Critics of the Calvin vs. the Calvinists thesis often seem to
suggest that those who posit the notion have erected a straw man – the supposed
epistemological and methodological divide between the first generation of
Magisterial Reformers and their seventeenth century descendants just isn't
there.
People repeatedly point to the work of scholars like Paul
Helm and Richard Muller and how they have effectively quashed the arguments put
forward by men like Brian Armstrong and RT Kendall (among others) who posit
that figures like Amyraut were more faithful to Calvin even while the
Scholastic or Orthodox theologians of the seventeenth century rejected him and
denounced the methodology he represented. These critics of Protestant Orthodoxy
argue a shift took place and the older methodology and theological ethos of the
Reformers had been replaced by something else – a reiteration of
Aristotelian-influenced Scholasticism very much akin to the schoolmen of the
Middle Ages.
The case has been closed or so many think. The Calvin vs. the
Calvinists are simply wrong. And yet, I regularly run into articles and other
writings that (while certainly embracing the continuity thesis) will quote
Muller and even argue (on the basis of his work) that a shift of sorts took
place – just not a radical shift.
I've read Kendall, Armstrong, and other more mainstream
historians who have addressed this issue. No one is suggesting that Zanchi, Turretin,
Twisse, or Gomarus sat down and deliberately sought to enact a radical change.
No one said – Oh, this ad fontes
Renaissance Humanism is terrible, we need to bring in Aristotle and Aquinas to
correct it!
No one to my knowledge has ever suggested something so
absurd, something as radical as that. But these pro-continuity scholars
including Muller himself seem to concede that a shift (of sorts) took place and
the categories of Scholastic theology were re-embraced, theology was pursued in
a different context and with different purposes, and sometimes with different distinctions
often guided and shaped by polemical pursuits. The broad strokes were the same,
but there was a difference in style.
The shift wasn't radical but functionally there was a shift in how theology was
approached. To my mind this effectively grants the thesis of men like
Armstrong and Kendall. Just who is erecting a straw man?
It's what the shift would ultimately mean and how it would
play out that continues to interest me. I'm not a partisan of the Reformed
sphere and while at one time I wanted to claim the True Calvinism vs. its later
(and in my book) degenerate forms – that no longer concerns me. I'm interested
in historical outworkings and ultimately the bigger questions concerning
prolegomena and questions concerning the validity of the Magisterial
Reformation's claim to Sola Scriptura.
That transition albeit minor and innocent to start would bear
fruit by shifting the emphasis and method of theology, and would ultimately
change the nature of the task at hand when it comes to how doctrine is
understood. Confessionalism, a product of this period would further change the
nature of theological pursuit and how it is measured and judged. To many
Reformed adherents the Confessions became a benchmark by which subsequent arguments
are evaluated. This is no longer the ad fontes ethos of the
Renaissance-Reformation context even if a quick glance reveals many functional and
even lexical similarities. Some would justify and even celebrate this
development – fine. Others lament it and have their reasons as well. No one (to
my mind) is suggesting that the heirs of Scholasticism are not legitimate or
cannot lay claim to the heritage and legacy of the Reformation. The point is
that something changed and for some this change wasn't a good thing. Do with it
what you will but don't impose a phony and anachronistic narrative that
effectively romanticizes historical theology.
Critics of Protestant Scholasticism believe it opened the
door to a generalised rationalism – which admittedly went in different
directions. For some the emphasis remained on coherence, while others began to
interact with the growing influence of Baconian and other forms of empirically
rooted thought. Regardless of the direction, the new and broadened set of
epistemological concerns would have an effect on everything from dogma to
hermeneutics – and of course ethics.
In not a few cases the end result was Hyper-Calvinism (which is
actually something of a catch-all representing a spectrum of related ideas and
tendencies). That was one path and there were others, but the needed revision
argued for here leads one to interpret the following centuries in a different
manner – not one-for-one continuity, but permutation. The larger post-Hume and
post-Reidian shift which occurred in the Anglo-American context of the nineteenth
century would eventually result in the brittle, compromised and impotent
theology of Old Princeton – so acculturated that it was unable to withstand the
ideological assault brought on by the philosophical, epistemological, and
theological tumult of that period. The American context of the nineteenth century
was effectively a repeat of what occurred in eighteenth century Geneva and most
of Europe, and the 'stalwarts' at Princeton did not possess the means to combat
it and made substantial compromises which haunt the Church to this day.
Opponents of the continuity interpretation posit that
liberalism was Scholasticism gone to seed, even while many Protestant Confessionalists
try and lay the blame on Pietism and other influences that they believe
detracted from orthodoxy. But just as Scholasticism was often rich in terms of
experiential application, and thus far from the 'dry' method or manner it is
sometimes accused of being – Pietism also represents a spectrum and not a few
of its proponents were very interested in theological pursuits and sometimes
even Confessionalism. In other words these arguments paint with too broad a
brush.
In fact it is in New England that the Pietist argument utterly collapses as Puritan Orthodoxy did not face that particular challenge but instead their philosophically-driven Scholasticism turned on itself, its own methodology becoming self-destructive – and the end result was rationalism, Unitarianism, and ultimately Deism. It didn't have to go that way of course but the self-destructive seeds were present in the method, and one must ask if the struggle to maintain Confessional orthodoxy is a struggle for the faith – or is it a self-defeating, self-destructive process of its own making?