Theological Term of the Week: Apophatic Theology

 

 

apophatic theology
A method of describing God by saying what he is not. Also called via negationis.1

• From None Greater by Matthew Barrett:

This approach is sometimes referred to as the via negativa or via negationis, the way of negation, because it is asserting something true about God by denying something false about him. So when we want to say that God is not mutable or that he does not change, we simply say he is immutable. Essentially, we are identifying all that is creaturely and therefore cannot be in God.2

• From The Christian Faith by Michael Horton:

[T]he incommunicable attributes are especially identified by the way of negation (via negationis), by stating some of the respects in which God is not like us. Characteristically, these attributes are recognized by the alpha privative in Greek (the initial a of words such as apatheia (non-suffering) or a similarly negating prefix in Latin, which is taken over into English (for example, immortal, invisible, immutable).3

[I]t is these attributes of the way of negation that are most frequently challenged as a supposedly later corruption of biblical theology by pagan (Greek) metaphysics. However, it is not only later theologians but the apostle Paul as well who use the alpha-privative prefix, referring to God, for example, as immortal (aphthartos) and invisible (aoratos) (1 Ti 1:17; cf. 6:15-16).4

Learn more:

1. Got Questions: What is apophatic theology?
2. Theopedia: Negative Theology

Related terms:

• cataphatic theology
• immutability
• impassibility
• incommunicable attributes
• infinitude

Filed under God’s Nature and His Work

1From None Greater, page 248.

2 From None Greater, page 37.

3 From The Christian Faith, page 225.

4 From The Christian Faith, page 226.

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Theological Term of the Week: Accommodation

 

accommodation 
“God’s appropriation of humanly intelligible means to communicate real knowledge of himself.”1 God speaking to us in a form that is suited to our human capacity.

• From Institutes of the Christian Religion by John Calvin, 1.17.13:

Because our weakness cannot reach his height, any description which we receive of him must be lowered to our capacity in order to be intelligible. And the mode of lowering is to represent him not as he really is, but as we conceive of him.

• From None Greater by Matthew Barrett:

After forming humankind in his image, God then spoke. That’s right, the infinite, transcendent incomprehensible God used words, and these words revealed not only who he is but what duty God requires of humans. His word established a covenantal relationship between God and his people. 

Theologians have a word for this: “accomodation.” The parent talking to his two-year-old, speaking “inarticulately because of the child” since it is impossible for the parent to be understood by the child apart from “condescending to their mode of speech.” John Calvin compared God to a nurse caring for an infant. The nurse bends low to speak a language that the infant can understand.

Learn more:

1. Tom Ascol: The Biblical Doctrine of Divine Accommodation (audio)
2. Hans Madueme: Inerrance and Divine Accommodation
3. Vern S. Poythress: Rethinking Accomodation in Revelation

Related terms:

• anthropomorphism
• anthropopathism
• covenant
• general revelation
• special revelation

Filed under God’s Nature and His Work

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Theological Term of the Week: Longer Ending of Mark

longer ending of Mark
Mark 16:9-20, which is not included in some of the oldest manuscripts, and is considered by most scholars to be a later addition and not the original ending of the Gospel of Mark.

• Mark 16:9-20 from the ESV, which puts these verses inside double brackets with a note that they are not included in some of the earliest manuscripts:

[9] [[Now when he rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons. [10] She went and told those who had been with him, as they mourned and wept. [11] But when they heard that he was alive and had been seen by her, they would not believe it.

[12] After these things he appeared in another form to two of them, as they were walking into the country. [13] And they went back and told the rest, but they did not believe them.

[14] Afterward he appeared to the eleven themselves as they were reclining at table, and he rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen. [15] And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. [16] Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. [17] And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; [18] they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.”

[19] So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God. [20] And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by accompanying signs.]] (ESV)

• From the MacArthur ESV Study Bible notes on the longer ending of Mark:

The external evidence strongly suggests these verses were not originally part of Mark’s Gospel. While the majority of Greek manuscripts contain these verses, the earliest and most reliable do not. A shorter ending also existed, but it is not included in the text. Further, some that include the passage note that it was missing from older Greek manuscripts, while others have scribal marks indicating the passage was considered spurious. The fourth-century church Fathers Eusebius and Jerome noted that almost all Greek manuscripts available to them lacked vv. 9–20. The internal evidence from this passage also weighs heavily against Mark’s authorship. The transition between vv. 8 and 9 is abrupt and awkward. The Greek particle translated “now” that begins v. 9 implies continuity with the preceding narrative. What follows, however, does not continue the story of the women referred to in v. 8, but describes Christ’s appearance to Mary Magdalene (cf. John 20:11–18). The masculine participle in Mark 16:9 expects “he” as its antecedent, yet the subject of v. 8 is the women. Although she had just been mentioned three times (v. 1; 15:40, 47), 16:9 introduces Mary Magdalene as if for the first time. Further, if Mark wrote v. 9, it is strange that he would only now note that Jesus had cast seven demons out of her. The angel spoke of Jesus’ appearing to his followers in Galilee, yet the appearances described in vv. 9–20 are all in the Jerusalem area. Finally, the presence in these verses of a significant number of Greek words used nowhere else in Mark argues that Mark did not write them. Verses 9–20 represent an early (they were known to the second-century Fathers Irenaeus, Tatian, and, possibly, Justin Martyr) attempt to complete Mark’s Gospel. 

Learn more:

1. Got Questions: Should Mark 16:9-20 be in the Bible?
2. Bible Research: The Ending of Mark
3. Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry: Is the ending of Mark really scripture?
4. F.F. Bruce: The End of the Second Gospel (pdf)
5. Paul Carter: What Do You Do With the End of Mark’s Gospel?
6. John MacArthur: The Fitting End to Mark’s Gospel

Related terms:

• autographs
• inerrancy of scripture
• inspiration of scripture
• comma Johannean
• KJV Onlyism
• manuscripts
• pericope adulterae
• text criticism

Filed under Scripture

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Clicking on the Theological Terms button will take you to an alphabetical list of all the previous theological terms.