Shorthand

Language is symbolism. It translates your ideas and mental images into symbols that you and I share so that I can share in your ideas and mental images. Language simply offers shared symbols of things that you and I are both familiar with so that we can communicate. When your symbols are not familiar to me (you're speaking Chinese and I'm speaking English, for instance), even if the ideas and images would be familiar, communication fails because the symbolism doesn't connect.

So what gets in the way of communication when two people are using what appears to be the same symbolism? You are speaking English and I am speaking English but we still don't seem to be able to have a dialog. Why? Often the problem is that one or the other (or both) isn't listening. This occurs when you're distracted. Distractions can come from outside, but very often they're internal. You have said something to me that has bypassed my cognitive processes and struck me in my emotional processes. In this case, I'm not listening anymore; I'm feeling. In cases like this, the "feeler" will no longer be analyzing symbols for common meaning. Instead, he or she will likely be building up defenses or launching attacks.

One of the real difficulties with communication, however, is what I call "shorthand". We often use shorthand in our conversation because it's faster and easier. An easy example is the term "Calvinism." What is it? Well, interestingly enough, it isn't related to Calvin. It's actually connected to a dispute some time after Calvin died where some students raised 5 points of concern with the doctrine they were being taught and the Church met and decided they were wrong. "Calvinism" became those 5 points. And while lots of people believe they know what those 5 points are, in my discussions with people (both those who agree with them and those who don't), it turns out that those 5 points are poor shorthand not understood by most. So here we have layers of shorthand for very big ideas that very few people actually agree on. What I mean is that when I say, for instance, "Limited Atonement", what any variety of people will hear will vary. Anti-Calvinists hear one thing. Calvinists hear another. Within both camps there are subtle and even broad variations. And when a person who identifies themself as "Calvinist" but understand the term "Limited Atonement" much differently than another "Calvinist", it doesn't matter. You see, the anti-Calvinist will say, "I heard it from a Calvinist and he said ..." and the error is propagated, so to speak. Now we've gone from a variation in the understanding of the symbol, "Limited Atonement", to a completely different comprehension of the broader symbol, "Calvinism." And communication has broken down. What seems like a simple term, "Calvinism", has now become a complete breach of communication. What I mean by the term and what you mean by the term may not even be similar, but we're both using the term and we both think that this shorthand symbol means the same thing. So now we're back to the "not listening" problem, where you are attacking my biblical view and I am attacking yours not because we properly understand each other and are disagreeing, but because we don't understand each other and cannot begin to address whatever disagreement we might have.

Unfortunately I don't have an easy alternative. We use this shorthand all the time. It's a given part of normal use of language. "Guys" may mean "males" or it may refer to a group of people, regardless of gender. If you decided, "I'm not using shorthand anymore," you'd have to address that particular group differently: "Hello, group of people comprised of both male and female with whom I have what I consider to be a congenial relationship." Now that would become cumbersome really fast. Imagine if I had to explain my theology every time rather than "Reformed"! It seems that the fix isn't to stop using shorthand. I would suggest that the fix would be to attempt to listen, to understand, to question, to give the benefit of the doubt, to extend charity in all cases. At least, it seems to me that would be a reasonable approach.