Machen,
J. Gresham. The New Testament: An
Introduction to its Literature and History. Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1976.
Available at: http://www.amazon.com/New-Testament-Introduction-History-Literature/dp/0851514499/ref=sr_1_13?ie=UTF8&qid=1376966663&sr=8-13&keywords=j.+gresham+machen
A few notes on the biography
(Wiki) followed by an outline of his work.
The Wiki-article is not too bad, but for a serious treatment, we
recommend:
Hart, D. G. (2003). Defending the Faith: J. Gresham
Machen and the Crisis of Conservative Protestantism in Modern America. P
& R Publishing. It is available at: http://www.amazon.com/Defending-Faith-Gresham-Conservative-Protestantism/dp/0875525636/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1376968625&sr=8-1-fkmr0&keywords=darryl+hart+machen
Mr. (Rev. Dr. Prof.) Allen C. Guelzo
said of Mr. (Dr. Prof.) Hart’s work: "One of the great achievements of Hart's
biography is his contextualization of Machen, in which these anomalies resolve
themselves into a coherent if not always attractive personality... What makes
Hart's achievement remarkable is the skill with which he has synthesized these
interpretive pieces into a readable and compelling narrative."--
Christianity Today.
Here’s the Wiki-summary.
John Gresham Machen. July 28, 1881 – January 1, 1937. Machen was an American Presbyterian theologian in the early 20th century. He was the Professor of New Testament at Princeton Seminary between 1906 and 1929, and led a conservative revolt against modernist theology at Princeton and formed Westminster Theological Seminary as a more orthodox alternative. As the Northern Presbyterian Church continued to reject conservative attempts to enforce faithfulness to the Westminster Confession, Machen led a small group of conservatives out of the church to form the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. When the northern Presbyterian church (PCUSA) rejected his arguments during the mid-1920s and decided to reorganize Princeton Seminary to create a moderate school, Machen took the lead in founding Westminster Seminary in Philadelphia (1929) where he taught New Testament until his death. His continued opposition during the 1930s to liberalism in his denomination's foreign missions agencies led to the creation of a new organization, The Independent Board for Presbyterian Foreign Missions (1933). The trial, conviction and suspension from the ministry of Independent Board members, including Machen, in 1935 and 1936 provided the rationale for the formation in 1936 of the OPC.
Machen is considered to be the last of the great Princeton theologians who had, since the formation of the college in the early 19th century, developed Princeton theology: a conservative and Calvinist form of Evangelical Christianity. Although Machen can be compared to the great Princeton theologians (Archibald Alexander, Charles Hodge, A. A. Hodge and B. B. Warfield) he was neither a lecturer in theology (he was a New Testament scholar) nor did he ever become the seminary's principal.
Machen's influence can still be felt today through the existence of both institutions that he founded—Westminster Theological Seminary and the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. In addition, his textbook on basic New Testament Greek is still used today in many seminaries, including PCUSA schools.
Asked how to say his name, he told The Literary Digest, "The first syllable is pronounced like May, the name of the month. In the second syllable the ch is as in chin, with e as in pen: may'chen. In Gresham, the h is silent: gres'am."[1]
Early life
Machen was born in Baltimore to Arthur Webster Machen and Mary Jones Gresham. Arthur, a Baltimore lawyer, was 45 and Mary was 24 when they married. While Arthur was an Episcopalian, Mary was a Presbyterian, and taught her son The Westminster Shorter Catechism from an early age. The family attended Franklin Street Presbyterian Church.
Machen's upbringing was considered to be privileged. He attended a private college and received a classical education including Latin and Greek. Although no records exist, it was probably The University School for Boys. He was also taught the piano.
Early Adulthood
American Student Life
In 1898, the 17-year old Machen began studying at Johns Hopkins University for his undergraduate degree, and performed sufficiently well to gain a scholarship. He majored in classics and was a member of the Phi Kappa Psi Fraternity. Machen was a brilliant scholar and in 1901 was elected to the Phi Beta Kappa Society after graduation.
Despite having some indecisiveness about his future, in 1902 Machen opted to study theology at Princeton Seminary, whilst simultaneously studying a Master of Arts in Philosophy at Princeton University.
Encountering German Liberalism
He also pursued theological studies in Germany for a year in 1905. In a letter to his father, he admitted being thrown into confusion about his faith because of the liberalism taught by Professor Wilhelm Herrmann. Although he had an enormous respect for Herrmann, his time in Germany and his engagement with Modernist theologians led him to reject the movement and embrace conservative Reformed theology more firmly than before.
Pre War Period
Princeton 1906-1916
In 1906, Machen joined Princeton Seminary as an instructor in New Testament after assurances he would not have to sign a statement of faith. Among his Princeton influences were Francis Landey Patton, who had been the prosecutor in a nineteenth-century heresy trial, and B. B. Warfield, whom he described as the greatest man he had ever met. Warfield maintained that correct doctrine was the primary means by which Christians influenced the surrounding culture and he emphasised a high view of scripture and the defence of supernaturalism. It appears that under their influence Machen resolved his crisis of faith. In 1914, he was ordained and the next year he became the Assistant Professor of New Testament.
World War One
Machen did not serve "conventionally" during World War I, but instead went to France with the YMCA to do volunteer work near and at the front - a task he continued with for some time after the war. Though not a combatant, he witnessed first-hand the devastations of modern warfare. Suspicious of his family friend Woodrow Wilson's project of spreading democracy and of imperialism, he was staunchly opposed to the war, and upon returning to the U.S., he saw that many of the provisions of, "the Treaty of Versailles constituted an attack upon international and interracial peace....[W]ar will follow upon war in a wearisome progression."[2]
Post War Period
Princeton 1918-1926
After returning from Europe, Machen continued his work as a New Testament scholar at Princeton. During this period he gained a reputation as one of the few true scholars who was able to debate the growing prevalence of Modernist theology whilst maintaining an evangelical stance. The Origin of Paul's Religion (1921) is perhaps Machen's best known scholarly work. This book was a successful attempt at critiquing the Modernist belief that Paul's religion was based mainly upon Greek philosophy and was entirely different from the religion of Jesus. Christianity and Liberalism (1923) is another of Machen's books that critiqued theological modernism. The book compared conservative and Protestant Christianity to the rising popularity of Modernist (or "Liberal") theology. He concluded that "the chief modern rival of Christianity is Liberalism". In What is Faith? (1925) he set before him the pastoral task of anchoring faith in the historical fact of Christ's atonement. He found liberal theology anti-intellectual, insofar as it spiritualized Christianity and treated it as merely an expression of individual experience, thus emptying the Bible and creeds of all definitive meaning. These books, along with a number of others, placed Machen firmly in one theological camp within the Presbyterian Church. His work throughout the 1920s was divided between his time at Princeton and his political work with evangelical Presbyterians. Despite his conservative theological beliefs, Machen was never able to fully embrace popularist fundamentalism either. His refusal to accept premillennialism and other aspects of Fundamentalist belief was based upon his belief that Reformed Theology was the most biblical form of Christian belief - a theology that was generally missing from Fundamentalism at the time. Moreover, Machen's scholarly work and ability to engage with modernist theology was at odds with Fundamentalism's anti-intellectual attitude.
Controversies
Between 1924 and 1925, relations among the Princeton faculty deteriorated when The Presbyterian questioned if there were two different parties on the faculty. In response Machen remarked that his differences with Charles Erdman related to the importance they attributed to doctrine. He noted that Erdman was tolerant of those in doctrinal error. Erdman wrote privately ‘he (Dwight L. Moody) knew that controversialists do not usually win followers for Christ.’
Westminster Theological Seminary
The 1929 General Assembly voted to reorganise Princeton Seminary and appointed two of the Auburn Affirmation signatories as trustees. The Auburn Affirmation was a response by liberals[3] within the Northern Presbyterian Church that condemned the General Assembly's response to the controversy arising out of Harry Emerson Fosdick's May 1922 sermon "Shall the Fundamentalists Win?". Machen and some colleagues withdrew and set up Westminster Theological Seminary to continue reformed orthodox theology.
The Orthodox Presbyterian Church
In 1933, Machen, concerned about liberalism tolerated by Presbyterians on the mission field, formed The Independent Board for Presbyterian Foreign Missions. The next Presbyterian General Assembly reaffirmed that Independent Board was unconstitutional and gave the associated clergy an ultimatum to break their links. When Machen and seven other clergy refused, they were suspended from the Presbyterian ministry. The controversy divided Machen from many of his fundamentalist friends including Clarence Macartney who dropped away at the prospect of schism. Ultimately, Machen withdrew from the Northern Presbyterian Church and formed what later came to be known as the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.
In his book The Great Evangelical Disaster, Francis Schaeffer details the theological shift in American Christianity from conservatism to liberalism. In that discussion, Schaeffer describes how Machen's "defrocking" rightly became front page news in the secular media of the country. Schaeffer concludes: "A good case could be made that the news about Machen was the most significant U.S. news in the first half of the twentieth century. It was the culmination of a long trend toward liberalism within the Presbyterian Church and represented the same trend in most other denominations" (p 35).
Religion and politics
Machen was
suspicious of mixing religion and politics. He found attempts to establish a
Christian culture by political means insensitive to minorities.[4] He was even more concerned about the corrupting
influence of politics on Christianity and saw the social
gospel as a terrible warning. He opposed school
prayer and Bible reading in public school[citation needed]. This
position, however, implied that Christians should run their own schools.[5]
Historian George Marsden has described Machen as “radically libertarian. He opposed almost any extension of state power and took stands on a variety of issues. Like most libertarians, his stances violated usual categories of liberal or conservative.”[6] He opposed the establishment of a federal Department of Education, suggesting before a joint Congressional committee that government control of the children was the ultimate sacrifice of freedom.[7] He was not against locally operated public schools per se, but feared the influence of materialist ideology and opposition to higher human aspirations.[8] He also opposed Prohibition - a costly stance in an age when abstinence was almost a creed among Protestants.[6]
Death
Much to the sadness of those who had been involved in the movements that he had led, Machen died in 1937 at the age of 55. Some commentators (notably Stonehouse) point out that Machen's "constitution" was not always strong, and that he was constantly "burdened" with his responsibilities at the time.[citation needed]
Machen had decided to honor some speaking engagements he had in North Dakota in December, 1936, but developed pleurisy in the exceptionally cold weather there. After Christmas, he was hospitalized for pneumonia and died on January 1, 1937. Just before his death, he dictated a telegram to long-time friend and colleague John Murray -- the content of that telegram reflected deeply his lifelong faith: "I’m so thankful for active obedience of Christ. No hope without it."[9] He is buried in Greenmount Cemetery in Baltimore, Maryland. The stone covering his grave bears, very simply, his name, degree, dates, and the phrase "Faithful Unto Death," in Greek.
The Baltimore-born journalist, H. L. Mencken, wrote an editorial on Machen in December 1931[10] and later contributed an obituary entitled "Dr. Fundamentalis" which was published in the Baltimore Evening Sun on January 18, 1937. While disagreeing with Machen’s theology, Mencken nevertheless articulated a great respect and admiration for his intellectual ability. Mencken compared Machen to William Jennings Bryan, another well-known Presbyterian, with the statement, “Dr. Machen himself was to Bryan as the Matterhorn is to a wart.”[11]
Works
In addition to those mentioned in the main article, Machen's works include:
- "The Origin of Paul's Religion" (1921) online
- Christianity and Liberalism (1923) ISBN
0-8028-1121-3
- What is faith? (1925)
- New Testament Greek for Beginners (3rd printing was 1925)
- The virgin birth of Christ (1930)
- The Christian faith in the modern world (1936)
- The Christian view of man (1937)
- God transcendent (1949) edited by Ned
B. Stonehouse from Machen's sermons, ISBN
0-85151-355-7.
- What is Christianity? and other addresses (1951) edited by Ned B. Stonehouse
- The New Testament : an introduction to its literature and history (1976) edited by W. John Cook from two sets of Machen's course materials,
ISBN
0-85151-240-2.
Bibliography
- Coray, Henry W. (1981). J. Gresham Machen: A Silhouette. Grand
Rapids 1981, Kregel Publications. ISBN
0-8254-2327-9.
- Gatiss, L (2008). Christianity and the Tolerance of Liberalism:
J.Gresham Machen and the Presbyterian Controversy of 1922-1937.
London, Latimer Trust ISBN
978-0-946307-63-0
- Hart, D. G. (2003). Defending the Faith: J. Gresham Machen and the
Crisis of Conservative Protestantism in Modern America. P & R
Publishing. ISBN
0-87552-563-6
- Machen, J. Gresham (1923). Christianity and Liberalism. Wm. B.
Eerdmans Publishing Company. ISBN
0-8028-1121-3
- George M. Marsden: "Understanding J. Gresham Machen." In Understanding
Fundamentalism and Evangelicalism p. 182-201. Grand Rapids 1991,
Eerdmans. ISBN
0-8028-0539-6.
- Noll, M. A. (1988). "John Gresham Machen". In S. B.
Ferguson, D. F. Wright, and J. I. Packer (Eds.), The New Dictionary of
Theology. Inter-Varsity Press, Leicester. ISBN
0-8308-1400-0
- Stonehouse, Ned B. (1987). J. Gresham Machen - A Biographical
Memoir (3rd ed.). Banner of Truth Trust, Edinburgh. ISBN
0-85151-501-0. (Republished by the Committee for the Historian of the
Orthodox Presbyterian Church. ISBN
0-934688-97-4.)
Notes
2. ^ Douglas M. Jones III: J.
Gresham Machen Was Right About the Gulf Crisis ANTITHESIS
January/February 1991 - Volume 2, Number 1.
5. ^ J. Gresham Machen: "The Necessity of
the Christian School," in What Is Christianity? And Other Essays
by J. Gresham Machen, ed. by Ned B. Stonehouse. Grand Rapids, Mich. 1951
6. ^ a
b George M. Marsden: Understanding
Fundamentalism and Evangelicalism p. 196. Grand Rapids 1991, Eerdmans.
7. ^ Testimony
before the House & Senate Committees on the Proposed Department of
Education February 25, 1926.
10. ^ H.L. Mencken, “The Impregnable Rock,” American
Mercury, v. 24, no. 96 (December 1931) 411-412.
11. ^ H. L. Mencken, "Dr. Fundamentalis",
an obituary of Rev. J. Gresham Machen, Baltimore Evening Sun (January
18, 1937), 2nd Section, p. 15.
External links
- The
Origin of Paul's Religion by Machen
- Christianity
and Liberalism by Machen
- Christianity
and Culture an essay by Machen. Princeton Theological Review.
Vol. 11, 1913.
- A
Brief Bible History: A Survey of the Old and New Testaments by
Machen and James Boyd
- On the
Deity of Christ by Machen
- A Short
History of the Life of J. G. Machen by Professor Craig S. Hawkins
- Christianity,
Liberalism, and the New Evangelicalism by Carl
Trueman
- J. Gresham
Machen Sean Richardson's links to articles by Machen on various sites.
- Machen's
Warrior Children by John M. Frame
- The
Machen trial by an unidentified newspaper of the time.
- John
Gresham Machen's Gravesite
- J.
Gresham Machen: A Forgotten Libertarian| The Foundation for Economic
Education: The Freeman, Ideas on Liberty at www.fee.org J. Gresham
Machen: A Forgotten Libertarian]
- Machen and the OPC at opc.org
Machen and the OPC
- History
& Faith
The
book’s outline is as follows.
Introduction
Historical Background of
Christianity
1.
The New Testament
2.
The Roman Background of Christianity
3.
The Greek Background of Christianity
4.
The Jewish Background of
Christianity—Palestinian Judaism
5.
The Jewish Background of Christianity—the
Judaism of the Dispersion
6.
The Messiah
The
Early History of Christianity
7.
The Book of the Acts
8.
The Cross and the Resurrection as the Foundation
of Apostolic Preaching
9.
The Beginnings of the Early Church
10. The
First Persecution
11. The
First Gentile Converts
12. The Conversion of Paul
13. The Church at Antioch
Christianity
Established Among Gentiles
14. The Gospel to the Gentiles
15. The Council at Jerusalem
16. The Gospel Carried into Europe
17. Encouragement for New Converts
18. Conflict with the Judaizers
19. Problems with the Gentile Church
20. The Apostle and his Ministry
21. The Gospel of Salvation
22. Paul’s Journey to Rome
23. The Supremacy of Christ
24. The Church of Christ
25. Christ and His Followers
26. Training New Leaders
The
Presentation and Defense of Christianity
27. A Presentation of Jesus to Jewish Christians
28. Graphic Sketch of the Life of Christ
29. A Greek Historian’s Account of Jesus
30. The Testimony of the Beloved Disciple
31. The Jesus of the Gospels
32. A Document of the Jerusalem Church
33. Jesus the Fulfillment of the Old Testament
34. Christian Fortitude
35. The Christian’s Attitude towards Error and
Immorality
36. The Life of the Children of God
37. The Messages of the Living Christ
38. A Vision of the Final Triumph
39. Review
The
Apostolic Church and the Church of Today
40. The Church and the World
41. The Christian Message
42. The Word and Sacraments
43. Prayer
44. The Congregation
45. The Relief of the Needy
46. Organizing for Service
47. The Mission to the World
48. The Christian Ideal of Personal Morality
49. Christianity and Human Relationships
50. The Christian Use of the Intellect
51. The Christian Hope and the Present Possession
52. Retrospect: the First Christian Century
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