BIBLE AND ETHICS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE

Introduction

Bruce Birch of Wesley Theological Seminary has written extensively on the relationship of the Bible and ethics. The best known of his previous books is one coauthored with ethicist Larry Rasmussen entitled Bible and Ethics in the Christian Life. Birch and Rasmussen set out to make their new edition a more inviting text for basic courses in Christian ethics in colleges, universities, seminaries, and church. They substantially enlarge their earlier treatment of "the basic working concepts of Christian ethics." "Charting the Moral Life," introduces the vocabulary of morality. They also furnish new chapters on decision-making and on character and social structure that would be excellent material for any ethics course. The scholar-by-scholar review of ways of relating the Bible and Christian ethics has been scrapped, but the insights of those writers as well as more recent contributions to the discussion are woven beautifully into the tapestry of their treatment. In fact, the weaving was too good at times; the reader should not have to turn to the endnotes to find out who is speaking in quoted material.

The rationale for this collaboration between a scholar of Old Testament and a Christian ethicist may be easily summarized on the basis of the authors' own conclusions:

1. "Christian ethics is not synonymous with biblical ethics";[1]

2. "The Bible is nonetheless formative and normative for Christian ethics."[2] And the difficulties of the task implied by these propositions may be readily perceived from the authors' own examination of the various issues attending (and in a sense prior to) the use of the Bible in Christian ethical reflection.[3]

The Role Of The Scriptures

The first issue has to do with the role of the Scriptures in the task of Christian ethics. If, as Birch and Rasmussen contend, there is an emerging consensus between biblical scholars and Christian ethicists that the Bible is somehow normative,[4] what is the nature of that authority? In a 1965 article Edward Leroy Long established a typology of what he sees as the basic response to that question.[5]

analysis

With clarity and precision Birch and Rasmussen examine the central concepts which chart the moral life. They invite the reader to approach moral problems in the manner of the early Christian communities--to consider the moral life within the life of the community of faith. Indeed, their examination of the concept of moral agency and its communal context is reason enough to commend this book as an introductory text. It is lucidly written, with obvious sensitivity to students who are new to these issues.

1. The authors express their appreciation for recent trends in theology and biblical studies,[6] most importantly the hermeneutical theories associated with feminist and liberation theologies. Yet they fail to examine the many criticisms which may be made of these positions (e.g., a "hermeneutics of suspicion") and, in particular, fail to consider their implications for theology as a science.

2. The authors observe that our decisions are necessarily informed by a variety of extra-biblical and nonreligious sources, most notably the natural, human and social sciences.[7] And they recommend that we remain open to these authorities. Yet they fail to examine the claims of these secular authorities and so neglect the serious difficulties which attend them. How can such sources determine our moral obligation, for instance, to the human fetus or to the urban poor?

These difficulties are remarkable in view of the authors' professed confidence in the power of the Bible to form the Christian community and inform its actions.[8] The implication is that Birch and Rasmussen are bound by certain assumptions of modern scholarship which prevent them from mending the divide between biblical studies and theology. Indeed, they advance their own proposals on the use of the Bible only by ignoring their warrant in theology. They object, for instance, to some theories of inspiration on the ground that they restrict the freedom of God; their concern is that such theories may blind us to the activity of God in the present. But how is divine agency intelligible? How does the God of the Bible speak to us today? Of course, there are no easy answers to these questions. The difficulties will only pass when the wall that divides theology from biblical studies is surmounted.

Reflection

Birch and Rasmussen remain true to their earlier commitment to aid the community of faith "in traversing the distance between the primal documents of the faith-its Scriptures-and expressions of the faith in daily life" without claiming that biblical ethics and Christian ethics are synonymous. Coupling their twin major themes of community and moral agency, they explore the formation of moral selfhood in community in a probing and powerful way using specific historical examples and also making specific suggestions about how the church should use the Bible as it practices the morality of faith in its corporate life and its wider social involvements. In their discussion of "the moral world," they treat the ethics of virtue, of value (social consequences), of obligation, and of vision. Each ethic makes a needed contribution; each has biblical expressions; and moral vision is critical for the other three. I only regretted that, after treating justice as both a virtue and a social value, they did not explicitly discuss it as principle. The authors are not loathe to point directions regarding specific moral problems, but their project does not attempt to address the impressive list of various issues which has to be in the course of spelling out implications of the presumptions.

Birch and Rasmussen immerse us in the life of the Christian community, with a nod toward the supplementary value of a juridical ethic espousing rationality unbiased by provincial shortsightedness.

Conclusion

What should Bible-oriented Christians and Christian scholars do when they run into moral issues that the Bible does not and cannot address with clear moral injunctions?

This is a question that has occupied the attention of a number of biblical scholars and Christian ethicists in recent decades. An entire sub-literature in these two overlapping fields has developed in order to explore the broad question of how the Bible should be interpreted by Christians in shaping the moral life, and the more narrow issue of how to employ the Scriptures in relation to moral challenges not addressed in Scripture.

Birch and Rasmussen help define ethics terminology and how the pieces fit together. Even more helpful are their insights about how to use the whole Bible appropriately when engaging in ethical reflection. Birch and Rasmussen focuses their attention to both personal character and the decision-making process in view of prevalent tendencies to neglect one or the other. The Birch-Rasmussen treatment of "moral vision" as fundamental to both our being and our doing as moral agents plays a similar role in their new analysis. They also delve more deeply into the dynamics of the community matrix of Christian ethics.

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[1] Bruce C. Birch and Larry L Rasmussen, The Bible and Ethics in the Christian Life (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1976), pp. 45-46.

[2] Bruce C. Birch and Larry L Rasmussen, The Bible and Ethics in the Christian Life (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1976), pp. 45-46

[3] Ibid

[4] Ibid

[5] Edward Leroy Long, Jr., “The Use of the Bible in Christian Ethics,” Interpretation, 19/2 (1965), 149-62.

[6] Bruce C. Birch and Larry L Rasmussen, The Bible and Ethics in the Christian Life (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1976), pp. 35

[7] Bruce C. Birch and Larry L Rasmussen, The Bible and Ethics in the Christian Life (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1976), pp 44-51

[8] Ibid., 104