They believed he was a mere man but still worshipped him

When it came to degrading views of the person of the Lord Jesus Christ the seventeenth century Socinians were worse than the fourth century Arians. 

The Arians believed that he was the first and greatest of creatures, created out of nothing before the world was called into being.  The Socinians believed that he was a mere man who, on account of his obedience, was exalted to to such a place of honour that he should receive worship.

These differences are simply one of degree.  Both Socinians and Arians committed themselves to believing, teaching and confessing heresy. 

Whether he was made from nothing before the creation of time and space, or whether he was a mere man with no spiritual pre-existence before his conception, he was still a creature, he was still treated by them as belonging to the side of that great division where things are classed as made, created, contingent, finite, and not classed as infinite, eternal, and unchangeable. 

They were both horrifically wrong to make him stand solely with us as a creature, and not to bow the knee to him as Creator and Lord, the eternally begotten Son of the Father, equal with the Father in power and glory.  And that, ultimately, is a wicked thing to do.

The Socinians, however, although they believed that Jesus was a mere man, still worshipped him. 

The infamous Unitarian Joseph Priestly commented in 1782 on this self-evident inconsistency in Socinian doctrine and practice:

It is something extraordinary that the Socinians in Poland thought it their duty, as Christians, and indeed essential to Christianity, to pray to Jesus Christ, notwithstanding that they believed him to be a mere man, whose presence with them, and whose knowledge of their situation, they could not therefore be assured of.

The following extract from H. P. Liddon's The Divinity of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ on this Socinian anomaly makes for interesting reading:

The earliest Socinians taught that the Son of God was a mere man, who was conceived of the Holy Ghost, and was therefore called the Son of God.  But they also maintained that on account of his obedience, he was, after finishing his work of redemption, exalted to Divine dignity and honour.


Christians were to treat him as if he were God: they were to trust him implicitly; they were to adore him.  Faustus Socinus zealously insisted upon the duty of adoring Jesus Christ; and the Racovian Catechism expressly asserts that those who do not call upon or adore Christ are not to be accounted Christians.


But this was only the archaeology, or at most the better feeling of Socinianism.  Any such mere feeling was destined to yield surely and speedily to the logic of a strong destructive principle.  In vain did Blandrata appeal to Faustus Socinus himself, when endeavouring to persuade the Socinians of Transylvania to adore Jesus Christ: the Transylvanians would not be persuaded to yield an act of adoration to any creature.


In vain did the Socinian Catechism draw a distinction between a higher and lower worship, of which the former was reserved for the Father, while the latter was paid to Christ.  Practically this led to a violation of the one positive fundamental principle of Socinianism; it obscured the incommunicable prerogatives of the Supreme Being.


Accordingly, in spite of the texts of Scripture upon which their worship of Christ was rested by the Socinian theologians, such worship was soon abandoned; and the later practice of Socinians has illustrated the true doctrinal force and meaning of that adoration which Socinianism refuses, but which the Church of Jesus Christ unceasingly offers to Jesus, the Son of God made man.  Of this worship the only real justification is that full belief in Christ's essential unity with the Father which is expressed by the homoousion. (p. 414)

Begotten before all worlds? Is Driscoll right to reject the eternal generation of the Son?

Concerning the doctrine of the Trinity, Augustine wrote that "In no other subject is error more dangerous, or inquiry more laborious, or the discovery of truth more profitable" (De Trinitate 1.3.5). That is a weighty sentence and worth remembering. In medicine precision matters and we care about it a great deal. In theology it matters even more.

Mark Driscoll and Gerry Breshears new book Doctrine: What Christians Should Believe, has a truly grandstand opening. In unpacking the importance of the doctrine of the Trinity they reason that:

Our longings for love, unity in diversity, communication, community, humility, peace, and selflessness are in fact - by design - longings for the Trinitarian God of the Bible and a world that is a reflection of the Trinity. (p. 12)

What follows, or, more perhaps more appropriately given the subject, what proceeds from this, in the rest of the chapter is a straightforward, robust, well applied articulation, anchored in Scripture, of the truth that:

The Trinity is one God who eternally exists as three distinct persons -- Father, Son, and Spirit -- who are each fully and equally God in eternal relation with each other (p. 13).

Now it would be fair to say that most of us find it easier to defend from Scripture the truth that there is only one living and true God, that there are three distinct persons in the Godhead, and that each of these persons is fully God ("which means that they share all the divine attributes, such as eternality, omniscience, omnipotence and omnipresence" as Driscoll and Breshears helpfully put it) than we do to explain it. Moreover, we find it easier to demonstrate that the doctrine of the Trinity is found in Scripture than we find it to explain the relationships between the persons that distinguish them as distinct persons.

We know that Father is different from the Son because he is the Father. We know that the Son is different from the Spirit because he is the Son. But this difference is not found in their attributes as God. The Father, as God, is not more eternal than the Son is. The Son, as God, is no less self-existent than the Father is. The Spirit is no creature but is as omnipotent and omnipresent as the Father and the Son. Each person may be described as very God.  These truths are articulated by Driscoll and Breshears, and the corresponding heresies of Modalism (one God playing three successive roles), Arianism (one God, with Christ and Spirit lacking deity) and Tritheism, suitably smacked down.

How then are we to distinguish the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit from each other? Well, historically, this has been done by speaking in terms of their personal properties. The Westminster Larger Catechism sets this out as follows:

Q. 10. What are the personal properties of the three persons in the Godhead?
A. It is proper to the Father to beget the Son, and to the Son to be begotten of the Father, and to the Holy Ghost to proceed from the Father and the Son from all eternity.

These are the historic categories that Christians have reached for to state clearly, but not exhaustively, and with a self-confessed inability to adequately explain just how it is so, that the Father is “unbegotten,” that the Son is “begotten” and that the Spirit (who is neither “unbegotten” nor “begotten”) “proceeds,” from the Father and the Son from all eternity. The Son is therefore eternally begotten, and the procession of the Spirit is an eternal procession. These are eternal acts beyond our capacity to understand. You cannot find a point in time before they occurred. The Son was not begotten at a point in eternity past so that he became the Son.

Although Driscoll and Breshears deal with the personal properties of the Son and Spirit in the book my comments here will be restricted to the doctrine of the eternal generation of the Son. This is an important theological conviction for us to hold to, as I hope to show in due course. This is what Driscoll and Breshears say about it (I've broken up the paragraphs for ease of reading):

As the doctrine of the Trinity developed, theologians struggled to explain the eternal relationships of the Trinity. What differentiates Father from Son and Spirit? Using philosophical methodology, they worked backward from God's economic working in the world to define his eternal relationships.

The Bible says the Father sent the Spirit to conceive Jesus in the womb of Mary. Jesus is therefore referred to as the "only begotten [monogenes] Son." Theologians extended this begetting in history back into the eternal Trinity and posited that the Son is eternally begotten of or generated by the Father.

The whole attempt to define eternal relations in the immanent or ontological Trinity seems misguided. (p. 27)

The doctrine of the eternal generation of the Son of God can be found in the Nicene Creed, the Athanasian Creed, the Chalcedonian Definition, and the Reformed Confessions.  To jettison a doctrine that has a remarkable theological pedigree on the grounds that it has insufficient Scriptural support and is misguided is a significant claim, and one that needs to be carefully looked at and weighed.

Let me raise some preliminary questions about these statements.

•  Is the Sonship of the second person of the Trinity eternal, or is it temporal? 

• When Scripture speaks of the Son being begotten is it only talking about his human sonship and nature derived from Mary? Is this when he was begotten by the Father? 

• Has he always been the Son, or did the second person of the Trinity become the Son of God only when he became incarnate as Driscoll and Breshears seem to imply in the statements above? 

I'm not entirely sure what to make of the statement that “The Bible says the Father sent the Spirit to conceive Jesus in the womb of Mary. Jesus is therefore referred to as the "only begotten [monogenes] Son.” It strikes me as a sentence that doesn't precisely convey what the authors believe about the eternality of the Sonship of Christ.  Are they really suggesting that there is one generation of the Son, and that this consists in his being begotten by Mary?  Do all the references in Scripture to the Son being begotten by the Father refer to this?

We ought to speak of God creating the humanness of the Son from the substance of Mary, but we should avoid any implication that Christ's Sonship was begotten from the substance of Mary. Jesus is not referred to as the only begotten Son because of Mary, but because, unlike us, he is the natural Son of God.

Things are cleared up a little later on in the chapter when our authors helpfully say that “God the Father and God the Son were proverbially face-to-face in eternity past” (p. 34) and of the “unity and love that exist eternally between the Father and the Son” (p. 30). From these last two statements it seems clear that they do hold to the eternal Sonship of the second person of the Trinity in addition to his eternal pre-existence and deity.

Evidently then, the identity of the Son as the Son did not begin in a outhouse in Bethlehem. This is important. The principal casualty in the tinkering with the eternal Sonship of Christ, for tinkering there has been throughout church history, is the eternal paternity of God.  If the Son is not eternal, then the Father has not been the eternal Father, and before we know it the mutual love of the persons of the Trinity has been evacuated of its eternal depth and richness.  We are left with persons, but can no longer speak of how they relate to each other in eternity, and we cannot say with any confidence therefore that this relationship is one of eternal love.  This error is one that, even with their rejection of eternal generation, Driscoll and Breshears clearly avoid.

Driscoll and Breshears affirm that the Son is in eternal relationship with the Father, and the Spirit, but, that we know nothing, and can say nothing, concerning the nature of the eternal relationship between the Father and the Son. They are not willing to affirm that he is the Father's only begotten Son, “begotten, before all worlds.” Although the first person of the Trinity has revealed himself as the Father, and the second person of the Trinity is revealed to us as the eternal Son of the Father, and although the first person is said to have begotten the second person in Scripture (there is explicit Scriptural warrant for this in Hebrews 1:5 and elsewhere, there are nine references given in footnote 66 on p. 27), we are warned that any attempt to define this eternal relationship is misguided.

There are yet more questions to ask. What “philosophical methodology” did these theologians use as they worked backward from what the Trinity has done in time to work out what the Trinity is like in eternity? We are not told. What are we to make of the words of Jesus in John 5:26, “For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself,” as passage that Driscoll and Breshears do not refer to or discuss.

In the next post I will take up the three reasons why Driscoll and Breshears think that the attempt to "define eternal relations in the immanent or ontological Trinity seems misguided."

Denying exhaustive omniscience: Open theists and Socinians

The open theist denial of God's exhaustive foreknowledge is the same as the historic Socinian denial of this classical Christian doctrine.

The open theists hold to a particular version of free will (libertarianism), a view that they consider to be incompatible not merely with foreordination but also with foreknowledge. The Socinians held to the same beliefs around four hundred years ago. Open theism found significant historic precedent in the Socinian remodification of God's prescience.

The Socinians, by name, are almost entirely forgotten today. Their views, under different names, have become popular as contemporary evangelical alternatives to classically understood evangelical beliefs. The process philosopher Charles Hartshorne, writing in 1984, put forward the following:

Is God all-knowing? Yes, in the Socinian sense. Never has a great intellectual discovery passed with less notice by the world than the Socinian discovery of the proper meaning of omniscience. To this day works of reference fail to tell us about it. (Omnipotence and Other Theological Mistakes, p. 27, quoted by Erickson, What Does God Know & When Does He Know It? p. 128)

What Hartshorne meant by "all-knowing...in the Socinian sense" can be seen from the following written by him in 1941, and in the words written by Clark Pinnock in 1986:

We could then say that omniscience is all the knowledge that is possible, which by definition is perfect knowledge, but that since some of the truths about the future could not be known at present, omniscience does not know them. (Man's Vision of God and the Logic of Theism, p. 140)

God is omniscient in the sense that he knows everything which can be known, just as God is omnipotent in the sense that he can do everything that can be done. But free actions are not entities which can be known. God can surmise what you will do next Friday, but cannot know it for certain because you have not done it yet. ("God limits his foreknowledge" in Predestination and Free Will: Four views of divine sovereignty & human freedom, eds. David Basinger & Randall Basinger, 1986)

However, the charge that the open theist view is Socinian has proved to be somewhat controversial. It is not hard to see why. The Socinians were heretics. They denied the Trinity, the deity of Christ, justification by faith alone, and penal substitution. That open theists have reproduced the Socinian view of divine foreknowledge is surely undeniable. The comparison, however, has not been well received.

In The God Who Risks (rev. 2007), John Sanders admits that the correspondence between the two views holds, "we acknowledge that heretics such as the sixteenth-century Anabaptist Fausto Socinus affirmed this view" (p. 170). He also says that "there is no historical linkage between open theists and Socinus" (p. 170). I quite agree. An argument to the contrary cannot and need not be made. The two views share the same methodology.

Sanders goes further than this when he says that "Erickson seems to agree with some evangelical critics of open theism who attempt to discredit the view by calling it "Socinianism" (p. 170).

Pinnock also wrote that "The hope is to dispose of openness theology by tying it to some known heresy...The fact is, open theists are trinitarian believers, which means the Socinian charge is wide of the mark." (Most Moved Mover, p. 107).

Pinnock notes that Robert Strimple, President Emeritus, Westminster Seminary California, identified the open view as Socinian, rather than Arminian, and chides him for not mentioning that "openness theists are orthodox in their Christology...The tactic is to position free will theists with known heretics if at all possible" (Most Moved Mover, p. 107, n. 122).

Let me write this in clear, plain English. Robert Strimple and Millard Erickson claim that the open theist view of divine foreknowledge is the same as the Socinian view. They do not claim that open theists agree with Socinians on every doctrine. The Socinian view was regarded as unorthodox. It failed to gain a following even among those who carried on the anti-trintarian theology and rationalism of the Socinians (i.e. Unitarians). Open theists have accepted the same premise as the Socinians and have revised the doctrine of divine omniscience in line with it. In doing so they have used the same arguments that the Socinians put forward.

Sanders has accepted that open theists and Socinians are in agreement on omniscience. When Pinnock responded to the charge by saying "The fact is, open theists are trinitarian believers, which means the Socinian charge is wide of the mark" he was tilting at a windmill. No one, not least Robert Strimple, was equating open theists with Socinians at every point, and certainly not accusing them of being anti-trinitarian. One thing was clear. They had bidden farewell to Arminius and adopted the stance of Socinus.

That does not mean that revising omniscience in this way has no effect on other doctrines. Open theists, and their Socinian forebears, are logically consistent in their approach to libertarian freedom, and that to the cost of divine omniscience. Inevitably this does, and will, have an impact on other doctrines if the logic of the whole thing is carried through to its conclusion. At this point inconsistencies are a matter of gratitude and security. A Socinian doctrine of freedom and sin logically entailed a particular kind of Socinian saviour. The Socinians didn't need the kind of Saviour that the Reformed believed in.

Heresy Never Dies: Video

Thanks to Nick Batzig the video of my session "Heresy Never Dies" is available at Feeding on Christ.

The lecture will also be appearing in the near future as a series of articles at Reformation 21

The rough outline of the session is as follows:

Three notes of caution

• We are not personally immune to drifting into error (Acts 20:30)

• We must cultivate gratitude toward God, and patience and gentleness to those caught in the devil's snare (2 Timothy 2:22-26)

• We must exercise a tender hearted watchfulness over those committed to our care (Acts 20:28)

Five different kinds of people in error

1. Those who are sincerely ignorant (Apollos in Acts 18:24-28)

2. Those who have sincerely misunderstood Scripture (1 Cor. 5:9-12)

3. The temporarily inconsistent (Peter in Galatians 2:11-14)

4. The deceived (Galatians 3:1)

5. The deceivers (2 Cor. 11:13; 2 Timothy 3:13)

21st Century Evangelicals and the 17th Century Socinians

A case study: Open theists and Socinians on the denial of God's exhaustive foreknowledge

Why do old errors make a comeback?

• We have to reckon with the influence of Satan

• We have to get to grips with Evangelical historical amnesia and ignorance

• We have to face up to doctrinal neglect

• We have to recognise that some people are running away from the truth

Heresy never dies: Twin Lakes Fellowship audio

The audio from my lecture on "Heresy never dies" is available at the Twin Lakes site here. My friend Nick Batzig will be posting the video from this lecture and some others.

It has been a great, great privilege to attend the Twin Lakes Fellowship in Florence, Mississippi. This coming Lord's Day I will be preaching for my good friend David Strain at Main Street Presbyterian Church in Columbus, MS.

You can also listen to the other lectures and sermons from this year's conference.

Augustine and the Trinity: Lewis Ayres

This book looks very interesting. Shame that it is so expensive. I shall have to cancel the family holiday to buy it. I'm sure the kids will understand.

Here's the blurb:

Augustine of Hippo (354–430) strongly influenced western theology, but he has often been accused of over-emphasizing the unity of God to the detriment of the Trinity.

In this book Lewis Ayres demonstrates how Augustine’s writings actually offer one of the most sophisticated and persuasive of Nicene Trinitarian theologies. Culminating recent research by scholars in Europe and the US, Ayres argues that Augustine's earliest Trinitarian writings drew on a variety of earlier Latin traditions which stressed the irreducibility of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit as well as on the Neo-Platonist philosopher Plotinus.

Ayres then demonstrates how Augustine's mature writings offer an elaborate and unexpected account of the Trinity as defined by the inter-personal life of Father, Son and Spirit. Ayres also shows that Augustine shaped an account of Christian ascent toward understanding of and participation in the divine life which begins in faith and models itself on Christ’s humility.

This new treatment of Augustine of Hippo’s theology of the Trinity defends one of the most influential figures in western religious thought against the long-held assumption that he over-emphasized the unity of God. Culminating recent research, Ayres argues that Augustine actually offered one of the most sophisticated early Trinitarian theologies.

The Reformation and Deformation of the Church in Scotland: New titles from Christian Focus

Christian Focus have two new titles on the stories of gospel faithfulness and doctrinal decline among nineteenth century Scottish presbyterians.

Thanks to Iain D. Campbell for pointing out Sandy Finlayson's new book on the Free Church Fathers Unity & Diversity: The Founders of the Free Church of Scotland. Iain says of this volume "where there is a love for the gospel in Scotland, their story deserves to be told, and Sandy Finlayson has told it well. A highly commended volume."

Here's the blurb:

It has been many years since there has been a popular level book, which has looked at the life and ministry of some of the 'fathers' of the Free Church of Scotland. This book looks at the life and ministry of a number of the key figures in the Disruption era and late 19th Century Free Church.

Beginning with Thomas Chalmers, each chapter has a biographical sketch of a key figure with an emphasis on why these men mattered in their time and what they still have to say to us in the 21st century.

All of the men portrayed were committed to the advancement of the Gospel in Scotland and further afield. While they shared a commitment to the Confession of Faith and reformed theology, this was expressed in unique ways by each of these men. Hence both unity and diversity is on view in these fascinating pages.

Carl Trueman writes about the book:

"Sandy Finlayson's study of the nineteenth century leaders of the Free Church of Scotland is neither hagiography nor iconoclasm; rather, it is the thoughtful reflection of a committed presbyterian on the men who helped shape the Scottish church through their commitment to orthodoxy, evangelism, and social action.

The attractive churchmanship which these church leaders represented is all too rare today; and I hope this work will do something to restore it to its rightful place in the wider Christian landscape."

More details, sample pages and the contents page can be found here


Christian Focus are also due to release Ian Hamilton's book on The Erosion of Calvinist Orthodoxy: Drifting from the truth in Scottish confessional churches.

Here's the blurb:

This revealing read will give you an opportunity to learn from history. How do strong confessional churches that seem to be doing all the right things drift inexorably from the truth?. What is clear from Ian Hamilton's fascinating study is that it doesn't happen over night but it is a gradual erosion of theological and doctrinal standards.

Nineteenth century Scotland was seen as a Christian nation composed of church-going people. Among its churches, Presbyterianism was strongest, and within Presbyterianism there were several large denominations. The future looked bright and optimism marked many of the church leaders and congregations. Yet the sad fact is that most of them were blind to the presence of the warning signs that ultimately caused the decline and not the continued growth of the church in Scotland.

To understand how this happened Ian Hamilton looks at the changes that took place within one of these large Presbyterian denominations - the United Presbyterian Church - and analyses the roots, developments and consequences of these changes, particularly the departure from the doctrines summarised in the Westminster Confession of Faith.

It is a salutary lesson to observe that the movements for church unions and increased evangelism of the nineteenth century were not signs of spiritual health; instead they were inadequate sticking plasters that hid dangerous spiritual disease. This book also includes discussion on the nature of subscription to the Confession at time of 1733 secession, the atonement controversy 1841-45, the Union controversy 1863-1873 and 1879 United Presbyterian Church Declaratory Act.

More details can be found here

I love the Westminster Standards

In 1855 James Henley Thornwell became a professor at Columbia Theological Seminary. He was asked if he accepted the Westminster Confession. "Accept it?" he said "I love it."

I heartily agree, and I am grateful for all the available theological and historical tools to help me understand the Westminster Standards. Those available resources are being added to in a significant way. Iain D. Campbell points us to some news about this:

The Westminster Assembly Project and Reformation Heritage Books

The Westminster Assembly Project, best known for the edition of Assembly minutes and papers to be published by Oxford University Press, has now entered an extensive publishing agreement with Reformation Heritage Books.

John Bower has joined historian Chad Van Dixhoorn in launching three new series of books by the Westminster Assembly, and one series of new and classic studies on the Assembly, all being published by Reformation Heritage Books. It is hoped that both texts and studies will stimulate further research in the Assembly and the religious dimension of English civil war politics. Certainly future publications on British post-Reformation theology and Puritanism will be enriched by these publications, briefly described here.

The first volume on the Larger Catechism, and prepared by John Bower, will be out in March 2010.

You can order this volume here

Here's the blurb:

The Larger Catechism stands as one of the three major doctrinal standards produced by the Westminster Assembly. Often overshadowed by the Shorter Catechism and the Confession of Faith, the Larger Catechism exhibits the Assembly’s most mature theological reflection and insight.

In this remarkable volume, John Bower provides extensive historical background for the making of this colossal catechism. He traces the history of the Assembly’s efforts from the initial call for a catechism, through deliberations on its form and content, and down to the intricate process of monitoring its printing.

The centerpiece of the volume is Bower’s critical text of the catechism. Painstakingly checked and indexed, the critical text is supported by a four-column comparison of the authoritative manuscripts and printings. Graced with a glossary and a catalogue of corrected proof-texts, Bower’s text is sure to be the benchmark for future study, modern editions, and foreign translations for years to come.

And here is the recommendation from Carl Trueman:

The Westminster Standards are today of interest both to the confessional tradition of Reformed Christianity and to a growing number of scholars who see the Westminster Assembly as an important factor in understanding British politics and religion in the seventeenth century.

Thus, the arrival of this new series, dedicated to the production of scholarly editions of documents associated with the Assembly, will be greeted with pleasure by both groups. This first volume, a critical edition of the Larger Catechism, will no doubt rapidly establish itself—and the series as a whole—as a standard starting-point for anyone wishing to learn more about Reformed life and thought as articulated by the Westminster Divines.

Here are some more details about the series:

Principal Documents of the Westminster Assembly. This series will produce the six chief works authored by the Assembly for covenanted uniformity of religion in England: the Confession of Faith, Larger Catechism, Shorter Catechism, Directory for Public Worship, Directory for Church Government, and The Psalter. Each volume will contain a historical introduction, a critical text, and multi-column comparisons of original manuscripts and early editions.

Writings of the Westminster Divines. The aim of this series is to provide scholarly editions of texts by Westminster Assembly members and commissioners. Volumes will include previously unpublished manuscripts as well as republications of rare editions. Carefully determined editorial standards will be used to ensure an authoritative product that is accessible to modern readers, while remaining reliable for students and scholars.

Westminster Assembly Facsimiles. With this new series, Reformation Heritage Books and the Westminster Assembly Project are providing electronic and print access to publications by Assembly members in their original form. Free PDF downloads will be made available through the Westminster Assembly Project website. The same text can be purchased for your collection in paperback and hard cover from Reformation Heritage Books.

Studies of the Westminster Assembly. Complementing the primary source material in the other series, the Assembly studies will provide access to classic studies that have not been reprinted and to new studies, providing some of the best existing research on the Assembly and its members.

How a crisis in the Reformed churches was overcome

Scott Clark explains the problem and how it was addressed:

Everyone knows the acronym TULIP, but not everyone knows where this acronym comes from. The Canons of Dordt are among the most famous but unread deliverances of any Reformed Synod. The canons are more than five letters. The canons teach a pastoral doctrine of grace and provide a model for the stewardship of the Gospel.

The Canons (rules) of the Synod of Dordt were written after years of controversy within the Reformed churches in Europe and Britain. In the late sixteenth century the Reformed doctrines of sin, grace, faith, justification, atonement, perseverance, and assurance faced a growing resistance.

Read it all at the Ligonier site here

[NB: The Canons of Dordt are not to be placed in the same category as The Guns of Navarone]

Let us hold fast our confession

What do you think about evangelical doctrinal statements? How do you feel about them?

Some people regard them with suspicion because of their intellectual heaviness. Others view them as luxury items, or as impediments to fellowship and unity. They are looked upon as optional extras to the life and practice of the church. Of course there are those who cannot help but view them as precious because they convey in clear, precise, pastoral terms, the great indispensible articles of the Christian faith.

One way to measure our own thoughts and feelings on the matter is to compare them with assessments from previous centuries. The result will either be to strengthen our convictions in degree, or to expose them as of a different kind altogether.

Consider the story of Guido de Brès (1522-67), chief author of the Belgic Confession (you can get hold of Danny Hyde's exposition of it here) I came across the following anecdote in Joel Beeke's book Living for God's Glory. Concerning the Confession Beeke writes:

Though it follows an objective order, the confession has a warm, experiential, personal spirit, which is helped by its repeated use of the pronoun we.

As an example, consider these words from the chapter on the intercession of Christ:

We believe that we have no access to God except through the one and only Mediator and Intercessor: Jesus Christ the Righteous.

He therefore was made man, uniting together the divine and human natures, so that we human beings might have access to the divine Majesty. Otherwise we would have no access.

But this Mediator, whom the Father has appointed between himself and us, ought not terrify us by his greatness, so that we have to look for another one, according to our fancy. For neither in heaven nor among the creatures on earth is there anyone who loves us more than Jesus Christ does.

On de Brès, Beeke writes:

During the sixteenth century, the Reformed churches in the Netherlands experienced severe persecution at the hands of King Philip II of Spain, an ally of the Roman Catholic Church. In 1561, de Brès, likely assisted by fellow pastors, wrote the confession to prove that the adherents of the Reformed faith were not rebels but law abiding citizens who professed biblical doctrines.

The year after it was written, a copy of the confession was sent to Philip II, along with a statement that the petitioners were ready to obey the government in all things lawful, but would:

"offer their backs to stripes,
their tongues to knives,
their mouths to gags,
and their whole bodies to the fire,
well knowing that those who follow Christ must take up His cross and deny themselves"
rather than deny the truth expressed in the confession...

In 1567, de Brès became one martyr among hundreds who sealed their faith with blood. (p. 21)

At the turn of the nineteenth century, what Arichbald Alexander wrote of the Westminster Standards could have just as well been written of the Three Forms of Unity, of which the Belgic Confession is a part:

We venerate these standards, partly because they embody the wisdom of an august Synod; because they come down to us associated with the memory and faith of saints and martyrs and embalmed with their blood; but we love them most of all because they contain the truth of God--that truth which forms the foundation of our hopes. As our fathers prized them, and we prize them, so may our children and our children's children love and preserve them.

Quoted by David Calhoun, "Old Princeton Seminary and the Westminster Standards" in Ligon Duncan [ed], The Westminster Confession into the 21st Century Vol. 2, p.34

Proof-texting: A form of theological shorthand

I am currently working on a version of the Shorter Catechism with the proof-texts taken from the ESV. The process is slow and detailed and wonderful. I hope that the result will be of use to individuals and churches.

Allow me to make three points about proof-texts:

1. We should never assume that the use of proof-texts implies a cavalier attitude toward those texts in their contexts (unit of thought, chapter, genre, redemptive-historical location etc.)

2. We should never assume that the use of a proof-text implies a method divorced from responsible exegesis. We should never assume that we have no need to reach for the best commentaries on those texts, that grammatico-historical exegesis is irrelevant, that linguistic study is to be suspended. They should be offered and received in full knowledge and responsible use of all available interpretative tools.

3. We should assume the fundamental unity of Scripture, the "consent of all the parts," because of the superintending work of the Holy Spirit.

When the Westminster Assembly presented the Confession of Faith to Parliament, December 3rd 1646, it was further required of them that the "Assembly should attach their marginal notes, to prove every part from Scripture." Warfield noted that the "proof-texts for both Catechisms occupied the Assembly from Novemeber 30, 1647, to April 12, 1648, and were presented to Parliament April 14, 1648."

A few years back a good friend pointed me to John Frame's short section on proof-texting in The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God. I found it helpful, I hope that you will too:

"Proof-texting" has become almost a term of reproach today, but that was not always the case...A proof-text is simply a Scripture reference that is intended to show the basis for a particular theological assertion.

The danger in proof-texting is well known: proof-texts are sometimes misused and their contextual meaning distorted in an attempt to use them to support teachings they do not really support.

But it has never been shown that texts are always or necessarily misinterpreted when they are used as proofs for doctrines. And after all has been said, theology really cannot do without proof-texts.

Any theology that seeks accord with Scripture (that is, any theology worthy of the name) has an obligation to show where it gets its scriptural warrant. It may not claim to be based on "general scriptural principles"; it must show where Scripture teaches the doctrine in question.

In some cases, the theologian will display this warrant by presenting his own contextual exegesis of the relevant passages. But often an extended exegetical treatement is unnecessary and would be counterproductive.

The relationship of doctrine to text might be an obvious one once the text is cited (e.g., Gen. 1:1 as proof of the creation of the earth), or it may simply require too much space to go over the exegetical issues in detail.

To forbid proof-texts would be to forbid an obviously useful form of theological shorthand.

Obviously, we should not cite proof-texts unless we have a pretty good idea of what they mean in their context. We do not, however, have an obligation always to cite the context with the text, and far less do we have an obligation always to present an exegetical argument supporting our usage of the text.

John Frame, The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God, p. 197

Three cheers for Calvin's Institutes

Lig Duncan gives ten reasons to read the Institutes in 2009

Derek Thomas strikes up the band in praise of the theologian's theological masterpiece

Iain D. Campbell tells us how he found the Institutes when he was all at sea

The most influential evangelical theologian of the 21st century

Monergism have an article dedicated to the man and the movement he shaped here.

The proximate cause of all error and heresy

An extract from William Cunningham's Historical Theology (you can buy it at an excellent price here):

We have seen, in considering Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, that even in the second century there was, besides much very inaccurate interpretation of particular passages of Scripture, some tendency manifested to deviate from the simplicity of scriptural doctrine as taught by the apostles, though not yet carried out to any considerable extent.

Since there is as much of this tendency manifested by Irenaeus, who was no philosopher, as by Justin, who was well acquainted with the literature and philosophy of paganism, we cannot trace the incipient corruption of doctrine wholly at least to the influence of philosophical speculation, or indeed to any one specific cause, except what is in some sense the proximate cause of all error and heresy,--viz., the want of due subjection to the authority of God's word, and of due diligence and impartiality in the use of the right means of attaining to a correct knowledge of its meaning.

William Cunningham, Historical Theology vol. I, p. 146-7

The Usefulness of Heretics to the Church

In chapter one of his book on Paul and the New Perspective, Stephen Westerholm argues the case for Augustine being included in the debate over the right interpretation of the apostle's writings:

Augustine had his own spectacles, to be sure, furnished in part by his struggles with heretics. The latter, like other perversions of the good in Augustine's universe, inevitably served useful purposes: they compelled the church to "investigate [its articles of faith] more accurately, to understand them more clearly, and to proclaim them more earnestly" (De civ. Dei 16.2.).

Westerholm, Perspectives Old and New on Paul: The "Lutheran" Paul and His Critics, p.3

Heretics are useful because:

1. They compel the Church to Investigate the faith more accurately

2. They compel the Church to Understand the faith more clearly

3. They compel the Church to Proclaim the faith more earnestly

Augustine, Pelagius, the Nicene Creed, and the Men from California

Over at Pyromaniacs there has been some discussion about the book Listening to the Beliefs of the Emerging Churches, and particularly Dan Kimball's contribution.

Below I have posted Jaroslav Pelikan's discussion of the trinitarian orthodoxy of some of the Pelagians and the sticking point for their position in the Nicene Creed. To begin with here is Pelikan's summary of the the doctrine of sin held by Celestius:

"Adam was created mortal and would have died whether he had sinned or not sinned; the sin of Adam injured only him, not the human race; the law leads to the kingdom [of heaven], just as the gospel does; even before the coming of Christ there were men without sin; newborn infants are in the same state which Adam was before his transgression; the whole human race does not die through the death and transgression of Adam, nor does it rise again through the resurrection of Christ."

Following this Pelikan comments:

Much of this could claim support from the tradition as well as from contemporary Eastern theologians. What is more, it was combined with an impeccable trinitarian orthodoxy. Pelagius confessed: "I believe in the Trinity of the one substance, and I hold all things in accordance with the teachings of the holy catholic church." Before the outbreak of the controversy on grace and sin he had written a treatise On the Faith of the Trinity. Pelagius had a reputation for teaching "the right faith." Celestius, too, could wholeheartedly recite the creed, "from the Trinity of the one Godhead all the way to the kind of resurrection of the dead that there is to be." If the touchstone of orthodoxy was adherence to the true faith concerning the Trinity and the person of Christ, it was incorrect to call this doctrine of sin and grace a "heresy." Those who held to erroneous doctrines in this area were to be anathematized "as fools, not as heretics, for there is no dogma."

But this assessment of the controversy was not to last, as Pelikan further notes:

But the standard of trinitarian orthodoxy, the Nicene Creed, also contained the statement: "We confess...one baptism for the forgiveness of sins." And by the first part of the fifth century this meant, as a rule, the baptism of infants.

And the Pelagians held to doctrines that were inconsistent with this understanding of the need for forgiveness, original sin, and the subsequent necessity of infant baptism. Pelikan finally observes that:

In the person of Celestius, Pelagianism was condemned by the Council of Ephesus in 431 as a heresy.

Now the point of all this is to show that the Nicene Creed was an insufficient test to deal with the issues of sin and grace in salvation. It did, to be sure, not leave those issues completely untouched. But even when it touched upon them it did not clarify the crucial relationship of grace and faith. In fact we should go further and say with Warfield that "the problem which Augustine bequeathed to the Church for solution, the Church required a thousand years to solve," since it was "Augustine who gave us the Reformation."

For a fuller discussion of these matters see Pelikan, The Christian Tradition volume 1: The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition (100-600), and B. B. Warfield, "Augustine and the Pelagian Controversy," in The Works of Benjamin B. Warfield vol. IV: Studies in Tertullian and Augustine

The Agony of Deceit: When good teachers go bad

Two perceptive comments on heretics from Vincent of Lerins. The one states the principle, the other supplies an illustration of it:

The reason is clearer than day why Divine Providence sometimes permits certain doctors of the Churches to preach new doctrines--"That the Lord your God may try you;" he says. And assuredly it is a great trial when one whom thou believest to be a prophet, a disciple of prophets, a doctor and defender of the truth, whom thou hast folded to thy breast with the utmost veneration and love, when such a one of a sudden secretly and furtively brings in noxious errrors, which thou canst neither quickly detect, being held by the prestige of former authority, nor lightly think it right to condemn, being prevented by affection for thine old master.

For to take first a very recent and very plain case: what sort of trial, think we, was that which the Church had experience of the other day, when that unhappy Nestorius, all at once metamorphosed from a sheep into a wolf, began to make havoc of the flock of Christ, while as yet a large proportion of those whom he was devouring believed him to be a sheep, and consequently were the more exposed to his attacks? For who would readily suppose him to be in error, who was known to have been elected by the high choice of the Emperor, and to be held in the greatest esteem by the priesthood? who would readily suppose him to be in error, who, greatly beloved by the holy brethren, and in high favor with the populace, expounded the Scriptures in public daily, and confuted the pestilent errors both of Jews and Heathens? Who could choose but believe that his teaching was Orthodox, his preaching Orthodox, his belief Orthodox, who, that he might open the way to one heresy of his own, was zealously inveighing against the blasphemies of all heresies? But this was the very thing which Moses says: "The Lord your God doth try you that He may know whether you love Him or not."

Vincent of Lerins, Commonitorium, Extracts from Chapters X & XI

The Pelagian pelt under the Evangelical fleece

I'd forgotten just how much I appreciated this article on Charles Finney by Phil Johnson until I perused it again today.

The title is A Wolf In Sheep's Clothing: How Charles Finney's Theology Ravaged the Evangelical Movement

He denied the doctrines of original sin, justification by faith alone, and penal substitutionary atonement.

Here's Phil Johnson's conclusion:

Charles Grandison Finney was a heretic. That language is not too strong. Though he excelled at cloaking his opinions in ambiguous language and biblical-sounding expressions, his views were almost pure Pelagianism. The arguments he employed to sustain those views were nearly always rationalistic and philosophical, not biblical. To canonize this man as an evangelical hero is to ignore the facts of what he stood for.

A spoonful of sugar helps the heresy go down...

The way to get people to believe theological lies is to stress their benefits.

"It hath been the constant practice of all persons, in all ages, who have made it their design to beget and propagate a belief of any doctrine contrary to the form of wholesome words, to begin with, and insist mainly upon, those parts of their beloved conception and offspring which seem to be most beautiful and taking, for the turning aside of poor, weak, unlearned, and unstable souls; knowing full well that their judgments and attention being once engaged, such is the frame of men's spirits under delusion, they will choose rather to swallow down all that follows than to discharge themselves of what they have already received."

John Owen, Of the Death of Christ, p. 431

Contending for the Faith is a command

This is a great extract from Owen's preface to Of the Death of Christ, which he wrote in Dublin by way of reply to Richard Baxter.

Please note the origin of what Owen calls the "bitter streams." Note also the role he attributes to Satan in this doctrinal controversy.

Finally note how Owen affirms the necessity of publicly opposing public opposition to the truth. When that happens today the sympathy too often goes with the attacker and the criticism gets levelled at the defender of the truth.

"It was in our hopes and expectations, not many years ago, that the Lord would graciously have turned back all those bitter streams which, issuing from the pride, unthankfulness, and wisdom of the carnal mind, had many ways attempted to overflow the doctrine of the grace of God, that bringeth salvation; but finding now, by experience, that the day of the church's rest from persecution is the day of Satan's main work for seducing and temptation, and that not a few are attempting once more to renew the contest of sinful, guilty, defiled nature, against the sovereign distinguishing love and effectual grace of God, it cannot but be convenient, yea necessary, that the faith once delivered to the saints be contended for and asserted from the word of truth in the like public way wherein it is opposed."

John Owen, Of the Death of Christ, in Works vol. 10, p. 431