Recently, I Picked up from the library Peter Rollins book How (not) to Speak of God. The introduction pretty much sums up why I like the guy and why I find in the end am dissatisfied with his thought.
He begins quoting Ludwig Wittgenstien from the final sentence of the Tractatus Logico Philosophicus "What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence." This for Rollins is contrasted with an other assertion he found in the evangelical charismatic movement "God is the one subject of whom we must never stop speaking." Rollins sees these two attitudes as two extremes that he found himself swinging between these two extremes that he says manifested in himself either as mystical humanism or religious fundamentalism. However, he came to the conclusion which the book is about that " these positions need not be enemies. The more I reflected upon the dept of these perspectives, the more I began to suspect that far from being utterly foreign to each other, there was away for them to inform and enrich each other."
In this discussion Rollins avoids the terms apophatic (away from the voice, ie not speaking of God) and the kataphatic (with voice/towards voice, speaking of God) and I think that is fair since I knew of these two ways before I was introduced to these Greek terms. But here is where I find Rollins both congenial and irritating at the same time: My faith has never been absent of these two positions (though they have been more approaches to God) and yet I have never really swung between these two positions. For me when he sums union of these two approaches as "That which we cannot speak of is the one thing about whom and to whom we must never stop speaking." this is my faith and it seems tom e that the best of the Evangelical Covenant Church, or its version of Lutheran Pietism, raised me within this place of holding both approaches to (not)speaking of God. The revelation for me wasn't that these two approaches are supposed to be together; rather the revelation for me was that pretty much this has been the orthodox way, and opinion. Granted people within orthodoxy may want to emphasize or may have a tendency towards one or the other, but the overall trajectory is towards the union of the approaches.
Rollins admits that this discover is something like Chesterton’s outline of the story yachtsman who gets lost and attempts to claim Britain for Britain. I appreciate this being said in the introduction since it seems that many in the Emergent movement don’t always take the time to admit that much of what they are talking about is a discovery for themselves and their communities but not the church as a whole through time. I feel towards the emergent church like the people who would watch the Chesterton yachtsman claiming Britain for Britain. Even so Rollins posture is towards explaining this discovery somehow revitalizes rather than a space that one has to inhabit abandoning previous habitations. Even I who was raised upon a Christian faith that more or less worked with some union of these approaches, has had to inhabit another space where that union is built in without skepticism of either silence or words in the face of God. Still it was skeptical of too much silence in the face of the divine. In the end I have had to embrace a concept of tradition as part of revelation as I have embraced ever more the union of these two approaches, and live in orthodoxy, for it is after all the saints fo the church who have lived this theology that Rollins has discovered that the Evangelical covenant Church taught me poorly.
But I hear Rollins: for those who thought they had to choose, for those who were never taught otherwise, this is a discovery. And perhaps a quite radical one, that seems heretical. Even so it is perhaps key to remember that the defenders of Nicene orthodoxy against the Arian heresy were also the ones who spoke of the union of the kataphatic and apophatic approaches to speech of God. So this is not only a very old understanding of theology but one that was not afraid to speak of those who in their speaking spoke not of the true God at all. This also needs to be recovered if this approach is to have Rollins hope for revitalization of Christianity in the West.
As one from The Episcopal Church, whose language includes the via media as a core principle I also find Peter Rollins theology to be quite orthodox...in the traditional sense. In my sphere of influence, orthodoxy is a term used by conservative "traditionalists" to decry viewpoints that are not identical to the one they currently profess. So the common understanding of orthodox is quite not so. And further, the nature of the post-Nicea church was to live with dynamic tension--as well as kicking out faithful Christians. In other words, we are to hold the dynamic tension of apophatic and kataphatic simultaneously and to live with both understandings in a theoretical realm while the practical, pan-church sense has been to pick sides, cast some out as heretics, and shore up the foundation of belief around certain concepts (without stepping in it ourselves). Perhaps what I'm trying to say is that historic orthodoxy has created a safe and sanitary arena with which to deal with dynamic tension while relegating the dirty and less desirable bits to a different place, in many ways, breaking its own fundamental principles. I'm not saying we were wrong (well, maybe a little bit), but that our own theological foundations aren't pure.
ReplyDeleteI also am fairly certain that Rollins would classify himself as pretty orthodox--and that his views are representative of historic Christian faith. But he (and this is one of the reasons I like him) is from the school that is more interested in ancient practices than he is in preserving 20th Century customs and views of the church. As I said before, our common understanding of orthodox thought as it is currently articulated is really anything but, and it is this 2000s orthodoxy that he was wrestling with in the book.
[I found your blog through google alerts.]
Drew,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment. had meant to respond closer to the time of your posting it.
First your point about Rollins: I agree, though I'd be interested in what he thinks of all this evaluation, that he is pretty orthodox, and that he is interested in ancient practices than preserving 20th century customs. It is these things that I find a great deal in common.
I also see your point about how in certain circles "orthodoxy".
I am not sure what to make of your very brief summary of post-Nicea church, in part because I think that while perhaps some who were labled as heretics such as what we now call the Oriental Orthodox Churches but at the same time from my study I think there were definite heretics, whose positions deserved to be sidelined (Arius certainly, Nestorius probably in that the position eventually taken by the councils was better in my opinion that his problematic theology, but also perhaps was pushed to keep to his ideas) But all that to say that to evaluate yoru statement or even to completely understand what you are meaning would require a more in depth discussion of that history.
But in generally though I'd characterize the development of historic orthodoxy after Nicea as fine tuning and honing but not in intention or even in effect of creating a safe and sanitary place. Just don't see that characterization as reflecting what I have read of the history.
Glad you found my blog.