Vibrant Dance 2: Breakout Session 2: John Walton

On this Remembrance Day (Veterans Day), thank you to all who have said no to self and served this nation. May the Lord lift you up and sustain you for all your days, receiving you into His arms at journey’s end.

{RJW Note:  The final session of the conference was composed of breakout sessions by the various speakers to interact with attendees about the day’s panel discussions. I again attended Dr. John Walton’s session as a TA. It was primarily a Q&A format, so where necessary for context, the gist of the question is presented with the answer immediately following. As before, Genesis 1 and 2 are abbreviated as G1 and G2 respectively. Again, full audio and video of the conference (including the breakouts with the other speakers are available at www.vibrantdance.org.}

In Revelation, when it declares there is no sea, it is a functionality argument—no more chaos, not no more water.

To have “consistent hermeneutics” is to be a competent reader of what the author writes and an ethical reader of his words (versus how in literary criticism the reader starts out with disbelief). Virtuous readers use their perlocution {how the information is received by the audience} to identify what the human author intended and this can be applied regardless of genre. He is concerned with the label ‘history’ as a genre, it may indicate the subject is real and true but that label doesn’t say how authors communicate their reality. For example, it is not an ethical hermeneutic to apply standards of photography to modern art. It is competent to read a document as intended by the author. We have to understand authors’ conventions, not impose our conventions, but theirs.

Vibrant Dance 2: Breakout #1: John Walton

{RJW Note:  The last session Friday night was a breakout, with a separate room where each speaker led a Q&A about their plenary talk. I was a “teaching assistant” for Dr. Walton, which basically meant I made sure he got to the right room at the right time, and all needs were met. As his needs were few, I was able to take good notes. I do not have any info on the other breakout sessions, but CD’s, MP3’s and even DVD’s of the entire conference can be found at www.vibrantdance.org. Since it was a Q&A session, the topics jump around a bit. I will try to make each bit clear either by giving the question then answer or making the topic obvious from the context.

As a reminder, Walton’s position was that the Genesis Creation account was viewed by the ancient Hebrews as the story of inaugurating or consecrating the temple of Creation from chaos to order, with Eden effectively being the Holy of Holies and how God’s Sabbath rest was an active concept that meant He was situated to reign over a Creation brought under His order and control, not a passive kick back and eat Nachos in front of an NFL game in His Lay-Z-Boy.}

The Cosmic Temple Inauguration view is trying to understand/explain how the ancient world actually thought, what their ‘scientific’ understanding was. It in no way says or implies that the Hebrews borrowed from pagan mythology. This is because what the Canaanites believed about deity was different than what the Jews did, but how the Hebrews viewed science was extremely different from us and closer to the Babylonians, much as a modern Hindu’s scientific understanding of the world is much closer to ours than it is to that of ancient Hindus. From ancient near east (ANE) mythology we get information about their understanding of reality. There was a common understanding of reality but different explanations, as given by the different mythologies.

WE believe in a material ontology, which goes back originally to the Greeks, and sees the world in a material sense. Essentially, we believe an object exists if it has mass and volume and/or energy. We are so immersed in this ontology we don’t realize another exists, just as a fish doesn’t realize it’s wet. Science is our culture’s understanding of reality, and naturalism is our culture’s mythology.

Vibrant Dance 2: Walton: The Cosmic Temple Inauguration View of Genesis One

{RJW Note:  The fifth plenary session was by Dr. john Walton, Professor of Old Testament, Wheaton College and Graduate School Wheaton, Illinois. Dr Walton handed out a one page summary, including a table laying out his outline of Genesis 1 to everyone, so I did not ask him for a copy of his talk text. Thus, today’s post is a merger of my notes and the handout, which is reproduced here in its entirety. }

The Handout: