Exit To Entrance
A Post for NCRcafe: Exit to Entrance
By Marie Schickel Rottschaefer
Vol. 2 No. 3 July 7, 2008
The goal of these posts is to give a brief overview of developments that have relevance for us in the early 21st century, particularly in seeking solutions for pressing people and planet problems.
Faith Metamorphosis
Last time I proposed that humanity’s faith in the future as elaborated in Christianity is once again metamorphosing into a new faith -- a post-axial age one because of intellectual revolutions that are convincing us of the need to accommodate to the contemporary realities that we face. But the current metamorphosis is simply the latest in defining moments in the history of the changes in belief systems. The following are highlights.
Historical Examples
Let us begin with the Jerome Biblical Commentary that corroborates the leap from polytheism to monotheism. [See The Jerome Biblical Commentary Vol. I The Old Testament, Vol. II The New Testament and Topical Articles, edited by R.E. Brown, S.S., J.A. Fitzmyer, S.J., R.E. Murphy, O. Carm. (Prentice-Hall, Inc. Englewood Cliffs, NJ 1968)]. In “Genesis” (Chapter 2, Section 8, pg. 8) Eugene Maly states “Furthermore, Israel testifies of herself that her fathers came from “beyond the River, and worshipped other gods…” (Jos 24:2). These polytheistic “fathers” could not have been bearers of a monotheistic tradition. Therefore, because the narrative material antedates Israel herself, it must have originated outside Israel.”
But even this leap from polytheism to monotheism was large and long. The Fourth R An Advocate for Religious Literacy Vol.: 21 No. 2 Mar. – Apr. 2008 “No Other Gods The Bible as a Polytheistic Book” by David Penchansky makes a startling claim. “It would be easy to say that Israel outgrew its primitive polytheistic notions and advanced towards the more sophisticated and now nearly universally acknowledged monotheism. However, this would be inaccurate because this polytheistic voice appears throughout the Bible in every genre and in every historical period.”
Yet from that ancestral home the Judeo-Christian tradition emerged. John Crossan’s The Birth of Christianity: Discovering What Happened In The Years Immediately After The Execution Of Jesus (Harper: San Francisco, 1998) is an example of research that supports the in tandem origin of these contemporary traditions, considered by many today, to be in opposition to one another. However, others disagree. Crossan adds, “It is not even accurate to say that Christianity eventually broke away from Judaism. It is more accurate to say that, out of that matrix of biblical Judaism and that maelstrom of late second Temple Judaism, two great traditions eventually emerged, early Christianity and rabbinic Judaism. Each claimed exclusive continuity with the past, but in truth each was as great a leap and as valid a development from that common ancestry as was the other” (Prologue, “The Content Of Your Vision,” xxxii).
The history of Christianity is a story of change! It contains a large literature and is easily available in libraries. So no further elaboration is needed. I have given a few examples of a great religious tradition that has emerged, and some would say, is still emerging. We will examine even more of the Judeo-Christian tradition when we look at the reasons for demythologization.
Contemporary Faith Metamorphosis: What Change And To Where?
The biblically based Judeo-Christian tradition is currently in crisis because of the demythologization of its scriptural foundation that in turn radically invalidates its tradition-based religious infrastructure because the two bases, scripture and tradition, are so directly connected. Specifically, for now, let’s focus on Christianity. As referenced earlier in New Search, Thomas Sheehan is an example of a scholar telling us that there is scarcely a Catholic biblical scholar who maintains that Jesus thought he was the divine Son of God who preexisted from all eternity as the second person of the Trinity before he became a human being. This example, among others, tells us that a claim to divine authorization as insisted upon by the Church hierarchy is falling apart. This divine authorization, a secondary pillar of Catholic tradition works with the primary pillar of scripture. Because of biblical research and continuing demythologization, the pillars of Judaism and Christianity are collapsing. An understanding of this belief change may help to reinforce our comprehension when we discuss both Catholic and Protestant appeals to revelation, appeals which fail because each relies on a circular argument.
But the Judeo-Christian tradition still retains a moral value system that has served humanity well over eons, e.g. the Ten Commandments and the common-sense recognition of the moral deficits to which humans succumb -- what are called the seven capital sins: pride, covetousness, lust, anger, gluttony, envy and sloth. However, our contemporary world calls for an update of that moral value system to meet the critical, complex and comprehensive ethical problems of our times. Fortunately, this updating is occurring in moral philosophy, especially empirically based ethics. The philosophy of the various sciences will more than likely be a major source for solutions to our many current problems, both moral and non-moral, problems that threaten both people and planet in our precarious century.
Next time we will look at examples of demythologization of the Christian faith story as researched by leading scholars known as the Jesus Seminar. We will then move on to what other biblical scholars say and the implications of their research for the future of the Judeo-Christian tradition.
