Carson, Christ & Culture Revisited — Early Problems

I’ve just begun Carson’s “Christ and Culture Revisited.” It looks to be an interesting read.

Already though we have hit a snag. Carson offers,

“My focus is on how we should be thinking about the relations between Christ and culture now,at the beginning of the twenty first century….Our reflections are shaped by six unique factors,

4.) … debates rage regarding what is ‘cultural’ in ‘multicultural,’ which in turn has precipitated debates over the relative merits of one culture over another. That in turn, of course, feeds into debates over religious claims, since religions, too, under the definition of ‘culture’ already given, are necessarily forms of cultural expressions. What gives a religion, any religion, the right to claim its own superiority or even uniqueness.

The problem here is that Carson has presupposed without establishing that religions are merely forms of cultural expressions. I would contend that the opposite is the case arguing that cultures are merely forms of religious expressions. If we say that religions are necessarily forms of cultural expressions, as if culture is the goose that lays the egg of religion then we run the danger of suggesting that culture is a kind of ultimate starting point. But to make culture an ultimate starting point is to get things backwards since the cult (religion) is that which makes the cultus (culture). If we are to examine culture profitably, as Carson intends to do, then the beginning point is not the culture itself but rather the religion from which the culture springs. And behind the religion of a culture looms the God whom both cult and cultus serve.

Carson’s problem begins to reveal itself even more acutely when just a page later he can speak of ‘secular countries.’ What does Carson mean by this? Does he mean that these are countries and cultures that have never been based on any religions? Such a view would require culture to be seen as something prior to religion and something out of which religion might or might not come. But of course we know that it is not possible to have a a-religious culture and so the whole idea of a “secular country,” or a “secular culture” must be surrendered.

Another sign of looming trouble in Carson’s book is by his early assertion that, “in some ways the world has become more furiously religious.” This cannot be since religion can neither increase nor decreases but can only transmute itself into different forms. Christopher Hitchens is every bit as religious as Osama Bin Laden, and were Hitchens to convert tomorrow to Christianity he would not at that point become “more furiously religious,” just as if Osama Bin Laden decided to walk away from Allah and become an agnostic he wouldn’t become “less furiously religious.” Now, it may be that the world is becoming more furiously epistemologically self conscious about how religious it is but no individual, nor any culture can ever increase or decrease their religious quota.

Carson begins this book by giving a definition of culture that he favors from a gentleman named Clifford Geertz.

“The culture concept…denotes an historically transmitted pattern of meanings embodied in symbols, a system of inherited conceptions expressed in symbolic form by means of which men communicate, perpetuate, and develop their knowledge about and attitude towards life.”

Now this is fine as far as it goes but the question that begs being asked is, where do the pattern of meanings that are embodied in symbols come from? Sure, they are historically transmitted but the question is where did they originally come from? The answer to that is that they came from the cult (religion) of a people, which itself originated from how the people thought about God.

Author: jetbrane

I am a Pastor of a small Church in Mid-Michigan who delights in my family, my congregation and my calling. I am postmillennial in my eschatology. Paedo-Calvinist Covenantal in my Christianity Reformed in my Soteriology Presuppositional in my apologetics Familialist in my family theology Agrarian in my regional community social order belief Christianity creates culture and so Christendom in my national social order belief Mythic-Poetic / Grammatical Historical in my Hermeneutic Pre-modern, Medieval, & Feudal before Enlightenment, modernity, & postmodern Reconstructionist / Theonomic in my Worldview One part paleo-conservative / one part micro Libertarian in my politics Systematic and Biblical theology need one another but Systematics has pride of place Some of my favorite authors, Augustine, Turretin, Calvin, Tolkien, Chesterton, Nock, Tozer, Dabney, Bavinck, Wodehouse, Rushdoony, Bahnsen, Schaeffer, C. Van Til, H. Van Til, G. H. Clark, C. Dawson, H. Berman, R. Nash, C. G. Singer, R. Kipling, G. North, J. Edwards, S. Foote, F. Hayek, O. Guiness, J. Witte, M. Rothbard, Clyde Wilson, Mencken, Lasch, Postman, Gatto, T. Boston, Thomas Brooks, Terry Brooks, C. Hodge, J. Calhoun, Llyod-Jones, T. Sowell, A. McClaren, M. Muggeridge, C. F. H. Henry, F. Swarz, M. Henry, G. Marten, P. Schaff, T. S. Elliott, K. Van Hoozer, K. Gentry, etc. My passion is to write in such a way that the Lord Christ might be pleased. It is my hope that people will be challenged to reconsider what are considered the givens of the current culture. Your biggest help to me dear reader will be to often remind me that God is Sovereign and that all that is, is because it pleases him. View all posts by jetbrane