Note: Can I Say This at Church is produced for audio listening. If able, I strongly encourage you to listen to the audio, which has inflection, emotion, sarcasm where applicable, and emphasis for points that may not come across well in written word. This transcript is generated using a combination of my ears and software, and may contain errors. Please check the episode for clarity before quoting in print.
Jared 0:00
Some of these things are just…they become apparent when you read the Bible really carefully. And I think that's really the challenge. You don't have to be a scholar to realize that the days of creation don't match. And that there's contradictions in the two creation narratives. You don't have to be a Hebrew scholar to just know that because you can see that in English. You know, and the same with noticing that David kills Goliath and then Elhanan kills Goliath. Like you can read that in English. And so I think it's not so much do we know Hebrew it's have we been reading our Bible carefully? We usually inherit a certain framework for what the Bible is, what these stories mean, from a very young age. And so I think we kind of turn our brains off by the time we are teenagers, and in our 20s, and we no longer read the Bible carefully. We just reaffirm and concretize that interpretation we've always been receiving since we were kids. So I'm a big advocate for you not to be scholar but if you take your time, and just read the Bible carefully, you'll run into a lot of problems. And I mean that in the best possible way.
Seth Price 1:18
Hey, everybody, welcome back. I am Seth, and I'm so glad that you are here. Before we get going, would you do me a favor? As of recording this I think there's 98 reviews on iTunes. Let's just make that 100. It's one of those things that the algorithms decide, oh, other people like this. And so this new person looking for, you know, a podcast, talking about God, you know, they may enjoy this. And so that's, I'm sure it's a small part, but go ahead and rate and review the show on iTunes. I would appreciate it, you would appreciate me appreciating it. I feel like you would. Anyway, a couple other brief announcements, so remember, really appreciate it if you would think about supporting the show on Patreon. This show could not be done without the support of the patron supporters. Man, there's no way to adequately describe the impact that we all do that I've had on just this shows ability to continue and you know, my life personally and the relationships that have grown from that. And so let me encourage you jump into that if you've ever been on the fence or the show speaks to you in any way, I would greatly appreciate it. There is also, I decided I wanted some merchandise for myself, and so I made that and you'll find that at Can I Say This At Church.com, you'll click a button that says store and a couple different things. Check that out. See if you find something you like. And if you don't let me know, and I will figure out how to make it. Anyway, here we go.
The conversation today is Jared Byas and we talk about truth. We talk about the Old Testament we talk about certainty. And we talk about idolatry because all of those things can be idolatrous, but mostly certainty in the way that we view truth. It's a very fun conversation. I laugh quite a bit in it. And those are always near and dear to my heart. And as you'll hear in the beginning of the episode, Jared coming back is deeply meaningful because well, I don't want to spoil it. You'll literally hear it in the first few minutes of the episode. So here we go. I'm gonna roll the tape with Jared Byas.
Seth Price 3:45
Jared Byas, welcome back to the show, man. I'm gonna firstly say, thank you, but you'll understand why in a minute. So I think I told you last time, but you're actually the first person that said “yes” to come onto the show. And so I don't know what episode this will be when this airs. Let's say 95 and if it's not, then I'm not fixing that in the edit. (But) A lot of that is because you said yes. As opposed to discouraging this idiot from Virginia. So, welcome back to the show, man.
Jared 4:10
Hey, that's…I really appreciate that. Absolutely. Yeah, it's my honor. I mean, I had I remember distinctly remember having a great time, and especially Seth, you're just genuine curiosity and humility in the process. So that stuck out to me for sure. So it's great to be back on.
Seth Price 4:26
Well, what has changed? I don't necessarily need your story of you. Because for those that want to hear that, I think it's like Episode 2, 1, 3, 4, something like that. It's been a long time ago, almost two years, which doesn't seem like it's been that long. So what has changed, you know, from 2017 to now-what's new in your world?
Jared 4:43
Well, you know, the podcast The Bible for Normal People has, I think we've remained pretty consistent in our mission to bring the best in Biblical scholarship to everyday people. And so I don't think a lots changed there. I'm still really passionate about that. And I think I've maybe gotten better at talking to normal people. But I think that's, that's about it. I mean, I'm working through a book right now. And just thinking of like, all the concepts that are come to mind are the concepts that I've really been trying to work out for probably the last seven or eight years since I left being a pastor. And yeah, so I'm just trying to continue to work all that out.
Seth Price 5:25
Yeah. What qualifies someone as a normal people? What are the minimum parameters to be a normal people?
Jared 5:30
We get that all the time. It's like, well I listen to your podcast, but I don't know if I'm normal. Of course, all we mean by that is someone who didn't go to seminary and doesn't know all the big words and still wants to learn how to be a faithful Christian but doesn't necessarily have the pedigree. And so we want to bring all these really smart concepts that can be helpful to people and just translate them for everyday people.
Seth Price 5:58
I had someone, a friend of mine, that went to seminary that said, what I'm doing with this is like a miniature version of seminary in real time. And I don't know if I agree with that, because I've never been to seminary, but being that you do something similar, is it?
Jared 6:13
Yeah, I think so. I mean, I really think that is the mission. I think. I do agree. I think you do the same thing. And, but in actually in sometimes a more entertaining format, and in a way that's a little bit more accessible, relatable.
Seth Price 6:29
I hope so. I figured I would start out with a very important question. And that's going to be Carson Wentz. I feel like we said this last time but I don't know how you're an Eagles fan being from Texas but I mean…
Jared 6:43
You’re gonna get me into trouble with all my family. Hopefully doesn't listen to this.
Seth Price 6:48
Well, I'm assuming that they know that you're an Eagles fan.
Jared 6:50
They do its just that we don't talk about that. You're bringing it out.
Seth Price 6:54
Well, I mean, that's they can
Jared 6:56
Thanks a lot.
Seth Price 6:58
Just hit fast forward by 30 seconds (Jared chuckled) So how do you feel about him? Because you'll have like four quarterbacks and you want to pay all of them QB 1 kind of money. And that has nothing to do with church or the Bible. But I don't care.
Jared 7:12
Thats is how you win championships?
Seth Price 7:15
Is it though?
Jared 7:16
Well, I don't know..let's just check two years ago, I think…Oh, I see. Yeah. (Chuckles)
Seth Price 7:21
Oh. I see
Well, I think that you're you had a rookie getting paid nothing that did the job of a guy that busted his knee. Getting paid all the money. Just got all the money.
Jared 7:30
(Huge laughter) Yes, yes. Yeah. I'm not sure how I feel about that at this point. I am learning through also being a 76’s fan that you have to trust the process.
Seth Price 7:40
How did you get all-in on Philly teams?
Jared 7:43
Well, I'm still very much loyal to the Mavericks. I actually flew out to see Dirk’s last game just two months ago.
Seth Price 7:51
I saw that somewhere, you put a picture up of an airplane.
Jared 7:57
I’m definitely still loyal to the Mavericks. But I'm saying 76er’s fan too. But I grew up hating the Cowboys. So it just was so fitting to me that that I ended up in Philadelphia.
Seth Price 8:07
I had a guy asked me once he's like, why the Cowboys? You know, you're in Virginia now and you still root for him? I'm like, Well, when I grew up, it was the Oilers, or the Cowboys, and the Oilers were so good that they packed up shop, change your name, and move to Tennessee. So it wasn't the Oilers.
Jared 8:24
But that's why I didn't like Dallas. I didn't like Dallas, because they were always so good. And I just didn't like football. But that's all anyone ever wanted to talk about.
Seth Price 8:32
It's Texas. So yeah, um, so question. So while I have you on, I feel like and correct me if I'm wrong. where you're at, would you lean more towards a more of an expert, and we use those terms less loosely, a better versed in Old Testament as opposed to New Testament, correct?
Jared 8:56
Correct.
Seth Price 8:57
Yeah. So I have a lot of people tell me that when we read the Bible, and so we could define what the Bible is but lets not, that do it in a narrative way. What does that even mean? Like I was talking with a guy the other day. And he said the same thing is like, yeah, it's not written this way. We read it wrong. Formatting matters. Everything matters. And so you need to read it as a narrative. But there's multiple narratives, and there's multiple types of literature. And so how do I read it in a narrative way? What does that even mean?
Jared 9:21
Right? Well, there's the idea of narrative theology, which I think someone like Daniel Kirk, who we've had on the podcast does a really good job with in the New Testament. And he talks about it through Mark and doing narrative theology in that way. But yeah, I agree. I think there's a few ways to look at that one is making sure we understand the Bible is literature. And so there are ways in which we are triggered to read certain things certain ways. So I think it's important to recognize (that) the Bible is literature. That was a big thing. I think probably in the 80s and early 90s of this like renaissance of “Oh, yeah. Hey, guys, the Bible is literature, and all the things that you know about literature they apply to the Bible too”.
So you know, things like I had a professor who constantly said is like a mantra that says, genre triggers reading strategy. So meaning if you know the genre that triggers the strategy used to read it. And so it's really important to identify the genre of what you're reading. So if you're reading poetry you have to understand Hebrew poetry and how that would have been written and understood at that time. And if it's supposed to be, you know, like, I wanted to put some things like historical fiction, which would have been not a genre that they would have recognized. And that's I think, where we also get into trouble is we have all these categories now that they just wouldn't have had back then.
And so in some scientific, or historical critical way or literary criticism, it helps us to identify it. We put in our categories, but we have to realize that that's that is anachronistic meaning back then they wouldn't have understood what we were talking about. So they blend and blurred things. Like for instance, we would maybe consider the, the historical books, we call them the historical books. I think it's very telling that in the Jewish Bible, they call it the former prophets. Things like Samuel and Kings. Samuel and Kings aren't historical books in the Jewish tradition they are the former prophets. And so that's an important distinction, like we've already pigeonholed what it is by calling them the historical book, Samuel Kings. And also, you know, interestingly enough, kind of going down that same rabbit trail, in the Jewish Bible, the last books of the Bible are 1 and 2 Chronicles. They end with 1 and 2 Chronicles, for very, like purposeful reasons. But in the Jewish Bible, there's three sections you have your Torah, which is your law and instructions, the first five books, you have your Nevi'im, which are the prophets, which include things like Samuel and Kings, and you have the Ketuvim, which is just the writings. And Chronicles isn’t in the writings it's in the other stuff. And actually that says a lot again. So for if we are linking that genre triggers reading strategy, I always like looking at how the, how Judaism categorizes its texts because they just have such a deeper, in my understanding, usually a deeper, richer tradition. And it says a lot. Like Daniel isn't in the prophets its in the Ketuvim. And so that says something about how they held those books.
And just to kind of finish that thought that's why if you go to Barnes and Noble and look for Jewish Bible, it's called the Tanakh. And that's because it's those three sections TNK, stand for Torah, Nevi’im, and Ketuvim.
Seth Price 12:50
So that's an acronym, I didn’t know that. Well, I don't know if acronyms the right word.
Jared 12:55
Right that’s why I didn’t use it. I think it's an acronym right.
Seth Price 12:58
But why don't know what the “a” in there matter. Maybe they're just It doesn't matter.
Jared 13:02
Yeah, those are just vowels to get you to say it correctly.
Seth Price 13:06
Yeah. That's the phonetic pronunciation of the three letters. Yeah. So I've never heard that about Chronicles. I've heard that about the Tanakh. But honestly, it was only maybe in the last two, three years. So I got a copy of Bibliotheca. And he has brick…broken…brick…desegregated. I don't know what the word is—reordered it in a very different way. And so I found myself as I was reading, taken out of context, or what I thought would be there was not there. And it did change like it changed I don't know if it changed the way that I read Scripture because it was in a different order, or if it changed it because it forced me to think about things in a different pattern. I don't actually know. But why does that matter? Like Chronicles being at the end why does that matter?
Jared 13:49
Well, it matters for two reasons. One would be it's very interesting that the Christian Bible ends with these Minor Prophets that basically quote unquote, prophesied the coming of the Messiah. So you in the Old Testament with his trajectory toward the New Testament, that's very intentional. Where Chronicles with a retelling of the history of Israel in a post exotic setting. And so the questions that Chronicles is answering, the questions Chronicles are answering, are different than the questions that kings is answering. So there's no doubt that Chronicles is, is basically sitting there with kings open and rewriting that narrative.
And it's clear that as you read through that there's a reason why Chronicles looks the way it does. It's asking different questions. So if Kings is asking the question, why are we in exile? So Samuel-Kings seems to be a book that's asking that question. Why are we in exile? And that's why the kings in that story are so bad. And the classic example of this is King Manasseh, who's like the worst king. Who commits all these atrocities and leads Israel into idolatry and it ends with him being despised and an abomination in God's eyes. And then Chronicles has this telling of Manasseh, where he's actually taken down to Babylon. And then he repents, and then God restores my Manasseh and all is well. Well, that's not in Kings. That's not how that story happens. They're like, those are not the same story of this king, Manasseh. And the reason is, is because Chronicles is written at a different time with a different purpose in mind. The question now isn't, why are we in exile? Because Chronicles is written post exilic it's written after the exile and we’ve come back into the land and now the question are we still God’s people now they're in this desolated space?
And they've just been the very thing that they thought God had promised back in Samuel, 2 Samuel 7, I guess, 14 or 14:7, you know, that they will have forever King from the line of David sitting on the throne. They didn't have that. They were thrown into exile for you know, several decades. They come back. And now they're wondering what…what just happened? Are we still God's people?
And so that's why you would expect then the very boring for us beginning of Chronicles is just chapter after chapter after chapter of genealogy, because they're trying to connect their story with the pre exilic people and asking that question are we still God’s people? And so the story of Manasseh is an answer to that story. Yes. Manasseh repents, even the worst can still come back and still be connected to God's people and still be a part of this grand thing.
So I think that's important to recognize why Chronicles then is at the end is because it's asking that question, which is a much more rich and important question, meaningful question for the Israelites at that time.
Seth Price 16:47
I want to clarify something in Chronicles it's still not giving you the genealogy or it is? I still don't read the Old Testament as much as I should.
Jared 16:53
Yeah, Chronicles begins with this like chapter after chapter of genealogy.
Seth Price 16:55
So then how would that then relate for you and I with I believe it's Matthew that also begins with the genealogy all the way up? Although I feel like it's different than Chronicles, but um, this is from memory and I don't have it in front of me. Well, I have a different version that doesn't have verses in it in front of me, which won't be helpful. Is that intentional? Like, we're going to do this genealogy here. And then we're going to start in the New Testament with Matthew, we're going to do it again.
Jared 17:20
I mean, I would say it's very often that genealogies are trying to provide continuity. Trying to say we're connected this people before and we now as the audience of this are the same people and we are connected.
Seth Price 17:35
Thinking about the genres. So if we have 86 today, an arbitrary number, like how many mattered, you know, to the to the ancient near us, you know, the the Jews at the time, like if we're talking about the different genres that they're reading. And then yeah, how do I know that like as a normal people like how would I know like, how’s that even possible?
Jared 17:56
Yeah, well, you know, and this is where it's helpful, but also can be tricky because our translators do that work for us. So like, we had Robert Alter on the podcast not too long ago, he just spent 20 years retranslating the whole Old Testament. And one of his points he made was like, he doesn't like modern translations because they think that we're all dumb. So they make all these decisions for us, rather than just letting the text be what it is they sort of interpret it for us. And so it seems so small, you know, you talked earlier about what doesn't matter what order the books are in, but you don't even think about it when you open to Psalm and you see that it's formatted in a different way. It's set off like poetry.
Well, that genre triggers a reading strategy when you see that, just like if you hear the rustling of a newspaper, and it looks like a newspaper, and it's on that thin paper, and it's folded that way. And it's black and white. And you see the picture in the headline, you think “news”. And so you're going to read it in a certain way that says “news”. That's very different than when you get to the part of the newspaper that's in color, and there's these boxes that go across and you think, “oh, comic, that's a comic”. So it's like, almost subconsciously, we've changed our reading strategy without even thinking about it.
And the same is true when we see these things that tip us off in the Bible like, oh, now it's not in paragraph form. It's center justified. And it's line by line, we think poetry, and sometimes that's accurate. And there's some places in the Bible that's debatable, like, is this poetry or is this prose? And even that, I'm not sure…there's definitely some markers that they had something like poetry in the Hebrew Bible, but it doesn't look like ours. And some of those places are debatable whether this is poetry or whether it's prose.
Seth Price 19:41
This might be a question for like, Robert Alter, but there can't be a best version of the Bible, because they're all going to have a bias in the translation. And so, if we're going to read either, you know, the Apocrypha or the New Testament or the Old Testament, like how do we new nuance that? Like do I just need to get 17 versions of the Bible and read them all and figure out who's treating me less stupid, who's, you know, just looking for commonalities? How would one even go about doing that? Because I know most people, like I do know who Robert Alter is, but most people won't, or I do know through David Bentley Hart redid the New Testament, but most people won't. Most people were just going to go pick up that red leather bound in Barnes and Noble and then sit down with it.
Jared 20:25
Yeah. And I think that's okay. I mean, I think most New Testament, this is where I am, I'm not going to be a snob. Like I think that's okay. I do think the better translations or publishers of Bibles will footnote when they've made these decisions. So if you're reading the footnotes and you're reading, that's probably the best you'll get is being able to…
I think some of these things are just they become apparent when you read the Bible really carefully. I think that's really the challenge is you don't have to be a scholar to realize that the days of creation don't match. And that there's contradictions in the two creation narratives. You don't have to be a Hebrew scholar to just know that because you can see that in English. You know, and the same with noticing that David kills Goliath, and then Elhanan kills Goliath. Like you can read that in English.
And so I think it's not so much do we know Hebrew its have we been reading our Bible carefully? We usually inherit a certain framework for what the Bible is, what these stories mean, from a very young age. And so I think we kind of turn our brains off by the time we were teenagers, and in our 20s, and we no longer read the Bible carefully we just reaffirm and concretize that interpretation we've always been receiving since we were kids. So I'm a big advocate for you don't have to be a scholar but if you take your time and just read the Bible carefully, you'll run into a lot of problems. And I mean that in the best possible way.
Seth Price 21:57
No, I love the problems. This show is the results of those problems. And there's a bookshelf full of binders of notes and notes and notes. The problems are where I find Jesus.
Jared 22:12
Mm hmm!
Seth Price 22:13
But this is not a preaching show. So you have small kids as well, I saw one of them. I think recently do a backflip which scared the crap out of me on Instagram. I wasn't expecting that. I don't know what I was expecting. But it wasn't if you're listening. I don't know when it was and I don't know that it matters, but you can just troll Jared’s Instagram and
Jared 22:27
Yeah that terrified us to. I had no idea. It wasn't like, he wasn't like, Hey, watch me do a backflip. He just said Hey, watch this, and then he did a backflip.
Seth Price 22:36
I found myself thinking about that the other day. Somehow I saw it again. I must have been flipping through something and sometimes I get annoyed and I just hit it as fast as it can and it rolls for 10 seconds. That had to have been the second take or did he say get your phone video this watch this!
Jared 22:51
That was the second take. Yeah, that was the second one.
Seth Price 22:55
So you've got small kids. I have small kids. I've got a 10 year old and a 7 year old and how do I know Make sure that I'm pouring into them scripture in such a way that they don't check out at 15 or 12 and stop reading scripture carefully. Because I don't ever explain things well to my kids when they asked me a theological question, mostly because I'm realizing I don't really know the answer. And even if I did, there's probably three or four good ones and none of them that are right.
Jared 23:22
Well, I think what you said, I'm just gonna throw that back on you is I think there's a way so that you find Jesus in the problems. I think if you find the interesting thing in the warts and the imperfections of the text, we've just, I didn't grow up that way. I grew up thinking that the prettiest, most perfect Bible is the good Bible. And I just think that's not true in love. That's not true. Like, none of us have perfect spouses, but we come to love them not like in spite of those imperfections, but because of them. Those become the most endearing things once we are committed and we stay in that and we learn to love the people we see, because I think we need to learn to love the Bible we see. And over time, like, that's what's interesting to me. Those are the most engaging conversations I have with my kids, when we point out things, and when they say, Well, God created this and I'll say, Oh, yeah, in the first creation narrative, but in the second account, he's more intimate. And he does it this way. Oh, really? There's more though. Oh, man, that blows their mind. And it becomes interesting again, whenever, you know, questions, and uncertainties are interesting. We don't always like them. But they are very interesting.
And so for me, to keep me interested in the Bible, even when I was a kid, it was those curiosities I kept coming back too. Like, why is that like that? That doesn't make any sense. Right. If it all makes sense, and we just have it all buttoned up. I'm gonna get bored with it.
Seth Price 24:44
My middle child the other day, maybe you'll get a kick out of this. I was washing dishes and she looked at me She's like, was Adam and Eve last name Price? And I said, Why? And she's like, Well, our last names Price. And if they all I'm like, okay, no I don't know. No. I don't know. I don't know what to say to that. So, but I just I didn't even answer I just laughed like, it's just it was a naive question. Very funny. Very truthful. Very funny.
Jared 25:15
Yeah, I love using maybe and perhaps. I use that a lot with my kids.
Seth Price 25:21
You have, because you're a big deal now. I think I saw it on that black book. You're writing a book sometime now? Probably yesterday. Yeah, tomorrow. And from what i've gleaned from social media and reading in the margins, you're apparently dealing with truth and epistemology. Maybe I'm wrong. Hmm.
Jared 25:39
I don't use that term. But yeah.
Seth Price 25:43
Why?
Jared 25:44
Because it's not for normal people.
Seth Price 25:45
Epistemology,
Jared 25:46
Right
Seth Price 25:47
I didn't learn that word until I heard and maybe it was an episode of the Liturgists or Michael gore has a song called epistemological breakdown. And it sounds like a robot. I don't know if you've heard it or not.
Yeah, I'm not even going to try it here. I don't even know where it is, but they were talking about truth. And then you just hear a mix in. It was like a robotic banjofied song that just said epistemological breakdown. And as it as it saying, it broke further down into dissonant chords, it was just beautiful. And then I was like, well, what is this?
When you say truth, what angle are you going at? And what does that even mean? Because most people would say truth is relative to what I think is true.
Jared 26:46
Most people would say that?
Seth Price 26:47
I think so. I think most people I think most people would would if they were honest with themselves, they'll say that things are true, but the way that they act about things that are true is in deeply personal and has nothing to do with other people. I don't knew that they would say it out loud. But they're saying it with the way that they live, myself included. So what do we mean when we say true?
Jared 27:06
Yeah, well, I, you know, we're in an interesting time because we're also in a space with like alternative facts and people denying sort of scientific findings and evidence based claims. So I want to be careful on that side of things that I respect that and I want to not go against those things. But I also think we've made truth in idol, at least for me growing up in the church. That, like, what I was actually after was being certain about what's true. And that's what saves us if we get the things right, if we get the facts right about Jesus raising up from the dead. That's where salvation is. And that's what Christianity is all about, is getting the facts right.
Well, when we look at the Bible, it actually doesn't use truth in that way at all or very rarely. Primarily, in the Bible, at least truth is a very ethical term. Truth is a verb. So you do truth, you walk in truth, it doesn't over talk about believing in the truth. I mean, Jesus and John 14 says he is the truth, I am the way, the truth, and the life. What does that mean? Like, for some reason we have immediately translated that to mean, if you believe these facts about me, then you get into heaven. But that's not actually what it says says I am the way the truth and the life.
I don't actually even know what that means. I don't know what it means for a person to be the truth. And so what that that's where it started for me was thinking through, Oh, Jesus is the truth. Uh….what! Like it started short circuiting in my mind and had an epistemological breakdown, if you will, and started wondering, you know, and then even in our common sense, so what I what I'm doing in the book is breaking down some of the common ways we use the word truth. And helping us clarify that we often mean like facts; so truth facts, but then we also mean things that are meaningful. So when we say things like, that's true for me or that, you know, speaking my truth, we're talking about things that are significant to us. And that's not the same thing as facts, but it's maybe not less important than facts.
And then there's also this thing called wisdom truth. And these are just common ways that we use that phrase. And so I trace that through the Bible, and talk about how little the Bible talks about fact truths. It's really not interested in facts. It doesn't address them. It doesn't talk about facts as facts. I mean, that's a very enlightenment, post, sort of, rationalistic way of thinking about the world. And it's much more interested in the ethics of truth. Truth as honesty, truth as integrity, truth as acts of righteousness. Those are what it means to be truthful. And and so I try to recapture the ethics of truth telling. And it really is around this phrase that I used as a weapon. I used it as a weapon and it was used on me as a weapon telling the truth in love. And basically, which meant, the most important thing to do is tell the truth and if you can try to do it in a kind way. And I just think that's counter to what I see in the Bible.
Seth Price 30:16
What place do facts hold them for the church today? If truth is the way that we act our practices, as opposed to our doctrine, and I'm probably using doctrine wrongly, they're metaphorically comparing it to truth and you can correct me if I am. But what place two facts hold?
Jared 30:38
Well, I think facts are…I think facts are important, but I think that they are subservient to love. And so I think that it's not, which are more important. It's which one's driving, which is to be master. And I think we've put, again, idolatry for me is we've put—nowhere in the Scriptures is to say God is truth, it says Jesus is truth. But it does say God is love. And so I think there's something about a matter of emphasis and priority. So I do I mean, I'm all about facts. You know, I taught philosophy, I'm very interested in facts. However, I think we've bought into this idea, I think, from the right side of the spectrum and the left side of the spectrum, I call it the vending machine theory of facts. That somehow the world will be perfected when we get the facts about it, right. And I think that's just a naive, one dimensional, way of looking at the world. That's just not true. It's a very modernistic understanding of the world that the world is a machine. It's like this Rube Goldberg machine. It's perfectly set up. And if we just get the facts, right, if we just put that quarter in the vending machine, and we push the right numbers, outcomes, utopia!
And I think that's a un-nuanced, mechanical, view of the world, which would only be true if we were all robots. And we're not robots. And so I think that's important. But I think it's not a good use of our energy and resource be spending all of our talk. I mean, it goes even as basic as education, with our emphasis on STEM. And it's all about getting these students to learn mathematics and engineering and technology and science. And these are the things that will lead to this utopia. And yet we have not taught civics, and how to disagree, and how to respect and how to show civility and how to be kind. Like, I think those are just as important. And so I think it's just a matter of emphasis.
Seth Price 32:42
One of the questions I get often is, you know, listeners are sitting in their churches and then they'll hear a sermon, or there'll be talking after church at you know, lunch or whatever, Cracker Barrel because we're in the south, why not? And when someone says something that is truthful, but also entirely against I would call the heart of God. Like just is not like the way that you know our country, postures itself towards immigrants or that type of stuff? The question I get often is, well, how do I then have a discourse in a loving way? Because real quickly it devolves into that side of the family goes to that restaurant, and we're just gonna stay here
Jared 33:19
So why do you think it devolves?
Seth Price 33:22
From what you said earlier, like, people just don't know how to have arguments anymore. And I don't mean arguments in the yelling way. I mean, arguments in less structure, what I believe in why, and leave space in the middle. But I don't know how to tell people to do that. Like I don't like how would you practice that?
Jared 33:40
Well, I wouldn't ever tell someone how to do that. I would just invite them to…
Seth Price 33:45
Well (then) how do you do that?
Jared 33:47
I ask a lot of questions. And I ask a lot of questions because I always want to make sure that I understand first. I want to understand at a deep heart level where people are and why they are the way they are. And I think that's just so important. A lot of people just want to be heard. And they want to make sure that you understand their argument and why they're saying what they're saying. So, you know, there's a phrase I use a lot, it's just active listening, which is being able to repeat back to someone what you've heard, and make sure that the other person agrees with your interpretation of what they're saying, before you say anything about your own opinions. So I do that a lot of just saying, “Okay, let me make sure I'm hearing you, right. Is this what you're saying”? And if they say, “No, no, no”, then I keep listening to them until I get their position, right, in a way that they would agree with it.
Otherwise, we end up with these strawmen, where I'm arguing against something that they didn't even say. I'm just arguing against the most extreme example of what they said. And I find that really unhelpful, because it also comes back to why are we even talking? I don't talk to people to convince them of anything. I gave up on that a long time ago, I talked to people because I want to connect with them at a heart level, I want to be heard, and I want to hear them. And, for me, if that's the goal, then there's not as long as we're still talking, my goals being met, I don't need you to come to certain conclusions. I don't need you to want me to come to certain conclusions. I genuinely want you to feel heard and valued. And I want to feel heard and valued. So I think if we can keep those in mind we could do a lot better with the conversations.
Seth Price 35:30
So then how do we take it past the conversations? And I do want to bubble back up to a rabbit trail that you're talking about with utopia, because I like rabbit trails, but I want to stay on this thread for a minute. So you know, if I'm hearing you and let's say that you and I are vehemently disagreeing on why the Cowboys are better than the Eagles! And so I'm hearing you, you're hearing me we understand the Oilers were a dumpster on fire. And so that's why
Jared 35:54
Except for Warren Moon of course.
Seth Price 35:55
Yeah, but then he went to Minnesota and that I mean, he lost any credibility because it's like Emmitt Smith going to the Cardinals like, why would want…anyway. So like, I'm not going to bend, you're not going to bend. And it's trivial because it's sports. But when it's the way that we do church, or women in ministry, or the way that we raised children, or the way that we do our politics, or whatever matters to us, at a deeper level than sports, if I'm understanding what you're saying, and I can genuinely see where you're coming from, and I just believe that you're lost your flippin mind in the same what then?
Jared 36:34
Then, for me at least, I value being able to stay in your life over anything else, so it's fine. And this is will get me into trouble I think sometimes with my more progressive friends. But always in the back of my mind. I have these pages from Simone de Beauvoir, who wrote this book called The Ethics of Ambiguity. And in there, it's very Nietzschean. So Nietzsche says, you know, be careful when you stare into the abyss that it doesn't stare back into you. And Simone de Beauvoir in The Ethics of Ambiguity talks about these different kinds of people who engage in the world. And one of them, like, thinks they're doing good to build this sort of social revolution. But the means by which they do it, is to undermine the whole goal.
So if the way I engage with you isn't building the kind of world I want to be in, then the ends don't justify the means. Because it's just not logical that I'm going to build a more loving world by being angry and hateful. Even if I think I'm right about any of it that the process is just as important as the goal. And so you can't build you know, utopia with dystopian tactics.
And so for me, I always want to be the kind of person-I always want to act in a way that is modeling the kind of world I want to be in. So that's it for me is, at the end of the day, I value most keeping people in my life and having them understand I love them and I value them. So it doesn't matter. I mean, most of my family would disagree vehemently with most of my theology, and most of my politics, and that's okay. Like, it's okay. It's not okay that it sometimes can be discriminating. And I don't condone, you know, racism or bigotry in any of that. And so that's where it's, but I don't have to condone it to love people who aren't yet there. And it's also understanding that we're all on a journey. Like if I had people condemning me that I wasn't like supremely woke 15 years ago, I wouldn't be where I am now. Because that would have been such a turn off and I would have just retreated to my cave and like retrenched back into my beliefs. But instead, I had people inviting me into conversation and being generous with me and being forgiving when I didn't understand something, and when I said the wrong thing, and I use the wrong words, and that's what for me brings about change. It's not the rigid lines that we draw. And then we draw so many lines that eventually we're the only ones in our own box. And the only person who actually agrees with me is me.
Seth Price 39:25
I've never heard that. Is that you?
We draw so many lines. We're the only people in our own box.
Jared 39:35
Oh, I don't know. I just made that up.
Seth Price 39:37
I like it. I'm taking it.
Jared 39:39
Sure. I mean, I don't think I have any original thoughts. I'm sure.
Seth Price 39:39
(laughter from both)
I'm plagiarizing it from you plagiarized it. No, I won't.
Jared 39:42
Yes. That's all scholarship is just plagiarizing. We just changed the words a little bit.
Seth Price 39:48
Yeah. So I want to center on that word, utopia. So when you say utopia, what I think about is heaven. And when I think about heaven, I think about Shalom and the Kingdom of God.
Jared 40:00
Oh that is good! I still think about like, angels singing really boring songs and how I was so baffling as a kid like, why would I want to go there?
Seth Price 40:10
I'm gonna try this then why do you think that?
Jared 40:12
What do I think what?
Seth Price 40:13
You said you when someone says he would disagree with you try to ask more questions I said, so I thought I would try that about that about the angels. (Jared laughs) But that's what I think. And so when you say utopia, I'm assuming that you're saying that that's, you said it a few times. So that's like a goal, like ultimately all things. Can we just call that reconcilement? Or am I misusing what you're saying?
Jared 40:33
Yeah, I mean, I'm saying that a lot of people I think I would actually argue that utopia is not a good goal. I think more warfare violence has happened in the name of utopia than anything else.
Seth Price 40:45
I don't mean utopia is a governmental sense. I mean, it as a Jesus' sense of reconciling this.
Jared 40:53
How do you do that without government?
Seth Price 40:55
Oh, I don't know. I have no idea. The question I was going towards though is the…(Jared chuckles) I have no idea because I'm using utopia in a bad way because I'm not good at segues. So if I'm…here we go, I'm gonna call utopia the kingdom of heaven.
Jared 41:14
Okay
Seth Price 41:15
So is that something that Christ is pulling us towards or God is sending towards us?
Jared 41:23
Oh, I think God's sending toward us for sure if we want to use that language. I mean, I really like Jesus saying the kingdom of heaven is at hand. The Kingdom is here and now. And so I'm not one for thesiology to use a not normal word.
Seth Price 41:40
How many episodes of the Bible for Normal People as of June 10 do you have like what are y'all at?
Jared 41:47
I think we're at 90.
Seth Price 41:51
That's impressive considering you do less than the summer right, don't you?
Jared 41:56
Yeah, we go every other week in the summer.
Seth Price 41:57
Yeah, that's a good idea. I should probably try that.
Jared 41:58
Yeah, in September we'll hit Episode 100.
Seth Price 42:03
What's the party going to be?
Jared 42:05
We're doing it on Genesis and it's coinciding with our relaunch of Genesis For Normal People the book.
Seth Price 42:11
Is there new stuff?
Jared 42:13
Yeah, we're doing a second edition. It's slightly altered. But it's also starting a series of books that we want to publish in that for normal people tent.
Seth Price 42:22
What does that look like?
Jared 42:24
So Genesis For Normal People is like a 90 page overview, with a lot of sarcasm and snark about what Genesis is about and what it's not about. And then we hope to publish soon thereafter, probably the next year Exodus for Normal People. So Pete will be writing that one.
Seth Price 42:44
Will you go through the whole Bible, all the way to revelation?
Jared 42:45
Well, yeah, until we get tired and don't want to do it anymore. Yeah.
Seth Price 42:51
(laughs)
That's fair. Um, what has been the biggest change for you? You know, this many episodes in so like, I don't, and I don't mean So I feel like people that run podcasts can hear it on the people like, You're much better on the mic. You say less ummms. I can tell you, there's things that when you have to edit when you're like, oh, we're all getting better. Because it is hard to have a conversation with yourself. I mean, I can see you. But there's limited amount of FaceTime-ibility to have a genuine, you know what I mean? It's hard to do that. So what has been the biggest thing for you, though, personally, that you're spiritually or whatever that you're like, Yeah, because I'm doing this on a repetitive basis it's causing me to engage in new ideas, and it's changed this. Like, what would that be for you?
Jared 43:35
Yeah, it's not changed my ideas. Again, I've been always very good at engaging with ideas. So my concepts are still pretty constant in terms of how I see the world. I think what's changed for me, is the need to just be human and humanize this whole endeavor. I have a tendency to live in my head and just the amount of pastoral work, I think I underestimated the amount of pastoral work that's involved with doing the Bible for Normal People. Because they're just a lot of people. And I say this a lot. And I would say if it hasn't changed it, but it's definitely cemented that. I feel like most people don't need supporting arguments they need community. They need a place where they're not feeling so dang alone. Because usually once you change your mind about the Bible, you've essentially isolated yourself from your family, friends and community. And that is such a lonely place to be. So just the humanization of that have not like I can be a bit of a trailblazer and a pioneer because I'm an eight on the Enneagram and I just will burn everything down. And and I'm fine with that. But I recognize like, there are a lot of people who are don't know what they're getting into until it's too late. And just out of sincere questions that they have, end up losing all kinds of relationships and that I'm not okay with. So yeah, that's been more of my passion, I think in this last year is how to come back around with people not get too far ahead and say, hey, it's okay. Like, there are a lot of us here. You thought you were going into the desert, between, you know, you were getting kicked out of Egypt. You thought there was going to be a promised land, but you didn't realize there's 40 years of desert wandering, and helping them see like, well, this is more of a Burning Man. Really there's a lot of us out here, and it's pretty great.
Seth Price 45:29
Yeah, I would argue it is pretty great. And I agree about community. I've told many people often that I do as much almost like “church”, in the community surrounding the show than I do sometimes at church. Which I know a lot of people at my church will listen and I don't mean that as a as an insult in any way, shape, or form. This will be my last question, and then we'll let you plug the places. So who's more snarky you or Pete?
Jared 45:58
Well, Pete would argue that he is so I’ll let him have that one.
Seth Price 46:00
Oh, that's sweet of you. So I asked him being that I've had you and then I had him and I've had you again. I said, does that make me a God ordained podcast on the internet? To which he laughed and said, “That's not up to me, that's up to Jared” believe that's what he said. And so since I had Jared, does that make me a God ordained podcast on the internet?
Jared 46:23
Well, I think you know, we have these little cards, like when you go to a coffee shop, and you have to get ten, you know, 10 holes punched in your card. But you've had me on twice and Pete wants I think you have to get 10 or you can be ordained.
Seth Price 46:37
Is it just the two of you? Because that's gonna take some time. Yeah, that's gonna take some time.
Jared 46:40
Yeah, I mean, you have to earn it. I mean these aren’t gold stars here. God ordained podcast!
Seth Price 46:50
(both laught)
That's perfect. I'm gonna send you my I'm gonna get a card in the mail. Jared. I'm gonna punch it myself. It's fine. That should be something that you put on your Patreon. Like, send people anyway. Where do people, obviously the Bible for normal people, for some reason is that Pete Enns’ website. I feel like y'all are dropping the ball there. But that's not my business. So we send people to place where they should go that you engage with you, the podcast, check out stuff. When does your book coming out?
Jared 47:22
Next year. So it'll be it'll be a while until you can get you can invite me on next next summer. Okay, that'll be that'll be another punch in your card.
Seth Price 47:34
Yeah. And that'll put me four, not even halfway.
Jared 47:38
Yeah, so no, I mean, there's a lot of reasons why we do that. But yeah, you can go to the Biblefornormalpeople.com/podcast if you want to go straight to the podcast. But overall, I mean, I think that this is a this is a shameless self plug, for sure. But it's also where we we interact the most with people and that's on Patreon. So patreon.com/theBiblefornormalpeople. We do book studies. So we just did Joel Baden on historical David. And it just like, blew people's minds, including mine at some points. I was like, Oh, yeah, I went to seminary. I didn't learn that. Okay. So we yeah, we ruined David for people. And we're about to start Luke Timothy Johnson's the real, real Jesus, historical Jesus, something like that.
Seth Price 48:24
The really historical Jesus.
Jared 48:27
The really, really historical Jesus. So, but yeah, we do book studies. And we have a slack group with about, I don't know, four or 500 people on there that are just like chatting away all the time, about the Bible and all kinds of stuff. So yeah, we'd like to jump in there. And, you know, we post every week different videos, we call it our “rantings for normal people”. So check it out.
Seth Price 48:48
Cool. Fantastic. Well, those links will be in the show notes. Jared, thank you again, happy to get my third star. And I genuinely do hope to do it again. Thank you for suffering sideways in your car.
Jared 49:07
(laughs)
This is my studio here! Don’t give away my secrets here.
Seth Price 49:09
But thank you again for coming on man. I really appreciate it.
Jared 49:12
Absolutely
Seth Price 49:33
Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for listening. Please remember to rate and review this show. Share it with your friends. I'd love to hear your feedback at Can I Say This At Church calm, just hit the contact button there.
Follow the show on Facebook and Twitter and let me know what you think their today's music is used with permission from Daniel Callahan. His stuff is great and you'll find links to him in the show notes and the tracks today on the Can I Say This At Church. Spotify playlist. talk to y'all next week. I hope you're very blessed.