"The Matter is Quite Simple"

"The matter is quite simple. The Bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers. We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand we are obliged to act accordingly. Take any words in the New Testament and forget everything except pledging yourself to act accordingly. My God, you will say, if I do that my whole  life will be ruined. How would I ever get on in the world? Herein lies the real place of Christian scholarship. Christian scholarship is the Church's prodigious invention to defend itself against the Bible, to ensure that we can continue to be good Christians without the Bible coming too close. Oh, priceless scholarship, what would we do without you? Dreadful it is to fall into the hands of the living God. Yes, it is even dreadful to be alone with the New Testament."
Soren Kierkegaard

Quoted in the sample chapter of The Irresistible Revolution, by Shane Clairborne. Shane also used this quote to start off his Lenten presentation, which Beth has linked to here.

Comments

[wilsonian]

WOW!

[david]

ouch.

[Luke]

Daymn

[Ken]

The problem with the quote from K. is that it can (not does but can) lead to fundamentalism and close debate. Can we really just apply everything in the NT straight across into the 21C without the hard work of hermeneutics? If we insist on doing so when Jesus is said to have told a particular person to sell all they have and give it to the poor, are we prepared to do the same when the same NT tells us to keep our women quiet in the church? What Jesus, Paul, Peter, and John said must be interpreted. And if that is true, how helpful is it to say that scholarship is the work of swindlers trying to keep us from living the NT?

[Mike]

I think we have a ways to go before we need to worry about some of that, Ken.

For my part, the NT is a collection of writings from different authors. I don't equate Jesus' command to love our enemies with the Paul's oft debated words on women... and its more than just interpretation. I think the point Kierkegaard is making (and definitely the point I'm making) is we do not do what Jesus said.

[Ken]

I’m with you that dealing with the words of Jesus and Paul is more than a matter of interpretation because we all bring our ‘selves’, and all that means to the process. I’m also with you (and Kierkegaard) that we need to do what Jesus said. However, I hear many sound-bites and read a lot of blog-bites (not by you, but in general) that simplify what Jesus says to the point of closing discussion. They sound more sophisticated than the preachers I used to hear say, “The Bible says it. I believe it. That settles it.,” but they end up saying the same thing.
If the people in Jesus’ day found it hard to grasp what he was saying because it was so counter to what they expected he should be saying, how much more must we who are so removed from the 1st C grapple with getting at what Jesus meant by what he said.
For example, when Jesus cleansed the temple of money-changers, was he attacking commercialism in the church or was he making a statement about his own calling to be the new temple? [I’m not justifying commercialism but calling for caution on what we appeal to in the NT when we criticize it). Again, when Jesus told the rich young yuppy to sell all he had and give it to the poor, was he laying down a universal command for all who would ever follow him, or was he saying something about the Torah and our relationship to it?