10 Propositions on Certainty & Theology<\/p>\n
?We entirely renounce all attempts to prove the truth or necessity of Christianity<\/p>\n
— Friedrich Schleiermacher<\/p>\n
1. Theology is not a balm to heal doubt. Only the foolish attempt to treat the untreatable. Doubts existed prior to undertaking theological work and will be present at when the work is finished. The hope that doubt will cease, Schleiermacher warned us, is an empty illusion: ?the important misunderstandings are always there<\/p>\n
2. Demanding answers of the Whirlwind is the oldest presumption in the Book. Yet, this ancient and chronic presumption is made ever-available by the markets. Continually, we are tempted to buy get-sure-quick! remedies.<\/p>\n
3. Certainty is un-faith. ?The quest for certainty,? John Dewey says, ?has always been an effort to transcend belief.? While faith may provide security, it never is so confident that it ceases to be faith. While faith rests in ?absolute dependence, certainty fools itself into a ?feeling of absolute freedom.? When faith says ?absolutely? it is holy – wholly different than when certainty says ?absolutely.? Certainty?s ?absolutely? is an airbrushed supermodel – attractive and unreal.<\/p>\n
4. Theology deconstructs certainty. Theology renounces as idolatrous what Gerhard Ebeling calls the ?unfulfillable demand for guarantees of security? and ?illusory perfection.? Good theology reveals positivist hermeneutics as imploding hermeneutics and one-dimensional gods as scam artists.<\/p>\n
5. Theology redeems doubt. While certainty is deconstructed, doubt is reconstructed. Doubt no longer arrests or eclipses faith, but is a catalyst for reformed, revived faith.<\/p>\n
6. Faithful theology incorporates doubt but does not revel in it. Theology is not only suspicious of overly-protective truth claims but also of overly-zealous doubt claims. Theology is not so frivolous to assent to scorning ?disproofs? (ala Da Vinci Code).<\/p>\n
7. Faith begets redeemed doubt. ?The revelational encounter?confirms our doubt at the moment that it abolishes it. Because God makes himself known, we know once and for all that God can only be known by God? (Berkhof). Knowing God is not knowing God.<\/p>\n
8. Theology is not proof. Proof requires no faith. Schleiermacher said of his system: ?Dogmatics is only for Christians,? and, ?We entirely renounce all attempts to prove the truth or necessity of Christianity<\/p>\n
9. Truth and Falsity are not opposites. The Way, the Truth, and the Life is both compelling and complex and therefore naturally generates all sorts of wacky ideas. Not to worry: ?misunderstanding is not the same as not understanding?the divine revelation in Christ is indeed normative, but not exclusive? (Berkhof).<\/p>\n
10. Theology does not trump Tragedy. Questions about miscarriage, addiction, and disease are not answered by theology. Theology that presumes to end pain with the satisfaction of sure answers and happy resolutions only compounds suffering. Maranatha is a desperate prayer, not a theological proposition.<\/p>\n
?What gets us into trouble is not what we don?t know.<\/p>\n
It?s what we know for sure that just ain?t so.?<\/p>\n
— Mark Twain<\/p>\n
Some sources<\/p>\n
Gerhard Ebeling, The Nature of Faith<\/p>\n
Hendrikus Berkhof, Christian Faith<\/p>\n
Al Gore, An Inconvenient Truth (Mark Twain quote)<\/p>\n
John Dewey, The Quest for Certainty<\/p>\n
Friedrich Schleiermacher, The Christian Faith<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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