Theology is a matter of emphasis. Though from the surface this may appear rather abstract, the history of theology seems to authenticate this claim. For every significant theological position has shared this element of emphasis. From the various creedal formulations within Christianity, to the more modern articulations of the 20th century, i.e., Bonhoeffer’s religionless Christianity, Lindbeck’s cultural/linguistic approach, Panneberg’s theology of hope, Ruether’s feminist liberation theology and Tillich’s method of correlation, all have emphasized certain aspects of theology over others.
However, the hypothesis begs the question – why did these individuals choose to create and promote such an emphasis? It is on this premise that I argue for a collective cause; a cause rooted in what I call a theology of need. In each case, these individuals emphasized an aspect of theology that had its foundation in and subsequent formulation from what they saw as a definitive need in their ecclesiastical institutions and/or societies. What was this need? It was the need to react. In each situation, there was a definitive need to react to something that was occurring in the Church and/or culture. And, it was their reaction to this need that spawned the theological positions subsequently taken. In essence, their response found expression in a reformation of theological thought and practice that gave rise to a theology of emphasis and created a viable alternative to the situation that prompted the reaction.
With these things in mind, I argue that the constructive task of theology will always remain unfinished. While I believe that theology should seek to find some transcendence, the history of theology leads us to the idea that it has always been contextualized and open to revision, depending on the sitz im leben, as the above examples illustrate.
However, on the topic of theological development, a number of scholars clearly reflect the paleo-orthodoxy of Thomas Oden, D.H. Williams, and Robert Webber. They are often referred to as Evangelical Traditionalists, who identify an ancient doctrinal consensus as a ‘governing authority’ for evangelical theology, which then becomes the ultimate interpretive lens through which all Christians should read and interpret scripture.
In terms of doctrinal reflection and development, they maintain that theology should be conducted only in light of what the church has already decided about crucial doctrinal matters. This leads to a deep suspicion of any constructive aspect within theology. As a result, those who espouse this kind of traditionalist orientation have created theological boundaries and spend a great deal of time patrolling them. In such a scenario, theology’s constructive task is finished, which seems to go against the very nature and history of all doctrinal development.
However, doctrinal development will at times mean the introduction of changes (at least the possibility of change), and not just a response to how the historic creedal formulations can be rediscovered for the present. To place ‘fences’ on development is to render any legitimate development an impossibility. The creeds when developed were in fact changes to what had come before. They were far more than re-articulations or rediscoveries of existing formulations, but were theological responses to needs in their day. These reactions didn’t attempt to answer every question, but only to provide a suitable and necessary statement to a variety of contemporary theological concerns. Creeds help to guide us, but they do not spell the end to all future theological development and innovation.
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For additional reading, reference Roger Olson’s book Reformed and Always Reforming. N.T. Wright also begins his latest book, How God Became King, by describing the need to include, but also transcend, creedal formulations, in our theologizing. Both treat the above topic from different perspectives, but will provide a more informed understanding of my brief thoughts above. You may also be interested in a post I wrote in March entitled, Living Theology, where I argue that all theology is contextual and all of our contextualization is theological (LeRon Shults).
April 21, 2012 at 4:47 pm
Excellent article but it favors the rebuilding of faith without reference to the historical traditions. The ancient traditions are not infallible but sets the basis for the faith story for the future. The lack of knowledge of the past, which for the most part is still only preserved in Greek and Latin, and not in English, forces many to make erroneous assumptions of Ecclesiastical dogma and oversimplifications. What we need more is not to reconstruct without history but build a form of Jewish Halaka, which, among many things, has a system of building and development of a dogma from inception until eternity. The basic themes don’t change but nuance and expressions do, and Halaka allows for such things. Christianity does not have this form of study, and the links of developing doctrine from the past and using them as the basis for today are not easy to find. This severance is the one of the chief causes of the existential Evangelical vacuum we exist in today.
April 22, 2012 at 9:34 am
Hi Charles,
Actually, I did mention the place of the various creedal formulations throughout my post. As a post, however, I didn’t have the space to completely develop my ideas, but only to introduce them.
Regarding the creeds, however, I side with N.T. Wright in his book ‘How God Became King’ (2012). In it he makes the claim that while the creeds are valuable and communicate so many important themes to and for the church, they cannot be all the church looks to as they attempt to better understand, reflect on and live out their faith. His reasons are varied, but center on their omission of the story of Jesus; that is, in their emphasis on the incarnation, death and resurrection, all crucial to the Gospel, they also inadvertently failed to include the middle of the Jesus story. So, bearing these things in mind, not only do we need contemporary reflection on the historic creeds (which were not infallible), but also on the middle information that the various councils didn’t address in their formulations. Hence, the need for constructive theology.
Thanks for taking the time to stop by! I appreciate your comment.
August 26, 2012 at 11:34 am
Right on, Jeff.
But let me rant for just a second (and if sometimes unrelated to your post) to stick up for those who aren’t here to speak for themselves (i.e., the Fathers). I tend to defend them (even if I disagree with them a lot) just because so many Evangelicals dismiss them without having read them. As you know, there’s much more to the Fathers than the Creeds. Their homilies, for example, far exceed the texts of the Creeds, and discuss all the gospels passages from beginning to end—including the middle.
And even if the Creeds by nature are meant to summarize, they do so as the result of having taken everything into account, as you say. I mean, just read Cyril on the humanity of Jesus. He constructs his theology from the entirety of the story. So they do the sort of work you advocated, we just don’t SEE the Fathers DOING this constructing IN the final product of the Creeds. But if we read more than the Creeds we’d see the fuller work that led to the Creeds. For all our passion and concern for reconstructing the historical environment of Jesus’ entire life in his first-century world (a good thing), we forget to do the same when it comes to reconstructing the entirety of the third- and fourth-century worlds of the Father. We fail to read Athanasius or Cyril or the Cappadocians as carefully and studiously as we say Jesus or Paul must be read. But we make the same weighty conclusions re: the former as we do the latter. Something’s wrong.
When it comes to Creeds, also consider where they first show up. It’s not the third century. Paul passes on two such creeds or belief-traditions which one could argue, given just the words of the creeds themselves, ignore the middle of the story (1Cor 15.3-8; Phil. 2.5-11). Creeds are a biblical form of community faith-maintenance. Community’s don’t survive without them. Like Wright also says, “If the early Fathers didn’t exist, it would be necessary to invent them.”
Yes, one CAN check the creedal box without embracing the experience of the living faith. But that’s not the fault of latter Creeds any more than it was the fault of the traditions Paul passed on that some failed to turn belief-content into virtue and goodness (2Pet 1.5-9). Our problem as Evangelicals is not that we check the creedal boxes and fail to experience the living Christ. We don’t even KNOW the Creeds. Our problem is that we have an understanding of Christian experience that doesn’t need, or sometimes even disdains, creedal expressions. So good luck getting Evangelicals as a whole to, as you say, “include” the Creeds as part of “transcending them.” For most, transcending the Creeds just means ignoring them.
Thanks for letting me rant! ;o)
August 26, 2012 at 11:54 am
Rant away, my friend! I always appreciate your input.
September 26, 2012 at 3:26 pm
I posted a comment a few days ago, it said it was submitted but I still don’t see it here. I went ahead and just wrote a blog post sharing my comment, hopefully this gets posted: http://odayfam.com/a-response-to-constructive-theology-as-a-theology-of-need/