The mysterium horrendum or negative numinous is only mentioned in a footnote in Idea of the Holy. He says essentially that there is an evil side of the numinous, the Devil, but he refuses to elucidate it on it saying he'd rather leave it to other theologians. This is frustrating because his whole theology circles on the mysterium horrendum all the time. He says the numinous began with the mysterium horrendum and even when it has evolved to its highest manifestation, Christianity, there is remnant of the mysterium horrendum that never disappears. Consider these passages from Idea of the Holy, I could quote more but these are some spicy ones.

"Specially noticeable is the 'fear of God', which Yahweh can pour forth, dispatching almost like a daemon, and which seizes upon a man with paralyzing effect. Compare Exodus 23:27 'I will send my fear before thee, and will destroy all the people to whom thou shalt come…' also Job 9:34, 13:21 ('let not his fear terrify me'; let not thy dread make me afraid'). Here we have a terror fraught with an inward shuddering such as not even the most menacing and overpowering created thing can instil. It has something spectral in it." p13-14

"The numinous only unfolds its full content by slow degrees, as one by one the series of requisite stimuli or incitements becomes operative. But where any whole is as yet incompletely presented its earlier and partial constituent moments or elements, aroused in isolation, have naturally something bizarre, unintelligible, and even grotesque about them. This is especially true of that religious moment which would appear to have been in every case the first to be aroused in the human mind, viz. daemonic dread. Considered alone and per se, it necessarily and naturally looks more like the opposite of religion than religion itself. If it is singled out from the elements which form its context, it appears rather to resemble a dreadful form of auto-suggestion, a sort of psychological nightmare of the tribal mind, than to have anything to do with religion; and the supernatural beings with whom men at this early stage profess relations appear as phantoms, projected by a morbid, undeveloped imagination afflicted by a sort of persecution-phobia. One can understand how it is that not a few inquirers could seriously imagine that 'religion' began with devil-worship, and that at bottom the devil is more ancient than God." p132

"How should it be logically inferred from the still 'crude', half-daemonic character of a moon-god or a sun-god or a numen attached to some locality, that he is a guardian and guarantor of the oath and of honourable dealing, of hospitality, of the sanctity of marriage, and of duties to tribe and clan? How should it be inferred that he is a god who decrees happiness and misery, participates in the concerns of the tribe, provides for its well-being, and directs the course of destiny and history? Whence comes this most surprising of all the facts in the history of religion, that beings, obviously born originally of horror and terror, become gods - beings to whom men pray, to whom they confide their sorrow or their happiness, in whom they behold the origin and the sanction of morality, law, and the whole canon of justice? And how does all this come about in such a way that, when once such ideas have been aroused, it is understood at once as the plainest and most evident of axioms, that so it must be?" p136-137

I have a few analysis of Otto... Timothy Beal's Religion And Its Monsters and Todd Gooch's Numinous And Modernity. Timothy Beal is an ally for me. Because he recognizes the importance of the monstrous as the best expression of the numinous, also.. he recognizes the abject nature of the numinous, it's potential for illness and ugliness.

"As personifications of radical otherness, monsters are often identified with the divine, especially conjuring its more dreadful, maleficent aspects. And experiences of horror in the face of the monstrous are often described in ways that suggest a kind of religious experience, an encounter with mysterious, ineffable otherness, eliciting an irreducible mix of dread and fascination, horror and wonder.1 Early on in religious studies, Rudolph Otto’s The Idea of the Holy (Das Heilige; 1917) recognized this affinity between religious experiences of radical otherness and encounters with the monstrous, describing the monstrous as an apt expression of the holy in all its aspects of overwhelming awe, wonder and dread—what he called the mysterium tremendum. The monstrous, for Otto, was a kind of monstrum tremendum, a dread envoy of the holy. Otto’s translator effectively captured this unsettling alloy of awe and horror in his use of the older English spelling of “aweful” that retains vertiginous combination of fascination and terror, attraction and repulsion. Thus we may recognize both conservative and subversive religious dimensions to supernatural horror and the monstrous. On the one hand, conservatively, they function to maintain order against chaos, to police the boundaries of the normal and the known by projecting otherness—within oneself, society and the cosmos—onto the monster and then blowing it away. In this way, they serve what Russell McCutcheon, Bruce Lincoln and other ideological-critical scholars of religion argue to be the primary function of religion, namely, the legitimation and sanctification of existing social and institutional structures of power and authority.2 As objectifications of otherness and anomaly, monsters serve to clearly locate and securely ground “us,” “here.” On the other hand, monsters of supernatural horror may also reveal an equally powerful subversive religious desire for dislocation and ungrounding, for the terrifying dimensions of holiness, in the face of which our own sense of selfhood and control is lost—a kind of ego annihilation in relation to radical otherness.3 In this way, monstrous horror testifies to the chaotic, disorienting dimensions of religious experience, which is not reducible to common mainstream representations of it in terms of goodness, beauty and human thriving." p5-6

I also have The Terror That Comes In The Night by David Hufford who calls the nightmare or sleep paralysis phenomenon numinous, full stop. (he doesn't ever mention the mysterium horrendum)

This is one example of literature I am covering in my thesis. A Voyage To Arcturus by David Lindsay

"Maskull, though fully conscious of his companions and situation, imagined that he was being oppressed by a black, shapeless, supernatural being, who was trying to clasp him. He was filled with horror, trembled violently, yet could not move a limb. Sweat tumbled off his face in great drops. The waking nightmare lasted a long time, but during that space it kept coming and going. At one moment the vision seemed on the point of departing; the next it almost took shape—which he knew would be his death. Suddenly it vanished altogether—he was free. A fresh spring breeze fanned his face; he heard the slow, solitary singing of a sweet bird; and it seemed to him as if a poem had shot together in his soul. Such flashing, heartbreaking joy he had never experienced before in all his life! Almost immediately that too vanished. Sitting up, he passed his hand across his eyes and swayed quietly, like one who has been visited by an angel. 'Your colour changed to white,' said Corpang. 'What happened?' 'I passed through torture to love,' replied Maskull simply. He stood up. Haunte gazed at him sombrely. 'Will you not describe that passage?' Maskull answered slowly and thoughtfully. 'When I was in Matterplay, I saw heavy clouds discharge themselves and change to coloured, living animals. In the same way, my black, chaotic pangs just now seemed to consolidate themselves and spring together as a new sort of joy. The joy would not have been possible without the preliminary nightmare. It is not accidental; Nature intends it so. The truth has just flashed through my brain.... You men of Lichstorm don’t go far enough. You stop at the pangs, without realising that they are birth pangs.' 'If this is true, you are a great pioneer,' muttered Haunte. 'How does this sensation differ from common love?' interrogated Corpang. 'This was all that love is, multiplied by wildness.' " p311-312

This quote reflects the nuance my thesis is going to be about. The mysterium horrendum and the 'good' numinous is hard to separate. I want my thesis to cover a few authors, like David Lindsay (I have decided on some already) who demonstrate the mysterium horrendum as the numinous full stop is a trope.

I thought of analyzing Otto by way of Derrida, deconstructionism. But Derrida sounds like a mess and it is intimidating to me. Is there something I can read that explains it plainly? I think I could deconstruct the numinous as I have demonstrated a bit here. But the nightmare is foundational it has no 'differance' it cannot be related to infinite things.

Finally, it may be noted that the dynamic state of itself is

operative grace, but the same state as principle of acts of love,

hope, faith, repentance, and so on, is grace as cooperative. It

may be added that, lest conversion be too violent a change and

disrupt psychological continuity, the dynamic state may be

preceded by similar transient dispositions that also are both

operative and cooperative. Again, once the dynamic state has

been established, it is filled out and developed by still further

additional graces

Do you believe that Molinism could be true? If not, why not? What's your specific objections?

I was of the opinion that the traditional authorship was false until I heard that all the manuscripts barring 1 had the names of the traditional author at the end.

I'm attempting to figure out which career path is right for me, but doing so has been troubling. My interests lie across the board and aren't necessarily centric on one subject. That said, I believe that if I were to delve into the field of theology, it would give me a wide selection of topics to discuss and ponder from assorted religious beliefs. Furthermore, I could share my passion for the subject with my students, and being a professor yields benefits such as stability and plenty of time off too.

Hello, I am an undergrad student hoping to pursue a PhD! As I would love to become a professor but know about the competitiveness of the job market and thus want to position myself as well as possible by attending a highly ranked/top PhD program. However, I am also aware of the competitiveness of those programs! So, I was wondering about the outlook and chances so that I can approach this with realistic expectations. Here is my question:

If you are a strong applicant (high undergrad and grad GPA, positive letters of rec, strong writing and related experiences) and apply to multiple competitive/highly-ranked programs, do you have a good chance of getting into at least one?

Thanks for any insights you can offer.

I'm trying to work out terms to describe what I believe. Hopefully this sub can help?

I believe that our reality is within divinity, but part of divinity transcends reality. I understand this to be panendeism and panentheism. I believe the transcendent part of divinity, which I call the Transcendent God, is not active in our world, and just kind of exists. I understand that to mean I'm a panendeist. But there's more: I consider the totality of everything, divinity and reality, as the Mother. She is like the 'container' for everything. Our reality, the Transcendent God, and anything else that can be conceived of, exists within the container of the Mother. I'm not sure if this would still be panendeism or not.

I also believe in the existence of other deities/spirits that are more readily available in our reality that exist apart from the Transcendent God. I believe these 'lesser' deities (for lack of a better term) are able to be active in our world and exert some kind of force or mystical experience. I think this belief about the 'lesser' deities would be simply polytheism. I wonder if there's a term to describe all of this together? Polypanendeism mostly covers it I think. However it doesn't seem to clarify if the lesser deities that are apart from the Transcendent God have any interaction with our world. One may assume they do not because of the "deism". Perhaps polytheistic panendeism would be best, though it seems contradictory with both theist and deist terms in there.

Now for the next part of the title, I believe Jesus Christ is one of the 'lesser' deities that exists apart from the Transcendent God. Bart Ehrman has described a low christology/adoptionism is his book How Jesus Became God. I found it very compelling. So I believe Jesus was a mere man, and after death his spirit was "resurrected"/elevated/apotheosized. But adoptionism doesn't define when Jesus became divine. It could be believed he was adopted at his baptism for example. So I think the simplest way to describe my belief would be "resurrection adoptionism".

So if I wanted to describe all of these together, what would be the simplest way? Resurrection adoptionistic polypanendeist? Polytheist panendeistic resurrection adoptionist? What a mouthful. But I'm thinking something like that would be my best bet. Which terms should go first?

I'm writing my Master's thesis on the subject of love occuring within mystical experiences - thus, if any of you could suggest me any sources on that, I'd be eternally grateful!

Thank you!

What channels do you recommend for scholarly approaches to Biblical history, theology, etc.? It is so hard to know whom to trust. Thank you.

We increasingly know more about developmental psychology, how best people learn, and other areas of psychology. How can a God who is ambiguous and enigmatic in the ways we are communicated, be a good way of learning? Best parenting practices would not have them ambiguously talking to their child for them to learn. The bible, the holy spirit, or other forms of communication are not sufficient for proper communication. Why doesn't he talk to us in an unambiguous and clear way?

We do have theories on the problem of good and evil, I’m just looking for any possible theories as well. I’m open to any books that speak in depth about the topic as I can’t get through Google’s firewall of fluff and get actual meaningful answers

Sorry for the common question but I think it's anything but easy to answer if we dive really deep into it.

I spent several years studying theology. I absolutely fell in love with it and used to read and write all the time. I now have two degrees and I have the ability to push myself further.

In the last 3-4 years I’ve been married and had a child. Work is busy and there’s lots to do.

I’m wondering if there are others in similar situations, and I wanted to ask those people: how do you keep yourself on top of things academically? I adore my family, but I really miss my study, and I’d love to read and write again. I want to publish and get back into it. But because I don’t have the time I used to, and because I need more time than others usually to get myself into a groove (i.e. I am a massive perfectionist), I find that I’ve just stagnated.

The stagnation feels really painful because theology was (IS) such a huge part of my life and identity.

Just wanted some advice. Sorry if this is the wrong place

Hi everyone, I would like to know if you know websites or have PDFs of books by Johann Andreas Quenstedt, I am having trouble finding “Theologia Didactico-Polemica”

The Christian idea of salvation generally involves God changing you in some fashion. And we all change throughout time. But there's some point at which it seems difficult to distinguish between a person changing suddenly and a person being destroyed and replaced with a different person. A sudden change would seem to pose problems for the question of whether God, in fact, saved that person. Do any theologians address this problem?

I recently read Judas the Galilean: The Flesh and Blood Jesus. It was intriguing, and I'll admit, I'm always interested in historical events that led to myths, especially those we still believe. I looked for a solid academic review of the book but didn't find one. The argument basically says that Josephus never mentions a Jesus of Nazareth except in 2 or 3 sentences that are accepted as later additions to the text (he has citations, don't ask me if it's true...), but the events in the life of Jesus overlap very well with the life of Judas the Galilean, James, his son, and Manachem, his grandson (who rode a donkey into Jerusalem at the beginning of the Jewish revolt). The book goes on to argue that Paul was rejected by the movement these guys were in (the Zealots, the Fourth Philosophy) and that he ran with it in Gentile communities as a rogue preacher, making changes to the teaching of the movement. Some changes Paul supposedly made, were saying that believe in God is sufficient for salvation, when the belief of the 4th Philosophy was faith w/o works is nothing, that "Jesus" promised an end-times party called the kingdom of Heaven, when the kingdom of heaven of the 4th philosophy was just the freedom of the Judean nation, that Jesus's role was to free all people, when the 4th philosophy was just trying to free the Jews from Roman rule.

It all sounds really believable to me, especially given that Josephus wrote about all of this, but not about Jesus. Has anyone read the book or found a review of it? I'd love to hear an informed, unbiased analysis of the argument. Personally, I find it far more believable than the information provided in the bible.

Were the proto-Trinitarians more likely to hold to universalism than their Arian opponents?

Hermeneutics is the study of interpretation, particularly the interpretation of texts. The hermeneutical circle and hermeneutical spiral are both concepts within hermeneutics that describe the process of interpretation and the relationship between the parts and the whole of a text.

The hermeneutical circle is a metaphor used to describe the process of interpretation. It suggests that the meaning of a text is not fixed, but is influenced by the context in which it is read and the background of the reader. In order to understand a text, the reader must consider both the individual words and sentences within the text, as well as the overall structure and themes of the text. However, to understand the individual parts of the text, the reader must also consider the context in which it was written and the overall meaning of the text. This creates a circular relationship, in which the meaning of the text and the context in which it is read influence each other.

The hermeneutical spiral is a similar concept, but it expands on the idea of the hermeneutical circle by suggesting that the process of interpretation is not a one-time event, but is an ongoing process that evolves over time. The hermeneutical spiral suggests that each time a text is read and interpreted, the reader brings new perspectives, experiences, and understanding to the text, which can change the way they interpret it. This creates a spiral-like movement, in which the interpretation of the text continually evolves and deepens. Read more

Surely God already knows our desire and is willing to do the right thing, so why do we need to engage in petitionary prayer?

Doesn't that betray a misconception of God's character? As if he's ignorant and needs us to tell him what's going on in the earth, or apathetic if we need to pray for him to take action, as if he's unmoved by the evil in the world...

We need to learn the difference between necessity and non-necessity.

Does the fact I keep sinning mean that it is impossible to stop sinning in principle? It does not.

The fact that we sin doesn't mean we necessarily sin.

Nature is about what we are, not what we do. An example I can make is that it is impossible to draw a perfect triangle in this world, but that has nothing to do with what triangle is.

Our situation is even better than triangles. We are helped by the Holy Spirit to fight the urge to sin and be sanctified in this world before the resurrection. Galatians 5 say there is no law that can stop the works of the Holy spirit. So, this means our sanctification goes on infinitely.

This part of the bible alone disproves that there is sinful nature that ties us to sin necessarily.

This is the tag line to an add I saw on YouTube and was wondering if anyone knew where it was from

Hey there! I wanted to share that Baylor's Religion Department and Baylor University Press teamed up to start a podcast that hosts conversations with authors/scholars in religious studies, but with a focus on Christianity. It's called "Currents in Religion." Here's a link to the Anchor.fm page that includes links to Spotify, Apple, etc.: anchor.fm/currentsinreligion.

We've had episodes with:

• Natalie Carnes on feminist theology and the arts.
• Jonathan Tran and Jessica Wai-Fong Wong on icons, economies, and racism.
• Beverly Gaventa on the state of New Testament studies.
• Cynthia Shafer-Elliott on history, archaeology, and the Hebrew Bible.

​

Upcoming episodes include conversations with Mike Bird, Devan Stahl, Micheal O'Siadhail, etc.

Hope you enjoy it!

The Issue of Literalism and Symbolism regarding the Eucharist

Catholics say bread and wine literally changes into the substance of Jesus's flesh and blood, but that it only looks, smells, feels like bread and wine.

While I do think this is false, there is a more important issue at hand. We cannot simply say that the bread and wine we eat is the symbol of the flesh and blood that Jesus gave for us.

Jesus says this: “For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world."

The spiritual bread is more important than literal bread. The Symbolism vs literalism are all at fault for having our human understanding of “flesh” “blood”, and “bread” as the frame of reference.

When God is called as Father, or King, it doesn't mean he is those in the sense of human father or king. He is MORE than that, while the human concept is a lesser version. Human fatherhood is derived from God being the father. Human fatherhood represents the God as the Father of all life, but it never encompasses it. In the same way, when we say this bread we eat is the flesh and blood of Jesus, both “bread” and “flesh/blood” should be interpreted under their spiritual meaning.

Therefore, when we say literal vs symbolic, it masks what we are actually talking about.

When we say “flesh and blood” we tend to think it in terms of scientific biological definition. But it reduces the notion of the bible when it is said 'the work of the flesh.' Bible didn't mean the flesh to mean the flesh defined by biology.

The western point of view, starting from the Enlightenment , cuts out a big part of the original meaning of these key concepts in the bible, and it is not strange that the Church gradually lost power and fell into heretical progressive thinking. Of course homosexuality is not sin, because the body is understood in the terms of mechanistic thinking. Where is the wrong for a machine to work certain way? We are all machines. There is no right and wrong in the machine. Machines just have inputs and outputs. There is no notion of sin in this.

True father, true flesh, true bread. I think these have more meaning than how we understand them. The world we live in is a bastardized version of creation, which will be restored in the second heaven and earth. The creation and our language that describes it are all tainted by sin.

As an evangelical Christian for the past 11 years, I have always subscribed to the Protestant teaching of sola scriptura and the inerrancy of scripture. However, my recent readings about biblical scholarship has led me to see that biblical inerrancy doesn’t stand up to the historical evidence. I was asking in another subreddit on how does biblical errancy not lead to a slippery slope to apostasy and he/she mentioned how the bible itself is not an ultimatum to the Christian faith. This reminded me of the Eastern Orthodox concept of the teachings of Jesus being passed down as “tradition” with the bible being merely one of its aspects. Other aspects that are also integral to the Christian faith would include the oral tradition mentioned by Roman Catholics that are subsequently written down by the early church fathers. My question then would be how important are the writings of the early church be in constructing Christian theology?

I was raised from childhood in the IFB sect of Christianity and completely walked away from religion about 15-20 years ago. I'm now looking to refresh and build my knowledge of Christian theology to understand it better. This might be too vague, but any recommendations on books for someone trying to understand academically but not looking for spiritual answers? Thanks in advance.

Do you have favorite commentaries on the fourth gospel? I like postliberal theologians right now (William Placher’s Mark was a new perspective for me, really enjoyed it), but anything academic is welcome.

John’s always so lyrical in most translations, I’d love to study it more.

Thanks!

Are you in ministry alongside your academic work? Do you find it makes you a better theologian, or a worse one?

I currently divide my time between a part-time ministry role and a part-time postdoc position, and at times I wonder if I wouldn't be better at either if I did only that. I don't have as much time to spend with congregants as I would like, which makes me know their lives less well, which affects my preaching and teaching. At the same time, my research progresses more slowly, because there is always something urgent in the congregation to take care of by mid-day.

On the other hand, my sermons can draw on my research, which keeps the ideas fresh and makes the sermon-writing process (much) faster. And I feel my academic work, which is in part on ecclesiology, benefits somehow from the "grounding" in everyday church life. Plus, if I had a fulltime position in either path, I would have a larger workload, too - instead of congregation business, there might just be more conference organizing and teaching to take away from my research time (or, as the case may be, more committee meetings and building repairs to take away from pastoral visits).

I don't currently have the option to do either fulltime, so most of this is moot, but I feel like I should figure it out so I'll know what to do when the option presents itself.

What do you think? What is your experience? Does this combination work for you?