Scripture, Answers, and Alex Trebek
A few days ago I read this post over at Dan Kimball's blog, and I haven't been able to get it out of my head. I thought it was profoundly disturbing, particularly when I read the part about "some issues are just black and white". It's disturbing particularly because it's an approach to scripture that's so common among Christians today - God's Answer Book, or some such. But is that really what this is all about? I have to be honest with you - I can't make it work for me. Saying, "The Bible has all the answers," defines a rather odd relationship between a person and scripture. Besides the fact that reducing the Story of God to an encyclopedia of historic facts and theological statements, it clearly begs the question. Nobody who utters such a statement ever intends for it to be taken literally. There are any number of questions on which the Bible is completely and unabashedly silent. "How do I change the oil in my car?" "What kind of wine goes well with beef?" "How many licks does it take to get to the tootsie roll center of a tootsie pop?"
The difficulty with approaching scripture from this vantage is that it can't help but turn into something ugly. The reason that I say this is because one can only look for answers once we've defined the questions - and defining the questions is a matter of power and control. There are some questions that are approved: What does the Bible say about justification by faith? Ahhh, they say, and nod their heads. The Bible has the answers. Turn with me to Galatians. There are other questions, though, that are clearly not allowed: Where, exactly, does scripture call itself "inerrant"? How do we deal with the Old Testament picture of God, which seems so different from Jesus? What, exactly, is the gospel anyway? I'm not saying that scripture has no answers to these questions. I am, however, suggesting that merely providing answers may not be the point exactly. What if scripture is at least as much about the questions as it is about the answers? What if the point of much of the stuff that we struggle with is to get us to ask the questions in the first place?
If the Bible is an answer book, then it must, absolutely must, say the same thing all the time about a given subject - hence the focus on things like inerrancy and refuting contradictions and whatnot. But if scripture is a question book, then something changes. Ross wrote something a while back on hermeneutics, about how we need to be able to hold the "It is written," with the "It is also written." Here is a case in point: Deuteronomy, God's authoritative Word, defines the relationship that Israel was to have with Ammon and Moab: "No Ammonite or Moabite or any of his descendants may enter the assembly of the LORD, even down to the tenth generation." It's quite clear, right? No ambiguity there - it is written. But there's a slight problem. Fast forward to Ruth. Ruth, the Moabitess, is granted a place among the people of Israel. The irony isn't lost on the author of Ruth, because this is how the book ends:
This, then, is the family line of Perez: Perez was the father of Hezron, Hezron the father of Ram, Ram the father of Amminadab, Amminadab the father of Nahshon, Nahshon the father of Salmon, Salmon the father of Boaz, Boaz the father of Obed, Obed the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of David.Back up a second in case you missed it. The point of Ruth isn't that Ruth was a phenomenal woman (although she absolutely was). The point isn't even that God will make an exception if you're really nice to His people. The point of Ruth is that David is a Moabite. David, King of Israel, man after God's own heart, according to Torah should never have been allowed to enter the assembly of Israel. I don't suppose I need to remind you, then, of a certain other descendant of Ruth through the line of David... It is also written.
I suggest that the whole book, the whole collection of writings that we call scripture, is like this. Scripture isn't a song sung in unison. It's a chorus of voices all singing at times in harmony and at times in dissonance - but always beautifully. Does it provide answers? Most certainly. But often, for some strange reason, those answers might be in the form of a question.
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heretic! (huge grin)
thank you, this post today, wonderfully wonderfully blessed me :)
May He continue to bless your inquiring mind. God has all the answers, but often we dont take time to stop and ask Him
I had a weird one the other day.
Bear with me here
It is said that James (Epistle writer) was brother of Jesus. Well half brother. Same mother, different Father ... does this mean that Mary and Jesus shared some DNA.
ouch
(now the RC /Orthodox church don't believe that James was the brother at all - but still how would they answer the DNA question)
It intrigued me.
The Bible definitely doesn't talk about DNA and my salvation (and not even my theology!) is not dependent on knowing the answer - but it was mind blowing.
Like your "David is a Moabite." thought.
Does Jesus have Moabite blood? Maybe, maybe not - but God He is - and in Him -we can trust
fun? :)
It is a fun thought. It's interesting to think of Jesus as a man, as a human being in all respects, including the fact that he would have (I believe) inherited traits from his mother. Wonder how many people commented, "He looks like his dad?" :D
So here's a connecting thought for you - what happens when an unchanging, eternal God becomes human, learns, grows, lives, dies, and comes back to life?
Posted by ScottB on January 11, 2006 12:13 AMNear my home is prayer and healing ministry that occupies a corner storefront. Terrific, wonderful ministry. But it has a statement painted on one of the windows that reads, 'Christ is the Answer'. Every time I see it I can't help but ask, "What was the question?"
And for what it's worth, I suspect all human beings on the planet share most of our dna. If Christ was fully human (and yet fully God) he shared our dna, too - but we don't automatically share his. We, of course, need to be reborn 'in Him' in order to share His "dna".
Although there's a certain poetic beauty to Jesus being a Moabite I can't help but say that Ruth married a Jewish man, thereby being 'absorbed' - if you will - into Jewish lineage. I don't have the mind you do for this sort of thing but that just seems (the suffrage and feminist movements notwithstanding) well, it seems somehow beautiful in its own right, though I don't exactly understand why.
And yes, it is fun, isn't it?
Posted by [rhymes with kerouac] on January 11, 2006 12:37 AMrhymes - I think it's sort of both/and. The verse immediately preceeding the command from Deuteronomy says this:
No one born of a forbidden marriage nor any of his descendants may enter the assembly of the LORD, even down to the tenth generation.In one sense, it's sort of difficult to call Ruth's marriage to Boaz forbidden. On the other hand, it's extremely difficult to align her own acceptance into the people of Israel with the Torah code, and so I'd have to think that, by extension, the same taboo should exist for her descendants. But I'm just playing at this in some sense, so I don't claim any level of Old Testament scholarship here. ;)
As to being absorbed, so to speak - I'm with you. Beautiful, because it shouldn't have happened. I think, for me, the beauty is that redemption triumphs over law. That's a story I can find myself in, you know?
Posted by ScottB on January 11, 2006 11:58 PMYou've put me in mind of Matthew's genealogy of Jesus. Four women are mentioned: Tamar, Ruth, Uriah's wife, and Mary. Why are these women, with the exception perhaps of Mary, mentioned in Jesus' lineage? Redemption seems a fair answer.
Posted by Scott L on January 12, 2006 12:26 AMif nothing else sticks, i know this one will, "when is a Moabite not a Moabite?"
Posted by kristi on January 12, 2006 02:43 AMScott, I love this post. I've read it twice already.
One question though. I'm so behind on blog tech stuff and was wondering what to do with the track back link? I thought I was supposed to use it on my blog when I put up a link to this post, but the link didn't work. Well, whatever. Any thoughts would be swell.
Blessings to you and your family.
Great post, loved it - it reminds me that we worship the father son and the holy spirit and not the father son and the sola scriptura - meaning: The Bible has a lot of answers, but they are not as simple as we want to make it, and that the Holy Spirit works in mysterious ways - continually teaching us new things (gasp! - heresy) as he shows us what to say and what to do.
Posted by Praying Mantis on January 12, 2006 10:41 AMScott - redemption indeed. I think that's a way of showing, on some level, what God does with broken people.
Kristi - can't say I didn't learn anything, I suppose. ;)
Ed - email on its way.
pm - Well said! (You mean God still talks today? What a thought! ;)
Posted by ScottB on January 13, 2006 08:51 AM