Wrighting Natural Theology Personal Knowledge of God & the Importance of Narrative Jonathan C. Rutledge One central methodological issue addressed in N. T. Wright’s reflections on natural theology— reflections reaching their richest form in History and Eschatology—is the question of how it is that our own grand narratives—e.g., regarding God’s relationship to the world or history—play a part in both how we approach the topic of natural theology and how receptive we are to its deliverances. 1 And as Professor Wright’s broader corpus has illustrated so well, the narratives with which the early Christians navigated their reality look, in many ways, radically different from the narratives many of us assume today. 2 Whether our current grand narratives involve a strong Epicurean or deistic tendency— whereby we treat God as largely uninvolved or uninterested in human affairs—they determine to a large extent whether one thinks the events of the past (or the extant evidence regarding events of the past) are relevant to the question of God’s existence. Wright’s insistence that we attend to the inadequacies of these larger worldview narratives to allow for a robust, historically-informed, and self- awaringly narrative-focused natural theology has much to commend it. This paper unpacks Wright’s understanding of natural theology in two parts. First, we consider some recent criticisms of Wright from Andrew Ter Ern Loke, who, among other things, is concerned that Wright’s vision of natural theology is unbiblical and threatens to dissolve the all-important distinction between Christian theology and natural theology. I argue that Loke’s scripturally-inspired criticisms are unsuccessful due to either a misunderstanding of the scriptures he has in mind or a misunderstanding of Wright’s own views on natural theology. More specifically, I identify the fundamental obstacle to Loke’s rightly grasping Wright’s project with a lack of appreciation for the distinction between knowledge-that (sometimes called ‘propositional knowledge’) and knowledge- who (by which I mean subjective, personal knowledge). Once one appreciates that distinction, however, I show that the concerns Loke presents for Wright’s account disappear. The second part of this essay flows from the emphasis on personal knowledge of God on which the first part’s success depends. Particularly, I bring out the importance of narratives that, were they to take a more central role in natural theology, would more adequately contribute to the goal of personal knowledge of God. The reason for this is, very briefly, that narratives of other persons are among the best sources of the knowledge of persons. As a result, if we are to follow Wright’s lead in making personal knowledge of God—as historically revealed in Jesus—central to the enterprise of natural theology, we must articulate the role of narratives in that enterprise. §2 provides one provisional attempt at such an articulation followed by some clarifications and replies to objections in §3. But before we turn to narrative, let us begin with an attempt to grasp better Wright’s conception of natural theology. 1 N. T. Wright, History and Eschatology: Jesus and the Promise of Natural Theology (London: SPCK, 2019): 95–105. 2 N. T. Wright, The New Testament and the People of God (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1992): Parts III and IV.