The Blog of Toby J Sumpter
Culture is not a shadowy something existing in secret “behind” its “manifestations” in language, rites, and discipline. Culture is a people organized and united by its language, rites, rules, and mechanisms of enforcement.
So also is the covenant.
So also is the Church.
Peter Leithart, Against Christianity, 51
Each religion, and especially each civic religion, also enacted a particular way of life. To be Spartan meant living out of Spartan myths and being shaped by Spartan rituals, but also meant engaging the world as a Spartan. Being Athenian meant learning to “lean into life” in a particular manner. Being Roman was a matter of maintaining dignity and avoiding shame, as well as knowing the Roman myths and performing Roman rituals.
Now – when an apostle showed up at a synagogue in the diaspora, he preached the gospel into a culture, the Jewish culture, that already had its own myths and rites and rules of behavior…
…
And when the apostle came, he came with an alternative myth (which he called the “gospel”), taught his converts to perform rituals of initiation and conviviality (which Christians eventually called “sacraments”), and called men to an alternative way of life (which he called “becoming a disciple of Jesus”).
The wandering apostle may have no money in his kit; but he came to town with an alternative culture in his back pocket.
-Peter Leithart, Against Christianity, 50.
It is no doubt of significance that the apostle Paul appeared before kings, magistrates, presumably Caesar, and that he preached in Jewish synagogues, in stadia and in the temple. Only once, to our knowledge, did he preach to philosophers, and that was a distinctly unsuccessful venture (Acts 17). There is a message in that, both about the proper deployment of the Church’s energies and about the hopes for success in deal with the cultured despisers.
-Peter Leithart, Against Christianity, 48.
Theology is a “Victorian” enterprise, neoclassically bright and neat and clean, nothing out of place.
Whereas the Bible talks about hair, blood, sweat, entrails, menstruation, and genital emissions.
. . .
Here’s an experiment you can do at any theological library. You even have my permission to try this at home.
Step 1: Check the indexes of any theologian you choose for any of the words mentioned in section 9 above. (Augustine does not count. Augustine’s theology is as big as reality, or bigger.)
Step 2: Check the Bible concordance for the same words.
Step 3: Ponder these questions: Do theologians talk about the world the same way the Bible does? Do theologians talk about the same world the Bible does?
-Peter Leithart, Against Christianity, 47.
Practical theology departments at seminaries do not make theology more practical. They ensure that theology, outside PT departments, will remain impractical — that it will remain theology.
Practical theology ensures that life will remain outside theology.
Practical theology ensures that the secular remains secular.
-Peter Leithart, Against Christianity, 45.
Introduction
We move on to the Third Commandment today which continues to be concerned with idolatry. Here the specific concern is with bearing God’s name faithfully. Literally, the Third Word says: “You shall not lift up the name of Yahweh your God to vanity/worthlessness because Yahweh will not hold unpunished he who lifts His name to vanity” (Ex. 20:7). Frequently, we cite the Third Commandment when people swear or use God’s name frivolously, but that is merely a small expression of something much greater. For God to instruct His people to be careful with His name is to imply that His people bear His name.
Naming as Creation, Rule, and Love
The act of naming goes back to the act of creation in the beginning. When God created, He also named. And one of the signs of Adam’s calling to imitate God and grow up into His creativity and rule is found in Adam’s first task of naming the animals (Gen. 2:19). Then after God created the woman, it was Adam who named her woman (Gen. 2:23). Naming is bound up with creating and ruling. God is the original Creator and sovereign ruler, but man is created to join with Him in that creativity and rule. But naming is also an act uniting and relating, an act of love. To name is to distinguish: this is not that, but it is also to open the possibility of relating two different things. Adam names her woman in order to love her, to cleave to her, to be united to her. Continue Reading…
It’s striking that three of the four gospels have opening sentences referring to “the beginning” (Mk. 1:1, Lk. 1:2, Jn. 1:1). Counting Matthew’s “book of the genealogy” (Mt. 1:1) as an explicit referent to Genesis (Gen. 5:1, cf. Gen. 6:9, 10:1, 11:10, etc.), all four gospels begin with creation, insisting or implying to varying degrees that the gospel is as big of a deal as the creation of the world.
The gospel is the re-creation of the world, not a nice “religious” thought.
If theology deals with “timeless truths,” then all the temporal things we encounter in life are outside the range of theology.
But everything we encounter in life is temporal.
Therefore, all life is outside of theology.
. . .
Theology ensures that Christians have nothing to say about nearly everything.
-Peter Leithart, Against Christianity, 45.
Phil Johnson has replied here, mostly to Doug Wilson’s post but mentions me as well at a couple of points, so I’ll throw out a few other comments for whatever it’s worth.
First off, Doug’s follow up post here is really helpful in defining the issues and terms, and I’m in full agreement with it. And I would only reiterate what Doug mentioned in his earlier post that these principles ought to be the ground work for further discussion on what the Westminster Confession calls “private spirits” and what Driscoll calls the “gift of discernment.” Our common commitment to the finished and final authority of Scripture should give us the common ground to be able to have a conversation about what Driscoll talks about. And there are numerous indicators that Driscoll really is committed to the authority of Scripture, so it’s not like trying to find common ground for a conversation about fiscal responsibility with a congressman. Continue Reading…
A New York Times story relates a recent lawsuit from a few atheists who are upset – really, really upset, perhaps even offended and certainly experiencing mental pain and anguish. Seems someone found a large cross-shaped beam in the wreckage following the collapse of the towers from 9/11, and now that cross-shaped beam has found its way into the 9/11 museum. The atheists insist that either the symbol must be removed or there must be equal representation of all religions so as to not promote one single faith.
The article continues:
And if atheists could put a symbol in the museum, what would it be? Perhaps an atom, Mr. Silverman suggested, “because we’re all made out of atoms,” or maybe a depiction of a firefighter carrying a victim. “It would be about helping,” he said. “It would not be derogatory against any religion or anybody.”
The atheists claim that they have suffered “dyspepsia, symptoms of depression, headaches, anxiety, and mental pain and anguish from the knowledge that they are made to feel officially excluded from the ranks of citizens who were directly injured by the 9/11 attack.” Continue Reading…
