Though I've made it abundantly clear in the past that I'm not
a fan of Chris Arnzen's Iron Sharpens Iron, when I saw that Sam Waldron was to
be the guest I decided to give the show a listen. I was all the more intrigued
by the suggestion that there were problems or challenges with regard to Sola
Scriptura.
I was mostly pleased by what I heard. I feared that the show
would be about Critical Race Theory, alien epistemologies and things of that
order, but that wasn't it at all. They were talking about a debate taking place
within Reformed circles and given Arnzen and Waldron – specifically within
Reformed Baptist circles.
One of the frustrations with the show is that they refuse to
name names and do not sufficiently elaborate on the ideas. I know who and what
they are talking about to some degree but I also know that many listeners will
be lost. They are reacting to a growing challenge within the Reformed world
regarding the doctrine of Divine Simplicity. Men like James Dolezal have
suggested that the historic doctrine has been abandoned in some quarters and is
under attack in others. This argument rests heavily on the assumptions and
categories of medieval scholastic theology which would certainly include the
Thomistic tradition. Others, like Waldron take exception to this framing of the
issue and the charge of error – and rightly so we might add.
Dolezal is basically arguing that many have embraced what is
tantamount to a heretical view of the doctrine of God and needless to say an
error at this most fundamental of levels (theology proper and prolegomena) will
play out in the whole spectrum of theology. Once simplicity is lost, the
doctrine of God is in jeopardy and then the gospel – at least that is the
implied argument.
Waldron and Arnzen attempt to touch on some of the various
aspects of Sola Scriptura and though they don't get very far into it, the
listener will at least know that there's a spectrum to what this actually
means. This notion interacts with Biblicism (so-called) which in many cases is
not an actual Biblical Biblicism if we
can put it that way. The term is easily subject to abuse. Additionally, those
that wholly divorce their reading and understanding of Scripture from all
historical interaction are foolish – a point I've spent a fair bit of time on
over the years.
That said, many who claim Sola Scriptura (or Biblicism in
some cases) do so falsely. Many Evangelicals clearly demonstrate that they're
playing only a kind of lip service to the idea and in fact view Scripture as
little more than a starting point. Without a concept of sufficiency the sola in
Sola Scriptura means little. But then again, there are others within
conservative and Confessional spheres who place great emphasis on
'sufficiency', but demonstrate that what they really mean is that it's a launch
pad for philosophical speculation and deduction. In terms of ecclesiology and
ethics the Scriptures are no more sufficient for them than they are for the
Evangelicals. Others, like the Stone-Campbell movement and many Fundamentalists
subjugate their Scriptural authority under the aegis of Common Sense Realism
and other epistemological assumptions.
The whole issue of Confessions and Confessionalism comes into
play and some want to read their Confessions in light of what might be called
the Roman Catholic centuries while others would focus more on seeing a degree
of continuity with a selective reading of the early Ecumenical Councils but
also view the Protestant Confessions as a kind of new ground zero.
Waldron and Arnzen are concerned over those who over-magnify
the Confessions and rightly so. In some Presbyterian and Reformed circles the
Confessions are viewed as settled issues
and represent doctrines and doctrinal expressions that should not and in fact
cannot be revisited. In other words the Confessions are absolutised. No one is
going to formally admit to putting the Confessions on par with Scripture or
that they supersede Scripture. But practically speaking I know many
Confessionalists who in fact do this. And they are as likely to quote the
Confessions as they are Scripture and as far as they are concerned the authoritative
weight is the same. Yes, they play something of a word game – arguing the
Confessions express what the Bible teaches and therefore to quote them
authoritatively is not to supplant Scriptural authority – but that is in fact
what happens.
Waldron adheres to the 1689 London Baptist Confession but indicates
that he views it more in terms of a guide rather than an absolute authority or
something that limits doctrinal exploration and potential revision – something akin
to a chain. Semper Reformanda was
also mentioned at the end of the show, a controversial issue as few seem to
agree as to what 'always reforming' actually means. Does it mean fine tuning
the Confessions? Or can it mean revising the Confessions and in some cases
moving beyond them? For some the latter
is an impossibility especially in light of Confessional subscription. And no
one agrees on what subscription actually means. Exceptions are taken and in the
American Presbyterian tradition the Confession was modified in the late
eighteenth century. If it can be changed then what does that say about the
methodology that undergirds it, its authority, and subscription itself?
They do not touch on the problems associated with the
narratives surrounding the ecumenical councils. On the one hand they are
affirmed but no one ever talks about how they're only affirmed in part –
apparently their authority only extends to the realms of Trinitarian theology. The
other rulings in connection to Nicaea and Chalcedon are ignored as are the
later councils. But then somehow we're to be concerned with and invested in the
theological output of the Roman Catholic Church during the rest of the Middle
Ages. It's a rather strange and inconsistent position to say the least.
The Biblicism I advocate demands an interaction with
historical theology and views the creeds and confessions as helpful in this
regard but at the same time revision is due. It's not a question of tweaking
the symbols as they stand but rather revisiting prolegomena, the fundamental questions
of methodology and assumption that underlie the context of these documents and
the nature of their formation. One can condemn Arius and embrace the Trinity,
and yet also raise an eyebrow at some of the debates over terms like substance,
essence, nature, and person. This is not to say that extra-Biblical terms
cannot be employed but the introduction of these concepts rests upon
philosophical foundations and assumptions that were and remain unwarranted and
range well beyond what the text of Scripture reveals.
Waldron was candid enough to admit that 'good and necessary
consequence' itself isn't always so clear and I contend these terms have been
subject to gross abuse and are used as a cloak and justification for all sorts
of theological innovation and even a kind of theological trickery at times. The
problem is the concept leaves the door wide open to philosophical speculation –
all the more as 'good and necessary' are subjective criteria.
While not exactly a Van Tillian, I appreciate the movement's
challenge to Thomism and thus the categories of thought that Dolezal has
decided to rest his arguments upon. I really appreciated Waldron's point and
caution regarding the over-pressing of logic and the danger it contains though
again he does not elaborate on that point. The Van Tillian understanding of
analogical knowledge and limiting concepts allows for certain dynamics and
dualities to remain within the body of Christian doctrine – something certain
camps cannot tolerate. In many cases they believe such open-ended questions and
even mysteries constitute error and represent a kind of red-flag, a sure sign
of cognitive dissonance, equivocation, and the embrace of fallacy in the
reasoning process.
Of course it's something of a problem for men like Waldron as
they place great weight and emphasis on not only the Confessional heritage but
the Scholastic one as well. And the epistemological foundation of both these
movements is expressed in what was later called Systematic Theology – something
highly prized by most of the Reformed world and I daresay this is no less the
case with the Calvinistic Baptists. Waldron would temper these impulses but it's
not an easy thing as these movements are heavily invested in these concepts and
the narratives surrounding them. For Baptists in particular, the historical
theological justification for their movement was that its positions and
particularities regarding craedobaptism and the like represent a more thorough
and consistent application of systematic theology and Scholastic method. For
many of them, their movement is the ultimate (or full-harvest) expression of Reformation
theology, the full application of Reformation principle that was not manifest
with the early generations of Reformers. In other words by a more rigorous
application of scholastic methodology (and thus systematic theology) the end
result was a Baptistic theology. But even Waldron can see this is potentially
quite problematic.