Category Archives: Historiography

THE REFORMATION AS RENEWAL, CHAPTER 5

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Most Christians find theology unimportant. Whether it is due to poor Christian education in churches, poor teachers, boredom borne of spiritual apathy, or any number of other things, there is no doubt that the lifelong study of theology in most American churches has gone the way of the dodo bird.

Philosophy is even less valued than theology which is saying something. So, imagine trying to make the case that certain distinctions in philosophy are critical for doing theology well! That is a herculean task that few can persuade others to consider.

As many of us have heard, you can’t get away from being a theologian. It’s not whether we are a theologian. It’s whether we are thinking well theologically or not. When it comes to philosophy, we may conclude that we are definitely not a philosopher. I will let Dallas Willard take it from here. Willard regularly heard people object to the importance of philosophy by saying, “I don’t need philosophy. I am a practical person.” Willard would respond, “They don’t realize that their view is a philosophy!”

I have not included the subtitle to this chapter at the beginning for one simple reason: most of you would stop reading. For those curious types who are still reading, here it is: The Via Moderna, Nominalism, and the Late Medieval Departure from the Realism of Thomistic Augustinianism, and its Soteriology.

Barrett’s discussion about what constitutes an orthodox view of salvation is extremely well-done, and very helpful. Barrett introduces us to the debate in a way that illuminates what the proper truths are to keep in mind as one navigates the most important issue of all: What is the biblical view of how one enters into a relationship with God?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE REFORMATION AS RENEWAL, CHAPTER 4

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The Reformation as Renewal: Retrieving the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church by Matthew Barrett

Chapter 4: Thomas Aquinas as a “Sounder Scholastic”

The Reformation’s Critical Retrieval of Scholasticism

This is the longest chapter of Barrett’s nearly 900-page book. The chapter on Martin Luther comes in at second longest, but pride of place goes to Thomas Aquinas.

Why ninety pages on Thomas Aquinas? Didn’t Aquinas believe many things that are at odds with “biblical” Christianity? Shouldn’t we Protestants steer clear of “Catholic” thinkers like Aquinas?

All of the church’s history is for every Christian. Protestant Christians who believe their history began with the Protestant Reformation are robbing themselves of the riches of 2000 plus years of God’s dealings with His people. As historian Timothy George likes to say, “There is a whole lot more history to the Christian faith between the death of Jesus and the birth of your grandma.”

The “sounder Scholastic” in Barrett’s chapter title is to underscore the need to separate Aquinas (1225-74) from later medieval Scholastics. Some of these later Scholastics like Biel (ca. 1420-95) misrepresented what Aquinas wrote. In doing so, a young Martin Luther thought that Aquinas was of little value. Barrett does a great job of showing that Luther and Aquinas both valued the work of previous theologians like Augustine.

After a short-term mission in 1986 to the former Yugoslavia, I travelled throughout Europe for two weeks. One of my stops included four days of study at L’Abri in Switzerland. Some of you will know that this is the study center started by Francis and Edith Schaeffer. Francis Schaeffer’s blockbuster How Should We Then Live? is still worth reading, but he badly misrepresented Aquinas. Schaeffer wrote:

By the thirteenth century the great Aquinas (1225-74) has already begun, in deference to Aristotle (384-22 BC), to open the door to placing revelation and human reason on an equal footing. (p. 43, emphasis mine)

While I was at L’Abri, I asked one of the tutors about Schaeffer’s misrepresentation of Aquinas. Though this tutor was very fond of Schaeffer, he admitted that Schaeffer relied on poor, secondary sources.

Many believe that Aquinas leaned hard on Aristotle. Thomas did gain insight from Aristotle, but as Barrett shows, the great Christian thinker was very influenced by Augustine. And so was Luther. The irony, and it has led to much confusion, is that unbeknownst to Luther he shared much of Aquinas’s theology.

If you are looking for an entertaining, insightful, and short book on Aquinas, you will be hard-pressed to do any better than the one written by the master stylist, G.K. Chesterton in Saint Thomas Aquinas: The Dumb Ox.

 

BULLIES AND SAINTS

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I have read many books on history and the history of the church. Church history was also my minor or cognate field of study in seminary.

There is much to like about John Dickson’s Bullies and Saints: An Honest Look at the Good and Evil of Christian History. Sometimes instead of a regular review, I like to offer five things I appreciated about a book. Here goes with Bullies and Saints:

*Dickson is balanced in laying out the good, bad, and downright ugly or evil. He does not fall prey to either the cynic on one hand or the hagiographer on the other hand.

*There is a responsible engagement with the best scholarship, yet the book remains accessible.

*Dickson is a lucid writer who knows how to find the telling anecdote or illustration.

*Unlike some Christians, Dickson does not go back to the past to find talking points he already agrees with. He allows the strangeness of the past to speak to him and by way of extension, us.

*It is the kind of book that a Christian could comfortably give to a thoughtful non-Christian. I think many non-Christians would be pleasantly surprised by Dickson’s fair-mindedness.

THE MAKING OF BIBLICAL WOMANHOOD

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Along with the book, Jesus and John Wayne by Kristin Kobes Du Mez, these books raise a number of concerns about the biblical basis for the so-called complementarian position of men and women.

The Making of Biblical Womanhood does a good job of raising questions about how the social mores of one’s time influence the way one reads the Bible. Barr provides some interesting examples, especially from her area of expertise: the Medieval period.

All of us must wrestle honestly with how much our views are influenced by the socio-historic context (our own and previous periods) in assessing whether our views are consistent with the biblical record. This is a life-long process and one all of us will receive plenty of correction on in the next life! If Paul saw through a “mirror dimly” then we ought to be more circumspect about how clearly we see, especially with respect to the issues that thoughtful Christians disagree on.

This book does not purport to be a work of exegesis. As the good scholar that she is, Barr knows well that her main lane is history. That certainly does not mean that she has nothing of value to offer about the Scriptures. That is patently not the case.

I am in that small group of “left-leaning” complementarians (though I do not like the baggage that comes with the word complementarian). By that descriptor you will know that I didn’t find all of Barr’s arguments persuasive, but I am glad for the things that did make me think afresh about this issue. My own position is that women can teach both men and women as long as it is clear that they are under the authority of the church…something I wish was taken more seriously for men as well! Having heard many men who had no business preaching and teaching, I wish churches would be careful in vetting everyone.

WHY STUDY THE PAST?

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I have read a number of books that seek to motivate the reader to study history.

Though I had high expectations for this one by Williams, I was disappointed.

My disappointment was due to the rather meandering reflections, the less than clear writing style, and illustrating things with arcane examples from the history of the church.

It seems Rowan Williams so desperately wants to give credence to every possible position that it is difficult to see where his own convictions lie.

ROMAN HISTORY…THE ANCIENT VARIETY

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Mary Beard’s book on Roman History is terrific.  SPQR is the famous Roman catchphrase Senatus Populus Que Romanus or The Senate and People of Rome.  If you know anything about Mary Beard (perhaps via BBC specials) you know this Cambridge professor is as feisty as she is brilliant.  Her writing is magnificent.  She knows how to tell the stories of ancient Rome in a way that are accessible and entertaining.

Some who are able to spin a good yarn are not careful with the details.  Beard goes no further than the evidence will allow for telling this story.  In other words, she does not traffic in speculation or try to fill in details we would love to have, but simply do not.

She does include details that make the story interesting throughout, but these are details we can be pretty confident of.  For example, did you know that ancient Rome had one million inhabitants and that no city would have that many people until the nineteenth century?

Ancient Roman history is extremely relevant to the hurly-burly of twenty-first century America.  

Highly recommended!

 

 

LITTLE THINGS MATTER

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Adapted from my reading of After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory by Alasdair MacIntyre:

In the Pensées, Pascal remarks “Cleopatra’s nose, had it been shorter, the whole face of the world would have been changed” (180). Ironically, what he means is that, had her nose been smaller, she would have lacked the dominance and strength of character which, in the physiognomy of the seventeenth century (or, indeed, the nineteenth), a large nose symbolized. It is a salutary reminder that the aesthetics of beauty change over time and place. 

http://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/miscellanea/cleopatra/bust.html

William died at Kensington Palace where he had moved the royal household to escape swampy Westminster, which was bad for his asthma. His demise was the direct result of a fall from his horse which stumbled on a molehill, throwing its royal rider.

“…to the little gentleman in the black velvet waistcoat.”