tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15264500.post5752557445095125054..comments2023-07-11T05:13:06.461-06:00Comments on Morehead's Musings: An LDS Perspective on Claiming Christ: A Mormon-Evangelical DebateJohn W. Moreheadhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01262542253787543738noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15264500.post-38366452179868113052008-08-24T19:28:00.000-06:002008-08-24T19:28:00.000-06:00I'm getting the same impression of this book (I'm ...I'm getting the same impression of this book (I'm only a few chapters into it). The format is just confused and hard to read. I wasn't sure why this was, but I think Aquinas has nailed it.<BR/><BR/>McDermott comes looking for scrap and Millett simply isn't engaging him. It almost seems to mirror the problems of communication between the faith traditions generally.<BR/><BR/>For Evangelicals, orthodoxy is everything. But for Mormons, it's really almost a tertiary concern after a focus on ethics and historical narrative (via covenant-making). Thus, it is not really natural for an LDS theologian or scholars to speak in orthodox terms. When they do, they have to make a concerted effort - which Robinson managed well enough in HWD.<BR/><BR/>It has been said by more than one LDS scholar that Mormons do not have theologians. They have historians. For a Mormon, history really is the only theology we have that is native to us. Our eyes tend to glaze over whenever people start trying to get into philosophical line-drawing exercises. To speak to the philosophy-oriented approach of modern orthodox theologians takes quite a bit of Mormons artificially taking themselves away from their true religious passions and concerns.<BR/><BR/>Millet does not appear to be making a similar effort to speak in terms of orthodoxy in "Claiming Christ." He is speaking in the voice that is most comfortable to LDS - that of personal experience or "how I fit into the divine narrative found in scripture."<BR/><BR/>The result is satisfying for none. The Evangelicals leave feeling like they're being snow-jobbed (since their orthodox concerns are being ignored) while the LDS leave feeling picked-on by McDermott, who brings up concerns that are alien to them.<BR/><BR/>Robinson and Blomberg's book worked because it picked a paradigm and stuck with it. They committed to a discussion of orthodoxy, and tried to have it out. That worked.<BR/><BR/>If we could ever get an Evangelical scholar to abandon the cerebral obsession with orthodoxy for more than five seconds, Millet's approach will also work for a book. This is unlikely if you keep turning to Evangelical theologians for dialogue. I am convinced that they simply don't know how to abandon the orthodoxy, and I don't think they ever will for the foreseeable future.<BR/><BR/>The result is that the Mormons are the ones who end up debating on the Evangelicals' terms or not at all. It is the Mormon who must drop his or her experiential and historical approach in favor of the cold, forbidding, sterile, and unappealing analytical approach of modern Protestants. We give, or no one does. Because the Evangelicals do not seem willing to meet us on our turf.<BR/><BR/>This creates a dynamic where the Mormons are the ones who have to justify themselves in an Evangelical world and not the other way around. Evangelicals refuse to engage on Mormon terms or in ways that Mormons can relate to. So it is the Mormon scholars who must go, hat in hand, to the Protestant world and beg for a hearing - but only if they agree to behave themselves, and speak in properly orthodox language.Seth R.https://www.blogger.com/profile/13769247769345052208noreply@blogger.com