Rather, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice they sacrifice to demons and not to God,
and I do not want you to have fellowship with demons.” 1 Cor 10:19-20.
Mark Noll made an interesting parenthetical comment in his Scandal of the Evangelical Mind. His comment described the Manichean tendencies of contemporary Evangelicals.
To make room for Christian thought, evangelicals must also abandon the false disjunctions that their distinctives have historically encouraged. The cultivation of the mind for Christian reasons does not deny the appropriateness of activism, for example, but it does require activism to make room for study. Similarly, it is conversionism along with a consideration of lifelong spiritual development and trust in the Bible along with a critical use of wisdom from other sources (especially from the world that God made) that will lead to a better day. Modifying the evangelical tendency to Manichaeism may cost some of the single-minded enthusiasm of activism, but it will be worth it in order to be able to worship God with the mind.[1]
This admission from a lifelong historian is monumental. Noll here admits that a focus on the Great Commission and evangelism (“conversionism”) betrays a dualistic view of the world. In other words, conversionists do not believe that the “matter” or “substance” of this present world is eternal. On the other hand, these same Evangelicals do believe that the soul is eternal. When an Evangelical is saved, it is not his body that is saved, but rather his soul. Hence the term “soul winning.” The material world is fleeting, the spiritual world is eternal. In their most basic belief in being “born again,” Evangelicals betray their Manichean tendencies.
Others, such as Roman Catholics on the other hand, are monistic not dualistic. They adhere to the Creed of Chalcedon wherein spirituality is based in the person of Christ. Christ’s essence was not merely Docetic (appearing as human), but he was truly human. The consecrated bread of the Eucharist is true matter and true Spirit. Christ is truly present in the person of the Bishop of Rome, the true Vicar of Christ. The world is something to be cared for, and not merely a temporary place soon to be destroyed by fire.
What a massive difference!
Back to Manicheanism. Augustine of Hippo exaggerated the Manicheanism of the Donatists. In his unrelenting polemic mind, Manicheanism was a reductio ad absurdum of salvation by faith alone and through grace alone. Salvation to Augustine was much more than a mere spiritual phenomenon where a person is “born again” just by hearing the words of the gospel. No, the material world also has its place. The water on the head of the baptismal font representing the new birth. The bread on the tongue of the Host in the Eucharist representing true spiritual nourishment. True grace is only communicated when a physical species is accompanied with the spiritual presence. Separating the use of matter from their corresponding spiritual benefits was to Augustine denying that Christ came in the flesh. It was dualism. It was Manicheanism. It was heresy plain and simple.
Christ was true God and true man. He came in the flesh. And, according to the learned Augustine, no one comes to the Father but through the Christological means provided by Christ to His Church: the Sacraments, which all share Christologically true matter and true Spirit.
Evangelicals on the other hand, not only deny the need for material things in the salvation process, they also turn their backs on the One True Church instituted by Christ. All in the name of their Manichean tendencies. Evangelicals believe that matter is temporal and that the spirit is eternal. They agree with Paul that there is a dualism involved in both the worship of demons, as well as in the worship of God.
In 1 Corinthians 1:19, Paul responded to meat sacrificed to idols with clear materialism. “An idol is nothing” and the meat sacrificed to idols is also “nothing”—they are “nothing” spiritually. Rather, it is the dualistically differentiated demons behind the idols that are the problem. In 1 Corinthians 1:20, the items sacrificed to these material shapes of wood, stone, metal, or bone, are not actually being sacrificed to those material shapes. Rather the worship bestowed on these material shapes of stone, metal, wood, or bone are being given to the demons masquerading behind the material representations.
Idolatry happens in a dualistic world. Yes, there is an outward form, but it is truly nothing. Why? “The earth is the Lord’s and all it contains” (Psalm 24:1). On the other hand, there are demonic forces at work stealing the fear of God and the glory due to God alone. The worship of the idol forms plays into the hands of demons that are behind them.
Paul teaches a dualism in 1 Corinthians 10, while at the same time condemning idolatry. He teaches that there exists a separate spiritual realm, freeing Christians to eat meat sacrificed to idols. If they want to eat meat sacrificed to idols they are free to do so, notwithstanding the conscience of another. They are free to eat what is available to them if that is what they want to eat—not for the demon’s sake, but for their enjoyment of all things created by God, for which they give thanks to God (1 Timothy 4:1-5).
Freed from a slavery to a monistic view of matter and spirit, the Christian is a steward of this material world.
Meanwhile, Christ left a mission for His followers to fulfill. It is the Great Commission. This mission keeps His followers focusing not on the things of this life, but on those of the life to come. We are to go into all the world to preach the gospel to all creation. We are to snatch lost souls from the clutches of sin in this world, so that they can be born from above.
When they are saved their body may remain the same in its outward form, but their inner man is transformed into the likeness of Christ. And it all happens solely through the preaching of the gospel message. “Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” Romans 10:17.
“For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed,
we have a building from God, a house not made with hands,
eternal in the heavens.” 2 Corinthians 5:1.
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