Queen of the Sciences

We bet you still have a hangover from the crucifixion episode with which we opened this season. Well, you had to wait longer than three days, but here it is at last: the counterpart episode on the resurrection. For we consider the sufferings of the crucifixion episode are not worth comparing to the glory that is this resurrection episode.

We cover a range of questions here, from what is even meant by resurrection (and just as importantly what is not) to what an event like this means in the stream of creaturely history to the ultimate question of what the resurrection of the crucified one means within the life of God.

Plus, some fun verbs.

Support us on Patreon!

Notes:

1. Jesus Christ Superstar. I wouldn't go as far as to call it a "timeless" work as the advertising fluff on the homepage says—it's pretty obviously the product of its time—but still well worth the listen. Pilate gets to me every time.

2. Two essays by N. T. Wright addressing the meaning of "resurrection" and considerations for its historicity: "Christian Origins and the Resurrection of Jesus" and "Jesus' Resurrection and Christian Origins."

3. Bodily boundedness is discussed at greater length in our Leviticus episode

4. Pannenberg, Jesus: God and Man

5. My article on "The Verbs of the Resurrection"

6. Käsemann, Commentary on Romans

7. Theissen, The Miracle Stories of the Early Christian Tradition

8. For Dad vs. Bultmann, see: Divine Complexity ch. 2 for an extensive discussion of the resurrection and its metaphysical implications for God; Beloved Community on the difference between demythologization and deliteralization (easiest thing here is just to look at the index for all listings); the forthcoming Joshua commentary from Brazos, which will also deal extensively with this topic; and finally "The Theology of the Martyrs," in Martyrdom and the Suffering of the Righteous, 87–110.

More about us at sarahhinlickywilson.com and paulhinlicky.com!

Following on our last episode about eucharistic discipline, in this one we actually dig into the doctrine, discussing what and who it is in, with, and under the Lord's Supper and what it even means to talk about Christ's presence therein. Lots of fun terminology (see below). Then some liturgical advisories on bread vs. wafers, I momentarily lose it over how people approach their shot glasses, and we (perhaps a bit disappointingly) argue less about the eucharistic prayer than either of us anticipated.

Support us on Patreon!

Notes:

1. Luther's writings referred to in this episode are: The Small Catechism, Confession Concerning Christ's Supper, the Jonah commentary, and (obliquely) the Babylonian Captivity of the Church.

2. Some of us because theologians because we're enchanted by the vocabulary. Here are some good ones that were or weren't mentioned in this episode pertaining to the Lord's Supper that you can have fun googling: alleosis, capernaitism, epiclesis, ubivolipraesens, transubstantiation, consubstantiation (just so long as you promise not to use it to describe the Lutheran doctrine of the the Lord's Supper), and extracalvinisticum (N.B. I first fell in love with my husband because of a prank involving the extracalvinisticum, so, you know, there's more than one reason to master theological vocabulary).

3. I talk more about gospel imperatives in this bonus episode, and reflect on unusual sacramental circumstances in "The Sacraments in Time, Space, and Matter."

4. Dad discusses the Lord's Supper in detail in Beloved Community, pp. 476–509.

5. Sacramentine sisters

6. For a good survey of early church practice and Reformation response on the eucharistic prayer and the words of institution, see Dorothea Wendebourg, "Traveled the Full Extent of Rome's Erroneous Path?" Lutheran Forum 44/4 (2010): 18–33.

More about us at sarahhinlickywilson.com and paulhinlicky.com!

We put the cart ahead of the horse in this one: after a good start in I Corinthians, we gallop off into matters of eucharistic discipline, but not to worry, we decide to keep going in the next episode, in which we'll back up and deal with the doctrine. In the meanwhile, if you get really exercised about questions of who's in and who's out, you're either going to love this episode... or unsubscribe. Either way, enjoy!

Support us on Patreon!

Notes:

1. Dennis Di Mauro, "For You, For Many, For All People?" Lutheran Forum 50/4 (2016): 20–23.

2. We never did get around to infant communion, but here's an article I wrote on the topic called "Mildly Opposed to Infant Communion." A bit off topic but related to something that came up in this episode, I critique C. S. Lewis's doctrine of purgatory in "A Lutheran Reflection on C. S. Lewis."

3. For a study of early liturgical history that doesn't annoy me, see Paul F. Bradshaw and Maxwell E. Johnson's The Origin of Feasts, Fasts, and Seasons in Early Christianity

4. The Vatican II statement on ecumenism is Unitatis Redintegratio; see especially section 3 on "Churches and Ecclesial Communities Separated from the Roman Apostolic See."

More about us at sarahhinlickywilson.com and paulhinlicky.com!

Christianity has had a 1900+ year bad history with (rabbinic) Judaism, with devastating consequences for the lives of Jews and theological bankruptcy for Christians. We hone in on the problem within our own tradition by looking at Luther's contorted and confusing attitude to Jews—from being the first person in about 1000 years to propose toleration and speak well of them, to his famously horrific suggestions to drive them out, steal their books, and burn their synagogues. Yet Luther proves to be not unique but representative in his anti-Judaism, so we also address wider concerns such as the not-always-tenable difference between anti-Judaism and anti-Semitism, and to what extent the roots of Christian anti-Judaism lie in our Scripture, Old and New Testament alike. Romans chs. 9–11 guide us through this mare's nest of issues.

Support us on Patreon!

Notes:

1. David Nirenberg, Anti-Judaism: The Western Tradition

2. The chief texts of Luther relevant to his Janus-like relationship with the Jews are: “That Jesus Christ Was Born a Jew” (1523; Luther’s Works vol. 45), “Against the Sabbatarians” (1539; Luther’s Works vol. 47), and “On the Jews and Their Lies” (1543; Luther’s Works vol. 47)

3. The book that popularly made the case in America for the direct lineage between Hitler and Luther was William L. Shirer’s The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. Uwe Siemon-Netto wrote a rebuttal to this claim in his The Fabricated Luther: Refuting Nazi Connections and Other Modern Myths.

4. My choice for the best place to examine this issue is in Thomas Kaufmann’s Luther’s Jews: A Journey into Anti-Semitism. Here's a review I wrote of it.

5. See Dad’s review of the excellent book by Peter Ochs, Another Reformation: Postliberal Christianity and the Jews in The Journal of Scriptural Reasoning 13/2 (2014) and in his book Beloved Community the “Excursus: on Jewish perplexity as a principle internal to Christology” on pp. 416–428. Also, check out his book Before Auschwitz, which analyzes various Christian theological positions regarding Jews and Judaism and how they were able to resist Nazi ideology or, conversely, fell right in step with it.

6. A few things I’ve written dealing with these issues: “Still Reckoning with Luther” in The Christian Century; commentary on Mark 12:28–34 for Working Preacher; my chapter “Tradition: A Lutheran Perspective” in the collection The Idea of Tradition in the Late Modern World; and a chapter in my ebook Luther, Thrice, available by signing up for the Theology & a Recipe newsletter on my website.

More about us at sarahhinlickywilson.com and paulhinlicky.com!

Following hot on the heels of our last episode about St. Paul among the Philosophers, in this episode we take up his magnum opus, the Epistle to the Romans. Positioned first in the New Testament, it is actually the last extant letter he wrote. Hugely influential, it is densely packed, tightly argued, and generally impenetrable to a casual reading. So with the excellent aid of the brilliant interpreter Ernst Käsemann we walk through most of Romans (leaving chs. 9–11 for next time) to discover the power of the gospel, the ungodliness of the godly, and God's justification of precisely those ungodly people by His Son and Spirit.

Support us on Patreon!

Notes:

1. Käsemann, Commentary on Romans

2. Melanchthon, Loci Communes

3. Paulson, Lutheran Theology

4. J. L. Austin, How to Do Things with Words

5. Dad talks about baptism extensively in Beloved Community

6. Epp, Junia: The First Woman Apostle; I wrote a review of it for the late great Books & Culture

More about us at sarahhinlickywilson.com and paulhinlicky.com!

The apostle Paul gets a bad rap as the repressive, restrictive jerk who turned the hippie religion of Jesus into a metaphysical mess of religion about Jesus. Strangely enough, Christians seem to be the primary exponents of this misleading interpretation. But across the way in the realms of secular and socialist philosophy, Paul is enjoying a revival of sorts; and in some cases is even the object of envious longing. What gives? In this episode we offer a brief introduction to Paul (apostle, not Dad) and then Paul (Dad, not apostle) walks us through three contemporary philosophers' takes on this figure so important to the Christian faith.

Support us on Patreon!

Notes:

1. Nietzsche, The Antichrist

2. Stuhlmacher, Reconciliation, Law, Righteousness: Essays in Biblical Theology and Revisting Paul’s Doctrine of Justification: A Challenge to the New Perspective

3. Bultmann’s existentalist interpretation of the resurrection is found in Theology of the New Testament and draws on Heidegger’s Being and Time

4. Käsemann, Commentary on Romans

5. Stendahl, Paul among Jews and Gentiles

6. Dunn, “The New Perspective on Paul,” Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 65 (1983): 95–122

7. J. Louis Martyn, Galatians

8. N. T. Wright, The Climax of the Covenant: Christ and the Law in Pauline Theology

9. Žižek and Millbank, The Monstrosity of Christ: Paradox or Dialectic?

10. Badiou, Saint Paul: The Foundation of Universalism

11. Dad co-authored a book with Brent Adkins called Rethinking Theology and Philosophy with Deleuze which deals with some of these thinkers

12. Agamben, The Time That Remains

13. Benjamin and Agamben, Towards the Critique of Violence

More about us at sarahhinlickywilson.com and paulhinlicky.com!

Once again Luther proves his surprising relevance with his treatise "Whether One May Flee from a Deadly Plague." In light of the metastasizing coronavirus pandemic, Dad and I talk about the treatise and then offer our own reflections on how believers can and should respond.

Support us on Patreon!

Notes:

1. Luther's treatise is published in Luther's Works vol. 43 and you can also read it here.

2. Bonhoeffer discusses "natural life" in his Ethics

3. We refer in this episode to a previous episode we did on Faith to the Aid of Reason

4. I discussed at length what I learned about dealing with uncertainty and non-knowledge from the Book of Revelation in my latest issue of Theology & a Recipe (which includes recipes for Seven Bowls of Snacks)

More about us at sarahhinlickywilson.com and paulhinlicky.com!

Following on our last two episodes exploring the Lutheran doctrine of the "two kingdoms," in this one we dive deeply into the life of two extraordinary Ethiopian Lutherans. Gudina Tumsa was a pastor and the General Secretary of the Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus until his assassination by the communist Derg regime in 1979. His wife Tsehay Tolessa, an active evangelist, was arrested after his death, tortured, and imprisoned without trial or sentence for ten years. Only after the fall of the regime was Gudina's death confirmed and his body identified, exhumed, and given a Christian burial.

In addition to discussing their remarkable life stories and witness to Christ, we delve into Gudina's writings during his time of leadership in the ECMY, including his reflections on ecclesiology, wholistic mission, and the role of a Christian in public life, especially when faced with a hostile government. The parallels to Dietrich Bonhoeffer's life and witness earned Gudina the moniker "the Ethiopian Bonhoeffer," and he and Tsehay alike deserve wider renown.

One other item: we hit a milestone in the life of every podcast with this episode, namely, the Technical Glitch. As a result, the sound quality is poorer than usual. We apologize and have exorcised the relevant demons from the equipment, and expect that from now on the sound will be up to its usual standards.

Support us on Patreon!

Notes:

1. The book mentioned in the episode is The Life, Works, and Witness of Tsehay Tolessa and Gudina Tumsa, the Ethiopian Bonhoeffer, edited by me (Sarah) and my friend Samuel Yonas Deressa.

2. You can also read some of the papers of the Journal of the Gudina Tumsa Forum here and here (I have a paper in the latter).

3. Gudina Tumsa Foundation on Facebook and US branch of the Gudina Tumsa Foundation

4. Original English translation of Dietrich Bonhoeffer's The Cost of Discipleship

5. Dad wrote an entry on "Martin Luther in Karl Marx" for The Oxford Encyclopedia of Martin Luther

More about us at sarahhinlickywilson.com and paulhinlicky.com!

Can a distinction between the religious and governmental realms hashed out in the sixteenth century be remotely useful for us today? Well, we give it an honest try. If in the past the danger was religion invading the realm of the state and making use of violent coercion to advance its ultimate goals, today the danger (at least in the parts of the world we've lived in) is the other way around: the state attempting to assert itself in realms of conscience, mind, and ultimate salvation. We explore totalizing ideologies and share our insights on how to keep on distinguishing the two kingdoms for the good of all people, whatever their religion or politics.

Support us on Patreon!

Notes:

1. Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes about secularism and the French vs. American revolutions in “Inheritance and Decay” in Ethics

2. Alasdair MacIntyre observes how “we’re all liberals now” in Whose Justice? Which Rationality?

3. John Locke’s political essays mentioned in this episode are the Second Treatise on Government and A Letter Concerning Toleration

4. Dad calls Robert Benne a liberal in his essay “Luther and Liberalism” in A Report from the Front Lines: Conversations on Public Theology, A Festschrift in Honor of Robert Benne

5. John Witte Jr. discusses early Lutheran political theology in Law and Protestantism: The Legal Teachings of the Lutheran Reformation

6. Robert P. Ericksen, Theologians under Hitler

7. Martin Luther reminds us that the kingdom of God will come regardless of our efforts or obstructions in the Small Catechism

8. The excerpt of the song goes “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss,” and it’s from “Won’t Get Fooled Again” by The Who. If you didn’t already know that, you should probably drop everything and go listen to the album Who’s Next

9. Here’s a link to info about the memoir I mentioned (still forthcoming, but if you sign up for my Theology & a Recipe e-newsletter you’ll be notified about publication details… plus, of course, you’ll get Theology & a Recipe), as well as an article I wrote called “A Primer on Luther’s Politics”

More about us at sarahhinlickywilson.com and paulhinlicky.com!