Christianity: Details about 'John Robinson 1919 1983'
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
Home
|
Dr John Arthur Thomas Robinson (1919–December 5, 1983) was an Anglican New Testament scholar, author, former Anglican bishop of Woolwich, England. He was a lecturer at Trinity College, Cambridge and later Dean of Trinity College until his death in 1983 from cancer. Dr Robinson was considered a major force in shaping liberal Christian theology. Along with Harvard theologian Harvey Cox he spearheaded the field of secular theology. Robinson wrote several notable books, the most famous being Honest to God in 1963. Robinson's own evaluation of Honest to God, found in the subsequent Exploration into God stated that the chief contribution of this work was its successful synthesis of the work of seemingly opposed theologians Paul Tillich and Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Robinson proposed changing language to talk of "God out there" instead of "God up there". Honest to God caused a storm of controversy as the first publication by a leading churchman which asked the question
While the bulk of his ideas have become integrated with the more progressive circles of Christian thought, he is considered an extremist by some. As is often the case with iconoclasts who question traditional thinking, his ideas are considered anathema by Barthian evangelicals and by those whose concept of a supernatural God supercedes other theological concerns. Although Robinson was firmly within the camp of liberal theology, he did challenge the work of colleagues in the field of exegetical criticism. Specifically, Dr Robinson examined the New Testament's reliability, because he believed that very little original research had been completed in the field during the period between 1900 and the mid 1970s. Concluding his research, he wrote in his work, Redating the New Testament that past scholarship was based on a "tyranny of unexamined assumptions" and an "almost willful blindness". Robinson concluded that New Testament was written before AD 64, partly based on his judgement there is little textual evidence that the New Testament reflects knowledge of the Temple's AD 70 destruction. C. H. Dodd, in a frank letter to Robinson wrote: "I should agree with you that much of the late dating is quite arbitrary, even wanton, the offspring not of any argument that can be presented, but rather of the critic's prejudice that, if he appears to assent to the traditional position of the early church, he will be thought no better than a stick-in-the-mud." Robinson's call for redating the New Testament was echoed by subsequent scholarship such as John Wenham's work Redating Matthew, Mark and Luke: A Fresh Assault on the Synoptic Problem. Other subsequent works calling for redating of some or all of the gospels were written by such scholars as Claude Tresmontant, Gunther Zuntz, Carsten Peter Thiede, Eta Linneman, Harold Riley, Bernard Orchard. In relation to the four gospels dates of authorship, according to Norman Geisler, "Robinson places Matthew at 40 to after 60, Mark at about 45 to 60, Luke at before 57 to after 60, and John at from 40 to after 65." Robinson went on to state that the book of James was penned by a brother of the Jesus Christ within twenty years of Jesus’ death, that Paul authored all the books that bear his name, and that John, the apostle, wrote the fourth Gospel. Dr. Robinson believed the result of his investigations argued for the rewriting of many theologies of the New Testament. Robinson was also famous for his speech in the House of Lords against the censorship of Lady Chatterley's Lover. Two books have been written about Dr Robinson: A life of Bishop John A.T. Robinson: Scholar, pastor, prophet by Eric James and The Roots of Christian Freedom: The Theology of John A.T. Robinson by Alistair Kee. Robinson was born in Canterbury, England. Books by Robinson
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||