Scriptorium Daily
Yesterday and the day before, I led two class discussions on the writings of Gregory of Nazianzus, one of the Doctors of the Church (this blog is a synthesis of the two discussions). Gregory made an intriguing comment in his Five Theological Orations: “Once we have removed from our discussions all alien elements, and dispatched the great legion into the herd of swine to rush down into the abyss, the next step to take is to look at ourselves and to smooth the theologian in us, like a statue, into beauty” (from The First Theological Oration, “An Introductory Sermon against the Eunomians, Section 7). This prompted me to ask the class: “Is heresy a necessary step to orthodoxy?” or to put it another way, “Does good theology have to be preceded by bad theology?”
At face value, it seems that the answer is no. Why does the affirmation of truth necessitate the prior presence of falsehood? Ah, but therein lies the problem: Christians often equate truth and theology just because theology is true. That is a logical misstep. Theology (the study of God, or lit. “God talk”) is the articulation of truth, it is not truth itself. There is a huge difference. Truth exists; but heresy causes us to articulate that truth, and that articulation is called theology. After all, all Christians believe in the Trinity, but can they articulate it? Most have difficulty. They are able to believe in that truth, but they can’t theologize about it. It took heretics to cause theologians to come up with orthodox teachings on the Trinity, to put to words the truth that they’ve recognized all along.
C.S. Lewis wrote in Mere Christianity, “A man feels wet when he falls into water, because man is not a water animal: a fish would not feel wet.” The implication is that, if you are surrounded by something and are never given the chance to know anything different, are you able to comprehend or articulate what it is you’re experiencing? I would say no. A fish (if it were able to talk) would not be able to describe water unless it has experienced what it is like to be out of water. The sensation of air would cause the fish to understand water better than it ever has before, even though it has constantly been immersed in water.
This brings me to an extrapolated principle: we appreciate and understand something a lot better once we have experienced the lack of that something. Many of the Ecumenical Councils throughout church history were convened to refute a heresy. If it were not for heretics like Arius, Apollinarius, and Nestorius, would we have the beauty of the Chalcedonian Confession? There would be no need because it would just be universally assented to. Heretics who articulated wrong theology caused people to articulate right theology.
Take inerrancy, for instance. It was never an issue until the twentieth century. Up until then, it was assumed by all Christians. Ask any Christian before the twentieth century, and inerrancy would have puzzled them, because was there any other possibility? Either you believed it or you didn’t. However, once liberal text criticism came to the fore, inerrancy had to be brought in to combat suspicion about Scriptural authority.
Let me take my extrapolated principle one step further: if we appreciate and understand something a lot better once we have experienced the lack of that something (thus good theology, i.e. articulation of truth, was only necessary after heresy crept in), do we appreciate God’s love more when we have sinned?
This begs the question: did Adam & Eve not appreciate God’s love as much pre-Fall (because it was just assumed), and only after the Fall did they realize God’s love once it had been withdrawn from them? I would say yes. I point to two passages that seem to suggest this:
1) Luke 7:36-50 tells the story of the sinful woman who anointed Jesus and washed his feet. Jesus made the observation that the one who has had the bigger debt cancelled will love more: “Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven—for she loved much. But he who is forgiven little, loves little.”
2) The parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32) shows the joyful reaction of the “sinful” younger son who experiences great joy and celebration upon being re-accepted by his father. He knew the depth of his depravity and thus he was able to appreciate how great was his restoration. The “righteous” older son, who did very little wrong, could not enjoy his father’s love. He lives in the presence of the father’s constant love, like the fish in water, and therefore took for granted his father’s love since he never had the contrast of losing it.
So if God’s love is most fully appreciated by those who have sinned, does this mean that we ought to “continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means!” (Romans 6:1-2). The point is not that we ought to sin more to experience God’s love more, but if you happen to find yourself in a situation in which you are without God, that will cause you to appreciate him more.
There is an expression, “There are no atheists in foxholes,” which I think suggests that those who are most lacking are the ones who hold most tightly to God. When you’re in the middle of war in a foxhole and the bombs are exploding all around you, your degrees, money, education, relationships, and abilities don’t matter anymore. You are stripped of everything but prayer because you could die any second. It is similar with the poor; they can either “curse God and die,” or they can hold more tightly to their only safety line, whereas the rich and powerful have many safety lines and don’t often “need” to turn to God.
By analogy, to move from a physical to a spiritual understanding, those who are most sinful often have no other recourse than to hold tightly to God. Steven Curtis Chapman wrote a song called “Angels Wish” suggesting that angels are jealous of sinful humans because humans have experienced God’s mercy and angels haven’t. Here is the chorus:
Well, I can’t fly, at least not yet,
I’ve got no halo on my head,
And I can’t even start to picture heaven’s beauty.
But I’ve been shown the Savior’s love.
The grace of God has raised me up
To show me things the angels long to look into—
And I know things the angels only wish they knew.
If angels don’t know God’s mercy, do they fully know God? Isn’t God’s mercy such an integral part of who he is? As such, humans have experienced the full range of God—not just his love, but also his wrath; not just his judgment, but also his mercy. And I’d say, that as a result, humans can articulate the full range of God’s character more fully than angels can. And as such, we have “good theology.”
So, is heresy a necessary precursor to orthodoxy? Does good theology necessitate prior bad theology? Can you appreciate something good if you have not experienced the opposite (the bad)? And does this mean that we have to be sinful to really experience the fullness of God?
Is what I just wrote heretical? You tell me.
