The Biblical Text vs. the Old Myth
by Pierre Gilbert

At the eve of a new millennium, we cannot help but wonder about the insanity of the 20th Century. Whether it is children killing children in our high schools or abroad, the murderous conflicts between the Serbs and the Albanians, the Tutsi and the Hutus, Turks and the Kurds, the blind hatred of the Nazis for the Jews and the "substandards," or the almost gleeful eagerness to test the effects of atomic bombing on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the 20th Century has justifiably been characterized as the most murderous century in human history.

One of the noted philosophers of our times, Alain Finkielkraut, has recently observed that our contemporary society is ungrateful, self-centered, forgetful, terribly immodest; convinced of its superiority, convinced it has understood everything, while in its very heart germinates and prospers an inexplicable horror.

What is this inexplicable horror? This is not an easy question to answer. The Bible certainly alludes to it. The references to "sin", the "sinful nature", the "flesh" are attempts at pointing the finger at this horror which is in the center of the human heart. A horror that resulted from this terrible, fundamental rupture between humanity and God at the beginning of human history. Who we are today is irrevocably linked to that primordial event.

It is important to realize, however, that this fundamental flaw we all carry does not just manifest itself in some magical, ethereal fashion. I do not pretend that I understand all the ramifications of what happened to the human race. However, I would like to suggest that this fundamental flaw in us finds its full expression through the creation of ideas -- concepts that lead to the development of ideologies and full-fledge worldviews which in every generation worm themselves into the fabric of human society and corrupt social interactions. I said "ideologies and worldviews," but I am not sure that is quite accurate. I am more and more convinced that we have to speak of an ideology or a primordial worldview which in its most basic shape embraces the following ideas:

 Violence as a founding principle in creation and as a necessity for the perpetuation of human institutions.

The return of magical thinking

This worldview is what I call the "Old Myth." This Myth was present 4000 years ago in Ancient Mesopotamia. It was well and alive in the Greco-Roman world at the time of Jesus. It was present in the Middle Ages. The Nazis worshipped the "Old Myth," and in their insanity whole-heartedly embraced it and were destroyed by it.

Going back to Alain Finkielkraut. We are an arrogant people, for we only remember what we want to remember. We remember the crimes of the past, but we forget much. We are forgetting what gave us dignity in the first place. We are also forgetting that the evil that was in "them" is also in us.

I am convinced that there is ultimately precious little that separates us from embracing fully the old seductive Myth all over again. We can, today, observe many alarming signals that point us in that direction: abortion, euthanasia, materialism, the obsessive pursuit of profit, sexual immorality and exploitation, the widely-held notion that violence and wars can be justified by bringing up the conflicts of the past, etc. For those of us who think that Nazism died when Hitler put a bullet in his head, eugenics provides us with formidable tools that have the potential to create new classes of human beings which could and may lead to new forms of exploitation and more insidious mechanisms of dehumanization. Like a big ship, we are slowly, and it seems, inexorably orienting ourselves towards Death. Ironically, The "Old Myth," harbinger of death, is roaring back to life.

We often wonder how the church can be relevant in these secular times. Like turkeys with our heads cut off, we run to and fro, desperately trying to be contextual. Well, for starters, let us remember that the only thing that separates us from being swallowed and destroyed by the "Old Myth" is the Biblical Text. Christian pastors and leaders must constantly be in the process of exposing their people to the biblical worldview.

Our leaders should use all the skills, creativity, and energy they have to communicate what the Scriptures teach about the character of God, life, human dignity, human freedom, human significance, the human condition, humanity’s relationship to nature, and redemption in Jesus-Christ.

I see a vital, a critical role yet for the Christian community in these times. The Church will not, however, fulfill this role well if we do not have the kind of leaders who can passionately bring the Biblical Text to life. The development of such leaders does not happen in a vacuum or by some sort of fiat as many now seem to believe. When the Church is not intentional about the orientation of the theological training its leaders receive, then the theology of the church reverts to a default position which always carries with it the seeds of the "Old Myth." In this respect, I am more convinced today than I was three years ago, that MBBS does a wonderful job at providing the kind of learning community and theological training which are vital for the development of the type of church leaders and thinkers who will keep addressing the real critical issues of our times.