Too many theologians have turned their attention away from questions of objective, metaphysical truth to matters of aesthetics, or moral sentiment, or psychology, culture, or history.

. . . What Christian theology needs now more than ever is its traditional, Scholastic backbone.

—Dr. Edward Feser, “Neither nature alone nor grace alone”

The crying need in Roman Catholic theology finds an analog in contemporary Reformed catholicism. We Protestants used to know our Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, and Thomas as well as our Roman interlocutors. Moreover, we used to be concerned with the nature of reality, the nature of truth, and the unity of knowledge. Perhaps it is time for us, along with Rome, to steady our spines with some corrective surgery from the great doctors of the church. Where to begin? Try here, here, here, for starters.

• The Natural Desire to See God According to St. Thomas and His Interpreters, by Lawrence Feingold
• Surnatural: A Controversy at the Heart of Twentieth-Century Thomistic Thought, edited by Serge-Thomas Bonino Editor
• Wisdom in the Face of Modernity: A Study in Thomistic Natural Theology, by Thomas Joseph White

Apply the discount code at checkout: CZ138.

HT: Thomistica.

Take in the weightiness of the matter. Ah! would you err in this point, in a business that doth so deeply intrench upon the honour of God? The mistake being so dangerous, he is the more earnest. Oh! do not err. The note is, that errors about the nature of God are very dangerous. There is nothing more natural to us than to have ill thoughts of God, and nothing more dangerous; all practice dependeth upon it, to keep the glory of God unstained in your apprehensions. You shall see, Rom. i. 23, 24, ‘They changed the glory of God,’ &c., and then ‘God gave them up to uncleanness.’ Idolatry is often expressed by whoredom; bodily and spiritual uncleanness usually go together: ill thoughts of God debauch the spirit, and make men lose their sense and care of piety. Well, then, take heed of erring this error: let not the nature or glory of God be blemished in your thoughts; abhor whatever cometh into your mind, or may be suggested by others, if it tend any way to abate your esteem of God, or to eclipse the divine glory in your apprehensions.

—A Practical Exposition of James s.v. James 1:16, Obs. 4

Yet one aspect of the esteemed Old Princeton writers that is often overlooked by admirers—one that seems contradictory to their reputation of standing tall for strict orthodoxy against the manifold heterodoxies and heresies of their day—is that they actually favored theological progress. They did not merely beat the retreat to “dead” scholasticism with their heads in the academic sand or find satisfaction for their hearts with mere repristinations of bygone Protestant orthodoxy; rather, they candidly engaged the academic fray of the day, and they sought to advance theology just as practitioners of all other sciences seek to play their parts in advancing their fields.

For instance, as much as people poke fun at Hodge’s claim to have taught no new idea at Princeton during his tenure (a claim, BTW, that is not unlike Francis Turretin’s remark in the preface to his Elenctic about his relation to the Genevan Academy), Hodge insisted on going off to Germany to hear the incipient German higher criticism first hand. In the words of William Buell Sprague’s (1795–1876) discourse delivered at Princeton Seminary’s fiftieth anniversary:

The influence of this seminary, I remark again, has been a conservative, and yet not an unduly restrictive, influence—it has been adverse to a reckless spirit of innovation, but favourable to healthful progress. (p. 43)

The Princetonians favored progress. But they did so prudently: they distinguished the true freedom of “healthful progress”—liberty under divine law as pursued as sons of light—from the odious, cheap imitation of liberty—autonomy—that often masquerades under the banner of “academic freedom” yet leads to blindness and slavery to lesser lights. Again, in Sprague’s words:

The tendency to extremes is one of the qualities that mark the imperfection, not to say perverseness, of our common humanity; but never, perhaps, has this tendency manifested itself so palpably, or in so great a variety of forms, as since this seminary has been in existence; and hence, to meet the exigency hereby created, we have the new and expressive word, ultraism. (pp. 43–44)

This “ultraism,” writes Sprague, is  not outright opposition to truth but an imbalanced perspective that

always contemplates, originally, a good object—it always has its basis in truth and right; but, from being exclusively or disproportionately contemplated by an ill-balanced mind, the object either acquires an undue relative importance, or else it suggests the use of unjustifiable means for its accomplishment. (p. 44)

Though Sprague had in mind a particular issue of his day (i.e., the fanaticism that became rampant in certain forms of revivalism; see p. 44), deep within this definition resonates a tone of balance that can, with due prudence, be fruitfully applied to contemporary American Reformed theology of the NAPARC variety. For an elder—starting with his own heart—will likely face “ultraism” a thousand times more frequently than he will confront outright heresy. And among our theologians one wonders whether many—if not most—of the intramural debates that divide us, that we nit pick, or even slander each other about, have more to do with imbalance than heterodoxy: pondering good objects in such a way that favors one aspect of the object’s truth to the exclusion of other equally valid if not equally important aspects; or pursuing a valid scriptural end with invalid or partially invalid means.

Many specific intramural debates might be considered in this light. For instance, whether biblical theology—particularly the BT of the Vos-Ridderbos-Kline variety (though you know, BTW, that there are two Ridderbosses, father and son, right?)—has been overemphasized in the last few decades to the detriment of Reformed dogmatics. Likewise, larger-picture issues are worthy of considering on the scale of balance such as whether the nearly complete absence of engagement with classical metaphysics in our philosophical and theological discourse has brought enrichment or deprivation to our pursuit of supreme wisdom, that humble viewing of all things in God’s light and God’s light in all things; and consequently whether our reflection on topics such as political theology, social ethics, and atheism seems less than captivating, persuasive, or powerful.

Whether or not these particular issues are worthy of reflection, one thing is true: achieving balance in theology despite our human tendency to imbalance—our hearts, after all, are idol factories, said Calvin—is certainly not easy. But if the Old Princetonians are right, there will be no true theological progress in our churches and seminaries without it. And seeing this is perhaps one of the best reasons for spending time with the old writers.

Related

• Sprague’s discourse is included in Princeton and the Work of the Christian Ministry, ed. James M. Garretson.

[This verse] showeth what reason we have to mortify sin lest it mortify us; no sins are mortal but such as are not mortified; either sin must die, or the sinner. The life of sin and the life of a sinner are like two buckets in a well—if the one goeth up the other must come down. When sin liveth the sinner must die. . . . Oh! then, consider it is better sin should be condemned than you should be condemned; as the apostle speaketh of the condemnation of sin, Rom. viii. 3, ‘For sin, he condemned sin in the flesh;’ that is, Christ being made a sacrifice for sin, sin was condemned to save the sinner. Reason thus within yourselves: it is better sin should die than I should die . . . [1 Kings 20:39] . . . therefore let me destroy my sin, that my soul may escape.

—A Practical Exposition of James, Obs. 4, Use 2

Consider Thomas Manton’s (1620–1677) exposition of James 1:15. Herein we find a Protestant teacher—a Westminster divine, no less—using (gasp!) reason in the form of Aristotelian faculty psychology to explain the operations of the human soul in general in order that he might explain more clearly the meaning and uses (or “applications”) of James’s doctrine. “To open the process or successive inclination of the soul to sin,” he writes, “it will not be amiss to give the whole traverse of any practical matter in the soul” (p. 114). In other words, Manton suggests that Christians who know how the practical intellect works are better equipped to wield the shield of faith against Satan’s fiery darts of temptation than those who don’t (pp. 115–16).

Whether you think Aristotle’s psychology is sound or sophistic, the method on display here—and the metaphysic it presupposes—regarding the relation of reason and faith, philosophy and theology, is something that I think is worthy of emulation by all who call themselves Christian. For if there is truly one God who is Truth and indeed the fount of all created truths, then those truths which can be known by reason not only cannot contradict those truths which are revealed in Holy Scripture but also can and should be a ready and skilled assistant in theology’s pursuit of supreme wisdom. Inversely, the truths revealed in Holy Scripture cannot destroy or replace the truths of reason but are to purify and perfect them. Hence Manton’s willingness to put faculty psychology on the table in a discourse on James 1:15.

Counterintuitive as it might seem to our Protestant sensibilities, the wisdom that philosophy provides—when not despised but cherished as a gift from the God of all truth, and when applied appropriately—ought to be a boon to powerful preaching, teaching, and the building up of the saints in the gospel of Christ Jesus.

The new name (which derives from the heart of classical dogmatics: the locus de Deo) signals an admittedly counter-cultural note: until we humbly submit our hearts and minds to the very being which our naturalistic, materialistic, atheistic, nihilistic, idealist, restless age tells us is impossible, unreal, unnecessary, irrational, idiotic, and prudish, our hearts will remain in restless bondage to loves lesser than Love itself, and our minds will shackled to truths lesser than Truth itself.

It is my growing conviction that classical Christian wisdom as found in the Reformed catholic tradition offers much light for contemporary reflection upon philosophical and theological issues. Thus in accord with Psalm 36:9 I aim to inculcate in myself and in my readers a catholic sensibility: a deep appreciation for the great, universally-acclaimed Christian teachers of the past, not merely to parrot them but to follow in their footsteps as free and skillful apprentices in Wisdom’s court who ponder all things in light of their first and final cause and thereby find true rest for heart and mind in God.

The simpler, sleeker, and responsive look facilitates ongoing reflection with a new audience and all of their new web-savvy devices: my students, both past and present. For the topics I teach I will endeavor to keep you updated on what I’m reading, reflections on relevant current events, and the like.

Though the web, perhaps more than other mediums, lends itself to pandering to imprudence (Prov. 10:19), my prayer is that, by grace, my journal will be a boon to prudent reflection upon God in all things and all things in God.