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Open Theism Discussion Board > Public Forums > Theological Q&A > (No Subject)
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BBBCanada
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Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 2763
| Posted 8/1/2010 1:44 PM (GMT -6) |   | |
I'd really like to hear from Dwayne on this. What do you think of the article in terms of EO? Is it necessarily "instrumentalist" to say that you want to see God in all aspects of life? Does Jamie's idea of "expanding the mundane" or "expanding the world" do so without any hint of God? Isn't all art or all endeavor in some sense doxological?
I'm kinda floating around the idea (again) that when I create or have sex or eat or shower or enjoy time out on the town with friends or watch a movie I do so doxologically? Even though I may not "recognize God" God is actually there involved in it all?
Seriously. This is where some of these Calvinists almost seem like deists to me.
D? Tom? Bruce? Selah? Corey? Similitude? Asher? Starky baby?
The Book of Esther doesn't mention God. But it is also a book within a book that well, does mention God. Sure, I can create some art tthat is not "religious" and yet it can still reveal God to me can't it?
Brandon
It is the purpose that makes strong the vow, but vows to every purpose must not hold.--A friend.
To love without love is slavery--Mother Teresa
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One Love
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Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 8/4/2010 11:22 AM (GMT -6) | | Brandon,
You can tell Smith's starting point right off. The idea he's criticizing is pretty much some evangelical method of trying to find "redemptive analogies" (ala Charles Kraft, I think) in contemporary aesthetic ventures to make ties, often in a strained manner, to Christianity for the sake of evangelization. And he's talking about the truncation of the actual beauty in arts via this "instrumentalization."
He's not even really talking about finding God HIMSELF working (EO Grace) in these things...but then again, neither are the people he seems to be critiquing.
This quote says it all...
Unhooking the arts from a "theological" instrumentalism also grants space for the arts to reveal the brokenness of creation without being supervised by a banal moralism.
Seeing God Himself in all created beauty via theoria is QUITE DISTINCT from what Smith is even talking about.
Two different wavelengths, entirely. See what I'm saying?
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Post Edited (One Love) : 8/4/2010 11:25:26 AM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 8/4/2010 12:38 PM (GMT -6) | | Reading it again, I noticed Jaime's use of "obligque":
Of late, a stream of Christian cultural criticism has encouraged conservative evangelicals to "look for God" in contemporary culture. Exhorting us to overcome a rather Manichean dissection of the world into holy and profane, this mode of cultural engagement encourages us to "find God" in contemporary music, Hollywood movies, and various forms of popular culture. I'm not convinced this is the best hermeneutic frame for appreciating the arts. It still tends to instrumentalize the arts as a conduit for a Gospel "message" or "theistic" propositions. The result is too often a fixation on God-language in cultural artifacts or—worse—belaboured allegorical readings which see "Christ figures" everywhere. We should expect art to be more oblique. And instead of asking artists to show us God, we should want them to reveal the world—to expand the world, to make worlds that expand creation with their gifts of co- and sub-creative power.
It looks like he wants artists to be less overtly Christian, less concerned about using the arts to save souls, and so less offensive? I don't know. If he means art is an inherently obligque reflection of God, then yes. It's by the eye of faith we see God in creation. It's not the same as direct, unmediated vision of God. But to his "instead of asking artists to show us God we should want them to reveal the world" an Eastern Orthodox would reprimand him a bit for suggesting such a dichotomy, as if a person of faith could only see the world in the world.
Like D says, this is entirely different than the EO worldview where all creation is infused with divine presence and where what's most important is perceiving and apprehending this presence and then giving thanks. Whether one actually mentions God in a poem, or paints the cross in every painting is beside the point. First, one just recognizes that God is in/with/under/through and beyond all things. Once you do that, you don't HAVE to mention God all the time, but not for the reasons Jaime thinks. There's a difference between not being explicit because you think the evidence for God in creation is obligue (Jaime, perhaps?) and not being explicit because you believe all creation is already singularly explicit of the presence of God whether you name him or not (EO).
Tom
KIXYTΘEMTAPost Edited (Tom) : 8/4/2010 1:04:59 PM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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BBBCanada
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Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 2763
| Posted 8/4/2010 6:52 PM (GMT -6) | | Tom said: "...an Eastern Orthodox would reprimand him a bit for suggesting such a dichotomy, as if a person of faith could only see the world in the world."
This is my point. It seems that apart from frowning on Christians using the arts in an instrumentalist manner, he seems to want to expand the world without knowledge of the divine. I'm not necessarily saying that he has to see reality in an EO way nor am I saying he has to mention God within all artistic endeavor. But if "oblique" and "expanding the mundane" mean anything it seems that it means something that is the opposite of recognizing God, "in, with under through." At least that's how I'm reading him.
Brandon
It is the purpose that makes strong the vow, but vows to every purpose must not hold.--A friend.
To love without love is slavery--Mother Teresa
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BBBCanada
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Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 2763
| Posted 8/9/2010 10:16 AM (GMT -6) | | | I'm reading Jamie Smith's book, "Desiring the Kingdom: Worship, Worldview, and Cultural Formation" on my phone of all places. Downloaded a Kindle app and then zapped the book to my phone in about a minute. Is that cool or what? No waiting for it to be shipped via UPS or FedEx or the postal service. It's mind boggling. I may have to buy a Kindle which can hold up towards 3500 books or an ipad. So, now I have a book with me wherever I go. Not saying that to brag but saying that technology that puts books at our disposal at any moment blows my mind. Anyhoo...
In Jamie's book he talks about education as being not so much about downloading information to empty receptacles as much it is about FORMATION via appealing or evoking desire which happens on a different level altogether and moving towards practices on these levels which form us into certain creatures. He speaks about this not only with regard to formal education but how we are educated via television, the media, etc, as well as by "institutions" such as the mall. Here, with the mall, Smith takes something very familiar to us and makes it strange seeing it as something of a church selling another gospel, again with a telos in mind, to create us into particular creatures.
In describing the mall Jamie says: "The description is meant to be apocalyptic, in a sense, unveiling the real character of what presents itself as benign."
Now, I think about this in terms of what Jamie is saying about the arts "expanding the mundane" or "expanding the world" but only in terms of how he describes the mall. Behind the mall experience is really something deeper going on. Something spiritual. Something religious. Is not expanding the mundane or expanding the world an experiment in unveiling the real character of what presents itself as benign? This would hardly be instrumentalist.
Brandon
It is the purpose that makes strong the vow, but vows to every purpose must not hold.--A friend.
To love without love is slavery--Mother Teresa
Post Edited (BBBCanada) : 8/9/2010 10:24:12 AM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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BBBCanada
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 2763
| Posted 8/9/2010 1:35 PM (GMT -6) | | Sounds like you have a negative assessment of what Smith is saying on that score. I don't think because there is an affinity between Aristotle and what Smith is saying negates Smith.
Brandon
It is the purpose that makes strong the vow, but vows to every purpose must not hold.--A friend.
To love without love is slavery--Mother Teresa
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