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| John Knox statue, New College, Edinburgh, Scotland |
Psalm 100 &
Isaiah 55
Reformation
Sunday, 26th October 2014
On the 15th December 1423,
a Sicilian historian, manuscript dealer and collector, named Giovanni Aurispa
(1376-1459), arrived in Venice, after an extended stay in Constantinople. He
brought with him a treasure trove of ancient Greek manuscripts, 238 to be precise,
thus introducing Western Europeans to major texts of drama, including seven
plays by Sophocles and six plays by Aeschylus, along with philosophical works,
including all the works of Plato and Plotinus—texts of Plato that were unknown
in the west. Ancient Greek texts were
pouring into Europe from Constantinople and points east. The Ottoman conquests, pushing toward Europe,
terrorized Christian communities throughout Asia Minor. As a result, Christian scholars put their
manuscripts into their bags, they emptied their libraries, and moved west,
first to Constantinople and then eventually into the heart of Europe. For some, like Aurispa, there was money to be
made in the discovery and sale of manuscripts.
In 1453, Constantinople finally fell to the Ottoman Turks.
Aurispa wasn’t the only one
interested in ancient texts. It had
become an obsession in Europe, fueled by the emergence of humanism and the Renaissance. Christian
humanism, it must be said, driven by the idea that there was something valuable
buried under the artifacts of the Middle Ages.
Antiquity was buried there –literally.
Scholars started to rummage through cathedral basements and monastery
libraries searching for some connection to the past. Most of the texts they discovered were written
in Latin. In time, Greek manuscripts
also reemerged. In his magisterial
history of the Reformation, Diarmaid MacCulloch, who teaches church history at
Oxford, makes this startling claim—it was startling at least for me this week working
on the sermon—“Medieval western Europe had access to little Greek literature;
the text of such central works of literature as Homer’s epics, for instance,
was hardly known until the fifteenth century.
In fact, until then, very few scholars had any more than the vaguest
knowledge of the Greek language. If they
knew a learned language other than Latin, it was likely to be Hebrew, ….”[1]
As the Ottomans advanced toward Europe
they unintentionally pushed Greek culture and learning west, which would, in
time, have enormous consequences for the Church. There was a “flood of new and strange
material from the ancient world,” the philosophy of Plato, as well as the
writings of Gnostic Christians and Jewish mystics.[2] During the Middle Ages, especially in the twelfth
and thirteenth centuries, theology was shaped primarily by the writings of
Aristotle, “the philosopher whose work was characterized by lists, syntheses,
systems.”[3] But with the discovery of Plato, particularly
Plato’s “sense that the greatest reality lay beyond visible and quantifiable
reality,” scholars came to see how much of Christianity was influenced Plato,
less so by Aristotle.[4]
.JPG) |
| Codex Regius, 8th century Greek manuscript of the New Testament |
And so scholars in the fifteenth and
early sixteenth centuries started to reexamine everything in the light of this
emerging Greek world coming from the east.
It was, therefore, important to verify the authenticity of texts. Every text had to be assessed for its
“content, date, origins, motives, even its appearance.”[5] Could a text be trusted? Is it accurate?
This demand for accuracy led to the
shocking discovery in the fifteenth century when three different scholars came
to the conclusion that the manuscript known as the “Donation of Constantine”—a
manuscript that granted the pope enormous powers in the Christian world—was not
written in the fourth century, as assumed for centuries, but was an
eight-century forgery. These scholars
“instantly…shattered a prop of papal authority.”[6]
The motto of humanist scholarship, the
battle cry of the humanists was Ad fontes!
Back to the fountain! Back to the sources! In time, the demand for accuracy was also
directed at the source: the Bible.
It was important to read the Bible in its original languages, not
through Jerome’s (347-420) Latin translation, known as the Vulgate. Once scholars familiarized themselves with
Greek they were able to read the New Testament as it was originally written.
And when that happened, scholars found considerable mistranslations in the
text, especially in texts that supported key components of Medieval
theology.
It’s not surprising that Ad fontes—back to the sources—became the
rallying cry for the Protestant movement of the Church. At Princeton Seminary,
the professor who taught me Calvin, was fond of saying that Ad fontes, back to the sources, should
be embroidered on our pillows or framed and put on the walls of our homes as a
constant reminder of this essential idea of Protestantism. When Martin Luther (1483-1546) read the book
of Romans, for example, in Greek, he discovered, as the theologian Karl Barth
(1886-1968) would later say, “a strange new world in the Bible.”[7] Luther rediscovered
the gospel, the importance of grace and faith and the meaning of words such as
“righteousness;” and this reading of the biblical text brought into sharp
relief, at least from his perspective and others, the distortions of dogma and
the abuses of power within the Church.
Reform was needed. It was a
reform led and guided by a trust in the power of scripture, accurately translated
from the original language—again, back to the sources—and read simply, which,
then, had the ability to reform the Church, reform the people of God.
One of the mottos of the Reformed branch
of Protestantism, the so-called Calvinists, of which we Presbyterians are
theological heirs, was this marvelous saying: ecclesia reformata semper reformanda secundum verbum Dei, meaning
“The Church reformed and always being reformed according to the Word of God.” This
is the quote I would have embroidered. Ad fontes is great, but this one—semper reformanda secundum verbum Dei—is
even better! (Perhaps the Tuesday
morning quilting group could take this on as a project.)
 |
| Reformation Wall, Geneva, Switzerland |
Reformed and always being reformed—how?—according the Word of God. This quote doesn’t justify reform just for the
sake of reform. It’s not supporting
reform for reform’s sake. Instead, it emphasizes the power of God’s Word—when
it’s read and preached and heard and practiced—to bring about the needed and
necessary ongoing reform of the Church and God’s people.
It’s the divine Word that forms and
reforms us. But, what do we mean by “Word”?
Say “Word of God” and the first thing that comes to mind is probably the
Bible. It’s true that the reading of the Bible has the capacity to reform
us. Translating the Bible in one’s own
language and giving one the opportunity to read it for oneself is one of the
greatest gifts of the Reformation, both to the Church and to the world. But it’s also risky.
If the Bible is the Word of God, if it
has that kind of authority, then we better make sure we have a good translation
of the text. And we better make sure we
know how to interpret the text. This means we better make sure that we’re
accessing the absolute best scholarship available to help us read it, verse by
verse by verse. Because the Bible, like
any text, has been and can be used for destructive ends, it can be used as a weapon;
it can cause great damage in the wrong hands.
Most of the divisions in the Church over the last 500 years after the
Reformation, right up to present day, can find their origins in differing views
of what the Bible actually says. As a
result, it’s easy to see why people have turned away from the Bible—either
because it’s too demanding to read or because it’s become too divisive.
But there’s another way to say what we
mean by “Word of God.” Word of God—not
as the Bible, per se—but as the active, dynamic, divine Word of God
that’s heard behind the words of scripture
or comes to us through the words of
the Bible.
Have you ever notice that when Dorothy
and I introduce the scripture reading during worship we never say, “Listen to
the Word of God.” Instead, we say,
“Listen for the Word of God as it
comes to us from….” It’s a subtle
difference, but what a difference.
The Reformers believed that the Divine
Voice was heard in and through scripture in the plain meaning of a text. That is, the words of the Bible, when the power
of the Holy Spirit is working through the reading and hearing of the text, become God’s Word, God’s message to us.
Similarly, the words of a sermon, when the power of the Holy Spirit is
at work in the preaching and the hearing of
the sermon, become God’s Word, God’s message to us. The Word of God found in sermons also has the
power to reform us, reform the Church.
That’s why the Reformers elevated the importance of the sermon in
worship. The Word is heard in both
scripture and sermon.
But how did the Reformers arrive at such
an understanding? From the Bible. It’s found in many places. One of the best examples is right here in
Isaiah 55: “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not
return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and
sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,”—here it comes!—“so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth;
it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
and succeed in the thing for which I sent it” (55:10-11). So
shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth….
“Word” here doesn’t mean scripture or
the Bible. It refers to the divine word
– dabar in Hebrew—dabar is the active, dynamic, creative
voice of God that causes something to happen.
When God speaks—“Let there be,” for example—new worlds come into
existence. Creation in Genesis is
essentially a “speech-event,” a word-event.
When God speaks, something happens, something always happens. God’s Word
forms us, moves us, sends us, convicts us, loves us, holds us, creates
and recreates us. God’s Word brings new worlds into being, new possibilities,
new people, new relationships, and new communities. God’s Word brings life to God’s people, to
the world. This understanding culminates
in the New Testament when John says, “The Word became flesh and lived among us.”
(John 1:14). Jesus is the embodiment of
God’s voice, a walking sermon, for all to see, in the flesh. He’s a living Word.
That’s why we’re invited to “Listen for God’s Word.” Be attentive.
Hear. Really hear. Strain your ear, lean in and listen for what God might
be trying to say through the text, through the sermon. These words are alive! They’re active! Pay attention! And then look for it, for that moment of grace
when ordinary words—whether read on a page of the Bible or floating through the
air from the pulpit—suddenly become Word,
a Word that strikes us and pierces our hearts (for the way to the heart is
through the ear), a Word that completely enthralls us, a Word that we need to hear.
Word that change
our lives, forever.
Word that send
us out from the safety of our pews
into a world of need.
Word that
compels us to struggle and fight against injustice and violence and
suffering.
Word that overwhelms us in
its beauty and holiness.
Word that leaves
us shaking in fear and trembling.
Word that
unsettles us and disturbs us.
Word that might
even make us angry or confused.
Word that
scandalizes our middle-class sensibilities.
Word that offers
us grace and hope and healing and love and joy.
Word that causes
us to well-up with tears of joy or sorrow—maybe at the same time.
Word that causes
us to dance.
For in hearing of this Word we are changed.
And when the Word is really heard—here
in our hearts, not in our heads, in our hearts, as Calvin knew, and here in our
guts—we will find that we are being reformed. We will know that we are formed,
reformed, and always being reformed by the Word that will never rest until there’s
nothing left to be said, a Word that will continue to speak until there’s
nothing left that needs to be heard.
[1] Diarmaid
MacCulloch, The Reformation: A History
(New York: Viking, 2003), 75.
[2] MacColloch,
76-77, including works that make up the Corpus
Hermeticum, Egyptian-Greek wisdom texts attributed to Hermes Trismegistus,
which date from the first to third centuries C.E.
[3] MacCulloch, 76.
[4] MacCulloch, 76.
[5] MacCulloch, 78.
[6] MacCulloch, 78. The German cardinal Nicholas of Cusa in
1433-33, the Italian Lorenazo Valla in 1440, and the English bishop Reingald
Pecock in 1450. Valla was, curiously, a student of Aurispa.
[7] Karl Barth, The Word of God and the Word of Man(1928).
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