Gordon Lathrop, Holy Things, II

Lathrop starts with the Bible, which he describes as the source of both texts (such as readings and prayers) and of imagery. Its enacted meaning, however, comes from being used in the assembly, and from the resulting juxtaposition of old text and contemporary people. This pattern itself is biblical.

Nothing in worship arises de novo. Everything has some sort of precedent, even as it changes. No matter how significant the change or important the one making the change, the resulting form uses preexisting material. Thus for the sacraments, we cannot look to their institution as the moment they spring into existence. They have a prehistory, even if scholarship cannot reconstruct it and no documents exist to attest to this prehistory. (Consider, and this is my own comparison, the Goths, who were Arian. Surely they had worship texts, as they are contemporary to written orthodox texts, and furthermore we known they had literacy, even in their vernacular, Gothic, because Wulfila translated the Bible into it. But we do not know anything about the content of their liturgy.) This prehistory does not dictate the meaning of the ritual, however.

Gordon Lathrop, Holy Things I: Introduction

All this represents my understanding of Lathrop's ideas. Regrettably my Kindle copy does not include page numbers. As I am doing this post while reading the book these ideas are found in order. Don't quote me, read the book yourself!). The first main contribution of Lathrop is his distinction between "primary liturgical theology", which is theology expressed in the liturgy, and "secondary liturgical theology", which is theology expressed in reflecting on the liturgy. Just as the primary liturgical theology is the feedstock for the secondary, so in some sense is the primary as embodied in the practice of the community more fundamental than any reflections of theologians.

Methodologically speaking, start with simple, "non-theological" words (e.g., book, table, meal) and let the meaning of the acts arise from the acting, before using the jargon (e.g., Bible, altar, Eucharist), which can prejudge their meanings and become obstacles in themselves.

He notes the tension between the assertion of the existence of holy things and holy people, on the one hand, and its frequent companion in the liturgy, the assertion that God alone is holy.

Relaunching

Hello, everyone. Since I got no comments from my last post I have decided to change the focus of this blog. I'm preparing for my comps and I don't have time to spend on something that doesn't seem to be of much interest or use to people. So coming to this space will be reflections, hopefully daily, on what I'm reading for comps.

Hello Everyone!

I know, it's been a while since I blogged. Things have been busy in real life. Beyond that, however, one idea for a blog post hasn't worked out. So what I'm asking for is feedback. I can tell from Blogger that my posts have a few readers. However, without comments or other feedback, I have no idea if anyone is finding my posts interesting, stimulating, or anything else. So I invite your comments, either here or on the previous posts. I especially invite comments on the whole blog or issues you would like me to address in the future here. I invite disagreement and criticism, but keep in mind that I wish it to be civil, and anyone claiming that ecumenism is a heresy of satanic will be ignored, and their comments deleted: such statements are not useful.