The best theological age ---- is now!
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Theognome
Burrito Bill
Heh. This whole thread might be better in an eschatology forum...
Is it possible to address the reflection without the filter of an eschatologically driven worldview? Can the Amils, Postmils and Premils take static snapshots of history and make assertions based on the evidence thus presented?
When I attempt to do this, I find myself not marveling at advances, but yawning at the staticness of it all. Apostolic Church? They had their theological wars, indeed. Early Church? My what a list of problematic scratching posts. Medieval Church? More of the same, just new labels... And on, and on, and on, right to this age... and beyond.
If you make something idiot proof, they will develop a new and improved idiot. The various heresies available today are nothing more than variations on worn-out themes- and the response to them is as unchangeable as God's word. Thus I wouldn't call it advancement of Theology as much as I would call it diligence. We're not to be tossed to and fro by foolishness, but rather are to test all things according to Scripture; reveal Biblical absurdity as it's current incarnation arises, and look forward to the time when Christ shall come again to realize His perfection throughout the earth.
Theognome
Is it possible to address the reflection without the filter of an eschatologically driven worldview? Can the Amils, Postmils and Premils take static snapshots of history and make assertions based on the evidence thus presented?
When I attempt to do this, I find myself not marveling at advances, but yawning at the staticness of it all. Apostolic Church? They had their theological wars, indeed. Early Church? My what a list of problematic scratching posts. Medieval Church? More of the same, just new labels... And on, and on, and on, right to this age... and beyond.
If you make something idiot proof, they will develop a new and improved idiot. The various heresies available today are nothing more than variations on worn-out themes- and the response to them is as unchangeable as God's word. Thus I wouldn't call it advancement of Theology as much as I would call it diligence. We're not to be tossed to and fro by foolishness, but rather are to test all things according to Scripture; reveal Biblical absurdity as it's current incarnation arises, and look forward to the time when Christ shall come again to realize His perfection throughout the earth.
Theognome
SolaScriptura
Puritanboard Brimstone
Hogwash.
All it means is that we benefit from their work. We have the benefit of taking their thoughts and considerations into account when we do our thinking. In other words, they keep us from having to start at ground zero.
I'd pit the best of our scholars up against the best Puritan era scholar any day.
SolaScriptura
Puritanboard Brimstone
Look, I know this is a site dedicated to coming up just short of reverencing the Puritans and (apparently) their Age.
But good grief. They're touted here by some as virtual Masters of the Science of God, but they couldn't even figure out that if they washed their hands they could almost double their life expectancy. Or that "letting the bad blood out" of the sick didn't work. I'm not trying to say that the Puritans' work is useless (far from it! Not to mention that such an attempt would be sheer folly in this venue!), but again, good grief. They were just men. Fallible men who were just as influenced by their wretched culture as we are by ours.
But good grief. They're touted here by some as virtual Masters of the Science of God, but they couldn't even figure out that if they washed their hands they could almost double their life expectancy. Or that "letting the bad blood out" of the sick didn't work. I'm not trying to say that the Puritans' work is useless (far from it! Not to mention that such an attempt would be sheer folly in this venue!), but again, good grief. They were just men. Fallible men who were just as influenced by their wretched culture as we are by ours.
Thankyou for clarifying yet again the ill founded nature of many criticisms of the Puritans. Imagine making a person's views of medicine, with no authoritative source for its science, a criterion for judging a person's views of theology, which is supposedly based on Sola Scriptura.
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tellville
Puritan Board Junior
Good post Pergy.
I agree.
I haven't read every post but I know many disagree with you Pergy.
I personally think that any one who doesn't agree with you just has an ideal view of history. Except for maybe the apostles who got their information straight from the source, and maybe a few people directly after them, I think we are better off.
Most people here I think are thinking about the general state of the church and go "no way, no one knows anything, how can today be the pinnacle!!". But that's the wrong thinking. We need to compare apples to apples. The leading scholars and theologians today (and we can just look at Reformed ones if we want, though I'm not) have access to an incredible breadth of knowledge. Our knowledge of the ancient world, advances in textual data, standing on the shoulders of giants, the ability to communicate effortlessly, reading theology done by people who aren't just dead Europeans or their descendants (this is one of the best reasons), etc. What Pergy said, etc.
Sure the Puritans and the Reformers were saturated in the Biblical text and made it their life and probably knew the text inside and out and even knew church fathers and stuff. But their knowledge of foreign cultures was practically zip. Their knowledge of archaeology would have been very low. The questions they were asking and answering were very European thus limiting their applicability and scope. Not every culture thinks of theology in the "systematic" way we do. Read a Biblical theology from writers from Africa or Asia and be astounded.
There are also many more opportunities now to be informed. An average lay person in the pew today could learn on their own almost anything a scholar knows. Try learning this stuff on your own even a hundred years ago - not happening. Sure, many people aren't doing it. But then again, that's only if you believe census data and really think there are 2 billion Christians on the planet. In reality, there is much less, and out of true believers I think we are in much better theological shape then any other age.
I could go to my university and read a thesis, an entire thesis, on a word or phrase in the Bible! That can be over a hundred to two hundred pages or even more depending on what kind of thesis it is. And this thesis would include more information than most Christians would ever have even known in a lifetime. And there are thousands upon thousands of thesis' like this. Not to mention the plethora of books one can buy on every topic, which address every nuance and possibility there is.
We are at the pinnacle and we as believers should take advantage of this. We have NO excuses today.
Anyway, I don't know how much that made sense. And given some of the replies I've been reading probably not well received. But I think we are living in a golden age and I think WE are squandering it horribly.
Theologians do not work in a vacuum. I do not think the Reformers were any smarter or more informed than modern theologians, but they were a product of the time in which they lived. The Reformers were tried in the fire of persecution. By and large, modern theologians are a product of modernistic and post-modernistic times. The former resulted in unity, whereas the latter seems to work in doscord.
The collective Christian world.
Spinningplates2
Puritan Board Freshman
If knowledge is suppose to be increasing as we get nearer to the end of the Age, then how can we not be in the best age.
timmopussycat
Puritan Board Junior
In theory you might be right as far as you go but you do not go far enough. We have a lot of advantages available to us today that any Protestant age has not had and the church is having a far greater impact against Islam than in previous ages, but as JI Packer wrote some years ago, in the West the church has lost the ability to apply its theological knowledge in such a way that the civil laws of nations run (broadly speaking) within the gospel ethic.
Spinningplates2
Puritan Board Freshman
If not now, when?
With your above post you seem to imply that because this age has "errant theology" it can't be the height of theological knowledge. Could you please tell me when there has been less "errant theology." Please help me, because I would love to study that time period. I don't think it is fair to Pergamum for people to say, "I don't know when but I know it's not now."
With your above post you seem to imply that because this age has "errant theology" it can't be the height of theological knowledge. Could you please tell me when there has been less "errant theology." Please help me, because I would love to study that time period. I don't think it is fair to Pergamum for people to say, "I don't know when but I know it's not now."
Spinningplates2
Puritan Board Freshman
Mushroom
Puritan Board Doctor
The Lord is preparing His Bride for Himself. She will be without spot or wrinkle. Every day that we get closer to that day is a better one than the day before. We can look back and see the faithfulness of our God in carrying out the redemption of His people throughout the ages from the very beginning onward, in ever-increasing measure. We are not to look back and see one period or another as a golden age that we would long to return to, but to take heart that even when things don't appear by sight to be all that grand in the present, they are all working together towards a glorious conclusion. We walk by faith, not by sight. And the faith that comes from God looks forward, knowing that the best is yet to come, peaks and valleys along the way notwithstanding.
So why would this be an issue?
So why would this be an issue?
So to chronological snobbery we now add medical snobbery? Perhaps we have advanced since Puritan times, but I wonder how many of the Puritans would have used an argument this feeble?
greenbaggins
Puritan Board Doctor
Unfortunately, they would lose unless they had their computers. John Owen, for instance, not only had the complete Bible memorized in the original languages, but knew the classics and all the rabbinical literature backwards and forwards as well.
SolaScriptura
Puritanboard Brimstone
I think some of their arguments about certain things were far more feeble.
The point was cognitive process. The things I mentioned were things that simple observation could have told them. But they didn't see things to look a certain way because their culture conditioned them to see things a certain way. And certainly some - many - of their theological pronouncements were arrived at in similar fashion. And their culture was just as vile as ours, just as given to lack of education - more so actually, and just as hostile to the true gospel.
Quit with the chronological snobbery whine. No one said that things are better just because they're new or worse just because they're old. At least I didn't say that. But listen, kettle, chronological snobbery works both ways... Just because something is old doesn't mean it is better either. And don't give me this "the Puritans have stood the test of time" line. Most of them were and still are totally obscure to any and all but a small few. So just because you find a half faded book in a dusty library and proceed to republish it doesn't mean that it has "stood the test of time."
Sorry to rant, but I do get tired whenever I hear someone act like a certain group has "arrived." Usually I'm giving this same rant to my evangelical friends regarding their affinity for whatever new thing comes out. But I don't like such snobbery even when it is in regards to the Puritans.
The point was cognitive process. The things I mentioned were things that simple observation could have told them. But they didn't see things to look a certain way because their culture conditioned them to see things a certain way. And certainly some - many - of their theological pronouncements were arrived at in similar fashion. And their culture was just as vile as ours, just as given to lack of education - more so actually, and just as hostile to the true gospel.
Quit with the chronological snobbery whine. No one said that things are better just because they're new or worse just because they're old. At least I didn't say that. But listen, kettle, chronological snobbery works both ways... Just because something is old doesn't mean it is better either. And don't give me this "the Puritans have stood the test of time" line. Most of them were and still are totally obscure to any and all but a small few. So just because you find a half faded book in a dusty library and proceed to republish it doesn't mean that it has "stood the test of time."
Sorry to rant, but I do get tired whenever I hear someone act like a certain group has "arrived." Usually I'm giving this same rant to my evangelical friends regarding their affinity for whatever new thing comes out. But I don't like such snobbery even when it is in regards to the Puritans.
SolaScriptura
Puritanboard Brimstone
For all Owen's memorizing, it didn't help him arrive at correct ecclesiology, now did it?
Modern theologians have the ability to benefit from Owen's work as well as all the subsequent responses, so when they make doctrinal pronouncements they are able to build upon Owen in a way that Owen couldn't.
I for one don't think that the need for theologians and teachers in the church has been replaced by a need for research librarians.
Buddy, I suggest that if you were sorry to rant you wouldn't do so.
greenbaggins
Puritan Board Doctor
For all Owen's memorizing, it didn't help him arrive at correct ecclesiology, now did it?
Modern theologians have the ability to benefit from Owen's work as well as all the subsequent responses, so when they make doctrinal pronouncements they are able to build upon Owen in a way that Owen couldn't.
I for one don't think that the need for theologians and teachers in the church has been replaced by a need for research librarians.
But then, there are scads of moderns with incorrect ecclesiology, too, so what does that prove? I have yet to find the quotation in Calvin, but he said that any theologian can be at most %80 correct. Chalk up ecclesiology to Owen's %20 wrong. That doesn't mean he's inferior to moderns. Lewis had the best take on all this. Every age makes different errors. That is why it is so helpful to read older books, because even though they make errors, they won't make the same errors that we make. Yes, we can stand on the shoulders of those who came before. However, that hasn't prevented the horrible fractionalization of theology in seminaries today, which is probably our age's number one problem. We can't see the forests for the trees. Earlier ages had no problems with that.
SolaScriptura
Puritanboard Brimstone
Lane -
You're right, Owen was brilliant. But just as the brilliance of a relative few luminaries in the age of the Fathers doesn't qualify that period for consideration as "the best," neither does the presence of those bright lights in the 16th and 17th Centuries.
You're right, Owen was brilliant. But just as the brilliance of a relative few luminaries in the age of the Fathers doesn't qualify that period for consideration as "the best," neither does the presence of those bright lights in the 16th and 17th Centuries.
tellville
Puritan Board Junior
Anything is game!
greenbaggins
Puritan Board Doctor
Right, and that's why I don't think any age is the best, either the Puritan or the modern, or the early church fathers. I think that's pretty hard to judge, don't you think? But the problem with the modern age is that we have way too much information for anyone to digest it all. An Owen could have been master of the whole field of theology. That isn't possible anymore, unfortunately, which means that something always gets missed. The multiplication of knowledge has resulted in its atomization (by the way, this is what I am working on for my Ph.D. thesis).
With your above post you seem to imply that because this age has "errant theology" it can't be the height of theological knowledge. Could you please tell me when there has been less "errant theology." Please help me, because I would love to study that time period. I don't think it is fair to Pergamum for people to say, "I don't know when but I know it's not now."
The point is that the mere accumulation of facts is not in and of itself a sound criterion for saying we have reached a height of theological knowledge. The current predomination of errant theology is proof positive of that point. I don't need to offer an alternative in order to prove his thesis wrong; but if I were to offer an alternative, and being a Presbyterian, I would have to say that the formulation and adoption of the Westminster Standards provided a height of confessional attainment which is unprecedented in the Christian church. After the Revolution in 1690 until the challenge to Calvinist orthodoxy in the 19th century, these were the accepted standards of Presbyterianism.
SolaScriptura
Puritanboard Brimstone
From what institution are you pursuing your PhD?
Ben's quote:
I for one don't think that the need for theologians and teachers in the church has been replaced by a need for research librarians. sums a lot up.
We are doing good theology now, benefitting from the old and even sharpening that material with the new, and in the process the Church moves forward and actually advances throughout history in both expansiveness and also theological depth.
Error is not a new thing and still operates but we (the collective church as a whole) now know a lot MORE (yes, I said it) than the Puritans do because he have them, and we have a whole lot more.
I think the Universal church becomes qualitatively better as the Gospel penetrates Africa and Asia and is translated into many languages. I think the church is advancing in commentaries, linguistics, manuscripts, knowlege of the social background, and the general educational level of the world is higher than it ever has been, plus the church is not usually wedded to the state now.
I think Mark Maney's post sums up my view even better than I can communicate it.
I agree with Solomon in Ecclesiastes 7:10:
Say not, "Why were the former days better than these?"
For it is not from wisdom that you ask this.
p.s. this post is also related to psychology. Man's psyche seems prone to create "Golden Ages."
Every era has many problems and a mix of good and bad people. With the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, and the Reformation, we selectively pick the ideals and forget about the rest and then forget that these ideal folks that we advertize were often not the norm or average for that era. i.e. America just following the American Revolution was a godless place it seems but most think of that colonial era as a Golden Age. And venereal disease rates and rapes were common in the civil war and yet we only remember the valor of that war and not this or that fully 1/4th to 1/3rd of the army were deserters. We are revisionist in our histories I think and I think many on the PB hold a revisionist view of the Reformation, especially when anabaptists were being drowned and witch burnings were common in England and actually increased around the time of the Reformation. That era had its warts too.
I for one don't think that the need for theologians and teachers in the church has been replaced by a need for research librarians. sums a lot up.
We are doing good theology now, benefitting from the old and even sharpening that material with the new, and in the process the Church moves forward and actually advances throughout history in both expansiveness and also theological depth.
Error is not a new thing and still operates but we (the collective church as a whole) now know a lot MORE (yes, I said it) than the Puritans do because he have them, and we have a whole lot more.
I think the Universal church becomes qualitatively better as the Gospel penetrates Africa and Asia and is translated into many languages. I think the church is advancing in commentaries, linguistics, manuscripts, knowlege of the social background, and the general educational level of the world is higher than it ever has been, plus the church is not usually wedded to the state now.
I think Mark Maney's post sums up my view even better than I can communicate it.
I agree with Solomon in Ecclesiastes 7:10:
Say not, "Why were the former days better than these?"
For it is not from wisdom that you ask this.
p.s. this post is also related to psychology. Man's psyche seems prone to create "Golden Ages."
Every era has many problems and a mix of good and bad people. With the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, and the Reformation, we selectively pick the ideals and forget about the rest and then forget that these ideal folks that we advertize were often not the norm or average for that era. i.e. America just following the American Revolution was a godless place it seems but most think of that colonial era as a Golden Age. And venereal disease rates and rapes were common in the civil war and yet we only remember the valor of that war and not this or that fully 1/4th to 1/3rd of the army were deserters. We are revisionist in our histories I think and I think many on the PB hold a revisionist view of the Reformation, especially when anabaptists were being drowned and witch burnings were common in England and actually increased around the time of the Reformation. That era had its warts too.
greenbaggins
Puritan Board Doctor
I am writing it first, then applying to the school. Probably a British school, but I haven't applied yet, and am therefore not quite sure which one will work best. Still scouting that out.
One thing the Puritans did for us was help us define our soteriology. Our beloved understanding of Covenant Theology came from this period more defined and qualitatively better than the ages before. In the following era's it has been largely under attack. In fact our solid foundation in God's word was made better by the likes of these men who wrote on the Law and Gospel distincitons which are understood in our doctrine of the Covenants. The blood that was spilt during these times is a testimony to the importance and work that was done. I am not so sure that our modern systematic theologies are any better. In fact, I think Grudem is case and point that there had to be a dumming down for the modern reader.
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