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What Richard Hays really says - a response to the Archbishop of Canterbury's Presidential address
by Dr Lisa Severine Nolland
March 21st 2007
When the Archbishop of Canterbury speaks, people listen! He received my full attention as I read the transcript of his Presidential Address at General Synod, the 26th of February. I was particularly interested in the following paragraph:
"Now in the last ten years particularly, there have been numerous very substantial studies of the scriptural and traditional material which make it difficult to say that there is simply no debate to be had. Even a solidly conservative New Testament scholar like Richard Hays, to take one example out of many, would admit that work is needed to fill out and defend the traditional position, and to understand more deeply where the challenges to this position come from."
From what I know of Robert Gagnon, conservative author of the magisterial The Bible and Homosexual Practice: Texts and Hermeneutics, 2001 - http://www.robgagnon.net/ gives his latest research - he would not agree with Dr Williams here. But Richard Hays, though to the theological left of Rob Gagnon, was no liberal.
I knew something of Dr. Hays' views through his thoughtful Moral Vision of the New Testament (1996) and so was quite surprised by Dr Williams' comment. However, as so many theologians and church Ieaders seem to be softening their 'hard-line' views or seeing gay and other sexual issues in entirely new, 'fresh' ways these days, this was not an entirely unexpected development perhaps. However, I decided to ask the man himself, to satisfy my own curiosity if nothing else. .
In an email response of 20 March, 2007, Dr Hays wrote the following: 'Anyone who wants to know more about my position on these matters should see the chapter on "Homosexuality" in my book The Moral Vision of the New Testament ... pp. 379-406'. And from there, I picked up his book again and this is what I read.
In Part III I articulated the hermeneutical guideline that claims about divinely inspired experience that contradicts the witness of Scripture should be admitted to normative status in the church only after sustained and agonizing scrutiny by a consensus of the faithful. It is by no means clear that the community of the church as a whole is prepared to credit the experientially based claims being made at present for normative acceptance of homosexuality.
Furthermore, in its rush to be 'inclusive,' the church must not overlook the experience reported by those Christians who, like Gary, struggle with homosexual desires and find them a hindrance to living lives committed to the service of God. This is a complex matter, and we have not heard the end of it.
In any case, it is crucial to remember that experience must be treated as a hermeneutical lens for reading the New Testament rather than as an independent, counterbalancing authority. This is the point at which the analogy to the early church's acceptance of Gentiles fails decisively.
The church did not simply observe the experience of Cornelius and his household and decide that Scripture must be wrong after all. On the contrary, the experience of uncircumcised Gentiles responding in faith to the gospel message led the church back to a new reading of Scripture.
The new reading discovered in the texts a clear message of God's intent from the covenant with Abraham forward, to bless all nations and to bring Gentiles (qua Gentiles) to worship Israel's God ... Only because the new experience of Gentile converts proved hermeneutically illuminating of Scripture was the church, over time, able to accept the decision to embrace Gentiles within the fellowship of God's people.
This is precisely the step that has not - or at least not yet - been taken by the advocates of homosexuality in the church. Is it possible for them to reread the New Testament and show how this development can be understood as a fulfilment of God's design for human sexuality as previously revealed in Scripture? In view of the content of the biblical tests summarized above, it is difficult to imagine how such an argument could be made.
Thus, in view of the considerable uncertainty surrounding the scientific and experiential evidence, in view of our culture's present swirling confusion about gender roles, in view of our propensity for self-deception, I think it prudent and necessary to let the univocal testimony of Scripture and the Christian tradition order the life of the church on this painfully controversial matter. We must affirm that the New Testament tells us the truth about ourselves as sinners and as God's sexual creatures: marriage between man and woman is then normative form for human sexual fulfilment, and homosexuality is one among many tragic signs that we are a broken people, alienated from God's loving purpose. pp. 399-400
I have reproduced this material at length because it seems important to hear what Richard Hays is actually saying. I understand him to affirm that yes, more work needs to be done, but done especially by those who are asking us to revise our present sexual ethic.
Dr Hays is asking them to demonstrate how their argument works in relation to the biblical material; if they are able to do so, he is prepared to listen. But his scepticism at what can from their efforts is evident. 'In view of the content of the biblical tests summarized above, it is difficult to imagine how such an argument could be made.'
Is anyone listening?
