Here is the paradox that lies at the heart of this whole project. Although the Enlightenment began as, among other things, a critique of orthodox Christianity, it can function, and in many ways has functioned, as a means of recalling Christianity to genuine history, to its necessary roots. Much Christianity is afraid of history, frightened that if we really find out what happened in the first century our faith will collapse. But without historical enquiry there is no check on Christianity’s propensity to remake Jesus, never mind the Christian god, in its own image. Equally, much Christianity is afraid of scholarly learning, and in so far as the Enlightenment programme was an intellectual venture, Christianity has responded with the simplicities of faith. But, granted that learning without love is sterile and dry, enthusiasm without learning can easily become blind arrogance. Again, much Christianity has been afraid of reducing a supernatural faith to rationalist categories. But the sharp distinction between the ‘supernatural’ and the ‘rational’ is itself a product of Enlightenment thinking, and to emphasize the ‘supernatural’ at the expense of the ‘rational’ or ‘natural’ is itself to capitulate to the Enlightenment worldview at a deeper level than if we were merely to endorse, rather than marginalize, a post-Enlightenment rationalist programme. Wright, N. T. (1992). The New Testament and the People of God (p. 10). London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge.
Posted on: Sat, 03 Jan 2015 21:36:10 +0000
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