If being a Christian meant to simply inherit the Christian faith of the people before me and to uncritically hold to it, then it is nothing more than just a cultural element passed on like language, food, customs etc. I think that most of the time, in American church, because of the way things are set up, the masses of people have no way of knowing why they believe the things they are being taught.
The very hope of Christian faith, to me, is that God's Word can address us- break in to the present and transform us. Our relationship to our tradition is so important because the tendency in any tradition is for beliefs to solidify and harden into repeatable phrases, dogmas that lose their power to transform when separated from the real presence of the Spirit and the hope and expectation that God himself might be addressing us.
The problem when the Bible's meaning is presented by one person in a pastor/congregation model, is that the people become disempowered in terms of coming to the Bible's texts and actually coming to a better understanding of its meaning.
We have a big problem because we are inheriting a tradition and we are not even aware that there is a whole history behind us that affects how we think, our way of living and how we perceive ourselves in the world. My own tradition as a Western Protestant Christian is one that goes back from Scripture to the Church fathers, has been profoundly influenced by philosophy (from Plato to Descartes and beyond), the reformation, Luther and Calvin, the Enlightenment etc. As a white American I've been formed by the history of America, from Deism to slavery, from racial inequality and white flight to American individualism and consumerism.
Being critically real means first of all to acknowledge the fact that we have a history and a tradition. All of these things have formed us and our thinking in ways we might not even be aware of.
Beyond all of that, as an American evangelical, the way I was taught to read Scripture was formed by a tradition and handed on to me. The problem I have had, though is that the way I was taught to read the Bible and the actual subject matter of what I was reading came into a sharp tension. The tension has been formulated into a question which drives forward for an answer- and that is why I'm a critical realist. If I wanted to hold on to the way I was given Scripture, I would have to dismiss the question; however, if I follow the question, I need a method to guide me.
The general shape of critical realism as a method for understanding ourselves and our world is as follows: things are never what they seem. Appearances are always related to reality but never fully reveal it. Because of that, we need to be critical in the way we seek to know the world as it is presented to us. When it comes down to it, on a certain level we are all critical realists- for example, when watching a movie we interact with it on two levels- 1. As a story- we put on our blinders so to speak and enjoy it through a kind of chosen naivete. 2. We recognize that the reality of the movie is not the pictures flashing across the screen or the story told, but the whole system and industry surrounding it, from production (actors, stunt men, special effects) to advertising, and consumption.
If we are not critical, the reality behind the appearances will stay hidden.
When it comes to Christian faith and Scripture, it is necessary on a certain level to come to God as children- with a simple faith. At the same time we need to be critical in the way we appropriate what the tradition has given us. Otherwise we might get stuck in ways of living, acting and thinking which obscure true Christian faith and have now way of moving beyond what we have been given, and being transformed.
Often, when a question arises, we default to pregiven answers handed down to us by the tradition. A critical realist can not do that because he or she is compelled to seek an answer, which is relevant to the question being formed. If you do not follow the drive to know to the point where the question you want answered, even the question itself will come out of the tradition instead of from the process of seeking knowledge. It is not bad that the tradition gives us questions and answer, It becomes a problem when you get stuck in a circle of questions and answers which never change, and the faith that has been passed on to us is unable to be challenged and transformed even by the Scriptures themselves.
None of this makes sense unless we move on to understand it through concrete examples.
to be continued...
06 September 2006
05 June 2006
Lonergan's Breakthrough and Ben Meyer's Aims of Jesus
Ben F. Meyer: Critical Realism and the Aims of Jesus
Ben F. Meyer’s historical work on the life of Jesus came together in his book The Aims of Jesus. In addition much reflection concerning critical realism and New Testament studies (based mainly on Lonergan’s philosophy) has gone in to Meyer’s Critical Realism & the New Testament and Reality and Illusion in New Testament Scholarship. For Meyer, Lonergan’s work (following on Collingwood) established history as an autonomous field of knowledge free from intrusion by foreign ideologies (the perennial problem of historical Jesus research). Firm in this conviction, Meyer was free to reject “the Enlightenment conception of history as a closed continuum” as well as methodical skepticism. (Critical Realism and the New Testament 150). The gospel traditions were for him potential sources of rich historical data.
Lonergan’s work (as noted above) showed the myth underlying the conflicting epistemologies of naVve realism, empiricism and idealism. Namely, that they share the fallacy “that knowing is like seeing, that knowing the real is, or would be, akin to seeing it” (150). This allows for a critically real investigation into historical acts of meaning.
Lonergan understood world-process as “emergent probability” over and against the cosmologies of both the classical and modern era. Tracing classical cosmologies to Aristotle and modern ones to Galileo, Meyer notes that Lonergan’s emergent probability accounts for the functioning of scientific laws, changing their status from necessity to verifiable probability. Meyer concludes that “Emergent probability thus spelled an end to the cult of necessity characteristic of modern as well as Greek cosmology” and sees the “closed universe” thesis as its last gasp (150). Thus Meyer was freed from the presupposition of naturalism so common in historical Jesus scholarship.
Finally Lonergan’s Insight provided an account of common sense knowledge of which historical knowledge is a specialization. Meyer refers to Insight as the basis and Method in Theology’s treatment of the functional specialty history as the fully developed account of history-as-knowledge. All of this together affirmed the autonomy of history as a distinct field, free from ideological a priori declarations of what may or may not be historical. Thus, for Meyer, the question of the historicity of Jesus’ miracles for instance are open, a controversial assertion to be sure.
Ben F. Meyer’s historical work on the life of Jesus came together in his book The Aims of Jesus. In addition much reflection concerning critical realism and New Testament studies (based mainly on Lonergan’s philosophy) has gone in to Meyer’s Critical Realism & the New Testament and Reality and Illusion in New Testament Scholarship. For Meyer, Lonergan’s work (following on Collingwood) established history as an autonomous field of knowledge free from intrusion by foreign ideologies (the perennial problem of historical Jesus research). Firm in this conviction, Meyer was free to reject “the Enlightenment conception of history as a closed continuum” as well as methodical skepticism. (Critical Realism and the New Testament 150). The gospel traditions were for him potential sources of rich historical data.
Lonergan’s work (as noted above) showed the myth underlying the conflicting epistemologies of naVve realism, empiricism and idealism. Namely, that they share the fallacy “that knowing is like seeing, that knowing the real is, or would be, akin to seeing it” (150). This allows for a critically real investigation into historical acts of meaning.
Lonergan understood world-process as “emergent probability” over and against the cosmologies of both the classical and modern era. Tracing classical cosmologies to Aristotle and modern ones to Galileo, Meyer notes that Lonergan’s emergent probability accounts for the functioning of scientific laws, changing their status from necessity to verifiable probability. Meyer concludes that “Emergent probability thus spelled an end to the cult of necessity characteristic of modern as well as Greek cosmology” and sees the “closed universe” thesis as its last gasp (150). Thus Meyer was freed from the presupposition of naturalism so common in historical Jesus scholarship.
Finally Lonergan’s Insight provided an account of common sense knowledge of which historical knowledge is a specialization. Meyer refers to Insight as the basis and Method in Theology’s treatment of the functional specialty history as the fully developed account of history-as-knowledge. All of this together affirmed the autonomy of history as a distinct field, free from ideological a priori declarations of what may or may not be historical. Thus, for Meyer, the question of the historicity of Jesus’ miracles for instance are open, a controversial assertion to be sure.
17 March 2006
Lonergan's Cognitional Theory and Historical Method
Lonergan’s theory of history depends on an important distinction between the world of immediacy (the available sense world) and the world of meaning. The world of meaning is made up of the cultural matrix, the common held meanings of a group of people, and within that the meaning of individual speech and action. Lonergan says,
“Meaning, then, is a constitutive element in the conscious flow that is the normally controlling side of human action. It is this constitutive role of meaning in the controlling side of human action that grounds the peculiarity of the historical field of investigation” (178).
Lonergan shows that naive realism, empiricism and idealism share a basic supposition about knowledge: that knowing is like seeing. This myth of knowledge as seeing overlooks the distinction between the world of immediacy and that of meaning. The naive realist believes he knows the world of meaning in a way analogous to seeing (reading the meaning of a text straight off the page), while the empiricist limits knowledge to that which can be experienced by the senses. The idealist understands that knowledge is meaningful, but denies that it refers to reality (it is only ideal). Lonergan, over and against all, reveals the source of their disagreement: their shared myth of knowledge as seeing, and posits critical realism. The critical realist understands that the real world is that which is mediated by meaning. He says, “the reality known is not just looked at; it is given in experience, organized and extrapolated by understanding, posited by judgment and belief” [Please note the four levels of consciousness at work. Method 238.]
It is from this point that historical inquiry can begin, concerned with understanding human acts of meaning through a process in line with the operations of human knowing and proceeding through a process of hypothesis verification. Lonergan refers to British philosopher R.G. Collingwood’s well known work, The Idea of History. According to Collingwood the goal of historical inquiry was to come to understand the “inside of the event” in terms of the human intentionality of the actors involved. This accords with Lonergan’s epistemological breakthrough.
“Meaning, then, is a constitutive element in the conscious flow that is the normally controlling side of human action. It is this constitutive role of meaning in the controlling side of human action that grounds the peculiarity of the historical field of investigation” (178).
Lonergan shows that naive realism, empiricism and idealism share a basic supposition about knowledge: that knowing is like seeing. This myth of knowledge as seeing overlooks the distinction between the world of immediacy and that of meaning. The naive realist believes he knows the world of meaning in a way analogous to seeing (reading the meaning of a text straight off the page), while the empiricist limits knowledge to that which can be experienced by the senses. The idealist understands that knowledge is meaningful, but denies that it refers to reality (it is only ideal). Lonergan, over and against all, reveals the source of their disagreement: their shared myth of knowledge as seeing, and posits critical realism. The critical realist understands that the real world is that which is mediated by meaning. He says, “the reality known is not just looked at; it is given in experience, organized and extrapolated by understanding, posited by judgment and belief” [Please note the four levels of consciousness at work. Method 238.]
It is from this point that historical inquiry can begin, concerned with understanding human acts of meaning through a process in line with the operations of human knowing and proceeding through a process of hypothesis verification. Lonergan refers to British philosopher R.G. Collingwood’s well known work, The Idea of History. According to Collingwood the goal of historical inquiry was to come to understand the “inside of the event” in terms of the human intentionality of the actors involved. This accords with Lonergan’s epistemological breakthrough.
05 March 2006
Lonergan's Cognitional Theory: The Structure of Human Inquiry
Everything Bernard Lonergan does is based on and refers back to his cognitional theory. He argues that by attentiveness to the knowing subject (one's self), the structure of inquiry can be perceived, understood and then judged.
The drive to know and the structure it follows are common to all. All human knowing operates on four levels, all of which are conscious (aware) and intentional (having an outward object). They are the empirical, intellectual, rational and responsible levels of consciousness [The following discussion of the levels of consciousness can be found in Method in Theology, 9]. At the empirical level of consciousness the knowing subject is sensing, perceiving, imagining, feeling, speaking and moving. At the intellectual level it is inquiring, coming to understand, expressing the understanding and working out the presuppositions and implications of the expression formulated. At the rational level the knower is passing judgment on the truth or falsity of a statement after weighing the evidence and deciding if the conditions of its truth have been fulfilled. The final level is the responsible level in which the subject makes decisions concerning possible actions, evaluating and deciding the meaning of those actions in light of greater goals and aims.
The four levels of consciousness consist of relative operations each building on the previous, (1) experiencing leads to (2) inquiry and understanding by which intelligible answers are formed to questions arising from the first level. (3) Judging the veracity of the answers follows and finally (4) deciding a course of action in accord with what has been judged true is the final level of consciousness. The levels of consciousness are a dynamic unity, given as a whole.
Lonergan notes that “one and the same operation not only intends an object but also reveals an intending subject” (15). By attentiveness and awareness to one’s knowing, the knower can, in accordance with the very structure she is aware of, decide to “operate in accord with the norms immanent in the spontaneous relatedness of one’s experienced, understood, affirmed experiencing, understanding, judging, and deciding” (15).
This coming to acknowledge the structure of knowing, and then deciding to act in accordance with it is what Lonergan calls self-appropriation.
The drive to know and the structure it follows are common to all. All human knowing operates on four levels, all of which are conscious (aware) and intentional (having an outward object). They are the empirical, intellectual, rational and responsible levels of consciousness [The following discussion of the levels of consciousness can be found in Method in Theology, 9]. At the empirical level of consciousness the knowing subject is sensing, perceiving, imagining, feeling, speaking and moving. At the intellectual level it is inquiring, coming to understand, expressing the understanding and working out the presuppositions and implications of the expression formulated. At the rational level the knower is passing judgment on the truth or falsity of a statement after weighing the evidence and deciding if the conditions of its truth have been fulfilled. The final level is the responsible level in which the subject makes decisions concerning possible actions, evaluating and deciding the meaning of those actions in light of greater goals and aims.
The four levels of consciousness consist of relative operations each building on the previous, (1) experiencing leads to (2) inquiry and understanding by which intelligible answers are formed to questions arising from the first level. (3) Judging the veracity of the answers follows and finally (4) deciding a course of action in accord with what has been judged true is the final level of consciousness. The levels of consciousness are a dynamic unity, given as a whole.
Lonergan notes that “one and the same operation not only intends an object but also reveals an intending subject” (15). By attentiveness and awareness to one’s knowing, the knower can, in accordance with the very structure she is aware of, decide to “operate in accord with the norms immanent in the spontaneous relatedness of one’s experienced, understood, affirmed experiencing, understanding, judging, and deciding” (15).
This coming to acknowledge the structure of knowing, and then deciding to act in accordance with it is what Lonergan calls self-appropriation.
17 February 2006
Critical Realism and Justice continued
Follow the link to read some more on CR and Justice...
http://criticalrealism.blogspot.com/2006/02/critical-realism-and-justice.html
Tom
http://criticalrealism.blogspot.com/2006/02/critical-realism-and-justice.html
Tom
10 February 2006
Bibliography for CR and the Bible
When I talk about Critical Realism, I am referring to the work of Bernard Lonergan, Ben F. Meyer, and N.T. Wright. Here are some of their writings:
Lonergan, Bernard J. F. Method in Theology. Minneapolis : Seabury Pr, 1979.
In Method in Theology Lonergan lays out his proposed method for constructive, collaborative theological work based on his cognitional theory and critical realist epistemology which is laid out in his earlier work Insight: A Study of Human Understanding.
Meyer, Ben F. Reality and Illusion in New Testament Scholarship: A Primer in Critical Realist Hermeneutics. Collegeville, Minn : Liturgical Pr, 1994.
Meyer utilizes the thought of Lonergan and applies it specifically to New Testament scholarship. This book is a good introduction to Lonergan's thought as well as a good study of its implications for biblical study. Many of the ideas in Critical Realism and the New Testament are brought together in this book.
Meyer, Ben F. Critical Realism and the New Testament. Allison Park, Pa : Pickwick Pubns, 1989.
This book is a collection of essays and articles written by Meyer especially concerned with applying Lonergan's thought to New Testament studies.
Meyer, Ben F. The Aims of Jesus. [S.l.] : SCM Pr, 1979.
Ben Meyer's study of the historical Jesus. Many of Lonergan's insights have specific applications for Meyer. Meyer lays out many of the significant philosophical issues and shows how critical realism lays bare many unfounded enlightenment biases which have had a profound impact on historical Jesus studies. Critical realism provides a philosophical framework for his study of Jesus, whose principal aim according to Meyer was to gather the eschatological people of God.
Wright, N. T. The New Testament and the People of God. Minneapolis : Augsburg Fortress, 1989.
Wright's first volume in his series, Christian Origins and the Question of God. This work is devoted to Wright's methodology. Wright is strongly influenced by Meyer (and in turn Lonergan) although his critical realism is highly original. Wright posits critical realism over and against positivistic and phenomenalist epistemologies. His method utilizes 'story' (and metanarrative) as a fundamental category of knowing and proceeds as a combination of historical, literary and theological study of the New Testament.
Another Critical Realist approach (not influenced by Lonergan):
Vanhoozer, Kevin. Is There a Meaning in This Text? Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998.
Lonergan, Bernard J. F. Method in Theology. Minneapolis : Seabury Pr, 1979.
In Method in Theology Lonergan lays out his proposed method for constructive, collaborative theological work based on his cognitional theory and critical realist epistemology which is laid out in his earlier work Insight: A Study of Human Understanding.
Meyer, Ben F. Reality and Illusion in New Testament Scholarship: A Primer in Critical Realist Hermeneutics. Collegeville, Minn : Liturgical Pr, 1994.
Meyer utilizes the thought of Lonergan and applies it specifically to New Testament scholarship. This book is a good introduction to Lonergan's thought as well as a good study of its implications for biblical study. Many of the ideas in Critical Realism and the New Testament are brought together in this book.
Meyer, Ben F. Critical Realism and the New Testament. Allison Park, Pa : Pickwick Pubns, 1989.
This book is a collection of essays and articles written by Meyer especially concerned with applying Lonergan's thought to New Testament studies.
Meyer, Ben F. The Aims of Jesus. [S.l.] : SCM Pr, 1979.
Ben Meyer's study of the historical Jesus. Many of Lonergan's insights have specific applications for Meyer. Meyer lays out many of the significant philosophical issues and shows how critical realism lays bare many unfounded enlightenment biases which have had a profound impact on historical Jesus studies. Critical realism provides a philosophical framework for his study of Jesus, whose principal aim according to Meyer was to gather the eschatological people of God.
Wright, N. T. The New Testament and the People of God. Minneapolis : Augsburg Fortress, 1989.
Wright's first volume in his series, Christian Origins and the Question of God. This work is devoted to Wright's methodology. Wright is strongly influenced by Meyer (and in turn Lonergan) although his critical realism is highly original. Wright posits critical realism over and against positivistic and phenomenalist epistemologies. His method utilizes 'story' (and metanarrative) as a fundamental category of knowing and proceeds as a combination of historical, literary and theological study of the New Testament.
Another Critical Realist approach (not influenced by Lonergan):
Vanhoozer, Kevin. Is There a Meaning in This Text? Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998.
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