Who Says? Solving Doctrinal Controversy by Modern Reformation

Who Says? Solving Doctrinal Controversy When Tolerance Was No Ideal | by Jonathan Koch

Who Says? Solving Doctrinal Controversy | by Matthew Barrett

The Role of Creeds and Confessions in the Church | by Guy M. Richard

VO L . 31 , NO. 4

July/August 2022 M O D E R N R E FO R M AT I O N

$9.00 per issue

T H I N K I N G T H E O L O G I CA L LY

C E L E BRATE 30 YEARS OF MR

→

MODERNREFOR M A T I O N . O R G / S U B S C R I B E

Share the Gift GIVE A G I F T S U B S CR I PT I O N Give the gift of Modern Reformation and help others hone the art of theological thinking. For our thirtieth anniversary, MR is offering gift subscriptions at whatever price you can afford. Go to www.modernreformation.org/subscribe and bring others into the conversation.

A Production of Sola Media

Contents

I. RETRIEVE

10 R EFOR MATION R ESOURC ES

| “The Scriptures

Sufficiency to Determine All Matters of Faith”

Modern Reformation July/August 2022 Vol. 31, No. 4

| by William Twisse 14 R EFOR MATION OUT TAKES

| Lost and Found:

Calvin’s Sermons on the Scrap Heap | by Zachary Purvis II. CONVERSE

20 INTERV IEW

| When Doctrine Divides the

People of God | Modern Reformation with Rhyne R. Putman 27 GLOBAL THEOLOGICAL FOR UM

| An Interview

with Seblewengel Daniel 31 POEM

| Augury | by Joey Jekell

32 ESSAY

| When Tolerance Was No Ideal

| by Jonathan Koch III. P E R S UA D E

42 ESSAY

| Who Says? Solving Doctrinal

Controversy | by Matthew Barrett 52 ESSAY

| The Role of Creeds and Confessions in

the Church | by Guy M. Richard I V. ENGAGE

62 POEM

| The Scratch between Parallel Tracks

| by Josh Shelton 64 BOOK PR EV IEW

| Summer/Fall Book Preview

| by Noah Frens 05 F RO M THE E D ITOR

| by Joshua Schendel

67 POEM

| God Our Father, Source of Comfort

| by Duane R. Smith

07 L E T TE RS

68 B AC K PAGE

| Travailing We Seek | by Joshua Schendel

Endsheet illustration by Raxenne Maniquiz

Modern Reformation © 2022. All rights reserved. ISSN-1076-7169 | Modern Reformation (Subscriptions) 13230 Evening Creek Dr S Ste 220-222, San Diego, CA 92128 (877) 876-2026 | info@modernreformation.org | modernreformation.org | Subscription Information: US 1 YR $48. Canada add $10 per year for postage. Overseas add $9 per year for postage. Modern Reformation is a publication of Sola Media

J O I N THE CONVERS ATION

→

MODERNREFORMAT I O N . O R G / S U B M I S S I O N S

Call for Letters J O IN THE CO N V E RS AT I ON Since Modern Reformation appreciates a full theological conversation, we’d like to hear your thoughts about what you’re reading in the magazine. So please write to us at letters@modernreformation.org. Due to limited space, please keep your letter under 400 words (letters may be edited for length and clarity). Letters will be published two issues later. We look forward to hearing from you!

A Production of Sola Media

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

From the Editor

HE JESUIT PRIEST Clifford Howell has claimed that the very essence of Protestantism “is the principle of private judgement.” This means, Howell charges (as do many others), that Protestantism is at its core inherently divisive. Protestants have responded to this charge over and over again, as when Protestant historian Phillip Schaff remarked that the accusation of a “sect-system” is “a caricature of true Protestantism, and nothing else.” Still, a casual observance of the history of the Reformation movement, particularly in the Anglo-American world, does leave lingering questions: By whose authority are divergent opinions to be adjudicated? Is private opinion really the final arbiter and ever-increasing disunity the inevitable result? In this issue of MR we’re taking up the question, particularly as it relates to evangelicalism. In our Converse section, we discuss with Rhyne Putman his recent book When Doctrine Divides the People of God. How should we think about doctrine’s potential divisiveness so that we pursue unity in love without compromising biblical truth or personal conscience? And Jonathan Koch takes us on a broad historical tour of the idea of “toleration” in the early modern British context. Quite different from contemporary notions of “tolerance,” in this raucous period of English history, toleration was viewed more as “forbearance.” What might it look like, Dr. Koch challenges us, to take up such forbearance in our own time? In our Persuade section, Guy Richards’s essay argues that the purpose of creeds and confessions is not first and foremost to create a list by which to judge who is “in” and who is “out.” Their purpose is primarily to promote unity, ensure the peace and purity of the church, and provide protection to those within the church. Along the same lines, Matthew Barrett argues that the Great Tradition

serves the church in a twofold way: as a gardener, it nourishes the biblical soil so that the church’s theological reasoning flourishes in truth and faithfulness; and as a guardian, it protects the church’s theological reasoning from heresies that threaten its purity and peace. Particularly in the doctrine of God, he warns, evangelicals abandon the Great Tradition to their own peril. Also in this issue, we interview Dr. Seblewengel Daniel on the history of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church and its relations to evangelicalism in Ethiopia. The Retrieve section contains a portion of William Twisse’s answer to the Roman Catholic objection to the sufficiency of Scripture, and the always entertaining historical notes of Zack Purvis, this time on the turmoiled history of some of Calvin’s sermons. In the Engage section, Noah Frens points us to promising publications in his Book Preview column. In his essay “The Catholicity of Christianity and the Church,” Herman Bavinck writes, The one, holy, universal church that is presently an object of faith, will not come into being until the body of Christ reaches full maturity. Only then will the church achieve the unity of faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, and only then will she know as she is known. As you take up this issue, pray with us and with the saints the world over: “Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.”

Joshua Schendel Executive Editor

FINDING COURAGE IN A CULTURE OF FEAR

With 24-hour news cycles and constant screens, our fear is being used to breed hatred and divide us from one another. In Recovering Our Sanity, author Michael Horton mines the riches of Scripture and theology for the solution. “Horton shows you how to identify and fight against fear—supplanting the quivering of a limbic system with the adoration of a heart set free.”—RUSSELL MOORE Recovering Our Sanity provides a biblical and historical foundation for developing (and perhaps changing) our thinking about the most polarizing issues of our day.”—NANCY GUTHRIE

RecoveringOurSanity.com

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Letters

Re: “Evangelicals and the Evangel Future” March/April 2022

I’M A NEW SUBSCRIBER to Modern Reformation,

and I would first of all like to thank you for this edifying Reformed theological journal. Second, I’m writing in response to “Evangelicals and the Evangel Future” by Michael Horton. While I feel the article is spot on with its assessment, I do have a suggestion. Whenever the 1999 Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification is mentioned, there is often failure to mention that the Lutheran World Federation, which represented the Lutheran party to the Joint Declaration, is largely the liberal wing of Lutheranism, along with large participating bodies such as the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA). The conservative orthodox bodies within Lutheranism, such as the Missouri (LCMS) and Wisconsin (WELS) Synods, among others, stood staunchly against it. I only bring this up as I believe congregants need to be better educated on the doctrines and actions of their denominations in hopes that they will be more discerning in their choices for their church. God’s —Jan Novak blessings to you all!

Modern Reformation would like to welcome Jan as a new subscriber and thank her for these comments. She is absolutely correct that many of the conservative Lutheran bodies did not affirm the Joint Declaration. And not only conservative Lutherans, but other confessional Protestant denominations released responses. Even the Vatican, as Dr. Horton noted in his essay, claimed that while the Joint Declaration represents “significant progress,” the Catholic Church is “of the opinion that we cannot yet speak of a consensus.” Dr. Horton certainly did not intend to blur intra-confessional lines among the Lutherans, nor was the point in his essay to say that all Lutherans, Reformed, Anglicans, Methodists, and Baptists signed on to the supposed consensus. Rather, his point was that too many did and too quickly (whether more progressive or conservative). There were, as Jan rightly notes, both Protestants and Catholics who did not. Over the years, MR has often discussed the Joint Declaration and issues of ecumenism. In particular, readers may peruse the September/October 1998 and March/April 2002 issues of the magazine. Thank you, —MR editorial team Jan, for this clarification.

We’d like to hear your thoughts about what you’re reading in the magazine, so please write to us at letters@ modernreformation.org. Due to limited space, keep your letter under 400 words (letters may be edited for length and clarity). We look forward to hearing from you!

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Vol. 31, No. 4

Retrieve Learning from the wisdom of the past

July/August 2022

R E F O R M AT I O N R E S O U R C E S

“ The Scriptures Sufficiency to Determine All Matters of Faith” by William Twisse

William Twisse (1578–1646) wrote this work during his time as prolocutor of the Westminster Assembly (from 1643 until his death in 1646). This was his reply to a letter that had been anonymously written and sent to the assembly from Germany titled “A Perplexing Question and Doubtful Case of Conscience.” Though the letter claimed to come from a Protestant in the Netherlands, the assembly suspected that it had actually been written by a German Jesuit feigning a “question of conscience.” Twisse’s reply was posthumously discovered and printed in 1652 on the recommendation of Joseph Hall, bishop of Norwich. In the section of the letter just prior to the portion here republished, Twisse had concluded that although the author of the subversive letter frames the question as “whether we can have any certain faith by the holy Scriptures,” the real issue is “whether it be possible for us by the holy Scripture, to have any certain assurance of the meaning of it.” The following excerpt of Twisse’s response therefore takes up the issue of scriptural interpretation. this Author through the confusion of his wits, hath not hitherto been so happy as to deliver himself fairly of his own meaning: Therefore, let us take notice of the Discourse it self, whether it may bear any better state of the Question than yet we have been acquainted with: For I guess that in the issue the state of the Question will come to this, Whether it be possible for us by the holy Scripture to have any certain assurance of the meaning of it. BUT IT MAY BE

Disc. The reason of our doubting is this, Both Papists and Calvinists holding contrary opinions, do maintain & prove by the holy Scriptures (as they suppose) the contrary to that which the Lutherans hold; seriously affirming, that in the Scriptures the Lutheran Religion is condemned, and theirs confirmed. Which thing no man will deny to be an evident Argument of the obscurity of the holy Scriptures. . . . 2

Consid. The sum of all this is, that the Scripture is obscure; and that which the Author would infer from hence is this, therefore it is impossible to be sure of the meaning of it; whereby now I perceive the Perplexed Question and Doubtfull case of Conscience comes but to this in plain terms, Whether it be possible for a man to be sure of the meaning of Scripture; the Author maintains the Negative, & proves it, because the Scripture is obscure, and the obscurity of Scripture he proves by this, that men differ in the exposition of it. 3

The Scriptures Sufficiency to Determine All Matters of Faith by William Twisse

Retrieve

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Now this I will examine in order, and first observe the dodging disposition of this Author, and manifest evidence of his corrupt affection, and that he comes to this work with an intention not to seek the truth, but to circumvent it rather: For whereas the force of his Argument to prove that the Scripture is obscure, is but this, that Divines differ in the interpretation of Scripture, yet it served his turn rather to instance in Papists and Calvinists joyning together in the interpretation of Scripture contrary to the Lutherans. Might he not as well give instance in Papists and Lutherans holding together in interpretation of Scripture contrary to the Calvinists? Might he not as well have instanced in Lutherans and Calvinists joyning together in the interpretation of Scripture contrary to the Papists? Undoubtedly he might, for it is but an indefinite proposition, and the matter is clearly contingent. Now an indefinite proposition in a contingent matter is confessed in Schools to have no greater force than of a particular proposition: As much as to say, they differ one from another in the interpretation of some Scriptures. Now this may very well be true, not only of Papists differing from Protestants, but of Papists differing from Papists, as Maldonate from Jansenus, and Protestants from Protestants, not only Lutherans from Calvinists, but one Lutheran from another, and one Calvinist from another in the interpretation of some places of Scripture. Nay, doth not one Father differ from another after this very manner? And do not Modern Divines, even Papists as well as Protestants, take liberty of dissenting from all the Ancients, in the interpretation of some places of Scripture? Witness Maldonate in the interpretation of that Mat. 5. Blessed are the poor in spirit, who takes a way of interpretation different from all the Ancients, by his own confession. And Cardinall Cajetan when he was put upon the studying of Scripture by occasion of his conference with Martin Luther, who would hear nothing but Scripture, see what a profession he makes in his entrance upon writing Commentaries on the Scriptures, Si quando occurrerit novus sensus Textui consonus, nec à sacra Scriptura, nec ab Ecclesiae Doctrina dissonus, quamvis à torrente Doctorum sacrorum alienum, aequos se praebeant censores. And when Austin [Augustine] takes notice of the multiplicity of translations of the Scripture, he was so far from being offended thereat, that he professed there was more profit than damage redounding thereby to the Church; and why may it not be so by different interpretations also? it being more easie to judge which of them is the right, or by refuting them all to find out the true interpretation, than at the first dash to find out the true meaning. 2. Observe the absurd and malicious carriage of this Author. 1. In shaping different Religions, according to different interpretations of Scriptures, whereas I have shewed, that the force of the proposition is only a particular, namely, that they differ in the interpretation of some places of Scripture, which difference I have shewed may be found, and ever hath been found more or less, even amongst them that are of the same Religion, as amongst none have been more different interpretations of Scripture found, than amongst the Ancients. Yet what Christian is found to be so impudent and immodest, as to lay to their charge that they differed in Religion? And look how many different interpretations of 4

“ All things in Scripture are not alike plain in themselves, nor alike clear unto all; yet those things which are necessary to be known, believed, and observed, for salvation, are so clearly propounded and opened in some place of Scripture or other, that not only the learned, but the unlearned, in a due use of the ordinary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding of them.” –Westminster Confession of Faith, I.7

July/August 2022

Scripture were found amongst them, [were there as] many different Religions . . . amongst them? He might as well profess, that the Papists amongst themselves, the Lutherans amongst themselves, and the Calvinists amongst themselves are of different Religions. 3. We acknowledge different opinions between Lutherans and Calvinians; so no doubt there are different opinions among the Lutherans themselves, and the Calvinians themselves, but we utterly deny there are different Religions. The Lutherans we hold to be true Churches, agreeing with us in the fundamental points of faith, and likewise in being free from Idolatry; for albeit they have Images in their Churches, which we conceive to be a very dangerous thing, yet they doe not worship them; and although they hold real Presence in the Sacrament, yet they do not adore it. So that albeit we think some of their opinions are contrary to the Scripture, and they think the like of some of ours, yet neither we say of their Religion, nor they of ours I trow, that it is contrary to the Scripture, much less that it is condemned in Scripture. But come we to the main scope of this Authors Discourse, which is to prove that the Scriptures are obscure, and from thence to infer, that we can have no assurance of the true meaning of it. To this we answer, [. . .] By denying the consequence, which is this, Divines differ in the interpretation of Scripture, therefore the Scripture is obscure. And I prove the absurdity, and untruth, and weakness of it. 1. It is weak. For at the uttermost it proves that it is obscure but in some places: For this difference of interpretation is but of some places, as I have shewed, and the force of the proposition I have shewed to be no greater than the force of a particular. 2. It is absurd. For by the same reason [i.e., same mode of argument] I may prove, that the Scripture is clear. Thus: 7

hat Scripture is clear in the interpretation, wherein men of different opinions T and different Religions doe agree. ii. But men of different opinions and Religions do agree in the interpretation of divine Scripture. iii. Therefore the divine Scripture is clear. i.

And indeed it will be found that we agree in the interpretation not of some only, but of many places of holy Scripture. Now what absurd a course is it for a Disputant so to dispute, as that his Argument may be retorted with as good force against him; yea, and much more? For when men of different opinions are found to differ about the interpretation of a Scripture, it may be this ariseth from the love of their own opinions, which makes the Scripture seem to sound the same way, but when they agree in the interpretation of Scripture, notwithstanding their other differences, this argues the Scripture to be clear enough. Nay, we know Bellarmine will dislike an opinion, and Maldonate an interpretation of Scrip-

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Retrieve

ture, for Calvin’s sake, striving to differ from such as they hate, though without all just cause, and to wrest the Scriptures to serve their turns. 3. Lastly, the Consequence is as untrue, as it is weak and absurd. For the cause of this difference may be in the darkness of their understanding, who take upon them to interpret it, rather than in the darkness of the Scripture it self, which whether we consider the Law or the Gospell, each of them is termed light by the Spirit of God. Thy Law is a Lanthorn to my feet, and a light unto my pathes, saith David, Psal. 119. And of the Gospell our Saviour speaks, Light came into the world, but men loved darkness rather than light, Joh. 3, [so that] the greater will be their condemnation. 8

3. 4.

That is, the letter that was sent to the assembly and republished at the beginning of Twisse’s response. I.e., “Discourse.” This is a block quotation from the original letter. Twisse’s response consists of block quotes from the original letter followed by Twisse’s reply under the subtitle “Consider.” I.e., “Consider.” Juan de Maldonado, S.J. (1535–1583), who was trained under some famous Dominicans at the University of Salamanca yet became a famous Jesuit theologian, was particularly known for his commentaries on Scripture. Cornelius Jansen (1585–1638) was a Dutch Roman Catholic theologian who became famous (or infamous) for his strong anti-Jesuit responses from what was considered a faithful Augustinian position on grace, predestination, and human freedom. Tommaso de Vio Cajetan (1468–1534) was one of the most prominent Dominican theologians of the early sixteenth century and a primary respondent to the Protestant movement. “If ever a new and sound sense of the Scriptural text arises, and it is not dissonant either with Holy Scripture or with the

teaching of the church, then, even if that new sense differs from a torrent of holy doctors of the church, it is they who rightly expose themselves to censure [rather than the new and sound sense].”From the preface to Cajetan’s commentary on the literal sense of the Pentateuch, In Pentateuchum Mosis iuxta sensum quem dicunt literalem commentarii (1531). Here, as above, Twisse is making a logical point. One cannot validly draw a universal conclusion from particular premises. For example, from the particular premise that “some cats are black,” one cannot validly draw the conclusion that “all cats are black.” Likewise, from the particular premise that “some scriptural passages are obscure,” one cannot validly draw the conclusion that “all scriptural passages are obscure.” Roberto Bellarmino, S.J. (1542–1621) was one of the most prominent Jesuit theologians of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries and a primary respondent to the Protestant movement. Twisse’s point here is that these famous Roman Catholic exegetes at various places took a position on a scriptural text simply because it was the opposite position from the one taken by John Calvin.

July/August 2022

R E F O R M AT I O N O U T TA K E S

Lost and Found: Calvin’s Sermons on the Scrap Heap by Zachary Purvis

Guillaume and Adolphe Monod entered a junk shop in Geneva. A mysterious volume, unusually old and musty, caught their attention. When they examined it closely, the smudged ink inside resolved into letters and the letters into words. The script might have misled other men, but Guil laume and Adolphe came from a line of French Reformed ministers and studied theology themselves. Soon they identified the contents: nothing less than manuscript sermons from John Calvin. For a pittance they bought the set to which it belonged, eight folio volumes in all, for the clerk had priced it only by weight of the paper. They sent their treasure to Geneva’s public library for safekeeping. The episode seems surprising. In fact, the odyssey of Calvin’s sermons—from delivery to scrap heap, from discovery to preservation—is filled with remarkable twists. We begin with the Bourse française, a charity organization in Geneva that helped destitute immigrants and financed religious instruction. In 1549, the Bourse hired Denis Raguenier, himself a French refugee, as Calvin’s stenographer. Calvin entered the pulpit without notes, so Raguenier recorded what he said in shorthand and afterwards transcribed it in longhand. There had been repeated attempts to write down Calvin’s sermons and lectures as he spoke. “Many tried to do this,” Theodore Beza said in his early biography of Calvin, “but they had not yet been able to write everything down word for word.” Raguenier opened a new world and grew in ability as he went. The first sermons he recorded in 1549 ran to an average of 4,000 words each. The sermons he took down between 1550 and 1551 on Micah were 5,000 words. The sermons he transcribed between 1556 and 1559 on Isaiah ran to 7,000 words. It was Raguenier’s handwriting that the Monod brothers deciphered in the junk shop. Because Calvin preached without notes—though not without preparation— the transcribed sermons did not shine with the same polish as those texts that Calvin composed specifically for print. Guillaume Farel complained to him about this: “I would have liked it if you worked on your discourse with more care, as you usually do.” But Calvin was famously overburdened with work. Furthermore, he preached to the flesh-and-blood audience before him, even when that meant sacrificing style or brevity. No one had a sharper sense of the importance of genre: biblical commentaries were not sermons; sermons were not lectures; lectures were not treatises. No one knew more the distance between oral and IN 1823, THE BROTHERS

Retrieve

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

written discourse. In the case of Psalm 119, for example, Calvin confessed his preference “to print a brief commentary when the time was right, rather than to fill the sheet with so many long passages, just as in the pulpit.” Therefore, Calvin tended to resist publication of his sermons. “Calvin did not want his sermons to extend beyond his sheepfold,” acknowledged his contemporary Jacques Roux, “both because they were done for his own flock, adjusted as much as possible to their capacity, and because he felt that a different order and setup would be needed if the sermons were presented to the rest of the world.” Calvin’s printer, Conrad Badius, admitted in 1557 that those sermons that had reached print “were more the result of a forced and constrained permission, or even as a result of badgering than out of his free will and consent.” The published sermons nonetheless supplied a concrete model of Reformed preaching that carefully related exegesis and reflection, application and edification. For Calvin followed a simple homiletical pattern, always with a clear understanding of his particular congregants and a telling choice of words. For good reason, he achieved renown in his own time for his method of expository preaching. For good reason, too, he remains one of the great preachers in the history of the church. Badius spoke with more wisdom than he probably realized when he began to market Calvin’s sermons to young and inexperienced preachers: “It is expedient that those who are newly starting in this charge observe his way of teaching in order to follow it.” When the Bourse française eventually required the handwritten sermons to be deposited in Geneva’s library, it never foresaw the cruel fate that awaited the material. Librarians are usually the kindest of people, the souls of modesty. But in 1805, the library management directed the librarian, Jean Senebier, to sell some forty volumes of Calvin’s sermons to bookseller Gaspard-Joel Manget for reasons both lamentable and deplorable, if only in hindsight. The library was cramped, the sermons occupied several shelves, and there was an urgent need for space. Moreover, the librarian thought Raguenier’s handwritten pages were “doublets”—that is, copies that duplicated Calvin’s commentaries and published sermons already in the library’s possession. Worst of all, like the junk shop later on, the library sold the collection by the weight of the paper. Like recycled garbage, the sermons were scattered far and wide. Not until 1826 did Geneva’s local newspaper break the story that Guillaume and Adolphe had found and returned part of what the library had discarded. The new librarian wrote an op-ed to explain what had happened and to place blame firmly with his predecessor. In response, the newspaper quipped: “Perhaps it would have been better to let the public believe that Calvin’s manuscripts had disappeared than to tell the public that they had, according to a decision, been sold by the weight of paper. Would [Muslim leader] Caliph Umar have decided otherwise?” But all was not lost. Alongside the transcriptions by Raguenier and his successors in Geneva, several extant manuscripts of Calvin’s sermons have subsequently 5

Library of Geneva (present day)

July/August 2022

been discovered in the Bodleian Library in Oxford, the library of Lambeth Palace in London, the Walloon Church of London, and the Public Library and Archive in Bern, Switzerland, among other locations. In the imposing National Library of France in Paris, a few of Calvin’s sermons have been discovered on sheets of paper, folded in four, and coated with finger grease from being consulted so often. Like a detective story, the total history of Calvin’s sermons provokes and excites. In reading rooms and niche but fervent corners of academia, speculation on manuscript whereabouts continues—albeit in tones more wishful than confident. “Should we despair?” historians ask. “Or will an unexplored attic one day reveal that for which we have been looking so long: one or more small folio volumes bound in parchment and bearing a sixteenth-century script, perhaps Raguenier’s—the precise indication of Calvin’s sermons, which he had ‘faithfully received from his mouth’?” Scholars rightfully want to know. Yet one wonders whether Calvin would be pleased by the disappearance. He preached, after all, to the local church, and he insisted more on the power of the eternal word than on the preservation of his own words. 10

Zachary Purvis (DPhil, University of Oxford) is lecturer of church history at Edinburgh Theological

Seminary. He is the author of Theology and the University in Nineteenth-Century Germany (Oxford University Press, 2016), and his articles have appeared in such venues as Journal of the History of Ideas, Church History, and Journal of Ecclesiastical History.

ERRATA :

In the March/April 2022 issue, “Luther’s Marginal Notes on Melanchthon” by Zachary Purvis should have read “Melanchthon and the Material Cause,” and Melanchthon’s On the Authority of the Church was published in 1539 not 1538. We apologize for these editorial errors.

1. 2.

6. 7.

Journal de Genève (March 9, 1826). See Ioannis Calvini opera quae supersunt omnia, ed. G. Baum, E. Cunitz, and E. Reuss, 59 vols. (Brunswick: Schwetschke, 1863–1900), 21:70. F. M. Higman, T. H. L. Parker, and Lewis Thorpe, eds., Supplementa calviniana, vol. 3 (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Verlag der Buchhandlung des Erziehungsvereins, 1995), xxii–xxiii. Guillaume Farel to John Calvin, February 1546, in Ioannis Calvini opera quae supersunt omnia, 12:302. Rodolphe Peter and Jean-François Gilmont, Bibliotheca calviniana, 3 vols. (Geneva: Droz, 1991–2000), 1, no. 54/13. Peter and Gilmont, 2, no. 62/21. Peter and Gilmont, 2, no. 57/10.

Peter and Gilmont, 2, no. 58/5. Journal de Genève (March 23, 1826). 10. See, e.g., T. H. L. Parker, Calvin’s Preaching (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1992), 65–75; Max Engammare, “Calvin Incognito in London: The Rediscovery in London of Sermons on Isaiah,” Proceedings of the Huguenot Society 26 (1996), 453– 63; Richard Stauffer, “Les Sermons inédits de Calvin sur le livre de la Genèse,” Revue de Théologie et de Philosophie 98 (1945): 26–38. 11. Bernard Gagnebin, “L’incroyable histoire des sermons de Calvin,” Bulletin de la Société d’histoire et d’archéologie de Genève 10 (1956): 311–34. 8. 9.

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Vol. 31, No. 4

II.

Converse Discussing from perspectives of the present

July/August 2022

I N T E RV I EW

When Doctrine Divides the People of God Modern Reformation with Rhyne R. Putman

Dr. Rhyne Putman is Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs, director of Worldview Formation, and professor of Christian Ministries at Williams Baptist University. In this interview, MR’s executive editor discusses Dr. Putman’s recent book When Doctrine Divides the People of God: An Evangelical Approach to Theological Diversity (Crossway, 2020).

When Doctrine Divides the People of God by Rhyne R. Putman

The title of your book is intriguing to me for its honesty. It is commonplace to hear, “Doctrine divides!” Your book takes this objection seriously. You note as a matter of historical fact that since the Reformation’s inception, doctrine has indeed divided (to say nothing of the church prior to the Reformation). By way of introduction, can you say something about why you take this objection seriously and why you decided to write this book? Doctrinal disagreements have been with us since the very beginning. The apostles warned first-century churches about doctrines that were denials of the gospel, like requiring Gentiles to be circumcised in order to be saved, angel worship, and denials of the true humanity of Jesus. The apostles also made room for some liberty of conscience in “disputed matters” like diet (Rom. 14:1–2) or the consumption of food offered to idols (1 Cor. 8:1–13). What changed after the first century is that the apostles were no longer around to settle these debates, to sort them according to their importance. The church now had the written word of God that preserved the apostolic deposit, but it could be interpreted well or misinterpreted. The fifth-century Gallic theologian Vincent of Lérins understood this complication. He argued that because of “the depth of Holy Scripture, all do not accept it in one and the same sense, but one understands its words in one way, another in another; so that it seems to be capable of as many interpretations as there are interpreters” (Commonitory 2.5). For Vincent, the interpretative tradition of the church (the “faith which has been believed everywhere, always, by all”) provided an important safeguard against heretical sects like Arianism, Sabellianism, Donatism, and so on. When the Reformers entered the scene, there was already significant disagreement in the tradition. The medieval church had grown this tradition into a number of doctrines completely unsupported by Scripture. The Reformers chal-

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Converse

lenged us to return to the sources, to give Scripture supreme authority as the only sufficient and necessary standard for theological beliefs and practices, but they also opened Pandora’s box. As Alister McGrath puts it, the Reformers’ decision to put the Bible in the hands of ordinary believers was “Christianity’s Dangerous Idea.” So long as Christians were free to read the Bible for themselves, there would be disagreement about some things. But if the “dangerous idea” of the Reformation was putting the Bible in every hand, the “dangerous idea” of our technological age is giving anyone and everyone a platform to espouse their opinions publicly. Social media has exacerbated the contentiousness of our in-house fights. Twitter is not exactly the kind of forum that opens itself up to productive theological dialogue. It’s usually more about scoring points with likeminded individuals than making genuine headway with people who take differing positions. It’s no surprise when the unbelieving world has been caught up in a civil war of ideologies, but those who live their lives under the authority of the Bible and the power of the gospel should know better and do better. A better understanding of how we interpret the Bible and draw theological conclusions makes all of us better theologians. It is a humbling thing to recognize our own shortcomings as interpreters of God’s word. It also helps me understand people who reach different conclusions than me if I have some idea of how they got there. I remain convinced that theological method will not eliminate disagreements between us, but it can help us make more informed decisions about how we deal with disagreements and our interlocutors. The first part of your book addresses the question: “How do Christ-followers with similar convictions about Scripture and the gospel come to such drastically different points of view in matters of faith and practice?” You spend a number of chapters detailing issues in reading methods. Is doctrinal agreement simply a matter of becoming aware of and consistently applying good reading methods to the Bible? That’s an interesting question. Theologians who write in the area of theological prolegomena (the critical introduction to the study of theology) tend to talk about method in two broad ways: prescriptively and descriptively. I take up more of a prescriptive approach to method in my newest book The Method of Christian Theology. There, I am simply walking students of theology through one approach to studying theology. We do the same sort of thing in homiletics classes when we are teaching students how to exegete the text and formulate the sermon. Most seasoned preachers probably don’t use the same step-by-step process they learned in seminary, but learning those steps hopefully helped them become confident in their own process of sermon preparation. I hope prescriptive discussions of theological method can do the same thing for budding theologians. Here in When Doctrine Divides, my approach to method is more descriptive. My goal was not to prescribe how Christians should read the text and come to doctrinal conclusions but to describe what normally happens. There is, of course,

“ Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law.” –Psalm 119:18

July/August 2022

a degree of uniformity that interpreters of Scripture can have at some levels of historical-grammatical exegesis, particularly at the level of word studies and syntax. But things get far more complicated when we introduce competing understandings of the historical background of a biblical text or of its literary genre. The other issues I introduce really make it impossible for us to approach theological issues in the same way every time: there are differences in the way people reason through problems and differences in the way people feel through issues. The only way we could achieve complete doctrinal unanimity would be for us to share a brain! The differences in the ways our individual brains work and the differences between our theological traditions will contribute to unique theological thinking—and consequently, theological disagreement—until the Lord returns. Tradition is a bit of a buzzword in many evangelical circles today. You write positively of tradition, that it can help readers find their footing in Scripture (153). You also state that, as a matter of fact, tradition cannot be escaped: “We cannot theologize outside of some tradition of belief and practice” (154). Yet, you also warn that tradition can distort our ability to understand the authorial intent of Scripture. How should we think about the role of tradition in our own theological development? Tradition is another one of those words that can be used in many different senses. In the broadest sense of the term, “tradition” describes any belief, custom, or practice handed over from one individual to another or one group to another. Anything learned, taught, or passed along fits in this category: rituals, histories, folktales, recipes, songs, and so on. Though its divine inspiration clearly sets it apart as a truly unique assortment of writings, the Bible itself is part of tradition in this broader sense as it is a collection of teachings, histories, laws, songs, etc., handed down by Israel and later by the church. Paul, for example, encourages the church at Corinth to hold fast to the traditions instituted by Christ (1 Cor. 11:2) and notes that he passed along the same gospel tradition he received (1 Cor. 15:3). Christian theologians also use “Tradition” (with a capital T ) to describe the interpretation of Scripture throughout history. This is the faith once delivered over to the saints, believed everywhere, always, by all. Historical theology is a history of biblical interpretation in this sense. Another use of “tradition” (with a lowercase t) describes the particular faith traditions from which we think about and practice the Christian faith (Baptist, Presbyterian, Wesleyan, etc.). This is just a reminder that we always do theology in a church context. Tradition, while not infallible, can give us wise insights into the historic interpretation and application of biblical texts. What I warn about in the book is tradition unchecked, which often comes in the form of confirmation bias. Our theological tradition informs us that we should believe a certain way, and sometimes our approach to Scripture is simply a search for verses or texts that confirm that deeply held belief. We also ignore, rationalize, or deemphasize texts that are problematic for our theological tradi-

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Converse

tion. I have seen a student’s Bible where all the verses that contradicted the beliefs of his church were marked through with a pen. This kind of bias is not limited to conservative traditions. I have read liberal scholars who say we must dismiss Pauline passages about women or homosexuality as something from a bygone patriarchal society. Anything that does not confirm our theological biases must be reinterpreted or rejected. We all come to faith within a tradition. We are all discipled in a tradition. But my plea is to give Scripture primacy, to place ourselves under the Lordship of Christ expressed through the text. We shouldn’t feel obligated to make square pegs fit into round holes, nor should we feel that we have to pit our beliefs against what the text says or means. There are ways of alleviating this kind of bias, like reading broadly across several lowercase t traditions, asking what kind of evidence we would look for in Scripture if our preferred doctrinal tenet was wrong, and considering other hypotheses. You write that, hermeneutical difficulties aside, “the Bible is clear enough to bring any individual who reads it with an openness to the activity of the Spirit into an understanding sufficient unto obedience and service to God” (66). I can imagine someone thinking, “Well, isn’t the Christian life pretty much about obedience and service to God? Why not stop there? Why use the Scriptures for all this doctrine stuff, adding the further risk of division and discord?” How would you respond? The problem with the way the question is asked is that there is an assumption that doctrine is merely an intellectual pursuit, driven by speculative curiosities. But doctrine should not be reduced to a mere set of facts or propositions; it is guidance for how we think about who God truly is and how we apply his word in our world today. Elsewhere, I define doctrines as “faithful and true teachings derived from Scripture and used to grow God’s people in knowledge, spiritual maturity and obedience” (The Method of Christian Theology, 44). Doctrine is the primary instrument of disciple-making, how we teach them how to obey everything Jesus commanded us (Matt. 28:20). How can we worship and serve God if we do not know who he is and what he has done? How do we know we are making wise and godly judgments if we know nothing about his character? How do we know how a church should be run? How should we practice the sacraments or ordinances? As I conceive of doctrine, it involves a rehearsal of the grand story of the Bible, reflection on theological truths, practices and behaviors shaped by those truths, and direction for the hearts and affections. Doctrine and Christian practice are so integrally related that it is impossible to separate the two. The second half of your book is dedicated to the question of what like-minded Christians should do about the doctrine that divides them. In a culture where public disagreements are increasingly carried out sardonically, what would you say the initial posture of the Christian toward doctrinal disagreement

“ Whoever, then, thinks that he understands the Holy Scriptures, or any part of them, but puts such an interpretation upon them as does not tend to build up this twofold love of God and our neighbor, does not yet understand them as he ought.” –Augustine, On Christian Teaching, bk. 1, ch. 36

“ But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.” –Galatians 5:22–23

July/August 2022

should be? What character traits should mark the Christian who engages in doctrinal disputes? Unfortunately, many of our disputes are characterized by the works of the flesh: “hatred, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambitions, dissensions, factions” (Gal. 5:20 CSB). We are sometimes more concerned about people disagreeing with us than we are about the truth. It is easier (and more tempting) to build a platform and rouse the anger of the mob than it is to have patient and loving conversations with our interlocutors. So, what better place can we start in our disagreements with brothers and sisters than with the fruit of the Spirit? Believers characterized by the fruit of the Spirit exhibit (1) love for those people with whom they disagree; (2) joy, not anger, in disagreements; (3) peaceable spirits who yearn for peace rooted in truth; (4) kindness in speech and deed; (5) faithfulness to the word of God; and (6) selfcontrol in how they handle themselves in these debates. You write that “the desire for true, gospel-centered Christian unity honors God and builds up the body of Christ” (202). Yet, you also state that some doctrines related to Christian practice and worship “do and should divide us” because “we have arrived at different conclusions from Scripture” (240). Can you help us think through that a little more? How do we honor God by pursuing unity while also honoring God by not compromising truth or our own consciences? We have to get this idea out of our mind that unity means uniformity of thought or unanimity of cultural or ecclesial preferences. We can, with Jesus, pray that his followers will be one without expecting us all to come to the same conclusions about church government, the millennial reign of Christ, election, or whatever bothers us. It is one thing to have a conviction that we are correct in our understanding of the text, and another thing entirely to presume that everyone else will (or should) reach the same conclusions. That’s more about controlling people than being concerned for the truth. So, what unites Christians of different theological stripes? A shared conviction that we can or can’t eat meat offered to idols? A shared belief in autonomous church government? Do we have communion around our beliefs about the charismatic gifts? No, no, and no. It is the gospel that brings us together: the declaration that Jesus died for sinners, was buried, was raised from dead, and that he is Lord and king. We share a common metanarrative, a common hope, even if we parse some of the mechanics of the gospel in divergent ways (e.g., how the atonement works). I’m not saying that Baptist Calvinists and charismatic Arminians have to be members of the same church, or that they should give up their respective convictions about what Scripture means and how it is applied. This is almost impossible in matters of ecclesiology anyway. What I am saying is that we can cooperate together in kingdom efforts. This looks different in every setting. Maybe we come together for a citywide day of prayer. Perhaps we both invite people to the

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Converse

same evangelistic crusade. Maybe it’s just as simple as committing to pray for one another—that God would bless them and use them for his kingdom purposes. We do not have to abandon our convictions or violate our consciences to do that—unless we have somehow added extra intellectual requirements to the gospel. Perhaps one of the more practical questions that some may have after reading your book has to do with doctrinal disagreements within particular Christian communities, rather than between Christian communities. For example, how would you counsel the congregants who disagree with their pastor on a matter that is for them of some importance? Let me address this first as a pastor. Some years ago, I accepted the call to pastor an urban church that saw explosive growth in the 1970s and ’80s but dwindled down to a much smaller congregation in the decades that followed. There was a couple there I dearly loved (who have since gone home to be with the Lord) who called me out to their house to have a theological conversation with me. Decades before, they had come to faith under a previous pastor who grew a successful radio and TV ministry by preaching dispensational premillennialist eschatology (something that was very popular during that time). Knowing something about this background, I anticipated the kind of conversation we would be having when I got there. While they had some real frustrations with the way I preached through a book like Revelation, I never felt any genuine animosity from them. These were kindhearted senior adults who were nostalgic for a certain style of preaching attached to a particular subset of evangelical theology. I tried to listen carefully to their concerns, and sometimes I would attempt to explain rather delicately why I didn’t always understand biblical passages the same way that pastor from many years ago did. I had serious doubts about my ability to change their minds on the topic, and I didn’t exert much energy trying. Were I dealing with an issue that I believed presented real danger to the soul of a congregant, something that denied the very essence of the gospel, my response would have been very different. So long as this disagreement never became a source of open contention or division, it never really bothered me that they had a different millennial viewpoint than me. Over the years, I visited this couple many more times in their home, but the topic didn’t come up much. I left every single conversation verbally saying, “You know your pastor loves you.” For that church member who has genuine concerns or questions about theological disagreement with a pastor or teacher, I would recommend a few things. First, it’s important to assess the seriousness of the issue. I would recommend asking questions like, is this pastor teaching something that outright contradicts the gospel? Is he teaching something that explicitly contradicts our church or denomination’s statement of faith? Or is the pastor teaching something that I simply don’t agree with? Believers can fellowship together and do mission together even when they disagree about minor points of doctrine (like the timetable for

July/August 2022

the Lord’s coming or the order of God’s decrees), but cooperation is built around a strong gospel and confessional core. Second, if you suspect that your pastor is teaching something that contradicts the gospel or the local confession of faith, I think it is important to have a direct conversation with him before you start spreading those concerns to other people. This follows a Matthew 18 pattern, but it is also an opportunity to ask clarifying questions of your pastor before coming to rushed judgments. It is quite possible that you misunderstand what he is saying, or that there is some nuance you are missing. Third, if after conversing with the pastor you still are convinced that he is teaching/preaching something contrary to the gospel (first-tier issues) or contrary to the confession of faith (second-tier issues), then it may be wise to escalate the Matthew 18 process and revisit the conversation with several witnesses. Whether you take it to the church or leave the church altogether will be based entirely on the guidance of the Spirit. Thank you, Dr. Putman, for the wealth of resources you’ve provided in this book. The questions are honest, relevant, and clear, the discussions are insightful, and the overall organization of the material is very helpful. I also want to thank you for taking the time to discuss the book with MR.

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Converse

GLOBAL THEOLOGICAL FORUM

An Interview with Seblewengel Daniel

Dr. Seblewengel Daniel lives with her husband and three children in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. She earned her PhD from Akrofi-Christaller Institute of Theology, Mission, and Culture in Ghana. She is now the director of East Africa Sending Office, SIM, and a part-time faculty member at the Ethiopian Graduate School of Theology. She is also the author of Perception and Identity: A Study of the Relationship between the Ethiopian Orthodox Church and Evangelical Churches in Ethiopia (Carlisle, UK: Langham Press, 2019). Dr. Daniel, thank you for taking the time to talk with us here at Modern Reformation. Could you please tell us a little bit about yourself, your research, and what you are working on? Thank you for having me. Please refer to me as Seble as we have no surnames in Ethiopia. My full name is Seblewengel; it is a compound name. In Amharic, Seble means “harvest of ” and Wengel means “gospel.” While she was expecting me, my mother used to teach the Bible to women in the rural areas around Durame, southern Ethiopia, and that is why she named me “harvest of the gospel.” I am married to Tamiru, and we have three children: Sebhat, Leul, and Bamlak. I served in the academy for two decades as a faculty member in systematic theology, practical theology, and I taught a few Ethiopian church history courses. My PhD research focused on the relationship between the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, which follows one of the most ancient Christian traditions, and evangelical churches. I also engage in research that focuses on women’s contributions and eliminating harmful traditional practices. In our January/February 2022 issue, we learned about Ethiopian church history from an Ethiopian theologian (Dr. Frew Tamrat). We learned about the prominence of doctrinal disagreements between the Ethiopian Orthodox Church and Evangelical churches surrounding Christ’s two natures and Marian veneration. Could you briefly characterize those two doctrinal disagreements and any others you would like to add? First of all, I think it is very important to understand that the tradition of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church (EOC) is different from that of evangelicals. We should also refrain from using collective terms in speaking of followers in the EOC.

Ephrem the Syrian (c. 306–373)

July/August 2022

The concern of evangelicals is that some of the beliefs and practices of followers in the EOC undermine the authority of the Bible and the supremacy of Christ. One such belief is the elevation of Mary. The ever-growing trends of exalting Mary, even to the point of depicting her as a “co-redeemer,” is a matter of great concern. However, it is important to remember that some of the beliefs about the status of Mary do not have their origins in the Church of Ethiopia, but in ancient Christianity as handed down from the fathers. Frumentius, the first bishop of the Ethiopian Church, honored Mary by naming after her the first church building erected by the king and the first Christian fellowship “Society of Mary Zion.” Aba Ephrem, one of the Syrian church fathers, is credited with inaugurating a new era of praising the Son and the mother in one breath. Prominent church fathers such as St. Jerome, for example, strongly believed in Mary’s perpetual virginity. The great affection to Mary also stems from her unique role of bearing the Savior of the world. The debates as to whether to call her “Mother of God/ Θεοτόκος) or “Mother of Jesus” had a great God-bearer” (Θεοτόκος theological significance, because the issue can be christological. In other words, in refusing to call Mary “Godbearer,” it seemed that the very identity of Jesus Christ, the God-man she bore, was at stake! In the EOC’s official tradition, therefore, Mary was not exalted by her own merit but in relation to Christ and his work of salvation. However, in the fifteenth century, the era that followed the reigns of King Dawit and his heir Zer’a Ya’iqob, unprecedented devotion to Mary was inaugurated in which Mary was portrayed as co-redeemer. Objections to such degrees of elevation of Mary can be found within the writings of the Orthodox scholars and historians. It is explicitly stated in the writings of the Orthodox that the church does not worship Mary but honors her. However, most of the time, the mother and Son are inseparable in the minds of Orthodox followers. On the other hand, evangelicals seem to show little understanding of the dynamics at work while disregarding Mary and going to the other extreme. A friend of mine who is a former member of the Orthodox Church laments that in order to exalt the Savior, they seem to diminish the role of Mary in God’s plan of salvation. The natures of Christ are also points of contention between the two traditions. In fact, it is not uncommon to hear Orthodox writers identify evangelicals with Nestorius, who was anathematized in the fifth century and accused of dividing the person of Christ. On the other hand, depicting the Orthodox as Monophysite is a common error. Both Orthodox and evangelicals acknowledge that Christ has a human and a divine nature. As to how the natures existed within the one person and whether his humanity endured is where they disagree. The doctrinal difference between evangelicals and EOC can be summed up in the status of the Bible that according to the evangelicals is to serve as a standard against which to weigh any given doctrine or practice.

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Converse

There seems to be strong evidence to support the Protestant concern that in the structures of the Orthodox Church, Mary is exalted as high as or even higher than Christ. Although these claims are not accepted by the church’s theologians, Zer’a Ya’iqob’s composition (which explicitly exalts her as a savior) is read as part of worship in the church. Moreover, prominent preachers, teachers, and singers continue to use the platforms of the church to exalt Mary, angels, and other saints in a manner that is due to the living God alone. Hailing the Orthodox tradition as an authentic form of Christianity and depicting the evangelical one as foreign also continues to drive the followers of the two traditions apart. On the other hand, evangelicals tie their identity to the Bible, but their expression of Christianity has limited indigenization. Perhaps because they were rejected and persecuted by the Orthodox Church, they distance themselves from indigenous Ethiopian expressions of worship and ways of life. Moreover, their indiscriminate criticism of the Orthodox offends the ancient church, and most of all hinders evangelicals from admiring the unique Christian heritage that the EOC has preserved at an immeasurable cost. Why are these doctrinal disagreements so important to both EOC and evangelicals? As I indicated above, the status of Mary can sound like Christology for Orthodox believers. Maintaining tradition is also very important for the Orthodox. What is handed down from the fathers is to be preserved and passed on. Moreover, in the debate about the priesthood (intercessory role) of Christ, an Orthodox believer raises a question about Christ’s equality with the Father. Since Jesus is coequal with God the Father, how can he offer prayers but receive them? Evangelicals, on the other hand, maintain the authority of the Bible, the sole mediatorship of Christ, and the eternal coexistence of his human nature with the divine one. Understanding these positions and their sources is important to address questions that are of greater theological significance both to the Orthodox and to evangelicals. What approaches do you think are advisable or not advisable, as evangelicals continue to pursue biblical faithfulness and positively engage these doctrinal disagreements? Collective depiction of the Orthodox as this or that is quite unhelpful. Expecting the Orthodox to prescribe to an evangelical tradition is also inappropriate. Maintaining respect and expressing one’s conviction with love is important. Dialogue is a way forward. For a true dialogue to take place, both parties need to accept each other as coming from different traditions but with common heritage. Knowing the church fathers and their teaching is also very important on the part of evangelicals. Genuine interest in indigenous expressions of Christianity is something evangelicals have yet to work on. We seem to have more confidence in theologies developed elsewhere than EOC expressions.

July/August 2022

What positive examples and, conversely, warnings from experience can be learned as lessons from Ethiopian theology and history in regard to doctrinal controversies? The positive things we learn from mission history in Ethiopia is the act of indigenizing Christianity. Christian expressions are intertwined with the culture, and they have become part and parcel of one’s authentic identity. Indigenous expressions of theology are preserved and passed on from generation to generation. We can also learn from maintaining monasteries as centers of learning, solitude, and prayer. What may serve as a warning is that revivals were not handled well in the history of the Church of Ethiopia. God’s acts of awakening the church have been nearly quenched throughout our history. We are to work on listening to one another in true humility and acknowledging our common heritages.

To read more about this fascinating history, pick up a copy of Dr. Daniel's Perception and Identity.

What do you pray the future might hold for evangelicalism and the EOC? To some extent, the EOC and evangelicals have a desire to work together for a number of reasons. One of the reasons is internal turmoil they both faced. Both evangelicals and the Ethiopian Orthodox Church have experienced strong storms, which in the case of the Orthodox Church came near to splitting it. Evangelicals, on the other hand, are looking for a more stable and orderly church government. Thus their admiration for the EOC’s indigenous Christian values is growing, and disciplines such as fasting, order in the worship, and spiritual mentorship are being sought after. The government is also playing a role of enforcing peace between religious bodies in the country. The government brought together major religious organizations and formed an Inter-Religious Council. The council’s delegates meet regularly and discuss issues related to tolerance. The council also holds workshops in district towns and creates awareness and promotes tolerance between adherents of different religions. It is my prayer that both use the council and other relevant platforms (such as the Ethiopian Bible Society) for dialogue and grow to respect each other’s traditions and yet acknowledge that they are fallible. We are to learn to speak with and not just about one another. We are to listen to one another as those who have more in common. I also believe that both Orthodox and evangelicals need to deal with notorious preachers and teachers who diminish the centrality of Christ and the authority of the Bible for their own personal agenda.

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Converse

POEM

Augury by Joey Jekell

A growing headache as the pick-up glides on the interstate. I start to look outside the window to soothe the pain I feel in my temples. Remnants of trash scatter in the wind, or wait—birds hovering over the highway brambles. And other birds, crows, I believe, revolve in a dance above the truck like members of a baby-mobile suspended and spinning while I fail to sleep. What truth is drawn from wings and raucous caws? Why travel this road and read the varied patterns of flocking creatures? Maybe one could learn how the birds are not at war with God— perhaps I’m not to explicate the birds.

W H E N

Tolerance W A S

N O

IDEAL

by J O N A T H A N K O C H

Converse

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

virtue of the Enlightenment, has of late been under duress. Not only have the rhetoric and practice of intolerance suffused our political discourse and society, but the quality, the character, and the very constitution of tolerance have been questioned, and not just by those who oppose it. As those entrenched against the liberal project invoke bad-faith arguments for free speech and their own right to be tolerated in order to justify vitriolic and sometimes violent expression of their racial, sexual, religious, and political opinions, those sympathetic to tolerance have been confronted by its shortcomings and its costs. At the center of tolerance lies a conceptual problem: tolerance excludes even as it claims to include, accept, and approve of others; it presumes—even requires—a citizenry that is first and foremost tolerant, and only secondarily wedded to beliefs and convictions, communities, and identities that might need to be tolerated. For many, such a metaphysical division is impossible—indeed, unthinkable. By valorizing the freedom to choose, tolerance assumes its own elevation above belief and embodiment, yet this very assumption undermines its claim to neutrality: If all are called to exercise freedom of choice, and the good life is defined primarily by such elevation, what then of those who do not (or cannot) see or experience the world in such terms? A secularization story is implicit in the assertions of tolerance. Since dogmatic belief is on the decline and will soon die out, so the story goes, the claims of dissenting minorities need not be taken seriously. So defined, tolerance is an ideology: it is an intellectual system in which the tolerant see themselves as free agents operating in a world governed by rules that are easily apprehended, though in reality those rules are deeply informed by their own position in the world. If tolerance is not the neutral good, not the unquestioned virtue it was once thought to be, then what course should we take in our efforts to live together across deep differences? Should we seek to reform or refashion tolerance so that it might be better equipped for our age? Or should we abandon it altogether, as a passive instrument wielded by those in power to reinforce their power, insufficient to address the material disparities of our world? In response to these questions, some have proposed models based on constitutional rights; others have advanced a politics premised on a shared experience of trauma and alienation; some have called for new forms of dialogue; and others have asserted that dialogue will never be sufficient to address the injustices that divide us. The pitch and volume of diagnoses and solutions seem to have increased in recent years. As we try to listen through the noise and consider the best way forward, I would like to suggest that we would be well served to look again at the history of toleration in the Anglophone world, and more specifically to toleration’s

OLERANCE, THAT OFT-TOUTED

July/August 2022

earliest development as a concept in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, before it became an ideal or an ideology. In taking up the example of Reformation England, I do not mean that the toleration of that world should itself be our model; rather that by studying its premises and its mechanisms, and especially the emotions and behaviors associated with its modes of forbearance, we will become better equipped to construct, evaluate, revise, and implement our own solutions to the challenge of life in plurality. ***

Toleration in Early Modern England

Toleration comes from the Latin tolerare, which means “to bear, to endure.”

As several generations of historians have shown, early modern England was a world shaped not by a singular Reformation that irrevocably divided Catholic and Protestant, but by a series of reformations, whose effects rippled across the sixteenth and into the seventeenth century. The result was an uneven confessional landscape, proliferating with new sects and devotional practices, none of which conformed to a single theology, but also none of which was entirely discontinuous from existing forms of spirituality. Instead of sorting the women and men of early modern England into simple categories like Catholic and Protestant, Puritan and Anglican, we must recognize that these labels have been applied in retrospect; that Puritan identities and concepts of the church varied widely; that Catholic forms of spirituality persisted across the entire era; that not all Roman Catholics were recusants—some outwardly conformed to England’s church; and that what we might call the main stream of theology within the Church of England shifted gradually over the seventeenth century, as it was inflected by Calvinist, Arminian, and Presbyterian theologies and eventually by the more radical doctrines of Platonism, Socinianism, and Deism. Religious toleration was no virtue in early modern England; it was a limited and contingent set of grudging, even condescending behaviors, less secular than theological, less indifferent than ambivalent, less radical than pragmatic. For early moderns, toleration was a loser’s creed, a dirty word, an asymmetrical practice of forbearance performed across imbalances of power, not despite but in the face— against the full force—of fundamental difference and disagreement. There was no guarantee that forbearing practices would translate from setting to setting, from one excluded group to another; to tolerate was to invoke authority, to define the terms of engagement, to declare who, when, where, and why to forbear. These qualities distinguish early modern “toleration” from the modern concept of “tolerance.” The former term was much more common than the latter in the early modern world; not until 1765 does the Oxford English Dictionary record a use of “tolerance” to represent a program of religious accommodation. “Toleration,” on the other hand, emerges from its Latin sense—the action of bearing or enduring (tolerare)—which implies a difference between the “bearer” and the “borne with,” a bounded setting as well as a distinct telos, purpose, or end on behalf of which such endurance occurs. Tolerance as an ideal, as a right or liberty

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Converse

based on moral or ethical principles, emerged unevenly toward the end of the Enlightenment; only later did political thinkers return to moments like the English civil wars (1642–51) and the Glorious Revolution (1688–89) and to such texts as John Locke’s A Letter Concerning Toleration (1689) and John Milton’s Areopagitica (1644) to discover what they took to be the origins of tolerationist thought. But toleration as an emotion, experience, concept, and practice of forbearance existed before and among these texts and events. The discourse of toleration in early modern England comprised diverse theological and political languages, but it was the experience of forbearance that was shared—that was “taken together” (co-capere)—as a concept, long before toleration became an idea or an ideology. The groups of people that joined together to “bear with” one another were at times very large: the broadest settings of toleration in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England were the church and the state—spheres so desperately held to be congruent that they were continually redefined by those in power, expanded, and contracted to keep them tightly aligned. But groups of forbearers could also be much smaller: a parish, a neighborhood, a theatrical audience, a dinner party, a couple linked in interconfessional marriage, even an individual who harbored multiple convictions and doubts. In all these settings, acts of tolerating, of enduring difference, and forbearing from violence were possible only because they were undertaken on behalf of a community, real or imagined, and in pursuit of a goal, stated or unstated. At the highest level, communities of believers drew doctrines of forbearance from Scripture—understanding, for instance, Jesus’ parable of the wheat and the tares as allowing nonbelievers to coexist with believers until Judgment Day; or taking Paul’s teaching on protecting the tender consciences of fellow believers as requiring a surrender of personal liberty, a forbearing in adiaphora (things indifferent to salvation). But these doctrines require incredible finesse to put into practice, and early moderns struggled to implement them at large scale, in part because of tricky problems of ontology and authority. For who decides which beliefs are orthodox and which are heretical? Or whether a behavior is essential to salvation or indifferent? And what of those women and men whose spiritual beliefs were premised on different political constructs, like the Roman Catholics, whose loyalties were said to be with the pope first and the English monarch second? To study how early moderns strove—and often failed—to implement a theology of forbearance in their lives as members of the English church and state gives context and precedent to similar problems we face in reconciling private convictions with public and especially political life in our own world. In the early modern toleration discourse, we can find analogues to modern debates over whether to follow government mandates in religious spaces, over terms like “evangelical”

“ The World turn'd upside down” (pamphlet, 1646)

July/August 2022

that unevenly yoke political and religious identity, over social justice as it relates to social reform, over the interpretation of national histories and key documents. Like those living in early modern England, when we choose to tolerate others, we do so in pursuit of some telos or goal and on behalf of a particular community. Unlike the early moderns, however, we often leave unstated—perhaps even uninterrogated—the goals implicit in our acts of tolerating and the communities implicated in our refusals to tolerate. Framing our practices of tolerance over against early modern toleration may help us to craft better large-scale models for living together in plurality. I would like to suggest, however, that we can learn something further by extending our attention to the local level and by asking not only what it meant but what it felt like for early moderns to bear with one another—to forbear as they spoke or cited the words of another, as they engaged and inhabited other styles of written expression, as they drew close in physical proximity to one another, and as they learned when to disengage or move apart in order to prevent violence. ***

Imagining Forbearance in Early Modern England To find evidence of such micro-movements, we might turn from the realm of theology and policy, from the canonical texts of early modern toleration to imaginative texts: to poetry, satire, and drama that staged and voiced the divergent styles of seventeenth-century spiritualty. Here we will find plays, like Ben Jonson’s Bartholomew Fair (1614) and William Shakespeare’s The Tempest (1611), that staged acts of ventriloquy in which speaking the words of an opponent produces a momentary experience of forbearance, a temporary surrender of one’s own voice and the unintended amplification of another’s. Here we will find satires of the dinner table like Andrew Marvell’s Flecknoe, an English Priest at Rome (1646) or Lord Rochester’s Timon (1674), where guests of different political and religious persuasions are figured coming together through conflict, and where acts of writing bring the satirist into proximity with the satirized—for to write an effective satire is to know, to be intimate with the person and manner of the ridiculed. Here we will find as well epic poems like John Milton’s Samson Agonistes (1671) and Paradise Lost (1667) and Lucy Hutchinson’s Order and Disorder (1679)—poems that test the experiences and emotions of forbearing by putting them to practice in the close quarters of marital union, especially union between spouses with varying degrees of spiritual incompatibility. Milton himself lived in such a marriage—he was a staunch parliamentarian and was married to a royalist, Mary Powell—and for many writers in early modern England, toleration was a lived as well as an imagined reality. This was especially true in the decades following the restoration of the monarch, as political parties emerged and as religious conformity became a precondition for civil

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Converse

rights through a new set of Test Acts. In these years, we can trace the prevarications of writers like the poet laureate John Dryden, whose Religio Laici stages the increasingly public tolerationist debate in aesthetic terms. But we can also see movements between and among personal convictions and business practices in the lives of the printers and booksellers who were publishing key texts within that debate—print professionals like Awnsham Churchill who published John Locke’s Letter Concerning Toleration (1689), and whose output in the decade prior to that tract is a confounding mixture of Whig and Tory books. By paying attention to imaginative texts and to the lives of their authors and their readers, we gain a deeper understanding of how toleration was practiced at a time when it was just emerging as a defined and definable idea. These early modern texts and authors do not share a common language, argument, or style for toleration, but they do share an affective register, a conceptual and emotional vocabulary of forbearing. Drawing readers outside of their own convictions, a play or a poem or a novel can bring us into other spiritual, political, or cultural positions—that is, after all, the very premise of fiction. ***

Forbearing with One Another By studying and aggregating the movements of authors, readers, and viewers, both in the early modern world and in our own, we might begin to glimpse how everyday emotions and experiences of forbearing translate to concepts and ideas that can, in turn, help us as we seek to live with one another. By listening for the missing voices of toleration throughout history, we can better understand the challenges we face in constructing new models of tolerating. Our problem is, in part, a problem of aesthetics: how to define what seems more an absence than a presence, how to live in what seems to be a void at the center of noisy controversy. The solution, then, might be a matter of cultivating the imagination. To conjure images of intolerance, of persecution, and violence is quite easy—the aesthetic vocabulary is rich, developed, and close to hand. To conjure images of tolerance, of forbearing and enduring, however, is much more difficult. But this aesthetic labor, as it was in early modern England, may be the first step toward a life in plurality in a world convulsed by difference. Jonathan Koch (PhD, Washington University) is a postdoctoral fellow at the California Institution of

Technology and the Henry E. Huntington Library and currently working on With a Forbearing Spirit: The Poetics of Religious Toleration in Revolutionary England.

“ Bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.” –Colossians 3:13

July/August 2022

***

For Further Reading • Bejan, Teresa M. Mere Civility: Disagreement and the Limits of Toleration. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2017.

• Coffey, John. Persecution and Toleration in Protestant England, 1558–1689. New York: Longman, 2000.

• Forst, Rainer. Toleration in Conflict: Past and Present. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013.

• Gregory, Brad S. The Unintended Reformation: How a Religious Revolution Secularized Society. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2012.

• Inazu, John D. Confident Pluralism: Surviving and Thriving through Deep Difference. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2016.

• Kaplan, Benjamin J. Divided by Faith: Religious Conflict and the Practice of Toleration in Early Modern Europe. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2007.

• Murphy, Andrew R. Conscience and Community: Revisiting Toleration and Religious Dissent in Early Modern England and America. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2001.

• Ryan, Alan. The Making of Modern Liberalism. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2012.

• Sowerby, Scott. Making Toleration: The Repealers and the Glorious Revolution. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2013.

• Taylor, Charles. A Secular Age. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2007.

• Walsham, Alexandra. Charitable Hatred: Tolerance and Intolerance in England, 1500–1700. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2006.

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Vol. 31, No. 4

III.

Persuade Thinking theologically about all things

Who Says? S O L V I N G

DOCTRINAL

Controversy by M A T T H E W B A R R E T T

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Persuade

VANGELICALISM IS NO stranger to controversy. Debates over neo-Orthodoxy, the New Perspective on Paul, and Open Theism—to name only a few in the past half a century—have positioned evangelicals on the right side of controversy as they push back against attempts to abandon or modify major doctrines of the faith. However, recent debate over the doctrine of God has positioned evangelicals on the wrong side of controversy. For decades, notable evangelicals have questioned core components of theology proper, from God’s simplicity to his immutability and impassibility. The Great Tradition—from the church fathers to the Protestant Scholastics—considered these divine perfections indispensable to Christian orthodoxy’s distinction between the Creator and the creature, which explains why the Reformed tradition included them in their confessions and catechisms. Recent controversy escalated further when evangelicals taught a doctrine of the Trinity to churchgoers and students alike that they were convinced was biblical. Under further investigation, the recipients of this doctrine discovered that the Trinity they had been taught came dangerously close to the trinitarian heresies that motivated the Nicene Creed in the fourth century. Prominent evangelicals to this day advocate a hierarchy within the immanent life of the Trinity, believing the Father is greater in authority than the Son, whose functional subordination to the Father is even person-defining, necessary for the Son to be the Son in eternity. In addition, the trinitarianism that evangelical theologians claimed was pure Scripture has an uncanny resemblance to modern theology’s social trinitarianism, a novel view that has been charged as tritheism by critics. Recent controversy over the doctrine of God is nothing short of ironic. In the past, evangelicals grew comfortable pointing the finger at others who allowed the influence of modernity to seep within—the battle over the Bible is a case in point. But after decades of imbibing modern theology’s doctrine of God, evangelicals have no one left to blame but themselves. As I explain in my book Simply Trinity: The Unmanipulated Father, Son, and Spirit, evangelicals have drifted away from biblical and Nicene trinitarianism, all the while assuming they are still swimming in the waters of orthodoxy. As a result, our present doctrinal moment is one of flux. We await the outcome, wondering whether future evangelicalism will return to orthodoxy or continue down this deviant road of modernity. Our state of flux brings with it no small feeling of uncertainty. Those who long for the renewal of a Christianity that will not settle for anything less than fidelity are discouraged by the reluctance of evangelicals to reform. After all, in past decades, evangelicals were quick to defend doctrines like inerrancy or justification; yet with a locus as central as the doctrine of God, evangelicals have been slow, even hesitant, to demonstrate

July/August 2022

their orthodoxy. Such indecision speaks volumes: on the one hand, manifesting evangelicalism’s lack of familiarity with the weight of theology proper; and on the other hand, exposing the political nature of such reluctance. Few evangelicals desire to confront their own. Disenchantment with evangelicalism has followed. Those jaded may feel that a solution is daunting, as if change for the better is a boulder too big to roll over. Some have become so discouraged by evangelicalism’s vitriolic reaction against the creeds of the church and its refusal to ground Protestant theology in the deep roots of the Great Tradition that they are considering whether they should abandon all hope and swim the Tiber. “If this is what it means to be Protestant, count me out,” they reply disheartened and fatigued. All that to say, recent controversy has been painful, consequential, and still lingers in hope of a solution. Yet rather than despair in the darkness, this article is a small attempt to open a window of light and let a beam of hope shimmer inward. Some balk at controversy because it sheds more heat than light, but a more reasonable outlook recognizes that the light shines bright only after the purification of heat is applied. In that light, could this present moment be an opportunity to reflect on the ways that God designs controversy to lead us into further doctrinal sanctity and ecclesiastical unity? Might this be but a wrinkle in time, one that compels us to consider the strategies in the heat of controversy that might give birth to an illuminating solution? In that spirit of hope, the time has come to explore the nature of controversy itself and why we can be so audacious to claim that doctrinal disagreement might pave the way to a more mature reception of creedal authority. ***

Controversy: A Sanctifying Instrument in the Hand of the Almighty

“ But as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine.” –Titus 2:1

Doctrinal controversy is a friend to some and an enemy to others. Yet in the hands of the inscrutable wisdom of the Almighty, controversy does have a positive, even formidable role to play in the past, present, and future history of his church. First, controversy may be unpleasant, but we do well to remember that controversy is spiritual, a type of personal or corporate sanctification. Sanctification is often segregated to Christian living, but theology is also sanctification, a process in which your thoughts about God must be made holy. Those who are discouraged by past mistakes can be prone to arrogance (as if their theology has already reached a state of perfection) or prone to despair (a refusal to be encouraged by how far the Holy Spirit has brought them along). Yet theology is nothing less than the renewal of the mind. The sanctifying progress of the theologian or the church does not in any way lower the high standards God himself has set: he expects sound doctrine (Titus 2:1), but he summons the church to recognize that on this side of glory, instruction still needs to be given.

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Persuade

Controversy could be less unpleasant if those with doctrinal faults recognized their need for further theological sanctity. Yet this request does assume that a posture of humility is necessary on the part of the person or church, denomination, or institution under scrutiny. Personally, I have always admired those churches and pastors, institutions, and theologians who have paused in the midst of all their success to acknowledge that their theology could be—must be— improved both for the sake of further faithfulness to God and for the sake of those under their care. That pastoral posture of humility, however, is extremely rare for it requires an admission of guilt as well as a resolve to move upward to purer theological air. Second, controversy should be uncomfortable because we desire unity in the body of Christ, yet controversy should be considered necessary precisely because we desire unity in the body of Christ. Many evangelicals will avoid controversy at all costs because of the inevitable pain and potential division disputes cause in the body of Christ. To ignore this consequence is naive. Controversy is a knife; the only question is what type. Is controversy a butcher’s knife that hacks away and leaves carnage in the end, or is it the knife of the skilled surgeon, carefully cutting into the body to locate the sickness that threatens the body’s survival? The latter is the mindset of both Christ and his creeds. On the one hand, Jesus prays that his followers will be one as he is one with the Father (John 17:21). On the other hand, prior to praying for their unity, Jesus prays that his Father might sanctify his disciples in the truth of his word so that they will not go the way of the world (v. 17). Jesus even considers his own sacrifice a means to that end: “For their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth” (v. 19). His language of consecration and sanctification does not isolate the spiritual from the theological. Unity with Christ and with one another, according to Jesus, is never at the expense of sanctity in the truth. Such a consecration is the means by which unity is experienced and enjoyed. This pattern may have been articulated by Christ, but in the centuries that followed it was exemplified by his church’s creeds. The fourth century, for example, was an era birthed into controversy, as church fathers like Athanasius were exiled many times for advocating a Trinity without a trace of hierarchy or subordination. Yet apart from the fathers and their tenacious resilience, the church might have gone the way of Arianism altogether. If Athanasius seems bullish at points, he understands that apart from a controversy that settles in favor of orthodoxy, the faith confessed by the church will never arrive at a point of theological consecration and the body of Christ will remain divided. Naturally, not only Athanasius but also the Cappadocians considered controversy a painful but necessary tool, pruning those vines that threatened to choke the flower of trinitarian orthodoxy.

The First Council of Nicaea by Michael Damaskinos (1591)

July/August 2022

Whatever aggressive tactics they may have utilized, the fathers were characterized by a humility that considered their own theology in need of development. For example, in AD 325, the creed written at Nicaea was a monumental declaration in favor of the Son’s eternal generation. Nevertheless, in the condemnatory appendix, the fathers still considered hypostasis and ousia synonymous. Between 325 and the final codification of the creed at Constantinople in AD 381, the fathers reevaluated and entertained the possibility that their own articulation of trinitarian vocabulary needed refinement. In that interim, they acknowledged the potential for misunderstanding: treating hypostasis and ousia as synonyms could sound like person and essence should not be distinguished. Rather than doubling down, however, they humbled themselves and further refined their trinitarian grammar so that no misunderstanding could occur between hypostasis and ousia. In the end, the controversy that threatened to divide the church brought the church together, and some of those previously hesitant to affirm Nicene trinitarianism were brought into the fold. This progress was only possible because the same fathers who were unflinching in their opposition to those unwilling to leave subordination behind were also unpretentious enough to refine their vocabulary for those who were open to Nicaea but nonetheless reticent due to lingering confusion. In a similar vein, who is not encouraged to see so many churches and pastors today acknowledging past deviance from Nicene orthodoxy—either in their own theological education or present church—only to follow through with a willingness to take the next steps to reform? I propose that this is the way forward. Such humility will be the beginning of concord—consecration for the sake of unification. We all long for the church to be one, but if the church is not holy first, then unity is but a mirage. ***

Christ Will Build His Church: Tradition as Gardener and Guardian If such a bold claim is true—that is, controversy is instrumental to the doctrinal sanctification and unity of Christ’s church—then what strategies might lead those in the oven of controversy toward a solution? I offer the following strategies with the recent controversy over the doctrine of God in plain view. These strategies for a solution assume, however, that missteps with the doctrine of God are only a symptom. The virus itself is in the bloodstream and must be identified; otherwise, evangelicals will continue to suffer the symptoms. At the end of the Nicene Creed, our church fathers confessed their belief in one holy catholic and apostolic church. The fathers did not believe any of these ecclesiastical attributes were optional, and they also considered each mark indispensable to the next, a web of inseparable silk strands. That point is worth emphasizing because everyone desires the church to be one. Yet evangelicals rarely

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Persuade

recognize that for the church to be one, it must not remove itself from the church catholic—that is, universal. Unity in the present is achieved when we embrace the unity of the past. Should we sever ourselves from those brothers and sisters in Christ across the ages, cutting ourselves off from the church universal, then we leave ourselves disconnected from an apostolic witness. How can we confess the faith once for all delivered to the saints—a faith around which we unite—if we do not consider ourselves accountable to the faith once for all delivered to the saints? To clarify, the church catholic or universal is a subservient authority to Scripture, which alone is God’s written and infallible revelation to his people. At the same time, the light of the Holy Spirit was not extinguished after Pentecost. Jesus’ promise to build his church did not return void. In the centuries after the apostles, the Holy Spirit came through on that promise, yet not by means of additional acts of inspiration in the form of tradition. Rather, by the light of the Spirit, our Lord guided his church through the fires of heresy to providentially preserve a tradition that originated with the apostles and was passed down to all who confess the true God and the gospel of Jesus Christ. As far as that tradition was recapitulated by man, it remained open to fallibility, but this does not mean that such an apostolic tradition was impotent in authority. Scripture remained the magisterial authority for the church, said fathers such as Augustine. Yet these same fathers also recognized that God embedded his inscripturated gospel within his covenant community. Therefore, they marked that apostolic tradition as a ministerial authority and with humility received it as the handiwork of Christ the architect coming through on his promise to build his church even when the gates of hell itself stood in the way. The Great Tradition is ministerial in authority because it serves the church in two critical ways. First, its theology is a gardener, nurturing the biblical soil so that the church’s theological reasoning is true and faithful to the God it worships. For this reason, Reformed churches to this day implement catechisms to nurture the young and old in that historic faith. Second, the Great Tradition’s theology is a guardian, protecting the church from heresies that threaten the apostolic truth that was first articulated in the Scriptures and then passed along to all those faithful to confess its credibility. For this reason, for example, the church assembled to write the Nicene Creed. As a faithful representation of Scripture, as well as Scripture’s good and necessary consequences, the creed not only confessed the faith but also shielded the faith from those within the church who betrayed God and Christ with both exegetical and theological aberration. Evangelicalism shines bright for its devotion to the Bible. Unfortunately, some evangelicals have assumed that such devotion is also a license to read and wield the Bible on no authority but their own. The widespread misinterpretation of Martin Luther has not helped this plague. Luther, so we are told, threw off the chains of tradition, disdained one thousand years of “dark ages,” and stood all alone with nothing but his mallet and Bible in hand. This caricature is quite fatigued by now. As many scholars have observed, such a retelling betrays not only sixteenth-century history but also Luther’s mature perception of himself,

“ Wherefore, although the Church be a witness and a keeper of Holy Writ, yet, as it ought not to decree anything against the same, so besides the same ought it not to enforce anything to be believed for necessity of Salvation.” –Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion of the Church of England

In 1539, John Calvin wrote his famous reply to Cardinal Sadoleto, in which he argued for the continuity of the Protestant church with the historic Christian church.

July/August 2022

as evident in his later writings affirming the creeds of the faith and their ecclesiastical authority. Protestantism did not originate from an attempt to forge a new denomination, but the Reformers were excommunicated in their attempt to renew the church of their day. Renew—that word makes all the difference. The Reformers attempted to restore the one holy catholic and apostolic church. Rome claimed that the Reformers were innovators, propagating new doctrines, and therefore heretics. That charge frustrated the Reformers because it was a case of mistaken identity. The charge did not fit their profile but the radicals. The radicals claimed the church had been lost since the apostles but now, with their arrival, the true church would be established for the first time. The Reformers grew nauseated at such an arrogant view of history—what C. S. Lewis once called chronological snobbery. By contrast, the Reformers responded to Rome by demonstrating their continuity with the church catholic (universal). No doubt the Reformers enraged Rome when they concluded that it was the true innovator of doctrine, indebted to late medieval theology (Scotus, Ockham, Biel—the via moderna), rather than the fathers of the patristic and early and high Middle Ages (representatives of the via antiqua). ***

A Way Forward Unfortunately, the radicals and their misreading of ecclesiology were not extinguished with the passing of the sixteenth century, but continue today whenever evangelicals confuse sola scriptura with solo scriptura, most often heard in that defiant Enlightenment cry, “No creed but the Bible!” Ironically, even among those today who do hold to some confessional document, the same spirit is embodied whenever they dismiss the past as inferior to their own contemporary estimations. That spirit has become conspicuous with the doctrine of God controversy and may even be its cause in part. Well-known evangelicals have either resisted accountability to the Nicene Creed or found ways to (re)interpret the creed so that it supports their novel position and modern categories. For example, evangelicals who have functionally subordinated the Son within the Trinity have now conceded the doctrine of eternal generation, which they previously questioned. Nevertheless, they claim that a functional subordination must exist within and flow from the Son’s eternal generation from the Father, now infusing subordination much deeper into the immanent life of the Godhead. They then conclude that such a maneuver is consistent with the Nicene Creed, which is a bold but reckless claim considering the creed was a reaction against various types of subordinationist heresies. That maneuver—a most modern one—is

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Persuade

a manipulation of Nicene vocabulary and concepts to match the hierarchical agenda of evangelicals. How, then, might evangelicals once again enjoy doctrinal unity? The solution cannot be a concession to such novel aberration since maneuvers like these defy orthodoxy and its Nicene intention to preclude any inequality within the Trinity (hence the patristic emphasis on the Trinity’s simplicity). To concede in the end may result in a kind of unity, but only at the expense of doctrinal compromise. Evangelicals would be given the false impression that either position—classical or modern—is legitimate under the evangelical tent. By contrast, unity must be planted within the life-giving soil of Nicene orthodoxy. Evangelicals will be relieved to learn that they may already exist within denominations that were originally embedded within that Nicene soil. Lutheran and Reformed confessions, for example, affirmed the Nicene Creed without nuance and without hesitation. Baptists are not without a heritage either: seventeenth-century Baptists assembled to adopt a confession that mimicked the Westminster Confession, taking exception to secondary loci such as baptism, as to be expected. Unfortunately, two barriers stand in the way of making forward progress. First, evangelicals are so historically disoriented that they lack the ability to properly interpret these Lutheran, Reformed, and Baptist confessions and, as a result, do not know how to rightly handle a confession’s affirmation of historic creeds. As mentioned, that much has become obvious with the recent controversy over the Trinity as evangelicals try to project hierarchy back into creedal language. Yet this inability is also apparent in evangelical treatments of divine attributes. For example, the confessions clearly affirm divine simplicity (God is without parts), divine immutability (God is without change), and divine impassibility (God is so complete he is without emotional change). Nevertheless, evangelicals ignore how these attributes were defined by the confessions—confessions that proposed to preserve the Great Tradition’s intended definition of these perfections by the church fathers and their exegesis of Scripture. Evangelicals downgrade simplicity as if it merely means God does not have a body; they modify immutability as if God can still change relationally; and they undercut the power of impassibility when they say God does not have emotions like man, but he nonetheless is affected and changed by the creature. When these modifications are intentional, they become misleading, and nothing undermines the authority of a church or denomination’s confession like the absence of transparent, doctrinal honesty. When these modifications are accidental, they become irresponsible, and nothing cuts deeper at our doctrinal integrity than theological imprudence, however unwitting it may be. Second, an equally cancerous scenario exists among those churches, denominations, and institutions that adhere to “doctrinal statements” that have taken the approach of “doctrinal minimalism.” By “minimalism,” I do not refer to the absence of tertiary matters (e.g., the exact order of events in the eschaton). Minimalism in tertiary loci can be a hedge to foster harmony against those who would divide the body of Christ over beliefs miles away from the core of Christianity.

“ And when I looked a little closer, I saw, not the first and unmingled Nature . . . but only that Nature which at last even reaches to us. And that is, as far as I can learn, the Majesty–or, as holy David calls it, the Glory–which is manifested among the creatures, which it has produced and governs. For these are the 'back' of God, which the divine Trinity leaves behind as tokens of itself.” –Gregory of Nazianzus

July/August 2022

Rather, I use the term “minimalism” here to target those statements that devote few sentences to or settle for shallow prose on doctrines central to the faith. An irony persists in such instances because these minimalist statements are often forged out of a motivation for unity. Trouble occurs, however, when these same churches, denominations, and institutions assume that those under their statement will remain evangelical in the historic, reformational sense of the word. In the twenty-first century, history shows what a failed experiment this has become, and yet it is one we perpetuate. The solution—however painful—is a resolve to be far more robust on doctrines central to the faith. The goal is not to avoid controversy but the wrong type of controversy. In other words, controversy over tertiary matters of doctrine need not divide those evangelical institutions permitting denominational diversity. Nevertheless, there is another type of controversy that cannot and should not be avoided: division over primary loci. I am amazed I must say this, but the doctrine of God is primary. God and Christ, as Gregory of Nazianzus understood, is a hill worth dying on. To be practical, evangelical churches, denominations, and institutions are long overdue for a diagnostic check on their “statements of faith.” A quick survey will reveal that a minimalism has crept into those primary doctrines—the Trinity and the attributes of God, as well as the person of Christ—leaving them vulnerable to a host of theological novelties that look more like modern theology than orthodox Christianity. If the heat of controversy has any chance of ushering God’s people into the light of unity, then churches, denominations, and institutions can no longer lack creedal and confessional depth and accountability on a locus so central to orthodoxy. ***

The Courage of Conviction Change, however, will occur only if a newfound conviction is born in the hearts of evangelicals. Yet conviction is not enough; courage must follow. And if courage was ever needed, it is now, with the doctrine of God itself at hand. Although some evangelicals are willing to believe what is right, they are unwilling to stand up for right belief. The Lord Jesus was meek and mild, but he reserved some of his strongest words for these types because belief without conviction to act is nothing less than hypocrisy. Christ refused to sever the line between the hands and the heart. True followers not only believe the right doctrines in their hearts, but they also put their hands to good use instructing and, when necessary, admonishing others. But the man without a chest—to reappropriate a phrase from C. S. Lewis—will always find a way to justify not acting in times of controversy, using otherwise good motives to excuse his passivity. The passive person is the lion in the land of Oz, showing off his roar but never using it when it counts because he does not have the courage. When confrontation comes at little cost, he is bold against blatant error, but only against the type of error that

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Persuade

those around him already find disagreeable. Yet he cannot bring himself to turn against a theological blunder that is encased with subtlety and nuance and that resides comfortably within his own house, among his own friends. Following in the footnotes of his Lord, the apostle Paul showed little patience for such theological feebleness. As Paul reports in Galatians 2, Peter ate and drank with the Gentiles. And why not, for they were his equals, brothers in Christ? But when the circumcision party arrived, Peter no longer ate with the Gentiles. Paul, seeing this hypocrisy (as he calls it), “opposed him [Peter] to his face, because he stood condemned” (Gal. 2:11). Peter should have stood with the gospel—and with some courage—but fearing controversy with the Jews, Peter acquiesced and led others (Barnabas included) to misrepresent the “truth of the gospel” to the Gentiles (2:14). When courage does not accompany controversy—and notice, the lack of courage is masked as the religious option in Galatians 2—truth itself becomes collateral damage. The passive person may claim he is preserving the church’s unity, but he never makes the sacrifices necessary to ensure that the church remains holy. In the spirit of the apostle Paul, I leave the reader with this clarion call: jellyfish theologians have no backbone; but in times of controversy over doctrines most central to the Christian faith, both creedal sanctity and ecclesiastical unity depend on a spine injected with the courage of conviction. Matthew Barrett is the author of Simply Trinity: The Unmanipulated Father, Son, and Holy

Spirit (Baker, 2021). He is the founder and executive editor of Credo Magazine and host of the Credo podcast. He is associate professor of Christian theology at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.

T H E

R O L E

O F

Creeds A N D

Confessions I N

T H E

CHURCH

by G U Y M . R I C H A R D

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Persuade

N THE SUMMER OF 1824, Samuel Miller, long-time professor of church history at Princeton Theological Seminary, offered this counsel to students preparing for ministry: His words were meant to impress upon them the necessity of creeds and confessions for maintaining the unity, peace, and purity of the church. No church can hope to maintain a homogeneous character; no church can be secure either of purity or peace, for a single year; nay, no church can effectually guard against the highest degrees of corruption and strife, without some test of truth, explicitly agreed upon, and adopted by her in her ecclesiastical capacity: something recorded, something publicly known, something capable of being referred to when most needed, which not merely this or that private member supposes to have been received, but to which the church as such has agreed to adhere, as a bond of union. 1

Without publicly agreed-to creeds and confessions, he argued, it was only a matter of time before the church degenerated into tribalism or schism or, worse, into heresy or even apostasy. Why is this so? What role do confessional documents play within the church, especially in regard to ecclesial disputes and controversies? These are the questions we will attempt to answer in this article. We will begin by looking at what confessions are and then continue by examining a few examples what they do for the church. ***

What Are Creeds and Confessions? In a basic sense, creeds and confessions are simply statements of biblical doctrine. When we take the words in this way, we can readily see that all Christians necessarily have a creed or a confession of their own, because all Christians have a “statement” of doctrine they believe is representative of the Bible’s teaching. These kinds of statements are usually private and unwritten, but they exist at least in the mind of every Christian. All churches also have a creed or a confession, and far too frequently these kinds of statements also remain private and unwritten. When they do, they are unhelpful for the church and may even be downright harmful, as we will see. In order to be helpful, creeds and confessions must be, as Samuel Miller says above, “test[s] of truth, explicitly agreed upon, and adopted” by the church; and they must be “recorded” and “publicly known,” so that they function as a standard to guide God’s people at all times but especially in disputes and matters of controversy. That is what Miller intended when he said creeds and confessions must be “capable of being referred to when most needed.”

July/August 2022

The point is that creeds and confessions must be more than simple statements of biblical doctrine—although they are certainly not less. They must also be written, public documents that have been agreed upon and accepted by the church to be an expression of what it has historically believed the Bible teaches. In this sense, the Apostles’ Creed, the Nicene Creed, the Augsburg Confession, the Belgic Confession, the Westminster Confession of Faith, the London Baptist Confession, and many others are all considered creeds and confessions of the church. Within the tradition of the Reformation, creeds and confessions have always been considered as authoritative ecclesial standards. Their authority, however, has been regarded as only being secondary and derived. The Bible alone holds pride of place as the one standard that rules over all others (norma normans). It is primary in its authority. Creeds and confessions are secondary (norma normata); their authority flows from the authority of the Bible. This means that confessional documents speak with the Bible’s authority when and where they faithfully express the Bible’s teaching. It also means that confessional documents can be amended or updated whereas the Bible, as God’s infallible rule of faith and practice, cannot be. In the seventeenth century, the followers of the well-known Dutch theologian James Arminius were convinced that no one should ever be forced to embrace or subscribe to confessional documents that were merely human compositions. Instead, they believed that creeds and confessions should only and always be written in the express words of Scripture. Philip Van Limborch perhaps articulated this position most explicitly when he said that “no Man” should ever be “tied up” or required to embrace “such Words and Expressions as are not contain’d in the Holy Scripture, but are only of Human Invention.” This view is still prevalent in many circles today, especially within the fundamentalist tradition, although it usually is articulated slightly differently. The version we typically hear today goes something like this: “The Bible is our only creed or confession.” The problem with these pious-sounding approaches is that they overlook the necessity of creeds and confessions as expressions of what the church understands the Bible to be teaching. It is not enough for us to say that the Bible is our creed or even to express our creed or confession wholly in the words of Scripture. We must go beyond that and actually spell out what we think the Bible is saying. Church history is replete with examples of false teachers and heretics who appealed to the Bible in order to justify their unorthodox theological positions—often by ascribing different meanings to tried and true passages of Scripture. Beginning with at least the fourth century and the onset of the Arian controversy, the church has consistently advocated for and relied upon creeds and confessions as secondary standards “to preserve its commitment to the New Testament proclamation” by distinguishing accepted and orthodox interpretations of the Bible from every other alternative. The “no creed but the Bible” approach is misleading at best and dishonest at worst, because it hides the fact that it really does have a creed or a confession—in the most basic of senses discussed above—so that it doesn’t have to make that 2

Persuade

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

creed or confession available for all to see and examine. It thus puts itself beyond accountability and at the same time offers no help for church members in disputes and controversies, and it may actually leave them open to harm. This will be seen more clearly in the following section, where we will explore three main ways confessional documents help the church. They promote unity, ensure peace and purity, and provide protection for all of God’s people. ***

What Do Creeds and Confessions Do? THE Y PROMOTE UNIT Y

First, creeds and confessions promote unity in the church. They do this in at least two ways: (1) by providing a set of standards around which we can all come together and to which we can all agree, and (2) by providing a moderated standard or consensus document that allows for some amount of diversity in strategic areas. In regard to the first idea, it is important to point out that unity always assumes some kind of standard or common bond. The Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed may well provide for a broader unity than the Westminster Confession of Faith or London Baptist Confession. But the fact remains that all creeds and confessions are designed to provide unity among Christians and among Christian churches. This may be most helpfully seen when we consider the second way that creeds and confessions work to secure unity: They provide a moderated standard or consensus document that allows for diversity of thought. Chapter 3 of the Westminster Confession of Faith is a good example. This chapter does not explicitly take a position in regard to the debates over supralapsarianism and infralapsarianism, for instance, even though these debates were so prevalent in the church at the time. Rather, it offers a consensus view that could be easily embraced by both sides. Another example of consensus building in the Westminster Confession of Faith can be seen in its chapter on the covenants (ch. 7). The second paragraph of this chapter mentions the “first covenant” and calls it a “covenant of works, wherein life was promised to Adam; and in him to his posterity, upon condition of perfect and personal obedience.” Interestingly, the confession does not say “eternal life.” It only says “life.” The reason is that there was some amount of disagreement among the members of the Westminster Assembly as to whether Adam received merely an extended natural life in the Garden of Eden or an eternal life in heaven. Rather than coming down on one side or the other, however, the members of the assembly sanctioned a consensus view that could be embraced by all sides in the debate. Chapters 3 and 7 are just two examples of how the Westminster Confession of Faith functions as a consensus document. J. V. Fesko points out that the members of the assembly “incorporated doctrinal flexibility into the document to accommodate a pluriform orthodoxy.” They understood that the purpose of every 5

July/August 2022

creed and confession is “to codify the corporate faith of the church . . . not to be a manifesto that binds every individual on every doctrinal question.” But besides offering a consensus view on the lapsarian debate, chapter 3 of the Westminster Confession of Faith also employs moderate language to frame the whole topic in question and does so in such a way that, as Warfield has argued, it simply takes up the fundamental theistic position: 8

The most remarkable thing about the chapter introduced into the Confession [i.e., chapter 3] . . . is the fine restraint and simple directness of the language in which it gives expression to this divine teleology which governs the occurrence of all events. The Confession, to be sure, is not written in a philosophical but a religious interest. . . . He who has affirmed, with section 1, that “God from all eternity did by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will freely and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass,” has affirmed nothing but one of the most immediate implicates of a consistent theism . . . and hesitation or doubt as to it . . . is hesitation or doubt as to the most fundamental implicates of common theism. 9

As consensus documents that intentionally employ moderate language in moderate terms, creeds and confessions promote the unity of the church by allowing for diversity of opinion in regard to specific doctrines or the ways in which those doctrines are expressed. This eliminates needless disputes in the church over minor points of doctrine and reminds us that unity is not uniformity. Some doctrines are of fundamental importance in the church, while others are not. By allowing for some diversity of opinion, creeds and confessions unite Christians around fundamental doctrine while giving them some freedom in secondary or tertiary matters. T H E Y E N S U R E P E AC E A N D P U R I T Y

Second, creeds and confessions ensure the peace and purity of the church. They do this in at least two ways. First, they provide a standard to which all church officers and all church teaching must conform. Every church that is governed by a creed or confession—which, as noted, is every church—must ensure that its incoming officers are examined to ensure adherence to what it believes. Otherwise, a universalist congregation or denomination could potentially end up with a pastor who embraces Calvinism, or a pastor who embraces Calvinism could potentially end up being called to a congregation or denomination that adheres strictly to Arminianism and dispensationalism. Creeds and confessions thus ensure the peace and purity of the church by proactively establishing a benchmark on the front end that must be met by every incoming church officer. But creeds and confessions also proactively establish a benchmark for all the teaching that will take place within the church. Since they are public records of what the church believes, they provide every person in their midst with a statement of doctrine on the front end. Every person will therefore know not only

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Persuade

what to expect from the teaching that they will receive but also the expectations in regard to the teaching that they will provide. Creeds and confessions bring all of this out into the open. There are no hidden surprises, at least in terms of the teaching ministry of the church. One consequence of creeds and confessions establishing a proactive benchmark of the church’s teaching is that they also provide a standard of discipleship for every church member. If someone is curious what doctrinal commitments and priorities will shape their Christian experience and growth in grace as a member of a particular congregation, all they need to do is to look at its creed or confession. It will tell them everything that congregation believes to be important. As a case in point, the Westminster Confession of Faith’s chapter on baptism clearly avoids a mandate on pouring or sprinkling and acknowledges the validity of “dipping” or immersion. The obvious takeaway from this is that the confession doesn’t regard the mode of baptism as an important doctrinal distinctive or priority in the church. Anyone looking to join a congregation subscribing to the Westminster Confession of Faith would therefore expect to be discipled along these lines. The second way creeds and confessions ensure the peace and purity of the church is by providing a standard to resolve conflicts that may arise over doctrine. They are never the final court of appeals in matters of dispute. The Bible alone serves in that capacity. But confessional documents are, as previously indicated, secondary standards designed to provide a public record of what the church has understood the Bible to teach for centuries on end. It is precisely this historical connection that gives confessional documents such a weight of authority in the church. It is not one or two isolated individuals who are responsible for crafting confessional documents, but the church down through the ages. When conflicts arise over points of doctrine, it is therefore appropriate to appeal to creeds and confessions in order to resolve the disagreement, and to do so with an attitude of self-suspicion and humility that regards the church’s confession as weightier than one’s own theological conclusions: “Could I alone be right in this matter, and the wisdom of the church down through the ages be wrong?” When that is our attitude in approaching matters of dispute, we will not be so quick to leave and start a new church when things don’t go our way. Creeds and confessions help to resolve disputes and controversies with this kind of humble and teachable spirit—or at least they ought to.

T H E Y P ROV I D E P ROT ECT I O N

Third, creeds and confessions provide protection for everyone in the church. They do this in at least three ways. First, they provide a public and permanent record of what the church believes. They do this because they typically cannot be changed without great difficulty and near-unanimous agreement. In the Presbyterian Church in America, for instance, amending the Westminster Confession

The Westminster Confession of Faith (London, 1651)

July/August 2022

of Faith requires a three-fourths majority vote at its annual national meeting (called the General Assembly), followed by the approval of three-fourths of the presbyteries in the country, and then another three-fourths majority vote at a subsequent General Assembly. This kind of confessional permanence gives protection to ministers and church leaders insofar as it means that the requirements for ordination are not a moving target. What is required today for church office will be required tomorrow and the next day. Church leaders can exercise their callings in confidence, knowing that the standards to which they are held accountable will remain the same. But it gives protection to church members as well, because it ensures that the teaching they receive will not be constantly changing. The second way creeds and confessions provide protection is by limiting the authority of the church. No rogue minister or church officer can impose his will concerning any number of matters relating to the Christian life, because the church’s creed or confession limits what can be imposed upon its members. The church governed by “no creed but the Bible” may respond to these kinds of situations in the same way a confessional church would. But the members of that church wouldn’t have the same assurances and protections going in that the confessional congregation does, because creeds and confessions protect people from abuses and errors in regard to church authority and the ways in which it is imposed on them. The third way that confessional documents provide protection is by allowing for diversity of conviction and practice within a context in which the peace and purity of the church are preserved. Let me give an example of what I mean here. When my son was first learning to walk, my wife and I lived in a house that had a staircase in the kitchen that went up to an extra room over our garage. To ensure his safety at all times, therefore, we decided to put up a gate in front of the staircase to limit his access to them. Our son had the freedom to play as he wanted in the rest of the house without fear of serious injury. The gate protected him from the areas that were most dangerous. Creeds and confessions work in much the same way as that gate. They protect church members from those areas where the church has concluded it is theologically or practically dangerous for them to go, while giving them genuine freedom of conviction and practice everywhere else without fear of serious spiritual injury. They do this by virtue of taking up moderated topics and practices with moderated language and by serving as consensus documents within the church. 11

***

Summary and Conclusion Creeds and confessions promote unity, ensure peace and purity, and provide protection within the church. But they don’t do all this by themselves. It is not enough for a church or a denomination to have a creed or a confession. Traditionalism, which Jaroslav Pelikan so helpfully defined as “the dead faith of the living,”

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Persuade

and formalism are ever-present realities within the church of every generation. Creeds and confessions must be embraced and wholeheartedly adopted in order to serve the three ends we discussed in this article. That is the challenge presented to every generation of Christians. We must all seek to understand why the church has needed confessional documents and then to study the theology of those confessional documents for ourselves. Then and only then will we be able to persuade others in the church to do the same. In closing, it bears mentioning that creeds and confessions have been employed to great benefit by the majority of God’s people over the centuries. Only a small minority in the church have considered them unimportant. This may not be definitive proof of the necessity of creeds and confessions, but it certainly does add considerable weight to the persuasiveness of the argument for them. For at least fifteen hundred years, the church of the Lord Jesus has recognized what Samuel Miller stated so clearly at the beginning of this article: 12

No church can hope to maintain a homogeneous character; no church can be secure either of purity or peace, for a single year; nay, no church can effectually guard against the highest degrees of corruption and strife, without some test of truth, explicitly agreed upon, and adopted by her in her ecclesiastical capacity. It is my hope and prayer that the church will be characterized by the same recognition for the next fifteen hundred years—all to the praise of God’s glorious grace (Eph. 1:6). Guy M. Richard (PhD, University of Edinburgh) is president and associate professor of systematic theology

at Reformed Theological Seminary in Atlanta, Georgia, and is author of four books, including Baptism: Answers to Common Questions and Persistent Prayer.

Samuel Miller, Doctrinal Integrity: On the Utility and Importance of Creeds and Confessions and Adherence to Our Doctrinal Standards (Dallas: Presbyterian Heritage, 1989), 10–11. Philip Van Limborch, A Compleat System, or Body of Divinity (London, 1713), 1:22. See also James Arminius, The Works of James Arminius, trans. J. Nichols and W. Nichols (repr., Grand Rapids: Baker, 1991), 2:422. Carl R. Trueman, The Creedal Imperative (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012), 13. Trueman tells the story of a friend who frequented a church in which the pastor would regularly take the Bible in his hand, raise it high above his head, point to it, and say, “This . . . is our only creed and our only confession.” A. E. McGrath, The Genesis of Doctrine: A Study in the Foundations of Doctrinal Criticism (Oxford: Blackwell, 1990), 7. I have argued this point extensively in “Samuel Rutherford’s Supralapsarianism Revealed: A Key to the Lapsarian Position

of the Westminster Confession of Faith?,” Scottish Journal of Theology 59:1 (2006), 27–44. 6. Westminster Confession of Faith 7.2. 7. See the discussion in J. V. Fesko, The Need for Creeds Today: Confessional Faith in a Faithless Age (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2020), 84–85. 8. Fesko, The Need for Creeds Today, 84. 9. Benjamin B. Warfield, “The Significance of the Confessional Doctrine of the Decree,” in Selected Shorter Writings, 1:95–97. 10. Westminster Confession of Faith 28.3. 11. The Book of Church Order of the Presbyterian Church in America (Lawrenceville, GA: Office of the Stated Clerk of the General Assembly of the PCA, 2021), 23–26. 12. Jaroslav Pelikan, The Vindication of Tradition (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1984), 43.

“ Tradition is the living faith of the dead; traditionalism is the dead faith of the living.” –Jaroslav Pelikan

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Vol. 31, No. 4

IV.

Engage Understanding our time and place

July/August 2022

POEM

The Scratch between Parallel Tracks by Josh Shelton

Across the kitchen, the Voyager Golden Record revolves. In his rocket ship pajamas, a toddler tiptoes, watching. We listen together and not together at all, hearing without comprehending the songs of strangers we’ll never see. Without a common language, it’s hard to explain anything, much less this scattered constellation of cultures I don’t understand myself. Draw a man and draw a woman, not knowing what they will mean for him. Musicians long dead pluck at stringed instruments alien to both of us, and the vibrations begin again.

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Engage

We orbit each other in cycles of food and sleep, life forms at opposite ends of this three-bedroom space, a universe of things in common, and yet we barely know each other at all. Over the cluttered countertops, Unfamiliar notes cross the expanse of filtered air. Phrases, partially eclipsed by the rattle and ring of plates, disappear behind the closing of cabinet doors. I will teach him my handful of words this child of another millennium, and listen for him to re-arrange them in golden and unexpected ways.

July/August 2022

Summer/Fall Book Preview by Noah Frens

Reformation in the Low Countries, 1500–1620 by Christine Kooi CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS | JULY 2022 | 250 PAGES (PAPERBACK) | $39.99

the Reformation in the Netherlands has been long neglected. The only such volume came nearly three decades ago by Alastair Duke. Though good, his work was a collection of previously published essays that were formed into a history of the Reformation in the Low Countries and largely still reads as a series of essays rather than a book (Duke even acknowledged this in his introduction). All this is to say that the Dutch Reformation has been greatly neglected by scholars, and this volume by Christine Kooi is greatly welcomed. Kooi is well suited to write such a volume, having written two books and a number of articles on the various religious and political upheavals experienced in the Low Countries during the Reformation. I am particularly interested in how she narrates the often tense and tenuous interactions of the diverse religious groups that continued to call the Low Countries home even after the Dutch Reformation, from Jews to Catholics to Calvinists. A MONOGRAPH ON

Providence, Freedom, and the Will in Early Modern Reformed Theology by Richard A. Muller REFORMATION HERITAGE BOOKS | MAY 2022 | 304 PAGES (PAPERBACK) | $25.00

THIS NEW VOLUME by Richard Muller follows his recent trend of books on the topic of divine providence, free choice, and related concepts in the Reformed tradition. The volume is a mixture of previously published essays, most coming from articles in academic journals, and new essays on the topic that chart Reformed conceptions of providence from Peter Martyr Vermigli to Jonathan Edwards. The first seven chapters of the volume trace the development of the Reformed understanding of providence and free choice; one considers the debate over Jacob Arminius’s views, and the last three chart the revision of this Reformed understanding in Jonathan Edwards. Rather than seeing Edwards as continuing the Reformed legacy on the matter, Muller argues that he departed from this tradition in his understanding of necessity and contingency. This latter argument is one of the most controversial aspects of Muller’s recent works and has met with a range of positive and negative appraisal. I am glad his essays on the topic are now in one place, making them more easily accessible for a wider audience. This will also make his earlier work more coherent, as a fair bit of Divine Will and Human Choice presupposes knowledge of some of the articles in this present volume. 1

Alasdair MacIntyre: An Intellectual Biography by Émile Perreau-Saussine, translated by Nathan J. Pinkoski UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME PRESS | SEPTEMBER 2022 | 288 PAGES (HARDCOVER) | $40.00

probably one of the most important philosophers of the past half-century and easily the most discussed ethicist in recent ALASDAIR MACINTYRE IS

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Engage

memory. Though best known for his work After Virtue, MacIntyre is also known for his breadth of writing across several disciplines that appeals to people from different philosophical schools and theological and religious persuasions. This volume by the late Émile Perreau-Saussine first appeared in French over a decade ago to wide acclaim and is only now appearing in an English translation. The work critically, though sympathetically, engages MacIntyre’s thought around three chapters on his political thought, philosophy, and theology. These chapters for the most part revolve around MacIntyre’s political communitarianism, his work in moral philosophy, and the impact and importance of tradition on philosophical and theological enquiry, which are central themes in his Whose Justice? Which Rationality? and Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry. The volume will be of interest to anyone looking for a scholarly introduction to him or thoughtful interaction with his corpus.

concept of freedom, as he recounted in his earlier work Freedom from Reality. This earlier work diagnosed and critiqued what he believes is an insidious concept of freedom as arbitrary choice coming out of Locke. The work also traced an alternative, and what Schindler sees as a superior account of freedom, coming out of Plato and Aristotle. The present volume expands on this tradition of freedom by tracing it through the Christian tradition from antiquity to the Middle Ages. The volume should appeal to anyone interested in the recent postliberal debates or interested in contemporary and ancient conceptions of freedom. It should also be noted that one can accept much of Schindler’s genealogy of freedom without completely buying into his overall critique of liberalism, a camp in which I count myself. This genealogical narrative with regard to freedom is not novel, however, as a number of scholars over the years has argued a similar line of thought. The most prominent of them is Catholic philosopher Thomas Pink, who has argued that Thomas Hobbes, more so than Locke, was the pivotal figure for changing conceptions of freedom. 3

Retrieving Freedom: The Christian Appropriation of Classical Tradition by D. C. Schindler NOTRE DAME UNIVERSITY PRESS | OCTOBER 2022 | 550 PAGES (HARDCOVER) | $60.00

IN RECENT YEARS, there has been a growing number

of scholars, mainly Catholics, who are deeply critical of “classical liberalism,” often seen as descending from the figure and writings of John Locke. This postliberal movement sees the current political and cultural malaise of America, and the West in general, as a natural outgrowth of the inner logic of classical liberalism. For prolific Catholic scholar D. C. Schindler, the central problem with classical liberalism is its misconception of the

Knowledge Lost: A New View of Early Modern Intellectual History by Martin Mulsow PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS | NOVEMBER 2022 | 456 PAGES (HARDCOVER) | $39.95

OVER THE PAST several

decades, the scholarly understanding of the European “Enlightenment” has gone through serious revision. A part of this revision, to which Martin Mulsow has contributed, emphasizes that much of the Enlightenment was often not outright antireligious or a project in secularization, as some older scholarship

July/August 2022

tended to argue; the Enlightenment often had deeply religious overtones. Mulsow’s earlier work on the Enlightenment shows the importance and even centrality of religious views and arguments in various German figures of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century, though these religious perspectives were often quite heterodox or outright heretical. Because of the heterodox nature of these figures, Mulsow argues that their own views were either not expressed publicly (only discussed with those they trusted), or when expressed publicly were couched in prose that often veiled their meaning to the uninitiated, those not already sympathetic to their heterodox beliefs. The present volume follows Mulsow’s earlier work by tracing the ways in which the Renaissance and Reformation were not merely a blanketed return, ad fontes, to the sources. Some writings, ancient and contemporary, were at times deemed problematic and relegated to destruction, often by being burned (as with many Jewish books), or closely guarded by political or religious establishment (such as the Catholic Church’s Index of Prohibited Books, which first appeared in 1560). As Muslow’s title indicates, the early modern period was not just a reclamation project of ancient sources but also a destruction of such works. In light of this, Mulsow narrates how different figures throughout the period, often out of step with the political or reli5

Richard A. Muller, Divine Will and Human Choice: Freedom, Contingency, and Necessity in Early Modern Reformed Thought (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2017); and Grace and Freedom: William Perkins and the Early Modern Reformed Understanding of Free Choice and Divine Grace (New York: Oxford University Press, 2020). Alastair Duke, Reformation and Revolt in the Low Countries (London: The Hambledon Press, 1990), xi. The next best work that comes close to such a history is Jonathan Israel, The Dutch Republic: Its Rise, Greatness and Fall, 1477– 1806 (New York: Clarendon Press, 1995). D. C. Schindler, Freedom from Reality: The Diabolic Character of Modern Liberty

gious establishment of the day, continued to preserve this knowledge through obscure methods of allusion or unpublished manuscripts, sometimes handwritten and passed from hand to hand. Noah J. Frens is a graduate of Calvin University (Philoso-

phy) and Westminster Seminary California (MAHT) and is currently a PhD candidate in the history of Christianity at Vanderbilt University.

Other Works Jesus and the God of Classical Theism: Biblical Christology in Light of the Doctrine of God By Steven J. Duby BAKER ACADEMIC | APRIL 2022 | 464

PAGES

(HARDCOVER) | $55.00

Thomas Jefferson: A Biography of Spirit and Flesh By Thomas S. Kidd YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS | MAY 2022 | 320 PAGES (HARDCOVER) | $30.00

An Explorer’s Guide to John Calvin By Yudha Thianto IVP ACADEMIC | JULY 2022 | 235 PAGES (PAPERBACK) | $22.00

The Gospel and the Gospels: Christian Proclamation and Early Jesus Books By Simon J. Gathercole EERDMANS | AUGUST 2022 | 450 PAGES (HARDCOVER) | $55.99

Scribes and Scripture: The Amazing Story of How We Got the Bible By John D. Meade and Peter J. Gurry CROSSWAY | OCTOBER 2022 | 224 PAGES (PAPERBACK) | $19.99

(Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University Press, 2017). See Thomas Pink, “Hobbes on Liberty, Action and Free Will,” in The Oxford Handbook of Hobbes, ed. A. P. Martinich and K. Hoekstra (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016), 171–95. See also the account of freedom in the popular Catholic work by Servais Pinckaers, The Sources of Christian Ethics, trans. Sr. Mary Thomas Noble, 3rd ed. (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1995). Martin Mulsow, Enlightenment Underground: Radical Germany, 1680–1720, trans. H. C. Erik Midelfort (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2015).

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Engage

POEM

God Our Father, Source of Comfort by Duane R. Smith

Hymn based on the Heidelberg Catechism (Q /A 1, 26, 52, 122, 123) May be sung to the tune of “What a Friend We Have in Jesus”

God our Father, source of comfort, through Your Son who set us free From our sin and from our misery, and the devil’s tyranny. Jesus, we belong to you now, give our lives stability, That we in the Spirit’s power, live for you wholeheartedly. God our Father, source of comfort, with your Spirit at our side, Help us trust you, never doubting all our needs you will provide. Carry us in joy and sorrow, and turn all adversity To our good and for your glory, that your wisdom we may see. God our Father, source of comfort, when Your Son, the Judge appears. He already has stood trial, took our curse and calmed our fears. All his enemies will perish, but the ones he chose in love, He will take to heaven’s glory, to eternal joys above. God our Father, source of comfort, as we live by faith each day, Rule us by your Word and Spirit so we willingly obey. Help us govern all our living, what we think and do and say That your name be always honored and be praised in every way.

Back Page

July/August 2022

Travailing We Seek by Joshua Schendel

ecclesial conflicts that troubled England during its civil wars and the Restoration, John Owen (1616–1683) set for himself the task of specifying the terms upon which the English church could unite groups such as the Episcopalians, Presbyterians, and Independents, while also excluding such groups as the Catholics and Socinians. On one occasion, while speaking on the matter in London, he was heard by the then-ejected minister Richard Baxter (1615–1691). Baxter and Owen had previously engaged in a public, written dispute during the 1650s, which had set them greatly at odds with each other. Baxter wanted peace, not only between himself and Owen but also between the increasingly divided conformist and nonconformist groups in England. After their meeting, Owen returned Baxter’s sentiment in a letter: “Could I contribute anything towards the accomplishment of so holy, so necessary a work, I should willingly spend my self [sic], and be spent in it.” Over the next year, Owen and Baxter carried on toward their goal with secret meetings and correspondence for fear that their nonconformist attempts at a union would be interpreted by the conformists as a threat to the English Crown. Baxter wrote a set of theses he considered both “necessary to our agreement” and “as narrow a compass as may be.” He wanted to outline only the most foundational points upon which all parties could agree. So, he required only confession of the Holy Scriptures as the ultimate authority for life and faith and the Apostles’ Creed. Owen thought THROUGHOUT THE GREAT

this too broad. Such a confession would exclude the Catholics, he remarked, but not the Socinians. Not only the Apostles’ Creed, Owen suggested, but its exposition in the first four councils as well must be affirmed. Baxter responded by writing: “The reasons, why I make no larger a profession necessary than the Creed and Scriptures, are, because if we depart from this old sufficient catholicke [sic] rule, we narrow the Church, and depart from old Catholicism [the church universal]: And we never know where to rest: from the same reasons as you will take in four councils, another will take in six, and another eight, and the Papists will say, why not the rest, as well as these?” For Baxter, further doctrinal definition is required for growth in understanding and for correcting errors, but it is not the foundation on which true communion is established. For Owen, true communion is always firmly established on the truth; and because truth is always exclusive of falsity, true communion is manifest insofar as error is excluded. Due as much to external conditions as to personal convictions, the joint labors of Owen and Baxter were ultimately unproductive. Managing doctrinal disputes toward truth while pursuing unity in love has always been a fraught task. Indeed, as Owen wrote to Baxter in one of his letters, “If God give not an [sic] heart and mind to desire peace and union, every expression will be disputed, under the pretense of truth and accuracy.” Yet surely, we can all also agree with Owen that its difficulty does not invalidate it; it remains “a holy and necessary work,” a task we are summoned to by God who is himself one. Joshua Schendel is the executive editor of Modern Refor-

mation.

CHECK THEM O UT

→

CORECHRISTIANITY. C O M / S T U D I E S

Trustworthy Bible Studies ES S E N T I AL S E V E RY B E L I E V E R SHO U L D KN OW At Core Christianity, we work with top scholars and skilled theologians to produce reliable Bible studies that are accessible and clear. Whether on your own or with a group, you will gain a deeper understanding of how every part of Scripture points to Jesus and his saving work. We’ve just added these studies to our growing library: Ruth, Hebrews, and The Parables of King Jesus.

A Production of Sola Media

→

SOLAMEDIA.ORG

Who Says? Solving Doctrinal Controversy

Articles inside

BACK PAGE

ESSAY | The Role of Creeds and Confessions in

POEM | Augury | by Joey Jekell

POEM | God Our Father, Source of Comfort

LETTERS

REFORMATION OUTTAKES | Lost and Found

FROM THE EDITOR

BOOK PREVIEW | Summer/Fall Book Preview

GLOBAL THEOLOGICAL FORUM | An Interview