Claiming Christ: A Mormon-Evangelical Debate is a book written by Robert L. Millet1 and Gerald R. McDermott.2 The book follows up where Stephen E. Robinson and Craig L. Blomberg left off in How Wide the Divide?: A Mormon and an Evangelical in Conversation. Although I have not yet read Claiming Christ, aquinas at Summa Theologica appears to have written a masterful review at An LDS Perspective on Claiming Christ: A Mormon-Evangelical Debate. Here is an excerpt:
Morehead’s Musings: This book presents an academic discussion of theological issues. But while such theological frameworks may appeal to Evangelicals who approach their faith and interactions with those of other faiths with this priority and framework in mind, it runs the risk of missing the mark in communicating meaningfully with Latter-day Saints. This is not to dismiss the importance of worldview and doctrine which are surely related to ethics and praxis, but what might be the (even assumed) frameworks that Latter-day Saints begin with, and how might Evangelicals begin from these starting points and then bridge the way to their concerns over theological discussion?
Aquinas: This is a great question. We really need spend more time learning each others metaphors. I think McDermott “breaks” Latter-day Saint metaphors by projecting and imposing criteria and meaning from Evangelical metaphors. I’d like to offer three examples of this. First, McDermott makes the argument that the LDS Jesus doesn’t transcend the cosmos (Claming Christ, 75). The Latter-day Saint metaphor is that God creates by bringing order out of Chaos. Cosmos is order. Chaos is disorder, unformed the unorganized. God speaks to Chaos and it obeys. So, what McDermott really means is the LDS God doesn’t transcend Chaos because Chaos exists when God creates. However, this breaks the metaphor because the metaphor only works when Cosmos and Chaos are opposites. The metaphor doesn’t care or it doesn’t make an issue of Chaos pre-existing as a challenge to the absoluteness of God. The point is not who exists before: God or Chaos. The point is that it is God who is creating by speaking to the waters. The point in this metaphor is that God is God because of his creative powers. The Holy Ghost broods over the waters and brings forth heaven and earth from the primordial waters in Genesis. That is one example.
- Robert L. Millet is Professor of Ancient Scripture and the Richard L. Evans Professor of Religious Understanding at Brigham Young University.↩
- Gerald R. McDermott is Professor of Religion at Roanoke College.↩
Recent Comments