You readers of cryptotheology I mean. Among the most frequent google searches that reach my site (these come up without fail every day) are “ancient erotica” and “sexual penetration”. I didn’t even know I’d posted about sexual penetration! But just the other day came one that topped ‘em all: Someone got to me by searching for “a picture of a botty”. Honestly, talk about total depravity!!
Cultural Linguistics and Being Attentive to the New Testament
This post might be a bit long, so I’ll sum up the main point immediately – and you can read on if you think it’s interesting: The recent development of “cultural linguistics” includes the idea that our communication draws on cultural “schemas” (mental imagery) by which we make sense of the world. Could it be that one cultural schema of early Judaism was the pattern of “reversal” by which God vindicates the persecuted and punishes the boastful? And if we were better attuned to this underlying schema, might we hear parts of the New Testament more attentively?
Okay, now to fill it out: Firstly, “cultural linguistics”. My dad, Prof. Ian Malcolm, is an emeritus professor of linguistics in Australia. He recently gave a paper in which he outlined some features of this development in linguistics. In part, cultural linguistics considers how various groups, to varying degrees, share “mental imagery” that allows them to make sense of events and figures and stories, and to expect them to run a certain course. One cultural schema might be that of the “body”:
When we say, for example, “I can’t take it in,” or “He’s full of beans,” or “The boss blew his top,” we are operating according to the image of the body as a container, an image which, although we might be unaware of it, is embedded in our language; when we talk about the head of the page, or the school, or the bed, or whatever, we are following our culture’s pattern of projecting from our body onto the objects around us
One cultural schema among users of Australian Aboriginal English is the “tracking” pattern of repeated “movement” and “stopping” – which is expressed in much story-telling, reporting of events, etc.
I wonder if, for first century Judaism (for which the Psalms were an important resource for regular corporate recitation), the pattern of “human persecution” and “divine vindication” might have been a cultural schema that informed the way that history was read and expected to run. Consider the Jews who defiantly held out, against impossible odds, in Jerusalem or Masada – expecting God to step in at the last minute (or perhaps after death) and rescue them. Or consider Stephen’s reading of Hebrew history according to Acts 7:
- Abraham was promised that his descendants would be mistreated before God would step in
- Joseph suffered at the hands of his jealous brothers before God rescued him
- Moses was almost abandoned as a baby, before being adopted
- Moses was rejected and persecuted by fellow Israelites, before being commissioned by God
- Moses was again rejected as a ruler, before God judged Israelite idolatry
- Jesus, the Righteous One, was persecuted and crucified, before God raised him
Perhaps, in predicting that he would be “raised after three days”, Jesus was simply sharing this expectation that God would vindicate the righteous – and so the disciples, understandably, had no clear expectation that this would actually happen literally in the days following his crucifixion.
And perhaps, if Paul shared this “cultural schema”, which became further modified as it was applied to the death and resurrection of Jesus, it may have gone on to structure his expression of Christian identity and ethics in ways that, today, we are not fully appreciating… such as the flow of 1 Corinthians
A third of Australians is stoopid
According to Western Australia’s Baptist Advocate, a recent survey conducted by the Centre for Public Christianity found that 31% of Australians believe that Jesus lived “BC”.
Did I mention that I’m of Scottish stock? And there’s a bit of German in there too… And I’m living in the UK… And I can do a mean Mexican accent…
Latest Technology Hits Rome
One of the most significant churches in the world must surely be the Cathedral in Rome – that is, the church of which the Pope is bishop. But the curious thing is that, in front of the various little shrines, there are no candles to be seen. “So,” I hear you demand, “how does one express devotion at the shrines around the edge of the cathedral, if one cannot light a candle?” Look below, dear reader, and be impressed:
speaking of painting…
Here’s the previous picture I painted – a couple of years ago. It’s called ‘the body’. Hmm… looks like I need to do some more work on the foot…
Will Creation Burn?
Will all creation burn? Moltmann has said:
Since the Middle Ages, a conception of death and resurrection became fixed in Christian thinking that is deeply unchristian: the pictorial world of heaven and hell, the conception of a Last Judgement that rewards good works and punishes bad deeds to order the transition to the world to come. According to this notion, God’s judgement only knows two sentences: either eternal life or eternal death, either heaven or hell. If one asks what will come of the good visible creation, the earth and God’s other earthly creatures, the answer is everything will be burnt to ashes. This world will not be needed any more when the blessed will see directly in heaven without mediation by other creatures.
Where does this idea of “everything being burnt to ashes” come from? Well no doubt largely from 2 Peter 2:10:
But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything done in it will be laid bare.
This appears pretty conclusive. To me it has always sounded just like the Stoic conception of the end of all things: A massive conflagration in which creation itself is burnt up. But is that the best way to read it? At the recent Tyndale Conference at Cambridge, Jonathan Moo spoke on the topic of “Continuity, Discontinuity and Hope: The Contribution of New Testament Eschatology to a Distinctively Christian Environmental Ethos” – and his paper included an examination of the 2 Peter passage. Drawing on the work of Al Walters, he suggested a different reading:
- But the day of the Lord will come like a thief
- And then the heavens [i.e. the outermost cosmic level] will pass away with a loud noise,
- And the elements [stoicheia: the intermediate cosmic level] will be dissolved with fire [i.e. a fire that refines the next level]
- And the earth and everything that is done on it [i.e. the foundational level] will be disclosed [i.e. made evident]
Thus there is something of a parallel to the “fire” of 1 Corinthians, which refines in order to preserve: The outer levels burn, in order to bring to light – rather than destroy – the earth and everything that is done on it.
When I take the day off…
Took the day off uni today, and – amongst other things – finished off a painting I’ve been working on for a little while:
“All Things to All People” – Was Paul Duplicitous? (And how do you spell duplicitous?)
At the recent SBL conference in Rome, Mark Nanos presented a paper on Paul’s claim to be “all things to all people”. He suggested that if Paul was adapting his lifestyle to please Jews in one setting, and Gentiles in another setting, he lacked integrity and was duplicit… duplicit… two-faced. So Nanos offered a new interpretation of 1 Cor 9 that was, he implied, kinder to Paul and more attentive to Paul’s (consistent) relationship with the Torah.
He suggested that Paul never claimed to adapt his lifestyle for different contexts, but rather his rhetorical strategy. Acts 17 is illustrative – when speaking to Gentiles, Paul argues “as a Gentile” (as opposed to when he is addressing Jews and argues from the Scriptures). This adaptability of rhetorical strategy makes sense of Paul’s ministry, and presents no problem to Paul’s own integrity.
I don’t think that an appeal to “rhetorical adaptability” is sufficiently related to the argument of 1 Corinthians 8-10, which is all about questions of eating and drinking – that is, questions of lifestyle. But on the other hand, I think Nanos is right that Paul is not necessarily being two-faced. I think the issue is about the shape of his self-constraint. So, for example, Paul always rejects idol-meat. But while he is among Gentiles, Paul presents his rejection of idol-meat in a way that is sensitive to the Gentile concern that idols are dangerous gods. And this is exactly what he wants the Corinthians to develop: A sensitivity to those in danger of idolatry, so that the expression of “freedom” is not made into an unnecessary cause of stumbling.
The Pope has Paul’s Bones
Little did I know it, but while I was in Rome, speaking with much unction about the apostle Paul, the Pope was busily confirming that the Vatican definitely has Paul’s bones. Here’s how the logic goes:
- The bones can be proven to be from the first or second century
- Therefore they are definitely the Apostle Paul’s bones
ROME, Italy (CNN) — Scientific tests prove bones housed in the Basilica of St. Paul in Rome are those of the apostle St. Paul himself, according to Pope Benedict XVI.
Pope Benedict XVI looks at the tomb of St. Paul at the Basilica of St. Paul in Rome in 2007.
“Tiny fragments of bone” in the sarcophagus were subjected to carbon dating, showing they “belong to someone who lived in the first or second century,” the pope said in a homily carried on Italian television.
“This seems to confirm the unanimous and undisputed tradition that these are the mortal remains of the Apostle St. Paul,” Benedict said in Sunday’s announcement.
Paul’s Reception of the Psalms
I’ll be attending this conference, which explores the impact of the Psalms on Western Civilisation. I’m just putting the finishing touches on a paper that I’ll be presenting there: “The Rhetoric of the Psalms and the Imagination of the Apostle”. It is, of course, about 1 Corinthians. Here’s a summary:
Drawing on the dual-motif of the condemned boaster and the vindicated sufferer, this letter summons the believers of Corinth into the narrative of Christ’s own passion. They are called to give up their boastful, clamouring divisions, and inhabit Christ’s death in the present, looking ahead to sharing in his vindication in the future.
Paul has imaginatively evaluated the various situations in Corinth as having a common theological significance, and so has allowed this simple rhetorical pattern of reversal – found in Jewish literature and recited in the Psalms – to give theological shape to his response.
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