Between the Trees

This will be the first in a series of reviews I’m planning on putting up of books I’ve read over break. On my Christmas reading list there ended up being several books on the atonement. This has provoked a nice little storm of thought for me, and I’m sure it will emerge as I review them.

Scot McKnight’s (his blog is here) 2007 book “A Community Called Atonement” has been heralded by many as one of the first definitive and positive theological statements of the Emergent Church. Overall I would have to say that if this is true (though I rather suspect it isn’t), there is much less to fear from that quarter than many people I know of seem to think. I found it an engaging read, thought-provoking and generally encouraging.

What I Liked

McKnight’s treatment of the atonement sits at a level which is strongly theological but still accessible. Anyone can read it and understand the points he is driving toward, even if the massive number of names that get dropped is intimidating. He is also very well-read, drawing from all sorts of discussions across theological traditions in making his case. I would have to note that he is probably not equally critical of all these traditions, but that is hardly a problem, since the book is aimed at the modern “emergent” crowd, which is largely made up of post-evangelicals, with some disillusioned mainliners thrown into the mix. In that regard, I felt that McKnight did an admirable job of addressing and challenging both these traditions while not rejecting or attacking them.

More importantly, his theology of the atonement is solidly orthodox. I’m sure some people will disagree (and this may in part be McKnight’s fault, more below), but I think that his examination of different biblical approaches to the atonement is right on. He correctly recognizes and affirms different “atonement theories” as biblical and does not try to escape from any of them. Most notable for someone reacting to the largely evangelical world, he refuses to downplay sin, substitution, or the cross. He does criticize what he sees as an “over-judicialization” of atonement by some scholars, but in many ways I would have to agree with him here.

His overarching “bag” which he claims holds the different “golf clubs”/atonement theories is also sound. He argues that the ultimate explanation of the atonement is identification for incorporation (p. 107f). I think this is actually a useful summary of the atonement: Christ identifies with us in our fallenness/sin/death so that we might be incorporated/united/relationally restored to God. What I like about this is that its ultimately positive - its emphasis is on restoration of things.

Lastly, I appreciated McKnight’s discussion of the practical implications of the atonement. While I certainly wouldn’t agree with everything he argues for, his case is great, especially his chapter on justice.

What I Didn’t

From hearing Scot talk and reading this book, my distinct impression is that he likes to offend people with the truth. Coming from someone who shares this weakness, I sympathize. However, I think that this book is far more offensive to those who would profit from reading it than it should be. This particularly materializes in two spheres.

First is his asides. McKnight has a plethora of parenthetical comments which give color to the text. They contribute little or nothing to the course of his argument. However, an unfortunate number of them come across as barbs at evangelicals and protestant liberals the two groups I assume he is trying to dialog with. Considering how polarizing the issues he is discussing already are, McKnight seriously hurts his central case with these comments.

In addition, his case would be helped if he didn’t insist on using his categories/terms quite as much, in order to stress agreement as well as disagreement. There are times where he says something and I would go “What?!?” only to realize a sentence or two later, as he explained what he meant, that he wasn’t saying anything I disagreed with at all. However, I’m afraid that many people I know wouldn’t grant him the hearing he deserves because many of his perfectly-reasonable assertions come across in rather thorny language.  I don’t want to be unfair here; I realize McKnight probably has reasons for doing this, like avoiding the problems of traditional categories. Still, a little more common ground would have been helpful. On a related note, I am getting really tired of hipster-Christian jargon. Do we really need to talk about praxis and the missio Dei when “practise” and “God’s mission” would do just as well, and in the language of the rest of the book?

Two other side issues were also present. First, I with McKnight would have made his ideas sound a little less novel, because they really aren’t. Don’t misunderstand, I think they are both timely and insightful. I just feel like lots of theologians for lots of history have said similar things, its just that for one reason or another (laziness, denominational bickering) their comments were lost on the people leading and sitting in churches. Second, I do have some epistemological differences with McKnight. I still think he misapplies the category of metaphor. And his post-foundationalism keeps him from expressing just how deeply intertwined his different atonement theories really are.

Conclusion

Despite these complaints, the spine of this book is solid. It was both devotionally and practically helpful to me to interact with McKnight’s thinking. Indeed, much of my issue with the book is that his language and method of presentation will discourage many of the people I would otherwise recommend it to from engaging it thoughtfully and graciously, and so its left to linger on my shelf. Still, its a provoking and generally good read. If you have the inclination, check it out.