Eastern and Western Utopias

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In The Geography of Thought, How Asians and Westerners Think Differently … and Why, Richard E. Nesbitt mentions how all Western Utopias apart from those derived from the biblical ideas of the Garden of Eden and the promise of the New Jerusalem have five salient characteristics:

  • there is steady, more or less linear progress towards them
  • once attained, they become a permanent state
  • they are reached through human effort rather than Fate or divine intervention
  • they are usually egalitarian
  • they are usually based on a few extreme assumptions about human nature

Utopia in the Eastern mind is very different, more attuned to reversion rather than progress.

He writes: “It is worth noting here that the ancient Hebrews were in these respects closer to the Chinese than to the Greeks. Their Utopia – the Garden of Eden – was in the past and they hoped for at most a restoration. Their notion of the nature of change was similar to that of the Chinese – they held a clear notion of the yin and yang of life.”

In the first chapter of A Short History of Chinese Philosophy,  Fung Yu-Lan writes “The fact is that Chinese philosophers were accustomed to express themselves in the form of aphorisms, apothegms, or allusions and illustrations. The whole book of Lao-tzu consists of aphorisms, and most of the chapters of the Chuang-tzu are full of allusions and illustrations.”

When one considers the Old Testament Wisdom literature we can see a clear similarity here between the works of the Chinese philosophers and the Proverbs. When reading verses from Lao-tzu and Ecclesiastes in isolation, it is sometimes difficult to tell which verses belong to which writer, such is the similarity.

It seems that we can learn a lot about understanding Old Testament Jewish philosophy and writings by studying and comparing them with their Chinese counterparts.

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Who is my neighbour?

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This was the question a Jewish teacher had for Jesus in response to the command to “love your neighbour as yourself”. The question is essentially asking, who should we love?

Jesus’ answer was to tell a story, the story of the Good Samaritan.

Bruce Springsteen’s response is to sing a song

What do you think?

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Driscoll and Criticism

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Mark Driscoll is probably one of the most well-known preacher/pastors in the world right now. He is also one of the most polarising, whether it is because of his views on homosexuality, mixed martial arts, Avatar, or any number of other issues.

Recently Justin Brierley, the host of Unbelievable, a debate/interview show between Christians and non-Christians interviewed Mark Driscoll, for an article for Christianity Magazine, partly to tie in with Driscoll’s release of his new book Real Marriage (which is not without its own controversy).

Justin is known for his fair, and even-handed control of the debates between Christians and non-Christians. He doesn’t give patsy questions, but he doesn’t play attack dog either, and he generally lets both sides have their say and facilitates their interaction, which is probably one of the main strengths of the program – it leads to genuine dialogue between believers and non-believers on a wide range of topics.

Parts of the interview were broadcast on the New Year’s Eve Unbelievable show, including  one part where Driscoll said:

“Let’s just say this: right now, name for me the one young, good Bible teacher that is known across Great Britain. You don’t have one – that’s the problem. There are a bunch of cowards who aren’t telling the truth.”

This quote was picked up on by Christian Today magazine, who published a short article based on the excerpts from the Unbelievable show, which then prompted responses from people including Krish Kandiah, a director of the Evangelical Alliance.

I’m guessing that Mark Driscoll’s recent blog post, “A Blog Post for the Brits” is largely prompted by the initial reaction to this, and in anticipation that the article Justin Brierley will write for Christianity Magazine will be equally or more critical of him and his ministry.

What he says in this blog post is worse than anything in the interview. And you can have a listen to a portion of it (start at 34 minutes) and judge for yourself. He has launched a pre-emptive strike against Justin Brierley simply on the basis that he thinks that the article in Christianity Magazine will be uncomplimentary towards him.

He says this interview out of all he has done with both Christians and non-Christians associated with the release of real Marriage, this one “... was, in my opinion, the most disrespectful, adversarial, and subjective. As a result, we’ve since changed how we receive, process, and moderate media interviews.  ”

Ironically, according to a colleague of Justin Brierley’s, Mark Driscoll had little to worry about from the article:

and Driscoll apparently had no problem during the interview according to Justin Brierley himself:

 

 

What Driscoll has said amounts to character assassination. Honestly, if Mark Driscoll is so thin-skinned that the mere possibility of criticism causes him to treat people like that then he should not be pastoring or writing books, let alone controversial ones.

Update: The full interview audio is now available

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Love Me If … ?

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In February the five main campuses in Hong Kong will all run evangelistic meetings with the same theme: Love Me If …?

Every year our campuses in Hong Kong run evangelistic meetings which usually each attract several hundred students and have dozens of people pray to receive Christ. This year for the first time, each of the five main campuses are all using the same theme and speakers for the evangelistic meetings. This gives us opportunities to do things on a scale that we haven’t previously been able to, and to co-ordinate our promotion for these meetings.

I (Karl) have been leading our promotion team for this campaign. Our promotion campaign includes social media, website, and videos.

The idea behind Love Me If … ? is to raise the questions that most of us has at the back of their minds. Would the people in my life love me if things were different. Would they love me if I failed my exams? Would he love me if I was overweight? Would she love me if I had no money? I believe that everyone has these questions at the back of their minds, because we all desperately want to be loved, and because unconditional love is so rare. What we want to do with our campaign to is bring these questions from the back of their mind to the front. Then people will be ready to hear about the unconditional love that God offers.

Last week we released the first video promo for the campaign. It was deliberately ambiguous to encourage discussion and conversation. I know that most of you don’t understand Chinese but hopefully it should be obvious that both James and Chloe have secrets that they are hiding from each other. The text at the end of the video asks “Would he love me if he knew?”/”Would she love me if she knew?” We are encouraging students to give their suggestions of what their secrets are, then we will choose the best three and put them to the vote. The most popular option will then be filmed and the final version shown at the meetings. The purpose of this is break up a really big step (going from a website to an evangelistic meeting) into several smaller steps (leaving a comment, voting in a poll) and also hopefully building up a relationship with the students over several interactions so they are more interested in coming to the meeting.

Our main speaker in a Cantopop star, Jill Vidal, who became a Christian after being arrested for drugs and consequently losing her career. We will be releasing a second video closer to the date of the meetings which will be an interview of her telling her story. We have done it in the style of “I Am Second”, which has really stylish presentations of Christians telling their story of faith. I will be editing the footage over the next couple of weeks. She really does have a fantastic redemptive story.

We’re hoping and praying that God would use this promotional campaign to create genuine conversation between our students and their non-Christian friends over the next month or so, and that many of these friends would come to the meetings and have an opportunity to hear the gospel and respond.

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Manga Bible KJV

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I wrote recently that this is the 400th anniversary of the writing of the King James Bible. In the UK several organizations have partnered together to produce BibleFresh to encourage Bible reading and increased Biblical understanding in as this 400th anniversary occurs.

I also wrote recently abut Manga Jesus by Siku, who also wrote the Manga Bible. In cooperation with BibleFresh Siku has released excerpts from the Manga Bible and Manga Jesus with the King James text for free download. The excerpts include portions from Genesis and Exodus, and the Gospels, with the largest portion covering Jesus death and resurrection. If you have never viewed any manga or graphic representations of the Bible then check it out.

I have had the opportunity to communicate with Siku a little in the last month and they have some exciting new projects in the works. Watch this space.

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CS Lewis Audio

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Some of you are probably aware that CS Lewis’ most famous non-fiction book, Mere Christianity originated as a series of radio broadcasts in World War II. Unfortunately, due to the expense of recording media at the time, most media was re-used and original recordings were lost after broadcast. However one of Lewis’ radio broadcasts remains, it can be found at the BBC website, however, if (like me) you don’t live in the UK you will not be able to access the audio files.

Good news however, there is another copy here, which you can also download to put on your iPod and listen at your own convenience. It is also available in a Youtube clip.

You may also notice that the BBC site has another recording of Lewis introducing his book The Great Divorce, which, it seems is in line for a movie treatment.

And if you are interested in a history of how the radio broadcasts came about, check out the Kindlings Muse podcast - C.S. Lewis in a Time of WarPodcast: Live At Earl Palmer Ministries 1 of 1

 

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Ministry Net 2011

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Earlier this month I was in Bangkok with 170 others at the Ministry Net conference. This conference was put on by Campus Crusade for Christ for people who are involved in using the internet for evangelism and discipleship.

On the first morning there I was woken up at about 6:30 by the conference director to go to the airport to buy a same-day return ticket to Singapore. Watch the video below to find out why …

Selegna was on the design team with me, so it was really great that she was able to join us (even if a bit late) and participate in the conference she had had a part in planning.

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The Ontological Argument

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One of the most famous (or infamous, depending on your point of view) arguments for God’s existence is what is called the ontological argument. Its most famous form is that proposed by the 11th century monk St Anselm of Canterbury, and it goes something like this:

  • God is that being than which no greater can be conceived
  • That which exists in reality as well as in the mind is greater than that that exists in the mind only
  • Therefore if we can conceive of a being than which no greater exists, then it exists in reality
Since Anselm there have been different forms of the argument proposed by Descartes, Leibnitz and Alfred Plantinga, but this remains the most common form of the argument.
Many opponents have sought to prove the argument wrong, however most would end up concurring with Bertrand Russell, who said “the argument does not, to a modern mind, seem very convincing, but it is easier to feel convinced that it must be fallacious, than to find out precisely where the fallacy lies.” And I must admit, the argument does at first glance appear to be an illusionist’s trick of a logical argument, where instead of a rabbit, a proof of God is pulled out of a hat.
And so the argument troubled me when I encountered it, and so I set about trying to pull the argument apart to find out how it worked. Essentially it is saying that:
If there is a concept of God, then there is a God.
At this stage, I think most people would be in Bertrand Russell’s side. However, once it is put in the contrapositive form (note that the contrapositive always has the same truth value as the original form):
If there is no God, then there is no concept of God.
We have a bit more to work with. All the opponent need do to prove the ontological argument wrong is to explain how the concept of God could arise apart from God’s existence. No smoke or mirrors required to understand what this argument is claiming. And this is the point where I must side myself with Anselm and against Russell.
Although humans are incredibly creative, we are creative within limits. Whether you put it politely as Einstein did, when he spoke of “standing on the shoulders of giants“, or less so, as in “originality is the art of concealing your sources“, all human creativity requires inspiration. We see something, and we copy. We may transplant what we see into a different field, but we never create without a reference point. We never create anything that is not like something.
I remember my father suggesting that it was not God that created man, but that rather man created God. But when we consider a God who is transcendent – beyond the universe – we run into a difficulty. How could a human who had never encountered anything beyond the universe conceive of something beyond the universe? How could a human create the concept of transcendence? Yes, now, we can understand the concept, but that is because we have the reference point of the concept of God already in our minds. How could a human with no prior concept think it up? I am quite confident that it is impossible, and that the reason we have such a concept is because God does exist and has revealed Himself (including his transcendence) to us.
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