Nothing really needs to be added to that title except one blazingly evident fact: too many are so involved in pointless pursuits and the useless drivel and dreck of their own limited interests that they are blind to what’s going on around them and voiceless.
Therefore they are, as far as I am concerned, worthless. If the teaching of Scripture isn’t applied to real life (as opposed to attempting to apply it to sci-fi and other stupidities) and theologians and biblical scholars have nothing to say to or about events such as we are presently witnessing, I think they have proven themselves unworthy of the title they bear and no longer relevant to anything, for anything at all.
The silent theologian is a pseudo-theologian and the silent biblical scholar is a pseudo-scholar. They are the world’s true dilettantes.
irishanglican ~ Fr. Robert
29/01/2011 at 11:05
Jim, you have a theological doctorate, what say you then? Is theology to be done with an ear to present day current events? You distain this in the eschatological. So help us poor dummys out!
Joel
29/01/2011 at 11:06
Wonder what the excuses will be? Maybe they are asleep? Or on vacation? Or maybe they do not want RSS feeds or something?
Jim
29/01/2011 at 11:07
are you serious? how bout reading the earlier post on speaking out on the subject
Jim
29/01/2011 at 11:09
oh the excuse will be ‘my blog isnt about current events, because for me, the bible and theology are just curiosities from the ancient world that i like to study. surely you dont expect such an ancient text to have a connection with modern life- that’s just silly’.
same thing they said when the indonesian tsunami hit and they went on talking about enoch and tv shows.
Joel
29/01/2011 at 11:10
if for them, that is theology, then they should do away with the New Testament.
irishanglican ~ Fr. Robert
29/01/2011 at 11:13
I lived in Israel, and had/have Egyptian friends. I think we need to wait and see what happens first. It appears that perhaps real change might come, (over what you wrote earlier, that real change would be crushed). We just don’t know yet? And for the so-called Western world, who knows what’s coming?
irishanglican ~ Fr. Robert
29/01/2011 at 11:19
Just like old times, I got both the big blogger guns before me on this one! I who can’t find an RSS feed. lol
Joel
29/01/2011 at 13:00
well… seems you (and I) have made a few people upset about this. They would rather attack this stance than even mention the Egypt on their blogs…
Jim
29/01/2011 at 13:02
if i cared about upsetting people i would have quit living a long time ago. or to borrow paul’s phrase, ‘if i were a man-pleaser, i would have abandoned Christ’.
Joel
29/01/2011 at 13:03
Glad I can always count on that.
Roger Pearse
29/01/2011 at 14:32
Perhaps we could also have their opinion, as professional bible scholars, on whether we need to move beyond Java now that Sun has bought the company?
As professional bible scholars and theologians, they have nothing to say on this matter of contemporary politics. Their opinions, whether good are bad, are no better than those of the rest of us.
Unless someone has received a divine revelation that tells them that the relatively benign Mubarak regime (and I’m thinking Syria here) will be replaced by something better, rather than something worse?
We must all hope for the best, and wish the Egyptian people good luck. But there are lots of ways in which this could all go bad. Mubarak *protected* the Copts, remember. If the Moslem Brotherhood end up in power, they will see dark days. The Iranians revolted against the Shah, and got the Ayatollah. The French revolted against their king, and got an Emperor and twenty years of war. The Russians overthrew their Czar, and got Stalin. Revolutions favour the bold, the ruthless, and the desperate, not the kind, the gentle and the considerate.
Jim
29/01/2011 at 14:36
i could not disagree with you more. it isn’t possible. theologians are obliged by the very nature of their office (whether or not atheists accept it as a valid office or not is of no interest to me) to address contemporary life.
John Meunier
29/01/2011 at 14:36
I’m curious which theological issues you think bloggers should be expounding upon related to this set of events?
Most theo-bloggers – I assume – are not experts on Egyptian politics, culture, or recent events. Wouldn’t most of their “analysis” end up being knee-jerk reactions based on the headlines and pictures on cable news?
I’m just confused what you think they should be doing or saying.
Jim
29/01/2011 at 14:38
they ought to be speaking up on behalf of the oppressed, the injured, the wounded, the killed, and bringing pressure to bear however they can to bring it to an end.
given your reasoning, i assume you would have advised the german church to just be quiet while hitler massacred the jews in auschwitz because the opinions of the theologians wouldnt have been anything more than a knee jerk reaction to stories they had heard.
irishanglican ~ Fr. Robert
29/01/2011 at 15:08
Theologians are not arm-chair ideologs, nor social reformers. Their business is with the Word of God, and the doctrine of God, and always the Gospel of God, and hopefully too the Church of God. Sure they speak out against evil and human ill, but their focus is upon the revelation of God, and how it can best be placed in a spiritual and redemptive manner. Even Barth’s statements in the Barmen Declaration were theological. Though he did mail a copy to Hitler personally. But he was able he sit it out nicely back in his native Switzerland, and even do theology in Basel. And as we know, Bonhoeffer (a German), chose to leave New York, and take his place among the German people and also later the German resistance. Of course his fate was much different. The question would be, who chose the biblical path? Yes, we all must choose!
Jim
29/01/2011 at 18:32
i sure hope you arent suggesting that theology isn’t relevant to modern life.
irishanglican ~ Fr. Robert
29/01/2011 at 19:08
Jim, I did not say that at all, but certainly the pastor-theologian-scholar, etc. is not about some social-gospel, both Barth and even Bonhoeffer show this to be a negative. Though certainly Bonhoeffer’s work has been taken in directions I doubt he would have taken it had he lived. His work: Letters and Papers From Prison, show something of his duress, etc. And it is unfair to press Bonhoeffer in certain directions to my mind. Though as I have written else where that his Christology was certainly not classic, and he did not believe it seems in the Nicene homoousios, sadly. Note his Christ the Centre.
In the end, proper Christian theology cannot be done without the Ecumenical Councils. But then of course as an Anglican I follow both the Nicene, and even the Anglo-Orthodox positions here. Loss here is simply heterodox to High Church Anglicanism, and Orthodoxy.
irishanglican ~ Fr. Robert
29/01/2011 at 19:59
Btw, I think it is interesting that Bonhoeffer did his doctorate in theology on something of the Mystical Body of Christ: Sanctorum Communio, supervised by Reinhold Seeberg. He was only 21 at the time. And Jim you might be interested to know Bonhoeffer was influenced early by hearing Adolf Schlatter at Tubingen (1923). I was a Bonhoeffer “fellow” way back when in the Bon. Society, when I was even a R. Catholic. I loved his idea and question then, ‘Who is Jesus Christ, for us, today?’ … ‘Christ existing as a community of persons’, but finally for me anyway his Christology followed liberal Protestantism, at least theologically. But he was a great “Christian” personally!
Joel
29/01/2011 at 20:08
Where is the public call for prayer or action? Where are the missionary voices who serve there? As theologians, as bible believers, as Christians, we see war and destruction and our voice is where? Waiting on the issues?
We should at the very least speak to the fact in this time of destruction, we are seeing a remarkable venture of peace between the Copts and the Muslims community. Perhaps, theologically, we could mention that fact.
irishanglican ~ Fr. Robert
29/01/2011 at 20:20
Joel,
This is a great question and issue! I fear the ecclesiastical silence is simply fear, and or just not knowing what to do, or say? Perhaps “we” can learn ourselves from the Coptic Christians, and the Muslims “together” inside this whole affair?