The Place | Michael Hardin Talks Jesus, Atheism & Theism

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• published: 24 May 2015
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After the show, Jones made the following comments: ""Are there any coherent illustrations as to why we shouldn't avow an ancient abjad (the writing system of the Old Covenant) as something that is intentionally and traditionally ambiguous, and yet, truly stunning and the masterpiece of art itself, i.e., in that it's a creative writing febrile that's so contagious, all inspiring and a sovereign of a different kind. And about this awe, there is a strange forsooth that shadows in a particular, and yet, it cannot yield the intent of an author accurately, but without hesitation, it speaks as if it were alive while it serves as the best template for the creative processes and the transitional states in theology and the poetic side of philosophy. Jonathan Safran Foer said (translated by Nathan Englander): "Early Jewish sages viewed the lack of “pure” or “objective” truth as positive, one must come to faith by active intellectual engagement", i.e., as a cognitive operation. As reinforcement for the traditional aspects of this abjad, a scroll of the Hebrew writings must contain only consonants, thus forcing the reader into a creative process by having to determine contextual grammar, non-contextual grammar, inflections and the pragmatics. Thus, Jewish law is linear and moving forward from the constant creation and interpretation of texts. So, I ask, what do these transitional creations suggest about extant translations of the Old Testament? and how much of these creative processes influenced the theological gloss for Old and New Testament translations, hence, the metalanguage of its theology? and what translation model isn't extremely synthetic and subject to missing the mark? In an attempt to get the Protestants back to Rome, Bellarmine, Cano, Genebrard, Lindanus and others participated in a movement against the theological certitude of re-vocalization, i.e., in an effort to cast doubt upon the ancient Hebrew writing system--for their mission was simple: to keep the purity of the writings--whatever that might mean. To them, it was best to reject all of the theological notions of practicing re-vocalization, i.e., as the means to supporting church doctrine. For this reason and others, they made the argument that the vowel points were not authentic in any sense and that the consonantal text was nothing less than ambiguous. The Rev. Mitchell Dahood, professor at the Pontifical Bible Institute, was an American Jesuit and an authority on Semitic studies. He said, "I am not so naïve as to believe that the Masoretes...understood the fine points of archaic poetry." He went on to say, "The modern textual critic must consequently recover many of the syntactic and lexical treasures of Hebrew poetry from the thicket of Masoretic points." Some want to paint the Old Covenant writings as theological models of certitude, i.e., of the intent of each and every author, but the evidence suggests that it's not reasonable to approach this ancient writing system like we do others. Nevertheless, Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, Owen and others practiced re-vocalization to satisfy their theologies. So, it's in this sense that the Old Covenant is like abstract art and should be rendered in keeping within the tradition of the Jewish scribes, for this appears to be in step with most Jewish models and practices, unlike Catholic and Protestant modeling."