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Review Summary: well worth reading |
Date: 2008-10-31 |
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Details: finally got around to actually reading this book (I had only skimmed it before) and find it most interesting. I usually give rave reviews to anything that Spong writes, but this one is a little more difficult; very good, and thought provoking, but...
anyhow, well worth reading for the history and scholarship that it contains.
Spong goes to great lengths to explain the "midrash" method of Jewish thought and writing that they used to understand the present in reference to the past - everything gets repeated in a big cycle - everything old is new again.
along the way, he states again and again that the bible is not to be taken literally, and that such things as the virgin birth, miracles and physical resurrection never really happened...in a time when people believed in magic & miracles, of course they would interpret things that way, but that doesn't make them real. His main effort is to understand what really happened, and what caused people to see things the way they did.
he also explains how & why the myths & legends surrounding JC got started - good stuff
- well worth reading (note that hard cover copies are still available at a reasonable price) |
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Review Summary: Myth or Reality, Creative and Compelling? |
Date: 2008-10-21 |
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Details: Spong's title and question - Resurrection, Myth or Reality? is asked again in the book; "Can something be real and yet not occur in history?" His answer is "yes", the Resurrection is both. It did not occur in history, but is still real. His conclusion depends on post-modern thinking. And he tells us that if we are to maintain intellectual integrity and honesty, we must leave behind the modern belief that there is objective truth that can be known, and join him in applying his post-modern epistemology to the resurrection of Jesus.
In his chapter, A New Starting Point, he helps us understand this post-modern viewpoint. "Subjectivity is not escapable; rather objectivity is a carefully cultivated human myth." He goes farther to describe the modern person who holds this myth: " . . . all human claims to possess objectivity, certainty or infallibility are revealed as nothing but the weak and pitiable pleas of frantically insecure people who seek to live in an illusion because reality has proved to be too difficult."
Does Spong hold to his postmodernism consistently? And is a postmodern epistemology strong enough to build his argument on? Should the modern view of knowledge be abandoned as he demands? I think not on all counts, for the following reasons. First, he illegitimately conflates knowledge and certainty. He says that we cannot have certainty, by which I assume he means absolute certainty. He is in some modest way correct. But he is wrong to assert that the modern view of objective knowledge requires certainty. Second, Spong tells us that these insecure modern people find that "reality has proved to be too difficult." But his postmodern viewpoint excludes the ability to know reality objectively! To score his point against objectivity, he has to assume an objective viewpoint, and so he is self refuting. And third, he abandons the postmodern pretense of humility in knowledge and demonstrates uncharitable disrespect through name calling toward those who do not join him in his postmodern quest.
Although Spong's view on the resurrection requires a postmodern epistemology, he cannot use his postmodernism consistently. He has no foundation, therefore, his entire argument is weakened. And there are other weaknesses as well. What of his claim that the Gospels were not intended as history, but is written in the midrashic tradition? This is certainly contrary to the statements of the author of Luke's Gospel who claims to write history (Luke 1:1-4). There is good evidence that he in fact did first class historical work. Dr. John McRae, a professor of archaeology and New Testament who was interviewed by Lee Strobel in his book The Case for Christ, states that all ninety-five places mentioned in the book of Acts have been verified archaeologically. Many other historical people and events are also mentioned, and have been verified. Writers of myth do not mention specific people and places and events; historians do. If Luke was writing history as the evidence indicates, we can reasonably assume that he also intended the resurrection account as history.
Further, Spong finds inconsistencies between the various Gospel accounts when it is unnecessary to do so, and then uses these as evidence for an evolving story of Jesus' life in the Gospels. For example, he states the John's Gospel abandons the idea of Bethlehem for Nazareth as the birthplace of Jesus (John 1:46). The simplest and most obvious answer is that Nathaniel's reference to Nazareth is that of Jesus' hometown as Luke tells us, not his birthplace. Throughout the book there are similar interpretive leaps that support the idea that Spong's scholarship is directed toward supporting his conclusions rather than following the evidence to where it leads. Perhaps this is illustrative of his contention that objectivity does not exist!!
Spong's view of the resurrection is overall unconvincing and unsatisfying. This is not just my view; it is the verdict in the marketplace of ideas. Those who believe that the resurrection was literal and physical, essentially as taught in the gospels and by Paul, are those that maintain Christian faith. Those who take a view of the resurrection like Spong's and still maintain some level of faith are a shrinking minority. Even in his own Episcopal communion, most congregations who embrace views like Spong's are dying, and most of those that are growing reject them. Apparently these folks have decided that Spong's kind of faith is not worth pursuing and have moved on, either to orthodox faith or by leaving the church for apathy, agnosticism or atheism. Indeed, it is not courage as Spong asserts to abandon the belief that objective truth can be known. Rather, courage is demonstrated by the eleven apostles who gave their lives for what they believed to be objective historical reality, the resurrection of Jesus, the Son of God.
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Review Summary: Good Intentions, Unconvincing Arguments |
Date: 2008-10-19 |
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Details: John Shelby Spong's book, Resurrection: Myth or Reality, held no surprises; the title gave his position away, and I knew what the final conclusion would be before I started to read. In fairness, the book is readable, and Bishop Spong has obviously put some thought into this whole idea of Jesus' resurrection and how to understand it. However, I think his own personal background gives some clues to the trajectory of the Bishop's life and ministry, and his take on Jesus' life. His personal experience growing up in a fundamentalist background in the "Bible-belt" seems to have made a negative impression on him (Note the title of one of his other books: Rescuing the Bible From Fundamentalism). This is unfortunate, and I know the Bishop's experience is not unique. Too many people have had negative experiences with "fundamentalist" Christians who were harsh and judgmental, or lived a hypocritical lifestyle. Sometimes conservative evangelicals are short on love and long on Bible-thumping, which makes Christianity, or at least one version of it, very unattractive. If this was his experience, I am saddened that it happened. However, the whole tone of the book makes clear that Spong was trying to find a way to retain traditional Christian ideas without allowing the possibility that the Scriptures might literally mean what they say. He writes, "I cannot say my yes to legends that have been clearly and fancifully created... I will not allow my twentieth-century mind to be compromised by the literalism of another era that is not capable of being believed in a literal way today. If the resurrection of Jesus Christ cannot be believed except by assenting to the fantastic descriptions included in the Gospels, then Christianity is doomed" (237-8). This begs the question: why? Millions of Christians believe precisely this. A prior commitment to rejecting any literal interpretation seems to be Bishop Spong's most important agenda. He is entitled to his opinion. To dismiss fellow Christians who disagree with his point of view, though, seems contradictory with his goal to make Christianity more tolerant and accepting. He obviously has spent a lifetime studying and teaching the scriptures, but it does not appear as if that lifelong study on the topic led him definitively to his final conclusion. The questions concerning Jesus' resurrection were decided beforehand, then surrounded with enough argument to make the answers sound plausible.
Spong's Midrash paradigm is intriguing and I would like to read and reflect more on how the Jewish origins of Christianity may have influenced its first-century participants. However, his explanation falls flat. For example, he suggests that Jesus' flight to Egypt as an infant and his ascension were mere re-tellings of the story of Israel's "flight" to Egypt and of Elijah's ascension. Though many stories from Jesus' life are similar to Old Testament counterparts, why does this demand the Gospel accounts never occurred and were created later? Why believe that Jesus lived at all? Was he simply made up by Peter and the apostles as well? Another question is how long it might take for this Midrashic tradition to develop. Oral histories usually evolve over time, and even liberal dating would place the writing of the gospels in the latter part of the first-century (possibly as early as the 50s or 60s AD). Could these Midrashic stories have taken root in so short a time when living eyewitnesses would have been able to confirm or deny such stories? Jesus was a very well known figure in his day gaining the attention of kings and commoners alike. It is difficult to believe that stories about him could have developed in Palestine unchallenged unless they were true, or at the very least widely believed to be true. Assuming, for the sake of argument, that such stories did develop in a Midrashic tradition, and also assuming, as Spong suggests, that it was not until the second-century that Gentile Christians began believing them as literally true, why were Peter, John and the other apostles willing to suffer persecution and martyrdom? They got in trouble for testifying that Jesus rose from the dead - and paid for it with their lives. Spong's explanation does not fit with the history of the early church.
Bishop Spong's contention that the "resurrection" really occurred in Galilee in Peter's heart, and that the Triumphal Entry was made by Peter rather than Jesus in the fall during the Feast of Tabernacles illustrates a final point. If the Bishop desires to rescue Jesus from the hands of folks who have used his image to create their own reality, surely he would not want to do the same. In that case, he ought to have historical evidence that at least points in the direction he is headed. Where is it? Where are the documents that help to substantiate his point that Peter "saw" Jesus in Galilee some months later, and that it was Peter who rode triumphantly into Jerusalem rather than Jesus? Bishop Spong rejects a literal understanding of the Gospels and the traditional Christian interpretations of Jesus' life and work in spite of evidence supporting these views. While the Midrash paradigm is an interesting way to look at the life of Jesus, it seems to have no evidence to back it up. Spong needs to produce documents or other evidence to back up his position other than just his own presuppositions. I believe the Bishop really wants to present a version of Christianity that people can believe in a modern age. However, while his intentions may be good, his argument is unconvincing.
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Review Summary: Making sense of the resurrection |
Date: 2008-02-18 |
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Details: Spong presents reasons why he believes the resurrection of Jesus became literalized gradually after his death. Spong proceeds through the letters written by Paul to argue why he does not find good evidence that Paul regarded Jesus' resurrection as bodily. He then proceeds through the Synoptic Gospels in the order in which they are believed by most scholars today to have been written (Mark, Matthew, and finally Luke) to show what he believes are signs of increasingly literalized presentations of the resurrection. After reviewing all the Gospels including John, Spong speculates boldly to try to capture some sense in which Peter and the others who had known Jesus might have had a transforming Easter experience after the death of Jesus that led them to proclaim that he had been raised. Spong explains what it was about Jewish beliefs and the conditions of the times that would have influenced their response to Jesus's death.
Is it plausible? Probably not if you believe to begin with that the resurrection was bodily. It will seem that Spong is certainly reverse-engineering this book's arguments to fit his own rejection of a supernatural resurrection. Will it be plausible to other Christians? Perhaps but it may seem one set of speculations among many. Spong has not carefully graded his speculations as to which seem most likely and which least so he may have weakened his presentation by making it seem dependent on too many speculations. As for non-Christians, they may note that however "radical" Spong may seem to Christians in questioning the Gospel accounts, he seems not to question much, if at all, Jesus himself. One might compare Elaine Pagels' speculations in The Origin of Satan: How Christians Demonized Jews, Pagans, and Heretics or those of Bart Ehrman in Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium neither of whom seem to hold as closely to the Jesus of the Gospels as Spong does. It may seem baffling that Spong would question so much but not Jesus, especially given that Spong accepts that Paul, who had such a powerful response to Christ, seemed to know little about Jesus's life and especially given that Spong believes the Gospels were constructed by those not directly familiar with Jesus with heavy appeal in a midrash-like way to Old Testament writings. So who was this Jesus? Spong's faith seems to rest in a belief that Jesus had at the least earned the deepest love of those close to him, that he had taught them profoundly and that they had believed he had given himself for their sake. But it is the very Gospels that Spong calls into question which seem to provide Spong most of reasons for faith: Spong's attention to Paul seems secondary, mostly to convince himself that the resurrection was not bodily.
It seems a good idea to read Spong's books in the chronological order in which they were written. His theologizing evolves but whatever his skepticism of specific New Testament passages, his acceptance of the image of Jesus he derives from the New Testament seems not to be called into question by him in either of the later Why Christianity Must Change or Die: A Bishop Speaks to Believers In Exile or A New Christianity for a New World: Why Traditional Faith is Dying & How a New Faith is Being Born. In rejecting literal aspects of Jesus, Spong seems to hold tight to idealized aspects. But which came first, the Jesus Spong met or the New Testament texts through which Spong has freely speculated to arrive at the Jesus he proclaims?
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Review Summary: We can't know what happened but I think I do. |
Date: 2007-12-10 |
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Details: In Resurrection: Myth or Reality, John Shelby Spong argues against the literal bodily resurrection of Jesus. His argument rests on two foundations: the Jewish interpretive method called midrash, and linguistic subjectivism.
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Rabbi Iscah Waldman, in an article entitled Filling in the Gaps: How Midrash Functions available at MyJewishLearning.com explains, "Midrash is commonly defined as the process of interpretation by which the Rabbis filled in `gaps' in the Torah." Spong argues that this method should be applied to the New Testament as well. But I see nothing in this definition of midrash that requires non-literal interpretation of the words that are in the text. Speaking of the events that produced the Easter tradition, Spong himself agrees that something did happen. "So we look at the writings we have and seek to understand what they point to, what they reveal, what truth they convey. They all point to one consistent conclusion. Something Happened! Whatever that something was, it had power! Incredible power!" But even if a literal interpretation were excluded by midrash, Spong's argument ultimately falls to a fatal logical error.
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In chapter III, titled The Vehicle of Words, an Unsteady Ship, Spong lays his second foundation. "No word is subjective; hence no word ever passes from the lips of one person into the hearing of another without being changed in meaning." "Identical words, therefore, are never passed on with identical meaning to two different persons, even in the same tribe." "Words are never neutral or objective...words are never THE truth...so it is that no words employed by anyone at any time can be objective, infallible, inerrant, or strictly literal." "Above all, words must be recognized as symbolic pointers to truth not objective containers of truth." Spong repeats this theme throughout the book.
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Spong's argument falls on its own sword. If we cannot know what words mean, how can Spong be so sure that he knows what the Bible's words about Jesus' resurrection cannot mean? He, too, uses words to argue for his spiritualized view of the resurrection of Jesus. Even his understanding of Midrash must sail on the "unsteady ship" of words. Based on his own view of the subjectivity of words, I do not find Spong's position on the resurrection of Jesus very convincing. Any conclusion he draws ends up in the inescapable quagmire of its own subjectivity.
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out of 37 Reviews
