1956 Geloof en Wetenschap : Orgaan van de Christelijke vereeniging van natuur- en geneeskundigen in Nederland - pagina 230

188

L. VERDUIN

from the outside; the new „orthodoxy" which he proposed was one in the signature of process, with a God who was indissociable from process. The question is whether we are actually called upon to make this choice, whether indeed we are permitted to make it. This is the ancient problem of deism, pantheism, and theism. Deism is a system in wliich the prevailing line is that of transcendence; it is friendly toward irruption and averse to process. Pantheism on the other hand, is a system in which the prevailing line is that of immanence; it is friendly toward the process and averse to irruption. Theism refuses to put all its eggs in either of the two baskets. This theism is moreover not a system in which transcendence and immanence are alternating relationships. In Christian theism God's immanence is never at the cost of His transcendence and in it God's transcendence is never at the expense of His immanence In Christian theism immanence and transcendence do not take turns, as do the green and the red light at the intersection. One does not occur as a result of the cancellation of the other; they are not consecutive relationships but two different aspects of a single relationship. In Christian theism there is therefore no room for sheer transcendence and no place for sheer immanence. For our present purpose Christian theism implies that although we may continue to speak of irruption and of process we may not intend thereby a sequence in which the one displaces the other. That would be like trying to be a theist by being a deist during the odd hours of the day and a pantheist during the even hours! The irruptive and the processive are not two separate relationships; rather are they, like the warp and the woof of a single fabric, two dimensions of a single relationship, that of the Creator and the creature. It is really quite enlightening as we have already said in a note to see how the Bible brings in the dimension of process at the very moment the Good Book is setting forth the irruptive dimension. A few further examples? When Jehovah God brings His chosen people across the Red Sea without benefit of bridge or ferry He performs a miracle — if that is the right name for an act of God in which the irruptional dimension is in the foreground. But the inspired writer of Exodus proceeds at once to make plain that this irruptive act of God did not cancel out the processional dimension; for we are told that God made the dry sirocco form the Arabian desert to blow all the previous night. What is this if not a studied attempt to make theists of us, that is, to make us see that the integration of Creator and creature is one in which the irruptional does not cancel out the processional (5).

Deze tekst is geautomatiseerd gemaakt en kan nog fouten bevatten. Digibron werkt voortdurend aan correctie. Klik voor het origineel door naar de pdf. Voor opmerkingen, vragen, informatie: contact.

Op Digibron -en alle daarin opgenomen content- is het databankrecht van toepassing. Gebruiksvoorwaarden. Data protection law applies to Digibron and the content of this database. Terms of use.

Printen