tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post5971592447026572595..comments2023-12-08T04:43:40.135-06:00Comments on The Fire and the Rose: On the speciousness of the charge of “decadent Barthianism,” or, the problem with fundamentalismUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger14125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-35669629822151959952010-12-09T13:42:58.835-06:002010-12-09T13:42:58.835-06:00Good stuff, David. The hermeneutic of charity remi...Good stuff, David. The hermeneutic of charity reminds me of Iris Murdoch's "unselfing," the experience of and willingness to be changed by something outside oneself. Without a willingness to have our vision changed, we're unlikely to ever see anything new.keohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04504385481060936766noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-22697658287380407172010-12-02T22:57:27.592-06:002010-12-02T22:57:27.592-06:00Adam,
I think at least part of the point DWC was ...Adam,<br /><br />I think at least part of the point DWC was trying to make was in fact the possibility of allowing the arbitration of another in dialogue for the hope of development/growth/progess/whatever. To respond as though that arbitration may be correct and allow it in fact to be at work in you on some existential level. This is not some 'suspension of belief' just the allowance of influence which you can later reject in whole if desirable.<br />If you do not respect your dialogue partner or the topic s/he brings to the table that is fine but if you suspect some mutual growth can occur then it appears your posture is limiting.<br />I offer this mostly as a characterization of how I have approached AUFS in the last year or so. Many of the claims and positions at AUFS lacked a sense of clarity to me and yet I broadly respected and valued the approach and content and so have allowed myself a greater space for what once seemed like a insulating if not misleading approach. You can chalk this up to the falsity or disingenuous nature of 'persuasion' but I am more interested in growth and hope and healing and I do find those things operative on your site and so I am most definitely open to being persuaded and consider what it would mean to inhabit a differing position arbitration. Or, what the hell, at least I want to learn.<br />Of course you are your final arbitrator and so it is completely legitimate to go on about how you don't understand what someone means by a particular position but then to turn around and claim (or support claims) that the dialogue partner is not actually interested in dialogue is just poor work.<br />Just say you don't understand and move on.<br />- David CLDAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-86657509170541501362010-12-02T20:09:37.420-06:002010-12-02T20:09:37.420-06:00Scott:
Thanks for the comment and clarification. ...Scott:<br /><br />Thanks for the comment and clarification. Essentially, yes, what I'm saying is that the AUFS crowd cannot admit the possibility of any other position apart from their own on the question of transcendence. Transcendence = bad, as I put in the KBBC comments. But we can't go anywhere constructively with that starting-point. Now, I'm perfectly willing and able to offer any number of alternative conceptions of transcendence. I articulated at least two in the KBBC comments. Both were either ignored or lumped in the same category as the others.<br /><br />But this isn't new territory. I and many of my friends have had such encounters at AUFS for years now. None of this was new or unexpected for me. I think it's just helpful to make the problem explicit.David W. Congdonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03009330707703611224noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-82720618032682070482010-12-02T19:29:19.141-06:002010-12-02T19:29:19.141-06:00(I'm genuinely interested in understanding how...(I'm genuinely interested in understanding how you're interpreting this, by the way -- I'm not just being defensive on AUFS's part. My own views on the original KBBC issue actually line up with yours quite closely, and I as well have my suspicions about some rhetorical tendenices at AUFS I questioned in the comments to Adam's "decadent" post. I'm not trying to pin all the tension on you. But I was also put off by what seemed to me rhetorical violence on your part in the original KBBC post. Thus my questions.)scotthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07363699655835684168noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-20865336571944675032010-12-02T19:24:10.295-06:002010-12-02T19:24:10.295-06:00David,
Thanks for the response. It clarifies a bi...David,<br /><br />Thanks for the response. It clarifies a bit, but I'm still puzzled on your reading of the KBBC conversation, without your role in which we wouldn't have gotten Adam's decadent Barthianism and thus this post.<br /><br />It seems pretty clear that the rub is that what you take to be self-evident -- the possibility of non-ideological and/or non-metaphysical versions of trascendence, because you've got one -- they can't see as a possibility. But our reading of that convo parts ways here, because to me you seem to be sayiing: if Adam (or whomever) can't admit X (non-metaphys. transcendence) as a logical <i>possibility</i>, they are the ones "silencing" the conversation. But clearly they are asking for demonstration of a point they <i>don't</i> yet see or hold as such as possibility. <br /><br />So do you think their unwillingness to concede your point without being convinced you've provided them any reason to is what cuts off conversation?scotthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07363699655835684168noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-81532675077128782532010-12-02T18:52:21.612-06:002010-12-02T18:52:21.612-06:00Anonymous: Read the post again. You'll see I a...Anonymous: Read the post again. You'll see I already did that.<br /><br />(For the record, that's the last anonymous comment that will be accepted on this post.)David W. Congdonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03009330707703611224noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-65776318018409902572010-12-02T18:51:11.518-06:002010-12-02T18:51:11.518-06:00Scott,
You misread my post. I'm not criticizi...Scott,<br /><br />You misread my post. I'm not criticizing Adam for not meeting the first criterion; in fact, I take him at his word that he has done the careful reading of Barth, even if I'm personally rather skeptical that that is in fact the case. Also, the fact that the whole post is about fundamentalism should give you a tip-off that I'm only concerned with the second criterion, which I specifically state is directed against fundamentalism (whereas the first is directed against anti-intellectualism). Furthermore, the part about heresy is not directed at him. Rather, I'm saying that within the fundamentalist mindset, whoever disagrees is the heretic, which means that I am the "heretic" in Adam's system of thinking.<br /><br />Also, this post is not a commentary on the KBBC conversation. It is a response to Adam's post on AUFS. Both that post and this response could have been written without the KBBC conversation - though it happened to be provoked by it.<br /><br />Regarding the KBBC conversation, I did clarify my view and will continue to do so, so long as someone formulates a sincere question. On numerous occasions I have expounded on what I mean by transcendence, but Adam's fundamentalist perspective refuses to accept any variation in that concept. It is wholly and entirely relegated to the realm of the "master signifier." In the world of AUFS, there are gradations of materialism (democratic, dialectic, etc.), but there is no gradation and diversity whatsoever regarding transcendence.<br /><br />My post is therefore a way of saying that Adam's calls for conversation and critical dialogue are, based on the available evidence, bullshit. Either he is being deliberately disingenuous or he's a fool, and I don't take him for a fool. Eric's comment on the KBBC post really says everything I would want to say here.<br /><br />Finally, as for silencing the conversation, it's worth point out that I did no such thing. I stayed in the conversation and answered the questions. It was Adam who went on to write a post about not enjoying a conversation and then proceeded to tell everything that.<br /><br />But in any case I would insist that a person who refuses to recognize any possible rehabilitation of divine transcendence and who rejects sin and grace as religious ideology is likely not a person with whom one can engage in a meaningful theological conversation. I say "likely" because I do want to hold out the hope that he and I can have a meaningful conversation. But it has to begin with him saying, "My definition of transcendence is X. I recognize that you define transcendence as Y. Let's discuss this." Something along those lines is necessary for a dialogue to take place.<br /><br />As Barth wrote in the preface to <i>Church Dogmatics</i> IV/2: "There are obviously 'Fundamentalists' with whom one can discuss. Only butchers and cannibals are beyond the pale." I'm hoping Adam is not a cannibal.David W. Congdonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03009330707703611224noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-58571401018241853382010-12-02T18:45:57.635-06:002010-12-02T18:45:57.635-06:00David, this is a pretty good sermon in the making ...David, this is a pretty good sermon in the making here. Now you need to do the homiletical turn where you include yourself in with the sinners, or you risk having the congregation think you don't smell your own stink. Just a thought.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-5176286883937295162010-12-02T17:47:28.584-06:002010-12-02T17:47:28.584-06:00David,
Can you please point out precisely where t...David,<br /><br />Can you please point out precisely where the KBBC conversation went off the rails, in your view?<br /><br />It seems clear you think Adam was guilty of your #1 -- "Careful engagement with the texts or ideas in question" -- but that's debatable, because it's a matter of evaluation or judgment. And you don't seem right to me.<br /><br />Secondly, in my estimation you were the one breaking your criteria #2 -- "mutual willingness to learn from another and to have one’s horizon of understanding expanded through the dialogical encounter."<br /><br />I mean no ill-will, but as an outside observer, this post seems severely disingenuous to me for at least two reasons:<br />(1) You are conflating a perceived failure by Adam (and maybe Dan) to meet your 1st scientific criteria (careful engagement) with what was actually a genuine set of questions seeking you to explain or defend or clarify your view.<br /><br />And (2), you repeatedly invoked a kind of "silencing" hermeneutic by saying things like: I could explain why X is right but it would be pointless because we disagree about Y; or, "It's not something one can prove or disprove; it's an axiomatic decision of sorts, albeit one rooted in the scriptural witness." <br /><br />I'm not presuming we can ever get outside thinking from within certain commitments, or that we can't have partial clarity about what is axiomatic for us and rightfully refuse to give up the ground by making everything "negotiable." Of course Adam and Dan are working with basic presuppositions you disagree with (transcendence = big Other), and that you find irreconcilable with Christianity itself (they would admit the point, in terms of "traditional" Christianity; but an indicator of heresy is always worth throwing in.) Besides all that, though, you were the one stating your axioms or non-negotiables in such a way that, when asked for clarification by others who did not follow your logic or share your view, did not think it worthwhile to carry conversation forward.<br /><br />I'm sincerely confused by your reading of this situation.scotthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07363699655835684168noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-49990952697281969132010-12-02T16:59:23.530-06:002010-12-02T16:59:23.530-06:00I'll admit that I consider myself the sole arb...I'll admit that I consider myself the sole arbiter of what is clear or unclear <i>to me</i>. I'm not sure who else I should rely on to determine that.Adam Kotskohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00242669006117144100noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-23769380145080697342010-12-02T16:47:20.756-06:002010-12-02T16:47:20.756-06:00You've done it now David, here comes the inqui...You've done it now David, here comes the inquisition....Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-33144126065122354342010-12-02T16:09:09.600-06:002010-12-02T16:09:09.600-06:00That was pretty sad Adam seeing as you were also p...That was pretty sad Adam seeing as you were also proving the point earlier in the KBBC thread where you told David that you "didn't know how to respond" to him. Almost as though some mutual horizon was important and that it might actually be frustrating the conversation. After all aren't you both "human beings who speak English, and . . . can have a conversation"?<br />I really appreciate your line of thinking in this larger conversation but something seems to be getting short-circuited in your approach when you <i>tell</i> someone that they are not being clear or describing something well enough as though you maintain the final arbitration on the matter.<br />- David CLDAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-2390048580151745122010-12-02T14:46:43.579-06:002010-12-02T14:46:43.579-06:00So I guess your response is, "I know you are,...So I guess your response is, "I know you are, but what am I?"Adam Kotskohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00242669006117144100noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11393723.post-52975119553831714672010-12-02T12:46:39.831-06:002010-12-02T12:46:39.831-06:00Well put David. And timely, not only with respect...Well put David. And timely, not only with respect to your material point about Barth, but also in that theological blogging has become (predictably?, Jacques Ellul anyone?) dominated by the shrillness of fundamentalisms of many stripes.Mark Bowaldnoreply@blogger.com