Doors in the Walls of the World - A Review

At some stage in their career, if they are any good, an author gets to the point where their work will be enough of a commercial success that they gain freedom from publishers to write books that a less well-known author would not be able to get in print. Peter Kreeft hit that status quite a while ago and the freedom he has found to experiment and explore is a wonderful thing. Whenever Kreeft publishes a book, buy it and read it.

Doors in the Walls of the World: Signs of Transcendence in the Human Story is the sort of volume that probably wouldn’t have gotten off the ground if Kreeft were less well-known, but it is just the sort of book that many people need at just this moment. This is a book that is much needed in this age of scientism and materialism. It is, fundamentally, an apologetic for a supernatural understanding of this world.

The introduction begins by considering several kinds of wonder. Wonder may be found in surprise. It may be found in intellectual exploration and curiosity. Wonder also results in awe. It is this third form of wonder that is the main grist of this book. This is a book about finding something beyond the world as we see it. It is about finding a door in the wall of the world, as the title indicates. This world is the material reality that we sense—the cave in Plato’s myth—and the doors in the cave wall are gateways to the supernatural reality that lies beyond.

Kreeft proceeds to show that life, in many ways, is a story. There is a Storyteller beyond the story. There is plot, setting, characters, theme, and style. These are, in plain English, history, physical science, psychology, religion and philosophy, and art. All of these are doors in the walls of the world, through which we can pass to wonder at the supernatural. They are clues to help us understand the transcendent.

Each of the chapters is a brief discussion on one of the five elements of story. Kreeft uses fictionalized illustrations, literary examples, and plain prose writing to make his case. His case is that there is something beyond the world that we can see and we would be foolish to think that the shadows on the cave walls are all there is.

Doors in the Walls of the World is the sort of book that does not dazzle with its purple prose or overwhelm with a logical argument. It is like a short film that carries a powerful message that is vitally important and, perhaps, couldn’t be told in another way. This is the sort of volume that should be read quickly, and maybe repeatedly, to be digested in wonder of the goodness of the hope it points toward. It’s a rest stop that refreshes with a surprising garden in the middle of a journey. This book is a testament to wonder and deserves to be read for those of us in a dry and weary cave who could use a little magic, mystery, and joy.

Doors in the Walls of the World: Signs of Transcendence in the Human Story

By Kreeft, Peter

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From Plato to Christ - A Review

In the final pages of The Chronicles of Narnia in the grand eschatological conclusion to The Last Battle we find Professor Digory Kirke explaining the wonder that is before the faithful Narnians, muttering to himself impatiently as he tries to explain what is happening to the English children: “It’s all in Plato, all in Plato: bless me, what do they teach them at these schools!”

That is a comment that went largely over my head when first I read of Narnia. All I knew of ancient Greek philosophy in my school days came from the brief summaries of their lives in history textbooks, which might tell me something like, “Plato was the student of Socrates. He wrote much of the canon of Western philosophy.” Additional contributions came from sources like Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, which made a joke of pronouncing the names and generally reinforced the plausibility of ignorance. What did they teach in these schools, indeed!

Entirely missing from the accounts of any of the classical philosophers was the content of their teaching. That level of ignorance was only reinforced in college, where I earned a degree and became a Really Smart Person without ever encountering more than a passing familiarity with some of the philosopher that have largely shaped the contours of Western thought and civilization.

Then the classical education revival became more prominent, I had kids, we decided to homeschool, and I started to read C. S. Lewis more broadly. I came to understand that in order to understand where we are culturally and where we might want to go, it is necessary to understand how we got here. That includes both through the influence of Christianity and other sources. Moreover, how can I provide the sort of education to my children I wish I had had when I’m too busy to master all the information myself? I need an entry point to help bring things together.

From Plato to Christ: How Platonic Thought Shaped the Christian Faith is a resource that can stand in the gap for many parents who, like me, did not receive a classical education and lack time to cram it all in to teach our children. In this volume Louis Markos highlights significant points of contact between Christianity and Plato’s philosophy. He shows why some Christians theologians have been enamored of Plato and will describe themselves as platonic. He also shows some ways that some theologians may have less helpfully appropriated portions of Plato’s philosophy.

Markos is a classicist who teaches at Houston Baptist University. He has written extensively on the truthfulness of Christianity, ancient Greek and Roman cultures, various works of the Inklings, and certainly more. In other words, he’s just the sort of individual to teach contemporary Christians without a background in ancient philosophy about the relationship between philosophy and Christianity.

The first half of From Plato to Christ is a summary of the teaching of Plato’s philosophy. The work Markos does in the first six chapters is not exhaustive, but it lays the groundwork for the points of contact he will highlight with Christian theologians later in the work. This section of the book is enough to inspire greater interest for those unfamiliar with Plato and help draw some themes together for those, like me, who are somewhere at a midpoint on our journey to understanding philosophy.

The second half of the volume looks back through the Christian tradition at ways Plato and the platonic tradition have influenced Christian thinking. This is the section that will serve as a litmus test for how one perceives the relationship between Christ and culture and the way that a reader views common grace. For some, the influence of Plato on Christian thinking is a pollution of the pure source. For others, the influence of Plato on Christian thinking is a powerful aid to Scripture. The portrait Markos provides is something of both, which makes this volume balanced and helpful.

On the one hand, it is sometimes astonishing how much of what Plato and other ancient philosophers accomplished apart from direct special revelation. There are points at which they reasoned out the right ordering of the universe without a word from God. On the other hand, Markos makes it clear where Plato and his intellectual descendants clearly missed the mark. For example, Plato is one of the ancient philosophers who viewed women as deformed men—lesser creatures—which did negatively influence the Christian tradition. These pagan philosophers must not be taken without parsing their words carefully, as Markos regularly reminds readers.

To my mind, Markos ends up too positive toward Plato. At several points he describes him as inspired—not in the same sense as Scripture, but more than simply artistically. I’m not sure that is necessary. However, Markos is fair in pointing out the failings of the Platonic tradition where it has corrupted Christian theology. If nothing else, this book has the potential to help contemporary readers sift through the Western Christian theological tradition more carefully, becoming aware of the sources and ideas that were influencing them. Markos provides a helpful tool that can be used with Scripture to parse through the Christian tradition and ask whether a particular conclusion is indeed biblical or if it relies on conceptions from another source.

Most significantly, Markos can help the contemporary reader make sense of the platonic tradition and be better equipped to appreciate the goodness of it. This is a book that is engaging to read, but also useful. While it does not replace the reading of the original sources, Markos provides a commentary that can help readers understand the original sources better. This is the sort of instruction that a parent seeking to guide their children in a classical education—which they likely lacked themselves—will find invaluable.

From Plato to Christ: How Platonic Thought Shaped the Christian Faith

By Markos, Louis

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NOTE: I received a gratis copy of this volume from the publisher with no expectation of a positive review.

Did God Break the Law?

Recently a pastor of a megachurch declared that “God broke the law for love” when our sins were atoned for on the cross. The preacher's motives were good—he wanted to express the wonder of the gospel in terms people can understand—but his theology is terrible. In fact, there is direct biblical evidence that undermines his claim. Additionally, even without the direct claims of Scripture, God breaking the Law would undermine centuries of orthodox understanding of the nature of both God and the Law.

More significant than knowing who made this theological blunder is understanding why it is incorrect. It is easy to bash someone for being in error. It is more important to explain why they are in error, because it is much more likely to edify the body. The purpose of this post is to explain how we know that God did not break the Law.

Biblical Evidence

When Jesus died on the cross for our sins, that action did not break the Law. He fulfilled the Law by bearing the punishment for the sins of others. He paid our insurmountable debt as a substitutionary sacrifice once and for all. Taking the penalty for others did not, in itself, violate the Law.

Where do we get this in Scripture? For one, Jesus himself says in Matthew 5:17: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.”

Assuming we accept that all three persons of the Trinity are equally God, we have pretty good evidence here that the God did not break the Law.

Rather than breaking the Law, Christ fulfilled it. Failing to keep the Law is sin. We know that Christ was tempted just like we are but he did not sin.

He did this in his life and ministry by keeping Law in every way, though he sometimes kept the Law in a manner that confused many of the religiously wise of his day.

In some cases, the way that Jesus lived out the Law was different from the way that it had been interpreted by the Pharisees and Sadducees, who were the religious elite of his day. Thus, they got upset when he healed on the Sabbath and had contact with people that were taboo.

In these cases, Jesus points to the Law and explains how he is fulfilling it. In most cases, he points to the principle behind the particular expression of the Law. For example, when Jesus’ disciples pluck and eat grain on the Sabbath, they are accused of breaking the Law. Instead of telling his accuser that the law didn’t matter, he explained that “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.” (Mk 2:27)

In other words, Jesus explains that the Law still applies, but that the practices built around the Sabbath had a different function than what was commonly understood. The point of Sabbath was not to enforce inactivity, but to offer rest and remind the Jews that their financial well-being depended on God. The Sabbath was a gift from God, it was not meant to be an onerous duty.

Looking back at Matthew 5:17-20, we get a fuller picture of the relationship between the Trinity and the Law and it does not point to God breaking the Law but to the continued force of the Law for true worshipers:

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.  For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

We know simply based on the words of Christ that God did not break the Law, because heaven and earth have not passed away. Until that happens, Christ calls his followers to teach and follow the Law, though how that is fleshed out in contemporary Christianity is a topic for another post.

God Can’t Break the Law

The clear evidence of Scripture shows us that God did not break the Law when Christ paid the penalty for our sins. But we didn’t need that evidence (though I’m glad we have it) because the very nature of God and the Law prevent God from breaking the Law.

This goes back to a famous philosophical dialog in Plato, which is referred to as the Euthyphro Dilemma. I’ll leave you to read that on your own.

To summarize the dialog, however, the two horns of the dilemma are whether the Law is good because God declared it to be good or whether the Law was given because God recognized it as good. In both cases, there is a good God and a good Law.

However, neither explanation of the goodness of the Law and the goodness of God is sufficient.

In the first case, if God arbitrarily declared certain things to be good, then the Law is no longer grounded in the moral order of the created order or in God’s character. In other words, there is little reason to expect that obeying God would naturally result in better ordered societies and greater peace with universe. At some point in the future God could change the Law so that a new set of things is good.

For example, though God has declared not murdering to be good, by this logic he could have just as easily declared murder good. If this explanation of the relationship between God and the Law is accepted, then the Law is arbitrary and God may be capricious.

In the second case, if God merely recognized the Law as good and chose to communicate it to his people, then the Law precedes God and God himself is bound by the Law. This is problematic because it implies that there was something that exists prior to God. Additionally, in this understanding of the relationship between God and the Law, the Law becomes the supreme norm of the universe instead of God. In theory, God could sin in this second understanding. Indeed, according to the megachurch preacher’s statements, God did sin by violating the moral order of the universe. (However, it is unlikely that the preacher actually believes this implication.)

Both of these explanations fall short of orthodoxy. Neither describes a God who is worthy of worship in the way that Christians recognize. Thus, a third explanation of the relationship between God and the Law is needed.

This third option is that the Law is good because it reflects the character of God. In this solution God is self-existent, logically and temporally prior to all else, and wholly good. The Law reflects his character, in part. By conforming to the Law, the Israelites were communicating something about God to the surrounding peoples and to each other. Thus, the Law was never about earning salvation it was about worship and evangelism.

There’s another way to explain this. God is the ultimate good in the universe. He is essentially good and there is no mixture of evil in him. God wants his creation to be good, like him. Therefore, he tells his people to be holy as he is holy (Lev 11:44-45). To show how to do this, God gave his people the gift of the Law. The Law reflects his character, so that by obeying the Law—by embodying the Law—his people were acting consistently with God’s character.

Based on this logic, then, God cannot break the Law. To break the Law would be to deny his very character. It would, so to speak, unGod God. He would cease to be good and thus cease to be worthy of worship. The view that God can break the Law is questionable. The view that God did break the Law draws close to blasphemy, if the speaker rightly understands the import of his words.

This third view of the Law is consistent with the Reformed understanding that has been passed down through the ages. It is part of the foundation of argumentation from Natural Law in other traditions, as well. There is nothing new under the sun, so in this case, being aware of historical theology could have saved confusion for many.

Conclusion

As I began by stating, the bad theology that God broke the Law was proclaimed for a very noble purpose: to illustrate the astounding reality that the God of the universe took action on our behalf to redeem us. This is part of the gospel message, and an important part. I am thankful that the earnest preacher is trying to communicate that message.

However, logic and sound theology don’t become unnecessary when we try to preach the gospel. It is important to preach Christ and to preach Christ rightly. Understanding the relationship between God and the Law is important, and particularly important because this third understanding requires stability in moral norms throughout history. It is, in fact, the basis for the claim to objective morality within Christianity.

Obviously, there is more to be discussed about the relationship between the Mosaic Law and Christianity. However, that is a topic for another day. Suffice it to say that there are reasonable answers to that question. In the meanwhile, we should never say that God broke the Law because that is logically impossible and contrary to Scripture.