There is something disconcerting about a book that addresses submission as a theological category, not only so, but which seeks to rehabilitate the notion that self-surrender need not imply defeat, diminishment or inferiority, but may be a creative act of willed love. That said, ideas of submission are inherently suspect, for example in feminist theology, being contaminated by perceived patriarchal and authoritarian assumptions. Likewise postmodern rejection of the normativity of traditional readings of texts, expresses a powerfully antithetical resistance to the assumed dominance of such traditional interpretations; such truth claims have no inherent right either to require the submission of other minds or to negate other legitimate construals of truth.
This book sets out to explore whether submission is irredeemably locked into hierarchical sturctures and behaviour patterns. Semantically, is it the case that the term "submission" is irretrievably oppressive, coercive and indicative of a person's inferiority? Theologically, is hierarchy ruled out in any construal of the life of the Triune God that seeks to conceive of that life in relational terms? And even if it is, what of the concept of mutual submission within consensual parameters of love and being? Ethically and spiritually, in Christian existence, is it not the case that submission to the Gospel indicates that deep inner transormation of the self that discovers in obedience a radical and original freedom? Politically – and that means in social, economic and personal relations, is it not the case that the primary claim upon Christian inwardness is not the language of rights but the language of grace?
Questions like these open up wider questions of equality, freedom, mutuality – and also authority, power and hierarchy. Approached through the lens of a New Testament text such as Philippians, the concept of submission compels reflection on urgent contemporary issues of gender relations, Trinitarian theology, Christological models and the interpersonal dynamic of Christian community. Even early in my reading of this book I am aware of my own inner egalitarian prejudices. I genuinely hold to the deep conviction that the Christian mind, heart and will rightly, and only, recognise one absolute claim on their submission. And that is to Jesus as Lord – whose Lordship, authority and claim derive their power from the soul's encounter through the Spirit, with grace unspeakable and love crucified as encountered in the Risen Jesus, gift of the Father. So if I am to be persuaded by this book's title, that there is submission within the Godhead, and that submission is a defining characteristic of Christian community, then (for me, at least) these principles must grow out of an exegetical and reflective theology shaped and given content by attention to primary NT text, by creative Trinitarian reflection and by a Christological hermeneutic applied to Christian community.
The next post on this book will review chapter 1 – on Philippians 2.5-11. ?
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