Graham Ward: A Minor Annotated Bibliography IV
July 31, 2010
Be it the gripping Torture and Eucharist, the insightful Mystical Theology or the symphonic On Christian Theology, books in the Blackwell series “Challenges in Contemporary Theology” have yet to not drastically shift my worldview after reading, and Graham Ward’s Christ and Culture is no exception (I can’t wait to read the rest in the series).
Despite the fact that this is a collection of previously released and delivered essays, there is a certain deep similarity in theme, style and content between them. These pick up on all the collective themes of Christology; “incarnation, atonement, the economics of the Trinity what it is to be human [and] the Church” (23) but do so in a manner steeped in discourses very distant to the sort of christology of predication that I’m used to reading such as hermeneutics, metaphysics and cultural theory. Topics like embodiment and the operation of desire also play a large role. (23)
Yet all revolve around very close readings of Scripture. Ward pays particular attention to St. Mark’s Gospel but Scripture is used thoroughly and uniquely all throughout this book. Even if one were to disagree with all of Ward’s conclusions, many of which are controversial, this book is hugely important as I see it for its christological and exegetical method(s).
Ward builds off Aquinas where in the Summa he says, “God is not known to us in His nature, but is made known to us in His operations. (Summa Theologiae, I.Q13.8). Therefore Ward asks not “who is the Christ or what is the Christ [but] where is the Christ” (1) … and I might add, “what is Christ doing?”
The introduction alone is worth the price which not only concisely lays out his own vision but offers a substantive and wide ranging critique of Karl Barth, especially his christological dialectics which as Ward sees it, makes of Christ “either the absolute subject or the absolute object.” (12) (This seems not too unlike to some of Rowan Williams’ critique of Barth, cf. – “Barth on the Triune God,” Wrestling With Angels, pp.106-149) Briefly summing it up, Ward lays it out like this:
“Barth’s dogmatic approach to Christology (a) all too thinly defines the economies of salvation in which the gracious love of Christ finds a responding desire; (b) this finds expression in the thinness of his account of mediations (c) such that his mediating christology remains tied to specific cultural assumptions about the subject and nature; (d) this binds christology to the logic of dualism, itself a product of a certain cultural heritage in modernity; (e) this logic and these assumptions, on the basis of which we develops his dialectical method, render him unable to reflect upon his own cultural production of christology. The world is so lost, so secularized, so ignorant of God that both Christ and subsequently a theology of Christ operate above and beyond such a world, in contradistinction to it.” (14-15)
Of the Ward books I’ve read, this and his Cultural Transformation and Religious Practice were the ones that really captured my imagination. It is important in its own right (or seems like it to me at least) but also in that it renders such criticisms as “RO doesn’t deal with Christ or the Bible or discipleship seriously enough” in need of more evidence. And it also disrupts the all too common saying I hear, that Ward is some sort of exception to RO, “Ward I can take, Milbank I can’t.” Nevertheless, Ward would not want to be holed up on a “side” in contemporary theology.
I can’t wait to reread this one…hopefully I’ll make more strides toward comprehending the details.
It is perhaps predictable for readers of this blog that at least one of us should write about Memorial Day. We are not often shy in our youthful enthusiasm and naivity about our conflicted loyalties as American citizens and also of the Church; and of the necessity of radical discipleship in the face of what we, or I at least, perceive as a nation state who has hijacked a Christian soteriology.
I am an American. My life is pretty good. I am grateful for the gifts and opportunities that I have had throughout my life, some of which I would not have had in some other countries. It would be dishonest of me not to note this. I often hear that these benefits are only possible because of the sacrifices of soldiers who have bravely fought and willingly sacrificed for the United States. That may in part be true, but it also points to a larger picture that I should like to address.
It would be easy to blame Constantinianism, blame the Enlightenment, blame the rise of atomistic politics for war, but the old adage about pointing your finger seems to ring true: “If you point your finger, you’ve three fingers pointing back at you.” My life is what it is with reference to these things. I cannot transcend the history in which my identity is tied up. So a simple blame game can only implicate myself in those things which I blame. I am not an island unto myself: who I am is only as it is in relation to other people and to the past which we narrate into our identities.
I’d like to think through this with reference to a few Christian doctrines:
It is common to hear Augustine blamed for the doctrine of “Original Sin.” This is, as most such “blame the fathers for a doctrine” schemes are, reductionistic and crude. Whatever the case though, we can thank Foucault for making the doctrine much more plausible in the contemporary scene. There seem to be structures of power and violence in place before I even come to be in the world. They are things over which I have little to no control and are fundamental to my existence, so much so that for most of my life they are invisible. I am born into a world already organized politically, economically, sociologically, religiously. This is essentially the doctrine of Original Sin: that structures of oppression, violence and rebellion against God are ‘already in place’ and work to form us as people before we are able to understand or critically resist them.
Because these structures are there from the beginning, they are easily taken for granted; assumed to be a natural given, something inevitable and often even good, as in being American, or at the very least ethically neutral, as in market economics. Memorial Day fits in well here. It is easy to assume that, because we have a relatively good life, the given social structures that we have are ‘how things are’ or ‘how the world works.’ The thought follows, that if we as Americans enjoy “freedom” and “prosperity” then the possibility of war as means to defend this freedom and prosperity are a necessity.
But no sooner is that thought out of my mouth than I realize that this implicates my own well being in a cycle and chain of violence and oppression. We return again to the fact that our world still operates in a cycle of “Original Sin.” My life is implicated and intertwined in the lives of others and that life is often manifested in and guaranteed by war.
This is why classical theology is so very important. Christ enters into this world as one not implicated in this cycle. His sinlessness means for us that by the power of the Spirit we are brought into the life of a God whose very nature from all eternity is one of perfect peace, perfect mutuality. We are not merely shown a way to live well, as if Christ was a mere moral exemplar – which is good as we are rather bad at such imitation – rather, by virtue of our baptism and infilling of the Holy Spirit, we are incorporated into that life of peace and given the means to live it.
This is why the Church is a politics and why it can and ought to challenge the givenness of Memorial Day. In the Church, we are commanded to live reconciled lives to each other, submitting to each other, loving each other, giving to each other even as Christ gives perpetually and without reservation to the Father, a giving we are able to do only on account of the Spirit. There is no other name by which we might be saved.
This then is what I mean by the crisis of doctrinal imagination; that we have become accustomed to imagining the Christian Gospel as one merely effecting ones personal salvation post-mortem. Original Sin, Christ’s sinlessness, God as Trinity, the exclusivity of the Church; all of these reduced to crude propositional statements needed to fill a gap in narrative logic become worn out quickly and whither and die. The Gospel makes a difference as to how we conceive our political allegiances. This isn’t about some stupid “Right vs Left” thing. This is an Isaiah 2.1-5 kind of thing:
1 The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.
2 And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the LORD’S house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it.
3 And many people shall go and say , Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
4 And he shall judgeamong the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.
5 O house of Jacob, come ye, and let us walk in the light of the LORD
This raises the problem of the Church’s need to relearn how to read the Old Testament Christologically, but that is for another day. For now I hope I’ve hinted however poorly at the ways in which the Christian proclamation ought to revise other stories which we tell about ourselves. I also hope I’ve done it in a way that does not reduce to finger pointing at American soldiers as such essays as this even of mine have been prone to do.
12 Propositions…#9
January 2, 2010
Christology developed the way it did as a phenomenology of Salvation.
Wallace and the Hypostatic Union – Part III
July 29, 2009
The Hypostatic Union of Christ
The Hypostatic Union of Christ taught in the Chalcedonian Creed has a fine line to traverse, indeed. It must avoid the two major errors in contention up to 451AD: Apollinarianism and Nestorianism. Additionally, the Chalcedonian Creed must deal with the communicatio idiomatum. It is clear that the creed does not aim to solve any mysteries regarding the metaphysical co-subsistence of the two natures. In fact, a common argument leveled against the creed is that it does more to say what the union of Christ’s two natures is not than what it is. This problem is then left to philosophers and theologians who are faced with biblical facts that seem to contradict the orthodox position. One such situation is the position asserted by Wallace.
A more modern solution to the difficulties of what Chalcedon does not affirm is the Kenosis theory. Berkhof, especially, looks upon this theory with distaste, calling it “a pantheistic conception.”[1] While the kenotic theory is not preferred and most likely based on poor exegesis,[2] it articulates the metaphysical need for interaction between the two natures of Christ without blurring the lines into a single nature. Ronald Carson explains the difficulty of the biblical material thusly:
“The natures are not to be conceived of as being in any way mixed or blended; and yet there is a real exchange, a real communication of properties, in the case of the genus majesticum, the communication of divine attributes to Jesus Christ according to his human nature.”[3]
The stage is set for a stand off not unlike the one between the two camps on either side of the predestination and free will argument. Orthodoxy exclaims, accurately, what can be said positively and negatively about the direct statements in Scripture regarding Christ and the two natures. However, it does not speak directly to the metaphysical difficulties the likes of which Wallace has presented in his article. Rather than reject Chalcedon or prematurely accept kenosis, it may be helpful to review an article by Stephen W. Need.
Need wants us to examine the use of language in forming theological principles, especially as they relate to Chalcedon and Christology. He finds elucidating information in the examination of language. Specifically, he wants readers to accept the limitations of what our language is capable. Need offers the concept of an understanding on the basis of “double vision” in conceptualizing our theological notions, saying, “Human language relates to the divine in a way that is neither merely expressive nor permanently true.”[4] As much as our words are concrete, they should be given the freedom to express in their limited scope the larger infinite impossibility of our understanding the metaphysical postulations surrounding the hypostasis of Christ.
Need solidifies this claim by citing the use of metaphor, not only in theological propositions, but also in the biblical record as well. There is no shortage of people willing to acquiesce to the claim that our language is incapable of explaining the nature of God. There must also be no shortage of people willing to concede that even Christ, in dealing with the shortcomings of language, resorted to the use of metaphor in theological proposition.
“Metaphor constitutes an important element of human speech about God; its double element yields a tensive interaction. While articulating truth at one level, metaphors are usually literally false. They contain an “is and is not” structure, a simultaneous affirmation and denial. This gives them specific power and richness.”[5]
Need proposes, then, that this use and understanding of metaphor should also, and especially, be extended to Chalcedon. While the Chalcedonian creed would certainly not be labeled a metaphor by most, one wonders how helpful such an analysis would be in healing the disparity between the natures of Christ and the shortcoming of the adverbs ”inconfusedly, unchangeably, indivisibly and inseparably” used in the creed. He proposes that the etymology of these adverbs leads the reader to the conclusion that Chalcedonian Christology, “affirms unity between the defining characteristics of two things: a common derivation, continuity, or unity between the logos and the Father, on the one hand, and between Jesus’ humanity and that of humans, on the other.”[6]
Based on Need’s proposition of metaphor, the Chalcedonian Creed does not avoid speaking to the metaphysical. Instead, it offers a dynamic and fluid relationship between the two natures of Christ. Chalcedon in the true fashion of theological language is a set of guidelines or restrictions. If, then, Wallace does not violate what is implicitly stated as the positive or negative qualities of the hypostatic union, there seems to be some metaphysical ‘wiggle room’ afforded in orthodoxy.
Conclusion – Wallace’s Use of Attributes and Orthodoxy
How, then, does Wallace’s proposition for moral and amoral attributes coincide with orthodoxy? If we consider the premise of Need’s work to be sound, which we should, then Wallace has a good chance of conformity to orthodox teaching. The greatest challenge that Wallace’s proposition faces is the potential for his teaching to be misconstrued as dividing the attributes of God. However, he is in the company of Erickson who prefers to use a modification of the natural and moral division of God’s attributes.[7] Certainly, Wallace’s designation is similar in effect. The strength of Wallace’s proposition is that it derives basic information from sound biblical exegesis. There is a point in our theological posturing where even the orthodox creeds must bow to the supremacy of Scripture (yes, you heard me say that – quit gasping fellow Episcopalians).
Philosophically, Wallace’s designation of God’s attributes is preferable. Citing the biblical material, it offers the strength of speaking to the metaphysical interaction between the natures of Christ. In comparison to the work of Need, Wallace’s distribution has the strength of utilizing the metaphorical nature within the confines of Chalcedonian Christology. He does not purport that Christ grew into his divinity, but rather elements of that divinity were mitigated by the work of the Spirit in His life. Wallace thus makes a way for Christ’s humanity to be more significant than even Chalcedon allows, while also affording Christ the fullness of deity. We see in his understanding of the attributes of God, a careful estimation of how to reconcile the biblical material to orthodox teaching. It is an effort that has helped us to understand better the interaction of the dual natures of Christ. Ultimately, it may take modern theology time to round the corner, but efforts on behalf of thinkers like Wallace may smooth the path to an increasingly perfect theology.
[1] Berkhof, Systematic Theology, 328.
[2] See John G. Gibbs, “The Relation between Creation and Redemption According to Phil. II 5-11.” Novum Testamentum 12 (July 1970): 270-283. Specifically, he points to the focus of the passage being the work Christ came to the earth to do, “That Paul’s purpose was more to describe the work of Christ than present a metaphysic of the person of Christ is evident, also, in the fact that he does not elucidate the relation between “the form of God” and the ‘the form of a slave.”
[3] Ronald A. Carson, “The Motifs of ‘Kenosis’ and ‘Imitatio’ in the Work of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, with an Excursus on the ‘Communicato Idiomatum.’” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 43 (September 1975): 546.
[4] Stephen W. Need, “Language, Metaphor and Chalcedon: A Case of Theological Double Vision.” The Harvard Theological Review 88 (April 1995): 238.
[5] Ibid., 243.
[6] Ibid., 248.
[7] Erickson, Christian Theology, 293.
Wallace and the Hypostatic Union – Part II
July 27, 2009
Can God’s Attributes Be Divided?
While an exhaustive discourse on the attributes of God is quite out of scope presently, it is terribly pertinent to the present discussion to breach the topic. Any discussion about the hypostasis is ultimately going to reduce to a discussion about being and attribute. Specifically, and without encroaching too far into the hypostatic union just yet, if Christ is to be completely God and completely man in one being, then it will be necessary to define what it means to be ‘completely God.’ By necessity, this discussion will have to be preceded by an explanation of what it means to have attributes in being, and how those attributes should be viewed in light of the incarnation. For the sake of conciseness, then, the discussion will be limited to the relationship between attribute and being with brief introductory comments on classification of those attributes.
Historically, theologians have distinguished between elements of God’s personal being that are shared in some regard with humanity based on its creation in his image and those that are only experienced by God himself.[1] Though some, such as Haserot, have argued that the philosophical possibility of God possessing ‘individual attributes’ to be distinguished in substance and character is more a contribution of the intellect observing the attributes than indicative of separate qualities within the being,[2] it is important to acknowledge that, at least in perspective, there are some elements of God’s being that we cannot experience. Whether these distinctions represent some real kind of fissure or dissection in the being of God in comparison to attributes we do experience is the important relative issue. Can God be God without the function or experience of any of his attributes? Importantly, are God’s attributes the essence of his being, or merely an expression of his interaction with creation? Do attributes that can be ‘shared’ or imitated by humanity genuinely constitute the reality of God’s being? While these questions cannot all be probed presently, they at least point to the difficult task of classifying the nature of God’s being.
Something that aids our understanding of the classification of God’s attributes, but hinders our understanding of humanity’s interaction and experience of them is the notion of God’s unity.[3] The doctrine of God’s unity asserts that God is, in essence, all of his attributes fully and completely all the time. There is not an attribute that takes precedence over another, nor does one exist to a greater degree than another does. This helps us to understand that the attributes of God as expressed in Scripture are a type of ‘reader’ on who God is in reality. Our finite minds are not capable of understanding the infinitude of God’s being all at once, so he has compartmentalized the revelation into expressions of individual and necessary attributes. According to Grudem, it would be incorrect to say that at one time God functions in perfect love and at another time in perfect justice. He always functions perfectly in both love and justice. However, in our localized and temporal interaction with God we may only see one of those attributes at work.[4] This may tempt some to equate the being of God with his work.
Should we consider allowing God’s attributes, then, to become a function of a role or interaction with creation instead of essential to his nature and being? This is precisely how some see the attributes of God, not as an essential quality or the identity of God, but as creations of expression going out from God. Puccetti writes, “All of God’s necessary attributes, then, really describe God’s relation to the world, rather than God himself.”[5] The nuance here is that in God’s relation to the world you see indications of his character or attributes, and so indirectly through God’s behavior humanity experiences the being of God The problem with this view is that one cannot ‘experience’ the attributes of God in this regard without subjectively qualifying them. “Still those attributes have to be qualitatively symmetrical with our ordinary notions of such qualities if His attributes are to have any meaning for us.”[6]
These conjectures lead Puccetti, and rightly so, to the conclusion that God cannot exist. It is his reformulation of the classic ‘problem of evil’ argument. It is important to the present argument, however, because it shows the danger of not association God’s attributes with his person. The flaw in Puccetti’s presentation is that he refuses to see the attributes of God as descriptions of God’s person; rather he wants to presuppose that they are descriptions of God’s interaction with creation. While one certainly cannot argue that God’s behavior is apart from who he is, it is important to note that a being’s essence or attributes can certainly be withheld from its own interaction with objects outside of its being. Is the withholding of God’s essential attributes or being really a notion so foreign to biblical material? Puccetti has completely ignored the historical fall of humanity in his estimation of God’s interaction with the world. In addition, consideration of such an important part of our theological framework, the doctrine of original sin, places God’s interaction with creation into proper context. The limit is not God’s will; rather it is certainly his ability. God by essence cannot interact fully with the fallen world. It is, in fact, the very motivation behind the incarnation; the incarnation was the only way for God to reveal himself to humanity in a way that was meaningful to them.
Therefore, it is the attributes of God that must predicate our experience of God. The notion of unity or simplicity becomes a strong foundational notion for our understanding of God’s nature. God’s attributes are God. Leftow argues that this does not objectify God, nor does it violate Scriptural conceptions of theism. To the contrary, denial of this “Identity Thesis” is to assume that God must have created his own attributes, or that they are in some regard apart from his true essence.[7] Leftow explains that the claim of the unity of God in theology, “is shorthand for the claim that He exemplifies no metaphysical distinctions whatsoever, including that between subject and essential attribute.”[8] Therefore, to delineate distinction in the attributes of God is to delineate distinction within the being of God. This would be in direct violation of the ‘unity of simplicity.’
[1] These have received a multitude of treatments (i.e. communicable and incommunicable, immanent and intransitive, absolute and relative, natural and moral, as well as moral and amoral from Wallace). cf. Louis Berkhof. Systematic Theology, New Combined ed. (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1996), 54-57. Wayne Grudem. Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1994), 156-160. Millard J. Erickson. Christian Theology, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1998), 291-293.
[2] Francis S. Haserot, “Spinoza’s Definition of Attribute.” The Philosophical Review, 62 (October 1953): 510.
[3] Grudem makes good argument for preferring the term unity to the archaic sense utilized in the medieval doctrine of ‘simplicity.’ The complete term should be “unity of simplicity.” cf. Grudem, Systematic Theology, 177.
[4]Ibid., 180.
[5] Roland Puccetti, “The Concept of God,” The Philosophical Quarterly 14 (July 1964): 241.
[6] Ibid., 243.
[7] Brian Leftow, “Is God an Abstract Object?” Nous 24 (September 1990): 583.
[8] Ibid., 581.
Wallace and the Hypostatic Union – Part I
July 25, 2009
In a discussion of the NET’s translation of Matthew 12.25, found here, Daniel B. Wallace makes a strong case for the limited omniscience of Christ prior to the resurrection. This seems immediately to be an attack upon the foundational tenets that support orthodox Christology. The common understanding of patristic teaching and the embattled production of creeds in the fifth and sixth centuries has been to ascribe to Christ the fullness of deity. While there is no contention with Christ possessing the fullness of his divine nature, even from Wallace, there seem to be biblical, philosophical, and practical reasons to question exactly how the divine nature of Christ interacted with his human nature. Can Wallace, then, propagate the notion that Christ did not have full access to omniscience without doing irreparable damage to orthodox teaching? Within the context of our Christology, do Daniel B. Wallace’s designations for God’s attributes bring us closer to understanding the hypostatic union of Christ?
Wallace’s Contention
Wallace confronts the idea that certain biblical texts can be used to support the notion that Christ fully experienced omniscience prior to the resurrection. He has made his real contention, though indirectly at first, with the Doctrine of the Hypostatic Union of Christ. The Council of Chalcedon officially set into orthodoxy that in the incarnation, “a human nature was inseparably united forever with the divine nature in the one person of Jesus Christ, yet with the two natures remaining distinct, whole, and unchanged, without mixture or confusion, so that the one person, Jesus Christ, is truly God and truly man.”[1] Whether Wallace’s conclusion is unorthodox remains to be argued. However, whatever the outcome of his argument, Wallace’s article is worthy of attention as it relates to our understanding of how the two natures function within the person of Christ.
The immediate question underlying Wallace’s essay is whether or not there is valid biblical support, at least in Matthew 12.25, for the claim that Christ possessed free access to divine omniscience. Concerning a deviation in translation in the NET of Matthew 12.25, Wallace proposes two questions: “First, is the NET more accurate than the other translations in this passage? And second, if so, what does this mean for Jesus’ omniscience?”[2] While a prime facie treatment of his article reveals a kenotic undercurrent in the exegesis, the outcome has serious implications for the Hypostatic Union. If there is Biblical support for the notion that Christ did not have free access to the incommunicable attributes, which Wallace prefers to re-label the ‘amoral’ attributes, then what can be made of the notorious adverbs of the Chalcedonian Creed?
Wallace approaches his first question from a grammatical analysis of the Greek text. He prefaces his evaluation of the Matthew passage by citing other passages that have classically been used to establish Christ’s humanity by displaying the limitations of his knowledge. Wallace goes on to prove the validity of his claim that the aorist and perfect adverbial participles of perception are used regularly to communicate the notion of ‘growing in knowledge.’ He summarizes, stating that our translations are suspect of theological bias if grammatically similar texts are not all treated in the same fashion, even if they include Jesus as the subject.
Wallace concludes his explanation of the problem presented in the Matthew passage with a theological approach. He posits that, while few of the passages actually allude to omniscience, many of the passages concerning Christ’s knowledge as being greater than his contemporaries are questionable. However, he does not deny that there are passages that speak clearly and directly of Christ’s supernatural knowledge (Matt 17.27; John 1.48). He states succinctly that he believes that, “in some instances we can clearly see evidence of Jesus’ supernatural knowledge, knowledge that cannot be explained by any natural means.”[3]
Wallace is left trying to reconcile his position on the omniscience of Christ through his take on the attributes of deity. He admits that while most theologians view God’s attributes as communicable and incommunicable his take on them is different. He prefers to view God’s attributes as moral and amoral. That is respectively those dealing with God’s justice, mercy, love, kindness, etc, and those dealing with God’s omnipotence, omnipresence, omniscience, etc. In this kind of distinction, Wallace sees Christ as the complete embodiment of God’s moral attributes. Christ is perfect in justice, mercy, love, kindness, etc. Here, Wallace makes claims that are essential to the evaluation of the orthodoxy of his exegesis. He does not deny Christ access to the ‘amoral’ attributes of God. Rather, he places stipulation on the function and mode of access through which Christ utilized the ‘amoral’ attributes, preferring the empowering of the Spirit in such circumstances to classic divine, regulatory kenosis.
It is certain that Wallace questions the validity of arguing for Christ’s free access to omniscience. He affirms biblically that Christ grew in wisdom (Luke 2.52), and then asserts logically “an omniscient being never grows in wisdom.”[4] He believes it is illogical to assume that Jesus grew into omniscience. If he increased his knowledge and wisdom as a child, then he did so as an adult as well. Because it would be difficult to contradict such a statement without conceding to an Ebionite Christology, Wallace has a strong argument here. Additionally, Wallace reports that the biblical record testifies of Christ’s surprise and amazement, using terminology commonly associated with the emotional reaction of learning something new. Grammatically, Wallace has a well-presented argument. Without some internal indicator that the reader should receive the terms associated with Christ’s increase in knowledge with a different connotation than applies to the common usage of other passages, it is exegetically sound to assume that the author intended to communicate the same message about Christ.
Wallace’s distinction between the well-versed communicable/incommunicable description of God’s attributes and his own moral/amoral description of God’s attributes is ingenious in at least one regard. It allows him to have a fresh discussion about how we know God, and in that regard how God could reveal himself through the incarnation. Problematic to the theory, though, is the proposition’s nagging resemblance to ideas that sought to divide the attributes of God. An important question, both theologically and philosophically, is whether God’s attributes can be ‘divided’ or categorized in such a way. A more charitable characterization may be to say that Wallace has categorized the attributes of God. However, if both the moral and amoral attributes belong to God alone as tangible characterizations of his being, then how does one separate what becomes a manifestation of God’s being epistemologically and what becomes a component of God’s being ontologically?
[1] John H. Leith, ed. Creeds of the Churches: A Reader in Christian Doctrine from the Bible to the Present, 3rd ed. (Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1982), 36.
[2] Daniel B. Wallace, “When Did Jesus Know? The Translation of Aorist and Perfect Participle for Verbs of Perception in the Gospels.” Available from http://www.bible.org/page.php?page_id=1223. Internet; accessed 24 July 2009.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid.
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