Light Unapproachable, Ronni Kurtz. IVP Academic (ISBN: 9781514007105) 2024.
Summary: An explanation of the doctrine of divine incomprehensibility as well as God’s gracious accommodation.
“God, the blessed and only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone is immortal and who lives in unapproachable light, whom no one has seen or can see. To him be honor and might forever. Amen.” (1 Timothy 6:15b-16, NIV)
There is a paradox in the verses above. On one hand God lives in unapproachable light. Of ourselves we cannot approach the light, let alone the God who lives in it. From this, and verses like this, theologians speak of divine incomprehensibility. Yet these verses describe God as blessed, as ruler, king, and absolute Lord, immortal, and they tell us of God’s living in unapproachable light. That is, these verses do speak of God truthfully, faithfully, and worshipfully. While God in God’s self is incomprehensible, Paul affirms there are things about God that God has revealed, that we may apprehend.
In Light Inapproachable, Ronni Kurtz unpacks how we can affirm both aspects of this paradox. While affirming the doctrine of divine incomprehensibility, Kurtz does not believe this leaves us in a place of not being able to say anything of God. Rather, he believes God accommodates our creaturely nature, as he did Moses, in the cleft of the rock (Exodus 33:19-23).
First, Kurtz lays the groundwork for a definition of divine incomprehensibility. He observes there is a biblical tension between the imperatives to “know the Lord” and the indicatives speaking of the unknowability and unsearchability of the Lord. He addresses a number of misperceptions about incomprehensibility. Finally, he identifies two ditches to avoid: theological despair and theological idolatry. With that, he offers the following definition of divine incomprehensibility:
“Divine incomprehensibility affirms that God the Creator is wholly other than his creatures and the distinction between the two renders God out of the rational jurisdiction of the creature’s theological and intellectual comprehension. In no way can the creaturely imagination comprehend the divine nature as it truly is. As the finite will never circumscribe the infinite, the creaturely mind will never surround all that is in God. Since God as God is out of reach for the mind of the creature, so too is God as god out of reach for the words and names of the creature. Divine incomprehensibility necessitates divine ineffability as the creaturely limits, combined with the otherness of God, means that we cannot either fully know or name God as he really is in se” (pp. 20-21).
Kurtz begins this project by developing the biblical doctrine of incomprehensibility. As a result, he identifies scripture that declares the doctrine, others that demonstrate the doctrine and those that demand it. He then turns to a historical theological treatment. He begins with Chrysostom and his response to the Anomoeans, who maintained that humans could comprehend God. And he recounts Chrysostom’s five homilies that refute this idea. Then he shows how the Cappadocian fathers further developed the doctrine. Next, he discusses Pseudo-Dionysius and The Cloud of Unknowing. While recognizing the importance of negation and mystery, Kurtz argues against the pessimism of a completely negative theology. By contrast, he discusses how Aquinas spoke both of incomprehensibility and knowability. He concludes his discussion with the Reformation, and the more contemporary work of Herman Bavinck.
Part Two of the book moves from retrieval to constructive theology. Kurtz begins with a discussion of the dogmatic location of incomprehensibility. Specifically, he develops what was implicit in his definition, that the doctrine properly is located in the Creator/creature distinction. In contending this, he argues against locating the doctrine in either human sinfulness or in the “size” of God. Regarding sin, he observes that the sinless angels cannot fully comprehend God. And it is not that God is larger but rather that God is wholly other that makes God incomprehensible.
But how then may we speak of God at all? Our creaturely inability does not rule out God’s ability to graciously accommodate our creatureliness and reveal something of Himself. Specifically, through anthropomorphisms (describing God in terms of human parts), anthropopathisms (describing God through human passions and volition) and anthropochronisms (describing God in terms of human time and chronology), God accommodates himself to our creatureliness. He does so analogically, in which the term, while not signifying what God in himself is like, conveys through the creaturely shadow, reflects what is true and meaningful of God. This truth is ectypal, that is, a revelation in creation patterned after the archetypal knowledge of God, which is unknowable.
Finally, Kurtz concludes by discussing the implication of both God’s incomprehensibility and gracious accommodation. This bids us to humility but not hopelessness and calls us into a theology of prayer and pilgrimage. He proposes the vivid images of the limp of Jacob and the awe of Moses.
Kurtz writes clearly about the incomprehensible and with clarity about this doctrine. The combination of biblical, historical, and constructive theology in a relatively slim text makes this both accessible and substantial. And his pastoral approach of humility and hope that runs through the book translates this from abstract theologizing to truths we might embrace in both worship and life.
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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.