Why I think Brian Zahnd’s discussion of Jesus, the Church, the Bible, and Christianity is outdated

In a Substack post, Brian Zahnd looks at four key theological “entities” and warns of the “theological mischief” that happens when the “critical distinction” between them is not properly respected. The Church, the Bible, and the religion of Christianity are all good and important things, but not as good and important as Jesus. “The moment we try to nudge the Church or the Bible or Christianity toward equality with Christ we are headed down a theological path that leads to confusion and real-life trouble.”

My objection to this sort of analysis is two-fold. First, it relies on a flawed understanding of the categories if they are meant to be fundamentally biblical and not the product of later theological rationalisation. Secondly, it is an outdated analysis of “Christianity”: it deals with problems of the past, not of the future.

Read more...
Did God die on the cross? Part 1
This has been giving me a headache.Luke has Paul say to the Ephesian elders: “Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood” (Acts 20:28). In a sermon posted last week on… ( | 9 comments)
Trump vs. Kim: what does Jesus have to say about it?
In good off-the-cuff biblical language Donald Trump has warned that North Korea’s recent salvo of threats “will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen”.Jesus said that the Roman assault on Jerusalem would result in “such tribulation as has not been from the beginning of the… ( | 7 comments)
The centurion at the cross and the lack of a definite article
What did the centurion at the cross believe about Jesus? Did he believe that Jesus was the true Son of God? Did he believe that he was equivalent to the divinised emperor? Or did he merely agree with popular Jewish opinion that Jesus was a righteous man (and not the first), who had been… ( | 7 comments)
Melchizedek and the Son of God
This is a quick response to Mark Nieweg’s question, following yesterday’s post on Jesus as the Son of God, whether Hebrews 7:13 is an argument for the eternal existence of the Son of God: “He is without father or mother or genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but resembling… ( | 1 comment)
Truly this man was a son of God: Jesus, kingdom and the divinity of Caesar
Theological accounts of Jesus tend to portray him as a divine figure who descended to earth at a certain moment in human history, died on the cross for the sins of humanity, and then returned to heaven. Historical accounts place him firmly within a story about Israel under Roman… ( | 12 comments)
“Our job is to plant the story… in ways that make sense…”
I may get into trouble for this, but I want to make a couple of constructive critical points about this quotation from the missiologist Alan Hirsch, posted by communitaseuropa on Instagram. ( | 3 comments)
How does Paul fill up what is lacking of Christ’s sufferings?
My friend Joel White—well, technically I suppose he’s the brother of my friend Wes, but the brother of my friend is my friend—kindly sent me a copy of an article he wrote on Colossians 1:24 because we had a chat about this once. It’s a pet theme of mine. The article is entitled “Paul Completes the… ()