Theology, Typology, Testimony, and Trauma

Now these are the names of the sons of Israel who came to Egypt with Jacob; they came each one with his household: Exodus 1:1  NASB

Came to Egypt –  Bob Bartels wrote to me.  “I am finally realizing and enjoying the thought that the Bible is not a textbook but a story of God’s interaction with man.  If I can quote a small part of the movie: ‘Dead Poets Society’, I would say that the Bible (poetry) is beauty, love, and romance which are the things we stay alive for (a paraphrase might have Robin Williams put it). Along with poetry the Bible is a mystery, talking animals, unsolved problems, prose, great epic stories of angels and giants and men of all types both evil and righteous and about a great and ever lasting kingdom and the kind who will bring this kingdom to man.

“In my new way of thinking I am able to see why novels like The Hobbit and The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe are so enjoyable and instructive as eternal truths are told in story form and not by a formula or list of doctrines which are part of a solid, monolithic system.  But when the Bible is seen as a textbook it loses it[s] charm and delight and God becomes a formula that can be plugged into a problem to create the Right answer.  Textbooks are hard to remember, but stories, like songs, are easily learned and remembered and provide, at times, open ended problems that can, therefore, address many different solutions, thoughts and new questions.  Stories lead to great discussions which allow the participants to enter into new thinking, new responses to truth and a hunger to learn more not with fear of not having the RIGHT answer.  One cannot argue for or against the formula for aeronautical LIFT.

“Thank you for stimulating these thoughts: a new and helpful perspective on God’s revelation: a perspective that now takes me out of the dry, safe-controlled theological debate into life itself and God’s interaction with man in real time and real circumstances.  What a relief!”[1]

Bob gets it.  Yes, we can construct pigeonholes for Scripture.  We can pound the texts to make them fit, but, as Bob’s comment shows, the Bible as it stands isn’t really theology, typology, or eschatology.  It’s story.  It’s human drama, divine emotion, and chaos.  It’s love poems and curses, myths and political history, miracles and mania—all rolled up (literally) into a collection that creates a legacy and tradition for a particular people.  These are the people who came to Egypt with Jacob and left Egypt with Moses.  We know the stories, but I don’t think we know the people.  We don’t understand the messiah complex of Moses.  We don’t know the trauma of his defeat.  We can’t feel his despondency.  We don’t know the pathos of Jeremiah, the rage of Zechariah, the longing of Ezekiel.  We have only a glimmer of the submission of Mary, the anger of Joseph or the despair of Peter.  But these are the things we need to know.  The “Bible Answer Man” is an oxymoron.  If we’re going to read God’s word, we better start with a quest for the questions—ours and God’s.

Topical Index: story, answers, questions, Scripture, Exodus 1:1

[1] Bob Bartels in private correspondence