By Secco
Some years back for a course I was taking in psychiatry we were assigned to regularly visit a local mental hospital. The first and second floors were “day programs” and the third floor was the locked unit, for those not safe enough to be let out. I will never forget the intensity of the cigarette smoke: I’ve since learned that many schizophrenics self-medicate with nicotine. Also unforgettable was the look in the eyes of the many people wandering the bare rooms of the third floor. But for this post, I’d like to talk about what a psychiatrist had on a chalkboard in a side room for a group therapy session. It was a quote from Kierkegaard:
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By jupiterschild
I’m not a prescriptivist when it comes to language. That is, when a foreign-speaking missionary comes home from a mission correcting everyone’s grammar, people are correct (imo) to be turned off by it (this usually assumes, as prescriptivists have throughout time, that English should work like Latin, Greek, or some other language). This “correct” English itself would have been considered a bastardization not too terribly long ago. Split infinitives don’t bother me (though I try to really not use them), and I’m even okay with everyone bringing their books. You’ll hear me gleeflully postpositioning prepositions, at least when appropriate to the audience I’m speaking to, and I’ve certainly transitioned to verbing nouns.
But there are some things that I’d like to correct, for reasons other than to preserve grammar.*
Public enemy #1: “Processeez”: Read more »
By TT
Doesn’t everyone know that Jesus was 30 when he started his ministry, and 33 when he was killed? This seems to be common knowledge, right? Well, sort of. But not everyone agrees.
Let’s begin with the Synoptic Gospels (Mark, Matthew, and Luke). The only clear statement concerning Jesus’s age comes from Luke 3:23, which says that Jesus was “about 30 years of age” when he began his ministry, following his baptism by John. This obviously lacks some precision. How old Jesus was when he died is similarly ambiguous. According to the Synoptics, all of the events described in Jesus’ life can easily fit into just one year. When quoting Isaiah, Jesus invokes the “acceptable year of hte Lord” (Lk 4:19), which some Christians interpreted as referring to his single year of ministry. However, there is no attempt to give an accurate chronology of Jesus’ life in these gospels, so we shouldn’t expect precision. For other difficulties regarding the chronology of Jesus’ life, see Mogget’s previous post on Jesus’ birth and death. Read more »
By TT
The [bracket] has been the focus of some rather heated debates in the study of religion in recent years, and poses a particular challenge for Latter-day Saints. This debate was typified in a Harvard Divinity Bulletin exchange between Stephen Prothero of Boston University and Robert Orsi (et al.) who was then at Harvard, but has now moved to Northwestern. Prothero criticized Orsi for his methodological choice to “bracket” the truth claims of the religions he studied. He explains, “I have come to believe that the endless bracketing that I have always taken as my charge is viable only as long as our work exists in the splendid isolation of the Ivory Tower. In the rough and tumble of the real world, it is not possible, and likely not desirable.” He described the process of Religious Studies scholars who did not say what they really thought was a “good or a bad thing” as a “cat-and-mouse game.” Read more »
By smallaxe
In Pt I we looked at developing a curriculum and focused on “core classes”. That discussion is still on-going. This post will examine the develoment of an Introduction to Religious Studies course (which will be part of the core classes), and a required theories course which majors will take during the Sophomore (and perhaps Junior) year. The issue of language requirements was also raised so let’s toss that into the mix here. Read more »
By Mogget
Yesterday’s post was on Vatican II as a background to Dei Verbum. Here you will see how the Catholics talk about integrating critical methods with the pastoral mission of the Church. This is a very interesting topic, but I am assured that students at BYU would find this scary and useless (See comment #30) so if you came out of that institution you’ll want to read the rest of this with your eyes closed and the blankets over your head.
Although pretty much all of the documents of Vatican II made extensive use of scripture (the result of the research directed by Divino), the teaching of the Council on scripture is found in the Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation and called Dei Verbum. This document has six chapters, five of which we’ll cover today.
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By Mogget
Last time we met, Pius XII had published Divino, and set the Catholics on a glide path for a more productive encounter with modern life. I should emphasize that it’s a Catholic approach to modern life, so you won’t be finding a retreat from Catholic positions on faith and morals. But you will see that they are far more engaged than they had been.
Before we get into Vatican II, there’s one more event I’d like to mention because it gets at the relationship between exegesis and theology. Before Divino, and for quite some time afterward, many Catholic theologians used the Bible as a sourcebook for proof texts to create theologies that were often rather independent of the Bible. In the year preceding Vatican II, Karl Rahner, a theologian, tried to do something about that. His article was called “Exegese and Dogmatik” and it discussed the roles of exegetes and theologians. He used the formal “Ihr” (you) to address the exegetes and the familiar “Du” when speaking to his fellow theologians. To the exegetes he said that they must remember that they are Catholic exegetes, and that they must attend to “the Catholic principles governing the relationship between exegesis and dogmatic theology” and that they needed a more exact knowledge of scholastic theology. To his fellow theologians, however, he wrote:
You know less about exegesis than you should. As as dogmatic theologian you rightly claim to be allowed to engage in the work of exegesis and biblical theology in your own right, and not jsut to accept the results of the exegetical work of the specialist…But then you must perform the work of exegesis in the way that it has to be done today and not in the way you used to do it in the good old days…Your exegesis in dogmatic theology must be convincing also to the specialist in exegesis.
Among Catholics theology tends to be more highly regarded than exegesis. As is often the case, when an exegete must point out that some theological position is based on acontextual or ahistorical readings, or even just plain wrong, folks sometimes think that the exegete is attacking the Church. Rahner’s words came as a bit of a shock, but they were part of what was in the minds of those who worked on issues pertaining to scripture in Vatican II.
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By smallaxe
Okay, I know it will probably never happen, but… Read more »
By Mogget
Today’s important news is that I ate my first ripe tomato of the 2008 season last night. Now we can get back to the Catholics. When last we left off in this little exercise, Pius X had dealt rather, er…firmly…, with Modernism. In addition to excommunicating many of the Modernists, he condemned much of their thought. He also required the clergy to take an anti-Modernist oath. These folks seem to have complied, but not so enthusiastically, and once Pius X passed away things began to change.
So. Pius X was succeeded by Benedict XV in 1914. Benedict XV had been made an archbishop by Pius X, but he was also the target of a report rendered by one the “vigilance” committees. Under his pontificate, some of the worst excesses of the anti-Modernist movement were ended. Pius XI followed Benedict XV in 1922. His attention was pretty well captured by the need to deal with Fascism and Communism. Mit brennender Sorge called Nazism a new form of paganism and Divini Redemptoris condemned Communism. His successor was Pius XII (1939-1958). When folks discuss the response of Christianity to the Holocaust, it is this gentleman who often comes up at some point in the conversation.
And here we again pick up the story of how Catholics deal with scripture…
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By Mogget
When last we met to discuss the world of Catholic Biblical scholarship, Pius X had just excommunicated Alfred Loisy in an effort to suppress Modernism…
What else did Pius X do about Modernism? In addition to excommunicating Loisy, et. al., he called the Catholic faithful to reject Modernism root and branch. The first encyclical published was Lamentabili sane exitu, dated July 3, 1907. It listed 65 propositions, taken mostly from Loisy’s work but also including ideas from Tyrrell and a few others. What follows is from the preamble. Notice the negative evaluation of the idea that Biblical scholarship should go beyond the efforts of the “blessed past,” as also the condemnation of the idea that the doctrines of the Church change and develop:
With truly lamentable results, our age, casting aside all restraint in its search for the ultimate causes of things, frequently pursues novelties so ardently that it rejects the legacy of the human race. Thus it falls into very serious errors, which are even more serious when they concern sacred authority, the interpretation of Sacred Scripture, and the principal mysteries of Faith. The fact that many Catholic writers also go beyond the limits determined by the Fathers and the Church herself is extremely regrettable. In the name of higher knowledge and historical research (they say), they are looking for that progress of dogmas which is, in reality, nothing but the corruption of dogmas.
Then Pius X condemned 65 specific points, a few of which I have reproduced here. It’s pretty safe to say that now, one hundred years later, most of what Pius X condemned is accepted, albeit with some degree of nuance:
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By Mogget
This post arises from one of the issues raised in Nitsav’s Apologia. (Since it’s now, like, 130 comments long, I am sure we’ll never need any other identifier for that post.) At some point in the middle of all those comments, we got on to a discussion of how others handle the problematic issues raised by close study of the Bible, and from there to the modern Catholic approach to scripture. Since I come out of the Catholic intellectual tradition with respect to scripture, I decided I’d venture some thoughts. So by the end of this we’ll be at Dei Verbum and so forth, but right now we’ll start with the Modernist Crisis.
Modernism is one of those terms whose definition sometimes depends on just who is speaking. For our purposes, we’ll start with the idea that modernism is a way of thinking about the world that holds that folks can shape and improve their situation with the help of science, technology, and experimentation. What follows from this is that pretty much everything is examined, with the aim of determining what might be holding back progress. When something is identified as impeding progress, changes are advocated in order to bring about the desired outcomes. Therefore, modernism is in tension with traditional forms of art, thinking, religion, literature, etc., etc., and especially with the authority that supports these traditions. Since religions are typically pretty traditional with vertical authority structures and all, I am sure you can already see the train wreck in the distance.
Although Protestants made the leap into modernism first, the movement and the crisis it generated was not limited to them. Among Catholics, modernism was a pejorative expression first used about 1905 to describe a very loose association of scholarly trends in Catholic thinking. After examining the current state of the Catholic world, the modernists became convinced that Catholicism was not inherently incompatible with modernity and a synthesis was possible. Progress, however, was being held up and Catholics were behind Protestants.
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By Secco
There has been a fair amount of discussion on the question of whether Eve was deceived or not, as Paul says in 1 Tim 2:14. Books have been written, vociferous posts have gone back and forth, and apostles have been quoted. I’ve heard well-meaning Mormons dismiss the 1 Tim 2:14 verse as the only verse that supported the idea that Eve was misled, suggesting that in this case Paul was mistaken. Instead, the perspective is put forward that we should interpret Eve’s actions as courageous and done with foresight.
This is clearly a tricky topic, ripe for misogyny. I’m somewhat sympathetic to George Bernard Shaw’s claim that Paul is the “eternal enemy of women” (cited by Pagels, JAAR 42 [1974] 538) because Eve’s actions are so frequently interpreted as carrying implications for all women (a view I disagree with, btw). It will take another post to discuss the appropriateness of Eve’s actions; here, I want to show that (1) there is substantial textual support for what Paul says, based on the Old Testament account, and (2) other Standard Works confirm Paul’s assertion. Let me try and outline both points.
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By Nitsav
A commenter on another post said “To think that a couple years ago I envisioned myself wanting to work in the BYU Religious Department. For some reason however, I see myself more and more hoping to never do so. Hopefully smb is right and this will pass with the next generation.” I’m not picking on him, it’s a common enough sentiment, but he reminded me of this. Read more »
By jupiterschild
SCANDAL! Read on for details…
Given the many posts in the ‘nacle devoted to Sunday’s 30-year anniversary of the priesthood ban, I was surprised at the lack of attention given the anniversary in the Provo-based Daily Herald. Saturday, June 7th’s paper had a small (one-column) below-the-fold article noting the anniversary, while just under the Daily Herald’s logo at the top of the paper was a giant headline announcing the “Life and Style” section’s full-page article on Mack Wilberg’s taking the helm of the Tabernacle Choir. I do believe more was done in the online version,[1] but given the way this particular newspaper pitches to the LDS crowd, I find the lack of attention curious. Do they assume their readers would be upset by too much attention? Uninterested?
And I wonder if this seeming stance is at all related to perceptions promulgated recently by BYU’s top Religious Education professors in a discussion to air on KBYU this Sunday morning. They appear to defend (create?) a doctrinal basis for the priesthood ban. This was called to the ‘Nacle’s attention by David G at Juvenile Instructor. In the discussion that ensued, a call was made to petition KBYU not to broadcast the episode.
I don’t want to poach discussion from JI. [Go there and participate!] What I want to ask is what perspective is this answering? Does this represent tangible residues lingering from the Priesthood Ban, residues that the church has tried to denounce? Is it an attempt to counter the arguments that Brigham Young and Joseph Smith were simply racist?
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[1] I found this “vignette” of Darius Gray online, with the note that it ran on Saturday June 7th on A2, but in my (Provo-Orem) copy of the Herald there was no such article printed.
By Secco
Let me start out by saying I’m a big, big fan of obedience. And I also see many instances where the scriptures teach we should not criticize our leaders. I’ve got no problem with that – IMHO our leaders deserve all the support we can give them.
However, I think that we have been badly misinterpreting a story that is commonly used to support these concepts. The traditional Mormon interpretation of the story of Uzzah and the ark in 2 Samuel 6 and 1 Chr 13 is familiar to most of us: Uzzah reaches out to steady the ark during its transport and is killed for touching it. The modern-day interpretation for us has been that we should not correct Church leaders or Church policy, for despite our good intentions, the leaders of the Church are in charge and it is not our place to correct them. To quote from the D&C Student Manual for Religion 324/325, p188:
“’Uzzah was therefore a type of all who with good intentions, humanly speaking, yet with unsanctified minds, interfere in the affairs of the kingdom of God, from the notion that they are in danger, and with the hope of saving them.’…In modern revelation the Lord referred to this incident to teach the principle that the Lord does not need the help of men to defend his kingdom (see D&C 85:8). Yet even today there are those who fear the ark is tottering and presume to steady its course. There are those who are sure that women are not being treated fairly in the Church, those who would extend some unauthorized blessing, or those who would change the established doctrines of the Church. These are ark-steadiers. The best intentions do not justify such interference with the Lord’s plan.”
Or, in the shorter Seminary version (p97 of the Seminary D&C study guide),
“The phrase ’steady the ark’ has come to refer to those who lack faith in the Lord and His servants and instead do things based on their own wisdom.”
However, a close reading of the text supports just the opposite: Uzzah was likely killed for NOT correcting his priesthood leaders, who themselves were not following the scriptures. This conclusion is based on three items in the text:
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By jupiterschild
We’d like to welcome our newest guest blogger! Secco enjoys European breads, pastries, and all things chocolate (which fits in well over here). Secco is, as you may have already seen from the regular comments, full of interesting takes on scripture and Mormonism, and we look forward to the discussion that will no doubt be generated by this blogger’s presence. Welcome!
By TT
One of the recent debates in LDS intellectual circles has been whether or not Mormonism is about orthodoxy or orthopraxy. As far as I can remember, this debated heated up after Jim Faulconer’s 2002 Yale conference presentation on this topic. This debate has more or less died down, largely because people realized that it was a false dichotomy between the two options, and everyone recognized that it was a little bit of both. Today’s LDS Newsroom, however, seems to intervene in this debate with the following announcement:
SALT LAKE CITY | 6 Jun 2008 | The religious experience of members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is based on a spiritual witness from God that inspires both heart and mind, creating an interpersonal relationship directly with the divine. It does not require one to pass a rigorous theological test. Nor does it demand the extreme self-denial and seclusion of asceticism. Rather, this unique individual experience unfolds in the natural course of everyday living. Thus, the beliefs of Latter-day Saints are not rooted in concepts and principles, detached from the realities of life. They are grounded in a much deeper level of experience that motivates individuals to action.
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By jupiterschild
Last year I tried to give sure-fire evidence from a single chapter in Exodus supporting the claim that the first 5 books of the Hebrew Bible were arranged from multiple sources. One negative response to my three-part post came from Julie M. Smith over at Times and Seasons.* She said, essentially, that if this was the extent of the evidence for the Documentary Hypothesis, she’d lost her faith in what she’d been taught during her Master’s Degree in New Testament studies. In the discussion of her post that ensued, the disagreement centered on the existence of possible alternative explanations for the material I was discussing. I argued that we have clear evidence that Deuteronomy knew only one version of Moses’ re-ascent of Sinai (Horeb) preserved, in integrated fashion, in Exodus 34. The only logical explanation for this is that the author of Deuteronomy (not Moses) had before him two distinct sources (or one of the two), which he incorporated into his own source. On the other side, people including Julie argued that this is not the only (nor, I assume they meant to say, the best) explanation of the phenomenon. After all, because our literary sensitivities differ from those of the ancient world, we don’t have license to go carving up the text, especially not one that, tradition tells us, was penned by Moses himself. This is a common (if vernacular) type of critique of the DH, the misconceptions of which need to be dispelled.
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By TT
In many ways, the God of Mormonism is the patron saint of Lost Objects. Our relationship to this God is so close, to the point of calling him a “friend” at times, that he can help us retrace our steps to find some misplaced money, or most commonly, our keys. I admit that I have often utilized this particular service in my prayers.
God’s intimate involvement in our lives is one of the most central themes of Mormonism. Our testimony meetings are filled with accounts of God’s participation in the most mundane aspects of our existence. He can help us decide or know all sorts of things. For Mormons, the Spirit guides us to know the “truth” of all things; seriously, all things, especially the lame ones. Read more »
By Mogget
This is the third in a series of posts that will, at some point before Final Judgment, culminate in the exegesis of a selected section of 1 John. I will try to avoid the War and Peace effect this time but, my goodness, it is such fun to think about!
The bottom line is this: The community that had originally formed around the Beloved Disciple and the Fourth Gospel has now broken into at least two factions. The Elder writes to those who yet remain in his camp to confront and correct the errors of the schismatic group and to comfort them by assuring them that they have made the correct choice and are assured of eternal life. The cause of the break-up seems to be that while “both parties knew the proclamation of Christianity available to us through the Fourth Gospel…they interpreted it differently” (Brown, Community, 106).
HOW DO WE KNOW ANY OF THIS?
We know what we know about this conflict primarily from what 1 John tells us, so we have only the Elder’s word for the situation. There is no independent verification of the theological position taken by the Elder’s opponents, or of any of the ethical shortcomings that he attributes to them. It is quite likely that, if we had written evidence of their position, the Elder’s point of view would be declared just as profoundly inappropriate.
How, then, can we trust what he says? The best response to this question is to ask what might have been the consequences had the Elder misrepresented his opponents. It is clear enough that the breakup is quite recent, which implies that the Elder’s addressees knew from their own experience about his opponents. If his characterization were too far off, then his efforts to persuade and comfort would be rendered ineffective by this lack of authenticity. Personally, I think it more likely that we have an incomplete picture of the opponents rather than a very inaccurate one.
Finally, there is disagreement about whether or not the schism itself is the “main thrust” of the Elder’s remarks, or whether he has wider objectives including simply explaining what is an appropriate way to understand the Fourth Gospel. The folks who opt for the wider view are principally Pheme Perkins, Judith Lieu, and Ruth Edwards. My thought is that they have done us a service by calling attention back to the pastoral components of the text but I remain unconvinced of their larger position. You can get a synopsis of their thoughts and access to their works in any decent commentary. For my part, I will probably quote or allude to their thoughts at appropriate points rather than summarizing them now.
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