What Is a Parable? A Clarkian Analysis of Dr. Robert A. Traina's Comment

It may truly be said that the context of each term of a book is the book itself.  --  Dr. Robert A. Traina

I never took any classes with Dr. Robert A. Traina.  However, when I was a young Pentecostal and Arminian student at Asbury Theological Seminary, Dr. Traina's book on inductive biblical exegesis, Methodical Bible Study, was a standard textbook and still is today in many seminaries across the nation.  At Asbury in the early 1990s I took several classes called English Bible, which were really a form of literary criticism and inductive Bible study.  My professors were Dr. Joseph Dongell and Dr. David Bauer.  Both men were very good at inductive Bible study and making the logical and literary connections in the text, despite their Wesleyan Arminian presuppositions which influenced their overall interpretations of the biblical texts.

However, there is a problem with inductive Bible study and the problem is that the systematic whole often gets lost in the overall context, despite the fact that inductive Bible study is supposed to fit with the context of the whole Bible as well as with the context of the book, chapter, pericope and the paragraph in which the verse occurs.  Also, without logic and the law of contradiction language itself has no particular meaning.  When equivocation and analogical analysis is the beginning axiom of literary criticism, and an appeal to the neo-orthodox view of Scripture as merely the framework for the keryma of the early church, then the problems with inductive Bible study from an Arminian and Evangelical perspective become paramount. Furthermore, I was shocked to discover that Wesleyans do not believe in plenary verbal inspiration, even though the doctrinal statement at Asbury purports to believe in the inerrancy of the Bible.  This an equivocation because it turns out that Asbury believes that only the theological concepts of the Bible are without error:

Asbury Theological Seminary, which is one of the preferred seminaries of The Wesleyan Church, has a helpful statement on inerrancy: the Bible is “without error in all that it affirms.”  The important question is thus, “What was God affirming when He inspired this particular passage?”  For example, was the point of Philippians 2:10 that the earth is flat and that there are beings under and above the earth: “that at the name of Jesus every knee might bow—of those in the skies and on the earth and under the earth”? . . .

* * *
The idea that the Bible is inerrant in all that it affirms captures the Wesleyan sense of inerrancy well.  Certainly God’s word could never be in error.  The challenge is in determining what the Bible affirms rather than in acknowledging its inerrancy.  Certainly when God’s Spirit truly reveals something to an individual through the words of Scripture, this affirmation will be without error.  And anything that God has authentically revealed to the Church, to a specific church group or specific individuals, is an affirmation without error.

 Ken Schenck, What Wesleyans Mean By Inerrancy.  [I took my summer Hebrew courses with Ken Schenck when he was still a professor at Asbury.  John Walters, another professor at Asbury, said openly that the concepts of the Bible are inspired and inerrant but not every single word of the Bible.]

Please note well that Schenck appeals directly to existential encounter and personal illumination rather than to an objective and propositional revelation in the Scriptures:

Certainly when God’s Spirit truly reveals something to an individual through the words of Scripture, this affirmation will be without error.  (Schenck, Ibid.).

Schenck's view is practically identical with the neo-orthodox view.  If the Bible is not an objective revelation instead of a framework that needs personal revelation, Christianity is completely destroyed.   [He also places more authority in the church than in the Holy Scriptures.  Whatever happened to sola Scriptura?]

Also, as an aside, I should mention that no literary analysis of the Bible can be done in exactitude without knowing the biblical languages sufficiently to read and exegete the syntactical information in the original languages.  Although this method works for the layman who is reading the Bible in an English translation, the layman should be comparing various translations to see what translation issues become immediately apparent.  A further complication is the issue of textual criticism and what is considered to have been originally in the autographs. (Logical Criticisms of Textual Criticism).  [Note well that when I was a student at Asbury from 1992-1995 Hebrew was no longer required for the fulfillment of the degree for a master of divinity.  As stated above, I had to do Hebrew as a summer elective.]

First of all, Dr. Traina does not properly define his terms when he makes a distinction between the concrete details of a parable and the spiritual main point of the parable.  What is a "spiritual truth"?  Dr. Traina never defines this term for us; and worse, his definition of Scripture is that Scripture is a two fold revelation of truth.   Also, he thinks that scholarly articles are necessary to interpret the text.  This is only true in a secondary sense because the Protestant principle of interpretation is that Scripture alone is the Word of God (2 Timothy 3:16).  Scripture interprets Scripture first and any difficult passage of Scripture is to be interpreted by other more plain Scriptures.  This second point is what is generally called by Reformed scholars the perspicuity of Scripture.

To show what I am talking about I will quote the lengthy passage from Dr. Traina's book on pages 148 to 149:

(4) Connotations of General Literary Forms

Some of the intepretative implications of general literary forms were indicated in their previous treatment.  The purpose of the discussion at this juncture is to supply one or two illustrations which will clarify some of the means by which the utilization of literary forms will have a serious bearing on exegesis, and to suggest articles and books which may be read in order to broaden the reader's understanding of their exegetical importance.

Let us consider, for example, one of the factors involved in the interpretative significance of the parabolic form.  As was indicated previously, the parable is based on an analogy between the physical narrative and a spiritual truth.  Now such an analogy does not imply that the spiritual truth and the physical illustration are absolutely identical, since spiritual and physical truth are on two different planes and can never be equated.  Nor need they be, for all that is demanded of an analogy is similarity at certain points.  In fact, it is safe to limit the place of intersection between the spiritual truth and the physical illustration to one main point.

If this analysis is true, one of the factors involved in the exegetical significance of the parabolic form become abundantly clear.  The physical aspects of the parable should never be pressed in all its particulars in order to discover its meaning.  For the parable may be likened to a husk containing a kernel.  The husk must be removed until the kernel alone remains, because it is for the sake of the kernel that the husk exists.  The kernel may be compared with the one, main spiritual truth for which the parable is given.  When this kernel is discovered, the physical aspect, like the husk, may be set aside.  For to treat the physical factor of the parable as identical with the spiritual truth it carries, and consequently to find spiritual meaning in every of the narrative, is to misuse the parabolic form."

Robert A. Traina.  Methodical Bible Study.  1952.  1980.  Reprint.  (Grand Rapids:  Francis Asbury/Zondervan, 1985).  Pp. 148-149.

Dr. Gordon H. Clark, on the other hand, defined his terms carefully.  He said that behind every metaphor, simile, and parable there is a logical proposition.  The term "spiritual truth" is vague and not carefully defined.  A logical proposition is a logical statement that is composed of a subject and a predicate joined by a copula.  Dr. Clark's example of this is, "David was the king of Israel."  Even a basic English grammar student can see what this means because the grammar of a sentence and a logical statement are exactly identical in this case.  Parables are therefore not a contradiction to the principle of propositional revelation when we say that all knowledge is propositional.  The distinction between literal and symbolic or literal and analogical is therefore misleading.

However, to say that we can set aside the parable once we know the "spiritual truth" is dangerous.  The parable stands as God's written word and the meaning of the parable cannot be understood apart from the symbolic statements that lead us to the propositional statement behind the parable.  Dr. Traina's statement that the parable is just a husk while the truth within is the kernel and that we can dispose of the husk is nothing more than neo-orthodoxy.  All Scripture is inspired by God and all Scripture is profitable for doctrine.  (2 Timothy 3:16; Matthew 4:4; John 10:35).  Scripture stands as a totality, a systematic whole and no parts of the Scriptures may be discarded as husks just because we think we have arrived at the proper interpretation of the text.

According to Roger Johnson, Bultmann "rejected every effort to identify keryma with any past confession of faith."  (Roger Johnson, "The Relation Between Theology and Proclamation," in Rudolf Bultmann:  Interpreting Faith for the Modern Era, (San Francisco:  Collins, 1987), p. 235).  Bultmann completely rejected not only dogmatics and systematic theology but also propositional revelation.  This means that systematic organization of basic Christian doctrines into creeds or extended confessional statements is impossible.  For Bultmann truth is an existential encounter between an individual person and what that person perceives God is saying to him through direct encounter:

Bultmann's consistent focus on the New Testament kerygma as the locus of faith suggested to some a very specific and limited formulation of that kerygma, as if it could be defined in terms of certain core New Testament beliefs:  e.g., the confession that Jesus is Lord, that God has raised up this Jesus who was crucified, etc.  Bultmann, however, rejected every effort to identify the kerygma with any particular past confession of faith.  Since the keryma is nothing else than God's word of address to a particular person, no formulation of it can ever be regarded as complete.  It will always find expression in new forms of speech appropriate to the concrete situation of the person addressed.   (Roger Johnson, Ibid.).

Bultmann in his own words rejects the doctrine of dogmatic theology and propositional truth or any idea that theology or biblical theology can be systematized into a summary of biblical doctrine:

The science called New Testament theology has the task of setting forth the theology of the New Testament; i.e. of setting forth the theological thoughts of the New Testament writings, both those that are explicitly developed (such as Paul's teaching on the Law, for example) and those that are implicitly at work in narrative exhortation, in polemic or consolation.  The question may be raised whether it is more appropriate to treat the theological thoughts of the New Testament writings as a systematically ordered unity--a New Testament system of dogmatics, so to say--or treat them in their variety, each writing or group of writings by itself, in which case the individual writings can be understood as members of an historical continuity.

The second procedure is the one chosen in the treatment here offered.  By this choice the opinion is expressed that there can be no normative Christian dogmatics, in other words, that it is not possible to accomplish the theological task once for all--the task which consists of unfolding that understanding of God, and hence of the world and man, which arises from faith, for this task permits only ever-repeated solutions, or attempts at solution, each in its particular historical situation.  Theology's continuity through the centuries consists not in holding fast to once formulated propositions but in the constant vitality with which faith, fed by its origin, understandingly masters its constantly new historical situation.  It is of decisive importance that the theological thoughts be conceived and explicated as thoughts of faith, that is: as thoughts in which faith's understanding of God, the world, and man is unfolding itself--not as products of free speculation or of a scientific mastering of the problems involved in "God", "the world", and "man" carried out by the objectifying kind of thinking.

Theological propositions--even those of the New Testament--can never be the object of faith; they can only be the explication of the understanding which is inherent in faith itself.  Being such explication, they are determined by the believer's situation and hence are necessarily incomplete. . . .  

Rudolf Bultmann, quoted in "The Relation Between Theology and Proclamation," Rudolf Bultmann:  Interpreting Faith for the Modern Era.  (San Francisco:  Collins, 1987).  Pp. 235-236.

The similarities between the Wesleyan rejection of plenary verbal inspiration and their affirmation of the theological concepts only should be apparent.  Bultmann calls the thoughts of the New Testament the kerygma but he rejects any attempt to systematize the doctrines of the Bible into creeds or confessions.  Although the Wesleyans do not go that far, it should be noted that John Wesley never wrote a systematic theology.  His 52 standard sermons serve as the only systematic theology Wesley ever produced.  Unfortunately, modern Evangelical Wesleyans have used this as an excuse to dismiss the systematic theology of the Reformed scholars as overly scholastic.  This same tendency to endorse both higher and lower biblical criticism and to reject propositional revelation and confessional dogmatics and systematics has infiltrated not only the Wesleyan seminaries but by and large the majority of the Reformed and Evangelical seminaries due to the influence of Cornelius Van Til, who largely agreed with the neo-orthodoxy of G. C. Berkouwer.  Van Til most famously said that all Scripture is apparently contradictory:

Now since God is not fully comprehensible to us we are bound to come into what seems to be contradiction in all our knowledge. Our knowledge is analogical and therefore must be paradoxical. -Van Til, The Defense of the Faith, 61.


… while we shun as poison the idea of the really contradictory we embrace with passion the idea of the apparently contradictory. Van Til, Common Grace and the Gospel, 9.


All teaching of Scripture is apparently contradictory.  Ibid., 142.  (Quoted and cited by Patrick McWilliams, Cornelius Van Til vs. Zacharias Ursinus).

Dr. Traina at least acknowledges that inductive Bible study must have some connection to the overall structure of the book being studied and to the Bible as a whole:

. . . It may truly be said that the context of each term of a book is the book itself.


The purpose of emphasizing the complexity of contextual relations and their interpretative significance is to encourage the reader to be constantly on his guard lest he forget to utilize some important structural connections in the process of exposition.  For such an oversight will eventuate either in erroneous interpretation or at least incomplete interpretation.  In fact, it was because of this that the suggestion was made that an entire passage be observed before a serious attempt be made to interpret any of its parts.  It might even be added that the exegesis of each unit within a given book should remain tentative until the entire book is studied in order to give full consideration to the broader structural relations, which are frequently so important for proper exposition.  Traina, Ibid., pp. 145-146.

I will not quote Dr. Gordon H. Clark here because I have already quoted at length both Bultmann and Dr. Traina.  But suffice it to say that Dr. Clark believed that the Bible consists of propositional revelation that is univocally the very words of God.  These propositions in isolation would be meaningless apart from their systematic organization into a system of epistemological truth.  Verses of the Bible are not isolated aggregates that stand alone.   They appear in the total context of the pericope, chapter, book, and the whole Bible.  The old arguments between biblical theology, which is allegedly focused on inductive Bible study, and systematic theology is pertinent here because systematic theology is not merely proof texting out of context.  In fact, the proper exegesis of the proof texts is based on inductive study of the Bible and how all the parts fit together not only in a structural analysis of the biblical texts but also how all those parts fit together into a systematic summary of the doctrinal statements of the Bible.  Dr. Clark rejected the neo-orthodox distinction between kerygma and Scripture (Is There a Distinction Between Church Doctrine and Kerygma?, and  The Gospel Includes the Five Points of Calvinism), yet he supported proof texting as a legitimate method of supporting systematics and dogmatics.  Every scholar of Aristotle and Shakespeare proof texts those writers to show what their views were.  So why should Reformed Christians be prevented from proof texting?

The neo-orthodox attack on propositional revelation is prominent not only in Arminian seminaries but in practically every so-called Reformed seminary in the nation today.  Evangelicalism is infected with relativism and situational ethics and morality because it has as a movement rejected the dogmatic and systematic interpretation of Scripture as the univocal revelation of God in the very words of God.  Unless and until there is a return to classical Reformation theology and the doctrine of propositional and systematic revelation, the slide into apostasy will continue in Evangelicalism and in the so-called Reformed denominations.  While Asbury and other seminaries put on a show of their commitments to conservative theology and traditional Evangelicalism, the truth is that they equivocate significantly on the definitions of these terms.  Ken Schenck's article on biblical inerrancy cited above is just one example of that.  My own understanding of what Asbury stands for is that Asbury has long ago rejected the authority of Scripture and instead teaches neo-orthodox views of Scripture, including rejecting Genesis 1-11 as inspired myth rather than propositional revelation.  Reformed seminaries are now just as enamored with higher and lower biblical criticism as any openly liberal seminaries these days.

Charlie J. Ray, M. Div.

Is There a Distinction Between Church Doctrine and Kerygma?

Dr. Gordon H. Clark was asked a question following his lecture on Predestination in the Old Testament.  If you click on the link and then go to the 1:3:43 to 1:5:15 mark or so you can hear Dr. Clark's response to a question about how many propositions do we need to know from the Scriptures?  I will try to transcribe the question and answer here and you can also  click on the link to verify that this is what Dr. Clark said:

Dr. Clark:  Now then here are two questions.  Yes, oh, here comes some more.  Uh, what propositions do you try to get across when you present or preach the Gospel?  Well, first of all, I would say that the whole Bible is the Gospel, not just a little part of it.  And, uh, I do not like to reduce its scope and center only on, uh, some pet subject.  I do, however, recognize that there are things that must be emphasized more than others and that's what I said just a moment ago--that the, uh, the doctrine of the propitiatory sacrifice or the satisfaction view of the atonement is one thing I most certainly try to get across.  But, uh, I also try to follow Paul's, uh, advice to preach the whole counsel of God in order not to be guilty of the blood of men.  I think we must preach the whole counsel and this distinction between kerygma and, uh, church doctrine--as the neo-orthodox put it--I have no sympathy for that.

You can see the entire list of available mp3 sermons and lectures of Dr. Clark at the Trinity Foundation site.  Click here.

Who Is Your Higher Power?

. . . If conscience were entirely isolated from the deity and were independent of him, it could not make the solemn and sometimes terrible impression it does. No man would be afraid of himself if the self were not connected with a higher being than self. Of the judgments of conscience, it may be said literally that God reveals his own holy judgment through them. “Whence comes the restraint of conscience?” asks Selden (Table Talk); “from a higher power; nothing else can bind. I cannot bind myself, for I may untie myself again; an equal cannot bind me, for we may untie one another. It must be a superior power, even God Almighty.”

Shedd, William G. (2011-07-19). Dogmatic Theology (Kindle Locations 2495-2500). P&R Publishing. Kindle Edition.

Gordon H. Clark Quote of the Day: The System of Doctrine Cannot Be Reduced to Five Spiritual Laws

Evangelism is the exposition of the Scripture. God will do the regenerating.  -- Gordon H. Clark

It is impossible to teach the system of doctrine in five minutes, or to reduce it to five spiritual laws, recently discovered by psychology. The Christian message is the whole Bible; it is the whole counsel of God. All of it must be taught, not just a small part, for it is all profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. It is by taking heed thereto that a young man may cleanse his way. Evangelism is the exposition of the Scripture. God will do the regenerating.

Gordon H. Clark (2013-03-04T05:00:00+00:00). What Is The Christian Life? (Kindle Locations 3802-3807). The Trinity Foundation. Kindle Edition.

Westminster Larger Catechism: Question 3

Question 3

What is the word of God?

The holy scriptures of the Old and New Testament are the word of God, (2 Tim. 3:16, 2 Pet. 1:19–21) the only rule of faith and obedience. (Eph. 2:20, Rev. 22:18–19, Isa. 8 :20, Luke 16:29,31, Gal. 1:8–9, 2 Tim. 3:15–16)


The Westminster Larger Catechism: With Scripture Proofs. (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1996).

The catechumen should note that the Old Testament scriptures are said to be the word of God along with the New Testament.  That would contradict the modern Marcionites and Dispensationalists who reject the OT.

And while I'm making this short commentary, it should be pointed out that the purpose of a "catechism" is to instruct new converts in the doctrines of the Christian faith.  That presupposes that they are also expressing a desire to become communicant members of a local congregation.  On this score there are no orthodox Presbyterian denominations who follow this worthy practice.  That would mean that even "conservative" Reformed denominations like the Presbyterian Church in America, the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, the United Reformed Churches of North America, the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, and others are in effect rejecting the long standing Reformed practice of requiring new church members to memorize or at least review and learn the Larger Catechism.  

Pastor Brian McWilliams of Covenant Presbyterian Church (PCA), recently commented that the Shorter Catechism was intended for children.  If so, then that would imply that adults who wished to become communicant members of a local body of Reformed believers would have been required to learn and agree with the Larger Catechism.  The Larger Catechism was not meant just for ministers to learn.  It was intended to be used as a source for instruction and for a supplement to expository preaching.  The idea that the Larger or Shorter Catechism could not be a topic for preaching is therefore wrong.  The Dutch Reformed churches had an afternoon sermon dedicated just to the Heidelberg Catechism, while the morning sermon was an expository sermon from the text.

This debate goes back to the alleged conflict between biblical theology and systematic theology.  If the principle of Sola Scriptura is to be followed, the implication is that Scripture interprets Scripture.  Therefore, the Bible as a whole stands both in its inductive sources in the details and in the synthetic systematizing of the propositional doctrines of the Bible.  The purpose of the Reformed standards such as the Westminster Standards, the Three Forms of Unity, and the Anglican Formularies is to set out a systematic theology of the overall teaching of the scriptures.  Those who reject systematic theology are therefore opposing confessionalism.  That is not to say that expository preaching is to be rejected but rather that expository preaching must not contradict systematic theology, particularly as it is laid out in the confessional system of doctrine.  A single proposition taken out of a systematic context of the many essential propositions of Scripture becomes a heresy.

Furthermore, as worthy as expository preaching is, it should be pointed out that very few ministers follow the actual practice.  Many who claim to be preaching an expository series of sermons through a book of the Bible will skip over one or two verses along the way with no commentary on the verses whatsoever.  This process of selectively expositing a text renders the expository preaching more in line with a succession of textual sermons rather than genuine inductive study and preaching of an entire book of the Bible.  In other words, a genuinely expository study of a book of the Bible might take a year or two to complete.  When certain pericopes of a book are preached rather than the entire book then what you have is not expository preaching but a series of textual sermons based on an expurgated or selective text.

Charles Hodge Rebukes Mike Horton On Inspiration

[See also review of The Christian Faith, Part One].

Although Mike Horton exalts the "metanarrative" above the propositional truth claims of Holy Scripture and rejects the doctrine of plenary verbal inspiration indirectly, [Horton says that those who interpret Scripture as basically systematic expositions of propositional truth and that those who do so advocate both univocal knowledge and inspiration as mechanical dictation] the fact is that the classical reformed view is that what the Bible says God says:

On this subject the common doctrine of the Church is, and ever has been, that inspiration was an influence of the Holy Spirit on the minds of certain select men, which rendered them the organs of God for the infallible communication of his mind and will. They were in such a sense the organs of God, that what they said God said. 

Hodge, Charles (2011-10-20). Systematic Theology (With Active Table of Contents) (Kindle Locations 3449-3454). Kindle Edition.

According to this definition Horton must accuse Hodge of advocating the mechanical dictation view along with Gordon H. Clark and Carl F. H. Henry, those darned "fundamentalists!"

Furthermore, Hodge says that "knowledge" is what is communicated in revelation--NOT metanarratives, stories, dramatic recounting of salvation history, sagas, or "factual" myths!

    C. Distinction between Revelation and Inspiration.    Second. The above definition assumes a difference between revelation and inspiration. They differ, first, as to their object. The object of revelation is the communication of knowledge. The object or design of inspiration is to secure infallibility in teaching. Consequently they differ, secondly, in their effects. The effect of revelation was to render its recipient wiser. The effect of inspiration was to preserve him from error in teaching. These two gifts were often enjoyed by the same person at the same time. That is, the Spirit often imparted knowledge, and controlled [it] in its communication orally or in writing to others. This was no doubt the case with the Psalmists, and often with the Prophets and Apostles. Often, however, the revelations were made at one time, and were subsequently, under the guidance of the Spirit, committed to writing. Thus the Apostle Paul tells us that he received his knowledge of the gospel not from man, but by revelation from Jesus Christ; and this knowledge he communicated from time to time in his discourses and epistles.

Hodge, Charles (2011-10-20). Systematic Theology (With Active Table of Contents) (Kindle Locations 3468-3477). Kindle Edition.

Unfortunately, Hodge opens a door that should not be opened when he distinguishes between direct revelation from God and the inspired historical narratives which were also recorded in Scripture.  Although  Hodge is correct to make this distinction, he is wrong not to identify the whole body of the Scriptures as divine revelation.  He implies by this distinction that the Bible is inspired but only parts of the Bible are divine revelation.  The whole Bible is a revelation from God and is completely inspired or "breathed out by God."  

Moreover, everything we know about the history of Israel that is binding  upon us in regards to Christian doctrine and propositional truth is recorded in the inspired and inerrant Bible.  Hodge's view implies that some sections of Scripture are more important than others because one part conveys direct revelation from God in the form of knowledge and another merely conveys historical facts.  What Hodge overlooks is that historical facts are knowledge as well and this knowledge has profound impact on the doctrines of grace.  Hodge does, however, acknowledge that inspiration is for "teaching."

Futhermore, the proposition that "David was the king of Israel" is a propositional truth claim and it is an historical fact as well.  These historical events are given propositional meaning even when they are not given by direct revelation and are incorporated into the text from uninspired sources by the inspired writer.  Even quotes from pagan poets, philosophers and apocryphal books take on the nature of revelation as they are quoted for specific propositional and theological points by the inspired writers.  That would include places where Paul quotes pagan poets for a particular theological point (Acts 17:28) and where Jude quotes an apocryphal book, namely Enoch, in support of his theological point in the inspired text (Jude 1:14, 15).

To suggest, as Horton does, that these quotes are not inspired even when propositionally interpreted by the human authors and therefore not God's divine revelation is to create a canon within the canon:

Ascribing inspiration to Luke's acccount of Paul's speech in Athens in no way entails that the writings of pagan philosopher Epimenides or poet Aratus (the latter, in a hymn to Zeus) were inspired, even though Paul quoted them in Acts 17:28.  Nor does it mean that their words were inspired, but only that Paul's interpretation--his use of their words--shared in this inspired speech.  Whatever these speakers intended, God's intention was to use these lines in the script of his unfolding drama, although these pagan sources are not treated as normative.  Therefore, it is impossible to treat every word as normative, much less as the direct utterance of God.  Yet the Bible as a whole is God's inspired script for the drama of redemption.  Michael Horton.  The Christian Faith.  (Grand Rapids:  Zondervon, 2011), p. 162.

Any idea that some parts of Scripture are more inspired than other parts or that some conceptual knowledge in the Bible is more revelatory than other parts is to create a false distinction and an unnecessary one since Scripture interprets Scripture.  God's written words are logically consistent and God never contradicts Himself.  The axiom of the Apostle Paul stands firm here:  "All Scripture is inspired of God."  (2 Timothy 3:16).  No one denies that the sources, from which these quotes are drawn, are not inspired.  The issue here is that the quotes occur within the inspired Scriptures and therefore, even though the words are drawn from extrabiblical sources, the inspired record is infallible; therefore, in that sense every word in Scripture is an infallible record of what God intended for us to know.  Even natural revelation given to pagan poets is inspired of God when it is included in the verbally and plenarily inspired Scriptures and when such quotes are given propositional interpretation.  As Paul said, "All Scripture is inspired of God."  The proposition that "we live and move and have our being" because of God's sovereignty is certainly a true proposition, even when it is said by someone who is not an apostle or prophet (Acts 17:28).

Of considerable concern is Horton's animosity to Scripturalism and propositional truth, especially in regards to Gordon H. Clark. Alarmingly, Horton's biases cause him to endorse Donald Bloesch's neo-evangelical barthian theology.  In fairness to Horton, he does occasionally contradict himself and his emphasis on story and drama at certain points.  Although he fails to see the relative affinity between his own view and that of Bloesch, Horton does seem to uphold propositional truth when it suits his purposes:

There have been valiant attempts to reconcile Barth's doctrine of Scripture with the church's traditional view, among which that of Donald Bloesh is especially notable.  (104)  He allows that Barth's formulation too sharply separated the Word from the words, yet argues that "in his emphasis on the revealing work of the Spirit [Barth] is closer to the intention of the Reformers than is modern fundamentalism in this regard." (105)  Bloesch realizes that Protestant orthodoxy "sought to maintain a tendency to deny its human aspect.  (106)  He correctly observes the correlation between fundamentalism's mechanical view and belief in "the univocal language of Scripture concerning God, which contravenes the position of most theological luminaries of the past who held that human knowledge concerning God is either metaphorical or at the most analogical." (107)

Nevertheless, Bloesch repeats the prevalent caricature of Warfield's position when he suggests that the latter "is reluctant and often unwilling to affirm" the humanity of Scripture, including its "marks of historical conditioning." (108)  More problematic is Bloesch's own attempt at reconciliation.  On one hand, he writes, "Revelation includes both the events of divine self-disclosure in biblical history and their prophetic and apostolic interpretation."  On the other hand, he adds, "At the same time we must not infer that the propositional statements in the Bible are themselves revealed, since this makes the Bible the same kind of book as the Koran, which purports to be exclusively divine." (109)  It is unclear to me how the inclusion of propositions among other speech acts as part of revelation necessarily entails an "exclusively divine" dictation, as Islam considers the Qur'an to be.  How can we maintain coherently that Scripture is inspired--including "prophetic and apostolic interpretation" of divine acts--if we exclude propositional statements?  If Scripture cannot be reduced to propositions, it is just as arbitrary to exclude such statements.  (Horton, pp. 183-184).

Unfortunately, Horton cannot resist the temptation to throw in that last self-contradictory slam that propositional truths are not the focus of Scripture because that would "reduce" Scripture to propositions.  What is arbitrary is Horton's vacillation between propositional truth and the metanarratives of postmodernism.  Horton has clearly been influenced by neo-orthodoxy and by higher critical views of Scripture.

Charlie

The Gordon H. Clark and Cornelius Van Til Controversy Rages On: Mike Horton's Systematic Theology: Part Four

Michael Horton. The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims On the Way. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011). 1,051 pages.

It had never occurred to me the depth and breadth of the theological and doctrinal differences between the proponents of Gordon H. Clark's theology of Scripturalism and the proponents of Cornelius Van Til's theology of analogical knowledge.  Mike Horton's recent systematic theology draws these lines even more sharply. (See The Christian Faith: Part One, Part Two, Part Three). Horton's systematic theology in fact downplays traditional Reformed and Protestant theology in favor of an eclectic approach that tries to incorporate postmodernist theology into Evangelical theology. 

The reason for this is that Horton does not really believe in propositional truth anymore.  He definitely gives lip service to this doctrine but when the rubber meets the road, Horton cannot help trying to be all things to all men rather than simply holding the line against liberalism.  The reason for this is that Van Til's theology of analogy is essentially a mediating position between neo-orthodoxy and the traditional and classical Protestant view that Scripture is the very words of God, words breathed out by God himself through human agency.  (Listen carefully to Gordon H. Clark's lecture, Biblical Inerrancy).  Unfortunately once this position is taken the slippery slope leads directly to neo-orthodoxy.  Most Evangelicals today are completely unaware of the degree to which they have imbibed a neo-orthodox theology of Scripture.  After all, Scripture is the "dead letter" and we should worship the author of the book and not the book itself.  Christianity is more about a relationship with Jesus Christ than doctrinal precision or theological propositions, right?


Perhaps an interpolation of my own theological education and autobiographical "testimony" would be pertinent here?  I realize that anecdotal testimony is not necessarily true since personal experience is subjective.  On the other hand, Gordon H. Clark has correctly pointed out that salvation and sanctification depends on knowledge of Scripture.  The axiom that Scripture is the Word of God is applicable here. 

My theological education began in early age.  I was not raised in a Christian home.  But I did receive a Gideon's New Testament at school every year beginning with the first grade in Weaver, Alabama around 1965.  I read with interest the King James Version of the Scriptures.  Scripture has a way of piercing through the hardened heart and "piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit . . . and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart."  (Hebrews 4:12 KJV).  At that time there was still the practice of reciting the Lord's prayer, which was taken from the 1662 Book of Common Prayer in retrospection.   I was then motivated to read the entire Bible in the King James Version.  I read widely up to the age of eight.  I did not yet understand the trinity or the incarnation.  But as a child I did understand that God could do anything He wanted to do.  God by definition is sovereign.  Perhaps the concept of free moral agency did not occur to me; however, even as a child I understood that the Bible taught that God could and did cut men off in their sins--thus preventing their further propagation of even more evil acts.  That is, God is absolutely sovereign over even the "free acts" of men.  So when modernists and Arminians protest against this doctrine I have to say that even a child can understand this simple proposition, "God is absolutely sovereign."  (Isaiah 45:18; 2 Timothy 3:15).

Even more to the point, later in life when I felt a call to become a Christian, my first choice was a Pentecostal church.  The reason for this was that I did not yet understand the distinction between Calvinist and Arminian theology.  My basic assumption was that since God is sovereign then God must be able to do supernatural miracles today.  The sovereignty of God extends to every area of life, including transcending the natural world through divine intervention.  Unfortunately I would discover that Pentecostals do not really believe in the sovereignty of God over the natural realm at all.  Rather they believe in the sovereignty of man to do miracles by exercising their own faith, a faith which they work up from within themselves.  I would discover that the real roots of Pentecostalism were not connected to the doctrine of God's omnipotence and supernatural intervention but that the roots were connected to a combination of Arminian synergism and aberrant Christian Science and New Thought theology syncretized with Wesleyan holiness/entire sanctification.  Basically the Pentecostal/Charismatic movement is nothing more than a hodge podge and ad hoc collection of ecstatic mysticism, existential encounter, gnosticism, the New Age theology of Ralph Waldo Emerson, and whatever modern liberal theology as happens to agree with the Pentecostal theology of the moment.  Evangelical pietism is basically an anti-intellectual movement that empties the Protestant Reformation of all rational and logical content.

While Mike Horton claims to be opposed to pelagianism and "Christless Christianity", in the end he cannot bring himself to total separation from such heresy.  Instead Horton's theology makes it possible to reconcile totally contradictory theological traditions such as Arminianism and Calvinism.  This becomes possible because according to him we only know anything at all by analogical theology, not by univocal theology in the revelation in Scripture.  Every section of Horton's systematic theology continually repeats his attack against propositional truth claims and the doctrine of verbal/plenary inspiration and biblical inerrancy.  Although he does not name them explicitly, the implied accusation is that Horton even goes so far as to falsely accuse Gordon H. Clark and Carl F. H. Henry of teaching the mechanical dictation theory of inspiration:

When evaluating the relationship of God's activity and that of the creatures in the production of Scripture, the doctrine of analogy already proves its merits.  If agency is univocal (the same thing) for God and for creatures, then the question is raised:  Who acts more?  Is God the author of Romans or is Paul?  However, if agency is analogical, then God's activity in producing these texts is qualitatively different from human agency.  In this way it may be seen that the role of human authors in producing the Scriptures is entirely their own activity and entirely God's.  For example, Joseph could attribute the same act (his brother's treachery) to different agents with different intentions:  "As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today" (Genesis 50:20).  Scripture includes false utterances (namely, in the speeches of Job's friends, the psalmist's acknowledged misunderstandings of God and his ways--and those misunderstandings of the disciples in the Gospels--as well as the statements of pagan rulers and even Satan).  Ascribing inspiration to Luke's account of Paul's speech in Athens in no way entails that the writings of pagan philosopher Epimenides or poet Aratus (the latter, in a hymn to Zeus) were inspired, even though Paul quoted them in Acts 17:28.  Nor does it mean that their words were inspired, but only that Paul's interpretation--his use of their words--shared in this inspired speech.  Whatever these speakers intended, God's intentions was to use these lines in the script of his unfolding drama, although these pagan sources are not treated as normative.  Therefore, it is impossible to treat every word as normative, much less as the direct utterance of God.  Yet the Bible as a whole is God's inspired script for the drama of redemption.

In its treatment of creation as well as inspiration, fundamentalism tends to collapse God's indirect speech act, "'Let the earth sprout . . .'" into God's direct fiat, "'Let there be' . . . ."  To the extent that the Bible is the Word of God, on this view, human mediation must be diminished or even denied.  In this sense, fundamentalism shares with liberalism a univocal view of divine and human agency, leading the former to undervalue the Bible's humanity, while the latter interprets the obvious signs of the Bible's humanity as evidence of a merely natural process.

In contrast to mechanical inspiration, evangelical theology embraces a theory of organic inspiration. (18)  That is, God sanctifies the natural gifts, personalities, histories, languages, and cultural inheritance of the biblical writers.  These are not blemishes on or obstacles to divine inspiration but the very means that God employs for accommodating his revelation to our creaturely capacity.  The christological analogy reminds us that the Word became flesh.  The incarnation itself was a fiat declaration of the "'Let there be . . .'" variety.  Nevertheless, the Son's gestation and birth were part of a natural (Let the earth sprout . . .'") process.  Even his physical, intellectual, and spiritual maturation were gradual gains through ordinary means:  "And the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom" (Luke 2:40).  His humanity was not charged with superhuman abilities but was like ours in all respects except for sin (Hebrews 4:15).  "Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered" (Hebrews 5:8).  If God can assume our full humanity without sin, then he can speak through the fully human words of prophets and apostles without error.  As Herman Bavinck expressed this point, "Like Christ, [Scripture] considers nothing that is human strange." (19)  (Horton, pp. 162-163).

 This lengthy quote was necessary to show Horton's lack of precision in dealing with the doctrine of inspiration in general and in his false dilemma between univocal/propositional truth and analogical/dramatic truth told in stories.  First of all, he says,

If agency is univocal (the same thing) for God and for creatures, then the question is raised:  Who acts more?  Is God the author of Romans or is Paul?  However, if agency is analogical, then God's activity in producing these texts is qualitatively different from human agency (p. 162).

Anyone familiar with basic logic can tell that having a univocal theology of inspiration does not entail that two agents are the same agent.  Nor does it logically follow that because agency is a univocal concept for both man and God that this means that God and man are acting together in the same agency.  Not at all.  God is absolutely sovereign over human agency.  Horton's view implies synergism, not monergism.  Human agency is at God's disposal and not vice versa.  To ask who acts more betrays the semi-Arminian presuppositions of the Van Tilian position.  Analogy is a convenient excuse for Arminianism apparently.  Simply because humans are "free moral agents" does not mean that God is not sovereign over them.  So if the Arminian asks the question, "Who acts more?" the answer is obviously that God controls even human agency!  How does God do this?  The Westminster Confession says that God does so without violating the will of man:

Chapter 3: Of God's Eternal Decree

1. God, from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass:1 yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin,2 nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures; nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.3

See also: WLC 12 | WSC 7  (3. Cf.  Acts 2:23; 4:27, 28; Matthew 17:12; John 19:11; Proverbs 16:33).

 The Reformed confession answers Horton's hypothetical question with the proposition that God is sovereign over even human agency.  Any Reformed theologian who has no equivocal agenda could easily say this without any contradiction whatsoever.  But Horton's agenda is to mediate between mutually contradictory positions.  While the doctrine of plenary verbal inspiration does not necessarily imply mechanical dictation, as Horton rightly points out (see footnote 18, p. 163), the doctrine of plenary verbal inspiration positively asserts that it is the words of Scripture that are fully inspired.  Unfortunately, Horton contradicts this by saying that the concepts, the drama, or the story as a whole is inspired and not every single word and proposition of Scripture.  Even where the words of a pagan philosopher are recorded in the inspired text this accurate record of what that philosopher said is fully inerrant in regards to the record and in regards to the meaning given to those quotes by way of the propositional assertion made by the biblical writer.  Horton, on the other hand, implies that not all Scripture is inspired of God.  Only those portions of Scripture that are positive assertions of doctrine are true for Horton.  But that is not the traditional doctrine of plenary verbal inspiration.


The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy expresses the consensus on this:

Articles of Affirmation and Denial

 Article VI.

     We affirm that the whole of Scripture and all its parts, down to the very words of the original, were given by divine inspiration.
     We deny that the inspiration of Scripture can rightly be affirmed of the whole without the parts, or of some parts but not the whole.

Ironically, Gordon Clark and Carl Henry both denied mechanical dictation and affirmed the organic view.  While Horton does not name them in this section, his reference to univocal agency and inspiration strongly implies that they are also advocates of this view.  For Horton any view that tries to promote propositional truth is lumped together with liberalism, open theism, and other errors (pp. 238, 254).  Nothing could be further from the truth.  Gordon Clark's view follows the axiom that Scripture is the Word of God while for Horton God is hidden in what He reveals since at no single point does Scripture univocally converge or coincide with absolute truth, which Horton believes only God can know.  Sound familiar?  Yes, it does.  It's called neo-orthodoxy.  The theology of paradox.

Postmodernism Trumps Creation: Girl Scouts troops disband after chapter says it will allow transgendered 7-year-old - New York Daily News

Leaders of three troops of Girl Scouts quit their posts and disbanded the troops after the organization’s Colorado chapter said it would allow a transgendered 7-year-old to join.
The troop leaders, all affiliated with a Christian school in Louisiana, resigned in protest of the Colorado chapter’s decision to allow participation from any child who identifies as a girl, The Christian Post reported.

Controversy erupted when Felisha Archuleta tried to enroll her son, Bobby Montoya, who identifies as a girl, in a Girl Scouts troop in Denver.  Click here to read the story:  Troops Disband

Is it a surprise to anyone who is a Bible believing Christian that modern man thinks everything is optional, including a person's biological and physical body?  The post-Enlightenment rebellion against reason has reached a new low where nothing is certain, not even one's gender.  Gender, like reality, is merely an illusion of the mind to be changed at will or molded like a ball of wax.  After all, it is feelings that really matter, not facts.

It is this same sort of thinking that guides modern theology, which essentially denies that special revelation can exist except in subjective analogies and relativistic "factual" myths.  Michael Horton's new systematic theology is proof enough of that.  For Horton the Bible is not doctrinal or propositional unless it happens to be convenient for whatever point he wants to make.  Not even the Reformed confessions are about propositional truth for Horton.  Rather it's all an inspiring drama where the believer "feels" God analogically, though nothing univocally true exists.  Truth is ultimately relative and the God who reveals Himself remains hidden.  (See Part One:  Review of The Christian Faith.  See addendum below).

Carried over into the main culture not even science can determine what is obvious to the rest of us.  A baby born with certain biological and physical characteristics, including chromosomes, is not the test of gender.  Rather gender is simply a matter of psychological predetermination.  Or is it?  Now, it would seem, gender is more a matter of choice on the part of a person rather than a matter of God's established creation.  In the beginning God created Adam and Eve as male and female, husband and wife (Genesis 1:1, 26, 27; 2:7, 20-25; 5:1; Matthew 19:4; Mark 10:6)  What we see being pushed as the politically correct propaganda of the day is that individual liberty trumps biblical truth, special revelation and even natural revelation.  Even empirical science must bow to the idol of psychological "feelings" and "emotions" rather than objective truth.

Gordon H. Clark was prophetic when he said that science is only trustworthy in what it can produce practically.  Basically, empirical science is influenced by the subjective presuppositions of those who practice it.  Combine that with postmodernism and it is not hard to see why a postmodern culture defines reality via psychology and sociological presuppositions.  Empiricism, psychology, sociology and every other modern "science" basically sees what it has presupposed it wants to find.  This is why Clark began with Scripture as the ultimate basis for absolute truth in every other area of life.  With the special revelation of God in Holy Scripture all other "sciences" devolve into irrationalism--including Cornelius Van Til's theology of analogy.  Michael Horton's irrational tome, The Christian Faith is just more evidence that theology has become identical with existentialism and psychological feelings rather than propositional truth or absolute truth.  It's all relative.  Or is it?

The culture war is not over.  In fact, it has expanded.  The liberal left and the socialist agenda has taken the game to a new level.  Apparently the game plan is to divide and conquer, take no prisoners.  Sadly even so-called Christian churches, seminaries and leaders have sold out to this same agenda.  It seems to me that Mike Horton is more on the side of the enemy than defending the truth of Scripture, the law/gospel distinction, and propositional truth.


 Girl Scouts troops disband after chapter says it will allow transgendered 7-year-old  - New York Daily News

Addendum:  Horton reveals his prejudice in the postmodernism direction with statements that are explicitly Barthian:

As with all of the divine attributes, it is crucial to avoid two extremes, both of which presuppose a univocal rather than an analogical view of the relation in comparisons between God and human beings.  On one hand, the biblical testimony to a living history with a living God in a covenant with genuine interaction resists all Stoic and Platonic conceptions of a nonrelational and nonpersonal One.  In the unfolding drama there are suits and countersuits, witnesses and counterwitnesses, and God is presented as repenting, relenting, and responding to creatures.  On the other hand, we must always bear in mind that in revealing himself God hides himself.  God explicitly forbids univocal comparisons (Numbers 23:19; 1 Samuel 15:29; Isaiah 44:8, 9; 46:4; Hosea 11:9).   Michael Horton. The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims On the Way. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011), p. 240.

The idea that God "hides" himself even in special revelation comes from the theology of the neo-orthodox theologian, Karl Barth, and not from confessional and Reformed theology.  If there is no univocal truth but only analogies and comparisons that at no point coincide with God's words, thoughts, or absolute truth then the door is wide open to the sort of equivocation we see in the transgender movement.

Charlie

The Continuing Saga of Mike Horton's Systematic Theology: Part Three

For some time now it has been fashionable to deny what is called “propositional revelation”. The term has been coined by those who are opposed to the concept, and by it they appear to mean that revelation is not given to us by God in the form of truths couched in words, or propositions, but that all the revelation that God has given has come to us primarily as acts and events.  Dr. D. Broughton Knox.  (Propositional Revelation:  The Only Revelation).

The Continuing Saga of Mike Horton's Systematic Theology: Part Three

In the last installment I promised to examine Horton's theory of God's graces as His “acts” or “energies”. (See Part One, Part Two, Part Four). He draws this theory from Eastern Orthodoxy, which is itself semi-pelagian. In other words, Horton sees grace as God's “actions” rather than His gifts to us. Although it is true that God does effectually act, providentially guide every single event and human action, it is not true that God is simply what He does. God's predetermined plan or secret decrees matter as well. At this point Horton's presupposed dogma that we must not speak about God's inner being or secret decrees becomes obvious. For Horton God's absolute unknowability extends to propositional truth, special revelation, and any idea of a subjective appropriation of objective, propositional and doctrinal formulations of the truth. For Horton the Van Tilian mantra is stated many times over that God cannot reveal to the creature any univocal truth whatsoever and at no single point does God reveal anything to the creature that is absolutely true. Absolute truth in Horton's opinion is only possible for God in His archetypal knowledge and therefore all truth for the creature is ectypal and analogical. While it is true that the creature cannot intuitively or directly know God due to the Creator/creature distinction, it is questionable to assert that absolute truth is an incommunicable attribute of God. If so, then the implication is that God's written words, the Holy Scriptures, are in fact relative and subjective, not objective.

Unfortunately, this would imply that Scripture is not God's very words to man or God's very thoughts given to man on man's creaturely level. Moreover, this dispute goes all the way back to the Gordon H. Clark and Cornelius Van Til controversy in 1944. (See: The Complaint and The Answer). Horton continually spouts off the Van Tilian dogma of “at no single point” does God's Word coincide with God's univocally given Scriptures. For Horton Scripture is one big metaphor or analogy rather than being the fully inspired words of God given through human agency. This can be demonstrated in several quotes at different points in his book:

“We know God by his works, not in his hidden essence.”

We will return several times to this crucial distinction of Eastern theology between God's essence and energies. As I will argue more fully, Western theology—following Augustine and Aquinas—did not recognize this distinction and insisted that the only reason we do not behold Good in his essence at present is our bodily form. Although the East was as susceptible as the West to the influences of Platonism, its essence-energies distinction reckoned more fully with the Creator-creature difference and often guarded against the pantheistic tendencies evident in Western mysticism. (39)

In this respect, the Reformers reflect the East's emphasis on God's incomprehensibility (in his essence) and God's self-revealing condescension (in his energies). As we know the sun only as we are warmed by its rays, we know God only in his activity toward us, not as he is in himself. (40).

(Mike Horton, The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Christians On the Way, p. 52).

Here is another example of where Horton contradicts himself. He disparages Augustine and Aquinas as too western yet he affirms that the Van Tilian doctrine of analogy as he sees it is drawn from Aquinas:

Following Thomas Aquinas (1225-74), our older theologians therefore argued that human knowledge is analogical rather than either univocal or equivocal (two terms are related analogically when they are similar, univocally when they are identical, and equivocally when they have nothing in common). (45). (P. 54).

It becomes obvious that Horton is hopelessly self contradictory here. He states many times over his bias that God is only known through the big story, the narrative, the historical acts of God, and the “drama” as it unfolds:

A modern myth is that we outgrow stories. When someone asks us to explain who we are, we tell a story. Furthermore, we interpret our personal narratives as part of a larger plot. . . . The Christian answers these big questions by rehearsing the story of the triune God in creation, the fall of creatures he made in his own image, the promise of a redeemer through Israel, and the fulfillment of all types and shadows in the incarnation, life, death, resurrection, ascension, and return of Jesus Christ. The Apostles' and Nicene creeds are not just a list of key doctrines; they are a confession in the form of a story, our shared testimony to the most significant facts of reality. (P. 14).

. . .What we witness in our contemporary Western cultures is not so much a renunciation of metanarratives but the dominance of a new one. . . .

. . . . The Christian faith is, first and foremost, an unfolding drama. Geerhardus Vos observed, “The Bible is not a dogmatic handbook, but a historical book full of dramatic interest.” (8) This story that runs from Genesis to Revelation, centering on Christ, not only richly informs our minds; it captivates the heart and the imagination, animating and motivating our action in the world. (P. 19).

But according to Horton, God cannot reveal himself directly and univocally in words on the creaturely level since words are inherently subjective and “at no single point” does God reveal himself univocally—not even in special revelation:

At no point is goodness exactly the same for God as it is for Sally. The difference is qualitative, not just quantitative; yet there is enough similarity to communicate the point. (P. 55).

Thus, we need not accept the false choice between an encyclopedia of propositions that correspond univocally to God's mind and a merely human testimony to Christ that is related only equivocally to God's Word. (P. 182).

Therefore, creaturely knowledge will always be revealed, dependent, accommodated, ectypal, and analogical rather than coinciding with God's archetypal knowledge at any point. (P. 210).

Ironically, Horton cannot be consistent even here. He repeatedly falls back into appeals to propositional truths as a “direct identification” with God's Word even though he denies that Scripture is directly God's Word. For Horton God's Word is merely a subjective analogy. But in refuting Barth he cannot consistently affirm the Van Tilian theory of analogy:

. . . as we have seen, Barth tends to collapse inspiration into illumination in a single event of revelation in which God addresses an individual personally. The Scriptures are for Barth the normative Christian witness to revelation, but it is difficult to see how in his view the Bible could be more than first among equals—quantitatively but not qualitatively distinct from the church's interpretation. So, in spite of his noble labors to place the church back under the norm of Scripture (Deus dixit! [“God has said!”]), the ontological rationale for doing so remains questionable. Indeed, his refusal of any direct identification of God's Word with creaturely words of Scripture reflects the dualism of “Spirit” and “letter” that we discover in radical Anabaptist, pietist, and Enlightenment thinking. (P. 183).

Try as he might, Horton cannot pull off the magic trick he is attempting here. To assume a mediating position between neo-orthodoxy and conservative Reformed orthodoxy is in effect to concede the point to the liberals, modernists and the neo-orthodox. Basically, for Horton theology is always subjective and relative. This is why he must choose an eclectic approach to systematic theology as a combination of the following:

I. MODELS OF REVELATION

Dulles offers the following models:

• Model 1: Revelation as Doctrine (God as Teacher)

• Model 2: Revelation as History (God as Actor)

• Model 3: Revelation as Inner Experience (God as Guest)

• Model 4: Revelation as Dialectical Encounter (God as Judge)

• Model 5: Revelation as New Awareness (God as Poet)

Identifying revelation chiefly (if not exclusively) with true propositions, model 1 is associated with conservative evangelicals and neo-Thomists (2) (P. 113).

This eclectic approach continually uses ad hominem and straw man associations against Horton's perceived theological enemies. For Horton Carl F. H. Henry, Gordon H. Clark, and all Scripturalists are essentially dogmatic, anti-intellectual “biblicists” who have more in common with Roman Catholic “neo-Thomists” than with Van Tilian confessionalism. Ironically, Horton wishes to say that the confessions leave certain questions open and does not require subscription (P. 214). But Horton seems to dogmatically assert that only Van Til's theory of analogy is confessional and Horton himself requires subscription to his irrational contraditions via his semi-neo-orthodox Van Tilian theory of analogy, which is a modern innovative re-interpretation of the Thomist view.

Horton even repeats the error of liberals in saying that a former pope advocated the theory of mechanical dictation as the way God inspired the Bible:

Pope Leo XIII in 1893 went even further by espousing the dictation theory of inspiration, and successive popes during the twentieth century condemned the view that inerrancy was limited to that which is necessary for salvation. (P. 174).

It seems obvious from the statement that Horton does not believe that every word of Scripture is inspired. He confirms this by saying:

With equal clarity, Luther and Calvin can speak of Scripture as free from error. (69). However, it would be anachronistic to put post-Enlightenment questions to pre-Enlightenment figures. The Reformers could simultaneously affirm the inerrancy of Scripture—even to the point of using the unfortunate language of dictation—while pointing out apparent discrepancies in the text. (P. 174).

Basically, for Horton anyone who agrees with the Reformers' unfortunate emphasis on Scripture as the very words of God is a "biblicist" or a "fundamentalist". For Horton only an eclectic assimilation of factors can give any legitimate knowledge of God. He even goes so far as to endorse Donald Bloesch's theology to a degree, even though Bloesch is an outspoken neo-Evangelical advocate of Barthian theology. (Pp. 183-184). Horton disagrees with Bloesch's critique of Warfield but in the end cannot bring himself to divorce himself from Bloesch due to Bloesch's affinity with Van Til's theology:

There have been valiant attempts to reconcile Barth's doctrine of Scripture with the church's traditional view, among which that of Donald Bloesch is especially notable.(104) He allows that Barth's formulation too sharply separated the Word from the words, yet argues that “in his emphasis on the revealing work of the Spirit [Barth] is closer to the intention of the Reformers than is modern fundamentalism in this regard.”(105) Bloesch realizes that Protestant orthodoxy “sought to maintain a dynamic view of both revelation and inspiration” and eschewed fundamentalism's tendency to deny its human aspect.(106) He correctly observes the correlation between fundamentalism's mechanical view and belief in “the univocal language of Scripture concerning God, which contravenes the position of most theological luminaries of the past who held that human language concerning God is either metaphorical or at the most analogical.”(107) (P. 183).

Here we can see Horton's continuing self contradictions. First he tells us that the Reformers “unfortunately” used the terms of “dictation.” He then reverses himself and says the Reformers taught the Van Tilian theory of analogy. This sort of inconsistency is truly amazing. Although Horton claims that revelation comes from outside the believer in the form of an analogy of Scripture and is therefore “objective”, the implication is that this analogy is entirely experiential, existential, subjective and relative. (P. 219). He inconsistently labels the conservative Clarkian view as subjective, inside-out, univocal knowledge. (Ibid.). Nothing could be further from the truth. The fact of the matter is that Gordon H. Clark's view was meant to preserve the objective nature of Scripture while Horton's view endorses the Barthian view by way of dissimulation. If Scripture is not the very words of God—even if organically inspired and not by mechanical dictation as Horton incorrectly attributes to the Clarkian view—then the inference that can be logically drawn is that Scripture is not God's words or Word but merely a vessel of transmission that is existential and subjective. This is the implication of Horton's position despite his denials to the contrary. For Horton the Bible contains God's Word but cannot be directly identified with the very words of the Bible. He only mentions the doctrine of inerrancy as a concession to Old Princeton theology (pp. 176-78) and mentions the Chicago Statement On Biblical Inerrancy only in passing. (P. 184).

Ironically, Donald Bloesch adopted a form of Barth's universalism by asserting the idea that there would be a second chance in hell rather than eternal punishment.  Those who refuse to repent in hell would suffer eternal torment and those who repented would be saved.  But who would be stupid enough to refuse to repent for eternity?  (See:  Is There Salvation After Death?)   Horton would rather endorse Barthianism than to admit that the Bible is univocally the very words and thoughts of God or that propositional truth is the primary means of God's special revelation.  (See also:  Propositional Revelation:  The Only Revelation).

As time is limited, I will pause here and return to this issue in a future post.

Charlie

Addendum:  For further evidence of Horton's eclectic approach I offer this quote from page 87:

This supports my contention in the introduction that theology is the lived, social, and embodied integration of drama (story), doctrine, doxology, and discipleship.  I am suggesting that hearing the covenantal Word of our Lord is the source of that dethronement of the supposedly sovereign self and of the integration that subverts the disintegrating logic of Western dualism and individualism.  [Emphasis in italics in the original text].


Obviously, receiving one's identity from one's God, through a story that one hears, is different from determining one's own identity through idols that the worshiper has created and therefore controls.  (Horton, The Christian Faith, p. 87).

More Problems with Horton's Systematic Theology: Part Two

More Problems with Michael Horton's Systematic Theology

[See also Part Three].

As I noted in part one of this review, I am reading my way through Mike Horton's, The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims On the Way, (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011). In part one I noted that instead of starting with the doctrine of Scripture, Horton begins by explaining his epistemological presuppositions regarding the starting point for theology or studying God. Unfortunately, Horton's presupposition begins with a postmodernist, existentialist view of the doctrine of special revelation. For Horton the semi-neo-orthodox theology of “analogy” dominates such that for Horton the Bible is not really God's words but qualitatively different truths for God and man respectively. According to Horton, God cannot reveal propositions to man in any direct way, not even in the Bible. This means effectively that man cannot know truly any propositions from God since propositions for God are known qualitatively in a different way from the propositions known by man. According to the presuppositional theology of Cornelius Van Til, from whom Horton is drawing this theology of Scripture, the Creator/creature or archetypal/ectypal divide is of such a grand divide that at no single point can God reveal anything whatsoever in any univocal way.

Moreover, the practical result of Van Til's theology is that the Bible is not God's very inspired words but rather an analogical representation of God's words in human form. The real position of Mike Horton and other Van Tilians like R. Scott Clark is, for all practical purposes, a view that makes the Bible merely contain God's words in analogical, mystical form but not really God's Word in truth. Truth for Van Til is not absolute but rather a bifurcation of subjective, relativistic truth from the point of view of the creature such that the creature can never truly know even one proposition as God knows that proposition. In other words, God cannot reduce special revelation to a common point of understanding so that at that one point of understanding man can know what God intends to reveal on a creaturely level. In short, the implication of the analogical view is that the Bible is a merely human book. The Bible cannot truly be inspired of God or truly divine because at no single point does God's thoughts coincide with our thoughts—even on a creaturely level. This implies that God cannot know anything from our creaturely perspective, which implies that God is less than omniscient. 

Gordon H. Clark contended that even though God knows everything intuitively without the mediation of human sense perception and that God knows everything there is to know exhaustively and without limit, humans only know what they know via logic and the divine image in man. The image of God in man is intellect and thus the special revelation of God is revealed via the mind, which is synonymous with the “heart” in most places in Scripture. The heart is the totality of the inner being of man, including emotions, will, and the intellect. (See: Genesis 27:21; Exodus 4:21; Deuteronomy 2:30; Joshua 22:5; Job 38:36; Psalm 4:4; 19:14; 77:6; 119:11; Proverbs 2:1, 2; 3:5; Matthew 12:34; 15:19; Mark 11:23; Luke 2:19; Acts 4:32).

The fatal error of Van Til's views, here advocated by Horton, is that man cannot know anything with certainty. Only God knows absolute truth. Therefore, the implication of Horton's view is relativism whether or not he wishes to acknowledge this implication or not. Van Tilians vacillate or equivocate back and forth between fundamentalism when it suits them and neo-orthodoxy when they wish to obfuscate some point of doctrine with which they disagree.

Horton, for all practical purposes, confuses the doctrine of verbal plenary inspiration with the mechanical dictation view. He seems to infer that if anyone believes inspiration extends to every single word of Scripture then necessarily they are advocating the mechanical dictation view and cannot possibly hold to an incarnational or organic model of inspiration:

1. UNDERVALUING THE HUMANITY OF SCRIPTURE: THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPTATION

Similar to the early christological heresy of Doceticsm [sic], which denied the reality of Christ's full humanity, is a well-established historical tendency that one may discern in church history to downplay the humanity of Scripture. Some ancient theologians spoke of the biblical writers as mere “flutes” on which the Spirit played or “secretaries” through whom he dictated his revelation. Such analogies became literal theories in fundamentalism. J. I. Packer refers to the comment of J. W. Burgon: “Every book of it, every chapter of it, every word of it, every syllable of it, every letter of it, is the direct utterance of the Most High.” (16) W.A. Criswell expressed the same view: “Each sentence was dictated by God's Holy Spirit . . . . Everywhere in the Bible we find God speaking. It is God's voice, not man's.” (17) Fundamentalism and Protestant orthodoxy are distinct traditions, and nowhere can this be more clearly seen than in their differing emphases concerning biblical inspiration.

When evaluating the relationship of God's activity and that of creatures in the production of Scripture, the doctrine of analogy already proves its merits. If agency is univocal (the same thing) for God and for creatures, then the question is raised: Who acts more? Is God the author of Romans or is Paul? However, if agency is analogical, then God's activity in producing these texts is qualitatively different from human agency. In this way it may be seen that the role of human authors in producing the Scriptures is entirely their own activity and entirely God's. (Christian Faith, p. 162). [Doceticsm should be spelled as “docetism”].

Moreover, the Scripturalist position is not that "agency" is the same thing for God and for the creature.  The Scripturalist view is that the "proposition" is univocally the same proposition in God's mind and the creature's mind because God has revealed it on the creaturely level via a logical and propositional truth claim.  Furthermore, the sovereignty of God does not deny that God is in absolute control of everything that happens even down to human moral choices.  If so, then the doctrine of inspiration is impossible because God could not literally control what the actual words would be but left that completely up to the human author.  How God controls every word and every moral action without violating the will of free moral agents has not been fully revealed to us in Scripture.  However, that it is true without crossing over into making humans mere automatons is the teaching of Scripture.  (2 Peter 1:19, 20, 21; Hebrews 1:1, 2, 3).

The implication from the quote in Packer's Fundamentalism and the Word of God (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1984) is that the verbal plenary view is the mechanical dictation view and therefore only the concepts and doctrines of the Bible are inspired, not “every word”. Although it is true that not everything recorded in Scripture is meant to be understood as normative or as God speaking a command or promise, everything in Scripture is an infallibly and inerrantly inspired record of even ungodly statements and comments. But according to the Apostle Paul these things are written for us as examples and therefore are still part of the inspired Word of God, contra Mike Horton's view (1 Corinthians 10:6-11). Horton deliberately creates a straw man argument to discredit the Scripturalist view of Gordon H. Clark as if all Clarkians are somehow pejoratively “fundamentalists”. I can only conclude that Horton wishes to lump everyone who disagrees with Van Til's theology as “fundamentalists”.

It is fairly easy to discredit Horton's view since the Chicago Statement On Biblical Inerrancy says that inspiration extends to every word of Scripture without adopting a mechanical dictation view of inspiration:

Article VI

We affirm that the whole of Scripture and all its parts, down to the very words of the original, were given by divine inspiration.

We deny that the inspiration of Scripture can rightly be affirmed of the whole without the parts, or of some parts but not the whole.

(Articles of Affirmation and Denial).

It would seem then that either Horton is unaware of what the Chicago Statement says or that he deliberately has created a straw man argument that would seem to bolster his fallacious Van Tilian theology of analogy. In fact, the Chicago Statement says the following which would appear to discredit the semi-neo-orthodox view that Scripture is not the very words of God:

Article IV

We affirm that God who made mankind in His image has used language as a means of revelation.

We deny that human language is so limited by our creatureliness that it is rendered inadequate as a vehicle for divine revelation. We further deny that the corruption of human culture and language through sin has thwarted God's work of inspiration. (Ibid.).

Furthermore, the Chicago Statement On Biblical Inerrancy endorses the doctrine of an incarnational view of inspiration and not a mechanical dictation view, which Horton implies is true of the idea that inspiration extends to every word of Scripture and not just the normative concepts recorded in Scripture:

Article VII

We affirm that inspiration was the work in which God by His Spirit, through human writers, gave us His Word. The origin of Scripture is divine. The mode of divine inspiration remains largely a mystery to us.

We deny that inspiration can be reduced to human insight, or to heightened states of consciousness of any kind.

Article VIII

We affirm that God in His Work of inspiration utilized the distinctive personalities and literary styles of the writers whom He had chosen and prepared.

We deny that God, in causing these writers to use the very words that He chose, overrode their personalities.

Article IX

We affirm that inspiration, though not conferring omniscience, guaranteed true and trustworthy utterance on all matters of which the Biblical authors were moved to speak and write.

We deny that the finitude or fallenness of these writers, by necessity or otherwise, introduced distortion or falsehood into God's Word. (Ibid.).

Obviously, Horton's underhanded attack against the Scripturalist theology of Scripture as extending inspiration down to the very words of Scripture is meant as an ad hominem against those who hold to this view. Horton not only misrepresents Gordon H. Clark and Carl F. H. Henry but he appears to disagree with the Chicago Statement, implying that Horton rejects the affirmations and denials there because they appear to be the work of  “fundamentalists”.

Apparently, Horton takes an ad hoc approach to the doctrine of inspiration. When it suits his purposes he affirms propositional truth claims and inerrancy:

The preservation of human agents from error while their free agency remains intact is already presupposed in a biblical doctrine of God's sovereignty. God restrains sin and error in myriad ways every moment, yet without violence to creatures. . . . .

Given their high view of God's sovereignty in providence, signs of the Bible's humanity and historical conditioning, far from impeding, actually deepened their confidence in the inspiration of Scripture. (Christian Faith, p. 164).

But in another place Horton says that it is impossible that God can directly reveal any propositional truth that is the same for God and for man on man's level:

. . . However, Christianity teaches that because God exists, there is absolute (archetypal) truth, even if our knowledge of that truth is—and remains into eternity—finite, creaturely, and accommodated revelation from God. (Ibid., p. 73).

This is all well and good. However, Horton wishes to say that any idea of a univocal propositional truth at any single point is impossible. For Horton, then “accommodated revelation” excludes revelation on a creaturely level! The doctrine of Gordon H. Clark's Scripturalism is that univocal truth is accommodated to the creaturely level but that it is the exact same thought God inspired and directly mediates to us in fully inspired words—which by the way is not in contradistinction to the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy! Horton wishes to mediate between “fundamentalism” and “liberalism” but in the end creates a neo-evangelical view that is essentially a mediation between the biblical doctrine of inspiration as understood by classical Reformed theology and the Evangelical movement as a whole and the doctrine of inspiration held by the neo-orthodox theologians that human words cannot possibly be a special and direct revelation from God. I cannot understand how Horton's view is for any practical purpose any different from the view he supposedly rejects:

In many ways, postmodern skepticism about the possibility of language conveying transcendent truth and meaning reflects the exhaustion of modern rationalism, a sense of having had high hopes dashed. If we cannot have absolute (archetypal) knowledge, then we cannot have relative (ectypal) knowledge. If we cannot know as God knows, then we cannot even know as creatures. As a result, in Nietzsche's words, “Interpretation,' the introduction of meaning—not 'explanation' . . . . There are no facts, everything is in flux, incomprehensible, elusive; what is relatively most enduring is—our opinions.” (131) Modern philosophy merely mined Christian doctrines and transformed them into “concepts” and “categories.” In truth, they are merely metaphors. (132) “Truths are illusions which we have forgotten are illusions.” (133) Metaphors do not refer to extralinguistic “reality” but merely to other metaphors. (Ibid., pp. 73-74).

For the record, the following is Gordon H. Clark's view of biblical inspiration. First he quotes from Ed L. Miller's God and Reason (Macmillan, 1972) and then comments himself:

Often associated with the propositional view of revelation is the traditional doctrine of the inspiration of the Scriptures . . . . One view, sometimes called the “dictation” theory, holds that the writers of the Bible were, like typewriters, completely passive or even oblivious to the promptings of the Spirit. . . . This interpretation, or at least one version of it, was emphatically embraced by Pope Leo XIII in his 1893 encyclical Providentissimus Deus. . .

This recognition and account of Dogmatism is on the whole most excellent. At the very least it is an honest acknowledgement that there is and has been such a view held; and this acknowledgment contrasts with the silence of some other authors. The one part of Miller's account that must be emphatically rejected is his statement that the pope emphatically embraced the view that the writers of Scripture were like typewriters, oblivious of their surroundings and condition. Although the author completely misunderstands the pope. Similarly it would be difficult to find a single Protestant theologian who held such a view. If there be one, however, the stenographer or typewriter dictation theory has never been the traditional or majority view. [Gordon H. Clark, Christian Philosophy (Unicoi: Trinity Foundation, 2004), p. 19].

It seems to me that Horton and other Van Tilians have an ax to grind since the most of them never bother to investigate the firsthand sources for Gordon Clark's theology or other theologians like Carl Henry who follow Clark's view of Scripture as the propositional truth claims that bind men's consciences.

Since time is limited here I will take a pause. However, in the next installment I would like to take a look at Horton's adoption of the Eastern Orthodox doctrine of God's “energies”.

See Part Three.