IX. Of Original or Birth-Sin

I am about to speak of original sin. It seems appropriate to begin this discussion when a brief look at the news wires will confirm the inherent depravity of mankind to most people's satisfaction. I also should note that there is also plenty of evidence in the news of inherent goodness in us. The forbidden fruit is from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Thus in man unlike in the orthodox view of God, good and evil co-exist quite unhappily. Paul was an especially eloquent observer of this fact, theorizing that alienation from the worship, fear, and affection of the true God gave evil the clear edge (Romans 1). But Paul likewise writes of what a more recent theologian (Walter Wink) has called "the inner darkness of the redeemed." As much as we have been cleansed in the waters of baptism and continue in the sacramental life in which we are confronted by the presence of Jesus in the Eucharist and the example of his life in the Gospel with all of the praxis and mystical beauty that entails, we still do what we know is evil. Indeed, the more we live into the Christian life, the more we know our need for salvation. I constantly say to myself, "You suck." This is not an indication of low self-esteem. I think quite well of myself. Instead, I see how sinful I am and imagine how sinful I would be if I did not think my life wasn't already a losing investment to be accounted for to God, especially compared to the many irreligious people I see around me. I smell original sin and all I want to do is drown myself in the Grace of God in whom there is no evil at all.

Looking at Human Origins and Searching for Eden

But as real as original sin seems to me most of the time, the Scriptural basis for the doctrine is problematic in that it is ultimately based on a portion of the Scriptures which I cannot read as anything but metaphor. Now, of course, there are plenty of young earth creationists who go around saying and attempting to prove that the science I practice is a deceit of the devil and the first few chapters of Genesis should be read literally. Their soteriology is quite compelling. For indeed if corruptibility did not come into the world through Adam and Eve, what is this whole Christian business about anyway? Well, their soteriology is compelling until you think: is the essence of corruptibility in what kills the body or what kills both body and soul? The body in union with a "living" rational soul is a special thing. It is simultaneously a creature and capable of abstract creativity that is essentially the same as its Creator if only much more puny in degree. It is said of most of the lower animals that they have a much different sense of time, in which past and future exist on a very low level and everything that might involve thought is in the present. A mind of that kind is not likely to have a soul that can maintain any integrity without the body. But our mind just might have enough sense of the future. Neanderthals buried their dead with flowers and other objects, suggesting they had some concept of life after death. Elephants, for all I know, may have this concept, since they bury their dead and move their bones around after decomposition. But I know nothing of elephantine souls. Nor do I think that belief in the immortality of the soul makes one's soul immortal. But I do think that the very attributes and affections of our souls that allow some of us to believe in the soul's immortality are the reason for its immortality. But the issue arises over what happens to that immortal soul after death.

The young earth creationists are right to point out that a more literal reading of Genesis puts the Fall and the immortality of the soul into better perspective than whatever those who read metaphorically seem to think. Anglicans and other Christians generally have done well in rejecting the exegetical and natural worldview of young earth creationists but still have not done enough work disambiguating the ancient theology from the ancient worldview. AKMA, for instance, has expressed his belief that theology is the primary discourse, the queen of all the sciences. He doesn't think sociology, cultural anthropology, or whatever fashionable discourse presently holds sway should dictate anything to theology. As well he should. Theology must be the primary discourse, for its purview encompasses all time and space. But it might want to think about some of the natural sciences now and then, whose purview is not far from all time and space but whose epistemology is less certain. After all, a good friend and colleague of mine points out that divine revelation is clearly the most authoritative form of knowledge. Most scientists know their limits. A few troublemakers like Dawkins shouldn't send theologians into lager .

In this kind of thinking, I follow Galileo Galilei and his Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina , whose key point is strong analogy between the knowledge of Creation and the Holy Scriptures, since both emanate from the Divine Word. I once explained this idea to Mark McIntosh, who apparently is Canon Theologian to the Presiding Bishop. He thought the idea smelled of Bonaventure. This would not surprise me. Galileo counted radical theologians such as Paolo Sarpi among his friends. He certainly had very bright and learned men to bounce ideas off. And though Galileo often did not live his life in harmony with the more essential teachings of the Church, I think he earnestly believed he was arguing what was right and faithful. I call myself a Galilean theologian (yes, I understand the name has other significance), because I believe if we are going to treat passages in the Scriptures that have something to do with natural matters as metaphorical, faithful natural scientists will need to shed what light we can.

Thus, I read the early parts of Genesis not as the literal play-by-play of Creation but as a broad overview of how the universe came to be and how and why humans came to be. And the first piece relevant to our story is this, "In the image of God He created him, male and female He created him." You may have seen other translations of this verse. I'm fairly sure this is the right one... In this verse, I see the first human as androgyne (or really of common gender) both telling us of a God of common gender in whose image we are made and something quite interesting. The most primitive forms of life (and even higher ones) generally are asexual. Asexuality is quite boring. Reproduction essentially is by splitting up. Adulthood, if it can be called that, is attained by the new individuals quite quickly. Some asexual organisms I believe are colonial, but otherwise asexual creatures lead boring lives in which sex can be a strong barrier to sex. Sex for asexual reproducers involves spending energy modifying the genetic code of another creature while it does so for you. Yet survival is much more strongly guaranteed if you avoid sex, just reproduce as quickly as possible. But this is a short term view. If ecological conditions change, asexual reproducers cannot change their genes by natural selection very quickly. They are wiped out quite easily. From what we can tell, sexual reproduction originated with an asexual organism splitting meotically rather than mitotically, producing individuals with only a half-set of genes. This might produce useful mutations if there was recombination of the meiotic pairs of the individual combining with itself. But it allowed for much more interesting and advantageous to fitness combinations when the meiotic parts of different individuals combined.

Thus, the instinct of life for sociability was enhanced by sexual reproduction. Take from this what you will, but I do think there is some interesting theology buried in the transformation of rational androgyne into man and woman which speaks to a deeper purpose of gender than we can conceive. When Archbishop Akinola worries about homosexuals blurring gender distinctions, he implicitly slanders the proto-Adam without the justice of God behind him. The defect of the asexual and the proto-androgyne is not a blurring of gender, but instead the solitude of such creatures. "It is not good for the man to be alone." For a creature of such solitude is incapable, even if rational, of knowing love. And if such a creature cannot love a fellow, how can such a creature love God? There is much here...and Jesus' quotation of the first creation story of man attached to the conclusion of the second always has made me wonder about the limitations of the second account. Scientists also have investigated the possibility of life originating like Adam from the dust of the ground in recent years, but that's another story.

And of Adam and Eve I only can say, "Who did Cain etc. marry?" I think the story of Eden is God finally seeing the creature worthy of being in love with Him and sharing his dominion. The image of Christ and the Church as Bridegroom and Bride is good and glorious, more glorious than what originally was possible, but its foundation is in the relationship God thought he might have with Adam and Eve and their children before the Fall. Evolution came to a point where one among us was physiologically capable and "man became a living soul." God yearned to love and be loved as the Areopagite says. But it didn't work. We were given great gifts and we decided to disobey the One who should have been our Beloved, the One to whom we should have listened (and yes I do see in the story of the Baptism of Jesus by John an allusion to the Fall. One should be there, after all...). We didn't listen.

At the same time, I would beware of saying this is some sort of eco-myth. I do not think the essence of the Fall is killing of the large mammals or the invention of agriculture. These were merely effects of the Fall. For indeed, God before the Fall instructed us to dominate nature, which always has been the silent enemy of life. To give you an example, our present form of respiration, which is of such metaphorical importance to theology, is only possible because cyanobacteria developed photosynthesis, whose input is carbon dioxide and waste product is oxygen. There is some evidence that the Earth was kept warm in the past (when the Sun gave less light) by a methane greenhouse. Oxygen oxidizes methane to carbon dioxide. Hence, plants keep atmospheric methane at lower levels than in the past (volcanoes add methane to the atmosphere). Thus, the plants might have removed so much methane from the atmosphere that the Earth froze over. This is still a very unproven story, but it gives you an example of the kind of struggle with nature it requires for natural selection to make creatures worthy of reason. Stephen Jay Gould (and others) are convinced we are a random fluke. The Holy Scriptures say we were planned and desired, but nature never was cooperative. And nature still isn't very cooperative. But if we had maintained the pre-Fall relationship with God, I am quite sure God would have taught us to dominate nature as he does as Creator, to still the winds and the waters, to change water into wine.

Instead, we are told the Fall led to the pollution of the ground, so that it would not yield food without effort. The travails of childbirth likewise continued. "You will desire your husband" says the Lord. Might we think of a dog in heat? Through reason and right relationship with God, we might have been liberated from the corporeal exigencies of nature and learned to control it as God can. Instead, we polluted it with sins and the blood of our fellows, making ourselves subject to it and the corruptibility of the body. The Fall was not precipitated by our mismanagement of nature, but it did leave us more capable of mismanagement than any other creature on the planet. But indeed the Articulators knew nothing of this. What do they say of these things?

IX. Of Original or Birth-Sin

Original sin standeth not in the following of Adam (as the Pelagians do vainly talk;)

I had a fling with Pelagianism about the age of eleven. I did not the understand the fullness of the doctrine but simply liked the idea that infants weren't damned. The basic idea, as I now understand it, is that sin originated in the bad example of Adam (and Eve) that precipitated the Fall. Thus, the purpose of the Incarnation was for Christ as God-Man to set a better example. Through faith and imitation of that example, one can be saved. The way I first heard about Pelagianism probably was reading about the doctrines of Caelestius, which deny the resurrection of the body, the unique efficacy of the Gospel, and the unique sinlessness of Christ but also state that children come into the world in the state of Adam before the Fall.

In the theology of the Fall I set forth above, the less extreme view of Pelagius is clearly false. We are not inclined to sin because Adam merely set a bad example but because he was given the opportunity to dominate nature in relationship with God but rejected the commandment (and in the commandment the love of God who sought his good) and thus again became subject to nature and the evolutionary struggle though we now possessed rational souls. And as we have inherited rational souls from Adam, we are as subject to nature as Adam after the Fall or Adam's irrational ancestors according to the flesh. [Gosh, the young earth creationists really would be shocked by all this, wouldn't they? Thy ancestors were clever apes but God raised up thy father Adam and thy mother Eve from the apes and gave them mighty gifts, but they chose to disobey and so returned to the level of the apes yet they retained the chief of their gifts...]

The ancient and orthodox argument against the Pelagian view is that it has some weak resonance with the view of Paul, but it passes over much of Pauline theology about the regeneration of the baptized etc. More importantly, it belittles the Incarnation and all it entailed. Christ was more than mere teacher and exemplar. He triumphed over death. At the root of Pelagian theology is very bad Christology. And thus the ancient church rejected it, though it endured more mild forms.

Because of Luther's emphasis on justification by faith, Luther has been called a Pelagian. This is ridiculous. Luther had too strong a notion of the importance of the Incarnation and regeneration through Baptism to be a Pelagian.

...but it is the fault and corruption of the Nature of every man, that naturally is engendered of the offspring of Adam; whereby man is very far gone from original righteousness, and is of his own nature inclined to evil, so that the flesh lusteth always contrary to the Spirit...

This view of original sin is strongly Western, owing its first source to Paul, especially in Romans 7 and 8. But its strongest elaborator is that of Augustine, who was a strong advocate against Semi-Pelagianism but also a man who had lived a life which he problematized as a long wandering wallow in the flesh finally smatched by Christ and regenerated through the fruits of the Spirit. His chief work, as we should remember, is a discourse on the fruit of the Spirit known as peace against the inferior product peddled by the typical Greco-Roman city-state otherwise known as City of God . Original sin under that heading I believe is his creation. The Cappadocian Fathers had some conception of it did not believe it to be so important. Anglican Scotist might be able to give some further information about Duns Scotus' view of the matter, since he apparently elaborated on it. But I think the Articulators are giving the Augustinian view (based on "naturally engendered in the offspring of Adam," which implies inheritance but not stain per se), since Aquinas does not emphasize Original Sin too strongly (perhaps because it would complicate his vice-virtue ordering of morals).

The debate between the views of Original Sin held by the orthodox of the East and the West mainly concerns the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of Mary. In the Eastern view as I understand it, Original Sin is not some heritable stain on the soul but just theinclination to sin and away from original righteousness that is clear as we grow. Thus, Christ was sinless not because He did not inherit Original Sin through his mother (for Original Sin was held from her), but presumably because His righteousness was from God.

Well, what does the theology I propose have to say of this? Well, it would lean toward Original Sin as inheritable inclination. Animals are not held to sin, after all, having no knowledge of the moral as such. What distinguishes us from them and leads us into sin is possessing a rational faculty while being subject to nature. Thus, as our rational faculty develops, our potential to sin increases and so does our potential subjection to nature, thus also increasing our potential to sin. Thus, all infants are fairly close to original righteousness, but as we grow up, the inheritance of Adam works the desires of the flesh in us, inclining us to sin. As for the Immaculate Conception, I think of the Theotokos's response to Gabriel, "How can this be, since I have not known a man?" Gabriel tells her that the Holy Spirit shall come upon her, "All things are possible with God." And she replies, "Let it be with me according to your word." Thus, Mary really is the second Eve, since the first Eve disobeyed and became subject to nature rather than obeying and dominating it. But Mary obediently agrees to join with God in dominating nature (what else would you call the Incarnation after all?), and so in her womb she brings to fruit the Redeemer of the World. Her own sinlessness is a minor issue. She chooses the fruit, the act, the plan, and the gift of obedience just as her ancestors chose the fruit, the act, the plan, and the curse of disobedience.

...and therefore in every person born in this world, it deserveth God's wrath and damnation...

Well, maybe the Articulators thought it was a stain, but the language is ambiguous. If it were truly a stain, they would have said, "and therefore through it, every person born in this world deserveth God's wrath and damnation." But the idea is that the "wages of sin are death." Or in my view, when Adam became a living soul he and Eve were given the means of immortality for them and their descendants. In cooperation with God, their domination of nature and the immortality of their souls would have given them eternal life in the world and the approbation of God. Instead, we humans are capable of seeing the world and acting upon the world in many of the ways God does but because we do so in alienation from Him and in cooperation with the corruptibility to our flesh is subject, we injure one another and the creation to which I think we were meant to bring peace (inferring from the example of Christ).

And this infection of nature doth remain, yea, in them that are regenerated...

And yet we cannot be brought out of our fallen nature completely in this world. This has many implications for our dreams of the plasticity of nature. Our technology cannot save us, not because it has no effect on spiritual matters or because it is otherwise irrelevant before the power of God, but because nature ultimately is victor against us in this world. It is only after death or at the final trumpet sounds that "this corruptible body must put on incorruptibility, this mortal body must clothe itself in immortality." And the same is true of our utopian dreams, since our social order, even if all the citizenry were regenerate, would still have many lost every once in a while in the "inner darkness of the redeemed." Hugo Schwyzer has a good post on this: like Paul and Augustine, the inner darkness is an important part of Hugo's faith narrative. This is not an injunction to let things go. This is not a prohibition against innovation and improvement. This is a call to us who have been cleansed in baptism to recognize our limitations in this world. There is no man without sin. There is no perfect program of reform. The hope we have is in Him who comes on the clouds and refines all things in his fire, so that in an instant, in the twinkling of the eye, the dead shall be raised and the kingdom of this world become the kingdom of the Lord and of his Christ.

whereby the lust of the flesh, called in Greek, phronema sarkos (which some do expound the wisdom, some sensuality, some the affection, some the desire, of the flesh), is not subject to the Law of God.

The last discussion covers this. The Fall makes our conformation to divine law through Christ and the Gospel incomplete in this world. But I do like the term phronema sarkos . A couple of years ago, I thought it might be cool to introduce the term into the English language. Thus I would mention every once in a while that my "sarks was phronemating." No one bothered to ask why I was saying this. I am known to say a variety of weird things. But I do feel this phronemation rather often, usually directed in the ways common to men of my age and those common to all flesh. I struggle to resist, and thus when I consider my sins, I repent most firmly of those I see rooted in clear phronemation. For everything else, I just pray God give me a discerning heart. It's easier to fight the enemy you know rather than the enemies you don't.

And although there is no condemnation for them that believe and are baptized; yet the Apostle doth confess, that concupiscence and lust hath of itself the nature of sin.

We don't even need the Apostle (Romans again is likely the key text meant). Think of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew, e.g., "Whoever calls his brother 'good for nothing' deserves the sentence of the court; whoever calls him "fool" deserves the hell-fire." That gives me far deeper pause than looking at women or imagining them with lust in my heart. Divine law must be internalized. The Fall gives our interiority too much potential to sin. Those who use the Jesus Prayer I imagine can gain deep understanding of the depths of their concupiscence. And when the civil law loses force, phronemation may win great victory in the heart. The Law of God is not the only thing to which the flesh does not wish to be subject.

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Until next time, the Holy Brothers pray that you may be strengthened by faith, prayer, and all good works that are the fruits of these and by the Grace of God in Christ resist every evil to which the flesh inclines you in inheritance from Adam.

VIII. Of the Creeds

The Nicene Creed, and that which is commonly called the Apostles' Creed, ought thoroughly to be received and believed: for they may be proved by most certain warrants of Holy Scripture.

[The original Article given Royal assent in 1571 and reaffirmed in 1662, was entitled "Of the Three Creeds; and began as follows "The Three Creeds, Nicene Creed, Athanasius's Creed, and that which is commonly called the Apostles' Creed..."]

Since much of the discussion of the previous Articles has touched on the content of these Creeds, it would be overly repetitive, boring, and potentially fruitless for me to explain to prove the Creeds by Holy Scripture or explain why the General Convention of 1801 omitted the Athanasian Creed. Instead, I thought I would take this opportunity to examine the ontology of the Creeds and how I have observed them used or not used in Anglican churches. Please recognize that my experience is fairly limited. Doubtless, praxis varies more widely within the Communion than I have seen. Passing over these issues, the Article does make the interesting observation that the Apostles' Creed "is commonly called" such, implying that the Articulators did not believe the legend that the Creed originated with the Twelve Apostles on the Day of Pentecost. Each Apostle according to this legend contributed one clause. The Lord bless them for their skepticism concerning the origins of "the Symbol of Faith" and their faith in it nonetheless.

Additional note: Schaff, in his magisterial work on the ecumenical councils, argues that the purpose of a Council was not to interpret the Scriptures but to affirm the teaching of the church ultimately handed down by the Apostles. Thus, in Schaff's view, it was not necessary for the Nicene Creed to be proven by the Fathers from the Holy Scriptures. If Schaff is right, at least insofar as the Fathers problematized their role as reaffirming the doctrine of the Apostolic Church, we must be fairly sure from the varying Christologies inferred from the Holy Scriptures that the Fathers only could sense the odor of apostolicity through the Spirit. Thus we must be careful admitting Schaff's thesis, since it assumes that the Fathers believed unreservedly in the customary theory of law, in which law is merely the statement or elaboration of custom that is of great antiquity and potentially of divine ordinance. The usual reservation in customary theory is that what is customary always cannot confront the novel in itself but instead one must seek some essence of the customary that can legislate for the novel.

In support of this, Athanasius apparently quoted the Nicene Creed in an epistle to his diocese and argued for the verity of the Persons on the basis of the Great Commission commanding baptism in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and and of the Holy Spirit. And yet the Acts of the Apostles say that Peter baptized in the name of Jesus. Hippolytus, to whom we will return, reports "apostolic tradition" at Rome, one hundred and fifty years after Peter, in which baptism is by the Trinitarian formula. If we think charitably of the Fathers, some of them must have noticed these discrepancies and must have felt perfectly honest not simply affirming "Apostolic tradition" (and thus affirming teachings of more recent vintage as apostolic or contradictory ones) but affirming what they sensed was the essence of apostolic teaching. Schaff even quotes Petavius' commentary on the Fifth anathema of Nestorius against Cyril and vice versa that suggest how the Fathers circumvented problematic usage in their authorities.

In support of Schaff, the Nicene Creed evidently was the standard of faith (or Apostolic teaching) by which later Councils were supposed to evaluate controversies. By the Council of Chalcedon, the Fathers were claiming that they weren't setting forth anything new but affirming the previous versions of the Creed and the writings of certain authorities before them (in accordance with the Canons of the Council of Ephesus). But they also were being told that "the most pious lord [the Emperor]" believed the catholic faith was contained in these things. Anglicans at least should recognize the temptation of those under Erastian government to put on a fine show for the civil authorities.

I have no idea what the Articulators thought they were doing proving the Creeds by the Scriptures. But if we think charitably of them, they must have thought they could do it and were right to do so. To read Tradition, you seem to need a lot of charity.

The Present Use and Lack of Use of the Creeds

Generally, the modern Anglican is confronted by the Creeds as something proclaimed, perhaps prayed, but ostensibly professed in the course of public worship. Anglican liturgy (at least in the US) claims that this profession is not of the Creed itself but of "[our] Christian faith in the words" of the Creed.

There has developed a mythos of traditional usage of the Creeds, which might not be mythos at all. In this tradition, the Apostles' Creed is recited in the Daily Office and in the Sacrament of Holy Baptism at the Examination of the Candidates, the Nicene Creed is recited in the Sacrament of Holy Eucharist, and the Athanasian Creed is recited in place of the Nicene Creed at the Eucharist of Trinity Sunday (or in the Eucharist or Offices on Feasts of the Incarnation or the principal Apostles.) The last practice likely was introduced into this country among Anglicans by Anglo-Catholics and those who sought Home Reunion with the Eastern Orthodox churches (I actually first did it in college). If this tradition mandates anything about the placement of the Creeds in the liturgy, it is to be doubted. The 1549 BCP placed the recitation of the Nicene Creed before the Sermon, which considering some of the sermons I have heard in my short life, might be more appropriate than its present place after the Sermon.

Generally, I have worshipped in communities that have followed the traditional usage (with the exception of the Athanasian Creed at Trinity). But looking outward and to the exceptions among my nearest brethren, I have noticed other practices.

1. Yesterday, I was listening to BBC's Sunday Worship program, which was a program of either Morning or Evening Prayer presumably according to the liturgy of the Church of Ireland (it was at the Cathedral of Armagh officiated by the Dean). At the time of the Creed, the Dean asked the congregation whether they placed their faith and trust in God the Father, the congregants answered in the affirmative. Then he asked them the same with regards to His Son Jesus Christ and they responded similarly. Then he asked them the same of the Holy Spirit. After they gave assent to this, the Dean proclaimed this to be 'The Faith of the Church." I associate that particular usage with the Roman Catholic Church of this era, since the RCC Baptismal Customary certainly contains it. Generally, the similar Anglican usage is "The Faith of the Church down through the ages." I note that such a proclamation of faith is not merely the faith of the Church, but the faith of many who have had deep doctrinal disagreements with it.

2. In college, my chaplain on occasion replaced the Creed with Te Deum Laudamus or Pascha Nostra as other potential professions in words of the Christian faith. I have nothing snarky to say of this...

3. In some churches, the Creed has been replaced with a Mission Statement (sometimes drawn from the Scriptures). In some churches, the Mission Statement may be the corporate Mission Statement of the particular congregation.

4. Some churches will omit the Creed during festal Eucharists to save time.

This great variety of practices in the use of the Creeds during public worship suggests the existence of differing views about the nature of the Two (or Three Creeds) and more general creedal statements. The question arises whether the traditional use of the Creeds and these new innovations are good practices or not. I suggest that the answer to this question should be based on what meaning these practices have. Ultimately, that question is ontological. Or at least I hope so. It's not always very clear cut. What can the nature of a monkey tell us about the meaning of a monkey's use? Don't answer that.

The Ontology of the Creeds: A Somewhat Historical Peregrination

Jesus certainly didn't ordain the Creeds. Nowhere do you read, "Verily, I say unto you that if after that time I am taken from you, you do not come together and define my nature, the nature of the Father, and the Paraclete in some comprehensive statement you recite at worship, you will disappoint me greatly." But I think He is amenable to them. The Gospel readings from the last two Sundays (Matthew 16:13-27) suggest Jesus had some interest in doctrine. He asks his Disciples about the theories swimming around about his identity and once answered asks once more, "Who do you say that I am?" Peter, as we know, gives an acceptable answer. Yet despite knowing what mortals could not have taught him but only God the Father , Peter seems to assume that Jesus is the triumphal conqueror the Messiah is supposed to be. Thus, he is distressed to hear that Jesus must be handed over to the authorities and killed. "Lord, this must never happen to you." What he meant to say is this, "Master, I thought you were the Messiah. You're not supposed to get yourself killed." Jesus is not happy with this answer. Jesus knows who He is harmonizes with what He does (or will do). Peter's answer suggests discord in accordance with earthly assumptions. With heavenly assumptions, this all works. Jesus in the Gospels generally spends a lot of time instructing the Disciples in who He is and what He must do in a framework that is not of this world.

And this, expanded to the Triune God (Jesus is certainly concerned with explaining the relations between the Persons), is the essential nature of a creedal statement: it professes within the framework of the invisible things of God the harmony of who God is with what God does. We also see Jesus laying these kind of creedal foundations after his Resurrection. On the way to Emmaus we are told, Jesus explains to the two disciples why He needed to do what He did at the Passover by giving "certain warrants" of Himself from the Scriptures.

But no creedal statement does it perfectly. We are finite. Our words are finite. Our knowledge of God is finite. The Creeds thus do speak of who God is and what God does, but the harmony and purpose of it is less present. Though in the Nicene Creed, it should be pointed out that the purposes of God the Son are mentioned, "For us and for our salvation...according to the Scriptures..."

Nor do I think our occasional obsession with creedal statements would impress the Lord. He tended to say things like, "If you love me, keep my commandments." The persecution of heretical sects in the 12th and 13th centuries for suggesting (or not suggesting) a few quirky things about Him but also suggesting many correct things about his teachings would not impress Him. Right belief certainly was important to Him, but I suspect He thought it was of no use without following his example to some extent. Now it's possible I'm reading my own concerns into the Master, since I do talk about the synergy (gasp!) between right belief and right action a great deal. But I think of the example of Abbess Hilda of Whitby (one of the mothers of the Ecclesia Anglicana ), who instructed her theology students to spend equal amounts of time in study and works of mercy. When I first read of this I thought, "I wonder if she thought that was Jesus' pedagogy with the disciples." I'm still trying to find that balance between study and service.

But after Jesus, how did the Creeds come to be? Well, the first part of that story is about how creedal statements came to be. No doubt, the first creedal statements were the explanations of Jesus made by the Apostles to potential converts and the civil authorities. But another set of creedal statements arose in the context of worship. Before anyone formulated the principle that we pray in the light of our belief, often called lex orandi, lex credendi , Christians made hymns that tried to harmonize the divine nature and the divine acts. This early trend in hymnology was a happy one in that it has given a holy heritage to many later hymns. But in a time when hymns of praise seem to have become empty flattery or just vague, it is worth remembering the meat sung by our earliest fathers and mothers. Though potentially earlier in origin, Nunc dimittis and Magnificat in the Gospels have some creedal flair, especially the latter.

But the earliest Christian hymn is often argued to be Philippians 2:5-11, which Paul apparently quotes or paraphrases in exhortation. Is it poetic? Yes, it's very beautiful. Is it a meaty profession of faith or creedal statement in the way we have proposed? I think so.

Pascha Nostra and Dignus Es likewise have creedal elements. But as the present Creeds were being formulated, we can see interesting influences on the Church's beliefs in her hymnology. Ambrose of Milan wrote these words in the late 4th century, "O God, creation's secret force, yourself unmoved, all motion's source" (1982 Hymnal translation by John Mason Neale). God the unmoving mover, now where did that come from? Perhaps, the creedal element of hymnology was strongly backed by the cultural context. Greek pagan hymnology often was filled with esoteric doctrine. Think of Paul on the Areopagus, "In Him, we live and move and have our being, as you yourselves have said."

But all this does not tell us why there are Creeds. We cannot proceed by etymology for the usual reasons and indeed for the stronger reason that the use of symbolum to describe the Apostles' Creed is a problematization of Cyprian, who lived after our first glimmers of the Apostles' Creed in Tertullian and Hippolytus. But by combining information about these first uses with some Scriptural insight, we actually might get somewhere. In the case of Tertullian, he states elements of the Apostles' Creed with some variation throughout his work, suggesting he was recalling them from memory, not of one hearing but of many hearings of a text maintained by oral tradition more than writing. From Hippolytus, we cannot say much about how the Creed was preserved, except that Hippolytus believed there to be a standard liturgical version. But Hippolytus shows us clearly that it was used as a baptismal creed. In the Acts of the Apostles, baptism usually is preceded by the proclamation of faith by an Apostle (and sometimes the coming of the Spirit). In the Apostolic Tradition of Hippolytus, the Creed is expressed in a series of question to the baptized person in which the action of baptism in the name of a Person is linked to that Person. But this is really neither here nor there.

More relevant is the purpose of the Apostolic Tradition , which seems as if it is meant to be an instruction in orthopraxis, specifically the practice of the Church of Rome in Hippolytus' youth (apostolic through their supposed origins with Peter and Paul), to certain Churches subject to its moral authority. After the "baptismal customary" section, Hippolytus writes, "We have delivered these things to you only briefly concerning baptism and the oblation because you have already been instructed concerning the resurrection of the flesh and the rest according to what is written." The only thing the resurrection of the body has to do with the baptismal instructions is as part of the baptismal creed. Thus, Hippolytus suggests that the material of the Creed is controversial to churches other than Rome but founded on the apostolic tradition which that Church preserves. Through Tertullian we know there was a Creed at Rome, but in Hippolytus, its purpose evolved into the Clementine symbolum , commonly held doctrine whereby one Christian would know another or eventually whereby the world would know the Christian.

The Creed thus became a way to preserve a common faith among the churches that was above the personal opinion of a bishop, as the Apostolic Tradition says

"For if all who hear the apostolic tradition follow and keep it, no heretic will be able to introduce error, nor will any other person at all. It is in this manner that the many heresies have grown, for those who were leaders did not wish to inform themselves of the opinion of the apostles, but did what they wanted according to their own pleasure, and not what was appropriate."

To be fair, we should be careful giving this text the authority for which it asks, since it contradicts the Gospel at a few points. But it does convey well the idea of the Creed as common deposit of faith. And thus when a Creed is professed in church, it is meant not only as a reminder of faith to the local congregation but as a proclamation to any stranger of what the congregration believes. And since it is the symbol of the Christian faith, its proclamation more than anything else should make the stranger Christian feel at home. The Creed professed at public worship says to such a one as this that he or she is of the same Body as those with whom he or she worships. We alter its profession at our peril. It's a sad thing to hear the Creeds called exclusive, since they at least should be more inclusive of other Christians more than anything else in the liturgy with the exception of Scripture. But such is the wretchedness of the world.

However, I will admit that the Nicene and Athanasian Creeds are rather exclusive by their origins and natures. But we should remember that the Nicene Creed at least is not just a profession founded on anathemas but also the common sum of the voices of 318 Fathers, many of whom had suffered greatly for the faith they professed together. And we do omit the anathemas after all...

On How the Creeds are Professed

The most stereotypical pastoral problem of the Anglican priest is the parishioner who objects to professing the Creeds. The most stereotypical pastoral problem of the Anglican bishop is the rector who is complained of for not believing in the Creeds. The most vibrant argument of the reasserting crowd are the members of the episcopate who apparently do not believe the Creeds as written. It is therefore no surprise that I have been advised in various contexts of Christian formation that the Creeds are a prayer to believe what they contain (I also have heard it called a prayer to understand what they contain.) I detect some odor of error in this. The proof usually put forth in support of the prayer argument is that it ends Amen.

Yet here is the conciliar practice: At the Council of Chalcedon, the Creed was read to the bishops in the face of the Senate and the Emperor and the magistrates. After the reading of the Nicene ecthesis: the bishops are said to have proclaimed:

"This is the orthodox faith; this we all believe: into this we were baptized; into this we baptize: Blessed Cyril so taught: this is the true faith: this is the holy faith: this is the everlasting faith: into this we were baptized: into this we baptize: we all so believe: so believes Leo, the Pope: Cyril thus believed: Pope Leo so interpreted it."

From this, we must assume, the Nicene Creed is concordant with the Apostles' Creed. Yet more importantly, the Fathers seem very certain of their beliefs. Thus, for the bishops of the Church, it seems ridiculous for them to pray the Creed. At the least, they should make the Creed as their solemn affirmation of the Faith, for the Acts of Chalcedon say," Let each one of the most reverend bishops of the present synod, hasten to set forth how he believes, writing without any fear, but placing the fear of God before his eyes;"

So much for the bishops. To what end is the profession of the laity, then? At the time of Chalcedon, we can see that the Creed probably was chiefly a baptismal text, as I have said, 'into this we were baptized; into this we baptize." This is a rather literal reading but the idea of baptism occurs so early in the formula of affirmation for me to say they were alluding to the Scriptural idea of baptism in the faith rather than alluding to the most obvious use of the Creed in their churches.


However, in some churches, the Nicene Creed already was part of the Eucharist, inserted somewhere between the Peace and the Anaphora. As very learned students of the liturgy read this blog, I will not go on too much. A few examples will suffice. See the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom in which the Creed is introduced in the Prayer of the Prosthesis in this manner, "Let us love one another, that with one accord we may confess: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: the Trinity, one in essence and undivided." Likewise we hear the same words in the Liturgy of St. Basil the Great. Apparently, the Peace is exchanged in their midst, the people saying both the latter half of the quoted words and the Creed itself. The Tridentine Ordo, however, makes the Credo a recitation by the Priest and a chant by the Choir, putting it at a great distance from the Peace. The Sarum Rite is like unto it. Nor do the early Books of Common Prayer say otherwise. Nor is there any contextual information for the recitation of the Creed, except that it follows the Epistle and the Gospel. Either the Creed was regarded as some sort of epitome of the Scriptures or the purpose of reciting the Creed had been forgotten in the West. Thus, it should be no surprise that the Creed is considered a prayer among Episcopalians, since there is nothing in our own liturgies or the most notable Western liturgies to make it anything more.

But there is one difference between the Nicene Creed of the 1979 BCP and all liturgical version I know. In all other cases, the profession is individual. In the 1979 case, the contemporary translation most commonly used says, "We believe," making it corporate. In effect, if we say the Creed in this way, we say it in the same way as the Fathers of the Councils. Should it have the same import? Should it be done in the same way or in the same mind? The most common sense answer would be in the negative. The Nicene Creed never was an affirmation of confident corporate unity in the Western liturgy as it appears to be in the Councils and the Eastern liturgies. Furthermore, the Nicene Creed now has been theologized as a prayer of corporate doubt by the same sort that put it into the 1979 BCP in that form.

But as for me, I cannot say I can put away from my soul the practice of Councils nor the individual cum corporate confidence seen in the liturgies of the Two Amicable Hierarchs. Surely, I can say, "This is the orthodox faith; this I believe: into this I was baptized; into this I have seen folk baptized: this is the true faith: this is the holy faith: this is the everlasting faith: into this I was baptized: into this I would see folk baptized." Thus I do not pray to believe, for I believe. I pray somewhat to understand, but then who can understand? I pray mostly to live the Creeds, for what profiteth a man to have faith without works?

Until next time, the Holy Brothers pray that just as the apostolic women went to the tomb with spices and found the sweet savor of it empty and of the Risen Christ, you may go and confess the Creeds with both discernment and reverence, finding the sweet savor of both the faith of the Apostles and the Triune God therein professed and thus share in their mutual communion.

For the repose of the souls of the dead, for the welfare of the survivors, and for the protective witness of Joan of Arc, Father Benito Vines S.J., Father Lorenzo Gangoite S.J., and the triumphant Fathers of the College of the Immaculate Conception in New Orleans, the Holy Brothers pray, bless, and thank the Lord.

VII. Of the Old Testament

The Old Testament is not contrary to the New: for both in the Old and New Testament everlasting life is offered to Mankind by Christ, who is the only Mediator between God and Man, being both God and Man.

The LDS Church refers to the Book of Mormon as Another Testament of Jesus Christ. This is a helpful reminder to the rest of the world that Testament in Christian parlance means a text which is a witness (testis) to Jesus Christ and the promise of eternal life through Him. When Christians say Hebrew Scriptures, they could be saying "some stuff some Jews wrote down." When Christians say Old Testament they admit the sacred history of Israel as the first testimony to the Savior of the World.

Internet Monk in a fairly recent post reminds us that salvation through Christ is the fruition of the very ancient promise to Abraham even before his circumcision, "Go and I shall make of you a great nation." Paul, though cut off from his people, recognized intensely that the promise to Abraham was true for both Jews and Gentiles, for the latter through Christ and perhaps without Christ (if absolutely necessary) for the former. Jesus was a little more ambiguous. He really didn't like people going around doing whatever they felt like because they were children of Abraham. "From these stones, God can raise up children to Abraham." But this was a call for the Jews of his day to be worthy of the lineage of their father. We, Christians, are of that same lineage, either by the spirit or by both spirit and the flesh. And so we ought to be worthy of our lineage.

The Church sometimes has been greatly blessed by the witness of those in the latter category, Samuel Isaac Joseph Schereschewsky is a notable recent example. A gifted rabbinical student in the Ukraine. Blessed Samuel discovered the New Testament and left his community to study in Germany, convinced that Jesus was the Christ. Eventually, he translated the Old Testament from Hebrew into Chinese, apparently achieving great praise in Chinese literary circles.

When I look in the Old Testament for Christ, I go many places familiar to Christians down through the ages: to Isaiah and the Suffering Servant or to the Psalms etc. But I also go to the Book of Job. Job? There is much there which speaks to me of Christ as Savior but this above all:

Let not the earth cover my blood, and let my cry for justice find no rest! For now my witness is in heaven; there is One on high ready to answer for me. My appeal will come before God, while my eyes turn anxiously to him. If only there were arbitrate between man and God, as between a man and his neighbour. For there are but a few years to come before I take the road from which there is no return. My mind is distraught, my days are numbered, and the grave awaits me. Wherever I turn, I am taunted, and my eye meets nothing but sneers. Be my surety with yourself, for who else will pledge himself for me? [...] If I measure Sheol for my house, if I spread my couch in the darkness, if I call the grave my father and the worm my mother or my sister, where, then, will my hope be, and who will take account of my piety? I cannot take them with me down to Sheol, nor shall we descend together to the dust (Job 16:19-22, 17:1-3, 13-16).

In the other prophecies of Christ, I see Christ as liberator of Israel as community or nation, Christ as bearer of communal sins, Christ as the means to a salvation free to the world entire. These are joyful things. But sometimes we are like Job, we don't want messianic liberators. We are joyful that others will be saved. But we, in fear and trembling at our sins ("let not the earth cover my blood" has overtones of human sin as old as Genesis) want to know it will be all right. We know that God has the stuff on us, therefore we want our side of the story to be heard.

My favorite Epistle is that to the Hebrews in which Israel's entire sacred history is read as fulfilled in Christ and His Church with beautiful reasoning explaining how Christ's Sacrifice on the Cross is the fulfillment of the mystical and prophetic aspects of Jewish ritual worship in the Temple. It is beautiful and overpowering, especially when read on Maundy Thursday. But to the person first seeking Christ, it seems all too much. What does a lot of animal sacrifice have to do with this radical holy man? How is the New Testament really the fulfillment of the Old? Well, 500 years before Christ, some gifted writer expressed his longing for an advocate with God, a personal savior, not some great big cosmic and nationalistic figure. Through Israel, the human race in the Old Testament had many chances to tell God what they wanted, what they thought was just, what just plain annoyed them. Abraham and Moses showed God how much the righteous longed for mercy even for the wicked. At the crossing of the Red Sea, God saw how a show of force could stimulate thanksgiving from the most petulant of peoples. Did he already know these things? Of course, He's omniscient. But how many of us still want to hear our beloved's favorite color from his or her own lips, though we've known for twenty years? Or know what he or she really thinks about this or that, not just what they tell the rest of the world? And in Job, we hear the deepest longings of the human heart: What use is piety (and everything else we think makes us "good") if we are going to die anyway?

Then what does God's speech near the end of the Book tell us? Well to put it bluntly and uncharitably: You don't know anything, God does. But note how He says it, "Have you an arm like God's arm...Unleash the fury of your wrath, look on all who are proud, and humble them, look on all who are proud, and bring them low, crush the wicked where they stand; bury them in the earth together, and shroud them in an unknown grave. Then I in turn would acknowledge that your own right hand could save you" (Job 40:9, 11-14). God sounds like a jerk until I hear the strains of a young woman singing, "My soul doth magnify the Lord..." or the Psalm of Easter Sunday (118) chanted by the choir, "The Lord is my strength and my song and He has become my salvation. There is joy and exultation in the tents of the righteous. The right hand of the Lord hath triumphed, the right hand of the Lord has been exalted, the right hand of the Lord hath triumphed, I shall not die but live and proclaim all of the works of the Lord (see Job 38-41)." Surprise!, Job.

This is the beauty of the Old Testament that the Article emphasizes. Christ and salvation through Him are found everywhere. Once you know of Christ, the Old Testament stands unrolled and unraveled...or at least it is more clear and intelligible than before. Life first appears very easy when you know the right answer.

Yet also note that the view of the Tridentine Fathers on the importance of the Old Testament is based on a profession of faith: "God is the Author of both" and an invocation of aetiology and ontology: all Scriptures are the words of Christ or inspired by the Holy Ghost and preserved continuously in the Church Catholic as such. I prefer the Anglican version: both the Old and New Testaments proclaim salvation through Jesus Christ.

Wherefore they are not to be heard, which feign that the old Fathers did look only for transitory promises.

I've looked everywhere for some idea of who was feigning anything of this kind. I've found very little, but what I've found (mainly in 19th century sources) implies that this part of the Article argues against the view that the entire covenant of Israel with God was for carnal (transitory, worldly) purposes as opposed to the New Covenant which was more spiritual. This is an attractive idea, since playing carnal Israel off the spiritual Church is one of the oldest jeux de verite of Christendom. In an age when American Christians sometimes feel a religious duty to support Zion, it is important to realize that the Abrahamic covenant need not be honored by possession of the land in this world. Another implication of this view might be the antinomianism seemingly condemned in the next part of the Article. If the Old Covenant concerned material promises and material actions, it is only spiritual actions that have any bearing on spiritual promises. This, of course, is a very common but erroneous view of the human creature and the moral order. One of my 19th century sources is led to refer to this Article in the context of the manna in the desert, "when mortals ate the bread of angels and found it food enough."


Although the Law given from God by Moses, as touching Ceremonies and Rites, do not bind Christian men, nor the Civil Precepts thereof ought if necessity to be received in any commonwealth, yet notwithstanding, no Christian man whatsoever is free from obedience of the Commandments which are called Moral.

This part of the Article refers to one of the most fluid doctrines in the history of the Church and the source of its earliest controversy. At least since the time of the Schoolmen, there has been an exhaustive theological literature that shows how the Old Covenant is abolished (is replaced/ is fulfilled /is superseded/ hangs out still for fun or to spur men to redemption by showing them their helplessness in the face of sin) by or with the New. This literature also explains how the Ten Commandments transition nicely from the Old to the New.

I noted on Thinking Anglicans in June:

"The more Protestant leaning Anglicans in 1571 may have been like their descendants who wrote the Westminster Confession etc. and believed that the moral law is summarily comprehended in the Ten Commandments (proof-texting with Matthew 19:17-19. The more Catholic-leaning Anglicans would have agreed with the idea of summary comprehension if they followed Question 100 of Aquinas' Summa Theologica. But both sides probably would have disagreed about the exact content of the moral law, thus the Seventh Article contains the mutually inoffensive principle that all Christian men are bound by "the Commandments which are called Moral" (which are certainly the Ten Commandments and nothing else).

This is all very well and good until you read in Byzantine penitentials of the 8th century or so that the confessor was to ask if the penitent had eaten meat with the blood in it. One possibility for such a question is that a penitent who did so might be involved in pagan ritual practice. Another possibility is that the authors of the penitential were under the impression that the Noachian laws were binding on Christians. The particular commandment in question is certainly a dietary law. So apparently it took a while for the whole idea of the abolition of dietary laws to come into full acceptance. Moreover, some of those who say the Old Covenant is superseded in terms of rites and ceremonies will argue that it is improper to use musical instruments in worship etc.

Here's one case where "liberal" Episcopal theology really helps me out...wait...I mean Holy Eucharist I. When I was a little boy, I heard this every Sunday after the Collect for Purity:

Hear what our Lord Jesus Christ saith: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."

Before I begin my piece I would like to say that I regard myself and all other Christians as fully bound by the Ten Commandments understood narrowly, for they were understood narrowly when revealed at Sinai. But it is objected that they were merely elaborated by the Law. On the contrary, the very need for elaboration itself suggests that the commandments that elaborate are not contained within the Decalogue. I reply that it is the Summary of the Law in the New Covenant that should be read broadly, since it is the guiding principle of the Law and the Prophetic exhortations.

And here is what it says: the First Commandment strives for an inward affection toward God, not an outward affection of ritual and sacrifice. We regard all of the expressions of love of God in the First Commandment as inward affections, habits, or disciplines that condition outward actions. In the case of the Rites and Ceremonies of the Law, it was not that God could not see the inward emptiness of the Temple ritual performed by folks like those Jesus denounced as whitewashed tombs, He saw all and complained bitterly through the Prophets and as Emmanuel, begging like all lovers for deeply felt love, not candy, flowers, and burnt offerings. This is not to say that the ritual was merely carnal. Many Jews surely were greatly awed by God and loved Him deeply, but the Temple ritual also could be performed by those just going through the motions. It is hard for a just God to strike down a person obeying His commandments outwardly without inward affection (if only because it scares the genuine worshippers), but it surely stings.

Moreover, love of God without love of neighbor and vice versa is very difficult. This is an oft-repeated maxim in Episcopal churches these days, but it is of great truth. A just community cannot function without its members having a deep inner commitment to God who commands justice and mercy and deep love of justice and mercy inculcated by identification of one's neighbor with oneself. If anything else is included in the Ten Commandments or if they are to be read broadly, they will focus on the right ordering of that interiority that can be the source of many good and many dangerous external actions.

Finally, the New Covenant surpasses the ritual weaknesses of the Old sacramentally. Under the Old Law, the Samaritans are said by Jesus in the Gospel of John to worship what they know not and the Jews to worship what they know, for salvation (as we have said again and again) comes from the Jews. But Jesus says that the time has come for God to be worshipped in spirit and in truth, not by sacrifice on Zion and Gerizim. In the Eucharist, it is impossible that we can come without consequences to perform outward signs and remain vexingly pleasing to God, for in the Body and Blood of Christ we confront God Himself both carnally and spiritually. We know and are known in the company of the entire Church (these saints, these sinners, these our nearest neighbors, these our family). We obey the outward command through the innermost revelation of our being to God. We present ourselves as living offerings, allegedly holy and acceptable to God, which is our spiritual worship. And so, we, too, become as Christ on the Cross, combining the Passover and Yom Kippur sacrifices in ourselves, as both victim and priest, somehow liberated and still desperately unworthy. The rites and ceremonies of the old Fathers were not transitory, for if we strive to be worthy heirs of Abraham, they likewise are fulfilled through us.

----------------------------------

Until next time, the Holy Brothers pray that all you who have been led through the waters of the Red Sea may not test the Lord in your hearts as your fathers and mothers did at Meribah, nor go on sinning in the wilderness of these beauteous worlds. But instead may you brief that worthy Advocate in your cause who is your same Mighty Judge, even Jesus Christ, that He may give you a portion in the land of milk and honey and the world to come.

Article VI: Of the Sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures for Salvation

Before God and before Christ Jesus who is to the judge the living and the dead, I charge you solemnly by his coming appearance and his reign, proclaim the message, press it home in season and out of season, use argument, reproof, and appeal, with all the patience that teaching requires. For the time will come when people will not stand sound teaching , but each will follow his own whim and gather a crowd of teachers to his fancy. They will stop their ears to the truth and turn to fables (mythous) But you must keep your head whatever happens; put up with hardship, work to spread the gospel, discharge all the duties of your calling (2 Timothy 4:1-5).

I've been seeing these words a lot lately, dispersed in bits and pieces amongst the cluttering and clucking of many virtual tongues. It is a word spoken to many against their enemies. I wish to speak of it among friends. This is Paul's farewell address to Timothy, a distillation of the call to Timothy as a teacher of the Gospel. Paul reminds him first that the obligation of such teachers is ultimately to Almighty God who will hold all teachers responsible for their teaching. "At the watchmen's hand..." says Ezekiel and Augustine answered likewise in City of God .

Second, Paul calls Timothy to proclaim "the message, press it home in season and out of season." The Gospel should be proclaimed when fashionable and unfashionable. God has appointed no acceptable time for its proclamation to stop, therefore it must be human beings who are saying some words of Christ are seasonable or unseasonable.

Third, Paul discourses on methods: "argument, reproof, and appeal." The first is primarily founded on reason, the second on the evilness of a world assaulted by principalities, powers, and pettier but no less horrid inhumanities of man to man, and the third on the hope of freedom from the lusts of the flesh and the warfare of the cosmic order only known in the requital of the love of God and reconcilation to him through Jesus Christ. But Paul chides, "Be patient..."

Fourth, Paul warns that it will not be easy. In future, human beings will choose their teachers of the Gospel, and they will pick based on what they want to hear. This idea is so useful for polemic, but I see it also as a call to Timothy. What will differentiate a Timothy obedient to Paul from the competition is the preaching of the truth rather than mythos . Mythos is a funny word in that it can mean a true story as well as a false one. But given the context, Paul's sense of mythos is one very familiar to modern and ancient man. Mythoi are things we know are not truth, but we teach and profess them anyway because we think they are better or easier to take or more advantageous to ourselves and others. They are no substitute for the truth. John Chrysostom argues otherwise somewhat convincingly in On the Priesthood , but he likely would not want the Gospel seen this way. Whatever the distinctions or uses of truth and falsehood, the Good News of God in Christ is an abomination if it is merely a little white lie (or made up of them). Many important matters of human life, as Chrysostom agrees, are better proclaimed as the truth when they are truth.

And so, Timothy is charged to keep cool and persevere so that the Gospel remains true and not a series of placebos. If there is an interpretive community for the Holy Scriptures (and though I have spoken of it I wish to inquire further), Paul's charge remains in force.

What distances us from the Articulators in the matter of the Holy Scriptures is that some of the interpretive community has been very good at busting myths over the last three centuries. We no longer take so much for granted about how the text was assembled, having learned to speak about J and Deutero-Pauline whatnot. I still am working through how the Church before the Reformation did not understand the Scriptures as some pure text revealed by God in plain meaning, but I do not think the Fathers would be particularly appreciative to learn how good their instincts were. But despite the mess of what the Scriptures are, Christ was able to reveal himself in their letters (suggesting in the process how much mess there really was). Whatever ahistoricity, critical compilation, and contradictions "pollute the text," I believe there was a historical man and historical acts that purify and harmonize them. There was a Son of God, very man and very God, who speaks to my condition (hat tip to George Fox). That God-Man and man of history, I believe are one and the same. All of that messiness came and comes together because of Him. Most of all, I realize that the full fruition of the Holy Scriptures has not yet come, for God is not yet all in all. Therefore, keep your heads, the Scriptures still may be fulfilled in your hearing!

Paul's charge to Timothy also is instructive in that it represents the continuation of a tradition. On one hand, Timothy stands in the same place as the captains of hundreds and of thousands in Exodus who were to settle easy disputes and leave the hard judgments to Moses, the Prophet of God. Paul can fulfill this Mosaic function, because he sees himself as apostle at-large but also because he, like Moses, is on a transformational journey spurred by theophany. The Burning Bush for Moses, the Vision on the Damascus Road for Paul, the Life, Death, Resurrection of Jesus and the Pentecost for the other apostles are theophanic moments that must provide some confidence for those difficult cases. Those who see such things must throw away the idea that they will be like Aaron and lead the people into idolatry. The apostles, like many of their great forefathers among the Israelites, were almost direct conduits to God. On the other hand, this is Paul's farewell. The apostolic age is slowly drawing to a close. More definitely, the tradition bequeathed to Timothy could be called scribal or Levitical in the context of the Temple and rabbinical in the context of the synagogue.

The Book of Ezra is first to describe this role and what we know as the interpretive act. The Law has been restored to Judah after the return of some to Jerusalem and the rebuilding of the Temple. The Book of Nehemiah explains how it might have happened. The returnees are all settled and ask that the scribe and priest Ezra "bring the the book of the Law of Moses, which the Lord had enjoined upon Israel." Convicted of the offenses of their fathers and longing to be obedient so as to avoid their fate, they ask to hear the rules. From what I can tell, Ezra read the scroll of the Law ritually in the midst of a large crowd, while some among the Levites were scattered amidst the crowd reading as well and "made its sense plain, and gave instruction in what was read." Hmmm...Law needs interpretation. But the Book of Ezra records a possible result of this episode. Someone noticed the endogamy rules. Unfortunately, many people had taken foreign wives, including some very prominent people. It was decided that such people should abandon their wives and children. (Our sympathetic hearts are not assuaged. There is no talk of support payments and such, though notions of such things do exist in the Torah in other contexts.)

The interpretation entered in the story when the priests who had offended not only dismissed their foreign families but also offered a ram in expiation. Now there is no precedent in the Law for such a penalty. They as easily could have been deprived of their status and enrolled in another tribe. But it seems an interpretation of some sort was made. One possibility is that Ezra and his fellow interpreters saw the offense as desanctifying (as I suggest by implication) and offer a ram as a re-ordination sacrifice, since both Exodus and Leviticus state that a ram sacrifice is necessary for this ritual. Another possibility is that the interpreters recognized the offense as unintentional (as it might have been due to ignorance of the Law) and ordered that the priests at least should make the offering prescribed by Leviticus for unintentional offenses. But clearly Ezra and company went beyond the letter of the Law.

It might be argued against me that 1 Samuel 21 contains the first interpretive moment. But I think Ezra and Nehemiah are the clearest cases, because they show a community wrestling with a text. All of the earlier possible interpretive moments lack the clear presence of community approbation and a text. But whatever interpretive moments there are in the Old Testament, interpretation appears to be the business of prophets, priests, and kings, people like Timothy delegated in one way or another as set apart from the people.

Of course, as Christians, we must recognize ourselves as prophets, priests, and kings through Baptism. In the Old Testament, many of these figures also were direct conduits to God, not just interpreters of texts. The role of the Holy Spirit in Scriptural interpretation is part of a grand tradition of prophets, priests, and kings in the Old Testament. For it was often said of these men and women that the Spirit of God was with them.

Most instructive to us should be the case of Peter, who interprets the Scriptures in marvelous, Christ-affirming, and practical ways in the Acts of the Apostles. Prophet, priest, and king? Yes. Servant and Shepherd? Yes. But remember that the religious authorities of Jerusalem saw him as "an untutored layman." The Church is a kingdom of priests drawn from every class of people into which human beings have divided ourselves. The tasks of interpretation and proclamation bequeathed to Timothy and others like him surely belong to us all. But still we are merely human and there is something of the wanderer in the Wilderness of Sin about us. One of the great works of the Church since the Resurrection has been to determine how a kingdom of priests can work together to interpret and proclaim the truth rather than mythoi . Article VI presents one view. I will present another view contemporary with it.

Article VI: Of the Sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures for Salvation

Holy Scriptures containeth all things necessary to salvation: so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation. In the name of Holy Scripture, we do understand those Canonical books of the Old and New testament, of whose authority was never any doubt in the Church.
Of the names and number of the Canonical Books.
Genesis.
Exodus.
Leviticus.
Numbers.
Deuteronomy.
Joshua.
Judges.
Ruth.
The First Book of Samuel.
The Second Book of Samuel.
The First Book of Kings.
The Second Book of Kings.
The First Book of Chronicles.
The Second Book of Chronicles.
The First Book of Esdras.
The Second Book of Esdras.
The Book of Esther.
The Book of Job.
The Psalms.
The Proverbs.
Ecclesiastes, or the Preacher.
Cantica, or Songs of Solomon.
Four Prophets the Greater.
Twelve Prophets the Less.
And the other books (as Hierome saith) the Church doth read for example of life and instruction of manners; but yet doth it not apply them to establish any doctrine; such are these following:
The Third Book of Esdras.
The Fourth Book of Esdras.
The Book of Tobias.
The Book of Judith.
The rest of the Book of Esther.
The Book of Wisdom.
Jesus the Son of Sirach.
Baruch the Prophet.
The Song of the Three Children.
The Story of Susanna.
Of Bel and the Dragon.
The Prayer of Manasses.
The First Book of Maccabees.
The Second Book of Maccabees.
All the books of the New Testament, as they are commonly received, we do receive, and account them canonical.

The listing of books is especially interesting and suggests that this Article and the next one are replies to a purported "Ecumenical Council" held in the City of Trent about the same time. I submit for your consideration the relevant portion of its Acts.

See Council of Trent: Fourth Session

The listing of books is hierarchical for reasons we Anglicans attribute to St. Jerome (Hierome of the Article). Essentially, the Council of Trent was the first to set a Canon of Scripture with a lot of hemming and hawing about penalties and so forth. The Articulators seem to have replied that even Jerome (the translator of the Vulgate edition mentioned in the Tridentine decree) said certain books weren't to be considered sources of doctrine (and yet were used). If anyone knows where he said that, I'd appreciate a citation, but I'll trust the Articulators.

What interests me more is the different hermeneutical and soteriological implications of Article VI and the Tridentine decree.

Furthermore, in order to restrain petulant spirits, It decrees, that no one, relying on his own skill, shall,--in matters of faith, and of morals pertaining to the edification of Christian doctrine, --wresting the sacred Scripture to his own senses, presume to interpret the said sacred Scripture contrary to that sense which holy mother Church,--whose it is to judge of the true sense and interpretation of the holy Scriptures,--hath held and doth hold; or even contrary to the unanimous consent of the Fathers; even though such interpretations were never (intended) to be at any time published. Contraveners shall be made known by their Ordinaries, and be punished with the penalties by law established.

.

One result of the hermeneutical approach implied above is that the battle between Galileo and the Church wasn't about Science vs the Scriptures. Instead, Galileo was convinced that (a) nature and the Scriptures were in full agreement, (b) if they didn't appear that way, it was due to bad interpretation, and (c) Galileo had found some of those good interpretations. Such an approach apparently had support in Augustine and Bonaventure. But none of this mattered. Galileo relied on his own skill and interpreted the Scriptures against the unanimous consent of the Fathers, who apparently were all ardent promoters of the Ptolemaic system.

The approach of Article VI is somewhat different. It speaks to the abuses many saw in the Church of Rome. People were told such things as "salvation consists in total obedience to the will of the Roman pontiff" or "there's this Purgatory place but if you give alms and say prayers, you'll get to heaven that much faster" or "both the bread and the wine contain the Body and Blood of Christ." Article VI, I think arose, because it became very hard to see the interpretation of the Fathers for the opinions of the Fathers and harder still to see what present Catholic practice had to do with the words of the Scriptures. In some cases, this was an attack on ecclesiastical wealth. In other cases, it was an attack on plain ecclesiastical confusion. In yet other cases, it seems to have come down to soteriological worry. In cases such as Henry VIII's annulment case against Catherine of Aragon, Holy Mother Church seemed to become a wholly fallible institution, wont to change their interpretation of the Scriptures depending on whose army was marching on the Pope or what Cardinal was in England. Rome appeared to ply mythoi . How could anyone know the way to salvation presently taught wasn't a mythos ?

Article VI seems to say, if you want to know what is necessary to salvation, we are quite certain that is all in here somewhere. You don't need to do anything you don't see here. "Required of any man" personalizes it. But the Article does not answer the all-important question of who is reading and who is proving. Nor do we see any standard for proof.

In all honesty, I object to both the approach at Trent and in Article VI. I told you before that if the Church never dieth and God is the God of the living and the dead, I was going to believe that the entire communion of saints interprets the Holy Scriptures as a single Body whereof Christ is the Head. I object to Trent because it regards the contemporary and ordinary man as dead, unable to say anything against Holy Mother Church or the unanimous consent of the Fathers (whatever that is). I object to Article VI because it seems to respond to Trent but does not admit the Fathers to be alive and capable of argument. Now it is possible that Anglicanism is not condemned to poverty, that the inheritance in reasoning and holy example given to us by those who are now "a great cloud of witnesses" is not explicitly shoved away by Article VI. The authority of Jerome, for instance, is admitted. But in an age when intelligent, conscientious, and faithful people see the shadows of plots in ancient councils and see orthodox Christology at odds with the Scriptures, it would be useful to feel justified within this part of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church to point to the reasoning and example of those witnesses and say, "What did they miss? What better framework can you provide?" To others, I long to give answers on different questions infused not only by Scripture but also by Tradition. May I do this? Or will this age of itching ears say, "We will hear nothing unless it be the plain meaning of the Scriptures. And we don't want to hear we have the grammar wrong either..."?
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Until next time, the Holy Brothers pray that you may not weep at the words of the Holy Scriptures, but having heard them feast on that Most Rich Food and Sweet Drink that is the Body and Blood of Him wherein we have life and liberty.

Meme Alert: Avoid at Will

Derek tapped me for this one. Since both of my regular readers have done it, I tap no one. Instead, if some wayfarer should come across this entry, they may considered themselves tapped if they so wish.

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Overview: This post is a community experiment with two broad purposes. The first is to create publicly accessible data about bloggers' personalities, which may have sociological value in addition to being just plain fun. The second is to track the propagation of this meme through blogspace. Full details and explanation can be found on the original posting:

Instructions (to join in the experiment)

1) Take the IPIP-NEO personality test and the Political Compass quiz, if you have not done so already.

2) Copy to the clipboard that section of this post that is between the double lines, and paste it into your blog editor. (Blogger users may wish to use 'compose' mode to preserve formatting and hyperlinks. Otherwise, be sure to add hyperlinks as necessary.)

3) Replace the answers in the "survey" section below with your own.

4) Add your blog information to the "track list", in the form: "Linked title - URL - optional GUID".

5) Any additional comments should go outside of the double lines, including the (optional) nomination of bloggers you wish to pass this experimental meme on to.

6) Post it to your blog!

Survey:

Age: 22
Gender: Male
Location: Pasadena, CA, USA
Religion: Christian (Anglican)
Occupation: Natural Scientist
Began blogging: (dd/mm/yy): 09/01/02 [Just not here]

Political Compass results:

Economic Left/Right -3.50
Libertarian/Authoritarian -2.77

IPIP-NEO results:

EXTRAVERSION: 17
AGREEABLENESS: 62
CONSCIENTIOUSNESS: 65
NEUROTICISM: 60
OPENNESS TO EXPERIENCE: 84

Track List:

1. Philosophy, et cetera - pixnaps.blogspot.com - pixnaps97a2
2. Parableman - parablemania.ektopos.com - p8r8bl9m8n18
3. Rebecca Writes - everydaymusings.blogspot.com
4. Ales Rarus - alesrarus.funkydung.com - ales2112avis
5. Here I Stand - exiledcatholic.blogspot.com - exiled323catholic
6. Bending the Rule - regula.blogspot.com - regulabenedicti
7. lutherpunk - lutherpunk.blogspot.com - lutherpunk
8. haligweorc - haligweorc.blogspot.com - derek
9. The Monastery of the Remarkable English Martyrs - auluslactinus.blogspot.com - caelius
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Political Compass: This is an old score from back when my mind was changing about the war... Generally, the kind of political economic landscape to which I am attuned has nothing to do with what I see in the voting booth, but I've moved recently. I want to make taxation commensurate to environmental degradation, for instance.

IPIP-NEO:

Extraversion: You might guess that I am an introvert. This dates from those days when I was little and my parents wanted to sleep late. So I learned to entertain myself. I remain fairly socially awkward but not problematically so. The test considers me active but not very gregarious. I do things but not in groups (and this is a gross generalization).

Agreeable: Supposedly, I am especially cooperative and sympathetic but fairly immodest. This is rather funny, because I make a very conscious effort to be humble, because I am rather used to being praised.

Conscientiousness: I am apparently not particularly self-efficacious, which means that I have little confidence I can get things done. My life presents many difficult challenges. I tend to be pessimistic about what I can do, so I don't try to exert myself beyond what is humanly possible. It is alleged that I am orderly and cautious. I doubt that.

Neuroticism: It is alleged that I am highly neurotic. I score highest in vulnerability and self-consciousness. The first is no surprise. I tend to panic under some forms of pressure, especially those involving bloodletting. As for self-consciousness, I have had several experiences in my life in which it has been made clear to me that I am a serious annoyance to people with whom I live or work. Hence, I'm always a little anxious about others' perceptions of me.

Openness to Experience: I am more open to experience than I used to be. Ten years ago, I would have scored very low in Adventurousness. My score is now average. My score is boosted by high intellectual and imagination scores.

I do hope whoever is collecting this information is happy with their results.

Until next time, the Holy Brothers pray that the same mind be in you that was in Jesus Christ

Angloblogography

Reading Material

The next couple of Articles concern Scripture. I already have had some things to say about Scripture and Tradition , so I am going to take a slightly different tack on Article VI, which still may result in much lambasting of hermeneutics. But before I do, I want to talk about blogosphere stuff, some relevant and some not.

1.: The Scotist Speaks

The most relevant item is Anglican Scotist's recent piece called "Comments on William Witt's Exchange with Tobias Haller." Scotist basically concludes that this debate suggests that both sides of the sexuality debate lack intellect and imagination, especially when it comes to exegetical issues.

Three parts of Scotist's analysis really struck me: First, his identification in Haller's analysis at one point of "A and B" moments where it appears Haller is simultaneously A. reading Scripture as a lens through which to gaze at the reflected glory of God and B. reading Scripture as an entity wherein that reflected glory is contained. On one hand, Haller sees God through the box. On the other hand, Haller sees God in the box. Scotist is troubled by the schizophrenia of the approach, but it is a key part of our sanctified inheritance. Think on this maxim, "The Bible is not the Word of God, Jesus is the Word of God." And yet from the days of the Apostles, the Bible has been revealed and unrolled to us as the door whereof Christ is the key, the story whereof Christ is the protagonist, the prophecy wherein Christ is prophesied, the vehicle whereby in words Christ is made manifest to us. Throw the problem of Christ as Logos into the midst and strange signs and wonders are seen. In some cases, the text is deconstructed so far that the lens no longer seems to form a coherent image. In other cases, the Bible becomes Christ or vice versa . The fact that Haller is trying so clearly to keep those ideas in tension may represent some sort of failure of imagination (but certainly not one of faith), but if so, I know of no one who has succeeded.

Then we get to this:

"The Bible has no intrinsic meaning, I insist--whatever meaning it has it owes to its relation to other items: ultimately and primarily God, but more immediately and secondarily the Church, the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church, of which ECUSA is a part. Witt's talk of worlds within the text is so much mush, worlds apart from what is actually the case."

All right, I'll make one little hermeneutical comment here... There comes a time in all forms of deconstruction (and not merely textual) that nothing to appears to exist. Meaning is utterly vanquished. A few months ago, a class I was in had reached that point too many times for my comfort. The first time I tired of it, I asked him "Well, we really know nothing then?" And he said, "If that were true, I would walk out of that door and leave history for the rest of life. And as far as I am concerned, you could leave too. But I don't..." It was a long day, so I let him go. The next time it happened I said, "Why isn't this exercise [the kind of critique we'd been doing for nearly three months] some secular version of the silly women, always learning and never coming to the knowledge of the truth?" He answered to the effect that he's pretty sure that some things happened, some people lived, and they wrote texts that tried to explain their doings and their lives with more or less coherence. We break down texts in this way because it is good to help us think about the text, link apparently unrelated texts, and to think outside of the world of the text. Yes, the text creates a world, but it's not the real one. No world is fully real but the world we and ancient peoples share though dispersed throughout time. It almost seemed as if he were saying, "We deconstruct out of humility, to show how little we know and how little we can know for certain."

Thus, Scotist believes he (or someone else) has fully deconstructed the Scriptures. And thus, we would presume that the Scriptures stripped of intrinsic meaning still possess that which those texts I read in the spring possess. A. The text comprehends or is evidence for realia and B. The text possesses a group of interpreters who read in humility not in search of the world created by the text but in search of a second world mutual to both the realia of the text and the realia of the interpreters. The glorious thing about the Bible for those who believe is that we know what A and B are by faith. We have no need (nor does Scotist) to invent them. The Church therefore ultimately is victorious against both literalism and historicocriticism in this postmodern deconstructed world. Funnily enough, I do not think any of this really tells the Church anything it didn't know before the Reformation, but as my next post hopefully will show, the exact particulars of A. and B. have become a little nebulous. (Key to this paragraph: A is God, B is the Church (Militant and Triumphant Branches). But I do wonder what someone with some knowledge of Zen would have to say about having confidence in realia because of the mere existence of a text or vice versa .

Finally, Scotist serves as a perfect encourager for next post's offerings:

Both of them also err in agreeing that the authority of the 39 Articles is so great as to suffice to alone settle matters of theological dispute among Anglicans. Where on earth do they get this confidence? It is not the considered opinion of the place of the Articles in the Anglican Communion voiced in "The Study of Anglicanism" for instance--their agreement is tendentious at best. But it goes to show that both of them--not just Witt as Haller seems to think--are guilty of "begging the question" in the sense of merely reasserting what needs to be proven on the basis of contested authority. Why should anyone now assent to Articles VI and VII? Don't be shy: go ahead and argue your case.

A conservative Catholic friend of mine started reading Pontifications some time back. He commented to me that, "You Anglicans all argue in the same way no matter if you're liberal or conservative." I asked him what way he meant. He danced around that great mythos of Anglicanism, "the three-legged stool." I gave a name to his dance and agreed with his observation. It seems wherever you go you hear that the Elizabethan Settlement was a great thing. The 39 Articles therefore seem like our common deposit of faith. But ask deeper questions and you find tension underneath the surface. The present thalamofetishistic tendency in conservative theology and objections to women's ordination enter less favorable theological territory if Matrimony and Holy Orders are not "really" Sacraments. Liberals must contend with the particular church-state landscape on which the Articles are premised if they can get past the good and hearty catholic faith present in many of the Articles. The Scotist is right to ask who really believes in the authority of the Articles. In what does our Historic Faith and Order really reside or of what does it really consist?

Stand Firm, West Virginia!: "It's Not About Interpretation," It's About Misinterpretation

The idea of this piece is that our present unpleasantness stems from much of ECUSA's leadership not believing in the core tenets of the Christian faith and being idolaters and apostates of every variety. It's not just that they interpret the Bible differently. The only thing I can say about the piece is that it prooftexts people. It takes isolated quotes and uses them to make a point. In some cases, I see a clever attention to picking those phrases that directly contradict "the plain meaning of Scripture." In other cases, I see valid critiques of overenthusiastic social justice or ecumenical practice. In other cases, I see willful ignorance of the important work of God this church has done (even in the midst of iniquitous collaboration with the lusts of American civilization) in incorporating Native American spirituality into the Body of Christ. I also see other work of God unfolding. I can see we're sick. But we're not alone, nor do I see the causes of our malaise very clearly in this piece.

The HOBD Listhost Works in Mysterious Ways

Any visitor to the Anglican blogosphere starts noticing that a few General Convention deputies have blogs. Tobias Haller, Mark Harris of Preludium, and Louie Crew of Random Natter are probably the most notable examples. Are there others? Every once in a while, these bloggers will talk about threads on the House of Bishops and House of Deputies (HOBD) listhost. I do love how our church is embracing technology. But from my own experience with listhosts, they often descend into loci for strategic exchange of insults. HOBD listhost, however, does seem to have some interesting but often very heated debates. Through the Deputy bloggers, some information about what goes on circulates through the Internet in a variety of forms. Mrs. Leander Harding, wife of Rev. Dr. Leander Harding of his eponymous blog, referred to the members of GC2003 as 'church rats.' Well, if you want to know what the church rats are doing, I guess you are stuck gleaning tidbits from their blogs about the HOBD listhost.

Another Thought on the Problem at Hand

Another little musing about the exegesis problem from a blog with connections to AKMA. I like the color scheme on this blog.

ECUSA Turns Into Bad Word: IRD Named Thinktank of Interest

I have an Orthodox acquaintance of much blogging experience, one of whose passions in life is to find a wife who bakes good banana bread and will ensure he gets a proper Orthodox burial. He has other passions, but I think this is a sweet sentiment for a guy of my age. He apparently is joining a new liberal Christian group blog with folks he describes as "ECUSA types." One of these ECUSA types apparently is Chuck Currie. Chuck Currie, if you don't know, is the world's most famous UCC seminarian. But for an unreconstructed monarchist to the right of Montesquieu, ECUSA now represents all that is bad in the world and secretly in league with cosmic evil.

This would be disturbing if I didn't remember where I had seen the Episcopal Church called ECUSA. I first saw it in a little booklet not stylistically dissimilar from the Stand Firm piece linked above I read in 1998 or so. Until then, I always thought of the Episcopal Church. Now, ECUSA has become a bad word in the mouths of other Christians. Which is doubly funny to me because the old acronym would be PECUSA. One of the complaints of the booklet was about the P being dropped. I wonder if they complained because they realized that PECUSA could be turned into an object of derision more easily...

It's All Vain

bls in a recent post entitled "Friday Miscellany" noted how the current unpleasantness became really silly and unbloggable when Akinola threatened to discipline the Church of England. God, I think, recognizes the farcical nature of the business and in both perfect grief and perfect humor seems to have tried his "Surprise!" brand of humor so famous from the New Testament: Cleric's bishop post riles African critics . Until I see evidence to the contrary (open simony etc.), I am going to suspect the Holy Spirit is involved here as in so many episcopal elections you read about in hagiography. This, my friends, is what some good friends of mine call the Chiquita Banana aspect of the Holy Spirit.

Until next time, the Holy Brothers pray that you all may be fools for Christ and not merely foolish.

V. Of the Holy Ghost

A Matter Left From Last Post

It occurs to me that much of that vagina monologue could have been founded on 1 Timothy 2:15, but since A. the Apostle's reasoning seems based on obligations created after and consequent to the Fall and B. the Apostle is fine with women staying virgins elsewhere, we must conclude that the Apostle means reproduction can be a soteriologically positive activity if it takes place amidst the cultivation of the theological virtues. Believe me, I'm not arguing that people shouldn't be having children. (No one has said I was, but I wanted to make sure we're clear and I'm honest about the voice of Scripture.) Thank you for your attention.

Of the Holy Ghost

The Holy Ghost...

Perhaps, no quirk of English usage in theology has produced more humor than the title of the Third Person of the Trinity. We really have two options in interpreting Ghost as translation of the Latin spiritus or Greek pneuma . One is to see the Spirit (Ghost) as the incorporeal part of God. This is rather problematic in a number of ways. First, God doesn't have a body per se as we have said. Second, even if the Spirit were some more ineffable animating principle of God (who doesn't have a body), the Spirit somehow would be higher (or lower depending on your feelings on the hierarchy of effability) than the other Persons.

Third, such a status would suggest the Spirit was chiefly potential or participated chiefly in tendencies or potentiality. (What I mean by tendencies is this: in numerical physical prediction, it is often easier to calculate the trend or rate of change over time in a particular quantity at one or more times in the past to predict what will occur in the future than predicting everything a priori, Aristotelian potentiality reminds me of a purposeful tendency. Note that I only depend on Aristotle here because the Articulators may have been conscious of Aristotle's actual doctrine of the soul and its implications.) But whatever the passive implications of being a spirit, the Holy Spirit is certainly active. At the beginning, the Spirit moves over the primordial Chaos while Creation is spoken by the Father through or as the Son. The implication and the probable Scriptural seed of the beloved and problematic Neoplatonic problematization of the order we believe divine is confirmed elsewhere. The 104th Psalm asks, "Send forth your Spirit, O Lord and renew the face of the earth." In the New Testament, we are told the Spirit blows where it wills, plays a key role in the baptism preached by Christ, and performs all kinds of mediation between man and God. To summarize and do homage: the Lord, the Giver of life doesn't seem like a tame and ineffable Spirit. If one Person can be said to more active than another, we would place on our bets on the Spirit except for those few years near the beginning of the Era when the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. For the rest of the thirteen or fourteen billion years in which the worlds were made and continue in change and corruptibility, the Spirit seems to have been active.

So what's our other option? Well, we could see pneuma as wind and spiritus
as something different than the modern word spirit. We call liquor spirits in homage not just to the ineffable vapor of alcohol's volatilization but the very nature of its volatility. Liquor burns very well. The OED suggests blast as in storm-blast as an alternative translation of spiritus than ghost, and this seems like the sense of Ghost in ghost. Perhaps, the 1979 BCP by making fair linguistic concessions to modernity made quite a gaffe by talking about Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, when the doctrinal sense is neither carried by ghost or spirit as understood in modern usage. Perhaps, we ought to worship Father, Son, and Holy Blast or Father, Son, and Holy Blow (sounds a tad irreverent to me even if it might be more accurate.)

Perhaps, I might suggest another alternative. The Roman lawyers speak of the notion we call "Act of God" in terms of "irresistible or divine force ( vis divina ." In Greek law, they note this idea was captured under heading, "Act of God." But usually the lawyers talk in terms of rivers who overflow their common banks, unexpected landslides, great windstorms, and strong earthquake, a departure from past behavior which no prudent man can plan against and no work of man resist. As much as this is true of those acts of Nature that belong to God only insofar as Nature's author, this is true of the workings of the Holy Spirit in the worlds. The Spirit is a fire, a rush of wind, and all manner of other things, though the Spirit simply may be most deeply "a still, small voice" etc. of 2 Kings. Much more I could say on this, but I do like the ambiguity of the Spirit's nature in the story of the Samaritan Woman at Jacob's Well in 4:10. Christ offers the woman "living water." This is one of those moments where the poetry of the Bible seems present in the very realia of a conversation two thousand years ago. The Samaritan woman is drawing well water, which could be brackish and full of all sorts of contaminants. It was generally still and standing water (and less healthy). When the Samaritan woman asks about the living water she could mean two things, either she believes Jesus can give her some sort of special water or she believes that Jesus can give her inside information about a hidden river or stream in the area. "Living water" can mean in Greek water that is alive or a stream and river (in which the flowing water does seem to be alive). I've always read this story as a promise of the Holy Spirit, so I always thought it instructive to think of the Holy Spirit as a turbulent river. But if the Spirit is a turbulent river, we still might be able to drink it and never be thirsty again.

The problem with the analogies of the Holy Spirit with irresistible forces of nature is that they lose force when nature has been disenchanted. Whatever language of nature we use to name the Spirit and give worship makes the Spirit impersonal. The only other tack I can take is to see the idea of the Holy Spirit (or really matters spirtual in general) as effable through those times when our spiritousness is active. By our spiritousness, I mean our middle and mediating faculty between whatever part of the soul looks to the heights and whatever part of the soul looks to the ordinary. J-Tron blogrolls a fairly new blog called Expectations by a Rev. Mr. Grubbs in which he reviews a new book by Bret Easton Ellis. The novel presents a life of strikingly unredemptive immorality in a world in which it is not questioned (I have not read it, it's just the impression that I get.) He writes of

"the visceral reaction I had to “Less than Zero” which after almost a month after finishing the book I have barely come to shake off. I began this novel in an airport while waiting for a flight and finished it in mid-flight. And it was all I could do to keep from excusing myself to the lavatory in order to vomit. It was by far the first time a book had caused me to nearly physically react in such a violent way."

.

I do not think there is anything that should produce a physical reaction of that type in the novel, so it is not particularly explicable on the materialistic half-space of the world. Nor is this anything commonly called "moral disgust," which often seems rather bound to matters of the materialistic half-space. Nor is this conviction of sin from having swam in a moral cesspool. "This visceral reaction" instead seems to be the activity of spiritousness, a queerness to the matter of the body as if the soul says to the body, "I do not want to endure in you." But the Gnostics misinterpreted it. The spirit really is saying, "Let us both not endure these things of depravity, misery, and hopelessness, which are very limited views even of the visible things." For in depravity, there is always opportunity for repentance and absolution. In misery, there is always the seed of joy. And the hopeless need not always be so. The Christian mind feels the viscerality of the spiritousness when presented with a worldview directly opposed to its own. The Holy Spirit ultimately instructs us in such a worldview. Thus the leading of our spirit in such a way is often the leading of the Spirit. The Spirit thus is the ultimate queerness in the materialistic half-space that draws us away from the narrowness of the focus common to the ordinary not only into the fullness of the visible worlds but also into the equivalent verity of the invisible.

Isn't this a little like saying of Christ, "You are the eschatological manifestation of the ground of our being, the ontological foundation of the context of our very selfhood revealed"? (See Pontifications . Well, sort of. But when language evolves in such a way not only to fail (which is bound to happen) but to mislead when describing sacred doctrine, you do what you can. So let's be clearer. The Holy Ghost is like a ghost in this way and this way only. If there are ghosts, they are said to create a chill in their wake. The Holy Ghost is like that chill if it were perfectly true, beautiful, and good and made you want to be that way, too.

...proceeding from the Father and the Son...

At the next Prayer Book revision, ECUSA has agreed to omit "and the Son." The trouble I see is this. On one hand, saying "Father and the Son" seems to imply the Spirit's inferiority, although Augustine supposedly found a way to avoid this. On the other hand, it recognizes the Speaker, Word, (Active) Hoverer trichotomy of Genesis more fully, though there are arguments from the other side that the necessary trichotomies are captured by the original Nicene formulae. We'll not even get into the issue of Westerners adding something to the Nicene Creed without Eastern consultation. It should be clear from our discussion why this is an improper thing to do. But what's in the Article (if it were to be a confession) doesn't need to be in the Creed, though it shouldn't contradict it. Whatever formula is proper should allow the mind not to diminish the Holy Redundancies of the Athanasian Creed. I prefer "proceeds from the Father through the Son" which I think reflects the original trichotomy, but sometimes I just wish we would stop quibbling about words and teach these doctrines as guided meditations. I'll say the Creeds. I'll believe the Creeds. I never will heap any ignominy on the Creeds. They're great. I will encourage others to do likewise. But I'll never say that any man or text outside of them can fully comprehend what they teach. Yipe, I think I've applied Godel's Theorem to the Creeds.

...is of one substance, majesty, and glory, with the Father and the Son, very and eternal God.

Considering how much queerness of the materialistic half-space there can be in our lives, if we only dare to look, it is important that we not diminish the Spirit in our hearts and minds. The Holy Ghost is God. Accept no substitutes.

Until next time, the Holy Brothers pray that you may drink living water, be cooled by a mighty rush of wind, be warmed by fire from on high, and live in that still small silence at the heart of being.