SS: I just joined the Thomas F. Torrance `fan' page on Facebook (I've been a Torrance fan since the 80s) and I found a bunch of online lectures/papers etc including this one. I noticed Colin Gunton's `The One, the Three and the Many' in one of your book lists (at your `between' blog). Both Gunton and Torrance have (survived in their work) much to tell us ...
`That Thomas F. Torrance is a scientific theologian seems beyond dispute. But that he may also be understood as a theologian of culture is a permission given us through a consideration of his doctrine of God as triune Creator, his doctrine of creation as contingent, and his doctrine of humanity as a mediator of order and priest of creation, whose work results in, and is enabled by, the development of social coefficients of truth. If Torrance provides us with the fundamental assumptions and dynamics necessary for the development of a theology of culture, then we are also given permission to begin to see his work in this light and to develop it toward this end.'
JE: What I'm particularly interested in, I think, is the Trinity as a pattern for aspects of life which is why I enjoyed Gunton's 'The One, the Three and the Many' with its exploration of the implications of God in relation within himself as Trinity through the transcendentals – relationality, substantiality and perichoresis – which Gunton argues underpin all pattern and connection within the created order. This has similarities with Dorothy L. Sayers in 'The Mind of the Maker' and Christian Schumacher in 'God in Work'.
Gunton uses his theology of creation to identify three concepts that he calls (drawing on Coleridge) ‘open transcendentals’. That is, “possibilities for thought which are universal in scope yet open in their application” Gunton’s three open transcendentals are: relationality (“[a]ll things are what they are by being particulars constituted by many and various forms of relation”, p. 229); perichoresis (“all things are what they are in relations of mutual constitutiveness with all other things”, p. 178); and substantiality (all things are “substantial beings, having their own distinct and particular existence, by virtue of and not in the face of their relationality to the other”, p. 194). Sociality is a description of the social relation of personal beings, “their free relation-in-otherness” (Gunton, p. 229.). Gunton notes that, outside of God and humanity, “the rest of the creation … does not have the marks of love and freedom which are among the marks of the personal” and so cannot be said to be characterised by sociality.
Within the creation stories, sociality is seen in the joint working in which God and Adam shared to find a helper for Adam (Genesis 2: 15 - 25) and the conversation between God, Adam and Eve in Genesis 3: 8 - 19. Dorothy Sayers remarked on the fact that the one thing we know for sure about God at the point that he makes humanity in his own image is that he is creative [D. L. Sayers, The Mind of the Maker (Methuen & Co. Ltd. 1941)]. She argues that it is therefore logical to suppose that creativity is a significant aspect of humanity’s being made in the image of God. Within the creation stories human creativity is seen in: God’s blessing of humanity which included the tasks of increasing in number, filling and subduing the earth and, ruling over living creatures (Genesis 1: 28); Adam’s working and taking care of the garden (Genesis 2: 15); and, Adam’s naming of the living creatures (Genesis 2: 20). Albert Wolters brings both sociality and creativity together when he comments that: “Adam and Eve, as the first married couple, represent the beginnings of societal life; their task of tending the garden, the primary task of agriculture, represents the beginnings of cultural life" [A. M. Wolters, Creation Regained: Biblical Basics for a Reformational Worldview (Carlisle: Paternoster Press, 1996), p. 37].
Among those who have developed practical proposals for the implementation of relationality, perichoresis and substantiality through sociality and creativity are:
· Christian Schumacher with his system of work structuring outlined in God in Work: Discovering the divine pattern for work in the new millennium (Oxford, Lion Publishing plc, 1998);
· David Lee and Michael Schluter with the dimensions of relational proximity which they outline in The R Factor (Hodder & Stoughton, 1993).
Schumacher draws on Sayers and Distributionism to create a Trinitarian model while Lee and Schluter draw on the work of Christopher Wright who argues that the Israelite society of the Old Testament provides a paradigm for contemporary Christian lifestyle.
Gunton makes his argument based on Coleridge's work on transcendentals, which I haven't read in any depth, but was interested to have Coleridge's thought commended again in reading Dru's book on Charles Péguy. Not sure that any of this relates to Torrance particularly.
SS: Yes, at first blush I'm going to suggest that Torrance provides a lot of deep background in both patristics and quantum physics (and scientific ideas and history thereof) that hums away in the deep background of Colin Gunton's work. I'm prejudiced because I discovered both Torrance and Gunton `at once' on a sale/clearance table in Logos books in Berkeley in the late 70s or early 80s. There's a good book called `The Knight's Move: relationality in science and theology' (I think) that suggestively links Torrance, Niels Bohr, Kierkegaard and someone else whose name escapes me ... Ah. M. Polanyi. Here are some amazon reviews.
Fascinating second review; suggests that the author as a result of this book is going to read some T F Torrance. Anyway. If the (Trinity in) creative process includes aesthetic judgement (saw that it was good) and there's something optimally human or humanizing about our creative calling ... then this would link what that guy was saying about Torrance (Triune God, contingent creation, priestly Human) and the `open transcendentals' of Gunton's Trinity argument. They become `co inherent' categories that inform not only our `place' in the world, but also the inner dynamic of our art ... everything from the formal arguments about material and design up/out to the social /shalom implications of the work in context ... a la Bourraiud and Loraine Leeson and co. And this would make the Christian contribution to interfaith dialogue via, through or with the arts a distinct one.
JE: I particularly liked this quote from the essay on Torrance that you sent over:
"... human persons are not blank slates to be socially programmed as we wish, nor is the created order passive material that we can arrange as our needs and socioeconomic goals dictate. There is an order already present in reality, created into it by ‘the ultimate controlling ground of order’ prior to our ordering activities. Our task is to create cultural/conceptual tools that enable us to discern that order so that we may cooperate with it, not impose ourselves upon it. This is simply Torrance’s theological science applied to the social and material world."
I've tried to explore what I think this sense of partnership with God might involve in an outline theology of work. Underpinning this is the idea that I first came across through Dorothy L. Sayers in 'Mind of the Maker', but which is unpacked more fully by Paul Ricoeur, that humanity is made in the image of God because we enjoy the power of creativity.
“… according to Ricouer, human being is possibility: “it does not yet appear what we shall be” (1 John 3: 2). Human existence is “forward-orientated,” constantly projecting itself in front of itself towards a possible way of being. Possibility is therefore intimately connected to the imagination which projects it, and to time, specifically the future. Human being, then, is not limited to the here and now, that is, to actuality … there is a “surplus of being” to human existence, and this surplus of being is nothing other than possibility. We are not as we shall be. Thanks to this surplus of being – possibility – humanity can hope.”
Kevin Vanhoozer notes that: “In his essay “The Image of God and the Epic of Man,” Ricoeur suggests that humans are in the image of God because they too enjoy the power of creativity. Thus the image of God, creativity, gives rise to the images of man, in the sense of the images that man makes. These images constitute “the sum total of the ways in which man projects his vision on things.”” Ricoeur suggests that through our imagination we can determine (God created) possibilities and define the (God created) essence of all that is around us. Essence, in this sense, is similar to Gerard Manley Hopkins' idea of 'inscape'.
Possibilities are, Ricoeur argues, real, although unactualised and it is through imagination that actualisation occurs and with it self-understanding:“The point of phenomenology is to describe the meaning of “lived experience” rather than its factuality. Husserl calls the meaning of a thing its “essence” (eidos). We come to know the essence of a thing by exploring its various possibilities. These possibilities are explored in the workshop of the imagination. Ricoeur notes of phenomenology that “its favourite technique is the method of imaginative variations. It is in varying the possible realizations of the same essential structure that the fundamental articulation can be made manifest.” Husserl’s example of the meaning or “essence” of a table is helpful. By “free imaginative variation” we can alter its form, its color, its material. By then looking to see what there is in common among the various examples, we can determine its essence. We can also imagine possible uses of a table: we can eat a meal on it; we can write letters or do a jigsaw puzzle on it; we can stand on it to fix the lightbulb etc. These variations are not present, but they are imagined as possible. Phenomenological description is thus closely related to fiction and the realm of as if. As far as phenomenology is concerned, we may define the meaning or “essence” of something as the imagined ensemble of its possibilities”.
We see this happening too in Genesis 2. 18-25, where God brings all the animals in the Garden of Eden to Adam for him to name and, at the end of this naming process, Adam recognises Eve as his soulmate. The key to this story is that names in ancient times described the essence of the thing that was named. So Adam looks and listens in order to understand the essence of each different creature and then creates a name that reflects that essence. By so doing, he also sees what is different between himself and the creatures, so that when he sees Eve he is able to immediately recognise her as his soulmate.
This is also what I understand the Bible as doing for us. The Bible is a diverse book. In fact, it is more of a library than a book; a library of 66 different books containing biography, drama, history, law, letters, prophecy, poetry and proverbs. Mike Riddell calls it "a collection of bits" assembled to form God's home page while Mark Oakley uses a more poetic image in writing of the Bible as "the best example of a collage of God that we have." They use these images because the Bible contains, as Oakley writes, "different views, experiences, beliefs and prayers" drawn "from disparate era, cultures and authors" which are not systematic in their portrayal of God. As Riddell states: "The bits don't fit together very well - sometimes they even seem to be contradictory. Stories, poems, teachings, records, events and miracles rub up against each other. They come from all over the place, and span at least 4,000 years of history."
The point is that the Bible gives us many different perspectives on God and on human beings. These different perspectives produce new ways of thinking, seeing, imagining and creating in us. As we see God and human beings from different perspectives and through fresh eyes we are opened up to new possibilities. As we see and imagine possibilities we have the same experience as Adam and come to know ourselves better - we see the essence of who we are - and we change to become more like the people that God created us to be.
This is living creatively, living artistically. The art of life is to be open to the diversity of life in order to see life's possibilities from different perspectives and, as we compare and contrast these possibilities, to identify the essence of who we have been created by God to be and to become. By understanding ourselves and by responding to the essence of others, we are able to develop and use our talents for the enrichment of other people's lives. In doing so, we express the fact of being creative creatures made in the image of our Creator God.
I think all this connects well with your description of Torrance's argument; Triune God, contingent creation, priestly Human. Gunton's open transcendentals (and other Trinitarian patterns - Sayers, Schumacher etc.) would then help in exploring the essence of each thing that is around us; including artworks. To critique artworks in terms of relationality, perichoresis and substantiality would indeed be a fascinating and distinctively Christian approach to art criticism and would extend Bourraiud's Relational Aesthetics considerably.
SS: Yes, all true, and some of my thinking on this enhanced by a couple of books by Timothy Gorringe, and the collaborative/partnering with God in Eden was touched on by David Thistlewaite in his `Art of God'.
"As Richard Bauckham has stated, the Christian is thrust into a “painful contradiction between the promise and present reality”:
I think Colin Gunton made some remarks on this in light of Romans 8, and in the framework of his talking about `catharsis' and Trinitarian Aesthetics (a lecture he gave at Kings of which I got a reprint somehow .... and used for `the light by which we see' included in `Crying for a Vision' and is borne out by much of below ...)
“The contradiction arises from a hope for the world, for the whole of this worldly reality, which it exposes in all its god-forsakenness. The Christian’s suffering is thus a loving solidarity with the whole of the suffering creation … and a hopeful solidarity in expectation of the transformation of all creation … Love and hope for the world involve the Christian in a movement towards world-transformation which has two moments: critical opposition and creative expectation …. In the first moment, hope liberates the Christian from all accommodation to the status quo and sets him critically against it … In the second moment, it gives rise to attempts to change the world in the direction of its promised transformation, imaginatively grasping and realising the objective possibilities in the present which conform most closely to the coming Kingdom … .”
Yep, so the `imaginative grasping' probably includes the groaning of Romans 8.
“… according to Ricouer, human being is possibility: “it does not yet appear what we shall be” (1 John 3: 2). Human existence is “forward-orientated,” constantly projecting itself in front of itself towards a possible way of being."
I once had a coffee mug that was imprinted with a Ricouer slogan: `If you want to change a people's obedience, you must first change their imagination.' which, I think brings art to the front of the conversation about community and change......
“The point of phenomenology is to describe the meaning of “lived experience” rather than its factuality. Husserl calls the meaning of a thing its “essence” (eidos). We come to know the essence of a thing by exploring its various possibilities. These possibilities are explored in the workshop of the imagination. Ricoeur notes of phenomenology that “its favourite technique is the method of imaginative variations. It is in varying the possible realizations of the same essential structure that the fundamental articulation can be made manifest.” Husserl’s example of the meaning or “essence” of a table is helpful. By “free imaginative variation” we can alter its form, its color, its material. By then looking to see what there is in common among the various examples, we can determine its essence. We can also imagine possible uses of a table: we can eat a meal on it; we can write letters or do a jigsaw puzzle on it; we can stand on it to fix the lightbulb etc. These variations are not present, but they are imagined as possible. Phenomenological description is thus closely related to fiction and the realm of as if. As far as phenomenology is concerned, we may define the meaning or “essence” of something as the imagined ensemble of its possibilities”.
"This is also what I understand the Bible as doing for us. The Bible is a diverse book."
Polyphony. and the ideas of Mikhail Bahktin. Have you read any Bahktin on dialogism and the novel? Also, some people have done work on Bahktin's ideas about culture and implications for the Bible (or our reading of it).
JE: "I think C Gunton made some remarks on this in light of Rom 8, and in the framework of his talking about `catharsis' and Trinitarian Aesthetics (a lecture he gave at Kings I got a reprint of somehow.....and used for `the light by which we see' included in `Crying for a Vision.' and is borne out by much of below...."
Gunton stated in The Actuality of Atonement that “the victory of Jesus stands behind; the final revelation lies ahead [and] it is the gift of the Spirit to enable anticipations of the final victory to take place in our time”. As a result, “the Christian community lives neither in the sphere of the lie nor in the kingdom of heaven where we shall know as we are known, but ‘between the times’”. This ‘in between’ time, David Ford suggests in Self and Salvation, is eucharistic time: “In between the Last Supper and the expected consummation signified by the Kingdom of God there is history punctuated by obedience to the command to ‘Do this’. This is eucharistic time – time understood and shaped through the reality celebrated repeatedly in the eucharist.” All this is where the title of my blog derives from.
"Yep so the `imaginative grasping' probably includes the groaning of Rom 8"
Yes, and the resurrection; as Jurgen Moltmann says, the “resurrection of Christ does not mean a new possibility within the world and its history, but a new possibility altogether for the world, for existence, and for history.”
"I once had a coffee mug that was imprinted with a Ricouer slogan: `If you want to change a people's obedience, you must first change their imagination.' which, I think brings art to the front of the conversation about community and change..."
Fully agree. Moltmann also says that we have to perceive God’s activity in the gift of the future and in the stream of new possibilities.
"Polyphony. and the ideas of Mikhail Bahktin.Have you read any B on dialogism and the novel.....also, some people have done work on Bahktin's ideas about culture and implications for the Bible (or our reading of it....) ??"
I've read a bit on polyphony in relation to Solzhenitsyn (I think it must have been Krasnov on Solzhenitsyn and Dostoevsky - very interesting stuff and very relevant to the arguments I've been making about the structure and form of scripture) but I haven't read Bahktin. What would you recommend?
SS: Here are all the pdfs in my Bahktin and bible sub folder. I've got a couple of his titles, and I've read some things on Bahktin and cultural criticism/carnival etc. I'm still coming to understand him.
JE: Thanks for this. Have just skim read the Bahktin and the Bible pdf which is one of those 'ohmigod, someone is articulating what I have been thinking' moments. Much of what I was writing in my posts on 'The Bible: Open or Closed?' (click here, here, here, here, here) seems to be expressed more clearly in this article which I'll clearly need to read more closely together with the other Bahktin files. Having read the Krasnov book, I've clearly come across Bahktin's ideas but without having incorporated them directly into my own thinking and writing on these issues. So, am very grateful to have these essays to fill in this gap.
SS: Excellent. I've long been a fan of the polyphonic/mosaic approach to `the Bible' as a whole ... as was the author of Hebrews ...
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Noah and the Whale - 2 Bodies 1 Heart.
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