Emergent thinkers like to believe that they are advocating a move from the “absolute to the authentic.” But of course, the fact that these are a couple of adjectives being used as abstractions means that we do not yet know what we are talking about. Moving from the “absolute” to the “authentic” blends right in with the current kulturesmog since no one appears to feel the urge to ask what this is supposed to mean. Absolute what to authentic what? Absolute fraud to authentic integrity? Or absolute triune personality to authentic peach pits?
This sort of undefined thing is a marketing ploy, and works the way all marketing ploys do. What sounds good to the shopper, and, because he is in the grip of feeling good, will cause him to neglect the asking of pertinent questions. In the fifties bread was marketed with labels like enriched, which meant that they put the same kind of stuff in your bread that they put into linoleum somewhere during the manufacturing process. Today we market bread with very different phrases like all natural, which means that they put the same kind of stuff in your bread without running it through the filters first. Because, after all, if you go back far enough, linoleum is an “all natural” product. After all, the ingredients are not summoned up ex nihilo. Everything came from somewhere, and that somewhere was natural at some point. But nobody asks questions because all natural makes us feel at one with the rhythms of the earth. For the same reason we like to buy food that is “chemical free.” Really? What is it made of then? Any day now I expect someone to successfully market some organic food that is “free of all molecules.” Anyway, I know I am disgressing, but there is a point here. People buy into slogans when they ought to think for a minute.
Absolute to authentic. Huh. Why not inauthentic to authentic? That would at least imply that whatever noun this is modifying should be the same noun. Inauthentic Thai food to authentic Thai food might be a worthwhile move. But “absolute to authentic” is just a handwaving sham. If you don’t like absolutes in ethics, aesthetics, or theology, then go ahead and say so — but only if you are willing to refrain from the use of any absolutes in the condemnation. In other words, it is not possible to damn absolutes because damning is way too . . . absolute. The relativist, having nowhere to stand, can only summon up enough power to hecky-darn the absolutes. Fortunatley, the absolutes pay no attention.
From inauthentic art collections to authentic art collections makes sense. And absolute certainty to uncertainty makes sense too. I can go with that. But absolute to authentic. This just plain baffles me. It is like asking whether ice cream has no bones and the higher they fly the much.
Although it makes no sense, it still communicates something — just like the “all natural” communicates something. But what it communicates is a blurry feeling, and not anything that means anything with clarity or precision. And what this move is trying to get us to feel, in that blurry, sentimental postmodern way, is that dogmatic people are inveterate frauds. For did we not move from absolute (people) to authentic (people)? Okay, deal me in. I’ll play this game. I would like to propose a new absolute: authentic people are good people. This is my proposed absolute. Any takers? Is this right, or not? If it is, then we haven’t actually moved from absolute to authentic, for to embrace authenticity is to embrace this new absolute. But if it is not right, then why do we want to leave our absolutes if we are not going to become good people by so doing? Hey?
But I was not proposing my absolute as a mere reductio. I really believe that this is a true absolute, grounded in the absolute law of God, which in its turn is grounded in the nature of the divine being. We are to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect. We are to be authentic, for in Him is no shadow or variation due to change. This is true at all times, in all cultures, every day of the week, 24-7, and to be promulgated in every single Sunday School class, world without end. In short, it is true. It is an absolute.
Consequently, I want to chase this movement back into the hole it is emerging from because in their hostility to absolutes, they are a profound enemy of every virtue they say they are advancing. Are we to be humble? Not absolutely. Authentic? More or less, for now. Relational? Until the next big advance in theology and cultural surrender. Those who have embraced the emergent jargon can therefore be grouped into two categories — the first would be those who have been taken in by false alternatives. Absolute or authentic? do you want to buy five yards of cloth or blue cloth? dark beer or beer in a glass? The second category would be those who are liars and scoundrels, as inauthentic as it gets.
Do I therefore oppose authenticity? Absolutely not.