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From: mangoe@mimsy.umd.edu (Charley Wingate)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Breaking free of a literalistic interpretation of the Bible
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Date: 27 Sep 89 07:00:58 GMT
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Our querent might find some anglican writers worth reading as well.  I think
the unsophisticated reader may find Robinson's book confusing, but it is
worth reading with a LOT of salt.

One thing I've noticed from reading the net is that there is a strong modern
tendency towards a lack of criticism of one's own doubt.  Robinson shows a
certain amount of this bias, and his book has been criticized for it.  I
don't agree with the oft-advanced argument that if one has no hard standard,
one has no standard at all; scripture does not truly permit the hard
standard, so it appears that this is a risk we must take.  But it is not a
meritless criticism.  It is very tempting to doubt for the wrong reasons.
Urban Holmes made the comment about Tillich, who was fond of referring to
the doctrine of the incarnation as "the anglican heresy", that Tillich's
origin in the tradition of German idealism prevented him from taking the
doctrine seriously.

Here I would like to inject a little personal testimony.  There was a pair
of articles in _Atlantic_ about two years back in which many contemporary
theologians expressed their views of the state of theology.  In the midst of
this article, which I would highly commend to Mr. Daniels, Schillebeecx said
that he felt that, at root, the gospels showed that "something happened to
Jesus".  This struck me (especially in light of the skepticism seen in so
many of the other comments).  I too have come to feel that we should not be
so willing to let go of the resurrection.

Anyway, I would commend two authors here.  The first, and obvious, and so
very bourgeous, is C.S.Lewis.  His arguments are full of holes when he
argues for a point; his viewpoint is very naive.  Nevertheless, I think he
has a lot of useful things to say against skepticism-- and against mindless
dogmatism.  It's hard to pick a specific book to start with, given the
manifest imperfections of the various books.  Perhaps _Miracles_ would be
best.

Another author (one of my favorites) is Robert Farrar Capon, particularly
_Hunting the Divine Fox_ and _The Third Peacock_.  Capon is a bit mad and
rather irreverent (Jeff Smith, aka the Frugal Gourmet, cites him as an
inspiration [and resembles him physically too], and Capon has several books
on cooking, including the wonderfully absurd _The Supper of the Lamb_, which
is worth it just for the entertainment value).  Here, at least on one level,
we are about as far from Bonhoeffer as we can get.  But all his irreverence
has an important point to make, and his perspective is so different that I
think it may prove quite helpful.  And he is VERY funny....

Tillich's book on faith is also very interesting, even though I have some
strong disagreements with it.
C. Wingate           + "Our God, to whom we turn when weary with illusion,
                     + whose stars serenely burn above this earth's confusion,
mangoe@mimsy.umd.edu + thine is the mightly plan, the steadfast order sure
mimsy!mangoe         + in which the world began, endures, and shall endure."