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Jude the Obscure
Posted on Monday, December 13, 1999 - 7:36 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Allanette, you rung a bell when you said you were raised as an SDA PK. Reason: So was I!

I would agree, furthermore, that SDAism is anti-intellectual in the sense that everyone is mystified, under a spell. When a "spiritual fact" is pointed out to them that doesn't fit into their logically compartmentalized system, they twist their brains into pretzels in order to force it to fit.

For example, Colossians 2:14 (NIV) says Christ "forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross."

Now virtually the entire world of biblical scholarship interprets "the written code, with its regulations" as the law of Moses, including the 10 Commandments.

But because SDAs have to hang onto the seventh-day Sabbath at all costs, they have come up with absurd interpretations. In seminary Dr. Edward Heppenstall, rest his soul, came up with a half-way position. He used to say it was "the CURSE of the law" that was nailed to the cross, and he was the most liberal of SDA scholars and suffered accordingly.

Dr. Raul Dederen used to teach that "only the CEREMONIAL law" was nailed. I remember when Dr. H corrected Dr. D and made him change his interpretation mid-course. It was embarrassing for all of us. But Dr. H was then REMOVED from his post as head of the theology department at the SDA seminary at Andrews along with a large number of other professors during the great purge of the late 60s. And Dr. H's revised position never took hold.

Today the church still says it was only the ceremonial law that was nailed. And if you read Dr. Bacchiocchi's book FROM SABBATH TO SUNDAY you will find this "intellectual" interpretation:

On page 351 he says that what God "nailed on the cross" was "the record and the guilt of our sins." And he concludes by saying that Colossians 2:14 "has nothing to say about the law and the Sabbath."

And so Colleen's characterization -- "as Adventists we were taught that intellectual understanding is everything" -- has validity, since Adventists can read Dr. B's book (which is based on his Ph.D. work at Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome) and feel quite giddily "intellectual" and reassured that "intellectual understanding is everything."

But in reality all they are doing is turning their own brains into the exact same shape as Dr. Bacchiocchi's.

Pretzels, anyone?

--Jude
Allenette
Posted on Tuesday, December 14, 1999 - 4:32 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Hey Jude :-)
Thanks for the kind words. Here is a quote to tie into the subject of "intellectualism in SDA" (maybe this deserves a new thread?) from my favorite book ABOUT SDA, "Seeking a Sanctuary" p. 115:

"A study of the background of new members of the Georgia-Cumberland Conf between 1979 and 1980 was conducted by the Institute of Church Ministry (ICM) at the denomination's Andrews University. Of those who responded to the survey....The average level of education was to about 11th grade....54% gave their annual family income as less than $15,000....While Adventism appeared to recruit from all sections of society, they drew few converts from the ranks of the well-educated, affluent, suburban professionals who constituted 8% of the population but only 4% of new believers."

I would suggest that there is LESS brain twisting going on and more mindless nodding the head up and down.
Bruce H
Posted on Tuesday, December 14, 1999 - 4:54 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

JUDE you said above.

-----For example, Colossians 2:14 (NIV) says
Christ
"forgave us all our sins, having canceled the
written code, with its regulations, that was
against us and that stood opposed to us; he took
it away, nailing it to the cross."-----

JUDE I like what you said back there, but I look
at it this way. I do not care which Laws were
nailed to the cross, the text say's it is Just THE
ONES THAT ARE AGAINST ME that were nailed to the
cross. AMEN.

BH

.
Jude the Obscure
Posted on Tuesday, December 14, 1999 - 6:21 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Allenette: You'll get no argument from me. Thanks for the insight. -Jude
Jude the Obscure
Posted on Tuesday, December 14, 1999 - 6:23 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Bruce: Yes, each one of us should take the cross very personally. -Jude
Jude the Obscure
Posted on Tuesday, December 14, 1999 - 6:27 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Allenette: I've seen your delightful :-) And so I've been experimenting:

>:-(

<:-(

But yours is best.

:-)

-Jude
Colleentinker
Posted on Tuesday, December 14, 1999 - 8:59 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

I feel as if I need to explain myself a bit. When I say that Adventists think intellectual understanding is everything, I do not mean that they are "educated" or "perceptive" or "scholarly" or "well-read" or "informed" or "clear-thinking". I simply mean that they delight in neat explanations that bypass questions and contradictions. Even the most unexamined and "head-nodding" (to refer to Allenette) are proud of their proof-texts and clever answers to the theological and doctrinal dissonance that surfaces whenever people read the Bible.

By "intellectual" I simply mean "head knowledge". That's completely different from understanding or spiritual insight or discernment. And I still say Adventists are enamored with their head knowledge. When a person gets good at rationalizing and explaining things in sweeping generalities, they draw farther and farther away from reality. When a person deliberately avoids asking the hard questions or insists on answering questions with the same repetitive, simplistic responses, he or she will have an increasingly hard time recognizing or appreciating truth.

No, Adventists are not intellectual in a scholarly sense. If they were, they'd have to jettison their doctrines and traditions. On the other hand, they pride themselves on their cleverness and intellectual games. Many of the more liberal ones actually pride themselves on their scholarly-ness and consider themselves to be liberated from the provincial doctrines of historic Adventism. By the same token, however, they cling tenaciously to the church, insisting that it be "big enough" to accommodate all manner of divergent beliefs. If that attitude isn't religion by ratonalizing and mind-twisting, I don't know what is!

I praise God that He reveals spiritual truth to us, and I praise Him for making it increasingly clear that reality really is centered in Christ and not in our ability to figure out truth.

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