Tag: Brad Littlejohn

After All These Years It’s Still Theonomy vs. 2K

Published on by D. G. Hart4 Comments

From David VanDrunen’s review of Brad Littlejohn’s Called to Freedom: Retrieving Christian Liberty in an Age of License.

On a general level, Littlejohn at times seems to jump from the observation that without certain virtues, people won’t use their outward freedoms well the conclusion that civil officials may therefore legitimately restrict these freedoms. But although the observation is valid, the conclusion doesn’t necessarily follow. On what basis do civil officials have authority, for example, to restrict market transactions or prohibit non-Christian religions for the “common good” when no force or fraud is involved?

Perhaps instructive is Littlejohn’s understanding of civil authorities as “fathers of their people” who ought to “exercise paternal care” for them. There is some similarity between fathers and civil magistrates, but there are also so many differences that it seems dangerous to invoke this analogy as grounds for specific government regulations. For one thing, fathers have extensive authority over even minute details of their children’s lives. On that analogy, civil officials could regulate almost anything. Perhaps even worse, the analogy presumes that citizens are children. This seems to work at cross-purposes to Littlejohn’s oft-stated ideal that citizens be morally mature and self-governing.

We see another reason for Littlejohn’s openness to extensive government authority in his support for the “classical Protestant theory of religious liberty.” He explains this theory as follows: In Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2, God calls civil authorities to punish evil and praise the good (although not, contra Littlejohn, to “reward” or “promote” the good). The natural moral law defines what is evil and good. The Ten Commandments summarize the natural moral law. This means, in Littlejohn’s telling, that civil officials have authority to enforce the “full scope” of the Ten Commandments.

But there’s a problem with this reasoning. The fact that civil officials punish evil and praise the good doesn’t entail giving them jurisdiction over all that is evil and good. What’s more, the natural moral law—what we know about right and wrong from the testimony of nature—doesn’t provide nearly enough guidance for civil authorities on which religion to promote or restrain. The testimony of nature itself doesn’t reveal truths about the Trinity, atonement for sin, the church, and other core matters.

At best, Littlejohn’s belief that civil magistrates may restrain non-Christian worship and proselytizing needs more extensive argument. Could Scripture provide it? One might appeal to the precedent of Old Testament kings under the Mosaic theocracy, which is exactly what many pre-modern Christian theologians did. But since contemporary political communities are not God’s holy people, in redemptive covenant with God, such appeals are highly problematic. Littlejohn briefly glances at these issues but doesn’t really discuss them.

At one point, Littlejohn states that Christians can disregard ungodly rulers when they issue clear commands to transgress Scripture. Yet in other cases, he argues, we can cheerfully tolerate them. Are there really no other instances when Christians might justly disregard such rulers? When rulers act contrary to the laws of their own community, for example, shouldn’t citizens commit to following the law instead?

Littlejohn himself, when discussing political freedom as liberty under law, appeals to the classical notion that law should be consensual. In other words, it ought to emerge from “time-tested customs and communal practices, unwritten laws that written laws should respect.” This is indeed a noble idea. But if we take it seriously, it requires the people to have a great deal of independence to forge their own ways of life, which entails corresponding limitations on civil authority. It would have been interesting to see Littlejohn develop this theme and reflect more on its implications.

Even if Littlejohn’s conception of the extent of civil authority needs further defense, his larger perspective on Christian liberty is solid, insightful, and sometimes eloquent. Called to Freedom usefully clarifies the issues at stake, even if it doesn’t settle all of them. It should stimulate, but not end, important discussions on what it means to be free.

Evangelicals and Catholics Sixteenth-Century Style

Published on by D. G. Hart3 Comments

Brad Littlejohn reflects on the contribution of Peter Martyr Vermigli and the consequences of the Colloquy of Poissy (among others):

One more tantalizing opportunity was to present itself in 1561, however, and Vermigli once again was involved, after an illustrious career through the Protestant centers of northern Europe. In France, a nation that, while devout, had always harbored something of an independent streak vis-à-vis the Papacy, the Queen Mother Catherine de’ Medici, de facto ruler as regent of her ten-year-old son, was seeking to steer a middle course between the Huguenot and Catholic nobility vying for influence. Ignoring the decrees of Trent and the remonstrances of the papacy, Catherine determined to call a national church council, the Colloquy of Poissy, in 1561. Theodore Beza headed the Protestant delegation and was joined by Vermigli, whose Florentine background, it was hoped, would help influence the Queen.

After inconclusive opening sessions, leading members of both Catholic and Protestant delegations convened a private conference before the Queen, where, after a couple weeks of arguments they were able to produce a statement on the divisive issue of the Eucharist that while completely satisfying no one, was cautiously accepted by all. Unfortunately, as at Regensburg, once the formula was shared with the other Catholic prelates, it was angrily rejected and the Catholic negotiators disgraced. The Colloquy broke up without resolution, and not long afterward, France spiralled into religious civil war.

What can we learn from these episodes (besides the realization that the Reformation was a much more complex and unpredictable affair than we might have previously imagined)? Perhaps the clearest lesson of Regensburg, Poissy, and the failure of evangelical reform to capture the heart of the Roman church, is that while certainly embracing all opportunities for meaningful fraternal dialogue, we need to maintain a healthy skepticism about the apparent contemporary rapprochement between Protestantism and Rome. We have seen our own version of Regensburg in the Joint Declaration on Justification–aside from the ambiguities of the formula, which would no doubt have vexed Luther, the fact remains that reconciliation remains contingent on the good pleasure of the magisterium, which reserves full right to determine the boundaries of doctrine. Progress on the material principle of the Reformation is all well and good, but remains fragile indeed so long as the formal principle, sola Scriptura, is rejected.

Likewise, recent Protestant recovery of a robust sacramentology has held out the hope of at last transcending the great divide on transubstantiation. George Hunsinger’s acclaimed exposition of Calvinist eucharistic theology toward this end, Eucharist and Ecumenism, might be considered the modern equivalent of the Reformed formula at Poissy. But whatever individual Catholic sympathizers Hunsinger may have found, the Catholic Church as a whole is not about to rewrite their catechism on the issue. Protestants, especially in America, have been cheered by the appearance of modern-day Contarinis, Catholic leaders keen to dialogue with and learn from Protestants. We should welcome such opportunities, but with a sunny cynicism. We may find that if we keep on talking and studying Scripture and tradition, we will find common ground with some on justification, the sacraments, and more. But as long as the magisterium claims (as it certainly still does!) final authority to determine the shape of that common ground, the ecumenical bridge remains suspended over a chasm little narrower than the chasm that swallowed Contarini nearly five hundred years ago. In the end, our model must be a man like Vermigli–eager to seek reform from within a corrupt institution as long as he had reasonable opportunity to do so, but not hesitant to shake the dust from his feet and preach the pure gospel when faced with the choice of submission to man or to God.

Infallibility is as audacious as it makes reform impossible. As if we need more reasons to protest — still.

Speaking of Ecclesiastical Authority

Published on by D. G. Hart36 Comments

Matt Tuininga has been engaged in a debate with Brad Littlejohn (and Steven Wedgeworth and, of course, Peter Escalante because wherever Steven goes, Peter does) about 2k. Matt is sitting on an essay that attempts to refute Littlejohn (et al) about the spiritual nature of the kingdom of Christ. Ever since Wedgeworth reviewed VanDrunen‘s Natural Law and Two Kingdoms, I have been dumbfounded by a reading of 2k which puts the church’s institutional arrangements in the temporal realm and locates Christ’s authority entirely in the realm of the Spirit’s rule in believer’s hearts. One example of why this may be stupefying comes from an essay by Littlejohn which concludes this way:

Mr. Tuininga has insisted that we do not need to assume that two-kingdoms thinking entails the rejection of distinctively Christian action in the civil kingdom, of things like Christian education or Christian worldview thinking, as Hart and VanDrunen have suggested. But without challenging the basic parameters of their dualism, it is hard to see how he will succeed. Fundamentally, those attempting to re-establish this kind of two-kingdoms thinking will find that the Cartwrightian vision is an illiberal one, in which a clerocracy of human authorities within the Church may claim divine sanction for their teachings and their rulings about what constitutes the conditions for membership in Christ’s kingdom,[11] and what shape Christian life in the world must take, thus undermining both the freedom of the church and the state. Much as the modern R2K theorists proclaim their Liberal credentials, they have not changed the fundamental schema, and it is thus no wonder that so many Reformed churches of this stripe suffer from an atmosphere of legalism, authoritarian dogmatism, and spiritual tyranny.

In other words, communions like the OPC and the PCA (and I guess Doug Wilsons’ CREC) are clerocracies where spiritual tyranny reigns. I would have thought this view of the institutional church close to an Anabaptist reading. But I suppose that Littlejohn is following Hooker. How the church as a temporal authority, ruled by an earthly monarch, is going to be any less tyrannical, even if its reach only goes to externals, is a mystery. Still, a view that divorces the spiritual character of the keys of the kingdom from the actual administration of the word through preaching and discipline (i.e., the means of grace) is a mystery possibly only resolved by content analysis of the drinking water in Moscow, Idaho.

Not to be missed, by the way, is that the 2k position advocated by the likes of VanDrunen and me, is designed to distinguish those areas where the church has real authority (the Word) from those where Christians have liberty (the rest of life) as their consciences determine. In which case, Littlejohn is wrong to see the modern revival of 2k as a return to ecclesiastical tyranny. It is, instead, an effort to recover Christian liberty from the pious intentions and historical circumstances of some in the Reformed world eager to assert the Lordship of Christ without sufficient qualification.

Tuininga is eager to correct Littlejohn, not so much on his reading of Hooker, but on Calvin.

Calvin is absolutely clear here that he is distinguishing the spiritual government of the church by the pastors and elders, through the means of the keys of the kingdom, from the political government of the magistrates. He clearly draws in the distinction between the two kingdoms in 3.19.15 when, referring to 1 Corinthians 12:28 and Romans 12:28, he declares that Paul is not discussing the magistrates, but “those who were joined with the pastors in the spiritual rule of the church.” Here again Calvin makes it evident that when he is talking about the “spiritual rule” of the church he is not talking about some immediate governance of the invisible church. He is talking about the concrete government exercised by pastors and elders on behalf of Christ. Christ himself governs through these men: “Christ has testified that in the preaching of the gospel the apostles have no part save that of ministry; that it was he himself who would speak and promise all things through their lips as his instruments.” Calvin maintains that Christ’s spiritual government is exercised through the ministry of the church, in its fourfold office. (4.11.1)

Calvin’s views here have to be understood in the context of the willingness among the Zwinglians and Lutherans to cede church discipline to the civil government on the basis of the type of two realms interpretation that Wedgeworth attributes to Calvin.

Some of this is simply a historical debate of whether Cartwright or Hooker was closer to Calvin. But the bigger issue is that of ecclesiastical authority: do ministers when they go into the pulpit and members of sessions and consistories when they deliberate with church members actually hold the keys of the kingdom or does Christ reserve them for himself and the Spirit? It sure would be hard to read the Westminster Standards or the Three Forms of Unity in a way the severed spiritual authority from real blooded ministers and elders. But, as odd as it sounds, some critics of 2k — some who even circulate among the getting-over-theonomy-ranks of James Jordan and Peter Leithart — believe the version of 2k on the rise in the OPC and elsewhere is authoritarian. Holy cow! If only Littlejohn and Wedgeworth (and Escalante) could spend a few days with the crazy Baylys or their fellow Gordon-Conwell alum, Tim Keller, that is, with those who expand church power over every square inch.

At Least He Has An Ergo

Published on by D. G. Hart27 Comments

Nelson Kloosterman and Brad Littlejohn have been tag-team reviewing David VanDrunen’s recovery and defense of two-kingdom theology. Apparently, VanDrunen is deficient because he does not follow Abraham Kuyper (according to Klooserman’s pious desires) or Richard Hooker (by Littlejohn’s Anglophilic standards). Never mind that VanDrunen may have historical, theological, or biblical reasons for arguing the case for natural law and two-kingdom theology.

Recently, Littlejohn reviewed VanDrunen’s Living in God’s Two Kingdoms and summarized the two-kingdom perspective as follows (with a little instruction in Latin from Kloosterman):

1) Christ has fulfilled Adam’s original task.
2) Therefore [Latin, ergo], Christians are not called to fulfil that task.
3) Christians do not need to earn eternal life by cultural labours; they already possess the eternal life that Christ has won for them.
4) Our work does not participate in the coming of the new creation–it has already been attained once and for all by Christ.
5) Our cultural activity is important but temporary, since it will all be wiped away when Christ returns to destroy this present world.

Sounds pretty good to me (except for number 5 which is a bit of a caricature), but it also makes sense theologically since you wouldn’t want to argue the opposite of these deductions, would you? Do you really want to be on the side of affirming that Christians earn eternal life through cultural labors?

Such a question does not appear to be sufficiently troubling for Littlejohn or Kloosterman who regard VanDrunen as betraying the genius of a culturally engaged Christianity. According to the former, with a high five from the latter:

. . . for VanDrunen, the suggestion that we are called to participate with Christ in restoring the world suggests synergism, suggests that Christ is not all-sufficient—if we have something to contribute to the work of redemption, then this is something subtracted from Christ, something of our own that we bring apart from him. Solus Christus and sola fide must therefore entail that there is nothing left to do in the working out of Christ’s accomplishment in his death and resurrection, that we must be nothing but passive recipients.

Here we find, then, that Puritan spirit at the heart of VanDrunen’s project–the idea that God can only be glorified at man’s expense,** that it’s a zero-sum game, and that thus to attribute something to us is to take it away from Christ, and to attribute something to Christ is to take it away from us. If Christ redeems the world, then necessarily, we must have nothing to do with the process. But this is not how the Bible speaks. He is the head, and we are the body. We are united to him. He looks on us, and what we do, and says, “That is me.” We look on him, and what he does, and say, “That is us.” He invites us to take part in his work—this is what is so glorious about redemption, that we are not simply left as passive recipients, but raised up to be Christ-bearers in the world.

Sorry, but I missed the ergo after union with Christ. We are united with Christ, ergo, we take part in redeeming the world? How exactly does that follow?

Actually, God’s glory is not a zero-sum game but redemption is. Somehow my blogging may glorify God. Somehow my cat, Isabelle, doing her best impression of a rug, is glorifying God. Somehow John F. Kennedy, as the first Roman Catholic president of the United States, glorified God. Which is to say it is possible for the glory of God to be differentiated and seen apart from the work of redemption. Since the heavens declare the glory of God and Christ did not take human form in order to redeem the heavens, such a distinction does not seem to be inherently dubious.

But to turn cultural activity into a part of redemption does take away from the all sufficiency of Christ or misunderstands the nature of his redeeming work (not to mention his providential care of his creation). And this is the problem that afflicts so many critics of 2k, even those who claim to be allies for the proclamation of the gospel. You may understand the sole sufficiency of the work of Christ for saving sinners, but if you then add redeeming culture or word and deed ministries to the mix of redemption, you are taking away from Christ’s sufficiency, both for the salvation of sinners and to determine what his kingdom is going to be and how it will be established. Maybe you could possibly think about cultural activity as a part of sanctification where God works and we work when creating a pot of clay. But as I’ve said before, the fruit of the Spirit is not Bach, Shakespeare, or Sargent; if you turn cultural activity into redeemed work you need to account for the superior cultural products of non-believers compared to believers.

To Littlejohn’s credit (as opposed to Kloosterman who fails to notice that Littlejohn has anything positive about VanDrunen), he does see merits in VanDrunen’s position:

In short, I really do salute VanDrunen’s intention to liberate Christians for cultural engagement as a grateful response to Christ’s gift, but I have a hard time seeing how he can give any meaningful content to this, given the theological foundations he has provided.

Actually, VanDrunen supplies plenty of theological justification for his view of Christ and culture since he sees important layers of discontinuity between Israel and the church (which many Kuyperians, Federal Visionaries, and theonomists fail to see and refuse to concede any ground to Meredith Kline). It does not take much imagination to see that the Israelites, even the ones who trusted in Christ during his earthly ministry, were completely unprepared for the new order that was going to emerge after the resurrection. They were still committed to Jerusalem, the Temple, the sabbath, and eating kosher. And Paul, who set the Gentiles free from those obligations, even submitted to the old arrangements for the sake of unity. But the new order of the church was completely unprecedented in the history of redemption to that point in time.

I see no reason why the next age of redemptive history will similarly exceed any expectation that we have based on our experience of this world. In fact, it strikes me that those who can’t imagine a very different order in the new heavens and new earth — what, after all, is it like to be male and female without marriage or reproduction? — are so tied to the arrangements and attractions of this world that they cannot set their minds on things above.