We can, however, only express the Truth if we
foresee the extreme expression of all the contradictions inherent in it, from
which it follows that Truth itself encompasses the ultimate projection of all
its invalidations, is antonymic and cannot be otherwise.
Pavel Florensky
***
I wrote
in a previous article about the importance of contradictions in the knowledge
of God. The Orthodox faith utterly delights in paradox and contradiction and
liberally salts its language of worship with shockingly antonymic expressions.
This is intentional and inherent to the nature of the kind of knowledge
(koinonia) that alone is saving knowledge. Remembering this is important when
we come to the study of the Scriptures. Doubtless, the most devastating
practice with regard to the Scriptures is ridding them of contradiction. Today,
this is done regularly, and from a number of directions. Apparently, human
beings dislike contradiction and have a passion-driven instinct to minimize it.
This diminution of reason goes by many names – some of them being so bold as to
claim that this is reason itself. It is not. True reason is at home with
contradiction.
The
gospel proclamation of Christ is summarized by St. Paul in his First Letter to
the Corinthians:
For I
delivered [literally “traditioned” – it is a technical term in Greek] to you
first of all that which I also received [“received” by “tradition”]:
that Christ died for our sins according to
the Scriptures,
and that He was buried, and that He rose
again the third day according to the Scriptures,
and that He was seen by Cephas, then by the
twelve.
After that He was seen by over five hundred
brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to the present, but some have
fallen asleep.
After that He was seen by James, then by all
the apostles.
Then last of all He was seen by me also, as
by one born out of due time. (1Co 15:3-8)
If the
opening lines of this passage remind you of the Creed, it is because they most
likely come from the most primitive Baptismal Creed, one version of which was
later known as the Apostles’ Creed. This is not an off-hand narrative that St.
Paul is making up as he writes. He is quoting, and specifically quoting a
“tradition.”
At the
heart of that tradition of the risen Christ is that He “died for our sins
according to the Scriptures,” and that He “rose again the third day according
to the Scriptures.” This does not mean “because the Scriptures said he did.”
Rather it means, that His death for our sins and His resurrection on the third
day are in accordance with the right reading of the Old Testament Scriptures.
Indeed, we could say that the primitive Church proclaimed a message about the
Old Testament itself that was as important (and new) as the news of Christ’s
death and resurrection. Their radical proclamation was that all of the writings
of the Old Testament were about the death and resurrection of Christ!
As I
noted previously, this is simply not obvious on any reading of the Old
Testament – unless you have been previously taught how to see it, look for it,
and understand it, and have the ascetical discipline that allows the heart to
“see.” This “according to the Scriptures” is itself part of that which is
handed down. It is traditioned to us.
The
treatment of the Scriptures, particularly since the Reformation, have ceased to
acknowledge this dynamic, sometimes even being embarrassed by the unvarnished
allegorical readings of the Fathers. The Reformation mantra that the Scriptures
were the book for everyman, that each person, enlightened and guided by the
Spirit, was capable of reading and understanding the Scriptures has
consistently tended to privilege rationalistic schemes of interpretation.
Alexander Campbell, one of the founders of the Protestant Restoration Movement,
is said to have carried a Bible and the writings of John Locke. The “common
sense” of Scottish rationalism has deeply affected the popular treatment of the
Scriptures in the contemporary world.
There
seems to be a general sense that the New Testament, however it arrived at its
conclusions, is now the rational guide for reading the Old Testament. The
Apostolic Church wrote by a miracle and we read with our reason. There is a
rational paradigm that has risen in this context. It is rooted in the notion of
the “authority” of Scripture (and its infallibility). How do I know that Christ
is the truth? Because it’s in the Bible. How do I know that the Bible is true?
Well, it says so in this verse here. That circular reasoning is actually as
nonsensical as it sounds.
This also
creates an anxiety of reliability. Every questioning of historical accuracy,
every example of internal contradiction is met with rational explanations of
how the Scriptures must be true. Extreme examples are those who insist on
“Young Earth Creationism,” even suggesting that God created a universe that
appeared old, but really isn’t. In Orthodox circles, this same approach is
defended by citing any treatment within a Church Father that supports a
literalist understanding. I have seen Fr. Thomas Hopko, of blessed memory,
decried as a heretic because he suggested that Adam may not be a historical
figure! There is some version of a “house of cards” in all of this. If this
isn’t literally true, if this isn’t utterly reliable on a rational level, then
that may not be true, nor this, nor…until faith itself collapses.
This is
the tragic state of faith among many Christians, a foundation without merit,
vulnerably standing on the playing field of modern rationalism. I personally
believe it is the breeding ground of atheism…because it is a false position.
St. Luke
has this:
Then He said to them, “These are the words
which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things must be
fulfilled which were written in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the
Psalms concerning Me.” And He opened their understanding, that they might
comprehend the Scriptures. Then He said to them, “Thus it is written, and thus
it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third
day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name
to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.” (Luk 24:44-47)
This
passage needs some care. In the Greek, it does not say “He opened their
understanding.” Rather, it says, “He opened their nous.” The Scriptures are
noetically understood. The nous and the heart are synonymous in many of the
Fathers. It is by no means a synonym for discursive reason. Christ spiritually
changed the disciples, such that they could see things that before had been
hidden. And this change is directly associated with the encounter of the risen
Lord. Christ nowhere opens the understanding of the disciples until after the
resurrection. That noetic miracle is itself part of the resurrection. To be a
witness of the resurrection includes the noetic understanding of the
Scriptures.
And it is
at this point that I direct us to the inherent contradictions within the text.
I say “contradictions,” but I include within that the very “hiddenness” of the
meaning. That meaning, if you will, is a “contradiction” of the letter. If the
letter says, “Ark of the Covenant,” but we understand that it refers to the
Theotokos (to use but one common example), then, there is a seeming
contradiction between the letter and the meaning. If the text says, “lamb,” be
we read “Christ,” there is an apparent contradiction between the letter and the
meaning.
When we
no longer see the contradiction in these things, the nous is darkened, and we
begin to make of these great mysteries mere intellectual ciphers, rational
objects to be manipulated in arguments, systematized and refined. True noetic
perception involves great ascetic effort, in which we fast, pray and repent for
the hardness of our hearts and our constant efforts to substitute an
understanding that does not at every moment depend upon God.
There is
a sense in which I revel in the contradictions (at least the ones I see). They
are gateways into the Kingdom of God. I frequently encounter, however, an
“easy” Orthodoxy, or “easy” Protestantism, etc., in which paradox and
contradiction are deeply muted, explained, or simply avoided.
At every
Divine Liturgy, I stand at the altar, and speak the contradiction, “And make
this bread to be the precious Body of our Lord and God and Savior Jesus
Christ…” Its opacity is a measure of my own heart. On those occasions in which
things seem less than opaque, I do not know how to explain what I see. These are
the moments of faith, a “participatory adherence to the Presence” in the words
of Vladimir Lossky. And though I can proclaim, “Behold the Lamb of God who
takes away the sin of the world,” I cannot demonstrate it as an object. I can
love it and eat it and become one with it.
The
reading of Scripture should resemble this far more than we realize. For Christ
is there, within every word, every space between the words, and even in the
silence that frames them.
“Didn’t
our hearts burn within us!”
An
article by Fr. Stephen Freeman
Source: https://blogs.ancientfaith.com/glory2godforallthings/2016/06/29/the-contradictions-of-scripture/
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