The danger of de-personalizing God's wrath

D. A. Carson makes an excellent point here in his critique of N. T. Wright -- but it applies to many emergent and emergent-friendly authors as well, e.g., Scot McKnight. Carson writes:

At the end of the day, the central notion of sin in Wright’s thought is that it is somehow anarchic rebellion against shalom, and the triumph at the end is the restoration of shalom. What is lost is the intensely personal dimension of sin: it is rebellion against God, and he is regularly portrayed as the most offended party (cf. Ps 51!).

Of course, a low view of human sin and God's wrath goes hand-in-glove with a low view of Christ's atonement. N. T. Wright almost never speaks of "sin" and instead speaks of "evil." Scot McKnight speaks of "cracked eikons" (humans as images of God). In this view, the cross was God's way of dealing with "evil" in the world, or of restoring the image of God, but rarely is it described as the quenching of God's wrath directed against sin or the satisfaction of divine justice.

Read D. A. Carson's RBL review of Evil and the Justice of God by N. T. Wright.

Comments

[Steve Rives]

The cross can be viewed from various aspects, and Wright, in that particular book, explains it in terms of the Victory of God. Boersma in his book, Violence, Hospitality and the Cross explores all the major the views, and he places Wright within the spectrum of options. Carson can critique that particular view, but as Boersma points out, all the views offer up their valid points. Wright is going back to a view of the early church fathers, especially Irenaeus. It is not a matter that Irenaues got it wrong and "trivialized sin" as Carson put it, or didn't understand a real place of torment for real people, not at all, but that, like Wright, he put emphasis in a different place. Among all the views, to emphasis one over another is not a matter of rejecting the others. So when Wright writes a book about how Irenaues' view works, it is not a repudiation of other views.

Let me quote Wright as he comments on John 5:, "God the creator would bring people back into bodily life, to face the consequences of their evil deeds,..."

Wright knows about a personalized expression of God's wrath. My proof is the above quote. He does not have to say that in every book he writes, but it is sufficient that he knows it, explains it, etc. Apparently, Carson would want him to say all that things that could be said every time he writes a book.

Wright needs to be careful, for it seems that he is judged as much by what he is expected to say as by what he says. Personally, I don't read much of Wright. I just happened to know that if I looked up what he said on John 5:29 I would get his view on the subject.

It took me two minutes to find out Wright's view. Carson could have checked. It seems that Wright is a monster or boggy man. I think Carson looks under his bed each night to make sure Wright is not there to get him. This debate is pretty sad and pathetic to watch. A dose of church life might wake people up to the real troubles and tribulations we face. Wright is not an enemy. Nor is Carson.

[Lee Irons]

I'll respond in a separate post.

[Lee Irons]

Steve,

I looked up your Wright quote in context. Here are some other things Wright says in his comments on John 5:29:

"This [God's bringing justice to the world, putting everything to rights] would involve bringing all evil to scrutiny and condemnation, and vindicating all who had followed God's way."

"But bringing the new creation to birth can only be done if the evil that has corrupted the world is named, shamed and dealt with. That's what judgment is all about."

[Tom Wright, John for Everyone, Part 1: Chapters 1-10 (SPCK/WJK, 2004), 63-64]

Wright describes judgment in impersonal terms as God's way of dealing with "the evil that has corrupted the world."