8

POSTCONSERVATISM:
A THIRD WORLD PERSPECTIVE

Kwabena Donkor

POSTCONSERVATISM AS A MOOD in North American evangelical theology has been likened to postliberal theology.1 In this case, postconservative theology evidences a desire on the part of its practitioners to hold on to some of the qualities of conservative evangelical theology while simultaneously attempting to move beyond the confines of conservatism. Roger E. Olson has been foremost among evangelical theologians in trying to delineate the theological and practical contours of the postconservative mood.2 In recent articles he outlines the “conservative-postconservative” and “traditionalist-reformist” divides, and explicitly identifies “reformists” with “postconservatives.”3

When the “conservative-postconservative” divide is viewed in the apparently larger context of the “traditionalist-reformist” dialectic, it seems that Thomas Oden’s critique of Olson’s basic taxonomy is quite instructive. According to Oden, the traditionalist/reformist distinction may not be the best way to characterize the distinction between conservatives and postcon-servatives, for he believes that a more penetrating characterization would result from an examination of underlying assumptions.4 In my view, a careful analysis of basic assumptions is a necessary exercise in this debate because the issues at stake are inherently methodological ones.5 It may very well be that, upon closer examination, postconservatism does not simply involve the endorsement of the classic “Bebbingtonian” categories; rather, as Olson describes it, it ceases to make the defense of historic orthodoxy a primary objective.6 Thus, might it be possible that postconservativism holds to the so-called defining features of evangelicalism in such a novel fashion that it puts the whole evangelical movement at risk? In this chapter I argue that postconservativism involves a paradigm shift that places it in conflict with the ethos of historic evangelicalism. I also explore the implications of the post-conservative agenda for theological pluralism in general, and Third World religious thought in particular.

I. UNDERSTANDING POSTCONSERVATIVE THEOLOGY

To the extent that postconservativism is perhaps presently only a mood and not a full-blown theological movement, it is reasonable to conclude that its positions are still in the formative stages. As a general observation, however, the postconservative theological impulse derives from a sense that evangelicals must respond to the sea change in Western culture in order for evangel-icalism to maintain its relevance. While several evangelical theologians have reflected on the contemporary cultural context, few have actually written pro-grammatic theological responses. Two such programmatic proposals, writ-ten by Kevin J. Vanhoozer and Stanley J. Grenz, have been offered to evangelical scholars for study and reflection.7 In this chapter I look at post-conservative evangelical theology, primarily, through the eyes of Grenz, whose program, in my view, seems to depart the most from historical evangelicalism. I am nevertheless cognizant that, although postconservatism is only a mood at present, it is a diverse phenomenon.

Stanley J. Grenz: Theology as Articulating the
Christian Belief-Mosaic

In characterizing theology as the articulation of the Christian belief-mosaic, Grenz is seeking to develop an evangelical theological method that in his view will be relevant to postmodern thought.8 He begins this discussion by observing that the postmodern situation “calls for an evangelical theological method that proceeds nonfoundationally and in so doing takes seriously the post-modern situation characterized by the move away from both realism and the metanarrative.”9 Grenz’s view of Christian doctrine as “belief-mosaic” high-lights a fundamental concern in his approach. His use of the concept “belief-mosaic” synonymously with “web of belief” demonstrates the seriousness with which he takes the so-called demise of foundationalism and the credence he gives to coherentist epistemology.10 In Grenz’s approach, the starting point is the Christian community and not a Scripture principle.

The Community: “Basicality” for Christian Theology. For Grenz, since evangelical theology has a strong base in foundationalist epistemology, the demise of foundationalism with the dawn of postmodernism means that some kind of postfoundationalist epistemology needs to be worked out to ground a renewed evangelicalism. For this grounding, Grenz builds on what has been called “Reformed epistemology,” which, while it questions strong foundationalism, does not deny the foundationalist insight of searching for a type of basic belief. The particular interpretation of reason given by Reformed epistemologists needs outlining: there is no such thing as universal reason, which means that there is not available to us a single, universal set of criteria by which we may definitively judge the epistemic status of all beliefs.11 Reason is not a neutral instrument of reflection; it is rather “person specific” and “situation specific.”12 Instead of any given foundational cognitive datum, Grenz and Reformed epistemologists agree on constituting the believing community as the basic Christian belief for theological reflection. What is specifically basic is the Christian community as an experience-facilitating interpretive framework. The fundamental implication of this communitarian turn is that the believing Christian community becomes the matrix out of which theo-logical expression is brought forth.13 But Grenz is careful to point out that, although in his approach theological reflection issues from the community’s experience, this is not a return to foundationalism as in the liberal approach. In the latter approach, it was supposed that a single, universal, foundational religious experience “lay beneath the plethora of religious experiences found in the various religious traditions.”14 In Grenz’s approach, the experience of the Christian community is specific to it and indeed identifies it as such.

Recasting Theology. The distinguishing of Grenz’s approach from the liberal one in terms of the specificity of experience that characterizes it points to other significant insights in the approach. What is important to Grenz about the believing community is the view that religious experience is a function of a cognitive interpretive framework that “sets forth a specifically religious interpretation of the world.”15 In other words, Grenz agrees with the basic insight of Lindbeck that religious experience does not precede interpretation (as was the case in liberalism), rather religious experience is “filtered by an interpre-tive framework that facilitates the occurrence.”16 Applying this insight to his recasting of evangelical theology, Grenz states, “In this sense, the specifically Christian experience-facilitating interpretive framework, arising as it does out of the biblical gospel narrative, is ‘basic’ for Christian theology.”17 Grenz makes a further distinction of this elevation of experience from the classical liberal approach. In Grenz’s postconservatism, unlike in liberalism, there is no generic religious experience but, rather, tradition-specific religious experience. 18 From this perspective, Christian theology becomes an intellectual effort to “understand, clarify, and delineate” the community’s interpretive frame-work. Since the community’s interpretive framework that theology attempts to delineate is informed by the Bible’s narratives, the theological enterprise is not simply descriptive, but prescriptive as well, i.e., articulating what ought to be the interpretive framework of the Christian community.

In accordance with Grenz’s search for a coherentist theological method, he does not see the interpretive framework as a given that precedes the theological enterprise, and from which foundation the theological house is built, yielding separable units of doctrines. That view would signal a return to foundationalism. Rather, an interpretive framework is given with, or clothed in, any specific theological understanding. Christian theology, there-fore, embodies a specific interpretive framework of conceptualizing the world holistically, in connection with the biblical view of God. Hence, Grenz views Christian doctrine as a “web of belief.” But theology, according to Grenz, should not only explicate the belief-mosaic but should also demonstrate “the explicative power of the Christian faith by indicating the value of the Christian worldview for illuminating human experience.”19 Theology, then, is conversational—a conversation between the doctrinal mosaic and human experience—involving what Grenz describes as an “interplay, or perichoretic dance, of an ordered set of sources of insight.”20 It is a conversation in which the faith community, by explicating the meaning of the sacred texts, rituals, etc., through which it expresses its understanding of the world, seeks to articlate what ought to be the Christian belief mosaic. Grenz appears to antici-pate the apparent indeterminate nature of this community-based conversation by observing that it is not a conversation in which “anything goes.”21 Instead the conversation proceeds under the guidance or interplay of an ordered set of sources of insight. These sources of insight constitute the voices in the theological conversation.

Theology as Conversation. Grenz’s constructive theological conversation has three voices. The first and primary voice is the Bible. Formally, Grenz gives primacy to Scripture in theological reflection, but he has a nuanced view of the Scripture principle. He argues that under the foundationalist presuppositions of modernity, Luther’s sola Scriptura principle was deprived of its concern to bring Word and Spirit together in a living relationship.22 The Bible was trans-formed from a living text into the object of the theologian’s exegetical and systematizing effort. Consequently, the authority of Scripture became identified with its “stateable content,”23 namely, the doctrines it teaches, but Scripture is normative, says Grenz, “because it is the instrumentality of the Spirit.”24 Grenz’s point is that the “Protestant principle means that the Bible is authori tative in that it is the vehicle through which the Spirit speaks.”25 Indeed, Grenz takes the point a step further to say that, in the end, the Bible’s authority is the authority of the Spirit whose instrumentality it is.26 Grenz employs insights from contemporary speech-act theory to explain how his reformulated Scripture principle may be understood in the postmodern, postfoundationalist context. The Spirit, through Scripture, performs the illocutionary act of addressing humans, as well as a concomitant perlocutionary act of creating an “eschatological world” consisting of a new community of renewed individuals. By applying speech-act theory categories of illocutionary and perlocutionary acts to the role of the Spirit in the use of Scripture, Grenz legitimizes the primacy he accords the community in theological reflection. By the Spirit’s illocutionary act, contemporary believers are able to ascertain the meaning of the text for the present, and by his perlocutionary act a Spirit-formed community is established. The ongoing theological task, therefore, is to help the believing community hear the Spirit’s voice through the biblical text.27

The second voice in theology as conversation is tradition. Tradition in this sense means giving any particular believing community a historical sense of participation in “the one faith community that spans the ages.”28 Tradition in this conception is “the history of the interpretation and application of canonical scripture by the Christian community, the church, as it listens to the voice of the Spirit speaking through the text.”29 Grenz’s pneumatology runs through his whole methodological program. The Spirit forms the community and guides its ongoing reflection on the biblical message to the point that tradition, in Grenz’s view, “is in many respects an extension of the authority of scripture.”30 As a resource for theological reflection, the theo-logical heritage has value in helping the theologian avoid pitfalls as well as pointing out areas for fruitful reflection. It serves as a “hermeneutical con-text or trajectory”31 for the theological enterprise. The characteristic mark of this trajectory is its vitality, involving as it does the dialectic of change and continuity.32 It should be pointed out that in his portrayal of the nature of tradition and its role as theological resource, Grenz is intent on providing a non-foundational conception of tradition.33

Finally, the wider historical-cultural context should inform theological construction. Grenz comes to this conclusion based in part on his analysis of insights from cultural anthropology.34 He concludes that the quest for a culture- free theology is both theologically and biblically unwarranted, besides the fact that “all theology by its very nature as a human enterprise is influ-enced by its cultural context.”35 In particular, Grenz mentions the various dis-ciplines of human learning; these may lead to deeper or wider awareness of what is involved in the Spirit’s work of creating a new identity in the Christian person. More significant is the reason he gives for including the historical-cultural context as a resource:

Our theological reflections can draw from the so-called secular sciences, because ultimately no discipline is in fact purely secular. Above all, because God is the ground of truth, as Wolfhart Pannenberg so consistently argues, all truth ultimately comes together in God. . . . Because the life-giving Spirit is present wherever life flourishes, the Spirit’s voice can conceivably resound through many media, including the media of human culture. Because Spirit-induced human flourishing evokes cultural expression, Christians can anticipate in such expressions traces of the Creator Spirit’s presence.36

So deep is Grenz’s appreciation of the pneumatological basis of the Spirit’s speaking in culture that for him “culture and biblical text do not comprise two different moments of communication (with tradition then forming a third); rather, they are ultimately one speaking.”37

Acknowledging the role of culture in Christian theology is one thing, but the manner in which culture should be incorporated into the theological enterprise is a different matter altogether. Grenz contemplates the extant pro-grams of correlation and contextualization and concludes that both are inadequate by themselves. Methods of correlation and contextualization function in a foundationalist manner, although they move in opposite directions. Whereas correlationists tend to universalize culture, contextualizers are more often inclined to overlook the distinctiveness of every understanding of Christianity’s message.38 Grenz’s nonfoundationalist approach is to hold the two models in tandem and thereby bring about an interactive process that is both correlative and contextual. What is perhaps noteworthy in Grenz’s model is what it presupposes: “this model presupposes neither gospel nor culture—much less both gospel and culture—as preexisting, given realities that subsequently enter into conversation. Rather, in the interactive process both gospel . . . and culture . . . are dynamic realities that inform and are informed by the conversation itself.”39 Theology emerges out of this ongoing, interactive conversation between gospel and culture.

What Makes Theology Christian? Grenz is aware, and decidedly so, that his particular casting of evangelical theology makes all theology group- and sit-uation specific.40 This observation is characteristically postmodern as Grenz would have it, yet it raises for him the question of what constitutes any partic-ular local theology as “Christian.” Grenz answers this question by identifying three motifs, which for him reflect what he calls the Christian “style.”41 The Christian style comprises a Trinitarian structure, a communitarian focus, and an eschatological orientation. In other words, theology is Christian not only when it adopts a Trinitarian understanding of the Being of God, but when the very explication of the community’s belief structure is Trinitarian in nature. This means Christian theology is more than believing in the particular doctrine of the Trinity. It should allow the doctrines of God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit to frame theological discourse. Second, since it is one’s presence in the Christian community that necessitates theological reflection, Community becomes the integrative motif, i.e., the theme around which all Christian theo-logical foci should be understood and explored. Finally, the eschatological aspect of Christian theology, which Grenz identifies as its orientating motif, means that Christian theology does not deal with static realities, but realities that are linguistically and socially constructed, tending toward God’s eternal telos for the creation. Thus Grenz asks, “How can Christian theology continue to talk about an actual world, even if it is only future, in the face of the demise of realism and the advent of social constructionism?”42

II. SUMMARIZING POSTCONSERVATISM
METHODOLOGICALLY

Why embark on a methodological analysis of postconservative theology? In the fluid theological situation we have today, methodological analysis is helpful to clarify assumptions, explore connections in thought, and bring legitimacy to the theological enterprise. Theologians do their work on the basis of a method, whether it is stated explicitly or not, and it is the exploration of the conceptual, theoretical, epistemological, and metaphysical commitments underlying the work that gives the approach its particular identity. This is an essentially fundamental theological exercise.43

In outlining the proposal by Grenz, many of his methodological commitments have already become evident. It is necessary, however, to give a unified view of postconservative theology by providing a methodological summary. The need for a conversation among evangelicals on method is well acknowledged, but just what a conversation on method entails is not all that clear. Commenting on the paucity of evangelical engagement in method-ological discussions, John Stackhouse comments that evangelical discussions of methodology have often focused on the nature and interpretation of the Bible, whereas evangelical theology and methodology is more than exege-sis. 44 The broadness of the methodological question is, however, clearly perceived by Stephen Williams, who observes that “the matter of theological method inevitably raises the question of presuppositions about the theolog-ical task, and I believe that, within evangelicalism, attending to the task means raising some broader questions than we often do. . . .”45 At this point in this essay, I propose to summarize postconservative theology from the point of view of three aspects of method: the perceived goal of evangelical theology, the presuppositions with which it embarks on its theological for-mulations, and the sources that are admitted into its constructive work. When method per se is seen formally and primarily as activity, albeit, an intellectual activity, a structural analysis of it will reveal the components that I have highlighted above.46

The Goal of Postconservative Theology

J. I. Packer has made the point quite clearly that up until the opening of the nineteenth century, all mainline practitioners of the discipline variously called first principles, theology, dogmatics, systematic theology, etc., had a unified understanding of the aim of the discipline. Theology was under-stood to function as a science, “to give the world a body of analyzed, tested, correlated knowledge concerning God in relation to his creatures in general and to mankind in particular.”47 Packer notes also that systematic theology of the older type, more specifically the older evangelical type, shares this goal of theology. There is no question that postconservative evangelical theology intends to alter this classical evangelical understanding of the goal of theology.

Grenz’s view regarding the goal of theology is quite pragmatic.48 When we discussed his position on theology as conversation, it was pointed out that for him, the goal of theology is to help the believing community hear the voice of God in the text. It is to facilitate the restoration of what Grenz otherwise calls “convertive piety”49 by delineating the “Christian experience-facilitating interpretative framework” out of the biblical narrative.

It is quite clear that although in Grenz’s view the cognitive element in theology is not denied, there is a decided shift away from a cognitivist approach to theology. Grenz’s characterization of the eschatological motif that should inform Christian theology appears to diminish the cognitive aspect of evangelical theology, at least in the sense that Packer describes it. His preference for treating eschatology as eschaton rather than as eschata relates to this point.50 What is more significant in the postconservative approach is not the fact that there is a shift in understanding about the goal of theology, but the reason for the shift and its implications. This discussion leads us to a consideration of the presuppositions of postconservative theology.

Presuppositions of Postconservative
Theology

By presuppositions we mean fundamental hermeneutical principles that condition the whole theological enterprise.51 For this purpose, we will examine two interrelated types of presuppositions: epistemological and ontological. Simply stated, these are respectively, fundamental assumptions about how we know and about what we know.

Epistemologically, postconservative theology signals a shift from the foundationalist epistemology of the older evangelical theology52 to a post-foundationalist epistemology. This shift is rooted in a dynamic view of rev-elation. Grenz’s dynamic revelation is centered in his communitarian starting point. We have already noted his indebtedness to Reformed epistemologists for this move. Formally, Grenz gives a primary place to Scripture by making it the genesis of the community’s interpretive framework. However, because he does not make the interpretive framework a part of the given divine revelation that precedes the theological enterprise, but rather as something given with specific theological understandings, he effectively relocates revelation in the ongoing dynamism of the believing community.53 Furthermore, not only does postconservative epistemology displace the ultimate genesis of doctrine from divine revelation, the communitarian empha-sis makes this epistemology community-specific. In Grenz’s writings, this epistemological specificity seems to be intended to distinguish the Christian community from other religious communities, but nothing would seem to prevent its use to legitimize distinctive communities within the wider Christian community.

The question as to whether theology makes first-order or second-order declarations bears directly on the issue of ontology.54 On this issue, Grenz has expressed himself quite clearly:

Theology is a second-order enterprise, and its propositions are second-order propositions. Theology formulates in culturally conditioned language the confession and world-view of the community of faith—of that people who have been constituted by the human response to the story of the salvific act of God in the history of Jesus the Christ. The assertion that theology speaks a second-order language is not intended to deny the onto-logical nature of theological declarations. Nevertheless, the ontological claims implicit in theological assertions arise as an outworking of the intent of the theologian to provide a model of reality, rather than to describe reality directly.55

Elsewhere, Grenz develops his idea on reality by speaking of “eschatological realism.” Grenz clearly informs us that eschatological realism is his way of combining the insights of social constructionists with the concerns of critical realists.56 By this notion, Grenz wishes to say that while Christian theology maintains a certain undeniable givenness to the universe, it is not that of a “static actuality existing outside of, and co-temporally with, our social and linguistically constructed reality. It is not the objectivity of what some might call the ‘world as it is.’ Rather, the objectivity set forth in the biblical narrative is the objectivity of the world as God wills it. . . .”57 Under eschatologi-cal realism, Grenz acknowledges that there is a real universe “out there,” but it is a reality that “lies ‘before,’ rather than ‘beneath’ or ‘around’ us. Ours is a universe that is in the process of being created, as many scientists acknowledge.” 58 Again, it needs to be remembered that the framework for the cre-ation of this ongoing eschatological reality in the present is the interpretive framework of the community.

Sources for Postconservative Theology

On the question of sources, Grenz speaks explicitly of the three pillars of theology: the biblical message, the theoretical heritage of the church, and the thought-forms of the historical-cultural context of contemporary people.59 We discussed the sources for Grenz’s postconservative theological method when we considered the three primary voices in his construal of theology as conversation. What needs to be pointed out presently is that sources are not employed in any sort of deductive, propositionalist-style theologizing. Rather, the use of sources is an intensely hermeneutical process, involving the inter-play of the three-ordered set of sources of insight.

III. METHODOLOGICAL EVALUATION OF
POSTCONSERVATIVE THEOLOGY

The combined effect of postconservatism’s understanding of theology’s goal, presuppositions, and sources may be quite far-reaching; first, for the discipline of theology itself within evangelicalism, and second, for its implication for the Third World, and indeed evangelization among other world religions.

A Prescription for Pluralism?

It seems that postconservatism would in principle admit to a certain measure of plurality. Grenz believes that with the dawn of postmodernism, all theology is “local” or “specific.” But while admitting of plurality in postconservative theology, postconservatism does not welcome an ideology of pluralism. We must, however, ask: Does the pluralism that is structurally endemic to postconservative theology make evangelicalism worthwhile?

First, consider theology’s goal. Traditionally, it is not unusual to break theology’s goal into three formal tasks aimed at the achievement of the goal. Thus we distinguish constructive, apologetic, and critical tasks.60 The demise of propositionalism in postconservative theology is accompanied by a corresponding deemphasis of doctrine. The result is that a careful look at post-conservatism shows a fusion of the constructive and apologetic tasks as the critical task recedes into the background. As one reads the postconservative agenda, one is left wondering whether the question of heresy is even possible. On the one hand, the constructive effort does not seem to address the truth question directly, nor indeed can it. This is precisely because the goal of theology in postconservatism does not have to do primarily with truth. For Grenz, theology has a pragmatic concern: to delineate the Christian experience- facilitating interpretive framework. Regarding the truth question in Grenz, since he conceives a prescriptive component as an “ought” in his inter-pretive framework, it would be helpful for him to clarify, formally, how this “ought” is conceptualized.

On the other hand, the critical task, although not completely absent, lacks a strong critical principle. Grenz does recognize the critical task, yet there is no succinct statement or articulation of a critical principle.61 The closest he comes to doing this is his discussion of the three motifs of Christian theology, but this hardly goes far enough to answer the question of heresy in theology. We pointed out earlier that postconservative epistemology is community-specific. The point has relevance for the truth question. How does one go about providing criteria for the assessment of competing truth claims?62

Second, consider postconservative epistemology. Postconservative theology takes it as axiomatic that evangelical theology should move beyond foun-dationalism. 63 It is for this reason that the search is on for a postfoundationalist (not necessarily anti-foundationalist) epistemology in evangelical theology, a term that appears to have been coined by J. Wentzel van Huyssteen.64 On this issue, it is important to recall what is at stake. The rejection of foundational-ism is a rejection of Enlightenment rationality, which in Lyotard’s view constitutes a “totalizing” metanarrative.65 Postfoundationalism is an attempt to find that safe place “somewhere between the modern and the postmodern . . .where reason rules but does not tyrannize, where we enjoy the temperate gains of the postmodern without suffering its extremes.”66 Postfoundationalism tries to avoid the deconstructionist attempt to dispense with reason itself67 while at the same time rejecting modern rationality. The result for Grenz is “chastened rationality.”68

The result of van Huyssteen’s exploration in postfoundationalist epistemology reveals the conceptual pluralistic vulnerabilities to which postconservatism is exposed. Like Grenz, van Huyssteen’s postfoundational rationality finds its resting place in tradition, understood in a sense similar to Grenz’s community. But what kind of rationality is this? It is the community/ tradition’s communicative evaluations, responsible judgments, and prob-lem-solving theory choices that constitute the true nature of rational reflection.69 These constitute research/tradition paradigms whose application to the community’s conceptual problems leads to what the tradition/com-munity “could claim a very specific form of theoretical and experiential ade-quacy.” 70 It is a pragmatic move that yields a pragmatic rationality. Van Huyssteen acknowledges that his approach lacks a clear and objective criterion for judging the experiential adequacy of competing traditions, yet he is not prepared to admit that this leads to a radical pluralism or even an easy pluralism. Maybe true. But what real advantage is there for evangelical theology in his conclusion that “cognitive agreement or consensus in theology is also, and maybe especially, unattainable, and that what Nicholas Rescher has called ‘dissensus tolerance’ could prove to be a positive and constructive part of theological pluralism”?71

It should be clear on the basis of this kind of postfoundationalist epistemology how the truth question is avoided, hence encouraging pluralism. First, within a particular community, the implication is that “in any appraisal of the rationality of a particular belief, theory, or research tradi-tion, this belief, theory, or tradition is relative to its contemporaneous competitors, to prevailing doctrines of theory assessment, and to the previous theories within a research tradition.”72 Second, intersubjectively, this episte-mology provides “a theory of rationality without first presupposing anything about the truth or verisimilitude of those traditions we judge to be rational or irrational.”73

Finally, consider postconservative ontology. Postconservatism displays a variety of positions on the question of ontology. While at this time a good number of postconservatives are said to reject ontological relativism,74 methodologically, consistency demands a move beyond the correspondence theory of truth, since epistemologically we are made to lose an objective view to reality.75 The move is from epistemology to ontology; and the loss of rational objectivity is the main point of postmodernity’s “incredulity to metanar-ratives.” 76 But has postmodernity’s “incredulity to metanarratives,” especially as formulated by Lyotard, been misread by evangelicals?

James K. A. Smith, in an insightful article, makes the point that the work of evangelical scholars such as Grenz, J. Richard Middleton, and Brian J.Walsh77 involves a misreading of Lyotard. According to Smith, evangelicals have failed to realize that in the work The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge, Lyotard uses “metanarrative” critically, in the specific sense of scientific rationality’s failure to understand its own status as myth/narrative. 78 In other words, Lyotard is not merely criticizing the universality of metanarratives or the scope of metanarratives as Grenz and others make it seem; rather Lyotard is concerned about scientific rationality’s way of legit-imizing its knowledge.79 Indeed, in Smith’s view, the Bible story is not a meta-narrative in Lyotard’s sense, although it makes universal claims of truth, since these claims are made not on the basis of some kind of universal reason, but on the basis of faith.80 If Smith has read Lyotard correctly, then the point is this: “Lyotard relativizes [secular] philosophy’s claim to autonomy, and so grants the legitimacy of a philosophy which grounds itself in Christian faith.”81 Consequently, evangelical realism need not be subjugated to a rela-tivist view of reality. Mark Noll, raising the issue about the possibility of historical knowledge in traditional Christianity in the context of a postmodern world, observes that it is the very foundation of Christianity that is at stake in the crisis about realism.82 He notes that the very existence of orthodoxy, both Catholic and Protestant, is defined by purportedly historical events con-cerning an omnipotent deity who created out of nothing, called Abraham to be the father of all nations, and delivered his descendants from slavery in Egypt in order to preserve his purposes. The story of Jesus’ preexistence, incarnation and Virgin birth, and his death and resurrection are affirmed implicitly with a definite view of historical understanding.83

A Missiological Dilemma?

Conceptually, postconservative evangelical theology, in my view, seems to find itself in the unenviable position of having to be consistent with its method-ological commitments and at the same time having to maintain a missiological voice as evangelicalism inherently demands. Fundamentally, the problem is how, in formulating evangelical theology along the lines of postmodernism’s incredulity to metanarratives, postconservative theology can still maintain a legitimate apologetics. Clearly, postconservatism wishes to move beyond Lindbeck’s postliberal cultural-linguistic approach, which for Grenz “potentially results in a ‘sectarian’ church, one that no longer assumes any role in the public realm.”84 Postconservatism intends to be intratextual/subjective. Postconservatism wishes to avoid what van Huyssteen has described as “the insular comfort of a nonfoundationalist isolationism, whereby what we see as our preferred tradition(s) can easily be transformed from being rationality’s destiny to being more like rationality’s prison.”85 These considerations have far-reaching implications for evangelism within the postcon-servative theological construct.

We have already observed that in van Huyssteen’s postfoundational epistemology, traditions become research paradigms of relative experiential ade-quacy in their problem-solving ability. Applied to trans-contextual evaluation of beliefs and viewpoints, van Huyssteen sees rationality’s movement from “individual judgment to communal evaluation to intersubjective conversation.” 86 In using these paradigms to appraise different traditions, van Huyssteen observes, “we should choose the theory or research tradition that we find the most compelling and that we judge to have the highest problem-solving adequacy for a specific problem within a specific context.”87 From this perspective, the Christian missionary urge in postconservative theology is a very pragmatic one: Christian theology is a better research paradigm.

An approach similar to van Huyssteen’s is seen in Grenz’s approach to the vexing question regarding the relationship between Christianity’s unique claims and the religions of the world. After briefly outlining the options of exclusivism, inclusivism, and pluralism which, according to Grenz, are all framed by concern over the question of the final destiny of those outside the church, he transmutes the issue into the more pragmatic one of the role the religions play in the divine economy.88 On the basis of his view that, biblically, God’s overarching intent for creation may be summed in the word “community,”89 and that the providential place of the religions may lie in the role they play in fostering community,90 Grenz concludes that

any religion can be assessed according to both the personal identity/social structure it fosters and the underlying belief system that sanctions the social order. The primary question in appraising any religion, therefore, concerns the extent to which religious beliefs and practices lead to a personal identity and to social structures that cohere with God’s intent for human life.91

In this approach, the appropriate attitude to the religions is dialogue, and the process of critical appraisal as mentioned above is the context for determining the value of interreligious dialogue. Furthermore, in this appraisal process no religion, including Christianity, is allowed a privileged exemption.92

Yet, Grenz is concerned to maintain the finality of Christ for purposes of evangelization. The question is, in a pluralistic context where all religions tend to foster community, how do you maintain the finality of the Christian vision? Grenz’s answer is to postulate a “transcendent community vision”which he claims is embodied in the Christian community by virtue of the rev- elation of God in Jesus Christ. He maintains that “other religious visions can-not provide community in its ultimate sense, because they do not embody the highest understanding of who God actually is,” but “through the incarnate life of Jesus we discover the truest vision of the nature of God.”93

Obviously Grenz’s approach to the missiological issue raises a few conceptual difficulties. How, for example, can Grenz maintain that the Christian vision of community embodies the highest understanding of who God actually is, when he says that “the ontological claims implicit in theological asser-tions arise as an outworking of the intent of the theologian to provide a model of reality, rather than to describe reality directly”?94 Is not the claim that the Christian vision of community embodies the highest understanding of who God actually is a theological assertion? It would seem that on several fronts the postconservative approach to world religions faces a dilemma. I will look at this dilemma briefly from the African context.

Throughout Africa, there is a strong move to reinvent Christianity when it comes to evangelization, on the basis of a felt call for a Christian theology “with an African face.”95 Two main approaches are evident at this time: theology of adaptation and critical African theology.96 Adaptation theology seeks to penetrate the mentality, culture, and philosophy of Africans and adapt the gospel to those values. Critical African theology, on the other hand, adopts a more radical and pluralistic approach, accusing theology of adaptation of concordism.97 This is the theological context within which post-conservative theology must conduct apologetics. It is not simply a “world religions” context in which Christianity is seen over against different religions, but an amalgam of Christian/world religions context in which the dif-ferent world religions are believed to be “Christian” intrinsically. Both the theology of adaptation and critical African theology approaches create a dilemma for postconservative apologetics.

First, postconservatism’s own postmodern epistemological commitments will seem to create a roadblock for evangelization. It is true that postconservatism seems resigned to dialogue instead of evangelization, but Grenz’s postulation of the transcendent community vision clearly intends evangelization.Yet critical African theologians appear to see quite clearly the undeniable pluralism of postmodern epistemology. It is true that the same argument can be made against conservative evangelical apologetics, but the case for Christianity’s preeminence in the hands of postconservative theology is at best a weak one.98

Second, postconservatism’s communitarian turn, in the African context, would seem to provide a catalyst for pluralism. In contemporary African theology, the theme of community has been identified as a particularly rich con-cept for developing a genuinely African theology.99 The pluralistic problem would stem from the fact that whereas in the West the communitarian turn by and large involves different communities of the Christian faith, in the African context the turn revolves around traditional, religious, experience-constituting communities that are now deemed relevant for constructing a theology with an African face. The pluralistic potential should be obvious given the plethora of traditional African communities. At this point an observation needs to be made about the so-called comparative superiority of the Christian religion for fostering community in the African context vis-à-vis the traditional ancestral-based community construct. The report card from key African theologians in both the adaptation and critical camps is that Christianity has been disruptive of community/social order; hence they argue for the alleged need for a truly African theology.100

A final point regarding the dilemma I see postconservative apologetics facing in the African context concerns the nature of some traditional African communities. Most traditional African communities that pragmatically fostered wholesome communities still entailed aspects that would be deemed superstitious by biblical, Christian standards. Some of these elements, involving ancestral theology, are wont to be maintained by contemporary African Christian theologians.101 Requiring these communities to purge themselves of these “errors,” even in a dialogical setting, would seem to require the setting up of some “global” cognitive, propositional apparatus that would arise out- side of the traditional community’s interpretive framework, a move that would be fundamentally contrary to the postconservative ethos.

CONCLUSION

To sum up, I have tried to describe and evaluate postconservative evangelical theology from a methodological perspective primarily through the programmatic proposal of Stanley Grenz. I have examined the fundamental presuppositions on which the theology is being built in order to assess its compatibility with the older-type conservative evangelical theology. Although, materially, its proponents show a sincere desire to maintain the connection with conservative evangelicalism, its formal commitment to postmodern epistemological and ontological sensitivities seems to evidence the beginning of a paradigm shift. The implications of such a move for evangelical theology in general and for Third World evangelization in particular have been sketched. Clearly, the future direction of evangelicalism is at stake, and evangelical theology urgently needs an ongoing discussion and debate on these issues, especially from a methodological point of view.

1 Roger E. Olson, “Postconservative Evangelicals Greet the Postmodern Age,” Christian Century 112 (1995): 480. As Olson describes it, postliberal theology describes the posture of those theologians who, while trying to move beyond liberalism, continue to preserve some of its qualities.

2 See his “Postconservative Evangelicals Greet the Postmodern Age”; and idem, “The Future of Evangelical Theology,” Christianity Today 42 (February 9, 1998): 40-44. See also Millard J. Erickson, The Evangelical Left: Encountering Postconservative Evangelical Theology (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker, 1997), 29-30. Here, Erickson depends on Olson’s characterization of postconservatism. Indeed, the term “postconservative” is Olson’s creation. See Olson’s “Reforming Evangelical Theology,” in Evangelical Futures: A Conversation on Theological Method, ed. John G. Stackhouse, Jr. (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker, 2000), 201.

3 Olson, “Reforming Evangelical Theology,” 203.

4 Thomas C. Oden, “The Real Reformers Are Traditionalists,” Christianity Today 42 (February 9, 1998): 45.

5 While alluding to the need for methodological discussions in the current evangelical climate, Stephen Williams correctly observes that the matter of theological method inevitably raises the question of presuppositions. See Stephen Williams, “The Theological Task and Theological Method: Penitence, Parasitism, and Prophecy,” in Evangelical Futures, 159.

6 Olson, “Postconservative Evangelicals Greet the Postmodern Age,” 480. According to Olson, postconservatives continue to hold to four defining features of evangelicalism, which David Bebbington has classically formulated as conversion ism, biblicism, activism, and crucicentrism, but they no longer make it their chief role to defend historic orthodoxy.

7 Kevin J. Vanhoozer, “The Voice and the Actor: A Dramatic Proposal About the Ministry and Minstrelsy of Theology,” in Evangelical Futures, 61-106; Stanley J. Grenz, “Articulating the Christian Belief-Mosaic: Theological Method After the Demise of Foundationalism,” in Evangelical Futures, 107136. The essays presented here represent a rather concise statement of the authors’ position on the subject since both of them, especially Grenz, have written extensively on the issue. For a more complete presentation of Grenz’s ideas, see Stanley J. Grenz, Revisioning Evangelical Theology: A Fresh Agenda for the Twenty-first Century (Downers Grove, Ill: InterVarsity Press, 1993); Stanley J. Grenz, Renewing the Center: Evangelical Theology in a Post-Theological Era (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker, 2000); Stanley J. Grenz and John R. Franke, Beyond Foundationalism: Shaping Theology in a Postmodern Context (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001).

8 The concern to accommodate the postmodern situation in theological reflection has been expressed quite clearly as follows: “Two aspects of the postmodern ethos are especially important for theological method: the fundamental critique of modernity, and the attempt to live and think in a realm of chastened rationality characterized by the demise of modern epistemological foundationalism” (Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 19).

9 Grenz, “Articulating the Christian Belief-Mosaic,” 119.

10 Ibid., 123. For a brief account of coherentists’ rejection of foundationalism, see Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 38-40.

11 Grenz, “Articulating the Christian Belief-Mosaic,” 120.Grenz,

12 Ibid.

13 Elsewhere, Grenz describes theology as “the believing community’s reflection on faith.” See Grenz, Revisioning Evangelical Theology, 81.

14 Grenz, “Articulating the Christian Belief-Mosaic,” 121.

15 Ibid., 122.

16 Ibid.

17 Ibid.

18 Ibid.

19 Ibid., 124.

20 Ibid.

21 Ibid.

22 Ibid.

23 Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 62.

24 Grenz, “Articulating the Christian Belief-Mosaic,” 125.

25 Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 65.

26 Ibid.

27 Grenz explains how the Spirit enables the contemporary Christian community to respond appropriately to its cultural context: “Through the appropriated biblical text, the Spirit forms in us a communal interpretive framework that creates a new world. The Spirit leads us to view ourselves and all reality in light of an unabashedly Christian and specifically biblical interpretive framework so that we might thereby understand and respond to the challenges of life in the present as the contemporary embodiment of a faith community that spans the ages” (Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 81).

28 Grenz, “Articulating the Christian Belief-Mosaic,” 126.

29 Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 118. Grenz provides a concise definition of tradition in terms of its composition: “The Christian tradition is comprised of the historical attempts by the Christian community to explicate and translate faithfully the first-order language, symbols, and practices of the Christian faith, arising from the interaction among community, text, and culture, into the various social and cultural contexts in which that community has been situated.”

30 Ibid., 119.

31 Ibid., 120

32 Ibid., 126.

33 Ibid., 114.

34 See his discussion in Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 130-147.

35 Ibid., 151.

36 Grenz, “Articulating the Christian Belief-Mosaic,” 127-128.

37 Ibid., 128.

38 Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 157.

39 Ibid., 158.

40 Grenz, “Articulating the Christian Belief-Mosaic,” 129.

41 Ibid.

42 Ibid., 134.

43 See Randy L. Maddox, Toward an Ecumenical Fundamental Theology (Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1984), 109-112. Maddox argues that to bring legitimacy in theology a fundamental theological discipline is needed to “reflect upon the means by which theology executes its judgments concerning the legitimacy of particular theological formulations.”

44 John G. Stackhouse, “Preface,” in Evangelical Futures, 9.

45 Williams, “The Theological Task and Theological Method,” 159.

46 For a more complete discussion on the structural components of method, see chapter 3 of my Tradition, Method, and Contemporary Protestant Theology (Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 2003).

47 J. I. Packer, “Is Theology a Mirage?” in Doing Theology in Today’s World, ed. John D. Woodbridge and Thomas E. McComiskey (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 1991), 23. This should not be construed to mean that theology was a purely cognitive activity. As Packer points out, the classical exponents know that theology “yields genuine knowledge of God, first cognitive and then relational, being based on God’s own revelation of truth about himself as the lover, seeker, and Savior of lost mankind” (18).

48 Grenz provides the following concise working definition of theology’s nature, task, and purpose:“Christian theology is an ongoing, second-order, contextual discipline that engages in critical and constructive reflection on the faith, life, and practices of the Christian community. Its task is the articulation of biblically normed, historically informed, and culturally relevant models of the Christian belief-mosaic for the purpose of assisting the community of Christ’s followers in their vocation to live as the people of God in the particular social-historical context in which they are situated” (Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 16).

49 Grenz, Renewing the Center, 334-339.

50 Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 241. Grenz himself relies on Gerhard Sauter for this distinction. See Gerhard Sauter, Eschatological Rationality: Theological Issues in Focus (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker, 1996), 146-147. Grenz distinguishes eschata as the study of “last things” from the perspective of a conglomerate of future temporal occurrences from eschaton as the study of “last things”from an existential point of view without denying its futuristic aspects. Grenz chooses to treat eschatological realities theologically as becoming realities, tending toward God’s telos. See Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 238-273.

51 On the nature and significance of presuppositions see, David A. Powlison, “Which Presuppositions? Secular Psychology and the Categories of Biblical Thought,” Journal of Psychology and Theology 12 (1984): 271; Paul Helm, “Understanding Scholarly Presuppositions: A Crucial Tool for Research,” Tyndale Bulletin 44 (1993): 143-154.

52 Packer notes the epistemological basis of the older type evangelical theology as “God’s own self-disclosure to human beings in the past—an activity involving the giving of verbal messages and teachings through chosen agents and supremely through God’s incarnate Son, Jesus Christ, and the embodying of this material in permanent form for us in the canonical Scriptures” (Packer, “Is Theology a Mirage?” 18-19).

53 Vanhoozer appears to agree with Alister McGrath in criticizing approaches such as Grenz’s that appear to locate the genesis of doctrine in the believing community rather than in divine revelation. See Vanhoozer, “Voice and the Actor,” 77.

54 Wayne Proudfoot has noted that “First-order theology is executed when theologians claim to explain God and the world as they really are. Second-order theology emerges when the theologian realizes that her concepts are constructs of the imagination” (Wayne Proudfoot, “Regulae Fidei and Regulative Idea:Two Contemporary Theological Strategies,” in Theology at the End of Modernity: Essays in Honor of Gordon D. Kaufman, ed. Sheila Greeve Davaney [Philadelphia: Trinity Press International, 1991], 107).

55 Grenz, Revisioning Evangelical Theology, 78.

56 Grenz, Renewing the Center, 20.

57 Grenz, “Articulating the Christian Belief-Mosaic,” 135-136. Grenz appears to build his ontology of eschatological realism in part on the petition of the Lord’s Prayer, “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” (Matt. 6:10, NIV). One is left wondering whether ontology could be built legitimately on the Lord’s petition, which appears to be ethical at its core. Furthermore, granted that such a construction is legitimate, does not the plea for the possible coincidence of the Lord’s will in heaven and on earth (on earth as it is in heaven) undermine the characterization of present reality as becoming?

58 Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 272.

59 Grenz, Revisioning Evangelical Theology, 93ff.

60 See E. Ashby Johnson, The Crucial Task of Theology (Richmond, Va.: John Knox Press, 1958), 60ff. According to Johnson, the constructive task provides the church with constructional formulations through which the church apprehends and communicates its message. On the other hand, the apologetic task enables the church to speak to the secular world in a fashion that can be appreciated and understood by the critic. Finally, the critical task is the tool by which theology is able to distinguish “good” theology from “bad” theology. See also John B. Cobb, “Theological Data and Method,” Journal of Religion 32 34 (1953/1954): 213-214.

61 Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 18. The critical task for Grenz involves not only scrutiny of Christian beliefs and teachings for coherence with the biblical narratives, but also coherence with “the first-order commitments of the community” (ibid).

62 Nancey Murphy discusses the issue of truth in the context of the Yale School’s postliberal theology as represented by George Lindbeck. Murphy classes most postmodern formulations of the truth question as pragmatic theories of truth. In her estimation, these concepts of truth are inadequate substitutes of the correspondence theory of truth primarily because they provide no criteria for the assessment of such truth claims. See Nancey Murphy, “Philosophical Resources for Postmodern Evangelical Theology,” Christian Scholars Review 26, no. 2 (1996): 197-198.

63 See for example, Grenz, Renewing the Center, 184ff.; J. Wentzel van Huyssteen, “Tradition and the Task of Theology,” Theology Today 55 (1998): 213-228; James K. A. Smith, “A Little Story About Metanarratives: Lyotard, Religion, and Postmodernism Revisited,” Faith and Philosophy 18, no. 3 (2001): 353-368.

64 Grenz, “Articulating the Christian Belief-Mosaic,” 109. The term “postfoundational” is, as Grenz notes, van Huyssteen’s preferred term for a nonfoundationalist epistemology.

65 Jean-François Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge, trans. Geoff Bennington and Brian Massumi (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1984), 37.

66 Van Huyssteen, “Tradition and the Task of Theology,” 213.

67 See Anton A. Van Niekirk, “Postmetaphysical Thinking Versus Postmodern Thinking,” Philosophy Today 39 (1995): 177.

68 Grenz, “Articulating the Christian Belief-Mosaic,” 108.

69 Van Huyssteen, “Tradition and the Task of Theology,” 219.

70 Ibid., 220. Notice that van Huyssteen has observed that his postfoundationalist epistemology relates closely to that of Andy F. Sanders, which has been called “traditionalist fallibilism. fallibilism.” Ibid., 224.

71 Ibid., 226.

72 Ibid., 227.

73 Ibid. Compare this with Grenz’s proposed model to incorporate contemporary culture in theological reflection in which he explicitly states of the model, “this model presupposes neither gospel nor culture—much less both gospel and culture—as preexisting, given realities that subsequently enter into conversation. Rather, in the interactive process both gospel . . . and culture . . . are dynamic realities that inform and are informed by the conversation itself” (Grenz and Franke, Beyond Foundationalism, 158).

74 Olson, “Postconservative Evangelicals Greet the Postmodern Age,” 481. According to Olson, many postconservatives “opt for some version of critical realism, while others, such as Fuller professor Nancey Murphy, turn to philosophers such as Willard Van Orman Quine and Alasdair MacIntyre in developing a new philosophical orientation. A few have begun to explore the potential of postmodern antirealism.”

75 See Allan G. Padgett, “Christianity and Postmodernity,” Christian Scholars Review 26, no. 2 (1996):131. While Padgett does not seem to endorse common sense realism, he observes that “Christians will be (sophisticated) realists because they are theists. There is one God and therefore one world and one truth about that world (i.e., God’s knowledge of the world).”

76 Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition, xxiii-xxiv.

77 J. Richard Middleton and Brian J. Walsh, Truth Is Stranger than It Used to Be: Biblical Faith in a Postmodern Age (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1995).(Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity

78 Smith, “Little Story About Metanarratives.”

79 Lyotard’s point is that modernity’s so-called universal reason cannot disengage itself from narratives as its ultimate ground and thereby divorce itself from myth. It cannot constitute itself into a supernarrative, standing over every other narrative to adjudicate the legitimacy of other narratives.

80 Smith, “Little Story About Metanarratives,” 355.

81 Ibid., 362. As Smith correctly observes, previously, a distinctly Christian philosophy “would have been exiled from the ‘pure’ arena of philosophy because of its ‘infection’ with bias and prejudice. . . . In this way the playing field is leveled and new opportunities to voice a Christian philosophy are created.”

82 Mark A. Noll, “Traditional Christianity and the Possibility of Historical Knowledge,” Christian Scholars Review 19, no. 4 (1990): 392.Scholars

83 Ibid.

84 Grenz, Renewing the Center, 245.

85 Van Huyssteen, “Tradition and the Task of Theology,” 213-214.

86 Ibid., 224.

87 Ibid., 227.

88 Grenz, Renewing the Center, 252-269.

89 Ibid., 276.

90 Ibid.

91 Ibid., 278.

92 Ibid.

93 Ibid., 281-282.

94 Grenz, Revisioning Evangelical Theology, 78.

95 See John Parratt, Reinventing Christianity: African Theology Today (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1995), 13. For representative literature on the origins, progress, and attitudes of contemporary African theology see the following: Kofi Appiah-Kubi and Sergio Torres, eds., African Theology En Route (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis, 1977); Kwesi A. Dickson, Theology in Africa (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis, 1984); Gwinyai H. Muzorewa, The Origins and Development of African Theology (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis, 1985); Rosino Gibellini, ed., Paths of African Theology (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis, 1994).

96 See Gibellini, Paths of African Theology, 16-22.

97 Ibid. According to the critical African theologians, concordism “consists in confusing Christian revelation with the systems of thought that have historically served to express it” (18).

98 The insight of John Pobee that “‘all evangelism is in some sense subversion’ involving a change of loyalties from blood ancestors among whom Jesus historically and physically is not” could not apply to postconservative apologetics with the same force as it does to conservative evangelical apologetics. Cited by Ogbu U. Kalu, “Church Presence in Africa: A Historical Analysis of the Evangelization Process,” in Appiah-Kubi and Torres, African Theology En Route, 20.

99 See Parratt, Reinventing Christianity, 105-135.

100 The phenomenon of independent churches throughout Africa, in spite of their theological inadequacies, is seen as a sign of Christian authenticity. See Kofi Appiah-Kubi, “Indigenous African Churches: Signs of Authenticity,” in Appiah-Kubi and Torres, African Theology En Route, 117-125.

101 See Parratt, Reinventing Christianity, 122-136.