the church and postmodern culture: conversation

An Interview on Approaching Texts as Philosophical Improvisations

For those interested, I was interviewed recently by a colleague and fellow philosopher, J. Douglas Macready, who blogs at The Relative Absolute. In the interview, we discuss informally, what I have called in the past, an "improvisational" approach to texts.  You can access the interview here. The prelude to the interview reads:

"Every philosopher eventually stumbles upon the question of method. How should philosophical texts be approached, read, interpreted, and assimilated into one’s philosophical project? How should philosophical inquiry proceed? What are the sources of a genuine philosophical method? Conversely, is method even necessary, or does it impede philosophical reflection?

Recently, I have been thinking through these questions with my colleague Cynthia R. Nielsen, who blogs at Per Caritatem. We have been exploring the methodological potential of jazz improvisation. The possible relationship between jazz improvisation and philosophical methodology arose during a discussion of Nielsen’s dissertation and her forthcoming book titled Foucault and Self-Writing: On the Art of Living as Improvisation (forthcoming, Wipf & Stock 2012.) Nielsen, who is both a philosopher and a jazz guitarist, has been writing at the intersection of music and philosophy for some time (see her 'What Has Coltrane to Do With Mozart: The Dynamism and Built-in Flexibility of Music,' Expositions Vol 3 No 1 (August 2009): 57-71,) but recently jazz improvisation has begun to inform her approach to philosophical inquiry in a fresh and innovative way.

In the following interview, Nielsen explains her “improvisational approach” to philosophy, and sketches out the practical application of this approach, it benefits, and its limitations."

 

Review of James KA Smith's Thinking in Tongues in two parts: Part II

(x-posted at the de-scribe)

The stated goal of James KA Smith’s Thinking in Tongues: Pentecostal Contributions to Christian Philosophy is to promote the agenda of a distinctively pentecostal approach to philosophy (151).  Recognizing the sort of boundary crossing such an endeavour requires Smith admits that what he offers is a sketch, a ‘cartoon’ even (xxv).  The agenda and scope attempted ends up looking more a like the mascot for a minor league time considering the possibility of turning professional.  Until now the image of the team (pentecostalism) has been flat, predictable and poorly fitted in its costume.  Smith transforms what appeared shabby and turned it into gritty and then backs the mascot with a host dazzling and sexy European cheerleaders that have boosted other dominant teams of philosophy.  For this reason I suspect the book may well feel like a VIP pass to young pentecostal-minded (spirited?) undergrad philosophy students though how it will be met by larger audiences is less clear.

The basic movement of the book is first to demonstrate that pentecostalism (small-p to include a larger swath of expressions) has a legitimate place in larger philosophical conversations.  Smith then articulates an epistemology and ontology that reflects pentecostal spirituality.  Finally Smith offers a critique of contemporary philosophy of religion based on his prior epistemology and ontology and then adds a contribution to the philosophy of language using glossolalia as a test case.

Smith begins with a postmodern critique of the Enlightenment in which the Enlightenment is characterized as representing a foundational and objective rationality by which all truth can be evaluated.  Smith argues that strands of contemporary and postmodern philosophy have come to understand that humans function with a prior affective posture towards the world that conditions how we think and reason.  We are constituted by prior formations and beliefs (a worldview or spirituality) before we engage with philosophical ideas.  This critique is important for two reasons.  First, Smith takes this as admittance to the conversation.  “The crucial implication here is a certain levelling of the playing field: if everyone operates on the basis of a worldview, and all worldviews have a basically confessional status, then a specifically Christian or pentecostal worldview has as much right to come to the scholarly table as any other” (29).  The second reason for framing the conversation in this manner is because the postmodern philosophical critique as Smith tells it flows into his understanding and prospective project for a pentecostal contribution to philosophy. 

Smith’s project hinges on the question of whether or not a pentecostal spirituality offers a ‘radically open’ engagement with the world (epistemologically and ontologically).  This openness forms the centerpiece of his understanding of pentecostalism (33).  I want to focus my review on this element because the reader’s response to Smith’s overall contribution will likely be determined by how she or he interprets this claim.  Epistemologically this openness emphasizes an affective form of knowledge; a knowledge that is prior to objective reason and is formed ritually, bodily and narratively.  In this way personal testimonies, the laying on of hands, speaking in tongues, kneeling at the alter, emotive music, hand raising all create layers that reflexively mould an orientation towards the world.  It is these modes that create new possibilities prior to and outside the parameters of Enlightenment reason.  Ontologically this openness points towards an enchanted understanding of the material world.  Smith is hesitant to speak of supernaturalism as that term suggests a dichotomy he does not feel represents a pentecostal worldview.  In broad alignment with Radical Orthodoxy Smith views the entire material world as sustained and infused by God’s Spirit and as such it remains ready for the surprising and creative work of participating with God.  This is what Smith calls a non-interventionist view.  “A ‘miracle’ is not an event that ‘breaks’ any ‘laws’ of nature, since nature does not have such a reified character; rather, a miracle is a manifestation of the Spirit’s presence that is ‘out of the ordinary’ (referred to as ‘sped-up’ or more ‘intense’ in another context); but even the ordinary is a manifestation of the Spirit’s presence” (105; parentheses added). 

How is one to evaluate these claims to ‘openness’?  I would like to explore his contribution on his own terms by focusing on the bodily practices and testimonies (narratives) that shape the pentecostal worldview (xxiii, 31).  Each chapter begins with an account retelling a vignette of pentecostal spirituality.  I appreciate the risk of including these accounts as many ecclesial-minded theologies are sparse if not barren when it comes to testimony.  However, what I found surprising is the complete lack of paradox or irony in his accounts of pentecostal openness.  The only real hint of irony is when Smith says that for pentecostals “the unexpected is expected” (33).  Smith’s examples of a ‘radically open’ spirituality come off as a confirmation of the caricature I already have of pentecostal worship.  There is boisterous music, informal structure, sentimental testimonies and tearful alter calls.  I am not criticizing these expressions or this mode of worship, I actually have more than a little appreciation for the charismatic gifts of the church.  What I am criticizing is the notion that these forms reflect a unique mode of openness to the world.  I could have written similar accounts of pentecostal worship without ever having attended the churches he refers to. 

It is on this critique of pentecostal openness that Part I of my review was developed.  While Smith acknowledges at several points that pentecostals are not immune to abusing their practices nowhere does he reflect on the possibility that it is all scripted in a way that has little more internal variance than a Catholic Mass (or virtually any other liturgy).  Moreover I would suggest that the felt need for the unexpected lends itself to a much more coercive environment than many other traditions (as I give account in the first witness of Part I).  But more than the predictability of pentecostal worship I would argue that Smith nowhere entertains the sort of account that Bazan provides in Foregone Conclusions.

You were too busy steering / the conversation towards the Lord / to hear the voice of the Spirit / telling you to shut the fuck up. / You though it must be the devil / trying to make you go astray. / And besides, it could not have been the Lord / because you don't believe He talks that way.

It is the sort of structured practice of the ‘unexpected’ Smith gives account of that may actually keep people from the openness represented in the biblical account.  What would happen if someone told the worship band, in full-swing or the teary woman in mid-confession that God was telling them to shut the fuck up (not saying it hasn’t happened)?  Another testimony is of a woman who could not conceive (49-50).  She wanted to be a ‘Hannah’ but the Lord did not seem to be listening.  She even became angry with the Lord.  But now she is pregnant.  And so she is a Hannah.  The issue here is not about being happy for this woman but theologically this is not a unique account of entering God’s openness.  I am not convinced this is an instance being situated in the biblical narrative (51).  To be situated in the narrative is also to have a radical break with the narrative.  To be a ‘Hannah’ within the Bible is the shift from the desired pregnancy of Elizabeth in old age to the unexpected and unsought pregnancy of the single teenage Mary.  The precedent then is an ‘open’ and foreseen possibility in the present.  Openness is repetition in the Kierkegaardian sense which assumes and demands a difference.  Jesus’s (Yeshua’s) ministry is a repetition of Joshua’s conquest.

It is this complete lack of irony or paradox that ultimately keeps this project from gaining traction.  I am not suggesting that there are never occurrences of ‘openness’ or repetition in pentecostalism only that I don’t see pentecostalism being particularly unique in this case.  This is the point of my final witness in Part I.  There was nothing particularly ‘pentecostal’ in that account in that there was no discernable working of the Spirit.  It was, however, as best as I can interpret it an intensification, a ‘plateau’ perhaps, of God’s work.  It left an indelible mark upon me that both connects and breaks with what was prior and gave possible direction to what was to come.  In this way it may be better to speak of the ‘fugitivity’ of the Spirit to borrow from Peter Dula (who borrows from Sheldon Wolin) than to think about how to ‘structure’ for openness as Smith does.  If there is, however, an open structure it is more likely to be found in Liberation Theology than in pentecostalism (or most other confessional approaches for that matter).  I am not saying the pentecostalism and Liberation Theology are incompatible.  In fact Gustavo Guiterrez’s framework of beginning from a ‘pre-understanding’ seems to share some similarities with Smith’s affective or bodily approach.  However, I would maintain that Liberation Theology is better equipped to speak of ‘openness’ because of its posture towards the powers of the world.

While Smith makes several insightful and interesting observations relating strands of contemporary philosophy with pentecostal spirituality the whole project is plagued by the spectre of his ‘mascot’ (this appears to be a trend in recent writings here and here).  As he cheers on would-be pentcostal philosophers there is no irony in the prescribed forms that are to create openness and too many references to the ‘staid’(a favourite term in the book) academic community and how they would have a hard time handling the ‘raucous’ and ‘gritty’ pentecostals.  I am all for the promotion of more rigorous and diverse forms of thought and expression in the church but this notion of enforcing the ‘rights’ of pentcostalism to some elite academic ‘table’ does not seem to be a method that will bear good fruit.  Don’t worry about the mascot just play the game.

Review of James KA Smith's Thinking in Tongues in two parts: Part I

(x-posted at the de-scribe)

[Given James K.A. Smith's role on this site I should have initially prefaced this post by saying both that it was entirely unsolicited (no shameless self-promotion on his part) . . . and perhaps entirely undesired!  I decided to post the review here as I see it representing a direct engagement with stated purposes of this site which are an exploration of "the impact of postmodern theory for the faith and practice of the church".  Well anyway, hope that clears a few things up.]

In laying out his methodological framework for Thinking in Tongues: Pentecostal Contributions to Christian Philosophy James K.A. Smith refers to the centrality of story, witness and testimony.  “There is something irreducible about this mode of testimony – it cannot be simply reduced to a mere pool for extracting philosophical propositions” (xxiii).  Well I have already said too much.  Here then are the witnesses that make up Part I of my review.

I.

I was probably about 18 years old.  Having little involvement in the church through high school I became increasingly involved with a group of Christians for both existential and hormonal reasons.  A few in this crowd attended church in a nearby town.  We decided to go to an evening service there one Friday night.  It was a youth event with an extended period of upbeat praise and worship followed by a time of prayer where the preacher(?) asked if there was anyone that needed prayer.  I remember feeling a knot tighten in my stomach.  I took that to be a sign of God’s calling me forward.  I went to the front and the man asked me if I had ever been baptized in the Holy Spirit.  I did not understand that phrase but I had not been baptized at all so I said no.  I was brought to a separate room where two young men joined me.  One of the guys was someone from the group I hung out with and the other guy looked like someone who was supposed to look like a hippy/Vietnam vet.  They showed me verses about speaking in tongues in the Bible.  Then they asked me if I wanted to be baptized in the Holy Spirit.  Okay.  They laid their hands on me and began speaking in tongues encouraging me to do the same even if it sounds dumb.  Eventually I started babbling a little.  They responded.  Yes!  Thank-you Jesus!  Lamma shabbah sachnee ad naseum . . .  Eventually I stopped making the sounds I was making.  Then I noticed my arms tingling.  Both of them slowly went numb up to my shoulders.  In some unconscious transition I found myself on the floor rolling around laughing.  We all laughed together for a good 5 or 10 minutes.  The laughing felt good.  They told me I could now go home and speak in tongues whenever I wanted.  I went home and tried it.  It didn’t work.

II.

David Bazan – Foregone Conclusions

I don't want to believe that all of the above is true
But I could be persuaded if you were to give me proof
So why don't you come over Thursday?
Maybe we can talk it through
As if some new information were possible
To comprehend or introduce

And after all
You and I are nothing more than
Foregone conclusions

You were too busy steering the conversation toward the Lord
To hear the voice of the Spirit begging you to shut the fuck up
You thought it must be the devil trying to make you go astray
And besides, it could not have been the Lord
Because you don't believe He talks that way

And after all
You and I are nothing more than
Foregone conclusions
Too close to call
Yet we're still so tightly wound
Around our foregone conclusions

III.

We gathered Easter Sunday in the despised and ridiculed North End of Hamilton.  The small Mennonite church is located in the middle of a neighbourhood covered by thin layers of filth that have settled from the steel miles that line Lake Ontario.  Fortunately for the more wealthy citizens the city is cut in half by a massive rock escarpment where a quarter mile up they were able to build and sprawl away from the fumes and sediment.  The gathering is small.  The demographics are simple; do-gooders who have intentionally moved into the neighbourhood and those who have nowhere else they can afford to move.  About 15 of us are scattered around an open multipurpose room that is part of community centre.  On the walls are poorly constructed banners from years past.  In the air is poorly played music leads us in worship.  A blind man reads braille and tells of Jesus miraculously healing the blind.  A woman physically and mental handicapped from a car accident smiles a crooked smile and shakes a tambourine out of time.  We leave the service with no discernable change.

Review of 'Political Theology: Four New Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty'

 

Paul Kahn’s new work Political Theology: Four new chapters on the concept of sovereignty is not an immediate choice for a Brit like me to pay attention to.  For its immediate focus and concern is an examination of how the imagination for American political life is funded by ideas of revolution before notions of social contract (constitution). So for all non Americans turning away now, stay with me to the end of the review, for Kahn may prove vital to your non US context.

Kahn argues that to understand American life, and in particular the nature of law within that life, we must apprehend that it is the will and decision of a sovereign people, acting together, that creates and sustains the American idea of nationhood.  

Kahn frames his thesis and method around the work of Carl Schmitt’s classic 1922 text, Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty.  Schmitt made this very claim, that American legal order ultimately rests upon the decision of the sovereign and not ideas of social contract.  Kahn’s methodological aim is not so much a replaying or updating of Scmitt’s text, but a hope that Kahn in exploring Schmitt, can ‘think with him, rather than think about him’.¹

In one regard, Kahn’s work is an exploration of American exceptionalism.²  In that exploration Kahn reveals how current liberal political theory is unable to understand American exceptionalism, forced to view it merely as an unjust claim of privilege.  What is at stake for Kahn is that American exceptionalism is about identity, existence, and decision, something current liberal political theory cannot discern, whereas political theology can.  For it is a political theology that gave rise to this exceptionalism in the first place and Kahn constructs a political theology from Schmitt that reveals some of the identity, existence and decision of American exceptionalism.

Kahn’s work is at this level, a detailed philosophical exploration of the contours of American political and legal life. Again a territory largely alien to my British context.  However recent events with the assassination of Osama Bin Laden have caused Bishop N T Wright, to cite American exceptionalism in our UK national news today.³  

But there are some other riches in this work that correlate to the broader dimensions of political theology, and warrant attention by non Americans.  For political theory has become a dwindling field, in which the European imports of post-Marxist theory have found little traction and revitalization of American political thought and imagination (or so my American friends tell me, whilst this line of post-Marxist thinking is holding much sway and resourcement for people like me in Europe, but that is another story).  

What is revealed in that paucity of resourcing, is the failure to take seriously the concrete practices and beliefs of American life, and the need for an examination of the embedded political theologies that gave birth to current ways of American life.  In this regard one way to read Kahn is as a ‘reparative’ account of American life (a la Peter Ochs political theology aspirations).  And for those of us seeking similar ‘reparatives’ for our own contexts, Kahn’s work provides a narrative to fund our methodological processes and imaginations.  

For Kahn’s work is at heart an exploration of human freedom as it has been realized in the distinctive set of practices and beliefs of ‘sovereignty’.  Such practices and beliefs may differ in the United Kingdom, but the need for similar explorations of the realization of human freedoms is as pressing, as is the reality of how current political theory is similarly blind to the concrete practices and beliefs that gave rise to current ways of life.

It would be all to easy to pigeon hole Kahn’s book as a technical exploration of the nature of freedom within the American legal system, and American exceptionalism.  It is certainly a recondite account of this, but it is simultaneously a deep enquiry into the social imaginary of American life.  Therein Kahn provides a resource to stimulate an exploration of the impact of theology on non US contemporary political commitments, that suggests we focus attention on the theological underpinnings of european secular legal systems.  But most importantly if we read Kahn, we might find that his work beckons and entices us into an even larger endeavour.  The exploration of the social imaginaries of other nations through political theology.

_{1. Paul Khan, Political Theology, p28.}

2.  That the United States is qualitatively different from other nations with that exceptionalism emerging from revolution as ‘the first new nation’.

_{3. http://ruthgledhill.blogspot.com/2011/05/archbishop-of-canterbury-condemns.html.  Wrights polemical letter makes use of some narratives and mythologies adjacent to Kahn's understanding of American identity in it's approach to the Law and the social imaginary of sovereignty.}