Charles Hodge and the Error of Rationalistic Religion
A Theological Critique of the Opening of Systematic Theology by Charles Hodge
Introduction
Before we begin dissecting and refuting his errors, it must be stated, for the sake of historical clarity, that Charles Hodge stands among the most influential representatives of nineteenth-century American Presbyterian theology. This does not mean that he faithfully subscribed to historical Reformed orthodoxy, as we shall see, but that he was a major figure in the development of American religion. For more than fifty years he taught at Princeton Theological Seminary, and through his three-volume Systematic Theology he exercised a lasting influence upon what is now considered conservative Presbyterianism and the broader Calvinistic world.
Hodge is commonly represented as a defender of Old School Calvinism against German idealism, higher criticism, theological liberalism, and the rising secularism of the modern age. This is important, because modern theology, of which Hodge is a prime architect, insofar as it lacks doctrinal coherence, can by necessity oppose only secularism, having no stable ground of contention against heterodox theological systems which, despite their dubious conclusions, continue to employ Christian language. Ultimately, because Reformed authority had already been weakened through the preceding century—especially by the radical mysticism and hyper-emotionalism of the so-called Great Awakening—men like Hodge, rather than contending for the faith against heretics as the church had done throughout the previous millennium, were forced chiefly to contend against the irreligious. But such a venture is shouldered by every false religion. Papists, Mohammedans, Jews, moralists, and philosophers may all oppose atheism. Opposition to secular unbelief, or even theological liberalism does not itself establish Christian orthodoxy.
A theologian, therefore, must not be judged merely by the doctrines he professes to defend, or the heathen he inveighs against, but by the principles upon which he builds his arguments, the method by which he reasons, and the authority to which he ultimately appeals. A man may retain the words of orthodoxy while abandoning the spiritual ground upon which orthodoxy stands. He may repeat many of the same formal conclusions as the Reformers while subtly replacing their doctrine of knowledge with the corrupted philosophy of secular humanism. He may profess the inspiration of Scripture while treating Scripture according to a humanistic method which ultimately subjects revelation to the erring judgment of the human mind.
This is the damning error we find in Charles Hodge.
Hodge professes submission to Scripture, as any Reformed academic would, but in the opening of his principal theological treatise he does not begin with the authoritative voice of God, man’s dependence upon grace, or the nature of faith receiving the Word through divine wisdom and the right interpretation of Scripture. Instead, he begins with a convoluted philosophical definition of science and then proceeds to define theology as a science.
Theology, rather than being treated first as divine revelation, is placed beside astronomy, chemistry, mechanics, geography, and history. Scripture, rather than being exalted as the very Word of God—to which every man, including the theologian, is subject, and beneath which he must bring every thought into obedience—is described as a collection of facts. The theologian is then presented as one who must collect, authenticate, arrange, reconcile, and exhibit those facts in their proper relations.
Thus the whole order of revelation, grace, faith, repentance, and the fruits of the Spirit is turned upside down. The theologian is placed above God; his reason is placed above the right and proper interpretation of Scripture; and his arrangement of facts and relations replaces the duty of man to submit himself to what God hath revealed in His Word.
“To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.”
—Isaiah 8:20
The initial movement of Hodge’s theology is therefore not from God to man—not from the Word preached and formed in the understanding through a gospel ministry, unto the faithful reception and confession of sound doctrine—but from disorganised facts to the human mind. Nor does he identify this mind as either fallen or regenerate, which is another fatal defect. He speaks merely of “the mind,” as though the natural understanding stood neutrally before revelation and possessed an undifferentiated power to examine and arrange divine truth.
Revelation, then, is not presented as the living and authoritative communication of God, by which He judges, enlightens, quickens, and governs man. It is presented as abstracted material awaiting the scientific treatment of the scholar. Theology consequently becomes the intellectual labour of man upon what Hodge represents as the fragmented and incoherent contents of Scripture, rather than the humble reception, confession, and proclamation of the truth already given and arranged by the wisdom of God.
This is not merely a minor defect in terminology. It is a deeply flawed and unstable foundation; and unstable foundations in doctrine and theology govern everything which follows from them. For in theology, not only must the matter itself be correct, but the manner also. It is not sufficient to repeat an orthodox conclusion if the principle by which one reaches it is unbelieving.
Hodge may say with the orthodox, “I believe in the predestination of the saints.” But how does he come to this conclusion? According to Hodge himself, as we shall see, he reaches it because he has examined the facts and, as a wise and capable scholar, recommends that others arrive at the same conclusion from the same evidence. The truth is no longer received because God hath spoken, but accepted because the theologian has examined the material and pronounced the conclusion reasonable.
Josh McDowell proceeds in the same manner in his apologetical work Evidence That Demands a Verdict. R. C. Sproul, who pretends to be Reformed, likewise adopts the same manner of theology when he defends an evidential method of apologetics against what is called presuppositionalism—the only orthodox and biblical manner of refuting atheists and heretics. In both cases, the evidence is placed before supposedly neutral men, and the final act is left to their independent evaluation.
This is a pernicious and subtle means of bringing in the doctrine of free will.
Two men have the same evidence placed before them. One follows the evidence to one conclusion, and the other follows it to another. Ultimately, it is left for each man to decide whether he will follow the theologian’s recommendation and subscribe to his method. It may be said that it would be wiser or better for him to do so, but the determining act remains his own.
This is not biblical reasoning, nor godly wisdom. It is corrupt and natural man attributing to himself what belongs to God.
Hodge and Sproul both manifestly prove by this method that they have not the fruit of the Spirit and do not submit to God’s Word as their final authority, but to their own fleshly wisdom: their own evaluation, authentication, and conclusion concerning rational evidence which was presented to others no less than to them. The distinction between belief and unbelief is therefore placed, not in the sovereign operation of God, but in the superior judgment of one man over another.
Calvin writes in his Institutes:
“Just as God, by the efficacy of His calling toward the elect, brings to completion the salvation unto which He had destined them by His eternal counsel, so also He has His judgments against the reprobate, by which He executes His purpose concerning them. Those, therefore, whom He created unto the dishonour of life and the destruction of death, that they might be instruments of His wrath and examples of His severity, He now deprives of the opportunity of hearing His Word, and now by its very preaching blinds and stupefies them the more, that they may attain the end appointed for them.”
Calvin does not set the elect and the reprobate before the same neutral body of facts and then attribute their contrary conclusions to differing uses of a common natural faculty. The same preaching which calls, enlightens, and saves the elect blinds and stupefies the reprobate according to the purpose of God. The difference lies not in the superior wisdom of the believer, but in the efficacy of divine calling.
Hodge and the rationalists do not reason from grace to faith—from God’s mercy to man’s reception of His Word as true, as Abraham believed God and it was imputed unto him for righteousness. They reason from man’s authentication and evaluation of facts and materials to another man’s submission to their opinion concerning those facts. The one believes because he has judged rightly; the other disbelieves because he has judged wrongly. Grace is thereby displaced by evaluation, and revelation by evidence.
The question, therefore, is not whether Hodge occasionally employs orthodox phrases, nor whether portions of his theology agree in some form or matter with the Westminster Confession. The question is whether his entire theological method begins where Scripture begins, proceeds as Scripture commands, and assigns to the human understanding only that limited, subordinate, and ministerial place which belongs to it.
We will prove that it does not.
The opening of Hodge’s Systematic Theology represents the subtle insinuation of rationalistic method into professedly Reformed theology. It replaces the spiritual order of revelation, faith, illumination, confession, and obedience with the scientific order of facts, observation, authentication, arrangement, and inference.
The doctrines themselves may at times resemble orthodoxy, but the governing principle, and the manner by which Hodge arrives at them, is no longer that of Westminster, Calvin, Luther, the prophets, or the apostles. It is the principle of modern man, autonomous of God and unreconciled to Him: the mind stands before the evidence, examines it, verifies it, relates it, and constructs from it a system which it and other men may accept as reasonable.
The result is not theology in the proper Christian sense, but humanistic philosophy and the pride of man erected upon biblical materials. And there is no greater heresy in the world today.
“Now there is no other division or heresy in the world except man’s wisdom, and when man’s foolish wisdom interprets the Scripture. Man’s wisdom scatters, divides, and makes sects. While the wisdom of one says that a white coat is best to serve God in, another says it is black, another gray, and another blue. And while one says that God will hear your prayer in this place, another says it is in that place. While one says this place is holier, another says that place is holier; and this religion is holier than that; and this saint is greater with God than that; and an hundred thousand things like it. Man’s wisdom is plain idolatry. Nor is there any other idolatry than to imagine about God after man’s wisdom. God is not man’s imagination; but only that which he says of himself. God is nothing but his law and his promises; that is to say, that which he bids you to do, and that which he bids you to believe and hope. God is but his word, as Christ says, John 8:58, ‘I am what I say to you;’ that is to say, That which I preach I am; my words are spirit and life, John 6:63. God is only what he testifies of himself; and to imagine any other thing of God than that, is damnable idolatry.” William Tyndale
I. Hodge’s Definition of Theology
Hodge begins by saying:
“In every science there are two factors: facts and ideas; or, facts and the mind. Science is more than knowledge. Knowledge is the persuasion of what is true on adequate evidence. But the facts of astronomy, chemistry, or history do not constitute the science of those departments of knowledge. Nor does the mere orderly arrangement of facts amount to science. Historical facts arranged in chronological order, are mere annals. The philosophy of history supposes those facts to be understood in their causal relations. In every department the man of science is assumed to understand the laws by which the facts of experience are determined; so that he not only knows the past, but can predict the future.”
He then applies this definition to theology:
“If, therefore, theology be a science, it must include something more than a mere knowledge of facts. It must embrace an exhibition of the internal relation of those facts, one to another, and each to all. It must be able to show that if one be admitted, others cannot be denied.”
And then comes his governing comparison:
“The Bible is no more a system of theology, than nature is a system of chemistry or of mechanics. We find in nature the facts which the chemist or the mechanical philosopher has to examine, and from them to ascertain the laws by which they are determined. So the Bible contains the truths which the theologian has to collect, authenticate, arrange, and exhibit in their internal relation to each other.”
This is the foundation upon which Hodge raises his theological structure. He says that theology is a science. That scripture supplies the facts. The theologian then performs upon those facts an intellectual work analogous to that performed by the chemist upon nature. The facts must be collected. Their authenticity must be determined. Their relations must be discovered. Their harmony must be exhibited. Only then does a system of theology emerge. This is a serious departure not only from orthodox terminology, but methodology. It is heterodox both in the matter and the manner. The matter and truth of the case is that scripture is the very word of God which is truth, regardless of the authentication of man. “Thy word is truth” saith our Lord. God reveals this truth to whom He wills and the rest abide in darkness with Hodge. There is therefore internally in scripture a perfectly harmonious system of religion, which we commonly call Reformed orthodoxy, established by the doctrine of the prophets, the apostles and the Lord Himself when He came to earth, and taught in seed form by many faithful witnesses of the early church, articulated more fully by the Reformers, Luther, Calvin, Bullinger, Turretin, preached by the orthodox Puritans and set down as authoritative in the Westminster Confession of Faith. Those who depart from this system of religion depart from the profession of the true faith and cannot even be considered as members of the visible church, let alone true believers who constitute the invisible. How deceived are men to call them Christians who are not even outwardly members of Christ’s Church but members of sects, cults, heresies and the kingdom of antichrist!
For Hodge’s error does not lie merely in the use of the word science. Older divines occasionally used that term in a broad sense. Nor does it lie in the affirmation that scriptural doctrines possess relations to one another. No Christian can deny that the doctrines of God, creation, providence, sin, Christ, justification, sanctification, the church, and the final judgment are inseparably related.
The error lies in the direction of the method, in the office assigned to man, and ultimately to the way Hodge views holy scripture and man’s relation to it.
For he does not begin with the revelation of the truth of God and the efficacy of the self-authenticating Word upon the soul by the work of the Spirit. He begins rather with a general theory of human knowledge as from the view of a carnal man not acquainted with the truth as the truth. He does not establish the nature of theology from the testimony of Scripture. He begins by defining science according to the relation between facts and the mind, and then compels theology to enter that pre-existing philosophical structure. This is the quintessential expression of corrupt judgment and man’s carnal interpretations imposed on scripture. It would be no surprise at all for a secular philosopher or a theological liberal to assert these high blasphemies, but we are not dealing with a secular atheist, a skeptic, or a heathen philosopher. This impudent trash is being spewed by none other than one highly esteemed and respected in the Presbyterian world. Not only do we have an example of horrible departure from the material and method of Christian theology, but the acceptance of it as well, and the approval of the greater part of the Calvinistic world, so that despite these damming errors they will hold nothing against him, and are more likely to believe such nonsense without Biblical warrant than condemn him, which does have warrant.
The theologian is not permitted to define his own method according to revelation. He is commanded to submit to scripture and humble Himself before God. That there are so many different systems of religion supposedly drawn from scripture is not a testimony that these systems are legitimate and scripture has many potential systems which may be derived from it as Hodge seems to suggest. The multitude of false opinions rather is a witness that man’s judgment is wholly corrupt and does not interpret the scripture according to the light of grace but according to the counsel of his own will, and the carnal wisdom of those who do not know God. However, because the evangelical Calvinist loves the world and not God, he would justify men, and be ashamed to condemn the greater part of the professing religious world. He will not outright say he is pluralistic, but by affirming other systems of religion as legitimate, he in turn says there are many ways to God and not one in Jesus Christ. Therefore, regardless of what system Hodge professes to subscribe to, he has already departed from the faith by legitimizing false religion and justified man’s darkened understanding imposed on scripture. He is an advocate for sin interpreting righteousness and not a faithful messenger sent from God to declare to man his sin in contrast with God’s righteousness.
His method is not orthodoxy but rationalism, and it is high blasphemy and an egregious afrront to God. He who follows in the dubious and doubtful ways of Hodge will fall into the ditch with him.
II. Theology Must Begin with God, Not with Man’s Theory of Knowledge
We must state plainly that all true theology begins with God.
First, with God as He is in Himself: eternal and incomprehensible, all-knowing, all-sufficient, and infinitely blessed. It begins with God freely revealing Himself to His creatures. It begins with His Word proceeding from His own perfect knowledge and bearing the authority of His own divine nature.
The first principle of theology is not that there are facts and a mind capable of arranging them. The first principle is that God is, and that God has spoken.
“Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth: for the LORD hath spoken, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me.
The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib: but Israel doth not know, my people doth not consider.”
—Isaiah 1:2–3
The prophet does not summon men to inspect a collection of religious facts, but he compels by his message, heaven and earth to hear because the Lord hath spoken. The authority of that message does not arise from the adequacy of evidence as judged by the hearer. It arises from the identity of the Speaker.
When God speaks, it is not for man to authenticate, organise, or reconcile. Rather, he is to hear, believe, tremble, and obey with all godly submission. We must see how Hodge’s method is not only inconsistent with biblical revelation, but wholly antithetical to it. He speaks as an outsider, as one who does not already possess the knowledge of God and His Word, but one who, by his own efforts, must do the best he can to arrange the concepts in a manner best suited to his own understanding.
It is plain to see that this philosophy, running clearly contrary to Scripture, is the very same method of thought as that of the rest of the unbelieving world, and consistent with Adam fallen, and not with man regenerate. Adam had communion with God and lost it; therefore man’s relationship to God was marred beyond all natural repair. He became darkened in heart and soul, and his understanding was corrupted by ignorance, malice, deceit, and every manner of sinfulness. His mind became a lodge for all uncleanness, and his heart a factory of idols.
Thus man, as he is born into the world and understands it according to that nature and condition, views God as inaccessible, regardless of the revelation of Jesus Christ. Hodge’s entire theological method utterly removes Christ as Mediator from the theological equation, who is Himself the very substance of all Christian thought.
For we must remember that Christian theology, considered as a study, is not the bare advancement of knowledge contained in Scripture, nor is it so high and sophisticated that the common man, and even the unlearned, cannot attain unto it by the ordinary means (see the Westminster Confession on the perspicuity of Scripture). Thus Hodge’s method—“observe and relate,” “study and authenticate”—is theology without Jesus Christ.
The Westminster Larger Catechism says, “Christ executes the office of a prophet, in his revealing to the church, in all ages, by his Spirit and word, in divers ways of administration, the whole will of God, in all things concerning their edification and salvation.” Thus Christ is the divine Teacher of His people, inasmuch as He Himself, by the Spirit, instructs and illuminates His church in all things concerning Himself.
And thus, do we not immediately see a principle wholly antithetical to Hodge’s theology being established here upon just and reasonable grounds, even the doctrine contained in the Word of God? Therefore, the duty of Christian, theologian, layman, scholar, or peasant alike is humble submission to His Word and the doctrine contained in it. For thus it is written,
“Thus saith the LORD, The heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool: where is the house that ye build unto me? and where is the place of my rest?
For all those things hath mine hand made, and all those things have been, saith the LORD: but to this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word.”
—Isaiah 66:1–2
This is the true method of Christian theology: poverty of spirit, contrition of heart, and reverent trembling at the Word. Solomon says in the Proverbs, “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge Him and he shall direct thy paths”; and Scripture says elsewhere, “the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do his commandments.” Therefore all Christian theology must be built upon this principle as it is set forth in the Word: “Trust in the LORD.”
But Hodge begins elsewhere. He begins with the competent mind standing over facts and discerning their relations according to human wisdom. The divine Word is thereby introduced, not first as the sceptre by which God rules the conscience, but as the field of investigation upon which the theologian exercises his scientific ability.
Such a foundation is entirely unsuitable for a body of true Christian theology.
Anselm stated the proper order:
“I do not seek to understand in order that I may believe, but I believe in order that I may understand. For this also I believe: that unless I believe, I shall not understand.”
Faith precedes understanding, not chronologically in every elementary act of perception, but principally and spiritually. The sinner does not reason his way upward into faith. God speaks, the Spirit works, faith receives, and the renewed mind learns to understand that which it has received upon divine testimony.
Faith is not the triumphant conclusion of an autonomous intellectual investigation. It is the gift of God. Man does not stand over revelation and determine whether it possesses adequate evidence. God creates faith in the heart and brings the sinner into willing captivity to His truth by the preaching of the Word in the church.
Luther accordingly declared:
“The Holy Spirit is no sceptic, and the things which He hath written in our hearts are not doubts or opinions, but assertions, more certain and more firm than sense and life itself.”
This certainty is the opposite of Hodge’s scientific posture. The believer does not first authenticate the truth and then submit to it. He is conquered by it. He does not confer authority upon the Word. The Word comes clothed with the authority of God and breaks down all his resistance.
“Is not my word like as a fire? saith the LORD; and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces?”
—Jeremiah 23:29
Hodge presents the theologian as one who acts upon Scripture. Scripture presents itself as that by which God acts upon the theologian.
The difference is substantial.
III. The Fatal Error of Treating Revelation as a Collection of Facts
Even Hodge’s use of the word facts, therefore, reveals the naturalistic and heathenistic cast of his theology.
There are, of course, factual declarations in Scripture. God created the heavens and the earth. Adam sinned. Israel was brought out of Egypt by Moses. Christ was conceived of the Holy Ghost, born of the virgin Mary, crucified under Pontius Pilate, raised from the dead, and received into heaven. These are true events.
Yet Scripture is not merely a deposit of facts, and the theologian is not above them, but beneath them.
The Word of God contains commandments, covenants, promises, threatenings, prayers, judgments, songs, prophecies, parables, lamentations, blessings, curses, types, ceremonies, visions, histories, doctrines, and ultimately the divine interpretation of divine acts. It is a living thread of speech proceeding from the mouth of God and directed to the conscience of man.
A fact, considered merely as a fact, is something which the mind may observe while remaining personally detached from it. A chemist may examine a substance without loving or hating it. An astronomer may calculate the motion of a planet without repentance. A historian may arrange the events of a war without being morally judged by them. But no man may approach Scripture in this manner without already having sinned against it.
God, by His Word, commands the hearer. It accuses him. It reveals the secrets of his heart. It pronounces him guilty. It shuts his mouth before God. It declares the righteousness of Christ. It commands him to repent and believe. It exposes the hidden enmity of the natural mind. It promises eternal life to the believer and everlasting destruction to the impenitent.
Thus the beginning of Christian theology is not “evaluating and authenticating facts,” but abasement and humility before God. Hodge begins with pride and the cleverness of man’s wisdom, because Hodge, like many scholars in the Christian church, has not been humbled by the Word. His view of the Word is that of human arrangement and human doctrine, because God has not acted upon him, bringing him from rebellion into submission to the Word.
“For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.”
—Hebrews 4:12–13
And we must see that this is no mere slip of words, nor an accidental error which may be remedied by reevaluation and repentance. Ministers may err as to the precise use of words and the manner of articulating truth. God’s Word deserves perfection, and we all fall short of it. Yet we are not dealing here with a phrase of Hodge in which he treats a subject somewhat differently than it ought to be treated.
We may fault Calvin for his language concerning the Sabbath in his Institutes, for he greatly weakens the lawful and necessary time set apart for the worship of God. His theological substance is not erroneous, but some may be led, through an improper reading of his language, to cast off the doctrine of the Lord’s Day. Luther also may be faulted for holding too closely to a literal interpretation concerning the bread and cup of the Lord, imagining that there was some element of Christ’s body physically present—not in the same manner as the Papists, but with a similar error concerning the mode of presence.
But we are not dealing here with a mere fault of speech, nor with an area in which a theologian, not having been given full light in a particular branch of theology, uses words which are not entirely justifiable. We are dealing with a theologian who believes himself above Scripture, and therefore views Scripture not as authority, nor the doctrine contained in it as absolute, but as a collection of historical facts which must be arranged according to man’s wisdom—his own wisdom—and formed into a system according to that understanding.
We must remember that this is also how such men permit heretics into the kingdom: by insisting that theological systems are formed and framed by man, and therefore that the Arminian system, or even the liberal system, may be regarded as a virtuous attempt at the same task which he himself is performing. This is to remove the substance and doctrine of Scripture utterly from it, to deny the spiritual efficacy of the Word, and to place all of man’s learning concerning the Word within the realm of this world.
Once again, this is devilish reasoning. It is the words contained in the Bible without their spiritual meaning; teaching without doctrine; revelation without purpose and without meaning.
Scripture, in Hodge’s mind, does not teach predestination and effectual grace. It might, and he might gather from Romans 9 and Ephesians 1 that such doctrines are plausible, but ultimately he does not know this by revelation; it has not been revealed to him in the biblical sense of spiritual knowledge. Therefore the only thing he can finally say concerning his view of the Word of God is that it is his best judgment concerning the evidence before him.
But the Word is not the dead object of human analysis. It is quick and powerful. It is living and mighty in operation. It divides between good and evil. It pierces into the very soul. It judges man’s wisdom and finds it wanting. It lays man bare before God and gives him no excuse for his ignorance, malice, heresy, or hypocrisy.
Hodge’s method, therefore, is not merely a poor choice of words or a lack of clarity on one particular topic. He entirely reverses the relation of man and Scripture and begins his theology openly admitting that he is an unbeliever and an outsider. The theologian becomes the examiner, and Scripture becomes the examined object.
This is not mere error, but fatal error.
Turretin writes in his Institutes:
“One error directly, at first and immediately overthrows the foundation, another, indirectly, secondarily and by consequence. The former is undoubtedly the greater of the two. Again, an error can overturn the foundation indirectly and by a proximate, evident, necessary consequence; or by a remote, evident and wrested consequence. The former is certainly a deadly error, not so the latter. Thus the papists do not directly attack the sufficiency of the satisfaction of Christ and justification by faith and other like doctrines; but indirectly and by consequence (though evident and necessary) oppose it by their errors concerning the merit of works, their own satisfactions, the sacrifice of the Mass, purgatory, etc. They who quietly rest in the terms of an implied contradiction where there is opposition in apposition and a contradiction in the addition are to be regarded as overthrowing the foundation no less than those who directly attack it.”
We see in Hodge such an attack upon the foundation. Scripture is authoritative, and the doctrine contained in it—whether election, original sin, reprobation, effectual calling, or even the very authority of Scripture itself, which is a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path—is authoritative. Any doctrine which opposes it is therefore to be rejected; and he who holds to a doctrine which opposes it is to be regarded as a stranger to that grace which Scripture manifests.
Hodge’s scientific analogy therefore obscures the sovereign authority of revelation. It encourages a posture of detachment precisely where God demands submission.
IV. Hodge’s Definition of Knowledge Subjects Truth to Human Evidence
Hodge writes:
“Knowledge is the persuasion of what is true on adequate evidence.”
The phrase appears reasonable as to knowledge pertaining to this world, but one must immediately ask: adequate according to whom? Shall God’s Word be subjected to human evaluation, and shall God be judged by man as either sufficiently or insufficiently known? Is divine testimony to be received because God has spoken, or only after the human mind has examined the evidence and pronounced it sufficient?
If the latter, then man has become the judge of God.
But if Reformed doctrine is held to, we will know that the authority of Scripture depends wholly upon God, who is truth itself and the Author thereof. The church does not make Scripture authoritative. The theologian does not make Scripture credible. The believer does not confer certainty upon it by recognising its excellencies.
Hodge, however, has made himself a scholar-pope by this form of reasoning. Rather than auricular confession, and the layman being wholly dependent upon the priest for his spiritual welfare, the Christian becomes beholden to Hodge and to his evaluation of theology. From the beginning we are not led by Hodge to, “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart,” but rather, “Trust the experts to evaluate and authenticate.” Thus Protestants fall into the same damnable and accursed error as the Papists, taking to themselves new mediators to lead them unto salvation.
But there is no salvation outside of Jesus Christ, and there is no gospel save that which we preach and confess, which is contained in the Old and New Testaments, declared by the Reformers, and ratified in our Confession of Faith of 1646. Hodge would instead be a new priest, a new pope, and have all in the Christian church submit themselves to him for his expertise.
Hodge begins his work of theology not with, “Submit to God,” but with, “Submit to the scholars.” He is the one who has gathered the evidence. He has arranged the facts. He has determined their relations. He presents himself as the competent authority who has examined the material and reached the proper conclusions. Scripture itself is thereby made to mean nothing doctrinally until the scholar has arranged and authenticated its facts.
This method is utterly foreign to Scripture and to the Reformation, and it leads men astray unto destruction.
God speaks truth because He is the God of truth. His Word is certain because it is His Word.
“God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?”
—Numbers 23:19
The adequacy of divine testimony therefore rests in God, not in the tribunal of the human understanding.
This does not mean that Scripture is devoid of evidences of its divine origin. Its majesty, purity, consent of all its parts, scope, efficacy, and fulfilment of prophecy abundantly manifest its divine character. But these things do not constitute its authority. They manifest an authority which already belongs to it because God is its Author.
Once again, Hodge’s language turns this order upside down. Knowledge becomes persuasion founded upon adequate evidence, and the mind appears as the competent judge which evaluates that evidence and arrives at certainty.
Yet the natural mind is not a neutral court. It is corrupt, darkened, proud, hostile to God, and determined to suppress the truth.
“For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;
Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them.
For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.”
—Romans 1:18–22
The evidence is not defective. Man is defective. The truth is manifest, but man suppresses it. The things of God are clearly seen, but man has become altogether vain in his imaginations.
Therefore the problem of theology is not first the insufficiency of unarranged facts, but the depravity of the sinner who refuses to submit to the God who speaks in His holy Word. All Christian theology begins and ends with the Word of God, and all our understanding of Scripture must be according to what is written. Everything else is not merely an improper arrangement of facts, but accursed idolatry.
Tyndale writes:
“Man’s wisdom is plain idolatry. Nor is there any other idolatry than to imagine about God after man’s wisdom. God is not man’s imagination; but only that which he says of himself. God is nothing but his law and his promises; that is to say, that which he bids you to do, and that which he bids you to believe and hope. God is but his word, as Christ says, John 8.58 ‘I am, what I say to you;’ that is to say, That which I preach I am; my words are spirit and life. Joh 6.63 God is only what he testifies of himself; and to imagine any other thing of God than that, is damnable idolatry.”
Tyndale identifies the issue at hand precisely. Man’s wisdom is idolatry because (whether heathen or heretic) it presumes to determine what God is apart from what God has testified concerning Himself. The error is not merely that man reaches a poor conclusion from insufficient evidence. The error is that he assumes the right to stand over revelation and determine, by his own wisdom, what ought to be believed concerning God.
This is the principle already operative in Hodge’s definition of knowledge. God speaks, but man must first judge whether the evidence is adequate. Revelation is given, but the scholar must authenticate it. Doctrine is contained in Scripture, but the theologian must arrange it before it can become a coherent system.
Thus the authority which belongs to God is transferred to the judgment of man; and what begins as a seemingly harmless definition of knowledge ends in the very thing Tyndale condemns: man imagining God after man’s wisdom.
V. “The Bible Is No More a System of Theology”
But Hodge’s most insidious and offensive statement is not concerning knowledge, but theology. He says:
“The Bible is no more a system of theology, than nature is a system of chemistry or of mechanics.”
Once again, this is not merely an uneven comparison or a blatantly erroneous statement, but a denial of the gospel, the authority of God, the efficacy of the Word, and a blasphemy against the wisdom of God.
God created man upright and endowed him with the capacity to know, obey, and love his Maker and Lord. When man rebelled against his gracious Creator, he lost those precious and inestimable gifts which united him to his God. As the law and the prophets testify, “thou shalt surely die”; and again, “O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself”; and, “your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear.”
But God did not leave man in that estate whereinto he fell. In wonderful condescension and marvellous grace, He made a covenant with the Son for the redemption of His people from this bondage. Therefore it was necessary that God reveal His will unto His church, whom He determined to deliver from such a condition, uniting them unto Himself again through Jesus Christ, who is declared and set forth in that Word, and who Himself is the express image of His Father and the substance of all Christian revelation. For, “In the beginning was the Word.”
Thus from Scripture, which reveals unto us the mind of God, we are taught:
- That God made man upright. (Ecclesiastes 7:29)
- That man, deceived by Satan, fell through his own lusts, not for himself only, but for his posterity. (Romans 5:12)
- That after the fall he is in a condition of sin and misery, liable to the judgment of hellfire. (Romans 5:18)
- That God, according to the strict justice of His law, must punish man for sin. (Romans 3:25–26)
- That Christ died to save His people from this condition. (Matthew 1:21; John 14:1–3)
- That God does whatsoever He pleases and saves whom He will. (Romans 9)
- That He saves men by the preaching of the true gospel, and not by a lie. (Galatians 1:8–10; Romans 10; 2 Thessalonians 2:11)
These are but a few elementary principles which we are effectually taught from Scripture.
Now, we will not deny that Hodge is familiar with many of these doctrines and speaks of them in his work. But he does not begin his work with them as the governing principle because he believes them only as he has received them from men. He believes them as the word of Augustine or Calvin, but not as the Word of God.
It is not enough for us to receive some things in Scripture as true. We must receive them in the proper manner: that is, as they come from God.
Thus many in the churches today profess many things pertaining to Scripture. They may speak of election, grace, saving faith, the law, the justice of God, the atonement, and other doctrines contained in Scripture. But they do not receive them as from God; they receive them from men. Therefore, like Hodge, they call other men believers who deny them.
But the gospel is not, “Believe some or many of these things and you will be saved,” but, “Believe all things written in the Word of God for your salvation.” Therefore even those who appear most sound betray the gospel by their allowance and toleration of those who deny it under the guise and cloak of charity.
Charity is not receiving as Christian those who oppose the Word of God, but bearing with the faults and infirmities of those within the church who believe the Word of God. For love “rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth.”
Luther therefore says well:
“Accursed be that charity which is preserved through the loss of the doctrine of faith, to the which all things ought to give place, be it charity, an Apostle, or an angel from heaven, etc. Therefore, when they make this matter of so little account, they do sufficiently witness what store they set by the Word of God. Which if they did believe to be the Word of God, they would not so trifle with it, but would hold it in high honor, and without any disputing or doubting would put their faith in it, knowing that one word of God is all and all are one. Likewise they would know that one article [of doctrine] is all and all are one, so that if one is set aside, then by little and little all are lost: for they are joined the one to the other, and are bound up together as it were by one common bond. Let us suffer them therefore to extol charity and concord as much as they list: but on the other side, let us magnify the majesty of the Word and faith. Charity may be neglected in time and place without any danger: but so cannot the Word and faith be. Charity suffereth all things, giveth place to all men. Contrariwise, faith suffereth nothing, giveth place to no man.”
John Owen writes in the same manner:
“Now, what peace in the church without truth? All conformity to anything else is but the agreement of Herod and Pilate to destroy Christ and his kingdom. Neither is it this or that particular truth, but the whole counsel of God revealed unto us, without adding or detracting, whose embracement is required to make our peace firm and stable. No halting betwixt Jehovah and Baal, Christ and Antichrist; as good be all Philistine, and worshippers of Dagon, as to speak part the language of Ashdod and part the language of the Jews: hence, hence hath been the rise of all our miseries, of all our dissensions, whilst factious men labored everyday to commend themselves to them who sat aloft in the temple of God, by introducing new popish-arminian errors, whose patronage they had wickedly undertaken.”
And Bullinger writes:
“True faith therefore believes that life and every good thing freely comes to it from God through Christ. This is the chief article of our faith, as more largely laid out in the articles of belief. The second principal point of God’s word and faith is that there is set down in the word of God, all truth necessary to be believed; and that true faith believes all that is declared in the scriptures. For it tells us that God exists; what manner of God he is; what God’s works are; what his judgments, will, commandments, promises, and threatenings are. Finally, whatever is profitable or necessary to be believed, God’s word wholly sets these down for us, and true faith receives them, believing all things that are written in the law and the prophets, and in the gospel and writings of the apostles. But whatever cannot be fetched or proved out of those writings, or whatever is contrary to them, the faithful do not believe that at all — for the very nature of true faith is not to believe that which departs from the word of God. Whoever therefore does not believe the fables and opinions of men, he alone believes as he should: for he depends only upon the word of God, and so upon God himself, the only fountain of all truth.”
The Westminster Confession of Faith, therefore, in perfect agreement with Bullinger’s words—“This is the chief article of our faith, as more largely laid out in the articles of belief”—contains that system of religion which God has declared unto us in Scripture; and those who reject it do so unto their everlasting peril.
Scripture indeed contains a system of religion, because God is holy, wise, and just, and has deposited unto men that Word which alone is able to save their souls. Salvation cometh by knowledge, yet not by that worldly knowledge which imposeth itself upon Scripture and upon the consciences of men, but by that knowledge which is from above: which teaches humility, love, faith, and every Christian virtue, not merely in the abstract so that men may hope to possess them, but so that they really possess them through Jesus Christ the Lord and Saviour of men.
He is a Prophet to teach us all truth, a Priest to intercede for us at the right hand of God the Father, and a King to rule over us, lead us in the ways of obedience, and defend us from our enemies.
For so it is written:
“According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:
Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
Therefore give even all diligence thereunto: and join moreover virtue with your faith: and with virtue, knowledge;
And with knowledge, temperance; and with temperance, patience; and with patience, godliness;
And with godliness, brotherly kindness; and with brotherly kindness, love.
For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be idle nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
But he that hath not these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins.
Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall:
For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.”
The Holy Scripture, then, is not a confused accumulation of divine fragments from which man constructs theological order. It is the perfectly wise revelation of the perfectly wise God. Its several books, covenants, histories, prophecies, laws, and doctrines proceed from one divine Author. Its unity is not conferred upon it by the theologian. Its unity is inherent because God is one and His truth is one.
Hodge makes God a fool that he himself may be counted wise. God has scattered nonsense, but man must collect and arrange it. God has written confusion, but man must make sense of it as best he can. Few men in the history of the Christian church have written such egregious blasphemies against the Most High.
“The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.
Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.”
—Psalm 12:6–7
“For ever, O LORD, thy word is settled in heaven.
Thy faithfulness is unto all generations: thou hast established the earth, and it abideth.
They continue this day according to thine ordinances: for all are thy servants.”
—Psalm 119:89–91
Scripture is settled in heaven before the theologian approaches it. Its order, truth, purity, and harmony do not await his investigation.
Hodge’s analogy implies that Scripture bears the same relation to theology that unexamined nature bears to chemistry. Nature supplies substances; the chemist supplies scientific organisation. Scripture supplies truths; the theologian supplies theological organisation.
The necessary implication is that the Bible, as given by God, is not yet theology. It contains the materials of theology, but theology itself emerges only after the human mind has performed its labour upon those materials.
Thus God provides the fragments, and man provides the system.
God speaks the facts, and man supplies their higher meaning.
God gives the material, and man produces the science.
This is the exaltation of the theologian above revelation. It is to make the mind of man the organising principle of divine truth. However reverently the work may be described, the structure remains humanistic and rationalistic.
The Bible does indeed contain a system of theology, and that system man is bound to receive and obey with all reverence and fidelity. Scripture is the perfect fountain, rule, form, substance, and authority of all true theology. Its system does not appear in the artificial manner of a nineteenth-century textbook, but it is ever present in the unity of God’s covenant with man, the progress of His revelation, the harmony of His attributes, the agreement of His testimonies, the fulfilment of His prophecies, and the universal testimony borne to Jesus Christ and to the doctrine of the free grace of God in Him.
Jesus said:
“Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.
And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.
I receive not honour from men.”
—John 5:39–41
All Scripture testifies of Christ. The theologian does not create this unity. He receives it.
Again, Jesus said:
“O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken:
Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory?
And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.”
—Luke 24:25–27
Moses and all the prophets already possessed a unified testimony concerning Christ. The disciples’ error was not that the facts had not yet been systematised. Their defect was that they were slow of heart to believe what God had already spoken.
Hodge makes the deficiency intellectual and structural. Christ declares it to be moral and spiritual.
He who does not possess the doctrine of Christ does not possess Christ. Doctrine is not the scientific arrangement of religious facts added afterwards to Christianity; it is inseparable from the revelation of Christ Himself. Thus John writes:
“Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son.
If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed:
For he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds.”
—2 John 9–11
The apostle does not treat contrary systems as alternative scientific arrangements of common Christian facts. He joins possession of God to abiding in the doctrine of Christ. To depart from the doctrine is therefore to depart from God Himself.
VI. Scripture Is Not Raw Material Awaiting Human Arrangement.
Hodge says that the theologian must “collect, authenticate, arrange, and exhibit” the truths of Scripture. Every term places the theologian in an exalted office which he has not been given by God. He collects what God has scattered. He authenticates what God has spoken. He arranges what God has left without systematic order. He exhibits relations which were not previously manifest. Scripture is thus treated as raw theological material, and the theologian as the craftsman who converts that material into an intelligible system. This is not the language of stewardship. It is the language of intellectual mastery.
The minister of God does not authenticate the Word; the Word authenticates the minister. The minister does not judge whether Scripture is worthy to be believed; Scripture judges whether the minister is faithful. “To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.” —Isaiah 8:20. The prophet does not say that the theologian authenticates the law and testimony. He says that every teacher must be tried by them. The Word is the judge; man is the accused. The Lord Jesus declared, “If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken; Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God?” —John 10:35–36. Scripture cannot be broken. Its doctrinal verity and certainty do not arise from the work of the theologian.
The proper office of the theologian is therefore subordinate and ministerial. He is to hear, receive, believe, study, and preach; to compare Scripture with Scripture; to declare the whole counsel of God; to refute errors contrary to the Word; to feed the flock with knowledge and understanding; and to speak with the authority of God. But how shall he perform this office if he assumes instead the prerogative of arranging and authenticating the truths of God? The two offices are utterly contrary. The faithful minister searches into an authority already established and expounds a truth already revealed; Hodge’s theologian must first authenticate the material and ascertain its proper relations.
Yet while Scripture is authoritative, and men are commanded with all humility and fidelity to submit to its laws, ordinances, governing principles, and unified doctrinal system, there remains abundant labour for the Christian minister. While refuting Hodge, let us not fall into another error and imagine that all knowledge of God comes easily, without diligent searching, meditation, prayer, comparison, and study. The perspicuity of Scripture does not mean that every mystery lies equally upon the surface, nor does the perfection of revelation render the labour of the theologian superfluous. Rather, because God has spoken, the minister has something worthy of a lifetime of study; and because that Word is perfect, his labour consists in searching out what God has placed within it, not in supplying what God has omitted.
Thus the apostle writes, “Let us study therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of disobedience. For the word of God is lively, and mighty in operation, and sharper than any two edged sword, and entereth through, even unto the dividing asunder of the soul and the spirit, and of the joints, and the marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts, and the intents of the heart.” —Hebrews 4:11–12 GNV. The King James renders the same exhortation, “Let us labour therefore to enter into that rest.” The word translated study by the Geneva and labour by the King James is σπουδάζω: to apply oneself earnestly and diligently, to make serious endeavour. The older word study, therefore, must not be reduced to the modern notion of merely reading and examining information; it signifies earnest application and diligent labour toward an appointed end.
And observe the apostle’s reasoning: “Let us study”—or, “Let us labour”—“for the word of God is lively, and mighty in operation.” The efficacy lies not in the scholar, but in the Word. The Christian labours because God has spoken; he searches because divine treasures have been laid before him; he studies because the Word which he studies is itself powerful to convince, convict, pierce, judge, and cleanse the conscience. The theologian does not stand over Scripture performing an operation upon it. Scripture performs its operation upon him. This is precisely what Hodge’s method overturns. Hodge cannot be cleansed by the Word while he stands above it as its authenticator; but those who bow beneath it, hear it, keep it, search it, and tremble before it are taught of God according to His promise.
Hence it is written, “Blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it”; and again, “the meek he will teach his way and guide into judgment, and to those who fear Him, He will show them the secrets of his covenant.” The promise of divine instruction belongs not to the autonomous intellect, but to the meek and God-fearing man. God does not promise His covenantal secrets to the scholar because he is ingenious, but to those who fear Him; nor does He guide those who lean upon their own understanding, but those who submit themselves unto His testimony. Christian study, therefore, is neither indolence nor rationalism. It is the strenuous labour of faith beneath the authority and illumination of God.
Again it is written, “It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, and the honor of kings to search it out.” God has hidden many rich and glorious things in His Word, not because the Word is defective or confused, but because in His wisdom He has ordained that many of its treasures should reward diligent searching. There are depths which cannot be sounded by a superficial reader, relations which appear only after long meditation, types which require comparison, consequences which must be carefully deduced, and mysteries before which the greatest theologian must confess the poverty of his understanding. This searching is not an affront to the perfection of Scripture, but an honour bestowed upon those who search it. The treasure exists before the searcher discovers it.
So also Christ says, “every scribe which is instructed unto the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is an householder, which bringeth forth out of his treasure things new and old.” The faithful theologian is therefore not a passive and indolent reader, but neither is he the architect of divine truth. He is a scribe instructed unto the kingdom, bringing forth treasures which already belong to the household of God. He searches, compares, distinguishes, expounds, deduces, defends, and applies; but he does not authenticate. He discovers order; he does not confer it. He unfolds doctrine; he does not manufacture it. His labour is great precisely because his authority is small. He is a servant entrusted with treasures, not a master commissioned to determine whether they are genuine.
Therefore our argument is not that Scripture contains no mysteries which godly and diligent men are encouraged to seek out and find. Nor do we contend that every passage is equally easy, that every theological consequence lies naked upon the surface, or that there is no honour belonging to the learned minister who has spent his life searching the deep things contained in the Word. Our contention is that the system of religion revealed in Scripture, beginning with divine authority, sin, judgment, righteousness, redemption, and eternal life, as preached by the Reformers, expressed in the Confession of Faith, and commonly called Reformed orthodoxy, is so manifestly declared in Scripture that those who deny it do not merely propose another intellectually permissible arrangement of common religious data. Being blinded by their own deceits and lusts, they resist the testimony of God and show themselves servants of Satan and not of God. There is an immeasurable difference between searching more deeply into mysteries which God has revealed and contradicting those first principles which He has plainly declared.
Calvin and the Reformers therefore taught that Scripture is self-authenticating. Its certainty is not founded upon the judgment of men, but sealed upon the heart by the testimony of the Holy Ghost. The church receives Scripture because it is the Word of God; it does not make it the Word of God by receiving it. Hodge places the theologian where the Spirit alone belongs. He replaces autopistos—Scripture worthy of belief in itself—with scholarly verification. And since Hodge, as we have seen, errs upon this fundamental question of authority, usurping the office of the Spirit and making himself and other scholars the authenticators of the truths of Scripture, we can conclude without proceeding through every subsequent article of his theology that the corruption has already entered at the foundation. Whatever orthodox propositions may afterwards appear cannot repair a principle which reverses the relation between God who speaks and man who hears.
Upon the grounds already established, therefore, Hodge manifests himself not as a believer receiving the Word from God, but as an outsider, a hypocrite, and a heretic, teaching things not contained in Scripture and overthrowing the principal substance upon which all the doctrine of the Word rests: the authority of God. The matter is not remedied because he afterwards speaks orthodox words concerning predestination, justification, or the person of Christ. If the fountain of theological knowledge has first been subjected to the tribunal of human authentication, the subsequent orthodoxy is received upon a corrupted principle. Thus saith the Lord, “trust not in man, and cursed is he that maketh flesh his arm.” But Hodge saith, in substance, “Trust the experts to arrange and authenticate.” The opposition is not peripheral. It strikes at the very nature of faith, which receives God’s Word as true because it proceeds from Him and not from man.
Once again, this is a new form of papism. Rome places the church between Scripture and the believer, declaring that the authority and meaning of Scripture must be secured by the ecclesiastical magisterium. Rationalistic Protestantism places the scholar between Scripture and the believer, declaring that the facts of Scripture must be authenticated and arranged by the theologian. In the former, the pope governs the text; in the latter, the academic governs the text. Both interpose man between God and the conscience. Both establish a human tribunal where God alone ought to reign. Both obscure that immediate subjection of faith to the divine testimony by which the believer hears the voice of his Shepherd and receives His Word, not as the word of men, but, as it is in truth, the Word of God.
VII. Hodge Begins as a Philosopher, Not as a Theologian
It is written in the prophets: “Thus saith the LORD.”
And in the New Testament: “That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you.”
And our Lord saith: “Verily, verily, I say unto you.” This is because the governing authority for the Christian ministry is the word of God, namely the Spirit speaking in the word.
But Hodge, and many following after him begin instead not with the word of God, but with science and philosophy: He writes, “In every science there are two factors: facts and ideas; or, facts and the mind.”
From the outset Hodge seeks to establish himself as a cunning craft of words, and profound thinker before he establishes the word as truth. Once again, we see a fundamental error showing Hodge to be directly opposed to that heavenly spirit which is found in all God’s faithful ministers. For God’s ministers are ready to cast themselves down that God and His word may be exalted. Paul says, “to the weak I became as weak, that I may win the weak: I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some. And this I do for the Gospel’s sake, that I might be partaker thereof with you.” and Luther, “I did nothing. The word of God did all.” But Hodge’s spirit and authority are opposed to Christ and the gospel. He believes the “Calvinistic system” came from men, and it is only one way of looking at the Bible. This is why he can say, “If the facts of Scripture are what Augustinians believe them to be, then the Augustinian system is the only possible system of theology. If those facts be what Romanists or Remonstrants take them to be, then their system is the only true one.” According to the casual reader, he seems to be implying that the doctrine of free grace is the only possible conclusion based on all the facts because of their relation to each other, but if we take into consideration, 1. He calls Arminians and other heretics believers, 2. he says, “If those facts be what Romanists or Remonstrants take them to be…”leaving the question open. Once again, Christian ministers do not leave the door open for the possibility of heretical opinions to be true. Luther said rightly that the doctrine of free will was the doctrine of antichrist. Calvin said that those who hold hands with Rome deny God. And where comes this spirit of authority and conviction, to pass by the “facts” and declare plainly that those who deny predestination are atheists? (Knox, Ness, Owen) From the Spirit of God who teaches His elect to discern between good doctrine and false, so that, “if an angel from heaven preach any other gospel, we may boldly call him accursed”
For the prophets and apostles do not establish a theory of knowledge before they speak. They speak because the Word of the Lord came unto them. Their certainty rests upon divine commission. Their authority is not the authority of learned men who have achieved a persuasive system, but of servants sent by the living God.
“Then the LORD put forth his hand, and touched my mouth. And the LORD said unto me, Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth.
See, I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant.”
—Jeremiah 1:9–10
The true minister does not gather religious facts and create from them a plausible synthesis. God puts His Word in the minister’s mouth, and we speak by that authority.
Paul likewise distinguishes apostolic preaching from the wisdom of this world:
“And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God.
For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling.
And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power:
That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.”
—1 Corinthians 2:1–5
Hodge’s method leads men in the opposite direction. Faith comes to stand upon a system intellectually demonstrated by the theologian. The relation of facts is exhibited so that, if one truth is admitted, others cannot be denied. Theology is consequently presented as a structure of rational necessity. And while it is true that a person’s view of sin determines their view of salvation and grace, we do not mean to say that if you err from this, there is room for charity. Charity suffers long pertaining to that which may be forgiven without the loss of the doctrine of faith, as John says, “there is sin leading to death, I do not say that he should pray for it.” and again another apostle writes, “they which practice such things (heresy) shall not inherit the kingdom of God.” and Thomas Watson rightly notes, a “A man may go to hell as well for heresy as adultery.”
God will not have faith to stand in the wisdom of men. Paul as a faithful minister appeals to the demonstration of sound doctrine through the power and might of the Spirit. For the Spirit only can heal the blind and make men to see the glories of holy scripture.
This then we see is directly contrary to Hodge’s theology. His authority, method, spirit, epistemology and presupposition proceed not from the word and the Spirit, but from himself and his own darkened imagination.
VIII. Hodge’s Style Conceals the Nature of the Error under the Pretense of Knowledge
We must note that Hodge’s language is not authoritative and prophetic, but academic, abstract, and detached. Terms such as facts, ideas, internal relation, cognate truths, causal relations, scientific arrangement, and authentication create an appearance of precision; yet this precision is largely philosophical rather than biblical. Theological terms, in their proper function, are employed to convey truth and shed light upon the mysteries of religion, bringing heavenly doctrine, as it were, within the reach of men, and ultimately serving to instruct and edify the church. As it is written, “The righteousness which is of faith speaketh on this wise, Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend into heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down from above:) Or, Who shall descend into the deep? (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead.) But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach; That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.” Ministers, preachers, and theologians therefore have a duty before God not to make heavenly knowledge more abstract and nebulous than it ought to be, but to make general and universal truths concrete, intelligible, and practical unto the church.
Calvin, Beza, Turretin, and Owen, for all their scholastic gifts, mingled their learning with reverence and the fear of God. Their distinctions were not ornaments of intellect but instruments employed in the service of truth. Hodge, however, from the very beginning places his thoughts beyond the easy reach of common hearers by employing philosophical terms and a scholastic diction which often requires the reader to labour unnecessarily merely to understand his point. What is most notable is not that his words tend to glorify the Lord, as in the Reformed theologians before him, but that they tend rather to magnify man’s learning and aptitude. Theology itself becomes the occasion for displaying the competency of the scholar, and whatever is said concerning divine truth is made to serve, whether openly or by consequence, the praise of human erudition, especially among the learned in the church.
This is not a notable characteristic of the apostles, but of the Pharisees, who made broad their phylacteries and loved to be called of men, “Rabbi,” that is, teacher. Hodge, by his convoluted and onerous style, writes not as one chiefly concerned to reach the conscience of men and persuade them of truth according to the authority of God, but as one seeking the approbation of scholastics like himself. His theological manner tends to elevate the scholar even at the expense of the souls of others. His theology, then, becomes not a help but an obstacle to the sincere reader, even if we were to set aside the many glaring errors already found in the first few pages.
Hodge’s language is the language of pride, and he employs his learning in making theology more inaccessible rather than more intelligible to the Christian. Yet here we must carefully observe several points of doctrine, lest our adversaries seize upon the force of this charge and falsely accuse us of despising learning, theological terminology, or the diligent study of divine things.
First, by faulting Hodge for difficult and unnecessarily obscure language, we do not mean to suggest that the Christian is, or ought to remain, ignorant of theological terminology. We maintain with all the godly that the Christian, by that new nature given unto him, is made a scholar of Christ; and being delivered from ignorance, he desires to know more of God and His ways. For it is written, “they shall be taught of God.” Thomas Watson rightly observes: “There is none so dull but Christ can make him a good scholar. Even such as are ignorant, and of low parts, Christ teaches in such a manner that they know more than the great sages and wise men of the world. Hence that saying of Augustine, surgunt indocti, et rapiunt coelum; the unlearned men rise up, and take heaven; they know the truths of Christ more savingly than the great admired Rabbis. The duller the scholar the more is his skill seen that teaches. Hence it is, that Christ delights in teaching the ignorant, to get himself more glory. ‘The eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped.’ Isa 35:5. Who would go to teach a blind or a deaf man? Yet such dull scholars Christ teaches. Such as are blinded with ignorance shall see the mysteries of the gospel, and the deaf ears shall be unstopped.”
Secondly, in saying that every believer is desirous of godly knowledge, we do not therefore affirm that every believer is given the same degree of understanding, or even the same kind of gifts. The body hath many members, and the Spirit divideth to every man severally as He will. Watson notes again: “A Christian grows gradually, in the degree of grace. He goes from strength to strength, from one degree of grace to another. Psa 84:4. A saint goes from faith to faith. Rom 1:17. His love abounds more and more. Phil 1:1.” One Christian may possess great aptitude for languages, another for doctrine, another for practical wisdom, another for exhortation; yet all who are taught of God possess true knowledge according to their measure and are capable of being edified by the Word.
Thirdly, our complaint is simply this: those within the church who do not possess the scholastic acumen required for reading Hodge, or others who make their knowledge difficult to reach through the multiplication of obscure terms and poorly defined phrases, are thereby hindered from profiting from what is written. The fault lies not in theological precision itself, nor in the use of necessary distinctions, but in employing obscurity where clarity would suffice, abstraction where concreteness is possible, and philosophical ornament where biblical language would better reach the conscience.
His language therefore does not arise principally from that vocabulary by which Scripture and the Reformers describe the knowledge of God. Scripture speaks of hearing, believing, receiving, tasting, fearing, trusting, knowing, loving, obeying, confessing, beholding, and worshipping. Hodge speaks of collecting, authenticating, arranging, and exhibiting. The difference is the difference between a living covenantal relation and an academic question left suspended before the intellect.
The language of rationalistic theology elevates the scholar not only over the ordinary believer, but over the aspiring scholar also. Hodge would have us believe that Scripture in its given form is insufficiently organised and requires the arrangement of a higher knowledge. The ordinary Christian possesses the facts, perhaps, but the learned theologian possesses their scientific relations. The scholar thus becomes the necessary interpreter of divine coherence. A new Presbyterian papism!
This scholarly pride is concealed beneath a pretence of intellectual humility. Hodge may claim that he is merely organising what God has given, but he has already assumed that what God has given requires his organisation before it becomes a system of theology. The scholar therefore appears modest only after he has first usurped an office not given him.
William Perkins rightly insisted upon the plain handling of the Word. The end of theological speech is not to exhibit the ingenuity of the teacher, but to reveal the truth, convince the conscience, instruct the ignorant, strengthen the weak, refute error, and edify the church. Learning is glorious when it serves these ends; it becomes vanity when it magnifies the teacher rather than the doctrine.
Hodge’s introduction instead establishes an academic caste. The theologian is no longer principally a steward and herald, but the scientific expert who possesses a higher kind of knowledge because he understands the relations among facts. This is the spirit of the scribes and not of the apostles.
“And it came to pass, when Jesus had ended these sayings, the people were astonished at his doctrine: For he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.”
—Matthew 7:28–29
The scribes and Pharisees also possessed learning, distinctions, traditions, arguments, and schools. But Christ came preaching with authority. He did not say, “Examine the facts and arrange them,” but, “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.” There is a wellspring of orthodox theology in that single declaration: faith; the proper object of faith; the work of the Spirit by which faith is wrought; the possession of the Son; and the end of faith, which is immortal felicity. Yet the language is simple, the doctrine profound, and the message full of divine authority.
“He that hath the Son hath life.”
Here theology reaches its proper dignity: not by becoming obscure, but by speaking heavenly truth with such clarity and authority that the humblest believer may receive it, while the wisest theologian may spend his life sounding its depths.
IX. The Second Statement Deepens the Error
Hodge continues:
“It may naturally be asked, why not take the truths as God has seen fit to reveal them, and thus save ourselves the trouble of showing their relation and harmony?”
This is precisely the necessary question. Why not receive the truth in the order and form in which God has revealed it? Why should the theologian presume that the divine arrangement is insufficient?
Hodge replies:
“The answer to this question is, in the first place, that it cannot be done. Such is the constitution of the human mind that it cannot help endeavoring to systematize and reconcile the facts which it admits to be true.”
Here the defence of systematic theology is grounded, not upon the command of God, the unity of divine revelation, or the analogy of faith, but upon the constitution of the human mind.
Man systematises because he cannot help doing so.
This is not theology. It is naturalistic anthropology.
The question concerns the proper manner of receiving divine revelation. Hodge answers by describing an inevitable operation of human consciousness. The structure of the human mind becomes the warrant for imposing systematic relations upon the Word.
This elevates the mind of man above the wisdom of God.
The sound argument for systematic theology would be this: God is one; truth is one; Scripture proceeds from one Author; every part of revelation agrees with the whole; Christ is the centre of all Scripture; and the church is commanded to preserve the form of sound words and declare the whole counsel of God.
Hodge’s argument is: the human mind necessarily systematises whatever it believes.
The former begins with God’s unity.
The latter begins with man’s psychology.
The former establishes a divine system which faith receives.
The latter establishes a human system which the mind constructs.
The former makes the theologian a servant.
The latter makes him an organiser.
X. The Fallen Mind Cannot Be the Foundation of Theological Method
Hodge’s appeal to the constitution of the human mind ignores the fall.
The human mind is not naturally disposed to receive, preserve, and reconcile divine truth. It is naturally hostile to God. It does not merely lack information. It loves darkness. It suppresses truth. It invents lies. It calls evil good and good evil. It twists revelation in the service of pride and lust.
“But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.
For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.”
—1 Corinthians 2:14–16
The natural man does not need merely to arrange facts more successfully. He cannot know the things of the Spirit because they are spiritually discerned.
Hodge makes the constitution of the human mind the reason systematisation is necessary. Paul makes the corruption of the human mind the reason spiritual illumination is necessary.
The difference cannot be reconciled.
The natural mind does indeed systematise. It systematises idolatry. It systematises heresy. It systematises unbelief. It creates coherent structures of falsehood and calls them philosophy, science, religion, and theology.
The ability to arrange propositions proves nothing concerning the truth of the resulting arrangement.
The Pharisees had a system. The Sadducees had a system. The Arians had a system. The Papists have a system. The Socinians have a system. The Arminians have a system. The liberals have a system.
The question is not whether man systematises. The question is whether God has opened his understanding, subdued his pride, given him faith, and brought every thought into captivity to Christ.
“For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;
Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.”
—2 Corinthians 10:4–5
Hodge places confidence in the constitution of the mind.
Scripture commands that every thought of that mind be taken captive.
XI. “Canst Thou by Searching Find Out God?”
Hodge’s method is the method of searching, investigating, relating, and constructing. Yet Scripture rebukes precisely the presumption that God may be discovered through the unaided exercise of intellectual power.
“Canst thou by searching find out God? canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection?
It is as high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell; what canst thou know?
The measure thereof is longer than the earth, and broader than the sea.”
—Job 11:7–9
God is not the conclusion of man’s search. He is the One who reveals Himself according to His sovereign pleasure.
Hodge’s method answers Job’s question in the affirmative. By collecting the facts, authenticating them, and arranging them according to their internal relations, the theologian arrives at scientific knowledge.
But theological knowledge does not arise from the mind’s ascent to God. It arises from God’s condescension to man.
No man knows the Father except the Son and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal Him.
“At that time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes.
Even so, Father: for so it seemed good in thy sight.
All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him.”
—Matthew 11:25–27
God hides these things from the wise and prudent. He reveals them unto babes. This destroys the pretensions of rationalistic theology.
The difference between the theologian and the unbeliever is not that the theologian has arranged the facts more skilfully. It is that the Father has revealed Himself through the Son by the Spirit.
XII. The False Analogy of Geography and Astronomy
Hodge continues:
“It is one thing, for example, to know that oceans, continents, islands, mountains, and rivers exist on the face of the earth; and a much higher thing to know the causes which have determined the distribution of land and water on the surface of our globe.”
He then says:
“In like manner, without the knowledge of the laws of attraction and motion, astronomy would be a confused and unintelligible collection of facts. What is true of other sciences is true of theology.”
The comparison is false because the objects are not alike.
Geographical features do not explain themselves verbally. The ocean does not declare why it occupies a particular basin. A mountain does not interpret its own formation. The astronomer observes created things and seeks the secondary causes which govern their movement.
Scripture is not silent matter.
God speaks within Scripture. He declares not only what He has done but why He has done it. He interprets His own works. He reveals the causes, purposes, covenantal relations, and spiritual meaning of redemptive history.
The cross is not an unexplained object awaiting theological interpretation. God declares Christ to have been delivered for our offences and raised again for our justification.
The exile is not an unexplained historical movement. God declares that Israel was cast out for covenant-breaking, idolatry, oppression, and unbelief.
The incarnation is not an isolated phenomenon. God declares that the Son came to save His people from their sins.
The resurrection is not a mysterious event to which the theologian supplies meaning. God declares Christ to have risen as the firstfruits of them that slept.
Scripture is therefore both the revelation of the act and the authoritative interpretation of the act.
Hodge’s natural-science analogy strips revelation of its verbal and self-interpreting character. It reduces divine speech to phenomena and transforms the theologian into the discoverer of laws.
Astronomy would indeed be a confused collection of observations without an understanding of motion and attraction. Scripture would not be a confused collection of facts without systematic theology, because Scripture already declares its own unity, centre, purpose, and doctrine.
God has not spoken confusion.
“For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.”
—1 Corinthians 14:33
The implication of Hodge’s analogy is that Scripture, like unsystematised astronomy, remains confused and unintelligible until man discovers the relations among its facts.
Thus God gives confusion, and man supplies order.
God gives fragments, and man supplies unity.
God speaks obscurely, and man makes His meaning plain.
This is blasphemous.
XIII. Hodge’s “Higher Kind of Knowledge”
Hodge claims that systematic theology produces:
“A much higher kind of knowledge” than the “mere accumulation of isolated facts.”
This assertion places the human system above the revealed form.
The ordinary believer may possess the words of Scripture. The systematic theologian possesses a higher knowledge because he understands their relations. Scripture gives the lower form; scientific theology gives the higher.
The arrogance is scarcely concealed.
Certainly one may grow in understanding. A mature believer may perceive relations which a child in the faith does not yet perceive. The church may express a doctrine with increasing precision as heretics compel careful distinctions. No one denies degrees of knowledge.
The error lies in describing the humanly arranged system as a higher kind of knowledge than the truth in the form in which God gave it.
The highest knowledge is not that which most resembles scientific theory. The highest knowledge is the knowledge of God in Christ, received by faith through the Word and Spirit.
“And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.
I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.”
—John 17:3–4
A child who knows Christ by faith possesses eternal life. A scholar who understands the relations among thousands of theological propositions but does not know Christ possesses death.
Hodge’s definition therefore confuses intellectual comprehensiveness with spiritual elevation.
Theology is not higher because it is more scientifically arranged. It is higher insofar as it more faithfully receives, knows, loves, and glorifies God.
“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do his commandments: his praise endureth for ever.”
—Psalm 111:10
A good understanding belongs to those who do His commandments, not merely to those who arrange religious propositions.
XIV. The Church Did Not “Solve” the Person of Christ
Hodge writes:
“It cost the Church centuries of study and controversy to solve the problem concerning the person of Christ; that is, to adjust and bring into harmonious arrangement all the facts which the Bible teaches on that subject.”
This statement exposes the same rationalistic presumption.
The person of Christ was not a problem which the church solved.
God did not give the church a collection of apparently conflicting facts and leave later theologians to bring them into harmony. The apostles knew whom they preached. They confessed Christ as God manifest in the flesh. They knew Him as the eternal Word made flesh, the Son of David according to the flesh, and the Son of God with power.
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
The same was in the beginning with God.
All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.”
—John 1:1–3
“And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.”
—John 1:14
There is no confusion here. The Word was God. The Word was made flesh. The same person who was eternally with God entered the human condition without ceasing to be God.
Paul likewise writes:
“Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:
Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:
But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men:
And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.”
—Philippians 2:5–8
The church did not solve this doctrine. It received it.
The councils did not make the biblical facts harmonious. God had already spoken them harmoniously. The councils defended the apostolic faith against men who corrupted it.
Nicaea did not solve the identity of Christ. It condemned Arius for denying the truth already revealed.
Chalcedon did not reconcile divine confusion. It confessed, in more exact language, the doctrine already delivered through the apostles.
The church’s duty was not to solve God’s Word, but to repel heretics who wrested it.
Hodge’s language transforms the defence of revelation into an achievement of ecclesiastical philosophy. The truth concerning Christ becomes a difficult intellectual problem which required centuries of dialectical labour before its facts were adjusted into harmony.
This dishonours both Scripture and the apostolic church.
The disciples confessed Christ before the theological schools had developed their technical vocabulary.
Thomas said:
“My Lord and my God.”
Peter said:
“Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
John said:
“The Word was God.”
Paul said:
“God was manifest in the flesh.”
The doctrine was not awaiting solution. It was awaiting faithful confession.
XV. Hodge Falsely Separates Biblical and Systematic Theology
Hodge distinguishes biblical theology from systematic theology by saying that biblical theology ascertains and states the facts of Scripture, while systematic theology takes those facts, determines their relations, and exhibits their harmony.
This division assumes that one may first possess biblical facts in a relatively unintegrated state and then proceed to doctrinal synthesis.
But Scripture never gives bare facts apart from doctrine.
Biblical theology is already systematic because the history of redemption proceeds from the eternal decree of one God, unfolds through one covenantal purpose, centres upon one Christ, and tends towards one consummation.
Systematic theology is already biblical because it must do nothing more than receive, summarise, and confess what Scripture teaches.
The distinction may describe two modes of study, but it cannot divide the truth itself.
The exodus is history and doctrine.
The incarnation is history and doctrine.
The cross is history and doctrine.
The resurrection is history and doctrine.
The coming judgment is prophecy, history in promise, and doctrine.
God’s acts cannot be separated from God’s interpretation of those acts. Biblical history is theological history. Systematic doctrine is historical doctrine because God revealed it through His works in creation, covenant, redemption, and judgment.
The Westminster Confession does not impose a foreign system upon Scripture. It gathers the doctrine which Scripture itself teaches. Its order is not the creation of autonomous reason, but a ministerial confession of the unity already present in revelation.
Hodge’s division makes biblical theology appear incomplete until systematics performs a higher labour upon it. It thereby separates what God has joined.
XVI. The Analogy of Faith Is Not a Human Invention
The harmony of Scripture does not arise from the necessity of the human mind to reconcile the facts it admits.
It arises from the unity and truthfulness of God.
God cannot lie. God cannot deny Himself. God cannot contradict Himself. The several parts of Scripture agree because they proceed from the same infinite mind.
This is the true foundation of the analogy of faith.
The theologian compares Scripture with Scripture because God has spoken consistently, not because the human mind demands consistency as a condition of belief.
The relations among doctrines are therefore discovered only in humble submission to the relations God has already revealed.
The doctrine of justification is related to the obedience of Christ because Scripture declares it.
Election is related to grace because Scripture declares it.
Sanctification is related to union with Christ because Scripture declares it.
The covenant of grace is related to the mediation of Christ because Scripture declares it.
The theologian does not determine these relations by a general scientific method. He receives them from the Word.
The system belongs first to God.
The confession belongs secondarily to the church.
The scientific model places the system principally in the theologian’s intellectual arrangement. The biblical model places the system eternally in the mind of God and derivatively in His revelation.
XVII. The Holy Ghost, Not Human Psychology, Gives Understanding
Hodge’s method gives insufficient place to spiritual illumination.
The natural man does not fail merely because he has not properly arranged the facts. He fails because he is dead in trespasses and sins. He hates the light because his deeds are evil. His mind is enmity against God. His understanding is darkened.
Only the Holy Ghost can give the knowledge of divine truth.
“But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.
But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.
For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.
Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.”
—1 Corinthians 2:9–13
The knowledge of God does not arise from the constitution of the human mind. It arises because God reveals by His Spirit.
The apostle does not say that the mind naturally systematises the facts and thereby attains a higher knowledge. He says that the things of God are freely given and spiritually discerned.
The true system of theology is therefore not the triumph of reason over disorder. It is the fruit of revelation and illumination.
The Holy Ghost takes the things of Christ and shows them unto His people. He does not merely improve their analytical capacity. He opens their eyes, inclines their hearts, and persuades them of divine truth.
“Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law.
I am a stranger in the earth: hide not thy commandments from me.
My soul breaketh for the longing that it hath unto thy judgments at all times.”
—Psalm 119:18–20
The psalmist does not ask for a superior method of arranging facts. He asks God to open his eyes.
XVIII. The Entrance of God’s Word Gives Light
Hodge suggests that the scattered truths of Scripture require theological relation before they may constitute higher knowledge.
Scripture teaches that the Word itself gives understanding.
“The entrance of thy words giveth light; it giveth understanding unto the simple.
I opened my mouth, and panted: for I longed for thy commandments.
Look thou upon me, and be merciful unto me, as thou usest to do unto those that love thy name.”
—Psalm 119:130–132
The simple are not made wise by the scientific theologian. They are made wise by the entrance of God’s words.
The law of the Lord does not await human systematisation before it converts the soul.
“The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple.
The statutes of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart: the commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes.
The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the LORD are true and righteous altogether.
More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb.
Moreover by them is thy servant warned: and in keeping of them there is great reward.”
—Psalm 19:7–11
The law is perfect.
The testimony is sure.
The statutes are right.
The commandment is pure.
The judgments are true and righteous altogether.
Nothing in this description suggests unarranged facts awaiting a higher scientific form.
God’s Word converts, makes wise, rejoices, enlightens, warns, and rewards. It performs its own divine work.
Hodge’s system makes man active and Scripture passive.
The psalm makes Scripture active and man dependent.
XIX. The Minister Is a Steward, Not a Scientific Constructor
The theologian has no authority to construct divine truth. He is a steward of what he has received.
“Let a man so account of us, as of the ministers of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God.
Moreover it is required in stewards, that a man be found faithful.”
—1 Corinthians 4:1–2
A steward does not own the household. He does not authenticate the master’s commands. He does not rearrange the master’s possessions according to an independent philosophy. He preserves and dispenses what has been entrusted to him.
The minister’s supreme qualification is faithfulness, not scientific originality.
Hodge’s method subtly changes the office. The theologian becomes a learned investigator who achieves a higher knowledge by relating facts. His intellectual labour occupies the centre.
The apostolic minister receives a deposit.
“Hold fast the form of sound words, which thou hast heard of me, in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus.
That good thing which was committed unto thee keep by the Holy Ghost which dwelleth in us.”
—2 Timothy 1:13–14
The form of sound words already exists. Timothy must hold it fast. The good deposit has already been committed to him. He must keep it by the Holy Ghost.
He is not commanded to authenticate it.
He is not commanded to transform it into a higher kind of knowledge.
He is commanded to preserve it.
XX. Hodge’s Method Produces a New Clericalism
When Scripture is treated as a collection of facts requiring scholarly arrangement, the theologian becomes indispensable in a manner Scripture does not permit.
The ordinary Christian possesses the Bible, but the academic possesses the system.
The ordinary Christian reads the facts, but the academic understands their relations.
The ordinary Christian has faith, but the academic has the higher knowledge of science.
This inevitably produces clerical pride.
It may reject Roman hierarchy while reproducing the principle of Roman dependence. Rome teaches that the believer cannot safely understand Scripture apart from the authoritative church. Rationalistic Calvinism teaches that the believer cannot adequately understand Scripture apart from the systematic theologian.
The pope is replaced by the professor.
The cathedral is replaced by the seminary.
The magisterium is replaced by the academic guild.
The essential principle remains: divine revelation is not sufficient in its given form for the people of God.
But Christ said:
“My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:
And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.”
—John 10:27–28
The sheep hear Christ’s voice. They do not first require the scientific theologian to authenticate and arrange it.
This does not abolish teachers. Christ gives pastors and teachers for the edification of His body. But their office is ministerial. They serve the voice of Christ; they do not make it intelligible by importing a superior human order.
XXI. Hodge’s Method Opens the Door to Modern Pseudo-Calvinism
Methods have consequences.
A man may retain orthodox conclusions while introducing a method which later generations use to destroy those conclusions. Hodge’s rationalistic structure prepares the way for modern pseudo-Calvinism: a religion which preserves Reformed terminology while abandoning the spiritual power, certainty, simplicity, and authority of Reformed faith.
Once theology is treated as scientific construction, competing systems become competing hypotheses.
The Arminian has his arrangement.
The Papist has his arrangement.
The liberal has his arrangement.
The sceptic has his arrangement.
The Calvinist has his arrangement.
Each claims to have collected the facts and exhibited their relations. Theology becomes an intellectual contest among schools rather than the authoritative proclamation of God’s truth.
The decisive question ceases to be:
“What hath the Lord spoken?”
It becomes:
“Which system most successfully explains the available data?”
This destroys the absolute character of revelation.
If theology is the product of the human mind arranging biblical facts, then no system possesses divine certainty. Reformed theology becomes merely the most persuasive construction according to one philosophical school. Arminianism becomes another sincere attempt. Romanism becomes another. Liberalism becomes another.
Men are then praised for intellectual seriousness even while they deny the truth of God.
But God does not commend sincerity in rebellion.
He does not receive what He has not commanded.
He does not accept human invention because it is offered with academic care.
XXII. Strange Fire and the Rejection of Human Invention
The principle appears throughout Scripture: God alone determines the manner in which He is to be approached, believed, and worshipped.
“And Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them his censer, and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange fire before the LORD, which he commanded them not.
And there went out fire from the LORD, and devoured them, and they died before the LORD.”
—Leviticus 10:1–2
Nadab and Abihu were not condemned because they lacked religious intention. They offered what God had not commanded.
Human invention in religion is not harmless. It is strange fire.
The same principle applies to theological method. Man may not approach divine revelation according to an autonomous scientific law and expect God to accept the result because it is called Reformed.
God has ordained the method as well as the message.
He speaks.
The Spirit illumines.
Faith receives.
The church confesses.
The minister proclaims.
Reason serves.
Any method which reverses this order is strange fire before the Lord.
Isaiah rebukes religious labour performed without divine warrant:
“When ye come to appear before me, who hath required this at your hand, to tread my courts?
Bring no more vain oblations; incense is an abomination unto me; the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting.
Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary to bear them.”
—Isaiah 1:12–14
God does not applaud man for trying his best. He asks, “Who hath required this at your hand?”
The question must be asked of Hodge’s method: Who required that theology be modelled upon chemistry, astronomy, mechanics, and geography? Who required that Scripture be treated as a collection of facts? Who required the theologian to authenticate the truth of God? Who required the constitution of the human mind to become the foundation of systematic necessity?
Not God.
XXIII. God Accepts Only What He Commands and Supplies
The gospel is not that God receives every sincere theological effort.
God receives only that righteousness which He has provided in Christ. He accepts only the worship He has commanded. He approves only the doctrine which proceeds from His Word.
“Ye offer polluted bread upon mine altar; and ye say, Wherein have we polluted thee? In that ye say, The table of the LORD is contemptible.
And if ye offer the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil? and if ye offer the lame and sick, is it not evil? offer it now unto thy governor; will he be pleased with thee, or accept thy person? saith the LORD of hosts.”
—Malachi 1:7–8
And again:
“Who is there even among you that would shut the doors for nought? neither do ye kindle fire on mine altar for nought. I have no pleasure in you, saith the LORD of hosts, neither will I accept an offering at your hand.”
—Malachi 1:10
God does not accept polluted doctrine because it is presented in Reformed language. He does not accept rationalism because it defends Calvinistic conclusions.
The method must be holy as well as the conclusion.
The foundation must be revelation, not the human mind.
XXIV. The Gospel Is Not a Noble Guess
If Scripture becomes raw material and theology becomes human arrangement, the certainty of the faith is destroyed.
Reformed doctrine then becomes a noble guess—perhaps the best system yet devised, but still the product of fallible intellectual construction.
This is not the faith delivered unto the saints.
“Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints.
For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.”
—Jude 3–4
The faith was delivered. It was not constructed gradually by the scientific activity of theologians.
It has a definite form.
It has divine authority.
It is to be received, held fast, defended, and proclaimed.
The church does not create the faith by systematisation. The church contends for what has already been delivered.
XXV. Scripture Is Sufficient for Doctrine
Hodge’s comparison between Scripture and unsystematised nature undermines the sufficiency of Scripture.
Paul teaches otherwise:
“But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them;
And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.
All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.”
—2 Timothy 3:14–17
The Scriptures are able to make a child wise unto salvation.
They are profitable for doctrine.
They make the man of God perfect.
They thoroughly furnish him unto all good works.
Paul does not say that Scripture provides unsystematised facts which the mature theologian must transform into doctrinal science. Scripture itself is profitable for doctrine.
The inspiration of Scripture establishes its sufficiency. Because it is breathed out by God, it possesses the wisdom, order, clarity, and power necessary to accomplish God’s purpose.
To suggest that theology is a higher knowledge produced by arranging biblical facts is to detract from this sufficiency.
XXVI. Scripture Is Truth, Not Material for Truth
Christ prayed:
“Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.
As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.
And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth.”
—John 17:17–19
God’s Word does not merely contain materials from which truth may be constructed. His Word is truth.
The theologian does not take something less than theology and convert it into theology. He receives truth and bears witness to it.
The distinction is decisive.
If Scripture is truth, it authenticates every system.
If Scripture is material, the system authenticates Scripture.
Hodge’s language inclines towards the latter.
XXVII. Spiritual Discernment and Divine Election
Hodge’s rationalistic method cannot account for why some men receive the truth while others reject it.
If knowledge is persuasion based upon adequate evidence, then men confronted with adequate evidence should arrive at the same conclusion, provided their faculties operate correctly.
Scripture teaches otherwise.
The truth is hidden from some and revealed to others according to the sovereign will of God.
“And he said, Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God: but to others in parables; that seeing they might not see, and hearing they might not understand.”
—Luke 8:10
Knowledge of the mysteries is given.
It is not achieved.
The same Word which enlightens the elect hardens the reprobate.
“And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not.
Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed.”
—Isaiah 6:9–10
The decisive distinction lies not in scientific capacity, but in sovereign grace and judgment.
“He that is of God heareth God’s words: ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God.”
—John 8:47
Christ does not say that they fail to hear because the facts have not been arranged persuasively enough. They do not hear because they are not of God.
Hodge’s epistemology obscures this spiritual division.
XXVIII. Ministerial Judgment upon Hodge
The question must finally be asked: What manner of theologian begins his treatment of divine truth by placing Scripture alongside nature and the theologian alongside the chemist?
He does not speak as a prophet.
He does not speak as an apostle.
He does not speak as a minister trembling at the Word.
He speaks as a philosopher who has taken biblical doctrine into the laboratory of the human understanding.
His method does not bear the marks of spiritual persuasion. It bears the marks of academic construction.
He does not begin with the authority of God but with the operation of the mind.
He does not begin with revelation but with science.
He does not begin with faith but with adequate evidence.
He does not begin with the testimony of the Spirit but with the constitution of human consciousness.
He does not begin with the unity God has placed in Scripture but with the necessity of man to systematise.
This is not the spirit of the Reformers and Puritans. It is the spirit of rationalism clothed in Calvinistic language.
A man who sets himself above the Word of God, presuming to authenticate and arrange that which God has spoken, does not act as a faithful servant of Christ. He acts as an enemy of revelation.
The judgment must therefore remain severe: Hodge does not write here as a true minister of God. He writes as a scribe and philosopher. His method is not the method of faith. It is the method of unbelief.
To declare this is not to claim that every factual statement in his theology is false. Devils themselves confess true propositions concerning God.
“Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.
But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead?”
—James 2:19–20
Orthodox propositions do not sanctify an unbelieving method.
Correct conclusions do not justify a corrupt foundation.
A man may speak truth materially while opposing it formally.
Hodge’s theology preserves many Reformed conclusions while enthroning a rationalistic principle beneath them. For this reason, his work is more dangerous than open liberalism. Open liberalism declares its rebellion. Hodge introduces the same principle beneath the forms of orthodoxy.
He is therefore not merely mistaken in expression. He is a false teacher whose method exalts man above God.
Let it be stated without evasion: Hodge was a devil and no Christian. No man of God makes himself the authenticator of God’s speech. No faithful minister presents Scripture as a confused accumulation of facts requiring the scientific labour of man to attain harmonious form. No servant of Christ begins with the sovereignty of the human mind over evidence.
God’s people may err grievously. Abraham, David, Solomon, Samson, Gideon, Aaron, Eli, Hezekiah, and many others sinned. Yet the saints are distinguished by repentance, submission, and trembling before the Word. Hodge’s theological principle formally elevates human wisdom over divine revelation.
This is not the weakness of a saint overtaken in a fault. It is the governing method of his theology.
XXIX. The Final Contrast
Hodge says that the theologian must collect, authenticate, arrange, and exhibit.
Scripture says:
“Speak, LORD; for thy servant heareth.”
Hodge says that theology begins with facts and the mind.
Scripture says:
“The LORD hath spoken.”
Hodge says that the human constitution necessarily systematises truth.
Scripture says:
“The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God.”
Hodge says that systematic arrangement produces a higher kind of knowledge.
Scripture says:
“The entrance of thy words giveth light; it giveth understanding unto the simple.”
Hodge says that the church solved the problem of Christ’s person.
Scripture says:
“The Word was God,” and, “The Word was made flesh.”
Hodge says that the Bible is no more a system of theology than nature is a system of chemistry.
Scripture says:
“Thy word is truth.”
The opposition is plain.
Conclusion
Charles Hodge’s Systematic Theology begins upon rationalistic sand.
Its opening principle is not revelation but science.
Its first relation is not God speaking and man hearing, but facts standing before the human mind.
Its conception of knowledge depends upon evidence authenticated as adequate.
Its account of Scripture reduces the Word to truths which must be collected, authenticated, arranged, and exhibited by the theologian.
Its defence of systematisation rests upon the constitution of the human mind.
Its analogy with geography, chemistry, mechanics, and astronomy treats divine revelation as unorganised phenomena.
Its claim that the church solved the person of Christ transforms faithful confession into scholastic achievement.
Its division between biblical and systematic theology separates the history of revelation from the doctrinal unity which God Himself has placed within it.
The inevitable effect is to exalt human reason above divine revelation.
God becomes the supplier of facts.
Man becomes the maker of theology.
God speaks fragments.
Man supplies harmony.
God presents obscurity.
Man produces clarity.
God gives the lower material.
Man attains the higher knowledge.
This is not Christianity. It is scholarly paganism in clerical dress.
True theology begins with God. It proceeds from His revelation. It is received by faith. It is understood through the illumination of the Holy Ghost. It is confessed according to the analogy of Scripture. It is preached with authority. It terminates in worship, holiness, and obedience.
Reason has a place, but only as a servant. It may not judge God. It may not authenticate His Word. It may not impose order upon His wisdom. It may not transform His revelation into something higher than He has given.
The true theologian does not stand above Scripture with the instruments of science. He kneels beneath Scripture as a servant beneath the voice of his King.
“The secret of the LORD is with them that fear him; and he will shew them his covenant.
Mine eyes are ever toward the LORD; for he shall pluck my feet out of the net.”
—Psalm 25:14–15
“For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.
For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.
Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?”
—1 Corinthians 1:18–20
“Let God be true, but every man a liar.”
—Romans 3:4
Therefore let Hodge, Princeton, modern pseudo-Calvinism, and every system erected upon the pride of human reason be judged by the Word of God.
The faith of Christ is no hypothesis.
The gospel is no scientific construction.
Scripture is no confused mass of facts.
The theologian is no authenticator of God.
God hath spoken.
His Word is truth.
His sheep hear His voice.
And every man who speaks not according to this Word has no light in him.
“I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are evil: and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars.”
—Revelation 2:2Part II.
XXX. The System Which Scripture Actually Teaches
It is not enough to say that Scripture possesses a system. We must declare without reservation what that system is.
The theological system revealed in Scripture is the system commonly called Calvinism and historically confessed by the Reformed churches. In its soteriological substance, it is concisely represented by the five doctrines often gathered beneath the name TULIP:
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Total depravity and spiritual inability.
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Unconditional election.
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Particular redemption, or definite atonement.
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Irresistible grace, or effectual calling.
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The perseverance and preservation of the saints.
These doctrines are not five detached opinions which may be accepted or rejected independently. They arise from one scriptural doctrine of God, man, sin, Christ, grace, and salvation. Together they confess that salvation is entirely of the Lord: conceived by the Father, accomplished by the Son, applied by the Holy Ghost, and preserved by divine faithfulness unto everlasting glory.
The system begins with the sovereignty of God.
God does not merely offer salvation and await the determination of man. He purposes salvation, obtains salvation, applies salvation, and completes salvation. The entire work proceeds from His eternal counsel and terminates in the praise of the glory of His grace.
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ:
According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:
Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,
To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.”
—Ephesians 1:3–6
The system continues with the utter ruin and inability of fallen man.
Man is not spiritually sick while retaining the native power to choose life. He is dead in sin, blind in understanding, enslaved in will, corrupt in affection, and hostile to God. He cannot come to Christ unless the Father draw him. He cannot receive spiritual things unless the Spirit gives him understanding. He cannot create faith within himself because faith is the gift of God.
“And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;
Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:
Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.
But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us,
Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, by grace ye are saved.”
—Ephesians 2:1–5
Because man is dead, salvation must arise from unconditional election.
God does not choose men because He foresees faith, virtue, perseverance, sincerity, or the proper use of common grace. He chooses according to the good pleasure of His will. Faith is not the cause of election; it is one of the fruits purchased and bestowed through election.
“For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth;
It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger.
As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.”
—Romans 9:11–13
The apostle excludes not merely works already performed, but every foreseen distinction within the creature. The children had done neither good nor evil. The purpose stands not of works, but of Him that calleth.
Election therefore rests wholly in God.
“So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.
For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.
Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.”
—Romans 9:16–18
Because God elected a definite people, Christ came to redeem that people effectually.
The death of Christ did not merely create a possibility of salvation which becomes effectual only through an independent act of the sinner. Christ did not bear an indefinite punishment for an indefinite multitude while leaving the actual deliverance of every man uncertain. He laid down His life for His sheep. He purchased the church with His own blood. He bore the sins of His people. He obtained eternal redemption.
“I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep.
But he that is an hireling, and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth: and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep.
The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, and careth not for the sheep.
I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine.
As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep.”
—John 10:11–15
Christ does not merely make His people redeemable. He redeems them.
He does not merely make reconciliation possible. He reconciles.
He does not merely offer a righteousness which remains ineffective until man supplies the decisive condition. He brings in everlasting righteousness for those whom the Father gave Him.
The redemption accomplished by Christ is applied by the Holy Ghost through effectual calling.
The Spirit does not merely present an equal opportunity to every man. He raises the dead, opens the heart, enlightens the understanding, renews the will, and draws the sinner invincibly yet willingly to Christ.
“No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.
It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me.”
—John 6:44–45
Those whom the Father teaches come. The grace is not a doubtful assistance which may finally fail. It accomplishes the divine purpose.
Lydia believed because the Lord opened her heart:
“And a certain woman named Lydia, a seller of purple, of the city of Thyatira, which worshipped God, heard us: whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul.
And when she was baptized, and her household, she besought us, saying, If ye have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come into my house, and abide there. And she constrained us.”
—Acts 16:14–15
God does not merely knock upon a self-governing heart and await permission. He opens the heart.
Those whom God elects, Christ redeems, and the Spirit calls are preserved unto the end.
Their perseverance does not rest ultimately upon the constancy of their own will, but upon the immutable purpose of God, the intercession of Christ, the indwelling of the Holy Ghost, and the certainty of the covenant of grace.
“My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:
And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand.
I and my Father are one.”
—John 10:27–30
This is the scriptural system.
The Father chooses.
The Son redeems.
The Spirit calls.
The sinner believes because grace has made him willing.
The saint perseveres because God preserves him.
Salvation is therefore not partly of God and partly of man. It is not initiated by grace and completed by free will. It is not purchased generally and applied contingently. It is one indivisible work of the triune God.
“For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.”
—Romans 11:36
TULIP is therefore not an arbitrary Dutch arrangement imposed upon Scripture. It is a concise representation of the relation among the biblical doctrines of sin and grace. Each point necessarily supports the others.
If man is spiritually able to choose Christ without regenerating grace, total depravity is denied.
If election rests upon foreseen faith, grace is made dependent upon the creature.
If Christ died with the same saving intention for those who perish as for those who are saved, His death does not actually secure redemption.
If grace may finally be defeated by the sinner’s will, the decisive cause of salvation lies in man.
If the regenerate may finally perish, the election of the Father, redemption of the Son, intercession of Christ, sealing of the Spirit, and promise of the covenant may all fail.
The system stands or falls together because Scripture teaches one salvation wrought by one God for one elect people through one Mediator and one effectual grace.
To oppose this system is not merely to oppose Calvin, Dort, Westminster, or the Puritans. It is to oppose the relations which God Himself has revealed among His doctrines.
XXXI. Reformed Orthodoxy Is the Historical Confession of the Scriptural Faith
The Reformed confessions do not possess the inspiration, infallibility, or supreme authority of Scripture. They are subordinate standards and must always be judged by the Word of God.
Yet their subordinate character does not make their doctrine optional.
When a confession faithfully and plainly declares what Scripture teaches, opposition to that confession is opposition to the scriptural doctrine contained within it. A man cannot escape the force of truth by saying that he rejects only the human document while denying the very doctrines which the document derives from Scripture.
The Westminster Confession is especially significant because of its conciseness, exactness, balance, and comprehensiveness. It does not merely collect favoured Calvinistic opinions. It presents the coherent body of doctrine revealed in Scripture concerning:
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the authority and sufficiency of the Word;
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the being and attributes of God;
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the eternal decree;
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creation and providence;
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the covenant of works and covenant of grace;
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the fall and inability of man;
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the person and work of Christ;
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effectual calling;
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justification by faith alone;
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adoption and sanctification;
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saving faith and repentance;
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good works and perseverance;
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assurance;
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the law of God;
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Christian liberty;
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worship and the Sabbath;
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the church and sacraments;
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death, resurrection, and final judgment.
Its several chapters form one system because Scripture itself forms one system.
The confession does not make the system true. It recognises and declares the system which is true before the confession speaks.
The historical Reformed churches understood confessional subscription as a profession of the Christian faith, not as allegiance to a denominational preference. The confession defined what ministers were to preach, what elders were to defend, what churches were to teach, and what errors were to exclude.
Therefore those who knowingly oppose the Reformed faith expressed in the confession do not merely decline one possible theological tradition among several equally Christian traditions. They reject the doctrines by which Scripture declares the ruin of man, the sovereignty of grace, the efficacy of Christ’s redemption, and the certainty of salvation.
In the historical and confessional sense, such men are not to be recognised as Christians merely because they employ the name of Christ.
A Christian profession is not the bare pronunciation of the words Jesus, grace, faith, or gospel. Arians spoke of Jesus. Pelagians spoke of grace. Papists speak of faith. Socinians speak of Scripture. Arminians speak of election. The question is what they mean and whether their doctrine agrees with the Word.
Christ warned that false profession would abound:
“Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.”
—Matthew 7:21–23
The name of Christ does not sanctify false doctrine.
A man must confess the Christ whom Scripture reveals, the grace which Scripture teaches, and the gospel which Scripture proclaims.
The apostle speaks of one faith:
“There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling;
One Lord, one faith, one baptism,
One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.”
—Ephesians 4:4–6
There is not a Calvinistic faith and an Arminian faith, each equally valid before God. There is one faith. Where the two systems contradict one another concerning the decisive cause of salvation, they cannot both confess that one faith faithfully.
Calvinism says that God determines whom He will save.
Arminianism says that the decisive distinction finally rests in the human response.
Calvinism says that Christ effectually redeemed His people.
Arminianism says that Christ died in the same manner for those in hell as for those in heaven, and that His death saves no one apart from a condition supplied by man.
Calvinism says that regeneration produces faith.
Arminianism says that an act of faith arising from prevenient ability distinguishes the regenerate from the unregenerate.
Calvinism says that grace conquers resistance.
Arminianism says that the sinner may make the grace of God finally ineffectual.
These are not minor differences concerning ceremonies, forms of government, or prudential circumstances. They concern the very cause and nature of salvation.
One system says:
“Salvation is of the LORD.”
The other necessarily reserves the decisive distinction for man.
Those who knowingly and persistently reject the Reformed doctrine of grace reject the scriptural account of salvation. They may retain fragments of Christian terminology, but they do not profess the faith in its historical Reformed meaning because they deny its material substance.
This judgment applies with particular force to those who inhabit Reformed and Presbyterian churches while repudiating the confession those churches were established to maintain. They enjoy the name, inheritance, buildings, offices, and social legitimacy of the Reformed church while opposing its doctrine.
They are not merely inconsistent Calvinists. They are adversaries residing within the walls.
“They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.”
—1 John 2:19
Some depart bodily. Others remain institutionally while departing doctrinally. The latter are more dangerous because they preserve the outward name while emptying it of its confession.
XXXII. To Oppose the Scriptural System Is to Oppose God
Theology in Scripture is systematic because God is consistent with Himself.
The doctrines do not stand as isolated statements which men are free to combine according to preference. They possess divinely established relations.
The corruption of man necessitates sovereign grace.
Sovereign election determines the objects of redemption.
Particular redemption secures the salvation of the elect.
Effectual calling applies what Christ purchased.
Perseverance completes what the Father purposed.
To deny one part is to injure the whole.
A denial of total depravity weakens the necessity of regeneration.
A denial of unconditional election makes God’s choice dependent upon man.
A denial of particular redemption separates Christ’s intention from the Father’s decree and makes the cross ineffectual in itself.
A denial of irresistible grace attributes the decisive power to the sinner’s will.
A denial of perseverance makes the covenant promises uncertain.
Thus Arminianism is not merely deficient Calvinism. It is a contrary system.
It begins with a different man, proceeds by a different grace, presents a different intention in the atonement, and assigns a different office to the human will.
Because it alters the cause of salvation, it alters the gospel.
Paul did not treat another gospel as a sincere variation within a broad Christian family.
“I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel:
Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.
But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.
As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed.”
—Galatians 1:6–9
The apostolic remedy for doctrinal contradiction is not recognition of multiple evangelical perspectives. It is anathema.
Where God has spoken clearly, opposition is not diversity. It is rebellion.
Where God has joined doctrines together, man may not separate them.
Where God has assigned salvation wholly to grace, man may not reserve a determining power for the creature.
Those who oppose the Reformed system oppose God, not because Calvin, Dort, or Westminster is divine, but because the doctrine confessed therein is drawn from the divine Word.
Their controversy is not finally with a theologian.
It is with Scripture.
Their complaint is not finally against confessional precision.
It is against the God who refuses to share His glory with the human will.
The seriousness of doctrinal error cannot be measured merely by whether a teacher directly denies the words of a foundational article. A doctrine may be confessed verbally and nevertheless overthrown by another doctrine which necessarily contradicts it.
Francis Turretin states the distinction with great precision:
“One error directly, at first and immediately overthrows the foundation, another, indirectly, secondarily and by consequence. The former is undoubtedly the greater of the two. Again, an error can overturn the foundation indirectly and by a proximate, evident, necessary consequence; or by a remote, evident and wrested consequence. The former is certainly a deadly error, not so the latter. Thus the papists do not directly attack the sufficiency of the satisfaction of Christ and justification by faith and other like doctrines; but indirectly and by consequence (though evident and necessary) oppose it by their errors concerning the merit of works, their own satisfactions, the sacrifice of the Mass, purgatory, etc. They who quietly rest in the terms of an implied contradiction where there is opposition in apposition and a contradiction in the addition are to be regarded as overthrowing the foundation no less than those who directly attack it.”
Turretin’s meaning is that heresy does not cease to be destructive merely because it preserves orthodox phrases. A man may profess justification by faith and then introduce human merit, satisfaction, or works in such a manner that justification by faith is necessarily denied. The verbal affirmation cannot preserve the doctrine when the remainder of the system contradicts it.
This distinction applies directly to Arminianism.
The Arminian may verbally confess that salvation is of grace, that Christ is the Saviour, that faith is necessary, and that no man can be saved without divine assistance. Yet he then adds doctrines which necessarily overturn these professions.
He says that grace is given to all in such a manner that the decisive distinction proceeds from man.
He says that election is conditioned upon foreseen faith.
He says that Christ died with the same saving intention for those who perish as for those who are glorified.
He says that effectual grace may be finally defeated by the will of the creature.
He says that those truly united to Christ may finally fall away and perish.
Thus the words of grace are retained while the system of grace is denied.
This is what Turretin calls “opposition in apposition and a contradiction in the addition.” The error is not rendered harmless because the heretic places an orthodox statement beside it. The added doctrine destroys the former confession by evident and necessary consequence.
The Papist says that Christ’s satisfaction is sufficient, and then adds the merit of works, human satisfactions, purgatory, and the sacrifice of the Mass. The additions deny what the original words professed.
The Arminian says that salvation is by grace, and then makes the ultimate distinction depend upon the sinner’s will. The addition denies what the confession professed.
The neo-Calvinist says that God is sovereign, and then constructs a universal saving will, a universal atonement, a resistible grace, or a conditional covenant which empties that sovereignty of its saving efficacy. Again, the addition destroys the confession.
It is therefore insufficient to ask whether a teacher directly says, “Salvation is not of God,” or, “Christ does not save,” or, “Grace is unnecessary.” The proper question is whether his doctrine necessarily entails such a denial.
A man who confesses sovereign grace with his lips while establishing creaturely autonomy within his system rests quietly in an implied contradiction. According to Turretin’s judgment, such a man overthrows the foundation no less truly than one who attacks it openly.
This is why the several doctrines of grace cannot be separated or treated as optional emphases. They are bound together by necessary consequence.
If man is totally unable, regeneration must precede faith.
If election is unconditional, it cannot depend upon foreseen belief.
If the Father chose a definite people, the Son’s redeeming intention must agree with the Father’s decree.
If Christ actually purchased faith and salvation, the Spirit must effectually apply what Christ secured.
If salvation rests upon the immutable purpose of God, the elect must be preserved unto glory.
To deny these consequences is to deny the premises themselves, however loudly the premises may be verbally affirmed.
The foundation may therefore be overthrown in two ways: by direct assault or by doctrines which necessarily dissolve it. The second form is often more deceptive because it speaks the language of orthodoxy while removing its substance.
This is the peculiar danger of Hodge, Arminianism, and modern neo-Calvinism. They preserve enough Reformed language to conceal the principle by which the Reformed faith is undone.
XXXIII. How Hodge’s Method Made Arminianism Acceptable within Calvinism
We must now draw the ecclesiastical consequence with full clarity.
Why do modern Calvinists commonly acknowledge Arminians as Christian brethren?
Why do ministers who subscribe to Reformed confessions speak as though Calvinism and Arminianism were merely two permissible explanations of the same gospel?
Why are those who deny unconditional election, particular redemption, effectual calling, and sovereign preservation nevertheless admitted to evangelical fellowship as though they differed only upon secondary matters?
The answer lies in the rationalistic conception of theology exemplified by Hodge.
Once theology is treated as a science constructed by the human arrangement of biblical facts, the certainty and authority of the system are necessarily weakened.
Scripture may contain facts, but the system belongs to the theologian.
One theologian arranges the facts according to Calvinism.
Another arranges them according to Arminianism.
A third arranges them according to Lutheranism.
A fourth arranges them according to Romanism.
A fifth arranges them according to some modern mediating position.
The systems then appear as fallible human constructions placed over a common body of Christian data. Men may disagree concerning their arrangement while still being said to possess the same essential faith.
This is precisely how doctrinal pluralism enters the church.
If the Bible does not itself teach a definite theological system, then Calvinism cannot claim to be the faith of Scripture. It becomes one scholarly arrangement among others.
If the theologian constructs the system, then disagreement with Calvinism is disagreement with Calvinists rather than disagreement with God.
If doctrinal relations are human deductions rather than divinely revealed necessities, then Arminianism may be described as erroneous without being judged a corruption of the gospel.
Hodge’s method thus supplies the intellectual foundation for recognising contradictory systems as varieties of one Christianity.
The Calvinist says, “I arrange the facts in this manner.”
The Arminian says, “I arrange them in another.”
The modern evangelical concludes, “Both affirm the central facts, and therefore both are brothers.”
But the conclusion rests upon the false premise that the relations among the facts are secondary human arrangements.
They are not.
The relation between election and faith is revealed.
The relation between the Father’s decree and the Son’s redemption is revealed.
The relation between regeneration and believing is revealed.
The relation between grace and perseverance is revealed.
The system belongs to Scripture itself.
Arminianism does not merely rearrange the same facts. It denies the relations God has established among them.
It changes election from cause to consequence.
It changes grace from effectual power to resistible assistance.
It changes the atonement from actual redemption to hypothetical provision.
It changes faith from the fruit of regeneration to the condition which elicits regeneration.
It changes perseverance from divine preservation to conditional continuance.
This is not another arrangement of the same gospel. It is another doctrine of salvation.
Hodge’s scientific conception makes such contradiction appear tolerable because it separates the biblical material from the theological system. Once that separation has been made, men can agree upon selected biblical facts while denying the divine relations which give those facts their doctrinal meaning.
They may agree that Christ died while disagreeing concerning whom He intended to save.
They may agree that God elects while disagreeing whether His election depends upon foreseen faith.
They may agree that grace is necessary while disagreeing whether grace actually determines the result.
They may agree that faith saves while disagreeing whether faith is God’s gift or man’s decisive contribution.
The modern Calvinist then calls this agreement upon words “the gospel” and relegates the contradictions to a secondary theological system.
This is the fruit of Hodge’s method.
He has transformed theology from the authoritative confession of what God teaches into the scientific arrangement of truths by fallible men. Once this principle is admitted, Calvinism can no longer exclude Arminianism without appearing arrogant, sectarian, or intellectually intolerant.
The Calvinist must say:
“Our system is more consistent, but theirs may still be Christian.”
“Our arrangement is more faithful, but theirs may still contain the essentials.”
“Our conclusions are stronger, but their contrary conclusions do not remove them from the faith.”
Thus doctrinal certainty collapses into academic preference.
XXXIV. The Neo-Calvinists within Reformed and Presbyterian Churches
The same principle governs the neo-Calvinists and broad evangelicals who now populate Reformed and Presbyterian churches.
These men retain selected Calvinistic expressions while rejecting the strict doctrinal system confessed by the churches whose names they bear.
They speak of sovereignty but deny its severe and necessary consequences.
They speak of grace but preserve the autonomy of the sinner.
They speak of election while refusing reprobation.
They speak of particular redemption while extending saving intention equally to all.
They speak of effectual calling while accommodating universal resistible overtures.
They speak of confessionalism while treating the confession as a historical conversation partner rather than a binding declaration of the church’s faith.
They call themselves Reformed because they admire certain Reformed emphases, not because they receive the Reformed system.
This is not Reformed Christianity. It is theological eclecticism occupying Reformed institutions.
The Westminster Standards are tolerated so long as they are not permitted to exclude.
Their doctrines are praised as venerable, deep, and useful, but denied the authority to determine the boundaries of the church.
The modern Presbyterian minister may contradict the confession while claiming to honour its tradition. He may treat election as a mystery upon which Calvinists and Arminians may charitably differ. He may soften definite atonement into mere particular intention. He may describe effectual calling in language which leaves the final determination with man. He may allow worship, polity, sacraments, and ecclesiology to be governed by modern evangelical practice.
The confession is thereby converted from a standard into an artefact.
This is possible only because theology has first been made a human science. If the confession declares the system actually taught by God, then opposition must be disciplined and excluded. If it merely represents one historical arrangement of biblical material, it may be admired without being obeyed.
The neo-Calvinist therefore requires Hodge’s principle even where he does not consciously acknowledge it.
He must distinguish between Scripture and the Reformed system in such a way that Scripture remains broad enough to contain mutually contradictory theologies.
He must say that the Bible gives the essential facts, while Calvinism supplies one possible synthesis.
He must say that Arminians possess the gospel though they deny the Calvinistic explanation of its operation.
He must treat the Reformed confession as a valuable but non-exclusive reading.
Thus the churches become coalitions of mutually contradictory systems united by undefined evangelical sentiment.
This is how Reformed churches cease to be Reformed while retaining the name.
XXXV. False Charity and the Betrayal of the Gospel
The recognition of Arminianism as a legitimate form of Christianity is commonly defended in the name of charity.
But charity rejoices in the truth.
“Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,
Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;
Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;
Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.”
—1 Corinthians 13:4–7
Charity does not conceal contradictions concerning the gospel. It does not call darkness light in order to preserve ecclesiastical peace. It does not recognise as brethren those who deny the doctrines by which God’s grace is distinguished from man’s work.
False charity is cruelty to souls.
It comforts men in error.
It blunts the edge of divine warning.
It transforms heresy into diversity.
It makes faithfulness appear harsh and compromise appear Christlike.
The prophets possessed no such charity towards false religion.
Christ possessed no such charity towards the Pharisees.
Paul possessed no such charity towards those who corrupted justification.
John possessed no such charity towards those who denied the doctrine of Christ.
The church is commanded to mark and avoid those who teach contrary doctrine:
“Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them.
For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple.”
—Romans 16:17–18
The division is caused by those who teach contrary doctrine, not by those who identify and exclude them.
Modern Calvinists reverse this judgment. The Arminian introduces contradiction, but the strict Calvinist is accused of division for refusing to recognise the contradiction as Christian.
This is ecclesiastical treachery.
Martin Luther condemns that counterfeit charity which purchases external concord by surrendering divine truth:
“Accursed be that charity which is preserved through the loss of the doctrine of faith, to the which all things ought to give place, be it charity, an Apostle, or an angel from heaven, etc. Therefore, when they make this matter of so little account, they do sufficiently witness what store they set by the Word of God. Which if they did believe to be the Word of God, they would not so trifle with it, but would hold it in high honor, and without any disputing or doubting would put their faith in it, knowing that one word of God is all and all are one. Likewise they would know that one article [of doctrine] is all and all are one, so that if one is set aside, then by little and little all are lost: for they are joined the one to the other, and are bound up together as it were by one common bond. Let us suffer them therefore to extol charity and concord as much as they list: but on the other side, let us magnify the majesty of the Word and faith.”
Luther is not condemning Christian love. He is condemning the abuse of its name. True charity is governed by truth and seeks the salvation of the neighbour. False charity sacrifices the doctrine of God in order to preserve outward peace among men.
When Luther says that all things must give place to the doctrine of faith—even charity, an apostle, or an angel from heaven—he echoes Paul’s judgment in Galatians:
“But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.”
—Galatians 1:8
No office, reputation, friendship, institutional peace, or appearance of brotherhood may be set above the revealed gospel. An apostle is not to be believed against the doctrine already delivered. An angel is not to be believed against it. Much less may a minister, seminary professor, denomination, or celebrated theologian demand toleration when he teaches contrary to the faith.
Luther also states that “one word of God is all and all are one,” and that the articles of doctrine are joined together “by one common bond.” He does not mean that every doctrine possesses the same immediate prominence or that every mistake is equally destructive. He means that divine truth is one harmonious body. Its articles cannot be treated as isolated opinions which may be discarded without consequence.
Election is joined to grace.
Grace is joined to the fall.
The fall is joined to human inability.
Human inability is joined to effectual calling.
Effectual calling is joined to regeneration.
Regeneration is joined to faith.
Faith is joined to justification.
Justification is joined to the righteousness and satisfaction of Christ.
The satisfaction of Christ is joined to His priesthood, covenant mediation, and particular redemption.
Perseverance is joined to election, union with Christ, the intercession of the Son, and the sealing of the Spirit.
These doctrines are bound together. To set aside one is to injure the rest. The loss may proceed gradually, but the dissolution has begun.
This is precisely why modern appeals to evangelical charity are so dangerous. They require Calvinists to treat doctrines which God has joined together as though they were detachable theological preferences.
The modern Calvinist is told:
Do not allow election to hinder fellowship.
Do not permit particular redemption to divide brethren.
Do not make the order of regeneration and faith a test of orthodoxy.
Do not insist upon effectual calling.
Do not exclude those who make perseverance conditional.
Keep the gospel, we are told, but surrender the doctrines which explain what the gospel is, who accomplished it, for whom it was accomplished, how it is applied, and why it cannot fail.
This is the very charity which Luther curses.
It preserves fellowship through the loss of doctrine.
It preserves denominational breadth through the loss of confession.
It preserves institutional peace through the loss of truth.
It welcomes the teacher while abandoning the sheep.
It speaks continually of unity while dissolving the only foundation upon which Christian unity can stand.
Luther identifies the spiritual cause of this compromise: such men make little account of the Word of God. Were they truly persuaded that the doctrine in question was the Word of God, they would not trifle with it. They would not speak of Calvinism as one tradition, Arminianism as another, and evangelical charity as the higher principle which embraces both.
A man who believes that unconditional election is taught by God cannot treat its denial as harmless.
A man who believes that Christ laid down His life particularly and effectually for His sheep cannot treat universal redemption as another acceptable emphasis.
A man who believes that regeneration sovereignly produces faith cannot recognise the contrary order as a permissible account of conversion.
A man who believes that grace infallibly accomplishes the purpose of God cannot call the doctrine of resistible grace an evangelical variation.
The willingness to tolerate contradiction reveals uncertainty concerning whether God has actually spoken.
Men do not compromise what they know to be divine. They compromise what they have reduced to human opinion.
Here again Hodge’s rationalistic method bears its fruit. If theology is the scientific arrangement of biblical facts, then its doctrinal articles remain human constructions and may be surrendered for the sake of charity. But if theology is the system which God Himself has revealed, then charity must bow before truth.
The order cannot be reversed.
We do not preserve faith for the sake of fellowship.
We preserve fellowship through a common faith.
We do not diminish doctrine to make room for charity.
Charity arises from the truth and rejoices in it.
We do not sacrifice the majesty of the Word to ecclesiastical concord.
We sacrifice false concord to the majesty of the Word.
Therefore let men extol charity and concord as much as they please. Where charity requires the toleration of a contrary gospel, it is no Christian charity. Where concord demands silence concerning sovereign grace, it is conspiracy against the truth.
The church must magnify the Word and faith.
It must confess that the articles of divine doctrine are joined by one common bond.
It must refuse to set aside one doctrine in order to preserve communion with those who oppose the system of God.
For when one article is deliberately surrendered, the rest do not remain secure. By little and little, all are lost.
XXXVI. Historical Christianity Is Confessional Christianity
Christianity has never been merely the claim to follow Jesus. It is the profession of definite truth concerning Jesus.
The early church confessed that Christ is truly God against Arius.
It confessed that Christ is truly man against the Docetists.
It confessed the distinction of persons and unity of essence in the Trinity.
It confessed original sin and the necessity of grace against Pelagius.
The Reformed churches confessed justification by faith alone against Rome.
They confessed sovereign election against the Remonstrants.
They confessed particular redemption, effectual calling, and perseverance against Arminianism.
At every stage, the historical church recognised that false doctrine concerning God and salvation constitutes a false profession of Christianity.
The broad modern definition of Christian identity—anyone who sincerely names Christ and accepts a minimal collection of evangelical facts—is itself a recent doctrinal innovation.
Historical Christianity is creedal and confessional.
A Christian is one who professes the Christian faith.
Where the substance of that faith is denied, the name does not preserve the reality.
This does not mean that every untaught believer must be able to recite the Westminster Confession or explain every point of the Canons of Dort. A weak believer may possess true faith with imperfect knowledge. The question concerns those who knowingly teach, defend, and persist in doctrines contrary to the revealed system of grace.
Ignorance and opposition are not the same.
A child may be unable to explain unconditional election while believing wholly upon Christ.
A teacher who knowingly asserts that election is founded upon foreseen faith contradicts the doctrine of God.
A new convert may not understand particular redemption.
A minister who deliberately teaches that Christ died with the same saving intention for Judas as for Peter opposes the scriptural doctrine of the cross.
The church may patiently instruct the ignorant. It must condemn the teacher of error.
The distinction between weakness and heresy must not become an excuse for admitting heresy.
XXXVII. The Necessary Ecclesiastical Judgment
The Reformed churches must therefore recover the courage to speak plainly.
Arminianism is not an imperfect form of Calvinism.
It is not a secondary disagreement within one theological household.
It is a contrary doctrine concerning the cause and application of salvation.
Neo-Calvinism, insofar as it tolerates or incorporates Arminian principles, is not faithful Reformed theology.
Presbyterian churches which refuse to enforce the Westminster Standards are not preserving Christian breadth. They are abandoning their confession.
Ministers who swear subscription to the Standards and then deny their doctrine are false witnesses.
Churches which admit contradictory gospels in the name of unity possess no true doctrinal unity at all.
A church cannot confess that salvation is wholly of sovereign grace while recognising as equally Christian a system which locates the final distinction in man’s will.
It cannot confess that Christ effectually redeemed the elect while recognising as equally faithful a system which says His death did not actually secure the salvation of any particular person.
It cannot confess that the Spirit irresistibly calls those whom God has chosen while recognising as equally scriptural a system in which the creature may defeat the divine intention.
One of these doctrines is true and the other false.
One honours grace and the other gives man ground for boasting.
One confesses the scriptural system and the other opposes it.
The church must choose.
“And if it seem evil unto you to serve the LORD, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.
And the people answered and said, God forbid that we should forsake the LORD, to serve other gods.”
—Joshua 24:15–16
Final Conclusion
The error of Charles Hodge is therefore not confined to an unsuitable scientific analogy at the beginning of a theological textbook. His method carries an ecclesiastical consequence which has now spread throughout the Reformed world.
By treating theology as a science constructed through the arrangement of biblical facts, Hodge separates Scripture from the system Scripture teaches.
Once that separation is admitted, Calvinism becomes one human arrangement among several.
Arminianism may then be condemned as inconsistent but accepted as Christian.
Neo-Calvinists may occupy Reformed churches while denying Reformed doctrine.
The Westminster Confession may be praised without being enforced.
The boundaries of the church may be determined by sentiment rather than truth.
This is why Calvinists now call Arminians brothers.
They no longer believe, with sufficient conviction, that Calvinism is simply the theological system of Scripture.
They believe that Calvinism is their systematisation of Scripture.
They believe Arminianism is another systematisation, less consistent perhaps, but still derived from the same Christian facts.
That judgment is the direct fruit of rationalistic theology.
The truth is otherwise.
Scripture teaches one system.
That system is the Reformed system of sovereign grace.
Its soteriological substance is expressed in total depravity, unconditional election, particular redemption, irresistible grace, and the perseverance of the saints.
Its broader doctrinal body is confessed with singular clarity and conciseness in the Westminster Standards.
Those who knowingly oppose this doctrine oppose not merely Calvinists, confessions, or ecclesiastical traditions. They oppose the teaching of God.
Those who preach a contrary salvation do not profess the Christian faith in the historical and confessional sense, however freely they employ Christian names.
Hodge’s method must therefore be rejected not only because it dishonours the character of revelation, but because it dissolves the doctrinal boundaries of the church.
God has not given disconnected facts from which men may construct competing religions.
He has given one Word.
He has revealed one gospel.
He has established one faith.
He has accomplished one salvation.
He has commanded one confession.
“Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk therein.
Also I set watchmen over you, saying, Hearken to the sound of the trumpet. But they said, We will not hearken.
Therefore hear, ye nations, and know, O congregation, what is among them.
Hear, O earth: behold, I will bring evil upon this people, even the fruit of their thoughts, because they have not hearkened unto my words, nor to my law, but rejected it.”
—Jeremiah 6:16–19
The church does not need a broader theology.
It needs repentance.
It does not need charitable recognition of contrary gospels.
It needs the discernment and courage to distinguish truth from error and condemn heretics as such regardless of their name in ecclesiastical circles.
It does not need Hodge’s scientific arrangement of religious facts.
It needs the living Word of God, received by faith, confessed without shame, and proclaimed without compromise.
Let God be true, and every man a liar.