Monday, May 5, 2008

Denny Burk On Jeremiah Wright's Implied Salvation Under Christ For Muslims

Denny Burk is Assistant Professor of New Testament at the Criswell College in Dallas, Texas. If you noted my links on the right, he and Dr. Van Neste co-authored the amendment for "Amend ETS".

On Monday, Pastor Jeremiah Wright had the following exchange with the moderator at the National Press Club (transcript):

MODERATOR: “Jesus said, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the father but through me.’ Do you believe this? And do you think Islam is a way to salvation?”

WRIGHT: “Jesus also said, ‘Other sheep have I who are not of this fold.’”

Wright’s response clearly implies that Muslims are among the “other sheep” to which Jesus refers in John 10:16. Thus Wright affirms that people who do not have conscious faith in Christ can nevertheless have the hope of salvation — an inclusivist position that argues there are many paths to God.

There are two questions that need be addressed: (1) Did Jesus intend to include non-believers in the group called “other sheep”? (2) What difference does it make? Let’s take a look.

You can read more here.

Some questions:
-In our pluralistic society, is the exclusivity of the scriptures antiquated or is truth, truth?
-What is the context of the John 10 passage referenced above by the moderator?
-Should scripture be taken objectively (based on context) or subjectively (based on what you read into it)?
-Do you agree with Wright or with Burk or neither?

2 comments:

Craig said...

Very good post. I hope more people realized that Jeremiah Wright's belief in liberation theology is not isolated with him, but has a large following.

This teaching is not Biblical as you can see from his sermons and from the answer he gives quoted in this post.

The commentaries I looked at interpret that Jesus is talking about Gentiles versus Jews. This makes more sense because that was a big issue during his time and this was foretelling of the church.

B Nettles said...

Obomers (that term probably drives the Secret Service and Homeland Security guys crazy) accuse the press of taking Wright out of context, ignoring the fact that Wright takes Jesus out of context.

Several times Jesus demonstrates the "other sheep" with encounters such as the Samaritan woman at the well, the Syrophonecian woman, and the Roman centurion who had more faith than any in Israel.