A Rusty Aluminum Age

The letters of Paul are letters to people with serious problems: disunity (1 Corinthians), sexual distortion (2 Corinthians), heresy and doctrinal confusion (Galatians, Colossians, 2 Thessalonians), social confusion (Ephesians), racial misunderstanding and doctrinal intolerance (Romans), to name a few.

Some passages are almost embarrassing in their admission of glaring faults in the lives of Christians. I shudder to think that someday someone might discover some letter of mine written to friends containing descriptions similar to the disunity and depravity of the Corinthian church, or the tensions that rocked Timothy's struggling congregation.

Numerous scholars have (rightly) spoken of the 'golden age' of the first-century church as a myth. Instead, we would do better to see it as a rusty aluminum age, like a pile of discarded bicycles sitting in the rain, with various parts removed.

Thus, here is Pauline theology in a nutshell: humans need God's grace.

Religious Totalitarianism, Pluralism, Christianity, and Atheism

This morning I was listening to WNYC, the public radio station in New York City. The last segment on the Brian Lehrer Show was an interview with Eboo Patel, the founder of the Interfaith Youth Core. He has also just written a book, Acts of Faith: The Story of an American Muslim, the Struggle for the Soul of a Generation. The following is the audio of the interview:


In the interview Eboo Patel discusses the state of affairs in the world. He believes that the central conflict of the 21st Century is and will be the conflict between religious totalitarianism and pluralism and that young people will be central to the outcome of that conflict. He draws from W. E. B. Du Bois's idea of the color line of the 20th Century and calls this religious conflict of the 21st Century the faith line. His goal is to use the power of young people on the side of religious pluralism and points out how Martin Luther King, Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, and Nelson Mandela were all young when they began to make great strides for racial pluralism in the 20th Century.

Of course religious totalitarianism and pluralism are not the only options. I immediately thought about my own beliefs. I don't consider myself to be a totalitarian or a pluralist, though I am a fundamentalist by some definitions. The way that Patel describes and defines the two camps he has in mind leaves some question as to where he would put me. The only non-pluralistic religious groups that he mentioned are very radical. It seems that he fails to recognize the middle ground where I stand: I think other religions are wrong, but I am not trying to kill anybody.

The comments on the WNYC website bring up another option for belief as well: atheism. Most of the people that left comments are antitheists, people who believe that all religions are foolish, harmful, and morally wrong. There seems to be a growing movement toward this position. I have to wonder if this idea will eventually replace pluralism as the preferred belief system of liberal thinkers. I suppose it is closer to logical consistency at least. (By the way, Richard Dawkins, one of the leading proponents of this "New Atheism," will be debating John Lennox in Birmingham, Alabama, on October 3.)

This antitheistic New Atheism has more in common with religious fundamentalism than with agnosticism and "weak atheism." It will be interesting to see how the debate among pluralists, antitheists, and the various religious exclusivists develops and how the rise of New Atheism effects how Biblical Christianity does apologetics and evangelism. We may have to take another step back from the questions of the truth of Christianity and the plausibility of Christianity to the question of whether religious belief is even a valid human activity. Antitheism is gaining steam in the face of radical Islam, and it is now as important as ever to show that Christianity has a positive influence on the world by working to build the kingdom.

All Scripture is God-Breathed

"All scripture is inspired by God and useful for refuting error, for guiding people's lives and teaching them to be upright. This is how someone who is dedicated to God becomes fully equipped and ready for any good work."
- St. Paul, 2 Timothy 3:16-17, New Jerusalem Bible

2 Timothy is a dark letter. Compared to the rest of Paul's works, and to the New Testament in general, it is full of conflict, sadness, and struggle both inward and outward. There are moments when the glory of grace could not be brighter, but the most uplifting passages and stirring exhortations of 2 Timothy nevertheless presuppose a difficult road ahead.

In the midst of this comes a small section on "the sacred writings". Paul exhorts his protege to remain faithful to the scriptures and the teaching he has received on and from it. This bidding to hold fast to scripture is not without its urgency. "This is what you will need for the days ahead," says Paul. "And you are definitely going to need it."

Paul's tone, then, is somewhat foreboding. After all, Timothy and his Ephesian church are in a difficult situation to say the least, as is Paul himself. But these words are meant for comfort and assurance. Paul is here offering not merely an old friend's encouragement, but the key to Timothy's difficult task. The experienced apostle's point is that the scriptures are the foundation and means of Timothy's work, and they will not let him down, no matter how rough the road.

This point is driven home by a brief look at the overall context of the letter. Paul is on death row and, if the local heretics have their way, so is Timothy's church. Timothy's mentor and father in the faith has the opportunity -- the necessity -- to tell Timothy all that he needs to know, do, and have in order to build the Kingdom in this hostile environment. In this context his constant refrain is, Hold fast to the scriptures, for they are what you need; indeed, they are given by God Himself for this very purpose.

Here it must be noted that what many tend to read into v. 16 is simply not there; namely, a statement of the modern doctrine of the infallibility of the Bible. Such a doctrine, regardless of its accuracy, is simply absent from this text. Paul is here giving one long exhortation to courage, perseverance, and faithfulness in the thick of opposition; the furthest thing from his mind is the age of the earth and whether Jonah really spent three days in a fish's belly. Only if we read in our own notions of what "inspired" might mean can we find a claim here of Biblical infallibility as it is currently formulated. Paul's literal language, "all scripture is God-breathed (theopneustos)", is an evocative, wonderful phrase for God's personal involvement in the creation of the scriptures, but it is far from being support, by itself, of this doctrine. There is much to be said on either side of this controversy, but none of it will be said here.

What, then, does Paul mean? He is clear about one thing: these scriptures are what you need. They give wisdom, leading to salvation (v. 15); they are our foundation and means for "refuting error, for guiding people's lives and teaching them to be upright." They thoroughly prepare the agent of the Kingdom of God, so that he is ready to undertake and complete "any good work." Truly Timothy would have had a near-hopeless task in front of him had he not "the sacred writings".

What meaning can this have for us? Many of us still seek to answer this question within an overly modernist context. We know what the world needs, and that is good authority; we know what good authority is, and that is facts and laws; therefore the Bible is the source of reliable facts and laws.

Others of us are overly postmodern. We know what the world needs, and that is freedom; we know what freedom is, and that is choice and subjectivity; therefore the Bible must be the great affirmer of such things.

Both of these models, and others like them, assume much too readily that we know what the world needs. All of us alike exalt ourselves above the Bible, putting the scriptures into our own molds. In the words of N. T. Wright, "we have tended to let the word ‘authority’ be the fixed point and have adjusted ‘scripture’ to meet it, instead of the other way round." No one expects that what the world needs after all is the Bible; instead, we look for ways to make the Bible fit our own preconceived notions of problem and solution.

Paul would have us act differently. Paul's message to Timothy is that the Bible is profitable for thoroughly equipping the man of God, not because it is fact or law or timeless call to existential decision, but because by it "the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work." (v. 17) But Paul's message is not merely utilitarian. The Bible does not just happen to have this effect on and through the church, this is so precisely because all scripture is God-breathed.

Whatever the full meaning of this rich and beautiful phrase, it is the greatest reason we could have for taking the scriptures as they are. Perhaps this is impossible; perhaps we can never quite pull away from our own presuppositions. The question of whether we can ever actually get at the Bible without bringing a bit of ourselves into the picture, or even whether this is desirable, is not for now to decide.

What is clear is that this God-breathedness calls for a robust and vibrant praxis centered around the Bible. Liturgy and living, meditation and memorization, praying and preaching, reflection and research each play a role in building the Church's life on and around scripture. We must rush forward into this great and terrifying book God has given us, constantly working out fresher and more accurate ways of talking about and living by it.