The Postmodern University and Its New Methodologies

 

With the postmodern turn in the university have come various new methodologies.  These need to be understood as a shift from the dominance of the sciences during Modernity to the dominance of the social sciences during Postmodernity.  The Enlightenment opposed reason to belief and science to faith.  Christians could relate somewhat well to the university in Modernity by affirming the correspondence between truth and fact.  Now, in this postmodern turn, various challenges arise from a belief that truth is locally constructed, relative, and merely functional (political).  Aspects of postmodern presuppositions are evident in the following methodologies.  Research from a Christian tradition finds many points of conflict with these new approaches.

 

Critical Theory uses theories of social Marxism to understand and work to overcome social structures that oppress (or are believed to oppress) vulnerable and disenfranchised groups.  CT is a reaction to traditional theory, which affirms a transcendental epistemology; that is, CT rejected a correspondence between truth and fact (of a thought to a thing), especially in ethics, and theories that were non-historical.  Seeking revolutionary change, not some implementation of truth, CT is epistemologically and morally relativistic and pragmatic, having no place for the objectivism that belief in ‘God’ introduces into one’s worldview.  The ‘critical’ and Marxist element of CT has to do with seeing social institutions as oppressive and people as vulnerable victims in need of emancipation.  It seeks to be pragmatic and relativistic and to understand the world in terms of the power relationships of various groups.  The landscape of CT has been surveyed by key thinkers associated with the Frankfurt School (Horkheimer, Adorno, Marcuse, Habermas), Antonio Gramsci, and Sigmund Freud.  Various critical theories operating towards the end of liberation are liberation theology, feminism, black theology, critical race theory, post-colonialism (in certain authors), and queer or trans theory.  The Marxist origins of CT prioritise the social sciences in academic study and continue to exert an anti-religious bias, but twentieth century social Marxism is more destructive than constructive as it lacks Marx’s utopianism.  Thus, CT-inspired activists seek to ‘march through the social institutions’ to undermine them, but without any religious, especially any Christian, perspective.  It embraces violent action on behalf of perceived or real victims in society in order to bring about change that is yet to be understood.  While attacking structures of power, it still embraces power and suppression as a means of liberation.  To this end, it favours anarchy followed by socialism in the sense of a powerful state enforcing social change.

 

Posthumanism is a philosophical conceptualisation that not only removes God as the subject but also humans and replaces them with nonhuman agents (animals, environment), or removes persons and replaces them with practices.  It is a rejection of the Jewish-Christian understanding of humanity as bearers of God’s image.

 

Post-qualitative research accepts the existentialist notion that existence precedes essence.  (There is no God-given, human identity.)  It sees identity as a product of entangled existence with others in a constant process of reformation.  The perspective rejects objectivity and binary oppositions.

 

Decoloniality entails replacing the Modernist university’s objective, scientific approach to research with the subjective experiences and thinking of the ‘colonised.’  It deconstructs perceived colonial control, including reason and analytic approaches, any exercise of European power in thinking and doing, and the dominance of Western civilization.  It elevates socioeconomic and political interpretations that oppose the West.  By making colonialism the dominant category in a binary analysis of culture, including academics and religion, it is vulnerable to the charge of being inadequately analytical and critical.

 

Affective methodology highlights, as the name implies, feelings and emotions, such as love, disgust, and desire, in research.  It is intended to be a rejection of objective, dispassionate, value free, and disembodied research.  The researcher is not an objective observer but an active participant in a study.  This is a helpful challenge to modernity’s scientific objectivity, but in its postmodern iteration, it provides no faith-tradition by which to assess feelings and emotions.  To illustrate, in one, recent form of this approach, ‘living in love’ has been used to reject convictions about sexuality, gender, and marriage in the Church of England.  The emotion, love, is self-affirming and indiscriminate.

 

Vulnerable methodology highlights the vulnerability of subjects being researched.  Particular areas of vulnerability are cognitive or communicative, institutional, medical, economic, and social.  Researchers are expected to follow protocols that recognise and protect against their subjects’ vulnerabilities.

‘You’ve Been Served’

 

‘You’ve Been Served’

 

[A description of the context for this satirical play on the Church of England is provided in the Afterword.]

 

Knock-knock….  Knock-knock….  Knock-knock….

‘Maybe I’ll just peek in the window to see if anyone is here.’

‘Of course someone is here.  This is Lambeth Palace.  Someone is always here.’

Knock-knock….  (door is eventually opened by a person holding and stroking a Yorkshire Terrier)

‘Yes?’

‘Afternoon, Mum.  We’d like to speak with Mr. Canterbury, please.  Oh!  Ah, No offense.  I was just confused by the dress.  Would you be Mr. Canterbury, then, Sir?’

‘This is not a dress.  I’m wearing a robe.’

‘Right.  Very good, Sir.  Harold here likes to dress up, too!’

‘Oi, knock it off, mate!’

‘Just a little joke with my friend, Harold.  As it happens, Sir, I have some document here and just need your signature that you have received it.  Right on that line.  Official stuff, I imagine, but only Mr. Canterbury can sign for this one.’

‘Yes, yes, lots of official business here.  Thank you.  Let’s see what we have here.’  (opens envelope)

‘Well, how do you like that!  I’m being served divorce papers!’

‘So sorry to hear that, Sir!  Would you like to use my pen?’

‘It’s my wife, Ginger, divorcing me, and she wants most of our overseas properties.  Oh, and this is rich: she wants six of our eight children.’

‘Horrible stuff, Sir.  But I have a note here that the papers came from a Mrs. Gafcon in Rwanda.  I also don’t have the name ‘Ginger.’  And how is it she’s Gafcon and you are Canterbury?  Are we talking about the right person?’

‘Oh, she’s already using her new name, Gafcon.  And I nicknamed her Ginger, as in ‘ginger group’—an insignificant yapper always spicing things up and trying to control what goes on in grand halls such as mine.’

‘Ouch!  If you don’t mind me saying so, Sir, that might be one of the problems for this marriage!’

‘Good disagreement, my man, good disagreement.  Our marriage counsellor said years ago that disagreement is good if you keep walking together.  Just walking together, despite our differences, can be healing, you know.’

‘I see you have some very smart walking shoes, Sir.  But Harold, here, tells me that that didn’t work out so well for him and his trouble-and-strife.  The longer the walk, the more the disagreement.  Right, Harold?  Better resolve the differences than try to walk them out, I say.  What was the problem, if you don’t mind me asking?’

‘Well, it says here that I “tore the fabric of our community”.  What on earth does that mean?  As I recall, I was the one who wanted continuous and constructive dialogue.  Isn’t disagreement in a marriage just a higher form of unity?  This new value of diversity is so helpful as it teaches us to have ‘good disagreement’ and to celebrate it as a sign of our unity no matter what.  The more we disagree but still stay together, the greater our unity.’

‘Oh, Harold, what do you make of that?’

‘All I can say is that the wife was very disagreeable, indeed!  Very disagreeable.  We were united in disagreement for seven years.  Left me depressed in the end, and I nearly had a heart attack.’

‘Oh, nothing like that, I’m sure, for us.  The three of us had wonderful times of dialogue about living in love and faith together—one big, happy family over many years with lots of disagreement unity.  At least, so I thought.’

‘The three of you, Governor?  I see a man in a dress behind you.  Would that the third party?’

‘Why yes, bless him, er, her.  Come out over here, Fang.  Don’t hide yourself by the closet…. ((aside) I’m not sure he likes that nickname, but it is a play on his real name.) You see, my wife just never appreciated Fang in our marriage.  She wined and complained and, well, threw everything at me, including the Bible, of all things.’

 ‘Ooh, not very nice.  Mustn’t be throwing the Holy Book around.’

‘Indeed!  It has its place on the shelf.  It’s not one of the instruments of communion, you know.’

‘Now that there is a fine sounding thing.  What are these instruments of communion?’

‘Well, I’m one of them.’

‘Ah, now that is something to ponder.  It must be a very fine thing to be an instrument of communion.  How about that, Harold?  What are the others, then?’

‘Not “what” but ‘who.”  The instruments are three other groups of people.’

‘Just wondering out loud, Sir, but I once heard something about unity involving shared commitments, not just people stuck in endless disagreement with one another.  Mr. Sartre there over the Channel said something about that being hell.  People stuck with each other for eternity in snippy disagreement with each other—might be worse than fire and brimstone.  It is a lovely thought, mind you, to have so many people in your life, telling you that you are doing a fine job.  Three groups, you say?  But I imagine this wife of yours wanted to lay down a few rules for your unity—maybe, like, sticking to the old marriage vows.’

‘Lived experience makes the difference, not obedience to some old list of commitments that we once wrote up early in the marriage.  Things have changed, and we need to move with the times.  Our lived experience is what keeps the ship afloat, not the builder’s plans.  Hold me responsible for love, not commitments about the meaning of marriage, gender, and all that stuff. The problem with my wife was that she just did not want to live in love and faith with us.  She kept whining about my not living up to what we committed ourselves to years ago.  Fang needs our loving care and blessing.  Inclusion—that’s the word. Come here, Cuddles, I’ll include you.  Everyone needs to be loved and included.  Everyone counts.  Living in faith does not mean fidelity to commitments to way back when, you know, but to people, to one another no matter our disagreements.’

‘Yes, Governor, I was wondering about that word ‘faith’.  You have a way of giving words a twist or two.  What does ‘living in faith’ mean?’

‘Oh, it simply means we are a big family in relation to one another.  Like, for instance, there is a belching uncle in the corner, full of alcohol, at the family reunion, but he is still your uncle.  That is why the instruments of communion are all living people.  You cannot choose your family.  It has nothing to do with what we are committed to, as though commitments to beliefs are more important than commitments to each other.  It’s like being in a family—we’re stuck with each other no matter what we believe.’

‘That Mr. Sartre called his play, “No Exit.”  Stuck with each other in continuous disagreement for eternity.  You must have seen the play or read it at some point.  Anyway, am I right in concluding that you do not believe in any commitments to beliefs or practices, just people?’

‘Well, yes, you could put it that way.   But we do have beliefs somewhere on file, and we love our practices.  We even dress up for them.  As I say, though, neither is an instrument of unity for a marriage—not in my books.  Commitments have a place only because, without them, we could not disagree, and we show our unity by disagreeing about them together.  When we pull out our old documents with the commitments we once agreed on, I understand them to be a way to generate good discussion.  It is not as if they are revealed truth or anything wild like that!

 (Fang snickers)

You bring up a good point, though, because my wife was always trying to hold me to our old commitments as though they mattered more than our living in love together in this faith family.  She did treat them as a kind of objective truth.  Dripping faucet, she was.’

‘Oh, so what you mean by faith is not what you believe but with whom you hang out?  To live in faith is to hang out with your group?’

‘Something like that, I suppose.  I try not to get my thoughts confused.  Maybe Fang can explain.’

‘I’ll give it a go, Sweetie.  You see, once you realise that there is no objective truth, you can’t go around saying that ‘faith’ is something you believe to be true.  It is just something you do and do together.  Beliefs, truth—they are like optional earrings and necklaces.  What really matters is the party.’

‘That’s all a bit much for my mind, Sir, or Mum.  Harold, help me out here as I’m treading water.’

‘I’ve seen this stuff before.  You should take a walk down at Piccadilly Circus or Leicester Square sometime.  Build a statue to Eros, and you don’t ask questions about who is loving whom and how.  Folk who think this way say that love is all you need.  They claim that anyone who says some relationships are off limits is just stuck in a past century.  Instead, they say, love is a liquid.  There is no container, and so we should bless it wherever it flows.’

‘Harold, you are becoming a philosopher.’

‘I watch TV 4 and read the Daily Mail.’

‘Hmm.  A well-rounded man, indeed.  Right, now if what Harold says is right, I’m beginning to wonder if you’re going to sign for these papers, Mr. Canterbury, Sir.  Maybe marriage is anything to you because you don’t really believe in marriage.  And maybe you cannot sign divorce papers because you can play the same games with divorce that you play with marriage.  You’re wife seems to live in the real world where faith is what you believe and love does flow around but is constrained by certain do’s and don’ts and that sort of thing.  She seems to know what marriage is and wants a divorce.  I’ve seen that statue down in Piccadilly.  It should have its blindfold on because love shoots its arrows without reason or choice.  I suppose you have a statue to Eros here, too, at this grand palace, and I am sure that, if you do, it is wearing a blindfold.  Twang, twang—arrows flying every which way.  Maybe the statue of justice took off its blindfold and gave it to Eros in your garden.  You can make marriage mean whatever you want it to mean, and you can bless a couple of rocks on top of each other.  Things here are all sideways and upside down.  So, Mr. Canterbury, these papers here, they need a signature.’

‘I can’t sign those.  The structures of our marriage are always changing.  If I sign them today, they may change tomorrow.  But they haven’t changed, because they cannot—unless I and my fellow instruments of community change them.  We have not.  Not yet.  Neither I nor my friends have changed them.  Of course, our lived experience has nothing to do with them in any case.  After another ten years or so of lived experience, we might just change these structures.  Either way, she’s still my wife if I say so, and she cannot divorce me.’

‘I like playing ‘riddle me’ too, Sir, I really do.  But she is divorcing you.  All you need to do is sign the papers that I’m delivering about that.’

‘Well, we’ll give it a thought sometime.  I look forward to discussing this with my friends, along with other wonderful conversations we have all the time.’

‘I will need to report that you did not sign for the papers.  I will be back, of course.  I must say, Sir, that though this interlocution has not turned out as I had hoped, I very much look forward to visiting here again.  You have such a lovely palace, and I’d love to see the garden and its statues.’

‘Thank you.  Perhaps.  And please do tell my wife on her African tour that we pray for her and the children as they face poverty, conflict, famine, discrimination, and persecution around the world.  Such a shame about all that.  Goodbye….  And come, Lovey, let’s finish getting dressed up for our next conversation about the king’s coronation.’  (door closes)

‘Harold, whoever said Wonderland was down a rabbit hole?  I think we found it right here.’

‘Well, yes and no, I’d say.  In Wonderland, the sun was trying to make the billows smooth and bright, like this Mr. Canterbury.  I’ll give you that.  But it was shining with all its might in the middle of the night, as I recall.  Here, the sun only claims that the waves are smooth when they are right tumblers, and it is the darkness that is doing the shining—and in the middle of the day!’

‘God help that Mrs. Gafcon and her children!’

 

Afterword

Context for this satire: The Anglican Communion is breaking up, with the final straw being the Church of England’s vote to bless same-sex unions.  While Western provinces are in the great minority of Anglicans, they have maintained power through structure, antiquity, and wealth. 

 

The Global South Fellowship of Anglicans (GSFA) and the overlapping Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) associates, making up about 75% of the Anglican Communion, are rejecting the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Church of England.  GAFCON voted to do so at its fourth Conference (21-25 April, 2023) in Kigali, Rwanda. 

 

This follows many years of fruitless conversations in the Church of England meant to convince the orthodox to remain in fellowship with the revisionists (false teachers).  Despite calls for the wayward provinces, such as the Church of England, to repent and affirm the Church’s historic teaching and the authority of Scripture, the inexorable march away from the Christian faith has continued with same-sex blessings and a document rejecting Christian teaching called ‘Living in Love and Faith.’  These Western, minority provinces have rejected orthodox teaching on various important issues as they affirm the post-Christian culture.  Yet the focus has been on revising the Church’s teaching on sexuality, gender identity, and marriage. 

 

The official home of the Archbishop of the Church of England is at Lambeth Palace.  His historic residence is in Canterbury, and the recently elected dean of Canterbury Cathedral is a partnered homosexual.  The archbishop of York has also rejected the Church’s historic teaching on marriage and sexuality in favour of post-Christian England’s cultural changes.

Summer Reading in Christian Missions

 

Readings in Missions

Bible and Mission

Bauckham, Richard.  Bible and Mission: Christian Witness in a Postmodern World.  Carlisle: Paternoster Press and Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 2003.  Pp. 126.

Goheen, Michael.  A Light to the Nations: The Missional Church and the Biblical Story.  Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2011.  ISBN-10: 0801031419.  Pp. 256.  (Available on Kindle.)

Grams, Rollin.  New Testament Mission Theology. In progress.  [Sections available by request.]

Payne, J. D.  Theology of Mission: A Concise Biblical Theology.  Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2022.  Pp. 192.

Mission History

Green, Michael.  Evangelism in the Early Church.  Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1970, 2003.

Neill, Stephen, and Owen Chadwick.  A History of Christian Missions.  Penguin, 1991.  Pp. 466.

Smither, Edward L.  Christian Mission: A Concise, Global History.  Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2019.  Pp. 202.

Terry, Mark and Robert L. Gallagher.  Encountering the History of Missions: From the Early Church to Today.  Grand Rapids, MI; Baker Academic, 2017.  Pp. 362.

Theology of Mission

Bavinck, J. H. An Introduction to the Science of Missions. P&R Publishing, 1993.  See review by Andy Johnson at Book Review: An Introduction to the Science of Missions, by John Herman Bavinck : 9Marks.

Bosch, David.  Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission.  Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2011 (orig. 1991).  Pp. 658.  [Cf. chapters 6-9: Eastern Church, Medieval Roman Catholic, Protestant Reformation, Enlightenment; chapter 12: An Emerging Ecumenical Missionary Paradigm; chapter 13: Mission in Many Modes]

Bosch, David.  Witness to the World: The Christian Mission in Theological Perspective.  Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2006.

Jones, E. Stanley.  Conversion.  E. Stanley Jones Foundation, 2018 (orig. Abingdon, 1959).

Stott, John M. and Christopher J. H. Wright. Christian Mission in the Modern World.  Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2015.ISBN: Read pp. 15-218 = 204 pages.

Van Engen, Charles.  Transforming Mission Theology.  William Carey Library, 2017.  ISBN 10: 0878086358.  ISBN-13: 978-0878086351.  (Available on Kindle Books.)  436 pages.

Wright, Christopher J. H. The Great Story and the Great Commission.  Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2023.

Mission Practice and Context

Lovelace, Richard.  Dynamics of Spiritual Life.  Expanded ed.  Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2020.

Muck, Terry and Frances S. Adeney.  Encountering World Religions: The Practice of Mission in the Twenty-First Century.  Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2009.

Murray, Stuart.  Post-Christendom: Church and Mission in a Strange New World (After-Christendom).  Carlisle, UK: Paternoster, 2004.  ISBN: 978-1842272619.  Pp. 208.  (Available as a Kindle book.)

Newbigin, Lesslie.  The Gospel in a Puralistic Society (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1989).  Pp. 252.

Niebauer, Michael.  Virtuous Persuasion: A Theology of Christian Mission.  Lexham Academic, 2022.

Shaw, Ryan.  Rethinking Global Mobilization: Calling the Church to Her Core Identity.  Armstrong, MO: Ignite Media, 2022.

Biographies

Donovan, Vincent J.  Christianity Rediscovered.  25th ed.  Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2003.

Grams, Rollin G. Stewards of Grace: A Reflective, Mission Biography of Eugene and Phyllis Grams in South Africa, 1951-1962 (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2010). Pp. 222. (Available on Kindle.)

Long, Kathryn T. God in the Rainforest: A Tale of Martyrdom and Redemption in Amazonian Ecuador.  Oxford University Press, 2019.

Tucker, Ruth A.  From Jerusalem to Irian Jaya: A Biographical History of Christian Missions.  Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2004.  Pp. 528.

The Church’s Mission and Other Religions

Bavinck, J. H. The Church between Temple and Mosque.  Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Seminary Press, 2023.

Sookhdeo, Patrick.  A Christian’s Pocket Guide to Islam.  Rev. ed.  Christian Focus, 2013.  ISBN: 978-1845505721.  Pp. 144.

Tennent, Timothy.  Christianity at the Religious Roundtable: Evangelicalism in Conversation with Hinduism, Buddhism, and Islam.  Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2002.  Pp. 245.

From Gentle Admonishment to Exclusion from the Church: The Relevance of Paul's Pastoral Care of Sinners in First Corinthians for Churches Today

 Introduction

This study of the arrogant in the church in Corinth provides a Biblical precedent for what might be the next step for orthodox Christians in the Anglican and Methodist Churches in our day.  It also applies to other denominations that have already divided between the revisionists promoting sin and the orthodox who have, by and large, left to form new denominations.  Having spoken the truth in love over many years, Paul’s response to the arrogant faction in Corinth provides an example of good practice for believers concerned to follow God.

We live at a momentous time, not unlike the days of division of the Church in the 11^th and 16^th centuries, but with much more at stake.  Already in the first days of the Church, however, certain issues showed themselves that illustrated both what types of issues would divide the Church and how believers ought to handle them.  Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians is one of the Biblical texts that gives us this insight.  Paul had been made aware of a group in the Corinthian Church that was promoting various things to divide the Church, including sexual immorality.[1]  One way in which he describes this group is to say that they are arrogant.  This group was attempting to build a church that was not built on the foundation of the Gospel that Paul had proclaimed when establishing the Church, and they were building with materials of their culture, such as sexual morality, which would result in an unholy building rather than the temple of God.

Contemporary readers of 1 Corinthians 4.21 are likely taken aback by the roughness of Paul's words.  He says, 'What do you wish? Shall I come to you with a rod, or with love in a spirit of gentleness?'  How should we understand this?  Cultural context is important to understand the mention of a rod of punishment.  Also important is reading the context of this verse from 4.14 and further into chapter 5--the chapter break is unhelpful.  Finally, the gravity of the issue explains Paul's strong language. First Corinthians 4.14-5.13 is an instruction for the Church about what to do when gentle admonishing fails.  The presenting case is one of practicing sexual immorality and those approving of it.

Paul and His Relationship to the Corinthian Church

Paul wants to relate to the church as a parent to a child.  He had planted the church in Corinth, and he is, after all, the apostle to the Gentiles.  Such a relationship involves three things in 1 Corinthians 4.14-21.  First, it would allow Paul to admonish (νουθετῶν) them as 'my beloved children' (4.14).  Second, it involves children imitating their father.  Thus, Paul sends another of his children in the faith, Timothy, to remind the others of his 'ways in Christ' (4.17).  Third, the parental relationship would also allow him to discipline his children when they went wrong.  When disobedient children do not respond to gentleness, physical punishment may help.  Thus, Paul asks, 'Shall I come to you with a rod, or with love in a spirit of gentleness?' (4.21).

The role of the father overlaps with the teacher, and Paul claims both roles.  He admonishes the congregation, reminds his children in the faith of his own conduct so that they will imitate him, and disciplines them when necessary.  A couple passages from other writers in the culture show this disciplinary role of the teacher.  In Aristophanes’ play, Clouds, Socrates says, ‘This man is ignorant and brutish--I fear, old man, lest you will need blows’ (476).[2]  Also, Plutarch mentions that Cato’s teacher was more inclined to use reason than to thrash him (Cato the Younger 1.5).  Parents, not just teachers, teach their children.  As the parent of the church in Corinth, Paul teaches the congregation through admonition, imitation, and discipline.

Paul, of course, is not speaking literally.  He extends his metaphorical role of parent-teacher to include the punishment that people expected in the culture of his day.  Yet he does threaten the arrogant in the church with discipline of some sort.  What was this arrogant group all about?

The Arrogant Faction in Corinth

Paul uses the word 'arrogance' several times in 1 Corinthians.  His first use in 1 Corinthians 4.6 will be discussed shortly.  This word links the discussion in chapters 5 and 6 to what is said in chapter 4.  The chapter break between 4 and 5 may appear to introduce an entirely new subject--but it does not.  Chapter five clarifies what the issues under consideration about the arrogant faction are.  Paul says several things about this arrogant group.  First, the arrogant group have become puffed up because of Paul's absence and thinking he was not returning (4.18).  This is an attempt to take control of the church and, as we shall see, it has to do with a false teaching about sexuality, if nothing else.  We might expand the point and note that, when the arrogant in the Church today try to shuffle Paul off the platform so that their sexual ethics might be approved, they are doing the same thing that the arrogant faction in Corinth were trying to do.

Second, the arrogant are making a certain argument in the church.  The ESV's translation in 4.19 may mislead.  It says, 'I will find out not the talk of these arrogant people but their power.'  The word translated 'talk' is 'λόγον.'  Paul's point is not simply that this faction is arrogant in the sense of mouthing off as though they were in charge of the community and how they could live, but that they have some sort of reasoning that is opposed to Paul’s.  They are arrogant enough to present an argument in opposition to Paul.  Just over the chapter break, we read, 'It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that is not tolerated even among pagans, for a man has his father’s wife. ² And you are arrogant!’ (5.1-2a). Just what the argument of the arrogant group in the Corinthian church was actually emerges in chapter six.  Their slogans are, ‘All things are lawful for me’ and ‘food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food’ (6.12-13).  Both of these erroneous teachings may have stemmed from important early Christian discussion topics about the Law: the nature of Christian freedom from the Law, the Jewish question about clean and unclean food, and whether Gentiles need to abide by these laws.  The arrogant group has taken a stance: they claim that they do not fall under any Law, and they reason that sexual ethics is like Jewish teaching on food—no longer relevant for the Church.  That is, they are free from any restraint in sexual ethics.  Thus, their teaching is not only false but also ‘arrogant’ in their rejection of an external authority (cf. 4.6).  Paul’s response in chapters 5-6 explains that the sexual ethic of the Old Testament continues in effect for Christians even more so because there are now additional reasons for Christians to follow it.  To the Old Testament laws, such as in Leviticus 18, there are now the Christian arguments that:

1. The body is for the Lord and the Lord for the body (6.13)

2. God will raise us up in the resurrection (6.14)—i.e., embodied existence is God’s plan

3. Our bodies are members of Christ (6.15), so flee sexual immorality (6.18)

4. Our body is a temple of the Holy Spirit (6.19)

5. We are not our own; we were bought with a price (by Jesus’ death on the cross) (6.19b-20a)

6. We should glorify God in our bodies (6.20b)

There is no new sexual ethic from what is found in the Old Testament.  What is new are additional, Christian reasons for holiness of the body.

Arrogant Builders Create Division, Set Themselves Up as Authorities, Choose a Different Foundation from Jesus Christ, and Build with Poor Materials

The Builders

Paul presents himself and Apollos as servants in contrast to arrogant leaders in the Church.  In 1 Corinthians 4.6, Paul says that his illustration of Apollos and himself in chapter 3 was so ‘that you may learn by us not to go beyond what is written, that none of you may be puffed up in favor of one against another.’  He had stated in the previous chapter that, while the Corinthians had jealousy and strife among themselves (3.3), he and Apollos had laboured in unison (3.8) as fellow labourers in God’s field (3.9).  Changing the metaphor, Paul says that there is only one foundation to be laid for the building that workers are constructing, the foundation that he laid of Jesus Christ (3.11).  Paul presents himself and Apollos as mere servants (διάκονοι), not as persons with their own, independent authority.  One might imagine an arrogant ‘builder’ calling those who insist on not going beyond what has been written a ‘ginger group,’ as Archbishop Justin Welby did of GAFCON.[3]

The Foundation of Jesus Christ

The authority foundation of the Church is the Gospel: Jesus Christ and Him crucified (1.23).  One common feature of arrogance in the Church is when people seek to build on a different foundation, constructing their own version of the Gospel.  The arrogant in the Church invariably challenge this foundation.  They question one aspect of the Gospel or another: the incarnation of Jesus, the deity of Christ, the need for Jesus’ death on the cross, the literal resurrection of Jesus from the dead, and so forth.

Going Beyond Scripture

Also in 1 Corinthians 4.6, Paul says that the arrogant go beyond what has been written (ἃ γέγραπται).  We might translate this as, ‘what stands written,’ a common way to refer to the authoritative word of the Scriptures (which, for Paul, was the Old Testament).[4]  The arrogant were dismissing the sexual ethic of the Old Testament, showing themselves to be puffed up in their ‘going beyond’ the Scriptures.

At times, debate in the Church is characterised as a debate between equally authoritative interpreters.  This is not Paul’s view.  He does not regard his opponents as carrying equal authority as himself.  He is the apostle, the witness to the Gospel.  They are not.  Those ordained in the Church today who claim an authority based on their office are mistaken.  Ordained persons carry authority only as persons who pass on the teaching of the apostles.  This should be especially clear in denominations putting weight on apostolic succession.  An archbishop does not have authority because he steps into a high office but only because, as someone in that office, he passes on the faith once and for all delivered to the saints (Jude 3).  Someone in that office who does not uphold the faith but supports some innovation, as we see today in the case of false teachers who promulgate a new teaching on sexual ethics, even though holding the office of priest, bishop, or archbishop.  Arrogant, false teachers teaching a sexual ethic replicating the culture and defying the Scriptures was not only the problem that Paul addresses in 1 Corinthians but also elsewhere in the early Church (e.g., Jude; 2 Peter 2; Revelation 2-3).

Building a Holy Temple

A test for what one builds on this foundation is whether it produces holiness.  Paul explains that the building being built on the foundation of Jesus Christ is the temple of God, that is, the people of God in whom God’s Spirit dwells (3.16-17).  Those who oppose the holiness of the Church set themselves up as the defenders of the unity of the Church because they misunderstand ‘unity’ as communal fellowship, not unity in the faith.  First Corinthians is not a letter merely about unity but about how unity is to be attained.  It is attained only by building on the single foundation of Jesus Christ and by building a holy temple in which the Spirit of God dwells.  (Paul says the same thing in Ephesians 2.13-22.)

Later in the letter, Paul describes what destroying God’s temple involves when he says that people engaged in certain acts and holding certain dispositions will not inherit the kingdom of God:

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality [better: ‘nor soft men nor homosexuals’[5]], ¹⁰ nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. ¹¹ And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God (1 Corinthians 6.9-11).

Note that the last verse describes the ‘temple’ of God’s people as washed, sanctified, and justified (ESV; better, ‘made righteous’) by Christ and the Spirit.  Returning to ch. 3, then, we see that some attempt to build on the foundation of Christ not the righteous life that produces the temple in which God’s Spirit dwells but something else altogether.

The Arrogant Are Unloving

The arrogant group in the Corinthian church is also reminded that love is not arrogant (13.4).  Earlier, Paul spoke to the issue of division over eating food offered to idols (chs. 8-10).  Paul takes the position that Christians may eat food purchased in the market even if it had been sacrificed to idols.  He qualifies this permission if such an action could lead a weak brother or sister back into his or her idolatrous beliefs and practices.  No Christian, however, was to participate in a meal involving idolatrous worship.  From archaeological artifacts, we know that this might involve participation in a meal for a party held at a temple or shrine.  In this matter, the arrogant have the right theology about idols—that they are nothing—but the wrong approach to the issue.  They are willing to revile weaker Christians still under the spell of pagan religion and to present themselves as the stronger Christians with their superior theology (‘knowledge’ that puffs up, 1 Corinthians 8.1).  They may even sin by entering into worship involving other gods.  (Arrogant Anglicans have done so when they invite Muslims to participate in Christian worship services.)

Another aspect of the Corinthian faction’s arrogance had to do with their viewing some with certain gifts above others.  Gifts were supposed to create a unity in the church, however.  By understanding that our individual gifts produce a unity in the church, we can safeguard ourselves from the arrogance of some who have a more presentable ministry (1 Corinthians 12-14).  Paul allows that one gift should be sought in particular, but this gift is for the whole church.  By seeking the gift of prophecy, we will upbuild, encourage, and console others in the Church (14.3).  While Paul does not use the word ‘arrogant’ in his discussion of spiritual gifts, he does explain in the middle of his discussion that love is not arrogant (13.4). 

Given the adornment of office holders in Anglicanism and the arrogance of so many false teachers holding these offices, this may be a good occasion to renounce vestments in the Anglican Church and present to the laity the idea of service that Paul speaks of in ch. 3.  (Sackcloth would be far more appropriate than ornate mitres and robes, but a simple servant’s cloak would convey the right theology in the orthodox wing of the Church.)  There can be no denying that clericalism feeds arrogance.

People can and do claim that they are seeking to show love to others and not being arrogant when they, in fact, are not.  Too often, arrogant people seem to occupy the high ground of Christian ethics when they refuse to call sin sin and give license to the choices of others, no matter what Scripture says.  They present themselves as loving in not insisting on their own way in defining sin (1 Corinthians 13.4-5).  However, they are arrogant because, on this view, they position themselves above the Scriptures and the apostle’s teaching.  They make themselves out to be authoritative in matters of right and wrong.  Thus, Paul continues in his definition of love: love ‘does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth’ (13.6).  Love is not license, nor is it the affirmation of others’ choices (cf. Romans 1.32).  It is ‘speaking the truth in love’ (Ephesians 4.15).

Dealing with the Arrogant in the Church

The Power of the Kingdom of God Confronts Arrogant, False Teaching and Sin

In dealing with the arrogant in the Corinthian Church, Paul not only mounts arguments but also expects the unrighteous to encounter the power of the kingdom of God (4.19-20).  There is a spiritual dimension to the battle against false teaching and sinfulness in the Church.  As we read past the chapter break, we know that encountering the power of God involves exclusion from the Church (5.2).  In addition to this, we see later that it can also involve judgement in the form of sickness and even death (11.27-30).  That is, these Corinthians brought the social practices of their culture into the community of Christ gathered as the Church such that some had nothing to eat or drink while others had plenty.  That the church is a place to exercise divine judgement is also confirmed in 1 Corinthians 6.1-8.  Therefore, while Paul's threat to bring a rod to deal with the arrogant in the church was not literal, he expected God's power to bring judgement on these people even in his absence.  The Church has disciplinary authority (cf. John 20.23; Matthew 18.17-20).

 In chapter 5, Paul calls for an exercise of spiritual authority in the exclusion of the person committing sexual immorality that some arrogant persons have approved.  He says that he has already passed judgement on this person (5.3).  Next, he says that the Corinthian church should deliver the man over to Satan 'for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord' (5.5).  They are to do this when they are 'assembled in the name of the Lord Jesus,' with Paul present in spirit and 'in the power of the Lord Jesus Christ' (5.4).  Since Paul earlier said that the man should be removed from the church (5.2), this deliverance over to Satan must mean putting the man out of the fellowship of believers, leaving him in the hands of Satan.  If the church is a holy temple where God’s Spirit dwells, then being put out of the church is to be delivered over to Satan’s sphere. 

Since Paul hopes for the man's spirit to be saved, the purpose of this judgement is not only for the sake of the church--that they might not be unclean before the Lord (5.6-8)--but also for the man himself.  Without judgement, the man would think his behaviour was acceptable before God, and he would continue in it.  The 'destruction of the flesh' does not mean death but the destruction of the appetite of sexual immorality that the man has indulged, i.e., sleeping with his father's wife in disobedience of Leviticus 18.8.  Paul's initial description of the man's sin uses the general term for sexual immorality (πορνεία) before he explains the particular sin.  This allows him to teach the Corinthians that not simply this man's sin but sexual immorality in general--largely the subject of Leviticus 18--is something intolerable in the holy Church of God.  ‘Sexual immorality’ leads the list of sins in 1 Corinthians 5.11.  Paul says that, if such people claim to be Christians, the church should have no association with them.

Teaching on Sexual Ethics

Teaching Christian sexual ethics was foundational to Paul's ministry.  In 1 Thessalonians, we see that, as part of their evangelistic and church planting ministry, Paul and his team taught new believers 'how you ought to walk and to please God' (4.1).  As Paul was ejected from the city before he had established this church, he sent Timothy back to the church 'to establish and exhort you in the faith' (1 Thessalonians 3.2).  Finally, Paul wrote the letter to remind them again.  The first thing that Paul mentions as a reminder of his teaching was that they should abstain from sexual immorality (πορνεία, 4.3).  The focus on sexual immorality is understandable: Jewish and Christian ethics was counter-cultural.  Gentiles coming into the Church needed to be educated in Christian sexual ethics.  Inevitably, this challenge turned up as false teaching in the Church, as it does today in a post-Christian culture.

Similarly, Paul sent Timothy to the Corinthians to remind them of his ways in Christ (1 Corinthians 4.17).  One of the ministries of Timothy, then, was to teach Christian ethics, including sexual ethics, in the young churches that Paul's missionary team established. 

Ostracism from the Christian Community

If this teaching failed to bring a transformation in the church, Paul expected that he and the church would exercise discipline and, if necessary, ostracism from the community.  The church is misunderstood in Paul’s theology when it is said that it is just a community of sinners who have experienced God’s grace.  That is only part of the truth, but it is not a description of their ongoing life in Christ.  The church is a community of persons ‘sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints,’ as Paul addresses even the Corinthian church (1 Corinthians 1.2), called to be holy and blameless before God (Ephesians 1.4).  To make this point, Paul speaks of the Church as cleansed from the yeast of sin and ready to celebrate the Passover with sincerity and truth (1 Corinthians 5.7-8).  This meant, among other things, refusing to associate with anyone bearing the name of ‘brother’ who is guilty of sexual immorality or other sins (1 Corinthians 5.11-13).  This would refer to persons continuing in sin without repentance or a desire to change.[6]  Sinners who had turned to Christ were washed, sanctified, and made righteous by the work of Christ and the Spirit (1 Corinthians 6.11).

Conclusion

Thus, Paul’s strong warning to the Corinthians that he might come to discipline them came because some in the church opposed his teaching on sexual ethics, among other things.  One of the differences between the Gentile world on the one hand and Jews and Christians on the other was their sexual ethics.  As Christianity sought to include both Jews and Gentiles together in the Church, much teaching was needed about sexuality.  Not only were gentle admonition and teaching important, but also Church discipline.  Persons set on continuing in sexual immorality were to be excluded from the Church, and those arrogant, false teachers in the Church who supported sexually immoral persons for whatever reason were to be confronted with the power of God.

In our day, with false teachers abounding in what were once orthodox, Christian denominations, it bears saying that another of the sexually immoral sins in the list of such sins in Leviticus 18 was the very one that is now approved by the arrogant revisionists: homosexuality (18.22).  Paul’s pastoral care progresses from gentle admonition and teaching to disciple for recalcitrant sinners and the arrogant false teachers offering approval of the sinners’ sins.

---

[1] The two oft-repeated sins of Israel in the Old Testament prophets were idolatry and sexual immorality.  These sins were related in the fertility cults of Canaanite religion.  Also in New Testament times, the culture’s religion and sexuality was a major challenge for the people of God.

[2] Aristophanes, ‘Clouds,’ The Comedies of Aristophanes, trans. William James Hickie (London. Bohn. 1853?).

[3] Cf. Rollin G. Grams, ‘GAFCON the “Ginger Group”?’ Bible and Mission Blog (23 June, 2018); online at: https://bibleandmission.blogspot.com/2018/06/gafcon-ginger-group.html.  Stephen Noll, ‘Contention 3: Is GAFCON a Ginger Group?,’ (April 22, 2018); online at: http://contendinganglican.org/2018/04/22/contention-3-is-gafcon-a-ginger-group/ (accessed 22 June, 2018).

[4] The perfect tense carries the meaning of something in the past that continues in some way in the present.  In this case, what was written in the past continues to be authoritative.

[5] The ESV translation collapses two Greek words into one, ‘homosexuals.’  The first word is malachoi, meaning ‘soft men.’  This had a clear and rich usage in antiquity.  In this context, it has a sexual connotation, and in antiquity it could refer to persons with a lack of self-control who let their sexual appetites control them.  It was also used of men who maintained a life in the manner of women, what is now called ‘transsexual’ or ‘transgender.’  Note that this word has to do with orientation or disposition.  The second term has to do with acts and is rightly translated ‘homosexual’ in today’s English.  It is a compound term stemming from two adjacent words in Leviticus 20.13.  It refers to two men lying together as a man with a woman.  There is no qualification of this, such as pederasty.  The act itself is condemned, not some feature of relationship: a loving, committed, and mutual homosexual relationship would not make this act any more acceptable.  Rather, the deeper the commitment, the more serious the sin.

[6] Christians who fell into sin, rather than embraced sin and refused to change, could be restored with the help of more mature believers (Galatians 6.1).  The background is likely Leviticus 19.16-18: ‘You shall not go around as a slanderer among your people, and you shall not stand up against the life of your neighbor: I am the LORD. 17 “You shall not hate your brother in your heart, but you shall reason frankly with your neighbor, lest you incur sin because of him. 18 You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD.’  Cf. Matthew 18.15; 22.39.

Theological Education as Tradition Enquiry

 

Introduction

A great challenge facing the Church in the world lies in theological education.  Just what does this mean?  Some phrase this in equally general terms as ‘leadership training,’ which is, sadly, a step in the wrong direction as it removes the word ‘theological’ and it conceives of ministry as ‘leadership.’  Others conceive of theological education as an education in ‘religion,’ that is, a faith-less education in academia that is unrelated to the Church.  Still others mean by ‘theological education’ an action oriented education in ‘social justice’ or ‘public theology’ that has little to do with the interpretation of sacred texts or with the history of the interpreting community.  Relatedly, some understand ‘theological education’ as contemporary and contextual studies that are phenomenological, pragmatic, and grounded in the social sciences.  This approach may or may not engage with the canonically authoritative Scriptures or the Church’s history, but, if it does, it typically uses these anecdotally, as one might any other example.  The Church’s Scriptures and tradition are replaced with the gathering of data and the analysis of that data through some field in the social sciences (political science, sociology, anthropology, psychology, management, and economics).

Over against these approaches to theological education, this essay outlines some characteristics of theological education as tradition enquiry.  The characteristics of tradition enquiry were described in a book by Alasdair MacIntyre on ethics, first published in 1990.[1]  MacIntyre describes three rival versions of moral enquiry that correspond with modernity, postmodernity, and tradition.  Distinctions will be made between these, below, but a general understanding of the three versions of enquiry, which MacIntyre insists are incommensurable, are as follows.  Modernist enquiry, which MacIntyre calls ‘Encyclopedic,’ is enquiry that begins with no set of beliefs and seeks to establish belief through scientific enquiry.  Objective truth is possible, and all truth is ‘encyclopedic’ in the sense that it is cumulative, inter-disciplinary, and coherent.  Postmodern enquiry, which MacIntyre calls ‘genealogy,’ is relativistic, opposes metanarratives that account for everything (it is non-encyclopedic), and affirms locally constructed, functional understandings of knowledge and beliefs.  Tradition enquiry also begins with presuppositions, but it seeks to move from faith to reason, believing in objective truth.  Encyclopedia prioritises scientific study within the university, genealogy prioritises the social sciences and sees the ‘university’ more as a ‘diversity’ of perspectives and methodologies that are not coherent, cumulative, or authoritative, but that appreciates inter-disciplinary studies as a feature of diversity.  Tradition enquiry is favourable for the study of a theological tradition.  The tension between the Church and the modern university lay in the antagonisms that arose between faith and science, but both agreed on objective truth.  The tension between the Church and postmodern ‘diversity’ is the latter’s rejection of authoritative texts, historical enquiry, and objective truth, and its preference of the social scientific methodologies for merely descriptive studies.

One further feature of the postmodern turn is a focus on ethnicities and audiences.  Instead of asking what an author in Scripture meant in the context in which a text was written, postmodern reading of Scripture favours the reader: what meaning does the audience make of the text for its own contextual and contemporary situation?  This leads to a rejection of Biblical Studies and Historical Theology in the theological curriculum, and replacing these are studies pertaining to the readers and their contexts.  The meaning of texts is shifted from the author to the reader or readers, and the theological curriculum increasingly rejects Biblical studies, Church history, and theology, replacing this emphasis with ministry studies and public theology (an action oriented study of some sort that seeks common ground between the Church and society, such as in ‘social justice’ or ‘inter-faith dialogue.’)

With this introduction to the three rival versions of enquiry, this essay turns next to a description of tradition enquiry as laid out by Alasdair MacIntyre.  ‘Tradition’ enquiry should not be equated with Christian theology: the approach could be applied to any religious tradition.  However, MacIntyre primarily had in mind the Thomistic tradition stemming from Thomas Aquinas.  One might easily see, or should appreciate, that different traditions will oppose one another.  An orthodox Christian may find considerable room to disagree with another orthodox Christian in a different trajectory of the tradition, such as Roman Catholics and Southern Baptists.  They will find areas where they agree and disagree.  This will become more pronounced as significantly different traditions are in view, such as two religions, articulate their views and practices.  One must, therefore, not only define theological education as tradition enquiry but also clarify which tradition one has in view.  The following essay only outlines tradition enquiry in general and does not take that extra, necessary step.  Thus, the point being made is that, amidst calls for more ‘theological education,’ we need to understand that this will not be served by the universities, whether Modern or Postmodern, but can only be served by the Church with a clear understanding of the tradition of faith and practices that it seeks to study and pass on to the next generation.  Nor will theological education be adequate when pursued by denominations that attack their own traditions, as the mainline, Protestant denominations have been doing for a half century or more.

The Characteristics of Tradition Enquiry[2]

'Tradition' offers an alternative to encyclopaedic and genealogical versions of enquiry.  Alasdair MacIntyre defines 'tradition' as an ‘historically extended, socially embodied argument,’^[3] or ‘an argument extended over time in which certain fundamental agreements are defined and redefined in terms of two kinds of conflict’—that inside and that outside the tradition.^[4]  Over against the modernist understanding of reason as thinking without taking perspectives into account (so that reason can be universal and impersonal), MacIntyre avers that

 '…reason can only move towards being genuinely universal and impersonal insofar as it is neither neutral nor disinterested,… [and] membership in a particular type of moral community, one from which fundamental dissent has to be excluded, is a condition for genuinely rational enquiry and more especially for moral and theological enquiry.'^[5]

The history of this approach to moral enquiry stretches from Socrates to a time after Thomas Aquinas. MacIntyre's description of tradition includes the following points (my enumeration follows).

(1) Philosophical enquiry was perceived as requiring a prior commitment to a certain perspective.  This was phrased in terms of making oneself an apprentice to a craft (tecnh,), and so philosophy involved the practice (e;rgon) of a craft to achieve what is good—the good for me at my stage of learning as opposed to what is good without qualification, and the good for this craft as opposed to what appears good.^[6]  Furthermore, one entering a craft becomes part of the history of that craft.  In saying so, MacIntyre argues that one within a tradition is part of its dynamic flow.  Indeed, successful enquiry itself can only be written retrospectively and is therefore open to review at a later date.^[7]  Encyclopaedists, by contrast, believe in a neutral history: the past is waiting to be discovered, independent of characteristics from some particular point of view.^[8]  Tradition recognises that history is always written from the historian's perspective.

(2) Tradition has a narrative view of history.  MacIntyre speaks of a narrative structure to different theories of history, entailing different views on how actions and transactions of actual social life are embodied.  The encyclopaedist believes that the narrative structure involves the progression of reason.  This denigrates the past and appeals to timeless principles separate from the traditions that shaped them.  Tradition is to be sifted by our standards, and there is no need for a prior commitment to religious belief or tradition to understand these principles.  Genealogy, on the other hand, seeks to disclose what the encyclopaedic narrative has concealed by undermining that narrative and offering its own version of history.  Tradition, however, seeks to learn from the past by identifying and moving toward a telos more adequately in the present.    To do this, it asks questions such as the following: What is the telos of human beings?  What is right action towards the telos?  What are the virtues that issue in right action?  What are the laws that order human relationships so that we may possess these virtues?^[9]  Tradition also recognises the political (i.e., roles and social life) dimensions to tradition.

 MacIntyre says that

 'modern moral philosophy has in general been blind to the complementary character of narrative and theory both in moral enquiry and in the moral life itself.  In moral enquiry we are always concerned with the question: what type of enacted narrative would be the embodiment, in the actions and transactions of actual social life, of this particular theory?…the encyclopaedic, the genealogical, and the Thomistic tradition-constituted standpoints confront one another not only as rival moral theories but also as projects for constructing rival forms of moral narrative.'^[10]

Lucian, the second century satirist, saw this clearly: in depicting the various views of current philosophies as slaves to be sold in the market, he required each to describe the type of life (enacted narrative) which accompanies his understanding of the world rather than offer rational arguments in favour of each philosophy (Philosophies for Sale).

(3) Tradition locates authority in (a) a given community (e.g., Thomistic scholarship), (b) in authoritative texts (e.g., Scripture), and (c) in a tradition of interpretation of these texts by the community through history.^[11]  The encyclopaedist’s version of moral enquiry entails a separation of the individual, reasoning subject from authority, while the genealogist’s version resists all authority.  Tradition, on the other hand, requires thinking in community—apprenticing and practising one’s craft in the guild.  Tradition also appreciates the temporal reference of reasoning: the encyclopaedist seeks timeless, universal and objective truths, whereas tradition understands truth with respect to its history so far.  It makes claims about objective truth, but it makes those claims not from some neutral ground but from its own faith tradition.

 To share in the rationality of a craft requires sharing in the contingencies of its history, understanding its story as one’s own, and finding a place for oneself as a character in the enacted dramatic narrative which is that story so far.^[12]

Thus, one must become committed to a certain community with its unique tradition rather than work by means of reasoning from first principles, and one will find that the subject for investigation is not simply our tradition but ourselves.

In making this case for the nature of tradition as a means of enquiry, MacIntyre examines the Augustinian tradition through to Thomas Aquinas’ combination of this tradition with the Aristotelian tradition.  Some further points helping to describe tradition emerge from this survey.

(4) Tradition has a clear understanding of the different roles of the reader and teachers in interpretation. Interpretation of these texts requires ‘a prerational reordering of the self …before the reader can have an adequate standard by which to judge what is a good reason and what is not’.^[13]  This argument stems from Augustine’s understanding of the will as perverted, over against Aristotle’s trust that the mind will seek out the good and, having discovered it, do it.  But for Augustine, a transformation of the reader needs to take place in order to read with understanding.

If the reader needs a prerational reordering of the self in order to read rightly, what one needs is a trusted teacher to guide one during initial readings.  Humility, then, is a required virtue of the reader of texts and in education.  Contrast a Nietzschean opposition to such humility before tradition: what Nietzsche called for was a ‘nobility of instinct’.

(5) Tradition enquiry has a different understanding of reasoning.  It uses dialectic, arguing towards first principles.  Reasoning is ‘on the way’, it is exploratory, representing the state of the craft at this time in its history.  Encyclopaedia, on the contrary, argues from first principles and concerns itself with methods and principles.  These methods and principles are thought to be without influence from the interpreter's perspective, and the means of communication in education is therefore the lecture, a rather straight-forward presentation of facts which the student must learn.  Questions and answers in such lectures are for clarification, not for probing the argument through dialectic enquiry.  MacIntyre writes that the genealogist view of the lecture is that it is only an episode in a narrative of conflicts.  In fact, the lecture is not appropriate for Postmodern education.  Group projects and discussion make better sense on the view that affirms relativism, local truth, group identities, and our constructions of reality.  Tradition, on the other hand, sees the lecturer and his or her audience as interpreters of texts to be dialectically explored because both agree on an authority beyond themselves—the Divinely revealed, authoritative Scriptures.^[14]

If reasoning is 'on the way', then tradition is incorrectly understood when it is thought to be an encrustation of the past.  MacIntyre insists that tradition is dynamic: it develops as any 'craft' facing its own questions arising out of its past history.

Conclusion

This essay has sought to argue for a clear understanding that theological education needs to be education within a tradition.  The more general claim that all education lies within a tradition stands behind this claim but is not in focus.  If anything is to be a matter of ‘tradition enquiry,’ certainly theological studies is.  However, theological education has been pulled and pushed in various directions away from a study of a faith community articulating who it is, what it believes, what it practices, and how it relates to outsiders.  Both Modernity and Postmodernity have distracted the Church from its primary focus and contribution as a tradition.  Also, as the Church itself has fragmented and become confused in regard to its relationship to its own tradition, its understanding of theological education has been distorted one way or another.  The first step to rectifying this tremendous problem is to recognise that theological education is tradition enquiry.

As orthodox Evangelicals, we belong to several sub-traditions that come together because we are close enough in our understandings of orthodoxy and Reformational theology, as well as in our history of missions and the Church.  We have much in common and should have enough in common to cooperate in large part with one another in theological education.  We have virtually nothing in common with liberal Christianity, let alone the secular university and the interest in religious studies that resist the commitments of faith-based enquiry.

---

[1] Alasdair MacIntyre,  Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy, and Tradition (Notre Dame, IL: University of Notre Dame, 1990).

[2] From this point to the conclusion, the essay is a slight revision of a section from Rollin G. Grams, Rival Versions of Theological Enquiry (Prague: International Baptist Theological Seminary, 2005).

[3] Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue, 2^nd ed. (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1984), p. 222.

[4] Alasdair MacIntyre, Whose Justice?  Which Rationality? (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1988), p. 12.

[5] Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry, pp. 59f.

[6] Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry, pp. 61f.

[7] Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry, p. 150.

[8] Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry, p. 152.

[9] Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry, p. 80.

[10] Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry, p. 80.

[11] In medieval religious education, tradition developed as questiones related to the text.  These questions were first written in the margins of the Biblical text and, over time, were expanded into accompanying texts.  Questions arising from commentary on the text pertained to the three or four senses a text of Scripture was thought to have: the plain historical, the moral or tropological, the allegorical or mystical, and (sometimes added) the anagogical or spiritually educational sense (MacIntyre, p. 85).  Abbot Hugh of St. Victor (1125-1141) developed this Medieval approach to the text by emphasising the importance of the plain historical text and unifying the senses through encouraging a curriculum covering all three: the plain historical meaning calls for exegesis based on a knowledge of history and geography, the moral sense calls for a study of moral theology, the allegorical calls for a study of theological doctrine, and the tropological calls for a study of what work we have to do in the natural world and an understanding of the natural world so that we can do our work in the world well.  If one ignores the problematic sensus plenior involved in a search for the four senses of a text, these are similar to the four tasks of theology that occupy a community in its use of Scripture.

[12] Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry, p. 65.

[13] Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry, p. 82.

[14] MacIntyre notes that medieval theology also made use of distinctions (distinctiones) in types of sense, a method which made radical intellectual dissent possible, as in the case of Abelard.  This point overlaps with the history of Roman Catholic tradition after Abelard in Aquinas’ combining two distinct traditions in his Summa Theologica.