Posted on 01/03/2005 8:18:33 AM PST by kiriath_jearim
Open or Closed Case? Controversial theologian John Sanders on way out at Huntington. By Stan Guthrie | posted 12/22/2004
While John Sanders and the Board of Trustees at Huntington College in Indiana disagree on whether God exhaustively knows the future, they agree that his days as a theology professor at the evangelical school are running out. The issue, according to both Sanders and G. Blair Dowden, the college's president, is not Sanders' belief in open theology, but his notoriety in advocating the doctrine. Both acknowledged that others on the faculty hold the same open theology views.
"You can be an open theist," Sanders told CT. "You just can't be a well-known one. That makes this a very interesting case."
After an executive session of the board was held in October, Dowden told members of the faculty that there "was very little support for John's continued employment at Huntington." Neither Sanders nor Dowden expect him back for the 2005-2006 academic year, which begins next fall. Dowden told ct that while the controversy is "directly related" to open theism, there is no requirement for professors on the issue.
"Not at all," Dowden said. "We have some other faculty who are open theists, but they're not teaching theology or Bible. It's not a litmus test."
Sanders, who has taught at the school of about 1,000 students for seven years, has been a focus of controversy over open theism for the past four years, he said. In November 2003, Sanders narrowly avoided being expelled from the Evangelical Theological Society over his beliefs. Some society members believe open theology violates the society's commitment to scriptural inerrancy.
Huntington removed Sanders from the tenure track over the controversy, but school officials attempted to give him some financial security by signing him to three-year rolling contracts, automatically renewable annually, unless the administration or board says No. In the event Sanders were to be dismissed, he would receive payment for the balance of the contract.
Sanders told ct he expects to be relieved of his position shortly, and that Dowden has "made it clear that my contract will not be renewed after the 2004-5 academic year." Sanders said that he is looking into other teaching positions and research grants, but that he has no other options waiting in the wings right now.
Earlier reports in ct and the Chronicle of Higher Education that Sanders had been "fired" were inaccurate. Dowden, who called Sanders a "brilliant scholar" and "excellent teacher," has been a defender of Sanders.
"John has done everything we have asked of him," Dowden said. But Dowden said that the United Brethren in Christ, which sponsors the school, "finds open theism troubling—some [leaders find it] very troubling."
Dowden added that academic freedom, while important, is not absolute. "For all Christian colleges, academic freedom is bounded in some way."
Sanders said the school is not following its own guidelines. "I do believe that the right to publish and academic freedom statements that the professors actually are working under are being violated," Sanders said. "They are being trodden upon."
Some students at the school are upset. Joni Michaud, a senior history major who is a leader in a student group supporting Sanders, said the controversy is "a case study in academic freedom." The group meets weekly to discuss strategy, has sent letters supporting Sanders to the board, and is seeking to raise awareness among other students. Michaud said the treatment of Sanders violates the school's statements lauding the "benefits of controversy" in an academic setting.
"If Dr. Sanders is indeed fired, I will graduate with a much lowered opinion of the institution," said Michaud, a pre-law major. "I will probably not make any financial contribution, and I will discourage people from attending."
Such talk is no doubt troubling to administrators, who have announced a freeze in tuition rates for the 2005-2006 academic year. Huntington College, to be renamed Huntington University in mid-2005, says the annual U.S.News & World Report survey of colleges consistently ranks it as one of the top comprehensive colleges in the Midwest.
Dowden said the board will next meet January 19-23, and the fate of Sanders could be formally decided then.
[Stan Guthrie is senior associate news editor for Christianity Today]
Your statement that all beliefs are relative is an absolute, which in fact contradicts itself.
You're being foolish. If you cannot address the issue, and just want to play these word games, then I can't consider you mature enough to continue this discussion. Goodnite.
Huh?
I am addressing the issue. Your statements about negatives regarding morals are in effect absolutes. I understand you don't see that but thats not my fault. As soon as you realize that we all make absolute statements about morals we can proceed for there. Until then there is simply no point because you are unable to access your own absolutes.
Of course God is not pleased with this world. Why is this a surprise to you ?
God didn't say Saul had failed. God said He was "greived" He made Saul king. Please show me the verse where it says Saul was a failure.
Why would you expect that? There's a whole family of religions bult around the notion that humans need to have moral law revealed precisely because its knowledge is not inherent in all men at all time.
(Can I take it that by "self-evident" and "inherent in all men" you mean something like "perceived and acknowledged by all"? I don't think that's what the founders meant when they used "self-evident", by the way.)
On the other hand, read The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis, for starters. It appears that while there are always exceptions, there has been an impressive agreement about many moral issues throughout many cultures. There's considerable agreement (outside of college bull sessions) that you can't have sex with whomever you want to have sex with whenever you want, you can't just take what you want, you can only kill people with impunity under certain circumstances, and you ought to be generous.
The fact that some society tribe or group of individuals do not perceive certain moral truths might say more about their ability to perceive than about the truth of the propostion.
That George III did not agree with the notion that all men are created equal, doesn't show that it's not true or not self-evident. It merely shows that George III did not have as good a moral vision as did Thomas Jefferson. (I take "self-evident" as the Founders used it to mean something analagous to "axiom" or "postulate" in mathematics -- a starting point for argument, not something concluded by argument)
I want to parse out the question a little. Are you saying that the fact that it's hard to PROVE some proposition is a moral absolute means or suggests it's not a moral absolute?
Aristotle thought a body in motion tended to slow down (unless it was falling, that is.) Does that mean Newton's first Law is wrong or that we cannot know about the behavior of bodies in motion? (And since Newton's Laws of Motion have the place of axioms or postulates in his system, they are not "proved" except in the elegance of his system.)
The Spartans encouraged their boys to steal -- but whipped them when they were caught. To me that doesn't show that there is no moral law about stealing, it just shows that the Spartans, for all their many virtues, were brutes when it came to child rearing.
Difference of opinion about something does not show that something is true or false, knowable or unknowable, absolute or relative, it seems to me.
Thanks for the work out. The difference in the way we look at things is great.
First. I just don't see the relationship between provability and following a religion. I would venture to say that ALL (or nearly all) the important decisions we are obliged to make are made with insufficient data and knowledge. I can't prove my wife loves me. Sometimes I'm not sure I love her! But we are maried (these 29 years) and we stay married.
I can't prove I'm right when I resist the person attacking me with a club (this happened recently) and I can't prove I'm wrong to resist. I say my prayers (really quickly), make my best guess, and draw my pistol.
The question about being right or wrong was an effort to find your first principles, your axiomata or postulates. Some people say there IS no right or wrong. Others say there are right and wrong but they are unknowable. Ohers that they are knowable, but only through revelation. Others that they are knowable through careful thought. (And, no doubt, others say yet other things.)
I myself think that some matters are knowable generally (to humans who seek knowledge and who are of decent mental capacity and maturity, NOT to all humans) while other important matters are knowable only through revelation. It follows that I think some important matters are not provable in a secular sense. Consequently, to insist on secular provability is, in my view, to err and to err importantly.
For example, I think that in a polygamous marriage, husband, wives, and children are all going to have more difficulty being otherwise good and happy that they would if, to the extent possible ceteris paribus, they were in a monogamous household and/or some of the women involved were single and chaste. Whether the excellence of monogamy compared to polygamy is provable or not, the consequences will still be, um, consequent. So some decisions may matter gravely and affect innocent and otherwise uninvolved people. Standing by and waiting for iron-clad proofs MAY be a serious moral error with serious consequences.
Also, when you say you accept things as they are, again I don't see the relevance and I question the accuracy. Are you suggesting people who follow a religion do NOT accept things as they are? Is THAT provable? ;) Maybe they're the only ones who are close to perceiving things as they truly are. And again, unless you mean "I accept things as they SEEM to me," I don't understand. Who KNOWS or sees "... things as they are"? I think only God does -- not me, that's fer shur!
If you can't see that making God grieve over you is "failing", then there is no point in discussing anything with you. Saul made God grieve. In my book that is the definition of failure. I suppose you'd call it "success"?
Go back and re-read, kid. That is not my position.
Are you assuming that God's grief over something indicates His failure to bring about something He purposed to?
...'It appears that while there are always exceptions...'
I believe this is the key. My definition of an absolute is something that has no exceptions.
I'm saying that, since it is impossible to prove a moral absolute, because, as you say, there are always exceptions, then yes, I believe that there are no moral absolutes. Until some things are proven, then that's the way I will think, unless God wants me to change, then I'll wake up thinking differently.
You're right, opinion differences really don't mean much, I figure we'll all know after we're dead...then again, maybe not.
You're right, I should start saying that I accept things as they seem to be to me. I'll try and remember this. I always thought that when I say that this is what I believe, it meant the same as seems.
The way it seems to me, is that people are born...some good, some bad, with varying degrees of both or either. I have no idea why.
With reference to religion, I don't see how you can say that people accept things as they are. For some examples; how can Muslims believe that God wants them to kill for Him? That is just something written in a book, is this as things are. Or how can Christians believe in resurrection? Coming back from the dead is not as things are.
But then again, it seems to me that this is the way God wants it, or it would be different.
A Christian can grieve God (Eph 4:30) and can quench God (1 Thes 5:19), and those are momentary failures that have consequences like David’s sin with Bathsheba; but one can’t fail to carry out God’s will. Jonah grieved God by running away from Nineveh but God brought him back to do His will. Saul likewise fulfilled God’s will but God was grieved that Saul couldn’t be more than he was.
Saul failed but he had his successes as well. God looks at people as either "doing right in His eyes" or "doing evil in His eyes". The whole two books of Kings states this over and over again. King So-and-So did what was good (evil) in the sight of the Lord and then it goes into their history. There were some very good kings that did some bad things and there were some very bad kings that did some good things (Ahab humbled himself to God). But they all did what God wanted them to do. If Saul was listed in the books of Kings do you think it would say, “And Saul did what was right in God’s eyes…” or do you think it would say “And Saul did what was evil in God’s eyes…”?
Nowhere in scriptures does it say or even hint that we fail God. The only time “fail” is used is when we “fail the test” in knowing if Christ is in us. (2 Cor 13:5-6)
My flesh and my heart may fail, But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Psalms 73:26
Feelings and opinions are facts, or events or somesuch -- in the sense that they occur, that they are part of "things as they are (or seem)". I can say,"Yesterday I felt unhappy, and the day before I thought Osama is a scoundrel." That's the way things are.
Or maybe it's a question about "accept". I would say that "acceptance" involves accepting my notions and the way they influence my behavior as part of how things are -- and Osama's notions and the way they affect his behavior. To me "accept" and "approve" are not synonyms.
As to resurrection, I've never seen Moscow, I've read in books that it's really there. I reckon it is. I've never seen that Bristlecone Pine which is supposedly the oldest tree in the world, but I reckon it's there.
Nowhere is resurrection described as something that happens often. (Asteroids don't strike the earth too often, but I accept that possibility.) It's pretty much going to have to be a belief or disbelief issue, isn't it? Sources credible to me say they saw it.
Does accepting things as they are imply that they will always be this way? Maybe one aspect of things as they are is that they won't always be this way. Maybe one day there will be a whole mess of resurrections.
I'm not trying to be cute. I'm looking at the phrases "things as they are", "things as they seem", and at what it means to "accept" them.
I meant there are exceptions (like the Yanamoto) to the pool of people believing certain moral propositions. That Spartans taught their sons to steal does not in itself show that there is no moral law about stealing. It only shows there are differences of opinion about what that moral law is.
The being (or absoluteness?) of a law does not depend on its being known, does it? Wasn't Australia the largest island (or smallest continent) before it was discovered?
Yes, there are always exceptions and maybes...this is one of the reasons for my thinking that many things are relative. Some things are verifiable, some not. As we both agree, people have differing opinions.
Here is a proposed moral absolute.
Love is patient; love is kind
and envies no one.
Love is never boastful, nor conceited, nor rude;
never selfish, not quick to take offense.
There is nothing love cannot face;
there is no limit to its faith,
its hope, and endurance.
In a word, there are three things
that last forever: faith, hope, and love;
but the greatest of them all is love.
~ 1 Corinthians 13 ~
While the Spartan example does show that there are differing opinions of what moral law is, there is nothing in itself that does show a moral law either.
I think a law is quite different than a land mass.
By examining the witnesses.
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