{"id":144,"date":"2009-01-15T10:16:15","date_gmt":"2009-01-15T10:16:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/tonyjones\/2009\/01\/comment-of-the-day-18.html"},"modified":"2009-01-15T10:16:15","modified_gmt":"2009-01-15T10:16:15","slug":"comment-of-the-day-18","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/tonyjones\/2009\/01\/comment-of-the-day-18.html","title":{"rendered":"Comment of the Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dan dissents regarding the post, Is Mysticism Gnostic?<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

Tony writes:
\n“In my Monday post, I mused that the “secret knowledge” vibe expounded
\nby some conservative Christians opens them to the charge of gnosticism.
\nSome commenters mentioned that the other primary characteristic of
\ngnosticism is a strict, platonic dualism.”<\/p>\n

I don’t see the first charge as being valid for conservative
\nChristians at all. Unless Paul’s statement that spiritual truths are
\nonly discerned by the mind that is energized by the Holy Spirit is seen
\nas “secretive”. It may be true of some charismatics, but wouldn’t be
\ntrue of any of the folks I read or listen to. <\/p>\n

The Platonic dualism might have some validity in a second-hand way.
\nConservatives don’t get too involved in the arts for example. But that
\nhas more to do with a narrow moral focus than an actual belief that
\nmatter is evil or that knowledge is a secret mysticism. Oddly, when
\nconservative get involved in politics they’re told they’re too worldly
\nand should stick to spiritual things. We can’t win.<\/p>\n

And “lack of interest in creation-care”… Please. One can care about creation without buying Al Gore’s magic elixir. <\/p>\n

I’m guessing the original charge against you, Tony, is that you seem
\nto have a high degree of skepticism about the objective knowability of
\ntruth. You seem to ground knowledge in the experience of the local
\ncommunity to such a degree that one cannot really know much of anything
\nwith confidence. You seem to say that knowledge is cultural and
\nexperiential and mystical. That seems to separate knowledge from the
\nconcrete. That seems closer to gnosticism than the conservative
\nthinking of a Ravi Zacharias or a Francis Schaeffer or a J.P. Moreland
\nor an Al Mohler.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dan dissents regarding the post, Is Mysticism Gnostic?: Tony writes: “In my Monday post, I mused that the “secret knowledge” vibe expounded by some conservative Christians opens them to the charge of gnosticism. Some commenters mentioned that the other primary characteristic of gnosticism is a strict, platonic dualism.” I don’t see the first charge as…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":134,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comment-of-the-day","category-theology"],"yoast_head":"\nComment of the Day - The New Christians<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/tonyjones\/2009\/01\/comment-of-the-day-18.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Comment of the Day - The New Christians\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Dan dissents regarding the post, Is Mysticism Gnostic?: Tony writes: “In my Monday post, I mused that the “secret knowledge” vibe expounded by some conservative Christians opens them to the charge of gnosticism. Some commenters mentioned that the other primary characteristic of gnosticism is a strict, platonic dualism.” I don’t see the first charge as…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/tonyjones\/2009\/01\/comment-of-the-day-18.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The New Christians\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-01-15T10:16:15+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Tony Jones\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Comment of the Day - The New Christians","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/tonyjones\/2009\/01\/comment-of-the-day-18.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Comment of the Day - The New Christians","og_description":"Dan dissents regarding the post, Is Mysticism Gnostic?: Tony writes: “In my Monday post, I mused that the “secret knowledge” vibe expounded by some conservative Christians opens them to the charge of gnosticism. 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