Thiselton, Anthony C. Interpreting God and the Postmodern Self: On Meaning,Manipulation
and Promise. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing, 1995. 180 pp.

Leslie Zeigler

This book consists of the first in the new annual series of Scottish Journal of Theology Lectures at the University of Aberdeen. Anthony Thiselton, head of the Department of Theology at the University of Nottingham, is also the author of two of the most significant works in the field of biblical hermeneutics: The Two Horizons: New Testament Hermeneutics and Philosophical Description (Eerdmans, 1980) and New Horizons in Hermeneutics: The Theory and Practice of Transforming Biblical Reading (Zondervan Academic Books, 1992).

In these lectures Thiselton presents a brief, easily readable, precise, and informative history of the development of the position generally referred to as postmodernism and represented by such writers as Jacques Derrida, Michel Faucault, Richard Rorty, Roland Barthes, and their followers. He begins by noting the influence of Nietzsche in the academic and intellectual climate of today, in which "one of the major intellectual debates... concerns an alleged shift from the attitudes of 'modernity' to those of postmodernism" (pp. 8-9). Nietzsche claimed that language itself bewitches us, generates illusions, and that supposed issues of truth are actually issues of power. Truth claims and value systems are tools in the hands of the "masters," who use them to preserve their own status and to promote their own interests. Nietzsche's views are supplemented and reinforced by Freud's understanding of the effect of "unconscious forces" working upon the self-in other words, the role of self-deception in human existence and hence the need for suspicion in our understanding of ourselves and our actions.

As this perspective emerges today, postmodernism rejects the "modern" view of the self as an autonomous, active agent, capable of free decisions-capable of controlling its own destiny-in favor of a postmodern passive self constituted by and dependent upon the fluctuating, manipulative forces operative in its historical situatedness. This self has no identifiable "center" and understands itself as a passive victim of competing groups. Further, as "what counts as true for one group" is often understood as "a manipulative disguise to legitimate power-claims" by another group, "if different groups adopt different criteria of truth to determine what counts as true, or even what counts as a meaningful truth-claim," rational argument and dialogue become impossible. "Argument becomes transposed into rhetoric," and rhetoric then comes to rely on force, "i. e., power or manipulation" (pp. 12-13, italics in original).

Put in other words, as Nietzsche declared, "All that exists consists of interpretations" (p. 7). There are no objective data-"givens" or "facts" waiting to be categorized and ordered by the human mind. The understanding of selves and texts (hermeneutics) becomes a matter of interpretation of interpretations. There is no objective truth, value, or meaning-only that which we ourselves construct. And there is no continuing, identifiable agent carrying out the construction-only a passive "self" responding to fluctuating, manipulative power groups and forces. And, with the lack of any objective truth or value system, there is no available criterion for deciding between the merits of different truth-claims or value-claims.

As Thiselton notes, this postmodern perspective is rampant in the academic and intellectual climate which surrounds theology today and to which it presents a most serious and urgent challenge-one "in comparison with which the old-style attacks... appear relatively naive" (p. 16). Further, he points out that Christianity needs to recognize the force and partial relevance of this attack. For example, the postmodern self is more realistic than the modern self, characterized by its autonomy and accompanying naively innocent optimism. We need to recognize that much of what goes on under the banner of Christianity involves self-deception, manipulation, and power struggles. Many clergy and church leaders may even come to actually believe in the "truth" of their mistaken manipulative strategies, which produce churches that become havens for "consumers" who wish "to purchase power or comfort" (p. 22).

However, theology obviously cannot accept the postmodern view as ultimate. In Thiselton's words, "whereas the postmodern perspective rests on suspicion, theology serves to establish critically-informed trust" and "seeks to recover elements of the authentic and genuine from among the chaff of self-interest, manipulation, and power-claims" (p. 16). Expressed in theological terms, the challenge which postmodernism presents to Christianity is that of clearly distinguishing between the true Christian faith and various forms of self-serving illusions, between a life of Christian discipleship and one of self-interest, or between faithfulness and unfaithfulness.

Thiselton proceeds to distinguish between the authentic and the chaff in two arenas. One is the philosophical arena of the postmodern perspective itself. Here he presents basic criticisms derived primarily from the work of Wittgenstein and Ricoeur. He points out that Derrida and his followers present a crucially inadequate understanding of language-and hence fail to arrive at any "closure" for meaning or truth-because they fail to recognize Wittgenstein's insistence upon the stability of linguistic "markers" offered by human behavior in the public domain. As a result, they are proposing a contemporary gnosticism-simply another instance of the view which the early Church Fathers passionately opposed as "the gnostic attempt to construe the cross as an intra-linguistic entity, as an idea rather than an event in the public domain" (p. 39, italics in original). Contemporary gnosticism is no more adequate-and, unfortunately, its dangers frequently no more readily understood-than was its forerunner.

Ricoeur developed a hermeneutic of the self on the basis of recognition of its primary trait-temporality. He sees the notion of "narrative identity" as providing the view of a self which "not only initiates change, which may rebound in changing the self," but which also provides a "continuity of accountability as the action of this 'self'"-in other words, the identity of the self through time. Further, the "narrative plot" projects a future possibility, in that plots have a beginning and an end-a pattern of movement. Hence, "the identity of 'the real self' emerges fully only in relation to purposes which transcends the self." The narrative involves the past, present, and future action of a "larger plot" than that of just the self on center stage. It includes "the Other" (Ricoeur's term)-i. e., other selves existing in a background of a wider world. Selfhood and personhood, then, are what they are only in relation to this Other.

This, as Thiselton puts it, provides a clear statement of the similarities and differences between the postmodern perspective of selfhood and the Christian. "Christian theology endorses the realism of postmodernism in that the human self can fall victim to forces which overwhelm it, damage it, imprison it, and change it... However, from the vantage point of Christian revelation and faith a far wider and larger range of inter-personal relations, worlds of language and external forces serve to change or reconstitute the self than those of social, political and economic forces alone" (p. 77).

In the second arena, that of Christian theology itself, Thiselton makes use of biblical texts, supplemented by the work of Luther and Bonhoeffer, to demonstrate that authentic Christian faith and discipleship does not involve self-serving illusion, self-deception, or strategies of manipulation for the sake of retaining status or attaining power. All of these are clearly recognized for what they are and are condemned as such.

Before moving directly to his final point-his view of an adequate understanding of the Triune God as the foundation for authentic Christian life and hope, and hence the answer to the challenge of postmodernism-Thiselton gives us an interesting and illustrative presentation of the thought of an English clergyman, Don Cupitt. Cupitt began his career as a "traditional" believer who was Dean of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, but who came into prominence as the presenter, in 1984, of a television show entitled "Sea of Faith," which developed into a quite large following known as the Sea of Faith Network.

At first Cupitt claimed that traditional faith was in retreat on the basis of the modern (not postmodern) view of the self. "Theism" diminished the dignity of this self. His next step was to attack the "objectifying of God," holding that truth is a matter of human search rather than disclosure or discovery, and that "religious meaning is... to be sought within rather than from-'above us'" (p. 93). The term "God" becomes an expression of what we find convincing and helpful. Thus "the Gospel means a specific human state-and nothing but that." As Thiselton says, "on this basis no Gospel remains" (p. 104).

But Cupitt and his Network were not finished. They began moving to the postmodern perspective and aggressively presenting it as a call to reform with the future of the church at stake. It was frankly admitted that "Recent literary theory has shown that absolute integrity... is a myth" and that "the religious teacher must use language manipulatively, rhetorically, and deceitfully" (p. 115). As Thiselton states, they assert (in true postmodern fashion they never argue-i.e., never engage seriously with competing views), simultaneously appealing to "'pluralist' tolerance within the church," while at the same time insisting that this "entirely new theology actually accords with church tradition as its authentic heir." It "should not be regarded as discontinuous with the tradition since truth must change 'for each generation'" (p. 116). But, as Thiselton asks, how can this call to reform be anything other than a bid for power? Also-one cannot avoid the comment-the Network would be just as much at home in the United States as it is in England!

Thiselton also points out that the transition from the selfhood of modernity to the postmodern self "has deeply destructive consequences." "The postmodern self is predisposed to assume a stance of readiness for conflict..." In the case of the self of modernity, misfortune "may be construed at best as a challenge to courageous action," or, at worst, "as bad luck"-to which the modern self may say, "That's life." But for the postmodern self "the loss of power, loss of privilege, or loss of well-being is now ascribed to the manipulative power-interests of competing persons or groups. Misfortune seems to be neither random nor unavoidable but a by-product of the success of some other group" (p. 131, italics in original). Hence, instead of "That's life," the response becomes, "It's them," and only "as long as there remains a sufficient consensus regarding what counts as reasoned, rational, or moral" can reasoned debate become an effective arbiter. But "if each competing group, class, ethnic tradition, gender, guild, or party produces its own internal criteria of supposed rationality in order to serve its own power interests, rational debate collapses not only into rhetoric, but soon also into accusation, blame, corporate self-righteousness, and conflict" (p. 134, italics in original).

Thiselton sees the Christian faith, with its Triune God of promise, as speaking directly to this situation-providing the desperately needed hope. Believing Christian faith is centered in Jesus Christ, not in some inner state of the self, and Jesus Christ is seen as God's definitive revelation of his identity to the world. This identity is disclosed in the temporal narrative of his history with Israel in the Old Testament and the continuation of this history in the New Testament. In the New Testament the definitive divine actions and the basis of the future hope are, of course, the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. Thiselton quotes with approval Jungel's statement, "The crucified is, as it were, the material definition of what is meant by 'God'" (p. 154).

The cross, as Thiselton puts it, "constitutes the paradigm of God's gift of himself to others," and "in the cross not only suffering, pain and cost come to view, but also its interpersonal, interactive relation to others" (p. 154, italics in original). Thiselton relates this interpersonal, interactive nature of the act of God in the cross of Christ to God as Holy Trinity, understanding the work of Christ and the work of the Spirit as the creative interpersonal character of love-a self-giving love which "characterizes the very nature of God himself as Trinity" (p. 165).

The many and subtle nuances of Thiselton's discussion of the Trinity as the utter mutuality and reciprocity of communion between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and the significance of this as a model of "personhood" as "always being-in-relationship," cannot be adequately summarized in a brief space. Only two points need to be stated. First, Thiselton warns that "to write off" this approach as a "mere social Trinity"-i.e., to use it to justify the "social nature of persons," as has frequently been the case-is "over-hasty and unhermeneutical" (p. 156).

Second, Thiselton's conclusion is that the hope of Christian faith is based on the divine promise which is specifically expressed and the "first fruits" thereof experienced in the creative action of Holy Spirit-a creativity which, of course, comes from beyond and which gives the self a "reconstituted" identity. Analogously, he relates the experience of Jesus to that of the believer. "Being 'on the receiving end' of hostile power-interests... constituted for Jesus an episode within the larger narrative which only in its wholeness defined his selfhood" (p. 163, italics in original). The old self, whether that of modernity or postmodernism, is reconstituted within the framework of a much larger narrative than its own situatedness-within the narrative of God's dealings with the world. The person of faith becomes "re-centered," becomes a "new creature"-one whom the Holy Spirit begins to transform, a process to be completed in the future in accordance with the divine promise.

This book can only be whole-heartedly recommended to anyone who wishes to become better acquainted with the current theological climate and its relation to the Christian faith.