Desperate Houseflies: The Magazine

Feel free to pull out your trusty fly swatter and comment on what is posted here, realizing that this odd collection of writers may prove as difficult to kill as houseflies and are presumably just as pesky. “Desperate Houseflies” is a magazine that intends to publish weekly articles on subjects such as politics, literature, history, sports, photography, religion, and no telling what else. We’ll see what happens.

Tuesday, May 30, 2006

Karen Armstrong Explains It All To You

You all may remember from previous posts (or maybe this came up in a discussion) that I am a huge fan of Karen Armstrong and find her ideas about religion to be refreshing, inspiring, and closer to truth than anything else I've encountered so far. I actually think that she and Sam Harris, author of The End of Faith, a highly inflammatory book about Why (Organized) Religion Is Bad, are coming from exactly the same place, notwithstanding that she denounces some of his ideas in this interview, which is a MUST READ. Where Armstrong and Harris differ is that he says we have to scrap these old books, and she says we have to become educated enough to read and use them wisely. He's cynical about the capability of humans to do that, while she's hopeful. But their understandings about values and the need for the spiritual are precisely the same (as each other, and as mine). Hers is obviously the more publicly palatable position, but I read them as much more similar than do the critics. In any case, just a little light reading for your Tuesday morning. :)

23 Comments:

Blogger Al Sturgeon said...

Interesting stuff (though as you'd assume, we have some vastly different conclusions).

I like her answers concerning a "personal God," but my biggest point of contention would probably be describing Jesus as one who simply "went around doing good and being compassionate." This reaches back to my discussion of Jesus as being a political figure, not just someone who says to play nice.

At the seminar I attended, Hauerwas likewise criticized the popular talk today of "having a personal relationship with Jesus" as sentimentality (warm & cuddly), then said, "Listen to what he asks of you, then ask, 'do I really WANT a relationship with him?!'" The latter doesn't gibe with someone who just went around doing good and being compassionate.

As I've told you before, what consumes me religiously is the unique person of Jesus, who I just don't see as just another person like the rest. There is some resonance between the messages of different religions (and their texts), but Jesus is a very unique figure. From my vantage point.

Thanks for the link.

7:41 AM  
Blogger Al Sturgeon said...

Thanks, David.

You're right that Armstrong didn't say "simply" went around doing good and being compassionate, but she didn't make much of an argument for "profoundly" either. I think most readers would hear it as "simply," but that's just my guess.

I agree wholeheartedly that true compassion is hard, complex, uncommon, and noteworthy. And I would just add that it wasn't compassion itself that made his execution seem necessary to the powers that existed at the time, but his very real threat to their power (although it is true that it seems his threat stemmed from this heroic virtue of compassion). That's been my argument on the "seminar breakdown" post: that Jesus was a political figure and not just a superbly nice guy.

Thanks for your great insight.

3:58 PM  
Blogger juvenal_urbino said...

Somebody call me when there's a hit movie called "The Compassion of the Christ."

David's etymological point also calls my attention to something I always try to remember, and occasionally try to remind others of. Jesus didn't just die for us, he lived for us; and the former is not more important than the latter. His sacrifice of himself didn't happen just at his death; it happened every day of his life. That kind of daily pouring out of oneself is tough. Compassion ain't for sissies.

When scripture becomes fixed and rigid, it is stripped of much of its pedagogical and medicinal properties, and it becomes little more than a clumsy set of instructions that don’t always work when followed.

Kinda sounds like a constitution.

Jesus was a political figure and not just a superbly nice guy.

Yoder has taught you well, young Jedi.

7:24 PM  
Blogger Al Sturgeon said...

uCap'n wrote: "I would have thought Jesus would have been the least political figure in the story, although different factions did try to drag him into political issues. If he was a political figure, his followers seemed to have missed the point."

I respond: As I mentioned in my dialogue with Duane, at this point in my developing theology I believe that Jesus came and established a very real kingdom with himself as the very real king (which makes him most political). I think his kingdom is "not of this world" in that it doesn't use the ways of this world (including military armies to promote its cause as well as the machinery of nationalism irt geographic boundaries, ete.), but it is very much "in this world." In fact, his subjects are "resident aliens" in every nation on earth.

As a result, its my growing belief that it is too simplistic to reduce Jesus to...
* someone who went around being good to people (though he did)
* someone who came and paid off a debt and went back home (though true)
* someone who taught people a way of life (though vitally important)

All of these (combined, even) fail to capture the big picture that would get a man executed. He threatened the "powers that be" with a kingdom that forces one to pledge allegiance to another power (plus, often sought to take away the poor people on which the oppressors received their wealth). As a result, history tells of martyrs, martyrs everywhere. And when you are executed by "powers" for allegiance to another king, you die a political death.

Now you said that if he was political that his followers seemed to have missed the point. I think this is a valid discussion to have in America - the Tonto Principle as Hauerwas puts it. When talk arises of what "we" ought to do about aggression in the world, etc. the "we" is most often America instead of Christians. What would happen if the political "we" shifted in the minds of Christians from "you and I in America" to the we of "the Christian in Basra and I?"

That Jesus seems apolitical today leaves us to be more interested in selling capitalism/republicanism than the kingdom of God (since Jesus in our minds didn't concern himself with such things).

All this is new to me (and maybe more than just me), but it might sound like I'm coming around to promoting a theocracy. Instead, I'm coming to promote Church. I'm just starting to understand why we have trouble with "church discipline." We don't see it as anything more than a volunteer organization within a democratic form of government (as opposed to an established kingdom that transcends national governments).

Notice the end of the Matthew 18 instructions on church discipline is to treat someone as a pagan or tax collector (which is odd since Jesus hung out with tax collectors). I think that means that if you don't follow the path of love/compassion/reconciliation laid out by the King, then you can't be considered part of this kingdom anymore!

I know I'm getting all Catholic on us, but I don't think this requires a worldwide hierarchy with a guy wearing a funny hat in Rome. I would like to suggest that the catholic (little "c") message of the Restoration Movement and its inclusion of local congregation autonomy can mesh into this concept.

Okay, I've taken this discussion in all sorts of new directions. But maybe my explanation helps clarify the use of the word "political" a little bit, and if so, I'm thankful for people like Yoder & Hauerwas who, instead of making up personal opinions, are trying to look honestly at what Jesus said and do their best to consider that message fully.

5:56 AM  
Blogger Sandi said...

I hope this doesn't sound condescending, but I find the whole idea that there has to be a physical threat in order for people to be good profoundly sad. It reeks of the egotism that Armstrong was saying we have to let go of in order to be truly spiritual/religious. And it misses the point that she was making -- that morality is about human compassion and maximizing happiness, not about reluctantly acting a certain way because you're afraid of physical pain.

I just don't understand why there needs to be something outside of one's own conscience compelling moral behavior on pain of death. I never have. I am honest and compassionate because those are the right things to be ... because that's how I would want people to be to me ... and I don't need any other reason, eternal or otherwise. My morality is real because it comes from my sincere desire to be a good person -- I am not dissembling before others for social approbation or before a higher power for an expected eternal reward. Sorry for the back-patting, but I just think that acting the way you're supposed to because of fear rather than out of sincerity represents a low level of moral development that humanity has to get beyond. See Kohlberg's theories of moral development, summarized at http://www.nd.edu/~rbarger/kohlberg.html

I have struggled with the thought that maybe the ability to "be good" is in some measure biologically based and thus that some, perhaps most, human beings are not capable of it. That would be really unfortunate.

7:20 AM  
Blogger juvenal_urbino said...

but if the bottom line is that all this “scripture” they are talking about - be it the Bible or the Koran or whatever books go along with Budda or Confucius - is just the crowning efforts of the best and brightest of the Class of 500BCE, then they are all more or less worthless to me and to vast majority of humanity, past, present, and future.

This is false on its face, Cap'n. Buddhist, Confucian, and other scriptures have been of tremendous worth to vast numbers of humanity. How do we know that? Because vast numbers of humanity have demonstrated it in their lives and in the fact that they've kept these scriptures alive for thousands of years. People don't bother copying and passing down writings that are of no value to their lives. They certainly don't treat them as scripture.

These texts have survived and thrived despite the fact that they make no claim to anything like the current Christian notion of "inspiration" (much less "inerrancy") and are not considered so "inspired" by their readers.

If texts written in 500 BCE and treasured ever since as tremendous aids to living and making sense of the world around us -- treasured even by billions of people today, in a world radically changed, and in places culturally, linguistically, and physically remote from the texts' origins -- are of no value whatsoever in one's eyes, the most likely culprit is one's own perceptiveness.

It's empirically false to say such texts are worthless (even "more or less" worthless) to the "vast majority of humanity" simply because they make no claim to [frankly unbiblical] Christian notions of inspiration.

9:03 AM  
Blogger Al Sturgeon said...

Thanks, Cap'n...

As I did with Duane, I'll apologize for the little vocabulary game, but I think it makes my argument in some manner. Our (at the very least, American version of) modern-day Christianity doesn't behave much like a kingdom with a king. I think this is why our impression of Jesus is so predictably apolitical that we think I'm redefining the word when I use it in relation to him.

(And [smile], I'm not really trying to win the argument so much, so my semantics seeks less to be able to say I'm right with vocabulary tricks, and more to make a potentially monumental point with HUGE implications in regard to how we approach religion/politics.)

11:40 AM  
Blogger Al Sturgeon said...

Sometimes I hate blogger. I just typed a long response to you, Cap'n, and when I tried to publish it, it ate it alive.

Sigh...

Lots of ways come to mind. Let me try shorter versions:

#1: Practice church discipline. Not hit squads, but demand that people calling themselves Christians do what the King says & reconcile with their brother/sister. Love one another is not a suggestion for disciples.

#2: Have real stances on the issues of the day bigger than "we're against abortion." For instance, we will adopt any child that is in danger of abortion. And we will financially support any mother considering abortion because she can't afford it. Publicize it.

#3: Make marriage serious. When a couple declares marriage from within the kingdom, speak the vows publicly with the full understanding that the church is truly a witness, one that takes responsibility for the fidelity proclaimed.

#4: Use the money reportedly "given back to God" for kingdom purposes as opposed to using them primarily for our own comforts and purposes.

#5: Make church membership actually mean something beyond a listing in a church directory and a hope you might get involved someday (or the hope that the leaders might eventually learn your name). This is a kingdom, not a club, for Pete's sake!

I could list a bunch, but those are a few examples. Much of it has to do with the fact that America values privacy and rights and the freedom to do as you wish. All of these things are nonexistent in a kingdom. All of them exist in spades in a local church.

But let me say, I think the response we received from churches following Katrina was a powerful example of the kingdom of God at work, and in comparison to the federal government (e.g. FEMA) and capitalism (e.g. insurance industry), everyone could see the dramatic difference in the kingdom of God and the powers of this particular part of the world.

I just have to be honest enough to admit, however, that Katrina was abnormal for most churches. People are hurting all the time and all around, but churches typically spend mounds of money on real estate that is unused 95% of the time. It is primarily seen as a nice place to go on major holidays and a very nice place to have a wedding (how quaint!), but not a kingdom headquarters that either threatens the powers of the world nor offers true salvation from the powers of the world. Surely not both.

Just some thoughts, and I sure hope they publish this time!

3:10 PM  
Blogger Al Sturgeon said...

Here's a quote from the 2nd century where a pagan reflects on "Christians"...

"...though they are residents at home in their own countries, their behaviour there is more like that of transients; they take full part as citizens, but they also submit to anything and everything as if they were aliens. For them, any foreign country is a homeland, and any homeland a foreign country."

3:14 PM  
Blogger juvenal_urbino said...

Golly, Al. You really have been reading Hauerwas. :)

Much of it has to do with the fact that America values privacy and rights and the freedom to do as you wish. All of these things are nonexistent in a kingdom.

Only if the king says so. There's nothing in the notion of a kingdom that inherently precludes the existence of privacy and rights and freedom. (Except as these things stand against the king, of course, to whom the rules don't apply.)

I'm all for churches being more disciplined communities, but I think Hauerwas gets carried away; he ends up, IMHO, valuing Church more than he values people. That strikes me as wholly inconsistent with the Sermon and numerous other passages.

3:54 PM  
Blogger Al Sturgeon said...

As to meddling, Cap'n, I like Jeff Walling's little statement, "Don't worry, I'm not going to step on your toes today. I'm going for your throat!"
:-)

And Juvenal, I sure have been reading a lot of Hauerwas. Shoot me down. It's a personal problem of mine to get going in a new thought direction and becoming obsessive/compulsive. I've been serious in saying that I'm not necessarily concluding everything I'm saying here - more fleshing it out by discussion. I hope everyone will actually believe me in that.

Funny that we were taught that the Church "was" people on the Joy Bus, but Hauerwas does seem to approach it more as institution. Still, he generally makes a lot of sense when he's talking. More than anything, I respect his (seeming) ability to approach things from entirely different directions than everyone else. Well, more impressed than respect I guess. Maybe we could reform the institution w/o forgetting the most important thing of all (that I think you describe the best): that all people matter to God. Maybe we could help reform the institution to actually see that as central.

And point well taken on the king/kingdom, though I'd still argue that there are a lot less rights/freedom/privacy in the descriptions of the kingdom of God than are practiced in the American churches.

Still thinking out loud...

8:17 PM  
Blogger juvenal_urbino said...

One that claimed to come from Al’s “King” - someone who might have the authority and ability to affect me personally - would obviously have to be looked at differently from one coming from a very wise and good man who is, however, 2,000 years dead and lacks the same capability.

Okay. But I think the people who look at things that way are going to be disappointed with the available selection of religious texts that claim to come straight from the top, so to speak. Let's hypothesize one of these people and give him a name: Kenny.

In the NT, there's only one document that makes the claim Kenny's looking for, and even it doesn't quite make it: Revelation. Kenny won't read the gospels. He won't read the epistles. The Acts of the Apostles, neither.

In the OT, I haven't checked quite as closely, but the only ones that come to mind as Kenny-approved are the Prophets. Sections of some of the Pentateuch books claim to be direct revelations from God*, but, to the best of my recollection, none of Genesis. None of the wisdom literature makes it into Kenny's canon. (Of course, a lot of it isn't noticeably in the Christian canon, either, so that wouldn't really be a barrier to his being a churchgoer.) None of the histories make it, either.

So, all Kenny's going to accept from the Christian canon is parts of the OT and the whole of John's apocalypse. Personally, I don't like Kenny's chances of becoming a Jesus-follower.

OTOH, he probably will read the entire Quran.

[*Strictly speaking, even these sections of the Pentateuch don't claim it.]

8:37 PM  
Blogger juvenal_urbino said...

Thinking out loud is good, Al. Proceed apace.

I think Hauerwas is instructive, too, much the same way Yoder is (though to a considerably lesser degree, in my own experience). However, both are making particular arguments for particular points of view, and they're making them very strongly -- making extensive claims for their points of view -- and they should be read as such -- i.e., critically. With Hauerwas, especially, keep one hand on your wallet (so to speak).

And point well taken on the king/kingdom, though I'd still argue that there are a lot less rights/freedom/privacy in the descriptions of the kingdom of God than are practiced in the American churches.

Probably so. But it's a rather fundamental mistake, is it not, to equate the Kingdom with the church? I see where Hauerwas is coming from (church is to seek to emulate/model Kingdom, etc.), and I can see its utility, but again, I think it ultimately falls short because the church, despite its best efforts at emulation, is not the Kingdom. It is fallen, just as everything in this world is. As a fallen, all too fallible, often petty, human institution, some privacy, rights, and freedoms for the people within it are appropriate. I don't necessarily disagree that the pendulum has swung too far in that direction, but neither am I comfortable with where Hauerwas seems to want to swing it.

Maybe I underestimate the church's Kingdom-emulation potential. From where I sit, though, it looks to me like he overestimates it.

9:01 PM  
Blogger juvenal_urbino said...

I'm not sure I see your overall point, Cap. Maybe it's the hour.

To address your specific questions:

When did this mistaken idea that the Jewish and Christian scriptures actually claimed divine origins begin?

I don't know. It's an interesting historical question, but does it matter to our current discussion? The scriptures themselves don't make the claim. They don't even claim to be scripture. Those are claims we make for those texts; not because the texts need it, but because we do.

What would have been Kenny’s experience if he had been . . . exposed to the new sect called Christians through the preaching of Peter or Paul? Would he have been taught that Jesus was the latest and greatest Jewish Rabbi and philosopher or the risen Son of God?

Judging by the NT documents, Peter or Paul would have told Kenny Jesus was the risen son of God. Judging by those same documents, Kenny's exposure to Peter or Paul would have been extremely limited, they would not have been the only seemingly authoritative voices he heard, nor would all those voices have been in agreement. Adding the witness of contemporary extra-biblical sources, Kenny may well have heard an extraordinary variety of messages about who and what Jesus was, as well as on most other topics we know Paul or Peter addressed.

10:25 PM  
Blogger Al Sturgeon said...

No, and I wouldn't want to. I appreciate you guys burning the midnight oil so I can have something to read first thing in the morning!
:-)

4:52 AM  
Blogger Terry Austin said...

I appreciate you guys burning the midnight oil so I can have something to read first thing in the morning!

You mean, reading something other than how badly the Dogsandwich is pounding the Big Owls in the standings, right?

6:47 AM  
Blogger Al Sturgeon said...

Exactly.

Jerk.
:-)

7:30 AM  
Blogger juvenal_urbino said...

Well, since Peter and Paul certainly make claims for divine origins for their teachings very early on

Paul claims to have had a revelation at one point in his life. Although he briefly discusses that experience, none of the NT documents attributed to him equate their content with the content of that revelation.

As for Peter, I'm not sure what you're referring to.

Regarding the rest of your comment, I just don't have time to respond right now, but ISTM you're linking several things together that need not be linked.

9:38 AM  
Blogger juvenal_urbino said...

If there was no divine component in early Christianity

This is one of the things I was referring to as being unncessarily linked in your posts. Nobody has said there was no divine component in early Christianity (Armstrong strikes me as agnostic on the subject). All I've talked about is the texts we claim as our scriptures. Those don't claim to come straight from the top. Paul's claim of divine authority to teach is a long way from a claim that every word he says/writes is direct from God.

Does Paul claim that the Jesus he teaches/writes about is divine? Yes. But claiming that the subject of one's teachings speaks with the voice of God, and claiming that for ones' teachings themselves are two quite different things.

All I'm saying is that if you're operating on a standard that says either a religious text claims to be sourced directly from a divinity, or it has little value/authority, you're eliminating most of the Christian canon. Our texts simply don't make that claim.

As a side point, they also don't claim to be inerrant or even scripture.

One needn't apply higher criticism (for which I'm completely untrained) or research or anything highfalutin' to see that. One need only read the texts without reading into them; let them speak for themselves. Not make claims for them they don't make for themselves. Or, as the saying goes, speak where the bible speaks, and be silent where it is silent.

Do you think we need to make these claims for the text because we aren’t tough enough to face the fact that we are alone and on our own in the universe, and we need myths and “scriptures” to help us believe otherwise?

Yes and no. Your question assumes I'm saying much more than I am. The fact that our scriptures don't claim to be inspired in the way we'd like them to be in no way implies that we are alone in the universe. Just because we don't have any faxes from God doesn't mean he doesn't exist. Nor does it render the content of our scriptures meaningless or useless or illusory.

What it does mean is that we don't get to take the shortcut of claiming to know with absolute certainty everything we really need to know in religious matters. It means we still have to seek God's face if we want to see it; scripture is an aid to that journey, but not a substitute, and not a guarantee of success. It means we still have to do the hard work of figuring out what is the best thing to do in the situations that confront us in our lives, just as Jesus/Matthew taught us to do in the Sermon; scripture will give us tremendously powerful insights and principles to use, but it won't always spoonfeed us the answers. It means we still have to be humble about our knowledge, recognizing that it's partial and fallible, and that we would be wise to, as our scriptures teach us, be quick to hear and slow to speak.

And yes, many of us aren't strong enough to face up to that. Or we simply prefer not to when a convenient escape hatch is available. We all want certainty. We crave it. That's human nature. But we quickly realize we will never reach it on our own, so we manufacture it and slip it into our scriptures while nobody -- especially ourselves -- is looking.

~~

Congratulations on finishing your manuscript. That's a major accomplishment.

1:47 PM  
Blogger Al Sturgeon said...

Hey Cap'n, right now I'm semi-handling four days of the week when I'd prefer somewhere between one and zero.

Would you want to take a day each week and offer us a little of your research fun in history?

(Sorry everyone for doing business on the comment board!)

5:08 PM  
Blogger juvenal_urbino said...

Top notch idea, Al.

7:43 PM  
Blogger juvenal_urbino said...

Nope. I just think it's a good idea. Fer instance, I happen to know at least one reader here has an interest in Depression Era gangsters. As for the Civil War, I've dabbled in some of Shelby Foote's history (Stars in Their Courses and The Beleaguered City), which is why I got your reference to McClellan a while back.

History is full of interesting little stories. So I say throw some out there. You never know what might strike a chord.

8:29 PM  
Blogger Al Sturgeon said...

Yea! I'll send you an invitation to join this esteemed panel, Cap'n. As you can tell, we don't follow a schedule rigidly, but do you want to take Thursdays in theory (then actually post when the feeling hits ya)?

If so, I'll call Thursdays a day for "history," and as Juvenal said, just throw an interesting story out there, short or long, your complete freedom. The count is up to three that will be interested.

4:26 AM  

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