IVP - Addenda & Errata - It's All Clear, Depending on How You View It

It's All Clear, Depending on How You View It

At IVP we’ve gathered our multiview books—the three-views, four-views, five-views books—under the banner of Spectrum Multiview Books, and we’ve given their covers a new look.

So what can you look forward to? Well, we’ve just sent Justification: Five Views to the printer, and it’s coming out this fall. (I challenge you to read the endorsements and conclude you don’t need to bother with the book.) And next spring we will have Biblical Hermeneutics: Five Views. These two have been simmering on separate burners of my editorial range.

But with one dish heading for the table now, I’m ready to prepare another. And I think I just heard the order come in. Right now there is a new evangelical controversy breaking out of the gate: the issue is biblicism and its premise of the clarity (or perspicuity, if you like technical terms) of Scripture. So how about The Clarity of Scripture: Five Biblical Views?

Perhaps we could have these views:

View 1. Some biblicists maintain that the obscurities of Scripture are only illusions, apparent difficulties with common sense solutions. I’m thinking we call this view Virtual Clarity: The Illusion of Obscurities.

View 2. Then there are those who maintain that clarity is all in the big stuff and it’s not about the small fry. Let’s call this view the Potentate of Clarity: The Big Stuff Rules.

View 3. Others seem to think that if we can just get our hands on the “originals,” everything will be clarified. I’m thinking of calling this Deep-Text Clarity, or The Quest for Clear Springs of Clarity.

View 4. Then there are those who invoke drama and story. We’ll call this Shakespearean Clarity: Theology As Drama Queen.

View 5. Finally, there is the argument that all things will be clear bye and bye. So we’ll have Eschatological Clarity: One Clear Day You’ll See Forever.

I’m going to insist, of course, that each position be argued strictly on biblical grounds.

We’re going public with this because we need an editor and contributors. As I see it, they need to have a track record of brinksmanship and maybe a flair for self-destruction. Any descendants of Eutychus out there?

Posted by Dan Reid at August 30, 2011 3:52 PM