Recovering the First Reformation - Toward a Proto-Protestant Narrative of Church History (XIII)
Not all among the Czech Brethren and Waldensians greeted the
Magisterial Reformation with joy. Some were alarmed and not a little put off by
some of the ideas which they believed were being forced upon them by the
Reformers. There was (at least in the case of the Cottian valleys) a degree of resentment
with regard to the patronising attitude which they encountered from Guillaume Farel
and what would become the Calvinist wing of the Reformation.
With regard to the Lollards, we don't really know how they
viewed these questions apart from the fact that many continued as Lollards into
the 1530's or even later. The fact that they still identified as Lollards is
interesting. The Lutheran influence in England was probably more prevalent than
the Zwinglian and yet the Lollards were in spirit closer to the fuller-orbed
reforming impulses of Zurich than the Wittenberg theology. Does this suggest
they retained their separate Lollard identity (and thus by implication a
partial rejection of Lutheranism) up until the more explicit Swiss-Calvinist (proto-Puritan)
influence during the time of Edward VI (1547-1553)? It's possible but the data
are inconclusive.
The Magisterial Reformation made use of some similar
concepts. On the one hand Waldensian and Czech views would resonate more with
the Lutheran position – at least in terms of sacraments. On the other hand the
Waldensian and Lollard understanding of Scriptural Authority would resonate
more with the Calvinist factions. The largely Czech Unitas Fratrum would have
also been part of this camp apart from the theological shift that began to take
place under the unfortunate leadership of Lukas of Prague who steered the sect
away from its Biblicist moorings. Lukas who died in 1528 survived until the
time of the Reformation and even corresponded with Luther – but the Brethren
movement retained its own separate identity.
The Magisterial Reformation embraced Sola Scriptura but there were subtle shifts in this thinking. It
wasn't the Biblicism expressed in the First Reformation and over time it would move
even further away from this view with the advent of Scholastic-Confessional
theology which tended to subsume Biblical doctrine under the aegis of
systematic, coherent, philosophically driven constructs.
As with the First Constantinian Shift, the Second resulted
from a host of impulses – pragmatism being perhaps the most significant.
This pragmatism first and foremost flowed from a desire for
relief from persecution and in the Fifteenth Century it was severe and extended
into the first witchcraft craze which began to overlap with Inquisitorial
persecution of First Reformation Christians. Many Waldensians were accused of
witchcraft – a point which only demonstrates how confused were the times and
how unreliable were the judgments of the Inquisitors and their torture methods.
The idea of finding solace under the protective auspices of
Protestant princes had to be pretty appealing and it isn't hard to imagine many
Christians finding refuge in their lands. This would lead to them supporting
their politics as well as their allies. It's not hard to imagine the younger
generations becoming politically stirred and easily cajoled into taking up the
sword.
As Europe erupted into war, with Catholic and Protestant
factions at arms it would only take a generation for the shift to be complete.
Europe was undergoing a geopolitical and cultural whirlwind as the Continent
divided into blocs and camps. The resulting shift in populations would also
affect economics and old societal placements – forging new cultural identities.
Economics were also shifting with the Renaissance, the rise of banking and
trade, the discovery of the New World and the proliferation of printing. In
fact everything was changing and the First Reformation (already at a weak point
in the late 15th century), was like the tired Early Church of the 4th
century – it was simply swept away by the new Constantinianism. And those that
weren't carried away by the changes were compelled to re-examine core beliefs
in light of the new and rival claims. Other rival groups were now claiming their
movements and theologies to be in accord with the Scriptures. It is therefore
no surprise that even among those that retained the First Reformation
understanding of Two Kingdoms and the ethics which result from it – there were
subtle and not so subtle shifts in theology and epistemology.
For the advocates of the Magisterial Reformation, 1517 was a
glory and for many of the heirs of that movement the lamentable decline came
with the 18th century – a period sometimes reckoned as the beginning
of the Enlightenment. Regardless of how one frames the intellectual currents,
the 18th century did mark a beginning in the decline of Confessional
Protestantism, the beginnings of Theological Liberalism and the wider influence
of secular philosophy which would result in widespread Deism and eventually
agnosticism and rank unbelief.
But a different narrative can be suggested. While the 16th
century marked a shift and collapse of First Reformation ideals, the 1700's
marked the collapse of the new Protestant Christendom. Not its utter collapse
of course, but critical, even terminal fissures were appearing and the way was
being prepared for the modern secular state.
Protestant Orthodoxy had stagnated and slipped into a kind of
cultural nominalism (or worldliness). There was still the outward form of
Christianity but it had very little substance. Everything was Christian and so
over time nothing was. And while Pietism should not be exempt from criticism it
had a sustaining influence during this period. Though Confessionalists want to (rather
conveniently) blame Pietism for the Enlightenment's disintegration of Protestant
sacralist culture I would argue the Scholastic and Constantinian-driven collapse
might have come sooner if it were not for the inner vibrancy that Pietism provided.
There were others beyond the scope of strict Pietism that could also be
considered. The Quakers for all their errors provided a certain leavening
effect. There were also still some healthy strains of Biblically oriented
thought to be found in some sectors of English non-conformity and in the
Moravians.
By the end of the 18th century, the state-church
model of Protestant Christendom was beginning to formally collapse – signalled
by the French Declaration of the Rights of Man in 1789 and (ironically) in the
American experiment as expressed in the First Amendment of 1791. These would
establish a precedent for the final rending of Christendom – a point lamented
by today's Dominionist factions but one celebrated by many Christians at the
time. The tolerant regime of social pluralism (not to be confused or conflated
with theological or absolute pluralism) was both the ideal of the Early Church
and the First Reformation. *
Finally after an almost three century-long interlude, a great
possibility, a non-Constantinian option for Protestantism, was at the door. The
tragic sidetracking deviation born of the Magisterial Reformation at last had
hope of remedy. The Mercersburg 'Principle of Protestantism' is patently a
fiction, one that attempts to wed Protestant and Catholic by a narrative rooted
in the developments that span the gap from Medievalism to Modernity.
Magisterial-Confessional Protestantism played its part in
setting the stage for modernity and it shared some building blocks with its
Roman predecessor but both Nevin and Schaff in all their Hegelian wisdom missed
the narrative provided by the New Testament itself – a narrative that can be
found in Church History if one is looking. It's a story of a persecuted remnant
that rejects the world and its power, its sword, crowns and coins. They miss
that the Church is not found in acculturated ecclesiological institutions and
in the secure and respectable values of the bourgeoisie but in the faithful
apostolic witness, in the remnant that demonstrates the presence of the Spirit
by its adherence to the teaching of the apostles and rightly acknowledges their
Christ-granted authority – which is exhibited in the Spirit-inspired and
revelatory Holy Writings they provided for us.
The 19th century saw a proliferation of Free
Churches and Restorationist movements and by no means were these all positive
developments – but some were, and generally speaking it marked a constructive and
beneficial trajectory. Indeed freedom always brings risk and yet also the
possibility of reward. It is noteworthy that even many confessional bodies
during this time sought 'Free Church' status as the world and the Church had
changed. For many of them this did not represent a more Biblically oriented
shift in principle but was instead something of a strategic retreat. Also
during the period of Romanticism these same Protestant conservatives were not
exempt from its wistful remembrances – in their case of Reformation-fame, even
if these memories were fictionalised and in some respects no longer relevant.
This played into their narratives of romantic memory, historiography, and hope
of restoration – a desire to recapture the old and by then defunct vision of
Protestant Christendom.
In the 19th century, the Free Churches and
Restorationist groups were at last unshackled from the unfortunate heritage of
the Magisterial Reformation and in other cases from the Confessionalism and
traditionalism that had previously bound them. Again, the results were not
always happy but at the same there was an impulse at work in which all things
were being re-examined anew – including the legacy of the Second or Magisterial
Reformation. And not a few groups found its legacy to be clouded and wanting.
Some of these bodies would fall short of a First
Reformation/Primitivist recovery and fall prey to the cultural and
philosophical assumptions of their day. Liberalism (in all its manifestations) was
in the air and for many the answer to the Enlightenment and its esoteric and
sceptical philosophies was Common Sense Realism which was in reality little
more than a reductionist expression of Empiricism. Seemingly anti-Enlightenment,
this Baconian-like epistemology would greatly affect large sectors of the
Church and open it up to outside philosophical influences – a kind of back-door
for theological liberalism, the harvest of which we are witnessing in our own
day.
This would shape and cloud their thinking and theological
formulation and its influences would continue into the 20th century
playing no small part in the epistemic assumptions of both Fundamentalism and
large swathes of post-war Evangelicalism. Despite these currents, some
Restorationist-Primitivist groups would (through Biblical study) begin to
approach the Separatism of the First Reformation and the ethics which flow from
it.
But the world was in tumult. Apart from the normal wars and
rumours of wars it was an age of political revolutions and cultural ones. The
Industrial Revolution would sweep all previous paradigms away as cultures and
traditions were overturned and the old social, economic, and even ethical
paradigms were broken. There was both tragedy and promise in these shifts.
On the one hand the breaking of Christendom was actually
something to celebrate and indeed in many cases there had been forms of
persecution perpetuated by statist Protestants against Pietists and Free Church
folk throughout the 18th and 19th centuries. The days of
the fiery stake were gone but softer forms of persecution had not ended.
Secularisation, the child of Liberalism was in the air. While it becomes
dangerous when embraced by Christians and syncretised with their theology, on a
practical level it allowed for a degree of flourishing.
And yet this secularisation generated fear as did the revolutionary
currents of the time. Just as sectors of the Church were finally breaking away
from the assumptions, traditions, and thought-patterns of Constantinianism,
this new threat would once again cloud judgment, stoke anxiety and would (tragically)
by the end of the World Wars steer most of these separatist and
Biblicist-minded groups back into the embrace of yet a new Constantinian order,
one re-cast for the Liberal post-Revolutionary era – a Third Constantinian
Shift.
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*
Again this is not to say
there weren't good, healthy and Biblically minded movements within the
Magisterial Reformation centuries. It was not destitute though it was
sidetracked by the creation of a rival Protestant Christendom. I do not doubt
there were many Christians during this time and within this context but a close
examination also reveals the often superficial nature of conversions and
professions. And in many cases the Protestant cause was but a veneer for larger
and more complicated political and economic interests.
And even during this period there were those who flirted with
First Reformation principles. To some degree the Mayflower Pilgrims did but
would eventually abandon this legacy. There were also some of the aforementioned
Pietists, some among the growing numbers of Baptists, and certainly the
Anabaptists and Quakers.
The Moravian testimony and the movement's patterns of thought were by the 18th century grounded within the Lutheran Magisterial Reformation spectrum and yet they carved out a unique place and retained some of their First Reformation heritage as seen in their approach to missions and questions of politics.