A Few Words on Total Depravity
I've been meaning to write something about the concept of the total deprativity of the human nature for a while now. The very mention of the topic visibly pains Jackie, and that makes me sad because (in my own understanding, anyway) I think the idea is misinterpreted. The following is my own account, heavily dependent on my boys Augustine and Luther but by no means authorized or part of any party line.
First, total depravity does not mean that people are entirely bad in the conventional sense. It does not mean that we are not moral/ethical beings, or that we can't love each other, or that we can't experience the finer and higher things that existence allows. As only the most insane would deny, people (Christians and otherrwise) are quite able to live virtuous, productive, loving, and admirable lives.
Second, total depravity has nothing to do with particular sins. It's not about feeling bad because you surf the internet on the clock, or because you masturbate or something like that. The small-fry sins are not really the problem. As a consequence, knowledge of one's depravity has nothing to do with sitting around feeling shitty for doing various bad things.
The doctrine of total depravity, rather, holds that by virtue of the Fall, human beings are turned entirely away from God. Augustine understands this in terms of love: humans love God with the love due creatures and love creatures with the kind of love due to God. Luther understood it in terms of trust: we will trust anything with our ultimate well-being other than God. Either way, all of our faculties--even our good ones--are no longer directed at the love, trust, and glorification of God but are rather turned inward towards ourselves or outward at other created things. Moreover, our own power cannot, under any circumstances, turn ourselves back to God. People in this state (i.e., everyone) are entirely capable of doing wonderful things, but they are not capable of turning those wonderful things to the love and glory of God.
So yes, Shakespeare can write all the world-changing drama he wants, and Bach can write the most brilliant music a human has ever made. These are good and wonderful things that we rightly enjoy. But neither of them can come up to God and say, "take 'King Lear' or the Mass in B. Minor in behalf of my sins." Even the greatest things within us are of no help when we come before the big guy, because everything within us is turned to our own purposes.
Thus when Luther talks about human sinfulness, he's unlikely to talk about your penny-ante depredations. He's much likelier to talk about the great heroes and wise men of antiquity who, through all of their goodness, fought constantly against grace. Total depravity, I repeat, is not about feeling like a shitty person. It has nothing to do, in fact, with anything we can perceive or feel about ourselves. At best we can feel the consequences of our nature. It has nothing to do with guilt or shame, both of which can be assuaged by theological half-measures. Only a totally depraved person is in total need of grace.
First, total depravity does not mean that people are entirely bad in the conventional sense. It does not mean that we are not moral/ethical beings, or that we can't love each other, or that we can't experience the finer and higher things that existence allows. As only the most insane would deny, people (Christians and otherrwise) are quite able to live virtuous, productive, loving, and admirable lives.
Second, total depravity has nothing to do with particular sins. It's not about feeling bad because you surf the internet on the clock, or because you masturbate or something like that. The small-fry sins are not really the problem. As a consequence, knowledge of one's depravity has nothing to do with sitting around feeling shitty for doing various bad things.
The doctrine of total depravity, rather, holds that by virtue of the Fall, human beings are turned entirely away from God. Augustine understands this in terms of love: humans love God with the love due creatures and love creatures with the kind of love due to God. Luther understood it in terms of trust: we will trust anything with our ultimate well-being other than God. Either way, all of our faculties--even our good ones--are no longer directed at the love, trust, and glorification of God but are rather turned inward towards ourselves or outward at other created things. Moreover, our own power cannot, under any circumstances, turn ourselves back to God. People in this state (i.e., everyone) are entirely capable of doing wonderful things, but they are not capable of turning those wonderful things to the love and glory of God.
So yes, Shakespeare can write all the world-changing drama he wants, and Bach can write the most brilliant music a human has ever made. These are good and wonderful things that we rightly enjoy. But neither of them can come up to God and say, "take 'King Lear' or the Mass in B. Minor in behalf of my sins." Even the greatest things within us are of no help when we come before the big guy, because everything within us is turned to our own purposes.
Thus when Luther talks about human sinfulness, he's unlikely to talk about your penny-ante depredations. He's much likelier to talk about the great heroes and wise men of antiquity who, through all of their goodness, fought constantly against grace. Total depravity, I repeat, is not about feeling like a shitty person. It has nothing to do, in fact, with anything we can perceive or feel about ourselves. At best we can feel the consequences of our nature. It has nothing to do with guilt or shame, both of which can be assuaged by theological half-measures. Only a totally depraved person is in total need of grace.
thus sayeth Benjamin Dueholm on Saturday, May 06, 2006
49 Comments:
Luther does seem to suggest, though, that trusting Christians are more likely or better equipped to live according to the sermon on the mount in the actual world, doesn't he? If our lives are directed (by grace) "at the love, trust, and glorification of God," aren't we supposed to become better, more ethical people? Luther writes:
If someone cuts with a rusty and rough hatchet, even though the worker is a good craftsman, the hatchet leaves bad, jagged, and ugly gashes. So it is when God works through us.
But, surely there is a difference between the work we do when The Good Craftsperson works through us and the work we do when we are deceived and controlled by Satan.
If Christianity doesn't make people better, if Christians are no less totally depraved than anyone else, what good is it?
[N]either of them can come up to God and say, "take 'King Lear' or the Mass in B. Minor in behalf of my sins." Even the greatest things within us are of no help when we come before the big guy, because everything within us is turned to our own purposes.
How do you envision this "coming before the big guy?" I have a hard time thinking heaven and hell. JCHFleetguy once told me in a comment that he thinks God will knock me on the head a few times, then let me into heaven. I was oddly relieved, actually. Is it true that Buddhists, Jews and Secular Humanists are fated to eternal pain and damnation if they fail to confess faith in the risen Christ who died for all our sins? Any guesses on what that'll look like?
Now, I'd totally love to trust completely in the promise of God. Is there no difference, though, between that promise and St. Paul's promise that his is an accurate witness to God's promise? Is that not a problem? It's the holy spirit, not St. Paul, that confirms that the promise is from God, right? How can we tell the difference between the holy spirit and Satan disguised as the holy spirit, his favorite disguise?
Mind if I submit this post for next week's Christian Carnival, Ben? We might get a few extra hits if I do.
I rather like this explanation. I was thinking of writing something that would explain the Wesleyan doctrines of prevenient grace and sanctification, which apparently have some of your fellow Lutherans a bit confused. If I do that, at least now I won't have to give much background on total depravity, other than a link to this entry
I like it too.
I confess a difficulty with the T of TULIP - probably because I desire to feel a little better about myself. The word "depravity" is so, so harsh. [that is NOT a recommendation for a change]
I think Calvin would actually agree - since he said he granted that there is a general deep conscience in human beings flowing from God's character.
This would be a good Carnival post.
Oh Tyler
I think your question about shouldn't Christians be better is nailed by Lewis here
To all, on the subject of total depravity,
Very, very briefly (I can, in fact, be brief - I promise!) let me say that I once heard that total depravity was not saying that people are entirely bad; but rather saying that every aspect of human behavior (and perhaps extending beyond behavior into the very nature of any person) has been tainted by the bad, making the whole being tainted.
In other words, one is totally depraved not because everything one does and all that one is is entirely depraved, but because everything one does and all that one is is subject to depravity. There is nothing which is not in some way tainted or corrupt. This does not deny the absense of good, but affirms the presense of bad, holding the good and bad in tension.
Or something like that. As a Methodist I've never really been down with total depravity as a doctrine, and so I don't know if this wasn't some sort of misguided synthesis to make the doctrine sound like what I already believed.
JCHFleetguy,
I've often pondered that argument from Lewis. It was very important to me when I was in high school. By the end of my senior year in high school I had read every work by Lewis published in America. (That is an improbable claim, I know, and it may not even be true, but it certainly feels true. If there was a book I overlooked, it wasn't for a lack of trying!)
The problem with his argument is that, while it works on paper, there is no way to test for it. We can't collect any empirical data on it.
While in my life I think that my faith has had a tremendous (and positive) impact on my moral behavior, I have (anecdotally - again we can't collect empirical data here) seen other people behave quite badly after a conversion experience.
Faith, particularly immature faith, often brings out the worst in us, making us arrogant and condescending. While it makes us feel (and rightly so) chosen by God, we often wrongly assume that we are the only chosen ones, uniquely chosen and so uniquely endowed with moral standing. We can do whatever we want to them, the un-chosen, because we are the chosen ones.
Of course this is not a necessary consequence of the Christian faith, and it is not a problem unique to Christianity. But it is a serious problem which does anecdotally coincide with adopting the Christian faith. And, as such, honesty forces me to remain suspiciously agnostic about the claim that Christianity always or even generally makes one a morally better person.
Lewis accounts for one problem (the bad assumption that if Christianity always made one a better moral agent then Christians in all cases would be morally superior to non-Christians), but he does not address a whole host of other problems, which are created by our inability to test his theory.
As far as the Lewis goes:
There is either a warning or an encouragement here for every one of us. If you are a nice person - if virtue comes easily to you-beware! Much is expected from those to whom much is given. If you mistake for your own merits what are really God's gifts to you through nature, and if you are contented with simply being nice, you are still a rebel: and all those gifts will only make your fall more terrible, your corruption more complicated, your bad example more disastrous. The Devil was an archangel once; his natural gifts were as far above yours as yours are above those of a chimpanzee. (My emphasis)
So, Lewis suggests, unless you experience a true conversion, you're going to fall painfully. Christianity, in the end, will apparently make you happier. Your corruption is more complicated and you're a worse example if you don't convert, too. Doesn't this suggest that Lewis believes Christians are morally superior?
But if you are a poor creature- poisoned by a wretched upbringing in some house full of vulgar jealousies and senseless quarrels saddled, by no choice of your own, with some loathsome sexual, perversion- nagged day in and day out by an inferiority complex that makes you snap at your best friends-do not despair. He knows all about it. You are one of the poor whom He blessed. He knows what a wretched machine you are trying to drive. Keep on. Do what you can. One day (perhaps in another world, but perhaps far sooner than that) He will fling it on the scrap-heap and give you a new one. And then you may astonish us all-not least yourself: for you have learned your driving in a hard school. (Some of the last will be first and some of the first will be last.)
Oh, Christianity might make you a better person. If it doesn't, don't worry, everyone else isn't going to be allowed into the next world, anyway. Oh, wait...
There are people who do not accept the full Christian doctrine about Christ but who are so strongly attracted by Him that they are His in a much deeper sense than they themselves understand. There are people in other religions who are being led by God's secret influence to concentrate on those parts of their religion which are in agreement with Christianity, and who thus belong to Christ without knowing it. For example, a Buddhist of good will may be led to concentrate more and more on the Buddhist teaching about mercy and to leave in the background (though he might still say he believed) the Buddhist teaching on certain other points. Many of the good Pagans long before Christ's birth may have been in this position.
Oh! The secret Christians! I forgot about those. Noble pagans and ethical Buddhists are really Christians in disguise! I thought being a Christian had something to do with believing Jesus was the son of God or something. It turns out that doing justice and loving mercy is all that's needed. Thanks C.S. Lewis! Thanks JCHFleetguy!
(You knew what you were getting into, John, when you brought up Lewis. You know he irritates the shit out of me. I still love The Great Divorce, though. My fundamentalist friend Andrew called it a really beautiful description of a pantheist worldview, so it must be ok.)
In short, it seems that Lewis is arguing that Christianity, properly understood, should make people better. Ben once said, quoting someone else, possibly, that Christians aren't any better than anyone else, they're just forgiven. That seems different from what Lewis argues. Again, if Ben's right, what's the point?
Tyler
Well, ask Ben.
Lewis is arguing that you will be better as a Christian than if you are not - and yes I believe that is true. I think he would probably apply the 80/20 rule to this statement and not make it 100%
I notice you just jumped right over the really very good transition paragraph about people not being 100% anything - Christian or not - with everyone in a process of moving closer to God; or further away. That is kinda important.
As to your flippancy on the Buddhist paragraph: he is arguing that non-Christians are not denied heaven if they are still focusing on God's will in their life. Do you really disagree? [I know you do not]. If you do not disagree: how do you think that works? Anything goes? Are their elements of Buddhist, or Hindu, or Native American worship that would be offensive to God even if sincerely done? Would the Holy Spirit move people away from that to areas of worship that were not as offensive?
Hey, but I only bring up Lewis to give you a chance to vent. You can be so uptight :-)
Sandlestraps
Yeah; but I have never felt collecting empirical data on the work of the Holy Spirit to be real possible - or important.
JCHFleetguy,
Collecting empirical data on "the work of the Holy Spirit" is, as you say, not that important. It is religiously insignificant.
But, if your argument hinges on the truth-value of the statement
Christianity (either always or generally, I can't tell which you mean) makes you a morally better person
then for that argument to work we have to have some way of testing the truth value of that statement. And since:
1. Anecdotally, that statement is certainly not obviously true, and in many cases very strongly seems to be false (that is, there are many occasions in which an apparent conversion to Christianity leads to worse rather than better behavior), and
2. There is no empirical way to test the statement, leaving the anecdotal evidence as our sole evidence,
any argument built on that statement is at best dubious.
Tyler,
I spent too much time dealing with JCHFleetguy's response to you, and not enough (or even any) time dealing with your comment which gave rise to this silly little discussion.
That is in part because we have very little to discuss here, in part because I can't tell exactly what your "angle" is, and in part because I don't know whether or not you seriously believe that the value of religion is found solely in moral transformation.
If Christianity doesn't make people better, if Christians are no less totally depraved than anyone else, what good is it?
This implies that religion is principally or even singularly concerned with morality, but it does not really argue for that. It is certainly not obvious that the main concern of religion in general and Christianity in particular is morality. While there is a moral component to most religions, it is still the case that:
1. Not all religions even have a moral component,
2. Religion is not necessary for a moral life, and
3. Even in cases where the religion in question is concerned with morality, that is not the only concern of that religion.
In other words, moral concern is, while often and rightly associated with religion, neither a necessary
nor sufficient condition for describing something as religious.
While it is always dangerous to reduce religion (or anything else) to a single statement of purpose, if religion can be reduced as such to something, it is certainly not best reduced to morality. Rather, if it can be reduced to something, it is best reduced to something like
fascilitating contact with the sacred, and order life around the experience of that divine encounter.
While this would hopefully have some moral component, that moral component is not the subject of religion in general or Christianity in particular. The subject is instead one's relationship with the sacred, and how that provides our experience of life with meaning.
So, whether or not Christianity produces morally superior lives, its value is found in its ability to connect people to God. That is, of course, as untestable as the moral component. But, as JCHFleetguy reminds us in his own special way, not all claims are subject to empirical studies. How would one study "connection to God," anyway? I'd love to see that study. I know that some scientists have been doing work on religious experiences, but the data I've seen on that fundamentally misunderstands the phenomena involved.
Sandalstraps: I'm not sure that Tyler's question implied that religion's function is exclusively moral-- a thesis against which you have argued cogently many times. (I will let Tyler have the last word on what he meant, of course.) The claim agsinst which you argue is
(1) X is a religious belief, practice, etc. if and only if x is also a moral belief, practice, etc.
But Tyler's question could be taken to imply this weaker claim:
(2) If X is a religious belief, practice, etc., then x has moral implications.
(1) and (2) aren't the same. For starters, the way I expressed (2) speaks of "moral implications," not "moral beliefs, practices, etc." This is because (2) isn't an effort to analyze the content of religious beliefs and practices, but instead to say that religious beliefs may entail moral beliefs or otherwise have a moral influence over a religious person's behavior. But even if we rephrased (2) to make it about the content of religious beliefs (and parallel to (1)), it's still different from (1). (1) would entail a reformulation of (2), but (2) wouldn't entail (1); (1) entails that all moral beliefs, practices, etc. are also religious, and (2) doesn't.
The finer points of logical analysis aside, I agree that (1) is false, but I think that there are good reasons for accepting (2). What kind of religion would have nothing whatsoever to say about the good? The notion of a religion without a moral component, as you put it, trades on an overly narrow way of talking about morality, I think. Religions may differ in their accounts of the good, and many traditions might speak of two or more "orders" of good that differ from each other to such a degree that the term "good" can only be predicated analogically. But we might expect a religious tradition to say something about this, and for that account of value to have some influence over what it is that those who belong to the tradition actually do.
So I think that Tyler's question still stands. I don't have an answer ready, but that question has been on my mind for a long time.
Brian,
I appreciate the distinction between (1) and (2), and was (perhaps mistakenly) taking Tyler to mean something closer to (1) than (2).
I am also interested in the relationship between religion and ethics/morality. I am most interested in the possibility of an ethical criticism of different religions. The is interesting to me because of my arguments concerning our general inability to arrive at the truth-value of religious claims.
That is, if God is a complete mystery to us, then we cannot evaluate the truth-value of claims made about God (unless you are dealing with a series of claims about God which are inconsistent with each other but are to be held together, but that is a seperate issue with its own problems: assuming
1. The mysterious nature of God, and
2. inconsistent claims made about God, which are by the person making the claims to be held together, and
3. that it is possible that at least some of the claims could be true
we still, in the event of internal inconsistency don't know how to determine which of the competeing claims are true, and which are false. We can only say that if some are true then others must be false.)
Sorry for the long derailment. Anyway, if we can't evaluate religions for the truth-value of their fundamental claims, but still want some grounds on which to prefer some religions to others (or a single religion to all of its so-called "competition") then what grounds do we look for?
Ethics/morality would be a good place to start. But, of course, the problem there is that there is not some set of universally held ethical principles against which to test each religion. But, absent that universal set of ethical principles, we can still offer up some relative precepts, generally held, and part of our mostly collective moral intuition.
But while we are evaluating religions in terms of ethics we must also understand, as I've argued before, that ethics/morality is not the principal concern of religion. Our religion may inform our ethics, and have ethical implications, but ethics/morality is not the subject of religion. So even if a religion fails an ethical test, and so becomes a morally "bad" religion, it still might succeed as a religion.
I'm not sure about that. I can't arrive at the bottom of this one yet.
Sandlestraps
I will point out the same part of the chapter from Lewis to you that I pointed out to Tyler
People are not 100% anything; and some christians are in process to move away from Christ - some are moving toward christ.
What "transforms peoples minds" is the work of "Christ in them" reordering their lives and priorities to God's will - if they ignore that voice then there is little transformation.
I will say its a truth claim anecdotally. I haven't had this conversation with every follower of Christ - but I can think of few that did not see a transformation in themselves once they "came to Christ".
The spiritual arrogance you point out two comments above is off course a problem. In my original comment I was going to ask what constituted good and bad behavior - we wouldn't all agree - but decided that was a crazy topic. Still is.
Did the spiritually arrogant feel transformation and change - of course they did. Are they "better"? Probably, and hopefully spiritual maturity and a good witness from other christians will help them find humility.
Or, they may just find themselves chocked with weeds - and moving away from Christ as Lewis examines.
Oh, this comment came while I was writing mine
That is, if God is a complete mystery to us, then we cannot evaluate the truth-value of claims made about God
Gotta run, but God isn't a "complete" mystery to us. I know this is a popular refrain; but we have ways to know a great deal about God's character and desires - even outside the word of God.
You might read Martin Luther, JCH. I think that his ideas concerning the hiddenness, both of God and the devil has something to say about knowing the character of God outside of scripture (which Luther, too, to my eyes, misunderstands as the Word of God - there's a reason why our congregation says "Hear what the Spirit is saying to God's people" after scripture readings now.)
As to your flippancy on the Buddhist paragraph: he is arguing that non-Christians are not denied heaven if they are still focusing on God's will in their life. Do you really disagree?
1. I think the whole idea of a heaven where you go when you die is a little ridiculous to begin with.
2. I was asking my original question of Ben with specific regard to Luther's thought. He taught that God doesn't give a crap about your works. Our teacher, paraphrasing Luther, said something like this: "You can bring your little bag of good works up to God when you die. It can be a big bag, with really nice works. God isn't impressed by that kind of thing." If I remember right, this is Luther taking Augustine a step further and said that good works have nothing to do with one's salvation. God wants to know about the status of your trust in God's promise. That's it.
3. If I believed in a heaven where "good" (according to whatever definition I think best conforms to God's will) people go when they die, of course I would think that good buddhists and atheists go there when they die. If Luther's right about Christianity, though, this is impossible. Slavoj Zizek relates the following anecdote at the beginning of On Belief:
In the Larry King debate between a rabbi, a Catholic priest and a Southern Baptist, broadcast in March 2000, both the rabbi and the priest expressed their hope that the unification of religions is feasible since, irrespective of his or her official creed, a thoroughly good person can count on divine grace and redemption. Only the Baptist -- a young, well-tanned, slightly overweight and repulsively slick Southern yuppie -- insisted that, according to the letter of the Gospel, only those who "live in Christ" by explicitly recognizing themselves in his address will be redeemed, which is why, as he concluded with a barely discernible contemptuous smile, "a lot of good and honest people will burn in hell." In short, goodness (applying common moral norms) which is not grounded directly in the Gospel is ultimately just a perfidious semblance of itself, its own travesty...
I think Sandalstraps and Brian are being overly generous with me in assuming that I actually have a position on the value of religion, broadly speaking, or Christianity more specifically.
Brian's right in that I don't think the only purpose for religion is moral goodness, but my question for Ben was "What good is a Lutheran understanding of total depravity and Christianity in general if it doesn't make people better?" It seems that moral improvement is neither its goal or an expected side effect. It seems to me that the only reason to follow Luther and his understanding of Christ is to get into heaven when you die or when Christ comes back for the final judgment at some specific but constantly not-coming future point in history.
Part of what keeps me up at night is that I think Luther is giving a pretty correct interpretation of scripture, or at least one thread that runs through it, especially those parts written by Paul. To my eyes, JCHFleetguy's Christianity is just as revisionist as Strappy's or mine, only he thinks or calls it biblical, which looks like a mistake to me. Luther strikes me as representing about as appropriately orthodox position as possible, but I think that this outlook fails to respond appropriately to the full implications of our pluralistic situation. I also think that it might be a mistake to base everything on what St. Paul said will happen after we die.
Strappy's idea of religion as facilitating one's relationship with the sacred is an answer to this question, and probably along the lines of what I'd say, but I somehow don't think that it would be Ben's answer, which I'm waiting for.
If one were to try to evaluate the question of whether a religion (e.g., Christianity) correlates with more moral behavior, one would immediately run into the problem of establishing the population. Who is a Christian? Someone who identifies herself as one? Someone who has some affiliation to a Christian community? Someone who subscribes to the essential tenets of the faith? Someone who lives a life entirely focused on and guided by the faith in and example of Christ?
Each of these is obviously a very different population. In the case of exemplary Christians, of course, you would expect a strong correlation between Christianity and moral behavior. But that's just tautological and of no evidentiary use. It's like saying that there wouldn't be any thieves if people just obeyed laws against stealing.
So no, as JCH says,
What "transforms peoples minds" is the work of "Christ in them" reordering their lives and priorities to God's will
Christianity isn't a treatment that you can apply to some and not to a control group (perhaps have them worship a false god as a placebo) and then test the results. 'Christianity' is inert; asking whether it makes people better is like asking whether constitutional democracy makes people better. It may have some indirect sociological effect, I guess, but on the whole it's an absurd question.
Beyond that, of course, is the fact that Christians are hidden. A person may not even know herself if she's really a Christian, so deceptively can we appear to others and to ourselves. Do hidden Christians live more worthwhile lives than non-Christians? The only conceivable answer lies in faith.
And Tyler:
Now, I'd totally love to trust completely in the promise of God. Is there no difference, though, between that promise and St. Paul's promise that his is an accurate witness to God's promise? Is that not a problem?
God Almighty, son, there are times when you have to check your historical-critical method at the door. We need to get you into an intensive re-education session with Susan Schreiner so she can teach you about levels of meaning and the plague of historicizing and so forth. We have only the Scriptural witness as a basis even to speak of God's promises. If we reject it or complicate it out of all sensibility, then we either may not speak of God and his promises at all, or we have to invent them ourselves in accordance with what we find reasonable and correct.
It seems to me that the only reason to follow Luther and his understanding of Christ is to get into heaven when you die or when Christ comes back for the final judgment at some specific but constantly not-coming future point in history.
Tyler, please don't say this. It's embarrassing. Read 'The Freedom of a Christian,' or 'Address to the German Nobility,' or some of the later sections of the Galatians lectures. Luther's theology is not about getting into heaven. It's about giving up on getting into heaven and trusting solely in Christ's mercy.
With this in mind, the religious imagination actually becomes very this-worldly and quite entirely focused on the neighbor and on good deeds. As Luther says, this is when a work is truly good--when it is not done to appease God but for the good of the neighbor, gratuitously. Eternal life is not a goal to which you are capable of striving, so in fact nothing we do can be aimed at it. That's the heart of Luther's ethics.
Does that answer your question?
As for the question of access to the resurrection (I'm trying to wean myself from 'heaven,' which sounds to everyone like a physical place), I think it's easy to think about it the wrong way. Lewis goes for the 'anonymous Christians' route in which some approximation of Christian belief and practice will get you in the door. The Southern Baptist thinks that only the born-again (or whatever) are on the right side of the velvet rope. And Tyler seems to think that being a generally good person will be good enough.
In all of these cases, the emphasis is on human initiative rather than divine. There's nothing about us or in us that will survive death; we are not immortal souls, but rather resurrected to eternal life. It is God's work, and God will be just and loving. Eternal life will not be granted for the sake of some quality we possess, but for the sake of God's good pleasure. So I tend somewhat towards universalism, I guess, but in any case, I don't think there's much point in speculating about what we have to do to be on the right side of the rope, because all we get to do is die.
By the way, of course Luther believed that non-Christians were going to hell. With the exception of Erasmus and some of the humanists ('St. Socrates, pray for us'), that's what all Christians believed in the 16th century.
Getting there. Thanks for pointing that out.
I'm still bothered by the idea that trusting in Christ's mercy is somehow necessary for correct moral action. Am I wrong to put the two together like that? Is trusting Christ's mercy actually independent of correct moral action? That's still a little unclear to me.
Christians are hidden. A person may not even know herself if she's really a Christian, so deceptively can we appear to others and to ourselves. Do hidden Christians live more worthwhile lives than non-Christians? The only conceivable answer lies in faith.
I think that's so interesting, but I'm not sure exactly what you mean. Can you expand on it?
I take "hidden Christians" to mean people of other faiths and/or of no faith and/or the handful of confessing Christians who actually act on behalf of the neighbor gratuitously. Yes? Something about the term "hidden Christians" makes me instinctively uneasy and reminds me of how, as Noam Chompsky relates, Japanese people were considered "honorary whites" during apartheid-era South Africa. Kwok said something like this in the book of hers we read.
On the other hand, if one is a Christian, and thinks that one has correct beliefs (and who, really, consciously believes a falsehood?) but sees others acting in ways one considers good, maybe one can't help but think, "Hey, these people really do agree with me, they just don't realize where they're wrong." Maybe a secular humanist learns Luther's ethics and thinks, "Ah, Luther is just a hidden atheist. That is why I like this."
I started my last post before Ben posted his, by the way.
There's nothing about us or in us that will survive death; we are not immortal souls, but rather resurrected to eternal life. It is God's work, and God will be just and loving. Eternal life will not be granted for the sake of some quality we possess, but for the sake of God's good pleasure.
This is probably the fault of my inner atheist, but I don't have any idea what all this means.
Tyler,
"Hidden Christians" = Christians. It's Luther's idea that the true Church of Christ is invisible. I am not using it to mean anything about Lewis's good pagans. Since appearances are deceptive, we can't judge empirically whether someone is truly a Christian, and ultimately we can't even know this about ourselves because self-deception is so powerful.
still bothered by the idea that trusting in Christ's mercy is somehow necessary for correct moral action. Am I wrong to put the two together like that? Is trusting Christ's mercy actually independent of correct moral action?
Yes! Yes! A thousand times yes! That is exactly Luther's point. Faith is entirely independent of correct moral action (or rather, I will say, of salvific action or good works) because we're incapable of that kind of action. We can be conventionally good people and we can do nice things and so forth, but we can't merit anything by our works. We can only have faith.
Now when we have faith, the good works inevitably follow, and in that case the works are truly good and pleasing to God and action is truly "correct moral action." That doesn't mean that we become sinless--sin still clings to us in every way. But Luther's idea was that being freed from the punitive need to amass our wagonload of good works to offer to God would actually unleash the true human capacity for free and moral action.
Now I have problems with Luther's ideas on this point, but I won't go into them now. It's sufficient to try to make this clear.
As for eternal life, the point I'm trying to make is this: we tend to frame the question of who's in and who's out in terms of what we do or have or participate in that grants or makes us worthy of eternal life (Christianity, anonymous pagan Christianesque religion, being a good and worthy person). This is all wrong. Eternal life is God's gift and initiative. So when we ask who will go where and when, we need to look at the properties of God (omnipotent, benevolent) rather than ourselves.
Ben,
I feel deeply, deeply in love with you when you said this:
God Almighty, son, there are times when you have to check your historical-critical method at the door. We need to get you into an intensive re-education session with Susan Schreiner so she can teach you about levels of meaning and the plague of historicizing and so forth. We have only the Scriptural witness as a basis even to speak of God's promises. If we reject it or complicate it out of all sensibility, then we either may not speak of God and his promises at all, or we have to invent them ourselves in accordance with what we find reasonable and correct.
But you fell off the pedestal a little with this:
So I tend somewhat towards universalism
mainly because I see nothing in this paragraph:
In all of these cases, the emphasis is on human initiative rather than divine. There's nothing about us or in us that will survive death; we are not immortal souls, but rather resurrected to eternal life. It is God's work, and God will be just and loving. Eternal life will not be granted for the sake of some quality we possess, but for the sake of God's good pleasure. So I tend somewhat towards universalism, I guess, but in any case, I don't think there's much point in speculating about what we have to do to be on the right side of the rope, because all we get to do is die.
that implies universalism. I believe God has some requirements of His creatures. I think they are summarized in "Love God with your all; and your neighbor as yourself"
One of the core tenents of any ethical/moral structure is that you give what is due to whom it is owed. God is owed ALL by us. Any religion in the world believes [including Buddhism depending on how you define their creator] knows that you owe whoever gives you life everything.
Certainly, you do not do for your neighbor as a kind of rent payment on your future heavenly mansion. Ben is absolutely right that is is not about appeasing God. It can, however, be about pleasing and obeying God in the taking care of one of those others, like you, made in His image.
Tyler
Don't encourage the "exclusivist" fundamentalist in me. The Biblical witness is pretty stark actually - there is no real reason to hold out hope of salvation to the Buddhist.
However, as Lewis points out: Jesus will be at the gate of eternity; and as Ben points out He will allow in whoever it pleases Him to allow in. The Biblical witness tells us a sure road to the gate and beyond. I will follow Lewis in this and say that while no one will get to the Father except by the Son - and we are wise to follow the road we know about - I cannot say the Son will let no one but followers of Christ past the gate.
Sue me for being a liberal theologian I guess. Had to half-step somewhere I suppose :-)
JCH,
I agree with your comments to Tyler--I think that's the way to think of it. As for my own comments, I'm not making any strong claims for universalism. I suggest it for speculation. But the point of this thread has been that we don't get to the resurrection by virtue of our conformity to God's commandments (i.e., Law, in 16th-c. evangelical terms) but by our trust in God's promise (i.e., Gospel). The command to love God and neighbor totally is, on this account, one we will never fulfill in this life. It is given to us so that we know who we are (i.e., people hopelessly incapable of doing what God commands us to do). I don't really believe in partial credit--if you try hard to love G and N with all, or if you love G and N with most, or if you feel badly enough about not loving either all that much, the rest of it will be imputed to you. If I did, then I should probably be a Roman Catholic.
No, we're accountable for perfection, by which accountability we learn that we cannot attain perfection no matter how hard we try. This opens the door to Gospel, which says that the righteousness of God has been disclosed apart from the Law, by faith for faith. Our acceptance of this (passive) righteousness is what justifies us, not our own conformity to God's law (which we nonetheless strive to fulfill out of love and gratitude for God's absolutely free and gratuitous gift).
What does this have to do with universalism? I don't remember. There is a lot in the Bible that speaks against universalism, and a few passages that speak for it (my favorite being John 12:32, a verse that almost every commentator explains away), and lots of arguments both ways. But my sense is that who's in and who's out won't be based on the Law, but on something else.
How's that for some orthodox Lutheranism?
Put Ben and I on the same page please.
Such an active thread today!
Ben: You say the following:
"Now when we have faith, the good works inevitably follow, and in that case the works are truly good and pleasing to God and action is truly "correct moral action." That doesn't mean that we become sinless--sin still clings to us in every way. But Luther's idea was that being freed from the punitive need to amass our wagonload of good works to offer to God would actually unleash the true human capacity for free and moral action.
Now I have problems with Luther's ideas on this point, but I won't go into them now. It's sufficient to try to make this clear."
Am I to take it, then, that by definition the person who has faith can do no moral wrong? I don't think you mean to say that, at least if you think that sin is a category with any moral significance. But it sure sounds like that's what you're saying. And if that is what you're saying, then faith is morally inert after all.
To make my point, let me sketch out a dilemma your position might face. Either anything the confessed faithful do (ignoring all of the "hidden Christians" business for the moment) is automatically good and the doctrine is monstrous, or doing good with the right motivations is just all that faith means.
If it's the latter, then the Lutheran position you describe really boils down to Kant's moral theory: Moral goodness is simply having a good will independent of any anticipation of the consequences of one's actions. (Historically, of course, the influence was transmitted the other way, via German Pietism, but all of us posting on this thread are on the other side of Kant-- and his philosophical and theological successors.) Of course, when it's translated back into theological language Kant's moral theory implies universalism, since in principle all agents are equally capable of having a good will (since the will = practical rationality, and all rational beings are tautologically rational).
With Kant, you even get the human depravity, since it always has a tendency to act on motives other than just the moral law.
The problem, though, is that if Kant is really what we're going for here, orthodox religion is for Kantians, all we need religion for is to depict our moral vocation to us in a form that is accessible to our "pathological" human condition. An ideally rational being would be fully autonomous and wouldn't really stand in any need of God or the Bible or tradition or any of it.
(Historical note: This aspect of Kant is what led Schleiermacher to lay so much stress upon the feeling of utter dependence. Kant didn't have much to say about emotions, and an emotion that absolutely undermined autonomy would run counter to everything that Kant stood for.)
So: What do you mean to say, Ben, about faith and the moral agency of the faithful? Does Luther have a way out of the dilemma? Where does the tradition Kant represents go wrong?
I believe I am now a certifiable theological snob. I will not participate in a discussion once C.S. Lewis has been cited as an authority.
And sorry for the delay. Sometimes my computer doesn't acknowledge that changes have been made to the Watchpost until several days after they have occured (these include comments)
Gee, sorry to fall below your lofty standards.
Say something brilliant from some German source and maybe you can wash the British professor out of the conversation :-)
JCHFleetguy,
I hope you know that the distinction is not just (or even principally) between "German" and "British."
While I have long been a Lewis fan (even though at this point I don't agree with him nearly as often) it is important to point out that he has no formal theological training, and gets often out of his depth (like most commenters here, myself included). Lewis was, as you say, a professor. But he was a professor of literature. His best academic work was on Medieval and Renaissance romantic literature. None of his theological work was taken seriously by people in that field during his lifetime, and frankly, he did not expect them to.
See, for instance, his introduction to Reflections on the Psalms, in which he feels the need to almost apologize for writing a book on a subject far outside his area of expertise. His defense was that sometimes students learn best from other students, because they have not yet advanced so far thatthey have forgotten the concerns of the beginner.
Lewis is a great place to start for reflection on your faith, but he his not a theologian, and would not want to be considered as such. He wasn't an expert, but rather just a clever guy who wanted to apply his cleverness to such an important area of his faith. I have no doubt that, if he had developed his interest in theology as a student he might well have decided to study theology and would have become a theologian. But by the time he had his conversion experience he was already teaching literature, and never went back to school to change course.
This does not mean, as Kyle seems to imply, that he is never worth listening to or seriously considering on a theological point. But it does mean that there is a great deal which he fails to account for, since this is not his field. Lewis, in other words, was a layman, just like you and me. A very clever layman, but a layman nonetheless, who needs sometimes to be cleaned up by our betters before being presented to the serious theologian. And often, when he is cleaned up (see, for instance, the work on him by Jerry Walls at Asbury Theological Seminary) he stops sounding very much like the man I grew up reading.
Brian,
The short answer to your question is that I don't know. I am in no position to place Luther and Kant into dialogue, in part because I think they had such radically different views of the world that placing them over against each other necessitates some violence to their ideas.
What I was going for here was an explication of the standard Lutheran position, to the best of my knowledge, on the relationship between faith and works. It is clearly not the case that faith makes all actions good. Faith 'covers' our sinfulness in the eyes of God so that it is not imputed to us; faith does not change our natures as such. Thus we are constantly liable to sin, but our sin has no power to condemn us.
The question of whether grace in Luther's view is imputed or infused is, from what I know, still being argued. That would start to address the relationship between faith/justification and moral behavior. My own sense is that, for all Luther's ostensible misanthropy, on some level he was quite optimistic about human capacities when freed from the curse of the Law.
The matter of hiddenness, difficult as it is, is important here. Christians look pretty much like everyone else--doing good deeds, committing sins, being religious in some way. The real Christian is known only to God, not through externally moral conduct (of which the papists, Jews, and the Turk--in Luther's charming language--are all quite capable).
Sandlestraps
I understand that Lewis was an apologist and a popularizer - and not a theologian.
Frankly, Kyle caught me at a time when I am pretty sick and tired of attacks on the source rather than the position. Sore point - he touched it.
Ben could look at what I said - paraphrased from Lewis, him etc - and deal with it and interact.
[rant]
Kyle comes in, as he admits actually, with some flippant and intellectually arrogant comment about quoting Lewis essentially debasing a discussion to a level he is unwilling to lower himself to participate.
Does he disagree with Lewis's view on justification and redemption; and the ability of those who do not follow Christ to enter paradise? Then disagree. Or agree.
He can quote Kant, Hegel, Marx (Karl and Groucho) for all I care - I will take his position as it comes and disagree or agree with his position; and not batter him about because he read the wrong books and quotes the wrong guy to get it.
[/rant]
Ben and all
The Catholics and Lutherans have in theory unified their position on faith and works
JOINT DECLARATION ON THE DOCTRINE OF JUSTIFICATION
Maybe this will add to the discussion.
JCHFleetguy: Yes, attacks on the source are extremely tiresome. If there's any problem with what Lewis says, we should be able to discover it in what he says, not in examining his credentials. I personally find much of what Lewis says quite helpful.
The academy is beginning to re-discover Lewis, too; I knew an English professor at Penn State who regularly published papers on Lewis and was working on a book, and his judgments were (and are) extremely favorable.
Ben: I think that what you say is more helpful than you realize. A major reason I dragged Kant into all of this, other than the rather striking parallels, is that I know a lot more philosophy than theology, so I'm always trying to understand theologians' discourse using the tools available to me.
I'm not familiar with the dispute over grace's being "imputed" or "infused." What's the difference? Is "infusion" the optimistic position you credit to Luther in the remark which follows?
JCH--
As it happens, I've written a little essay on the JDDJ--you can read it here if you're interested: http://www.mcsletstalk.org/v10n17.htm
In retrospect I think I was too naive about some of the differences at stake, and I would probably write it much differently today, but it's an interesting topic. Our Reformation professor has called it an 'Augustinian compromise,' which strikes me as about right.
Brian--
"Imputed" grace is ascribed or reckoned to a person; it does not become a property or a part of the person, but merely changes them in the eyes of God. "Infused" grace is poured into the believing soul, transforming him/her in a life of faithfulness. Luther wrote some things favoring the former and some the latter; I don't know if he ever treated the topic systematically. Anyway, it's one of the things Lutherans have beaten each other up over through the years.
Also, you're right about the parallels between Luther and Kant on the point of disinterested action--that much I know something about. Beyond that, I'm on very shaky ground.
All--
As for Lewis, I agree with the general idea that you should argue with the proposition, not the man. In a way it's rather sad that his apologetics have eclipsed his scholarly work in so many ways, because he was actually a really great scholar of English literature.
Ben: Thanks, that helps. It actually helps a lot. Kant's position is definitely that the moral law is "infused" in a rational being. (Of course, it's a strange sort of law, purely formal without any content, but still the supreme principle of morality.) A rational being's coming with the moral law as part of her "equipment," as it were, is all that makes disinterested action (i.e. action done for the law's sake, not just in accordance with the law) possible. It's just this aspect of Kant's moral theory that many philosophical commentators call mythical-- one even calls it a "sham." Others consider it a kind of secularized Christianity. I'm not sure what to call it, frankly; I just know that there's something very powerful about the story Kant tells that I've never quite been able to get away from. I think that when it comes to religion, he misses the boat somehow, but I've always been very hard put to identify just where he makes his mistake.
I still have a lot of questions swirling around in my head, but they aren't taking much shape right now. That'll have to do for right now.
Ben,
I liked the essay. It, and your comment above, leave me hungry for what you would change now
There is a future post somewhere for you.
As an aside on Catholic and Lutheran views of faith and works as they relate to justification:
Hans Kung, one of my favorites, wrote one of his doctoral dissertations (two doctorates, one in philosophy and one in theology, means two dissertations. One would be bad enough for me, but that's why I'm not Hans Kung) on roughly that subject.
It was originally published in German in 1957, as Rechtfertigung: Die Lehre Karl Barths und die katholische Besinnung (interesting, looking at the German word for "justification," we can see the root rechts, "right," showing us an early meaning of the term: to make right) and was, in 2004, reprinted in a new English version as Justification: The Doctrine of Karl Barth and a Catholic Reflection (this was not the first English version, but it is the version currently in print).
In it, through the work of Barth, Kung attempts to demonstrate the connection between Lutherans and Catholics on the subject of justification. One of his main contentions eventually is that Luther was a Catholic, and should have been allowed to remain a Catholic. His doctrines remain within the bounds of sound Catholic theology, and his reforms were good solutions to very real problems within the church.
Anyone with way too much time to read should check it out.
Frankly, Kyle caught me at a time when I am pretty sick and tired of attacks on the source rather than the position. Sore point - he touched it.
Glad I gave you something to talk about. One minor clarification though: I did not attack Lewis. I merely stated (flippantly, as you noted, and not really for your benefit or harm) that I decline to participate in this particular discussion. As to your charge of intellectual arrogance, well, I can't really defend myself against a charge to which I've already pleaded guilty, can I?
Hey JCH -- I trashed Lewis, but at least I explained why in terms of how I read his actual words. Don't I get a cookie?
Ben you said this:
Now when we have faith, the good works inevitably follow, and in that case the works are truly good and pleasing to God and action is truly "correct moral action."
and this:
It is clearly not the case that faith makes all actions good. Faith 'covers' our sinfulness in the eyes of God so that it is not imputed to us; faith does not change our natures as such.
If we weren't able to perform "truly good" works, but, after a true conversion, we are, aren't our natures changed? There seems to be a disconnect here.
Yes! Yes! A thousand times yes! That is exactly Luther's point. Faith is entirely independent of correct moral action (or rather, I will say, of salvific action or good works) because we're incapable of that kind of action.
I'm not trying to argue (right now) that good works are necessary for salvation, but the two aren't entirely independent if good works flow inevitably follow.
I'm not trying to argue (right now) that good works are necessary for salvation, but the two aren't entirely independent if good works flow inevitably follow.
Correlation is not causation, however.
If somenoe does something nice for you, (generally) you thank them. You don't have to, but we usually do.
I wouldn't use the word "inevitably" but would rather state that if one truly understands the radical nature of grace through Christ which is completely undeserved, then how could one not give back to God in the only way that we know how? (By loving God and Neighbor.) What else can we do?
And sorry for the delay. Sometimes my computer doesn't acknowledge that changes have been made to the Watchpost until several days after they have occured (these include comments)
When you bring up the page, hit Control and F5 simultaneously. It was cause of a force refresh. If you do not clean out your cache regularly, the browser will refresh from cache instead of from the server so you won't see anything new because the browser hasn't queried the server.
Excellent post..thank you very much for clarifying this often-difficult concept.
Tyler, Tyler,
If we weren't able to perform "truly good" works, but, after a true conversion, we are, aren't our natures changed? There seems to be a disconnect here.
You've hit on something a problem with Luther, as I've mentioned in my comment on the imputation/infusion distinction. But the point, as I apparently must never tire of saying, is not that humans are bodily or morally incapable of doing good things. The vilest god-hater can build a skating rink for orphans and it is not a good, salvific, or "morally correct" deed in the absence of faith. You can do whatever the fuck you want for orphans, but without faith it's just warring against grace.
Now when you have faith, you can still do all the same things you could do before. Only now, since you are freed from the obligation to appease God through being kind to orphans, your good deeds are truly good. I don't think that means your nature has been changed. It's more in the nature of a realization--that's probably how Luther thought of it himself--that God is not cruel and angry and demanding but rather loving, mercifcul, and gracious. This realization--not some kind of mystical change in who we are--is what enables truly good works (the external forms of which we were always able to mimic, even in the depths of sin).
I'm not trying to argue (right now) that good works are necessary for salvation, but the two aren't entirely independent if good works flow inevitably follow.
Think back to math class. The x-axis is the independent variable, the y-axis is the dependent variable. Are they related? Of course. But you asked if faith is independent of works, which on this account it is. Works are dependent on faith, not vice versa.
Is this making any sense? I am trying to be brotherly about this because Schreiner will tear you multiple new ones if you don't get Luther right.
AMB,
As for good works inevitably following, that would be Luther's description, not my own.
Diane,
Thank you. I'm glad to see that this little colloquy has extended beyond the Divinity School nerd patrol.
Ben: Every time I think I understand what you're saying about moral motivation, your statements get up and start walking again.
In your response to Tyler, you say:
"The vilest god-hater can build a skating rink for orphans and it is not a good, salvific, or "morally correct" deed in the absence of faith. You can do whatever the fuck you want for orphans, but without faith it's just warring against grace.
Now when you have faith, you can still do all the same things you could do before. Only now, since you are freed from the obligation to appease God through being kind to orphans, your good deeds are truly good."
I think that my interests differ from Tyler's, and perhaps yours; I'm not in the market right now for a theology of salvation and justification. I'm just trying to figure out what you're trying to say about goodness (or what Luther is saying? I'm having trouble keeping track).
Let's try a little thought-experiment that's suggested by what you say here. The "god-hater" in your example does something that, were the person of faith to do it, would be a good action; let's use your example of starting an orphanage. The "god-hater," let's say, isn't doing it because she thinks that she's somehow buying off God. But let's change the stakes just a bit. Let's say that instead of being a "god-hater," as you put it, she's just an atheist, and she really doesn't think that the moral significance of her actions has anything to do with any theological narrative of salvation. She just starts up the orphanage because she thinks it's the right thing to do; she's not motivated by extrinsic considerations such as others' approval, self-gratification, or anything like that.
Has the atheist here acted morally, or not? Or is faith in God a necessary condition for truly moral action?
In order to head off some unproductive responses, let's first observe that whether there are any such atheists to be found in the world is utterly beside the point. Nothing about atheism as a conceptual matter commits one necessarily to a lack of moral conscience, at least not in any obvious sense. So it seems that, regardless of whether any of us can point to one or not, our orphanage-starting atheist COULD exist. Now, perhaps there are atheists in the world who in point of fact lack moral convictions. But I'm after a conceptual point here, not a moral psychology of atheists.
Second, we should avoid the false dilemma of saying that without genuine faith, people can only have extrinsic motivations (e.g. trying to please an angry God, please others, please oneself, etc.) for acting morally. This would just be a variation of the first move I've tried to outflank above. Our hypothetical orphanage-starting atheist really is starting the orphanage just because she thinks it's the right thing to do; she's not just kidding herself.
I think that in this scenario, there is no reason whatsoever to say that our orphanage-starting atheist isn't acting just as morally as the person of genuine faith as you describe her; both do the same thing, and neither is motivated by any expectation of reward. What leads them to this point of disinterest, however, is different; the person of faith because of her confidence in the grace of God, and the atheist because she believes in right and wrong, but she doesn't believe in a universe that keeps moral score.
Brian,
I see your point here and I think agree with what you're getting at. The whole idea of justification by faith, and the relationship between faith and good works, however, presumes an idea of human nature/psychology/motivation that I tried to lay out in the initial post of this thread. If you don't assume some idea of a radically impaired human nature, a whole being that is turned in on itself in some way or another, then justification by faith is not only senseless, but downright perverse. So yes, as you say:
Second, we should avoid the false dilemma of saying that without genuine faith, people can only have extrinsic motivations (e.g. trying to please an angry God, please others, please oneself, etc.) for acting morally. This would just be a variation of the first move I've tried to outflank above. Our hypothetical orphanage-starting atheist really is starting the orphanage just because she thinks it's the right thing to do; she's not just kidding herself.
This stipulation entirely excludes the discourse I've been trying to explain (in which I have been guilty of jumping back and forth between my own views and those of Luther).
In Lutheran theology (including moral theology), the human stands in two relationships--coram deo and coram hominibus (I think I got those right), before God and before neighbor/humanity. Before God you are a worthless sinner who is entirely unable to do anything pleasing or good. Before humanity you are a moral agent who can do some very fine things. The whole thrust of Lutheran theology on this point is that you cannot confuse the two--no aspect of your relationship before humans (athiest-built orphanges, e.g.) and their regard for you, or whatever moral philosophy you might stipulate, is of any avail in your stance coram deo. The only thing God demands is that you trust his promise of forgiveness of sins for the sake of faith. And that, of course, is no virtue coram hominibus.
So what I think of the virtuous atheist is really of no consequence here--I admire it and consider it a good example for all to follow, and I may even find something to emulate in the disinterest involved. But from the stanpoint of a moral anthropology that assumes 1) that all people stand liable to account before God and 2) that our motives are endlessly corrupt, you can see that it doesn't make any difference. So if
I'm not in the market right now for a theology of salvation and justification. I'm just trying to figure out what you're trying to say about goodness
then you're probably asking the wrong person (or in the wrong thread, anyway), because the question of goodness here his inextricably linked to matters of salvation and justification.
Apart from that discourse, however, I agree about your orphan-loving atheist.
Ben: You've exhibited great patience over the course of a very long thread. I think I'm beginning to understand where you're coming from on this. If I understand correctly, the position you are describing really entails two orders of goodness: Goodness before God and goodness before man. I still have the sneaking suspicion that both of these should have something to do with one another, but I won't delve into that issue at the moment.
P.S. When I said I wasn't in the market for a theology of justification, that doesn't mean that I lack interest in the topic, or that I don't feel that I stand in need of justification. I simply bristle at the possibility that justification is necessary for good conduct, because when that gets translated into public morality, it's a recipe for theocracy. I know that neither you nor Luther is angling for a theocracy, but there is a law of unintended consequences even in the sphere of high theory.
If I understand correctly, the position you are describing really entails two orders of goodness: Goodness before God and goodness before man. I still have the sneaking suspicion that both of these should have something to do with one another, but I won't delve into that issue at the moment.
You've touched on one of the big issues in Reformation theology. It seems very rational and reasonable that our conduct towards others influences our standing before God. This is why Luther stressed the utter irrationality of God's plan of justification--its sheer gratuitousness. It always seems that we should have something to add to the formula, something to contribute, but the whole point is that we don't. It's rather our good standing before God that authorizes and enables the (inward, invisible) goodness of our actions before each other. So in that sense, they do indeed have something to do with each other.
I simply bristle at the possibility that justification is necessary for good conduct, because when that gets translated into public morality, it's a recipe for theocracy.
Yes, I agree that what human ethics would consider good is not dependent on justification. This is evident in Luther, who insisted that the Law (human and divine) was necessary to coerce outward righteousness even in those who were not justified, and also that the just and the sinner are indistinguishable from appearances (see our discussion of hiddenness above). I don't think it's an accident that Lutheranism has never resulted in a theocracy that I know of. Calvin, on the other hand, had different ideas about the relationship between righteousness and external conduct, and I suspect that it's no accident that Calvinism did preside over theocracy.
Tyler--
Sorry if I was short or insulting above. I've spent a little too much time reading and wrangling with this stuff to remember how counterintuitive it is.
One more thing (although I invite continual conversation):
It may help with Luther to understand the nature of the Devil. The Devil for Luther was not the pitchforking tempter of popular imagination, but rather a strong advocate for piety, morality, and reason. The Devil is always encouraging you to be religious, but in a way that subtly and quite reasonably denies God and turns towards the works of the self. The Devil wants you to think that you're not good enough for God, and that only by being better--more pious and more upright--will God accept you. Likewise, the Devil is a big advocate of human reason ('the devil's whore,' to quote Luther's own phrase) which, noble as it is in other endeavors, does not know anything of God or of God's promises.
This is tough meat for the modern liberal, to be sure, but I find it interesting nonetheless. Luther summed it up well when he said that God never builds a church but the Devil builds a chapel next door. I think this illustrates rather powerfully the relationship between what is good and what seems good.
No wonder the last church I'll ever called me an agent of Satan sent to deceive the church. While they'd never studied Luther (or almost anything else), an aspect of your description of Luther's concept of Satan looks a whole lot like me. Of course, that same parts looks a whole lot like Bonhoeffer, who urged us to live for God, before God, as though there were no God.
The first sentence of my last comment should read:
No wonder the last church I'll ever pastor...
Don't know how I left that word out.
While I can't speak for your ministry, I will say, Sandalstraps, that you've actually caught Bonhoeffer in a classically Lutheran moment. When I wrote that the Devil is always trying to subtly turn you away from God, I didn't mean that the Devil was trying to make you an atheist or a secularist or something. The Devil is religious and wants you to be religious. He just wants you to turn away from the true (merciful, loving, hidden) God to a false (judging, visible) god that is approved by our own reason. Bonhoeffer's sentiment is clearly in the theme of hiddenness and the untested, untried mercy of God that Luther so fully embraced.
If you want to see these ideas more clearly laid out, check out the Theses for the Hiedelberg Disputation and their explanations. It's a good example of everything Luther says meaning the opposite of what it appears to say.
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