A ‘Non-religious’ Critique of ‘God’ Language - 1
I prepared the following set of reflections in February 2000 for the senior pastor (‘Steve’) of a theologically and socially progressive Presbyterian Church USA congregation in Nashville my family and I attended (as regular guests, not as members) for two years (1999-2001). I found Steve to be very thoughtful. He had mastered the art of writing sermons to be heard. He and I met twice monthly for conversations we found mutually beneficial for testing our core ideas re spirituality and ethics. I prepared this set of reflections after a conversation in which Steve asked for my reactions to four presentations a recently retired Vanderbilt Divinity School faculty member had delivered the previous month to an adult discussion group on successive Sunday mornings. I was not previously familiar with the professor’s work/thought. His presentations centered on the absence of critical thinking in ‘popular religion’ (with ‘fundamentalism’ being the more extreme and potentially violent form of ‘popular religion’). He did not limit the scope of his presentations to Christianity. He spent considerable time in one of the presentations developing the premise that human language, if taken literally, cannot be used in reference to ‘God’ without falling short of the subject and, therefore, without being a linguistic form of idolatry. I did not have an occasion to speak at length with the professor. However, the conversations with Steve that precipitated this set of reflections created a valuable opportunity to test/refine my ‘non-religious’ thoughts about ‘God’ language.
________________
Steve:
. . . here is a summary of the ideas/propositions I submitted yesterday for your consideration re the four presentations on critical thinking, the limitations of ‘God’ language, ‘popular religion’/‘fundamentalism’:
1. I did not anticipate the Vanderbilt professor’s observation that the presentations were new for him and not derived, at least to some degree, from his publications or his Divinity School course materials. He said something like, “I am thinking these presentations out week by week”. I do not have sufficient familiarity with his publications or course materials to determine whether this observation referred to all or to parts of the four presentations. I understood him to say that linking ‘linguistic idolatry’ with ‘popular religion’/‘fundamentalism’ was a part of this “week by week” development of the presentations.
2. Other than perhaps the Ecclesiastes essay (minus that essay’s last paragraph, which I view as an editorial attachment) and especially the story of Job (considered from the ‘scrapheap’ Job’s perspective), I do not think the writers of or authoritative personalities in the Jewish and Christian canons promote the caution regarding the limitations of ‘God’ language that the Vanderbilt professor proposed to be a “facet of faith”. I am not suggesting that the writers/speakers in the Jewish and Christian canons failed to recognize the distinctions of poetry, story, fable, or parable. I am suggesting that, other than the two exceptions of the Ecclesiastes essay and the story of Job (especially chapters 3-31), the writers/speakers in the Jewish and Christian canons used ‘God’ language in the idolatrous way the Vanderbilt professor discussed. Yes, they appealed to ‘mystery’ in reference to ‘God’. However, that appeal strikes me as most often either (1) a reaction to power perceived as limitless or (2) a description of ‘God’ as unpredictable (to human wisdom) and/or not accountable to any moral law/criticism. Such an appeal to ‘mystery’ does not necessitate or, in the case of these writers/speakers, does not point to a radical and thorough realization that all ‘God’ language is morphic. At the very most, those who were sanctioned as prophetic in the Jewish and Christian canons repeatedly made the point that physical/tangible objects are too limited to be regarded as essentially ‘God’. However, the idolatrous use of ‘God’ language that the Vanderbilt professor has addressed and warned against (i.e., using/hearing ‘God’ language as literally equivalent to the finite point/s of reference) seems to me to have occurred unchallenged throughout the Jewish and Christian canons. Is the ’God’ language attributed to ‘Jesus’ in the four Gospels idolatrous? Do the roots of the ‘negative theology’ tradition in the late patristic period reach into Jewish and Christian scripture? Is the proposition “Jesus was God” (or other variations on ‘high Christology’) idolatrous? I suspect that ‘Jesus’ spoke of ‘God’ and heard ‘God’ language minus a radical and thorough realization that all ‘God’ language is morphic. This conclusion is one of many reasons my ‘Christology’ is below ‘low’. In contrast, the ‘Christologies’ of the orthodox coalition in Christian thought/history (to use a parliamentary analogy) is ‘high’ (and apparently cannot be too ‘high’, even to the point of virtually dismissing the humanness of ‘Jesus’).
I prepared the following set of reflections in February 2000 for the senior pastor (‘Steve’) of a theologically and socially progressive Presbyterian Church USA congregation in Nashville my family and I attended (as regular guests, not as members) for two years (1999-2001). I found Steve to be very thoughtful. He had mastered the art of writing sermons to be heard. He and I met twice monthly for conversations we found mutually beneficial for testing our core ideas re spirituality and ethics. I prepared this set of reflections after a conversation in which Steve asked for my reactions to four presentations a recently retired Vanderbilt Divinity School faculty member had delivered the previous month to an adult discussion group on successive Sunday mornings. I was not previously familiar with the professor’s work/thought. His presentations centered on the absence of critical thinking in ‘popular religion’ (with ‘fundamentalism’ being the more extreme and potentially violent form of ‘popular religion’). He did not limit the scope of his presentations to Christianity. He spent considerable time in one of the presentations developing the premise that human language, if taken literally, cannot be used in reference to ‘God’ without falling short of the subject and, therefore, without being a linguistic form of idolatry. I did not have an occasion to speak at length with the professor. However, the conversations with Steve that precipitated this set of reflections created a valuable opportunity to test/refine my ‘non-religious’ thoughts about ‘God’ language.
________________
Steve:
. . . here is a summary of the ideas/propositions I submitted yesterday for your consideration re the four presentations on critical thinking, the limitations of ‘God’ language, ‘popular religion’/‘fundamentalism’:
1. I did not anticipate the Vanderbilt professor’s observation that the presentations were new for him and not derived, at least to some degree, from his publications or his Divinity School course materials. He said something like, “I am thinking these presentations out week by week”. I do not have sufficient familiarity with his publications or course materials to determine whether this observation referred to all or to parts of the four presentations. I understood him to say that linking ‘linguistic idolatry’ with ‘popular religion’/‘fundamentalism’ was a part of this “week by week” development of the presentations.
2. Other than perhaps the Ecclesiastes essay (minus that essay’s last paragraph, which I view as an editorial attachment) and especially the story of Job (considered from the ‘scrapheap’ Job’s perspective), I do not think the writers of or authoritative personalities in the Jewish and Christian canons promote the caution regarding the limitations of ‘God’ language that the Vanderbilt professor proposed to be a “facet of faith”. I am not suggesting that the writers/speakers in the Jewish and Christian canons failed to recognize the distinctions of poetry, story, fable, or parable. I am suggesting that, other than the two exceptions of the Ecclesiastes essay and the story of Job (especially chapters 3-31), the writers/speakers in the Jewish and Christian canons used ‘God’ language in the idolatrous way the Vanderbilt professor discussed. Yes, they appealed to ‘mystery’ in reference to ‘God’. However, that appeal strikes me as most often either (1) a reaction to power perceived as limitless or (2) a description of ‘God’ as unpredictable (to human wisdom) and/or not accountable to any moral law/criticism. Such an appeal to ‘mystery’ does not necessitate or, in the case of these writers/speakers, does not point to a radical and thorough realization that all ‘God’ language is morphic. At the very most, those who were sanctioned as prophetic in the Jewish and Christian canons repeatedly made the point that physical/tangible objects are too limited to be regarded as essentially ‘God’. However, the idolatrous use of ‘God’ language that the Vanderbilt professor has addressed and warned against (i.e., using/hearing ‘God’ language as literally equivalent to the finite point/s of reference) seems to me to have occurred unchallenged throughout the Jewish and Christian canons. Is the ’God’ language attributed to ‘Jesus’ in the four Gospels idolatrous? Do the roots of the ‘negative theology’ tradition in the late patristic period reach into Jewish and Christian scripture? Is the proposition “Jesus was God” (or other variations on ‘high Christology’) idolatrous? I suspect that ‘Jesus’ spoke of ‘God’ and heard ‘God’ language minus a radical and thorough realization that all ‘God’ language is morphic. This conclusion is one of many reasons my ‘Christology’ is below ‘low’. In contrast, the ‘Christologies’ of the orthodox coalition in Christian thought/history (to use a parliamentary analogy) is ‘high’ (and apparently cannot be too ‘high’, even to the point of virtually dismissing the humanness of ‘Jesus’).
