Isaiah Roman

Liberalism in the Faith

“One practical problem of this text mania is that the Bible, unlike the church, can’t answer questions, clarify earlier statements, arbitrate disagreements or deal with new developments. So those in search of religious certainty have to find it all in the text: if it says the earth was created in six days, or that gay sex is an abomination, them’s the facts, end of story. And if it forbids charging interest, well there’s always wriggle room.

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“People who convert to evangelical Christianity, including those who grow up with it, are persuaded by the experience of a religious community, and by finding that evangelical theology seems to hold water. All this is totally underpinned by the Bible – it’s the foundation and guarantee. But the only test of its reliability that inquirers are invited to make is to read it and ask ‘Is this something that I can accept wholesale and entrust my life to?’

“t’s generally much later that a convert will have to consider concrete evidence that biblical writers were human beings, capable of being one-sided, of writing myth, of exaggerating, of guessing, of having opinions it’s impossible to agree with.

“Some of us, faced with this evidence, shape our faith in the light of it, making the Bible a far more fascinating, revealing and diverse record of human religious experience. But it’s not surprising if for others the evidence comes as an attack that threatens to undermine the foundation of their faith, and has to be beaten off blindfold.”
– “How biblical literalism took root” by Stephen Tomkins, the Guardian, UK

There’s some good points in there, points that need to be attended to. Points that need to which we need to listen.

Like so many people in this world, the author (Stephen Tomkins) makes the right point, for the wrong reason and gives the right reasons for the wrong problem. The questions of how to define the church, what role the Bible plays in life, what authority the Bible has as scripture are all ongoing questions, debates that have thousands of years of history behind them.

Benjamin Franklin (among others) is considered a deist by many. Let’s be sure that we understand; a deist is someone who believes in God, but does not assign a particular identity to that God. In Benjamin Franklin’s case, he certainly identified God as the God described by the Judeo/Christian ethos, but he didn’t recognize Jesus as God. He merely recognized him as the Christ. The two are separate if you subscribe to the ideas behind Arian doctrine. Specifically, John Milton (the seventeenth-century author of Paradise Lost) brought back to prominence the debate between trinitarian doctrine and what has been termed “subordinationism” by some, and “Arianism” by others.

The complexity I just described comes from one thing; interpretation. How do you interpret the Bible? For that matter, how do you interpret Benjamin Franklin? The answer is; in context. Benjamin Franklin didn’t wake up one day and invent a brand new understanding of life, never before heard of in the history of mankind. He formulated his beliefs over several decades, based on his understanding of life and the experience it brings. The Bible is no different. It comes to us across many thousands of generations, built out of the understanding of life and the experiences it brought to it’s authors.

Stephen Tomkins seems to think that the church has the dominant role to play in the matter. Truthfully, for centuries the Pope and subsequently the Bishops were the arbiters of all things Christian. The problem is that the Church became wealthy, and money always breeds all kinds of evil. This simple truth of life is unavoidable. So, in response the Protestants declared the Bible to be the source of authority, and that Popes and Bishops and clergy were all subject to the letter of it’s laws. The problem with that is that the Bible was never intended that way.

If you’ve read a few of my articles you may be surprised to see that. Let me explain. The Bible is sixty-six different books, written by over forty authors, made up of material that spans of some five thousand years. It is improper to think of every single book in the Bible as homogenous in any but one sense; inspiration. Though every single book of the Bible is inspired by God and it is certainly true that the preservation of those words is singularly miraculous, the books themselves are distinct. They are written by different people, for different purposes. No one who studies the Bible would think to put Exodus in the same genre as Song of Songs. Neither would someone put Matthew in the same milieu as Deuteronomy. They’re simply different.

You cannot read Song of Songs literally, because its singular intent is figurative speech. You must take the book of Deuteronomy literally because its singular intent is history and law. The two books should be understood within their own distinct genres. The same is true of prophecy versus gospel, gospel versus historical record, historical record versus poetry. All of the Bible is inspired. All of the Bible is profitable for instruction. Not all of the Bible is the same.

However, where Mr Tomkins goes awry is in his proper understanding of the problem. The key sentence is this: “People who convert to evangelical Christianity, including those who grow up with it, are persuaded by the experience of a religious community, and by finding that evangelical theology seems to hold water.”

Experience. The Roman Catholic Church has, for hundreds of years, molded itself to a set of practices. As a result, the salvation of a man’s soul comes through obedience to the Church; duties and works. This was, of course, built upon the idea that a person of faith executes their faith practically and in plain view. The problem is that the practices mean nothing without the intent. This is never more clear than when you understand the simple Biblical principle; you do what you are. If you are a fraud, you will emulate the things of the model in order to fit in. A good emulation doesn’t mean you are genuine, that means you’re genuinely deceptive.

The moment that this deception comes under scrutiny, the deceiver has two choices; deepen the deception, or run away from the light. Here is where the author has failed his audience; faith breaks under scrutiny not because the Bible has flaws, or because the Word is not to be taken literally, but because those persons who claim adherence to it are frauds.

The Bible needs to be read within it’s intent. It is only understood by those who have the proper intent. This is not some secret coded message. The message is available to everyone, but emulating the practices of the letters in a book don’t give you understanding of the meaning behind the book. This sort of superficial examination of the Bible is really useless. It is in fact impossible to agree with the authors of scripture if you don’t share the same understanding of the intent behind scripture. It is indeed shallow to simply say that the earth was created in six days, or that homosexuality is an abomination, without some logical, reasonable underpinning for the belief.

To understand the Bible one must know it’s author. To know it’s author one must submit to the precepts contained within the Bible. To submit to the precepts of the Bible, we must have good cause. This cause comes from those persons who exemplify the Bible, who understand it’s precepts and from the ultimate author of the Bible. God has chosen to reveal himself to people in many ways; the Bible being just one of them.

Scripture is not intended to be a set of platitudes for the ignorant, or the undereducated. Scripture is intended to challenge you to grow, to be more than you are and to understand the reasons and meaning behind reality. It is intended as a record of humanity’s interactions with its God. It is intended to provide a clear understanding of the continuity of God’s will throughout all time. There is an underlying message there that must not be mistaken; scripture describes reality, or it’s not scripture.

Mr. Tomkins must understand that a “good moral tale” is as valuable as the paper it’s written on. Everyone recognizes a good moral tale when it is convenient, or when it becomes a broad pleasantry. The hard sayings are something quite different. It’s difficult to be challenged by an advocate of homosexual behavior and stand on the Biblical explanation when you don’t know the Biblical explanation, you only know that the Bible says it’s “bad.” It’s nearly impossible to tell someone that they’re living in sin when you don’t even know what the word sin really means.

Mr. Tomkins is a fraud. He’s trying to deepen the deception. This is the typical reaction among Christians who aren’t really Christians, but who are emulators of faith, engaged in the practices of religion and who would rather just simply get along. Yet, despite his obvious inept understanding, Stephen Tomkins understands precisely what the problem is.

“Some of us, faced with this evidence, shape our faith in the light of it, making the Bible a far more fascinating, revealing and diverse record of human religious experience. But it’s not surprising if for others the evidence comes as an attack that threatens to undermine the foundation of their faith, and has to be beaten off blindfold.”