| Chungsoo J. Lee |
| A philosophic and religious corner |
Bart, Revelation, Knowledge of God, Levinas, and the Good News
The term, “knowledge of God,” in Karl Bart troubles me. Because knowledge,
as Kant puts it, implies employment of concepts on the sensible intuitions,
which is different from practical/moral knowledge. The latter is more like an
awareness of the dictates of reason without sensible intuitions supporting or
occasioning the awareness—more like a “voice of reason” that compels us to
know what ought to be done (the voice of reason a philosophical formulation of
which could be the various formula of the categorical imperatives as articulated
by Kant). This Kantian distinction (between theoretical and practical
knowledge), of course, as you would agree, cannot be applied to Karl Bart when
he uses the term “knowledge of God.” Theologians are not so strict or technical
with choice of words as philosophers try to be.
As I understand him, which is limited, when Bart talks about the knowledge of
God, I think he means the Revelation in which God reveals himself as God. God
is God and He reveals Himself as such, as wholly Other, in the Scripture. Of
course, Christ is the ultimate embodiment as well as the content of the
Revelation, the content of the kerygma, that comes forth out of the pages of the
Scripture—the spiritual reality, the Word/Logos, that transcends history, human
reality, and human knowledge. Before the Revelation of God (in which God
reveals Himself as such in self-revelation) human knowledge crumbles. I think
this is what you are referring to when you speak about the denial of self-
knowledge as the condition of gaining the knowledge of God. If this is what
Bart meant, I think he is close to Levinas—at least in terms of the formal
structure of the relationship which Bart calls “knowledge of God” and which
Levinas calls “the idea of the Infinite.” The “idea,” for Levinas, is a relationship
without a relation in which the finite has a certain stance toward the Infinite—
the Overwhelming, that which overflows the finite capacity of the one who
thinks Him, the wholly Other. To have the idea of the Infinite is to worship (as
happens at the end of Descartes' Third Meditation), to kneel before Him and
say: “Here I am”--that is, to be ethical toward another human being.
However, the similarity between Bart and Levinas ends with the formal
structure of the relation (between God and man, between the Infinite and the
finite). For Levinas, the Infinite comes as a gentle (naked, vulnerable, helpless)
face of the neighbor. The relationship I have with the Other, the neighbor, is,
says he, like the formal structure of the idea of the Infinite in Descartes'
Meditations (especially the Third Meditation). My relation to God cannot be
established apart from my facing the neighbor, separate from my relation to the
neighbor, the face. Facing the Other is to have a relationship with God—
although the neighbor is not God (The neighbor stands in the trace of God,
Levinas would say). God cannot be discovered in any other way. The (Jewish)
Scripture, Levinas would say, teaches ethics, which is the only way to God.
My (ethical) relationship to my neighbor (and there could be no other
relationship, even if it is a relationship of violence, which is still a relationship
ethically prohibited) is the only way to God. My relation to the Other is my
relation to the Most High (God), says Levinas in the first part of Totality and
Infinity. Isn't this what the Prophets teach in the scriptures? “Worship I do
not desire but the true worship is to help the needy and to give alms” – to
paraphrase Micah, who is echoed by James.
In short, Bart lacks the specific content when he talks about God's self revealing
Word. That which strikes me in the kerygma, the Word, has no content, no
face. God as God—even God the Incarnate—has no hands that beckons my
attention and devotion—unless God reveals himself on the Cross as the helpless
Other, my neighbor, the first one I come across. Christ as face is my neighbor
whom I crucified, who nonetheless claims me as responsible. Christ, the
pierced, whom I must care for. In this sense, there could be no “knowledge of
God” without Christ on the cross. God is the Crucified Other who calls me first
and foremost as an ethical subject, as the one who is responsible, as obligated, as
accused, as the-one-for-the-other. God calls me to the world. God send me to
my neighbor. Isn't this the meaning of evangelism? To go out and peach the
Good News—that is to say, to heal the sick and to visit the prisoners. The
Good News is to bring It to the oppressed—the act of freeing the prisoners.
The Good News is not a content but an ethical act: establishment of the
Kingdom of God. The Good News: the work of ethics, the casting out of
demons from the ones who are possessed/oppressed.
April 2011
as Kant puts it, implies employment of concepts on the sensible intuitions,
which is different from practical/moral knowledge. The latter is more like an
awareness of the dictates of reason without sensible intuitions supporting or
occasioning the awareness—more like a “voice of reason” that compels us to
know what ought to be done (the voice of reason a philosophical formulation of
which could be the various formula of the categorical imperatives as articulated
by Kant). This Kantian distinction (between theoretical and practical
knowledge), of course, as you would agree, cannot be applied to Karl Bart when
he uses the term “knowledge of God.” Theologians are not so strict or technical
with choice of words as philosophers try to be.
As I understand him, which is limited, when Bart talks about the knowledge of
God, I think he means the Revelation in which God reveals himself as God. God
is God and He reveals Himself as such, as wholly Other, in the Scripture. Of
course, Christ is the ultimate embodiment as well as the content of the
Revelation, the content of the kerygma, that comes forth out of the pages of the
Scripture—the spiritual reality, the Word/Logos, that transcends history, human
reality, and human knowledge. Before the Revelation of God (in which God
reveals Himself as such in self-revelation) human knowledge crumbles. I think
this is what you are referring to when you speak about the denial of self-
knowledge as the condition of gaining the knowledge of God. If this is what
Bart meant, I think he is close to Levinas—at least in terms of the formal
structure of the relationship which Bart calls “knowledge of God” and which
Levinas calls “the idea of the Infinite.” The “idea,” for Levinas, is a relationship
without a relation in which the finite has a certain stance toward the Infinite—
the Overwhelming, that which overflows the finite capacity of the one who
thinks Him, the wholly Other. To have the idea of the Infinite is to worship (as
happens at the end of Descartes' Third Meditation), to kneel before Him and
say: “Here I am”--that is, to be ethical toward another human being.
However, the similarity between Bart and Levinas ends with the formal
structure of the relation (between God and man, between the Infinite and the
finite). For Levinas, the Infinite comes as a gentle (naked, vulnerable, helpless)
face of the neighbor. The relationship I have with the Other, the neighbor, is,
says he, like the formal structure of the idea of the Infinite in Descartes'
Meditations (especially the Third Meditation). My relation to God cannot be
established apart from my facing the neighbor, separate from my relation to the
neighbor, the face. Facing the Other is to have a relationship with God—
although the neighbor is not God (The neighbor stands in the trace of God,
Levinas would say). God cannot be discovered in any other way. The (Jewish)
Scripture, Levinas would say, teaches ethics, which is the only way to God.
My (ethical) relationship to my neighbor (and there could be no other
relationship, even if it is a relationship of violence, which is still a relationship
ethically prohibited) is the only way to God. My relation to the Other is my
relation to the Most High (God), says Levinas in the first part of Totality and
Infinity. Isn't this what the Prophets teach in the scriptures? “Worship I do
not desire but the true worship is to help the needy and to give alms” – to
paraphrase Micah, who is echoed by James.
In short, Bart lacks the specific content when he talks about God's self revealing
Word. That which strikes me in the kerygma, the Word, has no content, no
face. God as God—even God the Incarnate—has no hands that beckons my
attention and devotion—unless God reveals himself on the Cross as the helpless
Other, my neighbor, the first one I come across. Christ as face is my neighbor
whom I crucified, who nonetheless claims me as responsible. Christ, the
pierced, whom I must care for. In this sense, there could be no “knowledge of
God” without Christ on the cross. God is the Crucified Other who calls me first
and foremost as an ethical subject, as the one who is responsible, as obligated, as
accused, as the-one-for-the-other. God calls me to the world. God send me to
my neighbor. Isn't this the meaning of evangelism? To go out and peach the
Good News—that is to say, to heal the sick and to visit the prisoners. The
Good News is to bring It to the oppressed—the act of freeing the prisoners.
The Good News is not a content but an ethical act: establishment of the
Kingdom of God. The Good News: the work of ethics, the casting out of
demons from the ones who are possessed/oppressed.
April 2011
 |
| |
 |
| |
 |
| |
 |
| |
 |
| |
 |
| |
 |
| |
 |
| |
 |
| |
 |
| |
 |
| |
 |