Peter Enns Inspiration and Incarnation Chapter 4 Review

In affiliate 3 of Pete Enns' book, Inspiration and Incarnation, he deals with another topic that tin can tend to make Evangelicals rather uneasy. Simply put, Enns says, "Listen, when you read the Old Testament, there is a wide range of theological diverseness in it—it doesn't all fit together in a nice and peachy moving-picture show. There is a lot of ambiguity, and in that location are places that actually seem to reverberate points of view that contradict each other…and that's okay."

Enns actually begins the chapter past quoting a former professor who contrasted the traditional Jewish perspective of Scripture with the typical Christian view of Scripture: "For Jews, the Bible is a problem to exist solved. For Christians, it is a message to exist proclaimed" (61). When you look at the Jewish writings virtually the OT (i.eastward. the Talmud, the Mishnah, etc.), y'all run into that traditional Jewish interpretation revels in those tensions and ambiguities. They run across them as invitations for farther contemplation.

For some reason, though, that tends to cause shock waves to occur within some Evangelicals—"What? The Bible is proverb dissimilar things nigh God that don't fit into prissy, neat theological categories? Is this some sort of liberal agenda?" Enns response is that no, it's not liberal agenda. Information technology is the mode the Old Attestation is, and it'south something that Jews have known all forth. And that in no way renders the One-time Attestation unreliable—information technology is the way God has revealed Himself, and we need to be okay with it.

Enns makes a further comment that ironically, unlike the traditional Jewish approach to the One-time Testament, both the typical Evangelical approach and (gasp!) the historical-critical scholarly approach that so many Evangelicals are suspicious of, tend to view Scripture in the aforementioned manner, namely that if it is God'due south Discussion, then there can absolutely be no variety of theological teaching or presentation of facts. When some historical-critical scholars find these tensions, they merely dismiss the Bible every bit unreliable and but a human production. When some Evangelicals come across these tensions, they do everything they can to explain them away, and then that they can notwithstanding maintain that the Bible is a "perfect" book.

Diverseness in Proverbs
In any case, Enns spends most of this chapter highlighting various examples from the Old Attestation where at that place are articulate theological differences. But instead of so dismissing the Bible as a whole or sticking his head in the sand and explaining those differences away, Enns proceeds to show the mode he believes nosotros are to wrestle with such texts.

In Proverbs, you have in two sequent verses:

"Do not answer a fool according to his folly,
or you yourself with exist just like him" (26:4).

"Reply a fool co-ordinate to his folly,
or he volition exist wise in his own eyes" (26:5).

Well, you tin't go more than contradictory than that, tin you? "Not so fast," Enns says. The fact is, both sayings are true…it just depends on the situation, and, as Enns says, "the reader is expected to invest energy in discerning whether a certain proverb is relevant for a certain situation" (64). Enns shares other examples with Proverbs ten:fifteen and 18:11, and so 10:sixteen and 11:4—they seemingly say the opposite things, merely all of them are still wise proverbs, depending on whatever given circumstance one might detect oneself in.

Hence, Proverbs aren't just "recipes for success" that give yous simple directions to follow. If they were, and so we'd have a problem, because they ofttimes say opposite things. Rather, they are observations about life, and they claiming the reader "to know wisdom and didactics, and to understand words of insight…" (Proverbs 1:2).

Diversity in Ecclesiastes
Enns so turns his attention to Ecclesiastes, and he notes that Jewish commentators had long wrestled with the problems both within Ecclesiastes itself, as well equally the issues with Ecclesiastes in relation to the rest of the Onetime Testament. The virtually obvious signal of tension can be found between what Proverbs says almost wisdom and what Ecclesiastes says nearly wisdom. In Proverbs, the message is articulate: wisdom works and will not neglect yous. That is why in iv:vii, we read "The start of wisdom is this: get wisdom. Though it cost all you have, get understanding."

Yet in Ecclesiastes, it's pretty clear that wisdom doesn't always work. It's non always a guarantee that things will piece of work out well for yous. Certain, Ecclesiastes acknowledges that, generally speaking, wisdom is meliorate than foolishness, merely and then it takes the depressing route and concludes, "What's the indicate? The wise human is going to die, just like the fool. And furthermore, all he might accept gained volition probably end upwards in the hands of another fool…so what's the point?"

At present, to be honest, I feel Enns' point regarding Ecclesiastes is something to be desired. He simply says, "Hey, we need to respect the style God has given Ecclesiastes to us; the Bible reflects variety because human life is diverse." To that, I say, sure, but there's a lot more Enns could have said. Having said that, it is beyond question that the outlook of Ecclesiastes and Proverbs is radically unlike. And therefore, since both are in the Bible, nosotros cannot either ignore the differences, or try to superficially explicate those differences abroad. They provide a challenge to the reader to really wrestle with the realities of life: how would you respond if y'all "wisely" planned out a successful life and got everything you ever dreamed, yet found yourself despairing about life?

Diversity in Job
Enns and so looks at Job, and points out the "problem" that runs throughout the majority of the book (those chapters from iii to 41 that we tend to ignore!): Job's friends' conclusions are in the abstruse, correct: ordinarily, we assume God blesses those who are faithful, and punishes those who are sinful. That'due south the mentality 1 sees in Proverbs; that's the expected outcome one sees in the blessings and curses found in Deuteronomy.

But in reality, in the case of Job, that just isn't truthful. And those friends, by sticking to their superficial assumptions, end up making things worse for Job by refusing to look at his particular situation and comforting him. They are in such a hurry to "defend" God, they cease up making Job'south misery worse. And by the terminate of Job, when God shows upwards, he vindicates Task and basically chews out Job's friends and says that they accept non spoken truthfully—but they were but reflecting the kind of things one reads in Proverbs and Deuteronomy.

Does this mean the Bible is contradictory or unreliable? Enns says, "Of course non." Basically, what we see in both Ecclesiastes and Job is the acknowledgment that life is a whole lot more than complex than we generally like to admit. We want to keep and utilise our easy formulas and axioms to everything, with no fuss. Simply life isn't like that. Both Ecclesiastes and Job make it a point to drive that home.

Other Examples of Diversity in the Old Testament
Throughout the residue of the chapter, Enns touches upon countless other examples: (1) How Chronicles' version of the history of Israel occasionally dissimilar than that of Samuel-Kings; (2) How the two unlike accounts of the Ten Commandments (in Ex. twenty:2-17 and Deut. 5:6-21) aren't exactly alike; (3) Other differences betwixt the laws in Exodus and Deuteronomy, whether information technology involves laws regarding slaves, the Passover, cede, or dealing with Gentiles.

And then there's the event of, "Is there a single God, and all others are simulated gods, or is YHWH the main among all gods?" Sure, at that place are plenty of passages in the prophets that clearly state YHWH is the only true God, merely then you lot also take a number of psalms (86:8; 95:three; 96:4; 97:9; 135:v; and 136:2) in which YHWH is described as "above all gods," and "greater than all other gods."

On that upshot, Enns makes a particular poignant signal: "Nosotros must accept care to non allow our ain mod sensitivities to make up one's mind how nosotros understand Israel'south ancient faith. We may non believe that multiple gods e'er existed, but ancient Near Eastern people did. This is the religious world within which God called Israel to be his people. When God called State of israel, he began leading them into a full knowledge of who he is, simply he started where they were" (87). That is why we shouldn't be surprised to find parts of the Old Attestation talking near "other gods," and other parts talking about how there are no other gods, other than the God of Israel.

What it really comes down to is how we run across the Old Attestation in the first identify: exercise nosotros only meet it as "God's directions and rule book" that just tells us exactly what nosotros are to believe if nosotros want to get into heaven, or do we meet it as telling the unfolding story of God revealing Himself in the history of Israel?

If nosotros insist on the former, such multifariousness will seem like "contradictions," and might cause one to walk away from Christianity altogether—I've known a few people who've basically washed just that. They meet these tensions in the Bible, and thus conclude, "Oh, the Bible isn't perfect! It isn't giving me clear, non-controversial, undeniable answers!" I find that tragic.

But if we realize that the Bible bears witness to God's involvement in the messiness of human history, and it thus relates the unfolding drama of God slowing redeeming all creation and bringing people to a true knowledge of Him, these tensions actually tin can act as invitations for united states of america to wrestle with the very real messiness of life, and continue to walk in faith that God's salvation story still has a few more chapters to get.

What Does Diversity Tell Us Most Scripture?
I will let Enns'southward own words conclude his chapter about how we should understand theological diverseness in the Erstwhile Testament.

• "To accept the diversity of the Old Testament is not to 'cave into liberalism,' nor is it to seek after novelty. It is, rather, to read the One-time Attestation quite honestly and seriously. And if variety is such a prevalent miracle in the Old Attestation, information technology would seem to be important to do more than than explain it abroad or simply take note of diversity and file it away for future reference. Nosotros must inquire why God would do it this way. Why does God'due south word await the way it does?" (96).
• "Is the fact of diversity fundamentally contrary to the Bible being the discussion of God? My reply is no. And the style in which nosotros can begin to address this issue is to confess at the outset, along with the celebrated Christian church, that the Bible is the discussion of God" (96).
• "For God to reveal himself ways that he accommodates himself. To be understood, he condescends to the conventions and conditions of those to whom he is revealing himself. The word of God cannot exist kept safe from the rough-and-tumble drama of human history. For the Bible to be the word of God implies the exact contrary" (97).

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Source: http://www.joeledmundanderson.com/a-book-review-of-inspiration-and-incarnation-by-pete-enns-part-4-the-theological-diversity-in-the-old-testament/