In many churches, i.e. Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant, whenever a person (lay or ordained) reads a portion of Scripture, that person concludes by saying ¨This is the Word of the Lord.¨ The congregation will usually respond by saying ¨Thanks be to God.¨
Why do we refer to the Bible as ¨the Word of God?¨ There can be many answers to that question. One person can answer ¨Because God wrote it.¨ I would ask ¨Really?¨ Another person might respond by saying that ¨God inspired it.¨ Then the question would be ¨What does ´inspired´ mean?¨ Another response might possibly be ¨God speaks through it.¨ I would then ask ¨Does God speak through any other book or piece of literature, or is the voice of God found only in the Bible?¨
Whatever one´s answers to those questions may be, the fact remains that each of those answers reflect certain assumptions and presuppositions that we all have about the Scriptures. Some people treat the Bible as a book that was written in Heaven and thrown down to Earth. Others treat it as a book which was written passively by the individual authors as God controlled them in a mechanical and robotic manner. Others, yet, treat the Bible as if it were written in a cultural and historical vacuum, i.e. without any influence from the surrounding culture of the biblical writers or the historical events taking place at the time of writing.
I would like to pose a different set of questions for our consideration. Avery Dulles, who was a Professor of Theology at Woodstock College had issue with those who believed that the Bible must be purged of mythical and symbolic elements if its message is to be communicated to humanity in our time. But he also had problems with those who said that the Bible has no myth. Dulles defined myth as ¨symbolic narrative which deals with events attributed to superhuman, personalized agencies.¨
A provoking question that would anger many and please others is ¨Does the Bible contain myth?¨ The answer to that question would depend on what is meant by ¨myth.¨ Is Dulles´s definition of myth a correct one, or are there other possible definitions that we can work with?
We might ask if the presence of myth (however defined) in Scripture would diminish the element of divine inspiration. Would the content of myth and symbol lessen the authority and use of Scripture today?
This writer (yours truly) is of the persuasion that the Bible is a divinely inspired book. However, I do not believe that divine inspiration means that it is devoid of myth and symbol. At the same time that it is inspired, it is also culturally-conditioned. That in no way erodes the role of God in the production of the Scriptures. The Scriptural witness points to God working in and through culture, and human experience. It also involves divine use of all types of literature, including allegory, legend, myth, and symbol. Because God is sovereign, we cannot limit the means that He/She uses to communicate the divinely intended message.
Please join in dialogue with us as we ponder on the nature and role of Scripture, both in our individual spiritual journey, as well as in the life of the gathered community. Your input will be very helpful.
In the Name of the Creator, and of the Redeemer, and of the Sustainer. Amen.
Dr. Juan A. Carmona
Personally, I struggle with the term "myth" in that somehow I equate the term with untruth and I cringe at the idea of anything that may remotely say God's word holds untruth. God's word is true, but then what are those truths? Aren't they subjective to various interpretations? Again, more questions than answers. I'm learning to live with the questions. Ruth
ReplyDeleteRuth: Thank you so much for your input. It gives us food for thought. Yes, in order to avoid anyone cringing at the idea of there being myth in the Bible, the word myth has to be defined. Religionists and theologians usually define myth as a ¨sacred story.¨ Others define it as something that may or may not be literally and historically true, but that it is spiritually and theologically true. Either of those definitions can hold intact the belief in the divine inspiration without being encumbered by a literal interpretation of everything recorded in Scripture. As far as ¨the Word of God,¨ we have to ask ourselves if the Bible is the ¨word of God,¨ or is it a witness to the ¨Word,¨ which is Jesus the Christ. Thank you so much for your input.
ReplyDeleteJuan Carmona