Should we bring back the Fathers?

In our church today, especially in my own context, most people do not know about the church fathers. They know people like John Calvin, Luther, Wesley, but not Clement of Alexandria, Irenaeus, Athanasius, Tertullian and many more. The general impression of hearing the church father is that, they are all "old-fashion." Why we need to study theology with the people in previous century? are we are in a better state of understanding theology? However, if they are closer to the truth, and apostles, are they are more credible in teaching us things about theology than our modern theologians, right? 

Christopher Hall has resurrecting again the significance of Church fathers. He has made a tremendous job of writing books about church fathers especially in area of hermeneutics/biblical interpretation, theology and practical matter such as prayer (Loot at Christopher Hall's works: Reading Scripture with Church Fathers, Learning Theology with Church Fathers, and Praying with Church Fathers). He has raised the awareness of the importance of exploring the church fathers, the giants we all owe a shoulder. Other theologian such as Kallistos Ware, and Mike Aquilina, and also the Theological Hermeneutics Movement (Kevin Vanhoozer, Francis Watson, Stephen E Fowl) give a fairly significant contribution to this field of bringing Church father in the contemporary discussion. 

It is true, Christian today have a tendency to adopt and also attract to the things outside of their heritages. The grass is always greener on the other side is often our attitude in life. This is an irony since we have a rich traditions of the past, the wisdom that spring like an endless waterfall. Can they be relevant and bring a contemporary significance to our time and age? Surely they will.  We should bring back the fathers in our time. Their world in which they are living are actually not far from us today. They were living in the culture of Greek and Roman, cultures that we are still inherited today, only, that we are having a more "Techno" and "Digital" things, things that had not been developed in those time. Therefore, their world and thought are not totally far and foreign from us, and we can still find their presence is very significance to our day and time.  There are several benefits that we can draw from Church father that I should elaborate here, with my own limited understanding of this issue.

First, Church Fathers teach us the union between theology and spirituality. 

If we would like to explore the tradition of the church father, we can see there is hardly a distinction between theology and spirituality. Their theology is exercised with spirituality and their spirituality is theologically grounded. Study and Sanctuary is never split. The focus is not either heart or mind but both heart and mind. Of course, when I say theology here is a theology that is grounded in biblical interpretation, and therefore, it is distinct with Modern Christian today who are creating theology out of the stimulation of emotion or to draw a theology from a selected text of what Cornelius Van Til once says this type as "One-Text Christian". The richness of Spiritual tradition from the Church Father should make us aware that there is no need to adopt new-age spirituality or modern spirituality, that are founded and grounded in the Word of God. Documents like Didache, Shepherd of Hermas, Philokalia or various monastic traditions of the church in the past can provide us with a Bedrock spiritual Theology, both in practice and living.  

 

Second, Church Father teach us the rule and trajectory of Biblical interpretation

Although the hermeneutics of the church father are not well developed like us today, with the integration with various social-science and modern linguistics studies and theories. Their interpretation has becoming the kind of rule of faith (Using Augustine term) and has set the trajectory of  future Biblical interpretation. In one article mentioned how for instance the long debate of Romans on the idea of faithfulness or faith in Christ can be reshaped better. The article wrote, "It is extremely helpful to note that there are no early church fathers that interpret the pistis christou to mean “the faithfulness of Christ.” In fact, there is not even any debate about it. This is just one example of how studying the Early Church can help us read the New Testament." 

Of Course, many people are attacking the use of allegorical interpretation that is seems to be unbiblical and lead to extremes spiritualism. Indubitably, we cannot justify their action of allegory by providing the case that actually, apostle Paul also use allegory interpretation of the Old Testament text. There is some limit on which allegory is useful and it is still ongoing debate, although scholars who defend allegory interpretation is a minority. One of the way of justifying it by arguing that allegory is part of application and illustration or what we can say as "literary appropriation." At least, we can see how Origen for instance never jump to allegorical interpretation (deeper meaning) without looking at the literal meaning. Latter on, this become the basis of reformed hermeneutics of appreciating literal sense (Sensus Literalis): Bible need to be interpreted in the light of its literal sense, according to the manner on which it was written. Luther best urge, "we must everywhere adhere to the simple, pure, and natural meaning of the words." Figurative lens is secondary, only the context demand intepreter to do so.     

 

Third, Church father teach us how should we be agile and preserve in trials and harship.

What the church need today is the agile mentality and agile leadership. Various research and survey have concluded that this value is the utmost importance in the new normal. Honestly, speaking of today, It is quite hard to find the vivid example of these ethos, as all the churches today are struggling because of the limitation of what Covid-19 has brought about in our context. The title by Jesse T Jackson best portray the situation of the church, "Unsettling Exodus of Pastors Leaving the Ministry". Thus today, "Give-up" become two words that perhaps comes in the mind of the church and the leaders frequently. I was recently reading again the church history wrote by Eusebius. Reading the story of Polycarp as Martyr really inspire me again to have an agile mentality and preserve in every trials for the sake of Christ and faithful witness. What astonished me was the respond of Polycarp in the midst of his death threat. When crowd asked him to change his mind he reply, "we cannot change our mind from better to worse." This is a  deep word to think and reflect as this word is uttered not in the highest state of happiness but in the close edge of death. There are more stories of struggle from Didache to Nicea that can give a conclusion that the Church father embodied the true nature of agility and perseverance, the thing that we need to amplify today. If we struggle to quit, and plan to give up in this uneasy live, we are changing from better to worse and not the other way round, are not we?