Following the recent death of Jacques Derrida, JamesJ asked me this question: How does deconstruction relate to postmodernism?

This is a complicated question, mostly because most critics (literary critics, who don’t really criticize, but that's semantics) can’t talked about deconstruction without talking about postmodernism; understandably so, because deconstruction by its own definition cannot be defined.

Let’s understand what the two have in common. Boiled down to their basics, both methodologies question the relationship between the signifier and the signified. The basic argument is, meaning cannot be known because language is a collection of symbols, that are not always agreed upon; that is, the aporia of our language ( or any language for that matter) makes it impossible to determine absolute meaning. This function of language is responsible for puns, political humor, actually all sorts of humor, and questioning previously established truths.

Postmodernism is really anti modernism (again, literary terms that can be ... well ... deconstructed). Modernism longs for the past, and obsesses over chaos and discord, the complication of finding meaning. Postmodernism embraces the lack of clarity and runs with it (which, I must admit, makes for some of my favorite reading).

Deconstruction, is almost impossible to define, simply because it is a intellectual construct, defined by a signifier, that dictates that signifiers are insignificant. So to pin it down is a futile exercise, it is a catchall phrase that intellectuals throw out and define in their own image: the stem-cell of literature.

To put it simply, postmodernism teaches that meaning cannot be found because language is too vague; deconstruction teaches that language is vague because there is no meaning to be found. Now, most people who say they are deconstructionists are postmodernists because everyone wants to believe there is some meaning, even if it is convoluted.

JamesJ brought up a good point, that deconstruction may relate to modern rereading of the Bible. There are plenty examples of this, one being DECONSTRUCTING THE NEW TESTAMENT, by David Seeley. First, Seeley does not properly understand “deconstruction”, he uses it to picks apart the Bible to come to a “better” understanding of the early church; but we’ve established that deconstruction assumes there is nothing to understand. Secondly, he is taking on the sociological aspects of postmodernism, rather than a purely literary one, to meet an agenda. Postmodern society is much simpler than its literary progenitor; simply, question everything, there are no absolutes. And this is a serious problem that is plaguing biblical inquiry.

The real battle is over authorship. In postmodernism, authorship is irrelevant because meaning is determined by the reader. Secular critics (and many “evangelicals” as well) are applying this line of questioning to the Bible. Authorship is excruciatingly important for christians because if the Bible is not written by God, it is a lie. If its meaning is open to interpretation, than it is useless (or as useful as Winnie-the-Pooh).

This whole manifestation is dangerous to the church because it sounds reasonable. Our society is bred on mantras: “Don’t trust anyone over thirty” or “Question everything”. The church is surrounded by this, and infiltrated by it. That is one of the dangers.

The second danger applies to the softening of the mind that postmodernism and deconstruction pose. We have removed the bar of absolute truth, thereby eliminating critical thinking. Students, people in general, are not accountable for being reasonable, their impressions are correct regardless of relevance. Here lies the greatest danger to the church, that the saints lose the ability to think critically; we tend to defend our faith (if we do that much) with clichés and platitudes, not with reason enough to stand toe-to-toe with our critics. Believers have to raise themselves above the fray. That is why a proper hermeneutic is so important, it is the polar opposite of deconstruction or postmodernism. It is the bulwark by which we can mount our offense, rather than falling upon a sullen defense.

With that, the argument will never be resolved. Believers will say “this is absolute” while the world increasingly agrees “there are no absolutes” (of course, that is an absolute statement). I don’t believe that the battle will be won through logic debates, our battle field is not in the playground of ideas (though we should be mounting a front there), and we should avoid logic debates or mountains of evidence, our God defies both human institutions. No, our battle is for the souls of men, and we must use the Word; it is our sword. It is also our only weapon, there is no “mace of logic” or “M-16 of reason”. We should understand how the world reasons to make our effort efficient, but never get caught in the verbal battering in which they engage. We need to bring the battle to our field, and they can stay or run. That is the lynchpin of the deconstruction and postmodern movements, it is fleeing from the truth and trying to change the war venue. We cannot afford to follow because our only power is in the absolute, infallible word of God.