A. James Reimer died August 28 2010. For those who have not studied with him or read any of his books, he was one of the finest Mennonite thinkers of the 20th century. We have lost two of the best this year with the passing of Clark Pinnock and James Reimer. What follows is an article on Reimer that was previously published on Clarion (June 9 2006). We are reposting it in honour of Reimer's life? Reimer's life was not long (1942-2010), but he lived well and leaves us a significant legacy of Anabaptist thought.
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There is little doubt that James Reimer is one of the most articulate and thoughtful Mennonite theologians in North America, and he is certainly one of the finest in Canada. The publication of Mennonites and Classical Theology: Dogmatic Foundations for Christian Ethics (2001) and The Dogmatic Imagination: The Dynamics of Christian Belief (2003) positions Reimer at the very forefront and cutting edge of Mennonite thought in Canada and North America.
Reimer has dared, in Mennonites and Classical Theology, to challenge many an unexamined creed and dogma in the Mennonite tradition that tends to be weak historically, intellectually and theologically. He has also dared to question and doubt some of the monarchs and Sanhedrin of the protest approach to doing politics in the Mennonite tribe: Yoder, Weaver and Hauerwas. And, to his credit, Reimer has engaged some of the most important thinkers in the past and present in the process. James Reimer, in short, is a man who needs to be heard, and in many ways he is very much a prophet to his people.
Why do Mennonites need to hear more of Reimer, and how can Reimer’s many insights and probes take Mennonites to a deeper understanding of the Mennonite and Christian way? And, what might be some of the limitations of Reimer’s approach? The purpose of this short essay is to ponder some of these questions.
Why is Reimer so important to the Mennonites, and how has he challenged them to face themselves at a deeper and more demanding level? The importance of James Reimer to Mennonite thought and life is the way he has nudged and encouraged them to face and think through all sorts of prejudices and unexamined assumptions. Let us briefly take a look at five of these unexamined assumptions and stubborn prejudices.
First, many Mennonites accept the Constantinian Fall thesis. The theory and read of history is faulty, but such a myth has had much power in the Mennonite and Free Church read and interpretation of Christian history. The theory is rather simple and simplistic. It goes something lie this. Once upon a time there was the pure, true and remnant church that was true to her Lord and the Gospel. This period of time lasted throughout the early church, and with some leniency, into the post-apostolic era. But, by the 3rd and 4th centuries, as the church became bigger, more powerful and more central to the life of the waning Roman Empire, she began to betray and compromise her high calling. When the
Emperor Constantine embraced Christianity in the early years of the 4th century, and made Christianity the official religion of the empire; the church lost her heart and soul. In fact, the soul and heart (with a few exceptions) was lost and taken from the church until the coming of the Reformation. But, and here the tale continues. The Reformation, for the most part, continued the Constantinian compromise. The Reformation in England and on the Continent still took for granted that Church and State had much in common. The Magisterial Reformation of Cranmer, Luther and Calvin still, so this argument goes, did not truly understand the life of Christ and the Church. It was the Anabaptists that truly called the Church back to her true, pure and apostolic vision. It was the pure, true remnant, which was the prophetic people, and such a people were the anarchist Anabaptists. Such people could neither trust Church nor State, and it was in the distrust of both that the real Church of the gospels could be found. This is the Constantinian-Magisterial Fall thesis, and, rightly so, James Reimer questions this rather simplistic Anabaptist-Mennonite read of history both in the Classical Patristic era and the Reformation. Reimer has argued that there were some Christians who compromised in the 4th century, but most of the Fathers and Mothers of the Church were most critical of the Eusebian-Constantinian compromise. If, then, there is much good in the Patristic era that Mennonites have lost by their bad read of history, what is this good?
Second, Reimer walks the extra mile in both Mennonites and Classical Theology (2001) and The Dogmatic Imagination (2003) to point out how and why Mennonites need to return to and recover Classical theology. The ethos and world of the creeds and councils, if rightly heard and heeded, can ground the Mennonite way in a much deeper source of thought and life. Reimer is quick to acknowledge the contributions Mennonites such as Yoder and Weaver have made, but he is equally clear to make sure that there are serious problems and failings in both their read of Mennonite and Christian history and their understanding of theology. Karl Barth tends to stand back of those like Yoder, Weaver and Hauerwas, and again, Reimer makes it clear that he sees much good in this approach, but it has serious limitations, also. Reimer is very much a dialectical thinker who is more willing to live in the tension of Church and State than seeing them in contrast and opposition. It is in this living of the tension that the more simplistic anarchist analysis of thought and action crumbles. The turn to the Classical era of Christian faith does raise some important questions about the modern way of knowing and its limitations. This leads to the next point.
Third, Reimer is keen to hold in tension the best of the modern rational and empirical way of knowing with the Classical contemplative and mystical way of knowing and being. It is in the living of this important tension that various levels of knowing are welcomed. The modern way reveals and conceals much just as the more ancient way conceals and reveals much. It is easy to see at this point Reimer’s indebtedness to the important Canadian contemplative philosopher George Grant. The Classical Christian Tradition is firmly rooted in the contemplative, mystical and meditative way of being and knowing, and the hyper-activism of the protestant work ethic and the empirical and a scientific way of knowing have tended to subordinate, censure of banish this way of knowing. It is good to see two important Canadians on the forefront of reclaiming and recovering this older and deeper way of knowing. It is to Reimer’s credit that he has called his people back to the ancient springs where the water runs clearer and deeper.
Fourth, Reimer has done much more than merely address the Mennonite and Christian community. He has been quite willing to engage some of the finest and best philosophers of the 20th century and welcome their contributions to theology. In short, Reimer neither shrinks from facing the larger challenges of the modern world nor does he shy away from facing the challenges of the broader church. It is in this sense that Reimer is both an ecumenical contemplative theologian and a philosopher of much worth and note. He has, in brief, sought to be both interdisciplinary in his thinking and heed much from the catholic heritage without compromising the essence of the faith. It is in this sense that Reimer is very much a mediating theologian. He is wary of the Gordon Kaufman’s who give away too much and the Yoder/Weaver’s who are too lean, reactive and narrow. It is in this mediating and dialectical approach that Reimer has much to contribute. Much of his early work was in German theology at the time of WW II and the way many Christian thinkers of good faith interpreted their faith differently at the time. There was Barth and the Barmen Declaration. There was Tillich, Hirsch and Schmidt. Who was to be trusted and why? It is these sorts of questions that raise the perennial issues of the relationship between theology and philosophy, church and state, science and religion. Reimer, unlike many Mennonites, refuses to retreat into either an ethnic or pietistic ghetto or uncritically embrace the modern way of knowing and being.
Fifth, the Christian journey is about life in Christ, life in the church and life in the world. It is impossible to ignore these realities on the faith journey. Reimer has taken seriously the calling to be in the world as an agent of justice and maker of peace. But, what does this mean when interpreted in a particular and prudential way? Does it mean being an absolute pacifist and reducing politics to protest and advocacy work? Are there more ways in a liberal pluralist ethos of seeking justice and making peace? Reimer dares to raise these sorts of questions of the Mennonite community, and he does it in a sensitive and probing way. His is not the simplistic and formulaic answer to complex and hard questions. Reimer sees full and sure into the troubling problems of our time, and he calls the Mennonite community to do the same.
Mennonite and Classical Theology: Dogmatic Foundations for Christian Ethics and The Dogmatic Imagination: The Dynamics of Christian Belief are must reads for any Mennonite who seeks to grapple with their faith and the world they live in. Mennonites and Classical Theology is divided into three parts: 1) The Crises of Modernity, 2) Mennonites and Theology, and 3) The Classical Imagination. Each chapter and section in this well crafted book opens the reader up to larger and more important questions and issues and ways of thinking and living creatively and constructively with such issues.. The Dogmatic Imagination is a much smaller book than Mennonites and Classical Theology,but this important missive and tract for the times fills in many a detail that is missing in the larger tome.
There are a few questions that need to be placed before Reimer by way of closing. I come from the Classical High Church Anglican way, and, as such, I have some reservations and unsettled concerns about Reimer’s approach and interpretation of the Classical way, and the application of such a way to both the modern world we live in and the Canadian context. Let me briefly flag such questions.
First, I agree with Reimer that the Classical Tradition needs to be recovered and reclaimed in all its fullness and richness. The Constantinian Fall thesis tends to distort the past and offer a simplistic way of reading both the complex world of the past and present. When we turn to the ethos of the creeds and councils, we are faced with the fact that the Church speaks of ‘one, holy, catholic and apostolic church’. The Church is supposed to be, in a spiritual, material and formal sense ONE. Mennonite ecclesiology is schismatic, fragmentary and splinters in many directions. Is it consistent and honest to pick and choose from the ‘esse’ of The Great Tradition? It is one thing to turn to the creeds and councils for a dogmatic foundation for Christian ethics, but the foundations of the creeds and councils are as much about the unity of the church as they are about theology and ethics. It is this schismatic ecclesiology I find problematic in Reimer.
Second. I am very much with Reimer’s desire to call the church back to a contemplative and mystical theology. This approach is basic to the Mothers and Fathers, the Ammas and Abbas of the Church. It would have helped if Reimer had dealt more with some of the mystics and contemplatives in the life of the historic church. It is true that Reimer makes the important distinctions between the late Medieval monastic and scholastic way of knowing. It is also true he desires to honour both ways of knowing. But, some discussion of the contemplatives would have helped. This turn to the contemplative way of knowing in contrast to the scholastic, empirical and scientific way of knowing opens up the larger questions of the Christian contemplative way of knowing and being and various types of Oriental mysticism. Reimer does not deal with this either. It seems to me Reimer needs to follow some of his suggestions and leads further down the path and trail.
Third, I realize Reimer is primarily a theologian, but he is a theologian with a concern for the world of politics, social questions and economics. Reimer has inherited a past that has tended to retreat from the world in ethnic and intellectual enclaves, or, when the world is engaged, only done so in a confrontational and either-or manner. Reimer has walked the extra mile to highlight to his clan and tribe that history, the church and the world are much more complex than might appear. It does little good to slip into the contra mundi mentality when the world is in the church and each human soul. The tendency of many Mennonites is to slip into the pure remnant church mentality, then retreat from the world.
But, peace can destroy many, and Mennonites have had to learn this the hard way. There is a middle way (via media) between rejecting the world that God loves and being assimilated into it. The fact that Reimer has in the Patristic era sought to find the good in it, and in the Reformation era to turn to such engaged and active Mennonites as Pilgrim Marpeck does speak much about a forgotten but much needed Mennonite middle way. It is to this more dialogical and dialectical middle way that Reimer points. I would, though, as Canadian, have liked to have seen and heard more about what this might actually mean in terms of Canadian thought and political parties. Reimer tends to be rather thin on the ground in this area even though he turns his head in certain directions.
There is no doubt that A. James Reimer is one of the most important Mennonite theologians in North American today. He is a prophet to his people, and, as such, he has known what it mean to be on the narrow ridge and boundary places of thought and life. It’s never easy to walk the razor’s edge, but A. James Reimer has done this and done it well, and he will be remembered for doing so The more Mennonites, the broader Christian community and the world turn attentive ears to the probes and insights and Reimer, the better each and all will be for the experience.
rsd
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