Our Bible studies often start with some form of ‘icebreaker,’ this one was “Reflection: From where does evil come?” The biblical answer, of course, is “trees”.
But enough of that!
This is a magnificent chapter. It shows us that evil: the antithesis of God, is not ontologically basic. It is not part of what is ‘really real’. This is close to Augustine’s view that evil is constituted by deficit; (if I recall his work correctly) but different in that the absence is not metaphysical: evil is existentially real and consists of real events that bring the reverse of benefit, but it represents the absence of love, and is constituted as the Bible sharply puts it, as the work of the murderer (John 8:44). It emerges in actions taken in relationship that come from a denial of the ‘imageness’ of God in us. So evil is the outworking of the ‘image of God’ undone.
The study goes on to weave the basket of deception, half-truths and manipulation that characterises evil: the practice of the rejection of God, love and life; and their substitute in self obsession, pride and lust for self benefit by loss for others.
‘Sin’ is popularly regarded as somehow ‘fun’ or for innocent pleasure; but it is not and profoundly so, as 1 John 2:15ff tells. This reminds me of a great phrase spoken by a Roman Catholic monk in a sermon I heard many years ago at St Finbar’s church at Glenbrook, NSW: he referred to the ‘glamour of sin’ in a sermon that exposed the glamour as entirely hollow and like a mirage turning to nothing as it’s grasped. And so it is, the core of sin being its alignment with death and detachment from God. As one of the study group put it “living our own way, not God’s”.
I saw a poster recently that asked why limit sins to seven (the ‘seven deadly sins’), and felt somewhat perturbed: sin is about anti-love, rejection and dissolution; for some reason (the blandishments of the evil one) it is thought to represent the best fun. But it does not; it represents the worst sadness that comes from a marred and sullied ‘very good’ creation. It ends in the dust of death, not the glow of life.
The great hope in this chapter of the Bible is that while their world crumbles around them as God is pushed away from them and his creation, God nevertheless limits the damage and shows shimmers of hope at every turn: the seed will crush the serpent’s head, God saves A&E from their exposed embarrassment and provides animal skins (the first death in the fallen world is used in an act, the first act heralding God’s mission of rescue).
I wonder if another act of love is God turfing A&E out of the garden of Eden, to prevent their coming to the tree of life: how sad to endure everlasting life mired in sin! Once again, God inverts our values and disasters and brings life…in this case our death is that which he will set aside in the Christ who is to crush the serpent’s head.
One little detail in this account that I like comes in Gen 3:6c, “and she gave also to her husband with her.” Do I see here that the whole episode in which Eve conducted the interaction with the serpent was done with Adam there? There is no hint in the pre-fall moment that Eve should make way for Adam, that Adam’s head-ness is betrayed by Eve’s exercise of her intelligence. Adam, of course failed to speak up, but God’s point of accusation against him has nothing to do with Eve speaking as a female, but as one speaking error, with him not testing the error and entering into a corrective dialogue. Male supremacy, if it is imagined elsewhere in the Bible, is certainly not a feature of the ‘very good’ creation. It is however, a result of the fall and represents brokenness, as does the woman’s corresponding (dominating?) desire for him. From a relationship of corresponding good, we have it collapse into a correspondence of exploitation.
A member of the group brought along a small book by Marcus Loane, where he supposes that chapter three is an extended allegory. I’m not sure if this is helpful. As with all points in these opening chapters, if they have the character of allegory or are symbolic, we are lost for a reference. Because they are ontologically basic, and we have no other knowledge of the matters exposed, we would be hard pressed to make any headway understanding them. I don’t think they have any real ‘work’ to do if they are not directly true to events that happened.
Does this then put me in the position of populating the genealogy of evil with talking snakes, and fruit that can either make or break? Maybe. Because we have no access to the pre-fall world, we must to some degree suspend analysis and seek in the text what we can learn, as though it refers to what really happened; otherwise we are in the dessert of reader-response hermeneutic going where we want to without check or balance.
Death in this chapter is brought upon us. The rest of the Bible is God’s action to undo its effects. Yet the consequence of interpretations that manipulate the direct meaning of the text in these opening chapters has the effect of sidelining the pivotal role of death in the relationship between God and creation (refer to Paul in Romans, where it is the whole creation that groans), because it puts death prior to the fall. Somehow this trivialises death, and makes it part of the ‘very good’, when we are told that it is the final enemy, with ramifications extending into animal life, Isaiah making peace between prey and predator a mark of the new creation.
29 November 2008
28 November 2008
Sermon 5: Men and Women
The MP3 link for the sermon is here.
I thought that there was much good in the sermon…that is to say, I found myself in less disagreement than I had found with the first two sermons. I particularly liked what was said about sex (about the good it is in marriage, and the frequent disaster it brings when detached from a mutually serving marriage relationship) and the overall relationship between male and female. I was singularly impressed when we were told that the Bible does not set out ‘sex roles’, which of course it doesn’t, but shows how responsibility is distributed between relating men and women (refer to 1 Corinthians 7:4, 11:11, Eph 4:32 and 5:21 as guide on this matter). Pity that such views are not amplified and given public voice; but then, those outside the church are rarely willing to concede that it has anything to say, then self-fullfillingly accuse it of saying nothing!
It was very helpful for the sermon to touch on the damage between men and women that the fall brought, and how this is not normative, but aberrant, and for correction, not reinforcement.
There were some points of emphasis in the sermon that I would have preferred adjusted, but in the main, nothing major…except…
the topic of ‘headship;’ a notion invented in conservative denominations to foster their shameless adoption of a cultural imbalance in both marriage and ecclesiastical relationships between men and women.
There’s no denying that a number of relationships in the Bible have one of the parties as ‘head’ to the other. However, this simple statement of relational derivation cannot within the confines of the Bible be transformed into the state of ‘headship,’ particularly when this is defined in the Australian Oxford Dictionary as “the position of chief or leader…” As my blog on the related study to this sermon discusses, the concept is not in the Bible.
The very point of my disagreement with the sermon was that the relationship of the husband to the wife was labelled, after some reasonably helpful and biblical discussion on the operational dimensions of being ‘head,’ as that of “servant-leadership.”
This is a pretty popular phrase in Sydney (Diocese of) that attempts to soften the importation from the unredeemed culture of the exploitative and hierarchical aspects of ‘leadership’ as it is comprised in that culture.
To be a ‘leader’ is to be the more important; viz the recent popularity of ‘leadership’ in popular (junk?) business literature (although, I recommend the work of Ron Heifetz and James Collins on this subject). However, the softening, in my view is cynical, as it serves to allow the priority of ‘leader’ to be asserted in line with denominational structure, but in distinction from the Bible’s usage, against which it makes a poor fit. The concept of ‘leader’ in the Bible is very rarely employed in respect of church whereas the concept of ‘servant’ in isolation is far more extensively used. I would be much encouraged if the denomination de-emphasised its arbitrary structures in favour of a biblical approach and stopped using the faux humble term of ‘servant-leader’.
But in our immediate context, it fails completely! There is no ‘leader-led’ in the marriage relationship! Even if the pretence of ‘servant-leader’ is used. The Genesis passage excludes it completely.
Of course, this comes to us from the obdurate unbiblicality of the notion of ‘head’ as ‘authority over’ or ‘commander’ (or, one shudders to say ‘leader’, c.f. for instance Matt 20:25 and 23:10, Luke 22:26,27); careful regard for 1 Corinthians 11:3ff and Eph 4:15,16 can throw light here) which is a consequence of reading the structures of the Roman church (read, the Roman Empire) back into the church as the body of Christ. Simply not on!
On ‘head’ I refer to an article by Gilbert Bilezikian.
On the creation, I refer to an article by Carlson-Thies
But, all that aside, I found the sermon to be encouraging and to contain a number of helpful insights. It’s just a pity that the sermon ‘form’ doesn’t lend itself to the transformational benefits of discussion and reflection within the audience. See here, for a resource on this, and here for another.
Unfortunately, the sermon stopped short of the practical. What, for instance, does a man do as head of woman operationally; how do we put it into practice: take a job that demands less of family forbearance? Knock around the house instead of the golf course? The list could go on with dramatic and society changing consequences…are we brave enough?
I thought that there was much good in the sermon…that is to say, I found myself in less disagreement than I had found with the first two sermons. I particularly liked what was said about sex (about the good it is in marriage, and the frequent disaster it brings when detached from a mutually serving marriage relationship) and the overall relationship between male and female. I was singularly impressed when we were told that the Bible does not set out ‘sex roles’, which of course it doesn’t, but shows how responsibility is distributed between relating men and women (refer to 1 Corinthians 7:4, 11:11, Eph 4:32 and 5:21 as guide on this matter). Pity that such views are not amplified and given public voice; but then, those outside the church are rarely willing to concede that it has anything to say, then self-fullfillingly accuse it of saying nothing!
It was very helpful for the sermon to touch on the damage between men and women that the fall brought, and how this is not normative, but aberrant, and for correction, not reinforcement.
There were some points of emphasis in the sermon that I would have preferred adjusted, but in the main, nothing major…except…
the topic of ‘headship;’ a notion invented in conservative denominations to foster their shameless adoption of a cultural imbalance in both marriage and ecclesiastical relationships between men and women.
There’s no denying that a number of relationships in the Bible have one of the parties as ‘head’ to the other. However, this simple statement of relational derivation cannot within the confines of the Bible be transformed into the state of ‘headship,’ particularly when this is defined in the Australian Oxford Dictionary as “the position of chief or leader…” As my blog on the related study to this sermon discusses, the concept is not in the Bible.
The very point of my disagreement with the sermon was that the relationship of the husband to the wife was labelled, after some reasonably helpful and biblical discussion on the operational dimensions of being ‘head,’ as that of “servant-leadership.”
This is a pretty popular phrase in Sydney (Diocese of) that attempts to soften the importation from the unredeemed culture of the exploitative and hierarchical aspects of ‘leadership’ as it is comprised in that culture.
To be a ‘leader’ is to be the more important; viz the recent popularity of ‘leadership’ in popular (junk?) business literature (although, I recommend the work of Ron Heifetz and James Collins on this subject). However, the softening, in my view is cynical, as it serves to allow the priority of ‘leader’ to be asserted in line with denominational structure, but in distinction from the Bible’s usage, against which it makes a poor fit. The concept of ‘leader’ in the Bible is very rarely employed in respect of church whereas the concept of ‘servant’ in isolation is far more extensively used. I would be much encouraged if the denomination de-emphasised its arbitrary structures in favour of a biblical approach and stopped using the faux humble term of ‘servant-leader’.
But in our immediate context, it fails completely! There is no ‘leader-led’ in the marriage relationship! Even if the pretence of ‘servant-leader’ is used. The Genesis passage excludes it completely.
Of course, this comes to us from the obdurate unbiblicality of the notion of ‘head’ as ‘authority over’ or ‘commander’ (or, one shudders to say ‘leader’, c.f. for instance Matt 20:25 and 23:10, Luke 22:26,27); careful regard for 1 Corinthians 11:3ff and Eph 4:15,16 can throw light here) which is a consequence of reading the structures of the Roman church (read, the Roman Empire) back into the church as the body of Christ. Simply not on!
On ‘head’ I refer to an article by Gilbert Bilezikian.
On the creation, I refer to an article by Carlson-Thies
But, all that aside, I found the sermon to be encouraging and to contain a number of helpful insights. It’s just a pity that the sermon ‘form’ doesn’t lend itself to the transformational benefits of discussion and reflection within the audience. See here, for a resource on this, and here for another.
Unfortunately, the sermon stopped short of the practical. What, for instance, does a man do as head of woman operationally; how do we put it into practice: take a job that demands less of family forbearance? Knock around the house instead of the golf course? The list could go on with dramatic and society changing consequences…are we brave enough?
24 November 2008
Study 5: Men and Women in Relationship (Gen 2:18-25)
I missed the past two studies due to being away on holidays. I’ll prepare some notes, as time permits, based on the study book and the sermons when I get to listen to the MP3s.
The subject text: Ge 2:18-3:1
18 Then the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him." 19 Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name. 20 The man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him. 21 So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. 22 The LORD God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man. 23 The man said,
" This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh;
She shall be called Woman,
Because she was taken out of man."
24 For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh. 25 And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.(NASB)
The first question referred us back to Gen 1:26:28 and asked about it in relation to “men, women and marriage”.
Just to remind, that passage is:
26 Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth." 27 God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28 God blessed them; and God said to them, " Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth."NASB
This is one of the truly confronting and radical passages in the Bible, in my view! Considering what we know of the status of women in the ANE, this puts men and women on equal footing, and for no social reason, as far as I can see (even if one accepts the late date of this passage being a ‘priestly’ composition, or even more so, perhaps). I like Brunner’s remarks, reported by Von Rad in his commentary on Genesis: “That is the immense double statement, of a lapidary simplicity, so simple indeed that we hardly realise that with it a vast world of myth and Gnostic speculation, of cynicism and asceticism, of the deification of sexuality and fear of sex completely disappears.”
But, of course, it is more that this; man and woman are not just presented as equal (as the parish’s study notes declared with a limp flourish), which is certainly included here, as far as these words go, but far more. The image of God rests upon man as a collective, and male and female conjointly (and not just on paired men and women, in my view, but upon mankind in community): the image cannot be sundered apart by the sexual nature of our being which suggests a unity in image-bearing, but not one that is exhausted by the individual, per se or even as an exemplar. The lame jokes directed against women fall, by this passage, into a theological abyss, where they belong.
[An aside on this: against my better judgement I attended a ‘Katoomba Men’s Convention’ a few years ago. When I heard from the platform the first snide joke at the expense of women, I got the impression that this would mark the tone of the day. I decided to keep a count of this example of puerility. Unsurprisingly, on this one day I noted 8 such ‘jokes’. So much for men who’d taken upon themselves to ‘teach’ their brothers demonstrating an understanding of the nature of male and female as created! This is consistent, however with a) the widespread disregard for the direct meaning of Genesis 1 in the Anglican church, and b) the unbiblical view of women afoot in this diocese and represented in their exclusion from a number of man-made ‘offices’ in the diocese (you know the drill: ‘rector’; ‘bishop’, ‘archbishop’.)]
I was very pleased to see a comment in the study book on woman’s status as ‘helper’ of man. The author rightly pointed out that women are ‘helpers’ to men as God is ‘helper’ to Israel: that is, as one with superior endowment going to repair a deficiency in the other! The precise point of helping is of course that Adam needed help at the precise point of his alone-ness! The help was the companionship of an equal, at least!
Q. 3 “What does the passage teach us about men, women and marriage?” (2:18-25 that is).
The largest part of this passage concerns itself with the naming of animals (restricted to the beasts of field and birds of sky; incidentally notable against the ‘framework’ hypothesis that both avian and terrestrial animals are made from the ground, amplifying the confusion of its artificial tripartite mirroring scheme); so I wonder what we may draw from this.
I think an idea worth exploring is that Adam ‘names’ consistently with the mandate to rule. He identifies these creatures’ relationships to him and, perhaps, to each other and the creation. The naming reinforces the subjection of these creatures to him. Now, it gets interesting when he meets Eve. He doesn’t assign her a name as I infer from the passage he does with the animals, but recognises a creature astonishingly different from both them (in obvious morphology) and him (in refinement, she being made of his flesh, not of dust). Adam’s exclamation is of wonder: she is of him, with him and they are intimately in relationship (as flows from the joint image-bearing). He goes on not to name her, in the manner of animals, but describes her derivation that bespeaks an intimacy and equality that is shared by no other creature. It certainly comes over from Adam’s short hymn (v. 23) that he is not ‘over-above’ the woman in any sense, but an admirer of her as one like him and his companion.
This drives home the point of the special relationship between man and woman, and by extension, between men and women; it is not merely a reproductive relationship as would be obvious between the sexes in animals, but has a moral and spiritual dimension that is completely lacking in animals and flows from ‘image-bearing’ into a community of delight and purpose.
What does this go on to teach us about marriage?
It is a conjugate unity with the parties acting jointly because they are one family. It creates companionship that is marked by dynamic intimacy at all levels, and a depth of mutuality and respect that is notable in its absence since the fall!
In the study group we chatted about this for some time; with a couple of group members, at the end of discussions admitting: ‘but we know that the man is the head of the family.’
The illustration both of them gave (one a man, the other a woman) was the need in a business for a ‘final’ decision maker. Now, a married couple is not a business, and the decisions are personal not commercial!
I pointed out that the idea of a ‘final decision-maker’ and the man as ‘head of the family’ was not in the least biblical; much to their consternation. In a conjugate relationship it is the joint parties that are together the final decision maker. If there is to be any dispute, I would hope the godly direction of dispute would be each attempting to find the other’s best interest (Eph 5:21). Darn near impossible to live out, in my humble experience!
Naturally, we next went to the question of ‘head’, with a reference to 1 Cor 11:3. Knowing Sydney Diocese’s view of men, women, and heads, this was bound to come up. I am suspicious that it came up with more than a trace of tendentiousness.
Certainly Paul tells us in this verse that there are a number of ‘heads’. But he does so in a way that carefully avoids any implication of order to imply hierarchy (compare, for instance, the order in 1 Cor 12:28). This is a simple statement of relationship pairs; indeed, ‘source-response’ pairs, with the point being, I think, the validity of sexual difference and, by reference to Genesis 1 and 2, the lack of spiritual differentiation between male and female!
OK, so “how is male ‘headship’ [no such thing, of course, in the Bible] expressed in the context of the marriage relationship?”
The real question is: "what is it, then for a man to be 'head' in his relationships with women, particularly his wife?"
The answer is found by reflecting on Eph 4:15-16: the head serves the other as Christ served the church: to the promot the other's benefit to the point of sacrifice of the head.
An interesting little note struck about marriage in the Genesis 2 passage is that it is the man who leaves his originating family to assign his commitments to his wife. I wonder if there is any implication for women in their not being stated as leaving their family?
Singleness.
This took a heading in the study book. Just a brief remark here: “the New Testament shows us that a marriage relationship is not for everyone”. Yet I am told that singleness can be problematic if you seek ordination as an unmarried man and are confirmed in your desire to remain so. I know that we are built for sexual relationship, but some are gifted to, or choose to remain single (Matt 19:12); my Anglo-catholic friends would suggest that this scriptural fact is not always given the credibility it deserves in the Sydney diocese.
I wait with some interest the sermon on this passage on Sunday (23 Nov 8).
The subject text: Ge 2:18-3:1
18 Then the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him." 19 Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name. 20 The man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him. 21 So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. 22 The LORD God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man. 23 The man said,
" This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh;
She shall be called Woman,
Because she was taken out of man."
24 For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh. 25 And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.(NASB)
The first question referred us back to Gen 1:26:28 and asked about it in relation to “men, women and marriage”.
Just to remind, that passage is:
26 Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth." 27 God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28 God blessed them; and God said to them, " Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth."NASB
This is one of the truly confronting and radical passages in the Bible, in my view! Considering what we know of the status of women in the ANE, this puts men and women on equal footing, and for no social reason, as far as I can see (even if one accepts the late date of this passage being a ‘priestly’ composition, or even more so, perhaps). I like Brunner’s remarks, reported by Von Rad in his commentary on Genesis: “That is the immense double statement, of a lapidary simplicity, so simple indeed that we hardly realise that with it a vast world of myth and Gnostic speculation, of cynicism and asceticism, of the deification of sexuality and fear of sex completely disappears.”
But, of course, it is more that this; man and woman are not just presented as equal (as the parish’s study notes declared with a limp flourish), which is certainly included here, as far as these words go, but far more. The image of God rests upon man as a collective, and male and female conjointly (and not just on paired men and women, in my view, but upon mankind in community): the image cannot be sundered apart by the sexual nature of our being which suggests a unity in image-bearing, but not one that is exhausted by the individual, per se or even as an exemplar. The lame jokes directed against women fall, by this passage, into a theological abyss, where they belong.
[An aside on this: against my better judgement I attended a ‘Katoomba Men’s Convention’ a few years ago. When I heard from the platform the first snide joke at the expense of women, I got the impression that this would mark the tone of the day. I decided to keep a count of this example of puerility. Unsurprisingly, on this one day I noted 8 such ‘jokes’. So much for men who’d taken upon themselves to ‘teach’ their brothers demonstrating an understanding of the nature of male and female as created! This is consistent, however with a) the widespread disregard for the direct meaning of Genesis 1 in the Anglican church, and b) the unbiblical view of women afoot in this diocese and represented in their exclusion from a number of man-made ‘offices’ in the diocese (you know the drill: ‘rector’; ‘bishop’, ‘archbishop’.)]
I was very pleased to see a comment in the study book on woman’s status as ‘helper’ of man. The author rightly pointed out that women are ‘helpers’ to men as God is ‘helper’ to Israel: that is, as one with superior endowment going to repair a deficiency in the other! The precise point of helping is of course that Adam needed help at the precise point of his alone-ness! The help was the companionship of an equal, at least!
Q. 3 “What does the passage teach us about men, women and marriage?” (2:18-25 that is).
The largest part of this passage concerns itself with the naming of animals (restricted to the beasts of field and birds of sky; incidentally notable against the ‘framework’ hypothesis that both avian and terrestrial animals are made from the ground, amplifying the confusion of its artificial tripartite mirroring scheme); so I wonder what we may draw from this.
I think an idea worth exploring is that Adam ‘names’ consistently with the mandate to rule. He identifies these creatures’ relationships to him and, perhaps, to each other and the creation. The naming reinforces the subjection of these creatures to him. Now, it gets interesting when he meets Eve. He doesn’t assign her a name as I infer from the passage he does with the animals, but recognises a creature astonishingly different from both them (in obvious morphology) and him (in refinement, she being made of his flesh, not of dust). Adam’s exclamation is of wonder: she is of him, with him and they are intimately in relationship (as flows from the joint image-bearing). He goes on not to name her, in the manner of animals, but describes her derivation that bespeaks an intimacy and equality that is shared by no other creature. It certainly comes over from Adam’s short hymn (v. 23) that he is not ‘over-above’ the woman in any sense, but an admirer of her as one like him and his companion.
This drives home the point of the special relationship between man and woman, and by extension, between men and women; it is not merely a reproductive relationship as would be obvious between the sexes in animals, but has a moral and spiritual dimension that is completely lacking in animals and flows from ‘image-bearing’ into a community of delight and purpose.
What does this go on to teach us about marriage?
It is a conjugate unity with the parties acting jointly because they are one family. It creates companionship that is marked by dynamic intimacy at all levels, and a depth of mutuality and respect that is notable in its absence since the fall!
In the study group we chatted about this for some time; with a couple of group members, at the end of discussions admitting: ‘but we know that the man is the head of the family.’
The illustration both of them gave (one a man, the other a woman) was the need in a business for a ‘final’ decision maker. Now, a married couple is not a business, and the decisions are personal not commercial!
I pointed out that the idea of a ‘final decision-maker’ and the man as ‘head of the family’ was not in the least biblical; much to their consternation. In a conjugate relationship it is the joint parties that are together the final decision maker. If there is to be any dispute, I would hope the godly direction of dispute would be each attempting to find the other’s best interest (Eph 5:21). Darn near impossible to live out, in my humble experience!
Naturally, we next went to the question of ‘head’, with a reference to 1 Cor 11:3. Knowing Sydney Diocese’s view of men, women, and heads, this was bound to come up. I am suspicious that it came up with more than a trace of tendentiousness.
Certainly Paul tells us in this verse that there are a number of ‘heads’. But he does so in a way that carefully avoids any implication of order to imply hierarchy (compare, for instance, the order in 1 Cor 12:28). This is a simple statement of relationship pairs; indeed, ‘source-response’ pairs, with the point being, I think, the validity of sexual difference and, by reference to Genesis 1 and 2, the lack of spiritual differentiation between male and female!
OK, so “how is male ‘headship’ [no such thing, of course, in the Bible] expressed in the context of the marriage relationship?”
The real question is: "what is it, then for a man to be 'head' in his relationships with women, particularly his wife?"
The answer is found by reflecting on Eph 4:15-16: the head serves the other as Christ served the church: to the promot the other's benefit to the point of sacrifice of the head.
An interesting little note struck about marriage in the Genesis 2 passage is that it is the man who leaves his originating family to assign his commitments to his wife. I wonder if there is any implication for women in their not being stated as leaving their family?
Singleness.
This took a heading in the study book. Just a brief remark here: “the New Testament shows us that a marriage relationship is not for everyone”. Yet I am told that singleness can be problematic if you seek ordination as an unmarried man and are confirmed in your desire to remain so. I know that we are built for sexual relationship, but some are gifted to, or choose to remain single (Matt 19:12); my Anglo-catholic friends would suggest that this scriptural fact is not always given the credibility it deserves in the Sydney diocese.
I wait with some interest the sermon on this passage on Sunday (23 Nov 8).
1 November 2008
Genesis Links
I've added links to sites that have topics that overlap with this blog. Naturally, while I find these sites interesting and helpful, I don't necessarily agree with everything on them.
The Genesis sermons are from Christ Reformed Baptist Church, in the USA; Tom Chantry is the minister.
The Genesis sermons are from Christ Reformed Baptist Church, in the USA; Tom Chantry is the minister.
Comments on Sermon 2: Creation-Evolution
Second open letter reviewing a sermon on Genesis:
Dear M.
I’ve been thinking about your sermon on Sunday, but am not yet ready to set out my thoughts in detail. However, rather than delay, I'd like to give you this sketch of the topics and hope to provide a fuller discussion later.
1. The matter of Galileo’s treatment by the Church of Rome usually gets an airing when biblical origins are discussed. The airing usually addressees the converse of what happened. The problem Galileo encountered was that the church was wedded to the science of the day: Aristotelian in base, and had difficulty untangling this from what Galileo was doing. It was not a conflict between the Scripture and ‘science’ but between the church’s insufficient doctrine of creation being grafted onto Aristotle’s ideas.
The church is doing the same today, largely wed to evolutionary ideas, it seems reluctant to develop a theology of creation that sits squarely on the word of God (in terms consistent with the Bible, rather than borrowed extra-biblically, as per my previous letter) but instead seeks to read Genesis in worldly terms. A useful page on this is here.
2. If I heard you correctly, and please forgive me if I am wrong on this, you allowed that the spectrum of theological responses to Genesis 1 from historic creationism (i.e. ‘young earth creationism’, but I find that term inelegant and neglectful of the history of theology) to theistic evolution are valid.
Logically, at least three of the views have to be wrong; that is, not representative of real events; or indeed real theological meaning. If theistic evolution occurred, then the other alternatives did not.
What is important is how we come to a conclusion on what the text says; I quake in my boots when I read Kline’s wanting to adjust exegesis to the requirements of modern ‘science’. Here comes the church doing a Galileo again, I think, conforming its exegesis to the ideas of the day.
3. I would not think that there is adequate textual support for ‘apparent age’, ‘gap’, or indeed the ‘day-age’ view that you presented, let alone theistic evolution, which must step past so much of the text of Genesis 1 as to make it irrelevant. At a grab: Gn 1 tells us that creatures reproduced after their kind but evolution tells us that they don’t and that one kind has given rise to all other kinds (many people, including, for example, Pannenberg make the mistake of conflating ‘kind’ and ‘species’; but this attempts to read back into the text a modern concept that doesn't have the breadth of ‘kind’; this then invites the error of ‘fixity of species’, a notion used as a point of criticism by evolutionists, typically, but this comes by the influence of….our sponsor, Aristotle!). Hebrews 11:3 tells us that what is seen was not made out of what was visible, but evolution has it precisely opposite. I suppose it could be argued that the ‘big bang’ was putatively formed out of what is not visible, but the rest of the evolutionary scenario has it that everything was formed out of what is seen.
As an aside, the ‘apparent age’ notion comes up from time to time, but it ironically does so on the assumption that the pagan history of the cosmos is correct, negating the possible truthfulness of the word of God; for instance, it is said that the stars look as though they were placed billions of years ago because of the time light takes to travel. This makes an assumption about the absoluteness of time, which we know is not so, and that our physical understanding cannot be informed by revelation (and thus to the role of the Bible and the question of science…)
4. I think there is a lot of value in discussing the purposes of the Bible and science with respect to origins. I think I would differ with the purposes you canvassed, and for theological and philosophical reasons, however, I’ve got to think this through a little more; its along the lines of the Biblical revelation being bound to the terms and location of our experience, and this for theological reasons: it establishes the setting and terms of the covenant. If reality is ‘bent’ to do this, then the basis of the covenant is problematical and the real-ness of the relationship between God and man undone; if not ‘paganized’.
5. My thinking about the day-age idea ramifies along a number of lines. The one I find most interesting is the question of time.
First off the mechanism of creation we are told, repeatedly throughout the Bible, is that God spoke and it happened. There’s an immediacy to this by direct implication: the utterance of a word has immediate effect: one speaks, another hears; a law is commenced by proclamation, it commences, etc. I understand that the grammar of Genesis 1 is also the grammar of historical sequence, so inserting great undefined gaps between the days, or regarding the days as ‘pictures’ would be difficult, I’m told. The ‘pace’ of events in the text, and their structural configuration is congruent with the direct reading’s result: there’s a powerful rhythm of cause and effect that moves with an unremitting rationality and matter of fact-ness that also, on literary grounds, speaks of the dramatic rapid succession indicated by the cascade of ‘and it was so.’
This particularly comes together in the making of man. The sequence runs together: formed, breathed (2:7, but as the two passages go together, (refer for example to this article) I think this passage is germane); there are no logical gaps in the volition-to-outcome stream that I can see.
The critical context for consideration of the impact of ‘long durations’ is that, as far as I know, the Judaeo-Christian cosmology is the only one with short durations: all pagan cosmologies, including those that would have been known at the time in the ANE, that I’m aware of, have very long durations for earth or cosmic existence, which itself is a telling matter, I think. Now we have, in the last couple of hundred years a resurgence of the pagan-originated long ages.
Long durations have a couple of effects: they either would provide the time for chance to operate on matter; or they for practical purposes would remove the question of our maker’s identity and relationship with us from our consideration: it happened so long ago as to not matter. Time is the great ‘existential removalist’. Great periods speak of uninterest on the part of a creator who removed himself so far in time. Time is also the great existential coupler: in a relationship, we join in time, not in denial of time and temporal proximity is paramount.
In modern times, long periods serve to eliminate a creator, at least as we know him. Hutton, for instance, was driven explicitly by his deism and belief in eternal matter and cyclical history to propose what has become geological time. Nothing scientific about that! Long ages being indicative of random physical processes operating successfully is that they eliminate will, that is, the will of a person. The converse of course is that speedy action is a mark of the operation of will, given capability, and certainly if the operation is by spoken word, with its unavoidable immediacy. As a comparison, there’s an old saw amongst engineers that anyone can build a bridge, but an engineer will do it quickly and cheaply. That is, will, in the form of intelligence in this case, will do it faster than lack thereof.
I think one of the limbs of the polemic strength of the creation account (against origin fictions) is not only that it sets out what happened, in opposition to what did not happen, and thus gives us our foundation, not our myth, but its speed eliminates alternatives. Deny the speed, and alternative are invited with the possibility created of time providing a generative means when it in fact has none.
‘Long ages’ creates a dependency of our knowledge of God upon matter and how it works, rather than on God and his revelation. It allows the mistaking of the creation for the creator, and accommodates lines of thinking that deny a creator.
Dear M.
I’ve been thinking about your sermon on Sunday, but am not yet ready to set out my thoughts in detail. However, rather than delay, I'd like to give you this sketch of the topics and hope to provide a fuller discussion later.
1. The matter of Galileo’s treatment by the Church of Rome usually gets an airing when biblical origins are discussed. The airing usually addressees the converse of what happened. The problem Galileo encountered was that the church was wedded to the science of the day: Aristotelian in base, and had difficulty untangling this from what Galileo was doing. It was not a conflict between the Scripture and ‘science’ but between the church’s insufficient doctrine of creation being grafted onto Aristotle’s ideas.
The church is doing the same today, largely wed to evolutionary ideas, it seems reluctant to develop a theology of creation that sits squarely on the word of God (in terms consistent with the Bible, rather than borrowed extra-biblically, as per my previous letter) but instead seeks to read Genesis in worldly terms. A useful page on this is here.
2. If I heard you correctly, and please forgive me if I am wrong on this, you allowed that the spectrum of theological responses to Genesis 1 from historic creationism (i.e. ‘young earth creationism’, but I find that term inelegant and neglectful of the history of theology) to theistic evolution are valid.
Logically, at least three of the views have to be wrong; that is, not representative of real events; or indeed real theological meaning. If theistic evolution occurred, then the other alternatives did not.
What is important is how we come to a conclusion on what the text says; I quake in my boots when I read Kline’s wanting to adjust exegesis to the requirements of modern ‘science’. Here comes the church doing a Galileo again, I think, conforming its exegesis to the ideas of the day.
3. I would not think that there is adequate textual support for ‘apparent age’, ‘gap’, or indeed the ‘day-age’ view that you presented, let alone theistic evolution, which must step past so much of the text of Genesis 1 as to make it irrelevant. At a grab: Gn 1 tells us that creatures reproduced after their kind but evolution tells us that they don’t and that one kind has given rise to all other kinds (many people, including, for example, Pannenberg make the mistake of conflating ‘kind’ and ‘species’; but this attempts to read back into the text a modern concept that doesn't have the breadth of ‘kind’; this then invites the error of ‘fixity of species’, a notion used as a point of criticism by evolutionists, typically, but this comes by the influence of….our sponsor, Aristotle!). Hebrews 11:3 tells us that what is seen was not made out of what was visible, but evolution has it precisely opposite. I suppose it could be argued that the ‘big bang’ was putatively formed out of what is not visible, but the rest of the evolutionary scenario has it that everything was formed out of what is seen.
As an aside, the ‘apparent age’ notion comes up from time to time, but it ironically does so on the assumption that the pagan history of the cosmos is correct, negating the possible truthfulness of the word of God; for instance, it is said that the stars look as though they were placed billions of years ago because of the time light takes to travel. This makes an assumption about the absoluteness of time, which we know is not so, and that our physical understanding cannot be informed by revelation (and thus to the role of the Bible and the question of science…)
4. I think there is a lot of value in discussing the purposes of the Bible and science with respect to origins. I think I would differ with the purposes you canvassed, and for theological and philosophical reasons, however, I’ve got to think this through a little more; its along the lines of the Biblical revelation being bound to the terms and location of our experience, and this for theological reasons: it establishes the setting and terms of the covenant. If reality is ‘bent’ to do this, then the basis of the covenant is problematical and the real-ness of the relationship between God and man undone; if not ‘paganized’.
5. My thinking about the day-age idea ramifies along a number of lines. The one I find most interesting is the question of time.
First off the mechanism of creation we are told, repeatedly throughout the Bible, is that God spoke and it happened. There’s an immediacy to this by direct implication: the utterance of a word has immediate effect: one speaks, another hears; a law is commenced by proclamation, it commences, etc. I understand that the grammar of Genesis 1 is also the grammar of historical sequence, so inserting great undefined gaps between the days, or regarding the days as ‘pictures’ would be difficult, I’m told. The ‘pace’ of events in the text, and their structural configuration is congruent with the direct reading’s result: there’s a powerful rhythm of cause and effect that moves with an unremitting rationality and matter of fact-ness that also, on literary grounds, speaks of the dramatic rapid succession indicated by the cascade of ‘and it was so.’
This particularly comes together in the making of man. The sequence runs together: formed, breathed (2:7, but as the two passages go together, (refer for example to this article) I think this passage is germane); there are no logical gaps in the volition-to-outcome stream that I can see.
The critical context for consideration of the impact of ‘long durations’ is that, as far as I know, the Judaeo-Christian cosmology is the only one with short durations: all pagan cosmologies, including those that would have been known at the time in the ANE, that I’m aware of, have very long durations for earth or cosmic existence, which itself is a telling matter, I think. Now we have, in the last couple of hundred years a resurgence of the pagan-originated long ages.
Long durations have a couple of effects: they either would provide the time for chance to operate on matter; or they for practical purposes would remove the question of our maker’s identity and relationship with us from our consideration: it happened so long ago as to not matter. Time is the great ‘existential removalist’. Great periods speak of uninterest on the part of a creator who removed himself so far in time. Time is also the great existential coupler: in a relationship, we join in time, not in denial of time and temporal proximity is paramount.
In modern times, long periods serve to eliminate a creator, at least as we know him. Hutton, for instance, was driven explicitly by his deism and belief in eternal matter and cyclical history to propose what has become geological time. Nothing scientific about that! Long ages being indicative of random physical processes operating successfully is that they eliminate will, that is, the will of a person. The converse of course is that speedy action is a mark of the operation of will, given capability, and certainly if the operation is by spoken word, with its unavoidable immediacy. As a comparison, there’s an old saw amongst engineers that anyone can build a bridge, but an engineer will do it quickly and cheaply. That is, will, in the form of intelligence in this case, will do it faster than lack thereof.
I think one of the limbs of the polemic strength of the creation account (against origin fictions) is not only that it sets out what happened, in opposition to what did not happen, and thus gives us our foundation, not our myth, but its speed eliminates alternatives. Deny the speed, and alternative are invited with the possibility created of time providing a generative means when it in fact has none.
‘Long ages’ creates a dependency of our knowledge of God upon matter and how it works, rather than on God and his revelation. It allows the mistaking of the creation for the creator, and accommodates lines of thinking that deny a creator.
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