Post-liberal theology

[Nearly Sane]

Thanks for that, blue. As I suspected, it seems to me very much a resumption of a traditional (certainly early Protestant) approach to faith. However, if they're saying that the thinkers of the last 200 years have enthroned reason as king, this is certainly only a half-truth, since many of the early critical thinkers were firm believers, no matter what their researches led them to believe about the trustworthiness of scripture. They also appear to be using (a strange sort of) reason to assert that reason is useless.

It's the other forms of knowing bit that I am struggling with. I don't see the example given of being in love illustrates another form of knowing at all.

[Nearly Sane]

I think NS was reading extra motives and meanings in my posts, which I thought were quite simple and straightforward actually!

I read it at its most simple, as far as I can see. So for the avoidance of doubt, you don't see any issues with theologians talking as long as they don't claim stuff about god to be facts, I.e. that they can rationally discuss their beliefs?

[Udayana]

Here’s a description I found online (http://www.patheos.com/blogs/paperbacktheology/2011/05/postliberal-theology-for-dummies-like-me.html) that appears to be reasonably accurate.
...

In the end, Postliberal theologians typically call people to take up their cross and actually follow Jesus. They insist that faith (pistis) means much more than rational belief, but means believing allegiance and an active life of Christ followership. They would say that the church should gather around the scriptures and the traditions of the church and allow them to define our reality over and against any other story, be it Rationalism, Americanism, Capitalism, Liberalism, conservative/liberal politics, individualism, consumerism, militarism, nationalism, etc. It essentially contends that Jesus is Lord – there is not other Lord, not even doctrines or science.[/i]”

If that’s what it entails it seems pretty potty to me, but it might get the conversation going.

Thanks.  I get the references now ... actually it seems more "post-rational" rather than "post-liberal". They have decided to play a different game, without the rest of us.
 

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hi again Dicky,

Thanks for that, blue. As I suspected, it seems to me very much a resumption of a traditional (certainly early Protestant) approach to faith. However, if they're saying that the thinkers of the last 200 years have enthroned reason as king, this is certainly only a half-truth, since many of the early critical thinkers were firm believers, no matter what their researches led them to believe about the trustworthiness of scripture. They also appear to be using (a strange sort of) reason to assert that reason is useless.

No problem. Actually I’m not sure that when you examine the claim it’s even a half truth?

Here for example: “Protestant liberalism and conservative evangelicalism both make reason or rationality the epistemological center of their universe, thereby replacing God as the center. Of course they both deny this, but it is at the heart of their foundationalist epistemology.” is the straw man on which it seems to rest. Rationalists it seems to me don’t “replace God as the centre” at all, because the character of the positions are qualitatively different. “God” is said to be the absolute, be all and end all definitive truth of the matter – epistemically, it’s a claim of certainty. Rationalism on the other hand doesn’t claim to go to the centre of anything – it’s probabilistic. Indeed it’s that very rationalism that says we have no way to eliminate the possibility of an unknown unknown, and nor therefore to discount that that we’re not just, say, bits of junk code in a giant computer game.

I’m not sure I’d even claim rationalism as “neutral” either – rather it’s all we have that provides a working model that enables us to navigate the world we appear to occupy with solutions we call provisionally at least “true”. All that may of course be entirely false and so our rationalism is telling us only one possible story (or “narrative”) but the problem with other narratives it seems to me is that they provide no alternative method to distinguish themselves from just guessing.

In other words, it’s just an argument from ignorance – “you have no way of knowing that rationalism leads to certainty” – when rationalism claims no such thing and at best all it gives you for the alternative truth narratives is a “might be”. 

And again with the straw man: “What makes both Protestant liberalism and evangelicalism/fundamentalism somewhat pernicious is that each denies its own subjectivity and claims all of their content to be empirically true. Each claims to contain “true rationality,” and revealed “truth.” To the liberal this is revealed by science, to the evangelical/fundamentalist this is revealed by scripture (which really means their reading of scripture, i.e. their doctrines).” He’s mixing religious traditions with rationalism here, but in any case “empirically true” again misunderstands that in strict epistemic terms “empirical truth” is still probabilistic truth. 

Anyways, we could deconstruct this stuff for hours no doubt but - so far at least - I've yet to see the beef. Interesting topic though.

[bluehillside Retd.]

NS,

That's not how it reads to me since she seems to query any talking about it. If your reading is right then I am fine with it.

Here’s what Susan actually said:

“Theologists can talk till the cows come home, but not one of them knows, actually knows a single fact about God - or any other imagined religious spirit/entity. They never have done, nor ever will!”

Opening with “can talk till the cows come home” seems to me to be pretty much the opposite of “seems to query any talking about it”.

What she’s actually querying is such people claiming to “know a single fact about God”, which seems fair to me. The only place we part company is with the final “nor ever will” because, if we’re talking strict epistemology, we can’t make categoric statements about possible future events.

[SusanDoris]

The only place we part company is with the final “nor ever will” because, if we’re talking strict epistemology, we can’t make categoric statements about possible future events.

Yes, I agree of course!

[Dicky Underpants]

Hi again Dicky,

No problem. Actually I’m not sure that when you examine the claim it’s even a half truth?

Here for example: “Protestant liberalism and conservative evangelicalism both make reason or rationality the epistemological center of their universe, thereby replacing God as the center. Of course they both deny this, but it is at the heart of their foundationalist epistemology.” is the straw man on which it seems to rest. Rationalists it seems to me don’t “replace God as the centre” at all, because the character of the positions are qualitatively different. “God” is said to be the absolute, be all and end all definitive truth of the matter – epistemically, it’s a claim of certainty. Rationalism on the other hand doesn’t claim to go to the centre of anything – it’s probabilistic. Indeed it’s that very rationalism that says we have no way to eliminate the possibility of an unknown unknown, and nor therefore to discount that that we’re not just, say, bits of junk code in a giant computer game.

I’m not sure I’d even claim rationalism as “neutral” either – rather it’s all we have that provides a working model that enables us to navigate the world we appear to occupy with solutions we call provisionally at least “true”. All that may of course be entirely false and so our rationalism is telling us only one possible story (or “narrative”) but the problem with other narratives it seems to me is that they provide no alternative method to distinguish themselves from just guessing.

In other words, it’s just an argument from ignorance – “you have no way of knowing that rationalism leads to certainty” – when rationalism claims no such thing and at best all it gives you for the alternative truth narratives is a “might be”. 

Well summed up! Moreover, the things the post-liberals appear to take on trust as their starting point seem to a certain degree arbitrary, if your quoted material is a good guide. For instance:

Postliberal theology is typically characterized by a very high Christology (Jesus is very God/very man – 2 natures, one essence). It is Trinitarian, thus it affirms the creeds and the bodily resurrection of Jesus – in contrast to typical liberals who reject miracles.

Why accept this? Why not the Arian view? or any other unorthodox view? Do they automatically accept the authority of the Pope? Might as well start believing in Aboriginal Dreamtime and the role of Tickalick the Frog in the Flood.

All sounds a bit of a despairing stance in the face of complexity. In my native Norfolk, they'd probably say "Wha bugger, yew gotta start somewhere hincha?" On the other hand, if you can smuggle in a few references to Wittgenstein, and talk about "Language Games", some people may think you're talking wonderfully.

One line in your quote did have some sort of resonance, though:

In the end, Postliberal theologians typically call people to take up their cross and actually follow Jesus.

Which is okay as far as it goes, but does that extend to telling people that the End is just round the corner, and if they're not careful they'll burn?

P.S.

I think your post also covered the matter which NS found so contentious:

But, again, this assumes that rationality is the only form of knowing, which is simply not true. Anyone who has been in love or been a parent knows that there is a kind of knowing, or a knowledge that goes far beyond what is rationally explainable.

Firstly, I wouldn't assert that rationality is the only form of knowing, and as NS says, "being in love" is a debatable example of 'another form of knowing'. What 'knowing God' might be - when you've already decided that he's a Trinity, and that Jesus was God Incarnate without knowing these matters as truths
I'll leave it to any passing "post-liberals" to explain.

[Dicky Underpants]

Thanks.  I get the references now ... actually it seems more "post-rational" rather than "post-liberal". They have decided to play a different game, without the rest of us.

Well, it seems to be keeping them happy in Oxford and Yale, but I understand that it is beginning to percolate through to a more grass-roots level in places.

The following PDF is quite infomative (don't be put off by the 'C.S.Lewis Insitute' reference):

www.cslewisinstitute.org/webfm_send/492

"Theology Built on Vapours"

The writer of the above, however, seems to believe implicitly in Jesus' atoning sacrifice, which to me is a pretty meaningless item of faith in any case.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hi again Dicky,

I think your post also covered the matter which NS found so contentious:


Quote
But, again, this assumes that rationality is the only form of knowing, which is simply not true. Anyone who has been in love or been a parent knows that there is a kind of knowing, or a knowledge that goes far beyond what is rationally explainable.

Firstly, I wouldn't assert that rationality is the only form of knowing, and as NS says, "being in love" is a debatable example of 'another form of knowing'. What 'knowing God' might be - when you've already decided that he's a Trinity, and that Jesus was God Incarnate without knowing these matters as truths

I'll leave it to any passing "post-liberals” to explain.

I’m not sure about that. NS refers to “a kind of knowing, or a knowledge that goes far beyond what is rationally explainable”. The present tense of that “explainable” is important here: the extent to which our emotional responses are currently rationally explainable is debatable, but does that imply that they never could be?

Or is the problem even if we do discover everything about the physical properties of love, hate etc (hormonal profiles and so on) an experiential one: no matter what we “know”, the nature of some phenomena is such that the experience of them colours our understanding in a way that, say, Pythagoras’ theorem doesn’t?

As for “knowing God” presumably there no more needs actually to be a god for someone to feel they love him than there needs to be any other sufficiently convincing fictional character for the same response. Baddies in soap operas for example sometimes get death threats in the real world because their characters are sufficiently real to engender in some a strong emotional response.

I tried the article you posted to by the way (thanks). Tough going because its conclusions (“God”, gospel inerrancy etc) simply assume its premises, so he spent the article critiquing different approaches to his “truth” rather than trying to apply those approaches to the quality of that truth in the first place. In other words, it would have been helpful if he’d first turned his attention to establishing that all theology isn’t “built on vapors”.     

[Dicky Underpants]

Hi again Dicky,

I’m not sure about that. NS refers to “a kind of knowing, or a knowledge that goes far beyond what is rationally explainable”. The present tense of that “explainable” is important here: the extent to which our emotional responses are currently rationally explainable is debatable, but does that imply that they never could be?

Hiya blue

I don't think the 'explainability' of our emotional responses would add much to the kind of 'knowledge' that I personally rate. No doubt scientists will go a long way to explain why I or you respond in a certain way to various pieces of great classical music. But I'm quite happy with the response I get from Bach's St Matthew or Bellini's Norma* now, and understanding the science might be very interesting, but only as an adjunct to the response. The latter, however, are still physical phenomena as far as I'm concerned, and not pointers to something numinous.

Or is the problem even if we do discover everything about the physical properties of love, hate etc (hormonal profiles and so on) an experiential one: no matter what we “know”, the nature of some phenomena is such that the experience of them colours our understanding in a way that, say, Pythagoras’ theorem doesn’t?

I would say that would be the case for me (as I implied above), but I know that there are some scientists and mathematicians who can be moved in a way by scientific phenomena in a way that seems remarkably similar to the way some of us are moved by music or art. Andrew Wiles' reaction when he realised that he'd finally sorted out Fermat's Last Theorem comes to mind.

As for “knowing God” presumably there no more needs actually to be a god for someone to feel they love him than there needs to be any other sufficiently convincing fictional character for the same response. Baddies in soap operas for example sometimes get death threats in the real world because their characters are sufficiently real to engender in some a strong emotional response.

I tried the article you posted to by the way (thanks). Tough going because its conclusions (“God”, gospel inerrancy etc) simply assume its premises, so he spent the article critiquing different approaches to his “truth” rather than trying to apply those approaches to the quality of that truth in the first place. In other words, it would have been helpful if he’d first turned his attention to establishing that all theology isn’t “built on vapors”.     

I'd have to agree that would have been a less biased point to start from, whether we're talking of British or American 'misty matters'

I was hoping to meet again the young gentleman who first spoke to me about this subject. I have not seen him again in the pub. I gather he's a rather sensitive plant, who has had a nervous breakdown (probably as a result of the 'Christian' minister of his local church telling him to go forth and multiply). I think I was rather brusque with him when he laid out his beliefs. But this stuff does seem all rather arbitrary in what it accepts as a truthful starting point. The article I mentioned made a lot of the fact that the 'post-liberals' don't seem to make much of Jesus' 'atonement'. I'd have thought that if they're prepared to accept miracles, resurrection and Jesus' divinity, they might as well be prepared to go the whole hog. Anyway, I await futher clarification as to what critical methods they employ to be prepared to think that the acceptance of such whopping dogma might be a means to the truth of existence.

*I think you've mentioned these two as being works that provoke some strong emotions.

[Rhiannon]

As someone who has had a 'nervous breakdown' I was going to tell you to fuck off with your sensitive plant bollocks, but I like you too much for that.

[Dicky Underpants]

As someone who has had a 'nervous breakdown' I was going to tell you to fuck off with your sensitive plant bollocks, but I like you too much for that.

Mea culpa. There is of course no apodeictic relationship with being 'sensitive' and having a 'nervous breakdown'. I ought to have been wary of making glib implications of this kind, since I know only too well how little conscious control we have over many of our bodily responses, including the sympathetic nervous system. A series of panic attacks some decades back made me think I was going to end up with a heart attack or go completely mad, or both. And the phenomenon of 'post-traumatic stress disorder' is well-known by now, and is quite indiscriminate in the psychological types that it inflicts its delights upon.
The psychologist William James (brother of the novelist) had an instructive experience which filled him with existential dread when he visited an asylum and observed the behaviour of a 'lunatic'. He realised only too well that it was not a case of 'them and us' - I believe the thought which terrified him was something like "If the moment struck for me as it did for him, then there would be little I could do to prevent it".
This might be a subject for another thread - "How much conscious control do we have over our mental and bodily responses when we are under extreme stress?" I do know that there appears to be some, because on one of the occasions I mentioned earlier, I felt the only way to prevent myself from going insane was to focus my attention on a point on my forehead with all the concentration of an airline pilot trying to avoid a crash-landing, and that throughout the night. But would I have stayed sane if I had not so concentrated? Who knows? It was just an intuition.

[Rhiannon]

Nice response, Dicky. 

As someone who has had both a degree of PTSD and panic attacks I think it undeniable that we hold trauma in our bodies. I wonder if apparently unexplained panic attacks are a release of trauma that we don't recognise. But you are right, we rarely fully lose control; someone having a panic attack in a supermarket will very often put down their basket and walk out or at least stay put until it passes; what they don't do is fly out the plate glass window.

I've paced for six, seven hours through the night to relieve my anxiety but that was always a conscious choice on some level, because of the relief it brought. I wouldn't say it kept me sane exactly but it got me through til sun up.

[Sassy]

Any takers? I'd like some informed person to explain this to me. I was talking to a graduate in theology from Oxford University yesterday, who gave the impression that this kind of thinking is "quite the thing" in academic theological circles. From what he was saying, it seemed to me a last gasp of the TBs to try and re-instate a traditional Christian faith via the medium of posh-sounding philosophy. The movement apparently started in Yale University, owes a lot to Karl Barth, and plays Ludwig Wittgenstein as its trump card.

 The individual I was talking to apparently believes literally in the biblical miracles. 'Nuff said

Having spoken to this graduate imagine for yourself, that the biblical miracles are real. How would you view these things then?

[floo]

Having spoken to this graduate imagine for yourself, that the biblical miracles are real. How would you view these things then?

There is no evidence that they are anything but a myth. But if god and his sidekick can heal people they should heal all, not the chosen few when in the mood.

[Sassy]

There is no evidence that they are anything but a myth. But if god and his sidekick can heal people they should heal all, not the chosen few when in the mood.

You want to healing from a God you ignore and do not believe in?
Where you going to get the faith from?
Seems you believe and receive or you never ask as you haven't the faith.

Ask and ye shall receive... How can they ask if they do not believe.

It isn't a question of whether they should heal all. ALL do not come for healing because they don't believe.

Your thoughts are far from the truth of why some healed and some not healed.
If you don't ask you don't get, and if you don't believe how can you ask?

[Walter]

You want to healing from a God you ignore and do not believe in?
Where you going to get the faith from?
Seems you believe and receive or you never ask as you haven't the faith.

Ask and ye shall receive... How can they ask if they do not believe.

It isn't a question of whether they should heal all. ALL do not come for healing because they don't believe.

Your thoughts are far from the truth of why some healed and some not healed.
If you don't ask you don't get, and if you don't believe how can you ask?

why not structure your sentences into a form we can all understand, it may lead to an increase in responses?