The Intellectual Depth of Anabaptism

[Wayne in Maine]

We are not reading Jesus' words in the original language of Aramaic and Paul's letters in Greek while living in the culture of 1st century life. So much can get missed by translation and by cultural shift.

I have a constant struggle with the very concept of "Kingdom" as in "Kingdom of God" - what is the modern equivalent of this archaic form of governance/culture/political sphere?

[Wayne in Maine]

I can agree with what you are saying. I have to add though that we cannot attempt to make "scripture" answer questions it does not actually address and we have to make accommodations at times where it appears to contradict what anyone with a brain can see is obvious. The earth is not flat though scripture plainly suggests it is. The Universe is very, very old, though scripture suggests otherwise. We must not let our "simple" (young earth creationism, from the viewpoint of a geologist or physicist, is not in any way simple!) interpretation of scripture deny what is authentically true, we must be intellectually honest.

Is it possible that there can be multiple views that are intellectually honest? or do you view your view as the only intellectually honest one?
From an intellectual approach, the resurrection is impossible and many would argue using many authentic bits of data. Miracles have to be believed by faith.

There are of course multiple perspectives that can be intellectually honest, but there are not multiple truths. The "scientific method" is the process by which a "truth" is proposed and challenged with evidence. The earth cannot be both old and young, flat and spherical. Observation and authenticatable evidence will determine which is true and which is not. "We", as followers of Jesus, should not be afraid if the evidence indicates that the universe is vastly old, or that there are no gates in a firmament out of which poured water that covered the entire face of the spherical earth. We should find that a fascinating revelation while respecting the ancients whose best understanding of what they observed and what was revealed to them fit their intellect in an honest way.

I've studied Physics including Einsteins theory of Relativity and Quantum Mechanics where mathematics is the language that describes an otherwise incomprehensible universe on the tiniest and on vastest scales of time and space. But I know that the language of mathematics and our intellect are still inadequate to actually describe the depth and breadth of God creation - both the natural and the supernatural. I do not fault the writer of Genesis for how he described what was revealed to him - he did not even know that there was a number "zero" and could not say that "In the beginning God created

[Neto]

There was something about this that kept my mind at unrest. I think it is that I think that the degree of personal responsibility should determine whether we just accept what the specialist have said or written, or whether we should in some areas recheck their work. If, for instance, the 'radical reformers' had just assumed that since in many cases, those who had already written doctrinal descriptions of what they should believe were more 'learned' than they, that they should simply accept that as the truth. I would consider the case of trusting a bridge in this category. I can assume that the ones who designed and built the bridge knew what they were about, and that government standards require a sufficient margin of safety that allows me to confidently cross over it. Now I know that sometimes there are failures of this system of safety checks and standards. (Perhaps especially in foreign countries. The first time my wife's parents visited us in Brazil we were living in a major city on the east coast, a state capitol. Because he was a building contractor who had built a lot of large buildings, retirement homes, schools, etc., he was interested in visiting a nearby high rise apartment building under construction at that time. I got permission for us to go onto the construction site, and we went up into the building. I don't know how this type of building would be built here in the States, but we saw cold joints in the concrete pillars and beams, which even I knew was not proper. And on a visit back to the capitol city in the state where we lived most of our years in Brazil, we went to a new mall, and those who took us there warned us that there had been issues with tiles and parts of the walls breaking off and falling down on people. And there have been whole high-rises that have collapsed completely, due to poor construction methods. I'm reminded of a cartoon I saw years ago - two guys in togas facing the 'Leaning Tower of Pisa" in the background. Only it wasn't leaning. One guy says to the other: "I fudged a bit on the foundation, but no one will ever know.")
But this is why I brought up Bible translation work. Sure, the men who wrote the commentaries I studied had greater knowledge than I, and probably also greater intellect. But I had a keen sense of personal responsibility. One of my Translation Consultants once told me "You know you do not need to check out every verse - only where there are translation issues." My reply was that generally I didn't know there even WAS an issue or serious translation question until I read and compared the commentaries, basically, until I had studied it through for myself, to the greatest of my ability, using what intellect God had entrusted me with. Some translators got a lot more Scripture done in much shorter time than I did, by just picking an English translation and just translating whatever was there. But even a simple study Bible like the NIV will show alternate translations/meanings. I honestly tried to do that, but when I had done the work of translating that source into Banawa, I was left with a sense of uncertainty, a sense that I was "building on someone else's foundation" (see Paul's comment about that). A sense that I had not done my part, lived up to my responsibility. (The other problem with translating from another translation is that there is no exact corresponding of meaning between two languages, especially where one is an Indo-European language, and the other from a completely different language family. So sometimes the small things there were added to our English translations to make it read well are the very things that, as one translator put it, make us go around the barn a few times to get the idea across. So a translation using an English text as the source into a language like Banawa might have totally extra-Biblical stuff in it, things suggested by some small thing added to the English translation. And I DID actually find cases like this when I went back and re-did the parts that I had translated from another language. And that was not even English - it was another Indian language in the same language family, one that is close enough that people from the two tribes can actually communicate to some level. One expression I used directly out of that related language turned out to have a totally different connotation, one so nasty and crass that it "made a pagan man blush". And not believing that it was possible, I tried it out on more of the men, and they all reacted the same way.)
Another Translation Consultant told me that where there were two differing possible meanings, he just chose the one that was easiest to translate for the target language. In my experience (and supported by the work of scholars, the meaning that is most obscure is often the correct one. Or take a case like in Luke's account of Cornelius sending 3 men to fetch Paul. When they arrive at the gate of the house, in some of the oldest Eastern texts the servant tells Paul that there are TWO men come to see him. So many translations change it to THREE. (Some later texts leave out the number entirely, side-stepping the issue.) I think that TWO is the correct textual reading, and that it MAY indicate that the 2 servants Cornelius had sent (with 1 soldier being the third man) were Jews, and so then Paul didn't 'violate the Law' by close association with non-Jews until he arrived at Cornelius' house, and went in & ate with them, perhaps having thought deeply about the vision he had seen, and the immediately following request to visit a Gentile during the entire trip there. Regardless of whether these two men were Jews or not (their description of Cornelius also sounds like something a Jew would say), the most reliable texts say two. There is of course no doctrine that rests on this case - it is just an illustration of a textual question.
So my conclusion regarding bridges vs Bible translation is that the responsibility lies in different places, and that while the collapse of a bridge may well result in physical death, errors in the Scripture text or in doctrine may well end in SPIRITUAL death. So the early 'anabaptists' were justified in reexamining what the 'authorities' in the church handed down to them as Biblical truth. We (I, at least) follow them in that sense - the desire to know the truth, and to responsibly seek it out. But I don't necessarily follow them in all of their conclusions, knowing that they were also fallible men just like me. Yes, we might both err, or I might err in some area where I choose a different understanding than they did, but we all have carried out our responsibility before God to "diligently study the word of God".
I'd better submit this now before I proof read it again, because I just keep adding in more.

[Soloist]

There are of course multiple perspectives that can be intellectually honest, but there are not multiple truths. The "scientific method" is the process by which a "truth" is proposed and challenged with evidence. The earth cannot be both old and young, flat and spherical. Observation and authenticatable evidence will determine which is true and which is not. "We", as followers of Jesus, should not be afraid if the evidence indicates that the universe is vastly old, or that there are no gates in a firmament out of which poured water that covered the entire face of the spherical earth. We should find that a fascinating revelation while respecting the ancients whose best understanding of what they observed and what was revealed to them fit their intellect in an honest way.

While I'm not arguing for flat earth or round earth, I dispute your statements. Observations are not always correct. What is a scientist going to see when they look at layers of the earth and study the detail of rock decomposing to dirt? A very lengthy time must have taken place. What is someone going to say when they observe an adult? Naturally they must have lived a set amount of time. God set in order everything we see and placed an aged earth for us to use. In other words, we don't have a newly formed chunk of rock but rather an earth with layers that plants could grow in.
Do you believe in Evolution? What do you believe is accurate about Genesis? Jesus quoted from it attributing doctrine for the permanence of marriage and it was referenced by John for the beginning of the universe as created by the "Word"
You begin with science and analyze the Scriptures, I begin with Scriptures and analyze the science.

Do you believe in miracles? the global flood?
This is the very core of what my objection to intellectualism ends up being. A naturalistic world view that discredits what is transcribed for us to believe.
What the ignorant ancients believed must be wrong because they did not have the benefit of our advanced science.
Would God have created isotopes partly decayed? or would the isotopes be undecayed? Did the periodic table at creation of our planet still be missing some elements because enough time had not passed? and God waiting billions of years to create man? or did God not create man and just started the big bang and everything naturally came to be with billions of years?

[Bootstrap]

I've studied Physics including Einsteins theory of Relativity and Quantum Mechanics where mathematics is the language that describes an otherwise incomprehensible universe on the tiniest and on vastest scales of time and space. But I know that the language of mathematics and our intellect are still inadequate to actually describe the depth and breadth of God creation - both the natural and the supernatural. I do not fault the writer of Genesis for how he described what was revealed to him - he did not even know that there was a number "zero" and could not say that "In the beginning God created

Every model we construct is just that, a model, not reality. Newtonian physics and relativity disagree about how parallel lines work and various other things, their models contradict each other, but each works well to model reality for the purposes they were designed for. As Goedel showed, any complete model is going to have contradictions, any consistent model is going to be incomplete, that can be proven mathematically.

We need models for the same reason we need maps. Reality is too confusing to navigate without a map. But our maps are always at least a bit off.

And sometimes we know perfectly well how to navigate reality, we just don't know how to construct a map to fit it. There's nothing more practical than a good theory - when you need one. And nothing less practical than creating a theory you don't need.

An example:

I work this coming Monday.

Why is that a present tense verb, "work"? I think every native speaker of English knows how to interpret that sentence, most would never even stop to think about the present tense verb "work". I know a few linguists who love thinking about these corner cases, and they actually produce useful results, but most of us simply don't need that level of theory - and we can understand the sentence more efficiently by not worrying about it.

[Wayne in Maine]

The original statement that inspired this thread was the surprised statement from a young seeker "So Anabaptism has a high intellectual ceiling." The context was in our discussing how so many of the theological controversies and conflicts of Evangelical Protestant Christianity would be irrelevant to the early Anabaptist, and discussing the problem with conservative Mennonites adopting Protestant Fundamentalism as their key to understanding the bible rather than the rationalistic Christocentrism of the early Anabaptists.

I found in my notes the following:

Anabaptism has a high intellectual ceiling. It can withstand rational and scientific scrutiny better than any other model of Christianity. The shield of Fundamentalist bibliolatry fails to defend the claims of Christ instead insisting on slavish and unthinking dogmatism. On the other hand, a rationalistic reading of the words of the historical figure of Jesus aligns, naturally, with the Christocentric hermeneutic that is the core of original Anabaptism which grants freedom to question authoritative pronouncements about a gospel message and lets the seeker of truth hear the good news of the Kingdom of God and a clear calling to discipleship from the Master himself.

[Neto]

The original statement that inspired this thread was the surprised statement from a young seeker "So Anabaptism has a high intellectual ceiling." The context was in our discussing how so many of the theological controversies and conflicts of Evangelical Protestant Christianity would be irrelevant to the early Anabaptist, and discussing the problem with conservative Mennonites adopting Protestant Fundamentalism as their key to understanding the bible rather than the rationalistic Christocentrism of the early Anabaptists.

I found in my notes the following:

Anabaptism has a high intellectual ceiling. It can withstand rational and scientific scrutiny better than any other model of Christianity. The shield of Fundamentalist bibliolatry fails to defend the claims of Christ instead insisting on slavish and unthinking dogmatism. On the other hand, a rationalistic reading of the words of the historical figure of Jesus aligns, naturally, with the Christocentric hermeneutic that is the core of original Anabaptism which grants freedom to question authoritative pronouncements about a gospel message and lets the seeker of truth hear the good news of the Kingdom of God and a clear calling to discipleship from the Master himself.

I do not know about the Swiss Brethren, because there are few if any original writings from the early period, but judging from the writings of Menno Simons, in the Dutch 'baptism-minded' group at least, a determined stance to not go beyond Scripture is evidenced. That can be mistaken for an "anti-intellectualism" (as shown in my own experience in Theology class in an Evangelical Bible college) - an unwillingness to "use your brain" to figure out the puzzling questions left unanswered in Scripture. This can also be mistaken for "Biblioloty", or characterized as a slavishly limited view of truth. But I concur that a true Biblicism will recognize that from beginning to end the central theme of Scripture is salvation through the Messiah of God, Jesus.

I think that this is why, as you say, the controversies of the Evangelicals of today, and indeed, the controversies of the Protestant 'Reformers', and also of the Catholic Church of that time, these all fall away as irrelevant philosophical arguments about questions that were regarded as not things we should be concentrating on.

But where I beg to differ is where it is suggested that the very narrative upon which we depend for the anticipation of the Christ is to be questioned or doubted in those cases where it presents a different view of history than that surmised by the science of today, or of any other period in history. Once the historical narrative is doubted, then how can one continue to rest confidently in the non-narrative elements? And as to the historical narrative itself, at what point in the story of Scripture does it become reliable? The Scripture itself (in my understanding) does not give any indication of where to 'draw the line' of historical veracity. So the foundation of our Christocentrism is undermined by the backward glance of a current science-based reinterpretation of Biblical history. If Adam & Eve were not real people, then what about Enoch, Abraham, Moses, Joseph, David, the prophets?

[Wayne in Maine]

I concur that a true Biblicism will recognize that from beginning to end the central theme of Scripture is salvation through the Messiah of God, Jesus.

Well... I have to disagree with that. I am not sure that the "bible" has such a theme; there is no "scarlet thread".

I see the "bible" as a collection of individual books, not a comprehensive single text. For that reason my Christocentric "gospel" starts with the New Testament writings that document the mission and message of Jesus (The Word made flesh) whose theme was the good news of the Kingdom of God: its advent, its characteristics, and how to be a member of it. I recognized this in the writings of the early Anabaptist (there are a lot of pre-Menno writings of the Swiss Brethren out there!) and resonated with them ,which is how I came to be where I am in my comprehension of "the gospel" today. There may or may not have been a coincidence that the Erasmus Greek New Testament was all the rage in intellectual circles of the early 16th century, New Testament was translated and published in German long before the Old Testament, and that the focus of the earliest Anabaptists was on these writings.

where I beg to differ is where it is suggested that the very narrative upon which we depend for the anticipation of the Christ is to be questioned or doubted in those cases where it presents a different view of history than that surmised by the science of today, or of any other period in history. Once the historical narrative is doubted, then how can one continue to rest confidently in the non-narrative elements?

So you believe that the earth is flat, that it is at the center of the universe surrounded by a solid dome on which the celestial bodies move and which creates a “bubble” over the earth which is otherwise surrounded by water?

I think the historical veracity of Christ's resurrection is a sufficient basis for the reliability of what His chosen emissaries documented of His life and teachings. He Himself encouraged us to scatter seed, which is the word of the kingdom, some of which will fall on good soil yielding a hundred fold of what was sown. I don't think it is helpful to the building of the kingdom or the propagation of the word of the kingdom to build theme parks that attempt to demonstrate that geologists are wrong about sedimentation or physicists are wrong about radioactive decay. Quite the opposite, I think that kind of fundamentalist flat-bible biblicism encourages superstition, abuse of the written word and drives away many who would otherwise commit to following Jesus and building His kingdom.

The scriptures are full of types and shadows or what we might call "models" of reality. Our minds are no less finite than the patriarchs and prophets who penned the books narrative our modern minds want to comprehend as "literal history". We have more sophisticated tools for observing and analyzing nature, such that we no longer believe that the earth is flat and no longer debate as to whether the the sun moon and stars move along the inner surface of the solid dome spread over the earth or if they move inside the crystal dome that holds back the waters above us.

[Bootstrap]

I see the "bible" as a collection of individual books, not a comprehensive single text. For that reason my Christocentric "gospel" starts with the New Testament writings that document the mission and message of Jesus (The Word made flesh) whose theme was the good news of the Kingdom of God: its advent, its characteristics, and how to be a member of it. I recognized this in the writings of the early Anabaptist (there are a lot of pre-Menno writings of the Swiss Brethren out there!) and resonated with them ,which is how I came to be where I am in my comprehension of "the gospel" today. There may or may not have been a coincidence that the Erasmus Greek New Testament was all the rage in intellectual circles of the early 16th century, New Testament was translated and published in German long before the Old Testament, and that the focus of the earliest Anabaptists was on these writings.

How do you square that with the Book of Hebrews? Or with Stephen's testimony upon his martyrdom? Or the themes of prophet, priest, king, temple, and Eden in the New Testament? Or all the Old Testament quotations in the Gospels when describing who Jesus is? Hebrews makes it clear that Jesus was not "Plan B", Jesus was pre-existent, part of God's plan from the beginning.

I agree that the Bible is a collection of writings that were only later gathered together, "When God Spoke Greek" is an excellent description of how that happened. But I also agree with The Bible Project - these writings are different accounts of one story that leads to Jesus, and once you understand them, the story is coherent.

But the Bible is an old book, strange to our ears, especially much of the Old Testament, and most of us need some guidance to grasp the Old Testament. I sure did.

So you believe that the earth is flat, that it is at the center of the universe surrounded by a solid dome on which the celestial bodies move and which creates a “bubble” over the earth which is otherwise surrounded by water?

The Bible was written to humans, and not for the purpose of teaching science. I regularly hear people say that the sun rises in the morning, you and I know that's not an accurate scientific description of the phenomenon, but if we want to communicate with people, we might well use the same phrase.

Genres also need to be taken into account. What is the purpose of this writing? How is it written? To whom?

[Neto]

I concur that a true Biblicism will recognize that from beginning to end the central theme of Scripture is salvation through the Messiah of God, Jesus.

Well... I have to disagree with that. I am not sure that the "bible" has such a theme; there is no "scarlet thread".

I see the "bible" as a collection of individual books, not a comprehensive single text. For that reason my Christocentric "gospel" starts with the New Testament writings that document the mission and message of Jesus (The Word made flesh) whose theme was the good news of the Kingdom of God: its advent, its characteristics, and how to be a member of it. I recognized this in the writings of the early Anabaptist (there are a lot of pre-Menno writings of the Swiss Brethren out there!) and resonated with them ,which is how I came to be where I am in my comprehension of "the gospel" today. There may or may not have been a coincidence that the Erasmus Greek New Testament was all the rage in intellectual circles of the early 16th century, New Testament was translated and published in German long before the Old Testament, and that the focus of the earliest Anabaptists was on these writings.

Sorry I misunderstood you. I did not intend to “put words in your mouth”. But I do see it that way. It starts out with just little hints, but by the time you get to the Prophets it’s almost full-bore. I might say that I was just conditioned to think that way, but in the Gospel of Luke you find the account of when Joseph & Mary took the infant Jesus to the temple, and Simeon & Anna recognized him as the one they had been expecting. And there were others as well, those who were anxiously waiting for the Messiah. On what basis? The Spirit of God was involved, of course, but it was based on the OT Scriptures.

Boot answered this way:

How do you square that with the Book of Hebrews? Or with Stephen's testimony upon his martyrdom? Or the themes of prophet, priest, king, temple, and Eden in the New Testament? Or all the Old Testament quotations in the Gospels when describing who Jesus is? Hebrews makes it clear that Jesus was not "Plan B", Jesus was pre-existent, part of God's plan from the beginning.

I was thinking along similar lines (I saw your reply at noon, but didn't have time to make any response until this evening, and I really should be doing some other business bookwork), to suggest that you go through the NT and remove all of the quotations from the OT. Actual quotations would be a start, but so much of the thought and presentation is building on the OT Scripture. (Sort of got me in trouble in our Bible translation project, because when we saw how we had people responding to ‘Jesus the evil spirit chaser’, all with no admission or recognition of even any need for ‘Jesus the sin chaser’, we turned to the OT, aiming to show the need of a sacrifice. But we were not allowed to publish it, because the head of the translation department refused to allow it to consultant checked, saying that ‘it would not be surprising if someone came to the village in 20 years and found them doing OT sacrifices’.) And I guess you would need to remove all of the things Jesus said that assumed those OT characters were real people.

where I beg to differ is where it is suggested that the very narrative upon which we depend for the anticipation of the Christ is to be questioned or doubted in those cases where it presents a different view of history than that surmised by the science of today, or of any other period in history. Once the historical narrative is doubted, then how can one continue to rest confidently in the non-narrative elements?

So you believe that the earth is flat, that it is at the center of the universe surrounded by a solid dome on which the celestial bodies move and which creates a “bubble” over the earth which is otherwise surrounded by water?

I think the historical veracity of Christ's resurrection is a sufficient basis for the reliability of what His chosen emissaries documented of His life and teachings. He Himself encouraged us to scatter seed, which is the word of the kingdom, some of which will fall on good soil yielding a hundred fold of what was sown. I don't think it is helpful to the building of the kingdom or the propagation of the word of the kingdom to build theme parks that attempt to demonstrate that geologists are wrong about sedimentation or physicists are wrong about radioactive decay. Quite the opposite, I think that kind of fundamentalist flat-bible biblicism encourages superstition, abuse of the written word and drives away many who would otherwise commit to following Jesus and building His kingdom.

The scriptures are full of types and shadows or what we might call "models" of reality. Our minds are no less finite than the patriarchs and prophets who penned the books narrative our modern minds want to comprehend as "literal history". We have more sophisticated tools for observing and analyzing nature, such that we no longer believe that the earth is flat and no longer debate as to whether the sun moon and stars move along the inner surface of the solid dome spread over the earth or if they move inside the crystal dome that holds back the waters above us.

No, I don’t think the earth is flat. But your description is interesting because the traditional Banawa view is rather similar – based on what they have observed in their isolated existence. Their version says that the blue of the sky is a hard dome – they have a story about some people who built a tower to get up there, to escape some other people who had turned into jaguars. Anyway, the sun and the stars hang from it on cords. The story did not include any explanation of how the sun ends up on the other side again in the morning. When questioned further, they said that it probably went underneath. It is possible, however, that this myth/story is based on something they heard from a rubber collector or a priest, back in the late 1800’s or early 1900’s. (They do also have an old story about Jesus, but it is hardly recognizable, and you have to understand their world view before it makes any sense at all.)
There are, however, geological facts that may be results of the great body of water that was above the ‘sky’ prior to the flood, causing, as some suggest, a single world-wide environment more similar to the tropics than to that with which most of us are accustomed. Mainly, however, I’d rather find out after my death or at the return of Christ that I ‘believed the Scripture too much’, than to find out I had ‘disbelieved it too much’.