Faith, Form, and Fashion

Classical Reformed Theology and Its Postmodern Critics

Paul Helm

• Publisher: Cascade Books
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN:
  9781625645913
  9781498205603
• eBook ISBN:
  9781630874056
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Denominations

This is a detailed examination of the theological innovations of Kevin Vanhoozer and John Franke. Each proposes that doctrinal and systematic theology should be recast in the light of postmodernity. No longer can Christian theology be foundational, or have a stable metaphysical and epistemological framework. Vanhoozer advocates a theo-dramatic reconstruction of Christian doctrine, replacing the timeless propositions of the "purely cerebral theology" of the Reformed tradition in favor of a theology that does justice to the polyphony of multiple biblical genres. Franke holds that theology is part of a three-way conversation between Scripture, tradition, and culture, with an uncertain outcome. This study shows that each of these proposals is based on misunderstanding and exaggeration, and that the case against foundationalism is unclear and unpersuasive. It is argued that Vanhoozer's appeal to revelation as divine speech-acts is not as radical as he thinks, and his epistemology is weak. In the hands of postmodernity, Christian theology abandons its exactness and the standards of care that are a notable feature of doctrinal constrictions. The book will be of importance to those with interest in Reformed theology or Christian theology more generally. It provides a clear assessment of the impact of the postmodern mindset on theology.

Classic Reformed Theology

1

The Form of Theology

This chapter is devoted to outlining some of the essential features, the intellectual structures of Classical Reformed Theology (CRT). We shall not be chiefly concerned with the literary shape that a particular theologian chooses to give to his theology, though it might be worth saying a word or two about this to begin with.

Literary Shape

In his Institutes, John Calvin, one main fountain-head of Reformed theology, wrote what amounts to his systematic theology (though it has strong occasional elements in it), structuring it by the overarching claim that true wisdom consists in the knowledge of God and of ourselves. He announces this theme in the opening words of the book, and it controls the discussion of at least the first three books. It is only through Jesus Christ that we are brought to know God and ourselves. By contrast, others have preferred to follow the loci method. That is, they have constructed their work in the form of a series of discrete doctrinal topics, sometimes in a straightforwardly didactic way, sometimes in more polemical terms. And so Francis Turretin develops the loci method by elencthus, by questioning and answering. This method, both topical and catechetical, in which Christian theology is developed doctrine by doctrine, has come down to us as the dominant organizing principle. Instances of it can be found in Charles Hodge’s Systematic Theology, in William Shedd’s nineteenth-century Dogmatic Theology, and in the early twentieth century in such as Herman Bavinck and in the journal articles of B. B. Warfield, whose work has had a number of popular imitators, such as Louis Berkhof. Yet others, such as the Puritan John Owen, have “systematized” by considering Christian theology from a variety of complementary standpoints, such as the Holy Spirit, justification, and so on. Calvin’s own approach has rather dropped out of fashion; the only example I know of is the Southern Presbyterian Robert Breckinridge’s work The Knowledge of God,11 though no doubt there are others. Others have structured Christian theology in terms of the concept of the covenant and developed “covenant theology.” Herman Witsius in his Economy of the Covenants is a prime example.12 We shall consider the relation between systematic theology and covenant theology shortly.

Each approach has strengths and weaknesses. Having one main theme or concept, such as Calvin’s Institutes, provides a synoptic or unifying approach that binds together the various doctrinal discussions. In addition, Calvin writes in the first or second person, the knowledge of God and of ourselves, adopting a more immediately personal style. Calvin is also able, through this structure, to link together doctrines that are linked in reality. So he discusses justification and sanctification together, treating them as two distinct but inseparable gifts, through his brilliant idea of Christ’s two-fold grace. But the price he pays for this approach (despite his praiseworthy concern for “order”) is the toleration of a kind of disorderliness. For example, though he deals with the fall of mankind at the beginning of Book II, he has in fact already introduced some effects or results of the fall before that, in his treatment of the perversion of the natural knowledge of God. This knowledge with which we are endowed, he says in Book I, chapter 4, is stifled and corrupted as a result of the fall. So the structure of the work is not that of a set of topics or steps, but more like a symphony, in which an initial theme is introduced and elaborated, and developed further as the work progresses. The old idea of systematic theology as a “body of divinity” underlines this organic character. And so the theme of the knowledge of God and of ourselves, introduced in the very first lines of Book I of the work, returns at the beginning of Book II, and again elsewhere.

Others, such as Turretin and Hodge and Bavinck and Berkhof, favor a topical or loci method. This is a step-by-step approach, in which each topic is penetratingly discussed. In Turretin, each topic is framed in terms of the controversies of his day. The obvious advantages of this approach are thoroughness and clarity. But the separation of topics can sometimes create misleading impressions. Take again the relation of justification and sanctification. In Turretin’s and Hodge’s treatments, these topics are deliberately separated, and this works against what needs to be said about the connectedness of the two. For while justification and sanctification are two distinct elements in God’s saving purposes that are conceptually very different, they are nonetheless inseparably connected, as Calvin makes clear. Separating their treatment may suggest that they are only accidentally connected, even though efforts may be made to mitigate this impression.

Covenant Theology was developed within the Reformed community in the early years of the seventeenth century, by theologians such as Ursinus, Olevianus, Robert Rollock, John Preston, and John Ball. At least in Holland this development gave rise to a certain tension as it was seen to be less scholastic and exact than the dominant Reformed Orthodoxy, and not organized topically and controversially (i.e., in terms of the several doctrines of the Christian faith, and the analysis of doctrinal errors and their resolution). By contrast, the basic organizing principle of covenant theology is that of the unfolding economy of salvation, through a succession of developing covenants established between the Lord and his people. Such theology has a “redemptive historical” character. Though at first the scholastic and the covenant approaches were regarded as exclusive alternatives, hence the controversy, they were, in works such as that of Herman Witsius’ The Economy of the Covenants between God and Man, regarded as complementary. Creation, fall, and redemption, and particularly the historical unfolding of the one covenant of grace, is clearly set within the framework of systematic theology, employing its conceptuality. Witsius’s work was organized in terms of four topics: the Covenant of Works, the Covenant of Redemption, the Covenant of Grace, and the fourth on Covenant Ordinancies. Yet “he treats each topic analytically, and draws with evident happiness on the expository resources produced by systematicians during the previous 150 years.”13

This is the theology of the history of redemption, or, as might be said currently, narrative theology within a systematic theological framework. In the body of this book I shall be arguing that a careful balance between theological narrative set within a systematic framework is exactly right. The mix of these two elements is obviously a matter of judgment; nevertheless each is indispensable, because central to the Christian faith are the actions and words of God, the eternally triune Lord and creator, in human history. One reason for writing this book is to show the perils and dangers of current attempts to “theologize” without that framework of systematic theology in place. So is it to be biblical theology at the expense of systematic theology, or the reverse? The unoriginal answer that I shall give and defend is “it is to be both,” but with logical priority being given to systematic theological reasoning.

Intellectual Structure

So there will be gains and losses in any way of organizing a work of systematic theology. But this is not our chief concern, either in this chapter or in the book. Rather we are concerned in the first place not with the literary character but the intellectual structure of Christian systematic theology, with the appropriate manner in which Christian theological conclusions are to be drawn from both general and special revelation. Christian systematic theology builds on the work of exegetical theology, “biblical theology” in one sense of a phrase that has come to have other senses as well, as we shall see in due course. Exegetical theology informs the systematic theologian what a biblical passage means, or might plausibly mean, taking into account its scope and context, its situation in the canon, the genre of the work, and so on. The systematic theologian takes these results and links them to other biblical data concerned with the same or contrasting themes, employing them to contribute to the development or refining of the results, and then linking it with other themes.

It is important to note why this is done. It is not because the results of exegetical theology, the unfolding of the meaning of a biblical passage, are in any way imperfect or second-rate. It is to form an estimate of what a particular passage, in its particularity, contributes to the biblical revelation as a whole, and to the overall theme of that revelation under consideration, the doctrine of God, the work of Christ, the image of God in mankind, or whatever it may be. Parallel points arise about the relationship between systematic theology and historical theology. Doctrinal exactness has usually occurred when it has been possible to say what the doctrine implies, and also what it does not imply. It often takes the pressure of controversy to bring out the negative as well as the positive implications of a doctrine. That is why, once he has relied upon the exegetical theologian, the systematizer also has an eye to historical theology, for it is in discussion of some issue, even in historical controversy, that doctrines frequently receive their shape. For example, the controversies over Christology are in view in the Chalcedonian definition, and disputes over merit made possible the protest that justification is not by faith, but by faith only.

But what’s the point of such systematic endeavors? There is a sense in which systematic theology provides its own justification. Our pragmatic age, in which what we do can only be justified by its immediate payoff, is likely to be irritated by such an answer. Systematic theology is an end in itself, attempting to display in an orderly and connected way the “whole counsel of God” as revealed in Scripture. It shows, when every allowance has been made for the historically situated and occasional character of the books of Scripture, what is the overall teaching of Scripture about the nature of God and man, of the person and work of Christ, and so on. It is foolish to suppose that such a program disdains the original literature of the Bible. Systematic theology is not an endeavor to improve on that literature, but to do something else, to set forth the overall teaching of Scripture on who God is and what he has done and said. This enables the church to set out the character of the faith in terms that contrast it at the most general level with non-Christian and sub-Christian theologies, as well as to form a corrective to the way in which the prevailing culture may distort or enhance its teaching.

But while systemic theology may be pursued as an end in itself, this does not mean that it is merely academic. The goal of scientia legitimately leads to that of sapientia. And doctrine leads to application. B. B. Warfield expresses the relation between systematics and its biblical foundations in the following terms:

Systematic Theology is not founded on the direct and primary results of the exegetical process; it is founded on the final and complete results of exegesis as exhibited in Biblical Theology. Not exegesis itself, then, but Biblical Theology, provides the material for Systematics. Biblical Theology is not, then, a rival of Systematics; it is not even a parallel product of the same body of facts, provided by exegesis; it is the basis and source of Systematics. Systematic Theology is not a concatenation of the scattered theological data furnished by the exegetic process; it is the combination of the already concatenated data given to it by Biblical Theology. It uses the individual data furnished by exegesis, in a word, not crudely, not independently for itself, but only after these data have been worked up into Biblical Theology and have received from it their final coloring and subtlest shades of meaning—in other words, only in their true sense, and after Exegetics has said its last word upon them.14

This procedure is first exegetical, providing a “biblical theology,” as Warfield calls it. By this he means the practice of exegesis, conveying the most exact sense of the original passages that it is possible currently to give. Since for Warfield these passages are God’s word, the result is biblical theology. So his meaning is somewhat narrower in aim, and preparatory to biblical theology in its more recent meaning, which conveys in some sense the historical “story” or unfolding of God’s acts. Then follows systematic theological construction, based upon inference from the biblical data.

So, intellectual structu...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Preface
• Introduction
• Part 1: Classic Reformed Theology
• Chapter 1: The Form of Theology
• Chapter 2: Epistemology
• Part 2: Some New Proposals Considered
• Chapter 3: Nature and Narrative
• Chapter 4: Being and Doing
• Chapter 5: Speech Acts, Propositions, and Assertions
• Chapter 6: Propositions, Time, and Truth
• Chapter 7: Meaning and Reasoning
• Chapter 8: Foundationalism and Its Woes
• Chapter 9: Knowing and Believing
• Part 3: Conclusion
• Chapter 10: CRT and the Future
• Bibliography