The Lost Art of Writing Scripture

It is a common view that the Bible was written by God.  Or that the various texts that constitute it are the result of God writing through human hands.  Prophetic hands such as Moses' or John's.

An extension of this thinking is that if any other hands meddle with the Texts they become corrupt.  The divine original has been lost and what remains cannot be trusted, whether it came from God or not.

This 'God-as-author' view does more harm than good however.  Sure it is deeply true that God's voice is present in Scripture, but insisting upon the divine issuance of Scripture is not necessary at all.  We can avoid one of our society's major problems with Scripture by simply distinguishing between these two.  That is, when God speaks in Scripture we are to certainly take what God says as True.  But we are not to take Scripture itself as from God.  As if God wrote it and there is some original, untainted version, to which we have no access.

There is another problem as well with the God-as-author view.  More than just disconnecting us from Scripture it has also caused us, as a people, to lose touch with the art of writing Scripture.  Whether God is the original source of the Scripture written or not.

I say this for two reasons.

First, in believing that Scripture is God-authored we dismiss the possibility of it being the work of human hands.  It may be in us to theologize, or to provide commentary on Biblical texts, but the writing of Scripture is for God alone.  It is neither for us nor in us to take on such a holy task as Paul or Mark, and so we don't.  We don't engage in the work of writing Scripture since it is beyond our place as humankind.

Second, in believing that Scripture is God-authored the editing or redaction of Texts is an offence.  We lose touch with the fact that this is precisely how Scripture comes into being: through the successive iterations and perfections of generations throughout history.

Because we think that God wrote Scripture any change we see in a Biblical text over time is not appreciated as part of the writing process and as necessary to producing the truth-revealing power of Scripture but rather it is despised as a spoiler of what was once, or may once have been, a holy text.  We have lost the art of writing Scripture, which above all is multi-generational and involves the (re)expression of a wisdom that is generations in the making.  A wisdom that is very much like a tree.

As a people we must recognize once again that Scripture is produced just like any other piece of literature:  It doesn't come fully formed from the divine womb only to degrade under the profane influence of the world but rather Scripture is the result of a text's inception and maturation over time in the world through the tending of many human hands.  Edits, redactions, additions and all.

Scripture is not God-authored, nor is it authored by a single prophet, but rather it is a work of art that spans generations in its creation and perfection.

If we start to recognize the multi-generational authorship of Scripture maybe we'll start, once again, to pour over and (re)produce texts on the order of Genesis 2-3 and the book of Job.

Maybe our religious imagination as a people will be reawakened and the next time an argument is cast against the Bible because it was 'touched' by human hands we won't lament what is lost but rather we'll thank God that human hands are capable of such a marvelous craft.

Thanks be to God and to Job.

Copernicus Against the Church

A defining event in modern Western history is Copernicus' idea that the earth revolves around the sun.  Not the sun around the earth.

The veracity of the claim launched the Copernican Revolution and the ascendancy of science as our society's way to truth.  It marked a turning point in history where truth is obtained not through the teachings of the Church but through consultation with science.

The Church's resistance to Copernicus' idea effectively put the Church on the wrong side of history and was the beginning of the Church's (and Scripture's) growing irrelevance in people's lives.  Our society has lost and continues to lose faith in the Church (and Scripture) because we believe its positions are irreconcilable with such obvious facts as heliocentricity.

But here is the thing: isn't the Church treated a bit unfairly for its proclamations against Copernicus?  More to the point, wasn't the Church deeply right, if superficially wrong, in its insistence that the earth is at the centre of it all?  Or that we earthlings, and not the Sun, are in the position of command?  And are that around which all things revolve?

Just think for a moment: this position of the Church (and Scripture) is true!  Our life in the world shows us that it is!  Sure we are small.  Sure we can die in an instant and the cosmos is an expansive and mysterious space.  But look at what we have done and are able to do!  Look at what is under our power and what could be ours to control!

We have yet to subdue the stars but many of the earth's inhabitants are already under our command.  As human beings we have the power to make life hell just as we can build things like no other has built before.

The simple fact of the matter (evinced by our human capacity for science among other things) is that we are the centre of the universe.  The other planets and suns do, or are meant, to revolve around us.

We have the power, the responsibility, and the potential glory as humankind.  We are the ones who are called to speak so that others will listen and fall in line.  And will revolve around us and our Word.

In its resistance to heliocentricity the Church was simply proclaiming a truth that is deeper and more important than heliocentricity.  It made a mistake in regards to astronomy but it is understandable why it might make the mistake.

The Church did it for us.  To call us to the responsibility that we have all along been called to and to defend us against those who would say that we don't deserve it.

Thanks be to Job.

The Wisdom of our Ancestors

On occassion, typically as a last resort, you might hear a certain criticism being launched against Biblical philosophy, if there is such a thing, or against any ancient thinking for that matter.

The criticism is basically that, being written so long ago, such ancient teachings can hardly be right.  That we're sitting on the receiving end of a long development in thought, and as a result our thoughts today are far truer than were the thoughts of our ancestors.  The idea being that we have learned from their mistakes and long since improved upon their conclusions. 

But is this the case?  Are we wiser than our ancestors given our posterior position in history?

Another argument for this kind of thinking is based on the fairly safe premise that we have technological and scientific knowledge in excess of those who came before us.  And that just as we have superior knowledge in this regard we must have superior knowledge in matters of wisdom (or morality) as well.

But can we really make that first claim?  Are we more ingenious engineers than our ancestors?

Even when it comes to matters of science and technology it is not uncommon, when determining how the pyramids or other ancient wonders were built for example, to be flummoxed by how it was done.  Some people, because they can't fathom the process themselves, jump again to the (rather irrational) conclusion that divine (or alien!) intervention must somehow be involved.  Others, however, accept the ingenuity of humankind and hear rather the call to discern in such examples.  Instead of dismissing the inventive power of our ancestors they embrace it, and try to figure out how they could accomplish such feats...

So I ask, if we can credit our ancestors with marvels of engineering, and we can strive to discern their processes there, why not in matters of wisdom (or morality)?  Should we not, when flummoxed by an ancient text, be just as keen to figure out what is going on, or what it is that is being taught?  That here too may be a marvel of human ingenuity and inventiveness?

As great as our potential may be at the receiving end of history we should not be so full of ourselves or so dismissive of our ancestor's wisdom.  Although thinking is far from over we should not treat their works as dated but as a call to discern.  As revealing treasures as valuable today as ever before.

Thanks be to Job.