Dr. Vince Bantu: Egyptian Christological Identity [Torrey Honors Institute]

[Music] all right thank you so much dr. Sanders and good evening it's a pleasure to be with you all tonight and for this lecture entitled Egyptian christological identity and before we get into that I wanted to start off actually sharing a little bit more about myself more I think kind of on a more important level which is my testimony how I came to know Jesus as Lord and Savior that's actually My most important thing that's ever happened to me in my life sorry and that really kind of sets up a lot of where I'm coming

from with with this presentation but also just kind of things I do in reading theology African but um but yeah I'm from st. Louis I grew up in the west side of st. Louis Missouri in an urban community and and I grew I'm a bi-racial person so my dad is black my mom is white and and I grew up in a very racially segregated City st. Louis very like it's almost like cut in half like there's a black and white half to the city and I lived on the black out but not that far from

the white half and I actually grew up going to a church a white church on the white half so I grew up in a black neighborhood but I grew up going to a white church and and so for me growing up Christianity was white because my church was my world right I don't know if anybody else can relate to that but like when you're growing up Especially if you're a young Christian like me you know I don't have one of those kind of you know I guess sometimes I feel like more exciting testimonies or I've

you know went off and did all this kind of stuff I just like I got saved when I was like 7 years old and my mom shared the gospel with me and I was very aware of my need for a savior and my sin and I was really elated especially not having a father around that there was a Heavenly Father that came down and died For my sins so I could be reconciled to him despite how bad I was even as a 7 year old so I put my faith in Christ and started following him

at a young age and I had a passion for evangelism and I'd be sharing the gospel but again the place that I was being nurtured spiritually and trained up which was a great and godly church didn't reflect the culture that I really more so connected with and you know and we you know we can get into like biracial Identity but that's a whole other kind of can of worms but read the color of water James McBride it's a great book but suffice it to say that the church said I was growing up in as godly

and and and and loving as it was it really didn't connect with me culturally and I didn't really feel like I was growing in terms of discipleship in a way that made sense in my community that I lived in and the culture that I was growing up in so I always felt like there was a Disconnect between my cultural identity and my identity as a Christian and I always kind of felt like I had to pick one or the other and I actually almost you know again I was growing up you know and even I'm

in LA now and I grew up as a LA one too because I grew up in the 90s been like NWA and Tupac and all that stuff was big and so I I grew up on all that you know like throwing up Westside when I was like from Missouri and and so that was the culture I grew up in right That was the you know and and in it to be sure the kind of the urban culture there is a lot of brokenness there is a lot of sin in it but and and the funny

thing is nobody ever sat me down and told me that my culture was wrong or sinful or explained it to me or that it was incompatible with Christianity but yet somehow I internalized that message I think from lots of maybe indirect ways of that and and and I kind of just put it all together the good with the bad And just kind of thought my culture altogether is just not good so when I thought the Lord called me to ministry I felt like I had to throw away my cultural identity you know whether it was

like you know like just the all of the urban culture like whether it's like the way of talking what mannerisms or or music or you know again the good with the bad I felt like it all had to go and I had to assimilate to the culture of Christianity which my mindset was white Because that's just all that I was exposed to and so and so I you know ended up going to a Christian college to study theology and it was actually my first year there where the Lord really spoke to me my freshman year

in college where the Lord spoke to me and the pastors that he spoke to me through was in Acts chapter 10 where God the Holy Spirit has spoken to this god-fearing Gentile named Cornelius and he's actually the first Gentile to receive The Holy Spirit and become a Christian in Scripture which is the prophetic fulfillment of God's calling Abraham to be the father of a nation through whom all nations would be blessed and and and people but Peter you know he didn't quite understand what's going on God gave him this vision of this food and he

said kill Andy but he said no no I don't want to touch anything son clean God told him do not call unclean what I've called clean and Peter didn't yet Understand that God was prepping him for the realization of this prophecy that through the Jews and through Christ that the Gentiles are going to be grafted in and that and then Peter has this aha moment when he meets Cornelius and says in verse 34 I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts people from all people groups who fear Him

and do what is right and then it didn't stop there because Peter then Later at the a along with Paul and Barnabas and others at the Jerusalem Council in acts 15 when they're having this struggle the early church is having this struggle okay now that okay we know that Gentiles can be Christians right we know that that it's not only for Jews and we've known that from the Old Testament that's not a New Testament innovation but it's been that God that's been God's plan from the beginning to have a global plan of salvation not only

For the Jews but there was a question of you know how do they become Christian and do they still need to be circumcised or they still need to kind of assimilate or adhere to Jewish customs and the Holy Spirit led the council Jerusalem to realize that no they don't have to be circumcised they don't have to assimilate to Jewish culture in order to follow Jesus they just have to have faith in Christ and to be redeemed through the Holy Spirit by grace through Faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ and that you know these other

kind of cultural norms are not and in fact God speaks to their culture as well and when John talks about Jesus being the logos right that the idea of a logos is actually a platonic kind of Hellenistic philosophical term it's not a Hebrew or you know Old Testament Jewish term I didn't originate with the Hebrew people but it's a philosophical term that God uses and calls himself calls Jesus right You know and uses this term to contextualize the gospel and and and and that's what God's Word calls us to continue to do that God's Word

both embraces our culture and also transforms it at the same time it's not one or the other but it's both and that all of our cultures are fallen but all of our cultures are also beautiful and made in God's image as all of us are made and the Holy Spirit is working in and through all people groups and drawing All people unto himself through Christ and so that was that what that really hit me really hard and I I words that that God spoke to Peter don't call unclean what I've called clean that was really

that really cut me to my core cuz I realized I was calling myself and my people unclean which God has called clean and which he has redeemed through the blood of lamb and so I was really uh sorry I just you know just ever since then I've Had a strong burden for ministering to other people who maybe struggle with a similar kind of thing just real quick by a show of hands like how many people in here about quick show hands have ever heard someone say something like Christianity is the white man's religion whew okay

good number of people and maybe you might have heard them say something like Christianity is an American religion or Christianity is a Western religion or the moniker might Change right but but but there's a it seems pretty common among a lot of us that that it there is a common association a common belief a perception among people that Christianity belongs to a certain people group so again I I thought it and no one ever sat me down and told me that but even as like a nine year old I internalize it I don't know if

it was from seeing depictions of Augustan that looked like Santa Claus and not like a North African from hippo Or seeing pictures of Jesus that looked like Captain Jack Sparrow or Thor or if it was you know from like kind of especially when I went to college and started studying theology and everything I was reading was all predominately written by white males and I don't you know I don't know maybe was all of it but the point is that that message sunk in with me at a very young age and and it took the Holy

Spirit through Scripture to show me that actually no That's not my plan god never intended for me or anybody to feel like they have to choose between who they are culturally or who they are in Christ but that both of the that God and God created us differently with different cultures upon purpose so that through diversity just like through male and female we fully reflect the image of God and two different cultures different races that these are things that are going to follow us into heaven right Sometimes we tend to think about racial or ethnic

or linguistic or cultural diversity like there are like there are earthly kind of struggle that will get over one day and that's why we I think that's behind sometimes when we say things like why can't we just get past this or like I don't see color or I don't see difference right but again don't call unclean what God is called clean right God didn't create us differently for us to ignore it or say You know it's like me saying I don't see you as a woman I just you as a person so I will thank

you but I am a woman and your man and that's you know that's part of how God made us and it's part of how he intended for us to be and and again when John saw the heavenly vision in revelation 7:9 he saw people in flesh he saw them in different skin tones and he saw them in different hues and he heard different languages and he saw different Cultural traditions he said I saw a heavenly multitude of every race tribe and tongue so difference is not just for now it's forever it's for eternity and even

at you know and that's that's a connection to acts 2 right when the Holy Spirit falls at Pentecost and every nation tribe tongue are hearing the gospel in their own language so actually when we come into Christ it's not an invitation to reject our culture or to deny it or to you know like not talk About it or try to not see it but it's actually to celebrate it even more that's why I love the vision of reading theology African Athanasius and you know Cyril and every theologian is in is cultural right there's no such

thing as you know theology that is our cultural or that is not cultural because theology is a human work right it's in response to what God has done through revelation and through scripture and through the gospel but all theology is done from Human beings who are in certain cultural historical situations and that that colors you know no pun intended how we talk about theology just like all food is cultural right but we have this tendency to you know say things like ethnic food right and then what do we mean when we say ethnic food you

know we mean like non white food right like non American food and so but all food is ethnic right you know Tater Tot Casserole is ethnic as cultural Croissants are cultural and you know caramel macchiatos is cultural and so everything is cultural right but we have the same practice in theology that will you know sometimes put labels in front of theology like African theology you know Hispanic theology you know Asian theology Dali theology but then when it's theology from John Calvin or Martin Luther or Karl Bart or slyer mark it's just theology right there's no

there's no modifier but everybody is doing Theology from a location the the imagery I love from Missy ologists Andrew walls is like the church is like a theater watching a stage play we're all watching the same play but we're seeing it from different perspectives right so don't don't don't hear me wrong not multiple plays there's not multiple ways Jesus is the only way to thin the life and the gospel is the only way to salvation but we as the church inside of the the theater of the church so to Speak we all have different seats

and we have different perspectives people in the front row see things differently than people in the balconies do and people on stage left can see things that people on say - I can't even see that's why we need to talk to each other that's why we need to share our perspectives become more rich when we do that but that was really uh you know so that's that's really kind of my burden my I think you know so going back to when I Was seven years old my biggest burden really is to share the gospel is

for people to come to know Christ as Lord and Savior and to be reconciled to him that's my biggest goal that's my biggest life's calling and I'm convinced that the biggest single obstacle in the world that we live in today just by numbers maybe not necessarily it's more important or anything but just in terms of just sheer numbers I believe the biggest obstacle to people in the world Today coming to faith in Jesus Christ is the perception that Christianity is only for white Western American people and and I say that it is hard for people

to wrap their head around that in the United States because when you share the gospel of people who aren't Christians in in in like North America and Europe it's usually for like philosophical or scientific or or you know political or personal reasons right but that's only a small portion of the world but when you Go into South Asia and East Asia in Southeast Asia and the Middle East and Africa and native peoples of the Americas and and you know the Pacific Islands the I would argue the number one reason why people in those places don't

want to be a Christian is because they see Christianity as a white Western American religion that is fundamentally antithetical to their identity so it's a non-starter you know we forget about Jesus and who He says he is in salvation from sin that's not the contention it's not the contention I don't believe in the miraculous most people believe in the miraculous most people believe in the divine it's not for reasons of theology or or or or you know kind of again the belief in the divine but it's for reasons of identity and that's a big issue

around the world but especially in my particular community in the urban african-american community there are Many people who are walking away from the church primarily for identity reasons right you guys have heard of like Kendrick Lamar the rapper right you know he says he's a Hebrew Israelite anybody familiar with the Hebrew Israelites this is one group of many these are after this is african-american religion that is actually been around for a long time but it claims that black people are the true Jews and that Christianity as its Taught as a white man's religion and you

need to not trust the church and there are so many groups like that the conscious community or committed community of the Nation of Islam the more science tipple the five percent nation about Earth there are so many different groups just in African American community that all are rejecting the gospel and it's interesting because they're all rejecting it and going to different False teachings but they're rejecting for the same reason right and that's the other thing too is that they're walking away from the church so they all have a Christian background they all have a Christian

beginning and they're walking away from the church because of the way it's presented in the same way as it was for me I remember being a young person trying to share the gospel to friends of mine and say hey you want to come to church you know friends might be smoking Weed that'd be gang banging you know I grew up in a crib neighborhood and you know friends of mine that would be doing that stuff and I'd be trying to get him to come to my by a white church with me that I was trying

to assimilate to and they were like no I'm good you know I'm good and I was like why not you know so cuz they're singing that you know like acoustic guitar with all the songs about mountains and deers and valleys and rivers and lakes and and then they want To take you to those places they wouldn't go camping out in the woods and stuff and go sing to God out the woods I'm good bro and so like and so I I would always just kind of like you know be frustrated but then it clicked one

day when I had that that you know that realization that I was trying to present to them a gospel a particular you know method of discipleship and and and method of evangelism that wasn't suitable for them right and so that's Really my biggest burden in life is really to so you know I hope you hear me when I say that when I say that I think that it's time kind of like Paul says in first Corinthians 12 to give greater honor to the parts that lack it that I am NOT saying that you know white

people are bad or white expressions of Christianity are bad or white theology as bad or white worship as bad in fact I like I like all of it right I know I listen to Michael W Smith and And I love reading Carl Bart and I love you know you know so many different variations of European expression right and so that's not what I'm saying but what I'm saying is again that there's one particular sliver of the body of Christ that has a disproportionately large voice in how we do church and there are myriad of other

components of the body of Christ that do not have as much of a voice and so that's where I'm my my sense of call is to do again what Paul says in first Corinthians 12 and that's give greater honor to the parts that have lacked it and it Illustrated with the particular biblical passage one of my favorite passages is from acts 21 where Paul the great missionary to the Gentiles right who takes great pains to communicate the gospel to the Gentiles in Gentile ways right he just a few chapters ago he's in the Areopagus and

he's preaching the gospel and he's even using and connecting it with pagan Gentile worship in order so that he might bring them unto the God that is no right but this is a this passage is a different picture than we usually think of with Paul where in acts 21 Paul goes back to Jerusalem and in verse 17 it says when we arrived to Jerusalem the brothers and sisters received us warmly the next day Paul and the rest of us went to see James and all the elders were present Paul greeted them and reported in detail

What God had done among the Gentiles through his ministry when they heard this they praised God then they said to Paul you see brother how many thousands of Jews have believed and all of them are zealous for the law they have been informed that you teach all the Jews who live among the Gentiles to turn away from Moses telling them not to circumcise their children or live according to our customs what shall we do they will certainly hear that you Have come so do what we tell you there are four men with us who have

made a vow take these men join in their purification rites and pay their expenses so that they can have their head shaved then everyone will know that there is no truth in these reports about you but that you yourself are living in obedience to the law as for the Gentile believers we have written to them our decision that they should abstain from food sacrifice to idols from blood from The meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality the next day Paul took the men and purified himself along with then he went to the temple to

give notice of the date when the days of purification would end and the offering would be made for each of them so one of the reasons I love this passage so much is that it shows how can this is why I'm so concerned about this right this is again for for a lot of us if you again if you've never been faced with the Message directly or indirectly that you know it's either it's either your Christian identity or your cultural identity and the two don't go together it can be hard to understand how much of

a crisis this is right but when we look at Scripture actually and it's usually the other way around that that you know all throughout the New Testament that Jesus and Paul and the New Testament writers are making it painfully out and in the Old Testament as well that God's Salvation is not only for the Jews right and so Christianity is nobody's religion it's nobody's religion and it's everybody's religion right it doesn't belong to any one people yet God brings to himself a multitude of all peoples and our culture's again are all reflected so it doesn't

belong in any one group and Christianity is unique in that way because most other especially in the ancient world most religions are tied to a particular language or culture Or region or tribe or you know people group that the gods or the god of a particular people group are intimately tied to that people and so that conversion into that religion is like a conversion into that people group into that culture so there is a cultural assimilation as well as a theological Christianity is unique in that way in the fact that God God creates unto himself

a multiple people and in his Providence he chose a people Israel who Were strategically placed in every nation on earth they were in Persia in Arabia in in Rome in Cappadocia in North Africa in Egypt and that was the the initial path that Christianity spread along in the first and early second century right and so but in this passage I love seeing the way in which now there are certain Jewish Christians that because of this emphasis that Paul's been placing on that Gentiles can be Christians and you know you don't need To be circumcised that

that there was a miscommunication there was a false perception being communicated among certain Jewish believers in Jerusalem that that Paul was saying that they should just forget about their Jewish heritage but James shows us in this passage that that was not God's intention that Jews can still be Jews and that God is still allowing them and welcoming them to still be Jewish and the and Paul goes in And him and these other you know Naza rights probably they even pays for their purification so he puts financial resources into it so that people who have been

told that they have to reject their cultural identity to be a Christian that they can actually be empowered again just like having conversations like this is putting resources into trying to correct this false narrative just like it was a false report that the believers had received That Paul was saying you had to give up your Jewishness and Paul never said that right but that's what people thought and in the same way Jesus never said the Bible never says you have to give up your identity but that's still a perception that we all have come across

or many of us have come across it's still a real perception regardless of the fact that it's not true and so really trying to realign that perception is really kind of my goal but again not To disparage any other group because all of us are brothers in Christ that's our first and foremost identity is as sons and daughters of the King Jesus and God has also made us in different cultures right and this is a huge stumbling block so for that reason not to the denigration of someone else that's where I'm arguing that we have

to start placing attention on other both past and present other segments of the body of Christ That have not gotten enough attention so that people can see who are still caught in the same struggle that I was caught in that you can be Jesus you can be you can be who you are and follow Jesus in fact the only way to truly be who you are is to follow Jesus because Jesus is the completion of all of who we are whether were Chinese Korean black Mexican euro French Irish whatever God only in Christ can we

be fully Irish and fully Jewish and fully african-american and fully Korean and that's God's plan for all of us right and so with that's that's that's the that's the theological and just personal dynamic I'm come with it so with that I'm gonna transition into this into this lecture and talk a little bit about how we see that playing kind of a little bit of where that first went wrong but then also an example I'm going to show you an example basically of what I'm saying right now how we can Place attention on members of the

body of Christ who not gotten as much attention but whose story actually are going to be very helpful I believe in helping us to share with various people who have this this false perception and then I'll just go through this and then we'll we'll have some questions and comments so when we talk about Egyptian christological identity what basically what the idea here is that just to sum it up that the Church of Egypt has a particular identity that is cultural and is theological at the same time and one of the great things about this particular

community is that that the again the idea that Christianity is a white Western American religion whatever is totally foreign because as we know here because of the work that dr. Sanders and others have been doing that actually some of the some of the most foundational theologians were from Egypt And were from North Africa and we're from the continent of Africa right but the problem is that a little bit after a lot of those foundational theologians in the you know 2nd 3rd and 4th centuries the 5th century witnessed a major rupture in the church so you

know what happened right this is a quick answer to like how did we get here how did we get to this point that Christianity is seen as a white religion right when we know as we said in the New Testament itself It shows us you had Ethiopian and you had Persian and you had elamite and and Roman and you had Christians of all cultures and there was and and there was no sense that they belong to one people and yet 2,000 years later all of us are saying but we see this perception alive and well

that it's only for a certain people right how did that get there well I would argue that it starts at the Council of Chalcedon in the year 451 and this is what's considered the 4th Ecumenical council as it's reckoned in the Roman Western tradition and this was a council that was the result of various christological debates that were going on in the fourths in the 5th century in the 4th century a lot of the big topic especially in the Roman Empire was on Jesus's divinity right now that wasn't we always have to always have to

specify when you talk about church history because one of my little pet peeves is when we again kind of like normative Eyes and we say well this was happening in the church when we really talk about the Western or the Roman Church right so we need to specify some up the Roman Church right now because the per Church was not really wrestling with whether or not Jesus was God they were pretty clear on that at the Council of Seleucia testifyin which is in 315 before the Council of Nicaea right so there's multiple church histories that

we always need to keep in mind but in The Roman context because of Arianism there was this belief there was a struggle that you know talking developing Trinitarian theology that you know all of these different communities that became split in the fifth century agreed about about Jesus being you know fully God and fully man and that God being the the Godhead being Father Son and Holy Spirit but the question that arose in the Roman Empire both east and west in the fifth century was if Jesus Is God then how is he also a human and

how do we talk about that in a way that makes sense well at the Council of Cal seeding the the decision was that and this was mainly through the roman bishop Leo's tome that G the way the way to best talk about her articulate the humanity divinity of Christ is that Jesus is one who pasta --ss and he exists in two physics so I'll just write that right here and It should have had on the slide now the Persian Church which had existed since you know the beginning of Christianity in the Persian Empire it's either

woman if I had a totally different you know Christology where they would argue that Jesus is one parse OPA but that he has two kyani and each of which have their own corresponding Konomi and it can O'Mahoney Syriac thought is is the kind of manifestation of a particular kyani or nature but these terms do not Equivocate to these terms in fact there really is no way to say kinoma in greek and so a lot of this was kind of people talking past each other or not exactly having the same words in one another's language and

and there were these things meaning the same thing right now the Egyptian Church which is the focus what we're talking about they had a different theology where they said that Jesus is one who posses us but in one physicists that he is one physics and This is something that cyril of alexandria said although not exactly in the same way that it came to me and by the Bishop of Egypt the Oscars but the Oscars who's the Pope of Egypt was sent into exile and there was a lot of tension then that was that's what really

what instigated the schism between not only the Egyptian Church but then eventually the Arabian and Syrian and Armenian churches as well split from the Roman Church at the at the Council of 451 and so you know the Byzantine Emperor Zeno tried to issue a document called the Hinata Kahn but to kind of you know say that well you you know we can accept the the tome of Leo but not necessarily or the council calcined but not the Toma Leo but it didn't ultimately work and then in you know the in the 6th century you have

Emperor Justinian who was exiling the patriarch of Antioch Severus as well as the Egyptian patriarch Theodosius and the Really his Justinian's goal was to really try to bring the Roman Empire back into unity both theological II and Imperial II but in the writer a little after the time of Justinian died Mohammed was born and Islam is starting to get going in the middle of the Roman and Persian empires which are warring with each other and actually Emperor Heraclius won back lots of the Roman Empire from Persia and also just like Justinian Before and began to

strongly enforce Caledonian theology right theology that Jesus is one person in two natures now now the thing is is that when you read the theology of the tome of Leo and when you read the theology of Timothy eliris for example or Die Icarus both sides of this debate believe that Jesus is that he's God Father Son and Holy Spirit and that Jesus the Son of God is fully God and fully human the dispute came from talking about this Word about natures right and so just to show I'm gonna I'm gonna skip a little bit ahead

just to save some time but this is a this is excerpt from the tome of Leo and this is the this is the part here that becomes problematic everything else in the tome of Leo would have been acceptable except for these words right here the one and the same Christ son Lord only begotten recognized in two natures without confusion change division separation that it's it's the Again the idea of two natures did not work precisely because the the Church of Persia which they embraced some partly the teachings of Nestorius also taught two natures but again

in this particularly Persian way that that was really not common or known to the churches of Egypt or Rome and so and so what happened was the Egyptian church felt that the Caledonian decision that Jesus is one person into physicists that there are two different physicists In the Godhead the perception was it's not an accurate one but the perception on the part of the Egyptian church and then later the Syrian church was that that the council of Kassadin was dividing the trinity into a quarter natee and they were making three into four and that they

were dividing Jesus now that's not what the tome of Leo or what subsequent centuries of Western Christianity that have adopted the Caledonian definition have intended to Do but that's what was the perception of it in like manner subsequent centuries of Western Christian history have mischaracterized a lot of early Christianity in Egypt and Syria as being one nature in a docetic way that they that even today in modern Western church history textbooks a lot of Egyptian and Syrian and Arabian and Armenian Christianity is is characterized as as believing in one nature and that that one nature

is only actually divine and That the early Egyptian or the even current Egyptian or Syrian Christians don't believe Jesus is fully human and that's just not that that's just not the case so this is a quote from Timothy Lewis who is the Pope of Egypt and again you can kind of see the way in which both of these sides are actually appealing to a tenacious and Cyril they're both appealing to the same sources but they're interpreting them in different ways they're basically both Kind of interpolating what they would have said if they had been alive

today and we're claiming that they would agree with them Timothy either says that any of our sainted fathers who said that the one that the one Christ was of two natures taught that God's Word became incarnate from our common human nature form and this is the key right here he's trying to he's trying to comment on what Leo is picking up on in earlier church Theologians who did talk about two natures and this is the key though he says for before the Incarnation God's Word was fleshless but after the Incarnation he is one nature one

physics Mia physics not Monophysite that's a considered a you know historian Monophysite are not good terms to use and you know Church of the East for the Persian church not in historian and then me a site for the Coptic and Syrian Orthodox in Armenian which means one Nature and not Monophysite but he's saying but after the incarnation he is one nature me a physicist of God the word incarnate of human flesh and common soul and so again we can see right here that Timothy eliris is claiming that Jesus is fully God he's fully man he's

not one more than the other but that his humanity and divinity exist in one physics so the different slides and how people are understanding the word physics and aspect and then also how That word is being translated into other language this comes a bit later but the Ethiopian church that weighs in on this and they're in in the Ethiopian language there there isn't multiple words to talk about person in nature it's just one word so in when you translate the tome of Leo into that language what they're hearing is that Jesus is two people that

there are two different Jesus's right again that's not what's intended to be communicated but that would be how it Would be received in that language so this is where I'm arguing that the debate here in the fifth century and actually Pope's and patriarchs of these churches today have even said this not just me that really this was a linguistic and cultural misunderstanding and doesn't actually to quote literally doesn't touch the essence of our shared faith but unfortunately this has been a riff that's still persistent to the present of 1500 years and and not only That

but also it entailed a relationship of oppression so at at 451 when kind of Orthodoxy began to be framed specifically by the roman councils and that particular articulation of christianity was seen as the only right one then what happened was 200 years of oppression of the roman church coming in and persecuting the Egyptian and Syrian and Arabian churches which kind of engendered this bitter divide within the church that was largely geographical and Culture was almost like for you know in many respects it was almost kind of like the European Church coming in and persecuting the

African and the Middle Eastern Church meanwhile the Asian Church is growing and going into China and India and just doing its own thing and not even in in some ways not even affected by a lot of this tension that's going on in the Roman and this is an example of this from the life of Daniel of skaters Daniel skaters Was a Egyptian bishop in the Wadena Troon and and this is an example of that emperor justinian that I mentioned who was going all throughout the Roman Empire and enforcing the Caledonian Creed IND and even to

the point of kidnapping monastic leaders and popes and and replacing them with Caledonian Roman theologians so again this is this is that tension that that I'm talking about that really just kind of widen the gap so it says and it was at this time At that time that the Empire's Justinian became Emperor he who was polluted and terrorized the entire world and the Catholic Church in every place so notice how from the Egyptian side they are the Catholic Church and you know the what would actually be known as the Catholic Church is the impious you

know terrorizing polluted church and that's not a nice way to talk I'm not condoning that it's not good Daniel but um but he says he endeavored to enforce the Accursed faith of the defiled Council of Cal seeding everywhere and scattered the beautiful flocks of price he chased the Orthodox bishops and Archbishop's from their thrones and the umpires Justinian is not satisfied with this but also disseminated the umpires tome of Leo which the umpires Council of Cal Seton had accepted he propagated it everywhere that lay under his control in order to make everyone subscribe to it

so notice from the Egyptian state a side point the Marriage of Roman imperial authority and the Empire and the particular expression of Caledonian faith right so this is where you're starting to see in the Western the the seeds in the Western world of church and state and kind of Christian nationalism becoming a kind of thing and that goes back to Constantine but and also we see the kind of complications that that makes for brothers and sisters in Christ who live outside of that cultural sphere of Influence and this continues it when it was brought to

Egypt the tome a great disturbance occurred among all the Orthodox faithful who were in the land of Egypt and it was brought to the holy mountain of status in order that our Holy Fathers might subscribe to it since our Holy Father Daniel was father of skaters at that time the Lord revealed the matter to him before it was brought to skate us the same himself gathered together all the elders and told them What the Lord revealed to him and he taught them everything in order that they became strong the Orthodox faith and not turn away

even unto death when the Emperor's soldiers brought the tome filled with every impiety of lawlessly o to the holy mountain of status our holy father Abba Daniel came out before them in like manner the superior came out to meet them along with multitudes of elders among the Saints when the others met the Soldiers the soldiers brought the tome filled with impiety and extended it to the elder saying the emperor has commanded all of you to subscribe to the formula of the faith our holy father Abba Daniel the Blessed superior responded and said to the soldiers

what formula of the faith is this they said to him that of the Great Council of calcium of which 634 bishops gathered our Father Abba Daniel was filled with the grace of the Holy Spirit he lept Forward and sees that tome filled with every impiety he tore it and cried out to the soldiers saying anathema to the defiled council of cows leaden anathema to anyone who is in communion with it anathema to anyone who believes according to it anathema to anyone who turns away from the life-giving suffering of Christ as for us it will never

happen that we accept this impious rule of the faith but we will anathematized everyone who accepts it And believes in it we will believe in the father and the son and the holy spirit consubstantial trinity existing in a single godhead unto our last breath and so you kind of see the the continuation actually of Egyptian theological resistance of martyrdom I mean there's this is like a martyr story right from like the first or second century only instead of it being Christians facing the Lions in the Coliseum by pagans it's Christians being Martyred by Christians now

I'm not you know the Egyptians actually committed acts of violence as well so I'm not just saying oh they're the good guys and the Romans are the bad guys but what I am saying is that this was the beginnings of a the way that theology had become encapsulated in kind of the greco-roman context and language and philosophical you know conceptualizations to the point to where that became the only seat in the theatre by wit that was seen as Authoritative right and other seats in the same theater of the body of Christ were seen as not

authoritative or not as not as valid and then this is a this is just to you know show this is a some wall graffiti from the monastery of the Seri and just this is a monastery also in the Wadena Troon in Egypt that shows kind of the the unity that was happening between various Syrian and Arabian Egyptian bishops who were also the same kind of Thing that happened in Egypt is happening in Arabia and in Syria and Armenia as well and there was a unity that grew and even today this branch of Christianity is all

are largely United in one you know called Oriental Orthodox and yet there is a way in which the Egyptian Church bolete understood it's it's kind of me a facade identity to be international and as to be one universal Catholic Church and yet at the same time there's evidences in sixth century Christian Egyptian christological identity of their being kind of a pro Egyptian rhetoric that happens and Severus of Antioch was the Bishop of Antioch and he was also kicked out of hit by Emperor Justin Justinian's uncle and he was sent into exile in Egypt where he

lived and likely at the monastery of the Syrians and was joining with the Egyptian Church but and I won't I won't you know I won't read it for for time sake but this this quote basically Shows that there was unity for the most part between cows anti Caledonians or me Hafez ayats in different cultural contexts but that according to Severus there was still kind of an ethnocentrism among Egyptian Christians to where they still kind of felt like they were better than other people and he says I'll just read this part right here where he says

it's the habit of the Alexandrian is to think that the Sun rises for them only and towards them only the lamp shines so That they even jokingly nicknamed outside cities as lamp lists and so there was there was there was an issue going on as Syrian and Arabian Egyptian me a sites were all living in exile and living under the oppression of the Roman Caledonian Church and Empire where they were joining together but Severus indicates in his letter that that some of them didn't want to take communion with each other and that it was really

just for cultural differences and Severus is actually pushing against this and saying hey we're all me a sites were all Christians we're all Orthodox we're we're all on the same side it's those Caledonian impious Roman folks that are the bad guy and but it still kind of shows that you know kind of a differentiation but also to the to the degree to which the more the Egyptian Church in particular was suffering under cows dony and hegemony that had actually even Engendered a greater response or a greater degree of ethnic pride and resistance that was not

really there before when you read the Desert Fathers or when you read a tenacious or Anthony or even Shenouda who's the first kind of big Coptic writer in the Coptic language there there's certainly a pride in being Egyptian but it's not a big deal it doesn't really come to the fore in a major way but after the Council of Cal seeding where there's this big schism Now you start to see this this ethnic rhetoric if you will or this Pro Egyptian emphasis and how that's linked specifically with me APA's I'd doctrine come to the fore

in a major way and so going into the seventh century Benjamin of Alexandre is another kind of good witness to this dynamic the same dynamic now that's had been happening for two years since the Year 451 up until now Benjamin was the Pope of Egypt starting in the 620 s and some of us are Actually reading some of his writings today and Benjamin lived at a very crucial time in Egyptian history he lived he was the Pope of Egypt for you know it was 40 years before during and after both the Persian conquest of Egypt

the Roman reconquest of Egypt and the eventual Islamic conquest of Egypt he lived and saw all of that and yet interestingly this is a this is a an excerpt from Benjamin as he after the after the Muslims conquered Egypt Interestingly the Miatas eyed Christians actually came back into power and and it's highly likely that the Muslim conquerors knew that there was a tension between the Egyptian myocytes and the Roman Caledonian Imperial authorities and that's probably why me a sites were given more favor in Islamic controlled Egypt and so Benjamin was allowed to kind of almost

run the country because even though Muslims were in charge now they were in the numerical minority most Egyptians were still Christians and they were specifically again the me--off as I'd church because they knew there was already a bitter relationship between the Roman Empire that they had just conquered oh thank you and so so so what's interesting about the writings of Benjamin is that he's he writes this and you know the the the Islamic governor armored ribbon alas has allowed Benjamin to go back into he had been living in exile because Emperor Heraclius was kicked him

out of his office and replaced him with a Caledonian patriarch that the Egyptian church rejected and is interesting the sources often referred to this his name was Cyrus and they refer to them as Cyrus the Caucasian but not in the sense that we use it today but as in the sense of he was from the caucus mountains right but even the fact that they identify him as a foreigner shows the degree to which Miatas ideology was Ingrained in the Egyptian christological consciousness as part of their cultural identity and so Benjamin was living in exile in

the Egyptian desert for thirteen years but when the Muslims conquered he was allowed back to be the patriarch again and he went back into churches and monasteries and he was reestablishing them and reestablishing the map as a church and this is an excerpt from when he consecrated a the the Church of Macarius at the monastery Of Macarius in other Wadena Troon and he's giving thanks to God for his freedom which is which is really interesting that that Benjamin is actually displaying signs of gratefulness for the Muslim conquest of Egypt and now that now that's a

tricky touchy subject and Christians in Egypt and all over the what then became the Islamic world had varying degrees of responses to Islamic conquests but Benjamin for one particularly had it Seems to express positivity and really has no critique of Islamic conquerors but really only of actually still Roman Castle donors who aren't even in power anymore but he's still so mad at them so he says I give you thanks my Lord Jesus Christ because you have made me worthy once more to witness the freedom of expression of the Orthodox faith and the fulfillment of the

holy churches the destruction and overthrow of the godless heretics he's talking about you know Counseled onehans now he's that's how about Muslims cuz they're the ones that just won the praise is yours benevolent savior for the way in which you have allowed me to see the churches yet again in their glory and their good condition I give you thanks my Lord Jesus Christ for you have saved my soul from the hands of the tyrant dragon apostate the one who chased me on account of the Orthodox faith he's somewhat Cyrus the Caledonian imposed replaced patriarch That

that that correctly is put in his place I'll give you thanks my lord Christ for you have allowed me to see my sons once more as they surround me in your honor My Lord Jesus and and this is a this is another really great example that shows again the the consolidation of Egyptian identity with me a phase I theology with Egyptian christological identity this is a this is another monastery the monastery of Metris that Benjamin came Back after he returned back as the Pope and he was going back and kind of restraint thinning all the

different churches and monasteries he went to one in particular and he has some interesting comments about it he says now the place where in the patriarch dwelt was a pure habitation without defilement and what does defilement mean in a monastery called the monastery of Metris which was the Episcopal residence for all the churches and monasteries Which belonged to the virgins and monks had been defiled by her a CLIs the heretic right so again Caledonian ISM is kind of cast as defilement when he forced them to accept the faith of calcium except this monastery alone for

the inmates of it were exceedingly powerful being Egyptians by race and all of them natives without a stranger among them or foreigner among them and therefore he could not incline their hearts towards him for this reason when The father Benjamin returned from Upper Egypt he took up his residence with them because they had kept the Orthodox faith and had never deviated from it so again notice the reason that Benjamin gives at this particular monastery had not apostatized or I'm not calling Caledonian theology heretical but I'm just also not calling me a facade Christology heretical but

he did I don't agree with him but he's saying you know he's saying what was the factor that Helped these Egyptian monks in his monastery not apostatize or become defiled in their faith through Caledonian ISM it was the fact that their Egyptians by race with no foreigners among them he says for this reason when the father returned he took his residence so it's showing very clearly the degree to which me a physic Christology which in their minds is the only orthodoxy had come to overlap with being Egyptian so for this particular Context the idea that

Christianity is a Roman or Western religion a lot of these different groups that I was taught and about earlier a big claim you'll often hear is that you know Christianity was invented by the Roman Empire during the time of Constantine as a method to subjugate black people and people of color and and nobody believed Jesus was God before the fourth century so these people obviously are not reading Irenaeus and and you know Justin Martyr And and all these other folks Tertullian but that's the idea right and the and and but that kind of idea is

totally foreign to this context because this particular expression of Christianity happened at the same time as Roman and platonic and Hellenistic Christianity and it happened centuries before there was a Roman dominance in Christianity before there was any kind of dominance in Christianity and not only that but there was actually a tension between Coptic and Egyptian and Roman Caledonia and Christianity but yet this particular community fought for their particular expressions of Orthodoxy right now I'm not saying fighting is good but I'm saying that one thing that is good is the idea that these Egyptian believers were

so sure of their own cultural identity and proud of their Egyptian heritage that they weren't about to assimilate to any other person's particular expression of Christology but They were fighting for their own and that's the piece of it that I think we need to really reclaim and and especially by going back and looking at Christian traditions that are in Africa and Middle East and Asia that even precede Western European colonialism and this is all in with this one and then stop for some questions and comments and discussion but this is a this is a picture

of a monastery that were that was the one I mentioned a minute ago That Benjamin came in and reconsecrated in the seventh century the MA this is at the monastery of Macarius and the wadi nut rune and this is kind of a unique cost I don't know if anybody's ever seen one like it before but I hadn't seen one like it before to cross shaped into the roof and sorry it's a little blurry but if you can kind of make out each end of the Cross has two kind of ends to each end of it

right which is a little bit it's kind of like the Coptic cross axe Had a picture of more of a modern Coptic cross that a lot of them look like nowadays a lot of them have that three-sided end to represent the Trinity but this one was unique and I was asking the monks worth you know why was it made that way it's kind of unique and they were saying that's actually meant to represent Egyptian christological ident which is why I want to end with this that this represents the humanity and divinity of Christ coming into

one Nature after the Incarnation right but that and this this is a visual I think a good visual depiction of the way in which the Egyptian Church found its own unique way to identify and represent the distinctiveness of Jesus's humanity and his divinity and yet the fundamental unity of them in the one person Jesus Christ so thank you very much this gets tricky because there's a lot of there's a big debate and like ancient studies Classical studies you know Late Antiquity studies early Christianity about if you can even talk about issues like race and ethnicity

and identity in the ancient world they're like oh that's a modern concept nobody in the ancient world thought about race or ethnicity or anything like that you know and there's a lot of great books on that the ethnic origins of Nations why this new race by Denis well the invention of racism and classical antiquity by Benjamin Isaac But you know I'm so I'm saying that cognitive the fact that I'm entering into a very lively debate in classical and in late antique studies but I'm on the side that says I do think that the ancient world

saw noticed that people looked at different and that notice that people had different cultures and ethnic identities yes they didn't make of that what we make of it today they didn't think of it in the same way that we do today but I mean honestly is there even A uniform way that we think of race or ethnicity or culture even today in the world we live in so I don't think that there is or has ever been a uniform agreed-upon identity about what race ethnicity culture even mean and so so to say they didn't think

of it the same way we do isn't really saying much but all that to say that I think like today most most of us as a lot of times as Christians I would argue that we have an underdeveloped kind of an underdeveloped Theology of culture right that sometimes we don't we don't know or realize even our own cultural biases or influences and how they affect everything we do right culture is the lens through which we see the world and it's the value system through which we make decisions and it's what we it's what it's and

it's a community shared thing it's what we decide how we decide what's funny and what is respectful and how respect is communicated or honor or shame or you Know all of these different things right and so I think that in the same way that the the Caledonian and the me off-site as I've shown you they all thought they were right and the other woman was wrong one of them just had the power to actuate it and say because you're wrong we're gonna come in and force it on you right and so I don't think that

colonialism or bigotry or hegemony is none of no people group is immune to that I think if any of us had the power We would all do it and it's just certain of us have been able to do it and others of us have done it in other times right and so I think that I think that I think that in many of these cases folks didn't realize the different cultural and linguistic factors that were going into their particular way of talking about the wording they're using to talk about the full humanity and full divinity

of Christ which they all believed in but I don't think they were really cognizant Of you know the cross-cultural dynamics that were going on and rather just said that sounds different than the way I say it so it must be wrong right which I think that's kind of a human tendency to automatically judge something that's wrong you know just because it's not the same as you like David Livermore as a great book called cultural intelligence and he he has this I mean this again getting out of the patristic but I think he has this really

helpful way of Talking about what he calls category width and so he'll he'll say that most cultures in the world divide behaviors and value systems into three categories good bad and different like all of us in here believe that there are things that are good and there are things that are bad and there are things that are just different killing people is bad and you know helping someone who falls on the floor is good no matter what culture you're in that's that's a good thing for The most part but you know some cultures when you

come over someone's house you take your shoes off before you enter the house other cultures you don't that's not really good or bad it's not a sin if you don't send us in if you do it's just different there's different strokes for different folks as my dad would say but Livermore talks about category within the sense that every culture has these categories but some of us have wider categories of different than Others and for some of us our category of different is very narrow we are some of us are like often will want to put

as little things as possible in the different category and we want as many things as possible to be in the only good or the only bad category and though again don't hit me wrong the scripture is clear that there's a lot of things that are just good or bad that are sinful and that are righteous but there are also a lot of things that are just Different and it's just I mean again his book is called cultural intelligence right and one thing I will say is that conversation about different cultures is really more developed in

the modern world but again it's not to say that people didn't think about that back then because bar Daesan of Edessa was a third century heretic who wrote a text called the book of the laws of the countries and it was an anthropological study of you know and and you know Aristotle and All these other pope they also wrote these you know kind of kind of proto anthropological studies trying to explain why different people do different things so again an ancient world thought in culture but I think we've advanced it we at least we have

it at a higher level now but even still we don't always I was sharing this example in the in the class here later this is a this is a generalization right I don't know if anybody else has ever seen this Or experienced this but again I'm black and white so I traverse a lot of black and white worlds and one thing I've noticed is generalization not true for everybody but I've noticed that a lot of black churches tend to be a lot more lively than their worship and in the preaching and in the interaction right

and a lot of white churches tend to be a little bit more reserved and quiet right I would argue that there's a cultural value system at play that's not for Everybody right but nothing's for everybody right there's generalizations to everything and so I would say there's a cultural value system at play that in African and African descended cultures in interaction and in call and response and in there's I think there's a cultural value in among many African people in African descent of people that if you are to demonstrate that you're in agreement with and appreciating

what's Being said you vocalize that and you show it verbally thank you come on somebody but and I would say that in many European and European descended cultures and Asian cultures was the opposite that you communicate respect and you communicate a tenderness by listening and being quiet right and so those are two different values that actually our opposite you know and so but the problem comes when we judge one another right and another thing I've Seen right is a lot of judgment going both ways I've seen a lot of black people judge white churches and

say there's they're dead they don't got the Holy Spirit they're not saying nothing they're just quiet they're not yeah I must have been preaching good there you know and and they or they must not really be listen to the Holy Spirit and and it's a judgement that you can't say that you don't know you don't know that but it's a judgement based on your Cultural values and the same thing happens to the way why are they so loud in church why are they putting so much attention on the pastor and the choir it's a big

showmanship it's all it's all emotionalism and no and no meat Baba it's again judging people's cultures when you don't even have the language to judges exactly what happened at callous evening I think I mean that gets into another big topic about you know our all church is called to be multi-ethnic like The book what's the book united by faith like ten years ago the like they argued or is there a place for mono-ethnic churches especially they have a particular mission to them to reach a particular people group and so that's what that's a that's a

big issue I think it depends on what you know what is the mission of the church that you've stepped into what's their kind of goal but I do think that if a church is going to be multi-ethnic and not just say that It is you know just for marketing or whatever and say yeah we're multi I think we have like you know two Nigerian families and a Korean international student and you know 98% white people I'm like okay come on really but uh if you were if we're if we're actually believe that God has called

us to be intentionally multi-ethnic then I do think it has to be very intentional and I would say that we have to be very careful not to assimilate to any Particular culture and the way that they you know simple we have to bring our own authentic voices because again when I look at revelation 7:9 I you know John saw and we see and we hear of of a heavenly multitude where everyone's authentic flavor is all there right so we like to use the salad bowl analogy but God doesn't want a salad bowl where you just

drench the whole thing in ranch sauce and now every single thing that once had its own flavor all tastes like Ranch sauce right and that's a that's kind of what we have going on where we we have assimilation going and again it just depends on the calling but I would say if that's the call of that church then I would say that you don't want to do that yeah right yeah I think um you know room here oh here we go thank you Jesus need an eraser sorry if you didn't get this but I think

again going to well I would say I would say I'm not necessarily you know don't really necessarily feel like I can speak to what other people should or shouldn't be connected to in ancient times I will say from I will speak for myself that as a scholar of Ethiopian and ancient Egyptian and Nubian Christianity and like who I'd live in breathing's the stuff all day every day I haven't chosen to convert to this particular expression of Christianity not that I have a problem I see it as my brothers and Sisters in Christ at a Trinitarian

and believe in Jesus is the only way and the Bible the Word of God so they're my brothers in Christ but but I also really appreciate the rich history of the african-american church and and that I really connect with a lot more culturally and and so I don't I I don't personally approach it in kind of a kind of like a neo Orthodox way of like going back to ancient stuff but when I look for me when I look at this history of a People who though they were being subjugated and they definitely did wrong

too but at the end of the day they were actually the ones being killed and and persecuted and I I find inspiration especially on this side of the translating slave trade and this side of the in comiendo system and mission schools among Native Americans and powder ATO systems in India and in the Caribbean and the list goes on and on of you know manifest destiny that the ways In which you know ways in which the this again not white Christianity and white expressions of Christianity is good and great and that's been here since since the

Bible and going forward but a white or any dominant church is what I'm saying is the problem and that's what has created the problem and so for me I don't see it as a means of going back to or trying to reclaim or connect with something from a long time ago but I see it more as inspiration for those of us On the on this side of of colonialism and slavery and the implication of mission Western missions with colonialism and the the residue and the difficulty that that has made it for Christians in various parts

of Asia Africa Polynesia and South America it's a very hard thing for Christians right because because Christianity is still seen largely as a Western white American what everyone called it religion it makes it hard for Christians who live in the non West right we talked about you know Philip Jenkins you know great book next Christian time talking about how Christian is a global religion right now one thing I like to point out is that well yes that's true but it's always been a global religion right it's not becoming a global religion it's been a global

religion since day one since the books in the New Testament Since Old Testament but but we're seeing it go into new places and maybe we're feeling the effects of that global global this more visibly but it's always been a global religion and but again this side of colonialism and slavery much of the non Western Christian world has has their roots in Western colonialism and/or slavery and so now we have to try to work to disentangle that and figure out again what is our seat in the theatre not not towards Ethnocentrism or not towards an idolatry

of our cultural identity but to truly own who we are in the way that God intended us to and not feel that we have to assimilate to another expression of Christianity just because it's better cuz that's still a problem even as Christianity is blowing up all over the world it's very often a Western American kind of white expression of Christianity that's being practiced in many different countries in the world and we got to Think about what does that look like to you know what does it look like to non-christians in that particular place like the

you know Gospels blowing up in China and yes and praise God for that right but it's it's very very often in house churches in international churches and the government churches it's often a very westernized expression of Christianity and so non-christians who see that they're they don't see they don't see their fellow oftentimes don't See their fellow Chinese citizens who converted to Christianity as they don't see it as oh you've made a theological conversion or you've followed Jesus know you've become American you become Western you joined a Western religion and that dynamic is all over the

place I just use that one example and so I think that's that's for me what the value in looking at this stuff that is pre-colonial that even precedes Kind of westernizing Christianity right I'm not talking I'm not say anything about Western Christian time what westernizing Christianity is the problem that this stuff shows us that that there are Christians that are Asian Christians in China a movie and getting to that but Christians in China since the six hundreds Christians in India since the 200s and and you know Christians in the Arabian Peninsula since the 300s and

all of these expressions of Christianity Were in this these urban parts the world and sometimes even fought against attempts at westernizing and so I don't I don't think we should be looking to this to spread this unity or discord but I do think we can look at the the meat that we can glean and spit out the bones spit out the bones of violence and and and and and you know all these other kind of things but I think we can take the meat of that God is calling us as a play especially again giving

greater Honors to the parts that lack it I think that Christians of color in particular really need to do we need to do work to start to really contextualize our our theology our worship the way we do church in a way that embraces a lot of our ancestry and our culture and our identity in ways that I mean just giving example our friends at our Native American with the North American Institute of indigenous theological studies and this is a network a Coalition of Native American biblical Christians who are contextualized in the gospel and they're figuring

out they're deciding for themselves like into obviously through the leadership of the Holy Spirit but not with another group deciding for them what they can and can't keep and take right and so they're having sweat lodges in Jesus name as a way of worshiping Jesus and they have Christian totem poles right but they get pushed back not only from white Christians but from other native Christians who tell them you can't do that because that's not that's not part of you know that's that's that's a pagan thing that has its roots in paganism and then they'll

come back and say okay well what about Christmas trees and what about Christmas wreaths and what about the name Easter right Western Christianity is littered with pagan pre-christian anglo-saxon European imagery and language and we Fused with crochet and to the point we forgot about that right and that's okay that's okay that's it that's a we you know when when when Christianity came into Germania and and you know the Saxons began to become Christians a lot of them under pain of death but but they began to contextualize the gospel and talk about Jesus as the as

the warrior and began to and then they instead of worshiping trees they use that to you know celebrate Christmas trees that's Fine but why can't Native American brothers do the same thing with totem poles and why can't you know Christians around the world do do similar ways of contact we have to we have to avoid the extremes of again if the gospel invites us to embrace our culture and reject it at the same time then we can't only do one of those right and I think the first step is we need to recognize our culture

we need to be able to acknowledge it and that's hard as for the dominant culture It's I think I think non-white people can acknowledge and recognize white culture better than white people can yeah you know because it's like trying to explain water to a fish right if you're you know or another analogy that was used once is that it's like trying to explain to a right-handed person the way that the world is really made for for right-handed people trying to explain because you don't see it but when you're left-handed you see it and You're reminded

of it every day I'm not I'm right-handed and I don't ever think about the fact that I'm right-handed and you know when you're in the dominant culture you just don't think about it and so I think that's the extra step that our white brothers and sisters in Christ will often have is to first acknowledge the cultural difference and be able to discern the difference well is this a biblical value or is this actually just my cultural Value and know the difference because they're not always the same but then for all of us to embrace and

that includes our white brothers all of us to be able to embrace who we are in Christ and to transform it at the same time yet in the back end mm-hmm yeah I think I think that that was definitely a factor and I think we have to we have I say this only because of issues in scholarship that we have to be careful how far we understand that to have played a role in the fifth Century christological controversies there's a whole kind of field of scholarship that that really reduced a lot of these Christological controversies

so just being kind of political or nationalistic you know there's maize I mean I'm just being crass and summarizing but a lot of early late antique and and patristic scholarship basically just kind of summarized coptic in Syriac and our median Christology and this resistance That we're seeing they just kind of characterize it and summarize it as well they were just nationalist they didn't they didn't really care about orthodoxy or theology they just cared about you know the Alexandrian church being on top and the Antiochian turks being on top and the roman church has cared about

them being on top and they came out the winner you know in the roman empire again so lucio test found was a whole other you know kind of bishop but that We need to have another lecture on but and so so certainly there was that vying for power because part of the canons of cal Seton was also recognizing that's when that this is when you finally start to see the idea that Rome and that the bishop the the the seat of Peter is above other apostles that wasn't really part of earlier Christianity there was a

sense of which Peter was kind of the rock and that he was you know had a certain primacy but there wasn't a sense In which he is over other apostles but that's when you start to see that come to the fore at Cal Seton and then and these you know you kind of had these major cities the Penn turkey like consent noble and and Rome and so even between the two of them even at Cal scene you started to see the seeds of dissent grow between them that was political and they ended up splitting in

the 11th century it was also a theological over the Filioque Controversy and so I I say that it was it was that to a degree but it even but also it was also genuinely theological at the same time and we see that in this text any sects that I've shown you that you know you know you don't necessarily see kind of a at least stated I mean it was definitely there but what we see stated in the writings of Timothy ealer is Daniel skaters Abraham afar shoot is this sense in which they were motivated by

the fact that they felt that the Caledonian church was perverting the gospel and that they were they were defiling the Incarnation in their in their theological description of it they felt that they were dividing Jesus and to that's not what they were doing but that's how they felt and so that's really what their main motivation was but uh but yeah but I do think the politics was a part of it and of course we need to you know today make sure that we don't fall into those same traps and We you know of course we

need to be socially and civically engaged but not in a way that's partisan right because we understand that that in Christ there is no democrat or republican discover who you're called to be at Biola University a leading christ-centered University in Los Angeles with programs on campus and online subscribe for more of our videos and learn more at biola.edu [Music]