We've recently completed our first encounter with the study course "Living the Questions" (www.livingthequestions.com) and are now rerunning several sessions for those who missed those sessions the first time around. LtQ has been so well-received that we've acquired LtQ2, which is the new edition of the course, intending it for this winter. LtQ2 is organized a 3 7-session courses rather than the single 12-session course of the original LtQ.
LtQ is an introduction to Progressive Theology, and the "faculty" (presented by DVD) includes such folk on the current theological scene as Borg, Ammermann, Crossan, Sample, Townes. The challenge students to consider how they feel and what they truly believe about numerous issues--questions--of the past century so they can decide how they choose to live in this century. Some of the questions discussed are "biblical authority," "biblical authorship," "facts about the historical Jesus," and what our scripture, history, and doctrine call us to in the 21st century.
At one point, Crossan summarizes the focal issue for us, "It has begun. Are you with the program?" The "it" is the imperative Jesus presents to us in our day to live both as a people of faith and as a faithful people. For the "faculty" of LtQ and for us, the questions relate less to "what do you believe?" but "how do you live?" Another faculty member provides one answer to those who inquire, "Come see how we live and work--see what difference this makes in our lives."
These and other issues continue to be living concerns for those of us who take the Bible "seriously but not necessarily literally." What questions of life and living keep you awake at night? Do you have a secure and safe place to discuss your questions? Are there people you can trust to hear you and work with you to engage those questions as you examine potential answers? If not "in church," where? Churches which offer LtQ (or LtQ2) as part of their curriculum are very likely places such as this. Pilgrims' (www.pucc.info) is one.
08 September 2007
03 September 2007
Can We Trust the New Testament?
The title of this note is also the title of a 1977 book by Bishop John A.T. Robinson which I've reread a number of times. Most recently, I read it while facilitating sessions of the "Living the Questions" (LTQ) course in progress at Pilgrims'.
Several members of the "faculty" of LTQ are members of "the Jesus Seminar" which, like most post-World War II Christian scholarship hold that most of the New Testament (NT) books were written decades--generations--after the days of Jesus and the beginning of the Christian church. However, it is seldom pointed out that all of the bases for this "late" dating of the NT books are founded on untested, largely unexamined, and unverified assumptions. These assumptions, for the most part, were the product of the "German School" of theologians working in the late 1940's and '50's and, in my view, were based on the assumptions--not of First Century patterns of writing and authorship--but on their own 20th Century patterns of writing. It appears that their controlling hypothesis was, "This is how we do it, so that's how they must have done it."
From such assumptions come the hypotheses that Mark, the shortest gospel, was written first--because it's the shortest and scholars' first editions are always shorter than their later editions. And that, because Mark was thus first, then Luke and Matthew copied from Mark, adding their own material gathered from other sources.
As Robinson notes in his book, the arguments also try to explain away the "difficult sections" of the NT books by making them the work of second or third generation Christians, rather than eyewitnesses or companions of the eyewitnesses, and slotting their work in the 70's and later of the First Century CE, and into the early 2nd Century. Robinson also comments that the selection of target decades for the hypotheses is interesting because the 70's in particular are a decade we really know little about.
Robinson concludes that there is no hard evidence and no serious reason for the late dating of the texts, strongly suggesting that, both the early lore of the church (cf. Eusebius, et al) and the internal evidence of the texts (none mentions the fall of Jerusalem in 70 CE--a cataclysm which would hardly have gone unnoted) may be yet more reliable. His timeline puts the authorship of the NT in the 45-69 CE range and also makes room still for development of proto-gospels prior to that.
His conclusion? The NT is probably more trustworthy than less, particularly when understood better in its own context.
Several members of the "faculty" of LTQ are members of "the Jesus Seminar" which, like most post-World War II Christian scholarship hold that most of the New Testament (NT) books were written decades--generations--after the days of Jesus and the beginning of the Christian church. However, it is seldom pointed out that all of the bases for this "late" dating of the NT books are founded on untested, largely unexamined, and unverified assumptions. These assumptions, for the most part, were the product of the "German School" of theologians working in the late 1940's and '50's and, in my view, were based on the assumptions--not of First Century patterns of writing and authorship--but on their own 20th Century patterns of writing. It appears that their controlling hypothesis was, "This is how we do it, so that's how they must have done it."
From such assumptions come the hypotheses that Mark, the shortest gospel, was written first--because it's the shortest and scholars' first editions are always shorter than their later editions. And that, because Mark was thus first, then Luke and Matthew copied from Mark, adding their own material gathered from other sources.
As Robinson notes in his book, the arguments also try to explain away the "difficult sections" of the NT books by making them the work of second or third generation Christians, rather than eyewitnesses or companions of the eyewitnesses, and slotting their work in the 70's and later of the First Century CE, and into the early 2nd Century. Robinson also comments that the selection of target decades for the hypotheses is interesting because the 70's in particular are a decade we really know little about.
Robinson concludes that there is no hard evidence and no serious reason for the late dating of the texts, strongly suggesting that, both the early lore of the church (cf. Eusebius, et al) and the internal evidence of the texts (none mentions the fall of Jerusalem in 70 CE--a cataclysm which would hardly have gone unnoted) may be yet more reliable. His timeline puts the authorship of the NT in the 45-69 CE range and also makes room still for development of proto-gospels prior to that.
His conclusion? The NT is probably more trustworthy than less, particularly when understood better in its own context.
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