I'm an Atheist, but I enjoyed your exchange. It was probably among the most masterful defenses of Universalism I've ever seen. My favorite moment was when responding to the topic of scripture and cultural depictions of infernalism; you cited the consideration of the Kings of the Earth as present in The Apocalypse of John. That was such a beautifully disarming rejoinder and a complete reversal of points that generally tell in favor of infernalism.
As an academic, you're probably not inclined to debate these sorts of things often, but you're among the most effective advocates of the Universalist hope I've seen in the debate sphere. I'm looking forward to more of your work in this area.
Late to the party, but re-reading after your most recent post. Two questions for you, if you’d oblige:
1) Do you think universalism can be argued on an inerrantist (Traditional or Scriptural) own terms? It makes sense to me to attack the opposition to Catholic universalism ‘at the root’ the way you have, but I wonder if a little goading toward the possibility of universalism is possible with in a traditionalist/inerrantist epistemological framework. Thinking of real world or parish level conversations where shifting this framework may be difficult.
2) How do you see DBH’s recent essay/book on Tradition align with the way you describe it in the debate? I see a general cohesion with what you’re suggesting here I can recall from him- but I’m sure I’m missing some nuance.
(1) Yes, but with different challenges, as you indicate. The way to open up, if possible, an inerrantist/trad framework is to follow the sequence of early church history itself: the first major controversy with Marcion was not merely over what books were inspired and canonical, but more fundamentally about what it even means for canonical books to be inspired. Marcion was a literalist, the orthodox defenders were not. They agreed with him that *if* literalist readings were alone proper to interpreting inspired scripture, then it would follow that the canon has no harmony (I'm being a bit anachronistic, but you follow me). But they disagreed that he was correct to think that literalism was the proper and only way to read inspired texts, and indeed that, as St. Paul had already indicated, the very nature of an inspired text demands one go beyond the literal (the "body") to the divine realities disclosed (the "Spirit"). Literalists/inerrantists/traditionalists today are in an impossible quandary because they retain a canon that was only defended by those who *opposed* literalism as the sole way to interpret. In short, modern inerrantists reject the very theology of inspiration, and with it the very hermeneutic, that secured the canon in the first place. So ours am a time when at least some deconstruction is imperative, exposing literal errors/inconsistencies in scripture itself or in the sprawling magisterial tradition, all of which are there in abundance. But we don't leave them there; one deconstructs to reconstruct. Rather we insist with the earliest Fathers that deconstruction is itself an invitation to believe at last that the letter kills while the Spirit gives life, and to seek the divine truth and authority precisely in the interpretation that gives life. I see no other way in our time.
(2) I think we're in broad agreement, though I'd want a more thoroughly Christological account of tradition and apocalypse. True, the nature of the whole lies only in the end, and in a crucial sense the end lies ahead of us. But it's no less true that in Christ "the end of the ages are come" (1 Cor 10.11), and that he himself is the "alpha and omega" revealed precisely in the midst of history (Rev 22.3). So we *know*, for instance, that the synthesis of tradition/apocalypse is Christ himself, and that he is no mere formal telos on the horizon of history. He is also in history here and now, being embodied here and now. So I'm not content with a merely Aristotelian teleology of Christian tradition, which, as one colleague colorfully put it, is just as true of the US Postal Service as it is of the Church. One can begin there, but the fuller and more proper account of tradition and revelation needs to reside in Christology itself, especially since/if the Church is his Body, as will be the entire cosmos. On this score, then, while I sympathize with DBH's critique of Newman, I think he gets Blondel dreadfully wrong.
i think ppl relate to Matthew’s humility, not because of all the issuant versions on offer, which universalism is one, ( its not simply ECT vs Univ.) but similair to Tollefsens view on Maximus’ possibilty of exceptions in the new order “Maximus suggests an idea of eschatological punishment in some places, and I am not in the position to rule out that he had a notion of eternal damnation in mind “, , overall y’all got it wrong thing is too thin
My point however is that Matthew's humility is not free of personal judgment, and that it actually performs a species of arrogance by failing to notice that it equates its own judgment with the very essence of tradition. So I don't think your comparison works, and I don't think Tollefsen is right about Maximus either. Now, I may indeed be arrogant. But I also may be correct. And I might be both or neither. I fail, then, to see these general admonitions as much more than earnest but beside-the-point reminders about being good, at best, and dishonest gestures at worse. Enough with the abstract worries: get to the business of theological work, the details, the content itself, not mere form for form's sake and for the sake of our own fragile egos.
Thanks for this comment, Hyde. I hope it comes through that I'm not public about this just to be avant-garde or edgy, but because once one sees it, you cannot unsee it, and once one experiences what it does to the vitality of one's faith in Jesus Christ, one cannot easily pretend otherwise. I have a few other comrades in this conviction, as it were, and there will be yet more substantive work made known in the years to come, God willing.
This is excellent. Thank you!
❤️
Yum. Now I want a Hazily Liberal IPA
An essential moment of the whole, no doubt.
I'm an Atheist, but I enjoyed your exchange. It was probably among the most masterful defenses of Universalism I've ever seen. My favorite moment was when responding to the topic of scripture and cultural depictions of infernalism; you cited the consideration of the Kings of the Earth as present in The Apocalypse of John. That was such a beautifully disarming rejoinder and a complete reversal of points that generally tell in favor of infernalism.
As an academic, you're probably not inclined to debate these sorts of things often, but you're among the most effective advocates of the Universalist hope I've seen in the debate sphere. I'm looking forward to more of your work in this area.
Many thanks for the kind words!
❤️
great stuff thanks
Gosh this was good. had to re-read it four times, and will need to come back. But a JDW drop is always worth it.
Late to the party, but re-reading after your most recent post. Two questions for you, if you’d oblige:
1) Do you think universalism can be argued on an inerrantist (Traditional or Scriptural) own terms? It makes sense to me to attack the opposition to Catholic universalism ‘at the root’ the way you have, but I wonder if a little goading toward the possibility of universalism is possible with in a traditionalist/inerrantist epistemological framework. Thinking of real world or parish level conversations where shifting this framework may be difficult.
2) How do you see DBH’s recent essay/book on Tradition align with the way you describe it in the debate? I see a general cohesion with what you’re suggesting here I can recall from him- but I’m sure I’m missing some nuance.
Thanks for these questions.
(1) Yes, but with different challenges, as you indicate. The way to open up, if possible, an inerrantist/trad framework is to follow the sequence of early church history itself: the first major controversy with Marcion was not merely over what books were inspired and canonical, but more fundamentally about what it even means for canonical books to be inspired. Marcion was a literalist, the orthodox defenders were not. They agreed with him that *if* literalist readings were alone proper to interpreting inspired scripture, then it would follow that the canon has no harmony (I'm being a bit anachronistic, but you follow me). But they disagreed that he was correct to think that literalism was the proper and only way to read inspired texts, and indeed that, as St. Paul had already indicated, the very nature of an inspired text demands one go beyond the literal (the "body") to the divine realities disclosed (the "Spirit"). Literalists/inerrantists/traditionalists today are in an impossible quandary because they retain a canon that was only defended by those who *opposed* literalism as the sole way to interpret. In short, modern inerrantists reject the very theology of inspiration, and with it the very hermeneutic, that secured the canon in the first place. So ours am a time when at least some deconstruction is imperative, exposing literal errors/inconsistencies in scripture itself or in the sprawling magisterial tradition, all of which are there in abundance. But we don't leave them there; one deconstructs to reconstruct. Rather we insist with the earliest Fathers that deconstruction is itself an invitation to believe at last that the letter kills while the Spirit gives life, and to seek the divine truth and authority precisely in the interpretation that gives life. I see no other way in our time.
(2) I think we're in broad agreement, though I'd want a more thoroughly Christological account of tradition and apocalypse. True, the nature of the whole lies only in the end, and in a crucial sense the end lies ahead of us. But it's no less true that in Christ "the end of the ages are come" (1 Cor 10.11), and that he himself is the "alpha and omega" revealed precisely in the midst of history (Rev 22.3). So we *know*, for instance, that the synthesis of tradition/apocalypse is Christ himself, and that he is no mere formal telos on the horizon of history. He is also in history here and now, being embodied here and now. So I'm not content with a merely Aristotelian teleology of Christian tradition, which, as one colleague colorfully put it, is just as true of the US Postal Service as it is of the Church. One can begin there, but the fuller and more proper account of tradition and revelation needs to reside in Christology itself, especially since/if the Church is his Body, as will be the entire cosmos. On this score, then, while I sympathize with DBH's critique of Newman, I think he gets Blondel dreadfully wrong.
i think ppl relate to Matthew’s humility, not because of all the issuant versions on offer, which universalism is one, ( its not simply ECT vs Univ.) but similair to Tollefsens view on Maximus’ possibilty of exceptions in the new order “Maximus suggests an idea of eschatological punishment in some places, and I am not in the position to rule out that he had a notion of eternal damnation in mind “, , overall y’all got it wrong thing is too thin
My point however is that Matthew's humility is not free of personal judgment, and that it actually performs a species of arrogance by failing to notice that it equates its own judgment with the very essence of tradition. So I don't think your comparison works, and I don't think Tollefsen is right about Maximus either. Now, I may indeed be arrogant. But I also may be correct. And I might be both or neither. I fail, then, to see these general admonitions as much more than earnest but beside-the-point reminders about being good, at best, and dishonest gestures at worse. Enough with the abstract worries: get to the business of theological work, the details, the content itself, not mere form for form's sake and for the sake of our own fragile egos.
Thanks for this comment, Hyde. I hope it comes through that I'm not public about this just to be avant-garde or edgy, but because once one sees it, you cannot unsee it, and once one experiences what it does to the vitality of one's faith in Jesus Christ, one cannot easily pretend otherwise. I have a few other comrades in this conviction, as it were, and there will be yet more substantive work made known in the years to come, God willing.