Danutz, thanks for your comments. I did wonder if perhaps I was being a bit heavy-handed. However, I don’t think the stance I took with regard to the book is entirely indefensible.

Obviously the editors of the book are entitled to make of it what they want. They do not have to pander to every self-appointed lobbyist within the emerging church movement. My problem is that not only does the book profess to be a ‘manifesto’ for the church but it also claims, both implicitly and explicitly, to be biblical. I don’t think it takes either of those objectives seriously enough.

I know I’ve heard you focus on narrative of Israel over and over and it grew so tiring that I stopped listening. You can’t expect everyone else to want to play your game or use your language.

Damn. That’s a shame. I’ve taken note of it.

The fact is that these people HAVE THOUGHT THIS THROUGH and they have moved past those arguments. For many it is over.

Have they really thought it through? One of the things that most disappointed me about the book was the lack of imagination in dealing with scripture. But even if they have thought it through, that does not necessarily mean that they have reached good conclusions. My view is that we are a long way from getting beyond those arguments. There is a lot of criticism of the emerging church out there, and much of it has to do with the fact that many within the movement appear to play fast and loose with the Bible. For the sake of the whole church I would like to see the emerging movement listen more carefully to the complaints and develop an appropriate theological and biblical response. I think it can be done - not by insisting on a single correct interpretation but through an open and faithful process that keeps us all talking to each other.

This is not simply about my reading of the biblical narrative. I do want to insist that we have to take the Bible seriously - and that trying to understand how the Bible spoke to its original audience is a legitimate and necessary task. I would also ask what is to be gained by misreading the Bible. You have come to the conclusion (no less dogmatic than my own position - arguably more so) that sometimes the Bible is wrong, but I have seen too many people reach that conclusion on the basis of a misunderstanding of the text or as a reaction to someone else’s misunderstanding of the text. The debate over penal substitutionary atonement is, to my mind, a prime example.

I would suggest, therefore, that there are ways of addressing the problem of inclusiveness that do not require us to re-interpret the word ‘gospel’ in the way that Selmanovic does, but it takes work. Deconstructing the dogmatism of modern evangelicalism is only a first step - and it’s too easy then just to give up and move on, to recreate Christianity in our own image. I think we are both theologically and morally bound as those who profess to follow Israel’s messiah, who are Christian because we confess Jesus as Lord, to ground our faith in the particular narrative about the descendants of Abraham. You will hear that as narrow-minded and reactionary, but I still think that this offers the best hope for reconstructing a viable post-Christendom, post-modern Christian faith.

In the long run I think it would be better to find a way to be comfortable with the whole biblical story, not just the bits that fit our emerging post-conservative sensibilities. We are not there yet, but my personal hope is that a coherent biblical mindset will emerge that will help us to resolve many of the theological issues that currently divide us - and I think that should be an explicit part of an ‘emergent manifesto’. It may prove to be wishful thinking, or it may turn out very different to how I imagine it; but I don’t see how matters are helped by giving up and moving on.

Yes, I think that the historical narrative about Israel is important - that is what the Bible is, a historical narrative about Israel. I think that a misunderstanding of that narrative has been responsible for the distortions and blindspots of much modern Christianity. I also do not believe that we can generate something new simply by abandoning the biblical narrative. So I would argue that one of the things (and only one of the things) the emerging church needs to do is persistently go back and re-examine the Bible as it presents itself to us and ask what it means to live and act self-critically and faithfully in continuity with that narrative. That seems to me a sine qua non of being Christian. The danger otherwise is that the emerging church will simply repeat the mistakes of modern evangelicalism, propagating a reduced theology in the interests of a culturally conditioned, pragmatic agenda. This will sustain a movement in the short term, but I do not think that it will provide an adequate foundation for Christianity in the long run.

Finally, I must admit that I have worried at times about how the ‘open source’ aspect of this site should be preserved. I’m sure there are plenty of people who would agree with you that the focus of the site has become too narrow; others no doubt think it is far too wide. In the end it is only one conversation among many. I actually find myself increasingly in disagreement with Wright; and despite my remarks above, I also find myself agreeing with much of what John Dominic Crossan has to say - I greatly appreciate you putting me on to his book (with Borg) The Last Week. The whole thing is in a state of flux. But I strongly believe that the biblical narrative is much more expansive, much more coherent, much more powerful, and much more credible than you seem prepared to allow. If this doesn’t sound too self-important, I see it as part of my role to lobby for that credibility within the emerging church in particular - I hope not as a crude rationalist apologetic but as the experience of indwelling the story of the creative God. I don’t think we need to be ashamed of the Bible. In a sense, concretely speaking, it’s all we’ve got.