Does Anyone See Anything Coming? (Reflection on the Treaty of Waitangi)

In another world of conversation recently, the question came up, in my words, Why didn't evangelical historians see ahead and predict the emergence of Trump and evangelical support for him? There are some obvious answers about that: historians look back not forward; history never repeats itself exactly; since when was it a moral indictment on an historian to not also be a clairvoyant?!

A simple case in point involves Trump himself in the past month or so: suppose you had predicted ten or twenty years ago that a Trump would burst onto the US political scene and [many] evangelicals would swoon at his anti-abortionist feet. Well done you! But would you have predicted this year's turn of events in which Trump has suddenly and (as far as I can tell) unexpectedly changed tunes on abortion, stating a position closer to the centre of US politics, and pretty obviously designed to pick up (if possible) a bunch of votes otherwise likely unavailable to him in November. Cue angst and dilemma for a section of US Christian (Protestant and Catholic) pro-life voters: where does the lesser of two "evils" now lie when going into the polling booth?

Down Under, have we ever seen what is coming in respect of relations between Maori and Pakeha?

Marsden in 1814 could have foreseen the arrival of European settlers. He would not have foreseen the Treaty of Waitangi in the form it actually took.

The Treaty itself was the outcome of a variety of hugely interesting factors, from the local (the role of the likes of Bushby, Hobson, the Williams' family, Maori chiefs) to the wider movement of people (the interests of and interests by British, French, American settlers, sailors and sealers in carving out better lives through farming and trading), to the distantly international considerations of the British offices of state overseeing colonial developments and how they were, in their view, often a deeply evangelical Christian view, best shaped and supported by agreements such as the Treaty of Waitangi - all admirably told in various histories of our Treaty, most recently in respect of "big books" by Ned Fletcher, The English Text of the Treaty of Waitangi, and in terms of "small books" by Alistair Reese in He Tatou Pounamu .

I think I am right in saying that on 6 February 1840, no one signing the Treaty in with the English or Maori versions could see coming some 135 years later [1975], through till the present, and, no doubt beyond today, that having the Treaty in two versions would be highly controversial!

Also on that day, I assume that what the signers assumed was that the Treaty would be a document acknowledged appropriately as European settlement of Aotearoa developed through the decades ahead. Not so. Fairly quickly the Treaty was ignored. Its relevance to the settlement of our country died away as the document settled into a comfortable (for the settlers and their political leaders) existence in the bottom of the bottom drawer of the Premier's desk!

At the lowest point in the general fortunes of Maori (when illness decimated numbers of Maori in the late 19th century), no one foresaw the reviving of the relevance of the Treaty in 1975, let alone the revival of the number of Maori in our society (so that the general reckoning now is that 1 million of 5 million NZers identify as Maori).

And that initial reviving of the fortunes of the Treaty as a foundation document of our nation, through the establishment of the Waitangi Tribunal, was not in 1975 a predictor of how as a society, including churches, educational institutions, local and central government, and departments of such governments, we would develop principles of the Treaty to guide us in giving effect to the Treaty. Or, more simply, that we would make actual big strides as a bicultural nation. We are far from becoming what the Treaty envisaged we might be; but we have moved on a long way from days when Maori were refused entry to some pubs and public facilities, and when we would go along with South African requests not to bring "coloured" players on All Black tours to that country. 

We do, of course, see that in 2040 we have opportunity to celebrate 200 years of the Treaty. Sixteen years to make further progress? Sixteen years to wind back the clock (per current machinations by the ACT Party)? While I am committed to not winding the clock of history backwards, I am not going to make a prediction about where we will be in 2040. (I would be 80 by then, so I am not even predicting I will be alive to ruminate on the state of Aotearoa New Zealand in that year!!)

Although last week's ADU post was not directly about the Treaty, a long string of comments were about the Treaty and related matters of relationship between Maori and Pakeha. The following are some ruminations on such matters (but not intended to be a point by point response to points made in the thread of comments).

There is no definitive understanding of the Treaty, there may never be, but there is a definitive state of affairs, namely, the present situation we face as a nation, as a society, as a series of community and whanau networks, and we have a choice to face the present with the Treaty informing us and influencing us, or to sideline it, to put it back into the bottom of the bottom drawer of the Prime Minister's desk. Like many - I suggest most - Kiwis, I think it better to keep on working out the meaning of the Treaty for life today, than to give up, to seek some other basis for how we honour and respect one another as the mix of indigenous and non-indigenous people that we are.

Nevertheless, even if there is no single definitive understanding of the Treaty, there are claims as understandings which are at best unhelpful and at worst injurious to our moving forward as a nation to a better state of affairs than we currently experience.

One such claim is the notion that the Treaty makes us all "equal" with the consequence that there should be no special advantage to Maori as measured by, say, some medical treatments being available to Maori ahead of Pakeha, or some other forms of material assistance in life. This is an odd claim to make when on a bunch of significant statistics, from prison population to academic achievement to life expectancy, it is very clear that in the warp and woof of life and how it unfolds for each NZer, Maori are not treated equally. Perhaps when we are statistically equal we could propose that everyone, irrespective of racial/cultural identity, is treated "equally." In the meantime we have a long way to go and we are only just beginning to understand the effects of colonization on Maori - let alone how those effects might be undone.

Another claim being advanced today is that the Treaty amounts to nothing more than property rights: I as a Pakeha have rights as to how I use and what I do on my suburban city property; a Maori (individual, whanau, hapu, iwi) also have property rights for lands and waterways to which there is clear title. But - the kicker - that is all: stay out of attempts to co-govern, say, the quality of water in the rivers of Canterbury; do not aspire to have specific Maori representation on city and district councils; and so forth. There is a lot to discuss about the meaning of the Treaty, and we may never settle on one single, agreed definition of what the Treaty means for each nook and cranny of these islands, but there is agreement by most scholars - historians, legal boffins - that the Treaty is not reducible to property rights. We need - I suggest - an approach to the Treaty which respects and assists Maori seeking to be Maori.

On Saturday I was at a bicultural event in one of the pa of the Canterbury district. A Maori leader made the simple point about this particular place (calling it a "reservation" - reserved from being for sale to settlors): It has allowed Maori to be Maori. How might our approach to understanding and applying the Treaty do this across our nation?

There are lots of questions to ask, discuss and find answers to. There are and will be proposals that need testing. For instance, also over the weekend, I saw a social media post along these lines: In institution X, a law professor teaches that there are and always have been two legal systems, Maori and Pakeha; this is a bad thing because there must be one law for all, and only one law for all. This sounds like something that needs testing: there can be two legal systems within one nation (the church has canons!!!!!!!), but can there be two wholly parallel systems without one system being available to appeal to when within either system a matter needs a final arbitration? (Even the church operates within its constitution and canons on the basis that potentially an appeal can be made to the secular legal system.)

Similarly, as we discuss concepts of sovereignty/rangitiratanga/kawanatanga, can we find a way to a single parliament within which are two houses, Maori and Pakeha, with all important decisions being agreed by both houses? The Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia has something to offer on this possibility.

Yesterday I spoke at a service on Micah 6:6-8, the threefold summary (in my view) of all the teaching in the OT: do justice, love kindness, walk humbly with your God.

At the heart of all debates on the Treaty, can we Christians engaging in the quest for the meaning and application of the Treaty today press for justice to be done and kindness to be shown? To do otherwise is incompatible with walking humbly with our God, is it not?

Might we be open to futures we cannot yet see which fulfil intentions in the Treaty and requirements of Scripture?

Postscript: a different topic

Also in the thread of comments to last week's post, this comment was made:

"People don’t go to Church anymore because they simply do not believe in the supernatural - outstanding claims require outstanding evidence. People need to be taught the deeper meanings within scripture if any form of Christianity is to survive. Science has beaten back the grey haired man in the sky that parts seas and raises the dead."

No doubt this is so for many people, even though I hardly ever hear people frankly express such explanation for non-involvement in church. People are polite!

Yes, there is "deeper meaning" within Scripture to find and to expound. John himself ensures this is so when he takes the kinds of miracles we now apparently object to (Feeding the 5000, Walking on Water, 6:1-21) and makes them the occasion for Jesus to offer "deeper meaning" about himself as the bread from heaven.

But may we so deftly set aside all testimonies to the supernatural within Scripture, whether Parting the Red Sea or Walking on Water, Healing the Sick or Raising the Dead?

On the one side of this question is the fact that "something(s) happened" which in OT times fuelled Israel's conviction that the "god" of Israel was like no other "gods" and in NT times fuelled Christian conviction that Jesus was more than another itinerant rabbi. Miracles, supernatural acts, call them what you will, were critical to the case advanced, whether in preaching the gospel to Jews or to Gentiles, that God's acts of power in and through Jesus, and supremely in raising him from the dead underscored the claim that Jesus was both son of David and son of God.

On the other side of this question is the result of "deeper meaning" as we engage with Scripture: that God is Being (not just a Supreme Being, or the Supreme Being), the very life and power of the universe able to work within the universe to do marvellous things. The distinction between "nature" and "supernature" can be argued to fade away when we dig deep into the meaning of God as Being itself.

And then, perhaps as a third side of this question, is the matter of many Christians' own testimonies: that the Jesus we have met and who has met us, is precisely the powerful Son of God as well as the vulnerable, mocked, humiliated, executed son of Mary.

A is for Apokatastasis - you knew that!

Quite a bit is going on in my world. Yes, everyone kindly asks me about how I am in the midst of the newest chapter in the story of our Cathedral's Reinstatement (title of the current chapter, "How the Christ Church Cathedral Reinstatement Hit A Large Block On the Way to Completion aka Lack of Funds Underlined By the NZ Government Saying No"). See here for latest Press article and there will be more media interest this Tuesday. But this is a hugely interesting time to be alive, as a citizen of the world and as a theologically-interested citizen of heaven.

For instance, in a world falling apart with climate change, wars and threats of war, economic challenges, Mpox runs around the world, socio-political tensions in some societies and disruption as political winds change - including Aotearoa New Zealand - "from left to right" and "right to left," where are we heading according to the divine plan for the universe? Creation sure is groaning (Romans 8), anti-God forces prevail in too many dicatorships and, some say, in democracies too (Revelation), injustice abounds (Amos), and, in contrast to the sunny gospel-optimism of Acts (the gospel spreads further and further despite setbacks here and there), the gospel is on retreat in parts of the world which not so long ago could glorify in the description "Christendom."

Yet, God's plan, Ephesians 1:10, is for the union of all things in Christ. The 21st century cynic might say, "So, how's that going?" A 21st century Christian might, picking up words from Sunday's epistle, cry to God, "How can we live carefully, making the most of the opportunities of this time, not as wunwise people but as wise?" (riffing on Ephesians 5:15-16).

Such a search for wisdom could take us to X/Twitter, where we find a continuing debate (among many unedifying debates!! And that's just talking about the Christian ones ... :),) about "DBH" or David Bentley Hart, doyen of current Orthodox theologians. In turn, reading there opened up for me a lovely, long (you deserve fair warning) essay by Fr Aidan Kimel on a specific aspect of ancient debate about the union of all things: vitriol over Origen and his reputed errors, including that relating to aspects of the union of everything and everyone in Christ. As Fr Kimel opens up for his readers there was a lot going on in the centuries after Origen did his voluminous theological work.

Fr Aidan Kimel's fascinating exploration of ancient opposition to Origen (my ancient theologian of special interest currently) is found in an article entitled, "Apokatastasis, Origenism, Fifth Ecumenical Council - with a Dash of Theophilus."

It begins with this citation from St. Gregory of Nyssa:

"By uniting us to himself, Christ is our unity; and having become one body with us through all things, he looks after us all. Subjection to God is our chief good when all creation resounds as one voice, when everything in heaven, on earth and under the earth bends the knee to him, and when every tongue will confess that has become one body and is joined in Christ through obedience to one another, he will bring into subjection his own body to the Father.

St Gregory of Nyssa

“The Father of Fathers”"

If this was all apokatastasis refers to, then no particular problems, but apokastasis tends to refer to a specific understanding that this union of all things includes the union of all (or ALL) sinful beings, i.e. universal salvation. Thus Wikipedia:

"In theology, apokatastasis (Greek: ἀποκατάστασις, /æpoʊkəˈtæstəsɪs/, also spelled apocatastasis) is the restoration of creation to a condition of perfection.^[1][2] In Christianity, the term refers to a form of Christian universalism, often associated with Origen, that includes the ultimate salvation of everyone—including the damned and the Devil.^[3][4][5] The New Testament (Acts 3:21) speaks of the "apokatastasis of all things," although this passage is not usually understood to teach universal salvation.^[6] The dogmatic status of apokatastasis is disputed,^[7] and some orthodox fathers such as Gregory of Nyssa taught apokatastasis and were never condemned.^[8]"

Gregory of Nyssa, like some All Blacks scoring their tries on Saturday night, glides his way past potential opposition. Origen not so much. As Fr Kimel points out, there was a very complicated political calculus going on in the ancient opposition to Origen. Try this for a flavour:

"Theophilus’ quick acceptance of the mob’s demand to denounce the writings of Origen raises questions. Did he have a St Paul conversion moment?—not likely, though cowardly duplicity cannot be totally dismissed. Did he always strongly object to Origen and is only now, under the threat of violence, revealing his true colors?—probably not. Theophilus would resume his opposition to anthropomorphism just a few years later. Or is he shrewdly exploiting the crowd’s disdain for Origen to advance his own ecclesial and political agendas?—ding! ding! ding! Now that sounds like the Theophilus we have all come to know and love.

So why was this moment the catalyst for Theophilus’ sudden and intense campaign against Origen? Because, Russell suggests, the leaders of the pro-Origen faction (specifically the Four Tall Brothers, as well as a priest and former confidant of Theophilus named Isidore) had become painful pebbles in the patriarch’s sandals. He shrewdly saw that by methodically attacking the orthodoxy of Origen, he might well strengthen his position in Nitria, effect the departure of Origenists from Egypt, and establish within the monastic communities a theological orthodoxy free from the influence of Origen and Evagrius Ponticus."

Anyway, just to be clear: this post is not arguing for or against universal salvation (it is not something finally settled in my mind). But it is arguing for us humans, especially us Christian humans, to work for the unity of all things, rather than for the disunity of many things.

On the way to a better Christian political outlook, I like this review by Stephen Driscoll on John Sandeman's The Other Cheek of Sydney theologian Rev. Dr. Michael Jensen's latest book, Subjects and Citizens The Politics of the Gospel: Lessons from Romans 12–15. The review is much shorter than Fr Kimel's article!

Finally, for now, looking at disunity in society, and hoping for unity, especially here in Aotearoa New Zealand, Damien Grant has some pertinent things to say about our tortured present re Maori-Pakeha relationships, under the gaze of the Treaty of Waitangi, the torture deepened by the Act Party's attempt to define "principles" of the Treaty.

I like the note he strikes in his concluding paragraph - there is one enduring principle we could perhaps all agree on:

"The enduring principle that we should take from 1840 was the willingness of both parties to seek creative and enduring solutions to what looked to be intractable difficulties. That required courage, wisdom, and a determined focus on what could be rather than an obsessive focus on past grievances."

Postscript: if none of the above draws you into reading and reflection, then try this interesting piece on the limitations of marriage metaphors in Scripture, by Kate Keefe. Not sure that I agree with her - metaphors invite us to think about the meaning of things (in this case our relationship as Christians, as church with God, with Christ) as much as they prompt us to think about the limitations of particular metaphors. 

Back to translations: more to NRSVUE than I thought

 "You be the judge!"

A few posts ago I engaged with a question or two re modern translations - plethora thereof - and upgrades of.

Today I note a post from the wonderful ETC blog - Evangelical Textual Criticism - on the NRSVUE - NRSV Update Edition.

I had thought the NRSVUE was the NRSVUE taken in an even more inclusive direction re language.

There is more going on, as Peter Gurry in this post makes clear.

Excerpt:

"In light of the emphasis on textual criticism, I wondered what changes I could find. This is just from my spot-checking, mind you. I haven’t found a list of changes anywhere yet.

• Matt. 19.9: “And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.” The longer reading was in the footnote before along with the reading of B and some others. I’m guessing this change is due to Holmes’s influence given his 1990 JBL article on the subject which you should all read and heed.
• Mark 1.1: “The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ.” To which I can only say, booooo! (The right reading is in the footnote and at least they got Mark 1.41 right.)

"

But is this enough to buy a copy when one has (as I have) some five or six copies of the NRSV?

 "You be the judge!"

What on earth is going on in the CofE and is it an expression of God's will in heaven?

With all the usual caveats about commenting on the affairs of another church (my own church is hardly perfect, what do I know when looking from a distance, that sort of thing) I wonder if some comment is in order about developments in the CofE right now. The reasonable concern from a Down Under perspective being that the CofE is just a tad more important than any other province to the Communion as a whole because the ABC is the Primate of All England AND the Primus Inter Pares among the bishops of the Communion. If England goes ...

This is my potted version of developments:

In recent years the CofE has been discussing and determining that prayers might be offered for same sex partnerships. Arguments back and forth in meetings of the General Synod. Ups and downs re people appointed or resigning from roles in the considered and considerable process of formalising the aforementioned prayers. Statements made by various bodies including conservative evangelical bodies which are both distinct from one another and interconnected which represent a kind of jockeying for position (many would say "power") in whatever may happen as convulsions in the CofE variously look like internal restructuring underway or schism fermenting or something else.

So in recent days a particular development has been not one but two "commissioning services", one in All Souls Langham Place and the other in St Helens Bishopgate (on any reckoning, flagships of the English evangelical fleet), for "overseers" (quasi-bishops, many do think) and seven men to lead, teach, and preside at breaking of bread services which are vowed and declared not to be eucharists, with a further commissioning a year from now (quasi-deacons become quasi-priests, many do think.) (Read more here and then here.)

A formal response from the Diocese of London - issued after some days rather than immediately, so presumably with aforethought and canon lawyer consultation behind and within its words - is here. It has the feel of "nothing much to see here" but that is not what one commentator thinks, the redoubtable Angela Tilby, who writes in the Church Times:

"IN CASE of any doubt, it can now be assumed that the C of E really is in a state of schism. After the commissioning service at All Souls’, Langham Place, on 12 July (Comment, 19 July), a second service took place last week at St Helen’s, Bishopsgate, attended by representatives of the Alliance network, which includes New Wine and Holy Trinity, Brompton."

She goes onto argue that Puritanism has reappeared in the CofE:

"The claim to represent the true voice of the C of E in countering doctrinal infidelity is nothing new. It is the voice of the angry Puritanism that has been channelled down from the Reformation, when it was mostly directed at those who were not thought sufficiently anti-Catholic. It is also the contempt of those who habitually mocked liturgy, bishops, and vestments during the reign of Elizabeth I. It is the rage of the Roundheads in the Civil War, and the bitter disappointment of those ejected from their livings with the return of the Prayer Book in 1662."

From one side of the matters unfolding, Colin Coward is clear and convicted.

From another side of the matters unfolding, Martin Davie races ahead to the possibility of a Third Province (after Canterbury and York) being formed. That is, although Martin does not specifically discuss current manoeuvres, to the extent that they are the advancing a new structure of authority within the CofE, then they may in the future be seen as de facto steps in establishing such a province.

From a Communion perspective, perhaps establishing a "Third Province" would settle those voices within the Global South (though possibly not within Gafcon) who are concerned about where the CofE is heading over same-sex partnerships. A significant development which provided an ecclesial structure for those whose views align with the views of Global South/Gafcon could mean that Global South voices (if not also Gafcon) would need a nuanced approach to the CofE because the CofE could not be dismissed as a faithless, unorthodox church. Instead it would need to be treated as a church in which room had been found for all sides on these matters to remain in one entity. I use "entity" deliberately: it would be interesting to see if a Third Province meant it was in communion with the other two provinces or not.

Therein, of course, lies an ecclesiological rub: would the CofE remain a "church" (an expression of the body of Christ) if it had three provinces, only two of which were in communion with each other? Other questions arise, such as whether a "church" is a church when it divides internally/structurally on theological grounds? Or, is it two churches talking as though they are one for the sake of property, assets and civil law, but not one for the sake of Christ?

My own desire is that we would focus less on describing "the other" as "homophobic" or as "faithless, unorthodox" and more on what it might mean to be "in Christ" but not agreed on a matter. Everyone arguing the various positions, in the CofE, in the Communion, is a follower of Christ. That we do not agree on a matter does not make one side some set of bad Christians or sub Christians or whatever disapproving term we wish to use to justify talk of Third Provinces, schism and so forth.

God's will in heaven is for unity in the church on earth because our heavenly future starts now and not at the End.

Samoa ... and contextual theology

It has been a real privilege these past few days to be in Samoa - my first visit to this beautiful country, some four hours flying time to the north of Auckland airport. 

The occasion has been a meeting of Te Kotahitanga, a standing commission of our General Synod/Te Hinota Whanui, tasked with formal advice and guidance on theological education and ministry training for our whole church, a church which encompasses via the Diocese of Polynesia, Anglican churches, schools and a theological college, spread across Fiji, Tonga, Samoa and American Samoa. Hence some of our physical meetings take place in one or other island in the Diocese of Polynesia.

It has also been rather pleasant to have a few days away from the NZ winter - temperatures here in the high 20s Celsius, and there have been some lovely swims, including one today in a very warm sea.

People do not come to this blog for travel experiences, so, to business.

Part of the privilege of being together in this way, with various interactions with the local Anglican parish as well, is to experience directly the diversity of voices in our church (and thus in God's catholic church) in the context of some of those voices. (Mostly our meetings are in the context of Aotearoa New Zealand.) There is something beneficial about this mix of diversity and context which enables new insight into the challenges we face.

Reflecting more widely, into the general world of theology, attention to context can be challenging: surely, one line goes, the truth is the truth and its purity as truth is beyond considerations of context. There is, of course, truth in this proposition! Yet if we focus within the general world of theology, to the world of biblical theology - or the way in which theology is worked out within the pages of Scripture - we do see contextual shaping of the truth conveyed through Scripture.

One such example, in my view, was present in our lectionary readings yesterday (if we focus on Ephesians 3:14-21 and John 6:1-21). Paul writing to the Ephesians sets out in this passage a theology of God's love - of God's unlimited, immeasurable love. Within the context of the whole of the epistle, what Paul says is not (so to speak) a theory of love: what he says is anchored into the action of divine love, into the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ (as expounded previously to 3:14).

Yet, if we ask "who is Jesus Christ that this human being should be the exemplification of the love of God for humanity?", we have John's Gospel to consider, and in particular there is help for our thinking in yesterday's passage.

At the end of the Walking on the Water story, as Jesus seeks to calm his terrified disciples, he says, "... it is I ...", or, ego eimi, I am (6:20). Language already used by Jesus (John 4:26) and reminiscent of God's revelation to Moses about his Name (Exodus 3:14), and regularly reappearing through John's Gospel, notably in the "I am X" statements, including the imminent "I am the bread of life" (John 6:34). In other words, John takes up a clue re Jesus as God (e.g., pertinently, see the parallel stories, John 6:1-21/Mark 6:30-52, and "it is I" in Mark 6:50) and develops his incarnational theology: that Jesus is no mere man, nor mere prophet/teacher, nor a man filled with the Holy Spirit (per Luke's Gospel) - he is all of those and "the Word made flesh" (John 1:14). Let alone a man with magician skills re food multiplication and walking on water.

Alternatively put, it is God-in-Jesus who feeds the Five Thousand and Walks on Water, and thus, John sets the followers of Jesus on the pathway to understanding that God himself is involved in the event of the cross-and-resurrection. The love of God for humanity, which Paul so beautifully expounds in Ephesians, is the love of God grounded in the event of the cross-and-resurrection.

But John does all this in a context - in the context of time (he has distance from the actual life of Jesus to reflect on the meaning of that life, and that reflection is to a greater degree than his Synoptic colleagues have been able to do), location (John's Gospel is anchored into Judaism (as he experienced and understood it), into then conflict between Judaism and fledgling Christianity and into the realms of Hellenistic philosophy (albeit perhaps channelled through Philo, a Jewish philosopher).

Conversely, John's context leads him to embed his theological/christological insights into a new version of the gospel narrative of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus: he is no Augustine, Aquinas, Calvin, or Barth, he is a gospel writer. The abstract theology later theologians will develop is not handed to them on a plate, they need to dig deep into "story", in some cases, for John's Gospel, his story needs comparing to other versions of the story to yield the subtle shifts he discloses to us.

For travel reasons I need to draw this reflection to something of an unfinished close. I mentioned diversity above: in the wisdom of God and in the inspired understanding of the ancient church, we have four diverse gospels. No matter how amazing John's Gospel is, the church continues to appreciate other versions, each of which is expressed within contexts other than that of John's Gospels own context.

To God be the glory in the church ...

PS Noting a comment below re the publication last Wednesday 24 June 2024 of the report of the  [NZ] Royal Commission on Abuse: I think likely I will not comment on the report and related matters here on this "personal" blog. The report is so significant and important for the life of our church that it is important than any comments I make (any responses to the report and its recommendations) are via "official diocesan channels." (See Anglican Life - our website.) Here in this post, I also commend visiting Anglican Taonga and these articles, here and here.)

 

An ordination service

On Saturday we had a diocesan ordinand service in the Transitional Cathedral and it was a privilege to ordain two people to the diaconate, one of whom happens to be my wife!

Teresa's story of call in ministry is her story to tell and I am not going to tell it here.

But there were some features of the ordination service which I observed, so I will write about them!

Incidentally they are features of many if not all ordination services, so while yesterday was a very special day, I am not here reporting on something unique.

First, ordination services bring a lot of people together who might not otherwise be in the same church building for any other occasion. Between the two ordinands and their respective networks of families, friends, colleagues, and supporting parishioners there were simultaneously a lot of people strangers to one another and there were a lot of interesting connections present. Looking around the pre and post ordination sets of conversations it was a delight to see catch up conversations taking place. The primary joy in an ordination service is the joy of the occasion for those being ordained but there is plenty of joy to go around.

Secondly, ordination services involve a lot of enthusiasm. Most people present have made a conscious choice to be there rather than to be somewhere else (or to be there because, well, it is the habitual Sunday time for service). And that conscious choice involves wanting to be there to especially support one or more of those being ordained. It is noticeable in an ordination service how passionate the congregational responses are to the questions asked of them!

Thirdly, and most importantly, ordination services are solemn, profound occasions - there is a lot of emotion in the air. Every person being ordained has committed themselves to a seaching process of discernment, training and study (which is always a testing of calling) and generally reflecting within one's own heart and mind through years on whether this particular step is the right one or not. There may also be heightened emotion for such an occasion because this significant moment has been delayed for one reason or another.

God is good. The Holy Spirit comes. We had a wonderful service yesterday!

 

On Bible translations

A recent visit to a local Christian bookshop is one provocation for this post. Another is reading Peter Simpson's Colin McCahon: Is This the Promised Land? Vol. 2 1960-1987 (Auckland University Press, 2020) on NZ’s (arguably) greatest artist, Colin McCahon, and seeing the impact the New English Bible translation made on him and his religious paintings.

Taking the bookshop first: I am bewildered by two observations looking at the Bible section of the bookshop. 

1. The available Bibles are dominated by (i) fairly recent translations published by North American publishers and (ii) the ESV (which is not so recent, and is a certain form of conservative Christianity’s go to successor to the KJV/RSV/ASB line (both evangelical and - in respect of some parts of the English-speaking world re "lectionary Bibles" - Catholic).)  

2. Thus very good English translations (such as NRSV, New Jerusalem Bible, Revised English Bible, Good News Bible, NIV, New Living Translation) are hard to find (at least in this particular shop). 

(Obviously such observations will vary from store to store, from Protestant store to Catholic store and so on.)

Apart from the obvious commercial consideration (a publisher will make more out of their own “brand” of translation than out of another translation that they (presumably) pay royalties on to the copyright holder of the translation), why would the English-speaking Christian world - at least as measured by what a bookshop thinks it can sell most of - move on from the translations I list above? What on earth is wrong with:

- NRSV: best, modern, scholarly, appreciated by Catholics and Protestants, inclusive (great for congregational reading in worship; better than ESV on that score) translation ever?

- New Jerusalem Bible: learned, readable, scholarly Catholic translation, widely appeciated by Protestants as well?

- Revised English Bible: updated successor to the fine New English Bible (more on that below) and with good ecumenical scholarship behind its updates?

- Good News Bible: brilliant translation within confines of deliberately limited vocabulary; and when supplied with Annie Vallotton drawings, the best ever illustrated Bible, and not particularly needing updating even as English speech has changed over the 50+ years since it first appeared?

- New Living Translation: fresh, vibrant English, easy to read - potentially the new Good News Bible of its day?

- NIV: ok if all the above impress you but you are keener on a translation skewed favourably by its evangelical translators, then this is for you and for me?

(I would be happy to put The Message in the list as well. There weren't many copies of it available in this store …!)

It is not as though, before we get to the actual plethora of very recent translations or current availability of diverse forms of publication of the ESV, that the English-speaking Christian world has been short of great translations. Who would need more than the six I list above to choose from?

Apparently we all do!

What is wrong here with even more choice in 2024? Arguably, nothing! Choice is good. The paper Bibles are printed on will be just the same amount of paper whether we have a choice of six translations or of sixteen (assuming something of a consistent rate of purchases among Christians). Etc. It does make it harder to have a sense of a common reading of Scripture together - though it could reasonably be argued that if we are not all reading the NRSV in church then we do not have a common reading whether the range beyond the NRSV is two or ten or twenty versions.

We might also add that the Bible has always been a “contested space”. Even when there was no translating going on, just copying of Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic texts in pre-printing press scriptoria, we know that various scribes sought to improve the text before them with the odd extra clarifying word or the subtle change which harmonised one text with another or made some difficult to understand sentence less difficult. Then when (in the English speaking world) translations took off, the much loved 1611 KJV was the outcome of several esrtwhile attempts through the previous century to form a widely agreeable text for the whole of the then English-speaking world.

Once, several centuries later, the stability and continuity of the KJV was no longer fit for a now changed English language, it was always unlikely that a “revised version” of the KJV would satisfy all across the UK/Commonwealth and USA, across Catholic and Protestant communities, and across theologically diverse congregations. Thus by the time the 19th century Revised Version gave way to the post WW2 Revised Standard Version (with various other Catholic and Protestant translations popping up through the first half of the 20th century), the character of 20th century English was ripe for the 1950s (JB Philips New Testament), 1960s (NEB New Testament, Today’s English Version (Good News Bible) New Testament, The Jerusalem Bible), 1970s (completion of NEB, GNB, emergence of The Living Translation) and 1980s (NIV, The New Jerusalem Bible).

If, then, within the particular “contest” of the diverse character of English (incuding the diverse character of its speakers: first language, second language; “American” v “British”; “popular” v “academic”), to say nothing of diverse nature of desired translations (word for word, meaning for meaning, somewhere in between), we allow that there was never going to be a “new KJV for the 20th and 21st centuries” which swept all other “wannabe” dominant Bibles before it (and, we might note, even the so-called New KJV has not particularly dominated the field of modern English Bibles), the question remains: do we need all the translations currently available? 

(My associated question: are we seeing the sweeping aside of wonderful translations in favour of North American publishing houses turning a profit on their “house” translations which have nothing much to commend them, relative to what is already in existence?)

Yet, without particularly wanting to support the most recent of translations and the publishers behind them, might we note that there has been an unhelpful tendency on the part of the major players of the mid to late 20th centuries to adjust/update their translations so that no particular moral authority exists anywhere in the English speaking world to stop others coming forward with new translations?

Consider:

While the NEB, dating from the early 1960s/70s, had some old fashioned English, so could have been updated by its publishers (i.e. the REB), has the REB met any particular need for a solid, academically very sound translation not already met by the NRSV? (And, the NRSV is better at inclusive language that the REB!)

The Bible Societies, while still publishing the Good News Bible, felt it had shortcomings in the market for “limited vocabulary” English Bibles, and so published the Common English Version (CEV). But was it really needed? Many years later it seems that the GNB is still around (albeit very, very hard to find in the Chch bookshop I mentioned above) and the CEV is … not so much.

Then what about the NRSV itself? Recently, its progenitors determined it was in need of an update, it seems in an even more inclusive direction re its language, so we now have the “NRSVUE” (NRSV Updated Edition). Well, OK, but if body A thinks an update in a particular direction of an existing translation is needed, why shouldn’t body B think a new translation is needed in another direction? What is wrong with some stability of availability of a translation? The KJV was available for some 270 years before the Revised Version came along. The NRSVUE has come along after some 30 - 40 years of the NRSV!

Put another way, could all Bible publishers, societies and committees just stop bringing out new or updated editions of their English versions! Let a season of settlement enter into our English speaking world. In 2100, let the wise owls of Rome, Geneva, Oxbridge, Harvard, Toronto, Melbourne, Dublin and Auckland get together and sift through the current practice of the congregational and individual reading of Scripture to determine, say, the top four versions, and then whether any or all of those versions need updating. Let’s then just publish those versions for the next 270 years!

How about that second provocation for this post?

For those unfamiliar with NZ art, Colin McCahon was (even in his own life-time) and is (in his works which live on) one of our foremost artists and probably our foremost "religious" artist, noting that a considerable portion of his prolific output of paintings focus on Christian themes. In the second volume of Peter Simpson's biography of McCahon (splendidly illustrated with reproductions of his paintings), he describes McCahon discovering the then still fairly new New English Bible New Testament (pp. 95-99), and cites from a 1969 letter McCahon wrote:

"Have you looked at the New English Bible (Oxford-Cambridge 1961) WOW. It says lovely things - like - Mary went to the place where Jesus was - " [ p. 96]

Simpson then references five works of McCahon's each of which consisted of a biblical text, worked from (in McCahon's words) "my rediscovery of the meaning of the story of Lazarus," i.e. from John 11 - these works themselves forerunners of much larger 1970 paintings. (See also Simpson's exposition on pp. 144-147.)

But, relative to this post, let's take the words noted above, "Mary went to the place where Jesus was" (John 11:32). In the KJV (which presumably was the translation McCahon was familiar with prior to his being gifted the 1961 NEB New Testament), these words are rendered, "Then when Mary was come where Jesus was". The freshness of the NEB is immediately obvious, and raises for the reader the life-giving thought, Might I, like Mary, go to the place where Jesus is?

But here is the thing, when I went to check my own NEB New Testament re these words, I could not find them. Instead, John 11:32 reads, "Mary came to the place where Jesus was". Subtlely different! What gives? On closer inspection, I have a copy of the 1970 Second Edition. Changes here and there have entered in, in the space of nine years. My point here is not to evaluate whether those changes are good, bad or indifferent. (The Greek points more to "came" than to "went to".) My point is that "we" keep changing the English text of Scripture, even within the tradition of a particular translation, and, so, the likes of, well, me, can scarcely complain when I go into a bookshop and see a bunch of new translations!

The NEB, incidentally, is a great translation - it has a feel for the English language which other translations - including the Revised English Bible do not have. Hard to get hold of a copy!