postmodernbible

Emergent/Emerging

Had an email the other day from a part-time theological student up at Durham (called Tom...no, honest, just a joke...).  He quoted my suggestion that people need to know the difference between Emergent and Emerging.  This is what he asked:

I'm in the middle of doing an end of term essay on the differences. My

experience of EC is all book and web stuff.  I think I have worked out most

of the differences but if you are able to suggest a good bullet point list

somewhere I would welcome the help.

A good point and I don't know of anywhere where the differences are made clear - it seems to be more of a gut reaction thing?  Anyway, if you know of a good, short, bullet-pointed list - let me know!  But this is the rather more wordy response I sent to Bob and which he has agreed that I might share on here:

Hi Bob,

Not really…sorry.  The essential difference for me is the interpretation of emerging church/fresh expression stuff over here in the UK and the link with institutionalism/church planting and postmodernism in the states.  I think emerging church in the UK/Antipodean cultures is more instinctually a postmodern phenomenon arising from Gen X explorations and so on but with a church-planting/evangelism bent.  I think that the emerging church in the US  (formally Emergent but with lots of spin-offs) has a huge baggage to carry around because the US  is less consciously a postmodern society.  I think that the US  is fundamentally postmodern – especially in the concepts which underlie the American Dream, the use of power, the development of a media-saturated culture.  Postmodernism is essentially a different beast in the UK (interesting phrase) since it is not predicated on the American Dream concept but on post-war, post-colonial cynicism.  However, the is much more consciously postmodern and not too bothered about it.  The US, the Bible belt in particular, and key elements within the US church seem categorically opposed to all things postmodern and as such suppress or repress the postmodern in an attempt to assert their modernist, scientific and rationalist identity.  Evangelicalism is essentially a modernist, scientific and rationalist concept and as such evangelicalism runs counter to the philosophical background of (American) postmodernism – so McClaren represents the postmodern American dream – everyone can have a dream and aspirational evangelicalism can get you there – while Don Carson represents the anti-emergent process – only God can get you to really live the American Dream.  In the UK, this kind of stand-off developed into post-evangelical and then post-liberal studies and the whole Gen X debate – what’s this about dreaming anyway?

Does this help at all?  You might want to look at some of the counter PM/Emergent materials like Reclaiming the Centre and Scot Smith’s Truth and the New Kind of Christian.

Well, I quite liked the concepts I was playing with and thought I would blog them to see whether anyone wanted to play?

Pete

The Ehrhardt Seminar

Last Thursday I presented the Ehrhardt Seminar at Manchester Uni. 

It’s a post-doctoral, research seminar for Biblical Studies – with profs and lecturers and students and research fellows present.  Pretty intimidating. 

I presented a paper on Intertextuality – specifically about the work of Genette and Eco and how this might be brought within the NT fold a little more.  It seemed to go down quite well from the extended conversation that went on afterwards. Some of the questions were crackers!  Here's the handout in case nothing of the rest of this post makes sense - it may not in any case! Download handout_for_manchester.doc

One of the OT guys commented, on a taxonomy which I had put together commenting that at first it looked complicated but it had really helped him to get hold of what I was saying.  I was chuffed at this because the taxonomy is something I’ve been toying with for ages now – since before the book came out or was completed.  The question I had was whether it raised more questions than produced answers. 

What the seminar were discussing actually suggested that there as a difference between the first three categories (ancient intertextuality/original intertextuality?) and the last one – contemporary intertextuality.  Evidently, such intertextuality is of a different order from the rest because the author could not have inputted it into the text intentionally or by accident – and unless you start a fifth category of Holy Spirit Intertextuality, then this fourth set seems to focus far more on the what the reader brings to the text.

Peter Oakes asked a question about intertextuality and postmodernism that I really botched.  I think I tried to be clever in replying to him – sorry Peter! 

Basically, I think that what Peter was actually getting at was the broadnesss of intertextuality.  I was suggesting that intertextuality could either be seen as a centripetal process – trying to get to the centre or source of a text by analysing its sources and direct links with other texts – or centrifugal – a process which drives the boundaries of the text out into other literature and contemporary culture by bringing those texts within the focus text – in other words, the intertexts become bridges between the text and its dominant host culture (now, that bit went further than the paper did…mmm…). 

Of course when the reader comes into question, then the reader can foist their own intertexts upon the text and as such you could end up with a never ending chain of intertextuality.  That bit of intertextuality – the development of reader-oriented intertextuality is certainly postmodern in that it opens a text out to mean or to signify just about anything you want it to.  Moreover, centrifugal intertextuality certainly would be a good example of Derridean jouissance – the infinite play of interpretation…

But I think that I tried to avoid this postmodern intertextuality – so much so that one of the profs said I was a good modernist (alas!). 

Basically, I wanted to show that centrifugal intertextuality does not broaden meaning without boundaries but rather defines the context within which a text should be read and understood - and so bringing in Eco and his semiotic theories about the role of intertextual encyclopedias and merging this with Loveday Alexander's work on classic texts and intertextuality. 

In other words, intertextuality acts as a kind of buffer against misinterpretation – it corals the text into a specific cultural milieu and guides the reader to read what follows within that milieu rather than any other.  Hence, a politician’s speech which quotes the Bible begs to be interpreted within the milieu of Judeao-Christian Ethics.  It may be completely wrong in its quotation but it has done so for a reason.  If it wanted to be understood within some other ethical framework, then it could have quoted from elsewhere.

This post is getting too long.  Comments would be very welcome.

Pete   

The Book

Well, the book has arrived on my desk.  It looks...well, like a book.  Hardback, blue, with the T&T Clark and Continuum graphics on the two right hand corners and down in the left my name Peter M Phillips. It looks nice - the font is great and readable and the footnotes come out fine.  The Greek and Hebrew fonts are readable too.

I read through the preface and it seems to make sense!

Interesting comments so far - "a good doorstop", "well done", "hey, that's great".  What do you say when someone shows you his first book - goo goo gah gah?

Pete

The Eagles have Landed

Well, I arrived back, absolutely knackered, from London today having had the most amazing week with our first year students down there.  A great bunch and some absolutely amazing times - walking around galleries and going to the theatre and listening to lectures and doing workshops and simply listening to students who have suddenly become overawed by the effect of something new in their lives, or to hear their theological interpretation of what they see going on around them, or just to share their awe...what a privilege.  Some of the highlights for me from this week...in no particular order...

• The Rothko room at the Tate Modern...

Simply  amazing effect, peace, melancholy, emotion?

...another blog is clearly unhappy about the setting within the new surrealism section, and suggests that this sets the rothko murals within the belly of the whale that is Tate Modern. 

I don't see it that way - nor do others...

These murals do something for me - take me somewhere else...how do they do that?

• Bizarrely, the opening evening

...which we spent at the Hillsongs service at the Dominion Theatre.  Others have been here before...and others...like them, I didn't like the preach one bit - I wish some of these people would take a few moment to think what they are saying about Jesus!  But the event was awesome in many ways - it gave the tag for the week when the (rather strange and eccentric) preacher stated that if you wanted to get on in life you need to leave behind your current group and instead move on to a better one - "if you want to be an eagle - it's time to stop spending time with the turkeys!"  A most regrettable secetion of the sermon I felt.  It sounded like re-hashed, christianised thatcherism with a huge dose of aspirational entrepreneurship.  It certainly was not the gospel.  I was certain I knew where Jesus was - with the drop outs on the Centre Point crossroads, with the pimps and druggies out there, with those queuing for G.A.Y. down the road - I think he decided we were holy enough to let us get on with it ourselves...OK too harsh - he was with us too...but I bet his buttcheeks were clenched with embarrassment too!

• The National Gallery on the first afternoon...!!!

This Delacroix crucifixion which I had never noticed (shame on me!) at the National Gallery before. 

I love the reds, I love the sky, I love the forms and the shapes, I found this to be an icon to the presence of God. 

A beautiful moment. 

It may not be to everyone's taste...but I thought and think it is so beautiful...

• Spending time looking at the London night sky along the Thames...

• Seeing the Motorcycle Diaries for the first time

...wow - but now I want to learn Spanish to see it without the subtitles. 

A road movie, a passion for people, a beautiful piece of cinematography - and a thoroughly romanticised and fuzzy-pictured look at a ruthless revolutionary...when does a revolutionary become a terrorist?  When does revolution become liberation?

• A snap decision

...to arrange to take the students to see Resurrection Blues at the Old Vic on Wednesday afternoon...more on this another time because for me it was the highlight of the week. 

I can see why it isn't exactly perfection according to the critics but this play has so much to say and so much to reflect on theologically...as I say just wait for the comments...in the mean time GO AND SEE IT!!! 

It was a snap decision which caused some problems - were they spiritually induced? - but one which I felt added to so much of the power of the week... and then the very next day, a report on the news saying how historic the production is...sure impressed the students...but by now they were raving about various characters - clearly Stanley and Jeanine (Neve Campbell) were the favourites but the General and Jeanine's dad, Henri, also were in the running. 

Anyway, more will follow on this...

• ...one of the students sharing their awe at coming face to face with a picture and not understanding why it touched them, moved them, inspired them.  Why - how does it do it?  What's happening?  Others exploring new experiences as they compare the beauty in the Tate with the beauty of the river sliding by, the snow flurries, the sunset reflected in the glass facades along the Thames, the beauty of evensong in the heart of the cathedral, the blue of the frosty sky...

• Tate Late

..what an experience on Friday night going to the Tate Britain for their late night opening

...a bar - music in the galleries - a video installation with lizards on the walls, a sound installation, all manner of strange people wandering around

...the incessant smell of cannabis, the laughter of people enjoying themselves, the infectious presence of great art

...the bizarre absurdity of some of the new Triennial exhibits...and those absolute gems like the video installations, hanging texts, the bricked up door...

...one of the students exploring their interpretation of the heady mix of metropolitan life on display under a massive canvas depicting the deluge

...and his sense of God's patience and kindness and the promise never to repeat it, despite humanity's all too obvious decadence...

...the sheer awe I felt when seeing Chris Ofili's Upper Room - have you seen it?

Wow...I want to worship in this room...what would it be like to turn this chapel-esque design into a place for an alternative worship session? 

Here's a Guardian report on when it was staged elsewhere...I agree that this is a fantastic experience not just an amazing piece of art...

And Turner...alone, just me and his work, in the darkened evening light, no one, well harldy anyone else. 

Sat on a seat gazing at the interplay of canvas, paint, skill, haste, passion, confusion...as I said to one of the students earlier in the week, I see the whole Gospel in this painting...

• ...morning prayers, in a circle, sharing our god-moments from galleries and films and conversations and services...so varied, so different, so real.

There was so much more crammed into just about every hour of this week...non-stop...too hectic...not enough time to reflect and now we all have indigestion...but for now I need to go to bed and sleep...what a week...great students to spend some time with, loads to see and the rich context of London to see it in.

Pete