Wisdom Christology at Credo Magazine

Luke Stamps has written a helpful and fair review of Wisdom Christology at Credo Magazine. His concern that I may underplay the legitimate function of Lady Wisdom as a Christological type is a valid concern. I commented on the legitimate use of such an approach in an earlier interview with Andy Naselli at the Gospel Coalation. The relevant part follows here:

The Gospel Coalition has been highlighting resources on preaching Christ in the Old Testament. How does your book help people in this regard?

These confessional texts and New Testament Christology in general have multiple Old Testament roots. So when students of the New Testament locate such a strand (particularly one related to creation, redemption, and revelation) the proper move would be to

run the theme through the OT,

then to the life and ministry of Jesus, and

finally to a confession about Christ in one of these apostolic texts.

Consider “wisdom” in Proverbs 8. Like the function of other Old Testament figures and institutions (e.g., prophets, angels, Torah, temple), Wisdom culminates in Christ. If I were preaching from Proverbs 8, I would look earlier to God’s creation by his word in Genesis 1. Then I would move forward to Christ’s public ministry, with his verbal power over creation exhibited in his nature miracles. I would then land in John’s prologue, which emphasizes the Word and the Son’s creative power. Or one could end in Hebrews 1:1-4, where the Son’s creative power symmetrically aligns with his redemptive power (i.e., the one who “made” all things is the same one who “made” cleansing for sin).

The practical takeaway is that we can be confident that the gospel is the wisdom and power of God (Rom 1:16). God powerfully removes our sins. This helps God’s people see that the Old and New Testaments cohere, that Christology is rich, and that the gospel is climatically important.

No “Brutum Factum Historicum” or Principles for the Study of History

1. The past no long exists, only the present.

Corollaries:

  • There is no way to actually return to the past (no time machine).
  • The present is, in part, a large “archive” of the past.

2. Historical study reconstructs the past from fragments found in the extant archive.

Corollaries:

  • Historical reconstructions are selective.
  • Historical studies are necessarily interpretations (human acts and artifacts).
  • There is no brutum factum historicum (“pure historical fact”).
  • The would-be “facts” of history come to us within inescapable interpretive frameworks.

3. All recorded human histories (selective reconstructions of the past) are fallible, provisional, and in need of continuous revision.

Corollaries:

  • The historical data is always incomplete.
  • Historical interpretations are never final and perfect.

4. Historical reconstructions are always from a particular perspective or orientation.

Corollaries:

  • Every historical interpretation has its own context and presuppositions, whether explicitly acknowledged or not.
  • While historians can be critically self aware, they cannot fully escape their own historical situatedness.  (cultural embeddedness in time, place, and language)

5. Historical interpretations can be more or less valid.

Corollaries:

  • There are criteria for evaluating historical validity.
  • Historical work should be evaluated.  It is appropriate to ask, “Is this interpretation warranted? And if so, why?”

6.  “History” is an exercise in power (over others).

Corollaries:

  • Historical work has ethical entailments. This includes historical research, the reconstruction/interpretation of the past, and the transmission (dissemination/reception/archiving) of history.
  • “History” is an activity with moral implications.

Greene (Christology in Culture Perspective: Marking Out the Horizons, section on history, chapter 5) writes, “Even within contemporary theology there are those who are suspicious of the claim that history mirrors reality. Rather, it is claimed that history merely portrays ideological self-interest and the inevitable bias of one cultural aspiration over and against another” (p. 161).

The six principles found on page 164 are helpful: The first three deal with the historian (presuppositions, limitations, prejudices, etc.). It is imperative to ask who the historian is, what is his cultural setting, what is his time in history. The last three deal with how the historical record influences the view of history. This involves the combining of records, interpretation of records, framework of the presentation, and the response of readers.

Which Jesus and Which Wisdom?

Many recognize that  “wisdom” (the Greek word is sophia) can be a rich resource for contemporary life. Recently, it has become a popular motif for:

However, there are hidden dangers, and a tendency to drift away from what the New Testament documents actually teach about wisdom.  The movement known as gnosticism showed the greatest interest in “Sophia” or Lady Wisdom in the post-New Testament period.  Recently some streams of theology have been enamored with the gnostic “Gospel of Thomas.”

Because it is such a needed virtue, and because a metaphor like “Lady Wisdom” is so powerful, it is critical that biblical wisdom be interpreted faithfully. One of the best selling books on the theme of Jesus and wisdom, reinterprets Jesus as a “wisdom teacher” in a broad and sweeping tradition of ancient wisdom (sophia perrenis).   The Wisdom Jesus: Transforming Heart and Mind–A New Perspective on Christ and His Message by Cynthia Bourgeault provides a novel focus on Jesus as Wisdom.   Wisdom JesusThis book and the ideas behind it have become increasingly popular.   This very different approach to Jesus and wisdom highlights the importance of a careful reading of the New Testament, and the relationship between Sophia (wisdom) and the gospel (1 Cor 1:24, 1 Cor 1:30). For those who have read Bourgeault’s book, or who want a New Testament framework for thinking about “Sophia,” see Wisdom Christology, How Jesus Becomes God’s Wisdom for Us (Explorations in Biblical Theology)
Comparing the two books should stimulate an important conversation about the nature of the wisdom Jesus brings to us.

Wisdom in the New Testament by Thiselton

Anthony ThiseltonAnthony Thiselton has written some helpful comments on Wisdom that are relevant to my recent book, Wisdom Christology.   Here is the bibliographic information, followed by an abstract of his article.

“Wisdom in James denotes not intellectual cleverness but a practical gift from God for everyday life, especially in the face of trials. Parallels exist in Judaism and Stoicism. In the Gospels wisdom often finds expression in short, pithy aphorisms, particularly in ‘Q’ and in pronouncements following parables. Jesus is more, but not less, than a wisdom-teacher. Examples are considered. In Corinth wisdom had become a status-seeking commodity. Hence Paul speaks of the wisdom of God and of the cross. In the Pauline epistles wisdom has Christological significance.”

The Missional Church in Perspective


This book is a must read for those who want the status quaestionis on  “the missional church.”  A flurry of publications in the last few years on the theology of the Church, on the state of the American Evangelical church (including its increasing diversity), as well as on the global church, make this an exciting period for the study and practice of what it means to be the Triune God’s missional people for the sake of our world.

I am reminded of  Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s remark that the only choice for the Church is between concrete statement and silence, and that the Church is lying if it only utters principles.  His overstatement can be forgiven (considering the desperate need to resist Nazism in his day).  This is the point:   “missional” MUST NOT be an mere “master signifier” (see Fitch, The End of Evangelicalism?), rather it must result in the concrete materialization of the Church in our day.  That  is the challenge.  May Christ build his church among us in the power of the Spirit and for the glory of the Father.

Expanding the Church’s Vision of “Witness”

John G. Flett on The Witness of God

This quote is worth pondering.  It sets the present mission of the Church in a richer eternal and Trinitarian context:

“Witness is the nature of the Son’s relationship with the Father (John 14:10), the Father’s relationship to the Son (John 5:32), the Spirit’s relationship to the Son (John 15:26), the Son’s relationship to the disciples (Acts 26:16-18), and the disciples’ relationship to the Son (Rev. 7:9-10).  Witness is not something beyond which the community will move in the eschaton.  It is the very nature of the eschaton, for it is the very nature of the history that is the human fellowship with the divine (pp. 224-225).

While much of Fleet’s book is a critique of the use of the “missio Dei” motif  (it has functioned almost like a “Master Signifier” to link it with the fascinating and troubling book, The End of Evangelicalism? by David E. Fitch).  However, in chapter six  (“The Trinity Is a Missionary God”) Fleet gets to his positive construction.  The following paragraph summarizes his thesis well:

“The question of the grounding and consequent form of mission is, first, a question of who God is in himself.  God is a missionary God because his deliberate acting in apostolic movement toward humanity is not a second step alongside – and thus in distinction to – his perfect divine being.  In his economy, in his movement for the human, God lives his own eternal life….Second, it is a question of how it is actual that this God lives his own proper life in the economy of salvation.  Jesus Christ, the mediator between God and humanity, has objectively completed the reconciliation of the world, and he calls humanity to active participation in the fellowship of God’s self-humiliation and his exaltation of the human.  Third it is a question of the accomplishment of reconciliation. The Spirit acts to secure the human’s subjective involvement in God’s act, uniting the human with the history that takes place first in God’s own life and then in the history of Jesus Christ with us.  Participation in this history takes the particular form of a servant.  That is, the community accompanies Jesus Christ in his mission as she herself is an apostolic community – shaped to be so by the witness of the Spirit” (197).

For a helpful reviews of the book see the following:

Deanna Ferree Womack’s review at Princeton Theological Seminary

W. Travis McMaken  at Der Evangelische Theologe

Sarah Wilson at The Lutheran Forum

And for some helpful background to the discussion, see the post by Andrew Perriman:

“Missio Dei” in historical perspectives, part 1

Allah

Miroslav Volf has written an important book  for the church on the question of the God of Islam and the God of Christianity, entitled  Allah: A Christian Response.  Whether one agrees with Volf on all the details of his argument or not, this volume will help advance an important and necessary conversation.  May this  help us who confess to follow Jesus to be “peacemakers” and faithful to the gospel.  May Muslims who  listen to our conversation find a people who love in word and deed.