February 17, 2003
ANOTHER VIEW:
'Man-made' theology can be conduit for divine revelation
___By Roger Olson
___Many Christians are more than a little bit confused about theology. That's understandable; the word "theology" has several popular meanings. One writer of a letter to the Baptist Standard caught my attention and provoked me to think about how most people in the pews--and perhaps some in the pulpits as well--understand theology.
___The writer called a new proposal for interpreting God's omniscience "man-made theology."
ROGER OLSON
___In fact, all theology is "man-made." The letter writer's own theology is man-made. To claim otherwise would be to claim that some human person can think God's thoughts after him. Few, if any, Christian theologians have ever claimed that ability. To claim it would be tantamount to confusing oneself with God.
___The prophet Isaiah quoted God as saying, "My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord" (Isaiah 55:8).
___The Apostle Paul admitted that even he only knew in part and looked into the mysteries of God as at puzzles, or enigmas (1 Corinthians 13:12). Only when Christ returns, Paul continued, will we know fully.
___Theology is not "thinking God's thoughts after him." Theology is human reflection on God's word guided by tradition, reason and experience. God's word in Scripture is not theology; it is divinely inspired communication from God through human authors.
___God's word stands above theology as the United States Constitution stands above the deliberations of even Supreme Court judges. Theology is analogous to the deliberations of the judges as they seek to interpret the Constitution in light of previous high court rulings using reason and their experience as jurists. Theologians, however, are not judges; they are servants of the churches whose task is to examine what is believed and taught in light of God's word and construct faithful and relevant models of revelation for the health of the churches and all believers. They do this as human beings and not as gods; the theologians of the past are fallible as are those of the present.
___Theology is fallible human reflection that aims at purifying Christian belief by eliminating unbiblical elements from it and bringing it more closely into correspondence with God's word. But as Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote:Our little systems ___Theology literally means "God wisdom." A looser translation of the compound word that is composed of two Greek words--"Theos" for God and "logos" for thought, wisdom, understanding--is "thinking about God." An ancient Christian definition of theology is "faith seeking understanding."
have their day;
They have their day
and cease to be.
They are but broken lights
of Thee
And Thou, O God,
art more than they.
___Theology, then, is the secondary language of the church. The primary language of the church is the language of faith, which expresses back to God and to each other the truths God has revealed in prayer, praise, worship and proclamation. There is a sense in which it might be better to say that theology comes third rather than second. The primary speech is God's to us--in Jesus Christ and in the scriptural witness to him. The secondary speech of the church is its own doxological--having to do with worship--language of worship. The third speech is that of the theologians, and every Christian is a theologian in some sense. In theology we ask, "Are we being faithful to the primary and secondary speech of God and of the church's historical witness in worship in what we teach and believe about God?" And we do our best with God's help to purify the language of belief of alien concepts and correlate it ever more closely with God's own word in Jesus Christ and Scripture.
___What of doctrine, then? Where does it fit into this scheme of theology in relation to divine revelation and human reflection? Doctrine is the collective belief of the church or of a group of churches. To be sure, there is doctrine in Scripture as well. But the moment we go beyond biblical language in affirming truth about God that ought to be believed, we are creating human doctrine.
___That's part of the process of theology--to construct right doctrine, such as the Trinity, and to critique imperfect doctrine and bring it more into line with revelation using tradition, reason and experience as tools of reflection. Theologians are the servant scholars of the churches in this process; they do not dictate anything, but they recommend ways in which doctrine might be adjusted and expressed.
___Bad theology attempts to adjust the substance of doctrine to culture, while good theology seeks to adjust it to greater faithfulness to God's word. Bad theology insists that past formulations of doctrine be treated as God's word itself and kept aloof from all critical reflection or relevant re-expression to culture. Good theology recognizes the difference between doctrine--beyond quoting passages of Scripture--and divine revelation and seeks to relate sound doctrine to culture in intelligible ways.
___What does all this add up to practically? The need for sound theology should be obvious; it's the only alternative to unsound theology. Reflection on God's word in the light of tradition, reason and experience is always happening--even where it doesn't wear the label "theology."
___But what I'm afraid many good Christian folks fail to realize is the importance of listening carefully to unfamiliar voices and new ideas arising from faithful, committed theological reflection. The great Reformation happened because Luther challenged the accepted ideas about salvation of his time. No doubt some of his critics labeled his doctrine of justification by grace through faith alone "man-made theology." Well, he'd be the first to admit it, insofar as it went beyond just the words of Scripture. However, it offered a much-needed corrective to the theology and even to the doctrine of his day.
___The first Baptists were rejected as heretics and fanatics by defenders of the status quo--infant baptism. Let us not over-react negatively to voices from within the community of God-fearing, Bible-believing, Jesus-loving people who seek to correct and improve the accepted ideas about God and salvation so long as they are basing their corrections and improvements on God's word and not on culture or subjective experience.
___All theology is man-made. The only question is: What might God want to say through it to us? We'll only know as we patiently listen and discern the quality of the message through Spirit-led and Scripture-guided study.
___Roger Olson is professor of theology at Baylor University's George W. Truett Theological Seminary
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