CONTRA FATUM

Clocktower in Prague. A friend recently posted this quote on Facebook: “The present moment is all that is real. The past is gone. The future is not yet. We remember the past and anticipate the future, but we always do so in the present. Reality is always now...” (Greg Boyd, Present Perfect) I have much good to say about Boyd (and I haven't read the book, it might be good, who knows). But I believe that Boyd here relies on a tradition of thought that is deeply problematic. This way of thinking about time can at least be traced back to the Platonism of Augustine: “How can the past and future be, when the past no longer is, and the future is not yet? As for the present, if it were always present and never moved on to become the past, it would not be time, but eternity.” (Augustine of Hippo, Confessions)

Christ the teacher? Is this Clement's 'subjective' view of the atonement? According to Gustaf Aulen (Christus Victor), the 'moral influence theory' of the atonement (the 'subjective theory') can be traced more or less back to Abelard. It seems to me, though, that more of the early Church Fathers represent this theory, than Aulen would admit (correct me if I'm wrong!). Take Clement of Alexandria (ca. 150-215). Emancipation or liberation is central in Clement’s theory of atonement. Christ is the good Samaritan that liberates us from the “rulers of darkness” (Clement of Alexandria, Who is the Rich Man That Shall Be Saved?, XXVIII). But! Even if a 'Christus Victor'-motif is present, all this, it seems, happens through 'teaching'.