The Rev. Jeremiah Wright

I just finished reading Jeremiah Wright's speeches to the NAACP and to the National Press Club. I found nothing at all in either of those statements (nor in any quotation from his sermons) which ought to be a source of controversy.

Rev. Wright is simply preaching the sometimes-harsh truth of the gospel. He made one statement which sounds pretty off the wall--regarding the theory that the AIDS virus was created by the U.S. government to control or exterminate the black population. While I (as a middle-class, white and Chinese American) doubt there is anywhere near sufficient evidence to support this conspiracy theory, one must remember that the black community has been given more than ample reason to completely mistrust the U.S. government.

Anyway, I was surprised to find the Rev. so eminently reasonable and gospel-focused, considering the controversy he's stirred up. I am now interested to read and try to analyze some articles which bash him. What the heck kind of presuppositions and attitudes--apart from simple racism--could have gotten people so riled up about this preacher of Christ? Or is it really just racism?

More on the Virginity of Mary

At one presbytery meeting I attended, a (seemingly fairly conservative) ordination Candidate was being questioned about his personal statement of faith. Someone asked why he didn't include "the virgin birth" (by which most people mean what is technically called "the virgin conception"). He had simply forgotten to include it.

But I have asked myself whether, when I read my personal statement of faith before presbytery, I will include the virgin conception of Christ. If I do not, and if I am asked why, I will explain that whether or not Jesus was born of a virgin is not essential to the Christian faith, and does not change the message of the gospel. Jesus could have been fully human and fully divine even if he had been born in the natural way. If God had wanted to do it that way, he could have. And it would have been no less a miracle.

But affirming the virgin conception of Christ is important for a couple reasons--not as a litmus test for orthodoxy, but as an indication of some underlying attitudes. It may indicate whether one believes that miracles are possible. It is a mistake to reject the virgin conception because of an underlying belief that miracles simply do not happen. In that case, one would also have to reject belief in Christ's resurrection, which is essential to Christian faith.

Also, one's belief in or rejection of the virgin conception is an indication of whether one accepts the canonical Gospels as being generally historically reliable. If one believes that the writers of the Gospels were just making stuff up with no basis in reality, one is no longer within the bounds of traditional Christian faith. Now, I believe there is a lot of room for orthodox attitudes between the view mentioned above and biblical inerrancy (which I will someday make a case against on this blog). But my personal feeling is that, if you're going to say something in the Gospels is not true, you'd better have a darned good reason for it.

And also, it is appropriate for Christians to have a humble attitude of deference to church tradition. Obviously, church tradition has not been infallible. Mistakes have been made. But I probably will affirm the virgin conception in my statement of faith, because I don't disagree with it, and it is in the Apostle's Creed--and who the heck am I to mess with ancient church tradition? I feel it would be arrogant of me to do such a thing.

Poem

A Hymn of Greeting
To the newest member of the ivory brigade

1.
Who knew at twenty two
it should assail my weathered jaws
that draws the infant’s wail

2.
Insufficient funds could not procure
the aid of surgeon’s blade
to halt the rightful course of things
beneath a blissful ignorance, fast fading into pain.
Uncomprehending shall not be, like for the babe, my bane.

3.
Tongue tests, tastes, traverses
Sore, soft, weakened spot
where flesh is torn apart, revealing
The unyielding ivory peak:
The birth of wisdom.

4.
With age come crowded digits
Skewing youthful tooth perfection.
Mourn not beauty; patience.
Wait for transformation.

04/01/08


I liked this poem when I first wrote it, but now I think it's pretty awkward. Oh well. It is the first poem that's come to me in a very long time.

"The Virgin Shall Conceive"

Some people seem to think that the virgin conception of Jesus is discounted by the fact that the verse in Isaiah, which says that “the virgin shall conceive and bear a son” (Isa. 7:14) meant, to its author, simply “the young woman will conceive and bear a son,” and the child is not, apparently, supposed to be an important personage at all--his significance seems to lie in marking the amount of time which will pass between his birth and the imminent times of plenty (“he shall eat curds and honey when he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good” Isa. 7:15).

People “argue” that because the supposed fulfillment of the prophecy was “based on a simple linguistic mistake,” the virgin conception did not happen at all. This “argument” is not very well thought out.

It is not as though the authors of Matthew and Luke first read the verse in Isaiah, then inexplicably decided it must refer to the expected messiah, and then invented fanciful, completely fictitious, but fairly detailed accounts of the miraculous conception and birth Jesus “must have had” because of the passage in Isaiah.

Given the length and degree of detail of the conception and birth narratives, it is clear that they are not “based on” or “inspired by” Isaiah 7:14. Whether or not you accept them as historical accounts, they are clearly based on stories that were being told about Jesus. Luke doesn’t even explicitly reference Isa. 7:14.

And secondly, Matthew and Luke were not necessarily ignorant of the fact that the author of Isaiah did not mean a “virgin” but rather, a “young woman” and they did not necessarily think that the author of Isaiah knew he was referring to Jesus. And if someone had explained to them that Isaiah was not referring to Jesus’ virgin conception, but to some other person’s non-miraculous conception, they probably would have said “You’re wrong. The old interpretation of scripture is ‘outdated.’ Jesus, by his life, death and resurrection, has opened our eyes to the true meaning and fulfillment of the scriptures.”

I don’t think they would have cared what the human author of Isaiah thought he was predicting. To the Christian (at the very least, to Christians in the early church), the meaning of the Hebrew Scriptures goes beyond the intentions of the original authors.

Now, there is debate over this point in Christian circles nowadays--and even among the evangelical Fuller faculty. But I don’t know how evangelical Christians who do not advocate reading the Old Testament in light of the New can explain away the fact that within the New Testament itself it is assumed that Jesus is, in a real sense, the fulfillment of the Hebrew Scriptures, and they are incomplete without an understanding of who he is.

My personal opinion, though, is that exegetical courses on the Hebrew Scriptures ought to focus strictly on the authors’ intentions and the historical-social context in which the books were written. Theology and New Testament courses are the place to discuss how the Hebrew Scriptures find their fulfillment in Christ.

Rape Counselor of Hippo, 413 C.E.

I've been reading Saint Augustine of Hippo's City of God. It is a rip-roarin' good time. Augustine has been very much maligned by some contemporary scholars, and I'm beginning to see how very wrong they are about him. For example: Augustine is said to have hated the body, sex, and women.

In City of God, I have noticed a remarkable sensitivity to the experiences of women, particularly the suffering of women due to Rome's war-mongering. Augustine devotes a significant portion of Book I to consoling Christian women who were raped during the sack of Rome, reassuring them that they have nothing to be ashamed of and that their chastity has not been compromised. He also tells them not to commit suicide, but is sympathetic toward women who have taken their own lives in grief.

And, CHECK THIS:

Book III, chapter 21: Augustine is describing the depths of moral deterioration to which Rome sank in the period between the Second and Third Punic Wars. "In that very period," he writes, "the law called the Lex Voconia was passed, forbidding the appointment of a woman, even an only daughter, as heir. I cannot quote, or even imagine, a more inequitable law."

By his words may he be aquitted.

The quotation is from the Penguin Classics 1984 edition, translated by John O'Meara.

It begins ...

I am very happy to be living in a place with warm weather. But it also means parasitic bugs are out and about. I woke up this morning with several itchy bites. And just now, as I sat typing here at the Fuller library computer, I spotted and subsequently tore apart with my fingernails a blood-filled flea. AUGH! How could our apartment have become infested? There are no pets allowed in the apartment complex. 'Tis an ugly mystery.

Post-Lent Reflections

I had a lousy attitude about our Lenten fast this year. Brandon and I fasted from meat and dairy (an idea we adapted from Eastern Orthodox practice). And basically I just felt miserable and resentful about it the whole time and complained a lot.

Two Fridays ago (which was the Friday before finals week), my computer's fan broke and I had a very stressful, exhausting day. By the time Brandon came home, I was just about ready to blow the fast and go out and eat cheeseburgers to console myself. I felt Life owed me something for all that I'd suffered.

But even as I felt that I was owed something, I knew I wasn't. God does not want his children to become whiney and demanding in the face of discomfort. God wants us to learn to patiently endure unpleasantness, knowing that He will wring good out of it yet.

I could benefit a lot from having this attitude toward my classes at Fuller. I have often been disappointed and frustrated with the courses I've taken (two in particular come to mind ... ), but if I allow it, God will bring forth good fruit from seemingly wasted time.