Reflections on "God Without Being" by Jean-Luc Marion

Marion’s first task is explaining the difference between an idol and an icon. Fundamentally, an idol is mirror image of the self. It is called into being by the self when the self conceptualizes it. Marion describes a gaze looking into transcendence; the gaze has an aim, and when the aim sees, the gaze is reflected back by an invisible mirror. “The first intention aims at the divine and the gaze strains itself to see the divine, to see it by taking it up into the field of the gazeable." Like an idol in the classical sense, the conceptual idol of the gaze is forged, though by the intentional ideas of the gazer rather than by masons and artists. The idol appears because the gaze has been stopped, because a visible object in the transcendence has come to be. Before the gaze stopped, it did not see the idol because it “transpierced” the idol, it found nothing upon which to lay its sight. When the visible emerges to the gaze, the gaze is filled, saturated because of its intention. The visible saturates the gaze by delimiting its scope, and thereby reflecting the gaze back upon itself: it is a visualization of the gazer, a mirror – though an invisible mirror, for the nature of the aim of the gaze is precisely that which must exhaust every aim. The idol is the only visible, the extent of the aim; it “admits no beyond, because the gaze cannot raise the sight of its aim."

The critique of metaphysics here is pointed and fearsome. Marion critiques the onto-theo-logical traditions by labeling them as idolatrous. The “God” of metaphysics is a conceptual idol, a visible mirror upon which a gaze has rested, investing the visible with concepts born out of the gaze. The idol, being a mirror, reflects the gazer’s limits. Thus, the metaphysical God is a causa sui, a prime mover, an unchanging form. This very much corresponds to Karl Barth’s Not-God, which is nothing more than “humanity writ large.” This conceptual idol called “God” is bound up in the necessary limits of Dasein, who believes in his experience of the divine in the idol because he is no longer capable of seeing (gazing) past the idol to the invisible. However, it is precisely the epochal character of Dasein that is returned by the idol, though Dasein is incapable of recognizing this due to his intentional gaze upon the divine. “The idol: less a false or untrue image of the divine than a real, limited, and indefinitely variable function of Dasein considered in its aiming at the divine." This conceptual “God” is precisely available for death, as Nietzsche discovers, for it is only a functional apparatus for investigation, formulization, and structuralizing of morals. “The ‘death of God’ presupposes a concept equivalent to that which it apprehends under the name of ‘God’." Thus, even in Nietzsche’s atheism is only the death of the “God” of metaphysics, the Not-God who is merely an idol reflecting the impositions of Dasein in his particular epoch. As for proving this Not-God’s existence, one need only appeal to the concepts that brought him forth in the first place; however, such proofs can be reversed, and this God can die. “Every proof, in fact, demonstrative as it may appear, can lead only to the concept…."

Following this attack on the metaphysical “moral God” and causa sui, Marion begins his examination of the even greater Not-God: the God who belongs to being. In this examination is a critique of Heidegger, though Heidegger himself seemed to realize the critique, but had no intention of answering such questions himself. The critique involves the primacy of being, which Heidegger introduces as the reversal of the metaphysical, philosophical, ontotheological traditions. Being, for Heidegger, is that from which all beings constitute themselves; humanity is Dasein, and as such its purpose is “to be” authentically. There is no ground of being, for it is the category by which all is made intelligible, speakable, etc. Since God, for Heidegger, is not to be equated with being, then it would seem that God has indeed died, and that there is no longer room in language to speak of the divine, since man speaks and thinks being and nothing else. Marion understands Heidegger’s necessary commentary on God as follows: “What is essential in the question of ‘the existence of God’ stems less from ‘God’ than from existence itself, therefore from Being… [The] truth on ‘God’ could never come but from where truth itself issues, namely from Being as such…." Thus, Marion asks the question of whether thinking of God is even possible, considering the infinitude of God and his non-relation to being. In this question it first appears as though the answer is that thought about the divine is entirely impossible, but what is possible is for theology to take as its purpose an analytic of Dasein as being-towards-God. Theology becomes a primarily anthropological task undertaking the liberation of God from being by associating with theology only what Dasein is capable of referencing. However, Marion recognizes the fundamental flaw such an idea poses: for theology to be an ontic examination of the faith of Dasein, it must, as the other ontic sciences must, place itself under the being of Dasein. If, therefore, Dasein takes aim at that which it cannot know or comprehend because it remains outside being, then the aim never leaves Dasein to begin with, and imposes an atheism upon Dasein’s theology, for “God” is nothing other than the invention of Dasein, and is therefore still subjugated to being.

What Marion proposes is the liberation of God from being, a task that must be accomplished without creating an idol that still finds itself either in the ontotheological tradition or the Heideggerian existential tradition. This God, says Marion, is revealed as absolute giving – pure, divine love. Of course, one should be quick to point out that love is a concept, but God’s love is revealed as agape. Such love stops all idolatry from issuing from it, “Because, as opposed to the concept that, by the very definition of apprehension, gathers what it comprehends, and, because of this, almost inevitably comes to completion in an idol, love… does not pretend to comprehend, since it does not mean at all to take…." Love cannot be a conceptual idol because it does not offer itself as something to be conceived (i.e. it does not receive the gaze), but something that ever-gives, transcending conceptual boundaries by reaching outwards. Of course, Marion is echoing Derrida’s notion of the gift, which must be given seemingly without intention of being given as a gift and without being received as a gift (except in retrospect); it must be the identification of the giver with the gift, which is precisely how Jesus fits Marion’s greater schema. Jesus, the giver and the gift, is the revelation of agape. He is the pure gift because he is the icon of the invisible God: an icon, as opposed to an idol, is the meeting of the visible and the invisible, the tension of their difference. It is not a visualization of what was once invisible, but the visualization of that which remains invisible – and invisible not because it is outside the aim, but because it cannot be brought into the aim of the gaze. Christ, first and foremost, is this icon, and in Christ mankind is remade as the icon. What the icon does is give itself, the visible of the invisible, which is the giving of Christ first as an icon (i.e. at the Incarnation), but envisaged most emphatically in his death.

Marion spends the latter sections of his work clarifying the various details of his premises. Most significant is his commentary on the Eucharist and its relationship to the “Christic event,” whereby humanity is always given agape. Of course, Marion’s commentary is built on the Roman Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation, though his argumentation is only partially based on Catholic tradition. The real presence of Christ in the Eucharist first illustrates the a-temporality of the pure gift, but it is most important as the hermeneutic of Scripture. Marion’s example is the meeting of Jesus with the disciples on the road to Emmaus, wherein Jesus first interprets himself in Scripture, but the disciples do not recognize him until they break bread. The text of Scripture itself, when aimed at, cannot yield the icon. Only the substantial Christ in the paschal sacrifice provides the icon whereby the reader looks beyond the words to the Word. The agape-Christ in the paschal sacrifice yields the icon of the invisible agape-God revealed in Scripture.

Concerning ethics, the icon/idol interplay echoes the it/Thou contrast of Buber, and builds on Levinas’ foundation of the Other. The Other is an icon of the invisible God, like Christ, though less than Christ. The Eucharistic hermeneutic, therefore, indicates what agape does; it reveals God, and by revealing him it opens the icon to what it must do for it to be an icon. The summation of ethics is therefore in the Eucharist, which looks past the words to the Word, seeing him as invisible. A simplified form of this kind of ethics would be to ask the question, “What would Jesus do?” Of course, one must wonder if ethics is possible outside of Eucharistic theology, to which Marion might respond in the negative since such ethics would be outside agape. However, every time the Eucharistic sacrifice is imitated in life’s circumstances, even by non-Christians, the gift of agape is present. For non-Catholics, particularly Christians in the Reformed tradition with a strict understanding of election and atonement, such a linking of God and agape is heterodox due to its inevitable inclusivism (and potential universalism). Roman Catholics, however (as well as much of mainstream Protestantism), have no issues with these soteriological implications as they were formalized by Vatican II. Whether Marion understands soteriology to be the divine forming of an icon out of a human idol-unto-himself (i.e. every man under sin), or as something else, the doctrine of salvation and its relationship to God as agape remains dangerously elusive. It is possible that Marion simply assumes the Catholic sacramental position here, affirming the cleansing waters of Baptism as regenerative.

It is clear that Marion is challenging the entire Thomist tradition when he strikes out against the God that is. What Marion is not saying, however, is that God must not be, or that he is not, but only that such categories do not confine him. “God can choose that which is not as if it were," and vice-versa. The category by which beingness or non-beingness is defined is that of faith, rather than ontology. This category of faith is indifferent to being, because being is “delivered” by the gift (i.e. the pure gift, agape). Whether or not Marion accomplishes his goal of showing God to be free of categories, including being, is debatable, but the more important question is the relevance of Marion’s whole system outside of Catholic theology. Without his understanding of the Eucharist, there is no substantial sacrifice presented in the sacrament. Without the substantial sacrifice, the historical crucifixion does not transcend time and appear outside the confines of being. Christ himself, therefore, does not transcend being, but instead remains bound to a (former) present. How, then, can Christ be an icon if his agape has boundaries? Such a question is worth considering for Protestants who wish to see a God with power over being rather than bound by his own.

How is the Church to appropriate a theology such as Marion’s? Are not the foundational doctrines of Christianity – the Trinity and the Hypostatic Union – formulated precisely in post-Socratic metaphysical terms? Marion argues passionately against such an idea, attempting to free such doctrines from the metaphysical tradition he rejects, but what is potentially threatened by Marion’s ideas is not just these cornerstone doctrines, but the whole kerygmatic tradition of Christianity, the positions established in the ancient creeds. However, what Marion may have found is not a rejection of any of these things, but a light by which to view them, a light of agape rather than a light of being, but can the Church remain the Church without preferencing its creeds and doctrinal positions? Perhaps the question is whether such a Church of agape would be an idol or an icon?

Reflections on Kierkegaard's "Fear and Trembling"

If I am to accept Kierkegaard’s leap of faith – the actions of infinite resignation and wholly identifying oneself with the object of faith, Jesus (that is, making the God-man my paradigm for existence, the category by which I identify realities, truths, moralities, etc., and the lens by which I perceive all things epistemological and ontological) – must I also accept Kierkegaard’s notion that this act is meaningful by virtue of its identifying me as an individual, by eliminating me as a member of the mediated (as Hegel puts it) class? Kierkegaard elevates the man who, leaving the rational and logical behind (the mediated class), engages the absurd commitment to a particular relationship (i.e. makes a leap of faith) despite – and perhaps because of – the lack of verifiable evidence or reasoning to justify the commitment. However, Kierkegaard’s perception of the absurd is entirely subjective, as its very nature implies that naturally (that is, to the natural man) the evidence-less leap of faith should look ridiculous! Therefore, it cannot be shared by a community, but must be an entirely personal commitment.

Obviously, this grinds me a little because I can’t stand the abuses this notion has received in 20’th century American Evangelicalism. It also worries me as it seems to make particular religious claims (i.e. Jesus is the absolute, only way to God) irrelevant, and allows for pluralism and, as Kierkegaard himself proclaims, the subjectivity of truth. So, what must be said of Papa Sǿren?

First, Kierkegaard is right, I believe, to identify Jesus as the object of faith and the defining paradigm for existence. He is the icon by which we perceive reality, and all our decisions, actions, patterns of thought, etc., operate under this assumption, whether consciously or unconsciously. This is the leap of faith, the infinite resignation of rationality as subordinate to the commitment to Jesus. The notion that this must be a subjective decision, however, does not seem necessary, as part of the leap must be identifying oneself as a member of the body of Christ, and therefore part of the “absurd family,” the covenant community. If it is an act of infinite resignation to surrender reason for the sake of one’s subjective calling to love and believe in Jesus, is it not an even greater resignation to abrogate that calling, setting it aside in favor of the calling of the family? This greater resignation does not involve the ceasing of love for or belief in Jesus, but identifies it as the absurd resignation of those who receive the same calling (Calvin’s “effectual call” of grace). This shared calling does not make it any less absurd, nor does it imply that it is less risky, less demanding of individual devotion, etc. It merely implies that one’s leap of faith is not made alone, but by an intra-responsible group.

There are rebuttals that may be made to my statements, but I’ll forego them for now.

The second issue is pluralism, which Kierkegaard himself rejects but his heirs in secular existentialism and postmodernism do not. The subjectivity of truth comes from Kierkegaard’s notion that the object of faith becomes the paradigm for engaging all things in existence, and so for Martin Luther King the object of faith is civil rights and equality, but for Adolf Hitler the object of faith is Aryan supremacy. Both have existential value for each individual, and as such are individualized truths. This is the flip-flopping of the traditional philosophical model, essence before existence, into the existential-philosophical model, existence before essence. The individual who exists comes to define his or her own essence for Kierkegaard and his progeny, rather than the “essence of mankind,” with all of its philosophied trappings and absolute systems, working out its particular existences. This must be answered in almost the same way as the last issue, because it overemphasizes the importance of the individual while ignoring the very corporate nature of the covenant family. However, this also has greater application to all areas of life.

Kierkegaard’s process is this: Individuals possess innately their immediate desires. This is infantile immediacy, and is fulfilled by gratification. This, however, is a base feeling, and must be made subject to rational, logical mediation, which will provide the proper synthesis between opposing immediate desires or concepts. This is the state of natural, mature man – rationally and scientifically able to exist by creating new syntheses out of opposing theses. However, Kierkegaard proposes that a higher immediacy exists outside this rational stage (thereby making it “irrational” and “absurd”), and that the truly great heroes make this leap into the irrational by virtue of their infinite resignation of the rational for the sake of shifting their paradigm of existence from reason and logic to the new object of their faith. However, Kierkegaard ends the process at this stage of infinite resignation, with which I am dreadfully uncomfortable.

Consider the Bodhisattvas of Buddhism. These are people who have reached Nirvana, but return to provide assistance to those still journeying. This is similar to my perception of the stage Kierkegaard fails to see. Once the infinite-individual resignation has occurred, it must give way to an infinite-corporate resignation that identifies itself with the community. This does not occur because of a perceived reward, the avoidance of punishment, the logic of systematized doctrine, or as an individual calling, but rather as an identification of oneself as a part of a whole. The whole expands with each application: a whole family, local church, community, universal Church, state, nation, species, living organism, item in creation. Thus, the subjectivity of truth must give way to the “objectivity” of truth, or the “assigned-objectivity” of truth. The act of assigning truth to a given idea results from the conclusion of the whole, which can occur any number of ways (i.e. unanimous vote, coercion, some type of bureaucratic legality, etc.). In Christian circles, this assigned-objectivity occurs in the counsiliar decisions symbolized in the Nicene Creed, for example. In politics, this is the statement that all men are created equal. In economics, this is the resolution that laundering is a punishable crime. These examples, of course, can occur out of the lower, mediated stage (pre-leap of faith), the stage of reason and logic. However, they can be given fuller meaning and improved upon in the assigned-objectivity stage, whereas unnecessary systems still in the mediated stage may be filtered out and discarded.

You're Own Personal Jesus

"It is by all means to be believed, because it is absurd." - Tertullian, referring to the death of the Son of God

I’ve been listening to a Stanford University class on “The Historical Jesus,” taught by Thomas Sheehan (itunes U, totally free! Be careful, though, as this is a full-fledged attack on everything orthodox Christian’s believe, and is not for those who are ill-prepared.). Sheehan is a Jesus Seminar guy who is “Christian” according to only the loosest of definitions, who is lecturing on the Jesus of history as opposed to the Jesus of faith. This Jesus, according to Sheehan and the rest of the Seminar, didn’t say or do most of what is in the New Testament. He didn’t claim to be the messiah, he never thought of himself as the pre-existing, divine Son of God, and his resurrection corresponded to Siddhartha Gautama’s “awakening” (i.e. “Buddha,” the enlightened or awakened one). Obviously, this historical Jesus, a charismatic prophet by all accounts, cannot be reconciled with orthodox Christianity, and, if these ideas are true, those of us who take Jesus to be the Logos of God are naïve at very, very best.

I haven’t done much “historical Jesus” research, but it’s a field that totally fascinates me, because Jesus as God’s revelation, Jesus as the icon of our faith, is more important to me than Jesus as the worker or miracles, Jesus as the Davidite born in Bethlehem, Jesus as the apocalyptic preacher. But, like anyone with conviction and faith, I can only go so far. I get to an impasse where my gut says “Wait, I must believe points A, B, and C actually happened in space and time in order for the Gospel to have eternal value.” Let’s assume there is credibility to the Jesus Seminar’s conclusions and that the Synoptic Tradition – the Gospels as history – as well as the Pauline doctrines do not reflect in their entirety the message and life of Jesus. Of course, there is plenty of scholarly research that pokes major holes in the methods used by the Jesus Seminar, but let’s plays their game first. The questions must be these: What are the essentials (i.e. what must have happened in space and time for the Gospel to have eternal value)? If the historical Jesus is so vastly different from the Jesus of faith, should we re-interpret the Gospel according to history, or is our Christian mythology divinely inspired?

We can only tackle the first question according to denominational traditions, but certain doctrines are easy to label as “essential” to all orthodox Christians. First, the bodily resurrection of Jesus from the dead is perhaps the most important of all propositions. This is based on Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 15, and is, in my perspective, unavoidable for those who accept the Pauline letters as authoritative. Let’s consider those who disagree, and who say Paul’s version of Christianity is a later development, manifesting itself some 20+ years after Jesus’ death. If that is the case, and if Paul is only expressing the legends and propaganda of his particular Christian community, then we can reject the necessity of the resurrection. Of course, this means we really don’t have much else to label “essential” because Paul’s letters are the earliest Christian documents we possess. All other Gnostic texts, New Testament Apocrypha, writings of the Church Fathers, as well as the rest of the Apostolic writings and Gospels, were written much later. So where do we start? We must start with an assumption about the bearers of Christian orthodoxy – the real Christian community that carried down the exact traditions of Jesus’ life and teachings. Whose community was it? Was it the community that created Mark or John, or Paul’s community, or some Gnostics? Were things really as organized as the episcopalian-governed churches (Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican) would have us believe to the point where the Apostles gave a “deposit of faith” to their successors who maintained true Christianity up through Constantine and beyond?

Maybe our answer is that we believe God divinely inspire the Bible, and so when Matthew writes that the gates of Hell will not prevail against the Church, and that when Paul writes the Church is the pillar and ground of truth, that God is communicating to the hearers of the Scriptures His promise to guide the Church into all truth, despite the Bible’s historical flimsiness. This would have to be our assumption, however, and we would be exercising faith in spite of the testimony of history.

What about the option of assuming nothing about Jesus, and choosing to experience him in the Scriptures and in the traditions of the churches? This is the method of Schleiermacher and the classic liberals who present Jesus as a personal, existential crisis that each individual incorporates and modifies according to his or her own preferences (and prejudices). This seems like a valid option, though it wouldn’t have any significance other than serving private feelings of fulfillment. It’s theology as therapy at its most evident.

Or there’s the option of rejecting the necessity of historical accuracy: we can admit the Jesus of history is entirely different than the Jesus of faith, but refuse to label one or the other as being the “true” Jesus. This would take a position on faith that it involves intentional rejection of historical, empirical data. Faith would become an act of rebellion against science, against empirical epistemology, and demand that truth be the product not of collected data or religious dogma, but of the person of Jesus. Faith would be total cognitive absurdity, staring at a 4, knowing it is a 4, and insisting it is a 5, believing it to be a 5. This is the position of fideism, but only initially. Only the leap of faith is absurd, but after making it, one enters a new world, an enlightened (awakened) world where the language of faith may be spoken of rationally, and where divine things become objects that can be spoken of.

This doesn’t seem any different to me than actually going insane. It is the foolishness of men, retardation to a state of mental infancy. In other words, it’s exactly what the Jesus of faith demands of his followers: God confuses the wisdom of men with foolishness, and only those with a childlike faith can enter the Kingdom. Of course, the idea that this is the biblical perspective does nothing but supplement the notion that the Scriptures and Christian orthodoxy are not historically sound. Perhaps God providentially caused the Jesus Seminar to push believers into a new arena wherein it becomes necessary to conclude the absurdity of the Scriptures as well as things like the Incarnation, Resurrection, Trinity, etc. It’s that last bastion of Christianity to which we have always attempted to apply reason and human wisdom, and maybe God’s just gotten fed up with it.

Again, all of this is just reflections on the situation at hand if the Jesus Seminar’s conclusions are true. That premise is still very much up for debate, and I plan on devoting a good amount of research to that very problem. All insights are appreciated, as always.

Revelation (...not the book...)

“For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.” – St. Paul

“In as much as the known thing of God is manifest in them, for God has brought them to light. For his invisible things, from the creation of the cosmos, the marking works, [are] being perceived, both His everlasting power and divinity, in the ‘to be,’ they without excuse.” – My translation

Revelation I define as the cognition of truth. What is meant by cognition will be explored. The question of revelation begins, for many, with the presupposition of the divine – God is truth. If the plenary inspiration of the Scriptures is assumed (which it isn’t, but play along), then the first revelation appears to be God (Gen. 1.1), but it is, in fact, Scripture itself, for before one can know the God who is truth one must assume that the thing that testifies of God (i.e. Scripture) is trustworthy and true. Scripture, at that point, is equated to truth itself, and so knowledge of Scripture is knowledge of the divine, which is revelation.

Of course, this is operating under the assumption that “revelation” is equated to knowledge. To assume Scripture as revelation before assuming the God of those Scriptures is backwards at best, since man’s first assumption in this case would be a book – an object, a collection, scribbles on parchment – rather than a transcendence of some kind, which is a better type of existence than corrupt and dying man and his reason, not to mention crumbling paper. Revelation cannot be equated with the knowledge of Scripture without first assuming the God of that Scripture, but how is that God to be revealed that He might be within man’s ability to assume? A type of divinity could be assumed a priori, without any type of revelation, but, shy of complete chance, this a priori assumption would be no different than a tribal deity who is assumed out of the desire for explanations. Indeed, the Abrahamic God cannot be assumed without experiencing him in the Bible.

If knowledge of the Scriptures is not revelation (i.e. the Bible is not a revelation of God), or if it is at least not the first revelation, then what is man’s a priori knowledge of God? Can one assume God? Is there any other revelation that exists outside the Scriptures that is valid to assume as the initial source of truth? Paul’s answer is that revelation exists in creation (nature) – that the invisible qualities of God (the unrevealed) are perceived in the “to be” (that is, in the things that exist, creation). The infinite, unknowable God is perceived, not known, in the things he has created. This is, more or less, the teleological argument: order, purpose, and therefore divinity and providence, are perceivable in nature: in the water cycle, the circulatory system, the passing of seasons, bees carrying pollen, etc. All creation testifies to what otherwise remains invisible.

“But Paul,” says I, “what about the calamity of the universe? What of its chaos, vanity, and corruption? Surely this indicates that nature is a poor, poor a priori revelator of truth; the Abrahamic God can be no more assumed by one who observes creation as He can be by observing a dusted house before guests arrive: they are both indicative of organization and purpose, but neither reveals the existence of an organizer. Should they indicate anything at all, it would be that the organizer existed in the past. Further than this, there is nothing to be known.” Paul’s argument is nothing more than the admission that creation only allows for the a priori assumption that an organized transcendence existed.

Of course, the key notion is that of perception rather than knowledge. Paul says that God is perceived in creation, and so it is not necessary for his argument to prove that the Abrahamic God is knowable via the revelation of creation. So then, what is perception? Perception, in this instance, is cognition without comprehension: creation is recognized as having the infusion of teleological, transcendent properties, though none of the teleology or the transcendent is categorically understood. This is the divine darkness, the perception of a reality outside the empirical, sensory world.

Thus, we cannot in any sense assume that revelation may be equated to knowledge, unless we say that we know only that we do not know, and we are aware only of our state of blindness. God’s revelation in Romans 1 is the reality of His being hidden.

The paradox of this whole discourse has been the use of Scripture, which I’ve noted is not to be assumed as a form of revelation, to justify the nature of creation as a revelation-unto-blindness. In order to argue properly, this type of argumentation must be rejected, lest the reasoning be circular. We must back up once more, and ask whether a “dusted house” is even observable. Is even the prior existence of a transcendent reality assumable via the medium of creation? If creation tells us nothing, not even a base teleology, without first assuming the authority of Paul’s argument in Romans 1, then does any revelation exist?

My answer is no, there is no revelation that may be assumed a priori. Because Paul’s argument cannot be assumed, and because the authority of the Bible may not be assumed, there is no manner by which one may even become aware of the existence – past or present – of any teleology or transcendence. The answer, then, is the evidence-less leap of faith in assuming a priori the revelation of Jesus Christ… but is Jesus only knowable through Scripture?

Sola Saliens - "Leap Alone"

The title "Sola Saliens" (and someone please correct my Latin if I'm wrong) is a new Sola for a "new" kind of reformation. This is not Faith Alone or Scripture Alone, but Leap Alone - the leap into the divine darkness. What I hope to do with this blog is create an atmosphere of open dialog on theological issues. I also hope to share with you some of my thoughts on the Christian faith. This is likely going to be a very Kierkegaard and Barth-friendly blog (thus the "Leap"), but by no means am I attempting to limit the discussion to existentialists and the neo-orthodox. I insist on the utter fallibility of mankind and his logic, especially my own, so please comment only if you take pleasure in learning, not fighting along party lines. Please stay only if you enjoy being wrong, and leave if you can't handle delightful disagreements.

I love being wrong. It helps me keep a proper perspective on my limited knowledge. So, let's all be wrong together, and take a leap into a world we can't ever reach... or maybe we can. I don't know, that's one of the questions, I guess...