August 27, 2010  

The ‘Cues’ for Evangelical Calvinism

**I wanted to repost this for some of you who just recently started reading here; and as a refresher for those who haven’t**

Here is a quote from T. F. Torrance, from the preface of his book Scottish Theology. This really captures the distinction and nuance that I am trying to make through this blog for the uninitiated (thus far). That indeed there is a rift between what has been called Federal Calvinism (or what I’ve been calling “Classic”), and Evangelical Calvinism (or “Scottish Theology”). TFT is introducing his book, and giving some of the rationale for writing it.

In Chapter One on John Knox and the Scottish Reformation, I have offered a general account of the deep doctrinal change that took place, but in the succeeding chapters I have tried to focus on the main issues that arose as a result of the adherence of the Church of Scotland to the Westminster Confession of Faith. Following upon the teaching of the great Reformers there developed what is known as ‘federal theology’, in which the place John Calvin gave to the biblical conception of the covenant was radically altered through being schematised to a framework of law and grace governed by a severely contractual notion of covenant, with a stress upon a primitive ‘covenant of works’, resulting in a change in the Reformed understanding of ‘covenant of grace’. This was what Protestant scholastics called ‘a two-winged’, and not ‘a one-winged’ covenant, which my brother James has called a bilateral and a unilateral conception of the Covenant. The former carries with it legal stipulations which have to be fulfilled in order for it to take effect, while the latter derives from the infinite love of God, and is freely proclaimed to all mankind in the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. It was the imposition of a rigidly logicalised federal system of thought upon Reformed theology that gave rise to many of the problems which have afflicted Scottish theology, and thereby made central doctrines of predestination, the limited or unlimited range of the atoning death of Christ, the problem of assurance, and the nature of what was called ‘the Gospel-offer’ to sinners. This meant that relatively little attention after the middle of the seventeenth century was given to the doctrine of the Holy Trinity and to a trinitarian understanding of redemption and worship. Basic to this change was the conception of the nature and character of God. It is in relation to that issue that one must understand the divisions which have kept troubling the Kirk [church] after its hard-line commitment to the so-called ‘orthodox Calvinism’ of the Westminster Standards, and the damaging effect that had upon the understanding of the World of God and the message of the Gospel. . . . (Thomas F. Torrance, “Scottish Theology,” x-xi)

This encapsulates the motivation for the blog here; my desire is to alert folks to the reality that TF is speaking to. Here TFT highlights the development of a tradition of Calvinism that is particular to Scotland; but, also want to note that this phenomenon was not unique to the Scots. This kind of development was also, contemporaneously, at play in England as well; Janice Knight has identified this branch of development within Calvinism, as The Spiritual Brethren (as opposed to The Intellectual Fathers — the Westminster Divines).

Calvinists of today, need to know, that they aren’t the only Calvinist ‘orthodoxy’ around; that history is not on their side, per se. Even more importantly, beyond history, I really do not believe that scripture is on their side — by and large.

Anyway, I hope this quote gives you more insight on where many of my cues have been and are coming from. I also hope that if you are into ‘federal theology’ that this will at least make you pause.

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6 Responses to “The ‘Cues’ for Evangelical Calvinism”

  1. Duane says :

    Bobby, do you know where the Scottish reformed church is now on calvinism?
    I met a missionary couple who ministered in Scotland, a number of years ago. He is an American, she, Scottish.
    The church which sent them had a free grace pastor (from Florida Bible College)but was mixed free grace arminian and fedcal.

  2. Bobby Grow says :

    Duane,

    As far as I know, the lion share of the Scottish church has always been in line — theologically — with Westminster (in fact they were major contributors to Westminster). TF Torrance makes the point though, that EC was always present within the developing dogma of the Scottish Reformed church; and he thinks, as do I, that EC is indeed more “Evangelical” and “Calvinian.”

    She’s probably quite liberal today; with I’m sure pockets of good “Evangelical” (but not EC) clergy and laity scattered about.

  3. Brian MacArevey says :

    Thank you Bobby,

    This was helpful. It is this exact issue that has led me to reconsider federal calvinism. I was a little confused about where you were coming from on covenental issues, but this clears it up…and I agree here.

    Brian

  4. Bobby Grow says :

    Good, Brian,

    I’m glad that you found this helpful; this is exactly why I wanted to repost this!

  5. Solly Gratia says :

    Thanks for this Bobby.

    I come at all this as a sometime Calvinistic Baptist. i was High Calvinist, of the John Gill/William Huntington variety, and we were always being picked on the Westminsterites at Banner of Truth. But the more i looked into the underlying Calvinism of the Baptists, the more I wondered why we merely used a tweaked version of Westminster theology. I found out about early 17th century New Covenant theology, which the Baptists dropped in favour of Westminster after the Restoration. The Baptists HCs had an angle on the law/gospel issue, seeing the gospel as the believer’s rule of life, not the law.
    Although there seemed to be scope for a recasting of Covenant theology from a Baptist angle, yet the supralapsarianism of the HCs undercut that attempt.
    My own journey led me away from the Apollinarianism of Reformed church life in favour of anabaptist views, but that has come full circle with the rediscovery of a fully theological point of view, via Barth, and now the early Reformers, as oppsoed to the historicist pov. As i have said on my blog, Barth was a Baptist by 1947 – see his essays on God Here and Now, and his article on Baptism, and this gives me fresh vigour to pursue some of my own studies.
    Alongside this, i was looking into law/gospel, justification issues, after encountering Wright. I was struck by how legalistic Reformed views on atonement are, since the foundation of it all was that the law had to be satisfied for us to be forgiven, whether we satisfied it, or Jesus. Barth’s priority of the Gospel over law is a major change – and I can see that traditional Reformed, and Lutherans, don’t like it.

    Scottish Reformed church life is as much dead in the water as any other Reformed group in the UK. either they have moved in a liberal direction, or they are holding to the shibboleths of the past, and not living the semper reformanda. Academics such as the chaps at Aberdeen Uni are trying to move things along, but there is a huge disconnect between theological work and the churches, since we don’t have the same Seminary structures as the US. It’s either denominational Bible colleges, or Theology Depts in secular establishments.

  6. Bobby Grow says :

    Thanks for sharing. I read most of your history over at your blog.

    I know that the Scottish Reformed life is “dead” in general, that’s because they followed Westminster and not some of these other noteables that TFT highlights in his book: Scottish Theology (if you read this book, you’ll really begin to grasp what EC is all about — and then of course we have our own book coming out late 2011).

    I don’t think the American seminary system is all that great either; although, I suppose it does have more of an immediate impact upon the local church. Of course the problem is, is that most Evangelical Seminaries in the states aren’t doing much but teaching guys “church growth” stuff (I generalize of course).

    I understand your attraction to Barth, I think it’s great that you’re reading his CD along with Calvin’s Institutes . . . a noble and fruitful endeavor, indeed!