KENARCHY JOURNAL VOLUME 5
Editorial
Roger Haydon Mitchell
Roger Haydon Mitchell, PhD, is a theologian and activist, an honorary researcher in the Lancaster University Centre for Alternatives to Social and Economic Inequalities, and political theologian with the Westminster Theological Centre.
Volume 5.1
Biblical & Christological Foundations for Voluntary Kenosis
Bradley Jersak
Bradley (BradJersak.com) is the editor of CWRmagazine and Clarion-Journal.com, Principal & Director of Theology & Culture, at St. Stephen’s University Canada SSU.ca and the author of numerous books and papers.
Abstract
Paul’s use of the word kenosis in Philippians 2:7 (“he emptied himself”) launched a long and winding quest to understand its meaning in biblical context, its implications for Christology, and its application for personal and public ethics. That journey has been fraught and, at times, badly sidetracked, most notably around the question of diminishment: what Christ surrendered and what we are asked to surrender. This study will briefly exegete the biblical text, then retrace some key questions and themes in kenotic theology. Ultimately, this overview will lead us to three main convictions: (1) what is “poured out” in kenosis is Christ himself, both and indivisibly as the eternal Logos and in the humanity of Jesus of Nazareth; (2) kenosis is an attribute of self-giving love and cruciform surrender in both divine and human nature, not the surrender of divine attributes or diminishment of the divine nature; and (3) central and essential to kenosis is its voluntary and consensual nature as gift or self-donation, without diminishment, even when undergoing affliction—both for God-in-Christ and in those who follow his footsteps. The essay will conclude with a nuanced demonstration of voluntary consent from the works of Sergius Bulgakov and Simone Weil.
Volume 5.2
Into the Wilderness: Tracing the Steps of a Birdlike Wisdom
Julie Tomlin
Julie Tomlin, has postgraduate qualifications in both journalism and political theology and is a writer living in Lancashire.
Abstract
This paper draws on the threads of Wisdom spirituality that were explored within the context of the history of capitalism and its underpinning ideologies in two papers previously published in the Kenarchy Journal: The Spiralling Dance of Wisdom and Hidden in Plain Sight: reconsidering the value of social reproduction, work and nature. Envisaged as occupying the centre in what I have come to imagine as a Triptych, this third paper works with and through two, sketching an outline of Divine Wisdom, both figurative and as praxis, to add further dimension to what was glimpsed in the earlier papers.
Sight of a multi-faceted feminine divinity is first sought out through Walter Brueggemann’s interpretation of the Exodus account as a journey to the common good in an existential struggle against empire forces. To this is added Catherine’s Keller’s “dreamreading” of John’s first-century CE text of Revelation and the “great sign” of the woman clothed with the sun who flees an imperially-charged Dragon to the refuge of the wilderness. Both texts are read together for insinuations of a complex, grammatically feminine figure of Divine Wisdom, whose cosmic and everyday dimensions can be traced in struggles for the common good in opposition to centralising forces of domination.
Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza’s feminist biblical inquiry which formed the foundation of the inquiry into Divine Wisdom in the two previous papers is developed by A. Paige Rawson’s queer postcolonial reading from a socioeconomic perspective that further unties Wisdom from masculine/feminine binaries. Correlating with the Shekinah-Hochma-Ruach presence of the two wilderness accounts, the political nature of wild Wisdom is further explored via the Black Studies of Fred Moten and Stefano Harney. The central theme of their work, “the undercommons,” suggests a wild, unregulated and ungovernable realm that lies beyond institutions of control. The concept of the fugitive is key to the understanding of space where the colonised, queer, and otherwise marginal make meaning with each other; for the undercommons is not a settled location, but something always there, a way of life in antagonistic relationship to colonialism and capitalism. In particular, Jack Halberstam’s introduction to Moten and Harvey’s book is drawn upon to form a bridge between the wild spatiality of the divine, dynamic, agent and guide who merges from the two wilderness accounts and the politics of the undercommons. The nature of generative struggle – identified in the Exodus and Revelation accounts – is further explored in relation to the politics of the undercommons as outlined by Catherine Keller in The Political Theology of the Earth. The strategic importance of the work of social reproduction, of re-enchantment and re-connection to the earth as sites of social, economic and political transformation is emphasised as part of the concluding section that connects the wilderness divinity to Jesus and the kenarchy project of recognising a loving God who empowers forms of living for the good of both people and the earth
Volume 5.3
Spiritual Capital – Observations in Process
Simon Cross
Simon Cross PhD is a Freelance writer & inter-disciplinary researcher. He chairs the British Progressive Christianity Network.
Abstract
This article outlines some observations and recommendations derived from a study of the experiences of people who understand themselves to work for the ‘common good’. Drawing on theological analysis of a series of surveys and interviews, this article sets out some key observations which are framed as having potential for practical application. The work draws on an underpinning of process-relational theology, which is, broadly, an extension of the philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead. Recommendations for action are intended to provide suggested ways for the church, and wider elements of civil society, to grapple with some of the apparent challenges presented by the context of a post secular society.
Volume 5.4
Struggling for Good against Evil
Dave Andrews
Dave Andrews, his wife Ange, and their family, have lived and worked in intentional communities with marginalised groups of people in Australia and Asia for more than forty years. Dave is interested in radical spirituality, incarnational community and the dynamics of personal and social transformation. He is a Member of the Waiters Union and an Emeritus Elder for Servants To Asia’s Urban Poor. See www.daveandrews.com.au.
Abstract
This charts my quest for ‘good’, and my struggle for ‘good’ against ‘evil’, growing up in an evangelical tradition. In the process I particularly distinguish the category of ‘evil’ from the categories of ‘bad’ and ‘sin’ and reflect on some of the dominant manifestations of this ‘evil’ during the century in which I grew up. I specifically explore what it has meant for me, in my personal struggle for ‘good’ against ‘evil’, to deal in ever expanding concentric circles of concern, with the ‘evil in ourselves’ the ‘evil in our communities’, the ‘evil in our institutions’, the ‘evil in our nations’ and the ‘evil in our religions’. And the struggle goes on….
Volume 5.5
Palestinian Arabs as Co-Heirs of the Abrahamic Promise: Revisiting a Literal, Unconditional Interpretation
Michael Huffman
Michael Huffman has served as a pastor, teacher, and mentor of Christian youth in various capacities throughout his adult life He is currently Coordinator of the Center of Theological Development in Antalya, Turkey.
Abstract
A majority of American evangelicals interpret God’s promise to give a certain land to Abraham’s descendants both literally and unconditionally (see Gen 12:2–3 and Gen 15). Because the promise is literal, Abraham’s living descendants are the rightful heirs of the promised land; because it is unconditional, this right belongs to Abraham’s biological descendants regardless of their behavior, beliefs, or other changeable factors. Evangelicals who support Israel as a Jewish nation-state do so largely in response to this way of reading the biblical Abrahamic promise. Meanwhile, others express alarm at what this implies for Arabs who live there, as well as for those who have been compelled to leave. The result is an impasse in Christian political posture toward the role of Arabs in the modern state of Israel, seemingly with no hope of resolution apart from a seismic shift in approaches to biblical hermeneutics. This article argues, however, that even a literal, unconditional reading of the Abrahamic promise, when followed to its logical end, leads necessarily to the welcoming of modern Arabs in the promised land. Without minimizing the importance of hermeneutical differences among Christians, the article shows that these do not need to be resolved before an unqualified advocacy for the welcoming of Arabs, both in Israel and elsewhere, can become standard among all Christians.
Volume 5.6
Book Review: Kenosis
Mark Corner
Mark Corner has written both theology and political science books. He has taught in universities in England, The Czech Republic and Belgium. He is married to a Czech EU official. They have two sons, one dog, four cats and twenty hens and live in the centre of Brussels.
Volume 5.7
Book Review: Saving Liberalism from Itself
Bradley Jersak
Bradley (BradJersak.com) is the editor of CWRmagazine and Clarion-Journal.com, Principal & Director of Theology & Culture, at St. Stephen’s University Canada SSU.ca and the author of numerous books and papers.
Volume 5.8
Book Review: Anthony Reddie introducing James H. Cone
Michael McDougle
Michael McDougle is a postgraduate researcher at St.Stephen’s University, Canada.
Volume 5.9
Book Review: Out of the Embers
Paul Lancaster
Paul Lancaster has been a Religious Studies and History teacher and currently directs the Interact Centre for Intercultural Learning & Action and the international network Hope for the Nations in Leeds, UK.
Volume 5.10
Book Review: Enchantments of Mammon
Spencer Thompson
Spencer Thompson PhD is an economist in the Scottish Government. His academic research has explored the potential of cooperatives as an alternative model of business.
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