{"id":88444,"date":"2021-04-03T05:22:10","date_gmt":"2021-04-03T09:22:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/?p=88444"},"modified":"2021-04-02T13:38:09","modified_gmt":"2021-04-02T17:38:09","slug":"the-divinity-of-christ-and-the-learning-jesus-continued","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2021\/04\/the-divinity-of-christ-and-the-learning-jesus-continued.html","title":{"rendered":"The Divinity of Christ and the Learning Jesus Continued"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Here is an edited and expanded version of what I wrote on Facebook the day before yesterday when I shared my blog post:<\/p>\n

\"\"According to classic theism, God doesn\u2019t change. God is omniscient and doesn\u2019t learn. The Gospels are clear that Jesus changed, grew, and learned.<\/p>\n

Where does that leave us?<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

It is possible to experience an encounter with God in and through Jesus, to be convinced that (as Paul put it) \u201cGod was in Christ.\u201d It is even possible to affirm that in the very person of Jesus one encounters divinity and humanity united in this one human life. One can do these things without feeling the need to diminish, downplay, or deny Jesus\u2019 humanity either in theory or in practice.<\/p>\n

If, however, you assert a doctrine about who Jesus was that denies his humanity and what the Gospels clearly state about it, isn\u2019t that a problem? It seems to me that it is a problem both for those who are conservative in the sense of emphasizing biblical authority, and those who are conservative in adhering to the creedal orthodoxy that includes the formula adopted at the Council of Chalcedon which emphasized the integrity and full undiluted genuineness of Jesus\u2019 humanity, as well as his divinity.<\/p>\n

It is par for the course for those who assert viewpoints like biblical inerrancy to have to deny and twist things the Bible says in order to affirm their doctrine about the Bible. They insist that the words of Paul in his letters are the very words of God and then are flummoxed when asked about Paul\u2019s statement in 2 Corinthians 11:17, \u201cIn this self-confident boasting I am not talking as the Lord would, but as a fool.\u201d It is no surprise then that they also assert things about Jesus that encounter serious problems when they bump up against what the Bible actually says.<\/p>\n

My book What Jesus Learned from Women<\/em><\/a>\u00a0ventures and explores beyond what the Bible says, but in the interest of understanding the contents of the New Testament, the early Christian movement, and the historical Jesus. It thus takes what the Bible says as its starting point. Both as a practitioner of historical criticism and as a liberal Christian I will obviously be the last to say \u201cthe Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it.\u201d My point is the irony that those who use such slogans are so often believed when they do so, and yet their viewpoint is far less founded in and compatible with what the Bible says than my own.<\/p>\n

I also mentioned on Facebook yesterday that the Religion News Service shared a list of ten books recommended to keep Women\u2019s History Month going all year long<\/a>, and kindly included\u00a0What Jesus Learned from Women<\/em><\/a> on the list. The book is also mentioned in the latest Biblical Studies Carnival<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Still haven\u2019t bought your copy? Get 20% off if you buy through the Wipf & Stock website<\/a> using the coupon code APR21.<\/p>\n

Finally, here\u2019s a meme of the conclusion of the book.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

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

Here is an edited and expanded version of what I wrote on Facebook the day before yesterday when I shared my blog post: According to classic theism, God doesn\u2019t change. God is omniscient and doesn\u2019t learn. The Gospels are clear that Jesus changed, grew, and learned. Where does that leave us? It is possible to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":136,"featured_media":88481,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,39,43],"tags":[2750,4861,5677,17054],"class_list":["post-88444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-christology","category-historical-jesus","category-inerrancy","tag-divinity","tag-humanity","tag-jesus","tag-what-jesus-learned-from-women"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Divinity of Christ and the Learning Jesus Continued<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Here is an edited and expanded version of what I wrote on Facebook the day before yesterday when I shared my blog post: According to classic theism, God\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2021\/04\/the-divinity-of-christ-and-the-learning-jesus-continued.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Divinity of Christ and the Learning Jesus Continued\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Here is an edited and expanded version of what I wrote on Facebook the day before yesterday when I shared my blog post: According to classic theism, God\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2021\/04\/the-divinity-of-christ-and-the-learning-jesus-continued.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Religion Prof: The Blog of James F. 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