Concrete Foundation For Faith
Where Is History Going?, by John W. Montgomery (Zondervan, 1969, 250 pp., $5.95), is reviewed by H. Crosby Englizian, librarian, Western Conservative Baptist Seminary, Portland, Oregon.
John W. Montgomery, a Lutheran who is chairman of the Division of Church History at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, examines here secular philosophies of history current in our day and finds they have four basic deficiencies: their goals have no necessitarian character; their criteria for what is historically significant are unrelated to absolute terms; their understanding of human nature is woefully deficient; and their gratuitous presupposition of ethical principles renders them suspect in the face of final truth.
Montgomery’s burden is to make a case for the necessity of an absolute historical perspective—provided solely by divine revelation—if one seeks to formulate a Christian philosophy of history and to avoid the errors he discusses in this book. For example, both Barth and Tillich have made a grievous mistake in divorcing history from theology; this dualism has led to a denial of the real history of, say, the incarnation and has made of the whole orthodox faith “a timeless, unsupportable religion of the order of Buddhism, Hinduism, and their theosophical counterparts.” Here the author quotes appreciatively Van Til: “We dare not follow Barth any more than we dare follow Bultmann.” (Why be surprised, indeed, that such a subjective, unverifiable neo-orthodox God should sooner or later be obliged to die at the hands of such as Van Buren, who as a student imbibed the thought of Barth!)
Montgomery sees evidences of a similar metahistory among evangelicals. Bernard Ramm and George Ladd appear to be guilty of a like divorcement. “Dr. Ladd makes Barth’s very mistake. He creates a metahistorical category of interpretation for the resurrection … to preserve its theological truth from historical criticism.” Montgomery asks: Given the objectivity of the events of Heilsgeschichte, why not use the language of objective facticity? “What are we afraid of?”
It may be, however, that he is a bit hard on Ramm when he makes him say that Scripture does not have demonstrable reality as historical revelation apart from the internal witness of the Spirit, and places a Barthian interpretation on this statement by suggesting Ramm is denying the objectivity of historical revelation, when in another place he admits Ramm’s innocence of such a denial. To be sure, Scripture is fully objective; but the witness of the Spirit is as necessary to Scripture as its objective character. Is it possible to conceive of Scripture apart from the Holy Spirit? Scripture is alive and God-breathed; therefore, no part of it, no study of it, is completely in order apart from the Spirit of God. Paul declares that the things of God are “examined” (1 Cor. 2:14) only in conjunction with the Spirit’s aid. The verb anakrinetai refers, interestingly enough, to a preliminary examination such as Dr. Montgomery teaches is necessary to determining the revelational validity of Scripture. Even such an examination, however, though made on the basis of accepted investigative principles, is misdirected apart from the Holy Spirit. If the Spirit’s witness does not make Scripture trustworthy (for it is this already), as Montgomery rightly avers, neither does the application of accepted principles of textual and historical analysis make it trustworthy.
Calvinist Gordon Clark rates an entire chapter. His Lutheran critic respectfully rakes him over the coals for failure to recognize the primary place of historical evidence in a truly Christian philosophy (“theology”) of history. Montgomery rejects Clark’s opinion that “no theory of history rests on an empirical basis” alone, and sharply disagrees with his further contention that “unless a thinker begins with God, he can never end with God, or get the facts either.” Our author counters that apart from objectively discoverable historical facts, beginning with God is an impossibility. The Bible, which speaks of God, is a sensory, historical object; therefore, before one can be sure it is revelation, one must examine the historical evidences concerning the Book. “Christian revelation is irreducibly historical.… Any attempts to reduce historical objectivity in the interests of revelational truth always and by logical necessity boomerang: they eliminate the possibility of all significant talk about revelation itself.”
“Can one begin with God … without facts?” asks Montgomery. No, but having the facts, God comes in mighty handy. One might suspect that perhaps Montgomery is arguing in a circle. To be sure, the Bible is a sensory, historical object; but since a Christian philosophy of history requires a biblical perspective, we must speak of the Bible not merely in any sensory way, even at the very beginning, but in a revelational way as well. Dr. Montgomery makes an admirable case for the facticity of the Bible, but what is the value of facts if one does not know what to do with them, or what to make of them? And who shall say what the facts really are? Even our author admits the existence of this difficulty!
Montgomery criticizes Ramm for his assertion that the “fanatical ‘objectivizing’ of Scripture can be as detrimental to its proper understanding as a frightful ‘subjectivizing,’ ” and goes on to declare, “There are no degrees of objectivity.” True, but objectivity may be spoiled by a failure to balance it properly with an equally important weight. According to the learned professor (450 names discussed or cited some 941 times in 240 pages), the determination of the revelatory character of Scripture must await an examination of its historical evidences. But will the latter always prove the former to every investigator?
The emphasis upon the necessity of the revelational-historical ingredient in a Christian philosophy of history is commendable, but one wonders if the author is not guilty of the error he finds in others: the tendency to give more to the way of sight than to the way of faith.
He does, nevertheless, recognize that there is a better way, “another way [than that of textual and historical analysis] to attest Christ’s claims.… ‘If any man’s will is to do his will, he shall know whether the teaching is from God.’ ” And this, I believe, brings us back to Gordon Clark’s God.
The Ecumenical Swindle
Power Without Glory, by Ian Henderson (John Knox, 1969, 184 pp., $4.50), is reviewed by J. D. Douglas, British editorial representative,CHRISTIANITY TODAY, London, England.
Here we have a live-ammunition broadside fired across the bows of the ecumenical bark from an unlikely quarter. Ian Henderson, who died earlier this year, was professor of systematic theology at Glasgow University. Although he was trained under Brunner and Barth, it was with Bultmann that he latterly claimed theological kinship.
His thesis is simple. A cosmic swindle is being practiced; ecumenical discussions are never what they seem; the double-think and the double-tongue are inevitable; language is used to conceal motives; ecclesiastical takeover bids are proliferating alarmingly; failure to recognize institutional churches as power structures is leading to mass delusion; and, far from desiring organic unity, God finds the whole concept as distasteful as does this Scots professor. “In this ghastly internecine strife among Christians which the Ecumenical Movement has brought about, it is only the Ecumenical who knows how to hallow acrimony, only he can justify any barb, however vicious, in his knowledge that it is directed against those who are opposing Christ.”
Overstatement abounds as the author cavalierly sweeps through history and emerges with interpretations that are pressed into service in the anti-ecumenical crusade. Thus in the Church of South India, Anglican imperialism is allegedly advanced by a technique “so macabre as to be fascinating” (CSI policy accepted nonepiscopal ministers but stipulated future ordinations by bishops). At the deathbed of the last Protestant minister, warns Henderson, “the Anglicans will be waiting with the vultures. His last breath will be the signal for rejoicing to break out.…”
He is particularly waspish in discussing the Bishops’ Report that in the fifties tried to unite the national churches of England and Scotland. He calls it “a kind of Operation Naboth’s Vineyard” and throws doubts on the integrity of some of his fellow presbyters.
Among the signs of wretched proofreading in this book: “Sudan” on page 63 is “Sedan”; 1946 on page 78 should be 1646; and on page 107, 1960 should be 1966, at the start of a chapter in which Henderson owes his basic facts (and an acknowledgment) to the present reviewer.
I enjoy Ian Henderson’s writings, but I can’t bring myself to swallow them whole. They tell me that the Coming Great Church will persecute nonconformists, among them prominent theologians who cannot “honestly sign the Nicean or Chalcedonian creeds.” If this is to be the theological norm, the power-packed corridors of the WCC’s own Geneva H.Q. will be emptied to fill a few tumbrels.
Will Become A Standard
The Cambridge History of the Bible, Volume II: The West from the Fathers to the Reformation, edited by G. W. H. Lampe (Cambridge University, 1969, 566 pp., $12.50), is reviewed by John Gerstner, professor of church history, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
The history of the Bible, essentially a popular theme, does not often receive scholarly handling. Yet there is a market for such a treatment, and not only among professional students. Within the last few years at least two scholarly treatments have appeared, one by Geddes MacGregor, and now this three-volume Cambridge work produced by a team of experts and edited by G. W. H. Lampe. Volume III (The West From the Reformation to the Present Day) has already appeared, and Volume I. From the Beginning to Jerome, is yet to come.
This is a history not only of the translations of the Bible but of the manuscripts, canon, exegesis, illumination, and liturgical use of the Bible as well. As for the history of the versions, no fewer than eight scholarly chapters deal with Latin, Gothic, English, German, French, Italian, and Spanish vernacular editions. The volume concludes with a transitional study of the work of Erasmus. Useful, rare, well-executed plates embellish the text. Many excellent features distinguish this work, including fascinating studies of the original use of papyrus and vellum, the technicalia of illumination, the details of Jewish counter-attack to Christian exegesis of the Old Testament and the bearing of it all on the manuscripts.
This history attempts so much so well that one wonders why there is no adequate discussion of inspiration or biblical theology, or of the Bible-Church authority question. Such topics are not usually found in a history of the Bible, but then neither is a history of exegesis. In this volume there is the unevenness of handling usually seen in a composite production; and unfortunately, the editor does not quite succeed imposing a well-integrated structure. Grouping illustrations together in the rear of the book is no doubt less expensive, but in a definitive volume such as this would not the extra expense of working them into the textual discussion be justified?
Nevertheless, this is a masterly performance on a supremely important subject. The three volumes can hardly fail to become the standard history of the Bible.
Psychology Of Conversion
Personal Renewal Through Christian Conversion, by W. Curry Mavis (Beacon Hill, 1969, 165 pp., $3.50), is reviewed by James Edward Doty, president, Baker University, Baldwin City, Kansas.
W. Curry Mavis, professor of pastoral theology at Asbury Seminary since 1947, explains in his introduction, “Much of the experiential material of this book comes from the experiences of English-speaking evangelical Christians in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.” What he gives us in this readable volume is a careful, historical study of conversion in the English-speaking world, with emphasis on the eighteenth century. Indeed, a more accurate title might have been “Personal Renewal Through Christian Conversion in the Eighteenth Century.”
Mavis applies psychological insights of the twentieth century to the seventeenth and eighteenth. His understanding of Maslow, Jung, Lewin, Boisen, Outler, and Frankl makes some of the chapters highly contemporary. I feel the book would have been more valuable, however, had he said more about the spiritual struggle through which modern man is moving, applying insights of these giants through the most recent decades of their work.
John Wesley, Mavis says, “knew that the sinner must feel deeply a sense of need before he could accept the divine provisions of salvation from his sins.” The author agrees with Kierkegaard that “a consciousness of sin was essential in motivating a man to accept Christ.” The psychological-spiritual condition within a person, Mavis feels, serves an important function in the preparation for personal renewal in Christian conversion. He finds three main elements in this preparation: (1) the experience of guilt heightens the consciousness of selfhood, and the seeker is motivated to assume an increased degree of responsibility for his own life; (2) guilt as a psychic threat to the inner self motivates an open-minded man to re-examine the basic qualities of his life; (3) a sense of guilt creates within an awakened person a constructive anxiety that motivates him to accept Christ for personal renewal. If one sees oneself as a responsible individual, says the author, he is involved in a basic pattern in renewal. But the anonymity of our present day threatens this sense of selfhood.
This book will provide sermonic possibilities for the man who delves into eighteenth-century church history, but the shortage of illustrative material out of the twentieth century is a definite weakness. Perhaps the author will give us this in a future volume.
Focus On Unrest
The Urban Crisis, edited by David McKenna (Zondervan, 1969, 146 pp., $3.95), is reviewed by Donald H. De-Young, pastor, Elmendorf Reformed Church, New York City.
In the catalogue of combat, the sequence of Watts, Detroit, and Newark is as identifiable as that of Pearl Harbor, Guam, and Normandy. I agree with this book that the urban scene is one of immediate crisis. The hazard is increased by the reluctance of our nation to appreciate the wisdom of Walt Kelly’s Pogo: “We have met the enemy and they is us!”
I therefore have a built-in appreciation for any effort that focuses on the unrest in our metropolitan complexes, and particular gratitude to David McKenna for laying this child of our times at the doorstep of the evangelical church. “We do not think of the city as Rich, Restless and Ripe,” he says. “Rather, we think of its Rumbles, Riot and Ruin. The city scares us and Christianity has never been more impotent than it is today in the concrete jungles.”
Contributors to the book were speakers at an Urban Crisis Seminar held at Spring Arbor College; they are Jerome P. Cavanagh, David O. Moberg, George Schermer, F. Brooks Sanders, Hubert G. Locke, Jerome Stromberg, Francis Keppel, and Mariano DiGangi.
It seems to me that in these academic environs there was some lack of down-to-earth perspective. For example, a series of five recommendations for action in the last summary chapter begins with a call to “continued study of the urban crisis” and ends with, “Therefore I dare you to show the way by following your compassion to some new area of human need.” If a vote were taken where I live and work, recommendation five would surely be moved to the head of the line!
Academia likes to place “experts” in the political, sociological, and religious world on the platform; this often makes for an antiseptic quality. When Dr. Keppel spoke about the problem of education, he daringly called for cooperation and partnership at all levels, thus suggesting that the wall separating the management of the schools and the rest of civil government be broken down. Yet there was no mention of the involvement of parents through community-action programs. Where I sit, the wall of educational expertise so jealously projected and protected by unionized professionals is being attacked by growing bands of parents who feel they don’t need the experts to understand that the system is failing our children.
The editor points out three items that through accuracy or irony find immediate relevance. (1) Mayor Cavanagh enunciated the “reparation principle.” (Enter: Mr. James Forman.) (2) Professor Locke called for a federal urban guerrilla force on standby alert. (Enter: the choral refrain of “law and order.”) (3) Dr. Keppel advocated greater state control of public education now controlled at the local level. (Enter: decentralization confrontations with I.S. 201, Oceanhill-Brownsville, and Two Bridges.) Then he said that when these proposals are heard “we will remember that they were advanced on the platform provided by the Urban Crisis Seminar at Spring Arbor College.” If so, I hope the experts will still have the stomach to follow compassion “to some new area of human need.”
Book Briefs
The Christian’s Great Interest, by William Guthrie (Banner of Truth Trust, 1969, 207 pp., paperback, 5s.) Reprint of a Puritan classic that investigates two questions: How may one know whether or not he has a true and saving interest in Christ?, and, How may he acquire such an interest if he is without it?
Religion and Change, by David L. Edwards (Harper & Row, 1969, 383 pp., $8). A comprehensive survey and evaluation of changing patterns in church theology during the twentieth century, the “secular century.” Concludes that the old shape of Christian life and thought—reflected in both Catholic and Protestant conservatism—will not regain its place as the powerful religion of the West.
Not Made for Defeat, by Douglas Hall (Zondervan, 1969, 192 pp., paperback, $2.15). A biography of the outstanding missionary statesman Oswald J. Smith.
The Quiet Revolution, by James D. Smart (Westminster, 1969, 158 pp., paperback, $2.95). Although the author sees the gospel accounts as overlaid with later traditions, these studies of Jesus’ encounters with various persons provide interesting insights into the revolutionary character of his ministry.
The Image of Man in C. S. Lewis, by William Luther White (Abingdon, 1969, 239 pp., $5.95). An enlightening analysis of the doctrine of man reflected in the writings of C. S. Lewis.
The Titles of Jesus in Christology, by Ferdinand Hahn (World, 1969, 415 pp,. $12.50). A standard work on the history of the titles of Jesus is now made available in English.
Social Justice and the Latin Churches (John Knox, 1969, 137 pp., paperback, $2.95). A compilation of papers presented at the Second Latin American Conference on Church and Society, which met at El Tabo, Chile, in January, 1966.
New Testament Questions of Today, by Ernst Käsemann (Fortress, 1969, 305 pp., $6.75). Fifteen essays by a well-known and controversial New Testament scholar. Originally published in the 1950s and early 1960s.
Holy Holy Land, edited by Charles L. Wallis (Harper & Row, 1969, 224 pp., $4.95). A devotional anthology in poetry, prose, and photographs, related to various settings in the Holy Land.
Ways to Wake Up Your Church, by Edgar R. Trexler (Fortress, 1969, 152 pp., paperback, $2.95). Twenty-five exciting articles about ordinary congregations that have adapted to change. Encouraging examples that it can be done!
Jesus and Your Nice Church, by Ed Richter (Eerdmans, 1969, 88 pp., paperback, $1.65). A stimulating critique of the institutional church and suggestions for dealing with the problems.
Timothy the Young Elder, by Mary Helm Clarke (Herald, 1969, 208 pp., $4.95). A historical novel about Timothy, the faithful companion of the Apostle Paul.
