Douglas, I’m up to the part on hermeneutical considerations, where I was most keenly interested in what you were going to say about the Reformed Tradition. But before we get there…
I thought you did a very good job laying out the building blocks of interpreting a text. In particular, there were three important pieces you brought to the table. One was that we need to read things such that they make sense within a flow of an argument (at least, that should be our preference). The other was to make us step back and start to think through whether a word or set of words might have a very different set of connotations in the first century than they do in the sixteenth.
The third piece was one that I especially resonated with,
and that was the often unacknowledged power of the system on the lower layers of theological interpretation. This gets ramped up in any number of ways (including saying that ‘the gospel’ is at stake)–all of which are question begging. Having spent far too much of my life trying to have biblical-exegetical questions in the conservative Reformed world, I can testify to the fact that the concern to allow the text to speak, and the danger that it will become a dummy to the system’s ventriloquist is not a bogeyman but the reality of a large and growing swath of American conservative Reformed Christianity (how’s that for a series of qualifiers?!).
I am very glad that you put all these issues on the table.
But I wasn’t happy with the investigations into Luther and Calvin. Not that you aren’t right about the things they say, but that I’m not sure you’ve dealt the the looming objection to your project.
If I understand you correctly, your point is that Luther and Calving both contain “mixed” systems. They promote the system of “justification theory” as you outline it, and they also promote a system of election, depravity, etc.
Why didn’t I find this helpful? First, it seemed that if this was all you need to say, it could have been dispensed with in one sentence: “Yes, the two things you associate with Calvinism are both present in the Reformers; i.e., justification theory and that series of doctrines tied to predestination/election.” Calvinism in my worlds typically connotes TULIP or something close to it. That it’s present in Calvin is not all that significant.
The more important argument that needs to be addressed is not whether both dynamics are present, but how they are related. Thus, for example, you cite Institutes 3.1.1, where Calvin talks about the need for the Holy Spirit to unite us to Christ, as an example of the latter, “alternative”/participatory theory. But you’ve also talked about his later discussions of justification as embodying what you call “justification theory.”
But what you haven’t done is to get into Calvin’s system and see how these two are related; you haven’t delved into how, in fact, justification is subordinated to union with Christ soteriology! This is the great argument the Reformed Tradition has to make against your project, not simply that both elements are present in both Paul and the Tradition, but that they are fit together into a coherent system.
Under your justification theory, there’s no way to integrate the two, but Calvin has done so. Now, he might be confused, but he still needs to be addressed (it seems to me). For example: under your understanding of justification theory, Calvin is bound to place justification fully within the free choice of a non-regenerate person. But why is it that he not only takes up justification after union with Christ (3.1.1.) but even after sanctification?! For a Reformer, this might seem to be selling the farm on justification. But Calvin can do this because it’s a function or facet of his union with Christ soteriology.
In my estimation, the only way to make a compelling case against the Reformers at this point is to show that their system must fall apart as its given. This has been my concern all along with your articulation of justification theory. Why must your articulation of the theory be correct? And does the fact that it is clearly not the justification theory of the Reformers (with the possible exception of Melanchthon) not take away some of the power from the argument?
We need to wrestle with a couple other points related to this: (1) what if such a mixed theory is Pauline? (2) what if in promoting a mixed theology of grace and choice Paul is simply reflecting the theological possibilities of early Judaism? and (3) what if in this early Judaism is accurately embodying the apparently mixed theology of the Old Testament?
I’ll outline those concerns in my next post.
Disclaimer: Eerdmans sent me a gratis copy of this book, but without the stipulation either that it would be reviewed or that it would be reviewed favorably.
Daniel,
While I haven’t read through “Deliverance” is seems that these same objections re: the Reformation apply to Augustine. He is often the bugaboo charged with ruining Pauline interpretation for 1500 years. Stendahl popularized this trend (“Introspective Conscience”) and most scholars have continued it (Witherington, McKight…don’t know about Wright). But it seems that Augustine held together justification and participation in the way you are also advocating. I guess I hope that Gorman’s work on theosis and Paul will renew an appreciation for Augustine’s Pauline interpretation.
what are your thought?
Geoff, Great questions.
In this section of the book Campbell seeks to deliver Augustine from the charges laid before his feet by Stendhal. I don’t have the book right in front of me at this moment, but if I recall correctly, he takes a couple different lines, including separating an early Augustine from a later one. My frustrations with this engagement were similar to those I experienced in reading about the Reformers: On the one hand, it’s good not to have them villainized; on the other, the a priori separation of the two ways of articulating salvation is not one I’m prepared to jump on board with. More on my own reasons tomorrow.
I’ll have to check it out. I generally get nervous regarding the earlier/later Augustine depending on how it is drawn. while I’m still checking it out, union with God is paramount for Augustine, and his theories of salvation (predestination) are only toward that goal.
thanks
Campbell puts “union” into the same theological model as “predestination,” both of which are entirely dependent on grace, not human initiative, they assume it’s all God and we can’t do anything. DAC sees “justification theory” as trading on an essentially voluntarist model, where people are capable of responding to God and either choose to so respond or not.
Daniel,
I’m quite happy for Calvin to subordinate some system called “Justification” to Sanctification, properly conceived, but it won’t make sense of Paul’s texts, which is my ultimate objective. If you follow this line then you end up with a theory with the right words detached from its scripture exemplars.
In a similar vein, I’m not trying to supply a comprehensive theory of Calvin or Luther–which I think I say quite clearly. I’m only trying to nuance their insertion into the debate concerning the meaning of Paul’s relevant texts. Basically, I’m complicating their insertion. They have been used in an extraordinarily crude way in the past, and still frequently are. I take it both of the main sides in the debate can take comfort from things that they say at certain points–although I suspect that Calvin is far more in my court than the opposition’s.
As to the extent to which the two systems fit together: I think there has been a lot of sloppy thinking and skulduggery going on here in the past. I remain to be convinced that a classically foundationalist system IS compatible at all with one controlled by christology. The former seems to be irreducibly Arian to me, and the latter irreducibly Athanasian, which is to say, orthodox. If you can show me how to fit all this together then fine, but my entire interpretative and theological journey of 25 plus years has only reinforced to me the importance of this distinction, its fundamental truthfulness, and the appalling political, ethical, and theological prices paid for ignoring or obscuring it. Its exposure and elimination from Paul are basically why I wrote this book.
BTW, Alan Torrance’s SBL papers speaks to this question very clearly.
A final caveat: although I wish my language had been clearer, I am emphatically not eliminating human freedom from my account of salvation by election and grace. With many others, I take a voluntarist versus a causal account to be a false dichotomy. I DO take a purely voluntarist account to be problematic, i.e., Arminianism. I do, however, want to offer an alternative account of “freedom” and of all the agencies involved in Christian salvation. I take both divine and human freedom ultimately to be real and non-negotiable, although in that order.
Barth is pretty clear on both the preceding points BTW, and in many respects pretty Reformed I would say.
Keep at it!