{"id":8441,"date":"2015-07-28T01:44:21","date_gmt":"2015-07-28T05:44:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/euangelion\/?p=8441"},"modified":"2015-07-20T01:49:31","modified_gmt":"2015-07-20T05:49:31","slug":"book-notice-language-for-god-in-patristic-tradition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/euangelion\/2015\/07\/book-notice-language-for-god-in-patristic-tradition\/","title":{"rendered":"Book Notice: Language for God in Patristic Tradition"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"\"<\/a>Mark Sheridan<\/strong><\/span>
\nLanguage for God in Patristic Tradition: Wrestling with Anthropomorphism<\/span><\/strong><\/em>
\nDowners Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2015.
\nAvailable at Amazon.com<\/a><\/p>\n

In this volume, Mark Sheridan wrestles with biblical anthropomorphism, the depiction of God as a human figure, with human emotions and characteristics in Scripture. That God is not really like humans, goes back as far as Xenophon, and his attempt to distinguish the gods from Homeric myths. Others like Philo and Origen, interpreted scripture in such a way as to distinguish a literal sense, from\u00a0senses that illuminated the divine nature and divine plan. These patristic authors tried to interpret Scripture over against the philosophers, the heretics, and the simple who they saw as wrongfully reading Scripture. In the final chapter, Sheridan attempts to show how ancient interpretation is still relevant even if many of their tenets are no longer tenable. Texts are there to be reinterpreted, a process already begun within the NT, and continued on in the Fathers. Sheridan thinks this might be an option for how we look at things like the genocidal texts of the Pentateuch of the imprecatory psalms. He writes:<\/p>\n

We must always ask how these texts can be understood by Christians, and this question involves theology, the discourse about the nature of God. The literal, isolated text is not normative, but rather theology, not in the broad, all-inclusive sense in which it is often used now nor in the confession sense of \u2018Lutheran,\u2019 \u2018Calvinist\u2019 or \u2018Catholic\u2019theology, but in the original sense of the word, the discussion about the nature of God. In this sense the theological question should be primary in the interpretation of Scripture today. Perhaps the most enduring and fitting solution remains that of Philo, Origen and John Chrysostom with which we began: God spoke then like a father to his children. That should not be confused with the way he really is in himself. God does not behave like humans.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mark Sheridan Language for God in Patristic Tradition: Wrestling with Anthropomorphism Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2015. Available at Amazon.com In this volume, Mark Sheridan wrestles with biblical anthropomorphism, the depiction of God as a human figure, with human emotions and characteristics in Scripture. That God is not really like humans, goes back as far as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":196,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8441","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nBook Notice: Language for God in Patristic Tradition<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Mark Sheridan Language for God in Patristic Tradition: Wrestling with Anthropomorphism Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2015. 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