Was Jesus just a preacher of principles?

Often we hear pastors pray for God to speak in the event of his or her preaching. I think this is a fine prayer and pray that indeed God answers it! However, I wonder if those who then intentionally preach principles regardless of the biblical text are taking their own prayer seriously. If we are asking for God to speak through his Word by his Spirit, then we must first remember that God has already done this in Jesus. The Word of God has (literally) spoken to us. If God continues to speak to us through the Word, as many pray, then it follows that we are asking Jesus to preach that morning. If the preacher preaches principles, then it follows they believe Jesus to be a preacher of timeless truths, removed from his historical context. Of course, there is room for preaching some kinds of principles--akin to the sermon on the mount, but if we're asking Jesus to preach, we should let him do so in a way that reflects how he already has.

Efficiency and "Tachnology" in Preaching

I was listening intently, taking notes, and energetically critiquing the Christian leader who would later, sadly, have a moral failure, when his words hit me deeply: "Efficiency is the value of the day." He believed that churches must exhibit a high degree of efficiency in their activities because today people value efficiency. Whether or not people do value efficiency, I wondered what implications this had.

Skip ahead two years. I am reading Jean-Francois Lyotard's "The Postmodern Condition." Lyotard notes that a technological society is concerned with decreasing input and increasing output. This means that a technological society values, you guessed it, efficiency.

Which brings me to yesterday. I was reviewing my notes in a book on preaching, when I came across this quote: "The very presence of such media [as TV clips] serves to associate the sermon with the glamour, power, and authority of the same technology that rules the world. The medium really is the message. Technology is the new symbol of power" (Richard Lischer, The End of Words, p. 27). Media allows us to engage several senses at once--we see and hear at once. In part, it increases efficiency.

I think, in part, the church aims to be efficient. Efficiency is not a bad thing; in fact, being more efficient en route to our goal is a good thing. However, efficiency is not a value. There are many things the church does that are not efficient. Preaching is one of them. Pretending to make something efficient that really isn't, like preaching, by using contemporary tools, like technology, is dangerous because the church cannot do culture as well as culture can and so the church's use of technology comes off being tacky. It's tachnology.

Of course, there are some who really can use, say, technology to real communication and I envy them. But for those of us who can't...well, I'm not sweating it anymore.

"Is There a Meaning in This Text?", Chapter 2

Part One is Vanhoozer's exploration of the undoing of the author, the book, and the reader, with chapter 2 focusing on the author.

Most believe that there are texts because authors wrote them. We can interpret what a text means because the signs used (words) reflect reality, or at least reality as the author sees it. Vanhoozer argues, however, that postmodernity "puts into question the notion that signs are reliable indicators of the way things really are (43). This, of course, poses a problem to the author.

Modernity lifts up the individual and their consciousness as the home of meaning. An author writes what she consciously thinks. Once we figure out what the author thinks, we have the (original, authentic, stable) meaning of the text.

Kant began the undoing of this notion, however, by suggesting that the categories in which we interpret reality actually mold what they are interpreting. The categories of thought mold the world they interpret. Derrida takes this one step further by saying that the categories of thought are themselves constructions. This obviously does away with stability: The world is formed by the categories that understand it that are themselves formed. This is then applied to language: Language is not the great mirror of reality, but as much caught in the trap of being formed and forming thought. No one can escape this matrix and so all thought is constructed or interpreted. This is the root of Derrida's critique of "logocentrism," which believes that we talk about reality, not just about talk. This view of language explains why Derrida critiques philosophy's preference for speech: Speech shows the continuity of language with author much more closely than writing.

So, what of Derrida's famous dictum: "There is nothing outside the text"? Only this: "everything is part of a signifying system" (63). In other words, there's no base; it's interpretation all the way down. Words are signs that "play" with one another; they operate in a system of différance, which means defer presence (of something real) and differ from one another. Meaning is created in the system of deferring a real meaning using signs that differ from one another.

But what about dictionaries? Don't dictionaries tell us what word means? Think about words that change meaning. Does "cool" reflect temperature? Mood? Fashion style? Reaction to anger? Which of these goes down to the "real" meaning? Of course, it depends on context and Derrida's point is that context never goes all the way down to something real, but always reflects the interchange of signs/words. So, is the author in control of the words, then? Could it just as easily be the case that the words control the author? If yes, then does the author have "control" over meaning?

Vanhoozer consistently brings this back to theology. If language reflects this indeterminacy, then what of God? If the author is in the control of language, then is God a product, or a projection, as well?

But certainly an author intends something when they write, don't they? If we can grasp what the author intends, isn't that the meaning? This is the position of E.D. Hirsch. This is not to grasp the author's mental intention, but to the effect it seems the text was aimed to have. The text is stabilized by the author, but it is still the text we are focusing on and not the author. The person who wrote meant something by these words that is not destabilized because words differ. While the text is stable, it's applications to new settings are endless.

The response is that the author's intention is still subject to language and systems. The author herself is not stable, but constructed by language and society, and so intention is not stable either. Even if the author intends something really, really badly, they are as confined to language as anyone. This means that the author's intention is irrelevant, but that it is insufficient to interpretation.

In light of this discussion, Vanhoozer summarizes four fallacies with regard to authorial intention:
1. Fallacy of Relevancy: the author's intentions are irrelevant for the purpose of a text's interpretation.
2. Fallacy of Transparency: the author's intentions are not transparent but coated with cultural practices and beliefs, coded in this culture's language.
3. Fallacy of Identity: The author's intention and a text's meaning are not one in the same. The text has a "career of its own."
4. Fallacy of Objectivity: We do not stand apart from texts, but in their reading are already at work in interpreting them by our own structures, cultures, and language. We do not stand apart from the text.

So, what does this say about the Bible? Do scholars write commentaries on revelatory texts or on (biblical) texts that are themselves commentaries? The postmodern critic believes that the intention of whatever biblical author is indecipherable and that Jesus cannot be a reliable sign of God. Vanhoozer believes that the author's death spells doom for human agency, proper speech (commentary) about texts, and meaning in texts. (But, as Part 2 asserts, the author can come back to life.)

Theology of Revelation

Sitting on my shelf is a book called, "A Brief Theology of Revelation" by Colin Gunton that I now wish I'd read. I have been reading my friend Matt's posts on a book by Frank Viola called "Pagan Christianity." Today he mentioned that Viola is not pleased with revelation through reason, but more interested in revelation by the heart. This got me wondering about my own thoughts on a theology of revelation, by which I mean, what do I think about revelation based on my thoughts on God. Bit of a catch 22, of course, because what I know of God is revealed!

My own theological method tends to be pastoral, by which I mean I am interested in the shaping and forming of persons in community, which involves practices. I read and employ psychological and sociological studies through theological understanding for these purposes. So, because I think God is concerned with forming people and that social sciences can be sufficiently deconstructed to be interpreted and applied Christianly, my theology of revelation involves sources which are not Christian.

Interesting.

Based on what you know and believe of God, how do you think he reveals himself?

Hmmmm.....

Today I saw a church sign that read, "Spring is God's Way of Saying He Loves Us."

My question: Then what, pray tell, is WINTER?

"Is There A Meaning in this Text?", Chapter 1

Some authors are able to take large issues and condense them into small books. In my opinion, Colin Gunton did that in "Actuality of Atonement." Kevin Vanhoozer has taken a large issue--do texts mean anything outside their encounter with a reader and if so, how does one interpret ethically?--and written a large book. The book is large because Vanhoozer describes the work of deconstructionists and pragmatists vis-a-vis texts (Part I) and then proposes a solution (Part II). Each part is broken into three chapters, with Part II's matching the problem addressed by its Part I counterpart. If you're wondering what all this is about, then the Introduction should put us on the same footing.

Is understanding texts (books, articles, events) a matter of faith or reason or both? Going further, in reading texts, do we see ourselves or do we see a reality outside ourselves? To answer these questions, Vanhoozer starts with Plato. Do words give us knowledge of the world or not? For some, language is a human construct, which means that all interpretation is human construct, as well. And because texts are linguistically created (you can't think of an event without ascribing a word to it!), then interpretation is what originally creates the text. This need not be free-floating interpretation. For example, a "birthday party" cannot be interpreted as "a solemn, bleak affair." But even the event of "birthday party" is socially constructed and its interpretation generated by a particular society. Interpretation, as a result, is not just "recovering verbal messages," because the message itself is socially constructed.

Hermeneutics is the "reflection on the principles that undergird correct textual interpretation" (19). Philosophy has often believed that it sets these principles, but Jacques Derrida shows that philosophy itself is a kind of hermeneutics. In other words, philosophy interprets texts just as much as any other discipline (sociology, psychology, theology, etc.). This means that interpretations are situated and so hermeneutical study involved not only studying the text, but the interpreter. We now see why interpretations create new texts! It's texts all the way down and texts all the way up--theologically speaking. Even God is a text--interpreted and created by our interpretations, used to manipulate and control for the sake of some group, culture, nation, etc.

Vanhoozer does not want to leave the situation so hopeless. He believes in reality, in a reality to which texts testify that is not only the reader of the texts. So, Vanhoozer writes that "literary theory relies not only on philosophical assumptions but on assumptions that are implicitly theological as well" (25). This means that Vanhoozer believes in ethical interpretation, grounded in his (trinitarian) theological commitments. More on this in Part II.

Vanhoozer then lays out the structure of Part I: How does the recent philosophical mindset (deconstruction and pragmatism) treat the (1) Author; (2) Text; (3) Reader?

The point of the book is to ask the (what will soon be obviously) theological question: "Is there a meaning in this text?" Vanhoozer points to the answer he will give: there is a meaning that is other than the reader and that is connected to the author's intention.

Wesleyan Deal breakers

My friend Matt's recent blog post has me thinking: What constitutes a deal breaker for The Wesleyan Church?

Matt mentions his belief that lay people could baptize or serve communion. The Wesleyan Church allows only ordained clergy to do these things. Matt does not think this is a problem. This is an important issue because it reflects the Hochschild/Wheaton and the Enns/Westminster Theological Seminary affairs. Hochschild said he could affirm Wheaton's statement of faith even after converting to Catholocism; Enns published a book that the Board at WTS is deciding whether or not falls outside the bounds of Westminster Confession of Faith. The institutions have the ability to say who agrees with them enough to be one of them.

Matt doesn't think the sacraments would break the commitment he has to The Wesleyan Church and that The Wesleyan Church has to him. What issues in The Wesleyan Church would be deal breakers?