Pieper on Sin: Contra Naturam, Contra Rationem

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

Joseph Pieper, discussing the irrationality of sin writes:

“Sin is something contrary to reason, an actus contra rationem, a kind of ‘craziness.’ Yet despite that, sin is no something diseased, certainly not a ‘disease’ in the ordinary sense of what people mean by that word: something that simply comes upon a person without any choice in the matter. On the contrary, sin goes contrary to reason by a deliberate act committed with a full and clear understanding of what one is doing and with full responsibility (which is precisely what makes sin, as people say, that much ‘crazier’!)

Quite spontaneously the concept of ‘blinding’ enters the discussion here, but obviously not in the sense that people mean when they speak of blindness as an inability to see, the sheer absence of knowledge, etc. Rather, as we see in common proverbs like ‘none so blind as those who will not see,’ the notion of sin’s blinding effects includes a dimension accountability and guilt. Once again we are hit with the weirdness of it all: we get an inkling of an inner contradiction in sin, we feel its absurdity.” (Joseph Pieper, The Concept of Sin, p. 42).

Human Freedom, G. C. Berkouwer, Part II

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

The following passage is from Berkouwer and is the second part of a two-part post on “Human Freedom.” Again, my desire in posting this is not polemical, but rather as a clarification and hopefully a helpful elucidation of the Reformers’ position regarding human freedom. In my experience with both Protestants and Catholics in discussing this topic, there is often misunderstanding on both sides as to what the Reformers are actually teaching. Consequently, I decided to post Berkouwer’s explanation as I appreciate both his “tone” and the clarity and depth of his presentation. As usual, I look forward to your thoughts and hope to hear from “both” sides and everyone “in between.”

*******

“It is thus of importance, for purposes of orientation regarding the problem of freedom, to know how and on what grounds freedom of the will is attacked. This can be done from the vantage point of determinism or fatalism, which allows no place for any freedom: but it is also possible to reject such a vantage point, and to see the affirmation of the enslavement of the will as a corollary of an affirmation of guilt.* And when Rome supported the physical freedom of the will and from this viewpoint disqualified the Reformation, a horrible misunderstanding had arisen in the Church, a misunderstanding whose effects can still be felt. The difficulty of removing this misunderstanding becomes apparent even today in rather spectacular fashion when we consider Erich Przywara, who views Luther as replacing the All-wirksamkeit of God by an Allein-wirksamkeit so that the creature is completely and totally moved by the divine will, and who then concludes that Luther’s view is the same as Spinoza’s [5]. And when the first phase of Neo-Orthodoxy stressed the infinite qualitative distinction between man and God, Catholic theologians took this as showing once again that the basic idea of the Reformation was a ‘deterministic’ view of the will — apparently having no notion of the fact that the Reformation actually was concerned with something wholly different from a metaphysical conclusion regarding absolute transcendence as over against immanence, or from exclusive activity as over against inclusive. We shall be able to gain perspective on this point insofar as it occurs in the Protestant — Catholic controversy only when this still influential interpretation of the denial of freedom of the will becomes past history, and the religious meaning of the Reformation’s belief on this point at least begins again to be understood [6]. And that we are not here giving a more recent interpretation, arising after the Reformation because of the ever more clearly noted dangers of determinism, is apparent if one but refers, for example, to Calvin (Institutes , II, II) [7]. He says that man has been deprived of his freedom of will and as a result has been subjected to a miserable enslavement. Calvin asks what it means that the fathers so often dealt with the question of free will; he sees in them — with the exception of Augustine — a good deal of uncertainty and confusion, and concludes that they, though disciples of Christ, treated the problem too much in the manner of philosophers. The Latin Fathers usually treated free will as though man was still pure and undefiled, but the Greek writers used a much more presumptuous approach and said that man was autonomous. Calvin then asks what we are to understand by free will. He is not concerned to extinguish man’s will. He emphasizes that man does evil with his will and not through compulsion.* One might here speak of a psychological freedom which Calvin would fully acknowledge. But he holds that to call this ‘free will’ is not at all justified, and is most confusing terminology. If ‘free will’ means merely such psychological freedom, fine; but, he says, why give such an unimportant thing so proud a title? On the one hand, he says, it is an excellent thing that man is not compelled to sin; but on the other hand, it is of limited importance, since man is still a sinner in this psychological freedom, this spontaneous action. He is a ‘willing’ servant of sin, and his will is fettered with the shackles of sin. Thus Calvin’s opposition to freedom of the will becomes evident. He cites Augustine, who called the will the slave of sin, and said that the will has been used badly and is now imprisoned. And the decisive argument for Calvin, as for Augustine, is that man was created with the great powers of a free will, but lost these through sin. It is very clear here — in this loss of the free will — that the concern is not with a metaphysical interpretation of an enslaved will. If Calvin’s opposition to free will had been based on a deterministic causality, it would have been impossible for him to distinguish the situations before and after the fall; freedom would never have existed. But this is precisely not the case. Calvin views free will as something which has been lost; man has been deprived of it. The fall marks a basic change, for man lost what he once possessed [8] .* And this distinction also marks Calvin’s judgment of the term. If freedom of the will means that man sins with his will and not through compulsion, then Calvin has no objection; but he considers that the term must be used with great caution, and would prefer that it not be used at all ( Institutes , II, II, 8). For, he says, he has found that the usual connotation of the term is not merely that the will is not externally compelled but also includes the idea that man can freely determine his own path and the direction of his whole life in autonomy, as if the man who wills is not a fallen and falling man, whose life’s direction is already decided because of the fall. And so our conclusion must be that Calvin took up the problem of the freedom of the will as an historical and religious problem, and that in this approach his own deepest interests revealed themselves [9]. And thus he can ask (II, II, 8) why men boast of their free will, when they are actually slaves to sin; and as for freedom, he can cite the words of Scripture, ‘and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty’ (II Cor. 3:17). Man, then, according to Calvin, was free before the fall, and lost this freedom through sin. As fallen man he does indeed will and act, but in this activity he walks on a path he cannot leave through his own powers. It is the path of alienation and rebellion. And once on this path, man’s conversion, his return, by his own power — is ruled out. This is man’s enslaved will, his servum arbitrium [10]. Before the fall, freedom; and after the fall, enslavement. When the Reformation so speaks, it implies the breaking through of every form of determinism. Anyone who should wish to oppose this formulation from the standpoint of divine omnipotence and sovereignty so as to deny man any freedom a priori — apart, that is, from the question of before or after the fall — would be introducing a most unbiblical view of freedom, and at the same time a very inexact concept of God. He might perhaps from such a concept reach the conclusion that man ‘naturally’ is not free; but it is clear that with such an approach he must develop an idea of freedom as autonomy and arbitrary choice. And this implies a line of thought which makes it finally impossible to catch the Biblical light on freedom. And it certainly must then sound strange to hear life restored through the grace of God described as a free life. No, it is precisely the clarity of the Biblical witness regarding freedom which should make us very cautious of any abstract concept of freedom*. A determinist may view all actual freedom —apart from the concrete situation, however disposed — as contraband; but from Scripture it is evident that there is room for an important historical variation, and it is apparently possible to speak of human freedom once again released from restrictions. It is obvious that this freedom, which is held before us as awe-inspiring wealth, has nothing to do with autonomy or arbitrariness, and that it does not stand opposed to submission to God. We can not even say that freedom and submission are two aspects of the Christian life. There is, according to the Bible, only one solution which gives the gospel message its full due: when we refer not merely to aspects, nor to a dialectical relation between submission and freedom, but to their identity [11]. We must then speak without any hesitation of human freedom as a creaturely freedom given by God.”

* Indicates added emphases.

Notes
[5] E. Przywara, “Gott in uns und Gott über uns,” Ringen der Gegenwart, II (1929), 550ff. He is followed by many Catholics in this view; recently by Marlet, Grundlinien der Kalvinistischen Philosophie der Gesetzesidee als Christlicher Transzendentalphilosophie (1954), pp. 129ff.
[6] Marlet, op. cit., p. 131. He refers to Calvin in support of his position. He says that Calvin stresses exclusively the Allein-wirksamkeit of God, so that both in the individual and the areas of life — all bound immediately to Him — all independence is denied; and Marlet sees this as meaning that secondary causes are completely absorbed in the original causality of God. Cf. his reference to J. L. Witte, Het Probleem Individugemeenschap in Calvijns Geloofsnorm (1949). Witte views Calvin as stressing transcendence at the cost of immanence. It would seem that there is some conflict between exclusive divine transcendence on the one hand, and a unique and complete divine activity in every creaturelv act on the other — but Marlet uses both as characteristic of Calvinism. His expression “Allein-wirksamkeit” is unsatisfactory, since Calvin’s protest against man’s independence is a protest against man’s supposed autonomy, and has nothing to do with a depreciation of the meaning and worth of creaturely activity. And thus Marlet’s reference in this connection to the difference between Dooyeweerd and Stoker hardly indicates a flaw in the “structure” of Calvinism!
[7] The discussion following is based on the Institutes , II, II. The introductory mention of the loss of free will is from the heading of II, II. For the Latin fathers, ibid., 4, 9. For the Greek fathers, ibid., 4; the word Calvin sees used by them is autexousion. Niesel refers to Clement, Origen. Chrysostom (cf. Calvin’s remarks) and to Gregory Nazianzus, Op. Sel. IV, 246. For Calvin’s stress on will rather than compulsion, see II, II, 7, 8.
[8] On this point see also the Canons of Dordt , III, IV, Rejection of Errors. Here freedom of the will is rejected, and the elevation of the powers of the free will (III. IV, III), with a reference to the guile fullness of the heart. Cf. the Confessio Scotiana , art. 2, on the original libertas arbitrii (Muller, Die Bekenntnisschriften der Reformierten Kirche , p. 250); Confessio Helvetica Posterior , art. IX, the will has been made enslaved: “voluntas vero ex libera facta est voluntas sewa” (ibid., p. 179); cf. the further remark “servit peccato non nolens, sed volens. Etenin voluntas, non noluntas dicitur” (ibid.)
[9] When Calvin distinguishes between necessity and compulsion (necessitas and coactio), necessity refers to a necessitas arising from the corruption of human nature. Cf. J. Bohatec, “Calvins Vorsehungslehre,” in his Calvinstudien (1909), p. 365. For the distinction, see Institutes, II. III, 5. Calvin there says the will is deprived of its freedom and necessarily follows evil (with citations of Augustine and Bernard). Man sins with his will and not against his will; through inclination, not compulsion; through desire, not through external compulsion .
[10] The point can be sharpened by saying that we are not dealing with determinism, but with the accusation of Jeremiah: “Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? then may ye also do good, that are accustomed to do evil” (Jer. 13:23). Cf. Aalders, Commentaar, ad loc. He says that this text is often cited in connection with the corruptness of human nature, but wrongly, since it deals with a hardening of the heart through continual living in sin. But this does not rule Out the fact that the impossible is here spoken of in connection with an existing situation in which man moves and in which he is powerless.
[11] In my Divine Election (1955). p. 327. I noted Otto Ritschl’s idea that some Calvinists when they took up man before the fall suddenly returned to an “indeterministic” outlook, and accepted free will. This is a typical misunderstanding; if Ritschl had been logical, he should then have been amazed at the “illogicality” of the Calvinists when they went on to speak of Christian freedom! Determinism has no room, either protologically or eschatologically, for freedom. Ritschl’s astonishment thus does not correspond to the actual situation among Calvinist theologians, who evidently were completely aware of historical and eschatological perspectives on the problem.

Human Freedom by G.C. Berkouwer, Part I

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

The following passage is from Berkouwer and is part I of a two part post on “Human Freedom.” My desire in posting this is not polemical, but rather as a clarification and hopefully helpful elucidation of the Reformers’ position regarding human freedom. In my experience with both Protestants and Catholics in discussing this topic, there is often misunderstanding on both sides as to what the Reformers are actually teaching. Consequently, I decided to post Berkouwer’s explanation as I appreciate both his “tone” and the clarity and depth of his presentation. As usual, I look forward to your thoughts and hope to hear from “both” sides and everyone “in between.”

*******

“And even when men prize freedom as the summum bonum of human personality, there is still the possibility of a degeneration of freedom. And when we raise this possibility, we also bring to the fore the problem of a norm for freedom. Even those who do not relate the degeneration of freedom to what Leo XIII called ‘the total rejection of the sovereignty of the almighty God’ (in his encyclical Libertas) often nevertheless speak of a ‘perversion’ of freedom, as is shown, e.g., in the term ‘true freedom,’ which is then distinguished from false or illusory freedom. This usage already shows us that a merely formal treatment of what man is ‘free from’ says little or nothing. For the moment that freedom is posited, one is confronted by the question of the limits of freedom, and the problem reaches formidable complexity as soon as we intuitively reject the completely individualistic and normless concept of freedom which the purely formal ‘free from’ approach seeks to realize.

Nevertheless, we gain the impression that men are often little conscious of this complexity in their manifold use of the concept of freedom, in everyday practical life, all sorts of restrictions play so great a role, restrictions experienced as essentially alien and as threatening, that we are sometimes inclined without further thought to proclaim ‘free from’ as the essence of freedom. And this definition often finds expression in everyday life. Thus we speak of liberalism in the political and social area, meaning that the state should allow man’s life to keep its ‘freedom’; and we speak of freedom of religion and conscience, freedom of expression, academic freedom, and so forth. In this all a protest is registered against restrictions on human life which cannot be tolerated, as, for example, when during a period of occupation by a foreign power a people undergoes an experience of unfreedom, and the ‘free from’ approach can then be the basis for a blazing enthusiasm when the conquerors are driven out and the people regain their freedom.

But this apparently clear and lucid concept of freedom is never able by itself to bring about a solution of the real and deepest problem of human freedom. For in every situation the ‘free from’ approach immediately poses numerous problems as to the nature and the meaning of freedom, and its limits.
In theological reflection on human freedom one continually faces a much deeper question than that posed by the usual controversy between determinism and indeterminism. For when theologians discussed human freedom, they were not concerned with the freedom of a self-sufficient ‘being’ but rather with the freedom of the man of God. Thus we need not be surprised that in this approach the problem of the relationship between human freedom and the sovereignty of God continually came to the fore. And it is also true that the determinism — indeterminism controversy was often incorporated in theological reflection on this problem. We often encounter these terms in the history of dogma, and this religiously neutral anthropological controversy was then grafted on to the religious questions. We can observe ‘deterministic’ tendencies which because of the (determining) sovereignty of God reserved no freedom for man, while indeterminism, in reaction, often relativized the sovereignty of God to preserve the freedom of man. And thus theology fell into a most regrettable controversy,* since an apparent dilemma was raised which is really non-religious in nature, and which is wholly outside of the Biblical witness. It may be stated, and happily so, that this false approach was often recognized, and that attempts were made to banish it from the theological tradition; as, for example, when the absence of human freedom was expounded not in terms of a general determinism, but rather in terms of sin: the slavery of fallen and lost man, who because of the fall was a slave to the dark powers of apostasy, which overpowered and ruled him in all his ways.

This view of man’s slavery constantly comes to the fore in the history of theology in connection with the question of whether or not man had ‘freedom’ to accept divine grace. Was it actually so that on the one hand there was a divine offer of grace, and on the other a free man, who could respond to this grace negatively as well as positively, so that the decision as to salvation lay in man’s own hands only? Can the distinction between ‘objective’ grace and ‘subjective’ free decision be so simple? That was the question at issue in the struggle between Pelagius and Augustine, and in later forms of this controversy between, for example, Erasmus and Luther, in their argument de libero arbitrio or de servo arbitrio.

When as over against Rome the Reformation denied the freedom of the will, rejected the subject — object separation, and spoke of an enslaved will, most Catholic and humanist thinkers saw this as nothing less than an attack on, and indeed an annihilation of, human nature, of man’s essence, which was presumed to be inconceivable without freedom as part of it.

They saw in the denial of freedom of the will a proclamation of a divine grace which was overwhelming and which could affect human life only in irruptive and mechanical fashion, overpowering defenseless and enslaved man. The Reformers’ teaching on the will of man was interpreted as coactio, as necessitas, and over against this the so-called physical freedom of the will was stressed, a freedom not destroyed through the power of sin because it belonged to the essential structure of man’s nature [1]. According to Rome, we can speak of a saving and restoring divine power only if we postulate an organic connection between grace and freedom. The point was one, Rome felt, of essential importance, and it is not coincidental that as early as 1520 Rome denounced as one of Luther’s errors his denial of free will, just as it was not coincidental that the controversy between Luther and Erasmus broke out over exactly this point [2]. For the controversy was on whether man was or was not ‘open’ to divine grace, able to accept it ‘freely.’ When Luther (and after him Calvin) denied this so-called freedom of the will, this was seen by many as an erroneous view of human nature. And therein lies the reason that Catholic theologians in various polemics against the Reformation stress so strongly the inalienable and essential and evident anthropological structure of human freedom.

Actually, it is clear enough that the Reformation’s intention was not at all to posit compulsion as over against freedom. There was no suggestion that its critique of the freedom of the will meant to hold, in deterministic fashion, that only God acted, and that man was powerless, deprived of will, and driven* [3]. Such an approach to the problem was definitely not the background of the real controversy. It was readily acknowledged that man followed his own way in ‘free,’ not compulsive, acts, in a self-willed activity and spontaneity from day to day. The denial of the freedom of the will posited, rather, that it was precisely this active and willing human being in his willing and acting who was alienated from God and enslaved to sin; and in no sense a man who stood like a tabula rasa before continually new possibilities of choosing between good and evil. The problem with which the Reformation was concerned was not first of all a psychological or anthropological problem, and still less was it taught that man did not will or act or choose: attention was directed to man as active and willing! The problem was then the condition, the state of ‘being’ of sinful and lost mankind, the being with which he willed and acted and chose in all his activities. Thus it was primarily the central religious question which was raised. Is the ‘being’ of fallen man of such a sort that he is ‘free’ in each new situation of his life, in each new decisive turning point of his existence, free in the sense that the possibility of doing good, of obeying God’s commands, of being ‘open’ to divine grace, is always there? Or is he enslaved to his sinful past and to the corruption of his heart, to his alienation from God? The Reformation did not hesitate as to the answer to these questions. And its answer did not arise from a deterministic view of the acts of God or from an annihilation of man’s will, but rather from its belief in man’s lostness, his fallen state. The criticism of free will was not based on the assumption of a universal necessitarianism, but on the confession of man’s guileful, stony heart, which — mightily active — pushed man forward on a way of sin and corruption which he is no longer able to abandon by means of the “freedom” presumed to be essentially and anthropologically his*[4].

* Italicized words marked with a star indicate emphases added.

[1] On this “physical” (or natural) freedom, cf. Leo XlII’s encyclical Libertas; “the ability to choose the means proper to the desired goal” (pp. 17-18). Free choice (liberum arbitrium) is a property of the will, something proper to the will, seu potius ipsa voluntas. It is noteworthy that despite the supposed indestructability of this freedom, the encyclical goes on to say that the “power to sin is not freedom” (p. 19), with a citation of John 8:34 (‘Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin”). On the concept of freedom in this encyclical, and problems surrounding it, see B. van Beyen, “De Opvatting van de mensclijke Wilsvrijheid in de Neo-Scholastiek,” Studia Catholica (1956), pp. 213-215. For the organic relation between grace and freedom in Catholic thought, see ch. 2 of my Divine Election (1955).
[2] The condemnation of Luther is in Exsurge Domine (Denzinger, 776). For Luther and Erasmus, cf. further my Conflict met Rome, ch. 4.
[3] Iwand, op. cit., p. 241. He sees the equation of the idea of the unfree will with the idea of determinism as the most common misunderstanding of the former. For man’s enslaved will, cf. I Pet. 2:16 warning against “using your liberty for a cloke of maliciousness”: this refers to an enslaved will, not to an annihilated will. Thus we speak of a “servum arbitrium” in the “privatio actuosa” — a term which stresses the dynamic and active character of sin. The enslaved will manifests itself in this alarming dynamism.
[4] Cf. Realencyklopädie für protestantische Theologie und Kirche (s.v., Willensfreiheit), XXI, 317.

Call For Papers: "The World and Christian Imagination"

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

SCP Conference Notes

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

We had a great time at the SCP conference at Notre Dame this past week. We were particularly encouraged by Dr. Merold Westphal’s and Dr. William Wainwright’s lectures (two of the plenary speakers), as well as a paper presented by Dr. David Burrell of Notre Dame. All three professors presented views that embrace mystery, seeing mystery as essential and necessary for a vibrant Christian faith. Dr. Westphal described God’s incomprehensibility as a positive concept that speaks of an overflowing plenitude, and brought in themes from Jean-Luc Marion such as saturated phenomenon and bedazzlement. Dr. Wainwright discussed negative theology and several interesting ideas from Karl Rahner–including the notion that God is in awe of Himself–i.e., there is wonder among the members of the Trinity–(this wonder and mystery within the Trinity however is not to be understood as set against God’s omniscience). Dr. Burrell’s paper was entitled, “Creator/creature Relation: ‘the distinction’ vs. ‘onto-theology’”. Burrell discussed Marion’s critique of onto-theology and how the being discovered by Marion has much more in common with Scotus than Aquinas. Likewise, contra Richard Cross (the third plenary speaker and a known Scotus scholar), Burrell argued that any univocal notion of being between Creator and creature amounts to idolatry. During the Q & A time of Cross’ lecture, Burrell challenged Cross’ view that our concepts must be univocal, lest we fall into meaningless nonsense and equivocation in our predications–against this understanding, Burrell said that univocity is not only undesirable in regard to our predications between Creator and creatures, but even among created beings, there are numerous “fuzzy” areas with univocal predication. Cross also said something to the effect that our only other option (should we deny univocal predication in theology) would be to appeal to special revelation–something that Cross said would be very “undesirable.” During the Q & A, Dr. Westphal suggested that in fact revelation is exactly what we should appeal to and that perhaps he and Cross simply have two different views of what theology “is”–to which Cross simply said, “Yes, we do.”

(By the way, if you would like to read the paper that I presented, I have posted it on my website: Does God’s Incomprehensibility Combined with Human Finitude (and Fallen-ness) Make Reasonable (a qualified) Fideism and a Certain Kind of Defeat Immunity? Yes, I received the award for the longest titled paper at the conference).

SCP Conference

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

It is likely that I won’t be posting for the next few days (though I’ll be checking email), as I will be at the midwest SCP conference presenting a paper. (See info below). If you happen to be at the conference or a student at Notre Dame, please drop by and say, “hello.”

Dooyeweerd and the Religious "Ground Motive" of All Theoretical Thought

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

Herman Dooyeweerd (1894-1977), a Dutch Reformed philosopher of the continental flavor, has discussed at length what he calls the critique of the pretended autonomy of philosophical thought. According to Dooyeweerd, all philosophical or more broadly speaking theoretical accounts of the world are in fact rooted in a religious starting point or using Dooyeweerdian terminology, a religious “ground motive.” Thus, all worldviews are ultimately grounded in a religious starting point; however, those that reject the biblical ground motive cannot help but to accept an apostate ground motive that manifests its apostate direction by absolutizing and hence distorting one aspect of creation which results in numerous irresolvable dialectical tensions.

Integral to Dooyeweerd’s Weltanschauung are structural modes or modal aspects of creation [1]. As Dooyeweerd explains,

“Within the horizon and order of time, […], our experience displays a great diversity of fundamental aspects or experiential modes, which, as such, do not refer to a concrete what, i.e., to concrete things or events of our empirical world, but only to the how, i.e., a special manner of experiencing them. […] All these fundamental and irreducible modalities of our experience have their common foundation in the order of time, established by the creative will of God. This order of time has arranged them in an irreversible succession and keeps them in an unbreakable mutual coherence. This is why the modal aspects of our experience are essentially modes of time, which in each of these expresses itself in a specific modal sense” (In the Twilight of Western Thought, p. 122).

In contrast to the temporal horizon in which we experience these diverse modal aspects, we have the “human I,” or “heart,” which Dooyeweerd explicates at the “religious center and radical unity of human existence,” and the “central seat of the imago Dei [2]. The human person as imago Dei, brings unity to the various temporal aspects of his or her experience by loving God first and foremost above all. Relatedly, because all human beings are mysteriously united (in Adam) and as God’s image bearers are called to love God with all that we are, love for one’s neighbor is intimately bound up in our love of God. “We cannot love God without loving His image, expressed in the ego of ourselves and that of our-fellow men» [3]. Thus, God’s Law for creation in all its diverse, progressive and unfolding expressions manifests its unity in the great commandment of love, “addressed to the heart, i.e., the religious center of human life” [4]. In this account, human beings only experience this harmony with God and fellow human beings when rightly related to God. Given that our purpose is to reflect God whose image we are, we see that in ourselves we are nothing. Consequently, the movement from intimate union with God in his original creation to a separation from God in the “fall” brings dis-integration and disharmony between the Creator and his creation and within creation itself. As Dooyeweerd explains not only in our postlapsarian but also our prelapsarian state, the spiritual life of human beings has always depended upon our openly receiving and embracing the Word of God. However, when our first parents (and we “in them,”) closed their hearts to the Word of God and choose to listen to the father of lies who assured them that human beings are not dependent upon God, the imago Dei was darkened and now reflects only a shattered image (apart from re-creation in Christ) [5]. The Christian metanarrative, i.e., creation, fall, redemption in Christ, and final consummation in Christ, therefore, has “a radical unity of meaning, which is related to the central unity of our human existence” [6]. Not only does embracing this metanarrative (through a work of grace no doubt) effect true knowledge of God and ourselves, but it also suggests that we are in sense “beyond the scientific problems of both theology and philosophy” [7]. That is, our acceptance of the biblical ground motive (i.e., the Christian metanarrative) has to do with a pre-theoretical orientation and as such is not the subject of theoretical reflection.

As Dooyeweerd explains,

“the Christian metanarrative is the common supra-scientific starting point of a really biblical theology and of a really Christian philosophy. […] It is the religious presupposition of any theoretical thought, which may rightly claim a biblical foundation. But, as such, it can never become the theoretical object of theology; no more than God and the human I can become such an object” [8].

Here Dooyeweerd makes a crucial distinction between theology as a second-order science and the biblical ground motive of creation, fall, redemption in Christ and final consummation as the pre-theoretical framework and “foundation” upon which all second order special sciences (including theology) must be built. Thus, for Dooyeweerd theology (as a science) should not function as the “queen of the sciences” because this would amount to absolutizing one aspect of our temporal experience, which would in essence amount to idolatry.

Notes
[1] Within this temporal order our experience displays a numerical aspect, a spatial aspect, an aspect of extensive movement, an aspect of energy in which we experience the physico-chemical mode of change, a biotic aspect or that of organic life, a sensitive aspect or that of feeling and sensory perception, a logical aspect, i.e., the analytical mode of distinction in our experience lying at the foundation of our logical concepts and judgments. Further, our temporal horizon of experience displays an historical aspect, or, that of the cultural mode of development of social life, an aspect of symbolical signification lying at the foundation of all linguistic phenomena; and finally an aspect of social intercourse, an economic, an aesthetical, a juridical, a moral and a faith aspect” ( In the Twilight of Western Thought, p. 122).
[2] Ibid. , p. 123. God is of course also “beyond” the temporal horizon of our experience. That is, he is both transcendent and simple in himself (and of course Triune). This is in no way to deny his immanence or to lessen the reality of his ir-ruption into our world through the Incarnation.
[3] Ibid. , p. 123.
[4] Ibid. , p. 123. Dooyeweerd seems to use “heart” in the all-encompassing Hebrew sense.
[5] Ibid. , p. 124. Dooyeweerd continues, “This apostasy implied the apostasy of the whole temporal world which was concentrated in man’s ego. Therefore the earth was cursed, because it had no religious root of its own, but was related to the religious root or center of human existence. For the same reason the redemption in Jesus Christ and the communion of the Holy Spirit, which makes us into members of His body, has a central and radical sense. In Christ, mankind and the whole temporal world have received a new religious root in which the imago Dei is revealed in the fullness of its meaning” (Ibid. , p. 124).
[6] Ibid. , p. 125.
[7] Ibid. , p. 125.
[8] Ibid. , p. 125.

Ridderbos on the Trinitarian Character of the "Word became Flesh"

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

Not only does Balthasar see a Trinitarian acting in the Word becoming flesh, but Ridderbos does as well (here focusing specifically on the Father and the Son). In his commentary on the Gospel of John, Ridderbos writes, commenting on John 3:16,

“Here we read not of the Son of man but of God’s only-begotten Son (cf. 1:18), so designated here as the highest gift God could give (cf. Ro. 8:32: ‘who did not spare his own Son’; Gn. 22:16). And we read, ‘gave’ in the sense of what is elsewhere called ‘giving up,’ ’surrendering’ (e.g., Ro. 4:25; 8:32; Mk. 9:31), namely to death on a cross. All this shows how in the Fourth Gospel, as elsewhere in the New Testament, the God-given sacrifice of Christ is of central significance. This is surely the case also because in that surrender the glory of God manifested itself so clearly ‘in the flesh’ of the man Jesus, but above all because it brought to its highest manifestation the measure of God’s love for the world (cf. 13:1). [...] it is God who makes the all-embracing sacrifice for the world. There is no further analysis of why God loves thus. The text’s exclusive concern is the fact and the magnitude of God’s love. It is love that not only manifests itself over death, the death into which the world (like Israel in the wilderness) would sink: in the death of Christ it also identifies with the world in its lostness and thus imparts the deepest meaning to the great statement in the prologue, ‘and the Word became flesh.’ [...] God in his eternal love returned to the world as to his own, that he loved it in the surrender of his only-begotten Son (cf. 3:35), and that the Father loves the Son because he gave his own life (cf. 10:15) in a love that persisted to the end (cf. 13:1ff.)” [pp. 138-39].

Balthasar on the Trinitarian Character of the Descensus and the Resurrection

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

“That the Redeemer is solidary with the dead, or, better, with this death which makes of the dead, for the first time, dead human beings in all reality–this is the final consequence of the redemptive mission he has received from the Father. His being with the dead is an existence at the utmost pitch of obedience, and because the One thus obedient is the dead Christ, it constitutes the ‘obedience of a corpse’ (the phrase is Francis of Assisi’s) of a theologically unique kind. By it Christ takes the existential measure of everything that is sheerly contrary to God, of the entire object of the divine eschatological judgment, which here is grasped in that event in which it is ‘cast down’ [...]. But at the same time, this happening gives the measure of the Father’s mission in all its amplitude: the ‘exploration’ of Hell is an event of the (economic) Trinity” (Mysterium Paschale, pp. 174-175).

Balthasar continues regarding the Father’s role, stating that not only does he send the Son into the world to save it rather that judge it, he “must also introduce the Son made man into ‘Hell’ (as the supreme entailment of human liberty). But the Son cannot really be introduced into Hell save as a dead man, on Holy Saturday. [...] The Son must ‘take in with his own eyes what in the realm of creation is imperfect, unformed, chaotic’ so as to make it pass over into his own domain as the Redeemer (Ibid., p. 175).

Though Christ has experienced and endured the deepest Hell, He can yet cross this chaotic darkness because He is “not bound by any of the bonds of sin.” Balthasar then by means of Gregory the Great calls us to consider not only the event of Holy Saturday, but the “spiritual descent of the Redeemer into the lostness of the sinful heart; the very same descensus is repeated each time that the Lord goes down into the depths of the desperata corda (Ibid., p. 176).

Yet, our story does not end here. The Apostle Paul tells us that Christ has trampled down death with death and that if Christ has not risen, we of all people should be pitied. Again drawing us to the Trinitarian character — now of the Resurrection–Balthasar writes, “The Father is the Creator who, acting at Easter in the Son, brings his work to completion; the Father in exalting his Son, also brings the Son’s mission to its conclusion, and makes the Son visible to the world, spreading abroad there the Spirit which is common to them both” (Ibid., p. 189). As he continues his contemplations on the mystery of the Resurrection and the many paradoxes that confront us, e.g, that “this event includes which includes everything within its embrace at one and the same time withdraws itself from our gaze (inasmuch as it happens in the form of a return to the Father, to eternity) and also reveals itself to us (so that we may grasp by faith the meaning of the history of salvation, that it must needs be simultaneously ‘meta-historical’ or ‘pre-historical’ and also historical” (p. 188) and the list goes on, Balthasar then points us to John’s simple yet profound expression of this Trinitarian mystery, viz., “The Word became flesh (sarx).” As Balthasar explains, “this formula allows us to understand the man Jesus–his life, death and resurrection–as the fulfilment of the living Word of God of the old covenant, shows the event of Jesus to be the definitive, superabundant consequence of the event of God himself, and interprets the Son’s Resurrection as God’s take-over of power in his own world, the fundamental breakthrough of the Kingdom” (pp. 203-204). Not only do we read of the Father’s power at work in resurrecting the Son, but the Apostle Paul likewise speaks of the “Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead” (Rom 8:11). In all of these mighty works, the Triune God shows himself as the “true and living God in whom Abraham already believed [...] And he seals his final covenant with the world, inasmuch as ‘in Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself (II Corinthians 5, 19), for ‘in him all the fullness of God (in gracious activity) was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his Cross (Colossians 1, 20)” (pp. 204-205). Hallelujah! He is Risen!

The Decision is In!

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

Today was the big day for deciding which offer to accept in regard to doctoral programs of study. Of the six schools to which I applied, three came back negative, two positive and one a “maybe” (i.e., I was placed on a waiting list for admission for the Fall). For a number of reasons that I won’t go into here, we have decided to accept the offer from the University of Dallas (Interdisciplinary Program of Study in Philosophy). I look forward with great joy to the next 3-4 years of study at UD, and am extremely grateful to all my professors at UD from whom I have learned so much. I am also excited about so many new and growing friendships among the UD academic community–David A., Allison R., Jonathan M., Bret S., David C., Father Basil, Steve B. and the list goes on. Many thanks to all who prayed for us while making this decision–special thanks to our dear friends Mike and Rachel V. who constantly write, call, pray and encourage us. We’re sad that we won’t be in your “neck of the woods,” but I’m sure that our paths will cross from time to time when you guys visit family.

Flesh and Spirit: An Original Dualism?

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

Addressing the common allegations of a flesh and Spirit opposition as a hermeneutic key to understanding the Fourth Gospel (e.g., Bultmann’s gnostic interpretation), Ridderbos offers a different take. First, reveiwing briefly Bultmaann’s position, according to his view “flesh” and “spirit” denote “the radical opposition between two mutually exclusive metaphysical principles, which he then “demythologizes” and interprets utilizing terms and concepts taken from existentialist philosophy (Ridderbos, The Gospel of John, p. 130). “Flesh,” e.g., speaks of the “nothingness” and “inauthenticity” of human existence, whereas “spirit” refers to “authentic” existence in which “nothingness” ceases to have dominion. Ridderbos, in contrast, rejects an original dualism, pointing out that from the very beginning of the Fourth Gospel, we encounter the notion that the Word is the creation of all things–παντα δι αυτου εγενετο, και χωρις αυτου εγενετο ουδε εν (John 3:3). Commenting further, Ridderbos states,

“The opposition between flesh and Spirit primarily relates therefore to the creatureliness and dependence of humanity in relation to God as Spirit, Source, and Ruler of all life. In that connection, ‘flesh’ does not denote what is ‘lower’ in humankind but the whole human person, physical as well as spiritual. Accordingly, what is opposed to humankind in its ‘authentic existence’ adn threatens us as our ‘fate’ is not our existence as flesh but the radical disturbance that has arisen in that existence as the result of the self-direction that has brought us into a position of estrangement from God, of guilt and powerlessness, of transience, uncertainty, and meaninglessness. Hence, when, as here, the ‘Spirit’ is contrasted with this powerlessness of the flesh to enter the kingdom of God and to inherit the true life, ‘Spirit’ does not denote the great ontological anti-flesh principle, but God himself as the source of life (cf. 1:13) and above all in his restorative and life-renewing power as the only possibility left to humans to save them from lostness and alienation from God and to give them eternal life. [...] The alternatives ‘flesh’ and ‘Spirit’ are not ‘anthropological’ in the sense of humankind as it is and as it should become in order to rise from the inferiority or nothingness of one existence (flesh) to a higher or ‘authentic’ existence (Spirit). The alternatives rather concern humankind in its (fleshly) powerlessness over against the sovereignty of and omnipotence of God (the Spirit), who alone can transform humankind, that is, grant us the needed rebirth from above” (Ibid., p. 131).

Song of Songs and Eros

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

For a delightful and provactive series of posts on the Song of Songs in light of Benedict’s encyclical, visit Jo’s blog.

HT to Ben M. at “Faith and Theology,” for bringing this to my attention.

Balthasar on the Unsurpassable Scandal of the Cross

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

At the end of a wonderful section entitled, “The ‘Word of the Cross’ and its Logic,” Balthasar writes,

“If theology is to be Christian, then it can only be a theology which understands in dynamic fashion the unsurpassable scandal of the Cross. Certainly, such a theology will understand the Cross as a ‘crisis’, but it will see the crisis in question as a turning-point between the old aeon and the new, in the tension between the ‘world’s situation’ and the ‘world’s goal’. What ensures the connexion between these two is no immanent evolution, but that inconceivable moment between Holy Saturday and Easter. That can also be seen clearly enough from the side of anthropology, since ‘evolution’, no matter how one understands it, will never reunite the two extremities of interiorly ruptured man but at best must consider sick and broken human individuals as constituting the dépassé pre-history of a humanity progressing towards health. Jesus, however, did not come to encourage those who were well, but to cure those who were sick (Mark 2, 17 and parallels). And in any case authentic theology, faced with the ‘death of God’ in the Triduum Mortis is so thoroughly absorbed in its supreme object that it has no time to lose itself in idle questions” (Mysterium Paschale, p. 56).

Excerpts from Milbank’s "The Future of Love" Article

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

Below are excerpts from Milbank’s article, “The Future of Love: A Reading of Benedict XVI’s Encyclical Deus Caritas Est,” that I found particularly interesting and encouraging. First, Milbank describes the relationship between faith and reason as the “yearning of reason towards faith.” E.g., Milbank writes:

“[the Pope’s] thoughts are in continuity with those of his predecessor, yet they are marked by the fact he is a theologian before he is a philosopher and a theologian in the lineage of the nouvelle théologie who tends to stress the implicit yearning of reason towards faith and the completion of reason by faith, even within its own proper sphere of human understanding.”

Likewise, I resonate with Milbank’s comments on Benedict’s awareness of the debates in theology and philosophy regarding the nature of love, giving and friendship. As Milbank explains, “Broadly speaking, these hover about the issue of whether love is primarily an agapeic self-oblation, or whether, to the contrary, it is an erotic reciprocity and mutual fulfilling of desire. Here Benedict adroitly holds a balance between both emphases, and in doing so also undermines completely the claims of those who see Christianity as the enemy of erotic love (emphases added).” Continuing and expanding the love theme, Milbank writes,

“The [Church] is the Bride of God the Son: hence the gospels are precisely, as Benedict says, a ‘love story’, the story of God’s seeking out of his lost love, the highest possible romance.

But even within his own Trinitarian life, God is not just a free-giving; he is equally a constant receiving. Thus Benedict insists that insofar as the Bible qualifies a Greek metaphysical presentation of the absolute with a personalist emphasis, it accentuates and purifies, rather than abandoning, the Greek concern with eros. As personal God himself not only exhibits preference but also receptivity.

Likewise, the Pope cunningly turns the conventional tables in the case of human agape also. To be sure, this concerns a love for the neighbour that must be self-sacrificial and include love for enemies and even the unknown. Yet how is such a superhuman and heroic love possible for us? Not because it is commanded. Rather, because its possibility is given to us insofar as it arrives along with our agape for God. But this love of God is overwhelmingly receptive and therefore has an erotic dimension: to love God is obviously not to meet his needs but rather is to encounter him in personal union that issues in a merging of will and purpose.”

Christian agape involves eros (e.g., Milbank discusses the “erotic” context of Eucharistic worship—our encounter with God within the social context of the church, which also involves encountering our neighbor and is a “celebratory foretaste of the heavenly banquet”). Then Milbank goes on to contrast these ideas with pagan religion. As Milbank explains,

“In pagan religion (he does not really discuss the role of eros in pagan philosophy) eros was ecstasy, in the mere sense of self-intoxication which often involved the gross exploitation of women. But in the Hebraic Song of Songs by contrast, the physically erotic is poetically intensified precisely because the erotic is now linked to preference for a single one, to fidelity and to commitment unto sacrificial death. Romance, one might say, is born here and not with the Greeks. Nor (and here Benedict is very acute) is this any neglect of ecstasy: rather the truly ecstatic is here discovered in terms of a self-abandoning movement towards the other that is also a paradoxical self-realisation. Far from this being a banning of pleasure, it is rather the first discovery of real pleasure – including, one could add, in a physical sense.

To put it bluntly: Benedict here boldly declares that not only is the Catholic Church not opposed to sexual love – to the contrary, it alone truly understands it and fully promotes it. In an epoch-making fashion, a Pope now declares that the literal sense of the Song of Songs, in other word its first intention of meaning, is indeed what the naïve reader would take it to be. The mystical meaning arises now only through a proper acceptance of the worth of this literal meaning, while at the same time the depth of the latter is lost if it is not read also allegorically: that is as pointing to the mystical marriage between Christ and the Church.”

Lastly, Milbank discusses Benedict’s views on welfare as a “proper aspect of the Church’s own life and cannot be altogether handed over to the state.” Though certain neoconservatives might as Milbank puts it, “read into this an encouragement for the privatisation of all welfare functions,” the Pope is not an “ideological dogmatist of the Right about welfare. He advocates collaboration with state and international secular agencies pursuing the genuine human good in every respect. So his insistence on the diaconate is not to be read as lining up with a privatisation of welfare, but rather as a new and typically nouvelle théologie stress on the Church itself as the fulfilment of human society: with and yet beyond justice the Church is the place of the exercise of charity. State agencies can never displace ecclesial ones because what the human person needs is direct attention and appreciation of his uniqueness beyond the mere just granting of him his due – and in the Catechism of the Church, which Benedict prior to becoming Pope oversaw, it is insisted that charity cannot displace the demands of the poor for justice. Moreover, Benedict suggests that even secular projects of justice will only reach fruition if they are infused by a grace-given sense of charity – by the sense that through the eucharist and in Christ we are becoming at one with an infinite and all-powerful love.”

Milbank on Benedict’s ”Deus Caritas Est”

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

The following article by Professor John Milbank, “The Future of Love: A Reading of Benedict XVI’s Encyclical Deus Caritas Est,” has been posted by our friends at TheoPhenomenon.

Begbie on Repetition in Music

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

Jeremy Begbie makes the interesting observation that “in music, structure is built primarily on relations based not upon difference or contrast but on attraction” (Theology, Music, and Time, pp. 158-159). Music of course utilizes sameness and difference, and repetition is largely responsible for the sameness. Yet unlike other art forms, music “tends toward the pole of absolute sameness” (p. 156). In a musical score, one commonly finds entire sections repeated note for note at the command of a repeat sign. Begbie also points out that repetition comes in different flavors and types. Repetition can be of the concealed sort and one only becomes aware of this type with intimate familiarity. Other kinds are more “immediate,” i.e., the repetition is obvious and repeated in close proximity (e.g., a section repeated by means of a repeat sign). Then there is “remote” repetition (or “return”), when the section or motif recurs after a significant time interval (p. 157). To illustrate the way in which music “gets away” with repetition in the extreme, Begbie cites the first movement of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6 in F major, op. 68, bars 151-162, where we find a rhythmic motif relentlessly repeated. Begbie then asks, “Why has this music claimed so much enjoyment? What is novel amidst the almost the almost obsessive reiteration? Prima facie it would seem that we should be thoroughly weary after only a few bars. Why are we prepared to put up with so much repetition?” (p. 158). Begbie suggests that though “variation of musical parameters” (e.g., changes in orchestration, dynamics, re-harmonization etc.) and a constantly changing musical “environment” in regard to the repeated unit are partial answers, they do not reach the heart of the matter, viz., “each repeated component of music will have a different dynamic quality because each occurs in relation to a different configuration of metrical tensions and resolutions.” In other words, Begbie is highlighting the various points of tension and resolution in both micro and macrocosmic view. “It follows the every re-iterated note, motif or whatever is going to possess a different dynamic quality. The repetitions ride the waves in different ways. This is where the fundamental novelty lies within tonal music—two occurrences of the same motif can be sensed as different because each relates to a different combination of metrical tensions and resolutions. Viewed from the point of view of metre, everything is ‘new,’ […] This is why, as Berleant puts it, ‘Repetition … becomes regeneration rather than reiteration’” (p. 252). Thus, Begbie concludes that the harmonic, dynamic and other alterations do not serve the purpose primarily of keeping our attention and staving off our boredom, rather “they bring to our ear the patterns of tension and release in metrical waves. We are left with a fascinating irony:
The tones do not alter for the sake of variety, that is in order to give the same thing an appearance of being different; on the contrary, because what is apparently the same is basically always different, the tones do not always want to remain the same” (p. 162).

Balthasar’s Call for an Incarnationally Concrete Theology

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

Yet another delicious morsel from Balthasar:

“What is necessary today, after long experience of the history of theology is an effort at an authentic theological deepening of the particular mysteries of salvation in their incarnationally concrete character–without surrendering thereby to an untheological historicism interest, and, above all, without losing to view the Trinitarian background and so the functional aspect of the work of Jesus, which means no less than the relations within the Trinity that define his Person” (Mysterium Paschale, p. 41).

Jazz Tunes from Some Time Ago

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

The following three “tunes” are from my senior recital (I’m not going to give the year, so don’t ask : ). The quartet consists of Manuel Castenada on alto/soprano saxophone, Kerry Wilson on bass, Joey Carter on drums, and me on guitar. (Unfortunately, the sound quality is fairly poor because I had to record the tracks from a cassette player to a MP3 player which results in a good deal of background noise. So you’ll have to use your imagination and abstract the distortion).

1. Some Time Ago
2. Lucky Southern
3. The Great Illuminator (This is an orignial tune that I wrote a few months after I was converted).

Balthasar’s Contentment with Necessary Paradox

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

Having discussed various attempts to incorporate Hegelian insights in order to explicate the Kenosis doctrine, Balthasar writes,

“these speculations lead nowhere; their only result is to bring to our attention in striking fashion how deep the mystery of the Kenosis lies. Just as the ancient ontic theology was impotent to render credible the idea that the Incarnation was a ‘complementary factor’ added to the immutable divine nature (for the Kenosis is not a harpagmos, a gain), so too the theology of consciousness—whether in speculative or empirical guise—did not succeed in finding a ‘third’ position from which the interplay of the divine and human consciousness might be surveyed. The paradox must be allowed to stand: in the undiminished humanity of Jesus, the whole power and glory of God are made present to us” (Mysterium Paschale, p. 33).

Balthasar then cites with affirmation the following passage by P. Althaus,

“Christology must be thought out from the vantage-point of the Cross. In the total powerlessness, the death anguish, of the Crucified—from which one cannot keep unscathed the ‘divine nature’ – the full undiminished divinity of God is at work. What Paul heard as a word of the Lord for his own life—‘My power is made perfect in weakness’ (II Corinthians 12, 9), we recognize through faith in Jesus Christ as a law of the divine life itself. With this recognition, it is true, the old conception of God’s immutability breaks into pieces. Christology must take seriously the fact that, in the Son, God himself really entered into suffering, and in that very entrance is and remains entirely God” [P. Althaus, “Kenosis,” RGG III. 1245ff.] (Ibid., p. 33).

Contrary to the common assertion that embracing mystery spells “death” to the intellect, I suggest that embracing the fact that “in the Son, God himself really entered into suffering, and in that very entrance is and remains entirely God” spells worship and a proper acceptance of our creaturely limitations.

Shady Parodies and Shadowy Hearts

By Cynthia R. Nielsen

I recently came across a fascinating passage in Augustine’s Confessions, in which he seems to say that even in our seeking autonomy, we are imitating God (although in a distorted way). As Augustine explains,

“All those who wander far away and set themselves up against you are imitating you, but in a perverse way [recalling Adam and Eve in the garden]; yet by this very mimicry they proclaim that you are the creator of the whole of nature, and that in consequence there is no place whatever where we can hide from your presence” (II.14; p. 71 Boulding translation). Augustine then recalls the pear tree incident of his youth when he and some friends stole pears for the mere pleasure of getting away with it. “With regard to my theft, then: what did I love in it, and in what sense did I imitate my Lord, even if only with vicious perversity? Did the pleasure I sought lie in breaking the law at least in that sneaky way, since I was unable to do so with any show of strength? Was I, in truth a prisoner, trying to simulate a crippled sort of freedom, attempting a shady parody of omnipotence by getting away with something forbidden? How like that servant of yours who fled from his Lord and hid in the shadows!” (Ibid., p. 71).

Though we might at first think that Augustine’s dwelling on this simple act of stealing pears is a bit excessive; however, reflecting back on the incident, Augustine looks upon the state of his heart and sees that what was going on in the subterranean depths was more than a simple childish act—rather, it revealed the deceptive ways of his heart—a heart in need of spiritual circumcision.

Just as Adam and Eve in the Garden sought to carve out an autonomous space for themselves, so too Augustine attempted a “shady parody of omnipotence” and sought in a twisted way to be like God. Yet, Augustine had come to know the Lord’s forgiveness—“by your sheer grace and mercy you melted my sins away like ice” (Ibid., p. 72). Lord, my heart is no different than Augustine’s—shine your light on its shadows and bind it to You that I may daily rest and trust in You.