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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: David Bentley Hart on Paul
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Dark Knight
Super Zero
# 9415
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Posted
Kerg hosts - feel free to move to Purg if you think that forum better suits.
A friend sent through the provocatively titled piece by Eastern Orthodox NT scholar David Bentley Hart, who is here to tell you that everything you think you know about Paul is likely wrong.
I think some of the work on covenantal nomism has been excellent in dispersing the fallacious dichotomy that many of us who grew up Protestant were once taught existed between "law" and "grace" in the Bible. Although it is taking some time for that to die a death.
What I like about Hart's piece is how emphatically he makes the point that Paul's world is so fundamentally different from ours. Of course, the hermeneutic task is to try and bridge that gap and understand how the Scripture speaks to our present circumstance, but without understanding that initial, deep otherness, attempting to apply the texts ends up in little but eisegesis.
I understand Hart has authored a translation of the New Testament, which he refers to in the linked piece. So my questions to you lot, many of whom have forgotten more about the NT than I will ever know, are these:
- Have you had a look at the translation, and if so what do you make of it?
- What do you think of Hart's argument here?
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So don't ever call me lucky
You don't know what I done, what it was, who I lost, or what it cost me - A B Original: I C U
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Love is as strong as death (Song of Solomon 8:6).
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
As recently as this week I've been wondering out loud whether guilt is an intrinsic part of Paul's theology (my dad has a book somewhere entitled "Romans - a courtroom drama") - and commented out loud that in my limited understanding, the Orthodox don't have the same theological concept of guilt that Western Christianity does.
I'm drawn to what Hart writes (especially as he seems to have absorbed a lot of CS Lewis along the way...), but I am very attached to the idea of grace triumphing over law and legalism and a little suspicious of basing theology on a one-man translation (speaking here as a translator).
To my surprise, a quick word search for "guilt" and "guilty" in the NIV produces no results in Romans at all. However, I would be interested to know how, and how legitimately, Hart translates what the NIV has as "condemnation" in Romans 3.8, 5.16,18, and 8.1.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Dark Knight
Super Zero
# 9415
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Posted
That is fair enough. I would very much like to see his translation. He does seem a bit dismissive of translation by committee. I would think the presence of others would help balance prejuduces.
I spoke to a mate of mine who is a NT scholar, and a big fan of DBH. My mate thinks he is right that Paul did not affirm an eternal conscious hell, which is not the same as saying he did not hold to it (but arguments from silence are never a great idea); but DBH is almost certainly wrong on Paul's view of the law. Re the latter, Paul was not simply critical of the ritual law (as for example Mark is in Mark 7:1-23), but also of the moral law (see for example Romans chapter 7, where Paul's diatribe focuses on the moral law "You shall not covet").
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
I have a friend, also Orthodox, who is a student at ND and knows Hart personally. He says Hart is a solid scholar, and that he will let me know what he thinks after he gets a chance to look at the translation.
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Dark Knight
Super Zero
# 9415
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Posted
Glad you are reading, mt! Particularly as I was wondering if DBH's view of hell is influenced by his Orthodoxy. Do you think this possible?
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So don't ever call me lucky
You don't know what I done, what it was, who I lost, or what it cost me - A B Original: I C U
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Love is as strong as death (Song of Solomon 8:6).
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Honest Ron Bacardi
Shipmate
# 38
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Posted
Dark Knight - DBH is addressing several topics here which have been the attention of a number of high-profile protestant scholars over the last few decades. That work gets lumped together under the title of "The New Perspective(S) on Paul". The Wiki page is well worth a look - New Perspective on Paul. You'll see a comment towards the end on how Orthodox scholars tend to rate such work.
quote:
He does seem a bit dismissive of translation by committee. I would think the presence of others would help balance prejuduces.
That's true, but it can work the other way around too. Single translators may be prone to individualist interpretations. Groups of translators may be more prone to groupthink-type errors. In this respect, it's worth noting that both the NPoP and DBH are pointing towards interpretive mindsets heavily informed by reformation hot-topics (if you see what I mean), so the latter type of misinterpretation is very much in view.
You can read most of DBH's translation of Matthew and Mark if you follow the links you supplied in your OP. I read the first ten pages of Matthew, and found myself warming to it. It does come across as very close to the original, though I can't say I have tried taking that to any depth - I just skim-read it. It's a pity the available example chapters didn't include Romans!
Interesting topic - thanks for the lead.
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Anglo-Cthulhic
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Honest Ron Bacardi
Shipmate
# 38
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Posted
Eutychus wrote: quote:
To my surprise, a quick word search for "guilt" and "guilty" in the NIV produces no results in Romans at all. However, I would be interested to know how, and how legitimately, Hart translates what the NIV has as "condemnation" in Romans 3.8, 5.16,18, and 8.1.
All those are courtroom terms rather than eschatological terms (though obviously you might be able to read the latter into the former, though embedding that jump into your translation looks potentially highly problematic). In fact, the word used in 3.8 is krima (judgement) - it's the same word Paul uses in 11:33 in the plural, and I really dont think it carries the connotation of condemnation there. Damnation sounds a step beyond that even, and some translations use that word.
The word meaning "Penalty following that judgement" would be katakrima I think.
You would need a separate thread to look at all the cognate uses I suspect.
[ 10. January 2018, 10:11: Message edited by: Honest Ron Bacardi ]
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Anglo-Cthulhic
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Dark Knight
Super Zero
# 9415
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Posted
Thankyou Honest Ron, I have heard a bit about the New Perspectives. Sounds very stimulating to me.
Our NT guy at my uni has just ordered DBH's translation. Looking forward to having a look.
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So don't ever call me lucky
You don't know what I done, what it was, who I lost, or what it cost me - A B Original: I C U
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Love is as strong as death (Song of Solomon 8:6).
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dark Knight:
Glad you are reading, mt! Particularly as I was wondering if DBH's view of hell is influenced by his Orthodoxy. Do you think this possible?
Of course; we all bring our perspectives to bear on anything we read. Orthodoxy has no dogma concerning Hell, other than that God will not save people against their will. We do have a lot of images of what people think Hell looks like. The most common (popular) one, the "River of Fire" image, is that Hell is the river of fire that emanates from God, and is God's love. It burns and torments those who hate him.
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Evensong
Shipmate
# 14696
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dark Knight:
- Have you had a look at the translation, and if so what do you make of it?
- What do you think of Hart's argument here?
Heard lots of whinging about the translation but have not read it myself.
I think his argument in that article you linked to is right in the sense that Paul was rather a mystic in believing Jesus had conquered the principalities and powers of "this present evil age" and by being "in Christ" we can become part of that.
He is always banging on about being "in Christ".
Rather Christos Victor wot?
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a theological scrapbook
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
As I said, irresistibly reminded of CS Lewis in Perelandra: quote:
When the Bible used that very expression about fighting with principalities and powers and depraved hypersomatic beings at great heights (our translation is very misleading at that point, by the way) it meant that quite ordinary people were to do the fighting…
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Honest Ron Bacardi
Shipmate
# 38
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Posted
Evensong wrote: quote:
Heard lots of whinging about the translation but have not read it myself.
Really? Any guidance for us on the subjects or the direction from where the criticism came?
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Anglo-Cthulhic
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RdrEmCofE
Shipmate
# 17511
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Posted
quote:
Eutychus I'm drawn to what Hart writes (especially as he seems to have absorbed a lot of CS Lewis along the way...), but I am very attached to the idea of grace triumphing over law and legalism and a little suspicious of basing theology on a one-man translation (speaking here as a translator).
To my surprise, a quick word search for "guilt" and "guilty" in the NIV produces no results in Romans at all. However, I would be interested to know how, and how legitimately, Hart translates what the NIV has as "condemnation" in Romans 3.8, 5.16,18, and 8.1.
Jaques Ellul has something to say on the subject.
quote:
When we dissociate, when we choose (a text , an aspect, or a truth), trying to construct a rational and noncontradictory system, we plunge tragically into nihilism. An example is provided by sin, whose importance we have seen for the birth of Western nihilism. The mistake has been to divide sin into original and personal sin, to describe ourselves as intrinsically sinners, as though we are without God (but how can we be without God if God is God?). There has thus arisen the disastrous and ridiculous debate whether sin has brought total corruption, or whether there is still anything left in us, as Roman Catholics believe but Protestants do not. Sin becomes a category of its own. Sin becomes our human nature, etc. What is forgotten here is simply that the Bible does not describe sin and sinners in this way. We learn about sin only on the basis of the proclamation of grace and pardon. It is when we take God's Word with absolute seriousness that we find that we are sinners, we and not others, not people as such, not objectively, but I myself as I hear this Word. It is when I believe in Christ crucified that I learn the depth of my sin. It is as one who is pardoned that I see myself as a sinner. It is we ourselves who have restored what seems to us to be logical order, that first we are objectively sinners, and then God pardons us; for in our logic we pardon a child only when it has first disobeyed. From this logic of ours we derive a general law and formulate the universality of human sin. WE begin with an abstract and collective message about sinners, with the proclamation of sin. But Biblically we have only a proclamation of grace and a preaching of pardon. The Biblical revelation about sin proceeds in retroactive fashion, whereas we set up a progressive method where, once pardon is no longer heard and people are no longer conscious of grace, only the residue of sin remains. Christianity then falls justly under the charge of having crushed people with guilt and chained them to evil. To get out, to escape this evil, there is then negation of God's will for us, of the law, of all morality, etc. There is thus an entry into nihilism. The same danger is run, the same illusion fostered, by the tendency to make Jesus and the gospel a political message, to select from revelation only the part that concerns the poor, revolution, etc.
Jaques Ellul, The Subversion of Christianity
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Love covers many sins. 1 Pet.4:8. God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, not holding their sins against them; 2 Cor.5:19
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Evensong
Shipmate
# 14696
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
Evensong wrote: quote:
Heard lots of whinging about the translation but have not read it myself.
Really? Any guidance for us on the subjects or the direction from where the criticism came?
I'm part of a group called Fans of David Bentley Hart on Facebook and there's been lots of talk that I'm afraid I haven't really paid much attention to but an article appeared today worth looking at.
It's NT Wright's review of the translation. See here.
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a theological scrapbook
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
It's NT Wright's review of the translation. See here.
That was good but it felt like it ended way too soon. He was just getting going and then it stopped. ![[Frown]](frown.gif)
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
The review confirms my suspicions about lone Bible translators. I can't claim to be a Greek scholar but I'm enough of a linguist to see that he grabs the Greek by the neck and makes it do things in English it was never designed to do in the original to give it a sort of exotic flavour.
Rather like Eugene Peterson's Message translation, this might make it a refreshing read of a familiar text and possibly offer some new insights, but these would then need to be checked more cautiously against the Greek before being taken as legitimate.
Moreover, I agree with Wright's assessment that doing so as a one-man translation team with a theological agenda in mind is indeed going to result in a very idiosyncratic translation in which, in the case of doubt, one takes one's preferred meaning for the translation rather than finding a word that conveys the ambiguity of the original.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Jengie jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
Lets be slightly careful, that is also true of committee versions when there is a dominant translator. I am thinking here of the New English Bible Old Testament where I happen to know the back story.
Jengie
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
Oh, the stories I could tell about French bible translations...
Some translations are more biased than others. The JW's New World translation springs to mind, as does, in French, the Bible du Semeur favoured by many evangelicals. Others, such as the TOB ecumenical translation or Parole de Vie, are done with more of an eye to neutrality.
Having a translation committee does not remove all bias, but it certainly has less bias than a single translator.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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fletcher christian
Mutinous Seadog
# 13919
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Posted
I'm not sure how relevant this is, but I remember reading material on Paul that was looking at his 'hierarchy of heaven', if you will, in regards to his understanding of how the Law operated. This would have been some time in the mid-1990's. It was suggesting that he uses this model to demonstrate how 'in Christ' humanity is lifted higher than the angelic host into a more privileged and special position before God than the angels. In doing so, humanity is lifted above the confines of Law into a new and more perfect freedom. In this sense Paul can be read in somewhat mystical terms. Work stemming from this - but based more on Ephesians than anything else - has been done by the Augustinian Kieran O'Mahony, who argues to see and read Paul in the mystical tradition of his time.
Sadly, time has ravaged this old brain, and while I can see the colour and design of the book I originally read on this, I cannot for the life of me recall its title or its contributors. I may also be misrepresenting some of the ideas too.
[ 17. January 2018, 09:31: Message edited by: fletcher christian ]
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Staretz Silouan
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
That's the kind of detective work I live for!
Anything here look familiar?
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Dark Knight
Super Zero
# 9415
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
Moreover, I agree with Wright's assessment that doing so as a one-man translation team with a theological agenda in mind is indeed going to result in a very idiosyncratic translation in which, in the case of doubt, one takes one's preferred meaning for the translation rather than finding a word that conveys the ambiguity of the original.
Like this, for example?
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So don't ever call me lucky
You don't know what I done, what it was, who I lost, or what it cost me - A B Original: I C U
----
Love is as strong as death (Song of Solomon 8:6).
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Jack o' the Green
Shipmate
# 11091
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
quote:
Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
Evensong wrote: quote:
Heard lots of whinging about the translation but have not read it myself.
Really? Any guidance for us on the subjects or the direction from where the criticism came?
I'm part of a group called Fans of David Bentley Hart on Facebook and there's been lots of talk that I'm afraid I haven't really paid much attention to but an article appeared today worth looking at.
It's NT Wright's review of the translation. See here.
Bentley Hart's response can be found here.
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Dark Knight
Super Zero
# 9415
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Posted
You beat me to it, Jack!
To mt's comment earlier - having read DBH's response, I am left wondering if Wright's "review" was so brief because he hasn't actually read that much of the text.
Certainly, in this brawl, Wright seems to have brought a shiv to a gun fight.
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So don't ever call me lucky
You don't know what I done, what it was, who I lost, or what it cost me - A B Original: I C U
----
Love is as strong as death (Song of Solomon 8:6).
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Jack o' the Green
Shipmate
# 11091
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Posted
![[Biased]](wink.gif) I'm a member of the same FB group as Evensong. Bentley Hart seems to be quite thin skinned and combative by nature. I don't really think that he is in a position to complain about rhetorical devices. His clashes with Edward Feser make quite interesting reading.
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Dark Knight
Super Zero
# 9415
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Posted
While I will take your word on that (and I can't say I disagree re the thickness of our intrepid scholar's skin), certainly Wright criticising another scholar for doing translation work with a theological agenda is more than a bit rich.
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So don't ever call me lucky
You don't know what I done, what it was, who I lost, or what it cost me - A B Original: I C U
----
Love is as strong as death (Song of Solomon 8:6).
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Jack o' the Green
Shipmate
# 11091
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dark Knight:
While I will take your word on that (and I can't say I disagree re the thickness of our intrepid scholar's skin), certainly Wright criticising another scholar for doing translation work with a theological agenda is more than a bit rich.
Agreed. I doubt very much whether any of us are completely blank slates in that regard.
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
I once again refer Kerygmania readers to the now sadly defunct Better Bibles Blog.
There's such a thing as translating to an agenda and such a thing as translating to the best of one's ability despite recognition of one's own potential agendas.
I had the privilege of knowing Jules-Marcel Nicole who amongst other things translated Job in the Nouvelle Segond Bible - and publicly admitted that another translation, published between when he did it and when it went to press, had made him realise he had it all wrong.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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BroJames
Shipmate
# 9636
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Posted
David Bentley Hart is obviously cross about Wright's review, and understandably so (even if it should happen to be that Wright is correct). This does lead David Bentley Hart to be a little slapdash, in one instance, anyway, in his response.
Wright comments that quote:
and anyone hearing “one such as was rapt up all the way” will think of parcels, or perhaps overcoats
[my emphasis - Wright's choice of word is significant] and David Bentley Hart responds quote:
He even seems to think that the phrase “rapt up” will be unintelligible to modern readers
[my emphasis again]
Further, David Bentley Hart then goes on and illustrates (IMO) precisely the potential confusion that Wright identifies quote:
but to me phrases like “rapt in contemplation” or “rapt up in his own affairs” or “rapt admiration”
Of those three phrases the middle one is surely 'wrapped up in his own affairs' Indeed the only usages of 'rapt up' that I can find are deliberate plays on words between the use of 'rapt' and the idea of 'wrapped up'.
I don't feel able to comment on the rest with out reading David Bentley Hart's translation - and I suspect any comment would exceed a reasonable length of post.
[ 17. January 2018, 15:49: Message edited by: BroJames ]
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Dark Knight
Super Zero
# 9415
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Posted
The point, Eutychus, is that Wright appears to be critiquing DBH for doing exactly what he himself did - translating the NT with a theological agenda.
I still haven't read DBH's translation, and look forward to doing so. It may be that the linguistic problems Wright and others have pointed out are real. But DBH is at least admitting he has a dogmatic position. It would behoove Wright to do the same.
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So don't ever call me lucky
You don't know what I done, what it was, who I lost, or what it cost me - A B Original: I C U
----
Love is as strong as death (Song of Solomon 8:6).
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
Oh, I got your point. Many translators are prima donnas (interpreters even more so); and I would think the tendency is exacerbated by being a theologian first and a translator second, irrespective of the views espoused.
Getting seventy translators to work together on the LXX must have been like herding cats, but it was probably a wise decision even though I suspect no single one of them was happy with the outcome.
[ 18. January 2018, 05:20: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Zappa
Ship's Wake
# 8433
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
Getting seventy translators to work together on the LXX must have been like herding cats, but it was probably a wise decision even though I suspect no single one of them was happy with the outcome.
Maybe like The Jesus Seminar thay had little green and blue and I dunno, white placards and waved them around to express views on each word. But the LXX dudes did a good job. ![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif)
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Jack o' the Green
Shipmate
# 11091
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Posted
The story of the 70 translators of the Septuagint is alas untrue. I believe that according to legend, each scholar worked on the translation alone and they independently produced 70 identical versions.
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Honest Ron Bacardi
Shipmate
# 38
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Posted
Eutychus wrote: quote:
Oh, I got your point. Many translators are prima donnas (interpreters even more so); and I would think the tendency is exacerbated by being a theologian first and a translator second, irrespective of the views espoused.
Many detailed commentaries include a personal translation of this sort. I suppose their redeeming feature (if they are any good) is that they also take you through all the other various options which of course a straight translation alone will not.
Some of those critiques look serious to me. Pity. Though I would still tend to stick with my observation earlier that group translations will tend to avoid this sort of thing, though not groupthink type errors, which they may in fact reinforce.
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Anglo-Cthulhic
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
Both the Segond Révisé (that was the version I meant above, sorry, not the Nouvelle Segond) and the Revised KJV do an especially good, lingustic job of providing footnotes with linguistic/textual variants, rather than little theological "explanations" which the uninformed take to be as inspired as the text (e.g. Scofield, Semeur).
Ideally, I suppose one assembles a team of translators from different religious backgrounds, though of course no solution is perfect.
[ 19. January 2018, 04:18: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Honest Ron Bacardi
Shipmate
# 38
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Posted
Eutychus wrote: quote:
Ideally, I suppose one assembles a team of translators from different religious backgrounds, though of course no solution is perfect.
Yes, that's the way to go. Though whether that would fly with certain sectors of the bible-buying public I'm less clear. Some would certainly consider that a minus point.
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Anglo-Cthulhic
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fletcher christian
Mutinous Seadog
# 13919
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Posted
Posted by Euty:
quote:
That's the kind of detective work I live for!
Anything here look familiar?
Sorry, I've been away a couple of days and clearly led you on a wild goose chase. The book I was initially referring to was not by Kieran O'Mahony (although KM does use a similar lens with which to look at Paul). The initial book I was referring to was a collection of papers by different authors. I've done a bit of a search, but not being able to recall the title means it's a bit of a shot in the dark trying to find ti.
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'God is love insaturable, love impossible to describe'
Staretz Silouan
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fletcher christian
Mutinous Seadog
# 13919
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Posted
Posted by Dark Knight:
quote:
Wright criticising another scholar for doing translation work with a theological agenda is more than a bit rich
I must confess I find Wright's work is becoming less and less convincing to me. It's not that his early material wasn't solid old stuff in the vein of Gore - albeit a little (or perhaps a lot) less daring - but his alignment of his work and opinion with the politics of the church have to my mind, discredited him and are possible veering towards making him irrelevant. The older he has become the more pompous he comes across (this of course may not be true in reality at all, but is nevertheless a perceived notion) and he has moved away from inquiry to that bilious position of 'I've done this for so long that I am now so important and indispensable and therefore you must pay my opinion greater respect than anyone else.' The reality is he is a two-bit scholar in the UK and UK theology and Biblical Studies frankly doesn't command that level of respect when compared to recent years in the States or continental Europe. There's a certain delusional nature to Wright's approach to all these things in this regard.
I suspect though - if I am forced to be kind - that he recognises that the tide is moving out on his scholarship that he has invested so much time and effort in and scholars do tend to get a little excitable when this begins to happen in their own lifetimes. I understand the pain of that and most are spared it and die off before it comes, but when you model yourself on being a new and more evangelical Gore for the Biblical Studies world you can;t exactly act all surprised when the inevitable happens.
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'God is love insaturable, love impossible to describe'
Staretz Silouan
Posts: 5235 | From: a prefecture | Registered: Jul 2008
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k-mann
Shipmate
# 8490
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dark Knight:
While I will take your word on that (and I can't say I disagree re the thickness of our intrepid scholar's skin), certainly Wright criticising another scholar for doing translation work with a theological agenda is more than a bit rich.
Except he did no such thing. He criticised another scholar for that scholar's claim that he didn't translated with theological agenda.
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"Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt."
— Paul Tillich
Katolikken
Posts: 1314 | From: Norway | Registered: Sep 2004
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Unum Solum
Shipmate
# 18904
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Posted
Reading this thread and much other material out there that implies we have misunderstood what the original biblical writers were ‘really’ saying, not being a theologian, not being a scholar, not being able to read the original languages - what do I do with the Bible?
If I pick it up to read now there is this undercurrent of doubt created by ‘scholars’ that what I am reading is somehow flawed. I then find it almost impossible to separate this sense of doubt to all other matters of faith.
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I will not say do not weep for not all tears are an evil. - Gandalf
Posts: 53 | From: Auckland, New Zealand | Registered: Jan 2018
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
Hi Unum Solum, welcome, great first post ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
We've been discussing the inspiration of Scripture down in Dead Horses (again) recently, but I hope I can risk a response to this here.
Firstly, in terms of Scripture being a source of God's revelation to us, I think the written word is only one half of the deal: the other half is the Spirit of God working in the reader to bring that written word alive to them and make it relevant and life-changing for them.
Even if we had access to a flawless, original, 100-proof divinely-inspired manuscript, how successive generations rightly understood it (which in my reading involves actually applying it) would be constantly updated as they interacted with that original 'Word'. And so it is for us.
Secondly, and thanks in part to my view on the role of the Spirit in bringing us the Word of God, I believe that Scripture "works" on an infinite number of levels. Enlightened and enlivened by the Spirit, it "works" for a child who hears it, for an unsophisticated, unschooled person who reads it, and for the learned theologian and linguist who struggles with translation and historical interpretations and manuscript reliability and sources and all the rest. It just does.
What God expects of us is to love him with all we have, including all our minds, however deep or limited they may be, and to work through our doubts in a walk with him.
The key is doing that with integrity.
As a preacher, I need to be able to preach to people with a very unsophisticated view of Scripture without looking down on their beliefs and without causing them unnecessarily to stumble, but I also need to be honest in what I assert about the text and with myself about my doubts. So far I've found that wrestling with my doubts with honesty and before God doesn't draw me away from the text, it draws me closer to both it and him.
I must confess to never having finished an NT Wright book. Melon sent me one called What Saint Paul really said and me being me, I found it hard to get beyond the title. Of course there's room for new scholarship and off-the-wall, make-familiar-text-jump-off-the-page-at-you translations, but at the end of the day it's not about what some expert says St Paul really said but about what the Spirit is really saying to you.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
I suppose for me, there is a growing realisation that there is a high degree of "operator error" when seeking to interpret the bible.
Accepting that reality seems to me to be part of the business of faith: deciding for oneself what it means.
And there are a bunch of strategies: for example diving deep into a particular framework of understanding based on Tradition. Or there is a strategy of trying to peel back the layers to get to the unvarnished origins of the text. Or there is (some kind of) engagement between culture and the text so that the one mediates the other and vice versa.
It seems to me that there is at least one value to studies about "what Paul really meant" essays, namely that often these exposés challenge our unthought-out assumptions and cultural baggage. On the other hand, I can't really see that it is possible to be sure which of the panoply of possibilities is "really" true.
Ultimately I suppose the challenge is to think and engage and determine whether they are useful/helpful or not.
The only alternative appears to be to throw up ones hands and say that it is all incomprehensible gibberish. Which, admittedly, is a fairly attractive - if bleak - option at times.
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arse
Posts: 10697 | Registered: Sep 2002
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balaam
Making an ass of myself
# 4543
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
It seems to me that there is at least one value to studies about "what Paul really meant" essays, namely that often these exposés challenge our unthought-out assumptions and cultural baggage.
What Paul meant by "works" may not be what Luther, Calvin etc. said, But ...
- Luther and Calvin were wrong. Paul was writing to Jews who did not believe in salvation by works as we now interpret it. What Paul was writing about were markers to being Gods people, including circumcision. That is the conclusion if you go back to Paul's time.
- Luther and Calvin were right. Salvation by works was being taught by the Roman Catholic Church at that time and was implicit in the selling of indulgences at that time. I needed to be said. That is my conclusion if you go back to Luther's time.
It all depends on which historical perspective you take.
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Last ever sig ...
blog
Posts: 9049 | From: Hen Ogledd | Registered: May 2003
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Dark Knight
Super Zero
# 9415
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
quote:
Originally posted by Dark Knight:
While I will take your word on that (and I can't say I disagree re the thickness of our intrepid scholar's skin), certainly Wright criticising another scholar for doing translation work with a theological agenda is more than a bit rich.
Except he did no such thing. He criticised another scholar for that scholar's claim that he didn't translated with theological agenda.
Huh?
Posts: 2958 | From: Beyond the Yellow Brick Road | Registered: Apr 2005
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Jengie jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
Not synonymous statements.
People like me would maintain that everyone has an agenda. A person who says they have not is deluding themselves.
The claim that someone is giving a biased translation would assume that this was deliberate rather than inevitable. In other words it is the difference created by whether you believe an unbiased translation is possible.
It is also true that we are most often blind to our own biases. My test of a translation is good is whether it will translate against a known agenda. Oddly enough more commonly found in conservative* Christian translations than Liberal ones in my experience. This may be because I am more clear on conservative biases. Conservative here means intelligent sola scriptura grouping who take biblical criticism seriously when trying to establish the text.
Jengie
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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge
Back to my blog
Posts: 20894 | From: city of steel, butterflies and rainbows | Registered: May 2001
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k-mann
Shipmate
# 8490
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dark Knight:
quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
quote:
Originally posted by Dark Knight:
While I will take your word on that (and I can't say I disagree re the thickness of our intrepid scholar's skin), certainly Wright criticising another scholar for doing translation work with a theological agenda is more than a bit rich.
Except he did no such thing. He criticised another scholar for that scholar's claim that he didn't translated with theological agenda.
Huh?
You say that Wright criticised a scholar for doing translation work with a theological agenda. He did not. Wright points out that Hart claimed to give a "pitilessly literal translation" of the New Testament, "not shaped by later theological and doctrinal history." He then pointed out that these claims, to be 'literal' and 'undogmatic,' are "not borne out" by pointing out Hart's own theological agenda. He wasn't criticising Hart for doing a biased translation but for claiming not to do so.
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"Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt."
— Paul Tillich
Katolikken
Posts: 1314 | From: Norway | Registered: Sep 2004
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