The response to last week’s post about the similarities between the religious right and political Islam is in (at least from the person who inspired the comparison) and it seems to be to deny the point about the ways in which Christians and Muslims object to secular society simply by stamping feet harder and louder. Bill Evans is back with this rejoinder (though it is not all about me):
Some are opposed to Christian political involvement on theological grounds. Here we think of the current proponents in Reformed circles of the so-called “two-kingdoms” doctrine (2K). According to this way of thinking, Christians have no business involving themselves as Christians in the political process, nor of proclaiming that there is a Christian position on the issues of the day. Such political activity, it is argued, fails to recognize the essentially spiritual mission of the Church, and to acknowledge that the task of the Church is to prepare people for the hereafter, not to work for political or social transformation. Some 2K advocates (e.g., here) have recently upped the rhetorical ante, suggesting that there is no essential difference between Christians who seek cultural transformation and Muslims seeking to impose Sharia law.
Although my main point here is not to provide an extended critique of current Reformed 2K thinking, I do have significant reservations about it. I tend to agree with the standard objections—that it has rather little connection to the two-kingdoms theme in Calvin and the earlier Reformed tradition (Calvin certainly thought that Geneva should be governed in accordance with broadly Christian principles), and that it confuses the Kingdom of God and the Church (biblically speaking, the Kingdom involves the Church but is not coextensive with it). Moreover, its working assumption that there is no middle ground of principled pluralism between theocracy and 2K is certainly open to question, and I sense that what traction 2K is getting stems largely from the fact that it provides a theological fig leaf for the evangelical culture-war fatigue referenced earlier.
Not to be missed is that Evans’ main point is that Christians have an obligation to engage the culture war (say, hello to Abraham Kuyper):
Simply put, a refusal to engage the cultural and political issues of the day is no longer an option for thoughtful conservative Christians in America. The battle has been forced upon us. Reasons for this have to do with current political realities, especially the wholesale shift of administrative power to a technocratic elite with a rather clear progressive social agenda. Wesley J. Smith of the Discovery Institute’s Center on Human Exceptionalism has recently explored this development in an insightful article in The Weekly Standard. Smith writes, “Liberals today seek to create a stable, and what they perceive to be a socially just, society via rule by experts—in which most of the activities of society are micromanaged by technocrats for the economic and social benefit of the whole. In other words, social democracy without the messiness of democracy, like the European Union’s rule-by-bureaucrats-in-Brussels. This is the ‘fundamental transformation’ that President Obama seeks to implement in this country.” . . . If Smith is correct, and I think he is, culturally conservative religion and religious believers are in the crosshairs of these secular, culturally progressive technocratic elites.
This is a remarkable misreading of 2k and American politics. First the theology bit.
Evans, who is a graduate of Westminster Theological Seminary, should know something about J. Gresham Machen who advocated the church staying out of politics (a 2k view) but then turned around and testified before Congress against the Department of Education, for instance. The lesson Machen taught me at least is that 2k is not opposed to Christian political involvement. What 2k opposes is the blurring of categories and confusion of arguments that so often afflicts Christians who either want to redeem the world or fear the world is out to get them. What is more, 2k actually follows the categories supplied by Reformed orthodoxy, such as the Westminster Confession.
Notice that within the Confession Christian involvement in politics has three possible expressions — believers, church officers, and Christians who hold political office.
On the involvement of Christians: It is lawful for Christians to accept and execute the office of a magistrate, when called thereunto: in the managing whereof, as they ought especially to maintain piety, justice, and peace, according to the wholesome laws of each commonwealth; so, for that end, they may lawfully, now under the new testament, wage war, upon just and necessary occasion. (23.2)
On the involvement of church officers as members of assemblies (and all Presbyterian pastors are members of presbyteries, not congregations): Synods and councils are to handle, or conclude nothing, but that which is ecclesiastical: and are not to intermeddle with civil affairs which concern the commonwealth, unless by way of humble petition in cases extraordinary; or, by way of advice, for satisfaction of conscience, if they be thereunto required by the civil magistrate. (31.4)
On the involvement of the magistrate, well here you may get a difference of opinion, but the revised confession says: It is the duty of civil magistrates to protect the person and good name of all their people, in such an effectual manner as that no person be suffered, either upon pretense of religion or of infidelity, to offer any indignity, violence, abuse, or injury to any other person whatsoever: and to take order, that all religious and ecclesiastical assemblies be held without molestation or disturbance. (23.3)
I believe this would apply to Christian magistrates protecting Muslims even though Islam is not Christian. Even the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, for which Evans works (at Erskine Seminary) allows the possibility of Christian magistrates in a secular country protecting Muslims:
Christian magistrates, as such, in a Christian country, are bound to promote the Christian religion, as the most valuable interest of their subjects, by all such means as are not inconsistent with civil rights; and do not imply an interference with the policy of the church, which is the free and independent kingdom of the Redeemer; nor an assumption of dominion over conscience. (23.3 ARPC Confession of Faith)
Since the United States is not a Christian country (just ask the Covenanters), the part about promoting the Christian religion is off.
What this adds up to is that 2k is once again tried and true according to the confessional heritage of the Reformed churches. I don’t suppose that Evans faults 2k for teaching that Christians may participate in politics (whether we turn into a Kuyperian holy duty is another matter but that sacred cause of politics is not something that Reformed Christians have adopted as part of their confession). Evans may disagree with 2k for arguing that churches should not meddle in politics. But that’s an issue he should likely take up with the Westminster Divines.
Perhaps the real disagreement comes over the nature of the magistrate. Here comes the political part of the post. Again, I wish that 2k’s critics would just once notice how practically all of the Reformed churches, liberal and conservative, have revised the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century chapters on the duties of the civil magistrate. But let’s go one step farther. Let’s say that Evans wants the kind of magistrate taught by the Westminster Divines, the one who can call councils and synods, be present at them, insure that they follow the word of God in Constantine like fashion, not to mention have the power to abolish heresies and blasphemies. If that is the kind of magistrate Evans wants, isn’t that what he has with today’s “technocratic elite” who are increasingly regulating more and more aspects of human life? Of course, the problem for him is that today’s politicians are not Christian and are not implementing Christian orthodoxy and morality. But if his fear is of a powerful state that can interfere with all parts of our affairs, wouldn’t the magistrate envisioned by the original Westminster Confession of Faith be the kind of big government that Evans believes Christians should oppose?
This is why if you want small government you should spend more time reading not the Bible but the debates between the Federalists and Anti-Federalists. The Bible has virtually nothing to say directly to check and balances, constitutions, executives, legislatures, and judiciaries. But the framers of the U.S. Constitution and their critics did.
2k gives a better reason to oppose the technocratic elites than Evans’ dismissal of 2k does on the way to a call for culture war (jihad?). It frees Christians to take their cues politically from non-believers. Evans appears to be left with either the Bible or the sixteenth-century Constantinian order which give him no grounds for a constitutional republic. Aside from a different religion, how is that different from political Islam?
76 Comments
I find it ironic that Evans suggests that our current class of political elites are bent on replacing our Constitutional republic with a secular technocratic state. After all, Evans is basically proposing that we replace our Constitutional republic with a Christian technocratic state.
Frankly, I sometimes wonder what world these guys live in. According to them, the sky always seems to be falling down. Except that…it isn’t.
I’ll just say, Eric, that who is in charge does make a difference. Would Nixon have handled the Cuban Missile Crisis the same as Kennedy masterfully did? Following WW2, General Patton wanted to push the Soviets by force back to their borders. He was relieved of his command, as I recall. I’m sure glad the conservative Wisconsin governor survived political challenges and is implementing sane fiscal gov’t policies. As Joseph and Daniel aided the public weal, so do wise magistrates today, “to the end that the dissoluteness of men might be restrained, and all things carried on among them with good order and decency.” Belgic Confession Art. 36 m among them with good order and decency.” (Belgic Confession Art. 36)
gas, don’t rebel. Obey the law. Stay on line. Read more. when has 2k ever said that obeying the magistrate will produce better churches. What 2k says — in case you missed it — is that the church holds the keys of THE kingdom. So the magistrate’s business is not as important.
DGH wrote:
What 2k says — in case you missed it — is that the church holds the keys of THE kingdom. So the magistrate’s business is not as important.
Concise! And one of the two is passing away.
So, as individuals, be at liberty to lend aid to the public weal. Just don’t lose your balance.
gas, disagreeing isn’t the same as disobeying. Pushing back on technocrats and their multiculturalism seems different from the “taxation is theft” meme you’ve pushed before. And since Jesus’ own point about rendering was really a point about obedience and submission (not so much filing honestly and on time), the meme is one about disobedience. So the next question is: Why do you disagree with Jesus?
I certainly agree with dgh, zrim, and jack that there’s no point in rebellion against that which will pass away. Though I don’t usually quote Karl Barth (because he is a universalist with a false double-talking gospel), I do find his comments on Romans 13 to be very suggestive of the attitude we need to have as we submit to that which is not ultimately important.
Barth: “The travesty is that men should, as a matter of course, claim to possess a higher right over their fellow men, that they should, as a matter of course, dare to regulate almost all their conduct, that those who put forward such a manifestly fraudulent claim should be crowned with a halo of real power and should be capable of requiring obedience and sacrifice as though they had been invested with the authority of God, that the Many should conspire to speak as though they were the One… This whole pseudo-transcendence claimed by an altogether immanent order is the wound that is inflicted by every existing government–even by the best. The more successfully the good and the right assume power, the more they become evil (Romans, p. 479)
Barth: From this perception of the evil that lies in the very existence of existing government, Revolution is born. The revolutionary seeks to be rid of the evil by bestirring himself to battle with it and to overthrow it. He determines to remove the existing ordinances, in order that he may erect in their place the new right…. The revolutionary must, however, own that in adopting his plan he allows
himself to be overcome of evil (Rom. 12:21) He forgets that he is not the One, that for all the strange brightness of his eyes, he is not the Christ….The revolutionary is overcome of evil. This is the tragedy of revolution. Evil is not the true answer to evil. (Romans, p.480)
Barth: What more radical action can one perform than the action of turning back to the original root of “not-doing”–and NOT be angry, NOT engage in assault, NOT demolish? This turning back is the ethical factor in the command, Overcome evil with good. Romans 12:21 There is here no word of approval of the existing order; but there is disapproval of every enemy of it. It is God who will be recognized as He that overcomes the unrighteousness of the existing order. (Romans, p.481)
Barth: Let every man be in subjection to the existing powers (Rom. 13:1). Though “subjection” may assume from time to time many various concrete forms, as an ethical conception it is here purely negative. IT MEANS TO WITHDRAW AND MAKE WAYI; it means to have no resentment, and not to overthrow. …. Even the most radical revolution CAN DO NO MORE THAN SET WHAT EXISTS AGAINST WHAT EXISTS. Even the most radical revolution–and this is so even when it is called a “spiritual” or “peaceful” revolution–can be no more than a revolt; that is to say, it is in itself simply a justification and confirmation of what already exists (Romans, pp.481-82)
Barth: It is evident that there can be no more devastating undermining of the existing order than the recognition of it which is here recommended, a recognition rid of all illusion and devoid of all the joy of triumph ,a recognizing of them for what they are, “FULL OF SOUND AND FURY, SIGNIFYING NOTHING (Romans, p.483)
Erik,
Going waaaaaaay back in the comments, yes, John Turturro, and I’d have to say Lebowski (though it has been a long time since I’ve seen Millers’ Crossing, and – lame fan that I am – I have not seen Rounders). The handle was somewhat of a tongue in cheek play on TurretinFan. Is he still around?
TFan II
Calvin, Institutes, book 4—-Whoever knows how to distinguish between this fleeting life and that future spiritual life, will without difficulty know that Christ’s spiritual kingdom and the civil jurisdiction are things completely distinct. It is a Jewish vanity to seek and enclose Christ’s Kingdom within the elements of this world…..
Verduin, p68–”Great allegorizer that he was, Augustine managed to overpower another Scripture to suit his purpose. Augustine found what he needed in the family situation of Abraham where there were two wives, one a free woman and the other a slave. By this Augustine justified the presence of two kinds of Christians in the church (in both water baptism and Supper), one kind by faith and the other kind without faith….If anyone does not of his own accord have himself regenerated by baptism, he shall be coerced to it by the king.”
What I read @ OLT today made me come out of hiding from some strange fellow Christian Brothers!— “There is no essential difference between Christians who seek cultural transformation, and Muslims seeking to impose Sharia law.” Wow! If I understand “cult.trans.,” “impose”, and “Sharia law”, and I feel sure I do, then that is the most anti-Biblical, non-Reformed, ignorant, junk I have heard in all my 84 years— 64 as a Christian and 58 as a WTS grad! Sleight exaggeration! Doesn’t anyone see that Islam is not just a religion? Not protected by First Amendment? In our language, it is both “church” AND state? One Kingdom? Not as evil as King George III in Founding Fathers’ day. but just as evil and dangerous to our USA as was (1K) Nazi Germany and Communist Soviet Union of the last century? Thank God for Abraham Kuyper and Focus on the Family!
Bob,
I somewhat disagree with Darryl, on the nature of ‘true’ Islam and where it has the potential to end up as regards nation/state considerations. However, to the extent christians politicize their faith and extend the great commission to culture transformation projects from moral majority types all the way to the reconstructionists, the rhetoric from both sides is eerily similar. And if we want to return to medieval erastian constructs, even without the whole roman bit, has the potential to get just as bloody.
Thanks for reply, Sean, Must go, but all I am saying is that we should all read Tom Minnery’s book, as plugged by Hugh Hewitt and many others, (Why We Must Not Be Silent), at least vote and try, without war, to help our USA at least get back to the world of our Founding Fathers. Love in Jesus, Bob Morris. PS. I can’t for my life see why DGH and others with his particular view of Two Kingdoms, should criticize great guys like Peter A. Lillback, prez of WTS!
Bob, you have to get out more. The words you quote are not from Old Life but from Bill Evans. He could have said “no difference.” That wouldn’t describe my position either. But he added “essential” to make the comparison all the more nutty.
But political Islamists and some Christians do object to secularism on the similar grounds of appealing to special revelation. I didn’t make that up. I simply noticed.
And for what it’s worth, here’s the comment of someone you should respect — an evangelical at the Gospel Coalition — who notices the same similarity:
Bob,
Without being too contrarian and considering myself a 2ker, I have to say Darryl does a good job of keeping the gloves on when it comes to the ‘in-house’ scuffles. Personally, I’d like to see some trials. Alas, politics are everywhere and the faculty lounge is in no-wise immune. Part of what 2K and reformed theology is supposed to do for us, is relegate all humans to non-hero status and turn our hope on Jesus Christ. There are no ultimate political or cultural solutions this side of glory. I like Paul’s advice to live quietly, mind your own business, and work with your hands or Jeremiah’s advice to the Israelites carried away in captivity. Jer. 29:7
Bob, if you set aside your American lenses for a moment you might see the comparison a little better. A large part of what gets in the way may be national pride.
William Cavanaugh–”The Muslim world plays the role of religious other. THEY have not learned to remove the dangerous influence of religion from political life. THEIR violence is therefore irrational and fanatical. OUR violence, by contrast, is rational and peacemaking, and sometimes regrettably necessary to contain THEIR violence.” Sins of Omission: What Religion and Violence Arguments Ignore, The Hedgehog Review 6;35
Sean, what kind of trials would you like to see?
MM,
I’d like to see Murray’s monocovenantalism ruled inconsistent and outside the pale of the reformed tradition. Murray self-confessed that he was ‘recasting’ covenant theology. So, I’d like that to be rendered much the way we’re confessing NPP and FV as ‘out of bounds’. If we can get monocovenantalism ruled out then theonomy, fv, ‘union’ re-ordering of the ordo, neonomianism and law/gospel aspersions as Lutheran can all be relegated to the trash heap as ‘ non-round’ wheels. And as is being born out even now, trying to keep Rome on the sidelines is really tough without strict justice in Eden, and clear law/gospel declarations. So, if we have any teachers who may be confused about such things or desire to continue Murray’s legacy on this score, we can show them where the exit lies.
Sean, what do you think of David Gordon’s comments at the end of his Murray essay about why he (David Gordon) is not ready yet to go to trials against mono-covenantalists?
If the covenant children don’t miss out on any of the promises by having to wait a while for the Supper, what would they miss out if they also were waiting for Jesus to come back while in a visible administration without OT judicial laws?
Bob – What happened to the CAPS? Are you under the weather?
Does James Dobson even have a clue who Abraham Kuyper was?
McMark,
I haven’t read Gordon on Murray.
McMark, huh?
Th essay is “Reflections on Auburn Theology”, in By Faith Alone, edited by Gary Johnson and Guy Waters. The remarks about trials begin on p123, but the entire essay is well worth your time.
I was assuming Sean that you do not practice paedo-communion and that you think infants who wait for communion are not missing out on any promises….
Who would be missing out by Christians not being in charge of the direction of history at this present time?
McMark,
Thanks for the heads up on the article.
You’re right I do not hold to paedo-communion. But, this is what I mean when I say I struggle following your covenant theology all the way through. You have to talk to me like you would a 4 year old because I just struggle, at this point mightily, drawing together all your lines of inference and points of contention. It’s not purposeful, I’m just a bit thick at times. I honestly don’t understand your question here so I don’t know how to answer it. All I can say is that Christians aren’t in charge of history, and neither is any creature, but we all believe that God is sovereign and directing all things to their alloted end.
Thanks, Darryl and all your fan-Commentators. I see now that I should have kept up longer my vow of several weeks not to visit OLT. I will stick to those, like my sweet CPC wife and I, weaker in mind and body, education, Bible knowledge, and care for the future of our many descendants (including 25 grands) living in this world where silence is thought superior to NON VIOLENT involvement in Jesus’ World. I wish DGH had more descendants. Might change his views a bit. Don’t know how a flawed guy like me and wife managed to parent a son like our Tim, PhD in Molecular Bio and Bio Prof at Covenant College since 1995. (Co-Author: “Science and Grace”) Not a boast; a PTL. Finally, if any of you do some evangelism (our major?) I suggest warmer words. In Him, OB
Bob – I sense some self-pity in your post. If you would engage rather than drive-by you might get more respect.
“Church Takes Firm Stand on Judicial Pamphlet” – http://www.desmoinesregister.com/viewart/20121015/NEWS09/310150027/Burlington-church-takes-firm-stand-on-judicial-retention-pamphlet?News