone does hermeneutics!  What is problematic, however, is that most Biblical scholars refuse to admit that their starting points are not self evident and that their very thinking patters must be justified!

When one uncritically imbibes from the results of so called “scientific study of the Bible,” there is not much that will compel him or her to trust the Bible as God’s word!  At that point, they no longer view the Bible as that canon that informs and determines their thinking patters (read: epistemology), but view their own reason as the canon that informs and determines their thoughts about the Bible.

__________________________
Andrew Compton
Upland, CA