Yearly Archives: 2009

Michael J. Gorman. Inhabiting the Cruciform God

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Michael J. Gorman. Inhabiting the Cruciform God: Kenosis, Justification, and Theosis in Paul’s Narrative Soteriology. Eerdmans, 2009. 194 pages.

I really like this new book from Michael Gorman, a Methodist New Testament scholar teaching in a Roman Catholic seminary (the Ecumenical Institute of Theology at St. Mary’s Seminary and University in Baltimore). Gorman has been prolific in recent years writing on Paul; this book stands alone but is surely best understood when read in conjunction with others of Gorman’s books, especially Cruciformity: Paul’s Narrative Spirituality of the Cross (Eerdmans, 2001).

I am a bit put off by terms such as “cruciformity,” “spirituality,” and “theosis.”  I’m not totally happy with Gorman’s choice to use these words. But the way he uses them and the meaning he gives to them make a lot of sense and are part of an extremely attractive theological reading of Paul.

Gorman writes with great clarity and economy. He’s a scholar well-versed in current Pauline scholarship and the broader theological world–but this book is quite accessible and would probably even work as a text for mid- and upper-level undergrads, and certainly for lower-level seminarians.

He sees Philippians 2 and its affirmation of the centrality of Jesus’ self-giving in its view of God’s involvement in the world as a key element “Paul’s master story.” And at the heart of this story we find a view of God that sees the best understanding of God being one wherein God is self-giving–not simply Jesus.

Along with seeing God as self-giving and vulnerable, Gorman argues strongly for an understanding of Christian faith where the believer identifies so closely with Jesus (and God) that it is most meaningful to think not so much in terms of belief or even following so much as participation, sharing life with–even to the point of sharing in Jesus’ crucifixion (hence, the term “cruciform”).

When we share in God’s self-giving, we share in the life of God– “theosis.” And this takes the form of self-giving love. Gorman’s understanding of God is determined in large part by his understanding of Jesus. And his understanding of Jesus centers on Jesus’ self-giving love described in Philippians 2 and manifested most fundamentally in Jesus’ way of life that led to his crucifixion.

While not as “political” in his reading of Paul as a scholar such as Neil Elliott (see Elliott’s insightful book The Arrogance of the Nations: Reading Romans in the Shadow of Empire), Gorman takes the social and political implications of Paul’s theology quite seriously (on this point I read Gorman’s approach as lining up closely with N.T. Wright’s, a scholar Gorman uses extensively).

The central “political” message Gorman sees in Paul is the message of nonviolence. His fourth chapter, “‘While We Were Enemies’: Paul, the Resurrection, and the End of Violence,” is a tour de force. Better than anyone I have read, Gorman helps us understand Paul’s own journey from sacred violence as a persecutor of Jesus’ followers to a powerful advocate of the way of peace.

Along with his forceful argument for Paul as a pacifist, Gorman helps us understand Paul’s integration of theology and practice more generally. Paul’s pacifism links inextricably with Paul’s affirmation of Jesus’ divinity–and with Paul’s portrayal of God’s own cruciformity (that is, God’s own nonviolence).

I really can’t recommend this book highly enough. It ranks right at the top of an ever-growing list of valuable books on Paul’s theology, especially notable for his clarity, accessibility, and (most of all) for its portrayal of a Paul whose life and thought link him intimately with the Jesus of the gospels and his message of peace.

My only hesitation with this book is Gorman’s use of key terms such as “cruciform” and “theosis.” Before reading this book (and his others) I would have more often associated these words with apolitical and even otherworldly piety and spirituality. Gorman goes a long way toward redeeming this language, but I still wonder if he makes his presentation a little too jargonish and insiderish and less accessible to those who don’t know these words.  If one follows Gorman’s own use of his key terms, though, one will be left with a clear sense of a gospel that fully engages this world we live in, and engages it with a transformative message of peace.

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The Scandal of God’s Mercy: Jonah

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Here is the eighteenth in a series of Bible studies that present the Bible as being on the side of pacifism.  This essay, “The Scandal of God’s Mercy,” considers the message of the book of Jonah.

Jonah may be understood as a protest document, telling a story that serves as a parable challenging Israel to understand their God as the merciful God who desires healing for all of humanity. The book protests against an overemphasis on Israel’s over-againstness in relation to surrounding nations—a characteristic especially of the community in the generations following the destruction of the temple, et al, and the “Babylonian exile.”

The character Jonah, representing Israel, is called to take the message of Yahweh to Israel’s worst enemies, the Ninevites. Knowing that God is indeed merciful, Jonah resists this calling because Jonah does not want the Ninevites to know God’s mercy. Through some extreme adventures when Jonah flees far from home the opposite direction of Nineveh, God displays God universal power and mercy—and then does the same in Nineveh when Jonah finally goes there.  And Jonah is ticked.

The story ends with a question—does Jonah want the mercy his people has known to be shared with others or not?

A Book of Questions: Job

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Here is the seventeenth in a series of Bible studies that present the Bible as being on the side of pacifism.  This essay, “A Book of Questions,” considers one of the most enigmatic books in the Bible, the Book of Job.

In the spirit of the book itself, the essay generally focuses more on asking questions of the book of Job, God, and theology than on giving answers. Is Job a hero and “God” the villain of this book? If so, what might the point be–and how might the book’s perspective be instructive for peace theology?

Is it possible that the book actually makes the case for a very positive view of humanity–not the “humans are only dust” traditional view? And that the book means to leave us with the conclusion that we have the calling to love justice and pursue it even when we can’t be clear about God’s involvement? Even when the world does not seem to operate according to the dictates of justice that often?

How do we sustain faith and practice justice in a chaotic universe?  The book of Job doesn’t answer this question–but perhaps it challenges us in ways that might help up as we struggle with it.

Israel’s Fall and Its Hope: Jeremiah and 2 Isaiah

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Here is the sixteenth in a series of Bible studies that present the Bible as being on the side of pacifism. This essay, “Israel’s Fall and Its Hope,” looks at two of the voices of understanding and hope in Israel following the destruction wreaked on their political and religious worlds by the Babylonian Empire–the prophet Jeremiah and the prophet who words are contained in the book of Isaiah, chapters 40–66.

These two prophets reinforce the critique of Israel’s corrupt power politics, underscoring the dictum that those who live by the sword will also die by the sword–a dictum certainly applying to political entities. However, beyond the critique, these prophets offer words of hope–God’s mercy nonetheless endures.

Their message is that the God of Israel remains a God of healing love whose call to Israel to bless all the families of the earth remains in effect. However, as the story will emphasize as it continues beyond the destruction and exile, this promise will never again be centered around a nation state–but rather around countercultural faith communities whose hope rests on the word of God, not on weapons of war.

Around the Internet

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The American criminal justice system is abysmal and getting worse, a terrible indictment of a sick society. However, we can see signs of the movement toward health around the edges. Here’s a New York Reveiw of Books review of an encouraging book that tells of restorative justice strategies that do make a positive difference. It is a reason to hope when we see a mainstream media outlet spreading the word.

If people who care deeply about human rights and the soul of America were hopeful that we might see some major changes under the Obama administration, torture expert Alfred McCoy gives us reason for discouragement. Perhaps with Obama and Empire, we will mostly get “kinder, gentler machine-gun hand” (quoting Neil Young’s song about America in the presidency of George H. W. Bush) where the most important contrast with the Bush II years will be more effective public relations.

Here’s another current account of the American Empire at work–a tragic and arrogant destruction of an Indian Ocean island culture for the sake of U.S. power.

A sharp critique of American higher education–and how we are fairly to prepare young people to question and change the world for the better.

Chris Hedges, former prize-winning war correspondent has some harsh words about the irredeemable character of the institution of warfare–welcome words indeed. But does he take it all back with this one sentence: “Wars may have to be fought to ensure survival, but they are always tragic”?  Can we hope to overcome this curse until we reject totally the notion that wars may “have to be fought to ensure survival”?

Evidence that we are moving closer to the abyss in the war on Afghanistan.

A fascinating account of an Ivy League student who went “underground” at Liberty University and came away with the wise complexifying the the cultural wars.

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William Hitchcock. The Bitter Road to Freedom

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William I. Hitchcock. The Bitter Road to Freedom: A New History of the Liberation of Europe. Free Press, 2008.

This is an interesting and significant book. Hitchcock, who teaches history at Temple University, tells an important story well. His agenda is mainly to complexify the way we Americans (and others) view World War II. He does not question the necessity of the war to defeat Germany, but he does question the simplistic character of the basic story we have been told about the nobility of this war.

For many of those “liberated” by this war–the citizens of Normandy, Belgium, and Holland; the populations of Eastern Europe; and most tragically Europe’s Jewish people–the “cure” of Allied conquest was nearly as devastating as the “disease” of German domination.

I learned a lot from Hitchcock’s account. Normandy, the scene of the great invasion of the Allies that signaled the final push into Germany from the west, faced extraordinary (and often inefficient and unnecessary) destruction from their supposed allies. For example, the city of Caen (population 60,000) was bombed to smithereens by the British, an attack that served no real strategic purpose. Holland, on the cusp of “liberation” in the late Fall of 1944, was deemed peripheral to the core priorities of the Allies and left to suffer through one more winter of starvation and disease at the cost of tens of thousands of lives.

I was aware of the unbelievable death and annihilation of Eastern Europe in the ruthless back and forth of the Germans and Russians. Hitchcock’s account, nonetheless, still left this reader shaken at the shear nihilism of that conflict.

The story of the fate of Europe’s Jews carries the most potent punch in this account. If anyone still imagined that this war was fought in order to “save the Jews,” reading what happened after the defeat of the Nazis will refute such a notion. Shockingly, we learn that for months, even years, after the end of the war Jewish survivors remained in prison-like camps under conditions not greatly improved from the death camps. Clearly, the Allies had given no thought to these victims of Nazi insanity.

Hitchcock ends the story in 1947, so we only get hints concerning the connection between Europe’s utter amorality concerning the treatment of Jewish people, Britain’s vain but devastating efforts to hold on to the remnants of their Empire in the Middle East, and today’s intractable conflicts in that part of the world.

As I mentioned above, Hitchcock does not mean to question the necessity of the War. He mainly seems to want to remind his readers that such a necessary effort nonetheless came at great cost. He hopes we can gain a more complex and less romantic perspective on the terrible cost so many paid on this “bitter road to freedom.”

As one less certain of the necessity for this War, I came away from this book with many percolating thoughts. For one thing, it seems clear that most if not all of the moral-high-ground type of justifications for this “last resort” of violence had little significance in the event of the actual war. Clearly, this war had nothing to do with saving or caring about the welfare of Europe’s Jewish people. It had little to do with protecting human life (see the destruction of Normandy and the lack of concern with the Dutch people). It had little to do with democracy and freedom (see the total abandonment of Eastern Europe to Stalin at the end of the War).

The War inevitably took on its own logic–which, paraphrasing the words of one American general, was to kill and kill until the enemy quits.

We must not minimize the evils of Nazism. Hitchcock powerfully reminds us of those. However, the basic issue this War raises–the basic issue humanity must resolve if we are to have a future–is how do we successfully resist evil without becoming evil ourselves. Hitchcock’s important book helps us see that “the Good War” only intensified this problem.

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Sometimes Repentance Isn’t Enough

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Here is the fifteenth in a series of Bible studies that presents the Bible as being on the side of pacifism.  This essay, “Sometimes Repentance Isn’t Enough”, takes up the story of Judah’s “boy king,” Josiah.  Josiah follows a long line of corrupt kings characterized by injustice and idolatry. During his kingship, the scroll of the Law is discovered in the dusty corners of the Temple. When it is read to Josiah, he realizes its importance, repents, and seeks to reform Judah in line with the demands of Torah.

Josiah meets with some success, but ends up killed on the battlefield with the task uncompleted. His successor moves the nation back on the track of corruption and within a few years Judah’s temple and king’s palace lie in ruins.

The failure of Josiah’s reform shows just how far Israel had moved from the expectations of Torah, and marks the end of the nation-state as the possible channel for God’s work of blessing all the families of the earth. From now on, it is God’s people in faith communities separate from state domination that fuel the outworking of the promise.

Josiah’s main accomplishment, in the end, was to recognize the Law scroll for what it was and to bring back into the community this essential resource. When the nation-state falls, Torah provides the orienting point that enables the people of the promise to sustain their identity.

Johanna W. H. Van Wijk-Bos. Making Wise the Simple: The Torah and Christian Faith and Practice

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Johanna W. H. Van Wijk-Bos. Making Wise The Simple: The Torah In Christian Faith And Practice. Eerdmans, 2005.

Van Wijk-Bos, professor of Old Testament at Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, has written a helpful and important, if somewhat frustrating, book on a Christian appropriation of Old Testament law.

I greatly appreciate Van Wijk-Bos’s sympathetic reading of Torah and her deep concern for faithful Christian living. She helps us better understand how from the start Torah was rooted in God’s healing mercy–not legalism and fearfulness. She writes as a Christian, but with high regard for the Jewish tradition. While the scholarship is deep and sound, the writing is accessible, clear, and generally engaging.

However, the book’s organization seems fragmented and the book doesn’t follow as coherent a flow of logic as might be desired. It’s impact is lessened by its scatteredness.

Overall, though, Making Wise the Simple makes a strong contribution on a vital theme.

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G. K. Beale. We Become What We Worship.

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G. K. Beale. We Become What We Worship: A Biblical Theology of Idolatry. InterVarsity Press, 2008.

I read this book because it is one of the few I know of that addresses what I see as a hugely important and interesting theme in the Bible–idolatry. While I like Beale’s basic argument, that we become like the things we give our highest loyalty to, I found the book quite a disappointment. I would not recommend it except for those with a strong research-kind of interest in biblical teaching on idolatry.

My main criticisms have to do with Beale’s very narrow sense of what idolatry is about–he minimizes the social dynamics of idolatry linked with nationalism, ethno-centrism, religious exclusivism, and various other ways idolatry and violence and injustice connect. He approaches the Bible with great reverence, but seems oblivious to many of the core elements of the Bible’s critical stance towards imperialistic social institutions and the role these institutions play in turning people and their religiosity against the true God.

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Is Pacifism Ever an Idol?

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Critics of pacifism, especially (ironically) some from within the broader peace church community, often warn that too much of an emphasis on pacifism can become idolatrous. This sermon, “Is Pacifism Ever an Idol?”  presents a biblically-based argument that, when properly understood, pacifism is one commitment that can never be idolatrous.