Animal Farm

 Hebrews 9:23

“VAna,gkh ou=n ta. me.n u`podei,gmata tw/n evn toi/j ouvranoi/j tou,toij kaqari,zesqai( auvta. de. ta. evpoura,nia krei,ttosin qusi,aij para. tau,tajÅ”

It is necessary then that on the one hand the copies of “things in the heavens” to be cleansed, but the things of heaven themselves, (are to be cleansed) with better sacrifices

The writer of the book of Hebrews is writing about the implements of the temple and the temple itself (Hebrews 9:21). He states that these things are copies of heavenly things. What precisely does he mean by copies of heavenly things, and the things themselves? In the next verse he compounds this language when he says…

Hebrews 9:24 - For Christ did not go into a holy place made by hands, which are an antitype of the true things”

The word for antitype which many translations render copies, is pivotal for understanding the viewpoint of the writer of Hebrews.

What does it mean to have a heavenly representation, a true thing, which on earth exists as mere copies of what it actually is? Well if you were a first century Greek it would mean you were a Platonist. The way in which the writer frames his theology is necessarily dependant on the Platonic philosophy of his day.

Some people are content to ignore evidence such as this. They simply gloss over the connection between this sort of language and the dominate philosophical themes of the era in which it is written. I personally find it impossibly dissonant to do so. It appears to me overwhelmingly the case that this is Platonic language. Others acknowledge the implications of the passage, but speak of it as a borrowing of a language and a culture for a purpose. These argue that the writer of Hebrew was not a Platonist but he used Platonic language as part of a missionary strategy to convert gentiles. In both cases the assumption of the a-cultural nature of the writer is being maintained. Why is it that we must frame the writer as a-cultural rather than see him as a product of his time? Why must the inspired writers of scripture be spiritually aloof from their own culture?

I think there are two or three psychological / sociological factors from our modern culture which lead us to reread the writers of scripture as a-cultural beings. The writer of Hebrews (some would reason) could not have had a metaphysical belief in Platonism for one or all of the following reasons.

(1) Truth is transcendent not culturally contextual. If we say this text represents Platonic thought we make the Bible dependant on a specific culture which we dont share, but for scripture to be true it must be a-cultural and transcendent.

(2) Platonism is wrong (because our culture has transcended it philosophically) and therefore to say that a human author is Platonic in his thinking is to say the Bible is sophmoric and unadvanced and in error.

(3) Some people are just mired in cultural classism, which unconciously assumes that one’s own culture is representative of all cultures in matters of philosophy and perspective. Therefore they reason that “The Bible’s culture must be essentially like my culture.”

In all three cases assumptions like these fail to take into account that their viewpoint is itself a product of its own specific philosophical culture. Unreflectively they assume that one’s own culture is “the right culture” when it comes to philosophy. Our post enlightenment minds read overtop the Platonic message of Hebrews because it is unthinkable to do otherwise for the modern man. To allow the writer of Hebrews to be a barbarous Platonist is tantamount to calling God’s word worthless. We have transcended that sort of base philosophical speculation and have come into true modernity.

This assumption of one’s own culture is what is responsible for much of the fundamentalist backlash against supposed “liberalism” which seeks to understand scripture from within its own contextual world. I am one of these “liberals.” I simply think that the human author of Hebrews is a Platonist, and he is framing his theology through Platonic patterns. There is nothing odd about this at all; all cultures try to do this. The question at hand then is which culture has the “right” philosophical worldview to properly understand the Bible?

The answer is all of them, instead of none of them. The message of the Bible is neither culturally centered nor a-cultural, but trans-cultural. It crosses over worlds, kingdoms, tribes and nations and somehow unifies them.

Take for example the modern evangelical Christian world. When it argues against evolutionary theory it does so to demonstrate that Genesis 1 has a literal fulfillment; and why is this important? It is important because in our culture literal is equated with true. Interesting enough St. Augustine when speaking about creation and the same passage of Genesis 1 argues that creation must be instantaneous. And why does Augustine depart into such rank heresy? Because he was a neo-Platonist, and what was “actual” was what was heavenly and of the world of the forms; not what was actual on the earth. What a different viewpoint Augustine held! Many today try to make the story of Genesis fit within a scientific framework, because what is naturalistic and material is what is real. Augustine, however, was the exact opposite. What happened in the material world was immaterial (this word itself is a vestige of our culture) only what happened in the invisible, metaphysical world of the forms counted.

WHich is the “right” answer? Which culture has the Biblical world view? I think the answer is both of them do. Biblical worldviews are conversations, not paradigms. The transcendent Logos speaks into the cultural world of its readers and produces a worldview which is a combination of them both. This is as true of the Bible’s writers as it is of its readers. We reproduce worldviews when we read scripture and transport them into our own world. What Genesis 1 meant to the original writer is different than what it meant to Augustine and different than what it means to a modern creationist. There simply is not “transcendant worldview” which we are supposed to appropriate. Rather there is “transcendant Logos” which appropriates itself contextually into our lives.

We ought not try and sort out which one of these is the one and only true philosophical world, but accept that God’s message crosses worlds, working within them not outside of them.

Perhaps if we would stop viewing the Bible through cultural lenses to identify the correct philosophical world from which to read scripture and would instead focus on Christ, in whom the panoply of philosophical worlds have been united, then maybe we could move beyond the debates which have so bitterly divided the church. In short I am suggesting a post modern turn, but then again…it is my philosophical world.