Francis Berger
  • Blog
  • My Work

Still One of My Favorite Encapsulations of What It Means to Be a Christian

2/1/2022

4 Comments

 
It goes without saying that the very best encapsulations of what a follower of Christ is meant to do come from Jesus Himself, but excellent compact summaries beyond the Gospels do exist. 

One of my favorites can be found in Dostoevsky's The Legend of the Grand Inquisitor chapter in The Brothers Karamazov. I have published this excerpt on this blog many times over the years, but never as an encapsulation of what it means to be a Christian. Without further ado, here is the excerpt:

Thou didst desire man's free love, that he should follow Thee freely, enticed and taken captive by Thee. In place of the rigid ancient law, man must hereafter with free heart decide for himself what is good and what is evil, having only Thy image before him as his guide.

Those lines -- spoken by the Grand Inquisitor, who is, ironically enough, an enemy of Christ -- provide an effective and succinct definition of what a Christian should be.

Not only does it cover the core features of what being a Christian means, but it also strikes at the very essence of what a Christian should do. 

And it does all of this in a way that is easily comprehensible -- even to a child.


  • Freedom
  • Love
  • Follow
  • In place of rigid, ancient law
  • Free heart
  • Decide for himself what is good and what is evil
  • Using only Christ as his guide

As is the case with every encapsulation, this compact excerpt from Dostoevsky misses a few key features -- resurrection, everlasting life, heaven. At the same, it gets to the very root of what being a follower of Christ means -- the foundation upon which all else is constructed. 

When I consider the simplicity, accessibility, and comprehensibility of excerpted lines above, I am immediately struck by all the unnecessarily complex, inaccessible, and incomprehensible aspects of Christianity that often bury the heart of what it means to be a follower of Christ.

So many doctrines, denominations, rites, interpretations, reinterpretations, credos, creeds, tenets, precepts, principles, systems, canons, and so forth -- all created to explain and glorify the substance of an offer that is -- fundamentally -- so simple and so clear that even a child can understand it. 

Christians need to become children once again -- at least when it comes to knowing what it means to be a follower of Christ.

Note added: The close positioning of "follow Thee freely" and "enticed, and taken captive by Thee" in the Dostoevsky excerpt reveal much about the spiritual freedom Christ offers.      
4 Comments
bruce charlton
2/2/2022 00:41:22

It is a striking passage - if you know what to look for. But to the reader who did not already know - I think it would not communicate what it does to us.

The main thing missing from the definition is resurrection and heaven.

I personally think that this is the most shocking thing about Christianity in the modern world: the offer of life everlasting - it was for me, at any rate.

It is easier for a typical modern Man to believe in a Jesus who changed this world, even a moral miracle-worker Jesus who made the world a better place - than a Jesus whose major claim was to have made possible eternal life.

Even CS Lewis said that he was a Christian for some time before he believed in eternal life - which would have seemed like an oxymoron to the Men of Jesus's time... How can you be A Christian if you don't believe in resurrection? Surely resurrection was the point of it?

Yet it seems that this became possible, then relatively common.

Reply
Francis Berger
2/2/2022 20:28:51

@ Bruce - Yes, I completely agree. As I mentioned in the post, the absence of heaven, resurrection, and everlasting life is glaring -- and a major gap.

D's encapsulation fits well into the distinction about favorites/best you mentioned recently on my Caspar David Friedrich Post.

D's encapsulation here is not the best, but it is still among my favorites.

What I find most appealing about it is the emphasis on the heart and direct-knowing. I shall explore that in a little more detail in a future post.

Reply
Lady Mermaid
2/3/2022 02:13:22

This is a beautiful post! The sound message behind it is desperately needed in these trying times, especially as so many people no longer have access to a church. However, they do have access to the Holy Spirit and His saving grace. Jesus said to enter the kingdom, we must do so as a child.

Reply
Papa
2/4/2022 01:20:33

Good post.
A timely reminder for me of what the very root of being a follower of Christ means.
Thanks.

Your use of the words simplicity and simple reminded me of this passage:

2 Corinthians 11: 3 - 4
But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.
For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him.

Reply

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Picture

    RSS Feed

    Blog and Comments

    Blog posts tend to be spontaneous, unpolished, first draft entries ranging from the insightful and periodically profound to the poorly-argued and occasionally disparaging.
     

    Comments are moderated. Anonymous comments are never published (please use your name or a pseudonym). 

    Emails welcome:

    f er en c ber g er (at) h otm   ail (dot) co m
    Blogs/Sites I Read
    Bruce Charlton's Notions
    Meeting the Masters
    From The Narrow Desert
    Synlogos ✞ Aggregator
    New World Island  
    New World Island YouTube
    ​Steeple Tea
    Berdyaev.com
    Adam Piggott
    Fourth Gospel Blog
    The Orthosphere
    Junior Ganymede

    Archives

    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    July 2018
    May 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    November 2016
    June 2016
    March 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    July 2015
    April 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    October 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012

    Picture
    A free PDF is also available in My Work. 
Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.