In his posting on “the full monty … (of discipleship),” Alan Hirsch offers a helpful Venn diagram on Hebraic epistemology as where all three “ortho’s” overlap: orthodoxy (right beliefs), orthopraxy (right actions), and orthopathy (right feelings).

While I find his graphic somewhat helpful, actually I’d like to push back on this ortho-vennography. I am coming from a slightly different set of assumptions. I believe there are two additional core realms to consider beyond just mind, emotions, and will, and that these are consistent with a Hebraic epistemology. 

I think this view is best summarized by a preacher-theologian-author who was somewhat known in his time (1920s to 1950s), but now has been mostly forgotten. He stated: 

“A basic trouble is that most Churches limit themselves unnecessarily by addressing their message almost exclusively to those who are open to religious impression through the intellect, whereas … there are at least four other gateways – the emotions, the imagination, the aesthetic feeling, and the will – through which they can be reached.”  A. J. Gossip (1873-1954)

 

[Sidenote: How often do we get to pass on Gossip and it not be a sin?! You heard it here first …] 

Anyway, is it possible that this Venn diagram needs at least two other circles – to represent the imagination and the aesthetic feeling? I see imagination as a crucial dimension of our immaterial being. Imagination relates to our abilities to perceive unseen things (and thus is tied to hope, perseverance, and other such theological realities in the fulfillment of God’s personal and eschatological promises), as well as to creativity and the bringing forth concrete realities from abstract concepts. I see aesthetic feeling as equating both to aesthetics in beauty and to balance in paradox, but that is my sense of the term, not necessarily Gossip’s. 

Also, what would happen if the approach were changed from a two-dimensional diagram to a three-dimensional model? I keep thinking that since orthodoxy is “right belief,” what is the term for “righteous wisdom”? What if wisdom actually includes righteous principles rightly applied in situations where it is not necessarily just a moral issue of right-and-wrong? Could it be that wisdom is the actually the realm of overlap among the three ortho-circles in Alan’s diagram? And so, would a more comprehensive and integrated model have the overlap area as the heart or wisdom (both central to Hebraic epistemology, in my understanding)? 

Or perhaps even more than a pushback, what if there was a pushforward? How about switching to a three-dimensional and have five flexible and permeable ortho-spheres inside a much larger wisdom-sphere, where the goal is to expand each of the five smaller ortho-spheres to where they completely fill the wisdom-sphere, intermeshing and interacting with each other as they grow? This 3-D approach still allows for the overlapping of any two realms, as in a 2-D diagram, but also for the interpenetration among any number of the dimensions as we seek to have them filled up to the fullness of Christ. 

Sorry if that’s hard to picture; I think in 3-D sometimes, and I realize not everyone does. It’s just a providential learning style thing and I know my approach won’t make sense to everyone … but the same is also true in reverse, and that’s why 2-D seems literally too flat for me most times.)

Anyway, if we kept that picture in mind, perhaps it would be easier to meditate on how our orthopraxy might be fueled by our imagination into completely fresh directions and in boldly creative actions.

Or how our orthopathy might be both reigned in and released by the double realities of aesthetics. For instance, aesthetics as paradox might help us put strong emotions about grieving into the perspective of long-suffering so they do not completely overwhelm us in the here-and-now. Aesthetics as beauty would release us because emotions reflect a deep and wonderful aspect of God’s being and character, and our deep feelings resonate with His image.

Or how our orthodoxy might be challenged in new ways by aesthetics. For instance, we could be challenged to create a minimalist approach to reconstruction of theologies that reintegrates truth into a more “elegant” SYSTEM that maintains both consistency and integrity. This would not necessarily lose ANY truths, but would reframe them so they were reconnected, instead of disconnected as typically happens in Western SYSTEMATIC categorizing, which is based more on Greek analytical epistemology.

Anyway, much to think about, but the goal is still as Alan states: “I am convinced that if we are to come to a full appreciation of God, our thinking about him must be right, but it must be complemented by othopraxy and orthopathy if we are to come to a full-orbed, biblical, engagement with (and knowledge of) God.”