Re: [asa] restrained accommodationism?

Christ is central, and God's message to us is understood in the light of the
divine Kenosis. Your reminding me of that is helpful -- thanks for the
reference to your essay.

I don't demand or adhere to accommodation as a principle. I just think it's a
descriptive word of how truth is best apprehended from a sacred text for a
modern world. Your assertion that "it is God who accommodates the divine
message to the limitations of human culture" is one that is especially useful.

To restrict the debate to various concordisms may be to miss out on larger parts
of the playing field. E.g. getting bogged down in something like whether or
not a particular parable is historical or just a fable, misses the entire point
of the parable and the profundity/application it has to our lives. Demanding
concordism may have this same kind of distracting effect if it is universally
applied. When one listens to scientific/technical experts apply their trade
relentlessly to scripture, one may want to ask "Where's the English major when
you need him?" Inside every engineer there must be a liberal arts major
struggling to get out. At least I'm feeling this way at the moment.

--merv

Quoting George Murphy <gmurphy@raex.com>:

> Merv -
>
> I can only speak for myself & can't give any statistics on who "we" are
> collectively, though I suspect that the distribution on the list is more
> heavily weighted in the "concordism" direction than you 1st thought.
>
> I would hesitate to describe myself as an "accomodationist" since
> "accomodation" isn't a principle which I hold, & I don't immediately appeal
> to accomodation in order to solve any & all problems of biblical
> interpretation. My more fundamental (really _most_ fundamental) theological
>
> position is a theology of the cross, & my appeals to the idea of
> accomodation are based on that fundamental position. In support of this
> arguments I've referred a couple of times previously to my brief essay
> "Couldn't God Get It Right?" which can be found at
>
http://www.elca.org/faithandscience/covalence/story/default.asp?Copyright=06-03-15&Author=murphy&Pages=1
> )
>
>
> Shalom
> George
> http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <mrb22667@kansas.net>
> To: <asa@calvin.edu>
> Sent: Friday, June 30, 2006 3:19 PM
> Subject: [asa] restrained accommodationism?
>
>
> >
> > My early impression of this [ASA] list was that most of you are TEs, and
> > that
> > with that you are probably accommodationists of varying degree. Yet since
>
> > I've
> > been lurking over the last months, the most active threads have always
> > involved
> > concordism of varying flavors. (i.e. debates over Adam as Neolithic, or
> > ancient, etc. -but always as a historical person) so much so to make me
> > think
> > my impression was mistaken.
> >
> > Are most of you actually concordists who just differ over the details? Am
>
> > I
> > alone in my thoughts that my faith would not be much affected if, for
> > example,
> > Jonah, Job, NT parables, (or even early Genesis) was not completely
> > historical -
> > in fact, some of it maybe not historical at all -- but yet is truth
> > without
> > having to be so in the modern/historical sense?
> >
> > Granted the difficulties much expressed about messy transition between
> > early
> > Genesis mythology (NOT to be taken as a demeaning term here) and the
> > necessary
> > historicity in later Genesis, that problem seems no less messy than
> > awkwardly
> > forced concordisms.
> >
> > Or is my original impression correct, and you just find yourselves engaged
>
> > with
> > a vocal group of well-researched and persistent concordists (who do
> > indeed
> > bring a great wealth of knowledge and perspective to the debate - don't
> > get me
> > wrong.)
> >
> > As always, I'm sure my inquiry is the umpteenth of its nature on this list
> > history, and any patience you all choose to extend is always appreciated.
> > You
> > have every right to start saying: To your inquiry (#23) we respond with
> > devastating reply #219 and for penance read "you idiot" #64. Or you can
> > just
> > refer to earlier posts. But I do mostly appreciate the exchange here
> > from all
> > sides be they concordist or accomodationist -- or at least the ones I've
> > taken
> > time to read out of the volumes written.
> >
> > --merv
> >
> > Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines. --Steven
> > Wright
> >
> > To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
> > "unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.
> >
>

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Received on Fri Jun 30 17:51:29 2006