The City of God I, 19: Rape and Suicide

For some reason not entirely clear to me, Augustine now enters on a long argumentation against suicide (17-27). He starts by discussing the opinion that consecrated virgins maybe should considering taking their lives rather than getting raped (this appearently happened during the Sack of Rome).

In chapter 19 he refers to the Roman legend about Lucretia, who after being raped took her life. This legend is one of the legends that was thought to all children in the Roman Empire, and Lucretias courage and sense of justice was seen as a great example of Roman virtue. So when Augustine criticises her and upholds the Christian idea that suicide is always wrong (unless God commands it, Augustine is not entirely sure about the storis offChristian saints that did the same, 26), he is engaging in a nice little piece of culture criticism, displaying how Christinaity values different virtues from the (pagan) empire.

In that case, therefore, when she slew herself because she had endured the act of an adulterer even though she was not an adulteress herself, she did this not from love of purity, but because of a weakness arising from shame. She was made ashamed by the infamy of another, even though comitted against her without her consent. Being a Roman lady excessively eager for praise, she feared that, if she remained alive, she would be thought to have enjoyed suffering the violence that she had suffered when she lived. ...
But this is not what those Christian women did who suffered the same way yet are still alive. They did not avenge another's crime upon themselves; and it was because they feared adding to the crime of others a crime of their own that they did not do so.

But this is not what those Christian women did who suffered the same way yet are still alive. They did not avenge another's crime upon themselves; and it was because they feared adding to the crime of others a crime of their own that they did not do so.

I wonder what the raped women would think of this.

The City of God I,9: Why Bad Things Happen to Good People

So, I am reading Augustine, The City of God Against the Pagans. Since I kind of want to do political theology based on the early Church, it is more or less mandatory reading, isn't it? I'll be posting down the things that strike me as interesting, mostly for future reference. I have only read parts of it before, even though Augustine was a kind of first love to me as a undergraduate.

Augustine's argument here is simply that everybody do commit some sins, so everybody deserves the bad things that happen to them. He qualifies this a bit later on, but what strikes me about this is how very "western" this kind of thinking in, perhaps even Augustinian. Augustine refers to the difference between laymen and ascetics. Even those that have chosen "a higher order of life" do commit the sin of not rebuking other peoples crimes.

This, I would argue, is an idea that is not very likely to show up in the eastern fathers. First of all, they would not actually refer to sin to answer the question, they would say that God lets bad things happen to people in order to make it possible for them to improve their way of life. "Without temptations, no one could ever be saved". (Isaac of Nineveh)

Secondly, at least among eastern ascetics, to argue that people should pay more attentions to other people's sins would be very unusual. In fact, I think that would be considered a very grave temptation!

John Milbank: The Future of Love

If you, like me, have had a hard time to really understand what Milbank is really about, this is the book for you. What these essays do is really to clarify a lot of things that remains unclear in his other books. This happens in different ways. In the first section we get (mildly updated) versions of Milbanks really early eighties stuff, and this for me shows where he is coming from. These are readings of English theologians (!) that I have never heard of ( apart from Newman). These texts are mostly interesting to someone who wants to study Milbanks own development, but for the rest of us they are mainly interesting beacuase they are fairly ordinary. This is before TST, and he is not as well read as later (he mainly sticks to the writer at issue).

The fun begins with the TST era writings. There are two chapters (I think) must have been written while he was working on TST and here we see the Milbankisms starting to appear (sociology in inverted commas, references to nihilism and french philosophy by the truckloads). Then there are three chapters made up of responses to criticism of TST and these really help to answer some of the questions I had after reading it. In particular, Milbank really fleshes out his vision of the Church, the major flaw of TST, IMO. And obviously his politics is made much more explicit here.

But the most impressive part of the book is the three chapters under the header "Political Theology Today". Here Milbank uses his wide knowledge of western intellectual history to comment on current affairs, in he does this extremely well. In particular the essay on 9/11 is among the best I have read on the topic. As a critic of US policy he is defintiely on par with the chomsky's and Klein's of the world, and original too. I do not think I could say this about another theologian. Please correct me if I am wrong.

Then follows a part on theology and pluralism, and obviously this is much more problematic at least for me. If the "political theology" part is what attracts me to Milbank, this is what makes me hesitant. His stand on dialogue between religions goes beyond merely pointing out real problems in the field. His conclusion is bascially "convert!" and clearly this is a bit disappointing. I am not sure either that his rather fanatical view of theology as a field in academia is very helpful.

In the final part we find the superb "Postmodern Critical Augustinianism", which probably is the best text Milbank has written. Had I not chanced on this I would not have bothered reading a word more from him after TST. Why is it so good? Not only is it concise and well argued. It has a tone that is somewhat different from most of Milbanks writings, maybe because this is a rare moment where he is not polemicising against anyone (there are parts of "Being reconciled" that are similar in this sense). This feels like an important point to make, but I do not know what to make of it myself. It is clear that to be able to say what he says hear about Christianity and Theology would not be possible for him to say had he not first "liberated" himself from so much of the liberal and secular thinking he fights against elsewere.

All of these texts are published elsewere, so they can be dug up in the library. But the volume is really worth its price for anyone interested in political theology today.

On Theology as "Resource"

This recently occured to me and I haven't really worked out the implications of this notion yet. There are certain kinds of theology that I just do not like, even if I agree with lots of what is said. I can be certain kinds of political theology, ecotheology, some feminist theology and so on. Why? Because it tries to make use of theology for other non-theological purposes. It speaks a lot of the Christian tradition as a resource for tackling various issues.

There are some obvious problems with this approach. Most importantly, it seems to imply that theology itself is not involved in the actual engagement with these problems, that happens on some different arena, be it the political world, everyday life or some kind of activism. Theology is then seen as a reserve of ideas or structures of thinking that can be taken out of its context and "applied" (is there any use of that world that is not corrupt?). Obviously very few of these theologians would agree with this image of theology, because paradoxically, that would be a extremely "conservative" view of theology, and the theologies I am now talking about usually thinks of themselves as progressive or even radical. So what is going on here?

What seems to be the motivation for this move is a wish to be relevant in a larger sphere of society than academia or church. This in itself is commendable, but there are a number of possible preconceptions that seem to be at work here that are problematic.

First, there seems to be an idea of the church as either isolated or insignificant, or both. To be relevant one has to engage with the secular, and then on secular terms, that is to bring in isolated ideas without connection to the messy religious stuff. Like, "See you can view nature as creation, with all the nice possibilities that opens up, without really having to think about God", which is obvious nonsense. So, instead of being relevant, you end up being incoherent or just confused.

Further, is not this an essentially market-based view of the world? Theology is then the production of marketable "ideas" as semi-products, competing in a imaginary marketplace of ideas. This is especially ironic if the "ideas" created are supposed to be a criticism of capitalism.

Ultimately this is a view of theology that presupposes that theology in fact is not "relevant" and thus has to become something else to be that. I wonder if one can say anything with some kind of importance if one starts by believing that one in fact cannot. Yet this seems to be the logic behind this kind of reasoning.

This brings me to the kind of theology that I do like. This would be the kind that instead of "exporting" ideas from theology to the outside, incorporates the world into theology. (see that I tried to continue with the market metaphor and say "import" but it would not fit). Now this is exactly what Tillich did, but I have to say that the ones that understand themselves to stand in some tradition from Tillich today are very often doing theology of the other kind. However, theologians that do theology more or less consciously against that tradition (Hauerwas, Milbank) end up doing what he did.

More on the Monstrosity of ZIzek

Adam Kotsko of An und für sich do not see what my problem is with Zizek's position in The Monstrosity of Christ. Adam clearly knows much more than me about Zizek, so it might just be me who do not understand Zizek, or (more likely) that this is what Zizek always have been saying.

My point is simply this: The way I read Zizek's response to Milbank is as an attempt to show that even though he finds some aspects of Christianity interesting (The death of God as a basis for Athesim), he really has no interest in ledning his support to theological projects of other kinds. He simplt isn't interested in love as Christianity understands it, in redemption and so on. It seems to me he wants to make clear how far away he is from any more properly Christian position on ethics, on community or on a vision of a good society. In seeking to avoid the "disgusting proximity" of other humans, Zizek effectively and completely rejects the idea of Church.

In short: I read him as saying: "Fu*k off stupid theologians stop bothering me".

Louth on Litugy, Tradition and the Child

This is from Andrew Louth's Discerning the Mystery:

The importance of liturgy, then, for tradition is that by the very fact of its being performed, of its being the doing of something that others have done before us, of its being a matter of significant actions that suggest meaning rather than define it, it introduces us into a context, a realm of values, in which the significance of tradition can be seen. By the fact that it goes beyond speech, it impresses on us the importance of the inarticulate: and it is not without significance that inarticulateness about what is deeply important is characteristic of the child, whom we have to be like if we are to enter the kingdom of heaven.

This is exactly right. Isn't it so that traditions with little appreciation of liturgy either have little appreciation of tradition or a very legalistic understanding of tradition, as something that has to be obeyed? And his incredibly exact comment on the child has a very deep meaning, not only about how adults should approach the liturgy, but about how essential it is that we have children there - as teachers.

Kathryn Tanner: Economy of Grace

A collegue, upon hearing that I was reading a lot of Milbank, focusing on the political and ecclesiological implications, groaned and told me I should read Kathryn Tanner instead. Why not, I thought, there is plenty of room for other perspectives in relation to Milbank that is for sure. And the text on the back of this one was very promising, speaking of "alternatives to global capitalism" and "specific principles of economics and economic justice".

However, this is in my opinion false advertising. Tanner is not proposing an alternative to capitalism, she is concerned with modifying it in a slightly more humane direction. This is a pragmatic move, she wants to avoid utopia. Fair enough, I can accept that, although I personally think that we need a utopia to imagine what really needs to change.

Tanner's criticism of capitalism is rather shallow however. She criticises the rather obvious consequences of global capitalism - rampaging unfairness rather well, although anybody even remotely familiar with "leftist" writings will find little new here. She also argues for some "theological principles" based mainly on creation, trinity and grace in general that she maintains offers an alternative to capitalist economics.

But from a theological point of view i find the main part of the book "Putting a theological Economy to Work" the most problematic. None of the suggestions she actually makes here seems to need ant theological underpinning whatsoever. The Marxist "to each according to his needs" will work just as well. Furthermore, in order to be "realistic" she compromises each of the principles she argued for in the preceding chapters. In the end she ends up arguing for a model that "everybody" is profiting from, including (especially) the capitalist. In other words, what we have here is little but the now traditional "third way" socialism, an improved capitalism in an essentially Keynesian tradition.

This means that Tanner has to pass over some extremely important points. One, isn't it from a theological point of view less important if capitalism works or not, compared to what it does to us, what kind of human beings this system produces? In essence, capitalism in all its knows forms (including the famed Scandinavian model) makes use of (and thus encourages) greed, a vice an almost unanomous Christian tradition claims corrodes the soul. To try to improve this system thus ammounts to giving it a "human face" while its heart remains decidedly rotten.

There is a good discussion on method here, but apart from that, this just isn't very good theology. However, in the end that is not the point of this book. It is not driven by a theological motive, but a political one.

This book tries to provide such grounds for Christians, especially in the United States, advantaged beyond all decent proportions by the present system. The more economic benefits we enjoy, the more power we are likely to have to change things. We should use that power - say, the power of our vote in the most economically dominant nation on earth - to put pressure on the U.S. government to change its policies for international trade and financing agreements that only further disadvantage the already disadvantaged around the globe. (p 142)

While I do think a lot of the things she writes makes political sense, I would really like to see a more radical alternative than "vote for change".Because it is the lack of alternatives that at the moment continues to further capitalism today more than a real belief in its superiority.

Milbank vs. Zizek: The Monstrosity of Christ

I guess there should be a spoiler warning here, at least for me this book had what can be best describe as a surprise ending: I threw it away in disgust. But we're getting ahead of ourselves.

A lot has happened since this infamous (in my universe anyway) post, where I went my frustration over Milbank's Theology and Social Theory. I have to admit that I am at the moment compeltely fascinated by Being reconciled, although there are large chunks of it I do not agree with, either regarding method (the chapter on forgiveness) or substance (violence, of course). However, the chapter on Church, Politics and Culture are about the best I have read in a long time.

I also enjoy(ed) Zizek a lot. His way of reading texts (in a very broad sense) is incredibly creative, and I will never see The Sound of Music the same way again.

This book leaves a lot of shattered dreams behind, I'm sure. A lot of attempts to do theology in dialogue with Zizek that will now have to be rethought, or abandoned. Because at least as far as I know, In his past discussion of Christian theology, he has always remained somewhat ambigous, always left things a bit open for interpretation. Not this time.

But no one can possibly be more disappointed than Milbank. I do not know where that blurb on the back of Being Reconciled comes from (does anyone know if there is an actual review of it out there somewhere?) where Zizek basically says that this is finally the real shit. Milbank must have been so proud of that. What theologian would not be when hearing praise like that from one of the worlds most famous intellectuals? And then this.

The first part, where Zizek presents his reading of Christianity adds little to The Puppet and the Dwarf. The most striking thing here is that it is really apparent that Zizek's knowledge is of theology is really patchy. He makes som really far fetched claims about Eastern Orthodoxy based on Lossky alone, and makes some rather obvious mistakes that Milbank rather kindly points out later on.

Milbanks part of the book, is not that revealing either. Lots of discussion on Hegel and more interestingly, Meister Eckhart. Milbank accuses Zizek of being protestant, basically. And for me this was the most interesting aspect of Milbank's text, his criticism of Lutheranism is fleshed out a lot more than what I have read so far. His attempt to make Kierkegaard an "Catholic honoris causa" is a bit awkward though.

So obvious it is Zizeks response to Milbank's criticism that is what ultimately makes this book worth its prize. After som niceties about the "authentic spirituality" of Milbank's position, he bluntsly states: "Of course i fail to see this ... because to me, there is no transcendent God-Father. " What that basically says is: "Nice120 pages, but did do miss the part about me being an atheist?" But it gets worse, much worse. For then he goes on to show Milbank that his Catholicism is basically a form of paganism, that is protestantism that is the kind of Christianity he finds interesting, with the focus on the Cross, and especially, get this, radical death-of-God theology in the vain of Thomas Altizer. Poor Milbank.

So that is the one big point of this book. Now a completely different kind of theology is endorsed by the great Zizek. However. The other point is that I am not sure if any theologian actually want tha endorsement anymore. Because the dialogue form of this book makes Zizek come clear on several areas at least I was not aware of his stance on. Maybe it is just me, but I kind of felt all this talk about being stalinist and so on was ironic posturing. Not so. Not only does Zizek's atheism in the end be like any other atheist's, only slightly more educated. But his ethics are described in a way that made me, as a christian, loose al my interest in whatever else he has to say.

At one points he discusses the situation where he would encounter one of thos doctors that aid in torture, helping the torturers decide how much the victim can take.

I must admit that if I were to encounter such a person, knowing that there was little chance of bringing him to legal justice, and be given the opportunity to murder him discreetly, I would simply do it, without a vestige of remorse about "taking the law into my own hands."

In another instance he seems to endorse a "violent totalitarian regime", but here there is some ambiguity. But no matter, for his final definition of his moral ideal in itself is enough, and that was where to book flew out of my hands in disgust.

This is where I stand - how I would love to be: an ethical monster without empathy, doing what is done in a weird coincidence of blind spontaneity and reflexive distance, helping others while avoiding their disgusting proximity. With more people like this, the world would be a pleasant place which sentimentality would be replaced by cold and cruel passion.

Surely, after this any theological engagement with this kind of philosophy will be nothing but a waste of time, a way of keep missing the point about Christianity?

Done!

On Friday I publicly defended my dissertation Understanding Asceticism. Body and Society in the Asceticism of St Isaac of Nineveh. During three hours Professor Samuel Rubenson (right) of Lund University examined every aspect of my book and I did my best to defend it. It was a good experience, though it certainly felt eerie to hear somebody else retell what I have written. It was a good day in all, both the Disputatio and the dinner in the evening.

And my dissertation? Here's what its about:

The scholarly understanding of asceticism has in the recent decades shifted away from a negative view where asceticism is primarily seen as (self-)renunciation, towards a view where the focus is on asceticism as performance and recreated identity. In this study the texts of St Isaac of Nineveh (7th century) is read in order to clarify the role of the body in asceticism and the relationship between asceticism and society.

For Isaac ascetic life is a way to manage the universally human fear of death. This fear can be detected beneath several everyday worries, such as fear of sickness and other hazards, but also in the form of pursuit of riches and power. It is a central aspect of Isaac’s thinking that society works by exploiting the human weaknesses called passions. This means that a life focused towards God is a life directed against life in society, in the “world”.

In order to understand ascetic techniques such as fasting, vigils and prayer, it is helpful to see them as symbolical acts similar to rituals. A person going through a ritual is on the one hand transformed; on the other hand a message is communicated to the community. Ascetic life can be seen as such a ritual that encompasses the entire life of the ascetic. The ascetic separates him- or herself from society in order to enter into community with the angels and the coming world. In this way the ascetic communicates a distancing from society and its structures.

To understand the symbolical content of the ascetic techniques it is necessary to know their original context. To fast will send out completely different signals in a society where all meals signify community, than in a society where meals are often taken alone. In general the ascetic techniques can be interpreted as either ways to distance oneself from society or for integration into the community of the coming world (or both).

In these techniques the body plays a special role. Isaac talks about the body in two contrasting ways. When describing the role of the body in prayer it is something very positive; when describing human weaknesses the body is very negative. This duality in body-talk suggests an awareness of the capacity of the body to function as a symbol rather than some extreme body-soul dualism. Within the framework of a certain ascetic technique the body comes to represent human weakness, a body of passions. In a different context the body will signify something else.

For Isaac ascetic life is a parallel to the sacraments of the Church. Both phenomena are understood as the breaking in of the next world in this one, and thus creating in this world a tangible image of a different possible world. When Isaac is describing ecstatic experiences he does it in terms of a union like that of human and divine in Christ, or in terms of the unity between the persons of the Holy Trinity. Through asceticism the ascetic becomes theology.

Milbank discussion

There is a extremely revealaing discussion with John Milbank posted at livedtheology.org (HT: Theopolitical.com, F&T). It discusses the last chapter of Theology and Social Thery, but it goes off in all kinds of directions, and Milbank talks a bit about his background and stuff. For those of you, like me, still trying to figure out what it actually is Milbank wants to accomplish this is a great source.

Otherwise, the book came to be written really by accident in the sense that I was asked to write a textbook, and the publishers were totally horrified when I didn’t produce a text book. And when I set out to write it I really honestly and truly assumed I was going to talk about the mutual help that theology, sociology, and Marxism could give to each other. But somehow quite quickly when I started to get into that I felt that there was an incredible assumption going on in the usual approaches, that somehow social/scientific discourses were sort of theologically innocent or neutral, and that theology wasn’t inherently itself a social theory and an account of history. And I suppose that is the main methodological point in a sense that is being made.

Meme: The Academy and the Poor

Dan asks the difficult question: when confronted with 'the Poor' of our day, how do you justify your own academic endeavours?

As I have said before, living in Finland, "the poor" tend to be arather abstract concept. Although the divide between those that have and those that don't has widened considerably in Finland during the last few decades, what goves for poverty here is still being privileged if want takes the global perspective.

But that does not really change things that much. So I would answer the question this way.

1. The Academy has not given me very much in terms of money, power or security. I'm really badly paid (mind you I'm not complaining), my wife works in a kindergarten and she has a lot more than I. Which is ok, because I love my job. People that have jobs that need big salaty as motivation are kind of sad. What I'm saying with this is that working in the academy has for me moved me closer to the "poor" of our community, in that I share with them the constant feeling that when my short term working contract ends (next month) I have no real idea how to pay the mortages on our house.

2. I would never ever ever accept to do academic work that I do not feel in the long run at least serves to somehow change this world a little. Be it by teaching future pastors to see the global implications of their future work, or by working on theology in a way that asks the questions about the way our world functions. I cannot honestly say that I know of a way that I could hope to do more good than in the way I hope to do inside, or one the margin of academia. For me, in my situation, the university is still a place where there is at least some space for thinking against the powers of the world. As long as that is true (and that space is shrinking all the time), I'll try to hang on.

I'm not sure if a meme on a subject like this can work (a bit easier to name your favourite book!), but do feel tagged if you like to.

Book Review: Theology and the Political - The New Debate

I was very excited about this volume, since it seems to take the Radical Orthodoxy in the direction I find most interesting, and because it has such a impressive list of writers from outside of Theology, many of which I regard highly (Zizek, Toni Negri, Simon Critchley to a degree). And there is much of interest here (and a lot of filler, that has to be said), but still one comes away from it with some sense of disappontment. None of the writers from outside theology engage with the RO perspective, nor, with the exception of Zizek, with theology properly. Thus the title is kind of misleading.

In this volume the bad i mostly boring so I won't waste time on that. The writers that stand out for me in this volume is Zizek, Daniel M. Bell, Catherine Picstock (much better here than in "Radical Orthodoxy"), Graham Ward and John Millbank. In other words, the core of the RO-Movement all give good contributions here.

Zizek reads Chesterton like no other, and comes out with very interesting things about paganism and Christianity. Only Christianity gives us possibility to enjoy this world, because unlike for pagans, Christians do not belive that "tomorrow we will die". Funny as hell also, although I still do not understand why he insists on describing Christianity as perverse.

Bell reads Deleuze, and more interestingly, Anselm. To read Anselm away from the ususal economic framwork is fruitful, and of the many criticisms of Capitalism that are found in this book, Bell's is the one I feel most likely to return to.

Ward does Marx. His argument, that is repeated in many of the other essays, is that capitalism and marxism share too much in terms of basic premises, and that Christianity offers a radically different view of man and the world, one that is based on gift instead of contract, on love instead of fear and so on.

Millbank discusses the Christian claim to universality based on Badiou and Zizek. I think a lot of this is solid stuff. I have been hesitant to think much about the idea of universal truth and Milbank does have some interesting points. But there is an obvious problem, that is not so much visible here as in this interview.

(The ‘other religions’ thing doesn’t matter. The world as a whole is rapidly Christianizing and even in Islamic countries Muslims are finding their own intriguing Islamic way to Christ in ever increasing numbers; this is readily verifiable).

What on earth can he possibly mean? Is this Milbank's suggestion for how Christianity is to deal with "other religions". It seems absurdly naive, to the point of delusional. If this is what his notion Christian universalism is like, I think we'd better pass on it.

Can anybody possibly shed som light on what he could be referring to?

The Real Method of Correlation

This recently occured to me, and I am a fool for just spilling it out on the net and not writing an article for some famous periodical on it.

I now why Tillich fell out of favour. It's David Tracy's fault.

See, every time I see a reference to correlation in theology these days, I always have the same feeling that there is something wrong. I always feel that what the writer is criticising has little resemblance to what Tillich intended with his correlation method.

Let me first describe what I feel is the usual notion of what the method of correlation does, then describe what Tillich really meant, and finally describe how this is the fault of poor Tracy.

It may all be down to a poor choice of term (English, as you know, was not one of Tillich's strengths). Usually people think that when using a correlation method in Theology you seek for similarities in the Christian tradition on the one hand, and for example (secular) philosophy on the other. In effect you would be saying something like "The Christian doctrine of sin is the same as Heidegger's notion of guilt". This method is correctly criticised for in effect using semi-religious language to re-tell the secular story.

However, this was not what Tillich meant with the method of correlation. For Tillich the point is to use philosophy, psychology, art and similar discourses to describe relevant questions in the present cultural situation. Theology then seeks to give answers to these questions, based on revelation (scripture, tradition and so on). Interestingly a few decades ago this idea was considered to be to give theology a to great role, believing that theology could actually provide answers to common human problems. Wouldn't it be better to just let Theology deal with religious problems?

I guess this is one of the reasons Tracy developed Tillichs method by adding the idea of the hermeneutic circle. No longer would Theology give answers to problems in the human situation but there would be a going back and forth where theology and the situation would interpret each other. This, however, seems to lead to a situation where theology looses its right to interpret itself by its own rules, which is what the method is usually criticised for.

Of course, Tracy is not completely wrong. What he describes does take place. But it is not a method for theology. What he describes is something that has to do with being a theologian, which is a slight but important difference.

Tillich's point was that Theology always has used the method of correlation and always will. And I still can't see how it could be otherwise if theology want to be relevant in any way. So, case in point. In the introduction of "Radical Orthodoxy - a New Theology" we read:

The present collection of essayes attempts to reclaim the world by situating its concerns and activities within a theological framework. Not simply returning in nostalgia to the premodern, it visits sites in which secularism has invested heavily - aesthetics, politics, sex, the body, personhood, visibility, space - and resituates them from a Christian standpoint; that is in terms of the Trinity, Christology, the Church and the Eucharist.

This is exactly what Tillich meant with correlation, to address concerns in the present world from a theological standpoint. Clearly, depending on what questions are asked, different aspects of the Christian tradition will be emphasized, but the fact that Tillich would put the focus on creation and salvation rather than Trinity and Christology is more down to him being Lutheran and not a (roman/anglo) catholic in an age where that mattered.

Radical Orthodoxy - a book review

Here's some thoughts on Radical Orthodoxy - A New Theology. I have to say that on the whole I am glad I read it. A few of the essay's are really good, and a few are quite bad, and a few are somewhere in between.

My faviorites are John Montag's essay on Revelation, and William T. Cavanaugh's text on the state. Montag's article for me cleared up why the reason-revelation dichotomy is false. That it is false i pretty obvious, but it was interesting to see how we got into that place.

Cavanaugh's text is my favorite of the bunch. I am actually discussing it more thoroughly in an article I'm writing at the moment. He shows how the state is a parody of the Church, that fails to deliver what both Church and State promises to deliver - peace. A Church that has given up this task (to bring peace) and delegated it to the secular state is to me a good definition of a State Church. We have a lot of those, and it really is a good question to ask if the can properly be called churches at all.

While I agree that the Eucharist should be the place where true peace is fostered, I wonder what we should do when it in practice clearly isn't to most. Most people that care about the Eucharist see it as some form of spiritual reload, and most, at least in Lutheran Finland, seem to see it as a nice coda after the sermon. These questions I discuss in my article...

But yeah, that bad ones. I already wrote on the one on Wittgenstein. I didn't understand a word of Catherine Pickstock's text on music. Graham Ward's text on the Body of Christ is interesting, but some of the themes hinted at there are quite disturbing... I am NOT sure if it is a good idea to explore Christ's relationship to Mary in terms of incest.

But the real rotten egg of the bunch is Philip Blond's essay on art. While he clearly knows way more about art than I do, I still feel he is in no position to lecture on what art should be like. I won't even go into why he makes these recommendations nor what they are, simply the idea that theology should somehow dictate art is preposterous. If that is his vision of a Christianity free from secular bonds, I'll go with the seculars, thank you. His vision of an art that correctly portays the real makes me think of Christian pop music, another disgusting concept.

Anyway, what I find inspiring with this book is that it covers such a wide area of themes, yet manages to keep one distinctive approach to them. This, I guess, is what has made Radical Orthodoxy so popular (for want of a better word). That, and the cool name. Although it is a bit ironic that a theology that carries a criticism of capitalism with it would make use of such a central capitalistic concept as the brand.

Next, I'll tackle the newer volume on Politics and Theology edited by Milbank.

Wittgensteinian metaphysics

I bet that header will get me a lot of google hits.

So, well, yeah, I am reading Radical Orthodoxy - a New Theology. The first two essay's I like. Millbank is doing his "I know how secularism came about" thing, and manages not to be very obnoxious... In the second essayJohn Montag traces the reason/revelation division back to Suárez, thus creating another theology bad guy. This is very good stuff.

But the third essay is much weaker. Here Conor Cunningham tries to show a few things. First that the "two Wittgensteins" are in fact rather close to each other, which is probably not very surprising. More importantly, Cunningham tries to show that Wittgenstein in spite of claims to the contrary, in fact builds his philosophy on (you guessed it) secular metaphysics. I do not find this convincing at all.

It is one thing to state that Wittgenstein in some sense stands in the tradition of Kant. This I can accept: there are clear parallels between Kant's critique of reason and Wittgenstein's "critique" of language. But when Cunningham tries to show that the (mostly later) Wittgenstein's ideas about language is a kind of undercover metaphysics the arguing becomes almost embarrassing.

Let me state first that I am no expert on Wittgenstein. The fact is I have read very little by him. But I do work in a very Wittgensteinian environment. Philosophy at my University is very much Wittgenstein so one tends to pick up a lot of Wittgensteinian influences by osmosis. (We actually have something of a tradition. Finland's greates philosopher, Georg Henrik von Wright, who succeeded Wittgentein as professor of Philosophy at Camebridge came here for the later part of his carreer. Besides being a close friend of Wittgentein he also oversaw the publication of most of the posthumous writings). Anyway, I do have some sense of what is usually considered to be themost central points in Wittgenstein's philosophy.

Cunnigham basically suggests that because Wittgenstein says that "language games" are given, this is to say that they have some kind of metaphysical status, analogous to Kant's categories. This seems to me to be to willfully misunderstand W's point. Cunnigham seems to think that Wittgenstein means that language game and the grammar of language games "exist" prior to the actually situation where they are put to use. This would indeed be some kind of covert metaphysics.

But what W means when he says that language games are given is rather that they are not constructed, that they are not "made up" and that they therefore could be in need of some kind of improvement by philosophers. They are the way they are. But it is absurd to read this as a kind of metaphysics. A language game does not exist prior to the life-form it functions in. When a new life-form arises (I guess by and by) a new language game arises with it. There is nothing mysterious about this. Language games are not like Kant's categories, they do not shape our use of language, the notion of language games just helps us describe how language functions.

I read this essay as a symptom of some kind of theological paranoia. A more generous approach would be to grant that Wittgenstein's philosophy accepts that various sorts of language, including Christian language does not have to measure up to some universal standard (reason, secular or otherwise), but functions according to its own logic. Isn't this pretty close to what RO is about?

Back?

I'm not sure if I feel ready to get back into theology-blogging, but maybe I'll give it a try. I'm reading theology again, and in the past blogging has been a good way for me to organize my reading.

First some updates, if anybody has wondered what I have been up to.

My thesis is more or less finished. Actually, It would have been finished already if a certain famous professor had not taken quite a bit more time than expected to read it and give it a go ahead...

As the last few posts showed, my interest in politics has lately overtaken my interest for theology... That may be changing at the moment, but as I say that is too soon to say. The combination of theology and politics is still my major area of interest.

If some of my more regular readers are still around, they will find this very ironic, but what I'm currently doing is trying to get a deeper understanding of, yep, postmodern theology. Particularly Radical Orthodoxy. I'm still not 100% convinced that it is worth while doing, but there are some aspects of it that intrigue me, and I have a hunch that my "expertise" on asceticism actually may have some value in this discussion... More about that later, maybe.

What I like about radical orthodoxy is that it shuns both conservative and liberal theology, although I do not at all agree with the image of 20th century theology that the foster. There seems to be a will to completely by-pass this century (and the 19th) among these writers. I don't think this is a valid way to be post-modern.

I am also intrigued my some of the political ideas around among these writers, but I'm still not sure about the way they fit together with the other ideas.

And I'm still to find a proper worked out radical orthodoxy ecclesiology - is there one? The entire concept points towards ecclesiology, but exactly what that ecclesiology is like seems to be difficult to articulate. But I may just have missed it. Suggestions welcome.

Anyway, I might post some on my continued reading of radical orthodoxy texts. Or not. Will see.

New Radiohead album!

I knew they were up to something!

This appeared on the Radiohead blog today:

Hello everyone. Well, the new album is finished, and it's coming out in 10 days; We've called it In Rainbows. Love from us all. Jonny

Radiohead has been without a recording contract since the last album, and there has been much speculation on what they would do with this new album. Well their sollution is quite radical.

There are two options. Either you chose to download it from the "In Rainbows" site. Hear this: You decide what to pay for it.

Or you order the "Discbox" which includes two cd:s and vinyls, a book with artwork and lyrics, and the download. Price 40 pounds.

So this is Radiohead's bid for the future of the musicindustry then.

Why Bush Invaded Iraq and How it Went Wrong

Ok, this is a long speach, but it is really the best account of the US occupation of Iraq that I have come across. Naomi Klein deals with the motives for the occupation - military bases and a free market economy - and tells how the Amercan administration did anything but bring democracy to Iraq. They actually fought every tendency towards democracy in Iraq with everything the had.

It's a fascinating story, and it makes one quite angry. Hopwfully it will make some angry enough to act.

Muslim Creationism - A Case of Interfaith Dialogue?

Just as some Christians feel the Theory of Evolution stands in conflict with the Bible, some Muslims feel it is in Conflict with the Quran. This is perhaps not so odd in itself, but I at least was surprised to find out that these groups actually stand in contact with each other.

During a visit to the University of Göttingen in Germany last week, I was given a publication in which Dr. Martin Riexinger tells the interesting story of Turkish Creationism. The history goes back to the 19th century, but gets interesting during the 1980's, when the school books in the (until then?) rigorously secular state schools were modified so that not only were creationism introduced as an alternative to evolution in biology, but fierce anti-evolution polemics was introduced in the books on religious education (a subject introduced at the same time).

The Turkish found inspiration among American Evangelicals, who were often cited as western scientists. The reason that evangelical protestants were noted in Muslim circles in Turkey also had to do with the fact that US creationists repeatedly visited Turkey to look for Noak's ark on mount Ararat. However, the evangelical argumentation for a young earth was of no interest to the Turks, since the Quran does not contain any narrative comparable to that of Genesis regarding the early generations of humans.

Even more fascinating is the fact that the contacts have also gone in the other direction, from Turkey to the US. In 2004, Mustafa Akyol, who teaches an Islamic variation of the "Intelligent Design"-theory, was invited to a hearing at the Kansas Department of Education, at which the question if ID was to be taught in Kansas Schools was discussed. The idea was to bring in a Muslim in order to rebut the argument that ID is based on Christian Theology.

Monbiot sums up the Cliamte Camp

Here.

(Note: I will post some religion-relevant material soon, I promise...)