November
2014 A.D. Remembering
Knox Seminary, D.Min. Program in English Reformation and (Rev. Dr. Prof.)
Gerald Bray
New at Knox Seminary = Doctor
of Ministry–Theology and Worship of the English Reformation Track
New at Knox
Theological Seminary.
Doctor of
Ministry–Theology and Worship of the English Reformation Track
*NEW
FALL 2014*
The
Theology and Worship of the English Reformation Track is designed to equip
those in ministry to understand the doctrinal and liturgical reforms of the
16th and 17th centuries.
The
received traditions of Catholic faith and practice were rethought in 16th
century Britain along the “evangelical” lines of the Reformation, resulting in
a consistent though broad Protestantism lived and expressed through the Book of
Common Prayer. The early English evangelicals did find a middle-way of sorts,
but not as is often imagined a via media between the Reformation and Rome.
Rather, the English Reformation listened to and learned from both the Lutheran
and Reformed traditions and attempted to express and embody a Protestantism
that could include both (or at least not exclude either).
This track
encourages an understanding of the mutuality of theology and worship and
considers the complexity of contextualization, as well as the process of
learning from the past for the sake of the present.
Learning
Outcomes
A graduate of
the Theology and Worship of the English Reformation Track will be capable of:
• Understanding
the complex social, political, and theological conditions that lead to and
shaped the English Reformation
• Understanding
the social, political, and theological consequences of the English Reformation
• Seeing
the interconnectedness of doctrinal and liturgical reform
• Learning
from and thinking with the worship and theology of the English Reformation for
contemporary ministry
Required
Courses
Anglican
Studies
• The English
Reformation: 1519-1688
• The Theology
of Cranmer and the Book of Common Prayer (1549 &1552)
The
Theology of the English Reformers (choose one)
• Theology
of Thomas Cranmer
• The
Theology of the Elizabethan Divines
• The
Theology of the Protestant Reformers in England
• The
Shape and Theology of the Thirty-Nine Articles
Understanding
the Present: Turning Points from a Protestant Perspective (choose one)
• Turning
Points: Laudianism, Tractarianism, and the 1979 Book of Common Prayer
• Comparing
the Prayer Books: From 1549-1979
• The
Americanization of the English Reformation: The Great Awakening, the Revolution,
and the Rest
4
elective courses
Taught by Leading Scholars in the field of Anglican Studies
and the English Reformation:
• Rev. Dr. Ashley Null
(the world’s leading Cranmer scholar)
• Dr.
Gerald Bray (editor of Documents
of the English Reformation)
• Dr.
Jonathan Linebaugh
• Rev.
Dr. Justin Holcomb
Final Project
The final
project will be an historical and theological study that looks back to the
English Reformation as it looks forward to the contexts and conditions of
contemporary ministry. The student will engage with an aspect of the
liturgical, social, political, and theological transformations that occurred
during and/or after the English Reformation. This research will facilitate an
understanding of the complexities of contextualization, the deep mutuality of
doctrinal and liturgical reform, and the process of listening to and learning
from the past for the sake of the present. The project concludes with a
consideration of the ways in which the materials studied can serve contemporary
ministry.
The first
course in this track is being offered in January 2015. To view all courses
being offered, please see the DMin
course schedule.
November
2014 A.D. Inerrancy and Church
History: The Early Fathers
Inerrancy and Church
History: The Early Fathers
Since 1978 and the release of Rogers and McKim’s massive The Authority and
Interpretation of the Bible,
it has been a strategy among evangelicals who dislike the doctrine of inerrancy
to suggest that the doctrine itself has a recent origin. Why some
evangelical non-inerrantists continue to hold this line is baffling,
however, for it is widely acknowledged that Rogers and McKim’s thesis–that
conservative efforts to uphold the doctrine of inerrancy are grounded in
theological innovation rather than historical precedent–was soundly and
definitively refuted by John Woodbridge’s Biblical Authority: A
Critique of the Rogers/McKim Proposal. The church has always believed in an error-free Bible.
Nevertheless, in light of recent challenges to inerrancy by those who self-consciously place themselves within the evangelical
tradition, it becomes necessary to revisit old paths for the sake of
clarity and certainty.
Over the next few weeks I want to look at the doctrine of
inerrancy in the history of the church. My goal here, however, is not to
provide a full history of the doctrine as it has been articulated by Christians
throughout the centuries. Such a task, as John Woodbridge noted in his own
volume on the subject, would be “herculean” and would require an entire
book! Rather, my aim in these few articles is to sketch a general picture
of the church’s belief in an error-free Bible in order to establish
that the doctrine of inerrancy as defined, for example, in the Chicago Statement on
Biblical Inerrancy, has strong historical precedent. I begin with the early church
fathers.
The Early Church Fathers
Although the word “inerrant” is a modern term used to
describe the nature of Scripture, the concept of inerrancy has been affirmed
throughout the history of the church. The early church is no
exception. While the ancient church fathers never sought to provide a
systematic treatment of the doctrine of Scripture, they did assert throughout
their writings that Scripture was without error. It is clear
that their unswerving commitment to the divine authorship of Scripture led
to their conviction concerning the nature of biblical truth; in their
theological practice, the early church fathers saw inerrancy as a corollary to
divine inspiration.
For example, Irenaeus attributes the “perfect” nature of
the Scriptures to the fact that they were inspired by God. “We should leave
things [of an unknowable] nature to God who creates us, being most assured that
the Scriptures are indeed perfect, since they were spoken by the Word of God
and His Spirit” (Against Heresies,
2.28.2, in ANF, 1:399). Writing to
the Corinthians, Clement of Rome exhorted his readers, “Look carefully into the
Scriptures, which are the true utterances of the Holy Spirit. Observe that
nothing of an unjust or counterfeit character is written in them” (First
Epistle to the Corinthians, 45, in ANF, 9:243). In the view of the ancient church fathers, because God was
the author of Scripture, Scripture itself could not err.
Explicit statements concerning the nature of biblical
truth are found throughout early church writings. Taken together, these statements
communicate two basic ideas about the nature of biblical truth. First, biblical
truth corresponds to reality. In other words, Scripture records events in the
way they actually occurred, it reports statements in a manner that accurately
communicates their intended meaning, and it predicates of God that which is
true of his real character. Tertullian states unambiguously, “The statements of
Holy Scripture will never be discordant with truth” (A
Treatise on the Soul, 21, in ANF, 3:202).
Second, Scripture cannot contradict itself. Origen
is resolute on this matter, likening the refusal to recognize the congruent
nature of biblical truth to spiritual tone-deafness.
And likewise he becomes a peacemaker as he demonstrates
that which appears to others to be a conflict in the Scriptures is no conflict,
and exhibits their concord and peace, whether of the Old Scriptures with the
New, or of the Law with the Prophets or of the gospels with the Apostolic
Scriptures, or of the Apostolic Scriptures with each other. . . . For as the
different chords of the psalter or the lyre, each of which gives forth a
certain sound of its own which seems unlike the sound of another chord, are
thought by a man who is not musical and ignorant of the principle of musical
harmony (Commentary on Matthew,
2, in ANF, 9:413).
Justin, in his famous, Dialogue, states clearly, “Since I am entirely convinced that no Scripture
contradicts another, I shall admit that I do not understand what is recorded,
and shall strive to persuade those who imagine that the Scriptures are
contradictory, to be rather of the same opinion of myself” (Dialogue
with Trypho, a Jew, 65, in ANF, 1:230).
Augustine, the famous bishop from North Africa and a
contemporary of Jerome, affirmed the inerrancy of Scripture by his practice in
preaching and writing, and in explicit statements concerning the integrity of
the biblical text. For example, in a letter to Jerome, Augustine stated,
For it seems to me that most disastrous consequences must
follow upon our believing that anything false is found in the sacred books;
that is to say, that the men by whom the Scripture has been given to us, and
committed to writing, did put down in these books anything false. It is one
question whether it may be at any time the duty of a good man to deceive; but
it is another question whether it can have been the duty of a writer of Holy
Scripture to deceive. For if you once admit into such a high sanctuary of
authority one false statement as made in the way of duty, there will not be
left a single sentence of those books which, if appearing to any one difficult
in practice or hard to believe, may not by the same fatal rule be explained
away, as a statement in which, intentionally, and under a sense of duty, the
author declared what was not true” (Letters, 28, in NPNF, 1:251-52).
In his Reply to Faustus the
Manichaean, Augustine set the Scripture apart from other
theological writings—including his own—stating that the latter may, in certain
instances, “[fall] short of the truth in obscure and recondite matters” (Reply
to Faustus the Manichaean, in NPNF, 4:180). Therefore, Christians are “without obligation to believe” what is
contained in these treatises; they are beholden only to place themselves under
the authority of the canonical Scriptures.
In a subsequent letter to Jerome, Augustine declared his
own personal devotion to the Scripture, linking his reverence for the Bible to
its own inerrancy. “I have learned to yield this [total] respect and honor only
to the canonical books of Scripture. Of these alone do I most firmly believe
that their authors were completely free from error” (Letters, 82, in NPNF, 1:350). If the bishop
came across a text that appeared incongruent with other biblical teaching or
seemed to purport some error, he located the root of the problem in one of
three places: (1) a faulty copy of the original text; (2) a poor translation of
the original text that does not capture rightly the author’s intended meaning;
or (3) himself as a fallible interpreter (Letters, 82, in NPNF, 1:350).
Thus, we see that the early church fathers through
explicit statements and in their theological practice affirmed the error-free
nature of Scripture. In the next article we will find similar
affirmations among theologians in the Middle Ages.
