Archive for the ‘Post-Modernism’ Category
Best Links of the Week
"I believe that God made me for a purpose, but He also made me fast. When I run, I feel His pleasure..."
WSJ Article: How Missionaries Lost Their Chariots of Fire and Why They Should Add the Gospel Back to Their Good Works. In this vein Desiring God had a great series re-thinking short-term missions as well as the Chalmers Center.
“White House Spent $23M of Taxpayers’ Money on Fight to Legalize Abortion in Kenya“
Man squatting foreclosed home tells judge in his defense that he “bought it from Yahweh.” You can’t make this stuff up.
Someone else has finally put into words the frustration of the script of the USPS mandatory upsell.
Man attempts to smuggle 18 monkeys through security and onto plane by hiding them under his shirt.
Ed Stetzer has an insightful post at Challies on “rockstar” pastors.
Black parents give birth to blond haired and blue-eyed baby.
How to win at Rock-Paper-Scissors.
Some of the craziest pools in the world.
Old Spice Voicemail Generator.
The man claiming ownership of 84% of Facebook may actually have some merit.
ESPN mocks itself and the ridiculousness of the “Lebron Decision” special with the help of Steve Carell and Paul Rudd:
HT: Kevin DeYoung
Why the Final Episode of LOST was so Frustrating
I feel like I’ve got to get this out of my system to justify spending 6 seasons watching a compelling narrative only to be severely disappointed. WARNING, this will contain spoilers, read on at your own risk.
There were two things that were compelling about the LOST narrative: it’s characters and it’s mythology. I believe that humans are hard-wired for stories. The most compelling stories are stories that illuminate some aspect of the Biblical storyline of creation-fall-redemption-re-creation. LOST focused heavily on the brokenness, alienation, and self-destructive patterns of its characters/candidates. We can empathize with the fallen condition of these characters – sons that didn’t measure up to their overly-expectant/deceptive/abusive fathers, addiction, purposelessness, and low self-esteem. We can empathize with the arcing of their characters as they realize their brokenness is due to a lack of community and that when we ask for help, redemption comes.
My frustration with the LOST narrative is its re-creation (I am not prepared to speculate about whether the flash-sideways end state of most of the characters is purgatory, a kind of heaven, or some sort of eternal recurrence, so no comments there). The fallen condition was redeemed through community and I was tracking with the arc of the storyline until the re-creation narrative (the final 10 minutes of the show). One of the things I have thoroughly enjoyed throughout LOST has been its intelligence and inter-textuality, continually making reference to excellent works of literature and philosophy. I share the same love for many of the authors referenced: Walker Percy, Flannery O’Connor, Fyodor Dostoevsky, C.S. Lewis, and Søren Kierkegaard. However, if the writers had even a cursory understanding of these writers (or philosophy in general), they would quickly dismiss the blatant syncretism of their own re-creation narrative. Stephen Prothero, religion professor at Boston University, dismembers the ‘One God, Many Paths’ sentiment of our day, showing that it is reductionistic and dangerous to pretend we are all the same. The quality of dialogue between Jack and his father was poor, the imagery was trite and reductionistic, and the final montage cliche.
My two cents, feel free to disagree with me…
Best Links of the Week
Joel Osteen or a Fortune Cookie?
Article on pay scales for different undergraduate degrees entitled: Momma’s Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Religious Study Majors… I guess my mom didn’t read that one.
Disturbing article from WIRED on Facebook’s out of control privacy policies.
Episcopal Church in Massachusetts creates worship service for dogs. Service includes Eucharist for the pets. Just when I think I have heard it all, something like this comes out of left field. Fail.
TSA employee beats up and threatens to kill other TSA employee over comments regarding his full-body scan.
Tony Reinke takes a stab at answering the question, “Does God Delight in Non-Christian Art?” (HT: JT)
The Washington Times and Bloomberg have some helpful articles explaining derivatives as an investment product and outlining some of their dangers.
Large pyschologist study shows that babies know difference from good and evil at 6 months old. I might add that they don’t need to be taught how to sin either.
If you like statistics and books, Tim Challies has a great analysis of the book-buying habits of the readers of his website.
Why Nietzsche is Helpful for the Christian
So, I’ve been chewing on some Nietzsche for the better part of the last 8 months (I mentioned a few things I was struck by here) . I think Nietzsche is very helpful for Christians and is worth reading/understanding. There are at least four reasons why this is the case:
First, Nietzsche is helpful because he presents a worldview almost completely antithetical to Christianity. From my experience, total opposites often have a lot in common and typically this is the case because opposites employ the same categories to divergent conclusions. Nietzsche takes many of orthodox Christianities’ categories and turns them on their head. He preaches the opposite of the Sermon on the Mount, encouraging master morality over slave morality. He preaches that humanity has killed God through our lack of worship of God and as a result there is no such thing as good/evil, right/wrong, or black/white because all of these depended on God for their existence. He preaches that all that humanity has is power through the assertion of one’s will.
Second, Nietzsche and Christianity have a few common assessments and aims (The Fall, Telos, and Pleasure). In my opinion, there is definitely a sense of the brokenness of things in Nietzsche’s philosophy. While not coming from a theistic framework, he sees that humanity needs to rise above its current pitiful state to something higher. While he might not refer to the ubermensch as redeemer of humanity, it is certainly Nietzsche’s telos for humanity. Nietzsche and the Christian see very eye-to-eye when it comes to a promotion of life-affirmation (given, from very different angles). Some may accuse Christianity of being prudish or oppressive but they haven’t read C.S. Lewis on joy, Jonathan Edwards on affection, or John Piper on Christian hedonism. Both Nietzsche, Lewis, Edwards, and Piper all put forth a very life-affirming, full-bodied, joy-filled, and pleasure-seeking vision of life.
Third, Nietzsche is correct in his assessment that the death of God necessitates nihilism (a rejection of all morality). For Nietzsche a large portion of his philosophy was devoted to the reevaluation of everything in light of the death of God (particularly morality). Unlike the New Atheists who want to have their cake and eat it too (atheism with some semblance of morality), Nietzsche obliterates this notion. Nietzsche rejects all transcendence in light of the death of God, for if God is the only transcendent thing/being in existence, then the death of God also destroys anything transcendent. The only meta-narrative (for Nietzsche) left is the assertion of power and pleasure in the face of the harsh world.
Fourth, Nietzsche’s worldview is horribly unlivable. The unlivability of the Nietzschean worldview is probably the greatest critique of his thinking. I won’t even delve into the fact that Nietzsche spent the last decade of his life severely mentally ill and institutionalized (as this has been abused by Nietzsche’s critics). It is no great secret that Nietzsche’s most faithful disciple was Michel Foucault. Foucault was an influential post-structuralist and post-modern thinker who sought to live Nietzsche’s worldview to its logical end. Power and pleasure were at the center for Foucault and Nietzsche and as such Foucault delved deep into the world of homosexual sadomasochism. It was not uncommon for Foucault to have 6-12 such encounters in a single night (facilitated by the bath-houses of 70s era Southern California). He was quite open and would brag about his sexual power and prowess. He was one of the first public figures to die of AIDS. He wanted to die in his native Paris and upon his triumphal entry to his city, 2 million people lined either side of the Champs-Élysées. Those celebrating his return carried posters with Foucault’s motto, “Be Cruel.”
Your thoughts?
Tim Keller Responds to the Big 5 Questions Facing the Western Church
Earlier, I posted on Tim Keller’s analysis of the “big 5 questions facing the Western church.” To summarize Keller, those 5 issues identified were:
1. The opportunity for extensive culture-making in the U.S
2. The rise of Islam
3. The new non-western Global Christianity
4. The growing cultural remoteness of the gospel
5. The end of prosperity?
Keller has followed up on these in an excellent little post well worth your reading.
Your thoughts?
The Snake Eats Its Own Tail
Protagoras (490-420 bc): “Man is the measure of all things.”
Gordon Clark, Thales to Dewey, p. 69:
Such is the fate of all relativistic theories, ancient or modern. They are self-destructive because self-contradictory. When a pragmatist asserts the impossibility of attaining the absolute, when an instrumentalist with his emphasis on change deplores the dogmatism of unchanging truth, or when a Freudian dismisses conscious reasoning as hypocritical rationalization, he means to except his own view. It is absolutely true that we miss the absolute; it is fixed truth that nothing is fixed; it is validly reasoned that reasoning is hypocrisy. Objections to dogmatism are always dogmatic, and relativisms are always asserted absolutely. For this the Man-measure theory must be rejected, and knowledge is shown to be other than perception.
Excellent Article from Tim Keller on Issues Facing the Western Church
The Big Issues Facing the Western Church
1. The opportunity for extensive culture-making in the U.S
2. The rise of Islam
3. The new non-western Global Christianity
4. The growing cultural remoteness of the gospel
5. The end of prosperity?
As usual, Keller has some prescient and keen cultural insight. Your thoughts?
3 Month Introspective
Introspective
So, I’ve been blogging consistently for three months. This is the week of Christmas and I’ll be all over the place. I thought I would briefly summarize the 3 months of blog series on here:
Blaise Pascal: We took a look at Blaise Pascal’s thinking, its use of aphorism and its relationship to both tri-perspectivalism and presuppositionalism. We also looked at his use of aphorism and his warnings against deism and atheism.
Thoughts on Evangelicalism Past, Present, and Future, Parts 1-7: We defined the term evangelical. We looked at its historical roots in the First Great Awakening, Second Great Awakening, and its ties to celebrity culture, democritization of knowledge, and modernism. Then we looked at the roots of liberalism, the Protestant split and suburbanization, and defined and outlined evangelical populism and their game plan for reaching America. Finally we assessed the current status of American evangelicalism and then made some predictions of future trends.
Introduction to Apologetics, Parts 1-7: We looked in broad strokes at the various schools of apologetics. We then took a more in-depth look at: Classical Apologetics, Evidentialist Apologetics, Presuppositional Apologetics, and the specific apologetics of Blaise Pascal and Alvin Plantinga. Finally, we employed the three phases football as an analogy for the different apologetic schools and I likened Tim Tebow to the presuppositionalists.
Thoughts on Evangelicalism Moving Forward, Parts 1-10: We looked at some analysis of some shifts evangelicalism will need to make moving forward: Doctrine, Worldview, Urbanization, Globality/Mobility, “Post-Modernism,” American Culture(s), Contextualization, Balance, and Final Analysis.
Top ~10 Books by Topic:
Top 10 Systematic Theology Texts
Top 10 Books on Science and Christianity
Top 10 Books on Christian Biography
Top 15 Books on Status of American Evangelicalism
Top 10 Books on Church History
Top 40 Books to Read While in College
Top 10 Books on Missions, Discipleship, and Evangelism
The 25 Most Destructive Books Ever Written…
Top 10 Books on Divine Sovereignty and Human Responsibility
Best Creeds, Confessions, and Catechisms of the Christian Church
A Comprehensive List of Top 10 Book Lists of 2009
Up Next: We will be looking at some thoughts on the economy and investment and then delve into the mind of Friedrich Nietzsche…
The 25 Most Destructive Books Ever Written…
Darwin: Origin of Species
…and why you should read them (or at least be familiar with them).
These are books that have had a deleterious affect on humanity (almost exclusively Western in their thinking). Some of them had “good intentions”* but fell flat on their face with horrible unintended consequences. The Christian has the responsibility to defend the truth of the Gospel. One part of defending the truth is refuting all untruth. We need to be reading primary sources of the things we are seeking to deconstruct – not summaries, the wikipedia article, or a blog post about it.
*1. The Origin of Species: By Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life by Charles Darwin
I do not think Darwin would agree with half of Neo-Darwinianism or macroevolution. He makes massive concessions that geology and microbiology would need to corroborate his thesis. He was a good scientist who followed the evidence, I think he would be in the intelligent design camp (perhaps this is a controversial statement, but read Origin for yourself). I have listed this as #1 as this work was critical in pretty much all of the destructive thoughts of the past 150 years: Eugenics, Scientific Naturalism, Nietzschean atheism, New Atheism, Liberal Protestantism, and Communism.
2. Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant
This book is probably the most influential book in philosophy since the ancient Greeks. Kant seeks to synthesize the great debate of the history of philosophy: Being vs. Becoming aka Plato vs. Aristotle. In the process, Kant comes to the conclusion that our minds cannot have knowledge of things that are not physical – ie. God and many other absolute truths. In defense of Kant, his thinking did begin to change in his third work as he makes some wiggle room for faith as being a legitimate pathway for knowledge (but almost no one reads his third volume).
3. The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels
20,000,000 dead under Stalin, 6-8,000,000 dead under Lenin, 40,000,000 dead under Mao Zedong, 1,700,000 dead under Pol Pot… case and point.
4. On Religion: Speeches to Its Cultured Despisers by Friedrich Schleiermacher
This guy birthed liberal Protestantism. His ideas split Protestantism and millions think they know Jesus when they don’t.
5. Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche
Nietzsche decries how humanity has killed God through our apathy. He then espouses why humanity needs to move beyond God, morality, truth, and the good, in favor of embracing exerting power and control over the weak.
*6. Meditations on First Philosophy by Rene Descartes
Descartes had every intention of proving through pure axiomatic reasoning that God existed. In short, his arguments for God’s existence were awful and his arguments for doubting everything were excellent. His legacy is solid argumentation for skepticism. Epic Fail.
7. Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler
11-17,000,000 dead. Hitler sees Judaism, capitalism, and communism as the three major threats to Germany. The Final Solution means purging all associated with these things and the result is the Holocaust. Awful.
8. Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity by Richard Rorty
In my view, this is the most important book to be read today for the Christian. For an explanation why, read my previous blog post on post-modern-pragmatism.
9. The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli
In order to be successful in life you must exercise control through power and manipulation. Morality hurts your ability to exert your will.
10. Origins of the History of Christianity by Ernest Renan
The New Testament is essentially myth. This revisionist history was seminal in classic liberalism and influential in the later Jesus Seminar.
11. Discourse on the Origin of Inequality Among Men by Jean Jacques Rousseau
Society is corrupt, man is good.
12. The Pivot of Civilization by Margaret Sanger
Sanger promoted sexual liberation and then birth control, abortion, and eugenics. 39,000,000+ babies dead worldwide… this year from abortion.
13. Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes
Humans are immoral, therefore only Leviathan is the solution… Leviathan is a strong and aggressive central government.
14. The Essence of Christianity by Ludwig von Feuerbach
Christianity is superstition that will soon be replaced by humanism.
15. The Future of an Illusion by Sigmund Freud
Humanity has invented God and this delusion is a kind of mental illness.
16. Various Writings by Pelagius
Denial of the doctrine of original sin, denial of efficacious grace, and the denial of the sovereignty of God. 1600 years later his teachings still plague the church.
17. Sexual Behavior in the Human Male by Alfred Kinsey
This was just painful to read (and I was unable to finish) and I am not endorsing actually getting a copy (hence no link). Kinsey basically says that no sexual behavior or orientation is immoral. All is permissible.
18. The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels
Some bit of gnosticism had to make this list. I wrestled with what to choose here. Pagels is your run of the mill critic who says that the gnostic “gospels” are the real story and history. These ideas are ridiculous due to their pseudepigraphic nature, date of writing, and mutually exclusive theologies.
19. Prolegomena to the History of Israel by Julius Wellhausen
Wellhausen espouses that the first five books of the Old Testament were not written by Moses but by editors from four schools of thought. A flood of Bible criticism followed Wellhausen.
20. Why I am Not a Christian by Bertrand Russell
Russell is one of the few atheists other than Nietzsche that I respect. His thoughts are well ordered and argued. The New Atheists (Dawkins, Hitchens…) wish they could hold a candle to Russell.
21. Process and Reality by A.N. Whitehead
Whitehead argues for Process Theology. Read about Process Theology here.
Justification by faith alone is anathematized. Veneration of Mary and saints upheld. Transubstantiation upheld. I love my brothers and sisters who are Christians in the Catholic church despite the Catholic church. Trent had the opportunity to listen to the Reformation and return to God’s Word for truth. It did not and left in its wake countless eternal casualties.
23. His Dark Materials Trilogy by Philip Pullman
Pullman sought to write the opposite of Milton’s Paradise Lost. He seeks to commend humanism and ultimately atheism as the commendable life path. His Dark Materials is aimed at young adults and has been recently popularized by the Golden Compass film.
24. Protagoras by Plato
For clarity sake, these are sayings ascribed to Protagoras and not Platonic thoughts. The famous quote is “Man is the measure of all things.” Protagoras is the first person to espouse a kind of moral relativism.
25. Coming of Age in Samoa by Margaret Mead
The logical consequences of naturalism and Darwinianism applied to anthropology and sociology. What is primitive is good, therefore the sexual inhibition she evidenced in primitive Samoa ought to be writ large.
Some thinkers who nearly made this list:
Leon Trotsky, Mao Zedong, Jean-Paul Sartre, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida, Victor Gollancz, Lillian Hellman, Cyril Connolly, Norman Mailer, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Bertolt Brecht, Johann Fichte, Georg Hegel, Arthur Schopenhauer, John Dewey, Joseph Smith, Percy Shelley, Henrik Ibsen, Edmund Wilson, James Baldwin, Kenneth Tynan, Jean-François Lyotard, Claude Levi-Strauss and Noam Chomsky.
What did I miss?
Top 15 Books on Status of American Evangelicalism
No Place for Truth by David Wells
These books represent the best analysis on the present status and recent history of evangelicalism. This list is meant to be informative and not to be alarmist or disconcerting. I think the classic Dicken’s line, ‘it was the best of times, it was the worst of times‘ will apply the Christ’s church til He return. It is implicit also in this list that works commending a Christian worldview, like Nancy Pearcey’s Total Truth, are must reads. I have also omitted more esoteric debates including books on open theism, federal vision, new perspectives on paul… etc. The purpose of this list is zoomed out than those specific issues.
1. No Place for Truth by David Wells [e, p, s]
How modernity crept in and screwed up evangelicalism. Absolute classic.
2. The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind by Mark Noll [y, l, e, p, s]
The scandal of the evangelical mind is that it is so scarce and scant. You may also want to read Os Guinness’ Fit Bodies Fat Minds, addressing evangelicalism’s intellectual laziness and preoccupation with the temporary.
3. The Democritization of American Christianity by Nathan Hatch [e, p, s]
Fascinating analysis of the democritization of Christianity in America. His historical analysis is keen and well-researched.
4. Christianity and Liberalism by J. Greshem Machen [e, p, s]
This classic work delineates the liberalism of the early 20th century as being a completely other faith than the historic orthodox Christian faith. 86 years later it is still relevant.
5. God in the Wasteland by David Wells [e, p, s]
Wells continues where he left off in No Place for Truth, by challenging evidenced consumerism in evangelicalism.
6. The Courage to Be Protestant by David Wells [e, p, s]
The title is a play on Paul Tillich’s The Courage to Be. Tillich’s work was a classic in early 20th century Protestant liberalism. Wells draws connections between the emergent movement as really being a form of rehashed 20th century era liberalism. Wells is also scathing on the level and abuse of marketing in modern evangelicalism. As far as Wells goes, his Above All Earthly Pow’rs s also a worthwhile read: in terms of analysis Pow’rs is to post-modernity what No Place for Truth was to modernity.
7. The New Shape of World Christianity: How American Experience Reflects Global Faith by Mark Noll [e, p, s]
I am surprised by the lack of press for this book. Noll examines the history of Christianity in America and draws parallels in key growth areas (Southern hemisphere and the East). Noll is actually rather positive amid the torrent of bad press on what American Christians are exporting. This is an important work because we are good to be reminded that American evangelicalism is not the height of church history. Further, the church is Christ’s and she will prevail. I think Noll has his fingers on the pulse of what is going on and what is next, we would be wise to listen to what he has to say.
8. Understanding Fundamentalism and Evangelicalism by George Marsden [e, p, s]
This is a must read if you seek to understand our history. Also an important work is Revival and Revivalism by Iain Murray.
9. Reclaiming the Center: Confronting Evangelical Accomodation to Postmodern Times by Various Authors [y, l, e, p, s]
Various heavyweights chime in on the necessity of remaining faithful to the preaching of the Word and to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. If you like this work, I suggest also Os Guinness’, Prophetic Untimeliness: Challenging the Idol of Relevance.
10. Christless Christianity by Michael Horton [y, l, e, p, s]
This books has caused a bit of a stir. You can read John Frame’s book review here. I have yet to read the book, but I thought it a worthwhile mention to engage in present dialogue over the status of the Gospel in evangelicalism. From what I gather, Horton has guys like Joel Osteen in view when he speaks of a Christianity without Christ.
11. Young, Restless, and Reformed by Colin Hansen [y, l, e, p, s]
This book is an important first look at the growing demographic of young Reformed folk. This is an area that needs further analysis and hopefully a good work will come soon.
12. Respectable Sins: Confronting the Sins We Tolerate by Jerry Bridges [y, l, e, p, s]
Bridges is 100% right when he highlights several sins that evangelicals strangely tolerate: gossip, anger, pride, jealousy, anxiety, and selfishness to name a few.
13. Why Johnny Can’t Preach: The Media Have Shaped the Messengers by T. David Gordon [e, p, s]
Gordon applies Marshall McLuhan’s keen insights to shed light on the dearth of serious bible teaching in evangelicalism.
14. Confessions of a Reformission Rev by Mark Driscoll [y, l, e, p, s]
I think Mark Driscoll is a very important voice in evangelicalism, moreso than many of my fellow Reformed brethren. This book is a humorous yet insightful look into the story of the planting of Mars Hill Church in Seattle. There are many lessons weaved into the narrative that are wise and memorable.
15. Why We’re Not Emergent: From Two Guys That Should Be and Why We Love the Church: In Praise of Institutions and Organized Religion by Kevin DeYoung and Ted Kluck [y, l, e, p, s]
The first book is a solid book on the emergent church. I also wanted to end this list with on a positive note with Why We Love the Church. Many times we can get so bogged down in self-criticism that we forget to praise God for all the truly good things he is doing in and through the church in America.
What we need is always adherence to the same three things: orthodoxy, orthopathos, and orthopraxis.
(c=children; y=young adult; l=lay leader; e=elder; p=pastor; s=scholar)
