A Situation Comedy Remarkably Similar to “The Big Bang Theory”

[A cool guitar riff as SWITCHFOOT begins to play the opening theme song. Images of the cosmos and human history flash across the screen in quick succession.]

JON FOREMAN FROM SWITCHFOOT [singing]:

OUR WHOLE UNIVERSE WAS IN A THICK, DARK HAZE.

THEN NEARLY… SIX THOUSAND YEARS AGO, IN SEVEN LITERAL DAYS,

GOD MADE IT ALL—BEHOLD!

HE MADE THE DINO BONES LOOK OLD,

HE PUT THE FOSSILS THERE TO THROW US OFF THE TRAIL

(AND CARBON DATING, TOO!)

MATH, SCIENCE, HISTORY,

THEY ALL CONCEAL THE MYSTERY

THAT ALL STARTED WITH THE YOUNG EARTH.

ALL SWITCHFOOT GUYS [shouting]:

EARTH!

[Scene: a suite in Owens 800. WELDON and KENNETH, roommates, are studying in the common room.]

KENNETH: Hey, what’s this form, wattishtahu?

WELDON: What do you think it is?

KENNETH: Well, Brown-Driver-Briggs says it’s the hithpael form of the verb shahah, to prostrate oneself. So, “Ruth prostrated herself to the ground.”

WELDON: Brown-Driver-Briggs? Are they still sacrificing trees to perpetuate that quaint museum piece?

KENNETH: Actually, it’s the latest digital version…

WELDON: Oh, good, that means you’re on the cutting edge of 19^th-century Hebrew philology. It’s all recycled from Gesenius, who failed to understand that Biblical Hebrew was not, actually, a form of Latin, Greek, or Arabic. Why don’t you have the Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament?

KENNETH: It’s sort of expensive. I thought I might ask for it for my birthday.

WELDON: I don’t think you can afford to wait until your birthday, my friend. That’s six months away, and in the meantime your exegesis is going to remain mired in the morass of yesterday’s benighted word studies. Here, use mine.

KENNETH: Thanks. [He looks up the word on Weldon’s computer.] Okay, so, it’s actually the hishtaphel of hawah? How do they figure that? Where’s the third root letter? Wouldn’t it be… let me see… wattishtahaweh, not wattishtahu?

WELDON: Wayyiqtol, Kenneth, wayyiqtol! It’s apocopated! The third root letter drops off! Honestly, I don’t know how you passed Hebrew II.

KENNETH: Well, maybe I just don’t agree with the Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament.

WELDON: On precisely what evidence? Show me one apocopated hithpael form of a weak verb that has final waw.

KENNETH: Maybe I will.

WELDON: I think not, because they don’t exist. It’s hishtaphel.

KENNETH: Hithpael!

WELDON: Hishtaphel!

KENNETH: Hithpael!

WELDON: Hishtaphel!

KENNETH: Hithpael!

[A knock at the door interrupts their argument. KENNETH opens the door. It is PAM.]

PAM: Hi, is Arnold home?

WELDON: [not looking up from his computer] Arnold is off studying the effects of Hellenism on 1^st-century Judaism, or something else that’s Post-Interesting.

KENNETH [extremely self-conscious]: Uh… Arnold’s not here right now. I’m his roommate, Kenneth.

PAM: Hi Kenneth, I’m Pam. I was supposed to meet Arnold at 4:00, and that’s in five minutes, so do you mind if I wait?

KENNETH [jaw dropping open]: Uh… well, uh… sure!  Come right on in! Can I get you some, uh, um… bananas from the dining hall?

PAM [entering, smiling]: Oh, no thanks. I’m not hungry. [She sees a whiteboard covered with foreign characters.] Wow, is that Hebrew?

WELDON [still not looking up]: Aramaic, actually. It’s understandable that a layperson would assume Hebrew, but actually the vocalic and grammatical structures are totally different, despite the obvious use of the same alphabet and some superficial similarities in vocabulary.

PAM [impressed]: So, you wrote all this? You can actually read Aramaic?

WELDON [looks up, gratified]: Why, yes. I’m an M.A. in Old Testament.

PAM: That’s awesome!

KENNETH: You… you like boards? I have a board, too. [He indicates a second whiteboard, covered with squiggles and dots. PAM comes over to look.] I’m M.A., too. Archaeology and Ancient Near Eastern Languages.

PAM: Oh my gosh! That looks really different.

WELDON: Arabic. Extremely limited application for biblical exegesis. Kenneth here is still fascinated with the comparative method, which has long been displaced by more contemporary linguistic approaches. He’s like a child playing with alphabet blocks when everyone else is reading Shakespeare.

KENNETH: Now, now, Weldon. Historical comparative Semitics is a worthy field of study in its own right.

WELDON: I wouldn’t claim otherwise, it’s just that it has hardly any bearing on interpreting the Old Testament.

KENNETH: Come on! How can you support a sweeping claim like that?

WELDON: I don’t have to. It’s true. Just read any of the Hebrew reference grammars of the last fifty years. Just because a Hebrew word looks like some Arabic or Akkadian word doesn’t imply they have to mean the same thing. Really, Kenneth, if you’re not going to familiarize yourself with the literature, these little conversations are pretty pointless.

KENNETH: Well, Arabic has independent applicability as an important world language, and one that is crucial for communicating the Gospel to unreached people groups.

WELDON: Granted, but you’re changing the subject.

KENNETH: Granted, but it’s impossible to have a discussion with someone who constantly presupposes the validity of his own claims!

[Their voices have risen to an uncomfortable level. KENNETH stops and remembers their guest. He turns to PAM after an awkward beat.]

KENNETH: So… Pam… what are you studying here?

PAM: I’m getting an M.A. in counseling.

KENNETH: Wow. Counseling. So I guess you, uh… tell people what to do, and stuff.

PAM [smiling]: That’s one way to describe it. I actually just started my internship, and right now I’m learning how to lead therapeutic group sessions.

KENNETH: That’s great!

WELDON: A lot of pop-psychology hokum.

KENNETH: Weldon! Do you know how rude that is?

WELDON: Well, it’s true. There’s no evidence that emotionally distressed people recover any faster in groups than individually. And where’s the logic in bringing together eight to ten mentally imbalanced people to reinforce each other’s neuroses?

PAM [still smiling, but rising to the challenge]: Actually, Weldon, I could provide you with a lot of evidence that group sessions are very effective. If you’re not going to read the literature, maybe these little discussions are pointless.

WELDON [touché!]: Hmm.

PAM: But if you want to test out the theory, why don’t we do a group right now? I’m sensing a lot of tension in this room, and I heard you guys shouting at each other when I was in the hallway. Don’t you think it would help to get your feelings out?

WELDON: Absolutely not. I once had a feeling and I had the presence of mind to suppress it.

KENNETH: I don’t know, Pam. I really didn’t grow up expressing my feelings. In my family, it was always better to just pretend everything was okay.

PAM: You’re not alone, Kenneth! But using a few simple techniques, I can help both of you express your feelings and work through this little spat you’ve been having.

WELDON: Little spat??!! Waterloo was a little spat. The Battle of Karkemish was a little spat. This is Armageddon!

PAM: Okay, okay, why don’t you tell me more about that? Why are you so upset?

WELDON: Because Kenneth here refuses to see reason in the light of modern scholarship, and tenaciously clings to comforting but disproven reductionist methodologies.

PAM: And how do you feel about that?

WELDON [after a long beat]: I’m not sure I understand the question.

PAM: I’ll come back to you. Kenneth, why are you upset with Weldon?

KENNETH: Because he is completely intractable, and when he disagrees with me, he attacks me personally, not just my position!

PAM: And do you have any feelings about that?

KENNETH: Uh, I… uh… I…

PAM: Let me help you out. Start with “I feel,” then put in a feeling word like “sad, frustrated, hurt, angry,” or whatever you’re feeling. It’s okay if you have a little trouble at first. Learning to express your feelings takes time!

KENNETH [uneasy]: Okay. Here goes. I feel… I… I feel…

WELDON: Oh, this is just ridiculous.

PAM: Weldon, please don’t interrupt Kenneth. Everyone in the group needs to feel that this is a safe place to be open and honest, and that their feelings are valued and appreciated  by others.

WELDON: Wow. That’s a new one on me.

KENNETH: I feel… bulldozed! By this self-important, hard-headed…

PAM: Now, now, Kenneth. We need to refrain from attacking one another during the group. Remember, you were upset with Weldon for doing the same thing to you. You both need to break out of this destructive cycle that has entrapped you. Now, it sounds to me that, by the word “bulldozed,” you mean that you aren’t feeling heard by Weldon. Is that true?

KENNETH: Yeah, that’s true. Weldon, I love you as a brother in Christ, but you just don’t listen to me! And you never have! I feel pretty hurt and frustrated by that.

PAM: There now! That wasn’t so hard. Weldon, do you have anything to say in response to Kenneth?

WELDON: Yes, I do. Kenneth, I am truly sorry for not listening to you.

KENNETH: I accept your apology.

PAM: This is wonderful, you guys! You see, when we turn to one another for help, and express what we are honestly thinking and feeling, then the Holy Spirit just moves in and heals hearts and restores relationships!

WELDON: I’m sorry for not listening to you, but you’d make it a lot easier if you said something that wasn’t a derivative regurgitation of ideas that were already stale a hundred years ago.

KENNETH and PAM: Weldon!

[ARNOLD walks in.]

ARNOLD: Hey, Pam! Hey, guys! Did I interrupt something?

KENNETH: Not at all. Thank God you’re here.

ARNOLD: Are you ready for dinner and the Switchfoot concert?

PAM: I can’t wait! Let’s go! Kenneth and Weldon, it was great to meet you. Don’t forget the tools I taught you. You can work through this! And remember, there is no shame in reaching out for help when you’re feeling overwhelmed.

ARNOLD: Did I miss something?

WELDON: Mercifully, yes.

ARNOLD: Well, let’s go, Pam. We have reservations downtown at five. See you guys.

KENNETH, WELDON, PAM: Bye.

[ARNOLD and PAM leave. There is a long beat.]

KENNETH: Wow. How did he get a date?

WELDON: One hypothesis would be that he talks to women.

KENNETH: That explains why I always see him hanging around the counseling department, even though he’s an M.Div. I can’t believe she went out with Arnold…

WELDON: I know. What a woman would see in someone studying an Indo-European language is beyond me.

KENNETH: Well, I have a date tonight, too.

WELDON: You do?

KENNETH: Her name is Ruth.

WELDON: You would have to go back 3000 years to find someone to go out with you.

KENNETH: So, maybe I like older women!

[SWITCHFOOT plays the closing theme song over the end titles.]

–

Joshua Tyra is a third-year MA/Arch student. In his spare time he watches The Big Bang Theory and writes parodies.

“It really runs at cross-purposes with the vision for the Kantzer Lectures,” said Dr. Doug Sweeney, director of the Carl. F. H. Henry Center for Theological Understanding and one of the few people on Trinity’s campus who has previously claimed to understanding the Kantzer Lectures in any substantive way. When informed of Mitchell’s impudence, Sweeney responded with similar astonishment. “The original idea for the lecture series was that it would raise Trinity’s intellectual credibility among evangelical institutions,” he said. “We also felt it would be advantageous to have an annual event that would humble our divinity students, and deprive them of any notion that they were starting to understand theology: a sort of annual beat-down of any upstart egos. It’s vital that those entering the ministry do so with utmost humility, and with no presumption to any kind of ‘higher theology.’ So as you can see, this girl’s precocity is at right angles with our original intentions for the lectures.” Sweeney promised to bring in someone next year whom no one will be able to claim they understand. “We’ve approached Cornel West,” he said.

“It makes it much worse that she’s an M.Div student,” said Dr. Tite Tienou, Dean of the Divinity School. “Our M.Div curriculum never even comes close to preparing students for the kind of theological waters Dr. McCormack was treading in those lectures. I’m surprised any M.Div students were even there.” Tienou also expressed concern that Mitchell’s future ministry would be impacted by her presumptuousness. “What if she incorporates McCormack’s thought into her own ministry?” he asked. “The faculty here certainly don’t agree with McCormack’s ideas about the Trinity, but we never dreamed any students would interact with them on any significant level.”

Mitchell herself remains unabashed by the hoop-lah her claims have occasioned. “I’m just wondering whether the divine self-determination of freedom is a free decision or a necessary one,” she said Wednesday. “I mean, the very form of the question, the either/or-ness of it, if you will, betrays a metaphysical sub-corporeality lurking in the background which somehow pre-obfusticates the act of self-determination. The metaphysical subject it conditions is in fact, the onto-pretranscendental subject of applied pre-metaphysics. Habba habba loop-dee-loo.”

Trinity’s administration and faculty take solace, however, in the fact that Mitchell’s experience at McCormack’s lecture series seems to be an isolated incident. No other Trinity students have claimed to have understood McCormack in the slightest. “I’m not too concerned,” said Dr. Thomas McCall, professor of systematic theology. “I haven’t had a single meaningful conversation with any students about the lectures.” Most of the students who attended the lectures seem to have had some ulterior motive. “I went mostly to impress my girlfriend,” said John Clark, a graduating M.Div student and promising pastor. “But don’t worry. I was thinking about my fantasy baseball team the whole time.”

Dr. Carson: “I Was Just Kidding About All That Reformed Stuff”

TIU President Craig Williford Admits to Learning the Bernie, the Shuffle, Others from Youtube

TEDS Student Photocopies 45% of Book, Feels Sort of Bad but Not Really

Dr. Washington Screams “YOLO,” Breaks Pool Cue Over Knee

University Chaplain Scott Samuelson Almost Raises Voice During Chapel Prayer

Newest NT Faculty Member Attempts to “Good Game” Dr. Tienou; Ensuing Interaction Described as “Inconclusively Awkward”

Third-Year MDiv Openly Wonders Whether It’s “Really That Weird to Ask Out That Cute Sophomore”

TIU Sophomore Reportedly Stalked by TEDS Student

Complementarian MDiv Student Admits to Allowing his Wife to Make Several Final Decisions

Rory Tyer is a seventh-year MDiv currently slated to be the next president of Trinity International University.

Holy Saturday: the desolation that is the death of Christ before the resurrection, when the mountains have fallen into the heart of the sea, when we cry out to God and there is no answer, when tears have fed us day and night, and our bones have been shattered.

It is said that evangelicals jump right from the death of Christ (conceived primarily if not solely in salvific terms) to the resurrection of Christ (as proof of the deity of Christ and therefore the efficacy of His death on our behalf)? I find such a critique to be vague sketch, an exaggeration. Yet, do we not jump from Friday to Sunday too quickly? Do we take time to sit in the darkness that is Holy Saturday?

For we need Holy Saturday to understand our story.

Story

Have you seen The Hunger Games? It seems to have engendered an unusual amount of discussion. What has struck a chord? Indeed, why did I myself like the movie? There are many answers to these questions, but certainly this is one: we can inhabit the story, relating the challenges of the heroine to our own lives, wondering what we would do if. Stories are like this. Not only do we put ourselves into them, but we take from them.

In my opinion, stories are the hidden cultural power behind the worldviews we share. They are more powerful than an argument, more binding than legislation, and more subtle than dreams. Few stories are simply evil, as some may claim—Harry Potter makes a compelling story today for the same reason the Greek gods made compelling stories in the Middle Ages: we no longer believe in witchcraft or in the gods. No, Harry Potter is not evil for speaking of sorcery—such an analysis is way too simple for the depth, complexity, and power of stories. Indeed, their power can be far more glorious and far more insidious than what can be judged by basic topical elements. Stories build our lives.

Stories are composed of character, plot, and theme (among other things). The characters we experience in novels or movies illustrate real-world roles we can accept, be they occupational—police officer, president—or cultural—the rebel, the peacemaker, the pushover. Indeed, much of our self-perceived identity is related directly to the roles we play. We are characters in the story of life.

What of plot and theme? If we believe a prominent thread of American culture, we are characters thrown into the world to make of it whatever we might. There is no unifying theme, other than the weavings of luck and happenstance. And yet, Americans remain enamored of the stories that betray the more that we sense; we inexorably seek a theme to our lives, a purpose to the disparate incidents (plot points). Even when one’s worldview—naturalistic, deistic, or pluralistic—does not support a plot, people still hope.

As Christians, we can make an answer. God is weaving together the occasions, the incidents of our lives into a grander whole: there is a purpose in our life and meaning in the world. It is reflected in our stories when denied everywhere else. In the end, there can be no dissolution between purpose and story, for there is no story without the plot points having a raison d’être, a teleology. God has not “lost the plot” (thank you Newsboys). God is taking sinners, on the path of the destructive and demonic, and He is making us into masterpieces, uniquely designed to facet God’s own nature in the radiance of His light.

The Suffering Sinner and the Suffering Servant

Why do humans suffer? Which of course is a different question than ‘Why do I suffer?’ Theodicy provides many good, right, and true answers. But when we personalize the question, may I suggest: let us submit our experience to the twofold story of suffering in Scripture.

It begins in Genesis, where Adam and Eve are the first to suffer on account of their sin. First comes a hefty dose of shame, then relational guilt and, of course, blaming another, and it ends with unforeseen cosmic consequences. And it’s downhill from there. In seventeen verses we move from painful labor(s) to strife between two sons (for whom Adam and Eve had labored greatly) and ultimately fratricide. Whether or not we encounter such drastic changes in our lives on account of the sinful actions we take, we do live this story of suffering.

Yet there is another story well represented in Scripture: that of the suffering of the righteous one. I certainly won’t rehash the arguments of Job’s friends, but the eponymous book affirms that his sufferings were not due to any failure on his part. The inspired psalmist can say, “Why have you forgotten me?” (Ps 42:9), and “All this happened to us, though we had not forgotten you or been false to your covenant. Our hearts had not turned back; our feet had not strayed from your path. But you crushed us and made us a haunt for jackals and covered us over with deep darkness” (Ps 44:17-19). And when the psalmist pleads, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Ps 22:1), let us remember that Christ can take up this cry, as the Suffering Servant of Israel, because Israelites for generations before him had also experienced darkness for want of God’s light.

God has woven these two stories together in Jesus: he is the righteous Suffering Servant and also the one who will heal the suffering of the sinners. It is a unique thing that God has done. In our lives, the stories remain separate. Yet Christ’s life intersects ours in this: there will be a final Easter morning. But what of our lives right now, before that day? How do we experience Holy Saturday, waiting for Easter morning amidst the losses that we experience?

The disciples experienced this story when they huddled together. Hope had poured out all over the ground. The world was in darkness. Despite all that Christ had said and done, they could not see through the fog. We do not do justice to them if we quickly answer, “But on the third day…” We honor them when we remember Holy Saturday as they experienced it.

God does not promise that what is lost will be recovered or recompensed. (Though sometimes it is.) Nor that what is broken will be made new. (Though sometimes he heals.) Nor that severed relationships will be reconciled. (Though he is a reconciler.) Nor that our efforts in this life will change anything. (Though He has given us good works to do.) This is Holy Saturday.

We know that answer and recompense may not come. But more so, we can trust that all of these things are a part of the story God is weaving. It is not an accident that we have been brought down this path. Most of the time the dead child will not rise, the effects of the stroke will not be taken away, the money will not be returned, the faith in your fallen pastor will not be remade, the spouse will not return. God does not call us to trust Him to provide these things. He calls us to trust Him—Jesus Himself is the answer, not anything He gives—and to trust in the story He is crafting. It bears repeating: our hope lies first in a Person, and second in knowing our losses fit within the grander story.

I would suggest that we place ourselves into the story of the suffering of the righteous. That we sit within Holy Saturday, under the cloud and the darkness, feeling the stinging of the rain and the bite of the wind. That we do not jump too quickly to the promised dawn, and more importantly, do not berate ourselves for not acting as if the sun has risen while the storm still rages. Let us sit still on our Holy Saturdays, and with the psalmist say “God, where are you,” and in the next breath, “God I will trust you.”

After all, what is Easter Sunday without truly experiencing Holy Saturday?

Jeff Calhoun is a TEDS alumnus with an M.Div who will be starting his PhD in Systematic Theology at TEDS in Fall 2012.

The most common belief among evangelicals today is that the unitive and procreative acts of sex can be separated, but often overlooked in this discussion is whether a petri dish can be added to the procreative act of marriage.  Christians differ in their answer to this question, but what must not be forgotten are the facts about in vitro fertilization.

The IVF procedure has many different variations, with some yielding greater ethical dilemmas than others.  This discussion will look at IVF as it is most commonly practiced.

In order to procure the eggs from the woman she is given medication, most commonly Lupron, which suppresses ovulation.[i]  This medication is approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for use in men with advanced prostate cancer, but is not approved for purposes of IVF.[ii]

The husband’s part is to produce a sperm sample.  In most IVF clinics, men are ushered into a separate room with a collection cup.  They are given pornographic materials and movies to aid in procurement and the sperm sample is produced without the wife’s involvement. (Although this is the most common method of sperm collection, couples can choose to procure sperm in ways that protect the sanctity of their marriage.)

After ovulation has been suppressed, the woman is given more drugs, injectable gonadotopin medications, to simulate advanced follicle growth in her ovaries.  Her eggs are retrieved and placed in a petri dish with the sperm.  Couples are not obligated to freeze their eggs, but because the process of retrieving the woman’s eggs is difficult and costly, most couples are encouraged to fertilize many eggs and freeze the left over embryos for future IVF treatments.  In fact, only about 30% of IVF cycles end in live birth and more cycles are usually needed until a live birth is finally achieved.[iii]

Is it ethical, though, to freeze fertilized eggs?  Once the sperm has penetrated the egg, the human embryo is in the image of God and has personhood.  If frozen, the embryo must be thawed before he or she can be placed in the woman’s uterus.  An embryo is considered to have survived the thawing process if greater than 50% of his or her cells are viable.[iv]  Many do not survive the thawing process.

What if a couple becomes pregnant through IVF and has a child?  What happens to the superfluous frozen embryos?  As of 2002, there were almost 400,000 frozen embryos in storage awaiting their fate.[v]  Couples may choose to donate their children to research which will lead to scientific experimentation and their eventual demise, they could have them destroyed, or they could give them to another couple to adopt.  For Christians, life begins at conception; therefore, the first two options are murder and not morally permissible.

After the eggs have been fertilized, they are placed in the woman’s uterus.  Unlike many countries, the United States does not have laws governing the number of eggs fertilized or the number of fertilized eggs placed in the woman in an IVF cycle.  This number is left to the discretion of the couple and their doctor.[vi]  Certain organizations have issued guidelines for the number of fertilized eggs to be inserted into the woman, but these guidelines are not law and cannot be enforced.  Couples who are concerned about superfluous embryos, have the option of inserting one fertilized egg at a time.  This practice, however, is less common and usually discouraged by IVF clinics because of lower live birth rates.

In about two weeks the woman will receive a blood pregnancy test.  If she is not pregnant, the woman will undergo more IVF cycles until she has a live birth or the couple abandons hope of pregnancy.  The price of all this can be around $8,000 to $25,000 depending upon the clinic the couple chooses, the number of IVF cycles required, and the age of the woman.[vii]

We ought to evaluate whether this practice is in the best interest of our children.  Children conceived through IVF are more likely to be a twin or a triplet and are at a higher risk for prematurity, low birth weight, and infant death.  Singleton babies face similar risks of prematurity, low birth weight, and perinatal mortality.[viii]

Some believe that embryos that do not implant as a result of IVF are no different than embryos that do not implant naturally (e.g. spontaneous abortions).  In other words, it is normal for women to become pregnant through natural means and not have their pregnancy successfully implant.  They argue that this is no different than a couple creating embryos, inserting them in the woman’s uterus, and having some not implant and die.

What is absent from this discussion, however, is intent.  During a normal ovulatory cycle, a woman produces one egg, two at most.  The woman does not produce more eggs than she is able to carry.  However, with IVF a couple chooses to place more fertilized eggs than she can carry in the woman’s uterus.  Their intent is that some of their fertilized eggs will not implant and die. Parents should never bring children in to the world with the hope that they will die. James M. Childs Jr. puts it this way, “The fact that all eggs fertilized normally by sexual intercourse do not implant is morally irrelevant because there is no human volition involved.”[ix]

IVF may appear unproblematic, but it yields a significant wastage of embryos, low success rates, and high financial costs.[x]  Pastors and counselors should discourage couples facing infertility from pursuing IVF, rather than being complicit in couples’ quest for children who are made and not begotten.

For more information on IVF, please see: http://cbhd.org/content/reproductive-technologies-101.

April Ponto is a second-year student working on an MA in Bioethics and an MA in Christian Thought at TGS and TEDS.

      Seen in a certain light, there is something deeply Christian about Francis Bacon’s exhortation.  It reminds us of what I fear is becoming an increasingly neglected Christian and academic virtue – cognitive humility. I think often we are tempted to suppose that humility is an emotional state, something that we feel about ourselves in response to particular circumstances. But Paul identifies humility with a particular way of thinking; with a cognitive, not merely an emotional state. “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who…” (Philippians 2:3-6)

     Cognitive humility is a particular way of thinking about our thoughts. To possess it is to hold an accurate assessment of our own reasoning faculties as finite human knowers, and to order our thoughts and interactions with others accordingly. So where does this fit in with theological education? To put it plainly, there is simply no room for hubris of any sort among students of divinity. Humility is a necessary condition given the subject matter. Sadly, theology students are not immune to name dropping Žižek in coffee shops or mocking the pre-modernity of historic touchstones of Christology.  We are not immune to it, but we do have the antidote – the Gospel.

The Gospel lays bare all of the emptiness of our pretentions to omniscience and confronts us with our own human frailty and finitude. We are but dust and breath; nevertheless dust that has been called to think God’s thoughts after him. It is between these two truths – recognition of our human limitations coupled with faithfulness to God’s call – that the theological task is to be carried out.

One is tempted to think that if we have a humble view of our own thoughts and understanding, then that somehow means that we are not entirely sure of what it is that we believe. This certainly can be the case; we can become so daunted by our own limitations that we refuse to hold to anything at all. But this is not an accurate assessment of our reasoning faculties; it is but the cognitive form of false humility. In other words, cognitive humility does not entail epistemic uncertainty – far from it. Rather, it enables the knower to be far more certain of what is in fact revealed to him. Touching on the necessity of humility, Chesterton writes:  “It is the humble man who has the sensational sights vouchsafed to him, and this for three obvious reasons: first, that he strains his eyes more than any other men to see them; second, that he is more overwhelmed and uplifted with them when they come; third, that he records them more exactly and sincerely and with less adulteration from his more commonplace and more conceited everyday self.” When we approach our work, or we engage in dialogue with others from different theological traditions or who use a different methodology than our own, the deliberate suspension of judgment until we have truly listened, until we have truly fought to understand to the best of our ability yields results of inestimable value.  The same should be true of when we come to the biblical text. When we come, not to force our preconceived notions of what this text can and cannot be saying, but to weigh and consider –it is there, in humility of mind, that the voice of God is heard.

But this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.

(Isaiah 66:2)

Joel Chopp is an MA in Christian Thought student at TEDS.

yet it hits, my defenses
by barbequed offerings
covertly sabotaged, there’s
small chance of recovery now

Perspiring, the plastic cup
in my hands deftly contains
the tension of the ice thrown
carelessly in its water

Crick. Creek. Crack. concerned, I cough
hoping to aid its struggle
to maintain a contained front
as ice succumbs to slaughter

thinking of speaking, i think
i speak boldly and often
for my broken, weak, abused,
voiceless sisters and brothers

you’re hurting him, accept her,
why’s your voice the only heard,
these people deserve justice;
all things i’ve said to others

plastic containers only hold so much
i’ve spoken I’VE SPOKEN -not what you asked
reenergized flames lick the dripping fat

like tongues of fire from high school prophets
fat
liar
faggot
too small
too much
trash
no cup. no hose. no feat to stomp them out

for the ill-pleased people pleaser speaker
silence spoken, as by those tasked to speak
for this beast defeated for our feasting

would a speaker have kept him from the pit?
negotiate offered service before
being unwillingly offered and served?

was his dad also afraid? to emote?
to call peace-making brave? say I love you?
hold his crying son? let him speak? save him?

Recontained, I doubt you know
with what shameful disregard
you spoke, simply the griller
dutiful to the tasking

no one has spoken for me
I cry out within, deftly
sip down the cup’s tension and
say “I’m fine. Thanks for asking.”

Andrew Bird
“Break It Yourself”
Mom + Pop Music, 2012

Andrew Bird’s most recent album, Break It Yourself, is like listening to a perfect summer afternoon. It is an altogether richly rewarding experience, by turns both excitingly upbeat and compellingly quiet, and in my judgment it is his most coherent offering to date.

What I mean by “most coherent” is that all of these tracks sit comfortably beside one another and seem to flow into and out of each other. There is a sense of fullness and depth that is part excellent production (much of the album was recorded live to 8-track) and part wistfully wonderful songwriting.

That is to be expected from Bird, but on this album he has left some of his more outrightly tongue-in-cheek lyrics behind him in favor of extended metaphors and sometimes plaintive meditations on love and growing up. He is very good at creating narratives that tug at your ears, building lush soundscapes of half-understood stories that practically beg for interpretation and multiple listens. It is like entering a whimsical fantasy world constructed mostly out of beautiful violin noises.

For those unfamiliar, Andrew Bird is a virtuoso violinist / songwriter / whistler who has a history of crafting very eclectic indie pop that often seamlessly blends Americana, folk, classical, gypsy, and electronica elements. His trademark technique, which makes for breathtakingly layered live performances, is to build violin loops that successively layer one upon another to create a wall of interesting sound, which he is then able to switch on and off or add to at will. He often strums and plucks his violin like a guitar (which he also picks up every once in a while), and is able to effortlessly move from this very quirky and untraditional way of playing the violin to melodies that demonstrate his mastery of the classical style.

All of this is incorporated into his songwriting at various (often unpredictable) points, and on this album this is truer than ever. It is clear that he continues to mature as a master blender of styles and as a songwriter, and fellow instrumentalists Martin Dosh (percussion), Jeremy Ylvisaker (guitar and keys), and Mike Lewis (bass) all contribute just the right amount of texture to get the songs where they need to go. Additionally, some have criticized his voice in the past for being often unclear (I read one reviewer once suggest that he had marbles in his mouth) or for being overly plaintive; on this album, however, his voice sounds better than ever, and he uses it in a variety of ways.

Overall I recommend this album very highly – if you’re curious to hear some of the tracks, YouTube “Orpheo Looks Back” or “Lusitania” (which features Annie Clark of St. Vincent) – and I also recommend seeing Andrew Bird live if you can. You won’t regret it.

It’s always interesting to think about how many great writers were fiercely (and sometimes blindly) nationalistic, deeply loyal to their own cultural and geographical heritage. Certainly that kind of allegiance to a particular place lends itself to beautiful language and aesthetic idiosyncrasy; but it also reminds us that, while it can be taken too far, there is a great value in local culture, agriculture and language which our own age of globalization is gradually losing sight of. There’s probably no greater example of this than the Welsh poet R. S. Thomas. For a writer whose career stretched well into our own time (he only died twelve years ago), he remained cantankerously stuck in the past. A priest of the church of England, he lived in a tiny parsonage bereft of modern amenities (no heat, for instance). He made his wife get rid of their vacuum cleaner, one of the few appliances they ever owned, because it was too noisy. Besides being a poet and a priest, he was a social activist, campaigning for Welsh nationalism. He believed in “the true Wales of my imagination,” a Welsh-speaking, indigenous community that was in tune with the natural world. He abhorred materialism and greed as destructive to the community, represented in his poetry by the mythical “Machine.” Other writers have campaigned on similar platforms. Wendell Berry comes to mind, and Tolkien’s “Scouring of the Shire.” Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy, Chesterton, and Flannery O’Connor had similar sentiments (I’d particularly recommend Chesterton’s immortal essay on the subject of cheese.) While some of them, Thomas included, probably take it too far, their voices together are a chorus we dare not ignore completely.

Rory

My endorsement this week is the practice of sitting alone in silence for an extended period of time. Perhaps there are some of you reading this who do this on a regular basis, or who are able, at whatever point you might choose, to pull this off without fidgeting and mind-wandering and generally just being uncomfortable, but I am not one of those people. This is a discipline of settledness, of being OK with one’s thoughts, of relinquishing your grip on the neverending stream of tasks and awarenesses and information-grabbing that tend to constitute our busy days. It is much easier for me to talk about the beneficial effects of spiritual disciplines on one’s life than to actually engage in them, and this is one of those which it is easy to underestimate, because I think I believe myself much more capable of doing this than I actually am. I say all this because I tried it yesterday and realized, first, that it was terribly difficult, and second, that I couldn’t remember the last time I did something like that on purpose – perhaps there were times where I ended up sitting alone and quiet but did so unintentionally – and, finally, that I want to be the kind of person who is able to simply be in such a way that sitting alone and quiet for five or ten minutes doesn’t feel like a strangling fidgety waste of time. I’m convinced that it is beneficial and would be beneficial for me if I could learn to practice it. So I endorse this practice – what is for me right now really a struggle – to you this week.

Jaye

This issue I think I’d like to go out on a limb and endorse… wait for it… the mall. Yes, that’s right, friends. The mall – that bastion of suburban affluence and apathy. Yes, yes, I know, every notion of the mall just seems abhorrent, but just bear with me here.

Recently I went out and did a thing that I had never in a million (billion, ga-jillion) years thought that I would do. I got a job working in a boutique at a mall. It’s at a store that I’ve liked for a while, so that helps out a bit, but it’s still at a mall. I was a little apprehensive. I mean, the mall, right?! The mall is where people shove each other around at Christmas to get the last fancy toy. It’s like the suburban zoo where laissez faire parents send their listless and overindulged children to be caged when they have no idea what else to do with them.

But here’s the surprise: I see God nearly every day at the mall. Yes, that’s right. It’s a shocker, I know. God is working in places that aren’t gritty and urban and filled with the underpriviledged. People at the mall need Him, too. They are lost there. Sometimes, I leave work smelling like work (I work at an organic cosmetics boutique), and often my friends will realise that I’ve been at work without me even having to tell them. And I think, am I not supposed to smell like God, too, when I’m in the world? A sweet smelling fragrance… I want the scent of godliness to ooze from my pores in the same way that the fragrant smells of my work linger on my skin for hours after I’ve left. I see opportunities to share God with my coworkers in ways that are organic and winsome. I’ve never had to manufacture for myself a way to ‘sell’ God to them. They know what I am, and when I offer them kindesses that to me seem an ordinary part of who I am, they often see them as extraordinary and unusual. And then God reminds me that they really are unusual. That ten years ago, before I knew Him, I would never have treated these people with this measure of grace. I even see God in my co-workers themselves – His general revelation through them, about what it means to be gracious and giving. I watched one of my co-workers last week do something for a customer that I thought I would never have done. She went out of her way to be gracious to this man in an extra-ordinary way. I prayed for God’s forgiveness, that this unbeliever would show a god-like kindness to someone that I, someone who bears His seal, would likely not have done.

There you have it – the mall. Someplace you’d never expect to find God, but (as if I didn’t know that He shows up everywhere) He’s there! So I guess this week’s endorsement is maybe more of my advice to you: go somewhere you wouldn’t ordinarily go. Seek out people you wouldn’t ordinarily seek out. Watch for God in the unexpected – both places and people. Be amazed and wonder once again, and God will do big things in and through you!

Editors’ note: The following article is a continuation of our series highlighting the academic departments at Trinity. The series seeks to apply the various academic disciplines in a practical way to the ministry of the church.

“We miss our friend Jane very much; it makes us sad that she’s not with us. But even though her body has died, we know Jane’s soul is with God now, and someday we’ll see her again.” As I spoke these words to the congregation of mentally-disabled individuals for whom I lead church services each week, attempting to comfort them after the death of a beloved member, I was tapping into a belief that runs deep in Christian tradition: human persons are more than physical bodies. We are, or at least have, immaterial souls that can exist apart from our bodies and thus survive physical death.

This view (substance dualism about human persons) has long been the majority perspective among Christians, shaping the church’s understanding of life, death, and life after death. But it has not gone unchallenged. A number of respected theologians and philosophers of religion argue that Christians can and should embrace an alternative view: human persons just are their physical bodies. According to this position (physicalism about human persons), the statement I made to my congregation about Jane’s current condition–the condition of all the dead in Christ–was fundamentally mistaken, because Jane neither is nor has ever had an immaterial soul.

Much of my current work as a PhD student in systematic theology involves issues like this one, in which theological discussion is advanced through application of philosophical insights and vice versa. Recently, I responded to an objection to substance dualism that falls soundly within this category. Trenton Merricks, a philosopher at the University of Virginia, has suggested that the Christian doctrine of the Incarnation is not only compatible with physicalism, but actually coheres better with physicalism than with substance dualism and thus constitutes a reason to accept the former. In his essay for the book Persons: Human and Divine (eds. van Inwagen and Zimmerman, 2007), he offers two primary arguments for this claim. For our purposes here, let’s focus on the second: unlike dualists, physicalists can affirm that God the Son had to become embodied to become human.

Physicalism holds that to be a human is to be identical to–that is, just to be–a human body. Clearly, then, a physicalist account of the Son’s becoming human does indeed require that he become a human body. But why does Merricks think dualism cannot likewise require embodiment for the Son’s humanity? If the dualist is correct in believing humans can exist as immaterial souls without bodies, Merricks reasons, then the Son could have become a human simply by virtue of becoming such a soul–even without a body.

It is one thing, however, to say an embodied soul which currently has the property being human could exist without a body, and another thing entirely to say this soul could have the property being human without a body. If humanity were an essential property (a property it is impossible for the bearer to exist without, like having three sides for a triangle) of souls that have it, then our souls would indeed be human regardless of whether we ever had bodies. Dualism does not, however, require that humanity be understood in this way. In fact, dualists can and sometimes do–and, I think, should–affirm that we qualify as human only by virtue of embodiment in human bodies; having a human body may not be sufficient for being human, but it is necessary for being human. Souls without bodies, therefore, can exist and be persons without being humans. If dualists can make this claim about human persons, then Merricks’ objection fails: dualists, like physicalists, can affirm that the Son had to become embodied to become human. (Incidentally, this is not the only viable dualist response; I discuss this one here simply because I think it is correct.)

This argument points to an important issue for dualism suggested by Merricks’ discussion. Some dualists have posed the following problem–call it the Incoherence Objection–for physicalist accounts of the Incarnation: since the Son was clearly immaterial before the Incarnation, the idea that he ceased being immaterial and became a material object appears to be incoherent. Does it make sense to suggest that the number 23 could become a piece of matter? According to the Incoherence Objection, the number 23 is not the kind of thing that could become material and still be itself, and neither is God the Son. If this objection holds, the physicalist understanding of the Incarnation cannot be correct. Merricks, however, presents a modified version of the objection in an attempt to demonstrate that it poses the same problem for dualism as for physicalism. If our souls belong to the human kind essentially, he asks, would it not be as much of a problem for God the Son, who did not belong to that kind prior to the Incarnation, to become human as it would for an immaterial object to become material?

This issue cannot be resolved simply by reiterating that our souls do not have the property being human essentially, because to affirm this is not to deny that they possess other properties essentially; some such properties may yet distinguish them irreconcilably from, for instance, a piece of matter, the number 23, an angel, or the persons of the Trinity. So Merricks’ Incoherence Objection, altered slightly to refer to human-type souls rather than to humans, is not rendered inapplicable by this consideration alone.

Here, I think, the benefits of drawing together insights from theological and philosophical discussions become especially evident. In the work mentioned above, I found it helpful to approach the Incoherence Objection by proposing counterexamples based on each of several views regarding the nature of the Incarnation itself. Let’s briefly consider two. First, take the view that the Incarnation involved the Son’s “acquiring”–coming to stand in a certain relation to–a human-type soul and a human body. According to this view, the Son did not gain or lose properties (except relational ones with reference to his human nature) in the Incarnation. The incarnate Son has a human-type soul, but is not identical to a human-type soul. This understanding of the Incarnation, therefore, does not involve the Son’s coming to belong to a kind to which he did not previously belong; the Incoherence Objection does not apply.

Alternatively, consider a view of the Incarnation in which the Son’s becoming incarnate involves his coming to possess whatever properties are necessary and sufficient for being human–including some properties always possessed by human-type souls. On the one hand, a dualist proponent of this view could argue that none of the properties the Son gains or loses turn out to be among the “clusters” of properties that define the respective kinds, so the Son still does not come to belong to a kind to which he previously did not belong. On the other hand, she could argue that although it is not possible to stop belonging to one’s natural kind, perhaps a unique, two-natured individual like Christ could belong to two kinds simultaneously by exemplifying the defining properties of each. In either case, the dualist can address the Incoherence Objection without rejecting the principles upon which it is applied to an immaterial object’s becoming a material object. (Once again, moreover, other responses are available; I mention these as non-exhaustive examples.)

Where, then, does all this leave us? There is more to say about the issues briefly sketched here, and much more to say about the relative value of substance dualism for Christianity. But the discussion above, if accurate, allows us to say this much: the argument addressed here does not seem to provide a compelling reason to reject dualism in favor of physicalism. As we confront the agony of death with the hope of Christ, therefore, we need not relinquish the pre-resurrection aspect of that hope. I can affirm that Jane’s soul is now with God, and we can affirm together that the dead in Christ share this blessed condition.

Jessica Wilson is a first-year doctoral student in the Systematic Theology department at TEDS.