Robert Munson's Blog, page 26

Why Did David Grab Five Stones?

This an excerpt from an article I wrote, suggesting the value of midrash discussions on Biblical narratives.

In a group theological reflection, suppose the story of David meeting Goliath is discussed using aggadic midrash. Focusing on the initial part where David enters the field of battle, perhaps one of them, named “Bill,” tells a part of his story.

As young David approached the brook that he had to cross to meet Goliath, all he had with him was a staff and a sling. He looked down and saw many different rocks. Some were flat— a bad choice to launch from a sling. Some had major cracks in them— making their desired impact uncertain. But then he saw some solid looking stones, worn smooth from centuries of water flowing over them. David thinks to himself. ‘Goliath is such a huge man, I must hit him squarely in the forehead to bring him down. I will need one stone for him, but he also has four brothers. I should grab four more stones— one for each of them— to remind myself that they are also a danger to God’s chosen people.

A second story was shared by “Ted”:

Young David reached the brook. Once he crossed the brook, he is in the field of battle. Having only his staff and sling with him, David realized that he had to hit Goliath squarely in a vulnerable place with a stone. Looking down he sees several fine looking stones, smooth and round. He takes what looks like the best one and puts it in his pouch. But then he thought to himself, “But what if I miss, or what if I don’t hit him hard enough?” He reaches down and grabs another fine looking stone. But again he is uncertain. He takes another and another until he has five total. He thinks of taking a sixth but that decides against it. He thinks that he is unlikely to get more than five chances to hit Goliath before he would be upon him. “Oh Lord God, may one of these five stones hit its mark, and may You grant Israel victory over its enemies for Your namesake.” Resolutely, David crossed the stream to face his opponent..

As the group discusses these two stories, they realize that neither story can be confirmed since the Bible is silent on why David grabbed 5 stones (as opposed to 1 or 2 or 19). That being said, as the group reflected on the first story, what insight could be gathered? In it David was super-confident and had special, perhaps prophetic, knowledge about Goliath’s family. For the second story, David is confident of ultimate victory, but seems uncertain as to how it will be accomplished. His trust is in God, not necessarily in his own skill or his ability to predict the future. In my view a discussion by the group would most likely find the second story to be the stronger one, not necessarily because it is historically true, but because it provides a perspective that is useful for us.

Robert H. Munson “Biblical Commentary as Story: Is There a Place for Aggadic Midrash in Oral Cultures?” https://www.academia.edu/108401821/Biblical_Commentary_as_Story_Is_There_a_Place_for_Aggadic_Midrash_in_Oral_Cultures

Storytelling and Samson’s Seven Braids

Something like 40 or 50 years ago I was in church and we had a guest preacher. He was in his 60s, possibly 70s. He gave an interesting little story— probably not true, but perhaps it was. It was something like this…

“When I was a young boy in church, our pastor was preaching, and he was preaching on Samson and Delilah. In the story, Samson reveals to Delilah that he will lose his strength if the seven braids are removed, he would lose his strength. The men of Gaza shave off the seven braids of his head and Samson is conquered. The preacher explained what each of those braids represented. I was enthralled. I was so amazed at the knowledge of our pastor. I thought to myself, ‘If only I could go to Bible School someday, I may learn such wondrous secret things about the Bible.’ I went to Bible School and was surprised to learn that the seven braids did not mean anything at all— it was just how many braids he had..”

For decades this little story reminds me of the temptation toward secret knowledge. I got lured by the enticements of aggressive typology, numerology, and eschatology. I think the story kept a skeptical edge in me. I appreciate that.

But lately I have done some thinking. Judges 16 is where the story of Samson and his seven braids is included. The story mentions his seven braids twice.

Why did it mention seven braids. I really don’t think each braid represented something. Story is whole without that detail. In fact, the story has lots of details missing and the braid thing could have been left out.

But while the number of braids is not necessary to the story… it is beneficial.

In telling the story, the fall is too quick. Samson gave his strength over to the enemy, and the enemy struck. But as a storyteller, the fall can be driven home in stages. He rejected his role as judge— snip and shave off the first braid. He took God’s empowerment and used it for drunken fights— snip and shave off the second braid. He rejected his people as he cavorted with the enemy— snip and shave off the third braid. The story could continue perhaps getting to the dramatic moment. Samson rejected the Torah and in so doing rejected his God— snip and shave of the final braid. Perhaps seven was the number of his braids— I tend to presume historicity. But if it was added for the purpose of the story, then it seems reasonable to assume that seven suggests a total fall.

The braids, then, don’t have actual meaning, but the preacher who used the braids as a framework for his sermon most likely was drawing from the oral roots of the story. Perhaps the only error of the preacher was to share this sermon with some who would confuse fact with rhetorical device.

Top Posts of 2023

The Top Posts During 2023

Beautiful Garden in the Desert (Isaiah 58:11-12) Curiously, this is my top post this year but not on this website. It is a Sermon I wrote years ago.

Sodalities and Modalities in Missions January 4, 2021. Classic missions on sodality and modality structures. The name pretty much describes it.

Medical Mission Events in the Philippines, Part I November 8, 2011. One of my early posts. Part one of a series of posts I wrote that relate to my dissertation on doing medical evangelistic mission event.

The Missionary Journeys of Peter (Part 1) July 5, 2021 One one of a review of St. Peter as potentially providing a structure for primitive church history rather than St, Paul (based on what we know or surmise).

Three Stages of Prophecy and Word November 30, 2016 An article that compares the transition from a prophet (oral word) religion to a religion of the written word in Jewish faith, with the similar transition of the Christian movement from oral word to written word. Considers the implications of that for today.

Nonviolent Response and Self-purification June 20, 2016 Simple look at nonviolent response as described from Martin Luther King Jr.

Cultural Perspective and the Prodigal Son February 5, 2017 Reviewing cultural intelligence and a book on this topic by Osobo Otaigbe.

Growing Your Church in Four Dimensions December 19, 2015. Reviewing the church growth model of Delos Miles.

Cultural Landmines and “The Pineapple Story” October 2, 2020 A (perhaps overly judgment) look at the Missions Story, “The Pineapple Story.”

Five Dangers of Neglecting Exegesis in the Field January 19, 2017 A bit more theological… looking at the importance of good theology (and exegesis) for good ministry (among other things).

Good Reflection on a Silly Question: Is Celebrating Halloween “Conservative” or “Liberal”?

Yes, I know this is an odd question. However it relates to a question I got in class. I was sharing with my class how my home church does “Trick or Trunk” on the Sunday afternoon before Halloween. Our church had around 2000 attendees making it (for our size church) wildly successful.

One students was a bit bothered by this. He believes that Halloween is a bad holiday and therefore churches should avoid being “tainted” by that in any way. He suggested, nicely in truth, that perhaps my openness to churches celebrating, in some way, Halloween is “Liberal.” I assume he means theologically liberal.

In truth, both politically and theologically, I don’t identify as either conservative or liberal— or somewhere in between. The terms are too changeable, and so are I. Also, often the labels appear to be wildly inconsistent where I feel that almost as if a perspective is given a label rather randomly.

As I thought about it, I realize that the celebration of Halloween is actually a good example of this. So here are some thoughts.

#1. Celebrating Halloween is Conservative. I was raised in a theologically conservative, ‘fundamentalist,’ church. In that church we celebrated Halloween with nary a qualm. If Conservative means looking backwards and aligning with the views of others who consider themselves to be Conservative, then celebrating Halloween is certainly Conservative.

#2. Celebrating Halloween is Liberal. There are different models of contextualization (according to Stephen Bevans). The Anthropological model is more in line with Liberal theology, and it is the model most likely to be open to embracing a cultural tradition. With this viewpoint, perhaps it would be appropriate to consider the celebration of Halloween as Liberal.

#3. Celebrating Halloween is Conservative. Conservatism looks to answers from the past and therefore is most likely (hopefully) to take the past seriously. Halloween is decried by some for its pagan roots. However, much of those alleged roots are actually revisionist. Halloween has relatively little to do with European paganism, much less demonism. Additionally, Halloween’s link to the spirit world is tied more to the idea of opposing evil spirits or ghosts rather than embracing them. Thus, from a historical standpoint, celebrating Halloween is more Conservative.

#4. Celebrating Halloween is Liberal. A lot of the people who oppose Halloween would self-identify as Conservative. Regardless of whether this belief makes sense as a liberal versus conservative issue, the labels tend to be more about how people use them than anything else. As such, in this vague sense, celebrating Halloween is Liberal.

In the end, I really don’t think Celebrating Halloween fits neatly into any Liberal/Conservative dichotomy. In fact, it is probably true that nothing much fits into such a dichotomy. I am reminded of the 5th chapter of the Epistle of Diognetus— a wonderful early Christian workd that speaks of how Christians are fully immersed in their cultures that in most ways they blend right in, but in specific ways stand in contrast to it. This I believe fits into Stephen Bevan’s Countercultural Model of contextualization. That model is often thought of as being Conservative, even though I believe it could be argued either as Liberal (agent of conservation) and Conservative (agent of change).

Even looking at this— the “liberal” perspective aligning with conservation, and “conservative” perspective aligning with change does show, I think, how somewhat random the labels are.

Labels can be useful, but sometimes that are lazy. Once we put a label on something we often put a judgment on it— good or bad. However, instead it is better to go through the process of thoughtful, spirit-led, reflection— ignoring what labels people will place on the topic…. or on you.

Ethics and Accountability in Missions

I recently bought a book titled “Serving Jesus with Integrity: Ethics and Accountability in Mission” edited by Dwight Baker and Doug Hayward. On a quick glance through, it looks like it should be a good read.

It got me thinking. I used to be a mechanical engineer. I served as an Engineering Officer in the Navy for 5 years, and as a mechanical design engineer for 8 years. I also have both a BS and an MS in Mechanical Engineering. That adds up to about 20 years. In all of those 20 years, I never received any training on engineering ethics. That is not to say, such a course does not exist. I have seen it in college catalogues before. However, it was never a core or required course, and it was never recommended for me to take. Serving in an engineering role, I never was in a seminar on that topic either.

I was in the US Navy, as noted before— a little over 5 years active. I don’t recall ever having an ethics class at OCS, SWS, NPC, NPP, or any shorter training. I vaguely remembering taking leadership training at Officer Candidate School with some talk of martial virtues (I think). However, more training was on law (Uniform Code of Military Justice— UCMJ, and Non-Judicial Punishment—NJP).

At seminary, we were required to take Christian Ethics. It had value in high end thoughts of ethics— like deontological versus teleological, or absolutist versus non-absolutist systems. Then ethics is applied to hot-topic current issues. The course is valuable… but a bit uncertain as to its relevance in regular ministry. I think it has value, but there is commonly a need for ethics that are specific to individual ministries.

In the book that my wife and I wrote on Clinical Pastoral Care, we had a section on ethics as it applied to pastoral counselors or clinical chaplains. In this, relevant topics would be such things as confidentiality, referral, exploitation.

I have never taken course on missionary ethics. However, there are so many ways in which a missionary can be unethical— issues of contextual ethics, as well as professional and ministerial ethics. Hopefully the book will be a big help.

Some Spot-on Literary Criticism Theories from… Reddit?

My son sent me a post from the r/tumblr by David J. Prokopetz. It is meant to be humorous but also a bit serious. As Prokopetz notes in the comments, “I am never more serious than when I’m joking.”

I am going to paraphrase his post, adjusting it more for Biblical Criticism. The areas in quotation marks are verbatim from the post.

Death of the Author. “Treating the author’s stated intention of their own work as merely one opinion among many, rather than the authoritative Word of God.”

Disappearance of the Author. Reading and interpreting a passage of Scripture as if it just popped into existence at that exact moment. As such, its history, context of writing, intended audience, and original language has no relevance to the reader.

Taxidermy of the Author. (Somewhat of a logical follow-on to the previous theory.) The interpretation of a Scripture passage, based on Disappearance of the Author, can be used to infer what the history, context of writing, intended audience, and authorial intent must be.

Undeath of the Author. Judge the writer, not for what they actually wrote, but on “every possible reading of their work, even one’s they could not reasonably have anticipated at the time of its authorship.”

Frankenstein’s Monster of the Author. Interpreting scripture not based on what the original text actually says, but rather on later translations, paraphrases, or adaptations of the passage.

Weekend at Bernie’s of the Author. Believing the author would personally support your interpretation and defend you against the ignorant rabble, if it were possible for them to be present.

https://prokopetz.net/>

A Research Article on Power of Myth

Years ago in Ethnography class, we our class did a research on the importance and role of Horror media and Filipino supernatural with youth in Baguio City.

The supernatural referred here is not necessarilly the same way that Americans think of it. Much of the Filipino supernatural is the green section in the figure below— that is, supernatural but grounded in the natural world. This would be the green section in the figure below. Filipino Spirit World: A Challenge for the Church (International Academic Pub., 2001); as well as Paul G. Hiebert, Anthropological Reflections on Missiological Issues. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1994), Chapter 6.>

Looking back, I realize that research and analysis is a bit inadequate. However, I still like the theological reflection.

The article is available here: “Fear Film and Faith Insights into the Perspective of High School Youth in Baguo City, Philippines.”

Article on Storytelling for Theological Reflection

I recently wrote an article titled: “Biblical Commentary as Story: Is There a Place for Aggadic Midrash in Oral Cultures?”

https://www.academia.edu/108401821/Biblical_Commentary_as_Story_Is_There_a_Place_for_Aggadic_Midrash_in_Oral_Cultures?source=swp_share

What is “Biblical” Anyway?

I have written some on different forms of Christian counseling. My wife is a Board Certified Clinical Chaplain and Board Certified Pastoral Counselor, as well as a Diplomate in Pastoral Supervision. Obviously, she is more of an expert on this topic than I am, but I am the one who likes to write.

Anyway, I was reading dissertation, I believe came out of Liberty University, speaking of different forms of Christian counseling, and it referenced a “Powerpoint “presentation that I created years ago to give a flavor of the different forms of counseling in Christian circles. The writer seemed to find that presentation useful, but gave a comment that I found odd. He said that some of the forms of counseling that I described are “Biblical” and some are not.

I avoid using the term Biblical for pretty much all Christian ministry because it is often used as a “Gatekeeper” term. “Oh, THIS form of worship is ‘Biblical,’ unlike THAT one which isn’t.” Or perhaps, “This type of church planting is good unlike that other one because this is ‘Biblical.'”

In counseling this is an especially egregious use of the term “Biblical” because often it is used to reduce counseling to almost meaningless.

—At its worst, “Biblical Counseling” becomes verse-dropping. “Oh, you are feeling depressed, well then read THIS verse.” “If you have are struggling with anxiety, you need to read this verse that says we are supposed to be ‘anxious for nothing.'” This is so far short of a “Biblical use of Scripture” that it is almost “anti-counseling.” Frankly, if this was counseling, then the counselor should be replaced by a Nave’s Topical Bible, or perhaps a Thompson Chain Reference Bible.

—Almost as bad is some versions of Nouthetic Counseling. At its best, this is perfectly fine. Confrontation, Concern, and Change (See more here). There are times when confrontation with God’s Word is appropriate. However, often (according to Scripture) it is not. When someone is disconsolate, the Bible doesn’t say to confront with Scripture. It says (II Cor. 1) that we are to give comfort reflecting the comfort we have received from God. When someone is weak, we are not supposed to confront them with Scriputure— rather, we are supposed to ‘bear one another’s burdens,’ and ‘comfort one another.’ Sometimes Nouthetic Counseling has drifted into behavioristic focus, and emphasis on person sin (what the counselee has done) rather than sin done unto them, or the ravages of living in a sinful, broken world. Does that make it always wrong? No. but if the model becomes a Bed of Procrustes, forcing counseling into that vein, it becomes sub-Biblical.

Good counsel needs the whole of Scripture rather than just one method, or a few verses. And this problem of “Biblical” doesn’t simply apply to counseling.

Consider Church Discipline. I have seen Church Bylaws that essentially say, “We apply Matthew 18 to Church Discipline.” I have no problem with that, but some suggest that applying Matthew 18 is Biblical Discipline. It most certainly is not. I have seen people who have learned to “game the system” by knowing how to do bad things in the church context and get away with it by living in the cracks of Matthew 18. That is the problem of confusing “Matthew 18 Discipline” with Biblical Discipline. I can’t hep but think that Jesus would jump in on this and say, “I didn’t replace the whole of Scripture with three verses” on the topic of discipline in the community of faith.

There are descriptions of what is Biblical fund-raising, Biblical church-plainting, Biblical missions, Biblical worship, and more. Often the term “Biblical” means something like, “Oh… we have found a verse or more that we can say our ___________ is based on.” In other cases, it is “Someone in the Bible did it this way, so we are doing thing Biblical, if we can see connections between what they do, and what we are doing.” Is that comforting? I suppose. I do think that Barnabas and Paul gave a good model for pioneer missions, but just repeating what they did could be inappropriate in a very different context. After all, even Paul and company did adjust to different contexts (sometimes successfully and sometimes less so).

So what is Biblical?

#1. Biblical ministry is based on truth. But if all truth is God’s truth (I know people who don’t like the feel of that statement, but it is still true) then one does not have to apologize for gaining from all of God’s truth.

#2. Biblical ministry is based on good theology. Good theology draws from the whole of Scripture… not just from a concordance or topical Bible.

#3. Biblical ministry is contextual. The Bible, unlike many other works thought of as holy scriptures, was created in more than one culture. As such, we know that good ministry looks different in different contexts. As such, we know (or are supposed to know) that Biblical does not simply mean “Do ministry exactly like the Jews did in 7th century BC in Jerusalem” or “Do ministry exactly like Hellenistic Jews and Greeks did in 1st century Corinth.” Arguably, if we copy things exactly in a completely different culture (21st century Philippines, for example) we are definitely NOT being Biblical.

#4. Biblical ministry is in line with the Great Commandment. As important as the Great Commission is, it is an application of the Great Commandment. That also means that it is subservient to the Great Commandment. Biblical ministry that is not focused on love (of God and others) is not Biblical, no matter how big vision or big numbers the work is.

Over- and Under-Contextualization

I have long struggled with the terms Over-contextualization, Under-contextualization, and Non-contextualization.

Paul Hiebert (using terms “uncritical contextualization” and “non-contextualization) stated that the danger of the former is syncretism (unhealthy degradation of essential aspects of the Christian faith by non-Christian beliefs within the recipients’ culture) while for the latter, the concern is a “foreign gospel” of a practice of Christianity where a ‘thin veneer’ of Christian practices covers non-Christian worldview and beliefs.

I find this valuable… but would also agree with Jackson Wu in stating that non-contextualization (we are speaking from the missionary’s perspective) still leads to syncretism— the unhealthy mixing of Christian beliefs with non-Christian belief’s in the missionary’s culture. I am a missionary from the United States who serves in Asia. If any American’s think that Christianity is not detrimentally affected by American culture… well, you really need to get out more (as in visit places outside of the US and meet Christians from other countries).

I really don’t have problem with Hiebert’s work on Critical Contextualization beyond the clarification by Wu. However, other terms used by some is under-contextualization (a failure to contextualize the Gospel message adequately for it to be understandable and resonant in a new setting) and over-contextualization (a failure coming from damaging the message of the Gospel in an attempt to contextualize the Gospel in a new setting).

This seems simple enough, except I have heard some examples of over-contextualization and under-contextualization that sound like each other. I mean, some examples of of under-contextualization sound to me like over-contextualization (and vice versa).

Perhaps the problem is perspective. Consider the diagram below.

Suppose we are looking at three cultures— the home culture of the missionary, the home culture of the recipient (that of the mission field from the perspective of the missionary), and “Bible culture” (more on this later).

Suppose a missionary (Timothy) leaves his home (I will assume Australia for this example) and goes to Indonesia (again for this example) to evangelize and plant churches.

Suppose people are led to Christ and begin to form into a community of the faithful. Timothy then is discipling the believers and in doing so makes sure that the new believers dress the way he dresses, listens to the “Christian” music he listens to, gathers in church groups in a manner very similar to his own churches back home and (perhaps most importantly) teaches them answers that resonate with him to questions that are relevant in Australia (rather than giving answers that resonate with Indonesian believers to questions of concern to Indonesians). We might describe this as non-contextualization, as Hiebert would. I don’t have a problem with that.

But is it over-contextualization or under-contextualization. It depends on the perspective. From the Indonesian perspective, it is under-contextualization. But from the Australian perspective it is arguably over-contextualization— that is, contextualized so much to the Australian setting that it is not relevant or resonant with the Indonesian setting. If Timothy, in an effort to make the message “hit home” with Indonesians, waters down the message and sets aside critical aspects of the faith, one could say that the gospel message with over-contextualized to the Indonesian setting. One could also, in theory, say that this over-contextualized message for Indonesia is under-contextualized for Australia, but we normally would not think of it that way, except in “reverse missions.”

Looking at the figure above… one might say the red-circle defines “orthodoxy.” Within that circle, the Christian faith is sound and outside of it is not. Of course, there is no such clear line of demarcation. The border is “fuzzy.” Still, conceptually one can imagine that there is a range of beliefs and practices that could be considered orthodox (even if not everyone agrees on what the range is) and there are places where one has drifted out of bounds (pulling the sports analogy from Stephen Bevans).

The Yellow colors those areas where over-contextualization occurs. It can happen with regards to the Missionary culture, with the Recipient culture, and (yes) with the Bible culture. Periodically restoration movements seek to do things because “the ancient Israelites did things that way” or because “the first century Hellenistic church did things that way.” While that feels right. the Bible is pretty clear that neither the Jews nor the Greeks got things completely correct.

So what should a properly contextualized faith look like in a culture? Well, I would like to suggest three things:

It should have a resemblance to the Universal church. It’s uniqueness should not undermine the fact that it is part of the Body of Christ. Particularist groups often are at risk in this area. When such groups suggest that “we are the only true church” and all others are damned, I think such a group is in a dangerous place. Additionally, when a group says, “We don’t value the critique or dialogue with other Christian groups because they simply don’t understand our truth and situation” I think such a group is in a very dangerous situation.It should resonate with the culture. It should address issues and concerns that people are asking (or feeling without verbalizing). It should ‘scratch where it itches’ and bring new answers that are from outside but expressible with insider language and concepts.It should scandalize the culture. The gospel will always, in some ways, scandalize or challenge whatever culture it is in. If it doesn’t, that doesn’t mean that this culture is so awesome, but that the message of the gospel is over-contextualized.

I would like to clarify the drawing a bit.

A. While I show different cultures at the vertex of the triangle. Rather, one can think of the culture as radiating from such a vertex with a wide range of beliefs and and variety of people that fit loosely into the culture. The drawing below attempts to show that. Cultures overlap with other cultures. In fact, the overlap on a LOT because we are all humans and are driven by very similar needs.

B. All cultures agrees with the Gospel message in some ways or may even be resonant with it— and this could be suggested by that part of the culture that is in the green section. All cultures also will be scandalized by the Gospel message and this would be what is in the yellow.

Whenever a missionary shares the gospel in such a way that the green and yellow are in some ways obscured, there is over-contextualization. Over-contextualization to the missionary culture will look at the recipient culture as bad… and reject aspects, including aspects that are good. Alternatively over-contextualizing the recipient culture takes away some critical aspects of scandal where the message no longer gives prophetic voice to change.