Michael Lakey

Lakey’s monograph is an example of what can be called the ritual turn in New Testament studies, that is, the attempt to better understand the theology of these writings by examining how ritual practices (baptism and the Lord’s Supper) express that theology. This assertion is based on the conviction that rituals both constitute and are constituted by the world view connected with them.
The theoretical foundation of Lakey’s approach is taken from the influential anthropologist Clifford Geertz. For Geertz, any religion has to be grasped in a three-fold way to be understood: the metaphysical, the ethical, and the symbolic.
In line with this, in Chapter Three, Lakey examines texts that cast light on Paul’s view of the cosmic order. These are 1 Corinthians 6:2–3; 15:45–49; Galatians 4:1–10; 1 Corinthians 3:16, and 5–6. His analysis shows that for Paul, the aim of faith in Jesus is the “eschatological elevation” of believers (p. 67). This is accomplished in two steps: liberation from the elements of this world (effected in baptism) and glorification at the resurrection. Further insight into Paul’s cosmology comes from his view that this elevation vaults transformed believers above a multitude of spirit entities, not all of them benign. Also, Paul’s use of the metaphor of temple space expresses his view of the “cultic identity of the ecclesial community” at the same time, it “reifies its boundedness” (p. 68). The eschatological temple expands from being a microcosm of the cosmos to encompass the whole of reality.
In Chapter Four, Lakey sets out to establish a congruence between Paul’s view of the world and the form of life he proposes for believers. The texts considered here don’t directly relate to either of the two rituals considered in the book. Lakey’s investigation of Philippians 2:5–11; Galatians 5:13–26; and 1 Corinthians 12:4–13 leads him to conclude that, in various ways, all involve a recentering of the self, which he expresses as “the non-identical replication of Christ’s mindset and narrative” (p. 106). This is done in anticipation of cosmic elevation—glorification at the resurrection.
The Lord’s Supper is examined in Chapter Five as a symbol of Paul’s metaphysics and form of life. Through it, the transformation effected in baptism is reaffirmed. The passages examined, 1 Corinthians 10:14–22 and 11:17–34, though addressing various crises, which elicit from Paul different responses, are complementary. Lakey detects in both passages a boundedness that is spatial, cultic, and social. The Lord’s Supper, for Paul, constitutes and depicts a community in solidarity with Christ and with each other: “When a community dines, it imbibes its identity, history and mode of organization” (p. 151; the missing comma between the second and third terms is consistent in Lakey’s prose). At the same time, this serves as a boundary of separation from those not a part of this community.
In all three of these chapters, there is little independent exegesis. For the most part, Lakey references the work of other scholars. His main interlocutors are N. T. Wright and James Dunn and, to a slightly lesser extent, Troels Engberg-Pedersen and Albert Schweitzer, but beyond these, he shows an extensive familiarity with the relevant literature.
The weakest chapter is the next, in which Lakey proposes to verify his results concerning baptism in the ritual world of texts he describes as “Paul’s early interpreters.” I missed a rigorous methodological reflection of how to determine that a text can be labeled as an “interpreter” of Paul. Lakey adduces Didache, for instance, in the discussion, yet comes up empty. The result is hardly more fruitful in the case of Justin Martyr. In two cases (Tertullian, Aphrahat), Lakey claims support for his thesis that, to me, seems to go beyond the evidence. Only when Lakey turns to the richly allusive homilies and hymns of the Syrian, Ephrem, does he turn up material that justifies calling Ephrem at least a recipient of Pauline ideas, even if one would hesitate to call him an interpreter.
Since this is a scholarly work, Lakey is careful to set out his aim at the outset of each chapter, summarize each section, and end each chapter with a conclusion highlighting his results. A final chapter, the seventh, then repeats this process for the entire book.
I was pleased when, in an epilogue, he addressed a question that had been on my mind throughout the book: Having seen how closely the rituals of baptism and the Lord’s Supper are tied to a world view that we might no longer share, even as we might not follow to the letter all of Paul’s ethical prescriptions, what does this mean for our continued practice of these rites?
Unfortunately, Lakey does little more than acknowledge this difficulty. To do more would be “outside the scope” of his inquiry. That phrase, by the way, recurs with irritating frequency throughout the book. Also, the words “it is worth noting at the outset that” (p. 154) is just one example of many such phrases that could have been stricken from the manuscript with no loss of sense. Nor is it surprising that, as a work of scholarship, the prose has a high proportion of jargon. Since I’m a trained theologian, I was able to follow for the most part. But on occasion, Lakey imports jargon from other fields, and I’m mystified. For example, I have no idea what makes baptism and the Lord’s supper “nodal” rituals. Nor did it help to consult a dictionary, where I learned that, in addition to the uses in botany and physiology I was familiar with, it’s used in mathematics and astronomy. But none of these helped me imagine why, among the set of practices called rituals, some are singled out as “nodal.” I might not be the only theologian who reads this book without being up to speed on anthropology, so an explication would have been appreciated.
These caveats aside, I felt that Lakey demonstrated his case that we shouldn’t view Paul’s teaching on baptism and the Lord’s supper without considering his metaphysics and his ethics. In particular, Paul’s conception for baptism goes far beyond the dying and rising with Christ of Romans 6 that is often cited as its “meaning” for Paul.… (més)