Bultmann notoriously claimed that no one who switches on an electric light or uses the cutting edge technology of the “wireless” can believe in a world of demons and angels. That’s not much of an argument, but insofar as it is one, it seems to be: Electric lights show that humans can control the world; if angels and demons exist, human beings are impotent pawns of invisible powers; the electric light therefore disproves the mythological world of the NT.
But what if ancient peoples really were powerless before invisible powers? What if ancient peoples really couldn’t control the universe? What if, prior to Jesus, everyone really was under guardians and managers, elementary principles and angelic rulers? What if God kept us safely under tutors while we were children, waiting for the time when he would give us our inheritance? What if the Father sent the Son to make us sons, to restore us to Adamic dominion?
In short: What if God, not Bultmann, is the One who “demythologized” the world?
YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE
Notes on Anosmia
One morning several years ago, as my wife, Wendy, and I were having breakfast together, I had…
Empire of Unreality
Shiva Naipaul (1945–1985) was the author of three novels and two books of mordant dispatches from places…
The Dreadful Christ of Pär Lagerkvist
It’s dangerous to meet a god,” says the disgraced Pythia in Pär Lagerkvist’s The Sibyl. Her observation…
