Monthly Archives: December 2008

New Book – The Deliverance of God: An Apocalyptic Rereading of Justification in Paul

Posted by on December 10, 2008 7 comments

Well, here’s a book to look forward to from Eerdmans. This looks like yet another excellent addition to the recent work on the doctrine of justification, Pauline theology, and apocalyptic. Here’s the blurb from the publisher:

This scholarly book breaks a significant impasse in much Pauline interpretation today, pushing beyond both “Lutheran” and “new” perspectives to a new, noncontractual, “apocalyptic” reading of many of the apostle’s most famous and most troublesome texts.

Douglas Campbell holds that the intrusion of an alien, essentially modern, and theologically unhealthy theoretical construct into the interpretation of Paul has disordered the broader interpretation of his thought and created many of the difficulties that scholars now struggle with. It has, in fact, produced an individualistic and contractual construct, which Campbell terms “the Justification discourse” that shares more with modern political traditions than with either orthodox theology or Paul’s first-century world. In order to counteract that influence, Campbell argues that it needs to be isolated and brought to the foreground before the interpretation of Paul’s texts begins. When that is done, new readings free from this intrusive paradigm become possible and surprising new interpretations unfold.

Demonstrating in detail how prior positions in theological and political terms affect exegesis, how commitments to either lead to bad exegetical decisions at key points, shifting the theoretical implications of certain key texts, The Deliverance of God proves itself a unique and very important work for those looking for an accurate reading of Paul’s words.

The Redemption of Propositions

Posted by on December 5, 2008 5 comments

I grew up in the evangelical tradition, and dealing with that fallout, theologically speaking had to do with learning what a terrible thing “propositions” are. In far-gone Bible college days, the question was always couched in whether or not revelation was “personal” or “propositional.” Well, whatever folks in such circles may still be saying about such parochial issues, I along with many others have discovered the redemption of propositions, at least as a form of theologizing, in the recent book of Kim Fabricius, occasional guest star on Faith and Theology.

Kim’s new book, Propositions on Christian Theology offers an expanded and complete edition of all the lists of propositions that Kim has posted on Faith and Theology in the last couple years. They range from Karl Barth, to preaching, from hell to heresy, theodicy to same-sex marriage. Always they provoke, stimulate and entertain.

Moreover, in addition to the sequences of propositions we get treated to many of Kim’s hymns, limericks, and aphorisms. Truly a joy to read. Quite honestly I don’t know how anyone could have come up with a book of propositions that are more fun to read. Of course, in a work such as this — clearly condensed and concise there is much more that one would love to hear from Kim about. And if I may nitpick a bit, I couldn’t help wondering why same-sex marriage merited twelve propositions to everyone else’s ten. Also, one is left to wonder what Kim’s propositions might be on race, gender, or . . . Christ. This of course is not really a criticism, merely a hope that the publication of this book will not eventuate in the end of Kim’s career of propositioning. There remains much more to do. In the meantime, buy the book and enjoy the read!

Stringfellow on Vocation

Posted by on December 4, 2008 6 comments

stringfellowBen has posted a quotation from William Stringfellow that is just too good not to reproduce here. This reminds me of how much I love Stringfellow’s work and life story, and hopefully will impel me to take up reading him more regularly again.

“I had elected then [in my early student years] to pursue no career. To put it theologically, I died to the idea of career and to the whole typical array of mundane calculations, grandiose goals and appropriate schemes to reach them…. I do not say this haughtily; this was an aspect of my conversion to the gospel….

“[Later] my renunciation of ambition in favor of vocation became resolute; I suppose some would think, eccentric. When I began law studies, I consider that I had few, if any, romantic illusions about becoming a lawyer, and I most certainly did not indulge any fantasies that God had called me, by some specific instruction, to be an attorney or, for that matter, to be a member of any profession or any occupation. I had come to understand the meaning of vocation more simply and quite differently.

“I believed then, as I do now, that I am called in the Word of God … to the vocation of being human, nothing more and nothing less…. Within the scope of the calling to be merely but truly human, any work, including that of any profession, can be rendered a sacrament of that vocation. On the other hand, no profession, discipline or employment, as such, is a vocation.”

—William Stringfellow, A Keeper of the Word: Selected Writings of William Stringfellow (Eerdmans, 1994), pp. 30-31.

This strikes a particular chord with me in regard to the issue of vocation as it bears on my own life. I remember clearly (because it was not too long ago!) the agony of learning to die to certain aspirations of career, status, and prestige. Not that I mean to commend my own path as exemplary–everything about my life-form I owe to the gifts I have been given through my church. But, I am certain that these sorts of ruminations on vocation are exactly what our culture, a culture of almost unquestioned prioritzing of carerr over all other ties, needs.

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