Spong's Twelve Theses

[Ianus]

What do you make of them?

1. Theism, as a way of defining God, is dead. So most theological God-talk is today meaningless. A new way to speak of God must be found.

2. Since God can no longer be conceived in theistic terms, it becomes nonsensical to seek to understand Jesus as the incarnation of the theistic deity. So the Christology of the ages is bankrupt.

3. The biblical story of the perfect and finished creation from which human beings fell into sin is pre-Darwinian mythology and post-Darwinian nonsense.

4. The virgin birth, understood as literal biology, makes Christ's divinity, as traditionally understood, impossible.

5. The miracle stories of the New Testament can no longer be interpreted in a post-Newtonian world as supernatural events performed by an incarnate deity.

6. The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.

7. Resurrection is an action of God. Jesus was raised into the meaning of God. It therefore cannot be a physical resuscitation occurring inside human history.

8. The story of the Ascension assumed a three-tiered universe and is therefore not capable of being translated into the concepts of a post-Copernican space age.

9. There is no external, objective, revealed standard writ in scripture or on tablets of stone that will govern our ethical behavior for all time.

10. Prayer cannot be a request made to a theistic deity to act in human history in a particular way.

11. The hope for life after death must be separated forever from the behavior control mentality of reward and punishment. The Church must abandon, therefore, its reliance on guilt as a motivator of behavior.

12. All human beings bear God's image and must be respected for what each person is. Therefore, no external description of one's being, whether based on race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, can properly be used as the basis for either rejection or discrimination.

 

[GrowingSmaller]

Theism, as a way of defining God, is dead. So most theological God-talk is today meaningless. A new way to speak of God must be found.

SO we can attribute other minds to humans and animals, but not the universe?

 

[Davian]

What do you make of them?

John Shelby Spong - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[keith99]

I think a few more Christians like him and us evil atheists and agnostics won't have anything left to do.

I also think he is a chronological snob, thinking all those from earlier ages were ignorant savages. His point 4 is a prime example as the implication is that earlier people were unaware of just how pregnancy occurred. Yet the story itself makes it quite clear that Joseph was quite aware of how babies were made.

I can find both wisdom and idiocy in Scripture.

His Christ seems more a pale shadow of Buddha.

 

[Paradoxum]

What do you make of them?

1. Theism, as a way of defining God, is dead. So most theological God-talk is today meaningless. A new way to speak of God must be found.

God doesn't exist outside theism or polytheism. That is what the word means. Just accept you are an atheist, and there is no God, if you aren't a theist of some kind.

I think the word comes with too much baggage, we will likely do more harm than good to truth, morality, and human-welfare.

God can be a beautiful concept, but it can be more beautiful when it is excepted as a non-existent ideal, rather than a mere label to make something else sound more magical.

2. Since God can no longer be conceived in theistic terms, it becomes nonsensical to seek to understand Jesus as the incarnation of the theistic deity. So the Christology of the ages is bankrupt.

I'm not sure if theism makes no sense. I'm also not sure if Jesus as God incarnate makes no sense. Personally I just find little reason to believe such things to be true.

3. The biblical story of the perfect and finished creation from which human beings fell into sin is pre-Darwinian mythology and post-Darwinian nonsense.

Of course.

4. The virgin birth, understood as literal biology, makes Christ's divinity, as traditionally understood, impossible.

I don't understand why it would.

5. The miracle stories of the New Testament can no longer be interpreted in a post-Newtonian world as supernatural events performed by an incarnate deity.

I also don't see why this would be true. The universe being mechanical tells us nothing about whether spirit can intervene from outside.

6. The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.

I find it strange that forgiveness would require a torturous death, but I still see how the cross can be express deep love. The cross as an expression of love still makes sense. I'm not sure I would judge the cross so harshly.

7. Resurrection is an action of God. Jesus was raised into the meaning of God. It therefore cannot be a physical resuscitation occurring inside human history.

I don't know what he is talking about.

8. The story of the Ascension assumed a three-tiered universe and is therefore not capable of being translated into the concepts of a post-Copernican space age.

I agree. Though it could perhaps be translated into a disappearance.

9. There is no external, objective, revealed standard writ in scripture or on tablets of stone that will govern our ethical behavior for all time.

I agree the Bible isn't a good moral standard.

10. Prayer cannot be a request made to a theistic deity to act in human history in a particular way.

This would seem to depend on (1).

11. The hope for life after death must be separated forever from the behavior control mentality of reward and punishment. The Church must abandon, therefore, its reliance on guilt as a motivator of behavior.

I think I agree.

12. All human beings bear God's image and must be respected for what each person is. Therefore, no external description of one's being, whether based on race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, can properly be used as the basis for either rejection or discrimination.

I wouldn't limit my ethical talk to just humans. We need ethical principles which can be made sense of for all beings.

 

[Eudaimonist]

SO we can attribute other minds to humans and animals, but not the universe?

You seem to be reading an awful lot into that quote.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Iosias]

I like him

 

[jayem]

I like Bishop Spong, too. His main point is that the OT and NT were written when supernatural beliefs were the norm. A strictly literal interpretation of scripture is not compatible with our modern understanding of the world. Christianity is still relevant as a moral teaching and a pathway to self-fulfillment and inner peace. But it's not an inerrant, unchanging dogma, which is authoritative in all respects, and binding for all time.

 

[bhsmte]

This guy is got to be getting lambasted by religious folks from all sects.

I will say this, what he states is full of logic and the guy has some serious courage.

 

[GrowingSmaller]

Why not 13?

 

[Eudaimonist]

Why not 13?

Because 12 were sufficient?


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[GrowingSmaller]

Maybe but perpaps he wanted to avoid the connotation of the unlucky #13.

 

[Paradoxum]

Maybe but perpaps he wanted to avoid the connotation of the unlucky #13.

I've been watching videos of Spong recently, and he had 13 points in one of them.

I do quite like him to be honest.