more inspiration and accommodation

And God said, "Let there be an expanse/firmament/vault/dome (Heb., 'raqiya') in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters." -Genesis 1:6

“Moses describes the special use of this expanse, “to divide the waters from the waters,” from which words arises a great difficulty. For it appears opposed to common sense, and quite incredible, that there should be waters above the heaven. Hence some resort to allegory, and philosophize concerning angels; but quite beside the purpose. For, to my mind, this is a certain principle, that nothing is here treated of but the visible form of the world. He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere.”
- John Calvin, Commentaries on the First Book of Moses called Genesis, 1:6

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"It is a fundamental misunderstanding of Genesis to expect it to answer questions generated by a modern worldview, such as whether the days were literal or figurative, or whether the days of creation can be lined up with modern science, or whether the flood was local or universal. The question that Genesis is prepared to answer is whether Yahweh, the God of Israel, is worthy of worship. And that point is made not by allowing ancient Israelites to catch a glimpse of a spherical earth or a heliocentric universe. It is wholly incomprehensible to think that thousands of years ago God would have felt constrained to speak in a way that would be meaningful only to Westerners several thousand years later. To do so borders on modern, Western arrogance. Rather, Genesis makes its case in a way that ancient men and women would have readily understood--indeed, the only way."

- Peter Enns, Inspiration and Incarnation, p. 55

I just thought it'd be good to give some more examples of the affinities between Calvin's doctrine of divine accommodation in Scripture and the uses to which Calvin put this doctrine and examples of the uses to which Enns has put his incarnational analogy. Enns may have done some slightly different things with Genesis than did Calvin. Of course he did. Calvin didn't have available the ancient near eastern literature to set Genesis in its historical and literary context whereas we and Enns do. But isn't it obvious that there are at least striking, even familial, resemblances between Enns' approach and Calvin's here?

an irony of theological education

One of the ironies of theological education (or at least in programs like the one I'm in at Westminster) is that you have to set your own theological questions, issues and struggles aside during the semester because all of your intellectual energy has to be devoted to meeting the demands of your course load. If you're at all like me, this state of affairs can put quite a strain you as you find yourself harboring questions of (seemingly) great personal importance, having to ignore them for the time being and getting on with the business of seeing how other men answered entirely different questions from your own. It can leave you with the sense that what you are studying is pointless and, what's worse, it is preventing you from pursuing the things for which you are truly passionate.

For my part, I've found my theological education thus far to be more valuable than I ever could have imagined. But, nevertheless, my time at Westminster has stirred up more longings than it has satisfied. But, then again, perhaps theological education is supposed to be all about stirring up longings....

inspiration and accommodation

"And God made the two great lights- the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night- and the stars." Genesis 1:16

“I have said, that Moses does not here subtilely descant, as a philosopher, on the secrets of nature, as may be seen in these words…. Here lies the difference; Moses wrote in a popular style things which, without instruction, all ordinary persons, endued with common sense, are able to understand; but astronomers investigate with great labor whatever the sagacity of the human mind can comprehend…. Nor did Moses truly wish to withdraw us from [astronomy] in omitting such things as are peculiar to the art; but because he was ordained a teacher as well of the unlearned and rude as of the learned, he could not otherwise fulfill his office than by descending to this grosser method of instruction….. Moses, therefore, rather adapts his discourse to common usage.”
-John Calvin, Commentaries on the First Book of Moses called Genesis, 1:16 (my italics)

In the spirit of kicking a dead horse, I thought I'd post some of my thoughts on Peter Enns' book, Inspiration and Incarnation. I haven’t quite understood why some folks have been so quick to declare Enns’ approach to Scripture to be outside the bounds of the Reformed tradition. I find myself wanting to say, “Have you never read the Institutes, ‘He accommodated diverse forms to different ages, as He knew would be expedient for each’?” or “Do you not know the tradition, that Calvin says, ‘He has accommodated Himself to men’s capacity, which is varied and changeable’?” (Institutes II:11:13)
To my mind, conceptually Enns has done nothing but taken up Calvin’s doctrine of divine accommodation and described it in the rhetoric of an ‘incarnational analogy.’ But the point of the incarnational analogy is in substance equivalent to Calvin’s doctrine of accommodation: In order to communicate to His people, God accommodated Himself to the communicational conventions of His people so that they might understand what He intends to communicate. As you might expect, the communicational conventions of God’s audience depend upon who His audience is, their time, location, cultural milieu, etc. In short, if the communicational conventions of God’s intended audience included mythic language as an effective mode of communication, why should God not speak to them in mythic language? If the communicational conventions of His audience include apocalyptic, why should God not speak in apocalyptic language?
Calvin used the concept of accommodation to explain various and sundry Biblical phenomena that would otherwise be considered “Bible difficulties.” The example I gave above is Calvin’s commentary on Genesis 1:16. The alleged difficulty with Genesis 1:16 is that it speaks of the sun and moon as the greater and lesser lights when the astronomers of Calvin’s knew full well that certain planets in our solar system (namely Saturn) were, despite appearances, actually larger than the moon. Calvin’s answer is not to come up with some cockamamie pseudo-scientific argument for the moon actually being larger than Saturn, nor does he do any sort of fancy exegetical footwork to show that this locution is some sort of upper-register spiritual metaphor. No. Rather, Calvin says that Moses does not subtilely descant as a philosopher but rather adapts his discourse to the common usage or communicational conventions of his audience. But, of course, that connects the language of Scripture to the varied and changeable diverse forms of human communication. Given that framework, what is the substantial difference between saying, “That the Bible, at every turn, shows how ‘connected’ it is to its own world is a necessary consequence of God accommodating Himself” and saying “That the Bible, at every turn, shows how ‘connected’ it is to its own world is a necessary consequence of God incarnating Himself” (I&I, p.20) given the way Enns uses the metaphor of 'incarnation'?

I cannot help thinking that those who try to push Enns outside the bounds of the Reformed tradition are as selectively engaged with the tradition as they are with the Biblical data. They ignore the bits of the tradition that do not square with their own personal theological convictions and dub the narrow stream of theological opinions with which they personally are comfortable as “the Tradition.” In my estimation, what such folk, in effect, do is form the Tradition in their own image.

handsome devils: part deux

Yet another example of the acorn not falling far from the tree. The one on the left is my dad's senior picture and the one on the right is mine.