Some cool Barth quotes

Listening to: Nothing


On preaching in Basel prison in the mid-50's:
'This morning I listened at length to three murderers, two confidence tricksters and one adulterer, added the odd remark here and there and gave each a fat cigar.'

On the cross, from the sermon 'They crucified him with the criminals, Luke 23.33':
'In Jesus, God took upon himself the full load of evil; he made our wickedness his own; he gave himself in his dear Son to be defamed as a criminal, to be accused, condemned, delivered from life unto death, as though he himself, the Holy God, had done all the evil we human beings did and do. In giving himself in Jesus Christ, he reconciled the world unto himself; he saved us and made us free to live in his everlasting kingdom; he removed the burden and took it upon himself He the innocent took the place of us the guilty. He the mighty took the place of us the weak. He the living One took the place of us the dying.'

On the jukebox of heaven (in a letter of thanks to Mozart):
'I have only a hazy feeling about the music played there where you now dwell. I once formulated my surmise about that as follows: whether the angels play only Bach in praising God I am not quite sure; I am sure, however, that en famille they play Mozart and that then also God the Lord is especially delighted to listen to them.'

On himself and his theology:
Once a young student asked Barth if he could sum up what was most important about his life's work and theology in just a few words. The question was posed even with gasps from the audience. Barth just thought for a moment and then smiled, 'Yes, in the words of a song my mother used to sing me, 'Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.''

Clive Parnell

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My friend and colleague Clive Parnell is blogging. Go and say hi!

Introducing... The Apostolic Fathers

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I've just uploaded Mike Reeves' seminar on the Apostolic Fathers to Theology Network. Click click clicky! Enjoy.

(There's Ignatius glady being eaten by lions in Rome.)

In time they'll be joined by their later friends Justin Martyr and Irenaeus of Lyon.

Meanwhile, I'm preparing for my sermon on Sunday night- Psalm 84. How lovely is Your dwelling place... Wonderful stuff!

How to survive theological puberty

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Today I was thoroughly humbled and well taught by reading Helmut Thielicke's 'A Little Exercise for Young Theologians'. If you do any theology at all- from PhD studies to irregular Bible studies, you should defintely pick-up this little gem. It'll only take you an hour, and the advice is practical, penetrating, and clear.

If you're thinking 'I won't bother- I'm sure I don't need to read a book intended for young theologians', then you should be all the more desperate to buy a copy. Do it now.

What would you like?

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Theology Network is a few months old now, and people are definitely using it well. We have a steady flow of new material coming online, and stacks of new stuff is building-up on my desk every day.

But we're really keen to commission articles. We want new material from great people on subjects that people want/need to know about.

What would you like to see?
Who do you want to hear from?
What should we cover?

Barth, Augustine, biblical history, and 'Saga'

Listening to: Nothing

One of the things I've struggled to get my head round in Barth as I've been reading is his idea of 'saga' to describe stuff like the creation account in Genesis. I'm going to put-ou what I think he's saying, and maybe the Barth experts who read (Glen, Dan) can let me know what they reckon!

'[Saga is] an intuitive and poetic picture of a pre-historical reality of history which is enacted once and for all within the confines of time and space.' (Church Dogmatics III.1)

It seems like he's saying that the account isn't pure history (i.e. something that happened), but it's also not a myth (i.e. a made-up story to illustrate something). Instead, it both happened in time, but also means something more than simply 'God made the world' (and for Barth, as I thought about last time, in creation itself we find the basis of God's covenant of grace).

So saga is more than just history that happened and has now passed, becuase it also represents something un-historical that means something for us beyond simply accepting that it did happen. Far from being either a bare recording of events, and far from being a simple allegorical tale, biblical history stands alone as histoical events shot-through with not only God's interpretation of them, but also his providential rule.

It seems at times like Barth is saying that these events aren't historical, but then you realise he's not really saying that at all- you have to read him in vast swathes in order not to misunderstand him. I guess that, in setting aside biblical history from what we normally see and define as 'history', Barth is attempting to rescue the events of the Bible from being critiqued and examined as being nothing more than history. In this way, we'd lose sight of valuable stuff like typology and prophecy- all in favour of being strictly 'historical'.

Today, I picked-up Augustine's City of God for £3 at a second-hand bookshop (bargain!). I flicked it open at a page about Noah, and Augustine makes what seems like a simlar point about the account of the flood.

The account of the Flood is neither merely historical nor purely allegorical.

No one ought to imagine... that this account was written for no purpose, or that we are to look solely for a relaiblae histoircal record without any allegorical meaning, or, conversely, that those events are entirely unhistoircal, and the language is purely symbolical, or that, whatever may be the nature of the story it has no connection with prophecy about the Church... no one, however stubborn, will venture to imagine that this narrative was written without an ulterior purpose; and it could not plausibly be said that the events, though histoical, have no symbolic meaning, or that the account is not factural, but merely symbolical, or that the symbolism has nothing to do with the Church. No; we must believe that the writings of this historical record had a wise purpose, that the events are historical, that they have a symbolic meaning, and that thismeaning gives a prophetic picture of the Church.

Augustine, City of God, XV, 27

That sounds like a similar idea to me! Do you think I'm on the right track?

NWA book promotion video

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Happy Ascension Day!

Listening to: 'Violet Hill' by Coldplay

Thought I'd wish you all a very happy Ascension Day (yes, it's today). Why so happy?

Well if you get a moment, have peek at Psalms 22, 23 and 24 today.

Ps 22 is an explicit prophecy of the cross and Jesus quotes it as He is crucified. He also quotes from Psalm 31v5 ('Into your hands...') which may indicate He's referring to everything that goes between those Psalms as a mini commentary on what is to happen. For a long time, people have suggested that Ps 22 is about the cross, Ps 23 is about resurrection (v6 apparently better translated 'I will return to the house of the Lord forever'), and Ps 24 about ascension. The rest (Ps 25-30) you can clearly see this in as well.

So definitely have a look at Ps 24. It's Christ who's the King of glory who can ascend having done His work of dying and rising- He will receive blessing and vindication from the Lord. He's strong and mighty. And of course, if He's the Head, and the Church is His body, if He's the first-fruits and we the harvest, then we'll be following Him (v6) in ascending to the Lord one day- with our own hands clean and our own hearts pure, to inherit with Him the whole world (v1). That makes Ascension Day a happy one.

Why and How to Do a Theology of Everything

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My little article on the way everything is theological appears to be a popular read on Theology Network at the moment. It's a very short (and very imperfect) punt at getting people to think theologically. If you have no idea what on earth I might be banging on about, go and have a read.