The biblical text, in its fullness,
which remains beyond our capacity to exhaustively grasp, is the ultimate
vocabulary upon which Walter Brueggemann stakes his identity. At the same
time, given the profound impact of secularism, anti-foundational postmodernity,
and our post-Christian society and culture (fundamentalist/evangelical revival
notwithstanding), from the point of view of perception and reception,
imaginative construal may be one of the most dynamic hermeneutics available to
many contemporary people in coming to grips with the revelation embedded in the
Biblical text. This may be particularly the case amongst those
who have fundamentally challenged the precepts of the Christian faith and who
have embraced one aspect or another of the secular city as their primary
vocabulary. There are many reasons why those who have had some level of
decent Christian formation in their background who have left the primary
vocabulary of faith, or who, even if, in faith they continue to adhere to its
primary truth, have not heard an Authentic Word in a very long time.
Simply put, for many the assumptions of the secular city seem to be
existentially primary and anything which fundamentally violates those precepts
takes on the appearance of the unreal. I haven’t done a formal study, but
I bet there are many people in our UCC congregations, if not pastors as well,
who at some powerful (and perhaps unconscious) level embrace the secular as
their primary (at least at the level of a very potent penultimacy) vocabulary.
In my reading of WB, it seems that
he is appealing in his many collections of short essays to these people as his
primary audience, while secondarily, encouraging the evangelical sector to
overhear the conversation. For the
former in particular, the eruption of the Spirit of God one verse, one miracle,
or one revelation at a time within the epicenter of the secular city may be
precisely the Word needed in order to break the logjam, however temporarily, of
the secular assumptions that ground their primary vocabulary. It is not
as an absolute truth, but as a manifestation of the contemporary kairos that WB
is skeptical of grand narratives as reflected in his ongoing dispute with
Brevard Childs, even as, at some profound level, as Gabriel Fackre suggests, he
adheres to the entire Story. Gabe quotes
the following WB text:
The Bible is inherently the live
word of God, revealing the character and will of God and empowering us for an
alternative life in the world. While I believe in the indeterminacy of the text
to some large extent, I know that finally the Bible is forceful and consistent
in its main theological claim. It expresses the conviction that the God who
created the world in love redeems the world in suffering and will consummate
the world in joyous well-being. That flow of conviction about God’s
self-disclosure in the Bible is surely the main claim of the apostolic faith, a
claim upon which the church fundamentally agrees.
As Gabe states, “this of course is not
the fullest summation of WB’s hermeneutic, but I think
that there appears to be more in common and for conversation than has
been suggested.”
When WB
refers to the dynamic of the imagination—the importance of imaginative
construal—I hypothesize that he is referring to nothing less than the Holy
Spirit in illuminating the disclosed Word to receptive listeners. What he
is implying, I think, given the current kairos, is that the third voice of the
Trinity requires a certain primacy in order to break through the logjams of
identities highly influenced by secular existentialism. It is always the
Word of which the imagination illuminates on WB’s interpretation, and on this
there is no equivocation. What is at issue is the extent to which strongly
formed Christian identities, particularly in mainline congregations will play a
central or more marginal role in the total identity formation of
believers. While WB would like to see
more, I think what he is saying, given the temper of the times is that there is
little choice, particularly among the mainline, than to come to terms with this
marginality. Given this assumption it is
through the imaginative dynamic encounter that the text may break in once again
one verse at a time in the important work of “funding” postmodernity. WB
does hope that through an accumulation of these individual encounters something
more coherent and stable will emerge at this time in the history of the west
even as he remains highly suspicious of comprehensive theologies breaking in
within the foreseeable future.
That said, it’s also limiting to
leave things there, which at his best, WB does not, even in Texts Under Negotiation. For while WB speaks to an
important some, there are important others even within the mainline for whom this
message remains unconvincing and certainly unsatisfactory. There is a
thirsting too (however repressed, at least in certain UCC congregations) for
what Gabe Fackre refers to as the “full-orbed” Word and the need to grapple
with entire Story with the sophistication and nuance that he does in The Christian Story and The Doctrine of Revelation. The
critical message of Fackre’s work is that any substantial encounter with the
Spirit itself requires a through understanding of and illumination by the Word,
including a solid appreciation of the entire Story.
I don’t think WB would deny this, although
he might wonder how that would occur in the given postmodern reality.
Certainly comprehensive Bible study needs to become a major congregational
focus which is far from given in the current reality of mainline
Protestantism. In the process many of the imaginative encounters of
which WB illuminates in his powerful narratives need to be experienced if there
is going to be any revitalization movement within the UCC. Broadly
speaking, what is needed is not so much a dialogue, but at the least a very
ongoing tripartite encounter between Walter Brueggemann, Donald Bloesch, and
Gabriel Fackre (which includes the various schools of thought which their work
together embodies) in order to substantially grapple with the many issues that
are on the UCC table in the current era.
May it be so!
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