Historical-Theology-Instructors-Manual-and-Test-Bank

The Middle Ages The medieval church continued in line with the early church, affirming and essentially reiterating the doctrine of the inspiration of Scripture with little development in

An Instructor’s Guide to Historical Theology: An

Introduction to Christian Doctrine(A Companion to Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology)

Tyler Smith, MDiv

with a foreword by the author

Foreword to Faculty

One of my purposes for writing Historical Theology: An Introduction to Christian

Doctrine was to offer professors a resource that provides a concise presentation of the

development of the key doctrines of the Christian faith beginning with the early church and continuing into the twenty-first century Organized topically, then chronologically, this book is unique in terms of its approach, and professors may consider using it in at least three ways:

1 In systematic theology courses, the book serves as a required textbook, along with a systematic theology textbook, providing students with an introduction to how the

doctrines they are studying came about historically

2 In systematic theology courses, the book serves as a supplemental textbook, offering students a choice between reading about the historical development of the doctrines they are studying and some other reading assignment or writing exercise

3 In church history and historical theology courses, the book serves as a required textbook, along with a textbook on the chronological development of the church in terms of key

events, movements, church struggles, leaders, and the like, with Historical Theology

emphasizing the development of Christian doctrines

Professors who use Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine (to which my Historical Theology is a companion) find my book to be a natural and easy addition to their courses (see the helpful chart in Historical Theology, pp 19–20, for how to

use these two volumes together for greatest benefit)

Adoption of a new textbook for a course is not without its difficulties, so Zondervan

offers this instructor’s manual for Historical Theology It includes such helpful elements as key

terms, key people, key points, and a summary for each chapter, along with chapter quizzes with true/false statements, multiple choice questions, and fill in the blank identifications Additional resources provided by Zondervan are videos, presentation slides (PowerPoint), online flashcards,and online quizzes With these elements at hand, professors should be able to write or rewrite course syllabi and exams, use media for creative and engaging communication, focus students’ reading and class discussion, and identify key areas in which further study (for example, in primary sources) may be profitable

I believe that you will benefit from the resources in this manual as you use my Historical Theology in your course(s) If your students gain a sense of rootedness to the church that has

gone before them, wisdom from the past, and an appreciation for the rich legacy that is theirs through historical theology, I will be very pleased and will have accomplished my task

Gregg R Allison, PhD

This Instructor’s Guide to Gregg Allison’s Historical Theology: An Introduction to Christian Doctrine provides the instructor with three primary tools for integrating the textbook

into his curriculum: an instructor’s manual, visual resources, and online resources

The instructor’s manual is written with the intention of supplying its reader with a

concise, yet thorough, summary of each chapter Though these summaries are not

all-encompassing in their presentation, major points are highlighted and elaborated on in some detail Important historical events and key historical figures are given special attention, while less significant elements are either briefly discussed or omitted altogether It is hoped that these summaries will serve to grant the instructor confidence as he seeks to explain the content of eachchapter to his students In addition to the chapter summaries, the instructor’s manual includes a list of each chapter’s key terms and key people, and further provides chapter quizzes It is

recommended that instructors focus on these key terms and key people during their lectures; many of these terms will be included as part of the quizzes

Visual resources are also provided for the instructor’s use Organized by chapter, succinctoutlines are supplied for the instructor to incorporate into his lectures Consistent with the

general structure of the textbook, these lecture outlines progress from the early church time period, to the Middle Ages, to the Reformation and post-Reformation, and finally to the modern era Each outline furnishes the instructor with organized speaking points that correspond with each of the respective eras Moreover, these outlines serve as a solid foundation for the

instructor, and each may be adapted to suit the instructor’s specific needs

The online components in this resource include chapter flash cards and chapter quizzes The flash cards provide definitions and descriptions of many of the key terms and key people that are found in each chapter Students should be encouraged to put the flash cards to use in their studies as they prepare for the quizzes, since many of these key terms and key people appear in the included quizzes The online quizzes test the students’ knowledge of the material using true/false, multiple choice, and fill in the blank questions If the instructor chooses to incorporate these quiz questions into his examinations, it is suggested that he address the content

of some of the questions during his lectures

Gregg Allison has masterfully provided his readers with the opportunity to encounter the historical development of theology in accordance with a topical-chronological arrangement The fruit of his labors is nothing short of a major achievement, and much credit is certainly due him for his fine work It is my hope that this resource will serve as a helpful complement to his work and that it will be used for the furthering of the kingdom of Christ, for the building up of the church, and for the glory of God

Tyler M Smith, MDiv

Table of Contents

Chapter Summaries 5

Chapter 1: Introduction to Historical Theology 5

PART 1: THE DOCTRINE OF THE WORD OF GOD Chapter 2: The Canon of Scripture 7

Chapter 3: The Inspiration of Scripture 10

Chapter 4: The Authority of Scripture 13

Chapter 5: The Inerrancy of Scripture 17

Chapter 6: The Clarity of Scripture 20

Chapter 7: The Sufficiency and Necessity of Scripture 23

Chapter 8: The Interpretation of Scripture 26

PART 2: THE DOCTRINE OF GOD Chapter 9: The Existence and Knowability of God 29

Chapter 10: The Character of God 33

Chapter 11: God in Three Persons—The Trinity 37

Chapter 12: Creation 41

Chapter 13: Providence 45

Chapter 14: Angels, Satan, and Demons 49

PART 3: THE DOCTRINE OF HUMANITY Chapter 15: The Creation and Nature of Humanity 52

Chapter 16: Sin 58

PART 4: THE DOCTRINES OF CHRIST AND THE HOLY SPIRIT Chapter 17: The Person of Jesus Christ 62

Chapter 18: The Atonement 66

Chapter 19: Resurrection and Ascension 70

Chapter 20: The Holy Spirit 73

PART 5: THE DOCTRINE OF THE APPLICATION OF REDEMPTION Chapter 21: Election and Reprobation 77

Chapter 22: regeneration, Conversion, and Effective Calling 81

Chapter 23: Justification (Right Legal Standing before God) 85

Chapter 24: Sanctification (Growth in Likeness to Christ) 89

Chapter 25: The Perseverance of the Saints (Remaining a Christian) 93

PART 6: THE DOCTRINE OF THE CHURCH Chapter 26: The Church—Its Nature, Its Marks, and Its Purposes 97

Chapter 27: Church Government 102

Chapter 28: Baptism 106

Chapter 29: The Lord’s Supper 110

Chapter 30: Worship 115

PART 7: THE DOCTRINE OF THE FUTURE Chapter 31: Christ’s Return and the Millennium 119

Chapter 32: The Final Judgment and Eternal Punishment 124

Chapter 33: The New Heavens and New Earth 127

Chapter Quizzes 130

Sample Syllabus 228

Chapter Summaries

Chapter 1 – Introduction to Historical Theology

Key Terms historical theology, orthodoxy, heresy, exegetical theology, biblical theology,

systematic theology, practical theology, synchronic approach, diachronic approach, relativist approach, essentialist approach, moderate essentialist approach, Council of Nicea

Key People Constantinople, Polycarp, Perpetua, Athanasius, Augustine, Olympias, John

Chrysostom, Gregory of Nazianzus, Martin Luther

Key Points

 Historical theology provides numerous benefits for Christians and today’s church

 While it is not infallible, historical theology plays a ministerial and helping role as it aids the church in its interpretation of Scripture

 An essential Christian theology really does exist, and churches, through the aid of

historical theology, can move closer to recognizing and affirming this sound doctrine

 Along with historical theology, the theological task must include exegetical theology, biblical theology, systematic theology, and practical theology Each of these other

disciplines are informed and aided by historical theology

Chapter Summary

The study of historical theology provides great benefit to Christians and churches today

as they seek to live faithfully and obediently for Jesus Christ Historical theology should be acknowledged as God’s providential guidance for his people throughout the ages Yet, it must ultimately be approved by the Word of God, since historical theology—unlike Scripture—is not infallible To put it another way, in determining doctrine and practice, the magisterial and

authoritative role belongs to Scripture alone, while historical theology functions in a ministerial and helping role

Dedication to the study of historical theology provides several benefits to the church First, it helps to distinguish orthodoxy from heresy Orthodoxy refers to that which the New Testament calls “sound doctrine” (1 Tim 1:10; 2 Tim 4:3; Titus 1:9; 2:1), that which rightly reflects in summary form all the teaching of Scripture and which the church is bound to believe and obey Heresy, on the other hand, is anything that contradicts sound doctrine It is false belief that misinterprets Scripture or that ignores some of the teaching of Scripture, or that incorrectly puts together all the teaching of Scripture A study of historical theology, then, functions to prepare the church to identify and embrace orthodoxy and reject and correct heresy

The second benefit historical theology provides the church is that it provides sound biblical interpretations and theological formulations The contemporary church does not begin with a blank slate as it seeks to do theology The basic contours of cardinal doctrines have been shaped by the church of the past and thus help churches do theology today

Third, it presents stellar examples of faith, love, courage, obedience, and mercy

Christians today can derive strength and encouragement from such early Christians as Polycarp,

Perpetua, Felicity, Athanasius, and Augustine These early saints along with the great Reformer Martin Luther and many others give today’s church strong examples of faith and courage.

A fourth benefit it provides the church is that it protects against the individualism that is rampant today among Christians Individuals are prone to consumeristically picking and

choosing the doctrines they want to believe and disbelieve However, historical theology helps toguard against such lone wolf theologians whose teachings are inconsistent with the overall teaching of the church as it has been delivered throughout history

Fifth, it not only helps the church understand the historical development of its beliefs, butenables it to express those beliefs in contemporary form Observing both the successes and the blunders of past theological work gives evangelicals today the opportunity to reformulate and express doctrine for their current context Reflecting on past theological work enables the

modern theologian to not simply repeat classical doctrines verbatim but also to expound on them

as their own for their specific context

The sixth area of benefit historical theology offers the church is that it encourages the church to focus on the essentials of the faith It majors on specific areas that have been

emphasized repeatedly throughout the history of the church Focusing on the foundational and core doctrines of the Christian faith encourages churches to become and remain gospel-focused communities

Seventh, it gives the church hope by providing assurance that Jesus is fulfilling his promise to his people In the midst of what is perhaps the most tumultuous period of the history

of the church, Christians can look to historical theology as a source of hope as they are reminded

of God’s faithfulness to his church throughout her history

Finally, historical theology privileges the church to enjoy a sense of belonging to the church of the past It connects the contemporary church to the church of all ages Unified in the substance of evangelical faith, the church joyously realizes its oneness with the church from its inception By understanding this heritage, the church of today experiences a sense of rootedness,depth, certainty, and hope

Two common approaches to studying historical theology are the synchronic and the diachronic approaches The synchronic approach engages in the study of the theology of a certaintime period, a particular theologian, a specific theological school or tradition, and the like The diachronic approach engages in the study of the development of thought on a given doctrine throughout the periods of the church’s history This book follows the latter approach

Within the diachronic approach two perspectives are commonly adopted The first

suggests that due to the immense doctrinal diversity that has existed among the church’s

teachers, it is impossible to find a core, an essential center, of the Christian faith as it has

developed over the centuries In this relativistic way of thinking, any minority position is just as viable as the next, and every form of Christianity is equally right and equally wrong This book rejects this perspective, suggesting instead that an essential Christian theology really does exist, and churches, through the aid of historical theology, can move closer to recognizing and

affirming this sound doctrine

Related to historical theology stand several other important biblical and theological disciplines, including exegetical theology, biblical theology, systematic theology, and practical theology While exegetical theology, biblical theology, and systematic theology each deal directlywith Scripture, constituting the important interpretive and organizational process in constructing theology, historical theology serves to inform each of these three disciplines with wisdom from

the past Practical theology likewise, as it consists of the communication of God’s Word to the church today, reflects the wisdom of the church of the past.

Chapter 2 – The Canon of Scripture

Key Terms canon, Apocrypha, rule of faith, The Muratorian Fragment, Montanism, Athanasius’s

Thirty-Ninth Easter Letter, Septuagint, Vulgate, humanism, ad fontes, sola Scriptura, Council of

Trent

Key People Josephus, Marcion, Montanus, Jerome, Augustine, Erasmus, Martin Luther, John

Calvin, Friedrich Schleiermacher, B B Warfield, Herman Ridderbos, Brevard Childs

 The Apocrypha has historically been accepted by the Roman Catholic Church and

rejected by Protestants as authoritative Scripture

 The humanist motto “ad fontes” and the Reformation principle “sola Scriptura” were

instrumental in recovering the authority of the original Hebrew Old Testament and Greek New Testament Scriptures

 Some modern scholars have questioned the traditional formulations of the canon through the employment of the historical-critical method

Chapter Summary

Throughout its history, the church has believed that a certain set of writings, called the canon of Scripture, has composed the Old and New Testaments The canon has developed from the inception of the church The Protestant canon includes sixty-six books while the Roman Catholic Church includes extra books, which make up the Apocrypha

I The Early Church

From the beginning of the church, the Hebrew Bible—the Old Testament—was considered to

be the Word of God According to Josephus, the canon of the Old Testament came to a close at the time of the writing of Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther, since the divine inspiration of the prophetshad ceased The Hebrew Canon was typically distributed into three major divisions: the Law, the Prophets, and the Writings Though it contained a different ordering and grouping of books from the Old Testament than people are familiar with today, the Hebrew Bible, with its fixed canon, was the Word of God for the Jewish people and the Christians of the early church

The early church, while relying on the Hebrew Scriptures, was conscious of the new truththat came in the person and work of Jesus Christ This truth was entrusted to certain faithful people and communicators of the new revelation; chief among these were the apostles The apologists underscored the unity of prophetic and apostolic revelation between the Testaments

The early church was dependent on two sources for authority in the beginning: written records and unwritten oral tradition These two witnesses to truth were not in conflict (as they later would be) but rather worked together to provide the foundation of truth in the early church These New Testament writings consisted of gospels, a historical account, letters, and an

apocalypse and were elevated to the same scriptural status as the Hebrew Bible by some of the apostles (1 Tim 5:18; 2 Pet 3:14–16) and other early Christian writers

The critical question arose: Which of the early church writings should be included in the expanding canon? Two criteria came to determine which writings to include: (1) apostolicity and

(2) antiquity The church did not set out to determine the canon as much as to recognize and affirm those writings that God intended for inclusion into the canon Several attempts have been

made at compiling the New Testament canon: the Muratorian Canon, Origen’s Canon, Eusebius’sCanon, and Athanasius’s Canon Generally speaking, the early church accepted nearly all of the New Testament writings that are found in the present day New Testament as canonical The four gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, thirteen letters of the apostle Paul, 1 Peter, 1 John, and

Revelation were for the most part accepted unanimously, while James, 2 Peter, 2 and 3 John,

Jude, and Hebrews were on the “fringe.” Other writings, including The Letter of Barnabas, The Shepherd of Hermas, the Didache, and some others were accepted marginally, but they were

eventually rejected since they did not pass the tests of apostolicity and antiquity The first

appearance of a list of New Testament writings that matches exactly with today’s canon is found

in Athanasius’s Thirty-Ninth Easter Letter written in AD 367 Athanasius’s canon was officially

endorsed by the Council of Hippo in AD 393 The church—both Catholic and Protestant—has recognized this New Testament canon from the end of the fourth century on

The Old Testament canon, on the other hand, has experienced some controversy

beginning in the fifth century, which led to the insertion of some writings into the overall book

list A Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, which came to be known as the Septuagint (LXX),

included additional writings that were not originally included in the Hebrew Bible These

additional books came to comprise what is known as the Apocrypha While the New Testament

writers were familiar with the apocryphal writings, at no point did they quote from them As the official language of the Roman Empire began to shift from Greek to Latin, the church began to adopt a Latin translation of the Bible that had been translated from the Septuagint instead of the original Hebrew Bible Realizing this error, in AD 382 Jerome began his project to translate the

Old Testament from its original Hebrew into Latin (called the Latin Vulgate) In the end, he

demoted the Apocrypha to secondary status in comparison with the canonical Scripture, carrying with it only edifying value rather than authoritative significance While Jerome rejected the authority of the Septuagint, Augustine saw that “one and the same Spirit” had spoken through both the writers of the Hebrew Bible and the Septuagint Augustine ultimately convinced Jerome

to translate the Vulgate from the Septuagint rather than the Hebrew Scripture, including the Apocrypha Being ratified at the Council of Hippo, the canon of the Vulgate became the new canon of the church; this would go without challenge until the Reformation of the sixteenth century

II The Middle Ages

For over a millennium the Latin Vulgate persisted as the church’s Bible However, two majordevelopments came to be during the medieval period that would reopen the issue The first was the elevation of the Roman Catholic Church to supreme authority, one that was greater than

Scripture This authority included the ability to decide on the canon of Scripture The second major development was the rise of humanism in the latter half of the Middle Ages This

movement’s motto was ad fontes: “back to the sources.” For the church, this meant a return to

the original Hebrew Old Testament and Greek New Testament This led the church to challenge the authority of the Apocrypha and a revival of Jerome’s distinction between canonical and apocryphal writings Furthermore, a comparison of the Latin translation in the Vulgate to the original Greek New Testament found that the Vulgate had poorly translated certain portions, which led some to revisit some doctrines and practices that were based on the Latin

III The Reformation and Post-Reformation

Influenced by the humanists, the Reformers concluded that the Old Testament should be based on the Hebrew Bible rather than the Septuagint with its apocryphal writings, thus

dismissing the Apocrypha from the canon altogether The Hebrew Old Testament and the Greek New Testament were said to carry ultimate authority This led Martin Luther to move that the Latin Vulgate term “penance” should be replaced with a better translated “repentance.” The

Reformers further moved that Scripture alone (thus, the Protestant principle sola Scriptura)

should be used to determine the church’s beliefs and practices Thus, the Bible did not require thechurch to confer authority on it The church, therefore, did not have the authority to determine the canon of Scripture According to John Calvin, the Scripture is self-affirming because of “the secret testimony of the Spirit” and Scripture’s own “clear evidence of its own truth.” Roman Catholics reacted against the Protestant rejection of the Apocrypha at the 1546 Council of Trent

by threatening Protestants with church condemnation for this rejection Nevertheless, Protestants continued in their insistence on the exclusion of the Apocrypha from the canon of Scripture

IV The Modern Period

By and large, this Roman Catholic–Protestant division over the canon has colored the landscape for all Christians even to the present day However, some have and continue to offer challenges to it Friedrich Schleiermacher sought to demote the Old Testament in terms of its importance With the rise of historical criticism came a greater frequency of assaults Traditional biblical authorship for certain books was doubted A division was alleged between the Bible and the Word of God Historical criticism drove many to deny any divine superintendence in the canonization of the Bible, suggesting that it was a work entirely carried out by man Standing against this onslaught of attacks, evangelicals contended for a traditional view of canonicity Others set out on the defensive, seeking to undermine and destroy the historical-critical method altogether

Chapter 3 – The Inspiration of Scripture

Key Terms verbal plenary inspiration, mechanical dictation, Nicene-Constantinople Creed,

inerrancy, The Westminster Confession of Faith, The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy

Key People Philo, Hippolytus, John Wycliffe, John Calvin, John Quenstedt, John Gerhard,

Friedrich Schleiermacher, Horace Bushnell, Karl Barth, B B Warfield

a personal experience of Jesus Christ that was not dependent on an inspired Bible

 Karl Barth made a distinction between the Bible and the Word of God, maintaining that the Bible is simply a witness to revelation and that it becomes the Word of God

 In response to a wide array of attacks, evangelicals have sought to defend the historical doctrine of the inspiration of Scripture The evangelical consensus was finally expressed

in the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, which upheld the verbal plenary

inspiration of Scripture, rejected the mechanical dictation theory, and affirmed Scripture’sinerrancy

I The Early Church

The writers of the New Testament considered the Hebrew Bible to be the Word of God (2 Tim 3:16; 2 Pet 1:19–21) It was not by human initiative that Scripture came to be, but it was instead the Holy Spirit who worked through the human authors as they wrote The Spirit’s work extended both to the human authors as well as the actual words that they wrote This same doctrine expanded to the New Testament writings as they came into being part of the canon

The early church was completely united in its belief that all of Scripture—including both Testaments—was divinely inspired by the Spirit However, early theologians differed when it

came to explaining how the Spirit inspired the biblical authors They tended to accentuate the

divine authorship of the Bible while neglecting the role of the human authors, oftentimes

embracing the theory of mechanical dictation While most in the early church believed this to be true, still others argued for a more active, responsible, and cooperative role of the human in the writing process

II The Middle Ages

The medieval church continued in line with the early church, affirming and essentially reiterating the doctrine of the inspiration of Scripture with little development in thought The Spirit was unanimously credited with inspiring the biblical authors and the very words of

Scripture Furthermore, divine and human cooperation in the writing of Scripture was affirmed

III The Reformation and Post-Reformation

The doctrine of divine inspiration was assumed throughout the writings of the

Reformation Neither Catholics nor Protestants dedicated much energy to the issue Instead, only passing comments and references were made to the divine authorship of Scripture The notion of mechanical inspiration was again rejected by the Reformers

Protestants in the post-Reformation period introduced a meticulous examination of the

doctrine of inspiration The efficient cause of divine revelation was said to be God, while the instrumental cause of Scripture was holy men of God This strong emphasis on divine and

human cooperation led to the defense of both a verbal-plenary understanding of the inspiration ofScripture and an emphasis on the inerrancy of Scripture in its original autographs Though not inspired, the copyists of the manuscripts were said to be aided by divine providence as they have gone about the task of copying and reproducing the Scriptures from one generation to the next Moreover, during this time, some insisted on the translation of the Hebrew and the Greek into thecommon language of every nation, so that all might have access to the Word of God Through inspiration, providence, and translation, the Scripture was said to be truthful and authoritative

IV The Modern Period

Not until the modern period did the doctrine of the inspiration of Scripture experience controversy and attack Theologians maintained a general antisupernatural attitude, which led to the dismissal of anything miraculous Human reason was elevated to the point of ultimate

authority, standing over biblical revelation Some biblical accounts were treated as myths, and divine inspiration was doubted Much of this change in direction concerning this doctrine had to

do with the advent of historical criticism The human contribution to the writing of Scripture came into focus while the divine aspect began to fade Critics insisted on the reality of genuine human error throughout the Bible

Friedrich Schleiermacher was a pivotal figure in this modern era of Protestant thought

He sought to completely reformulate the doctrine of inspiration, rooting one’s faith in one’s personal experience of Jesus Christ A person’s faith, according to Schleiermacher, by no means was dependent on a truthful and inspired Bible Inspiration was said to belong to all Christians and especially to the apostles throughout the extent of their ministries The doctrine of inspirationwas rejected as the foundation for the Christian faith Man’s faith must rest on the historic manifestation of God in Christ rather than the Bible as an infallible book It was believed that there was no qualitative difference between the Holy Spirit’s inspiration of the biblical writers and his inspiration of ordinary believers The Bible was said to have differing degrees of

inspiration, but it did not reach the extent of absolute infallibility What was left of the historical doctrine of inspiration was not an inspiration of the biblical writings themselves, but rather an inspiration of the biblical writers This was a far cry from what had been taught historically

Karl Barth continued the conversation by reformulating it altogether He maintained that the Bible is a witness to revelation and that it becomes the Word of God Thus, he made a

distinction between the Bible and the Word of God The Bible is not revelation in itself, but God can choose to reveal himself to people through the Bible as it becomes the Word of God God uses the errant Bible to communicate to his people as he chooses to reveal himself

The Roman Catholic Church condemned critics who rejected the historical doctrine of inspiration, claiming that inspiration is essentially incompatible with error On the Protestant side

of the matter, Basil Manly Jr affirmed both the divine and human authorship of the Bible B B Warfield offered the most formidable defense of the historic doctrine, claiming that there was a reason that the church has always held to the doctrine: because it was the same position held by the writers of the New Testament and even Jesus himself That is, it was the Bible’s doctrine before it was the church’s doctrine, and it is church doctrine only because it is Bible doctrine

Warfield offered the term confluence to describe the divine-human cooperation that took place in

producing the Scriptures

Despite these well-reasoned defenses for the church’s historical position on the

inspiration of Scripture, critics continue to launch their scathing attacks against the doctrine Some have suggested that it has not been the historical doctrine of the church; it is argued rather that it was introduced by the seventeenth-century theologian Francis Turretin Others have

sought to make a distinction between the words infallible and inerrant, adopting the former

rather than the latter as the proper description of the Scripture

A formidable evangelical response was made by John Woodbridge, who sought to

demonstrate their misinterpretation of the historical figures of the church and prove instead their affirmation of the inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture The evangelical consensus was finally

expressed in the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, which upheld the verbal plenary

inspiration of Scripture, rejected the mechanical dictation theory, and affirmed Scripture’s

inerrancy This document would become the standard and common expression of

evangelicalism’s doctrine of inspiration

Chapter 4 – The Authority of Scripture

Key Terms authority of Scripture, oral tradition, apostolic succession, sola Scriptura, Council of

Trent, infallibility of the pope, Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy

Key People Clement of Alexandria, Henry of Ghent, Gerald of Bologna, Thomas Netter

Waldensis, William of Ockham, Martin Luther, John Calvin, Friedrich Schleiermacher, Karl Barth, D Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Abraham Kuyper, Millard Erickson, Stanley Grenz

Key Points

 The church has historically acknowledged that all the words in Scripture are God’s words

in such a way that to believe and obey the Bible is to believe and obey God himself

 In the early church, appeal to tradition was never intended to deprive Scripture of its rightful place of authority, but rather it functioned as a support for the proper

understanding of authoritative Scripture against heretical claims

 For its first millennium and more, the church affirmed the supreme authority of Scripture,but during the latter part of the Middle Ages the Roman Catholic Church permitted other sources to lay claim to the title of authoritative truth A multiple-source notion arose, including Scripture, church tradition, and the teaching office of the church

 In response to Rome, Martin Luther championed the formal Protestant and Reformation

principle sola Scriptura, which presented Scripture as the final judge of Christian

doctrine and practice, standing above everything and everyone else

 A growing tide of biblical criticism, rooted in a denial of the divine inspiration and truthfulness of Scripture, has slowly diminished people’s traditional confidence in the authority of Scripture

period have understood the Bible’s authority in terms of the way it functions That is, it is

authoritative because it bears witness to revelation and becomes the Word of God, but it is not the Word of God by itself

I The Early Church

The early church inherited its doctrine on the authority of Scripture from its Jewish roots, whose Scripture was characterized by the prophetic formula, “Thus says the Lord.” In

anticipation of the New Testament, Jesus authorized his disciples to be his witnesses through the empowerment of the Holy Spirit As the apostles composed their writings, they wrote by the authority of Jesus and thus possessed divine authority Because Scripture was seen as

authoritative, it was also understood to determine what the church was to believe Heresy was seen as error because it lacked the authority of Scripture As heresies became common, the church began to invoke its own authority and tradition to defend and demonstrate the rightness ofits doctrines Appeal to tradition, however, was never intended to deprive Scripture of its rightful place of authority, but rather it functioned as a support for the proper understanding of

authoritative Scripture against heretical claims

II The Middle Ages

This same trend of maintaining a harmony between authoritative Scripture and the secondary contributions of church tradition and authority continued in the first part of the MiddleAges Even when philosophy and human reason became an important tool in scholastic theology,the authority of Scripture was still championed as the highest authority

In the latter part of the medieval period, papal interpretation of Scripture was considered

by many to be the highest authority in the church, but others stood firmly against this position While men such as John Hus stood by the traditional understanding of the doctrine, Henry of Ghent drove a wedge between the authority of the church and the Scripture Gerald of Bologna introduced the notion of “oral tradition,” a tradition expressed by the church fathers that comes from apostolic sources that are unwritten and additional to the Scripture Thomas Netter

Waldensis elaborated on this point and further introduced the controversial concept of “apostolic succession,” which ultimately appointed certain men to positions of highest authority and as guardians of the Roman Church It was taught that many doctrines that have not been taught in the Scripture have been taught and passed down to the church by the apostles and even through episcopal succession This church tradition was derived from unwritten apostolic sources,

postapostolic divine revelation, and the teachings of general church councils The stage was thus set for the subordination of the authority of Scripture to the authority of the church The church was granted the authority to determine the canon It furthermore expanded the notion of what constitutes heresy and deemed anyone heretical who taught doctrines contrary to church

tradition William of Ockham introduced yet another category of truth, saying that God has chosen to provide Catholics with continuing special revelation, which was not found in the Scriptures Though some pre-Reformers like John Wycliffe protested against such teaching, the apostolic tradition was added to Scripture as an authoritative source of truth in the Roman Catholic Church

III The Reformation and Post-Reformation

In response to the Roman Catholic Church, Martin Luther championed the formal

Protestant and Reformation principle sola Scriptura, which presented Scripture as the final judge

of Christian doctrine and practice, standing above everything and everyone else This meant that anything—including the extrabiblical doctrines of the Catholic Church—that lacks biblical warrant cannot be authoritative or binding for Christians While Luther firmly believed Scripture

to be supremely authoritative, he also understood the importance of certain church traditions In away reminiscent of the early church, Luther embraced a harmonious relationship between

authoritative Scripture and the historic creeds of the church For Luther, the authority of

Scripture meant that the preached word is to be regarded as the Word of God; the preacher, thus, communicates on the part of God Rhetorical ability was not of utmost importance; what

mattered was the communicated Word of God

John Calvin emphasized that the authority of Scripture is grounded in the authority of its divine Author He further defended the authority of Scripture over against the Roman Catholic Church’s claims to confer authority on Scripture, to proclaim certain teaching as part of

authoritative tradition, and to convene councils that were more authoritative than Scripture itself

The Roman Catholic Church reacted swiftly to such challenges to its own authority Catholics such as John Eck, John Cochlaus, and Albert Pigge sought to defend and expand on thechurch’s position In seeking to do so, the Catholic Church departed from its own traditional perspective and affirmed a new idea of its own supremacy over Scripture, insisting additionally

on church tradition as another inspired revelation from the Holy Spirit, which was of equal value

to the Word of God The official Roman Catholic position would be formulated at the Council of Trent, which affirmed that authoritative divine revelation comes from both Scripture and

tradition and that only the church’s interpretation of Scripture is to be considered authoritative

IV The Modern Period

At Vatican Council I the Roman Catholic Church pronounced the doctrine of the

infallibility of the pope, which assured that all church tradition would possess divine authority

As a result, the doctrines of the immaculate conception of Mary and the assumption of Mary must be embraced by all Catholics since they are believed to carry divine authority

Modern Protestants such as Charles Hodge have continued to denounce this Catholic doctrine Hodge argued that the Catholic two-source notion of authority, if taken to its logical end, really required one’s faith to rest not on the authority of Scripture but on the church’s interpretation, since the interpretation necessarily determines the faith of the people Protestants argued, therefore, that Catholics could not justifiably call Scripture their authority since tradition was their final authority

Beyond the debate between Protestants and Catholics has come a growing tide of biblical criticism, which, rooted in a denial of the divine inspiration and truthfulness of Scripture, has slowly diminished people’s traditional confidence in the authority of Scripture

Friedrich Schleiermacher proposed that the authority of Scripture cannot be foundational

to faith in Christ; rather, faith in Christ must be presupposed before any authority can be given toScripture His subjective experiential perspective, thus, reversed the historical order of Scripture

as leading to salvation

Emil Brunner exchanged the authority of Scripture with the authority of Christ, claiming that Christians believe in Christ not because of the Scriptures, but they believe the Scriptures insofar as they teach Christ Brunner’s position did not grant authority to Scripture but upon a subjective encounter with Christ in them

Karl Barth continued in this instrumental approach to biblical authority, teaching that

rather than viewing the Bible as the Word of God, it should be understood to become the Word of

God as God chooses to freely reveal himself to people through the Bible Authority, thus, becameassociated with the function of the Bible

Evangelicals such as J I Packer responded in defense of the traditional understanding of the doctrine He argued that, by trusting in their biblical criticism methods, they had elevated reason to an authority along with Scripture Abraham Kuyper argued that if Christians were to

call Jesus “Lord” then they must accept his view of the authority of Scripture D Martyn Lloyd Jones proposed that the authority of Scripture is not a matter of argument but one of faith; thoughcritical methods are of value, in the end, man must submit himself to the authority of Scripture as

a result of the internal witness of the Spirit A proper understanding of the relationship between the Word of God and the Spirit of God, according to Millard Erickson, must be viewed in terms

of the objective basis of authority in the written Word and the subjective dimension of the inwardilluminating and persuading work of the Holy Spirit Stanley Grenz, influenced heavily by neoorthodox theology, understood Scripture to possess only an instrumental authority He

granted Scripture a secondary role, making the Bible a servant to divine revelation and the Spirit

In response to opposition, contemporary evangelicalism has continued to argue for the classical

formulation of biblical authority and has presented its position in the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy Here, Protestants affirm the divine authority of Scripture and reject functional

interpretations of biblical authority

Chapter 5 – The Inerrancy of Scripture

Key Terms inerrancy, infallibility, Socinianism, Cogito, ergo sum, English Deism, documentary

hypothesis (JEDP theory), Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy

Key People Peter Abelard, Martin Luther, John Calvin, Socinus, Copernicus, Isaac La Peyrere,

Hugo Grotius, Baruch Spinoza, Richard Simon, Jean LeClerc, Edward Herbert of Cherbury, Charles Darwin, Crawford Toy, Karl Barth, Paul Feinberg

Key Points

 The church has historically acknowledged that Scripture in its original manuscripts and properly interpreted is completely true and without any error in everything that it affirms, whether that has to do with doctrine, moral conduct, or matters of history, cosmology, geography, and the like

 Following in line with its Jewish predecessors, the early church recognized the complete truthfulness of Scripture

 The vast majority of theologians during the Middle Ages understood the Scriptures to be totally truthful

 This same conviction of the inerrancy of Scripture continued throughout the Reformation and post-Reformation period Martin Luther taught that the truthful Scripture correspondswith reality and that it never contradicts itself

 With the rise of the scientific revolution and biblical criticism, the consensus concerning the inerrancy of Scripture that had been held throughout the history of the church began

to deteriorate during the seventeenth century

Chapter Summary

Using such words as truthful, inerrant, and infallible of the Bible, the church has

historically acknowledged that Scripture in its original manuscripts and properly interpreted is completely true and without any error in everything that it affirms No significant challenge to this belief came until the seventeenth century Increasing attacks against the inerrancy of

Scripture among present day evangelicals have necessitated a sustained defense of this teaching from some

I The Early Church

Just like its Jewish predecessors, the early church accepted the complete truthfulness of Scripture Early Christians such as Clement of Rome, Hippolytus, and Irenaeus affirmed that the Scriptures are completely truthful and perfect To say that Scripture is truthful meant that the affirmations of Scripture correspond to reality; furthermore, it meant that Scripture does not contradict Scripture Theologically speaking, Scripture was considered true because God, who is truth, cannot lie While affirming the simple truthfulness of Scripture, early writers also sought todeal with some evident difficulties found in Scripture This doctrine led early Christians to the

conviction that they are bound to believe everything in Scripture.

II The Middle Ages

The church during the Middle Ages also affirmed the complete truthfulness of Scripture Theologians of the time believed this doctrine so strongly that such men as Thomas Aquinas believed that the salvation of human beings depended on the total truthfulness of Scripture

Peter Abelard stood as an exception to the overwhelming majority of men who supported this doctrine when he taught that the prophets produced false prophecies Elsewhere, however, Abelard supported the traditional view of Scripture’s inerrancy

III The Reformation and Post-Reformation

The truthfulness of Scripture was a cardinal issue agreed upon by both Protestants and Catholics during the Reformation and post-Reformation period

Martin Luther proposed that Scripture “never erred” and “cannot err.” In this former expression, Luther meant that Scripture corresponds to reality, and in the latter one he meant that

no part of Scripture can contradict any other part of Scripture He further taught that because God is truthful, the Word of God must also be truthful Luther dealt with some of the supposed problem passages in Scripture, yet even when dealing with these passages he was troubled by hispretentiousness that he as a sinful man could ever think that the Word of a holy God might ever

be in error

John Calvin’s conviction of a fully truthful Bible was rooted in his belief that the Holy Spirit had inspired human writers of Scripture The Spirit’s superintending work, therefore, prevented any error on their part

The post-Reformation theologians’ affirmation of the truthfulness of Scripture was for themost part in reaction to a heretical movement called Socinianism, which allowed for errors in portions of Scripture Socinus suggested that because these were minor errors they had no effect

on matters of salvation and doctrine However, many of his contemporaries, including Calov and Quenstedt, denied that such minor errors would be as inconsequential as Socinus thought They, along with the majority of post-Reformers, affirmed the complete truthfulness of Scripture and founded this teaching in the doctrine of inspiration Because the doctrine of inspiration is

foundational, its corollary—the truthfulness of Scripture—needs only to be affirmed, not proved.Nevertheless, post-Reformers took it upon themselves to respond to and clear up scriptural problems In the end, they rested comfortably with the doctrine of inerrancy

IV The Modern Period

The notable consensus that had been held throughout the history of the church concerningthe inerrancy of Scripture began to unravel in the seventeenth century European society, and thus Christian society, was in the midst of a scientific revolution, which functioned to restructure how many people viewed the world

Biblical criticism was introduced to the world during this confusing time Isaac La Peyrere, with his “pre-Adam” theory set off the conflict between theology and science Hugo Grotius, known for his heretical views on the Trinity, Jesus Christ, and the atonement, also disbelieved that the entire Bible was God’s truthful revelation Baruch Spinoza, who relegated some parts of Scripture to an inferior status behind others, also insisted that human reason stood

above Scripture as its judge Highly influenced by the philosophy of René Descartes, Spinoza doubted the reliability of human experience and trusted human reason as the sure guide to what can be known He, thus, applied this methodology to the Bible, treating it as any other human book, and eliminated those things that did not fit together with his reasoning Spinoza left an infamous legacy behind him and influenced many, including the “father of biblical criticism,” Richard Simon Simon, along with Jena LeClerc, Johann Salomo Semler, and others, engaged in heated debates over the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch

Such biblical criticism extended into Great Britain and was especially evident in English Deism Edward Herbert of Cherbury led the way with his five tenets of Deism English Deism, together with the early development of German biblical criticism, was largely a theological attack against Scripture

Another development known as the documentary hypothesis proposed that the Pentateuch

is a collection of selections from a number of written documents, written by a number of

different authors, and composed in a number of different places over about five centuries’ time This hypothesis rejected any possibility of Mosaic authorship for the Pentateuch

Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species, published in 1859, had a profound effect on the

undermining of people’s confidence in the truthfulness of Scripture, especially as it pertained to the creation account in the book of Genesis According to John Broadus, if one accepts Darwin’s theory, and thus rejects the historical creation account in Genesis, then he would have no

problem rejecting the rest of Scripture as true An example of this development came when Crawford Toy, a professor of Old Testament at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, being influenced by higher criticism of the Bible and Darwinian evolutionary theory, rejected the historical creation accounts of Genesis in light of modern science

Others moved away from the historical position on biblical inerrancy by resorting to a

different approach These men sought to draw a distinction between the terms inerrancy and infallibility Rejecting inerrancy, which stood as the historical position of the church, theologians

adopted the term infallibility, which only required men to believe that the Bible makes no false

or misleading statements on any matter of faith and practice The most notable occurrence of thisshift came in Fuller Theological Seminary’s espousal of the language of infallibility

Evangelicals responded to this defection among Christians in their 1978 Chicago

Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, in which evangelicals once again argued for the historic

doctrine on the inerrancy of Scripture Paul Feinberg has continued in this evangelical stance for the inerrancy of Scripture and has formulated a definition on the doctrine that has become the standard view of conservative evangelicals in the twenty-first century: “Inerrancy means that when all facts are known, the Scriptures in their original autographs and properly interpreted will

be shown to be wholly true in everything they affirm, whether that has to do with doctrine or morality or with the social, physical, or life sciences.”

Chapter 6 – The Clarity of Scripture

Key Terms clarity, Gnosticism, Council of Toulouse, Council of Trent, hermeneutics, Chicago

Statement on Biblical Hermeneutics

Key People Clement of Alexandria, Origen, John Wycliffe, Waldensians, Martin Luther, John

Calvin, Huldrych Zwingli, Kevin Vanhoozer, Gregg Allison

 The clarity of Scripture became a major area of disagreement between the Roman

Catholic Church and the Protestants Defenses came from both sides of the argument

 While this doctrine, in the modern age, has experienced opposition as a result of both the science of hermeneutics and higher biblical criticism, it has served as the foundation and motivation for the translation of the Scriptures into numerous languages as a part of the Protestant missionary endeavor As a whole, the doctrine has been sorely neglected

I The Early Church

The clarity of Scripture was an assumption during the early church The authors of the New Testament assumed that their readers would be able to understand and profit from their teachings on the Old Testament As with the Old Testament, the New Testament was thought to

be written in such a way that ordinary believers could understand it The more difficult passages were to be interpreted and understood in light of those that are more clear and plain

Writing during the time of Gnosticism, Clement of Alexandria wrote of the inexpressible

nature of God From his writings, a two-tiered system of Christians was constructed, with

spiritual believers who were able to understand the mysteries of God and simple believers who could not Origen, reinforcing Clement’s teachings, emphasized the hidden meaning of Scripture

Others, such as Augustine, Chrysostom, and Gregory the Great, affirmed that Scripture is accessible even to the unlearned

II The Middle Ages

The emphasis on both the clarity and obscurity of Scripture continued in the Middle Ages Because the literate members of society were primarily priests, the duty of studying and teaching the Scriptures lay primarily in their hands A natural division, thus, developed between the clergy and laity Though this division helped guard the church against false doctrine and allowed the clergy to concentrate on stamping out heresy, this distinction also ensured that the church could retain its power over the people When laypeople opposed the church, they were cast out as heretics Some of the church’s councils even prohibited laypeople from owning a copy of the Scriptures

John Wycliffe dissented from this view that the laypeople should not have access to the Scriptures He instead thought that the Scriptures should be translated into the common language

of the people

III The Reformation and Post-Reformation

Besides the Protestant principle of sola Scriptura, the clarity of Scripture became another

key issue in the break between Protestants and the Catholics during the Reformation Martin Luther promoted the idea that the common man should be allowed to read, hear, and understand the Word of God for himself He encountered opposing perspectives among his contemporaries One position argued that the authority to interpret Scripture belonged solely to the pope A second position suggested that the church’s theology was determined with respect to Scripture, church tradition, and the teachings of the church fathers

Luther understood the doctrine of the clarity of Scripture to be axiomatic and without need for proof His was a twofold doctrine on the clarity of Scripture: external and internal clarity If anyone had difficulty interpreting the text, Luther pitted the error on the part of the

human, not the Scripture As a result, he believed that all of Scripture is clear The obscurity that

exists in the knowledge of God cannot be due to the Scripture While the text may be obscure, the subject matter is fully knowable To Luther, the clearer passages should be used to shine light

on the less clear ones Furthermore, he did not demand that all the mysteries of Scripture be

resolved in order to affirm the clarity of Scripture The Scripture is clear concerning the facts of

the mysteries, though it does not address the details of those mysteries

Huldrych Zwingli delineated between the internal Word and the external Word, saying that the clarity of Scripture only refers to the internal Word, the Word that the Holy Spirit

communicates to the hearts of the people This is to be differentiated from the external Word, which refers to the Scripture as it is read and preached in people’s hearing

To John Calvin, the Bible is not difficult to understand if the proper study is employed This is true even for the untrained and uneducated layman He underscored the necessity for the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit in the interpretation of Scripture Believers need his help

Moreover, the Bible is a closed book to unbelievers, because of the blindness that has been imposed on them by Satan

In response to the Reformers’ insistence on translating the Bible into the common

language of the people, the Roman Catholic Church reacted by prohibiting it and further

decreeing the Latin Vulgate as the official version of Scripture at the Council of Trent In

addition, the Council of Trent affirmed the sole authority of the church in interpreting the Bible

The post-Reformers had to respond to these Catholic declarations They insisted on scriptural clarity concerning those things that are inherent to the doctrine of salvation This doctrine, according to the post-Reformers, does not do away with diligent study, the teaching ministry of the church, or the need for the illumination of the Holy Spirit

IV The Modern Period

In the modern era, the expansion of the Protestant missionary endeavor has been

accompanied by Scripture being made available in the language of numerous people groups Thisventure was rooted in the conviction of Scripture’s clarity

Two main trends have to some degree undermined this doctrine The science of

hermeneutics handled the interpretation of the Bible as though it was nothing more than another piece of literature Higher biblical criticism also served to remove the individual’s ability to interpret the Bible for himself, leaving the layman to doubt his ability to understand anything

This doctrine rarely garners attention today, though exceptions to this are occasionally

found The Chicago Statement on Biblical Hermeneutics dealt with the issue extensively

Evangelical scholars, including Kevin Vanhoozer and Gregg Allison, have devoted serious study

to the matter

Chapter 7 – The Sufficiency and Necessity of Scripture

Key Terms sufficiency, necessity, apostolic tradition, canon of truth, church authority,

enthusiasts, Council of Trent, Wesleyan quadrilateral

Key People Thomas Aquinas, Gerald of Bologna, Thomas Netter Waldensis, Martin Luther, John

Calvin, J Rodman Williams, Wayne Grudem

 What started with the early church fathers making reference to other sources of Christian beliefs and practice—apostolic tradition, the canon of truth, and church authority—wouldprove to become the background for later controversies concerning the Bible

 In the early part of the medieval period, the correlation between Scripture and the

church’s traditional biblical interpretation was not problematic, since it held to the

sufficiency and necessity of Scripture However, these doctrines came under attack and began to fade away completely in the latter part of the Middle Ages

 The Roman Catholic Church came to affirm that Scripture is needed for the bene esse (well-being) but not the esse (existence) of the church.

 Martin Luther experienced resistance from two fronts: the Roman Catholic Church and the enthusiasts (or fanatics)

 As the third millennium of the church begins, evangelicals continue to face important debates over the sufficiency and necessity of Scripture

Chapter Summary

The church has historically acknowledged that the Bible is God’s revelation of himself, showing man the way of salvation and giving him instructions for living a life of faith and obedience The church has, furthermore, affirmed both the sufficiency and necessity of Scripture throughout its history Although these doctrines were firmly believed by the early church, they began to be questioned by the Roman Catholic Church in the Middle Ages The Protestant Reformers sought to change the tide by reaffirming these historical doctrines Evangelical

churches today have followed the Reformers’ lead in contending for these historical doctrines

I The Early Church

The early church looked to the Jewish Bible as its sufficient source for truth, doctrine, and practical instruction for life, faith, and obedience It was considered sufficient to lead these early Christians to faith in Christ Jesus and to prepare them to live the life of a Christian The sufficient Word was not to be altered Both Testaments were thought to be characterized by this

quality The early Christians were united in their belief that nothing could be considered true doctrine unless it could be proven by Scripture These Christians further affirmed the necessity ofScripture Christians were said to cut themselves off from the necessary cure for what ails them when they neglect the reading of Scripture

What started with the early church fathers simply making reference to other sources of Christian beliefs and practice—apostolic tradition, the canon of truth, and church authority—would prove to become the background for later controversies concerning the Bible Early Christians did not consult these other sources in such a way that the sources competed with Scripture, which was considered the ultimate source for truth No, Scripture was the only

sufficient source for truth, while these other sources functioned to support the proper

understanding of sufficient Scripture

II The Middle Ages

Continuing discussions of the sufficiency and necessity of Scripture were carried on throughout the Middle Ages Thomas Aquinas spoke of the importance of human reason but argued that any theological science must be rooted in divine revelation The medieval church emphasized the reading of Scripture in accordance with the church’s historical interpretation of

it Their motivation was simply to guard against innovative and, thus, incorrect ideas In the earlypart of the medieval period, the correlation between Scripture and the church’s traditional

biblical interpretation was not problematic, since the church held to the sufficiency and necessity

of Scripture

However, these doctrines came under attack and began to fade away completely in the latter part of the Middle Ages Through the influence of such men as Gerald of Bologna and Thomas Netter Waldensis the apostolic traditions came to be considered of equal authority, sufficiency, and necessity with Scripture The Roman Catholic Church would come to affirm that

Scripture is needed for the bene esse (well-being) but not the esse (existence) of the church.

III The Reformation and Post-Reformation

A defense for the historical understanding of these doctrines came during the

Reformation through the influence of Martin Luther Luther experienced resistance from two fronts: the Roman Catholic Church and the enthusiasts (or fanatics) Against the Roman Catholicinsistence on tradition, postapostolic revelations, and general councils as a source for authority, Luther emphasized the sufficiency of Scripture Against the enthusiasts’ belief that the Spirit of God speaks directly to believers apart from the Word of God, Luther again defended the

sufficiency of Scripture by saying that the Spirit carries out his ministry in believers through the Word of God and not apart from it

John Calvin agreed, teaching that the denial of the sufficiency of Scripture cuts against the Holy Spirit, and that the Spirit of God and the Word of God are inseparably linked

Therefore, the Spirit does his work of teaching only through the Word of God

While the Reformers made a strong defense for the doctrines of both the sufficiency and necessity of Scripture, the Catholic Church argued that the Holy Spirit moves the Church’s

“tongue” now in the utterance of what is necessary to salvation in the same way that he moved the hands of the writers who wrote the Scriptures The official Catholic objection came at the Council of Trent

Post-Reformation theologians such as John Owen, William Whitaker, Francis Turretin, and John Gill continued affirming and defending the thoughts of the Reformers.

IV The Modern Period

Continued defenses of Scripture’s necessity have been and continue to be made in the modern period John Murray noted that the period of revelation had concluded at the closing of the apostolic age, and the Bible as its stands today is the final and necessary revelation from God Charles Hodge argued against the Roman Catholic notion of the incompleteness of

Scripture, suggesting that their advocacy of tradition leads to the depreciation of the Scriptures

At the same time, Hodge acknowledged the Protestant respect for traditional teaching

The Wesleyan “quadrilateral”—Scripture, tradition, experience, and reason—was viewed

by some as a challenge to the authority, sufficiency, and necessity of Scripture, but in the end Scripture was thought to have supreme authority by most Methodists

Pentecostal/charismatic theology has presented another challenge against the traditional doctrines with its claims of direct guidance by the Holy Spirit and divine revelations through continuing spiritual gifts of prophecy However, J Rodman Williams taught that any such

revelation would not result in new truth and that it would be wholly subordinate to special revelation It instead provides a deeper appreciation for what has already been revealed in the Bible

Wayne Grudem, a third wave evangelical, has argued for a traditional view of Scripture’s sufficiency and necessity while also holding to the legitimacy of ongoing prophetic revelation

As the third millennium of the church begins, evangelicals continue to face an important debate over the sufficiency and necessity of Scripture as a general division is growing between strict Biblicists on the one hand, who affirm that the sufficiency of Scripture rules out any

integrations of biblical truth with humanly derived knowledge, and integrationists on the other hand, who accept these integrations

Chapter 8 – The Interpretation of Scripture

Key Terms literal method, allegorical method, typology, school of Alexandria, school of

Antioch, Book of Rules, Victorines, double-literal sense, Council of Trent, literary criticism, Chicago Statement on Biblical Hermeneutics

Key People Origen, Augustine, Jerome, Thomas Aquinas, Hugh of St Victor, Nicholas of Lyra,

Huldrych Zwingli, Robert Bellarmine, Philip Jacob Spener, William Robertson Smith, Baruch Spinoza, Charles Hodge, Alister McGrath

Key Points

 From the inception of the church, Christians have usually approached the interpretation

of the Bible using either a literal or an allegorical method

 During the early church, two major schools of thoughts developed The school of

Alexandria embraced a more allegorical approach to interpretation, and the school of Antioch embraced a more literal and typological approach

 A distinction between an allegorical/multiple-senses approach and a more literal and typological approach continued during the Middle Ages However, the Roman Catholic Church began to assert itself as the sole interpreter of Scripture

 The Reformers insisted on a literal interpretive approach, emphasizing the important role

of the Holy Spirit in illumining the reader in his hermeneutical work

 The Roman Catholic Church responded to Protestants at the Council of Trent by making the Latin Vulgate the official version of Scripture that the church must use and also by declaring that the church possesses the sole right to interpret the Bible

 Biblical criticism began to shake people’s confidence in the truthfulness and authority of Scripture during the modern age, which led to great diversity and change in biblical interpretation

 Evangelicals have continued to defend a more literal/typological approach while also seeking to present a more comprehensive approach to biblical interpretation

Chapter Summary

The church has historically acknowledged the need to interpret the Bible properly Throughout its history, the church has approached this endeavor differently Two basic

approaches have been employed, including the literal method and the allegorical method

Generally speaking, the literal method approaches interpretation through considering the words, grammar, and sentence structure of biblical passages Using the allegorical method, interpreters move from concrete realities in biblical passages to concepts that lie behind the text

I The Early Church

The interpretation of Scripture did not begin with the early church; Jews read and

interpreted the Hebrew Bible before the inception of the church The apostles in the early church sought to follow the example of Jesus, who approached interpreting the Hebrew Bible

typologically After the completion of the New Testament writings, the early church continued interpreting the Bible typologically, but a new approach would arise

Allegorical interpretation, an approach common within Judaism, would become a popularmethod for interpreting the Bible Among those in the early church, the debate over the use of allegorical interpretation led to the forming of two different schools of thought: the school of Alexandria, which embraced a more allegorical approach to interpretation, and the school of Antioch, which embraced a more literal and typological approach

Clement of Alexandria and his successor, Origen, from the Alexandrian school, promoted

an allegorical approach Origen proposed a three-level allegorical interpretation scheme He found three levels of meaning in Scripture, each corresponding with the three parts of human beings: body, soul, and spirit

Diodore of Tarsus, Theodore of Mopsuestia, Theodoret, and John Chrysostom each associated with the Antiochian school In their attempt to explain typological interpretation,

Antiochians contrasted allegory with what they called theoria

Though not a part of the Alexandrian school, Augustine argued for an allegorical

interpretation; he embraced a fourfold approach to interpretation, emphasizing Scripture’s literal,etiological, analogical, and allegorical senses Jerome championed an approach to interpretation that emphasized the authorial intention of the biblical writers This approach would become a major theme during the Reformation and has even become prominent in modern hermeneutics

II The Middle Ages

Medieval interpretation was highly influenced by Origen and Augustine’s multiple-sense approach to the interpretation of Scripture Gregory the Great, John Cassian, the Venerable Bede,and Thomas Aquinas each presented a multiple-sense approach

However, during the twelfth century, another school of thought developed Led by Hugh

of St Victor, the Victorines relied heavily on Jewish hermeneutics and once again emphasized a more literal approach Working from within this new school, Andrew of St Victor and Nicholas

of Lyra would prove to be influential

This unity of biblical interpretation began to unravel during the latter part of the Middle Ages when the Catholic Church began to assert itself as the authoritative interpreter of Scripture

III The Reformation and Post-Reformation

During the Reformation Martin Luther would come to question allegorical interpretation and would instead insist on a more literal approach He suggested that the interpreter should seek

to find one true meaning from the words of the text He offered a number of principles to guide the interpreter in his hermeneutical task: he recommended a familiarity with the book of

Romans; a knowledge of the overall subject matter of Scripture; a focus on a christological interpretation; a careful observance of the context of the passage; the need to distinguish betweenlaw and gospel; and the need to be the right kind of person

A large theme among the Reformers in their interpretive agenda was an overall

dependence on the Holy Spirit’s illumination of the Word A strong example of this was

Huldrych Zwingli who gathered with fellow pastors and students five days per week for an hour

of exegesis and interpretation of Scripture; each meeting began with prayer

John Calvin continued in line with Luther in his literal interpretive approach His goal was to discover the author’s intent Calvin offered a number of interpretive principles, including

having a familiarity with Romans, working from a proper theological framework, finding a christological interpretation, being attentive to the surrounding context, respecting the analogy offaith, and being the right kind of person

The Roman Catholic Church responded to Protestants at the Council of Trent by making the Latin Vulgate the official version of Scripture that the church must use and by declaring that the church possesses the sole right to interpret the Bible

Post-Reformers continued to promote a literal interpretation of Scripture However, despite the post-Reformers’ emphasis on proper interpretation of Scripture, an attitude of malaisebegan to characterize Protestant churches In response to sterile preaching and laxity in Bible study, Philip Jacob Spener hoped to inspire renewal among the churches Spener sought to introduce people to Scripture in ways other than through sermons His suggestions included having fathers lead their families in Bible studies; personal reading of Scripture; public reading

of Scripture during worship; and small group Bible studies

IV The Modern Period

Biblical criticism began to shake people’s confidence in the truthfulness and authority of Scripture during the modern age Along with this came a shift in interpretive methods For many,the Bible became just like any other book, and so its interpretation should be approached like anyother book An evolutionary perspective led to interpreters denying certain aspects of Scripture that seemed antiquated and barbaric

With the rise of biblical criticism came the rejection of the Roman Catholic claim to being the sole interpreter of Scripture

Baruch Spinoza led the way toward subjective interpretation as he promoted the right of interpreters to interpret Scripture as they saw fit Evangelicals rejected this subjective approach Some defended more of a scientific approach to interpretation, suggesting that God’s people should use the scientific method to interpret biblical truth While Charles Hodge used this

approach, he also insisted on the important role of the Holy Spirit in theology

Liberal Protestants concentrated on the historical-critical method to aid them in their interpretation of Scripture Such interpreters focused on the JEDP theory in the Old Testament and new critical approaches such as source, form, and redaction criticism in the New Testament

In response to the critical method, Alister McGrath argued for a mediating position between two extremes He pointed out that evangelicals tend to respond to critical methods in one of two ways: either they abandon their faith altogether or they resort to fundamentalism He suggested, rather, that evangelicals should welcome critical methods while denying that they would do away with biblical authority

Literary criticism became another challenge for the evangelical position The overall meaning of the text was called into question, and authorial intent was considered by some to be

meaningless In 1982, key evangelical leaders responded in their Chicago Statement on Biblical Hermeneutics by affirming that the meaning in Scripture is singular, definite, and fixed

Furthermore, they proposed that one meaning could engender multiple applications

Divergence of opinion continues to exist in the evangelical world of interpretation Such evangelicals as S Lewis Johnson, J I Packer, Elliott Johnson, and Douglas Moo have pointed

out the dual-authorship of the Bible (human and divine) and have promoted a sensus plenior, or

“fuller sense,” understanding of Scripture

Chapter 9 – The Existence and Knowability of God

Key Terms general revelation, special revelation, ontological argument, cosmological argument,

teleological argument, apophatic approach, kataphatic approach, beatific vision, logical

positivism

Key People Aristides, Dionysius the Pseudo-Areopagite, Augustine, Anselm, Thomas Aquinas,

Bonaventure, Martin Luther, John Calvin, Stephen Charnock, William Paley, Isaac Newton, David Hume, Immanuel Kant, Karl Barth, Frederick Ferre, William Craig, Norman Malcolm, C

S Lewis

Key Points

 Throughout its history, the church has believed in God’s existence and that his existence can be demonstrated and perhaps even proven

 The early church argued for the existence of God both from general and special

revelation There was disagreement as to the expressibility and the knowability of God

 During the Middle Ages both Anselm and Thomas Aquinas proved to be highly

influential thinkers regarding their proofs for the existence of God Anselm’s ontological argument and Aquinas’s cosmological and teleological arguments for the existence of God have shaped much of the church’s history concerning arguments for God’s existence

 During the Reformation both Martin Luther and John Calvin worked to make strong distinctions between the efficaciousness of general and special revelation While general revelation should lead man to an accurate knowledge of God, only special revelation is capable of accomplishing this

 Numerous changes have occurred in the modern period Some have questioned and even rejected the existence and knowability of God Traditional arguments have been set aside and prominent atheist thinkers have promulgated their thinking Still, other Christian apologists have risen to the occasion and have offered their own well-reasoned defenses

Chapter Summary

Throughout its history, the church has believed in God’s existence and that his existence can be demonstrated and perhaps even proven Various lines of support have been offered, including arguments from both general and special revelation Additionally, the church has argued for the existence of God using a number of “proofs,” which have included the

ontological, cosmological, teleological, and moral arguments While some have held that man can prove God’s existence, others have suggested rather that God’s existence cannot be proven and that his existence must be accepted by faith In addition to his existence, the church has also believed that God can be known

I The Early Church

Both God’s existence and his knowability were obvious facts in the early church,

particularly among Jesus and his disciples New Testament writers spoke of God providing a witness to his reality such that everyone knows by nature that he exists

Aristides followed Aristotle’s theory of motion to suggest that the observation of motion leads to the conclusion that there must have been a Prime Mover, which he concluded to be God.Origen pointed to the majesty of creation and questioned how anyone could reject the notion of acreator God Others understood God’s revelation in providence to be evidence of God’s

existence It was argued that someone had to design the universe Furthermore, that God has instilled an innate sense of himself on the hearts of all men was put forth as more evidence Scripture was also pointed to as God’s revelation of himself to men While men come to a knowledge of God through divine revelation, God’s incomprehensibility was also acknowledged.This is not to say that God could not be known at all, but instead that God could never be known exhaustively God’s incomprehensibility was understood in light of the infinite difference

between God and human beings Though humans can know something of God, they are limited

II The Middle Ages

The medieval church continued to believe there to be an availability of knowledge of the existence of God through the created order However, proofs for God’s existence were also

offered from reason Anselm offered his a priori ontological argument, which suggests that “God

is that being than which nothing greater can be conceived.” Known for his cosmological and

teleological arguments for the existence of God, Thomas Aquinas presented his a posteriori “five

ways.” Besides these proofs, Aquinas also developed his notion of the “beatific vision.”

Speaking of this vision, he said, “The created intellect cannot see the essence of God, unless God

by his grace unites himself to the created intellect, as an object made intelligible to it.”

Varied opinion continued to persist during the Middle Ages concerning the

incomprehensibility of God While the apophatic tradition continued to emphasize mankind’s inability to know God and to express its knowledge of him, other traditions (Bonaventure’s, for example), continued to present a more positive perspective Because God has left remnants of himself in the created order, Bonaventure believed man was able to know something of God He presented an introspective approach to knowing God, arguing that man should "enter into

himself" in order to see God through oneself as through an image Instead of obtaining cognitive knowledge of God, Bonaventure urged a mystical and experiential approach to knowing God.

III The Reformation and Post-Reformation

Those during the Reformation continued the argument that God could be known through creation However, as Martin Luther would argue, man would respond to God in misguided worship Man could, thus, through nature know that God existed, but man could not know who

or what God is through the same means If man was to know God for who he really is, then the Holy Spirit must teach man through special revelation, through Scripture, and specifically through Christ Jesus

John Calvin argued that if man should know God, then humanity must first come to a knowledge of itself by reflecting on its wonderful existence and makeup But Calvin did not stop there Self-knowledge makes man aware of his sin and his miserable state; thus, knowledge

of self brings man to seek God, but it also leads man by the hand to find God Concerning the knowledge of God, Calvin also suggested that a universal, innate, and divinely instilled sense of God lies within the consciousness of every man Furthermore, creation was thought to point to God’s existence as well However, even though sufficient internal and external evidence for God’s existence is available to all, Calvin held a pessimistic view of humanity’s ability to benefitfrom these sources of revelation Nevertheless, man’s inability to rightly understand this

revelation is not an indictment on the revelation On the contrary, it is the fault of the one who refuses to comprehend the revelation, and so man is without excuse before God While man has

no hope of coming to a right knowledge of God through general revelation, Calvin believed that special revelation through Scripture was a sufficient means to bring mankind into a right

relationship with and knowledge of God Fallen humanity must come to know God the

Redeemer in Jesus Christ before he can know God the Creator

Post-Reformation theologians continued to affirm the traditional understanding

concerning the existence and knowability of God through general and special revelation StephenCharnock devoted himself to arguing against much of the atheism that was prominent in his day

IV The Modern Period

During the modern period, Christians continued affirming the existence and knowability

of God, though their arguments were not consistent with what had been taught traditionally

In René Descartes’ argumentation, he began by doubting everything He realized that there was one belief that could not be doubted: his own existence as a thinking being From this

thinking, Descartes’ would become famous for his saying, Cogito, ergo sum (I think, therefore I

am) As a thinking being, Descartes asserted that he had an idea of God in his mind that came notfrom himself but must have come from God Since he should not have had an idea of an infinite being, he concluded that God must exist He made further arguments for the existence of God, including the notion that whatever has come to be only continues to be because God has caused

it to be and continues to cause it to be; thus, only God could be the cause Finally, Descartes offered an ontological argument for God’s existence He suggested that the idea of God as an infinitely perfect being requires the existence of such a being, since existence is included in thoseperfections

William Paley argued for the existence of God by pointing to the remarkable order and design among living organisms Isaac Newton argued that there must have been an intelligent and powerful being behind the formation of the solar system While these men and others made strong arguments for the existence of God, other men began to critique the historical arguments and raise doubts concerning the matter

David Hume attacked the teleological proof and also argued against the existence of God using evidence from evil, suggesting that if God is all-powerful and good then evil should not exist Since evil does exist, then Hume concludes that either evil is good or that God does not exist

Immanuel Kant contributed to the demise of all three of the historical proofs for the existence of God—the ontological, cosmological, and teleological arguments He offered a moralargument for God’s existence by suggesting that people who conform their will to the moral law will be happy Because this will never happen in this lifetime, it must happen in the next Thus,

the immortality of the soul is required According to Kant, his conclusion necessitated the

existence of God since only God is able to reward perfect conformity to the moral law with happiness In the end, Kant’s argument only postulated the existence of God but did not lead to any knowledge of God Kant would go on to suggest that he had to deny knowledge in order to make room for faith In an attempt to “rescue God” from the realm of unknowing, Friedrich Schleiermacher responded to Kant’s philosophy by locating God within the realm of human experience and consciousness

For Schleiermacher, only an intuitive feeling of complete dependence on God was needed

in order to provide humanity with the reality of God For him, no more proof than this is needed Karl Barth criticized Schleiermacher’s thought as pantheistic Barth understood knowledge of God to come from the Word of God He denied the legitimacy of natural theology and even the necessity of philosophical proofs for the existence of God He instead insisted that the

knowledge of God must come from one source only, Jesus Christ

Frederick Ferré sought to apply the principles of logical positivism to statements about God’s existence Because he could not verify anything supernatural—such as God’s existence—through his senses, he concluded that God’s existence is logically misguided

Amidst many attacks against the existence of God, C S Lewis revived the moral

argument, Norman Malcolm refreshed the ontological argument, and William Craig reworked thecosmological argument in favor of the existence of God In another approach, Alvin Plantinga has argued that belief in God is a properly basic belief

With the third millennium has come a new wave of critiques against theism, which have come from such men as Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Sam Harris As has always been the case throughout the history of the church, Christian theologians and apologists such as Timothy Keller, David Marshall, and Dinesh D’Souza have responded to the threats with

thoughtful and well-reasoned defenses of theism

Chapter 10 – The Character of God

Key Terms communicable attributes, incommunicable attributes, patripassianism,

anthropomorphism, Socinianism, middle knowledge, natural knowledge, free knowledge,

pantheism, panentheism, process theology, open theism

Key People Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin, Turretin, Luis de Molina, Stephen

Charnock, Friedrich Schleiermacher, Albrecht Ritschl, Albert Knudson, William G T Shedd, Alfred North Whitehead, Charles Hartshorne, Karl Barth, Clark Pinnock, John Sanders, Greg Boyd, Bruce Ware

 While some in the early church spoke of God’s attributes in detail, others took more of an

apophatic approach and spoke of what cannot be said of God rather than positively

affirming God’s attributes

 Thomas Aquinas made an important contribution to the discussion of God’s attributes when he distinguished between God’s attributes that are shared to some degree with humans and those attributes that are unique to God alone

 Both the Lutherans and the Calvinists opposed the Socinians who denied that God had the knowledge of future contingencies The Socinians’ endeavor to preserve man’s libertarian free will meant that not even God would have the ability to influence human decisions and the actions that would accord to God’s plan and purpose

 In keeping with the usual critical spirit of the time, theologians of the modern period launched attacks against the traditional formulation of the doctrine of God

Chapter Summary

The church has always sought to comprehend who God is or what God is like They have gone about this by studying his attributes or characteristics Numerous attributes have been suggested as characteristics of God, and theologians throughout church history have tried

classifying these attributes using different methods One of the most prominent of methods has been noting a distinction between incommunicable and communicable attributes Philosophy has had a large impact on the way the church has understood God’s attributes So, the church today must be careful to identify whether philosophy has informed its thinking or if it has instead led it astray Because God’s attributes are so numerous, only those that have come under significant scrutiny are dealt with

I The Early Church

For the most part, the early church inherited its understanding of God’s attributes from itsJewish roots Unlike the Old Testament, the New Testament writers do not engage in lengthy

descriptions of God’s attributes Instead, his attributes are interspersed throughout the New Testament

Early church writers do not detail God’s attributes in a systematic way Numerous

attributes were affirmed He was said to be self-sufficient, meaning that God does not need anything from anyone and is not benefitted by anything, since he is perfect in his being Even though God was said to be omnipotent, writers such as Origen explained that it is impossible for God to do things that are contrary to his nature God’s omnipresence was also affirmed Related

to this is his omniscience The church further believed in God’s impassibility, which became the basis for the early church’s rejection of the heresy of patripassianism

Augustine argued that God’s attributes are not characteristics that are added to his

essence; instead, each attribute is true of God in the totality of his essence For Augustine, discussion of God’s attributes seemed somewhat artificial Nevertheless, this did not keep him from speaking in detail of God’s attributes While some in the early church spoke of God’s

attributes in detail, others took more of an apophatic approach and spoke of what cannot be said

of God rather than positively affirming God’s attributes

II The Middle Ages

The medieval church continued to affirm what had been traditionally considered God’s attributes but added to the discussion through the use of philosophy and systematic formulations

Anselm, like the early church, affirmed the impassibility of God in his discussion of the atonement He also made an important contribution to the church’s belief about the relation between God’s knowledge of the future and man’s freedom He also spoke of God’s

omnipotence, affirming that God can only do things that are consistent with his character

Thomas Aquinas made a significant contribution to the medieval church’s understanding

of God through his systematic discussion of the attributes of God Arguing for the importance of

the via negativa, Aquinas spoke from the apophatic tradition which used the method of negation

to speak of God Attributes that do not belong to the nature of God were, thus, denied From this approach, Aquinas was able to affirm the simplicity of God This meant that God’s nature does not differ from his attributes; nor does his essence differ from his existence God was thus considered in no way to be composite but altogether simple He further asserted that man may attribute properties to God analogically, not univocally or equivocally His analogical approach enabled him to speak positively about God; he thus affirmed God’s perfect goodness, his

omnipresence, his perfect knowledge which included future contingent matters, his mercy, and his perfect blessedness In the end, Aquinas made an important contribution to the discussion of God’s attributes when he distinguished between God’s attributes that are shared to some degree with humans and those attributes that are unique to God alone

III The Reformation and Post-Reformation

Unlike many issues during the Reformation, the doctrine of God’s attributes was not a point of disagreement between Protestants and Roman Catholics

John Calvin spoke of God’s eternity and self-existence, his omnipresence,

unchangeableness, sustaining power, and sovereignty Calvin was careful to ensure that humans not seek to make God in their own image and thus define him as they please Instead, God is to

be worshiped in his fullness and in his glorious attributes Addressing the topic of God’s

“repentance” and unchangeableness, Calvin spoke of Scripture’s use of anthropomorphisms; God

is to be understood as unchangeable in his being, purpose, and will Repenting refers to God’s

changing actions as circumstances change

The post-Reformers expanded on the discussion of God’s attributes and also dealt with false beliefs of their time Both the Lutherans and the Calvinists opposed the Socinians who denied that God had the knowledge of future contingencies The Socinians’ endeavor to preserve man’s libertarian free will meant that not even God would have the ability to influence human decisions and the actions that would accord to God’s plan and purpose Turretin opposed the Socinians and argued that God can know contingent events and decisions because God’s decree determines the decisions and events that must and will take place While holding that God’s plan and purpose is determined, he also held that such foreknowledge and predetermination did not negate man’s freedom and responsibility

Luis do Molina presented a differing approach, which sought to harmonize human freedom with God’s foreknowledge and predestination He did this by appealing to what he called middle knowledge God’s middle knowledge was said to stand between God’s natural knowledge and free knowledge According to this scheme, Molina sought to resolve the tension between human free will and God’s foreknowledge and predestination While Lutheran

theologians generally affirmed the reality of middle knowledge, Reformed theologians typically rejected it Apart from this discussion, post-Reformers discussed all the other divine perfections

as well Stephen Charnock spoke of all the divine attributes but gave special significance to the attribute of God’s holiness, since he considered it to be the supreme attribute of God

IV The Modern Period

In keeping with the usual critical spirit of the time, theologians of the modern period launched attacks against the traditional formulation of the doctrine of God

Friedrich Schleiermacher opposed the church’s historical approach to listing and definingGod’s attributes; he instead sought to reformulate the Christian faith in terms of a self-conscious feeling of dependence on God

Possibly the most common practice of the time was the elevation of the attribute of God’slove above all of his other attributes Such thinkers as Albrecht Ritschl did this to such an extent that he denied the possibility of God’s wrath altogether Though not seeking to dismiss the retributive aspect of God’s character altogether, Albert Knudson moved instead to simply relax the divine justice In his scheme, God’s forgiveness, grace, and mercy can be expressed apart from Jesus’ sacrificial death on the cross In the end, for Knudson, the love of God trumps the holiness, righteousness, and wrath of God Huns Kung argued against the traditional

understanding of the cross being a sacrifice and instead suggested that it was the deepest

expression of God’s love

William G T Shedd, on the other hand, argued against the destructive tide of the modern era He, for example, opposed a pantheistic concept of God that was prominent in his time He further argued against the notion of happiness as the chief end of man Instead, Shedd proposed that man’s aim should be holiness

Arguing against the traditional notion of a perfect, immutable, static, impassible, and transcendent God, Alfred North Whitehead and Charles Hartshorne both contributed to what has become known as process theology Whitehead suggested that God’s primordial nature is

abstract, unconditioned, and absolute, while God’s consequent nature is concrete, conditioned, and relative and is changed by his relationship with the world Continuing in his way of thinking,Hartshorne argued that God’s abstract nature is absolute, immutable, independent, and

unsurpassable in perfection, while God’s concrete actuality is relative, changing, dependent, and always surpassing himself in perfection According to Hartshorne, God is constantly growing, responding, and being enriched by his relationship with the world He called this philosophy panentheism, which is to say that God is in everything

Karl Barth contributed much to the development of the doctrine of God Rooting his thinking in the self-giving nature of the triune God, Barth focused on God as being the one who loves in freedom and as being one who gives himself to humankind God’s love is necessary because it is in accordance with his essence, but it is also free He loves what he has created; yet

he does not need creation in order to love Indeed, he is rightfully understood as a loving deity with or without his creation Barth affirmed both divine transcendence and immanence In his thinking, Barth stood clearly against process theology, pantheism, panentheism, and any other theology that would limit the freedom of God and, thus, make him contingent on creation

One of the most recent challenges to the traditional doctrine of God has come from within evangelicalism Clark Pinnock, John Sanders, and Greg Boyd have each contributed to what has become known as openness theism According to openness theism, man enjoys

libertarian freedom Because God does not and cannot determine the future choices of humans, and because these choices are completely free, God is said to lack the cognizance or knowledge

of the future Other evangelicals, such as Bruce Ware, opposed the thinking of open theists Wareset out to critique the biblical support offered by open theism and further presented scriptural support for exhaustive divine foreknowledge The work of Ware and other evangelicals has been

so influential that the Southern Baptist Convention decided to edit its statement of faith to guard against the doctrine of open theism Furthermore, the Evangelical Theological Society dedicated one of its annual meetings to the investigation of two of its members, Clark Pinnock and John Sanders, because of their embrace of open theism

The church of the third millennium continues to discuss God’s other attributes as well, including omniscience, immutability, impassibility, eternity, simplicity, and more

Chapter 11 – God in Three Persons: The Trinity

Key Terms Trinity, Trinitarian consciousness, economic Trinity, monarchianism, dynamic

monarchianism, modalistic monarchianism, ontological Trinity, hypostases, homoousios,

Arianism, Creed of Nicea, perichoresis, Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, double procession, filioque, paternity, filiation, spiration, procession, autotheos, Socinianism, Rahner’s Rule,

Oneness Pentecostalism

Key People Tertullian, Origen, Arius, Cappadocian Fathers, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, John

Calvin, Friedrich Schleiermacher, Karl Barth, Karl Rahner, Wolfhart Pannenberg, Kevin Giles, J.Scott Horrell

Key Points

 Distinguishing itself from all other religions, Christianity has historically believed that God eternally exists as three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; each person is fully God, and there is one God

 Augustine articulated what would later be called the “double procession” of the Spirit, meaning that the Spirit proceeds from both the Father and the Son

 At the Third Council of Toledo in 589, a one-word alteration was made to the historical

Nicene Creed This word—filioque (“and the Son”)—was inserted into the creed to speak

of the procession of the Spirit from the Father “and the Son.”

 In defending the traditional view of the Trinity against heretics, John Calvin used the

novel term autotheos (God of himself) to express the deity of the Son and the Spirit That

is, both the Son, and thus the Spirit, is “God of himself,” and does not derive his deity from the Father He, thus, denied the notion that the Father infused the other persons withdeity

 Because the modern period has been characterized by a rise of materialism, agnosticism, and atheism, the doctrine of the Trinity has been de-emphasized What has historically been considered a cardinal doctrine of the faith has come to be relegated to something of little importance

Chapter Summary

Throughout history the church has believed that “God eternally exists as three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and each person is fully God, and there is one God.” This essential tenet of Christianity has distinguished the faith from all other religions In fact, no other religion teaches anything remotely similar to a triune God, and some explicitly deny this essential truth ofChristianity altogether The doctrine of the Trinity has been articulated from the early church andhas been a unifying mark throughout the history of the church All three branches of

Christendom, including the Roman Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant branch, have agreed on this doctrine However, the church has had to defend this doctrine against erroneous views

I The Early Church

The early church received its monotheism from Judaism This monotheism was affirmed

by both Jesus and the apostles in the New Testament writings While this is true, the New

Testament also affirmed a plurality of persons within the Godhead That is, it affirmed that there

is one God existing eternally in three persons—the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit This belief would later come to be called Trinitarianism

The early church developed a “Trinitarian” consciousness This Trinitarian consciousnessmanifested itself in the Trinitarian baptismal formula Baptisms were rendered incomplete unlessthe candidate was baptized in the name of the Trinity Furthermore, this Trinitarian consciousnesswas used throughout other aspects of the Christian life Polycarp prayed in light of the Trinity as

he was being martyred This consciousness also impacted the church’s worship, its ecclesiology, and its apologetics

In seeking to explain the relationship between the persons of the Trinity, the early church articulated what they called the economic Trinity, which referred to the different roles and activities of the three in relationship to the world While affirming that God is one, those in the early church also affirmed that the persons could be distinguished by their roles and activities in the world Those in the early church also discussed the inner council of the Trinity as its persons converse within the Godhead This sort of sophisticated thinking about the Trinity proved to be helpful as erroneous views began to creep in

One erring movement called monarchianism emphasized the oneness of God to the detriment of the plurality of the persons Monarchianism concluded that it is improper to refer to either Jesus or the Holy Spirit as God, since this would apparently lead to polytheism Dynamic monarchianism understood Jesus to be nothing more than an ordinary man who happened to be unusually good and holy Modalistic monarchianism—also referred to as modalism and

Sabellianism—held that there is one God who can be designated by three different names

(Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) at different times However, these three were not considered distinct persons but rather different modes of the one God In the end, the church rejected both forms of monarchianism Responding to the errors of monarchianism, Tertullian is known to have developed the clearest doctrine of the Trinity that had been formulated up to his time His articulation of the Trinity would become the foundation for the church’s definition of the Trinity

Origen added to the discussion by using the word hypostases to refer to the persons of the

Trinity The Trinity, according to Origen, consists of three hypostases; yet, these three persons share the same essence He further developed what would be called the ontological Trinity, referring to the eternal and ordered relationships that exist between the persons of the Trinity He spoke of the eternal generation of the Son from the Father, affirming the unity of nature and

substance belonging to both the Father and the Son Indeed, the Son is homoousios (of the same

nature) with the Father In the same way, the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father, and this procession has been from all eternity

In response to the fourth century heresy called Arianism, Athanasius sought to provide a robust defense of the Creed of Nicea, which underscored and formulated the church’s Trinitarian consciousness Against Arianism, Athanasius defended the notion that “the fullness of the

Father’s Godhead is the being of the Son, and the Son is whole God.” Therefore, whatever the Father is, so is the Son This is true with one exception—the Son is not the Father Likewise, Athanasius set out to defend the third member of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit In the end,

Athanasius referred to both the Son and the Spirit as homoousios and consubstantial (of one and

the same substance) with the Father While the persons are eternal and equal, they are yet

eternally and immutably distinct

The Cappadocian Fathers—Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa, and Gregory Nazianzus—further set out to formulate and defend the doctrine of the Trinity In doing so, they defended the

deity of both the Son and the Spirit, clarifying the orthodox formulation of one substance and three persons, and affirming the perichoretic unity between the persons

At the Council of Constantinople, the early church reworked the Creed of Nicea to produce the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, which served to produce a clear affirmation of thedeity of the Son and the Spirit

While affirming the historical doctrine of the Trinity, Augustine added his own unique contribution to the discussion He articulated what would later be called the “double procession”

of the Spirit, meaning that the Spirit proceeds from both the Father and the Son

II The Middle Ages

Apart from a few minor disagreements, the traditional doctrine of the Trinity was upheld during the Middle Ages

At the Third Council of Toledo in 589, a one-word alteration was made to the historical

Nicene Creed This word—filioque (“and the Son”)—was inserted into the creed to speak of the

procession of the Spirit from the Father “and the Son.” This one-word addition would prove to split the Roman Catholic Church from the Eastern Orthodox Church The Eastern part of the church opposed the addition, while the Western church supported it This division continues to the present day

Whether the Trinitarian nature of the Godhead was a revealed truth or could also be rationally proven was another debate Thomas Aquinas concluded that it is impossible to attain the knowledge of the Trinity apart from revelation, and by reason alone On the other hand, Richard of St Victor believed the Trinitarian nature of God can be rationally demonstrated Aquinas added to the discussion of the Trinity by identifying four relations of the Godhead: paternity, filiation, spiration, and procession While denying an inequality between the persons, Aquinas affirmed an eternal order between them

III The Reformation and Post-Reformation

While the Protestant Reformers parted ways from the Roman Catholic Church on many doctrinal issues, the two shared the traditional doctrine of the Trinity as it had been inherited from the early church and advanced during the medieval era The doctrine never became a source

of contention In fact, the Reformers added very little to the orthodox formulation

In defending the traditional view of the Trinity against heretics, John Calvin used the

novel term autotheos (God of himself) to express the deity of the Son and the Spirit That is, both

the Son and the Spirit is “God of himself,” and does not derive his deity from the Father Calvin, thus, denied the notion that the Father infused the other persons with deity He further sought to both distinguish the persons from one another while also maintaining their unity

Michael Servetus proved to be one of the most dangerous heretics during Calvin’s

ministry Because of Servetus’s anti-Trinitarianism, he was condemned and executed as a heretic.Heretics Lelio and Faustus Socinus would be denounced as heretics for their Unitarianism The Reformers denounced the Socinians as anti-Trinitarian and dangerous

IV The Modern Period

Because the modern period has been characterized by a rise of materialism, agnosticism, and atheism, the doctrine of the Trinity has been de-emphasized What has historically been