Posted by Helen on: 03.24.2007 /
These are my notes on the first of two lectures by NT Wright which I heard yesterday. (Update: you can order the CDs of the lectures using this form)
I found myself very engaged — I enjoyed listening to him. He’s a masterful speaker whose talk is an art form in itself — he puts his words together more carefully than I’ve heard from a Christian speaker since I heard John Stott speak almost two decades ago. I was wondering how much theological jargon I’d have to navigate but he stayed away from that — he is evidently skilled in positioning his talk for the audience expected. I loved that he used several words I don’t hear much in the circles I move in – but rather than being drawn from systematic theology textbooks, they exploited the richness of the English language. I love to hear talks and read books in which people do that.
I enjoyed his words and I enjoyed the content too — he was very positive and visionary and big-picture. He caught my imagination, another thing which hasn’t happened enough when I’ve heard Christians speak.
These two lectures were (at least partly) new material which NT Wright hasn’t written about yet. He said “I’m going to continue my theological education in public”. The seminary is going to sell CDs of the talks and publish them at some point.
These talks were given at a Catholic Seminary. I was impressed they were willing to invite an Anglican Bishop (and scholar) to talk to them about, of all things, the sacraments — a topic which tends to divide Catholics and Protestants. In his opening, NT Wright talked about a time some years ago when a Catholic said to him: “Would you speak to my students because it’s not often they get to hear from…” He said, he was ready to hear a flattering reference to his scholarship and cringe – but in fact the sentence ended “A filthy rotten Protestant!” And so at that moment, he said, he knew he’d be great friends with the person who asked.
My detailed notes follow.
We Anglicans get shot at “from both sides’ but cling to the hope we may be able to say something that will bring Christians together.
Catholics and Protestants are suspicious of each others’ theology of the sacraments: Protestants think Catholics indulge in idolatry and works righteousness no matter what they say. When Catholics say they don’t, Protestants say “we don’t believe you”. Catholics insist sacraments are God’s gracious gifts and Protestant objections to them show ingratitude to God and a stubborn determination to do things their own way. To Protestants, the Catholic Eucharist looks like magic being invoked by a shaman.
We could go the route of dissecting everyone’s beliefs, but that’s a massive task and would probably only serve to bring our differences into sharper focus.
Instead I want to start with the Biblical vision of the ultimate purposes of the creator God i.e. eschatology. Fully biblical eschatology offers a way through or round the back of these debates [between Christians of different traditions] and suggests a richer theology of the sacraments than most Western Christians have imagined.
The imperative — from the Fathers — is to go back to Scripture and think afresh, to live in dialog with traditions but not let them dictate what Scripture means. It’s disturbing that both Catholics and Protestants, while using Scripture as a source, treat their traditions as the real norm.
Everyone seems to be aware of the eschatological dimension of the sacraments but no-one’s been exploring it in the way open before us. The hope is that we will rub our eyes, blink, see some things differently, and creatively, with ecumenical hope.
God’s promise is of a new heavens and new earth, both joined once and for all forever. The New Testament knows nothing of “going to heaven’ as the ultimate destiny of those belonging ot Christ. “Heavenly reward’ promises mean what’s secure in God’s sphere, heaven, will be brought to birth on earth as it is in heaven. As Jesus prayed. The New Testament also knows nothing of a vague non spacio-temporal kingdom; this is a kingdom that needs to come to earth.
Heaven and Earth are interlocking halves of God’s reality and we look forward to the two becoming one. Even when everything is dark and bleak, God’s people know they are called for the world, not away from it. Their obedience, life and destiny will cause all creation to be transformed.
Jesus’ parables are full of echoes of the Old Testament, indicating when God restores his peoples’ fortunes the whole creation will be transformed. In Romans 8 we see that salvation, to Paul, was not about a disembodied eternity but the transformation & liberation of the whole creation. We see in the poems in Colossians and Ephesians that all things are made for Jesus and all things are reconciled through him; and God’s plan always was to unite all things on heaven & earth in him.
This is not a marginal or eccentric theme however much Western theology has ignored it in pursuit of “heaven only” salvation. When we get to Revelation 21 & 22, they shouldn’t shouldn’t make us say “what a strange idea’ but rather “this is what it was about all the time”.
We see from Genesis 1 that creation is good and humans are very good. There’s a coming together/renewal & uniting as a result of God the creator setting his world free at last from the chains of evil suffering corruption and death itself.
So much Western Christian theology colludes with death — it can have our bodies and this world if we can have a blessed platonic disembodied eternity. That distorts our hope and all aspects of our vision of the Christian life in the present. It has caused us to be resolutely dualist in missions. Some think we build the kingdom by our efforts; others focus on saving souls; this is a false dualism. As is the the choice between focusing on our deepest feelings, or racing to get into God’s throneroom.
Protestants are concerned that the sacraments are all about magic. Late medieval developments increased that concern. In the reformed traditions, this world remembers past events to stimulate faith, devotion and holiness and the Word is the true source of heavenly life. To Catholics that looks like man-centered religion & a denial of heavenly life. 17th and 18th protestant Christian developments increased that concern.
Protestants are trapped and unable to appreciate what Scripture says about God’s world, future and his grace in the present. Catholics are trapped into systems which sometimes do embody the very magical spirit they fear.
This is hopelessly broad brush and imprecise — but sets the context.
The Biblical vision is: evil and death have invaded and corrupted but the incarnation, crucifixion and resurrection overcome it and set in train the kingdom which, though not from the world, is for the world. It’s designed to come to birth on earth as in heaven.
Now I’ll explore space time & matter & show each will be renewed not abandoned. We don’t merely wait for this but it’s already begun in and through Jesus.
As people who live between Easter & final new creation our calling is to be people of New creation in the present — implementing Easter & thereby anticipating the final new creation.
Space, the overlap of heaven and earth
Heaven and earth aren’t far apart or detached in Biblical theology. They came together in Jesus’ death and resurrection. We’re encouraged to rework the sacraments in view of this.
From the first, God’s plan was not to abandon but renew creation. This is foreshadowed in Noah. Canaan was not a strip of territory for Abraham to live in while learning about non spacio-temporal salvation, but rather a bridgehead into the world, the beginning of renewal, so humans could discover what had been lost.
Western Christians are patronizing about how “this worldly’ Old Testament theology is; but rather the patriarchs should be puzzled by our dualism. In the new creation, the wolf and lamb lie down together. That’s not a low grade, this-worldly metaphor for non-physical existence. It’s a true pictorial image of present created order when heaven and earth are brought together.
New creation through conjoining is only possible by overthrowing powers that have corrupted the world. It’s not possible to effect a smooth progression to the new creation through trying harder. A dark force opposes us. God must defeat the evil which has enslaved his people and world to liberate it.
David defeats Goliath, then plans to build a temple for sacrifice. When evil is overthrown you get worship and presence. The temple is not just a reminder but reallywhere heaven and earth overlapped. It wasn’t as if you were in heaven; you really were there in God’s presence.
In chapter 53 of Isaiah we see the death of the suffering servant accomplishes the chapter 52 promise. Chapters 54 on talk about renewal through the present reality of the Word of God.
Abraham’s family is rescued by shed blood, crossing of the sea, God’s presence. The image of exodus dominates much 2nd temple Jewish thought and early Christian thought. The Roman Empire was the instantiation of the power of evil & death: “I have the power to release or condemn you”, to Jesus.
It was by the powerful healing presence of God and self-giving of Jesus that evil would be defeated so the kingdom could come about.
Jesus upstaged the temple — “I’m what it was supposed to be”. The only way of explaining Jesus was that he was the long awaited return of Yahweh to Zion — many themes come together in Jesus; all about heaven and earth coming together.
Jesus believed his calling was to bring this to a climax and embody the personal saving presence of Israel’s God Yahweh. Passover was Jesus’ choice as the grid of meaning to help the disciples grasp and live by this story of presence and sacrifice.
Jesus didn’t present them with a set of abstract ideas, or a theory of atonement in the head but rather a meal which spoke powerfully of the sacrifice that brought about the kingdom.
Jesus believed heaven and earth overlapped in him and his work. He bequeathed the story of sacrifice, the meal, the sea crossing. Heaven and earth overlap in these. This has been opaque to generations of Western thinkers but offers floods of light on Jesus’ thinking.
The overlap of heaven and earth has decidedly partial in the world since Jesus, in whom it was complete.
Time
In Jewish thought, time is not a cycle but a line with a beginning, middle and end. It’s not a circle nor does it recycle as in some pagan thought. There’s a hymn which implies circling years — that’s a pagan idea! I’ve challenged my students to rewrite it and I insist on a rewritten version whenever it’s sung at Durham Cathedral
Genesis 1 and 2 announce the launching of a project that’s going somewhere.
Revelation 21 & 22 tell us about the completion of the project, which turned out to involve various complexities. These complexities are the necessary outworking of Genesis 3 and 4.
Revelation 21 & 22 talk about a new project that God’s just beginning: the healing of the nations. There’s a sense of new beginning; maybe more can happen now? Maybe what seems like the end to us is actually a radical new start?
I find myself increasingly unable to go along with language about time traditional since late medieval period, which says eternity is non-temporal. It’s a misunderstanding. It claims some Biblical rootedness in Paul’s comments. However Paul didn’t mean a non-temporal state but rather, “the life of the age’ — the age to come, not the present age. “Age to come’ in Jewish thought is not a platonic but a temporal heaven.
Genesis 1 suggests time itself is part of the good creation. God made plants containing seed made to grow over time, humans have tasks to be done over time. Time – God made plenty of it and he likes it. (So enjoy it!) We’re the ones who associate time with change, change with decay, sadness and evil. We have supposed time is part of the problem rather than part of God’s good and glorious world.
“No more time” is counter-intuitive. Think of time remade and redeemed along with space and matter.
So what does that mean to the sacraments?
In the Jewish world view something strange begins to happen. Cycles of festivals are markers on the bigger framework. Think of a bicycle wheel, which goes round and round; each time it goes around it moves the bicycle forward along the line. So every Sabbath is a turn of th wheel but also another step along the road from the first Sabbath on which God rested, to the final one, the rest for the people of God.
Every Sabbath was the means by which the people who celebrated it were also present at the first Sabbath. “This is the night”: Somehow this is the same night. God didn’t make the covenant with others but with us — we are the people who came out of Egypt. The past comes rushing forward in the present to catch us up. Past events can become present again not just by memory but in obedience to God’s call to celebrate the feast.
Festivals can also point to the future and participate in it. When the spies brought back a branch with grapes on, the children of God in the wilderness ate fruit from the promised Land. The new creation is promised and we can taste it in advance.
Unfortunately the Israelites went the wrong way after they tasted the fruit. The church can do that too but that’s another story!
Jesus was like Elijah, like the temple but greater. Jesus believed he was inaugurating God’s kingdom. God’s sovereign rule, Yahweh present with his people. Jesus knew the fullness hadn’t come yet. At least not until the gospel would be announced everywhere.
In him and his work the future was not just glimpsed but anticipated, as well as recapitulating the past.
Time doesn’t collapse into pagan cycles — it maintains past and future but recapitulates and anticipates. Jesus had a different time scale to his contemporaries — he said “I’m working on the Sabbath like my Father” — John’s gospel.
Miracles: were not just that Jesus could do bizarre things in old creation but that he did what manifested the new creation. The resurrection is the full and substantial beginning of the new creation.
Paul’s now and not yet includes time as well. Death and life are simultaneously at work. Paul’s present is shot through equally with past and future but must make its way along step by step to the linear future.
Paul echoes the exodus in Romans 6, the promised land struggle in Romans 7, and living there in Romans 8. Paul roots the present Christian life in the death and resurrection of Jesus. The point of chapter 8 is that the ultimate future has already broken into the present creating the tension as well as the joy of anticipation.
Matter
God is going to enoble matter, not jettison it.
Gerard Manley Hopkin’s sonnet shows how the present creation is full of God’s glory — without stepping over into pantheism. He invokes the Holy Spirit as the means of remaking the world.
God will not reject creation but effect its full and glorious enhancement. Christians fall into problems such as loving the creation but not the creator; or rejecting the whole creation rather than just the evil currently in it.
Creation is full of God’s glory: the burning bush, the sea parting, the Passover bread, the stones in Jordan. Elements of the material world become charged with lasting significance.
This can become a problem if we turn these things into magic by attempting to possess the God-charged world as talismans. This is what the Israelites did with the bronze serpent. Another interesting example is Dagon and the ark. The ark taken to battle because it has been charged with significance — the people want its power without paying the price of faithful obedience.
The Philistines capture the ark, then bring it into Dagon’s temple. In the morning Dagon statue is flat on his face. They set him upright again but the next day he’s fallen over again and this time his head and hands have come off.
The ark of God — the sacramental sign of God’s presence — is less than no use when treated as a talisman. However it still retains its power.
God will do for whole cosmos what he did for Jesus at Easter, Paul says. By “inheritance’ Paul doesn’t mean heaven, but the whole world – all God’s holy land. The Holy Land — where Yahweh dwelt had concentric circles of holiness surrounding it. God’s eventual intention is to fill creation with his presence, so all life is full of his knowledge. Because the personal presence of Jesus within it will be at the center of new templeless creation and entire cosmos will be a temple of holiness around him. The present charging is but a foretaste.
What does it mean “as the waters cover the sea”, since the waters are the sea? This is like when Paul says “when the son hands over kingdom God will be all in all”.
Heaven and earth are designed to come together. The past, present and future will meet in new ways. The world will be filled with the personal presence of God; our present sense is a foretaste. All this follows from Jesus’ resurrection and coming new creation.
This vision give a context to think about sacramental reality in new ways.
If some of the debates have taken place at the fault line — where we can be too materialist and/or too dualist — maybe problem is not with the sacraments but with our worldviews.
A question and answer session followed.
I asked whether the view of time he presented opens up new possible ways of thinking about judgement and hell. He said, yes, all sorts of things probably should be rethought; however he wouldn’t want to suggest a universalism in which it doesn’t matter what how we live, because we are called to participate in what God is doing.
Someone asked him how he understands the 2 Peter passage about everything being destroyed; he said he believes it means only what is evil will be destroyed and remade. Not everything. He said this is a common interpretation.
Someone asked about the inclusivity of Jesus. He said we need to avoid 18th century tolerance, which is “I can put up with you, I don’t have to love you” — that’s only a low-grade form of love. The point about Jesus inclusivity is, it’s transforming. When he had dinner with Zaccheus, Zaccheus was changed. The welcome goes to all but all come by baptism and faith — dying to sin and rising to new life in Christ. For every single person this is not “stay as you are’ but a change: it’s a turning away from self — self-denial.
The second lecture
My laptop was about out of battery at this point, so I had to resort to pen and paper to take notes on the second lecture. That means it will take longer to get it online and it might be a shorter summary than this one. I do plan to put it online when I have time.
Update: my lecture notes to the second lecture are here: NT Wright: Sacraments of the New Creation
Comment by: Rod Pickett
1Helen,
My question was the second one. I asked him how he understood God’s relationship with time. He seems to hold to the “strong” view of sovereignty that allows for real freedom by individuals.
Rod
Comment by: Helen
2Thanks Rod – I didn’t take very thorough notes on the questions, I’m afraid.
Comment by: Ann
3Hi Helen, his notion about time and the Jewish understanding of it –Linear not circular — was an incredible departure from ancient beliefs according to a book I read, “The Gift of the Jews”. (highly recommend) I love the continuity. Thanks so much for your summary – it certainly gives me something to ponder!
Comment by: Mike Clawson
4Great summary Helen! I’m even more jealous now that I couldn’t go. That was some pretty powerful and amazing stuff. And I agree with his response to your question – in light of how he describes the Biblical story so many things need to be rethought. Personally I’ve been at this rethinking process for nearly a decade now, and yet reading your recap of what Wright said I feel like I’ve only just scratched the surface! It’s humbling.
Thanks again! :)
Comment by: Helen
5Ann, I really enjoyed what he said about time.
Mike, yes, it was powerful and amazing. I’ve found that all along with his writings. That’s why I wanted to go hear him, after ten years of reading his books.
It doesn’t change my almost-atheism but like I said, it was almost like that was irrelevant when I was there because what he said connected with me on a different level – like a piece of poetry or music; it connected with my imagination and appreciation of art – which don’t actually care if something is ‘true’ or not. As I said, this is so rare when I listen to conservative Christians. I wish it weren’t.
What he did was made theology a beautiful thing – something I hadn’t even dreamed I’d experience in theology lectures.
Comment by: Rose
6Helen,
Thanks for your notes! Capturing the imagination is so needed in our time when it comes to the Christian story. I appreciate your honest commentary.
Comment by: Paul
7Thanks Helen, much appreciated! And amazingly good notes too – you must have a great wpm speed
:)
Comment by: Helen
8Thanks Rose and Paul.
Paul, I filled in some words between my original notes and putting them up on here ;-)
(I’m hoping my memory served well enough that what I filled in wasn’t too different from the intent of the original!)
Comment by: Steven Carr
9Does Wright take Revelation 21 and 22 seriously as even a semi-literal account of what the author thought would happen?
How bizarre! Rev. 21:23 says there will be no sun or moon.
Even Revelation 21 doesn’t support Wright’s view that the world will not be destroyed.
Rev 21:1 ‘Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth , for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.’
Even taking seriously Wright’s view that Rev. 21 and 22 describe what will happen , the author clearly thinks the current earth will pass away. It will cease to be. It will be destroyed.
The sea won’t be transformed. It will be no more.
The first earth will also be no more. It will have passed away, but will be replaced by a new earth (unlike the sea, which will just disappear)
I quote from the article ‘Someone asked him how he understands the 2 Peter passage about everything being destroyed; he said he believes it means only what is evil will be destroyed and remade.’
It is beyond me how Wright can stand up in front of a bunch of people and keep a straight face when telling them that the Bible does not say the world will end, but will be ‘transformed’.
2 Peter says everything will be destroyed. ‘The elements will melt with fire’.
Or take Hebrews 1
“In the beginning, O Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands.
They will perish, but you remain;
they will all wear out like a garment.
You will roll them up like a robe;
like a garment they will be changed.
This is a very clear metaphor.
The world will be discarded the way we discard old clothes when we get new ones. They will be rolled up and thrown away.
The author of Hebrews contrasts God who never perishes, with his creation, which will perish.
Or take 1 Corinthians 6:13 ‘Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food, and God will destroy both one and the other.’
Wright says only what is evil will be destroyed. Paul says such un-sinful activities as eating will be destroyed.
How does Wright get away with speaking such rubbish in public?
It’s amazing!
Comment by: Helen
10Steven, thanks for your comments. All I know is, NT Wright claimed that his interpretation of the 2 Peter passage was ‘common’.
Comment by: Dean
11Steven, I am not trying to belittle you in any way, but there is a qualitative difference in the Greek between new and remewed or transformed. The verses which you referred to are using the Greek for renewed(transformed). The earth was destroyed(transformed) by water the first time. It will be transformed by fire as a purging agent but there will still be continuity between what was before and what will remain. That is why so many verses in the New Testament speak of our works lasting forever. As for the ‘sea”, that was representative of chaos to the Jews and there will be no ‘sea’ or chaos in the new order. It would be shocking indeed if there were no large bodies of water, but God can do as He wills. Revelation and 2 Peter are both books that are largely dependent on apocalyptic language and to take them as you read them is to do a great dishonor to the genre. If read literally is Jesus a lion or a lamb? Not either literally, but both are picture language. Jesus Christ is forever incarnated in the form of a man. God bless and I hope this helps to alleviate some of the confusion. Bishop Wright is many things but unfaithful to the scriptures is not one of them. He will go with scripture over tradition when it is very difficult to do so. God bless you in all you do.