Different Theologians on the Holy Spirit

Here are some theologians and some "pithy" statements describing their pneumatology.

Enjoy!

Chelle

1. Augustine: The Spirit is the bond of Love between the Father and the Son.

2. Irenaeus: The Son and the Spirit are the two hands of God.

3. St. Basil: The Spirit is the perfecting cause.

4. Richard of St. Victor: The Holy Spirit is the motor outward of God.

5. Wolfhart Pannenberg: The Spirit is a force field. (NOT like on Star Trek!)

6. Jurgen Moltmann: "wherever there is a passion for life, there the Spirit of God is operating" (Karkkainen, Pneumatology, 126)

7. Karl Barth: the Spirit is always in relation to Christ, mediating Christ (the Word of Christ) to people's hearts

8. Clark Pinnock: The Flame of Love OR The sex dude... 

9. John Zizioulas: Eastern Orthodox. The Trinity as an Ontology of Communion. The Spirit and the Son work in parallel: "The work of the Spirit is not the subordinate to the work of the Son, nor is Pentecost a continuation of the incarnation but rather its sequel, its result." (Karkkainen, Pneumatology, 109)

10. Elizabeth Johnson: The Holy Spirit as Sophia, or wisdom.

11. Karl Rahner: The Spirit has a universal orientation. He talks about 'anonymous Christians', as people who are Christians but just don't know it yet. In other words, the Spirit is at work in them.

12. Robert Jenson: Lutheran theologian who believes that the Spirit is moving Christianity back to being one Holy catholic/Catholic Church.

13. Stan Grenz: We are made in the image of God, therefore we have been created for community. The Spirit constitutes and dwells in the Community of God.

14. Elizabeth Schussler-Fiorenza: scholar who rigorously and passionately argues for the recognition of women in the establishing and forming of the Christian tradition. The Holy Spirit moved women into prominent positions in ministry back then, why not today?

15. Mark I. Wallace: Green or Ecological Pneumatology.

16. Karen Baker-Fletcher: The Spirit is at work today in our lives and is the resurrection (as in the resurrection of Jesus) and the resurrecting power (as in for us) of God, even in the darkest places of evil and oppression. 

Gordon Fee: Gender and Translation

As I was poking around the web for a picture of Gordon Fee, I found this article on Gender and Translation. This is a co-authored piece with Mark Strauss. I thought that some of you might be interested in this discussion. Enjoy!

• "Gender and Translation" by Gordon Fee and Mark Strauss

Gordon Fee

A few people asked if I would put the Fee quotes from this week's lecture on Kenosis up on the class blog. Since I'm not sure which quotes or ideas provoked further contemplation, I'll just put up my lecture and notes. If there were other quotes or ideas that you were interested in exploring, just let me know. Don't forget that all of my lectures and slides are posted in the class folder.

Gordon Fee: Defining Kenosis

Biblical theologian, Gordon Fee, can help us establish a different understanding of kenosis.[1] In his commentary on Philippians, Fee points out that the phrases ‘did not consider equality with God something to be grasped’ and ‘made himself nothing’ function together in the poetic form of the hymn. These two ideas play off each other, saying something similar.

Unfortunately, this pairing of phrases has often been translated or understood to mean that Jesus gave up or emptied out his divinity or something vital to his being. As if Jesus, in the incarnation, was like a bag that could only carry so much stuff and had to be emptied out in order to enable the incarnation. All the God-stuff had to be taken out of the bag.[2] Fee argues that the first phrase ‘did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,’ points to the reality of Jesus, that he truly was God. This identity as God was not something that he desired; it was always his from eternity.[3] He also notes that some commentators translate ‘to grasp’ [harpagmos] in a manner more unto being. That being God, Jesus did not grasp or seize, because that is not the way God is. Power, leadership, kingship is about service not about the grasping of power.[4] Fee seems to agree with this idea that the life of Christ reveals what God-likeness is. “Rather, his ‘equality with God’ found its truest expression when ‘he emptied himself’.”[5]

Fee asserts that the primary theological mistake in this passage has hinged on the assumption that if Jesus emptied himself [ekenosen] he emptied himself of something, rather than it being a statement of identity. This person, Jesus Christ, did not grasp at equality with God (he was God) and the one who didn’t grasp poured himself out by taking the form of a slave.[6] “God is not an acquisitive being, grasping and seizing, but self-giving for the sake of other.”[7] Thus this passage is talking more about the nature of who Jesus is rather than what was given up.[8]

Fee’s argument reminds me of the concept of perichoresis, as a gifting and giving of being from the Father, Son and the Spirit. This self-giving is the way of God. Thus, Christ’s self-giving and emptying is an eternal a continuous way of being. This is not given up in the incarnation—this can be seen in how he relates to the Father and the Spirit throughout his ministry. Jesus is given from the Father the renewed gift of the Holy Spirit at his baptism. This is the inauguration of his ministry. It is interesting that in the synoptic Gospels, immediately after his baptism, Jesus is lead by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by Satan. It is here that he truly does not grasp after power and authority. He takes no privileges—because the rule of the world was his by right—and remains a servant. He does not take the easy way toward Lordship that is offered to him. And, as the Christ hymns proclaims, it is in this way of not grasping and of pouring himself out as a servant for the sake of others that Jesus is exalted as Lord over all of creation.

---

[1] Gordon Fee, Paul’s Letter to the Philippians, 191-214, esp. 210-214.
[2] Though this is not really Kathryn Tanner’s articulation, I got this idea from her. Check out her discussion of the Chalcedonian definition in Tanner, Jesus, Humanity and the Trinity.
[3] Fee, 208.
[4] Cf. Fee, 206 for the discussion of harpagmos, which seems even more difficult to translate than kenosis.
[5] Fee, 208.
[6] Fee, 210.
[7] Fee, 211.
[8] Here is how Fee sums up his argument: “In Christ Jesus God has thus shown his true nature; this is what it means for Christ to be ‘equal with God’—to pour himself out for the sake of others and to do so by taking the role of a slave. Hereby he not only reveals the character of God, but from the perspective of the present context also reveals what it means for us to be created in God’s image, to bear his likeness and have his ‘mindset.’ It means taking the role of the slave for the sake of others…” (Fee, 214.)

C. S. Lewis

     This past summer I taught a class on C. S. Lewis. A graduating student had seen this class listed in the academic catalogue and asked me if I would teach it. I said yes with a little reluctance. Though I had read all of Lewis' fiction before, I had rarely read with much attention or care his non-fiction works.  


     I have to admit that I have been suspicious of how people (evangelicals in particular) say the name of Lewis with such reverence. "Well, as C. S. Lewis once said..." He is the 'thinking Christian's' patron saint and the champion of wisdom over knowledge. Oh, and everyone likes to read about talking animals. 


     Regardless of my previous prejudices, Lewis completely won me over. He is remarkably insightful and wisely subversive. When I say subversive I mean that he sees into the culture (both Christian and secular) and knows how to subtly deconstruct previous ways of understanding and then reframe the conversation with wit and depth. 


     What also surprised me was the relevancy of his voice. Even though he died in 1963, he addresses the same issues as students today wrestle to understand. I think part of this is because he lived in a culture (20th century war-torn Britain--Lewis fought in WWI and lost his best friend) that struggled with the relevancy of faith. Where was God in the midst of such evil and destruction? Or even, why believe in God when science and philosophy have shown the sheer ridiculousness of Christianity? 


     Despite all of this, Lewis--with the help of such friends as J. R. R. Tolkien and Charles Williams--moved through his own atheism and then deism back to Christianity. This formed his thought and his pursuit for God. He speaks to the sincere yet cynical soul who is not sure if the God of their youth is really viable anymore. How do we pursuit God in an age of cynicism? Lewis seems to know how to lead the way...


     In class I read the very beginning of Lewis' famous sermon, "The Weight of Glory." In this sermon he talks about 'desire.' This is a very important theme for Lewis in his writings. He believed that the telling of stories had the power to awaken desire in the human heart. More specifically he talked about desire as Sehnsucht, that desire and longing for God's presence; a heart sickness for home. For example, Reepicheep, the chief of the mice in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, had a Sehnsucht for Aslan's country. As a theology teacher, I often wonder what it means to awaken desire for God. Again, Lewis is able to lead the way... 

“If you asked twenty good men to-day what they thought the highest of the virtues, nineteen of them would reply, Unselfishness. But if you asked almost any of the great Christians of old he would have replied, Love. You see what has happened? A negative term has been substituted for a positive, and this is of more than philological importance. The negative ideal of Unselfishness carries with it the suggestion not primarily of securing good things for others, but of going without them ourselves, as if our abstinence and not their happiness was the important point. I do not think this is the Christian virtue of Love. The New Testament has lots to say about self-denial, but not about self-denial as an end in itself. We are told to deny ourselves and to take up our crosses in order that we may follow Christ; and nearly every description of what we shall ultimately find if we do so contains an appeal to desire. If there lurks in most modern minds the notion that to desire our own good and earnestly to hope for the enjoyment of it is a bad thing, I submit that this notion has crept in from Kant and the Stoics and is no part of the Christian faith. Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.” ("The Weight of Glory")