The Scientist

The Solipsist is now quietly crying into his beer, so you decide to call it a night. The Scientist and The Conversationalist took off yonks ago – only you would be daft enough to try to discuss Epistemology with an epishtemogled Solipist. But don’t despair, the path to wisdom is strewn with stewed Solipsists.

The following day you call The Scientist to see if he’d be willing to chew through THE QUESTION with you. He answers the phone by pretending it’s a StarTrek Communicator. You feel deflated. You manage to get him to agree to meet you for lunch then hang up before he can say, “Live long and Prosper!” (Even the path to wisdom can only handle a limited amount of StarTrekkin’).

You meet in The Refectory at the University, The Scientist is sipping instant coffee out of the lid of a Thermos he’s brought from home. There are x+1 number of things you need to know in order survive this situation:

1. Embrace the existential shudder you will inevitably feel as you sit down at the table. The Universe is reminding you that it still exists: that in a quiet corner of reality somewhere a wildflower dances with the wind; that the smell of hot grass and eucalyptus still talks; and that you might belong to this world in subtle, unexpected ways.
If you are overcome by a sudden Whitmanesque desire to jump on the table and bellow ‘YAWP!!!’ Do it.
Don’t expect anyone to care.

2. The Scientist is suspiciously like the mirror image of The Solipsist (could it be that this scenario is just a little too neat?). Whereas the Solipsist begins from the good intuition that all our knowledge of the world takes place from within our unique standpoint (place, time, experiences, faculties), the Scientist is fascinated by the insight that if our knowledge is to be genuinely of the world, then doesn’t just consist in stating the contents of our heads.
Sounds right, doesn’t it?

3. The problem arises when the Scientist gets carried away by the objectivity of knowledge and starts to claim that knowledge only consists in those things which exist independently of the person knowing them.

4. This claim immediately presents us with a problem: how do we sort out real Knowledge (i.e., that which exists independently of the person knowing) from mere Opinion (i.e., claims that have far too much to do with what the knower is drinking)?

5. Solipsists don’t have this problem because ultimately they don’t really believe in a difference between knowledge and opinion. But because Solipsists only rarely pop into existence the majority of the history of Epistemology is devoted to working on this problem.
(not the non-existence of solipsists, the other problem (see point 4))

6. The kind of Scientist that you are likely to be meeting in the Refec, will probably solve this problem by giving a strictly empirical definition of knowledge: i.e., he will claim that ‘knowledge’ only occurs when a particular claim can be backed up with a particular kind of evidence (experimental), and for which this evidence can be independently verified (or more properly, falsified), and most importantly, for which general rules can be framed that will be observable by others in relevantly similar situations.
(Yes, that was one long sentence…)

7. You be a lunatic to deny the power of this definition when applied in the context of scientific method.
But what is it power to do?
Largely, it is power to make accurate predictions about the future behaviour of material features of the world based on accurate observation of past patterns. It is about framing rules that explain causes.
And boy does it work!

8. But if we get too swept away with the Scientist’s strictly empirical definition of knowledge, then we end up thinking we only genuinely know two kinds of things: first, the immediate impressions of the world we get through our senses; secondly, the rules of causation which we arrive at when we have properly applied empirical methodology.

9. This restriction is difficult to swallow:
First, it’s very hard to point to anything that seems even remotely like ‘an immediate impression’, or ‘a pure observation’ of the world. Everything that we see, hear, feel, whatever other sense you might possess, has already worked its way through a cognitive process that has irretrievably synthesised these naked impressions into a larger experience. So, when Bruce the Bagman comes and sits down next to me at the bar, I don’t have a naked impression of Bruce’s smell which I can describe independent of my feelings of like or dislike, or the memories it evokes, or even the cultural vocabulary by which smells are described. Bruce’s eau, is definitely and irretrievably du toilet…
Of course, we can describe the mechanisms by which this might work, electrical impulses, the different centres of the brain, but that isn’t actually the same as actually experiencing the naked impression. There is really no way to get ‘behind-the-scenes’ in your mind, and see the ‘world-as-it-is-in-itself.’

Secondly, if we are sceptical about ‘pure observation’, then its also very difficult to accept that ‘rules of causal behaviour’ is a category significantly broad enough to cover the sorts of things we mean when we use the word ‘knowledge’. For example, it doesn’t seem like a satisfactory account of what it means for me to say, “I know Bruce.” Most of us would accept that “I know Bruce” is more than a claim to possess a great deal of empirical evidence about Bruce and that I can accurately form causal predictions about his future behaviour on the basis of my past observations (not for a minute denying that this is a valid and humorous activity in which to pass the hours).
If you asked me to back up my claim that I know Bruce, I would point to the kinds of things that Bruce and I have shared together, not merely the quality of the observations I have made of him.

Furthermore, things like ‘rules of causation’ have had a very hard time gaining purchase when it comes to the study of causally complex things like humans. And it gets even harder the smaller the population of people you are seeking to deal with. In fact, it is nonsensical to speak of general rules that would describe every aspect of an individual human life. Rules stated at that level of specificity are not rules at all, they are people.

10. I’ve rabbited on long enough…
Here’s the conclusion of the matter for now:
I’ve been in enough debates down the Pub to know that most of what we discuss in that August Hall of Disputation revolves around whether particular claims to knowledge, are in fact, objectively true.
It usually goes like this:
Dave: “It is, in fact, the case that Bruce here, is a dead-set legend, and once drank a schooner of horse tranquilliser and still walked home.
(some murmurs of approval, a few mutters of disagreement… someone throws a chair.)
Trevor: “What are your warrants for that claim, Dave?”
(Trevor, Dave, Bruce, and Others, proceed to cite evidence and question the logic for and against the position. This may or may not include arm-wrestling.)
My point is simply this: the claim that knowledge is (in some sense) ‘objective’, is important for our belief that we can actually live with, work, drink, and persuade each other. Debating Solipsists is a recipe for Mental Illness. However, our claims for objectivity in knowledge can’t be made in such a way that we ‘depersonalise’ the character of all our knowledge.

What do we do?
How do we keep an eye on Scylla, while surfing Charybdis?

Ironically, wilderness areas which were declared to preserve vulnerable physical habitats from rapine human consumption, may end up being the last resort for the fraying edges of human quiet.

Quiet will camp in small tents in the remote wilderness,
without any form of power generation.
It will always have a billy ready beside the fire,
just in case someone should drop by for a bit of it.
And not particularly mind if they don’t.

Quiet lives within cooeee of the Burning Bush

Interestingly, propositional revelation was the subject of our doctrine class today, and I find that I’m not completely on the same page that I used to be. Sometimes my whole life seems to be a process of working out what my Dad was talking about.

Our class today was a strong defence of the primacy of propositional revelation. In fact, I’m being generous – there were definite points at which it was claimed that there is no revelation other than propositional revelation. The discussion was heavily guided by D. B. Knox’s article entitled, Propositional Revelation, the Only Revelation. (Have a read).

It was an interesting, stimulating class. It’s always more interesting to be lectured by someone with whom you’re not sure you agree. As I sat and chewed over what we were being taught I had to conclude that I simply cannot agree with that statement, as expressed in the title of Knox’s article, if it is given its normal sense.

Put down your stones…

It turns out I’m not alone, Michael Jensen wrote a helpful blog post about the issue a couple of years ago, I wish more notice had been taken of his point.

There’s a couple of things I would add to Michael’s article.

First, the continued use of the phrase ‘propositional revelation’ with a idiomatic definition of ‘propositional’ fosters poor critique of other theories of revelation. In our class it was suggested that, ‘propositional’ in ‘propositional revelation’ should be “understood in the less rigorous sense, of truthful communication” (yes, that’s a quote). Surely, most people would agree that, on a charitable understanding, ‘truthful communication’ describes revelation per se. The addition of the adjective ‘propositional’ is intended to characterise the form of that truthful communication. If you are allowed to define your position this broadly, you can say whatever you like about competing theories, without really grappling with the questions a rival theory is trying to solve.

Someone like Pannenberg, or Brunner, would be a staunch defender of propositional revelation, if by this you simply meant, ‘truthful communication from God’. When they attack propositional revelation they are attacking a particular understanding of the form of that truthful communication. Either we hold the view they are attacking, or we do not. At least we should be clear.

Secondly, the problem we might have with Pannenberg, Brunner or others, in their attempts to understand revelation ‘non-propositionally’, is not really that they think the concept of ‘revelation’ is broader than ‘propositions’. We’ve already conceded that much. It is that they appear to be seeking a way around (or behind) the Scriptures for a kind of essential revelational bedrock.
As I understand it, Pannenberg wants to find the bedrock of revelation in the public history of Jesus, focussed upon the resurrection; Brunner, in the Divine-Human encounter.
Pannenberg and Brunner both appear to make Scripture a contingent element of revelation. Someone committed to ‘propositional revelation’ (in Knox’s sense) objects to this conclusion. The commitment to ‘propositional revelation’ is really the commitment to the essential role of the Scriptures in God’s revealing of himself.

The long and short of it is this,
I think my Dad was right, in that God’s communication of himself is not reducible to true or false statements about himself. And yet, God in his sovereign freedom communicates himself in an essential relation to the text of Scripture. I’m still working out what I think that means – intelligibly, linguistically, and?
But of this I’m pretty sure:

I believe in scriptural revelation.

V
If the lost word is lost, if the spent word is spent
If the unheard, unspoken
Word is unspoken, unheard;
Still is the unspoken word, the Word unheard,
The Word without a word, the Word within
The world and for the world;
And the light shone in darkness and
Against the Word the unstilled world still whirled
About the centre of the silent Word.
(Ash Wednesday, T.S. Eliot)

“Then Pilate took Jesus and had Him flogged. The soldiers also twisted together a crown of thorns, put it on His head, and threw a purple robe around Him. And they repeatedly came up to Him and said, “Hail, King of the Jews!” and were slapping His face.
Pilate went outside again and said to them, “Look, I’m bringing Him outside to you to let you know I find no grounds for charging Him.”
Then Jesus came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, “Here is the man!”

When the chief priests and the temple police saw Him, they shouted, “Crucify! Crucify!” Pilate responded, “Take Him and crucify Him yourselves, for I find no grounds for charging Him.”
“We have a law,” the Jews replied to him, “and according to that law He must die, because He made Himself the Son of God.”
When Pilate heard this statement, he was more afraid than ever. He went back into the headquarters and asked Jesus, “Where are You from?” But Jesus did not give him an answer.” (John 19:1-9 HCSB)

Some poems have their own gravitational field that ensures you keep orbiting back at specific times or through certain circumstances. It’s nearly Easter, it’s the time for reading Ash Wednesday.
What I notice this time is that even the poetic density of Eliot’s description can’t comprehend the questions, the cries, and the silence, as the world seeks words with which to bind the Word.

Really, I ask you, what maniac came up with that idea?

After the past fortnight dominated by Hebrew and Greek I’ve discovered that I actually love these crazy languages. Hebrew is a wild hairy beast of a language, wrestling with it makes me feel reconnected with my primal manliness.

… Am I suffering from Stockholm syndrome?

I’m discovering that as I struggle to read the New Testament in the original Greek I grasp again the original urgency of the Biblical writers.
The power of the Christian gospel produced such drama and texture in the words of these men.
My favourite passage in Greek (and I haven’t read a lot) is the first section of 1 John.

John strings together this long list of relative pronouns (‘what/that which’) – words that are supposed to refer back to a previously used noun. But it’s the start of the book and there are no previously used nouns for the relative pronoun to refer to. It creates this incredible sense of anticipation. John claims to have seen, touched, heard, that which was from the beginning – but what was it?

1 ὃ ἦν ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς ὃ ἀκηκόαμεν ὃ ἑωράκαμεν τοῖς ὀφθαλμοῖς ἡμῶν ὃ ἐθεασάμεθα καὶ αἱ χεῖρες ἡμῶν ἐψηλάφησαν περὶ τοῦ λόγου τῆς ζωῆς 2 καὶ ἡ ζωὴ ἐφανερώθη καὶ ἑωράκαμεν καὶ μαρτυροῦμεν καὶ ἀπαγγέλλομεν ὑμῖν τὴν ζωὴν τὴν αἰώνιον ἥτις ἦν πρὸς τὸν πατέρα καὶ ἐφανερώθη ἡμῖν 3 ὃ ἑωράκαμεν καὶ ἀκηκόαμεν ἀπαγγέλλομεν καὶ ὑμῖν ἵνα καὶ ὑμεῖς κοινωνίαν ἔχητε μεθ’ ἡμῶν καὶ ἡ κοινωνία δὲ ἡ ἡμετέρα μετὰ τοῦ πατρὸς καὶ μετὰ τοῦ υἱοῦ αὐτοῦ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ
(1 John 1:1-3)

and in English

What was from the beginning,
what we have heard,
what we have seen with our eyes,
what we have observed,
and have touched with our hands,
concerning the Word of life—
that life was revealed,
and we have seen it
and we testify and declare to you
the eternal life that was with the Father
and was revealed to us—
what we have seen and heard
we also declare to you,
so that you may have fellowship along with us;
and indeed our fellowship is with the Father
and with His Son Jesus Christ.
(1 John 1:1-3 HSCB)  

It seems that death has taken over this mantle.
We are struggling with ‘Death repression’

There is something strangely similar in the experiences of speaking about sex and death.
When we hold forth on either topic we are transgressing social boundaries and therefore consciously taking on ourselves a position ‘outside’ society.

Yet at the same time we are directly addressing society about issues that stand close to the core of how we define our identity. We are talking about what it means to be human.
Speaking about sex or death draws us inevitably into a relationship with society that is something akin to prophetic speech.

I’ve just come back from a mission week where we were engaged in a whole range of evangelistic presentations. We gave out CD’s and knocked on doors. I sat in on a ‘dialogue meeting’ (question and answer time with Christians and non-Christians), and spoke at a Chapel service. Each activity was designed to engage with people and persuade them that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God.

Yet we didn’t once engage in the form of persuasion and teaching that was employed by the writers of the Gospels.

I really don’t want to fall into the sad, trendiness, of those ‘Evangelists’ who want us to simply tell each other our ‘stories’. Narrative theology is all the rage at the moment and it has been very influential in thinking through how we preach and proclaim God’s word. It helpfully reminds us to be attentive to the form in which God’s word presents truth. It’s good to remember that the literary form of the scriptures isn’t just an accident of history. There are no accidents in history.

So why does Mark tell a story where he (and we) might reasonably have chosen a more direct form of argument?
I thought about this a lot while I was working to understand the overall significance of the feeding miracles for Mark’s presentation of Jesus.

I think the feeding miracles form a piece of the interpretative framework which Mark is unfolding for the reader. By that I mean, Mark isn’t just writing a narrative of Jesus’ life. He’s writing a narrative that will have a certain effect on the reader. Mark is creating a framework that is designed to create a reader who will encounter the events of Jesus’ death equipped to understand them as (among other things) the climax of Jesus’ kingly provision for his followers.

Mark establishes a resonance in the mind of the reader through his description of events. As you progress through the narrative, Jesus’ breaking bread to feed the hungry crowds, echoes in his breaking bread for his disciples at the Passover.
Jesus’ compassion, his power, his superabundant provision, are in the mind of the reader as he or she comes to the final meal that Jesus shares with his disciples. As the bread is broken once more, Mark adds the final touches to the framework through which the reader will encounter the death of Jesus.
The narrative structure of Mark is intended to create a reader who is capable of understanding the true significance of the disturbing events at the end.

Mark faced the difficulty of presenting a message to individuals who could not possibly have the framework of experience to understand its significance. How could anyone hear of the execution of a man for blasphemy and come to the conclusion that he is the answer to our seeking after God? In itself, the death of Jesus is a deeply ambiguous event.

We face the same problem as we seek to share the message of Jesus with people who are completely unequipped to understand it. On a practical level, the average Aussie doesn’t see themselves as occupying the same narrative world as Jesus, our questions about life seem different, the history of answers to these questions – the culture we share seems very removed from the world of the New Testament. On a spiritual level, the average Aussie is unable to understand the message of Jesus due to darkness and ignorance brought on by rebellion against God.

For anyone to encounter Jesus, his life, death, and resurrection – and to correctly understand the significance of these events – requires that they themselves be transformed into the kind of person capable of understanding. This requires the spiritual work of removing blindness. And it also requires the approach taken by Mark and the Gospel writers. The person will need to be transformed by the narrative so that they come to occupy the same thought-world, so that the reader is shaped to stand at the correct vantage point, the proper angle, from which to view the cross.

That’s why its fascinating to study the narrative techniques by which Mark does this shaping, and to wonder how we could apply similar techniques to our engagement with people.
Who’d be interested in writing an evangelistic book along these lines?

*topic of the essay was “What is the significance of the feeding miracles for Mark’s presentation of the ministry of Jesus?”

““When you see the abomination that causes desolation standing where it should not” (let the reader understand), “then those in Judea must flee to the mountains!” (Mark 13:14 HCSB)

That little parenthetical remark, “let the reader understand”, has been the source of a great deal of discussion over the centuries. Where would Markan theologians be without the endlessly useful variations for the titles of their books?

It’s a little bit like that moment in the movie Fight Club where Edward Norton’s character begins to realise the truth about Tyler Durden, the narrative that’s been playing in his head begins to unspool, the screen begins to flicker and it looks like the film strip is whirling off the projecter, the celluloid about to burst into flame.
It’s an interesting moment in the film, the scales drop from the eyes of the main character – and because we see the story through his eyes, we share in the experience of revelation.

The really interesting thing, though, is that screen flicker. It makes the characters suddenly come outside the screen. The medium of communication is exposed, the mechanics laid bare for a moment, but the character survives and continues to speak. It’s deliberately unnerving, like being in a room full of statues, thinking you are alone, and someone moves.

Mark inserts editorial remarks everywhere throughout the book. For example, he gives some classic comments on the reactions of Jesus disciples,

“Then Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here! Let us make three tabernacles: one for You, one for Moses, and one for Elijah”— because he did not know what he should say, since they were terrified.” (Mark 9:5-6 HCSB)

It’s impossible to write a narrative without having some kind of narration, the voice over who ties events together, provides insight into the motivations of the characters, and moves the action along. Every narrative has this with the exception of a first person narrative – where the Narrator is the main character.

And that really wasn’t an option for Mark’s Gospel…

What isn’t so common, is for the Narrator to interrupt the main character in the middle of a sentence.

““When you see the abomination that causes desolation standing where it should not” (let the reader understand), “then those in Judea must flee to the mountains!” (Mark 13:14 HCSB)

It’s a drastic ploy for any writer to make, most times the words of the Narrator can wait ’til the character has finished speaking. It’s a truly colossal thing when the speaker is Our Lord…

In reading Mark, it’s a moment when the screen flickers. The mechanics of Mark’s writing are put on view for a moment. The room full of statues – the text which we read as a work of art, held at a distance – suddenly moves. The Narrator steps out from behind the narrative, and pokes you in the ribs.

It has to be in the middle of a sentence to achieve this effect. There is no disrespect intended when Mark breaks in to Jesus’ sentence.
Jesus’ broken sentence has sharp edges, it has a cutting edge – it is not just another (admittedly strange) conversation between the characters in a story. It is an address through the pages directly to the reader.

The words are for YOU.

Mark 13 is known as the Apocalyptic chapter within this Gospel. It’s full of strange language and dark predictions. But there is more going on here than just old fashioned Buffy-the-Vampyre-Slayer weirdness.

‘Apocalyptic’ is a Greek word referring to something being ‘uncovered’ or ‘revealed’. Apocalyptic literature seeks to uncover the spiritual realities behind earthly events. That’s why at the start of the Book of Revelation (Greek name: The Apocalypse) John says, ‘After this I looked, and there in heaven was an open door.’ (Rev 4:1) John is being given an insight into what’s going on behind the scenes. Revelation is a backstage pass to Reality.

Mark 13 is an apocalyse about Jesus’ death. It’s a backstage pass to the Reality of Jesus’ death – the curtains are drawn back, the door stands open. It’s not easy to understand, if you’ve ever pulled apart a clock or a radio you’ll know that the insides of something very rarely look simple on first inspection, but it’s giving behind the scenes information.

It makes sense that at this point Mark the Writer breaks into the narrative. He reveals himself, for a moment his narrative techniques are left dangerously open to view. It is an apocalypse within an apocalypse.

And this double apocalypse has an uncanny effect.

In chapter 13 the narrative breaks out of this world, in order to reveal the Reality behind. At the same time, in the very middle of this movement, it also breaks into our world.

Mark’s direct address lets us know that we are the objects to whom this is being revealed – not just the confusing bits in Mark 13, but the entire narrative. It breaks through our arms-length reading and demands to be urgently understood.

Let the reader understand!!!

*(do you know that there is no such thing as one (1) shenanigan, it’s a plural noun. weird…
**(this has nothing to do with my essay on Mark, just found it interesting)

[This] questions the wisdom of centuries-old habits, such as reading along with Bible passages, at the same time they are being read aloud in church. More of the passages would be understood and retained, the researchers suggest, if heard or read separately.
Sydney Morning Herald

I was particularly interested in the application by the application of this research to the Christian practice of reading along with the Scripture passage being read out in a Church service. It struck true with me – my experience is that either listening or reading the Bible is likely to be more effective for absorbing what I’m studying than doing both at once.

Which makes me think that next time we do Bible study, I might suggest that one person read while the rest of the group simply listens. Perhaps we could discuss together whether this is more effective for absorbing the meaning of the text.

However, while I think that it’s appropriate for us to try this out at Bible study, I won’t be going down the same path at Church.
You see, reading along with the passage in Church is not simply about seeking to absorb the passage. There is the rest of the sermon for explanation and checking over the text (if the sermon is any good). The whole point of a good sermon should be to explain and encourage us to absorb the meaning of the text.

Even if reading along with the passage isn’t the quick absorbtion method for Bible understanding, I’d be worried if we stopped this practice. Not least because it might lead us to stop bringing our Bibles to Church.

Reading along with the passage is a crucial means of holding the Minister accountable for his words.

People like William Tyndale struggled and were killed so that men and women would have free access to God’s word in their own language. Their fight was not solely motivated by the belief that God speaks to each of us directly through Scripture.
Tyndale and others believed that the Church was best guarded against heresy when the members of a congregation are able to check the words of the preacher against the words of the text.

On 6th May 1536, King Henry VIII of England ordered that a copy of the newly translated English Bible be placed in every Church throughout the country. The people of each parish were to have free access to this Bible at any time of the week for their own reading.
This is the piece of history that lies behind those great big old Church Bibles you can still see around in older Churches. It was possibly the greatest piece of legislation ever passed.

So I’m all in favour of anything that helps us to absorb and understand the Bible better. But keep taking your Bibles to Church. Check the reading against the text, hold the preacher accountable for his words.

If the people stop taking their Bibles to Church, the Church will fall.

Do Tyndale proud…

I defie the Pope and all his lawes. If God spare my life, ere many yeares I wyl cause a boy that driveth the plough to know more of the Scripture, than he doust.
William Tyndale
As quoted in the Actes and Monuments of these Latter and Perillous Days, touching Matters of the Church (Foxe’s Book of Martyrs) by John Foxe