A Cross Vision of G. Boyd’s Cross Vision

Abstract

This paper critiques Greg Boyd’s Cross Vision: How the Crucifixion of Jesus Makes Sense of Old Testament Violence. The paper commends Boyd’s recognition that the God of the Bible prefers to extend grace and life instead of judgment and death, but addresses Boyd’s woefully inadequate hermeneutic—a hermeneutic based on a radically minimized concept of “revelation.” The paper addresses three basic concerns with Boyd’s approach: first, how Boyd’s hermeneutic fatally undermines the very concept of “inspired revelation”; second, that Boyd’s hermeneutic of “Christ crucified” is accurate but woefully incomplete; and third, that Boyd’s hermeneutic in continually contradicting major biblical themes is fatally hostile to Scripture.