Comments on: Yoder’s Legacy Will Continue: I Can Die in Peace (Discussing Three New Books on Yoder)

By: Justin Bronson Barringer

Justin Bronson Barringer — Fri, 12 Oct 2012 18:25:42 +0000

Mark, I know it has been out for quite a while, but I think Lee Camp’s Mere Discipleship is an important summation and interaction with Yoder’s work. Thoughts?

By: Mark

Mark — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 12:16:49 +0000

Jeremy, I won’t attempt to speak for Yoder. But, as someone steeped in his writings, I love Wright’s writings. From the first time I started reading Wright, I knew there were deep continuities between his work and Yoder’s. Given what Wright says in both the lecture and the book, When God Became King–and given the individualistic, anti-authority temptations within our present culture–Theocracy is perhaps one of the right terms to signal what the term “kingdom of God” is intended to convey. I also love Wright’s musical metaphor. It’s very creative and instructive.

In recent years I have tried to reflect on differences between Yoder and Wright as well. One way to signal them is to speak of the doctrine of the church (ecclesiology), pacifism and the word “politics.”

Jeremy Begbie, now of Duke Divinity School, gave a lecture on Wright’s understanding of the church as it intersects with his reception among emerging church sorts of Christians. (This was given at the Wheaton College conference, “Jesus, Paul and the People of God: A Theological Dialogue with N. T. Wright.” This can be listened to through itunes and the essays are now available as a book by the same title.) I have listened to and read the lecture (and Wright’s response). This is where I would begin examining the differences in relation to understandings of church. But I also think the essay needs to be linked to the reality that Wright was happily a bishop in the church of England. I think in some ways Wright’s ecclesiology and his ways of understanding church and society issues are very much related to this reality (without a serious re-think in light of what he seems to imply from his reading of Scripture).

This is then related to Wright’s understanding of the word “politics.” I think he means standard-issue politics when he employs the word in relation to the social relevance of Jesus, whereas Yoder thinks first in terms of the social existence, life, of the church (ala Aristotelian understandings of politics, theologically reconfigured). And thus, despite the fact that Wright’s interpretations of Jesus and Paul (mostly) comport with Yoder’s understanding, Wright does not embrace pacifism as an ethic for contemporary Christians. In fact, I think, as you mentioned in relation to Hauerwas, he–predictably–sees it as irresponsible and sectarian. (But see Richard Hays’ essay on Wright on Jesus and ethics in the book, Jesus and the Restoration of Israel.)

And following from what I’ve said briefly, above, I don’t think Wright would agree with Yoder on the Niebuhrs. On the other hand, I think you’re right to think that what Wright says about the overall biblical story and its culmination in Jesus, should lead him to appreciate Nugent’s book on Yoder and the Old Testament. But would it?

By: Jeremy Byler

Jeremy Byler — Sun, 25 Mar 2012 20:06:48 +0000

Mark,
In an earlier blog you pointed your readers to a lecture that NT Wright gave entitled “How God Became King”. I have since listened to it a couple of times as well as read the lecture that he gave at the Conference of Italian Bishops in Rome. I have not read the Nugent book but it seems from the title that it would perhaps make points that would resonate with Wright’s work. I am wondering how Yoder might react to Wright’s thoughts on Theocracy as well as the “quadraphonic music” metaphor that Wright uses to explicate the streams of thought within the NT concerning Jesus and how he relates to Israel, God, the Church, and the Kingdom of God. It seems to me that Wright and Yoder/Hauerwas often sound similar gongs but I have also heard Wright call Hauerwas a sectarian so I am somewhat unclear why because the reign of Christ seems to be central to both. I have also often thought that the eschatology that Yoder, Hauerwas, and Wright have pointed towards is a similar one which is inaugurated in Christ and pointing towards a New Heaven and Earth that is not yet realized. Why is it then that Wright and Yoder/Hauerwas are not seen to be in similar camps. I certainly think that Wright would have similar critiques of the Nieburhs as Yoder and Hauerwas do but I don’t know that as fact. What do you have to say about these questions and comments?

Thanks for starting this blog. I think it is great! I look forward to your thoughts.

Jeremy Byler