View of Revelation

Most of the people I know do not think that Revelation is real. They usually think that the person who wrote the book was crazy and that they were not a credible writer. It was interesting that most people in our class said that they believe that most of the events in the book still need to happen (meaning that we mostly believe that it WILL happen?).
Growing up in the Church has "made" me believe that the events will happen and are also spiritual because of symbolism. It would really be interesting to hear from someone who believes that all of the events took place a long time ago.  

Revelation.

It is really interesting the approach to Revelation that we had in our class.  We approached simply and looked at it for what it was.  I remember my church had a sermon series a couple of years ago, and the way we approached Revelation made it almost impossible to understand, at least in the way I thought about it.  The way we looked at in this class was far simpler.  It is very possible that is because I wasn't paying attention during the sermons, but still.  In church, which is also a different type of learning environment than our classroom. we dug deeper into the symbolistic meaning of things, almost to the point where we were lost in the meaning of things, rather than actually reading the book.  We would read a passage, and then break down what every section of that passage was.  It was almost as if "the" was actually a metaphor for some great prophet in the old testament if you cross reference with three other passages.  The way we approached in class seemed to make more sense, at least to me.  There are some great symbols and references in the book, but to dig to deep means you can't see the whole anymore, which I think a lot of people end up ding, especially with revelation because of the symbols that pervade the majority of the book.  At least that is a problem that I think I see in studies of Revelation.  

-Jacob Millay    

The "Insignificant Hero" Archetype: What is the Appeal?

When discussing Revelation, Keefer discusses how it is similar to the modern fantasy epics that surround today's culture. These include Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and Harry Potter. The storyline of these modern fantasies are all fairly similar - a seemingly insignificant person must stand for good and defeat some type of extreme evil.

Although Keefer's discussion of how Revelation relates to these stories is interesting, I was drawn to the idea of the archetype of these fantasy stories, especially of the "insignificant hero".

What I find so interesting is that essentially, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and Harry Potter are all the same story. What is it about these stories - that all use archetypal characters and plots that everyone is used to - that draw in an audience? How can we be constantly attracted and entertained by a story that we have heard a million times?

I think that perhaps, because we all feel insignificant and overwhelmed by evil, humans can identify with the archetypal "insignificant hero". And, not only do we identify with this hero, but desire to be exactly as he is. We wish that if we were asked to carry the Ring to Mordor, we would be as brave as poor little Frodo. We wish that we could be like Harry Potter, who defeats Voldemort after sacrificing his own life.

So, if Jesus is this archetypal hero in Revelation - which comes way before any of the modern fantasies Keefer and I are talking about - what does that say about modern fantasy? Are authors purposely attempting to draw correlations between Jesus and their Hero? Is this just a natural tendency for humans because we were made to love Jesus? Or, are authors just buying into the archetype because they know it appeals to us?

Timothy and Titus.

I have never actually thought of the books of Timothy and Titus were personal letters that were then distributed to the whole church.  I mean, it should be obvious, all you have to really do is look at the name to realize, but I guess I just forgot about it.  The main thing to remember when considering this is that these letters were still sort of intended to be sent to the entire church.  Timothy easily translates to the entire church.  Both of the letters of Timothy do.  But with Titus and some of the other personal letters, it is less obvious as to why they were widely distributed to the entire church since they seem more like personal letters.  I don' really see the purpose of doing this.  There are still god lessons in these books, but they are less obvious and you have to dig through the personal information and messages to find them in some cases.

Was the early church simply looking for anything from Paul that they widely distributed letters that weren't really intended for that function, or is it that these letters were written in a different fashion intentionally to draw people and have them search for the lessons in them?  And if it is the second option, why would Paul do that?

-Jacob Millay

Critique of Paul.

When I was being raised in the church, we were taught a lot about Paul, and rightly so.  He is a pretty big part of the New Testament.  Of the 27 books in the New Testament, I think 13 were written by Paul.  He also is the main source of knowledge about the church and he has basically shaped our modern day understanding of what the church is and what it should do.  Needless to say, he is pretty important.  That being said, in my own mind, Paul sort of took up this super hero sort of mantle in my mind.  He could do no wrong.  I mean, this is the guy that spread the knowledge of the Word to almost the entire Mediterrean!!  He is one of the main reasons why Gentiles are accepted in the church!!  However, with the recent critique of Paul that I read in Keefer, it sort of shook my view of Paul in a way.  Don't get me wrong, he is still amazing and probably the most influential person to Christianity outside of Jesus, but he isn't the super human that I thought he was.

You know what this really does is even more impress me with Jesus and his flawlessness.  Paul is an amazing teacher and follower of God, but he still has many flaws that are evident in his work.  Jesus has none of those in his life.  It really just makes it more evident how perfect Jesus was.

-Jacob Millay

Reading Acts: Theology vs. Literature

Last semester, I took "The Acts of the Apostles" with Jeremy Wynne for my BibLit credit. I really loved that class as we got to learn a lot of the historical context and theological teachings of a book that is normally considered to be just straight history. I know that both Jacob and I will be able to contribute a lot to the theological backgrounds of this text!

As an English major, I found myself wanting to interpret Acts with a more literary than theological lens. I am very excited to see what you have in store for us Doug! But, here are a few things that I am interested in and we hopefully get to explore together...

What are the effects on the reader if one considers Acts to be the "sequel" to Luke? What if Luke-Acts were made into one movie... what then would be the climax? What is the climax of Acts? Why does Luke choose to cut off the book right when Paul gets to Rome - what I was expecting to be the "climax"?

I really love Acts as it shows what the early church was like - and it provides our churches with a "format" to follow. I also think that it has a great place in the canon: between the last gospel and the beginning of Paul's letters. In the New Testament, we have been really interested in authorship and its effects on each gospel's perception/representation of Jesus. For Acts, I think that Luke is setting up the reader with this background for Paul - the man that will be writing most of the New Testament books.

If This Class Has Taught Me One Thing...

If this class has taught me one thing (although I am pretty sure that I have learned more than just one thing) it is that as a Christian you definitely have to search deeper into the Bible than most Christians tend to do.  To know the historical background to a section of verses adds a ton of depth to the passage, and knowing who the author was and what he was about helps understand what he wrote much better.  Often as Christians int his modern age we take things at face value and then allow everyone to come to their own interpretation and claim each one is true, which is a very postmodern take on the Bible.  When you look at the authors though and what they were writing for, it makes it much more clear what they were actually trying to do, and it makes it more interesting.  It also avoids us making the Bible into a collection of myths, even if there may be a myth of two in there in the Old Testament.  We can see these were real authors who were trying to document things in different ways since they were different people with different pasts.  It all just adds to a reading of the Bible.

-Jacob Millay