Quantum Physics and Theology

Saturday after Epiphany 2
January 23, 2010

The Lord be with you

“All truth is God’s truth” is a sentiment Rev. Dr. John Polkinghorne must certainly agree with. For the first twenty-five years of his adult life he made his living as a theoretical physicist working on theories of elementary particles and he played a significant role in the discovery of the quark. He then left that field of study and turned his focus to theology, becoming a priest in the Church of England. He excelled there also, eventually becoming president of Queens’ College, Cambridge. He has written numerous books and articles, received numerous awards, and been involved in numerous organizations, especially those that deal with the relationship between religion and science.

I have recently finished his book Quantum Physics and Theology: An Unexpected Kinship. His goal in this book is to encourage scientists who have discounted theology to take a second look at what theology has to say, and to encourage theologians who have discounted science to take a second look at what science has to say. As I do not fall into either of these categories, it is hard for me to say if the book accomplishes its goal (I am a theologian that feels science is a great blessing as it seeks to understand the created universe our God has placed us in.) You might say, for me, Polkinghorne was “preaching to the choir.”

I did, however, find the book fascinating. Polkinghorne was able to explain his scientific points in a way that a person unfamiliar with the intricacies of the mathematics of quantum physics could understand. The parallels between the truth seeking efforts of science and theology were well thought out. The possible theological implications of quantum physics could have been fleshed out more, but perhaps the scientists reading the book would not be quite ready for that. Then again a quantum physicist might feel the say same way about his field and theologians.

One thing that scientists often search for is some unified theory that explains everything, something like the underpinnings of all reality. Polkinghorne ends his book with the statement, “I believe that ultimately the cousinly relationships that we have investigated in this book find their most profound understanding in terms of that true Theory of Everything which is Trinitarian theology.” Though I do not agree with all his conclusions, to that one I give a big “Amen!”

This is a short book (just over 100 pages), and well written. However I do think that most people would need some college to really follow what he is saying. This is not Polkinghorne’s fault. It is the fault of the subject matter. For those of you who are members of Lamb of God Lutheran (LCMS), you can expect an insight or two that I’ve gleaned from this book to surface in my sermons from time to time.

Blessings in Christ,
Pastor John Rickert

Christmas Truce 1914

Epiphany 2
January 17, 2010

The Lord be with you

I have just finished the book Silent Night, the story of the World War I Christmas Truce by Stanley Weintraub. It recounts how, for Christmas 1914, the common soldiers in the trenches of WWI stopped fighting and celebrated the Lord’s birth. They sang Christmas Carols and other songs, they shared food, they buried their dead, and in many places even played soccer together. Sadly those who were in no danger of losing their lives, the politicians and Generals far from the front, were incensed by the peace and ensured that it would end. The blood of soldiers was a small price to pay to satisfy their greed. This soldier lead Christmas peace was an opportunity to end the war years before it actually ended, which would have saved the flower of the youth of all countries involved. The men who were fighting and dying realized that “at each end of the rifle, men were the same.”

The book is well written and well documented. It is not told in a story format, but more as an investigation of events as they happened along the entire front. Therefore this is not a warm and fuzzy book, nor is it overly grizzly. It is a “just the facts, maam” book, filled with excerpts from diaries and other firsthand accounts. Oh, and so you know, it was the Germans that instigated the peace. In the book, at least, the Allied Command and politicians were the most against it and worked hardest to end it, though the German Command did the same as well.

I can recommend this book as a fascinating window into a few days in 1914.

Blessings in Christ,
Pastor John Rickert

P.S. The photograph is an actual picture of German and English troops taken Christmas Day, 1914.

Two Powers in Heaven

Monday after the First Sunday of Epiphany
January 11, 2010

The Lord be with you

I have recently finished the book Two Powers in Heaven by the Jewish scholar Dr. Alan F. Segal, publisher Brill Academic Publishers, Inc., © 1977. The sub-title is Early Rabbinic Reports about Christianity and Gnosticism.

Within Rabbinic Judaism, as it is expressed in the Mishnah (compiled around 200 AD) and the Gemara (compiled around 500 AD) (the Mishnah and Gemara together comprise the Talmud) there was a polemic against a position known as “two powers in heaven.” Segal reviews first the Talmudic evidence, and then the extra-Rabbinic evidence in an effort to identify what group(s) this polemic was against.

Excluding biblical evidence, the earliest written evidence Segal considers is the Jew Philo (20 BC – 50 AD) who described the “logos” as a mediator and even as a “second god.” He also considers the New Testament witness and the witness of the Church Fathers. He reviews “Merkabah mysticism,” a form of Jewish mysticism that emerged after the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in 70 AD. Segal considers what can be known about Gnosticism in his target time as well. This is not a complete listing of the types of information Segal considers, but this sampling indicates that he was thorough.

Belief in “two powers in heaven” was the charge/heresy the rabbis accused groups/people of who broke with monotheism. Sometimes they were accused of believing in “many powers in heaven.”

While tentative, he concludes that a “radical Gnosticism superceded rather than preceded Christianity as a target for the rabbinic debate.” In other words, while certainly Christians came to be accused of this belief, they were not the original targets. Instead, Rabbis modified a pre-existing category to fit the Christian Faith.

Professor Segal’s book is well written, well researched, well foot-noted, and has had a significant impact on the understanding of this topic. However it is not a book for everyone for two reasons. First, he has to assume a general knowledge of Jewish history from say 500 BC to 500 AD, and many (most?) people simply do not have that knowledge. If he didn’t make this assumption the book would be two or three times longer. The second reason is that he has to assume that the reader is familiar with standard abbreviations used in the Talmud and other ancient documents. This includes a general knowledge of traditional dating for the material found in the Talmud. Still, I enjoyed the book.

You may be wondering why a Lutheran Christian pastor might be interested in the arguments of Jewish Rabbis from 200 to 500 AD. First of all, the Talmud represents the main-stream view of Rabbinic Judaism, and this tradition became Orthodox Judaism. Therefore the arguments they developed became the standard Jewish arguments for countering Christianity. If you plan to reach out to Jewish people today, knowledge of the standard counter-arguments to a Christian understanding of many Old Testament passages can be quite helpful. If you know where the land-mines are, so to speak, it is easier to diffuse them. This was not why I read the book. It was, though, a pleasant side-benefit.

The reason I read the book was to get a clearer picture of the diversity of thought among the Jews in the first few centuries of the Christian Era. It is obvious to anyone who reads the New Testament that there were divisions among the Jews. There were Pharisees, Sadducees, Scribes, Rabbis, Essenes, Hellenized Jews, and so on. It is also clear that some Jews quickly embraced Christianity while others quickly rejected the Faith. If we continue to consider what happened historically in the first few centuries AD, we find that in many areas Judaism actually disappears as entire Jewish populations become Christian. My question was: What was the intellectual milieu in the Jewish community that allowed Christianity to find such a positive responsive?

I think many tend to view First Century Judaism through anachronistic eyes. That is to say, we tend to think of First Century Jews as being pretty much like Twenty First Century Jews. However this book demonstrates that there was a great deal of divergence of thinking in the Jews of Jesus’ day. Often this difference of thinking centered on Old Testament passages that spoke of Jesus. However these groups did not put it all together. When someone like St. Paul came along and showed how Jesus was the being these passages were speaking of, many Jews received Jesus as their Lord and Savior. As Segal observed, “This leads one to suspect that Christianity was the first to synthesize the various divine agents at creation by identifying all of them with the Christian messiah.”

It seems that when Paul wrote “But when the fullness of time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman …: (Galatians 4:4), he meant more than just the Roman Peace, Roman roads, or the general use of the Greek language throughout the Roman Empire. He also meant the mind-set of many Jewish people; people who had been pondering the plural references to God, people who had been pondering the “Man of God,” “Angel of the Lord,” and so on, passages in the Old Testament. Who knows how many times Paul’s experience in Berea (Acts 17:10-12) was repeated by other Believers as they shared the Gospel of God’s grace in Christ Jesus with Jews in the first few centuries after the Resurrection of our Lord. May the Lord of the Church continue to bless efforts to reach all people, including Jews, with the message of salvation.

Blessings in Christ,
Pastor John Rickert

Dust to Dust or Ashes to Ashes?

Friday after Reformation Sunday
October 30, 2009

The Lord be with you

Book: Dust to Dust or Ashes to Ashes? A Biblical and Christian Examination of Cremation
Author: Dr. Alvin J. Schmidt
Publisher: Regina Orthodox Press, Inc
Copyright 2005
136 pages
Paperback
Cost: $14.95 (but right now Regina has a sale and is offering it for $7.48)

The practice of cremation has dramatically risen in the United States in the last 30 or 40 years. The Church, for the most part, has gone along for the ride. Those who have written about it tend to be those who are making money by it, so their objectivity is in question. Real and serious theological and historical reflection by those who are not making a living from the dead is desperately needed; not only for pastors, but also for those who are making decisions about loved ones that were the Temple of the Holy Spirit and will one day, in their body, stand before the Lord of Creation. Dr. Schmidt does an excellent job of reviewing the history of cremation and burial as well as the theology behind these ways of treating those who have fallen asleep in the Lord. He writes in a way that is easy to understand and grounded in the Word of God. While the book does have some limitations (I would love to have seen the connections between baptism and burial explored in greater detail), and some of his assertions need archeological and/or greater written support (such as the idea that Jesus would have been cremated if Joseph of Arimathea had not buried him), nonetheless I can give this book my wholehearted endorsement. It could also be used as a Bible study resource.

Blessings in Christ,
Pastor John Rickert