thread: 2006-09-08 : Salvation, damnation, justification, a la Sydney
On 2006-10-16, MikeRM wrote:
Um, am I allowed to just show up here and start talking? If so, thanks! If not, apologies.
I hang out at Story-Games quite a bit, hence my initial interest in this site, but I was surprised and delighted to come across this thread. Especially to see the openness and respect being practiced in it.
So, a slightly alternative viewpoint to Sydney's ??? my own angle only, of course, I don't speak for anyone else even though there are some other people who broadly think the same way.
Vincent asks 'way upthread at #15, That's all stories, though, isn't it? I mean, you say "God does this" and "Jesus did that," but is there any reason for me to believe that any of it, y'know, actually happened?
And I say: Well, stories. Let's think about stories. Yes, the Gospels (and much of the rest of the Bible) consists of stories. I think everyone can agree on that. Where we start to hit static is in the "stories that are about things that didn't happen are less important" assumption that seems to underlie Vincent's words. (Apologies if I've completely read that in.)
There's a spectrum of stories. Some are nearly history with some bits tidied up. Some are completely invented and make no bones about it. There's a very large middle ground, and I don't, myself, know exactly where the Gospels fall, though I suspect it's closer to the History end than, let's say, the Aesop's Fables end. My question is: Why is their exact location on the spectrum the most important thing to find out about them? It seems to me that's a post-Enlightenment obsession that we can usefully deemphasize (though probably not totally abandon) in favour of other questions such as:
* What happens if I read this as a story about me?
* What happens if I imagine myself into the scene?
* What happens if I hold the story in my mind, not analyzing, not judging, just letting it dissolve like a lozenge in my mouth?
I would agree with Sydney in saying, If you want to deepen your understanding of Christianity, if you want to give it a "fair trial" or something, definitely read the Gospels. Founding documents, right? If we're not paying any attention to them, I wonder why we'd call the result "Christianity" rather than something else. But the idea that what we primarily are looking for is intellectual content for our mental assent? I question that. That's an assumption that seeped into Christianity very early, when Paul preached to the Areopagites in Athens and it became another one of those ideas they argued about.
My provocative suggestion for you (all) is: Approach Christianity not primarily as a set of ideas to be evaluated, but as a path to be explored, as a mystery to be experienced, as a way to be practiced. I can refer you to some books if you want them, but part of the point I'm making is that reading and talking are like putting on your shoes rather than going for the walk. Put on your shoes by all means, but if that's all you do, you haven't gone walking.
