Parables of Time and Eternity

Keith Ward

• Publisher: Cascade Books
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9781725288430, 9781725288447
• eBook ISBN: 9781725288454
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Studies

Most people agree that Jesus' parables are about the kingdom of God. But what is that? They seem to have a lot about hell and judgment, but how is that consistent with the Parable of the Prodigal Son and Jesus' search for "lost sheep"? They speak of the "Son of Man, " but who or what is that? Some have thought they predict the end of the world, but could that be a failure to understand biblical language? In a new survey of Jesus' parables, Keith Ward proposes that they imply a theology of the universal and unlimited love of God, a moral demand to care for the well-being of all living things, a compassion for the poor and rejected of the earth, an open door of repentance that even death cannot close, the offer of new life in the Spirit, and an ultimate goal of universal creative sharing in the life of the cosmic Christ.

PART ONE

Why the Parables of Jesus Are Important

HOW PHILOSOPHY MAY APPEAL TO REVELATION

When I wrote Sharing in the Divine Nature1 I thought of it as the completion of my attempt to expound the Christian faith in terms of a form of personal idealism. In its Christian form, this is the belief that God is a personal being of the greatest possible value, who realizes the divine nature as love by creating free and developing communities of persons, with the ultimate goal of uniting them in the closest way to the divine self.

One major thing remained unclear, however. Why should these beliefs essentially depend upon Jesus? Might the figure of Jesus not just be a constructed ideal of the unity of divine and human, who might never have existed in history? The biblical story of Jesus might be a parable, a fictional account of what an ideal human being, if fully conscious of the presence of God and filled with the power of God, would be like. The parable could be based, in some cloudy way, on a real historical figure, but that figure could be a provincial faith-healer, exorcist, and peripatetic preacher, whose life had later been fantasized well beyond historical reality.

One modern New Testament scholar, John Dominic Crossan, suggests something very like this.2 He accepts that a historical Jesus probably existed, but the Gospel accounts of his life largely consist of fictional ideals, imagined speeches, and the occurrence of impossible miracles. Nevertheless, he holds it probable that Jesus was a preacher of non-violent justice and love, and that the existence of such a person is important, because it shows that a life empowered by God is possible. He says this proves that “at least one human being could cooperate fully with God,”3 and that this can serve as an inspiration to us.

However, on purely historical grounds it does not seem at all probable that we could be sure that an individual human being—whether Jesus or someone else—cooperated fully with God, or that only one such person in human history ever did so. Such a claim seems far beyond the bounds of historical verification, even if it concerned a person alive today let alone someone who died thousands of years ago. How could we possibly know this? That might be part of the fiction too, in which case it does not show that such a life is possible at all.

It also seems that personal idealism can exist without Jesus. It may seem that it is a general philosophy, not as such committed to any particular and specific historical claims. Yet, on reflection, it appears that it must make some historical claims, some claims about what happens in the universe. For a start, it claims that there is a spiritual and personal being on whom the whole universe depends. It claims that the nature of this being is love—and if that is not to be vacuous, it entails that there must be some historical events that manifest the love of God. There must, it seems, be some particular events in which the love of God is experienced and has some effect on what happens. It also claims that God has a purpose, so there must be a future in which the union of divinity and humanity is realized. And there must be some reason to think there is such a purpose.

If there is such a God, it is highly probable that God will cause some events in history that manifest the divine nature as love and give some idea of the divine purpose. Such events might not be so spectacular that no one could ignore them, but they must be strong enough to give evidence that God is indeed loving and purposeful. Personal idealism therefore increases the probability that there will be events of revelation in history, events disclosing the nature and purpose of God. If that is so, it follows that some historical claims will be relevant to philosophical claims, even if it is difficult to pin down exactly what they are.

It is sometimes objected that claims about history can only be made with probability, and so cannot give rise to certainty, whereas philosophical claims should not depend on contingent and contested claims about history. That, however, is not the case. Virtually all philosophical claims are contested and differ considerably depending on the philosophers who make them. The philosopher Lessing famously complained about “the ugly broad ditch” between accidental truths of history and necessary truths of reason.4 But the philosophy of personal idealism—or any competing philosophy, such as scientific naturalism or materialism—is by no means a necessary truth of reason. It is a hypothesis, based on a confluence of many factors that seems to converge on it. All philosophical hypotheses are highly disputed, so we cannot avoid probability. Probability just has to be sufficient for total commitment, if the cause is good and if a great deal is at stake, because nothing more than probability is available to us. That is true both in philosophy and in faith, except that in faith more is at stake, since a whole practical way of life, perhaps a life of self-sacrifice, is in question.

So we must ask what makes it probable to some of us that there is a God, that the divine nature is love, and that we are destined for union with God. The answer will lie in some historical facts, and in some human experiences, either of public events or in subjective experiences, whether ours or the experience of others. Those facts are likely to include claims to have experienced some form of revelation from something like God.

JESUS AS PART OF A DEVELOPING REVELATORY TRADITION

When we examine such facts, we must be aware that we do not start with a blank slate. We have all learned from others about many things. And we have learned things about God from others. Since we are not omniscient and are of very limited experience, we will do well to cast our net widely, and listen to the testimony of many people who seem to be intelligent, experienced, and competent in the things we wish to know about. At that point, if not before, we should become aware that we have not just conjured up ideas of God, love, and the consummation of all things out of our own minds and experiences. There is a history of developing, and often contrasting, ideas of God or of spiritual reality.

The idea of a God of love originated in the Jewish tradition of faith, and a line of developing thought about what this means can be traced in the Hebrew scriptures. The idea of an ultimate union with God is a relatively late development in that tradition, but the seeds of it are there, for instance in the prophetic image of a “marriage” of God and Israel.5

That tradition seems to find a specifically non-vindictive and non-violent form in many parts of the recorded teachings of Jesus. Dominic Crossan is right about that. He is also right to point out that the New Testament still contains some vindictive and judgmental and violent elements. 2 Thessalonians 1:8, for instance, is one of the worst, when Jesus is predicted to return “in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God.” Twist and turn as one will, it is hard not to see this as manifesting a desire for violent revenge on one’s enemies—a thing that the Jesus of the Sermon on the Mount roundly condemns.

There are two main points here. One is that the idea of a non-violent, loving God, who is concerned with the whole world and with a good purpose that will be realized in a world to come, did find clear expression in parts of the New Testament. The other is that there are other parts of the New Testament that have not escaped from a rather violent, vengeful attitude that seems to rejoice in the destruction of its enemies. The New Testament is not all peace and joy; but it does speak of peace and joy as the marks of a mature and morally acceptable faith. This, I agree with Crossan, argues for the records of Jesus’ teaching being basically reliable, especially when they run counter to many of the expectations of a liberated kingdom of Israel that some disciples were hoping for.

While it is impossible to find proof on purely historical grounds that Jesus “cooperated fully with God,” there is evidence in the Gospels that Jesus taught non-violent care for the outcasts of society, and stressed that God was a forgiving, merciful lover of all creation, especially of those who had at one time rejected love, and were not conventionally good or pious. Jesus apparently felt a close relationship with God, whom he called abba, father. He is recorded as adopting a view of himself as one anointed by God (the “Messiah”) to bring the Jewish tradition of faith to a new and climactic point of change. And if it is true that he appeared to his disciples after his physical death, this suggests a unique role in the disclosure of the divine nature and purpose. It would show, for instance, that there is life in the world to come, and that Jesus discloses this in a remarkable and definitive way. This is enough to make an assertion of some form of divine-human unity in his person a living possibility.

The idea of God is not just spun out of a philosopher’s head. The idea has a developing history, and philosophies have a developing history also. In the Jewish tradition, the idea of God has mainly originated in the experiences of prophetic figures, in events of revelation, when God was believed to “speak” to the prophets, or to disclose things about the divine contract of union with Israel. Philosophy does not come first; it springs from reflection on experience. Personal idealism, though it has its roots in Plato and Aristotle, has developed through Aquinas, Leibniz, Kant, Hegel, and others. It includes reflection on the claimed experiences of revelation in the Jewish and later in the Christian faith, on the sense of personal presence, the sense of moral demand, and the sense of providential guidance and purpose that has always been part of that faith. Philosophy has not preceded this sense; rather, much philosophy has built upon it.

Jesus has played an important part in this process, before anyone invented personal idealism. He is recorded as claiming an intimate awareness of divine presence, as preaching that this presence was both morally demanding and endlessly forgiving, as promising that humans would attain their fulfilment in the world to come, and, most importantly, as appearing after his death, if the disciples are to be believed. These claims are possible data for philosophy, not conclusions of philosophy. They give the person of Jesus, as it is recorded by some of his disciples, a revelatory status—he is a historical point at which something new and crucial about spiritual reality is unveiled.

This revelatory status implies that Jesus was in a uniquely favorable position to know God’s presence, demand, and promise. Within the New Testament itself, most explicitly in the Gospel of John, this was construed as a unique union of d...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Acknowledgements
• PART ONE
• PART TWO
• ONE: The Coming of the Kingdom
• TWO: The Growth of the Spirit Community
• THREE: The Universal Community of the Spirit
• FOUR: The Moral Demand
• FIVE: Judgement
• SIX: Reconciliation
• SEVEN: The Supreme Good
• Bibliography