history

An engine of the imagination of the Church is that the bizarre reality of Jesus occurred.

The modern prejudice against the past feeds the dismissal of Christianity as mere myth, a story, and it competes in a world with too many stories through the media.

In a way, the Church feels free of its past. Without being an integral part of the political apparatus, or even referenced on ‘values’ questions, the spiritual has broken slightly more free of its bonds with the apparatus of civilization.

I think a lot of people are really grappling with the kinds of issues that open source theology raises. The question for me is, can we really pin point where and how Platonic and Aristotelian thought warped our view of the scriptures? I know it has done great damage, in a lot of ways, but I am probably not the theologian to figure it out. That is because I am not a theologian.

However, one thing that is close to my heart is that we don’t do the same nonsense all over again. We caved into the rational humanism of the Renaissance and then the Enlightenment. If we are not careful we will cave again to the self centered humanism of postmodernity. Postmodernity, at its core, thinks that individuals can choose their own truth. I think postmodernity has a lot of good healthy questions to ask of our current rationalistic humanism/Christian syncretism. But, in the long run, postmodernity will not lead us to God because it is still at its heart a worship of self; every bit as much as the Modern age was.

I am wanting to learn about the temple sacrifice in the OT . Can someone recommend a historian who has dealt with this? I’m thinking someone like NT Wright, but I dont think he has dealt with this issue…

Ideally it would cover temple sacrfice in the time of the OT, as well as the temple sacrifice at the time of Jesus in context with pagan sagrafice at that time, and the practices of the early church. I am looking for solid well respected historians who would be respected across the board, not fringy people (ex: NT Wright=good, Jesus Seminar=bad)

thanks!

I want to try and put some thoughts together on this soon, but in the meantime, has anyone given any consideration to the usefulness or otherwise of N.T. Wright’s ‘Third Quest’ appoach to the historical Jesus for a postmodern emerging church theology? Does it help at all in making sense of who Jesus is for people today to relocate him firmly in the context of a story about first century Judaism? Wright’s work has gone a long way towards countering the reductionism of the Jesus Seminar, but does it offer anything for the more urgent task of being authentic church in a postmodern world?