Notice that it does not say, “Blessed are those who have had a conversion experience, for theirs is the kingdom.” In fact, Jesus later says that many who claim to have done great things for him are in fact strangers (Matt 7:23). What will you do with this?

My suggestion is to first of all confirm that I correctly understand the emphatic use of αυτος. (I am.) Secondly, ask yourself if your theology can handle this. If you have been following my blog for very long, you have probably gleaned that I am moderately reformed. But what I most try to be is biblical, and the Bible says that God shows mercy only to those who have shown it themselves. That the only people who will be filled are those who hunger and thirst for [His] righteousness. That the only ones who will inherit the kingdom are those who are poor in spirit and have been persecuted for that fact.

Talk of this kind is often met with angry blog comments, but the fact of the matter is that this is what the Greek text says. “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs, and theirs alone, is the kingdom of God.”

If a person’s theology can’t handle that, then their theology is simply wrong. How does the emphatic αυτος fit your theology?

Why expect angry comments? I think the same exegetical point could be made in a way to avoid them, but Mounce is not clothing his insight in the right context, in the story that his moderately to myopically Reformed readers find self-affirming. I’m truly curious why this is so, since I don’t think Mounce’s rather broad theological point comes, straightforwardly, from this particular text. Indeed, he may be putting too much weight on this pericope, to say nothing of the pronoun.

James Dunn addresses the language game of saved-ness thus:

It would be a mistake to take any one of Paul’s metaphors and to exalt it into some primary or normative status so that all the others must be fitted into its mould. Something like this has indeed happened with the metaphor of justification in classic Protestant theology. In popular evangelism it has happened with the metaphors of salvation and new birth. In such cases there is an obvious danger. The danger is that the event of new beginning in faith comes to be conceptualized as of necessity following a particular pattern, the same for everyone. Equally dangerous is the assumption often made that the same language or imagery must always be used, that experience of individuals must conform to the language which describes it. Instead of diversity of experience and imagery there can be pressure to reduplicate both pattern and jargon, in effect to mass reproduce believers according to a standard formula. No so with Paul. For him the crucial transition was a many-sided event, and not necessarily the same for any two people. And it required a whole vocabulary of words and metaphors to bring out the richness of its character and the diversity of individual cases.—James D. G. Dunn, The Theology of Paul the Apostle, 332

The book of Job is an instructive case in point. Job’s miseries begin not with lack of children, like Abraham’s, but with the loss of his children, which provokes suicidal thoughts and an existential and theological crisis that has continued to reverberate through the millennia (Job 1:13-19; Job 3). Here, bereavement of progeny is the functional equivalent of death, and here, too, the patriarch’s restoration inevitably entails his recovery of his seven sons and his three daughters (Job 42:13; cf. 1:2). [...] The tragedy of the mortality of individuals cannot but attract the attention of the modern reader. The interest of the ancient narrator lies, rather, in the restoration of Job through the return of his family.²

Levenson then pivots on the point that “childlessness is the equivalent of death.” Though I acknowledge that this also goes well with the standard understanding, it seems to me an excellent explanation for the reaction of Jephthah, his daughter, and the “daughters of Israel.” It seems likely that they annually recounted not the death of a single maiden, which was of no great consequence, but the giving up of the name of the house of Jephthah in obedience to a vow.

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[1] Jephthah’s Holocaust
[2] Jon Levenson, Resurrection and the Restoration of Israel: The Ultimate Victory of the God of Life (Yale University, 2006), 115.

The metaphorical language of the Bible communicates naturally to all who inhabit or can imaginatively enter its universe of discourse. We still have fathers and sons and, less universally, kings and shepherds as part of our conceptual world; and with only a little effort of the imagination we can appreciate the ancient habit of thinking of one who is spiritually close to God, a faithful servant of God, as a son of God. Such metaphors communicate successfully because they were formed within the ordinary discourse of the time. But the Chalcedonian formula is a philosophical artefact having whatever meaning it is defined to have. Such formulae are impressive precisely because their sole meaning is technical and known only to the learned. Critical philosophical scrutiny of such conceptual constructions must, however, always be in order. And in this case the possibility that has to be considered is that the formula, which at first seems so firm and definitive, is incapable of being explicated in any religiously acceptable way.

Hick is certainly not beyond updating the metaphors of the Bible or using theological language. He’s simply pointing out that the language used in credal formulation, particularly that explicating the mystery of the Incarnation (prosopon, persona, hypostasis, ousia, etc.) was forced, technical language. It makes sense because it is so defined, not because it has a ground in accessible truth, as does the Bible’s own ‘creeds.’ The theologian is reminded that when one’s theology becomes laden with arcane language or too easily takes recourse in tradition, it’s time to revise the system.

What, then, does the ascension do in Luke’s work? I find three functions. First, it signals the end of Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances. Theophany on the road to Damascus notwithstanding, the disciples no longer expected to see their Rabbi: they knew he was now at the right hand of God. His rising into the heavens provided the closure a simple vanishing would not have. Second, it is the consummation of Jesus’ exaltation. He was victorious over death, had presented himself as proof, and though already glorified and ‘transfigured,’ the ultimate glory would be reached in the heavens. Just so ends the Gospel of Luke.

I find the third function, the flip side of the first, the most interesting of all: the beginning of the inspired, apostolic, evangelizing congregation. The ascension ends the Gospel and begins the Acts of the Apostles. Jesus had told them that he would leave, but he would send pneuma hagion, and it would give them everything they would need. Indeed, he would have to leave for it to come, and it was to be the critical element in their witnessing.

Jesus’ personal earthly work was concluded. His ascension fixed the change in his disciples from students looking for their teacher to evangelists preaching and teaching the kingdom. The ascension inaugurated the execution of the great commission.

Pre-critical naivete. This is where folk theology swells out of a two-dimensional view of the biblical literature, unimpeded by an awareness of underlying problems.  Eschatology, typology, allegory, personal intuition/revelation, and emotion are at their highest.

Internal apologetic. Superficial problems are addressed, harmonized, and justified for oneself and the church. Long-solved issues from philosophy to archaeology are solved anew, giving the impression of critical engagement. Historical theology becomes important. There is a greater understanding of the need to read the text on its own terms and on a deeper level, but this is attempted with out-dated tools and clumsy methodology.

Engaged apologetic. Exegetical methodology is solid, though unsophisticated; if at the ‘internal apologetic’ level one commits the etymological fallacy, this is the level where one spots it.  Work on doctrine turns self-critical to hermeneutics, and outward to issues of canon, contemporaneous literature and culture, etc. Epistemic humility begins to develop.

Engaged intellectualism. Apologetics loses its primacy to intellectual curiosity and satisfaction. Ratio of questions to answers reverses. Gaps and contradictions are held in unresolved tension. Close study continues, but there is an increasing openness to broader philosophical questions, personal experience, community, and religious practice. Complex, nuanced theology develops.

Post-critical naivete. [?] “Beyond the desert of criticism, we wish to be called again.” (Paul Ricoeur, The Symbolism of Evil, 349)

My relatively minor problems close to the conservative end are amplified by those whose thinking has taken them to liberal Christianity. For many of them I wonder how it remains a “Christian” faith at all; perhaps Christian only in the sense that that is the tradition they are most comfortable with, or it’s simply a cultural identifier. I have tried to understand how some toss everything but Jesus, and even then in a qualified sense, or perhaps entirely existentially. But I can’t see why they don’t want to let go of that last thread. Why claim Christianity at all, with all that ugliness and culpability? I can’t help but think that it’s the bottomless abyss of disbelief, in which case it becomes a question of philosophy and psychology above all else.

Two of the Senate’s staunchest conservatives, Sens. James Inhofe of Oklahoma and Jim Bunning of Kentucky, who have said they intend to vote no on President Barack Obama’s first high court choice. Pennsylvania Sen. (Naftali BenDavid and Jess Bravin, Wall Street Journal, July 18, 2009)

Did the writers mean to say that the votes of the named senators had anything to do with the fact that the nominee is the President’s first? Language is so delicate, so ambiguous. But no, almost certainly not. This is a convention, a peculiarity of journalese, wherein, perhaps for brevity at times, another fact is reported in the same breadth. The writers just threw in the fact that Sotomayor is President Obama’s first nominee; they did not mean to say that somehow this was a factor in the Senators’ no-votes. This is why rhetorical (and related) studies of New Testament literature are so helpful. As much as they often fall flat in re-interpreting the epistles, say, they do alert us to over-reading, and help give us a feel for some of the conventions of antiquity.

A very readable existentialist, panenthieistic theology. MacQuarrie discusses as lucidly as anyone the concepts of authentic existence, being, transcendence, and the rest of the language of existentialism and dialectical theology. The author’s thinking draws evenly from tradition and continental philosophy, particularly Heidegger. In the first part of the book, really a prolegomena to a systematic theology, he charts a middle way between Bultmann and Barth, interacting with Tillich, Buber, Pannenberg, Niebuhr, and other theologians. The last two parts are a systematic discussion of classic doctrines read symbolically and existentially.

Though revised in 1977, Principles of Christian Theology is still dated and limited to a particular phase of theological discourse. MacQuarrie seems haunted by the specter of positivism, though that tension has long receded to background noise. He is given to considering Freud and Marx over the insights of cognitive science, psychology, and philosophy of mind. He engages in philosophical theology while devaluing analytical philosophy and natural theology, a conceding of ground quite typical of his contemporaries.

…It reveals a certain uneasiness, and more seriously, a sense of insecurity which is the real basis for the uneasiness. Surely our faith and our appeal are deserving of more confidence. We cannot afford to allow the fact that this enterprise is strange to some of us and therefore makes us uneasy, deny its legitimacy to others, to whom it is natural, and, indeed, necessary. If we do so, we shall only appear to be placing a premium on ignorance, and this is a disservice to the Christian faith.

Just as it is the intellectual’s responsibility to correct his view of the intellectual life, so certainly it is the duty of his opponent to learn to understand, if he cannot appreciate, that life properly….The response frequently offered, that when the Gospel is represented on a level a twelve-year old can understand it will answer all needs of all men, and can be understood by all men is both unrealistic and untrue. Such a response, besides leaving the questioner unsatisfied, also leaves the suspicion that anti-intellectualism is as much a kind of snobbery as intellectualism.

…If we are to take the Great Commission seriously, we must grant that “every creature” has a significance other than contributing to a geographical distribution of preachers. Surely “every creature” includes the intellectual. Or are we Calvinistic enough in this respect to damn him before we speak to him? If we do deign to speak to him about Christ, do we become all things to him, and speak to him in terms that are real to him, or do we insist on speaking to him as to a twelve-year old? Whose example shall we be following if we do this? Certainly not that of Paul. Paul was familiar with the intellectual currents of his own day. He knew that they revealed the needs of man, and he knew how to approach men in those terms.

…Let us put away recrimination and suspicion. Let us put into practice Paul’s conviction that the body consists of many members who have many different functions. Let us be concerned to develop the part God has given us, and have a care for one another. Let us all show our knowledge of the more excellent way as together we strive to build up the body of our Lord who died for us all.