The Crucifixion of the Warrior God: Interpreting the Old Testament’s Violent Portraits of God in Light of the Cross, Volume 1 & 2

This is an extremely difficult review to write ... I love Greg Boyd and everything he has written over the years. I have nothing but respect for him as a pastor, scholar, and theologian.When it comes to this new book of his, I agree with him on about 90% of what he has written. But I disagree with the central point of his book, which is that God withdraws from sin so that evil will be destroyed by evil.But I tend not to give negative reviews of books that I disagree with if they are well-written, well-argued, and thought-provoking. Such is the case with Crucifixion of the Warrior God. Whatever you believe about the violence of God in Scripture, this book will present you with a new way of looking at things so that you no longer have to choose between accepting that God is violent or writing off the Bible as hopelessly full of error. There are other explanations.Greg Boyd has presented one such explanation.I 100% agree with Greg Boyd that Jesus reveals God to us, especially through His crucifixion. Greg Boyd calls this the cruciform (or crucicentric) hermeneutic. I have referred to this elsewhere as reading the Bible with a crucivision lens.I 100% agree with Greg Boyd that God did not punish Jesus on the cross for our sin, and that God is not angry with humans about sin, but seeks only to rescue and deliver us from it.I 100% agree with Greg Boyd that sin bears its own punishment, so that when sin comes to fruition in our life, it brings forth only death and destruction.I could go on and on about the many areas of complete agreement I have with Greg Boyd and this book.But the only primary area I disagree with him on is the main thesis of his book, that sometimes God is faced with no choice but to painfully withdraw Himself from our sin and rebellion so that He allows sin to have its way in our lives and this world, since this is the only way that God can both show us the devastating consequences of sin and deliver us (and future generations from it).The flood event in Genesis 6-8 is one example. Greg Boyd says that since wickedness had spread over the face of the earth, all humanity had become corrupted by the sons of God (Gen 6:1-8), and so Noah was literally the last pure man on earth, and so to save, rescue, and deliver humanity from complete destruction, God had to step back from humanity and withdraw His protection so that sin would destroy humanity and a new creation could occur through Noah and his family, whom God rescued and delivered from the flood through the ark. Boyd argues that God's only activity in the flood was to rescue and deliver Noah. The flood waters came on their own as God stepped back.I am extremely uncomfortable with such an explanation of the flood account, or such a way of reading Scripture. My discomfort is not because Boyd's thesis is new, but because I think it ultimately violates one of his preliminary points, that all of Scripture must be read and interpreted through Jesus Christ, and especially through Jesus Christ on the cross. I do not believe that what we see on the cross is God withdrawing from sin, but rather jumping head-first into it.I believe that the incarnation is the missing element to Boyd's thesis. God does not back away from sin to let it have its way. No, God, in Jesus, enters fully into our sin, not to participate in it, but to deliver us from it. He does not draw away; He dives headlong into the mess.I do not believe that God allows sin to have its way with us, even if we continue to rebel and live in it. This is little more than another form of child abuse. A neglectful, absentee parent is barely better than an abusive one.I do not believe that God destroys sin by letting sin destroy itself. I believe that God destroys sin through redemption. He destroys sin by tearing it apart from the inside, not violently, but through love, grace, mercy, forgiveness, and revelation. I believe God destroys sin through the revelation and illumination brought by the incarnation. He rescues, not be retreating, but by redeeming. Jesus said "I will never leave you, nor forsake you." And neither does God. He never withdraws. Never backs away. Never leaves us alone.Does sin hurt us? Yes. Does sin bear its own punishment? Yes. God does not punish us for sin. But the blows we feel from sin are the glancing blows that hit His back first.This is starting to turn into a book of my own, so I will stop here. Look, read this book. Absolutely read this book. Even though I disagree with the central point of the book, I give it five stars because it does a fantastic job of presenting some truths that all Christians need to hear. But if you are uncomfortable with Greg's point that God withdraws from sin to let it have its way, that's okay ... be uncomfortable .. for there are other ways to maintain Boyd's cruciform hermeneutic without turning God into an absentee parent when we need Him most.

I highly enjoy Boyd's work, and his concern with being both thorough and pastoral. This is highly evident in the painstaking work to keep his thesis within the confines of confessional orthodoxy by building off the work(s) of church fathers (especially Origin). Further, his cruciform thesis is highly compelling: I have been swayed by proto-forms of it in the major works of scholars like Michael Gorman. Boyd's work deserves commendation for continuing the conversation forward with rigor and passion. However, I have three main critiques:1) The book mainly suffered most from length. While his work is meant to be academic in nature, and that does come with certain expectations of "dialogue partners" and fending off potential objections to his thesis, the Crucifixion of the warrior god could have shaved off most the contents in volume 1 in order to streamline the argumentation and thesis. Or, at least, been almost 2/3 the size that it is.2) The biggest issue comes through the theme of Gods divine condescension as reveled through the cross. Is the clearest picture of God found in Jesus? Yes. Is the cross the place where Jesus' life and work most evidently point to Gods love/humility/character, etc? Indeed. Cruciformity is humility, and that's the divine trait over-and-against human pride (the root of sin). None of that need be argued about. It's quite a convincing case; the NT seems clear on this, and the church has a long history of understanding Jesus this way. What is less convincing: the need to always understand God's "undoing" of evil and sin through the lens of non-violence (my critique is coming from a worldview that positively embraces Jesus' non-violent human ethic for citizens of the Kingdom). One of the prime examples would be Boyd's conception of account such as the flood; essentially, Boyd argues that the flood is God withdrawing his divine protection from creation enough that demonic forces are responsible for the consequences (because evil is unsustainable, and the forces of evil will only collapse/implode when left unchecked). Yet, it seems like God would still ultimately be responsible despite this line of reasoning, even if he removes himself from the equation somehow (something along the lines of Kants moral imperative and a philosophical "trolley" analogy spring to mind). So, Gods not exactly "off the hook" in a moral way. And Boyd's pitbull analogy--while not a straw-man per se--did not seem to account for necessary details in the problem of evil. But....I'm honestly not sure why, if God is good, His assessment and methodologies in dealing with evil can't be trusted, even if they're "violent" looking. Full disclosure: the only problems I have with violent portraits in scripture stem from human-on-human violence that seem to be assumed as divinely ordained (such as herem passages). Ultimately, I think that Boyd's work actually didn't explore how vastly ahead of its time the OT was. There's something supernatural about its composition when you start to actively investigate how ANE laws, like the lex talionis, are mitigated differently in Israelite Law codes (compared to Hammurabi's codes, etc). Further, bringing in the concept of psychological trauma, the APA defines it as such: "a type of damage to the mind that occurs as a result of a severely distressing event. Trauma is often the result of an overwhelming amount of stress that exceeds one's ability to cope, or integrate the emotions involved with that experience." Now, a trauma-informed worldview actually highlights that trauma is about how we process something (please read THE BODY KEEPS THE SCORE by Van der Kolk on the subject). One thing can be traumatic for someone, and not traumatic for another. Because this is how human brains are wired, it creates space for "violence" to be more circumstantial. I.E...a divine portrait of violence doesn't necessarily "have" to be perceived as traumatic, if it's processed (the action was "just" per se), or healing can still happen (a broken limb can be traumatic on a brain/body, but healing can happen, and the trauma dealt with). I don't see the need to find a "non violent" interpretation of God's character mitigated by the cross in every single "perceived" picture of violence in the OT. The concept of violence may be too abstract to justify a need to do so. But I am more persuaded by a joint Crucifixion-and-resurrection hermeneutic than I am by a sole "cruciform" thesis. My hope is placed on Jesus as the crucified-and-resurrected king, and in God's (re)new(ed) creation. Which brings me to my third and final critique.3) I am persuaded by a cruciform king and his cruciform kingdom (cf, chapter one in Michael Gorman's INHABITING THE CRUCIFORM GOD, and Jeremy Treat's THE CRUCIFIED KING). But not for Girardian scapegoat reasons (google "why Girardians exist" for a one-stop shop, devastating, critique of Girardianism), or for a purely non violent atonement theology. PSA, as well as Christus Victor, and all the various other kaleidoscopic facets of atonement theology, are too convincing to eject from a rich understanding of what happened in the cross. Further, the resurrection is where our hope lies—that's even basic to Judaism leading up through the first century. Is the resurrection possible without the cross? I don't think so. But to only have a cruciform thesis, not a co-equal emphasis (or, possibly, greater emphasis) on the resurrection and (re)new(ed) creation as a part of the structure seems like a pretty big misstep for a Christian hermeneutic. According to Paul in 1 Cor 15, more hermeneutic emphasis is given to the implications of Jesus' resurrection beyond His purely having "died according to the scriptures." Rather, He was "buried, and rose again three days later, and then appeared" to a lot of people. And, based upon these resurrection-based experiences, Paul extrapolates the support for Christian experience, baptism, the nature of the resurrected body, etc.. His point has more to do with the implications of the resurrection. Again, to summarize this last critique: I think a better hermeneutic would be a cruciform-and-resurrection one.Anyways, that's just my opinion. Again, I think Boyd did a commendable job. I would want that clear. And I am persuaded that the cross is not central enough to the church's hemenutical principles as a whole. Boyd's spot-on in much of his critique of the church's historic collusion with violence and "power(s)" that lead to destruction. I would hope that my words here would be understood as they're intended: a critique, not a tearing down as to offer something different/new. I would like to build off the cruciform thesis, and modify it to a cruciform-and-resurrection thesis.

Greg Boyd’s *Crucifixion Of the Warrior God* is nothing short of a tour de force in understanding how the revelation of God through the cruciform nature of Christ is supposed to revolutionise our understandings of the depictions of “divine/divine endorsed” violence within the Old Testament.Instead of just moralising these scenes away, or attempting to downplay/dismiss them on basis of historical data, or attempting to synthesise these contrasting portraits of God with what we are shown in Jesus’ life and death, Boyd offers another approach.Following the traditions/trajectories of the early church and the authors of the biblical texts themselves, Boyd suggests that through the lens of the crucifixion (and the cruciform posture that we see exhibited in Jesus’ ministry) we need to look back on these portraits and ask not only what the Cross exposes about the validity of these portraits, but also how does the God-breathed recording of these scenes speak of the Cross: a Cruciform Hermeneutic.Through his artful assessment of the New Testament and early church tradition within volume one, Boyd beautifully lays down the groundwork for his thesis. Concluding that in the same way as we understand the horror and brutality of the crucifixion to be God bearing the sin and violence of humanity, so too do the violent scenes of the OT reflect this sin-bearing nature of God. To use Boyd’s apt description, these texts of horror also perform as “Literary Crosses”. Within his second volume, Boyd then takes this hermeneutic and, by taking a closer look at a vast array of violent episodes within the OT, he discerns how we can perceive this sin-bearing nature of God at work within the narrative.Personally, I think this double-volume work is phenomenal and offers an important paradigm shift to our reading of the scriptures; a thesis that doesn’t deny the God-breathed nature of the text, but that also illuminates our minds to the generational consistency of God’s nonviolent nature.That’s not to say that I agree with everything in this volume, I do have a few minor and major niggles here and there (e.g., although I’d agree with Boyd’s assessment of God’s “wrath”, I would probably go further then him and suggest that even the language of “withdrawal” needs to be assessed as it can still assign too much culpability to God—and maybe I’d be wrong to do so, based on Boyd’s own refutations to this objection). But I’d still happily identify as being in the Cruciform Hermeneutic school of thought that Boyd has shed light on (in fact, this work has provided some much needed affirmation to a chapter that I’ve written in my next book).Overall, this is a must read—regardless of which side of the fence you sit on. And not only do I foresee this work being pivotal in opening the sluice gates for further developments and adaptations of the the Cruciform Hermeneutic being articulated, but I can also see this work as being one that cannot be ignored by those who are interested in honestly wrestling with the Bible.Thanks for your courage and words, Greg!—Tristan Sherwin, author of *Love: Expressed*

The idea that parts of scripture reflect the thinking of human beings with pre-Christian, inadequate and harmful Ancient Near East (ANE) ideas about God is a difficult one for many evangelicals. Was God involved, at all, in producing the most problematic texts, such as those demanding genocide? Boyd says yes, definitely yes! but, also that these texts, nevertheless, reflect the thinking of seriously theologically handicapped human beings. How can this be?Boyd insists that “all scripture is God breathed”. A search for ‘God’ and ‘breathed’ in the same sentence in the Bible (NIVUK) gets three hits:Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. Get. 2:7So Joshua subdued the whole region, including the hill country, the Negev, the western foothills and the mountain slopes, together with all their kings. He left no survivors. He totally destroyed all who breathed, just as the Lord, the God of Israel, had commanded. Josh. 10:40All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 2 Tim 3:16I’m not sure that this computer-assisted insight leads to any point we might want to make re the meaning of the phrase “God breathed”, but it does serve to illustrate the problem Boyd insists that we must face. Can we reject those texts clearly originating from badly misinformed ANE inspired authors? Do we just ignore them and hope nobody notices (a bit late for that). Do we just hope and pray that accepting such texts as the word of God won’t lead to some really awful outcomes? (also too late). Or do we find some way to accept that, at the same time, these are the words of seriously misinformed, yet inspired ANE people, and contain a message that God wants us to receive?Boyd, in over 1400 pages, tries to convince us that the last question can be answered in the affirmative. First, we should not be surprised that it might well take 1400 pages and more to accomplish Boyd’s objective. But, the arguments he makes are sound, Bible honouring, honest, and God fearing. They will not easily be dismissed by anyone who actually hears them. They are, however, easily misunderstood, and opportunities for willful misunderstanding and malicious obfuscation abound. A sympathetic and careful reading will be essential - all 1400 pages. This is a tall order.Fortunately the basic argument is so fundamentally Christian that it will be denied by few believers - the death of Jesus of Nazareth on a Roman cross is the centre of all things Christian. In reading this excellent two-volume argument, one can (should) continually imagine the image of a crucifix appearing on every page of the Bible - both testaments. This is how both words from God and words from ANE people with questionable theology can be considered ‘God breathed’. And this is how words of first century Christians who are trying to arrive at a new understanding of God, while still struggling with inadequate ideas, can be considered as breathed by the same God.This is the primary burden of Boyd’s message. Can we, by concentrating on the crucifixion of Christ and all that that means, figure out a way to see both human and divine expressions of what God is like, as revealed in scripture, to be breathed by God? For the parts that are clearly not in any way like Christ, are there ways to look beneath the text to find what message is being God breathed? Are we willing to always ask, ‘what else is here that I may have so far missed’? Are we willing to do this without yielding to the temptation to set really awful parts of scripture aside as not at all inspired while concentrating only on the parts that are clearly more Christlike? Are we willing to stop ignoring, or trying to explain away and rationalize the awful parts, as evangelical apologetics so often has done?Is Boyd offering just another, even a touch mystical, way of rationalizing the awful bits? Is it better to just dismiss these texts as human contamination? These are the basic question that interested readers are asked to wrestle with. Without careful, sympathetic reading of this really big book, and without a sincere desire to honestly deal with these awful bits (which are legion) the author of this book is unlikely to be well understood. That’s not to say that the careful, sympathetic reader will be convinced by the argument, but she/he will at least be able to say they have considered the questions with great care and with faithfulness to a belief in a scripture that can and will accomplish all that God intends for it to accomplish.Addendum May 23, 2107Boyd asks us to consider the biblical text as it is, as we have it, as the canon - all of it. Realizing that some things did not happen, some things did, but differently than reported, some things clearly reflect very poor theology, ideas about God far too influenced by ANE culture, and so on. This, in the end, does not matter. We have what we have, and Jesus, the Apostles and the early Church considered all of it revelatory. Our task, argues Boyd, is to find a hermeneutic wherein all of it, even the parts that did not happen but are either poetry, parable or outright misunderstandings of history, even untrue human stories, can be seen through the lens that is both the horror and the victory of the crucifixion. He reminds us that, basically, the Cross represents the worst and the best that could ever be, so it can be expected to provide a clear revelation for even the sacred, broken yet ‘God breathed’ Word of the Bible. God is there in all of it trying to reveal himself, and, also important, trying to reveal us. The fundamental assumption is that we need to know some horrible things about ourselves, and we need to know that God was willing to appear to participate in even the worst of it, for our sake.From another perspective, there is a worldview that will be necessary to fully appropriate Boyd's proposal. For many, this may be too much to ask. He clearly describes the hermeneutic and associated worldview desiderata in a variety of ways so it will be hard to miss. His careful and extensive critique of the common alternatives provides great encouragement to seriously consider his proposal. For a variety of reasons many may try to pick and choose, some of Boyd and some from here and there. Each reader will have to decide if Boyd's package needs all of its parts (hermeneutic and worldview) to function properly. This reader doesn't think a piecemeal approach will be satisfying or effective.And, by the way, even if you don't adopt Boyd's hermeneutic, you will still have a wonderful reference work and bibliography covering some of the current and challenging topics in post-conservative Christian thought. To give some idea of this, I'll close with a list of six of 15 subsections of the extensive bibliography, together with the number of titles in each. (These are the topics with the greatest number of references).Cosmic conflict in scripture and the early church (89)Centrality of the cross (81)Bible and the ANE (74)Dark side of scripture (61)Issues in biblical theology (40)Nature of divine judgement (36)Addendum July 11, 2107Boyd does a lot of teaching in this book. While firmly presenting his case, he also gives the reader a good understanding of other positions, in case they wish to choose one of those over his own. The text is well organized so it is easy to keep one’s bearings and possible to skip parts where the reader already knows the area well. More important, those of us who need a primer in the many areas related to the main question will find one-stop shopping between the covers. Boyd’s specific arguments are often unique to him, but his fine summaries of many other arguments and readings seem completely fair. What he does speak strongly against is settling for a malange of ideas that really don’t work well together.A quick way to get a feel for his overall approach would be to read Appendix IX pg. 1283-1295. It is a fine, short treatment of the story of Abraham’s ‘testing’ or the binding of Isaac in Gen 22: 1-19. The way he typically presents and critiques standard positions and his clear, non-dogmatic, arguments for his position are well illustrated.And, as in many places, if clear thinking of the critical realism variety leads to a new way of seeing things, Boyd does not flinch. For example in thinking through the ideas of obedience to God and God’s providence as the take home message of the Mount Moriah story Boyd says “Through this testing, Abraham demonstrated the same level of loyalty that the pagan gods demanded when they required a child sacrifice.” Wow! I’ve never thought of it that way, but it rings true. So what’s a better way to look at it? Quoting Tonstad (‘God of Sense’) “Abraham’s obedience sets the stage of the revelation…….it is the revelation and not the obedience that dominates the story.” And then with Nahum M. Sarna (Understanding Genesis) “on the mount of the Lord there is vision,” rather than “the Lord Will Provide.” Boyd is able to bring together disparate authors and mix their ideas with his overall thesis in a masterful way, whether he agrees or disagrees with their overall conclusions. Throughout, he mines not only scripture but the literature on the topic and builds a case that will be difficult to refute, if it is sympathetically considered and understood.

Worth the money.....the books are heavy to hold as the paper used is quality. Readable, understandable with solid theology that targets questions that real people are asking.

Jusqu'à présent excellent

Excellent