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Gbe  TUntveraitt?  of  Cbtcago 

FOUNDED  BY  JOHN  O.   ROCKEFELLER 


THE  BASIS  OF  ASSURANCE  IN  RECENT 
PROTESTANT  THEOLOGIES 

A  DISSERTATION 

SUBMITTED  TO  THE  FACULTY 
OF  THE 

GRADUATE  DIVINITY  SCHOOL 

IN  CANDIDACY  FOR  THE  DEGREE  OF 
DOCTOR  OF  PHILOSOPHY 

DEPARTMENT  OF  SYSTEMATIC  THEOLOGY 


(at?- 


BY 
HENRY  BURKE  ROBINS 


KANSAS  CITY,  MO. 

CHAS.  E.  BROWN  PRINTING  CO. 
1912 


^ 

V  «> 


Published  August,  1912 


Gift 

Tfe©  Univeraity 

13  NOV  19/2 


THE  BASIS  OF  ASSURANCE  IN 
RECENT  PROTESTANT  THEOLOGIES 


CONTENTS 
Bibliography. 

Introduction — Purpose  and  range  of  the  study.  Relation  of  assur- 
ance of  salvation  (Heilsgewissheit)  to  intellectual  certainty 
( Wahrheitsgewissheit) . 

I.     Preliminary  Survey. 

Brief  historical  survey  of  the  basis  of  assurance  in  Christian 
theology. 

A.  Before  the  Reformation. 

1.  The  Fathers. 

2.  The  Scholastics. 

3.  The  standard  Catholic  view.     Thomas  Aquinas. 
The  Council  of  Trent. 

B.  The  Reformation  and  After: 

Protestantism  . 

1.  Luther. 

2.  Melanchthon. 

3.  Calvin. 

4.  Pietism  and  English  Evangelicalism. 

5.  Schleiermacher. 

C.  The  Nineteenth  Century. 

The  Nineteenth   Century  revolution  in  world-view. 
Significance  of  the  new  view-point  for  theology.   How 
the  basis  of  assurance  is  involved. 
3 


f  THE   BASIS   OF  ASSURANCE   IN 

II.     Present-Day  Protestant  Types. 

The  types  to  be  considered  distinguished.    Their  genealogy. 

A.  General   Survey   of   the   Doctrinal    Systems   of 

Each  Group. 

1.  Conservative  Orthodoxy — 

Orr,  Warfield. 

2.  Ritschlianism — 

Herrmann,  Kaftan,  Harnack. 

3.  Modern  Positivism — 

Forsyth,  Seeberg,  Beth. 

4.  The  School  of  Comparative  Religions — 

Troeltsch,  Bousset. 

B.  Fundamental  Conceptions. 

1.  Theory  of  knowledge. 

2.  View  of  science  and  reality. 

3.  History. 

4.  Revelation. 

C.  The  Relation  of  These  Conceptions  to  the  Basis 

of  Assurance. 


III.     Alternative  Views. 

A.  The  supernaturalistic  view  of  the  world  as  determinant 
of  assurance. 

B.  The  equivalent  of  assurance  in  a  view  of  the  world- 
process  as  expression  of  personal  will. 

C.  Non-absolutistic  confidence  in  the  method  of  experimen- 
tation. 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Part  I  of  this  Bibliography  gives  a  limited  number  of  books,  each 
bearing  upon  some  aspect  of  the  subject  as  it  has  been  developed  in 
this  essay.  These  are  noted  under  four  heads :  General ;  Phases  of 
the  Doctrinal  Situation,  Past  and  Present ;  Sources ;  the  Problem  of 
Certainty.  Part  II  supplies  a  limited  bibliography  of  works  of  the 
ten  modern  theologians  whose  positions  form  the  basis  of  this 
study,  only  books  which  bear  in  some  way  upon  the  subject  under 
discussion  being  enumerated.  Generally  speaking,  no  attempt  has 
been  made  to  include  contributions  to  the  theological  reviews. 
Where  these  have  been  noted,  they  are  such  as  have  been  of  use  in 
this  discussion.  Works  of  the  ten  theologians  whose  thought  forms 
the  basis  of  this  essay  are  given  in  Part  II  of  the  Bibliography,  in 
no  case  being  mentioned  in  Part  I. 

PART   I. 

1.  General — 

Fisher,  History  of  Doctrine,  New  York,  1896. 

Hall,  History  of  Ethics  Within  Organized  Christianity,  New 

York,  1910. 
Loofs,  Dogmengeschichte,  Halle,  1893. 
Windelband,  A  History  of  Philosophy,  E.  Tr.,  New  York, 

1901. 

2.  Phases  of  the  Doctrinal  Situation,  Past  and  Present — 

Cross,  Schleiermacher,  Chicago,  1911. 

Cunningham,    The   Reformers   and   the    Theology   of   the 

Reformation,  Essay  III. 
Diehl,  Herrmann  u.  Troeltsch,  Zeitschr.  f.  T.  u.  K.,  1908. 
Garvie,  The  Ritschlian  Theology,  Edinburgh,  1899. 
Hodge,  Modern  Positive  Theology,  Princeton  Rev.,  Vol.  8. 
Kostlin,  The  Theology  of  Luther,  E.  Tr.,  Philadelphia,  1897. 
Mozley,  Ritschlianism,  London,  1909. 
McGiffert,  Protestant  Thought  Before  Kant,  New  York, 

1911. 

5 


6  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

Schian,  Zur  Beurteilung  der  mod.  pos.  Theologie,  Giessen, 

1907. 
Stephan,  D.  neuen  Ansatze  d.  conservat.    Dogmatik. 

u.  s.  w.,  Christliche  Welt,  1911,  Nos.  44-48. 
Wendland,  Ritschl  und  seine  Schiller,  Berlin,  1899. 

3.  Sources — 

(Attention  is  again  directed  to  the  fact  that  the  chief  sources 
are  enumerated;  in  Part  II  of  this  Bibliography.) 
Calvin,  Institutes,  Beveridge's  Tr.,  Edinburgh,  1895. 
Hodge,  Systematic  Theology,  New  York,  1871. 
Luther,  Sdmmtliche  Werke,  Erlangen  Ed.,  1841 ; 

Opera,   1829. 
Moehler,  Symbolik,  E.  Tr.,  New  York,  1894. 
Melanchthon,    Corpus    Reformatorum    (Bretschneider's), 

1834;  Loci,  Plitt's  Ed.  Revised,  1889. 
Ritschl,  Doctrine  of  Reconciliation  and  Justification,  E.  Tr. 
S chaff,  Creeds  of  Christendom,  New  York,  1877. 
Spener,  Das  geistliche  Priesterthum,  1677. 
Schleiermacher,  Der  christliche  Glaube,  Berlin,  1830. 
Thomas  Aquinas,  Summa  Theologica,  Rome,  1901. 
Wesley,  A  Plain  Account  of  Christian  Perfection,  Mason  and 

Lane  Ed.,  New  York,  1837. 

Sermons,  Eaton  and  Mains'  Ed. 

4.  The  Problem  of  Certainty — 

Clasen,  Die  christl.  Heilsgewissheit,  1897. 

Gottschick,  D.  Heilsgewissheit  d.  ev.  Christen  in  Anschluss 

an  Luther  dargestellt,  Zeitschr.  f.  T.  u.  K.,  1903. 
Heim,  Das  Gewissheitsproblem,  Leipzig,  1911. 
Ihmels,  Christliche  Wahrheitsgewissheit,  Leipzig,  1908. 
Tasker,  Art.  "Certainty,"  Ha.  Encyc.  Relig.  and  Eth.,  Vol. 

HI. 

PART  II. 

(The  order  in  which  authors  are  named  in  this  section  is  that  in 
which  their  work  is  treated  in  the  following  essay.) 
1.    James  Orr — 

The  Christian  View  of  God  and  the  World,   1893    (Kerr 
Lectures). 

6 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  7 

The  Supernatural  in   Christianity,    1894    (with  Rainy   and 

Dods). 
The  Ritschlian  Theology  and  the  Evangelical  Faith,  1897. 
Essays  on  Ritschlianism,  1903. 

The  Image  of  God  in  Man  and  its  Defacement,  1905. 
Sidelights  on  Christian  Doctrine,  1909. 
Revelation  and  Inspiration,  1910. 


2.  B.  B,  Warfieli 

The  Divine  Origin  of  the  Bible,  1882. 
Inspiration,  1882. 

The  Idea  of  Systematic  Theology,  1888. 
The  Gospel  of  the  Incarnation,  1893. 
The  Right  of  Systematic  Theology,  1897. 
The  Power  of  God  Unto  Salvation,  1903. 
The  Lord  of  Glory,  1907. 
u Incarnate  Truth"  (in  Princeton  Sermons). 
The  Task  and  Method  of  Systematic  Theology,  Am.  Jour,  of 
Theol.,  1910,  Vol.  14,  p.  192f. 

3.  W.  Herrmann — 

Die  Metaphysik  in  der  Theologie,  1876. 

Religion   in   Verhdltnis  z.    Welterkennen   u.   z.   Sittlichkeit, 

1879. 
Warum  bcdarf  unser  Glaube  geschichtl.    Tatsdchen,  2d  Ed., 

1895. 
Bedeutung  der  Insiprationslehre  f.  d.  evangelische  Kirche, 

1886. 
Begriff  d.  Offenbarung,  1887. 
Gewissheit  d.  Glaube  u.  d.  Freiheit  d.  Theologie,  2d  Ed., 

1889. 
D.  ev.  Glaube  u.  d.  Thcol.  A.  Ritschls,  2d  Ed.  1896;  E.  Tr. 

in  Faith  and  Morals,  1904. 
Verkehr  der  Christen  mit  Gott,  6th  Ed.  1908;  E.  Tr.,  2d 

Ed.,   1906. 
Ethik,  4th  Ed.,  1904. 
Rom.  u.  ev.  Sittlichkeit,  3d  Ed.  1903 ;  E.  Tr.  in  Faith  and 

Morals,  1904. 
Die  sittlichen  Weisungen  Jesu,  2d  Ed.  1907. 

7 


»  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

Christlich-protestantische  Dogmatik  (in  Die  christliche  Re- 
ligion, pp.  583-632). 

Lage  und  Aufgabe  der  ev.  Dogmatik,  Zeitschr.  f.  T.  u.  K., 
1907. 

Offenbarung  und  W under,  1908. 

D.  Widerspruch  i.  religios.  Denken  u.  s.  Bedeutung  f.  d. 
Leben  d.  Religion,  Zeitschr.  f.  T.  u.  K.,  1911. 

4.  J.  Kaftan — 

Soil  en  und  Sein  in  ihrem  Verhaltnis  zu  einander,  1872. 

D.  Predigt  d.  Evangelium  in  mod.  Geistesleben,  1879. 

D.  Ev.  des  Ap.  Paulus  in  Predigten  d.  Gemeinde  dargelegt, 

1879. 
D.  Wesen  der  christl.  Religion,  1881. 
Das  Leben  in  Christo  (sermons),  1883. 
D.  Wahrheit  d.  christl.  Religion,  1888 ;  E.  Tr.,  1894. 
Das  Verhaltnis  d.  ev.  Glaubens  z.  Logoslehre,  1896. 
Dogmatik,  1897. 
Heilige  Schrift  u.   kirchl.  Bekenntnis  in  ihr   Verhaltnis  z. 

einander,  1898. 
D.  Verpflichtung  auf  d.  Bekenntnis  in  d.  ev.  Kirche,  1898. 
D.  christl.  Glaube  im  geistigen  Leben  d.  Gegenwart,  2d  Ed., 

1898. 
Kant,  d.  Philosoph  d.  Protestantismus,  1904. 
Zur  Dogmatik,  1904. 
Zur  Dogmatik  u.  Glaubenspsychologie,  Zeitschr.  f.  T.  u.  K., 

1911. 

5.  A.  Harnack — 

Das  Monchthum,  seine  Ideal  u.  Geschichte,   1881 ;  E.  Tr. 

1895. 
Martin  Luther  in  seiner  Bedeutung  fur  d.  Geschichte  d.  Wis- 

senschaft  u.  d.  Bildung,  1883 
Dogmengeschichte,  3  vol.,  1886-1890. 
Das  Christentum  u.  d.  Geschichte,  1897;  E.  Tr.  1900. 
Das  Wesen  des  Christentums,  1900;  E.  Tr.  1901. 
Die  Aufgabe  der   theologisch.  Fakultdten  u.   d.   allgemein 

Religionsgeschichte,  1901. 
Reden  u.  Aufsdtze,  2  vol.,  1904. 

8 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  9 

6.  P.  T.  Forsyth— 

The  Holy  Father  and  the  Living  Christ,  1897. 
Christian  Perfection,  1899. 

Positive  Preaching  and  the  Modern  Mind,  1907  (Yale  Lect- 
ures). 
Person  and  Place  of  Jesus  Christ,  1909. 
Revelation  and  the  Bible,  Hibbert  Jour.,  Oct.,  1911. 

7.  R.  Seeberg — 

Begriff  d.  christl.  Kirche,  Bd.  I,  1885. 

Lehrbuch  d.  Dogmengeschichte,  R&  I,  1895,  Bd.  II,  1898;  E. 

Tr.  1904. 
An  d.  Schwelle  d.  ip  Jahrhunderts,  3d  Ed.  1901. 
D.  Grundwahrheit.  christl.  Relig.,  4th  Ed.  1906;  E.  Tr.  1908. 
D.  Personlichkeit  Christi  d.feste  Punkte  im  Hiessende  Strome 

d.  Gegenwart. 
Leitfad.  d.  Dogmengeschichte,  2d  Ed.  1905. 
Protestant.  Ethik,  in  Kultur  der  Gegenwart,  1906. 
Offenbarung  u.  Insipration,  1908. 
Zur  systemat.  Theologie,  1909. 

8.  K.  Beth— 

Das  Wesen  des  Christentums  u.  d.  mod.  hist.  Denkweise, 

1904. 
D.  Wunder  Jesu,  1905. 

Wunder  u.  Naturwissenschaft  (Konsist.  Monatschrift,  1906). 
Empirische,  Teleologie,  N.  K.  Zeitschr.,  1907. 
Die  Moderne  u.  d.  Prinzipien  der  Theologie,  1907. 
D.  Verstdndnis  v.  Leben  in  d.  neueren  Naturf.,  Reformat., 

1907. 
D.  Bindung  d.  Glaubens  an  d.  Person  Jesu,  Theol.  Rundschau, 

Jan.,  1912. 

9.  E.  Troeltsch — 

D.  wissenschaftliche  Lage  u.  ihre  Anforderung  an  d.  The- 
ologie, 1900. 
D.  Absolutheit  d.  Christentums,  u.  d.  relig.  Gesch.,  1902. 
Gegenwart  Lage  d.  Religionsphilosophie ,  1904. 

9 


10  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

D.  historische  in  Kants  Relig.-Philos.,  1904. 

Bedeutung,    d.    Protestantismus   f.  d.    Entstehung.    d.    mod. 

Kultur.,  1906. 
Psychologie  u.  Erkenntnistheorie  in  d.  Religionswiss.,  1905. 
Protestantismus,  Kultur  der  Gegenwart,  I,  4,  1906. 
Wesen  der  Religion,  Kultur  der  Gegenwart,  I,  4,  1906. 
Ritckblick  auf  ein  halbes  Jahrhundert  d.  theol.  Wissenschaft, 

Zeitschr.  f.  wiss.  TheoL,  1908-1909. 
Ueber  d.  Moglichkcit  eines  freien  Christcntums,  Weltkong.  f. 

freies  Christ entum ;  Protokoll,  1910,  p.  333  f. 

10.     W.  Bousset — 

Wesen  d.  Religion,  1903-1904;  E.  Tr.  1907. 
Schriftgelehrtentum  u.  V olksfrommigkeit ,  1903. 
Was  wis  sen  wir  von  Jesust  2d  Ed.  1906. 
Jesus,  E.  Tr.  1906. 

D.  Mission  u.  d.  sog.  religionsgescliicht.  Schule,  1907. 
Gottesglaube,  1908. 

D.  Bedeutung  d.  Person  Jcsu  f.  d.  Glauben,  Fiinfter  Welt- 
kongress  f.  freies  Christentum;  Protokoll,  1910,  p.  291  f. 


10 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  11 


INTRODUCTION 


The  interest  of  this  study  is  to  show  the  place  which  chief  types 
of  recent  Protestant  theology  give  the  classic  Protestant  doctrine  of 
religious  assurance.  The  undertaking  is  analytical  and  interpreta- 
tive; only  in  so  far  can  it  be  termed  constructive,  for  solutions 
beyond  those  which  will  pass  under  review  in  a  study  of  typical 
recent  theologies  are  not  here  attempted. 

In  the  systems  which  will  be  studied  intellectual  certainty  (Wahr- 
heitsgewissheit)  and  religious  assurance  (Heilsgewissheit)  are  inex- 
tricably interrelated ;  not  only  so,  they  are  logically  related.  Hence  a 
study  of  religious  assurance  within  the  field  indicated  will  involve 
the  wider  problem  of  intellectual  certainty.  Only  in  so  far  as  it  is 
thus  involved  will  it  be  here  considered. 

The  First  Division  will  sketch  the  history  of  the  doctrine  of  assur- 
ance in  Christian  theology,  as  this  forms  the  background  of  the 
current  views.  The  Second  Division  will  develop  the  content  of  four 
types  of  current  theology,  since  these  systems  thus  viewed  in  their 
various  bearings  afford  the  theological  context  of  the  doctrine  of 
Christian  assurance,  or  its  equivalent.  Further,  in  the  Second  Divis- 
ion, certain  fundamental  conceptions,  as  they  are  developed  by  the 
various  theological  types,  will  be  considered  in  their  bearing  upon 
Christian  assurance.  And,  in  conclusion,  the  Third  Division  will 
define  the  alternative  views  which  the  results  thus  obtained  suggest. 

The  types  of  theology  chosen  for  investigation  are :  Conservative 
Orthodoxy,  Ritschlianism,  Modern  Positivism,  and  the  School  of 
Comparative  Religions.  While  other  types  may  be  discriminated,  it 
is  believed  that  these  are  the  most  significant  recent  or  current  types. 
The  choice  of  theologians  has  been  governed  by  the  simple  purpose 
of  confining  the  study  to  theologians  who  are  truly  representative  of 
the  various  groups.  In  some  cases  other  theologians  than  those  cited 
would  have  served  the  end  in  view  quite  as  well ;  of  Herrmann, 
Seeberg,  and  Troeltsch  this  could  hardly  be  affirmed.  The  exposi- 
tion of  the  various  systems  of  theology  has  been  carried  only  far 
enough  to  yield  what  seems  a  sufficient  perspective  for  the  purposes 
of  this  study.  It  aims  at  cardinal  traits,  and,  while  attempting  to  be 
fair,  does  not  undertake  exhaustive  analysis. 

11 


12  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 


I.     PRELIMINARY  SURVEY 

The  note  of  religious  assurance  is  characteristic  of  the  New  Tes- 
tament, however  variously  it  may  be  grounded.  The  exulting  cer- 
tainty of  Romans  viii  will  never  be  surpassed.  We  should  expect  to 
find  a  marked  quality  of  personal  assurance  of  the  favor  of  God  in 
all  types  of  religion  rooting  in  the  Biblical  literature.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  however,  there  have  been  marked  fluctuations  in  quantity 
and  variations  in  the  quality  of  assurance  in  the  Christian  church  in 
the  course  of  its  history. 

A.  Views  of  the  Basis  of  Assurance  Before  the  Reforma- 
tion. 

1.     In  the  Fathers. 

Christianity  took  over  the  revelation  theory  of  the  Jews,  and  this, 
reinforced  by  the  Alexandrian  belief  in  revelation  as  the  highest 
source  of  knowledge,  became  characteristic  of  Christianity.  From 
the  time  of  Irenseus  and  Tertullian  this  belief  was  definitely  con- 
nected with  the  Old  and  New  Testaments.1  The  Nicene  and  Post- 
Nicene  Fathers  are  at  one  in  the  view  that  a  true  knowledge  of  God 
can  be  attained  only  through  revelation,  and  in  particular  through 
Jesus  Christ.  In  contradistinction  to  the  more  liberal  view  of  the 
Apologists  and  of  the  Alexandrian  Fathers,  which  recognized  all 
truth,  in  whatever  system,  as  from  the  Divine  Logos,  the  Western 
Fathers  limited  revelation  to  the  Christian  Scriptures.  The  same 
motives,  in  large  measure,  which  developed  the  Rule  of  Faith  and 
the  Catholic  Church  led  to  the  formation  of  a  Canon,  which  drew 
the  line  on  all  not  scripture  and  hence  not  revelation.  The  auctoritas 
variously  exercised  by  these  three  norms  had  ultimately  to  be  read- 
justed to  the  exercise  of  human  ratio.  Tertullian  held  that  the 
content  of  revelation  is  above  reason,  and,  further,  that  reason 
cannot  comprehend  it.  There  must  be  unconditional  surrender 
to  revelation.2 

In  the  West  auctoritas  and  ratio  remained  side  by  side,  their 
relations  being  undefined.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  Stoic  and  Aristotelian 
rationalism  was  carried  over  into  Catholic  Christianity  and  became 
characteristic  of  its  dogmatics  and  morality.*    With  Ambrose  faith 

iWindelband,  History  of  Philos,   E.  Tr.,   1901,  p.  219  f. 

2Ut  supra,  p.  225. 

•Harnack,  History  of  Dogma,  Vol.  V,  p.  20  f. 

12 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  13 

is  the  basic  fact  of  the  Christian  life ;  it  is  faith  which  lays  hold  of 
the  redemption  in  Christ,  and  not  mere  belief  in  authority ;  it  builds 
upon  the  blood  of  Christ.  The  question  of  salvation  is  not  one  of 
deliverance  from  death,  as  with  the  Eastern  theologians  so  largely, 
but  is  concerned  with  deliverance  from  sin  and  its  consequences.1  In 
Augustine,  however,  ratio  is  the  organ  by  which  God  reveals  Him- 
self to  man.  This  thought,  which  was  clearly  defined  in  his  first 
period,  he  never  surrendered;  yet  it  was  limited  in  a  marked  way 
by  the  admission  that  the  knowledge  due  to  faith  will  always  be 
uncertain  here  below.  The  only  thing  that  can  supersede  it  is 
revelation.  He  constantly  "appeased  with  revelation  his  hunger  for 
the  absolute."  Revelation  is  not  recommended  alone  or  chiefly  by  its 
intrinsic  worth.  Its  external  attestation,  its  certification  by  the 
Church,  is  conclusive.  "Man  needs  authority  to  discipline  his  mind 
and  to  support  a  certainty  not  to  be  obtained  elsewhere."  Augustine 
was  never  clear  about  the  relation  of  faith  and  knowledge;  but  his 
formal  appeal  was  to  authority — now  to  the  Scriptures  as  above  the 
Church,  now  to  the  Church  as  guaranteeing  the  Scriptures.2  He  was 
never  able  to  rest  his  faith  upon  the  rationality  of  Christian  truth  as 
revealed  in  the  Scriptures  alone.  "As  a  Christian  thinker  he  never 
gained  the  subjective  certitude  that  Christian  faith  was  clear,  con- 
sistent, demonstrable.  He  declared  that  he  believed  in  many  articles 
of  faith,  yes,  even  in  the  Gospel  itself,  only  on  Church  authority."' 
In  his  Confessions,  especially  Book  IX,  8-12,  we  find  the  Psalmist's 
faith  in  possession  of  the  living  God  expressed.  He  is  the  true  father 
of  that  Catholic  mysticism  which  was  at  home  within  the  Church 
until  after  the  Council  of  Trent.  But  the  assurance  which  such  a 
mysticism  expresses  did  not  become  doctrinally  articulate  with 
Augustine.  Justificatio  ex  tide,  as  a  subjective  experience,  is  never 
complete  in  this  life,  for  the  simple  reason  that  it  contemplates  the 
entire  transformation  of  its  subject.  Grace,  to  be  sure,  is  prevenient 
and  irresistible ;  the  external  means  of  grace  avail  for  the  elect ;  but 
only  perseverance  to  the  end  can  reveal  the  real  objects  of  irresistible 
grace.  Even  the  called  who  do  not  possess  this  final  grace  of  per- 
severance will  be  lost.  In  consequence,  there  is  a  wide  range  of 
contingency  in  this  view.  Yet  for  himself,  Augustine  was  sure  of 
communion  with  God;  he  really  possessed  the  certainty  of  faith. 

*Ut  supra,  V.,  p.  20  f. 

*.Ut  supra,  V.,  p.   125  {.,  Note  2. 

»Ut  supra,  V.,  p.   79  f. 

13 


14  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

Yet  he  held  that  no  one  can  be  certain  that  he  is  of  the  elect,  and 
thus  possessed  of  the  donum  perseverantiae.1 

Harnack  suggests  that  while  he  had  a  full  horror  of  sin,  he  had 
not  experienced  the  horror  of  the  uncertainty  of  salvation;  and 
that,  in  consequence,  he  did  not  give  Christ  the  central  place  in  his 
scheme  of  salvation  by  grace  which  he  otherwise  might.2 

Augustine's  philosophy  is  based  upon  the  conviction  of  the  imme- 
diate certainty  of  inner  experience.  And  he  regards  the  idea  of  God 
as  involved  in  the  certainty  which  individual  consciousness  has  of 
itself.  All  rational  knowledge  is  ultimately  knowledge  of  God, 
though  he  far  transcends  all  the  forms  of  human  thought.  Such 
rational  knowledge,  even,  as  the  illumination  of  the  individual 
consciousness  by  the  divine  truth,  is  essentially  an  act  of  divine 
grace,  for  God  bestows  the  revelation  of  his  truths  only  upon  him 
who  through  good  effort  and  morals  shows  himself  worthy.  The 
appropriation  of  these  truths  is  through  faith  rather  than  through 
insight.  Full  rational  insight  is  to  be  the  consummation ;  this  com- 
plete beholding  of  the  divine  truth  is  the  acme  of  blessedness ;  but  in 
order  of  time,  even  if  not  in  dignity,  faith  in  revelation  is  first.  And 
thus  we  are  brought  once  again  to  the  pathway  of  authority.  Here 
the  open  question  is  not  that  which  concerns  the  existence  of  a 
gracious  God,  but  that  which  concerns  the  matter  of  individual 
election.3 

2.     In  Scholasticism. 

Scholasticism  met  at  the  threshold  of  its  career  a  twofold  doctrine 
of  natural  and  revealed  religion.  It  developed  this  doctrine  exten- 
sively. The  two  are  in  the  closest  harmony;  but  natural  theology 
must  subordinate  itself  to  revealed,  for  it  has  its  foundation  in 
revelation.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  scholastic  theologian  alternated 
between  reason  and  revelation,  while  reason  really  determined  his 
method  and  the  structure  of  his  system.  Aquinas,  the  formulator  of 
classic  Roman  Catholicism,  held  revelation  above  reason,  but  not 
contrary  to  it.  Their  relation  is  that  of  different  stages  of  develop- 
ment ;  philosophical  knowledge  is  a  possibility  given  in  man's  natural 
endowment,  and  is  brought  to  full  and  entire  realization  only  by  the 
grace  active  in  revelation.  With  Aquinas  religion  and  theology  are 
essentially  speculative  and  not  practical.     He   is   an  absolutist  in 

»Ut  supra,  V.,  p.  204  f. 

*Ut  supra,  V.,  p.  210,   Note   1. 

3Windelband,  History  of  Philos.,   p.   276  f. 

14 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  15 

thought.  He  endeavors  to  demonstrate  the  Christian  religion  from 
principles,  and  when  in  any  particular  he  fails,  he  falls  back  upon 
authority.  His  theological  interest  is  that  of  Augustine ;  all  the 
results  of  world-knowledge  must  lead  to  that  knowledge  of  God 
which  liberates  the  soul.1 

There  are  truths  accessible  to  reason,  as  e.  g.  that  there  is  a  God ; 
yet  this  truth  could  be  reached  by  only  the  few,  after  long  effort  and 
very  imperfectly.  There  are  truths  above  reason,  e.  g.  the  Trinity. 
Even  the  truths  accessible  to  reason  need  to  be  confirmed  by  the 
testimony  of  revelation.  At  the  same  time,  though  reason  unaided 
could  not  arrive  at  the  highest  truths,  it  is  her  function  to 
set  in  order  even  that  knowledge  which  is  gained  through  revelation.2 
Philosophy,  as  secular  science,  is  over  against  theology,  which  is 
divine  science.  But  theology  is  above  philosophy,  the  Church  above 
the  State,  grace  above  natural  ability,  the  supernatural  above  the 
natural,  and  faith  above  reason.  "Faith  is  at  bottom  'believing 
things  true  because  God  said  them,'  and  is  therefore  a  more  certain 
basis  of  knowledge  than  science,  because  nothing  is  more  certain 
than  the  word  of  God.  At  the  same  time,  these  things  are  given 
in  articles  whose  acceptance  and  interpretation  belong  to  the  intel- 
lect."3 

The  type  of  piety  developed  by  this  view  of  things  is  mystical.  In 
the  mysticism  of  Aquinas  all  is  intellectually  conditioned.  The  vision 
of  God  is  essential  knowledge.  "Knowledge  is  the  means  of  reaching 
spiritual  freedom,  and  the  highest  knowledge  attained  is  nothing  but 
the  natural  result  of  the  absolute  knowledge  given  in  vision."4  But 
just  because  everything  is  intellectually  conditioned,  nihil  prohibit  id 
quod  est  certius  secundam  naturam,  esse  quod  nos  minus  certum 
propter  debilitatem  intellectus  nostri*  The  entire  scheme  in  which 
this  mysticism  moves  admits  of  only  "a  perpetually  increasing 
approach  to  the  Deity,  and  never  allows  the  feeling  of  sure  posses- 
sion to  arise."  The  debility  of  our  intellect  never  allows  the  process 
of  intellectual  certification  to  become  a  demonstration.6  As  with 
Augustine,  there  is  in  the  end  a  falling  back  upon  authority,  the 
churchly  guarantee.     To  be  sure,  there  remains  the  experience  of 

1Harnack,   History  of  Dogma,   VI.,   p.    152  f. 

2Fisher,   History   of   Doctrine,    New   York,    1896,    p.    234    f. 

'Hall,    History   of    Christian   Ethics,   p.    325. 

4Harnack,   History  of  Dogma,   VI.,   p.    106. 

5Summa,  Pars  Prima,  Quaest.   I,  Art.  2. 

"Summa,  Pars  Tertia,  Quaest.  I,  Art.   5,  Resp. 

15 


16  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

beatific  vision,  summum  hominis  bonum.1  But  this  is  granted  to  only 
a  very  few.  And  beyond  this  there  remain  the  judgment  from 
experience,  always  vitiated  by  subjective  doubts  and  defects;  and 
the  appeal  to  authority.  As  for  the  last  of  these,  from  the  days  of 
Augustine  it  forbade  positive  assurance  of  personal  salvation,  defin- 
ing it  as  praesumptio.  Yet  the  Church  enjoined  hope,  of  which 
Aquinas  says,  it  is  media  inter  praesumptionem  et  desperationem  ex 
parte  nostra.  And  further,  non  potest  esse  superabundant  spei  ex 
parte  Dei,  cuius  bonitas  est  infinita.2 

3.     The  Standard  Catholic  View. 

The  Catholic  view  of  faith  and  Christian  assurance  developed  in 
the  direction  indicated  by  Augustine  and  Aquinas.  Believers  could 
have  no  full  or  complete  assurance  except  through  special  revelation 
or  by  the  witness  of  the  Church.  Chapter  XII  of  the  Decree  of  the 
the  Council  of  Trent  concerning  Justification  makes  this  matter 
explicit. 

Nemo  quoque  quamdiu  in  hac  mortalitate  vivitur  de  arcano  divinae  prae- 
destinationis  mysterio  usque  adeo  praesumere  debet,  ut  certo  statuat,  se  omnino 
esse  in  numerum  praedestinatorum,  quasi  verum  esset,  quod  justificatus  aut 
amplius  peccare  non  possit,  aut,  si  peccaverit,  certain  sibi  resipiscentiam 
promittere  debeat.  Nam,  nisi  ex  speciali  revelatione,  sciri  non  potest,  quos 
Deus  sibi  eligerit.8 

Chapter  XIII,  which  deals  with  the  gift  of  perseverance,  enjoins 
that  no  one  promise  himself  anything  as  certain  with  an  absolute 
certainty,  though  all  ought  to  have  a  most  firm  hope  in  God's  help. 
Men  ought  to  fear  for  the  combat  which  remains  with  the  world, 
the  flesh,  and  the  devil.4  The  accompanying  Canons  enforce  this 
view.6 

In  his  Symbolik  Moehler  has  developed  the  Catholic  view  as  over 
against  the  view  of  the  Protestant  Reformers,  dwelling  upon  the 
grounds  upon  which  the  Catholic  feeling  of  uncertainty  rests.  Cath- 
olics have  no  criterion  by  which  to  distinguish  the  operations  of 
grace  from  the  natural  achievements  of  men,  and  even  if  they  could 
distinguish  the  operation  of  Divine  grace,  the  recollection  of  the 
frailty  of  men,  who  must  cooperate  with  that  grace  in  order  to  be 
saved,  would  render  full  assurance  impossible.    Thus  the  Catholic 

1Summa,   Prima   Secundae,    Quaest.    Ill,   Art.    1. 

2Cf,  Summa,  Prima  Secundae,  Quaest.  LXIV.  Art  4.     Secundae  Quaest.  XVIII,  Art. 
4.     Utrum  spes  viatorum  habeat  certitudinem. 
•Schaff,  Creeds  of  Christendom,  Vol.  II,  p.  103. 
4Ut  supra,  p.  103  f. 
6Ut  supra,  p.  113,  especially  Canons  XII  and  XIII. 

16 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  17 

Christian,  "without  false  security,  yet  full  of  consolation,  calm,  and 
entirely  resigned  to  the  Divine  mercy,  awaits  the  day  on  which  God 
shall  pronounce  His  final  award."1 

In  fact,  the  Catholic  view  of  Christian  assurance  has  had  no  mate- 
rial development  since  Aquinas.  The  Tridentine  Decree  and  Canons 
merely  erected  into  formal  dogma  what  had  long  been  characteristic 
of  Catholic  piety  and  teaching.  The  effect  of  it  was  to  make  men 
feel  their  entire  dependence  upon  the  Church  as  the  specially  ordered 
channel  of  Divine  grace.  This  was  the  pillar  and  ground  of  hope. 
And  if  any  individual  or  body  of  believers  cut  themselves  off  from 
this  channel  of  grace,  they  must  of  necessity  seek  some  other  prac- 
tical basis  of  assurance. 

B.     Protestant  Views  of  the  Basis  of  Assurance. 

1.     Luther. 

The  whole  scholastic  Catholic  view  forms  the  background  over 
against  which  the  theology  of  Luther  had  its  development.  His 
views  could  never  have  been  what  they  were  but  for  the  definition 
and  answers  which  Catholicism  afforded  his  intensest  personal 
religious  problems.  The  Reformation  did  not  start  from  a  criti- 
cism of  doctrine,  but  from  the  imperative  of  religious  experience. 
Overwhelmed  by  the  sense  of  his  sin,  Luther  fell  back  upon  the 
agencies  of  the  Church,  upon  the  sacraments  and  the  penitential 
system;  but  he  found  there  no  assurance  of  the  favor  of  God.  At 
length  he  found  in  Christ  the  evidence  of  the  gratia  Dei  which  is 
the  forgiveness  of  sins  sine  merito.  The  incarnate,  crucified  and 
risen  Christ  is  God's  word,  the  message  and  revelation  of  the  gra- 
cious God.  "Out  of  a  complex  system  of  expiations,  good  deeds 
and  comfortings,  or  strict  statutes  and  uncertain  apportionments 
of  grace,  out  of  magic  and  blind  obedience,  he  led  religion  forth. 
The  Christian  religion  is  living  assurance  of  the  living  God,  who 
has  revealed  himself  and  opened  his  heart  in  Christ."  Faith  is  thus 
no  longer  the  acceptance  of  certain  doctrines — assensus,  it  is  noth- 
ing other  than  certainty  of  the  forgiveness  of  sins.2 

Luther  never  identified  the  Word  of  God  with  the  Scriptures.  It 
may  be  read  in  the  Bible,  or  communicated  by  the  preacher,  or  con- 
veyed by  visible  signs,  i.  e.,  by  the  sacraments.  Luther  distinguishes 
the  revelation  which  the  Word  of  God  conveys  from  the  general  reve- 


^Symbolik.  pp.   154-156. 
2Werke,    Erl.    Ed.    14:24. 


17 


18  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

lation  contained  in  the  Bible  and  preached,  and  which  all  who  either 
read)  the  Bible  or  hear  preaching  are  acquainted  with.  This  revela- 
tion is  indeed  made  through  the  written  and  spoken  Word,  but  it  is 
not  granted  to  all.1 

On  Heb.  11:1  he  says,  "der  Glaube  ist  eine  gewisse  Zuversicht. 
.  .  .  .  der  Glaube  ist  und  soil  auch  sein  ein  Stand f est  des  Herzen, 
der  nicht  wanket,  wackelt,  bebet,  zappelt,  noch  zweifelt,  sondern 
fest  stehet,  und  seiner  Sachen  gewisz  ist."2  The  rise  of  such  a  faith 
in  one's  soul,  through  the  reception  of  God's  Word,  is  nothing  other 
than  the  gift  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  which  is  the  Spirit  of  Christ.*  In 
addition  to  this  inner  witness,  there  are  also  external  signs  of  the 
possession  of  the  Spirit;  and  these  signs  confirm  our  certainty  of 
being  in  grace.*  The  witness  of  the  Spirit  in  our  hearts  is  not  to 
be  confounded  with  or  set  aside  for  the  testimony  of  our  feelings. 
Our  judgment  should  be  according  to  the  Word  of  God,  that  is, 
according  to  the  Gospel.0 

This  joyous  certainty  of  the  Christian  is  the  theme  of  all  Script- 
ure. The  promises  of  God  are  pregnant  with  it.  The  gift  of  God's 
Son  is  the  seal  of  it.6  It  is  just  this  freedom  and  certainty  of  the 
Gospel  which  the  Catholic  Church  denies ;  and  thereby  it  renders 
the  Gospel  nugatory  and  the  Christian  a  slave  to  dead  works.7 

The  sacraments  and  the  power  of  the  keys  are.  of  great  signifi- 
cance in  Luther's  thought.  In  the  hour  of  uncertainty  the  Church 
becomes  the  refuge  of  the  perplexed.  The  priest  declares  the  peni- 
tent forgiven,  and  has  full  authority  to  declare  this  certainty.  It 
is  so  hard  to  trust  in  mercy,  the  individual  is  not  required  to  work 
out  his  assurance  all  for  himself;  he  obtains  it  from  the  office  of 
the  keys.  However,  what  endows  the  words  of  the  priest  with 
power  is  no  ecclesiastical  dignity  or  indelibility  of  office ;  it  is  Christ's 
word  of  promise  alone.8  The  place  from  which  assurance  of  the 
forgiveness  of  sins  is  regularly  to  be  obtained  is  the  Confessional. 
At  the  same  time,  forgiveness  is  not  a  function  of  the  priest  alone. 
"Where  there  is  no  priest,  any  Christian  person,  even  a  woman  or 
child  may  do  just  as  much."9     Such  a  person  brings  to  the  penitent 

»Ct  Werke,   1:246. 

2Ut  supra,  37:7  f. 

•Ex.  Opera,  30:161  i.,  on  Gal.  2:16  f. 

*Ut  supra. 

8Ut  supra,  pp.   172,  173. 

«Ut  supra,  p.    180. 

7Ut  supra,  p.   180. 

«Kostlin,  The  Theology  of  Luther,   Vol.   I,  p.   285   f. 

•Ut  supra. 

18 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  ,19 

the  word  of  the  Gospel,  and  pronounces  the  judgment,  "Be  of  cheer, 
thy  sins  are  forgiven  thee."1 

It  is  evident  that  Luther  does  not  have  in  mind  the  Church  as 
an  institution  and  authority,  but  the  Church  or  the  Christian  com- 
munity as  medium  of  the  Gospel.  The  whole  external  structure  is 
impotent  unless  the  individual  experiences  within  his  soul  the  voice 
of  the  Spirit  crying  "Abba,  Father !"  This  response  is  one  of  faith, 
and  not  the  product  of  mere  feeling.  When  feeling  is  at  a  low  ebb, 
faith  clings  to  the  naked  word  of  the  Gospel.  The  Holy  Ghost  bids 
the  agitated  sinner  find  comfort  and  be  joyous  in  the  promised  grace 
of  God  in  Christ.2  It  is  above  all  things  the  Gospel  which  makes 
the  heart  sure.* 

The  assurance  of  such  a  faith  issues  in  the  freedom  of  a  Chris- 
tian man,  which  frees  not  from  works  but  from  reliance  upon  works. 
We  are  all  equally  priests,  and  every  man  is  bound  to  direct  his  works 
for  the  good  of  others.  Luther  overthrew  the  outward  and  formal 
authorities  which  the  Catholics  had  set  up.  He  declared  the  media- 
tion of  a  priesthood,  whether  in  confession  or  absolution,  unneces- 
sary; he  made  an  end  to  the  calculation  of  external  and  temporal 
penalties ;  he  set  aside  the  doctrines  of  Purgatory,  indulgences,  and 
the  applied  merits  of  saints ;  in  short,  he  overturned  the  whole  Cath- 
olic penitential  system,  and  substituted  for  it  the  thought  of  justi- 
fication by  faith.  The  sacraments  themselves,  which  he  reduced  to 
two  (three),  have  efficacy  only  because  they  are  a  special  and  effect- 
ive form  of  the  saving  Word  of  God.4 

Everything  centers  for  him  in  the  self-certifying  content  of  the 
Gospel,  which  is  wholly  independent  of  all  the  channels  through 
which  the  Gospel  comes ;  it  is  manifest  in  the  power  with  which 
the  Word  lays  hold  upon  the  heart — a  power  so  great  that  one  would 
feel  bound  by  it,  would  feel  how  just  and  true  it  is,  "wenngleich  alle 
Welt,  alle  Engel,  alle  Fiirsten  der  Hollen  anders  sagten,  ja,  wenn 
Gott  gleich  selbst  anders  sagte."5  With  Luther,  then,  the  under- 
standing of  the  content  of  Scripture  as  the  divine  promise  and  re- 
mission of  sin  is  synonymous  with  trust  in  it;  assensus  and  fiducia 
are  resolved  into  one.  In  other  words,  there  are  not  with  Luther 
the  two  steps:  the  validation  of  the  Scripture  as  formal  authority, 

1Ut  supra,  where   Luther's    Werke   are   quoted.      Erl.    Ed.,    20:185. 

2Ut  supra,  16:16   f.   on  Luke   10:23-37;   also  Werke,   12:229. 

■Ut  supra,   49:285. 

4Harnack,   History  of  Dogma,   VII,   p.    212. 

'Luther,  Werke,   10:163. 

19 


20  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

and  the  appropriation  of  the  content  of  truth  thus  validated;  we 
are  certain  of  the  Scripture  only  as  we  take  home  to  our  hearts  this 
Gospel  content.1  Thus  Luther  does  not  offer  the  modern  antithesis 
of  personal  certainty  over  against  authority-faith  in  the  Scriptures. 
The  question  had  not  arisen  for  him  how,  if  the  assurance  of  the 
individual  decides  for  him  what  is  divine,  a  greater  certainty  could 
arise  from  the  Scriptures.  Or,  again,  if  the  Scriptures  be  set  up 
as  objective  authority,  how  is  it  possible  to  be  subjectively  certain 
of  them,  since  all  inquiries  concerning  their  origin  and  authors  can 
never  make  them  certain.  Logically,  one  would  say,  the  Gospel 
ougJht,  in  Luther's  view,  to  be  self-validating  to  all  who  hear  it ;  he 
recognizes  that  it  wins  no  such  assent,  and  holds  that  the  outer 
Word  is  not  sufficient  without  the  inner  operation  of  the  Holy 
Spirit.  This  supernatural  agency  inscribes  the  outer  Word  within 
the  heart.2  Luther  lands,  as  Heim  points  out,  in  this  paradox :  The 
witness  of  the  Spirit  is  a  transcendent  factor  over  against  the  Word 
which  lends  to  the  Word  a  certainty  whose  nature  it  is  to  be  wrought 
by  no  such  transcendent  factor. 

2.     Melanchthon. 

The  distinction  which  Luther  made  between  the  Scriptures  and 
the  Word  of  God  was  soon  lost.  Melanchthon  has  no  formal  doc- 
trine of  Scripture,  but  quotes  from  all  parts  of  it  as  if  it  were  of 
equal  authority,  as  he  seems  to  feel.  There  is  good  reason  for  this. 
He  had  no  such  religious  experience  as  Luther,  and,  furthermore, 
he  was  face  to  face  with  a  situation  which,  as  gauged  by  the  com- 
mon world-view  of  the  time,  demanded  an  external  authority.8  The 
evangelical  position  of  Melanchthon,  especially  in  his  early  years, 
was  essentially  that  of  Luther.* 

Successive  editions  of  the  Loci,  in  proportion  as  they  offered  a 
comprehensive  and  articulated  system  of  theology,  obscured  the 
simplicity  of  Luther's  gospel.  At  first,  the  bold  outline  of  the  new 
Reformation  position,  to  which  he  had  given  assent,  the  presence, 
influence,  and  warm  friendship  of  Luther,  and  the  simplicity  of  the 
situation  in  the  church  which  felt  itself  engaged  merely  in  a  reform 
movement,  led  Melanchthon  to  neglect  his  humanistic  antecedents 

1Heim,   Das   Gewissheitsproblem,    1911,   p.    257  f.,   where  reference  is  made   to   Ihmels. 

2Ut  supra,  p.  259. 

3McGiffert,    Protestant    Thought    Before    Kant,    p.    75.  _ 

♦Compare   his   utterances    on    Grace,    Corpus    Reformatorum,    xiii,    Col.    630;    Effect    of 
Grace,  ibidem:   Good  Works,  ibidem,  vii,  Col.   411  f. ;  "The  Security  of  God's  Children, 
Fish,  Masterpieces  of  Pulpit  Eloquence,  p.  457  f. ;  Justification,  Loci,  Plitt's  Ed.,  p.   170. 

20 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  21 

and  bent,  to  a  relative  contempt  of  reason.  But  as  time  passed,  he 
experienced  a  revulsion,  and  began  to  restore  reason,  making  it, 
alongside  revelation,  even  if  subordinate  to  it,  a  source  of  religious 
truth.  The  issue  of  this  was  a  natural  theology,  reinforced  and 
corrected  by  a  revealed.  The  sharp  distinction  which  Luther  had 
maintained  between  fides  acquisita  ex  testimoniis  auctoritatum  and 
the  inniti  veritati  propter  se  ipsam  is  no  longer  maintained  by 
Melanchthon.  He  coordinates  reason  and  Law  on  the  one  hand  with 
revelation  and  Gospel  on  the  other.  The  Law  is  based  upon  the 
essential  nature  of  man,  the  Gospel  issues  as  a  pure  mystery  from 
the  secret  wisdom  of  God.1 

It  is  in  harmony  with  this  distinction  that  Melanchthon  lays  down 
a  four-fold  criterion  of  certainty,  or  rather  four  distinct  criteria: 

Sunt  normae  certitudinis  juxta  philospohiam  tres :  experentia  universalis, 
noticiae  principiorum,  et  intellectus  ordinis  in  syllogismo.  In  ecclesia  habemus 
quartam  normam  certitudinis,  patefactionem  divinam,  quae  extat  in  libris 
propheticis  et  apostolicis.2 

It  is  maintained  that  the  certainty  yielded  by  this  last  criterion  is 
equally  valid  with  mathematical  certainty.8 

In  this  view  there  are  three  moments  in  the  attainment  of  cer- 
tainty. There  is  first  the  exercise  of  reason.  This  has  a  merely 
chronological  precedence,  and  is  decidedly  limited  in  its  function. 
Secondly,  the  Word  of  God,  confirmed  by  miracle  and  the  resurrec- 
tion of  Jesus  from  the  dead.  And,  thirdly,  the  inner  witness  of  the 
Spirit.  In  many  regards  the  second  and  third  factors  wholly  tran- 
scend the  first.  In  the  last  analysis,  causa  certitudinis  est  revelatio 
Dei,  qui  est  verax.4. 

According  to  Luther,  the  promise  was  the  particular  correlate  of 
faith.  Not  so  with  Melanchthon,  faith  is  not  merely  iiducia  miseri- 
cordiae  Dei  promissae  propter  Christum  mediatorem,  but  is — at  least, 
according  to  the  Loci  of  1559  and  thereafter — an  assentiri  universo 
verbo  Dei  nobis  proposito.  This  body  of  truth  Melanchthon  came 
to  designate  as  including  "the  whole  doctrine  handed  down  in  the 
books  of  the  prophets  and  apostles,  and  comprehended  in  the  Apos- 
tles', Nicene,  and  Athanasian  creeds."  Thus,  from  being  iiducia, 
repose  upon  the  promise  of  the  Gospel,  faith  has  come  to  be  assensus 
to  "the  whole  teaching  of  the  Word  of  God."5 

1Heim,    Das    Gewissheitsproblem,    pp.    263,    265. 
2Corpus   Reformatorum,    13:151. 
8Citation  by  Heim,  ut  supra,  p.   266. 
4Ut  supra,  p.  266. 
6McGiffert,   ut   supra,   p.    77. 

21 


22  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

The  concern  seems  to  be  with  certainty  concerning  "the  articles 
of  faith"  rather  than  with  personal  assurance  of  salvation ;  or,  rather, 
assent  to  "the  articles  of  faith,"  with  a  perception  that  they  are 
divinely  guaranteed  as  true,  is  the  real  basis  of  such  fiducia  as  pe  - 
sonal  experience  may  yield. 

Melanchthon  seems  not  to  have  realized  to  how  great  an  extent 
the  use  of  his  fourth  form  of  certainty  rendered  the  first  three 
superfluous,  and  their  use  illogical.  He  believed  that  revelation 
yields  a  sum  of  truths  which  are  to  be  accepted,  even  although  they 
may  not  seem  according  to  reason,  since  they  are  certified  by  a 
veracious  God.  While  he  preached  evangelical  assurance  somewhat 
in  the  fashion  of  Luther,  Melanchthon  was  more  interested  in  the 
certainty  of  truth,  and  was  thus  at  heart  a  rationalist  and  scholastic. 

3.     Calvin. 

It  is  the  will  of  God,  rather  than  his  grace,  which  is  central  for 
Calvin,  and  the  Bible  is  a  publication  of  that  will  rather  than  a 
manifesto  of  grace.  The  distinction  which  Luther  made  between 
the  Bible  and  the  Word  of  God  is  wholly  wanting;  the  Bible  is 
always  and  everywhere  the  Word  of  God,  and  of  equal  authority  in 
all  its  parts.  This  Bible,  in  order  to  be  Word  of  God  in  any  given 
case,  must  be  reinforced  for  the  individual's  experience  by  the 
inward  testimony  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  This  testimony  is  superior 
to  all  reason,  and  is  equal  to  an  intuitive  perception  of  God  himself 
in  the  Scriptures.1 

Calvin  marks  the  character  of  rational  proof  as  wholly  secondary, 
when  he  treats  its  function  in  establishing  belief  in  the  Scripture.2 
The  operation  of  the  Holy  Spirit  is  in  the  foreground,  but  is  not 
held  to  be  such  as  sets  aside  the  normal  activities  of  the  individual. 
It  rather  quickens  the  understanding  and  the  will  to  fresh  activities.8' 
It  is  quite  clear  that  the  whole  movement  of  the  soul  is  viewed  as 
autonomous,  though  induced  by  a  power  above  and  objective  to 
the  individual,  the  power  of  the  Divine  Spirit.  In  the  case  of  the 
elect,  to  whom  alone  the  Spirit  is  given,  that  witness  is  coincident 
with  the  unique  impression,  the  self -certifying  effect,  which  the 
Scriptures  make  upon  them.  Faith  is  defined  as  consisting  in  a 
knowledge  of  God  and  of  Christ ;  it  is  not  reverence  for  and  sub- 
mission to  the  Church.     The  heart  is  not  excited  to  faith  by  every 

institutes,  Bk.  I,  Chap.  vii:iv:v. 
2Ut  supra,   Bk.   I,  Chap.  viii. 
8Ut  supra,  i:vii:v. 

22 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  23 

part  of  the  Word  of  God;  that  which  it  finds  in  the  divine  Word 
upon  which  to  rest  its  dependence  and  confidence  is  Christ,  the 
pledge  of  the  Divine  benevolence  toward  us.  Faith  is  a  "steady 
and  certain  knowledge  of  the  Divine  benevolence  toward  us,"  and 
in  the  work  of  the  Holy  Spirit.1 

It  is  only  the  elect  who  have  the  witness  of  the  Spirit  to  the 
Scriptures,  and  they  alone,  as  matter  of  course,  have  full  assur- 
ance of  personal  salvation ;  yet  the  two  are  by  no  means  identical. 
Calvin  remarks  that  "full  assurance"  (plerophoria)  is  always  at- 
tributed to  faith  in  the  Scriptures.  The  real  believer  is  persuaded 
that  he  has  a  propitious  and  benevolent  Father.  Yet  the  assurance 
of  faith  is  not  unattended  by  doubts,  a  fact  which  Luther  empha- 
sized.2 The  dogma  of  the  Schoolmen  that  it  is  impossible  to  decide 
concerning  the  favor  of  God  is  rejected.  Faith  and  hope  go  together, 
they  are  sometimes  used  in  the  Scripture,  it  is  urged,  without  any 
distinction.*' 

Against  enthusiasts  who  proclaimed  a  witness  of  the  Spirit  inde- 
pendent of  the  Scriptures  and  affording  fresh  revelations  of  divine 
truth,  Calvin  had  but  one  answer :  God  displays  and  exerts  his 
power  only  where  his  word  is  received  with  due  reverence  and 
honor.4  The  witness  of  the  Spirit  not  only  attests  the  truth,  but 
the  new  estate  of  the  elect  believer ;  his  work  underlies  all  assurance.' 

4.     Pietism  and  English  Evangelicalism. 

That  dogmatic  Protestantism  which  succeeded  the  Reformation 
brought  to  full  fruition  the  scholastic  tendencies  which  were  already 
manifest  in  the  first  formulators  of  Protestant  theology,  Melanchthon 
and  Calvin.  The  inwardness  and  vitality  which  characterized  the 
faith  of  the  Reformers  were  in  large  measure  exchanged  for  formal 
intellectualism  and  orthodoxy.  There  is  no  more  barren  chapter 
in  the  history  of  Christian  thought  than  that  which  deals  with 
Protestant  scholasticism.  The  theology  of  this  period  developed  the 
doctrine  of  the  Scriptures  in  particular.  The  need  of  a  clearly  de- 
fined objective  standard  which  should  avail  against  the  common 
Catholic  use  of  tradition  led  to  the  acceptance  of  the  Bible  as  such 
an  objective  standard  entirely  apart  from  the  inward  witness  of 
the  Spirit.     The  witness  of  the  Spirit  in  the  heart  of  the  believer 

1Ut  supra,  Hi  :ii  :vii. 

2Ut  supra,  iii:ii:xvi  and  xvii. 

aUt  supra,  iii:ii:xlii. 

*Ut  supra,  i  :x  :iii. 

BUt  supra,  iii  :i  :iii. 

23 


24  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

was  set  aside  as  too  highly  subjective.  The  individual  was  held  to 
be  in  no  need  of  investigating  the  inspired  character  of  the  Bible, 
since  that  had  already  been  attested  to  the  Church  by  many  infalli- 
ble proofs.  As  such  a  book,  the  Bible  came  to  be  used  as  a  collec- 
tion of  proof-tests  for  the  establishment  of  a  doctrinal  code.  In 
harmony  with  this  point  of  view,  it  was  not  evangelical  assurance 
which  the  period  was  interested  in;  it  was,  rather,  intellectual  cer- 
tainty, based  upon  the  universally  assumed  divine  authority  of  the 
Scriptures.1 

Such  was  the  historical  background  over  against  which  the  Pietis- 
tic  movement  had  its  rise.  German  Pietism  combined  the  mystical 
and  the  practical,  and  depreciated  polemical  and  dogmatic  theology. 
It  had,  in  fact,  only  such  rudiments  of  a  theology  as  its  fundamental 
opposition  to  Protestant  dogmatism  demanded;  the  center  of  its 
interest  lay  in  personal  religion.  Philip  Jacob  Spener  was  probably 
the  most  influential  formative  influence  in  German  Pietism.  He 
was  an  orthodox  Lutheran,  and  never  attacked  the  current  theology. 
Yet  he  emphasized  individual  piety  and  sought  to  give  it  a  sufficient 
authoritative  basis.  He  felt  that  the  Protestantism  of  his  day 
accepted  justification  by  faith  in  much  too  formal  a  way,  and 
divorced  it  from  sanctification  to  an  unwarranted  degree.  His  ideal 
of  a  sanctified  life  was  ascetic  and  other-worldly.  But  his  insistence 
upon  real  piety  was  undoubtedly  justified  by  the  lax  and  formal 
morality  of  the  time,  and  the  way  in  which  the  doctrine  of  justifica- 
tion by  faith  was  made  to  serve  as  a  substitute  for  personal  purity 
and  goodness.  Justification,  as  Spener  looked  upon  it,  has  no 
meaning  apart  from  a  regenerate  and  sanctified  life.  Assurance 
which  builds  upon  any  other  foundation  than  a  holy  life  is  a  delusion. 
The  main  thing  is  not  to  have  peace  and  to  be  conscious  that  one  is 
a  child  of  God;  it  is,  rather,  to  have  a  holy  life  through  the  in- 
dwelling Spirit  of  God.2 

The  position  of  Spener  may  be  gathered  from  his  little  volume 
Das  geistliche  Priesterthum,  in  which  he  elaborates  a  fundamental 
aspect  of  his  thought  in  the  form  of  a  brief  catechism  upon  the 
universal  priesthood  of  believers.  Not  all  exercise  the  same  priestly 
function,  to  be  sure,  but  all  Christians  are,  in  one  sense  or  another, 
priests  unto  God.  All  are  to  go  directly  to  the  Scriptures,  where- 
even  though  they  lack  the  manifold  linguistic  and  other  aids  to 

iMcGiffert,   Protestant  Thought  Before  Kant,   Chap.  viii. 
2McGiffert,  Ut  supra,  Chap  xi:l. 

24 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  25 

interpretation  which  the  learned  possess — they  may  learn  and  under- 
stand the  truth.  They  may  know  all  that  has  to  do  with  their 
salvation  and  growth  in  the  inner  man  according  to  the  rule  of  grace ; 
and  all  this  comes  about  through  the  operation  of  the  Holy  Spirit.1 

The  function  of  the  Holy  Spirit  is  not  one  of  certifying  to  the 
truth  of  the  Word,  which  is  everywhere  assumed.  It  is,  rather, 
an  illumination  of  the  Word,  or  of  the  minds  of  Christian  readers, 
that  he  effects.  In  answer  to  the  question  how  the  Christian  must 
conduct  himself  to  be  assured  of  the  truth,  Spener  lays  down  (Sec. 
37)  a  number  of  simple  rules.  The  Scripture  must  be  read  in  de- 
pendence upon  the  grace  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  and  with  the  purpose 
of  applying  its  truth  to  life.  Christians  must  see  to  it  that  they  do 
not  let  reason  act  as  master,  but  pay  attention  rather  to  the  Holy 
Ghost,  and  believe  that  there  is  not  a  single  word  or  syllable  which 
the  Holy  Ghost  sets  forth  without  its  peculiar  meaning.2 

English  Evangelicalism  was  the  child  of  German  Pietism,  and, 
like  German  Pietism,  it  was  practical  in  its  aims.  As  Pietism  was 
a  reaction  against  scholasticism,  it  was  a  reaction  against  rationalism. 
While  not  intended  as  a  theological  reformation,  the  Evangelical 
movement  had  far-reaching  effects  in  the  field  of  theology,  especially 
in  that  portion  of  theology  which  deals  with  religious  experience. 
By  far  the  most  eminent  figure  in  the  field  of  English  Evangelical 
history  is  John  Wesley.  He  laid  emphasis  upon  just  those  doctrines 
which  were  being  discredited  by  the  current  theological  rationalism. 
The  center  of  emphasis  was  removed  from  the  external  revelation 
embodied  in  the  Scriptures  to  the  internal  miracle  by  which  the 
soul  is  born  anew  of  the  Spirit  of  God  A  rationalizing  orthodoxy 
was  inclined  to  concede  a  large  place  to  the  revelation  in  nature, 
making  the  revelation  in  the  Bible  supplementary.  But  in  the 
view  of  Wesley  no  amount  of  mere  revelation  could  meet  the  need 
of  sinful  man.  Christ,  as  the  divine  Redeemer  who  makes  a  vicari- 
ous atonement  for  sin,  and  the  Holy  Spirit,  as  the  quickening  instru- 
ment of  God  who  renews  the  heart  of  the  believer  and  abides 
therein,  became  the  two  cardinal  points  of  Evangelical  preaching 
and  belief. 

In  Wesley's  view,  salvation  is  no  mere  forensic  transaction;  it 
is  a  vital  renewal  of  the  heart,  a  "present  deliverance  from  sin,  a 
restoration  of  the  soul  to  its    primitive  health,  its  original  purity, 

xSpener,  Das  geistliche  Priesterthum,   1677,  p.   38  f. 
2Ut  supra,  p.  41. 

25 


26  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

a  recovery  of  the  divine  nature."  This  is  the  basis  of  the  Wesleyan 
doctrine  of  Christian  perfection.  The  "perfect  Christian"  Wesley 
describes  in  the  following  terms : 

He  loves  the  Lord  his  God  with  all  his  heart,  with  all  his  soul,  with  all  his 

mind,  and  with  all  his  strength He  is  anxiously  careful  for  nothing, 

.     .  .  .  prays  without  ceasing,  ....  his  heart  is  ever  with  the  Lord, 

and,  loving  God,  he  loves  his  neighbor  as  himself;  ....  his  heart  is  pure; 

his  one  design  in  life  is  "to  do  not  his  own  will,  but  the  will  of  him 

who  sent  him" As  he  loves  God,  so  he  keeps  his  commandments,  not 

only  some,  or  most,  but  all,  from  the  least  to  the  greatest Nor  do  the 

customs  of  the  world  at  all  hinder  his  running  the  race  which  is  set  before 
him.1 

The  "perfect  Christian"  has  the  unmistakable  witness  of  the 
Spirit.  This  witness  Wesley  distinguishes  from  the  witness  of  our 
own  spirit,  which  we  experience  jointly  with  it.  The  foundation  of 
the  latter  is  laid  in  many  texts  of  Scripture,  by  the  ministry  of 
the  Word,  by  meditating  before  God  in  secret,  and  by  conversing 
with  those  who  are  familiar  with  his  ways.  That  natural  reason 
which  religion  does  not  supplant  but  perfects,  every  man  may  put 
to  service,  "applying  those  scriptural  marks  to  himself,"  and  may 
know  whether  he  is  a  child  of  God  or  not. 

Thus,  if  he  know,  first,  "As  many  as  are  led  by  the  Spirit  of  God,"  into 
all  holy  tempers  and  actions,  "they  are  the  sons  of  God;"  (for  which  he 
has  the  infallible  assurance  of  holy  writ)  ;  secondly,  "I  am  led  by  the  Spirit 
of  God;"  he  will  easily  conclude,  therefore,  I  am  a  son  of  God.2 

The  witness  of  the  Divine  Spirit  which  is  conjoined  with  this 
witness  of  our  own  spirits  is  really  antecedent  thereto.  The  Spirit 
of  God,  in  a  manner  which  Wesley  will  not  undertake  to  describe, 
gives  the  believer  such  testimony  of  his  adoption  that  "he  can  no 
more  doubt  the  reality  of  his  sonship  than  he  can  doubt  the  reality 
of  the  shining  of  the  sun  while  he  stands  in  the  full  blaze  of  its 
beams."3 

With  Wesley  the  witness  of  the  Spirit  is  of  central  importance; 
and  it  is  to  be  noted  that  he  restores  to  the  doctrine  the  meaning 
which  Luther  attached  to  it :  that  of  a  witness  to  the  favor  of  God 
toward  the  individual  who  experiences  it.  This  is  quite  another  sense 
than  that  in  which  Calvin  applied  the  term  when  he  made  it  certify 
to  the  truth  of  the  Scriptures.  We  have  in  Wesley  a  revival  of  inter- 
est in  personal  religion ;  and  it  is  quite  natural  that  he  should  seek  a 

1Wesley,  A  Plain  Account  of  Christian   Perfection,   pp.    13-19. 

2 Wesley,  Sermons,  Eaton  and  Mains'  Ed.,  Vol.  I,  Sermon  X:  "The  Witness  of  the 
Spirit." 

•Ut  supra,   Vol.   I,   p.   89. 

26 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  27 

firm  basis  for  personal  assurance.  This  he  finds  in  the  witness  of 
the  Spirit ;  "what  he  testifies  to  is  that  we  are  the  children  of  God." 
And  the  immediate  result  of  this  witness  is  "the  fruit  of  the  Spirit." 

As  soon  as  ever  the  grace  of  God  (in  the  sense  of  his  pardoning  love)  is 
manifested  in  our  souls,  the  grace  of  God  in  the  latter  sense,  the  power  of 
his  Spirit,  takes  place  therein.  And  now  we  can  perform  through  God  what 
to  man  was  impossible.  Now  we  can  order  our  conversation  aright.  .  .  We 
now  have  "the  testimony  of  our  conscience"  which  we  could  never  have  by 
fleshly  wisdom,  "that  in  simplicity  and  godly  sincerity  we  have  our  conversa- 
tion in  the  world"  .  .  This  is  properly  the  ground  of  the  Christian's  joy.1 

5.     Schleiermacher. 

Religion  is  native  to  the  human  soul,  and  makes  its  appearance 
in  consciousness  in  the  form  of  feeling,  according  to  Schleiermacher. 
Specifically,  this  feeling  is  one  of  dependence  upon  the  absolute 
world-ground ;  i.  c,  upon  God,  who  is  known  only  through  this 
medium,  and  can  never  be  scientifically  apprehended.  By  thus 
defining  religion,  Schleiermacher  felt  that  he  preserved  its  freedom 
from  philosophical  complication  and  its  integrity  as  an  essential  of 
human  experience.2  With  such  a  fundamental  postulate,  it  is  at 
once  apparent  that  the  problem  of  religious  certainty  will  be  solved 
by  Schleiermacher  upon  no  basis  of  dogmatic  or  Scriptural  author- 
ity, but  in  harmony  with  his  philosophy.  He  belonged  to  a  group  of 
whom  Kant,  Fichte,  and  Schelling  were  members,  who  sought  cer- 
tainty concerning  the  transcendent  Reality  not  by  recourse  to  the 
facts  which  lie  at  the  basis  of  sense-experience,  nor  by  means  of  a 
supernatural  revelation  in  the  Scriptures ;  but  by  analysis  and  ex- 
clusion they  sought  the  ultimate  forms  of  thought  in  which  all 
reality  is  given.  With  Kant,  the  result  was  the  antinomy  of  the 
Theoretical  and  the  Practical  Reason,  the  former  yielding  only  a 
contentless  Ding-an-sich,  while  the  latter,  whose  primacy  over  the 
Theoretical  Reason  he  held,  gave,  as  ground  of  the  moral  order  of 
the  world,  the  Supreme  Reason — God.  W7ith  Fichte,  Schelling  and 
Schleiermacher,  the  distinction  between  Theoretical  and  Practical 
Reason  is  not  maintained ;  the  two  combine  and  yield  directly  a 
number  of  certainties  concerning  the  Absolute  Reality. 

Being  and  thinking  emerge  in  consciousness ;  their  real  adjust- 
ment would  give  knowledge,  but  they  remain  always  in  a  state  of 
difference — the  complete  adjustment  of  the  real  and  the  ideal  is 

1Ut  supra,  p.  105. 

2Cf.    Cross,  The  Theology  of  Schleiermacher,    1911,  p.    108  f. 

27 


28  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

nowhere  attained  in  cognition.  This  is  rather  the  infinitely  removed 
goal  of  thinking  which  desires  to  become  knowledge,  but  never  will 
succeed.  At  the  same  time,  it  presupposes  the  reality  of  this  unat- 
tained  goal,  the  identity  of  thought  and  being;  this  reality  Schleier- 
macher  calls  God.1 

To  put  it  another  way : 

...  in  religion  man  is  not  primarily  active  but  receptive.  It  must  be  so, 
for  though  in  all  consciousness  there  is  a  double  element,  namely,  the  self- 
consciousness  or  ego,  and  a  determination  of  the  self-consciousness,  or  experi- 
ence, it  is  impossible  that  the  latter  should  be  produced  by  the  former,  because 
the  ego  is  ever  self-identical,  but  experience  is  variable.  Nor  could  we  ever 
have  a  self-consciousness  of  the  ever-identical  self,  because  such  a  conscious- 
ness would  be  destitute  of  all  determination  or  of  quality;  and  consequently 
consciousness  of  self  is  dependent  upon  experience.  But  this  is  just  to  say 
that  all  consciousness,  our  objective  self-consciousness  included,  is  dependent 
upon  a  prior  influence  exerted  upon  our  receptivity.  We  are  compelled  there- 
fore to  seek  the  common  source  of  our  being  and  experience  in  an  Other.2 

God  is  not  an  inference;  he  is  not  arrived  at  after  a  process  of 
reasoning,  but  is  immediately  given  in  the  sense  of  dependence  which 
we  feel  toward  the  ultimate  world-ground.  ''The  true  God  denotes 
the  whence  of  our  sensible  and  self-active  existence."3 

While  the  sense  of  dependence  upon  God  is  not  wanting  in  man- 
kind in  general,  it  is  only  within  the  Christian  community  and 
through  Christ  himself  that  it  is  exalted  to  a  place  of  dominance. 
That  state  of  being  in  which  the  God-consciousness  is  depressed 
and  dominated  by  the  sensuous  consciousness  is  denominated  sin. 
The  conflict  between  the  submerged  God-consciousness  and  the 
dominant  sensuous  consciousness  produces  pain.  Through  the 
Christian  community  we  are  brought  into  contact  with  Christ, 
through  whom  we  gain  a  controlling  God-consciousness.  That  God- 
consciousness,  which  was  his  entire  personal  consciousness,  is  medi- 
ated to  the  individual  through  the  Christian  community.  Faith  is 
the  act  of  receiving  Christ  as  he  is  presented  by  the  Christian  com- 
munity. He  who  has  thus  received  Christ  is  conscious  of  partici- 
pation in  his  blessedness.  The  common  spirit  of  the  Christian 
community,  which  is  the  Spirit  of  Christ,  or  the  Holy  Spirit,  uttered 
itself  in  the  writings  of  the  New  Testament,  the  form  of  all  sub- 
sequent presentations  of  the  person  of  Christ.  Faith  in  Christ  is 
not,  however,  to  be  reposed  upon  the  authority  of  the  Scriptures; 

»Cf.   Windelband,   History   of   Philosophy,   p.    582. 

2Cross,   ut  supra,   p.    120  f. 

*Der  christliche  Glaube,   Sec.  4 :4. 

28 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  29 

at  the  same  time,  the  Scriptures  may  be  the  means  of  its  awakening. 
Faith  is  an  inner  certainty  accompanying  the  higher  self-conscious- 
ness; yet  it  is  not  an  objective  certainty  based  upon  demonstration.1 
Da  nun  aber  Jeder  nur  vermittelst  eines  eigenen  freien  Entschlusses  hine- 
intreten  kann;  so  musz  diesem  die  Gewissheit  vorangehen  dasz  durch  die 
Einwirkung  Christi  der  Zustand  der  Erlosungsbediirftigkeit  aufgehoben  und 
jener  herbeigefiihrt  werde,  und  diese  Gewissheit  ist  eben  der  Glaube  an 
Christum.2 

Schleiermacher's  discussion  makes  certain  things  clear.  He  is 
using  conventional  terms  in  an  unconventional  sense;  and  just  as 
this  yields  a  new  result  for  the  general  view  of  Christian  doctrine, 
so  it  does  in  the  matter  of  Christian  assurance.  It  is  clear  that 
with  him  the  Scriptures  hold  no  such  place  as  they  had  before 
held  in  Protestant  theology,  either  as  touch-stone  of  truth,  or  as 
norm  of  the  certainty  of  personal  salvation.  Further,  personal  as- 
surance is  directly  related  to  Christ.  At  the  same  time,  it  must  be 
recognized  that  Schleiermacher  the  philosopher,  and  Schleiermacher 
the  theologian  never  really  got  together.8  For  his  philosophy,  as 
Heim  points  out,  seeks  the  a  priori  of  universal  logical  validity, 
while  his  theology  starts  with  a  contingent  historic  figure — that  of 
Christ ;  and  that  which,  from  the  philosophical  side,  he  views  as 
inadequate  symbol,  from  the  churchly  side  he  allows  universal 
speculative  validity.  Schleiermacher  has  far  more  significance  for 
the  method  of  Christian  theology  as  a  whole  than  for  any  specific 
contribution  to  the  problem  of  personal  assurance. 

C.     The  Nineteenth  Century. 

The  advent  of  an  inductively-grounded  scientific  theory  of  evolu- 
tion was,  beyond  question,  the  most  far-reaching  and  significant 
development  in  the  field  of  thought  witnessed  by  the  Nineteenth 
Century.  The  broad,  present-day  conception  of  organic  world-proc- 
ess, as  over  against  the  earlier  view  of  static  mechanism,  was  of 
comparatively  slow  development.  As  theory,  it  had  won  its  place 
before  1830,  but  it  was  not  tested  out  in  the  laboratory  until  much 
later.  Charles  Darwin's  epoch-making  "Origin  of  Species,"  1859, 
afforded  this  confirmation,  while  Herbert  Spencer  in  his  Synthetic 
Philosophy  gave  the  theory  a  wider  currency  and  a  more  extensive 
application.     Thus,  hand  in  hand  with  the  development  of  the  evo- 


JDas    Gewissheitsproblem,    p.    376. 
2Cf.    Cross,   ut   supra,   p.    139   f. 
3Der    christliche    Glaube,    Sec.    14: 


29 


30  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

lutionary  hypothesis  went  the  application  of  the  method  of  induc- 
tion. As  the  theory  of  genetic  process  was  at  length  accepted  as 
the  fundamental  working  hypothesis  of  all  the  sciences,  and  has 
found  its  application  in  the  broad  field  of  philosophy  and  religion 
as  well,  so  also  the  method  of  induction  has  supplanted  the  deductive 
method  in  all  these  fields.  The  impulse  to  examine  data  had  led  to 
extensive  activities  in  many  fields — as  archeology,  philology,  biology 
— before  the  general  acceptance  of  the  theory  of  evolution;  but 
when  once  this  theory  became  an  actual  working  hypothesis  of  the 
scientific  world,  investigation  in  all  these,  and  in  numerous  virgin 
fields,  was  vastly  increased,  and  the  process  was  directed  and  results 
coordinated  in  a  manner  unparalleled.  And  today  the  method  of 
observation  and  induction  holds  the  field  in  every  department  of 
science. 

The  adoption  of  a  new  method  carried  with  it  the  reorganization 
of  all  the  developed  sciences,  and  the  creation  of  sciences  before 
unheard  of.  "Geology,  embryology,  comparative  philology,  the  his- 
tory of  religion,  of  social  institutions,  of  art,  of  politics,  anthropolog- 
ical research,  sociological  generalization — these  are  the  great  new 
achievements  of  Nineteenth-Century  science."1  It  would  be  too  much 
to  claim  that  all  these  had  their  rise  from  the  impulse  given  by 
the  newly- framed  theory  of  evolution.  They  did  not ;  but  they 
received  an  extension  and  gained  a  significance  therefrom  which 
would  have  been  impossible  otherwise. 

The  application  of  the  idea  of  process  in  the  provinces  of  philoso- 
phy, psychology,  ethics,  history,  and  the  new  science  of  sociology, 
has  brought  about  results  undreamed  of  by  the  classic  formulators  of 
these  sciences.  Philosophy  today  studies  life  instead  of  proceeding 
deductively  from  a  priori  principles ;  psychology  goes  back  of  psychic 
phenomena  to  seek  the  physical  and  social  conditions  which  make 
possible  the  observed  spiritual  process ;  ethics  seeks  to  view  the  field 
of  morals  in  connection  with  developing  situations  which  gave  rise 
to  successive  standards ;  history  no  longer  devotes  itself  to  isolated 
great  men,  but  recognizes  the  sway  of  social  movements  and  seeks 
to  trace  the  powerful  undercurrents  of  the  common  life;  while 
sociology  devotes  itself  to  no  mere  gathering  of  anthropological 
data,  but,  recognizing  society's  common  responsibility,  seeks  in  his- 

1Royce,   Herbert  Spencer,   p.    41. 

30 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  31 

tory  and  environment  the  causes  of  social  need  and  distress,  and 
indications  of  social  solutions. 

We  need  do  no  more  here  than  remind  ourselves  of  theology's 
struggle  with  the  changing  world-view.  She  could  not  maintain 
herself  in  isolation,  and  little  by  little,  in  one  department  and  another, 
altered  both  her  method  and  her  content;  the  whole  trend  of  her 
progress,  in  the  latter  half  of  the  Nineteenth  Century  particularly, 
was  toward  the  exchange  of  the  method  of  authority  for  the 
method  of  free  induction  from  the  data  of  history  and  experience. 
The  common  principles  of  modern  historical  science  were  applied 
to  the  Biblical  history,  there  arose  a  more  humanitarian  interest  in 
Biblical  personages  and  situations,  followed  by  an  attempt  to  con- 
ceive the  conditions  and  social  influences  which  could  give  rise  to 
the  movements  and  controlling  concepts  of  the  Biblical  history  and 
literature.  In  other  words,  from  being  treated  as  detached  and 
divine  in  essence,  the  Biblical  literature  and  history,  with  its  great 
ideas,  personages,  and  movements,  came  to  be  thought  of  as  a  sec- 
tion of  universal  history,  to  be  understood  and  interpreted  as  such. 
To  be  sure,  this  trend  was  not  universal,  even  at  the  end  of  the 
Nineteenth  Century,  but  it  was  the  new  and  dominant  aspect  of  the 
historical  study  of  the  Biblical  literature. 

The  passing  of  the  authority  method  was  accompanied  by  the 
breakdown  of  systems  of  theology.  If  the  assumption  underlying 
systems  of  theology,  that  the  Scriptures  afford  a  content  of 
revealed  truth,  which  is  the  chief  fabric  from  which  theology 
must  shape  its  formulae,  be  set  aside,  then  the  formal  shaping  of 
such  systems  must  come  to  an  end.  Quite  in  harmony  with  this 
necessity,  those  Nineteenth  Century  types  of  theology  which  passed 
beyond  the  merely  mediating  stage  did  not  develop  fully  articulated 
systems.  This  was  true  of  the  Ritschlian  school ;  it  was  also  true 
of  those  liberal  theologians  whose  theological  position  was  deter- 
mined by  a  thorough-going  acceptance  of  philosophical  postulates. 
Upon  whatever  basis,  these  systems  sought  to  legitimate  such  ele- 
ments of  religious  faith  as  seemed  to  them  essential  to  its  perpetua- 
tion. It  is  true,  however,  that  the  numerical  majority  continued  to 
use  the  authority  method,  with  such  modifications  of  philosophical 
or  scientific  views  as  seemed  not  to  destroy  the  fundamental  postu- 
lates of  authority  religion,  introduced  in  an  entirely  subordinate 
relation.     Thus,  evolution,  after  a  sort,  found  its  way  into  many 

31 


32  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

conservative  systems,  as  did  likewise  the  philosophical  concept  of 
immanence.  Certain  results  of  the  inductive  process,  too,  were 
felt  to  have  a  place  and  value  as  corroborative  of  revealed  truth. 
At  the  same  time,  the  real  essentials  of  faith  and  experience  were 
held  to  be  a  gift  of  divine  grace  from  the  supernatural  realm. 
Whatever  concessions  in  detail  here  and  there  have  been  made,  this 
is  the  essential  position  of  Conservative  Orthodoxy;  and  when  it 
recedes  from  this  position  it  ceases  to  be  Conservative  Orthodoxy. 
It  cannot  be  otherwise,  for  Conservative  Orthodoxy  proceeds  from 
the  assumption  of  a  final  content  of  truth  revealed  in  the  Scriptures 
and  interpreted  by  the  great  ecumenical  creeds. 

Modern  Positivism  has  scarcely  passed  beyond  the  mere  busi- 
ness of  mediation.  Though  feeling  very  strongly  the  pull  of  the 
modern  scientific  world-view,  the  Modern  Positive  is  an  absolutist 
and  an  authoritarian  at  heart.  Not  the  Bible  but  "the  Gospel"  is  his 
final  norm.  The  Ritschlian  endeavors  to  keep  his  scientific  truth 
and  his  religious  experience  in  two  sealed  compartments,  each  with 
a  validity  norm  of  its  own,  and  each  quite  independent  of  the  other. 
If  Christianity  were  a  system  of  truths,  it  would  have  to  be  related 
to  the  truths  of  science,  but  being  fundamentally  an  experience, 
it  is  under  no  such  imperative;  neither  science  nor  philosophy  can 
predetermine  it,  only  a  fact  of  history  can  do  so. 

The  rise  of  a  science  of  Comparative  Religion,  which  seeks  in 
the  religious  ideas,  customs,  and  experiences  of  humanity  a  basis 
for  its  generalizations,  indicates  a  cutting  loose  from  the  authority 
method  and  the  thorough-going  application  of  the  method  of  induc- 
tion. Should  this  become  general,  should  expounders  of  the  Chris- 
tian faith,  rejecting  a  static  authority  basis,  seek  to  ground  faith 
and  to  satisfy  religious  needs  by  a  broad  induction  from  the  field 
of  religious  history,  it  is  manifest  that  a  restatement  of  every  doc- 
trine vital  to  such  a  life  would  be  demanded,  and  that  the  passing 
of  elements  not  thus  vital  would  be  involved.  Liberal  Protestant 
theology  has  already  taken  that  step. 

The  doctrine  of  personal  religious  assurance  has,  as  we  shall 
see,  been  seriously  affected  by  the  movements  of  thought  of  the 
Nineteenth  Century.  Conservative  Orthodoxy  still  grounds  it  super- 
naturally  upon  the  whole  series  of  Divine  interpositions  in  human 
history  and  experience.  Ritschlianism  grounds  it  in  the  person 
of  Jesus,  a  historical  fact,  which— mediated  through  the  Christian 

32 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  33 

community — becomes  the  basis  of  individual  experience  of  the 
gracious  God.  Modern  Positivism  grounds  it  in  the  Gospel  of  the 
Son  of  God,  an  experience  of  whom  carries  with  it  the  validation 
of  a  certain  content  of  truth,  as  well  as  assurance  of  personal  sal- 
vation. The  school  of  Comparative  Religions  necessarily  has 
no  evangelical  doctrine  of  assurance;  yet  it  has  a  basis  of  confi- 
dence in  the  a  priori  of  reason  and  the  a  posteriori  of  experience.  It 
makes  a  thorough-going  application  to  religion  of  the  fundamental 
scientific  hypothesis  of  continuous  progressive  change;  and  yet 
it  reads  this  continuous  progressive  change  as  the  operation  of  an 
infinite  and  absolute  God.  A  yet  further  step  is  to  abandon  all  ab- 
solutism and  ground  confidence  in  the  method  of  experimentation. 
Some  are  taking  this  step. 


33 


34  THE  BASIS   OF  ASSURANCE  IN 


II.    PRESENT-DAY  PROTESTANT  TYPES. 

The  four  general  types  of  theology  to  be  considered  in  the  pres- 
ent survey  are  the  Conservative  Orthodox,  Ritschlian,  Modern 
Positive,  and  Religionsgeschichtliche.  Conservative  Orthodoxy  is 
clearly  a  survival  of  the  dogmatic  outcome  of  the  Protestant  Ref- 
ormation. It  represents  the  same  general  world-view  and  the  same 
theological  method  that  produced  Protestant  scholasticism.  At  the 
same  time,  it  has  faithfully  conserved  the  chief  religious  values 
achieved  by  the  Protestant  Reformation  as  a  whole.  Ritschlianism 
was  born  of  the  Protestant  line,  and  can  show  many  actual  affinities 
for  the  religious  faith  of  Martin  Luther,  but  it  is  very  far  removed 
from  scholastic  Protestantism,  and  from  the  whole  rationalistic,  sys- 
tem-making tendency.  It  was  born  of  a  Nineteenth  Century  situa- 
tion characterized  by  a  somewhat  rigid  view  of  science  and  a  me- 
chanical view  of  the  universe,  over  against  which  it  sought  a  firm 
basis  for  faith  by  positing  a  realm  of  religion  which  it  is  no  part 
of  the  province  of  science  to  enter,  and  whose  judgments  of  value 
are  of  equal  validity  with  scientific  determinations  in  the  physical 
realm.  A  sufficient  norm  of  judgment  is  found  in  the  historical 
Jesus  meditated  by  the  Christian  community.  Modern  Positivism 
is  the  fruit  of  a  meditating  and  conserving  impulse.  It  had  its  rise 
with  a  group  of  men  who  are  interested  in  a  body  of  positive 
Christian  truth,  and  who  at  the  same  time  have  been  more  or  less 
influenced  by  the  Ritschlian  plea  for  the  historical  and  by  the  claims 
of  the  modern  scientific  world- view.  The  Religionsgeschichtliche 
school  developed  under  the  direct  influence  of  the  Ritschlian  group, 
and  has  a  kindred  interest  in  the  historical — rather,  it  has  a  more 
profound  interest  in  the  historical,  being  convinced  that  a  scientific 
study  of  religions  will  yield  data  which  can  be  used  constructively 
for  the  guidance  of  the  religious  life  of  today,  while  at  the  same 
time  the  particular  forms  of  religion,  and  the  influence  and  memory 
of  religious  personages  pass  with  the  lapse  of  time. 
A.    General  Survey  of  Representative  Systems. 

1.  Conservative  Orthodoxy:    James  Orr  and  B.  B.  Warfield. 

An  extended  statement  of  the  positions  of  Conservative  Ortho- 
doxy need  not  be  presented  here ;  the  general  outline  of  this  system 

34 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  35 

is  quite  familiar.  Yet  a  brief  review  of  the  main  features  of  this 
type  of  theology  will  afford  us,  when  taken  in  relation  to  the  other 
theological  systems  to  be  reviewed,  the  necessary  perspective  for 
our  study  of  the  basis  of  assurance.  Such  an  outline  James  Orr 
affords  us  in  his  Christian  View  of  God  and  the  World,  p.  37  f., 
from  which  the  following  section  is  condensed: 

(The  Christian  view)  is  a  system  of  theism;  affirms  the  creation  of  the 
world  by  God,  his  immanent  presence  in  it,  his  transcendence  over  it ;  the  cre- 
ation of  man  in  the  divine  image;  the  fact  of  sin  and  disorder  in  the  world, 
due  to  the  voluntary  turning  aside  of  man  from  his  allegiance  to  God — a  Fall 
in  other  words ;  affirms  the  self-revelation  of  God  to  the  patriarchs,  to  Israel, 
of  a  gracious  purpose  of  salvation  in  Jesus  Christ,  his  Son ;  that  Jesus  Christ 
is  the  eternal  Son  of  God,  to  be  honored,  worshiped,  trusted,  even  as  God  is; 
that  the  Incarnation  reveals  the  nature  of  God  as  triune,  the  activity  of 
Christ  in  creation,  the  potential  nature  of  man,  the  purpose  of  creation  and 
redemption ;  affirms  the  redemption  of  the  world  through  the  Atonement, 
availing  for  all  who  do  not  reject  its  grace;  the  historical  aim  of  Christ's 
work  as  the  founding  of  the  Kingdom  of  God ;  that  the  present  order  will  be 
terminated  by  the  appearance  of  the  Son  of  Man  for  judgment. 

Professor  Orr's  work  in  the  field  of  Dogmatics  has  been  in  the 
exposition  and  defense  of  this  scheme.  The  very  topics  upon  which 
he  has  written  are  suggestive  of  the  field  of  his  interest.  The  Chris- 
tian View  of  God  and  the  World,  God's  Image  in  Man  and  Its  De- 
facement in  the  Light  of  Modern  Denials,  The  Bible  Under  Trial, 
The  Virgin  Birth  of  Christ,  The  Resurrection  of  Jesus,  Revelation 
and  Inspiration.  There  are  at  least  four  cardinal  points  in  the  gen- 
eral scheme  of  his  theology:  the  Fall,  Revelation,  Incarnation, 
Atonement;  all  the  minor  details  of  the  system  are  involved  in 
these. 

His  work  on  Revelation  and  Inspiration  enters  the  field  of  this 
study  more  directly.  Here  the  position  is  taken  that  any  tenable 
Theism  must  complete  itself  in  a  doctrine  of  special  revelation 
(p.  51).  Prophecy  and  miracle  were  common  forms  of  revelation. 
But  Jesus  Christ  is  the  supreme  revealer  and  the  supreme  miracle 
(p.  131).  He  assumed  a  true  humanity,  was  limited  but  did  not 
err;  yet  his  subliminal  consciousness  was  Godhead  itself  (p.  151). 
The  Scriptures,  as  the  record  of  the  whole  divinely-guided  history 
of  Israel  and  the  apostolic  action  in  the  founding  of  the  Church, 
are  revelation — God's  complete  word  for  us  (p.  150).  This  record 
is  sufficient  to  bring  us,  faithfully  and  purely,  the  complete  will 
of  God  for  our  salvation  and  guidance  (p.  175).    The  Bible  is  free 

35 


36  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

from  demonstrable  error  in  its  statements  to  a  degree  that  of  itself 
creates  an  irresistible  impression  of  a  supernatural  factor  in  its 
origin  (p.  216).  Only  upon  the  basis  of  such  a  revelation  can  man 
intelligently  cooperate  with  God  in  his  redemptive  purpose  (p.  52). 

Professor  Warfield's  theological  system  is  practically  identical 
with  that  of  Dr.  Orr;  but  his  somewhat  different  emphasis  reveals 
another  interest  which  they  have  in  common,  viz.,  the  development 
of  the  doctrinal  system  of  Christianity,  which  they  consider  as  all 
the  while  implicit  in  the  revealed  Word  of  God.  Prof.  Warfield 
says: 

The  development  of  the  doctrinal  system  of  Christianity  in  the  apprehen- 
sion of  the  Church  has  actually  run  through  a  regular  and  logical  course. 
First,  attention  was  absorbed  in  the  contemplation  of  the  objective  elements 
of  the  Christian  deposit,  and  only  afterward  were  the  subjective  elements 
taken  into  fuller  consideration  (the  doctrine  of  God  issuing  in  the  Trinity ; 
the  God-Man;  Sin;  the  Work  of  Christ;  the  Holy  Spirit).  This  is  the  logical 
order  of.  development,  and  this  is  the  actual  order  in  which  the  Church  has 
slowly  and  amid  the  throes  of  all  sorts  of  conflicts  .  .  worked  its  way  into 
the  whole  truth  revealed  to  it  in  the  Word.  The  order  is  .  .  .  :  Theology, 
Christology,  Anthropology  (Hamartology),  Impetration  of  Redemption,  Ap- 
plication of  Redemption.1 

Dr.  Warfield  insists  that  Christianity  is  built  upon  facts  which 
are  doctrines ;  that  Christianity  therefore  is  constituted  not  by  the 
facts,  but  by  the  dogmas,  i.  e.,  by  a  specific  interpretation  of  the 
facts.2  To  be  indifferent  to  doctrine  is  to  be  indifferent  to  Christian- 
ity itself.  In  his  Introduction  to  Professor  Warfield's  Right  of 
Systematic  Theology  Dr.  Orr  expresses  his  hearty  agreement  with 
this  view : 

if  what  men  have  is  at  best  vague  yearnings,  intuitions,  aspirations, 

guesses,  imaginings,  hypotheses,  about  God,  assuming  that  this  name  itself 
can  be  anything  more  than  a  symbol  of  the  dim  feeling  of  mystery  at  the 
root  of  the  universe, — if  these  emotional  states  and  the  conceptions  to  which 
they  give  rise  are  ever  changing  with  men's  changeful  fancies  and  the  vary- 
ing stages  of  culture, — then  it  is  as  vain  to  attempt  to  construct  a  science  of 
theology  out  of  such  materials  as  it  would  be  to  weave  a  solid  tissue  out  of 
sunbeams,  or  to  erect  a  temple  out  of  the  changing  shapes  and  hues  of 
cloudland.5 

In  this  view  certainty  is  grounded  upon  revelation,  and  not  upon 
revelation  in  experience  chiefly,  but  upon  authoritatively  attested 
external  revelation  which  conveys  to  us  a  body  of  truths  about  God, 

introduction  to  "The  Work  of  the  Holy  Spirit,"  Abraham  Kuyper,  E.  Tr.,  New  York, 
1900,  pp.  xxv,  xxvi. 

2The  Right  of  Systematic  Theology,  pp.   34,   38. 
3Ut  supra,  p.   9. 

36 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  37 

an  authoritative  interpretation  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  a  theological 
scheme  apart  from  which  his  life  and  death  could  not  have  their 
wonted  significance  for  our  faith.  We  are,  first  of  all,  certain 
of  the  truth;  and  that  is  of  greater  urgency,  even,  than  personal 
assurance  of  the  divine  favor;  and,  in  any  event,  it  is  prerequisite 
thereto.  Personal  assurance  rests  ultimately  upon  this  basis  of  ob- 
jective revelation,  but  is  mediated  through  the  psychological  miracle 
of  regeneration  and  the  subsequent  ministry  of  the  Holy  Spirit. 

2.    Ritschlianism :    Herrmann,  Kaftan,  and  Harnack. 

The  most  influential  Ritschlian  of  today  is  doubtless  Professor 
Herrmann,  from  whose  volume  Communion  with  God  the  follow- 
ing is  condensed : 

The  Christian  has  a  positive  revelation  of  God  in  the  person  of  Jesus  (p. 
34).  Our  confidence  in  God  needs  no  other  support.  We  are  Christians 
because  in  the  human  Jesus  we  have  met  with  a  fact  which  makes  us  so  cer- 
tain of  God  that  our  conviction  of  being  in  communion  with  him  can  justify 
itself  at  the  bar  of  reason  and  of  conscience  (p.  36).  We  see  ourselves  com- 
pelled to  recognize  the  spiritual  power  of  Jesus  as  the  only  thing  in  the  world 
to  which  we  surrender  in  utter  reverence  and  trust  (p.  82).  In  this  experi- 
ence we  lay  hold  of  Jesus  himself  as  the  ground  of  our  salvation.  Jesus 
differs  from  all  who  follow  him  by  his  conscious  rising  to  his  own  ideal 
(p.  92),  and  he  knows  no  more  sacred  task  than  to  point  men  to  his  own  ideal 
person  (p.  93).  In  our  confidence  in  the  person  and  cause  of  Jesus  is  implied 
the  idea  of  a  Power  greater  than  all  things,  which  will  see  to  it  that  Jesus, 
who  lost  his  life  in  this  world,  shall  be  none  the  less  victorious  over  the  world. 
The  thought  of  such  a  Power  lays  hold  upon  us  as  firmly  as  did  the  impres- 
sion of  the  person  of  Jesus  by  which  we  were  overwhelmed  (p.  97).  It  is  the 
beginning  of  the  consciousness  within  us  that  there  is  the  living  God  (p.  98). 
Through  the  strength  of  Jesus  the  Christian  is  made  to  acknowledge  the  reality 
of  an  Omnipotence  which  gives  this  Man  victory,  and  from  the  friendship  of 
Jesus  for  the  sinners  whom  he  humbles,  he  gathers  courage  to  believe  that  all 
these  things  mean  God's  love  seeking  him  out,  poor  sinner  that  he  is  (p.  115). 
We  know  that  in  Christ  we  meet  with  God,  and  we  know  what  sort  of  meeting- 
it  is ;  we  know  that  this  God  gives  us  comfort  and  courage  to  meet  the  world, 
joy  in  facing  the  demands  of  duty,  and,  with  all  this,  eternal  life  in  our  hearts 
(p.  173). 

Certainty  can  never  arise  from  an  equipment  of  supernatural  power,  which 
equipment  is,  moreover,  entirely  concealed,  but,  on  the  contrary,  it  does  arise 
from  the  vision  of  a  fact,  when  the  understanding  of  that  fact  is  accompanied 
by  a  complete  change  of  the  inner  life,  a  rearrangement  of  our  conscious  rela- 
tion towards  God  (p.  175).  Every  devout  man  knows  that  he  cannot  bring 
about  communion  with  God,  but  that  God  does  it  for  him.  This  act  of  God 
is  the  revelation  on  which  the  reality  of  all  religion  rests  (p.  199).  Thus  of 
the  Christ  that  tradition  hands  down  to  us  we  can  say,  "In  thy  light  do  we  see 

37 


38  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

light"  (p.  283).  This  is  the  only  presence  of  Christ  and  of  God  which  we  can 
experience,  and  we  desire  no  other  (p.  284).  Through  the  heartfelt  desire  for 
God  that  is  kindled  by  his  revelation,  the  Christian  is  driven  to  commune  with 
the  world  in  work  and  in  the  service  of  his  fellows  (p.  321). 

When  a  man  puts  clearly  before  him  what  Christ  means  for  him,  namely, 
the  God  who  turns  toward  him  and  fills  him  with  a  new  mind  for  life,  then 
at  the  same  moment  he  makes  it  plain  to  himself  that  he  has  become  a  new 
creature,  full  of  that  strength  that  flows  from  the  one  great  fact  that  God 
has  revealed  himself  to  us  in  the  flesh  (p.  346).  This  remains  for  him  a 
miracle  which  lies  beyond  all  experience,  inasmuch  as  he  never  exhausts  its 
meaning  in  any  moment  of  conscious  experience  (p.  346).  Two  different 
powers  combine  to  bring  about  the  certainty  of  faith ;  one,  the  impression 
made  upon  us  by  a  historical  personage  and  fact  which  comes  to  us  in  time; 
and  the  other,  the  moral  law  whose  eternal  truth  we  learn  to  know  at  once 
when  we  are  aware  of  that  law.  Religious  faith  in  general  arises  when  a 
man  runs  against  an  undeniable  fact  which  compels  him  by  force  of  what 
lies  in  it  to  recognize  that  in  it  God  is  touching  his  life  (p.  355). 

All  Herrmann's  theological  views  are  in  harmony  with  the 
positions  indicated  above.  The  conventional  terminology  which  he 
uses  is  given  a  new  content.  He  feels  that  the  positive  theologians, 
against  whom  he  particularly  inveighs,  have  not  acknowledged  nor 
even  felt  "the  spiritual  requirements  which  science  creates."  He 
himself  feels  them  so  keenly  that  he  seeks  a  way  of  escape  by 
positing  religion  as  a  thought  that  science  cannot  ground,  but  which 
itself  grounds  the  inner  life  of  each  individual.  Science  must 
recognize  in  religion  another  way  of  comprehending  and  ordering 
reality,  standing  alongside  itself.  And  in  turn  religion  must  give 
like  place  to  science  as  yielding  demonstrable  knowledge,  the  two 
together  forming  the  interrelated  yet  profoundly  distinct  forms  of 
our  existence,  the  revelations  to  us  of  a  hidden  whole.1 

Our  need  for  the  revelation  which  we  have  in  the  historical  Jesus 
arises  from  the  conflict  of  all  the  forces  of  our  existence  with  the 
good.  To  meet  our  need,  God  touches  us  in  a  historical  fact,  through 
the  intrinsic  qualities  and  immediate  effects  of  which  we  are  assured 
of  its  Divine  source ;  we  no  longer  have  need  of  miracles ;  the  deity 
of  Christ  is  not  a  term  to  be  contended  for,  it  can  mean  at  most 
only  that  in  the  human  life  of  Jesus  God  turns  to  sinners  and  opens 
his  heart  to  them;  "redemption"  is  fulfilled  by  Jesus  in  the  revela- 
tion which  he  affords  of  the  blessedness  of  the  man  who  is  in 
fellowship  with  God ;  but  in  order  to  make  such  a  revelation,  he  had 

^Zeitschr.  f.  T.  u.  K.  Vol.  17  (1907),  p.  197  f . ;  Lage  und  Aufgabe  der  evangelischen 
Dogmatik. 

38 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  39 

to  be  perfected  through  suffering,  and  in  that  sense  he  won  redemp- 
tion by  his  vicarious  suffering. 

In  this  scheme  the  starting-point  is  sin;  redemption  is  by  revela- 
tion, in  a  unique  human  life  so  indwelt  and  motivated  as  to  thought 
one  with  God;  this  unity,  however,  is  not  one  of  substance,  nor 
can  it  be  described  by  any  conventional  terms  referring  to  divine 
and  human  nature.  The  experience  of  this  revelation  gives  us  power 
and  impulse  to  will  the  right,  an  activity  which  is  the  counterpart 
of  our  life  of  faith  and  dependence  upon  God.  Doctrines  are  not 
antecedent  to  faith,  but  are  its  product ;  it  is  not  they  which  perpetu- 
ate Christianity,  but  the  community  of  experience  arising  from  con- 
tact with  the  historical  Jesus,  who  affords  a  vision  of  God. 

The  twofold  basis  of  certainty  in  this  view  is  that  the  demands  of 
the  moral  nature  yield  as  postulate  a  God  through  whom  the  moral 
spirit  reaches  freedom  and  autonomy,  and  that  this  postulate  of 
the  practical  reason  is  confirmed  by  the  experience  which  one  has 
when  he  meets  the  historical  Jesus,  the  rise  of  a  conviction  within 
him  that  in  Jesus  God  is  seeking  to  commune  with  him. 

In  his  more  philosophical  treatise  The  Truth  of  the  Christian  Re- 
ligion Julius  Kaftan  concludes  that  it  is  impossible  by  means  of 
common  knowledge  or  positive  science  to  attain  to  an  apprehension 
of  the  First  Cause  and  Final  Purpose  of  all  things.  Only  an  ideal- 
istic philosophy  can  give  us  the  highest  knowledge.1  Our  method 
must  start  with  the  primacy  of  the  will  in  our  self-consciousness 
and  of  the  practical  reason  in  our  philosophical  speculation 
(p.  302).  Only  an  idea  of  the  chief  good  can  serve  as  the 
principle  of  a  philosophy  based  on  practice  (p.  222).  And 
only  the  idea  of  the  Kingdom  of  God  as  the  chief  good  of 
humanity  answers  all  the  demands  of  truth,  rationality  and 
validity  upon  such  an  idea  (p.  325)  ;  for  the  chief  good  must  secure 
perfect  and  unconditional  satisfaction  for  the  human  soul  (p.  328). 
As  the  idea  of  the  highest  good,  the  Kingdom  of  God  is  a  postulate 
of  reason;  Kant's  distinction  between  the  theoretical  and  practical 
reason  is  here  intentionally  dropped,  for  all  reason  is  practical  in  one 
aspect  of  it  (p.  381).  Kant  does  not  go  beyond  the  postulate  as 
such;  if  we  are  not  to  end  there,  the  eternal  Kingdom  of  God  must 
have  been  proclaimed  in  the  world,  in  history,  by  a  Divine  revela- 
tion (p.  381  f).     That  inner  experience  by  which  the  fact  of  the 

JCf.   p.  422  f. 

39 


40  THE  BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

Kingdom  of  God  becomes  certainty  to  the  individual  is  possible 
only  in  relation  to  revelation  (p.  385).  Thus  reason  and  revela- 
tion meet  in  the  chief  good  (p.  386),  yet  only  where  the  subjective 
need  lays  hold  of  revelation  as  objectively  given  and  self-announcing 
is  certainty  attained  (p.  387).  This  revelation  objectively  given  is 
Jesus  Christ.  Jesus  is  a  historical  person,  that  history  of  which  he 
was  center  is  an  inseparable  unity  of  word  and  deed,  of  teaching 
and  life,  and  that  history  is  God's  revelation  to  us.  The  revelation 
does  not  lie  in  a  teaching  concerning  the  life  and  deeds,  the  death 
and  resurrection  of  Jesus,  but  just  in  these  things  themselves.1 

The  Scriptures  are  sources  of  the  divine  revelation,  but  Jesus  is 
in  the  highest  sense  that  revelation  itself.  Hence  we  ask  what  he 
announced  as  life's  highest  good.  From  the  New  Testament  we  learn 
that  it  was  the  Kingdom  of  God.  This  is  essentially  what  every 
religion  proclaims  as  the  chief  fact.  The  Kingdom  of  God  is,  there- 
fore, our  highest  good  and  our  supreme  ideal,  both  in  one. 

The  uniqueness  of  Christianity  lies  in  the  fact  that  while  it  re- 
mains most  closely  united  with  its  historical  origin,  it  is  yet  uni- 
versal as  no  other  religion  is.  Though  based  upon  the  revelation  of 
the  highest  good  revealed  by  the  historical  Jesus,  yet  it  reckons  only 
upon  what  is  universal  among  mankind — the  religious  need  and 
the  ethical  tendency  of  man.2 

Over  against  the  highest  good  is  the  fact  of  human  sin;  man  is 
by  nature  unfree  and  under  the  rule  of  sin.  Sin  is  defined  as  "alles 
menschliche  Wollen  und  Handeln,  welches  in  tatsachlichem  Wider- 
spruch  mit  dem  gottlichen  Willen  stent."8  In  the  Christian  religion  it 
is  made  clear  that  the  natural  life  of  man  is  sin  and  wretchedness.  We 
become  aware  of  the  divine  anger.  At  the  same  time,  God  is  re- 
vealed to  us  in  Christ  as  willing  our  salvation,  and  calling  us,  in 
spite  of  our  guilt,  into  his  Kingdom.  We  are  Christians  when  we 
receive  in  faith  the  offered  justification,  and,  as  partakers  in  the 
reconciliation,  win  the  eternal  life  in  participation  in  the  transfigured 
life  of  the  risen  Lord.4 

Thus  Kaftan  makes  a  use  of  the  risen  Christ  which  Herrmann 
declines.  He  also  makes  a  place  for  the  mystical  element  of 
Christianity,  which  Herrmann  declines  to  do.5     The  apologetic  start- 

1Wesen  der  christlichen  Religion,  p.   340  f. 

2Ut  supra,  p.   269. 

8Ut  supra,  p.  295. 

*Ut  supra,  p.  317. 

BGarvie,  The  Ritschlian  Theology,  p.   158. 

40 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  41 

ing-point  of  Herrmann  is  the  human  consciousness  of  the  uncondi- 
tioned moral  law ;  while  with  Kaftan  it  is  the  "supermundane  King- 
dom of  God,"  or  the  highest  good,  as  a  postulate  of  reason.1 

According  to  Kaftan,  the  work  of  the  Holy  Spirit  takes  place 
in  the  inner  life  of  the  human  spirit.  Here  the  Spirit  of  God  lays 
hold  of  man,  and  under  this  influence  he  first  appreciates  what  the 
revelation  of  God  in  Christ  really  signifies;  consequently  this  work 
of  the  Holy  Spirit  is  to  be  understood  as  the  continuation  of  the 
revelation,  and  as  in  a  certain  sense  its  fulfillment.2 

Der  Geist  Gottes,  welcher  da  erleuchtet,  ist  der  Geist  des  Herrn,  und  die 
Erleuchtung  selbst  ist  ihrem  Inhalt  nach  nichts  anderes  als  die  heilsame 
Erkenntnis  Jesu  Christi,  d.  h.  nicht  eines  Princips,  das  er  in  die  Welt 
gebracht,  sondern  seiner  geschichtlichen  Person.31 

No  man  can  have  the  enlightenment  of  the  Holy  Spirit  independ- 
ently of  the  knowledge  of  Jesus  Christ;  this  knowledge  is  primary, 
for  otherwise  Christ  would  not  be  the  perfect  revelation  of  God, 
but  would  be  superseded  by  the  Holy  Spirit. 

Like  Herrmann,  Kaftan  holds  that  faith  has  a  province  of  its 
own.  "Der  Glaube  ist  selbst  ein  Erkennen,  das  sich  auf  das  Ganze 
der  uns  gegebenen  Wirklichkeit  richtet . .  ." 

Das  der  Glaube  seine  Logik  fur  sich  habe,  auf  den  ihn  beherrschenden  Ideen 
begriindet,  heiszt,  dasz  er  im  Erkennen  anderen  Gesetzen  folgt  als  die  theoret- 
ische  Welterklarung  der  Wissenschaft.4 

While  Kaftan  uses  more  of  the  conventional  terms,  or  makes  an 
effort  to  give  these  terms  a  more  conventional  content  than  Herr- 
mann does,  his  view  is  not  fundamentally  different  in  its  main  out- 
lines. While  the  rational  at  one  end  of  the  line  and  the  mystical 
at  the  other  receive  more  emphasis  than  with  Herrmann,  certainty 
is  grounded  preeminently  in  the  revelation  of  God  in  history  in  the 
person  of  Jesus,  a  revelation  which  takes  up  the  thought  supplied 
by  natural  reason — the  idea  of  the  highest  good — and  confirms  and 
gives  content  to  it. 

Harnack  manifests  the  same  insistence  upon  the  historical  Jesus 
which  we  find  in  Herrmann  and  Kaftan.  The  New  Testament 
phenomena  are  such  that  Jesus  must  be  honored  as  a  unique  per- 

iOrr,   Ritschlianism,   p.    198. 

2Wesen   der  christlichen  Religion,   p.   345. 

sUt  supra,  p.  347. 

*Zur  Dogmatik,  p.  51. 

41 


42  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

sonality.1  He  believes  that  since  the  days  of  Strauss  historical  criti- 
cism has  succeeded  in  restoring  the  credibility  of  the  portrait  of  Jesus 
in  its  main  outlines.  The  Gospels  afford  us  a  plain  picture  of  the  main 
features  and  application  of  Jesus'  teaching;  they  tell  us  how  his 
life  issued  in  the  service  of  his  vocation;  and  they  report  the  im- 
pression which  he  made  upon  his  disciples  and  which  they  trans- 
mitted.2 There  were  three  moments  in  the  message  of  Jesus,  as 
Harnack  interprets  it,  viz.:  (1)  The  Kingdom  of  God  and  its 
Coming,  (2)  God  the  Father  and  the  infinite  value  of  the  human 
soul,  (3)  The  higher  righteousness  and  the  commandment  of  love.8 
The  Kingdom  of  God,  as  Harnack  understands  it,  is 

Firstly,  .  .  .  something  supernatural,  a  gift  from  above,  not  a  product 
of  ordinary  life.  Secondly,  it  is  a  purely  religious  blessing,  the  inner  link 
with  the  living  God;  thirdly,  it  is  the  most  important  experience  a  man  can 
have,  that  on  which  everything  else  depends ;  it  permeates  and  dominates  his 
whole  existence,  because  sin  is  forgiven  and  misery  banished.4 

The  Fatherhood  of  God  carries  with  it  the  infinite  value  of  the 
human  soul.  The  Gospel  is  the  Fatherhood  of  God  "applied  to  the 
whole  of  life;  (it  is)  and  inner  union  with  God's  will  and  God's 
kingdom,  and  a  joyous  certainty  of  the  possession  of  earthly  bless- 
ings and  protection  from  evil."5  The  higher  righteousness  causes 
love  and  mercy  to  displace  empty  ritual  acts,  makes  the  crux  of 
morality  to  lie  in  disposition  and  intention,  reduces  morality  to  one 
principle — love,  and  frees  morals  from  all  alien  connections,  while 
revealing  religion  as  its  soul.6 

Thus  the  Gospel  is  not  in  all  respects  identical  with  its  earliest 
form,  but  that  earliest  form  contained  something  which,  under  dif- 
ferent historical  forms,  is  of  permanent  validity.7  The  Gospel  as 
Jesus  preached  it  had  to  do  with  the  Son,  and  not  with  the  Father 
only.  He  is  the  way  to  the  Father,  appointed  by  the  Father,  and 
thus  he  is  the  Judge  of  all.  He  was,  and  is  still  felt  to  be,  the  per- 
sonal realization  and  strength  of  the  Gospel.8 

The  Gospel  is  no  system  of  theoretical  doctrines  of  universal 
philosophy ;  it  is  doctrine  only  in  so  far  "as  it  proclaims  the  reality 

1Harnack,   Christianity  and  History,   pp.   37-38. 

2  What  is   Christianity,  p.   31. 

3Ut  supra,  p.  51. 

4Ut  supra,  p.   62. 

BUt   supra,   p.   65. 

•Ut  supra,  pp.   71,  72. 

7Ut  supra,  p.  13  f. 

8Ut  supra,  pp.   130,   144,   145. 

42 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  43 

of  God  the  Father.  It  is  a  glad  message  assuring  us  of  the  life 
eternal,"  teaching  us  how  to  lead  our  lives  aright.  The  Protestant 
Reformation  went  far  toward  the  restoration  of  this  Gospel.  It 
was  a  "critical  reduction  to  principle,"  releasing  religion  from  "the 
vast  and  monstrous  fabric  which  had  been  previously  called  by  its 
name,"  and  reducing  it  to  its  essential  factors — the  Word  of  God 
and  faith.1 

In  the  sense  in  which  Luther  took  them,  both  can  be  embraced  in  one 
phrase :  the  confident  belief  in  a  God  of  grace.  They  put  an  end — such  was 
his  own  inner  experience,  and  such  was  what  he  taught — to  all  inner  discord 
in  a  man ;  they  overcome  the  burden  of  every  ill ;  they  destroy  the  sense  of 
guilt;  and,  despite  the  imperfection  of  a  man's  acts,  they  give  him  the  cer- 
tainty of  being  inseparably  united  with  the  holy  God.2 

The  tendency  to  turn  aside  from  the  validating  of  objective  doc- 
trine to  the  development  of  the  implications  of  Christian  experience 
goes  back  to  Schleiermacher.  The  rapidly  developing  historical 
disciplines  virtually  denied  the  scientific  character  of  dogmatics. 
With  Schleiermacher  the  historical  disciplines  were  given  entire  free- 
dom and  their  negative  issue  disregarded,  since  it  was  held  that 
religious  knowledge  goes  back  to  experience.  This  position  toward 
science  was  assumed  by  Ritschl ;  but  he  avoided  the  pitfall  of  mere 
subjectivism  by  emphasizing  the  objective  revelation  in  Jesus  Christ. 

Ritschlianism  found  no  way  to  reconcile  the  demands  of  thought 
with  the  convictions  of  the  Christian  community  other  than  the 
postulation  of  a  distinct  sundering  of  the  province  of  religion  from 
that  of  philosophy.  It  set  forth  a  reasonable,  practical,  manly 
Christianity  as  over  against  a  weakly  Pietism.  The  positive  elements 
of  Christianity  which  Ritschl  sought  to  ground,  especially  his 
grounding  of  theology  upon  the  relation  of  God  in  Christ,  have  ex- 
ercised a  profound  and  widespread  influence  upon  religious  thought.8' 

It  is  a  common  feature  of  the  Ritschlian  theology  that  it  believes 
itself  to  have  discovered  a  way  to  certainty  which  exactly  meets 
the  twofold  demand  for  moral  and  intellectual  autonomy,  and  which, 
at  the  same  time,  avoids  the  pitfalls  of  a  dogmatic  supernaturalism. 
Jesus  as  a  historical  figure  has  unique  and  God-revealing  signifi- 
cance for  us.  And  this  meaning  is  not  to  be  pressed  back  upon  de- 
tails dependent  upon  the  more  or  less  uncertain  results  of  criticism. 

Wt  supra,  p.  269. 
2Ut  supra,  p.  271. 
*Cf.    Wendland,    Ritschl    und   seine    Schuler,    p.    133    f. 

43 


44  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

The  Christ  of  community  tradition,  the  main  outlines  of  whose  por- 
trait are  historically  certain,  suffices.  That  figure  overcomes  us, 
masters  us,  brings  us  assurance  of  the  highest  good,  proclaims  to 
us  a  gospel  of  grace,  indeed.  But  he  is  himself  the  revelation,  with- 
out which  what  he  said  would  have  no  weight  of  revelation;  and 
the  impress  of  his  personality,  mediated  to  us  through  the  Christian 
tradition,  through  the  community  life,  brings  us  a  sense  of  the 
gracious  God,  his  Father,  and  affords  us  moral  strength  to  will  and 
to  do  the  Divine  will  in  the  common  walk  of  life.  There  again  we 
meet  the  gracious  God,  whose  will  our  daily  lives  thus  bring  to 
realization. 

Ritschlianism  refuses  to  put  its  faith  in  revelation  into  conven- 
tional formulae,  and  will  not  at  all  define  the  uniqueness  of  Jesus 
by  means  of  the  old  categories.  Its  rock  of  certainty  is,  neverthe- 
less, the  supernatural  revealing  activity  of  God. 

3.  Modern  Positivism:    Forsyth,   Seeberg,   Beth. 

Logically  Modern  Positivism  stands  much  closer  to  Conservative 
Orthodoxy  than  Ritschlianism  does,  but  chronologically  Ritschlian- 
ism anticipates  it.  Like  Conservative  Orthodoxy,  Modern  Positivism 
is  convinced  that  revelation  guarantees  certain  cardinal  truths,  that 
Christianity  is  not  a  series  of  facts  or  a  single  supreme  event  in 
the  midst  of  history,  but  that  it  is  supremely  a  certain  way  of  under- 
standing the  facts. 

Of  the  three  representatives  of  the  Modern  Positive  group  with 
whom  this  study  concerns  itself,  Forsyth  approaches  most  nearly 
the  scope  and  emphasis  of  Conservative  Orthodoxy.  In  his  Positive 
Preaching  and  the  Modern  Mind  he  expresses  himself  as  wishing 
to  be  understood  as  a  Modern  Positive  theologian.  He  defines  this 
type  of  theology  thus : 

(It  is)  a  theology  which  begins  with  God's  gift  of  a  superlogical  revelation 
in  Christ's  historic  person  and  cross,  whose  object  was  not  to  adjust  a  con- 
tradiction, but  to  resolve  a  crisis  and  save  a  situation  of  the  human  soul 
(p.  210). 

Dr.  Forsyth  makes  a  number  of  concessions  to  the  demands  of 
science  and  modern  thought.  The  Gospel  is  distinguished  from  the 
Bible  as  having  created  the  Bible  (p.  15)  ;  verbal  inspiration  is  hope- 
lessly gone  (p.  165)  ;  a  fixed  and  final  system  of  theology  is  ad- 
mitted to  be  inconsistent  with  the  genius  of  the  Gospel  (p.  208)  ;  we 

44 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  45 

are  counselled  to  distinguish  between  theoretical  and  practical 
knowledge  and  to  fall  in  with  the  stress  upon  the  latter  which  is 
characteristic  of  our  times  (p.  204)  ;  demand  as  to  the  Bible  must 
be  reduced,  but  demand  as  to  the  Gospel  pressed  (p.  373).  In  prac- 
tically all  these  matters  there  is  ostensible  agreement  with  the  Ritsch- 
lian  school;  but  the  limit  of  such  agreement  soon  becomes  evident. 
Forsyth  is  an  insistent  supernaturalist : 

The  Church  must  descend  on  the  world  out  of  heaven  from  God.  Her  note 
is  the  supernatural  note  which  distinguishes  incarnation  from  immanence, 
redemption  from  evolution,  the  Kingdom  of  God  from  mere  spiritual  prog- 
ress, and  the  Holy  Spirit  from  mere  spiritual  process  (p.  122).  The  preacher 
has  to  be  sure  of  a  knowledge  that  creates  experience  and  does  not  rise  out 
of  it.  His  burden  is  something  given,  something  that  reports  a  world  beyond 
experience  (p.  200). 

Forsyth  is  also  a  pronounced  anti-evolutionist,  holding  that  evolu- 
tion is  very  much  overworked,  and  even  treated  as  vera  causa.  It 
is  to  be  feared,  however,  only  when  it  becomes  monistic  (p.  266). 
When  evolution  escapes  from  the  bondage  of  the  physical  sciences 
and  its  mesalliance  with  monistic  dogma,  it  may  well  serve  the  ends 
of  the  modern  church  (p.  269). 

A  positive  Gospel  will  emphasize  a  real  supernatural  revelation, 
a  fundamental  perdition,  a  radical  evil  in  human  nature,  and  a  rescue 
from  without  (p.  234).  There  must  be  a  new  nature,  a  new  world, 
a  new  creation  (p.  56).  The  only  possible  revelation  to  such  a 
world  is  an  act  of  redemption  (p.  344).  Atonement  must  be  made, 
and  only  God  can  make  it  (p.  365). 

The  revealing  and  redeeming  act  of  God  "was  grafted  into  the  great 
psychology  of  the  race."1  Christ  does  not  simply  reveal  God; 
he  is  God  in  revelation,  the  gracious  God  revealed  (p.  213).  He  is 
to  be  set  apart  from  the  race  in  kind  as  well  as  in  function  (p.  252). 
He  does  not  help  us  to  God,  but  himself  brings  God.  He  is  not  the 
agent  of  God;  he  is  God  the  Son  (p.  353). 

It  is  through  the  Christian  community  that  Christ  arises  from 
his  cross  and  from  his  grave  (p.  77). 2  When  thus  God  comes  to  us, 
he  brings  more  than  a  mere  extension  of  our  previous  horizon,  and 
enrichment  of  our  previous  mentality;  his  is  a  new  creation,  a  free 
gift  (p.  54).    It  is  an  invasion,  not  an  emergence  from  us.    In  Chris- 

^ibbert  Journal,   October,    1911,   Revelation   and  the   Bible. 
2Positive    Preaching   and  the   Modern   Mind. 

45 


46  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

tian  experience  we  are  conscious  of  the  living  Christ ;  it  is  evoked  by- 
contact  with  Christ  (p.  67). 

The  man  who  is  living  in  intercourse  with  the  risen  Christ  is  in  possession 
of  a  fact  of  experience  as  real  as  any  mere  historic  fact,  or  any  experience 
of  reality,  that  the  critic  has  to  found  on  and  make  a  standard  (p.  276). 

Thus  Principal  Forsyth's  theology  is  supernaturalistic,  non-evolu- 
tionary, holds  humanity  lost  in  sin,  and  salvable  only  by  Divine  inter- 
vention; believes  that  such  intervention  occurred  when  Christ  be- 
came incarnate  and  died  a  redeeming  and  thus  revealing  death; 
holds  that  the  Bible  hands  down  in  the  Christian  community  a 
record  of  this  revelation — a  revelation  which  is  the  instrument  of 
a  new  creation  that  brings  the  soul  into  vital  contact  with  the  living 
Christ.  From  the  point  of  view  of  a  liberal  theologian,  this  would 
appear  as  essentially  the  earlier  conservative  Protestant  orthodoxy. 

Forsyth's  dependence  is  manifestly  upon  the  supernatural  in  history, 
for  we  are  sure  of  the  living  Christ  in  experience;  we  have  com- 
munion with  him  and  know  him  as  the  creator  of  our  experience. 
The  only  respect  in  which  Forsyth  differs  particularly  from  the 
Conservative  Orthodoxy  is  in  his  willingness  to  limit  the  extent  of 
revelation  so  that  it  shall  no  longer  be  considered  coextensive  with 
the  Bible,  but  be  limited  to  the  Gospel.  Forsyth  also  exhibits  an  ap- 
parent willingness  to  come  to  terms  with  the  modern  world-view,  but 
this  he  does  in  no  thorough-going  fashion.  He  is  unlike  the  Ritsch- 
lians,  on  the  other  hand,  in  his  belief  that  a  certain  theological  and 
forensic  construction  must  be  put  upon  the  life  of  Jesus,  and  in 
particular  upon  his  death,  in  order  to  make  it  Gospel;  and  in  his 
belief  that  the  certainty  of  Jesus  carries  with  it  a  body  of  truths 
and  the  present-day  experience  of  communion  with  the  risen  Lord. 
In  all  essentials,  he  bases  personal  assurance  as  the  Conservative 
Orthodox  does. 

Seeberg's  main  positions  may  easily  be  gathered  from  his  Funda- 
mental Truths  of  Christianity.  To  be  a  Christian  is  to  have  faith 
and  love  (p.  69).  Faith  corresponds  to  the  sovereignty  of  God,  love 
to  the  Kingdom  of  God  (p.  70).  Christ  is  the  expression  of  the 
Divine  will ;  his  words  awaken  faith  and  give  it  content  (p.  96).  He 
is  the  revelation  of  God,  God's  action,  his  word  (p.  139).  He  shows 
us  God  as  merciful,  loving,  holy,  almighty  (p.  145).  Humanity  says 
No  to  God  because  it  says  Yes  to  the  empirical  world.    Sin  is  guilt 

46 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  47 

(p.  188),  it  is  the  fundamental  bent  of  the  human  soul,  from  which 
neither  the  individual  nor  the  race  can  redeem  itself  (p.  195). 

Jesus  was  a  man,  not  empty  abstract  humanity  (p.  218)  ;  yet  at 
the  same  time  he  was  conscious  of  being  Lord  of  the  world  (p.  207). 
In  him  the  God-will  which  guides  human  history  to  salvation  entered 
into  history  (p.  222)  ;  that  is,  the  Divine  Person  himself  entered 
so  into  Jesus  as  to  become  one  spiritual  personal  life  with  him  (p. 
224).  The  expression  of  this  life  had  the  limitation  of  human 
nature  as  such  (p.  225)  ;  but  the  union  of  God  was  in  Jesus  fixed 
and  lasting  (p.  230).  The  human  soul  of  Jesus  is  in  God  and:  God 
is  in  it  (p.  236).  Thus  Jesus  was  God  and  man  (p.  237).  Because 
Christ  alone  among  all  the  figures  of  life  constrains  us  to  faith  and 
love  (p.  241),  he  is  our  Lord,  and  we  pray  to  him;  and  we  know 
that  prayer  can  be  made  to  God  alone  (p.  244). 

The  way  of  redemption  is  the  way  of  the  cross;  only  as  being 
necessary  for  man  was  it  necessary  for  God  (p.  215).  Jesus'  work 
may  be  summed  up  in  the  conception  of  vicarious  atonement  and 
vicarious  surety  (p.  255).  He  made  atonement  by  remaining  true 
against  the  heaviest  odds  (p.  255)  ;  and  the  cross  is  just  the  sign 
of  the  unyielding  power  of  the  good  in  the  last  hour  of  wickedness 
and  pain  (p.  258).  Through  the  divine  power  of  his  Holy  Spirit, 
Jesus  breaks  the  power  of  sin  in  us,  and  overcomes  the  consequences 
of  guilt  in  us  through  his  holy  humanity  proved  true  on  the  cross 
(p.  253). 

Our  individual  Christianity  was  not  effected  by  the  instreaming  of 
holy  magic  into  our  nature.  Our  souls  receive  a  new  content  from 
the  deeds  and  words  of  Jesus  which  live  in  history  and  in  the  church. 
We  experience  the  operation  of  God,  giving  faith  and  love  and 
assuring  us  of  the  forgiveness  of  sins.  Thus  we  are  born  again; 
yet  nothing  happens  to  the  soul  that  is  not  through  the  soul  (p.  292). 
Through  communion  with  Christ  we  are  preserved  and  shielded  (p. 
296).  Marvelous  means  of  help  in  the  soul's  struggle  are  not  to 
be  expected ;  in  the  new  content  of  faith  and  love  lie  the  means  by 
which  the  world  is  overcome    (p.  309). 

In  another  connection  Seeberg  develops  the  truth  of  Christianity 
in  the  following  propositions : 

1.  We  are  sinners,  simply  unfree  for  the  good,  and  enemies  of 
God.  We  are  therefore  lost  and  condemned.  2.  Christ  is  true  God, 
as  the  holy  Power  of  Love  which  changes  us  through  our  faith 

47 


48  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

and  love  into  new  creatures,  by  the  Holy  Ghost,  whom  he  sent  and 
through  whom  he  works.  3.  Christ  is  true  man  who  became  our 
representative  and  surety  before  God,  and  thereby  established  a  new 
relation  between  us  and  God.  4.  Thus  also  the  holy  Trinity,  as  well 
as  the  divinity  of  Christ,  as  well  the  work  of  Christ  in  salvation 
as  the  lost  condition  of  the  natural  man,  are  made  sure.1 

Seeberg  feels  the  pressure  of  science  and  the  historical ;  he  will 
not  debate  about  miracles,  inspiration,  Athanasian  formulae  and 
the  like,  but  seeks  a  modus  vivendi  for  the  Christian  system.  He  is 
a  good  deal  more  willing  than  Forsyth  to  part  with  a  detail  here 
and  there ;  he  will  not  debate  about  terminology.  Yet  for  him  the 
person  of  Jesus  is  unique;  in  short,  both  human  and  divine.  Sin 
is  of  human  origin ;  it  is  guilt.  Man  cannot  redeem  himself  from 
it.  God  in  Jesus  is  vicarious  surety  and  Redeemer;  yet  the  atone- 
ment was  not  a  matter  of  quantitative  satisfaction,  however  nec- 
essary for  man.  The  Christian  is  preserved  through  communion 
with  Christ.  Thus,  Seeberg  makes  essential  use  of  sin,  inability, 
revelation,  incarnation,  redemption,  and  communion  with  an  almighty 
Redeemer.  Though  he  will  not  argue  about  miracles,  he  believes 
that  Jesus  possessed  powers  which  slip  from  our  hands  (p.  226). 

Here  again,  as  with  Forsyth,  the  basis  of  personal  salvation  lies 
in  contact  with  God's  supernatural  revelation  in  Christ.  There  is 
the  same  faith  that  this  revelation  carries  with  it  the  certainty  of 
revealed  truths,  but  a  greater  desire  to  meet  the  demands  of  a 
modern  scientific  world-view.  Instead  of  separating  the  realms  of 
science  and  religion,  as  Ritschlianism  proposes,  they  are  to  be  har- 
monized. In  keeping  with  the  Ritschlian  contention,  the  revelation 
of  God  is  mediated  through  a  historical  personage,  but  there  is  an 
affirmation  of  certainty  concerning  the  risen  Christ  which  the 
typical  Ritschlian  will  not  make,  and  a  use  of  conventional  defini- 
tion which  is  likewise  foreign  to  Ritschlian  usage.  The  real  affinity 
of  Conservative  Orthodox  views  underlying  the  garb  of  modernism 
is  quite  indubitable. 

After  Seeberg,  perhaps  no  more  significant  representative  of  the 
Modern  Positive  point  of  view  has  appeared  than  Karl  Beth.  He 
has  been  described  as  a  "critical  realist,"  holding  as  he  does  not 
simply  that  we  know  real  objects  in  sense  perception,  but  that  a 
criticism  of  experience  yields  us  knowledge  of  the  ultimate  realities, 

*Zur  systematischen  Theologie,  p.   81  f. 

48 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  49 

God,  self,  world.1  With  Seeberg,  he  agrees  that  a  metaphysics  is 
necessary,  and  this  metaphysics  he  seeks  to  ground  by  means  of  his 
critical  realism. 

He  makes  a  sharp  distinction,  however,  between  theological 
knowledge,  which  is  scientific,  and  religious  knowledge,  which  is 
practical ;  if  religious  knowledge  were  based  upon  grounds  of  a 
theoretical  or  rational  character,  instead  of  upon  the  ground  of 
personal  experience  and  conviction,  Christian  faith  would  have  to 
change  with  every  change  in  theological  science.  Christian  faith 
is,  however,  independent  of  theological  science  and  theoretical  vali- 
dation. At  the  same  time,  Christianity  has  a  world-view  peculiar  to 
itself,  each  generation  develops  a  world-view  of  its  own,  and  just 
here  the  function  of  Christian  theology  appears — the  function  of 
bringing  Christian  truth  into  harmony  with  the  particular  world- 
view  of  a  given  age.2  A  positive  theology  starts  with  something 
given;  in  this  case  it  is  the  supernatural  origin  and  resurrection  of 
Christ,  his  deity  and  atoning  death.8  This  essence  of  Christianity 
must  now  be  stated  by  scientific  theology  in  harmony  with  modern 
thought.  The  Christian  world-view  must  receive  an  apologetic 
handling  which  will  bring  it  into  harmony  with  modern  science  and 
philosophy. 

In  keeping  with  this  fundamental  position,  Beth  attacks  the  prob- 
lem of  harmonizing  Christianity  with  the  chief  concept  of  modern 
science,  that  of  development.  In  his  discussion  of  empirische  Tele- 
ologie,  the  newest  tendency  in  science,4  Beth  shows  his  interest  in 
contemporary  science,  the  reason  for  which  is  the  fancied  discovery 
there  of  a  modus  vivendi  for  a  theology  with  equal  claims  to  a  scien- 
tific character.  Just  as  his  late-born  scientific  hypothesis  of  empirical 
teleology  asserts  the  impossibility  of  comprehending  the  organism 
with  which  it  deals  within  the  limits  of  physico-chemico  formulae, 
and  disclaims  a  complete  analysis  of  it  by  laboratory  means,  so 
theology  must  recognize  that  its  path  lies  in  no  mere  mechanical 
analysis  of  past  situations,  but  in  an  organic  study  of  life's  functions.5 
A  particular  application  of  this  principle  appears  in  Beth's  handling 
of  the  idea  of  evolution.  It  is  seen  to  be  teleological,  involving  from 
the  beginning  the  idea  of  the  goal ;  but  that  idea  of  a  goal  does  not 

iCf.  Hodge,  Princeton  Review,  Vol.   8,  p.  214. 

2Die  Modern  und  d.    Prinzipien  d.   Theologie,  p.   98  f. 

3Ut  supra,  p.   105;  also  p.    199  ff. 

4Neue  kirchl.   Zeitschr.,  Vol.   18,  pp.   23  f.,   115  f. 

8Ut  supra,  espec.  pp.   133,  134. 

49 


50  THE  BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE  IN 

signify  that  the  goal  itself  was  in  some  inchoate  and  embryonic 
fashion  present  from  the  beginning.  A  wide  distinction  is  to  be 
made  between  development  and  unfolding.  The  old  idea  of  evolu- 
tion held,  in  common  parlance,  that  there  is  "nothing  new  under 
the  sun."1  The  present  view  of  scientific  biology  is  that  development 
is  something  else  than  mere  unfolding ;  new  forms  are  seen  to  appear 
which  in  no  wise  existed  before.2  Development  by  no  means  ex- 
cludes the  spontaneous,  unexpected,  unprepared  for,  and  independ- 
ent. Beth  feels  that  Troeltsch  has  employed  the  old  notion  of  un- 
folding, and  consequently  encounters  great  difficulty  in  relating 
the  high  points  of  human  achievement  to  independent  higher 
powers — God,  etc. — which  cannot  be  harmonized  with  any  forecast 
of  ours.  If  Troeltsch  had  employed  the  modern  scientific  notion,  he 
would  not  have  encountered  this  difficulty,  for  the  thought  of  a 
divine-human  religious  history  falls  in  with  that  of  the  activity  of 
God  in  the  progress  of  religion  (to  which  latter  idea  Troeltsch 
holds).*  In  the  nature  of  religion  and  its  progress  there  will  always 
be  a  remainder  which  must  be  recognized  as  its  decisive  factor.  Just 
as  in  biology  the  nature  of  the  organism  and  of  life  is  not  explicable 
down  to  the  last  remainder,  so  also  with  religion. 

The  significance  of  this  is  not  far  to  seek.  As  in  science  there 
have  been  discovered  factors  which  transcend  analysis,  but  are  yet 
determinative;  so  in  religion.  In  other  words,  through  this  door 
the  supernatural  enters,  and  by  this  means  the  inter-working  of 
God  in  the  presence  of  the  soul  and  the  progress  of  history  finds 
validation.  Beth  quotes  with  approval  Lessing's  dictum  that  "Relig- 
ion is  shaped  according  to  the  schema  of  descendence ;"  yet  it  has  a 
developmental  history,  a  history  expressed  in  the  comprehensive 
education  of  humanity  by  God,  who  operates  now  by  environment, 
now  by  the  understanding,  now  by  a  temporary  method  of  propae- 
deutic, calling  and  drawing  men  out  of  the  world  nearer  and  nearer 
to  himself." 

In  this  connection  the  attitude  of  Beth  toward  miracle  becomes 
significant.  He  holds  that  the  faith  that  Jesus  is  our  Savior  cannot 
be  complete  without  the  idea  that  Jesus  had  absolute  power  over 
everything  earthly.     This  means  no  breaking  through  or  setting 

iZeitschr.  f.  T.  u.  K.,  1910,  p.  410.     Cf.  also  Beth,  Die  Moderne  u.  s.  w.,  p.  313 If. 
2Ut    supra,    p.   411,   where   appeal   is   made   to   the   experiments    of   Jacques    Loeb,    W 
Roux,  Driesch,  et  al. 
sUt  supra,  p.  414. 
*Ut  supra,  p.  417. 

50 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  51 

aside  of  natural  law ;  it  means  simply  the  governing  of  the  course 
and  appearance  of  natural  processes.  However,  it  is  a  question 
whether  such  control  as  Beth  postulates  is  not  equivalent  to  a  real 
setting  aside  of  natural  law.  Many  of  the  miracles  are  validated 
as  historically  certain.1  Yet  the  evangelists  did  not  base  their  faith 
upon  miracles  any  more  than  we  do.2 

As  above  indicated,  Beth  holds  the  Virgin  Birth  of  Jesus; 
he  holds  also  to  the  resurrection  of  Jesus,  though  he  inclines 
to  the  vision  theory  to  account  for  the  post-resurrection  appear- 
ances.8 The  accounts  of  the  appearances  cannot  be  harmonized. 
Peter  and  Paul  knew  nothing  of  a  distinction  between  a  period  in 
which  Jesus  still  appeared  to  the  disciples  and  another  in  which  he 
remained  at  the  right  hand  of  God.  The  speculation  about  the  two 
natures  does  not  find  place  in  the  modern  view.  The  death  of  Jesus 
is  the  culminating  point  of  revelation,  disclosing  his  true  divinity.* 

Schian  holds  that  Beth  exhibits  two  contradictory  tendencies : 
first,  the  holding  of  no  external  authority  which  we  must  follow, 
but  dependence  upon  positions  which  spring  from  faith  alone; 
secondly,  the  tendency  to  hold  fast  a  quite  definite  complex  of  facts 
and  views  to  which  the  character  of  the  "given"  is  assigned,  and 
established  particularly  by  reference  to  the  authority  of  the 
Scripture.5 

Though  the  items  of  truth  which  are  directly  given  in  the  revela- 
tion in  Christ  are  few  in  number,  they  are  of  such  significance  that 
they  logically  carry  with  them  a  much  larger  context  of  truth,  which 
— if  they  themselves  are  valid — must  be  equally  so.  This  seems  to 
be  the  natural  outcome  of  Beth's  position,  and  it  is  consequently 
very  difficult  to  maintain  the  distinction  between  theological  and 
religious  knowledge,  in  view  of  the  fact  that  just  these  items  which 
religious  knowledge  validates  become  the  materials  which  theological 
knowledge  must  present  to  a  given  age  in  terms  of  its  own  thinking. 
Neither  Beth  nor  Seeberg  really  maintains  the  distinction  in  practice. 

As  in  the  case  of  Seeberg  and  Forsyth,  Beth  grounds  certainty 
upon  revelation.  Forsyth  scarcely  attempts,  and  Seeberg  does  not 
carry  so  far,  the  endeavor  to  ground  modern  theology  in  strictly 

1Biblische  Zeit —  u.  Streit-fragen  IV,  5;  review  in  Theologischer  Jahresbericht,  XXVIII, 
II,  p.   72. 

2Ut  supra,  II  Ser.,  1  H.,  review  in  Theolog.  Jahresb.,  XXV,  p.  281. 

8Die  Moderne  u.  s.  w.,  p.  230  f. 

4Ut  supra,  p.  223. 

sZur  Beurteilung  der  mod.  pos.  Theologie,  pp.  86,  87;  of.  also  Beth,  Die  Moderne  u. 
s.    w.,   p.    197   f. 

51 


52  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

scientific  terms.  What  Seeberg  does  in  rather  broad  generalizations 
in  his  Grundwahrheiten,  for  example,  Beth  endeavors  to  make  scien- 
tifically detailed  and  explicit.  This  is  evident  in  his  handling  of 
evolution  particularly;  and  he  handles  evolution  thus  carefully  for 
the  reason  that  the  whole  issue  of  a  supernatural  activity  turns  urjon 
the  definition  given  to  the  evolutionary  process.  The  supernatural 
comes  in  with  the  overplus,  and  may  be  quite  unique  in  manifesta- 
tion and  independent  of  what  has  gone  before.  What  Beth  does  is, 
in  the  last  analysis,  to  make  everything  depend  upon  revelation. 
Revelation  is  objective  in  the  person  of  Jesus ;  but  revelation  is  ex- 
perienced, too,  and  it  is  just  here — as  with  Seeberg — that  assurance 
enters.  No  apologetic  grounding  can  yield  it ;  it  must  be  won  through 
experience.  At  the  same  time,  the  criticism  which  Schian  brings 
against  both  Seeberg  and  Beth,  that — though  rejecting  the  principle 
of  authority — both  of  them  insist  upon  a  group  of  doctrines  which 
rest  chiefly  upon  Scripture  as  an  external  authority,  is  a  valid  criti- 
cism. While  this  still  leaves  revelation  as  the  basis  of  assurance,  it 
places  a  decided  limitation  upon  subjective  experience  and  the  sort 
of  "religious"  knowledge  which  may  be  obtained  thereby. 

Thus,  as  a  group,  the  Modern  Positive  theologians  are  believers 
in  supernatural  revelation  which  communicates  essential  truths. 
These  essential  truths  are  to  be  harmonized  apologetically  with 
modern  culture;  the  product  of  such  harmonization,  however,  will 
not  constitute  the  basis  of  faith ;  that  will  in  any  case  be  the  historical 
Jesus  viewed  through  the  medium  of  certain  fundamental  aspects 
of  his  person  and  work:  his  supernatural  origin  and  resurrection, 
his  deity  and  atoning  work.  Assurance  is  not  less  dependent  upon 
history  than  in  the  Ritschlian  view,  but  is  more  dependent  upon  a 
theological  construction  of  the  person  of  Jesus.  The  general  en- 
deavor is  to  hold  faith  and  science  apart  for  experimental  purposes, 
but  to  bring  them  together  for  apologetic  purposes.  Either  Ritsch- 
lianism,  which  holds  that  they  are — for  us — incommensurables,  or 
Conservative  Orthodoxy — which  is  satisfied  with  revelation  and  pro- 
poses no  scientific  explanation — is  more  consistent  at  this  point.  At 
the  same  time,  one  feels  that  faith  and  science  must  be  harmonious 
interpretations  of  the  same  reality. 

4.  The  Religionsgeschichtliche  School:     Troeltsch,  Bousset. 
Here  the  general  view  is  that  Christianity  is  the  product  of  a 
prodigious  religious  syncretism,  product — in    other    words — of    a 

52 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  53 

natural  evolution.  In  the  view  of  Troeltsch,  the  fundamental  de- 
mand which  science  makes  upon  theology  is  just  the  investigation  and 
understanding  of  Christianity  in  connection  with  the  universal 
science  of  religion.1  The  results  of  science  are  gathered  up  in  a 
world-view,  the  chief  facts  of  which  are  these:  The  Copernican 
revolution  has  enormously  extended  our  apparent  world,  and  has 
brought  to  an  end  the  old  geo-  and  anthropocentric  view ;  the  theory 
of  descent  now  develops  the  whole  organic  world,  from  the  first  bit 
of  protoplasm  up  to  man,  out  of  the  cell ;  the  law  of  the  conservation 
of  energy  and  of  matter  points  to  a  monstrous  unity  of  nature  ex- 
pressed through  the  interrelation  of  all  its  forces ;  the  law  of  strug- 
gle for  existence  has  shown  that  every  class  value  arises  and  aug- 
ments itself  by  struggle  against  heavy  odds  and  by  the  sacrifice  of 
individuals,  and  that  this  is  the  basic  law  of  all  living  reality.2  At 
the  same  time,  man  is  not  thereby  reduced  to  a  mere  cog  in  the 
machine;  he  is  at  the  summit  of  this  development,  showing  that 
the  process  leads  ultimately  to  a  final  absolutely  worthful  spiritual 
goal.  It  is  the  task  of  theology  to  fuse  the  characteristic  religious 
expressions  of  humanity  so  situated  with  the  Christian  faith  in  God, 
to  overcome  a  narrow  and  petty  anthropocentrism,  and  to  bring  to 
view  the  holy  Divine  Love  in  this  infinitely  enlarged  world-view.* 

Troeltsch  denies  the  right  of  monism,  holding  that  there  are  as 
clear  indications  of  non-rationalistic  motives  as  of  rationalistic  in 
modern  world-thought.  Modern  thought  offers  no  single  decisive 
ground  of  opposition  to  prophetic-Christian  personalism.  This  view 
of  God  is  today,  as  ever,  at  the  basis  of  every  assertion  of  the  value 
of  personal  life.  It  is  the  summation  of  all  efforts  after  a  spiritual 
content  of  life  lasting  beyond  the  flux  of  things.4  Prophetic-Christian 
personalism  is  set  forth  in  the  following  terms : 

(Es  ist)  der  Glaube  an  erreichbare,  ewige  und  absolute  Werte  der  Person- 
lichkeit,  an  den  Bestand  eines  absoluten  Maszstabes  des  Wahren  und  Guten 
gegeniiber  allem  Tasten,  Suchen,  und  Irren  der  Kreatur,  and  die  Verankerung 
der  idealen  Personlichkeitswerte  in  einem  ihnen  verwandten  Wesen  der 
Gottheit,  an  die  Moglichkeit  der  Vollendung  der  Personlichkeit  in  der  Gemein- 
schaft  mit  dem  gottlichen  Personleben.5 

As  an  immanent  theism  this  view  is  a  radical  irrationalism,  dualism, 
and  personalism;  so  much  the  more  because  sin  and  suffering  are  to 

aDie  wissenschaftliche  Lage  u.  s.  w.,  p.  47. 

2Ut  supra,  p.   53. 

■Ut  supra,   p.    55. 

4Funfter  Weltkongress  fur  freies  Christentum:   Protokoll,  p.   336  f. 

8Ut  supra,  p.  335. 

53 


54  THE   BASIS   OF  ASSURANCE  IN 

be  thought  of  not  as  mere  issue  from  the  totality,  but  as  opposition 
to  the  highest  values — an  opposition  willed  with  the  world  itself.1 

The  question  concerning  the  person  of  Jesus  is  of  special  interest 
for  the  purpose  of  this  study.  Troeltsch  finds  that  the  whole  notion 
of  world-Savior  has  suffered  under  the  removal  of  the  geocentric 
and  the  anthropocentric. 

Wo  man  das  Dasein  der  Menschheit  auf  der  Erde  urn  Jahrhunderttausende 
riickwarts  und  vorwarts  verlangert  denkt,  wo  man  den  Wechsel  und  Nieder- 
gang  der  groszen  Geistes — und  Kultursysteme  vor  Augen  hat,  da  ist  es 
unmoglich,  diese  einzelne  Personlichkeit  als  Zentrum  der  ganzen  Mensch- 
heitsgeschichte  iiberhaupt  zu  denken.2 

On  the  other  hand,  the  common  confession  of  Jesus  holds  the 
Christian  community  together;  there  can  be  no  vital  confession  of 
Jesus  unless  one  see  in  him  the  incarnation  of  the  peculiarly 
Christian  thought  of  God.  If  Christian  faith  in  God  were  severed 
in  every  respect  from  the  person  of  Jesus,  it  would  be  cut  loose 
from  all  rootage  in  the  past  and  would  at  length  dissolve.  No,  the 
pious  man  is  not  at  all  hindered  from  placing  Jesus,  surrounded  and 
interpreted  by  the  choir  of  Old  Testament  prophets,  and  the  great 
religious  personalities  of  the  following  times,  before  his  believing 
imagination,  and  acknowledging  his  as  the  source  of  his  religious 
power  and  certainty.  But  one  thing  must  be  resigned,  the  construing 
of  Jesus  as  the  center  of  the  world,  or  even  of  human  history.  How- 
ever, even  though  there  be  other  cycles  of  history  and  circles  of 
light  in  the  great  world-process,  our  highest  human  powers  and  con- 
victions remain  bound  up  with  surrender  to  the  historical  community- 
life  of  which  Jesus  was  the  founder.8 

The  world-view  with  which  Troeltsch  works  is  essentially  other 
than  that  of  which  Conservative  Orthodoxy  makes  use,  and  it  is  not 
that  of  Modern  Positivism  or  of  Ritschlianism.  The  problem  of 
assurance  in  the  old  form  does  not  arise.  At  bottom,  the  significance 
of  Jesus  lies  in  the  fact  that  he  is  the  embodiment  of  superior  relig- 
ious power.  Only  in  the  vision  of  such  a  personality  will  faith 
rise  to  full  power  and  certainty;  and  thus  all  the  power  of  the 
Christian  faith  in  God  remains  inseparable  from  the  portrait  of 
Jesus.     This  certainty  of  faith  is  not,  however,  supernatural.4 

JUt  supra,  p.  336. 

2Ut  supra,  p.  337. 

3Ut  supra,  p.  338  f. 

*Ut  supra,  p.  338. 

54 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  55 

While  Bousset's  work  has  not  been  in  the  field  of  systematic 
theology,  he  is  a  significant  representative  of  the  point  of  view  of 
the  Religionsgeschichtliche  School.  His  opinions  which  are  of  sig- 
nificance for  the  present  purpose  may  nowhere  be  better  viewed 
than  in  his  little  volume,  The  Faith  of  a  Modern  Protestant. 

The  modern  world-view  impresses  us  with  a  sense  of  our  insig- 
nificance (p.  5)  ;  we  are  between  the  two  infinities  of  the  macro- 
cosmos  and  the  microcosmos  (p.  6).  The  human  spirit  has  pene- 
trated far;  yet,  however  life  conforms  to  law  and  evolution,  there  is 
at  bottom  something  inexplicable  about  it  (p.  9).  Are  we  only  like 
falling  leaves  after  the  brief  summer?  We  feel  that  we  transcend 
nature  (p.  13),  that  our  true  self  is  never  satisfied  but  stretches 
forth  beyond  this  finite  and  imperfect  existence  to  something  per- 
fect and  absolute.  Some  try  to  shelve  the  question ;  some  put  faith 
in  a  coming  superman ;  some  are  lost  in  the  intellectual  problem  of 
it ;  some  surrender  to  it,  and  resolve  to  make  the  best  of  life ;  some 
preach  a  gospel  of  beauty ;  but  others  have  found  the  way  of  faith 
(pp.  13-19). 

The  man  of  faith  accepts  the  universe  courageously  as  part  of  an 
intelligent  unity,  behind  which  he  finds  an  Absolute  which  supports 
his  life  (p.  20)  :  the  Father  of  Jesus  is  the  Lord  of  heaven  and 
earth  (p.  23).  Daily  we  are  surrounded  with  the  mystery  of  it; 
governed  by  law  as  we  are,  the  ineffable  remains  (p.  25).  Faith 
tells  us,  too,  that  the  almighty  God  inclines  to  us,  he  is  our  God  (p. 
29).    The  Gospel  announces  God  as  seeking  the  individual  soul. 

Kant  taught  us  that  we  should  seek  in  vain  for  a  support  for  the 
Absolute  in  the  world  of  things  limited  by  space  and  time;  that  we 
should  find  the  Absolute  in  the  self -existent  law  within  our  souls. 
Kant  is  the  philosopher  of  Protestantism  (p.  43  f). 

We  recognize  that  to  speak  of  God  as  personal  and  Father  is  to 
use  symbolism ;  but  we  need  symbolism,  and  can  never  resolve  it  into 
pure  thought  (p.  49).  To  call  God  Father  is  an  act  of  daring 
faith,  transcending  knowledge  (p.  49).  It  requires  utmost  religious 
energy  to  live  in  faith  in  the  personal  providence  of  God ;  we  must 
shut  our  eyes  to  the  terrible  reality  around  us  (p.  52).  But  when 
we  take  the  first  step  of  faith  the  way  gets  easier  (p.  54). 

Faith  denies  a  view  of  the  universe  which  makes  it  resemble  an 
artificially  constructed  machine ;  the  Almighty  is  present  in  all  that 
happens  in  the  world ;  out  of  the  depths  of  his  being  new  manifesta- 

55 


56  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

tions  continually  stream  into  the  ever-going  creation  (p.  56).  Yet 
God!  keeps  within  the  ordinances  he  has  himself  decreed  (p.  58). 

We  think  of  God  through  the  symbol  of  a  transfigured  person- 
ality. The  Gospel  shows  moral  good  and  our  own  impotence  (p.  87). 
But  the  Gospel  frees  us  from  that  impotence  which  it  discovers, 
through  redemption  and  the  forgiveness  of  sins  (p.  88).  Re- 
demption means  to  get  free  from  the  sensually-inclined  self,  to  be 
caught  up  by  the  power  of  God  (p.  91).  We  accept  the  law  of  our 
life  from  his  hand  (p.  91).  Something  within  us  must  be  cast  away 
if  the  new  life  is  to  arise;  in  and  with  redemption  our  powers  for 
good  are  freed  (p.  93). 

Our  conscience  will  always  make  us  responsible  for  sin  (p.  98), 
and  so  we  say  that  our  faith  is  a  faith  in  the  forgiveness  of  sins 
(p.  99).  The  Gospel  of  Jesus  makes  us  certain  and  secure  of  a 
God  who  forgives  sin.  Jesus  not  merely  taught  the  forgiveness  of 
sins;  he  poured  it  forth  upon  the  world  (p.  99).  A  stream  of  cer- 
tainty concerning  the  forgiveness  of  sins  has  flowed  into  the  world 
through  him  (p.  101).  The  believer  needs  the  certainty  that  in 
spite  of  all  opposition  and  hindrances  God  belongs  to  him  and  he 
to  God;  and  he  gains  this  when  he  joins  the  stream  of  religious 
certainty  which  issued  from  Jesus  of  Nazareth  (p.  104). 

Christian  belief  is  completed  in  hope.  Beyond  stretches  an  in- 
finite kingdom  of  personal  spirits,  in  which  each  generation  has 
its  place  (p.  116).  We  are  brought  to  this  faith  through  the  great 
personalities  to  whom  God's  word  was  comprehensible,  and  revealed 
with  inward  certainty,  among  whom  the  figure  of  Jesus  of  Nazareth 
towers  preeminent  (p.  118).  We  have  and  hold  our  faith  in  God 
in  the  spiritual  communion  created  by  Jesus  of  Nazareth  (p.  118). 

Bousset  shows  more  interest  in  the  problem  of  forgiveness  of 
sins  than  Troeltsch  manifests ;  but  even  so,  the  forgiveness  of  sins 
is  far  from  being  the  forensic  matter  which  it  is  with  Conservative 
Orthodoxy.  Since  in  this  view  the  forgiveness  of  sins — or  the  as- 
surance of  forgiveness,  at  any  rate — is  grounded  in  Jesus,  it  is  of 
interest  to  discover  what  further  he  has  to  say  of  the  insignificance 
of  Jesus.  In  an  address  delivered  before  the  Congress  of  Liberal 
Religions  in  1910,  he  discussed  the  theme  The  Significance  of  the 
Person  of  Jesus  for  Faith.  He  points  out  in  this  address  that  Nine- 
teenth Century  theology,  while  building  so  largely  upon  Schleier- 
macher,  dropped  his  view  of  immanence  in  favor  of  a  supernatural 

56 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  57 

conception.  Religion  comes  into  humanity  by  revelation,  instead  of 
unfolding  from  human  nature.  This  occasions  insupportable  diffi- 
culties.1 All  endeavors  to  base  the  content  of  our  belief  by  reflection 
merely  on  history  meet  with  peculiar  difficulties.  Over  against  this 
one-sided  historicism,  Bousset  lays  down  the  proposition  that  relig- 
ion rests  on  supernatural  revelation  in  no  strict  sense ;  it  is  an  orig- 
inal faculty  which  only  expands  in  history.  Following  Fries,  it  is 
held  that  the  existence  of  the  religious  idea  is  based  upon  pure  rea- 
son; it  is  an  indispensable  necessity  consequent  upon  human  mind.2 
Religious  ideas  are  not  logically  deducible  and  provable;  they  are  a 
constituent  part  of  our  reason. 

But  just  here  the  significance  of  the  historical  for  religion  comes 
to  light ;  pure  ideas  are  intangible,  impalpable  phantoms ;  they  need 
symbolic  clothing.  The  higher  religions  live  on  the  revelation  of 
God  in  history,  which  weaves  the  coverings  and  symbols  for  relig- 
ious ideas.  The  leaders  of  religious  evolution  are  the  great  religious 
personages  of  history ;  they  flash  light  into  the  depths  of  man's 
nature.  The  great  religious  personality  becomes  itself  a  symbol  to 
the  believing  community.  Thus  the  faith  of  Israel  was  based  upon 
the  person  of  Moses,  the  Iranian  religion  upon  Zarathustra,  the 
Chinese  upon  Confucius ;  thus  Buddhism  conquered  Brahminism 
because  it  was  centered  in  the  being  of  a  personal  founder.  Thus 
Jesus  became  himself  a  symbol  of  the  presence  and  nearness  of 
God,  a  symbol  of  God,  indeed;  and  yet  only  a  symbol.' 

The  symbol  serves  for  illustration,  not  for  demonstration;  and 
the  portrait  of  Jesus  in  the  Gospels  will  always  be  more  effective 
than  any  historical  attempt.  Even  should  science  pass  the  ultimate 
verdict  that  Jesus  never  lived,  faith  would  not  be  lost,  for  it  has 
foundations  of  its  own.  But,  even  so,  the  portrait  of  Jesus  would 
abide  as  of  eternal  symbolic  significance.  However,  the  historic 
reality  of  Jesus  will  stand  as  "das  andauernde  wirkungskraftigste 
Symbol  unseres  Glaubens."4 

Thus  Troeltsch  and  Bousset  are  in  practical  accord,  not  only  in 
their  theory  of  religious  knowledge,  but  also  in  their  evaluation  of 
Jesus.  The  apologetic  validation  of  the  content  of  religious  faith 
rests  upon  a  theory  of  knowledge  which  yields  the  God-idea  as 

1Funfter  Weltkongress  u.   s.   w.,   p.   294   f. 
2Ut  supra,  p.  299  f. 
sUt  supra,  p.  304. 
4Ut  supra,  p.  221. 

57 


58  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

rational.  But  the  actual  engendering  of  religious  certainty  is  by 
the  non-supernaturalistic  method  of  inspiring  contact,  either  mediate 
or  immediate,  with  great  religious  personalities.  As  related  to  the 
types  of  theology  previously  passed  under  review,  the  theology  of 
Troeltsch  is  non-supernaturalistic;  yet  it  is  not  non-absolutistic. 
The  ultimate  basis  of  faith  is  the  absolute  and  infinite  God,  who 
carries  forward  the  universal  process  by  the  immanent  law  of  pro- 
gressive change,  and  who  is  essentially  revealed  by  outstanding  moral 
and  personal  aspects  of  that  process — chiefly,  indeed,  by  its  produc- 
tion of  impressive  religious  personalities.  The  character  of  such 
personalities  gives  content  to  the  moral  ideal,  and  their  faith  becomes 
the  faith  of  the  rank  and  file ;  in  their  light  we  see  light.  Jesus  is, 
in  this  sense,  and  in  no  other,  a  revelation  of  God.  The  confidence 
which  we  gain  from  him  is  essentially  that  which  we  gain  from  all 
inspiring  personality;  its  content,  however,  may  vary  from  faith  in 
his  mercy  to  faith  in  his  help,  from  trust  in  himself  to  confidence 
in  the  teleology  of  the  world-process  which  expresses  his  will,  the 
variation  in  content  depending  upon  the  differences  of  medium  and 
environment  in  which  individual  faith  is  realized. 

Conservative  Orthodoxy  recognizes  science,  but  declares  it  sub- 
ordinate to  revelation.  Ritschlianism  says  that  science  and  the  con- 
tent of  revelation  belong  to  distinct  provinces  for  us — though  they 
deal  with  aspects  of  the  same  ultimate  reality,  it  is  not  our  business 
to  reconcile  them;  Modern  Positivism  says  that  science  and  the 
content  of  revelation  cannot  be  kept  in  separate  compartments,  they 
must  be  reconciled ;  while  the  Comparative-Religionists  say  that  the 
only  revelation  is  the  ordered  empirical  universe,  from  which  alone 
must  be  won  the  data  of  our  certainty  of  God. 

B.     Special  Conceptions  and  Their  Use. 

1.     Theory  of  Knowledge. 

The  particular  application  of  a  developed  theory  of  knowledge 
in  all  the  theological  types  passed  under  review  in  this  study  is 
rather  to  the  problem  of  the  existence  of  God  than  to  the  problem 
of  personal  assurance.  The  latter  problem,  however,  implies  an 
answer  to  the  former;  so  that  the  question  of  a  theory  of  knowl- 
edge, even  though  applied  as  has  been  indicated,  becomes  germane 
to  our  inquiry. 

58 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  59 

It  is  not  uncommon  for  Conservative  Orthodoxy  of  the  type  we 
have  surveyed  to  have  recourse  to  the  Common  Sense  philosophy 
of  the  Scottish  School,  which  holds  that  experience  gives  us  objects 
beyond.  Upon  the  basis  of  this  view  a  catalogue  of  intuitions  is 
drawn  up.  Among  these  first  truths — whose  criteria  are  simplicity, 
universality,  and  necessity — the  idea  of  God  is  found.  The  know- 
ledge of  God,  accordingly,  is  not  due  to  a  process  of  reasoning.1 
What  the  mind  perceives,  either  intuitively  or  discursively,  it  knows. 
The  knowledge  of  God  is  an  intuitive  perception.  Equipped  as  he 
is  with  this  intuitive  means  of  knowledge,  fallen  man  is  not  able 
to  give  that  content  to  the  idea  of  God  which  will  serve  his  religious 
needs;  hence  the  necessity  of  revelation.  Fallen  man  can  never, 
unaided,  attain  to  the  knowledge  of  God  necessary  to  salvation; 
he  cannot,  apart  from  revelation,  know  what  is  necessary  to  salva- 
tion. At  the  same  time,  his  natural  endowment  of  reason  is  divinely 
adapted1  to  the  reception  of  revelation ;  its  office  is  the  apprehension 
of  the  truths  offered  by  revelation. 

In  the  opinion  of  Dr.  Orr,  there  is  no  logical  halting-place  short 
of  agnosticism,  if  the  ground  of  revelation  be  once  left  behind. 
A  real  theism  cannot  long  remain  a  bare  theism.2  We  must  believe 
in  a  God  who  has  a  word  and  message  for  mankind,  a  God  who, 
having  the  power  and  will  to  bless  mankind,  does  it.3  In  the  Chris- 
tian view,  God  does  thus  enter  history,  giving  man  such  knowledge 
of  himself  as  enables  him  to  attain  the  ends  of  his  existence  and 
to  cooperate  in  carrying  out  the  Divine  purpose. 

In  unscholastic  phrase,  man  is  undone  by  his  ignorance  and  de- 
pravity. God  comes  across  the  boundaries  of  his  knowledge  and 
brings  him,  by  means  of  successive  theophanies  and  inspirations, 
a  sufficient  body  of  truths  to  serve  his  religious  needs.  But  man 
needs  power  as  well  as  knowledge;  this  he  receives  as  the  sequel 
of  a  course  of  Divine  activity — an  activity  which  clears  the  Divine 
docket  and  frees  man  from  all  liability  thereunder.  Upon  the  basis 
of  this,  God  enters  the  individual  soul  directly,  and  by  repeated 
contacts  infuses  power.  This  impartation  is,  however,  conditioned 
by,  or  the  occasion  of,  a  reciprocal  activity  of  faith  and  obedience. 

It  is  clear  that  a  theory  of  religious  knowledge  cannot  have  the 
same  significance  where  the  idea  of  revelation  is  taken  seriously 
that  it  has  where  the  contrary  is  true. 

»Cf.  Hodge,   Systematic  Theology,  Vol.   I,  p.   191  f. 

2 Christian  View,  p.   64.  sUt  supra,  p.  92  f. 

59 


60  THE  BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

The  Ritschlian  theology  adopts  the  distinction  between  theoretical 
and  practical  knowledge — a  distinction  which  goes  back  to  Schleier- 
macher,  as  has  already  been  indicated.  But  it  encounters  the  dan- 
ger, on  the  one  hand,  of  making  all  Christian  doctrine  purely  sub- 
jective and  thus  reducing  Christianity  to  mere  natural  religious  senti- 
ment; and,  on  the  other  hand,  the  danger  of  over-elaborating  the 
speculative  element,  as  the  mediating  theology  does.  In  order  to 
steer  a  straight  course,  Ritschlianism  strongly  affirms  an  objective 
revelation  in  the  historical  Christ,  while  at  the  same  time  making 
all  religious  knowledge  of  a  practical  character.  This  emphasis 
upon  the  practical  character  of  religious  knowledge  intends  merely 
to  recognize  that  proof  cannot  mean  in  theology  what  it  does  in 
natural  science,  but  that  in  theology  knowledge  must  be  a  matter 
of  personal  conviction  growing  out  of  individual  experience.1 

Herrmann,  as  we  have  seen,  is  careful  to  guard  this  practical 
character  of  religious  knowledge  from  the  implications  of  mysticism. 
God  is  a  reality  to  us  only  when  through  our  own  experiences  we 
feel  ourselves  to  acknowledge  him  as  real.  Herrmann's  second 
objective  ground  of  certainty  is  very  significant — viz.,  the  fact  that 
we  have  within  us  the  demand  of  the  moral  law.  Ritschl  found 
here  what  he  felt  to  be  the  most  impressive  argument  for  the  exist- 
ence of  God.  At  the  same  time,  he  came  to  feel  that  all  theoretic 
proofs  are  inadequate,  and  stated  that  the  acceptance  of  the  idea 
of  God  is,  as  Kant  declared,  a  practical  belief,  and  not  an  act  of 
theoretic  knowledge.  Herrmann,  likewise,  goes  back  to  Kant,  when 
he  declares  that  the  Christian  idea  of  God  is  but  a  function  of  the 
moral  spirit,  which  seeks  and  experiences  in  it  a  freedom  from  guilt 
and  evil.2 

But  Herrmann's  second  objective  basis  of  certainty  demands  the 
mediation  of  the  first,  the  historical  Jesus.  In  him  we  meet  with 
a  fact  which  makes  us  able  to  justify  at  the  bar  of  reason  and  con- 
science our  conviction  that  we  are  in  communion  with  God.  We 
might  be  aware,  even  apart  from  Christ,  of  our  dependence  upon 
an  infinite  Power,  but  we  could  never  reach  certainty  that  this 
Power  is  the  Will  of  the  gracious  God.  Jesus  so  interprets  to  us 
the  love  of  God  that  he  turns  our  rebellion  and  despair  into  humility 
and  consolation.* 


1Mozley,    Ritschlianism,   p.    110. 
2Metaphysik   der  Theologie,  p.    17. 
•Communion  with  God,  pp.   277,  289. 


60 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  61 

Kaftan  does  not  separate  the  sphere  of  Christian  thought  so 
widely  from  that  of  rational  knowledge.1  At  the  same  time,  he 
holds  that  it  is  only  by  looking  at  the  practical  side  that  we  can 
discover  what  is  real,  and  in  some  sense  objective.2  The  genius 
of  Kant  is  revealed  in  his  going  back  to  the  idea  of  the  chief  good ; 
that  idea  alone  is  fitted  to  serve  as  the  basis  of  a  practical  philosophy. 
The  chief  good  must  secure  perfect  satisfaction  for  the  soul ;  but 
there  is  no  such  chief  good  in  the  world.  (Truth  of  the  Christian 
Religion,  II,  328,  329.)  The  Christian  idea  of  the  Kingdom  of  God 
is  the  rational  idea  of  the  chief  good,  a  postulate  of  reason  (pp. 
378-380).  This  expression  postulate  of  reason  is  borrowed  from 
Kant,  who  described  the  existence  of  God  and  the  immortality  of 
the  human  soul  as  postulates  of  practical  reason.  But  the  distinc- 
tion between  theoretical  and  practical  reason  is  not  to  be  retained, 
because  reason  is  always  practical  in  one  aspect  of  it.  Starting  from 
knowledge  determined  by  the  interposition  of  reason,  the  way  to 
the  highest  knowledge  must  be  sought.  At  the  same  time,  a  funda- 
mental leaning  upon  Kant  is  acknowledged  (p.  381). 

But  Kant  does  not  go  beyond  the  postulate  as  such.  If  we  are 
not  to  stop  there,  says  Kaftan,  the  eternal  Kingdom  of  God  must 
have  been  made  known  in  history,  by  a  divine  revelation  (pp.  381, 
382).  Thus  it  comes  about  that  the  postulate  of  a  supermundane 
Kingdom  of  God  at  the  goal  of  human  history  is  simply  the  postulate 
of  a  special  revelation  of  that  Kingdom  in  history.  Thus  reason 
and  revelation  meet  in  the  conception  of  the  chief  good  (p.  386). 
But  a  theory  of  knowledge  alone  can  take  us  no  farther  than  the 
human,  finite,  relative :  only  an  idealistic  philosophy  which  finds  the 
key  to  the  world's  interpretation  in  the  spiritual  content  of  life  can 
here  avail ;  and  it  will  lead  us  to  God  by  the  path  of  moral  activity. 
Even  so,  man  can  realize  the  ethical  ideal  and  hold  fast  the  theo- 
retical faith  in  God  only  by  means  of  the  faith  reposed  in  the  Chris- 
tian revelation  (p.  422  f).  Thus  Kaftan's  somewhat  more  elaborate 
theory  of  knowledge  finds  supplementation  in  revelation,  somewhat 
as  Herrmann's  did.  And  the  sort  of  knowledge  at  which  one  arrives 
is  practical  religious  knowledge,  not  theoretical  scientific  knowledge. 

The  Modern  Positive  theologian  takes  a  somewhat  different  course. 
Seeberg  admits  that  the  idea  of  God  as  innate  is  as  great  a  figment 

1Ci.   Truth   of  the  Christian  Religion,   p.    11. 
2Ut  supra,   p.    176. 

61 


62  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

as,  for  example,  that  of  innate  right  (Fundamental  Truths,  p.  4). 
At  the  same  time,  the  thought  of  God  is  universal;  man  cannot 
have  produced  it,  nor  can  he  have  arrived  at  it  by  the  process  of 
induction;  it  is  given  him  from  without  (p.  10).  All  judgments 
as  to  the  objective  are,  however,  subjectively  based;  the  content  is 
from  without,  the  cognition  from  v/ithin.  The  content  is  made  up 
of  conceptions  and  perceptions  which  belong  to  history;  God  has 
revealed  himself  historically  (p.  69).  Only  he  who  already  has  the 
thought  of  God  understands  the  language  of  nature  in  a  religious 
sense.  A  knowledge  of  God  presupposes  a  revelation ;  God's  doings 
are  his  revelation  (p.  138).  At  Christianity's  beginning,  the  deeds 
and  words  by  which  God  became  manifest,  entered  into  history  in 
Jesus  Christ,  and  live  on  in  the  church.  But  heaven  was  not  rent 
asunder,  nor  does  a  supernatural  nature  stream  by  holy  magic  into 
us.  Nothing  happens  in  the  soul  which  is  not  through  the  soul 
(p.  292). 

Forsyth  does  not  take  so  much  time  showing  that  his  supernat- 
uralism  is  perfectly  natural.  He  frankly  says  that  there  is  a  knowl- 
edge by  faith  which  is  as  sound  of  its  kind  as  is  the  knowledge  by 
experience,  by  science,  and  it  is  much  superior  and  more  momentous. 
The  preacher  must  be  sure  of  a  kind  of  knowledge  which  creates 
experience;  his  message  reports  a  world  beyond  experience.1  In 
these  positions  Forsyth  displays  diverse  tendencies;  he  is  strongly 
influenced  by  the  Ritschlian  differentiation  between  religious  and 
scientific  knowledge.  On  the  other  hand,  he  is  too  much  interested 
in  the  realm  beyond  experience,  believing  as  he  does  that  the  preacher 
must  dogmatize  about  the  whole  of  it,  to  follow  out  the  Ritschlian 
suggestion.2  His  great  divergence  from  the  Ritschlian  position  is 
in  relation  to  the  content  of  revelation;  here  he  discovers  a  con- 
siderable body  of  truths.  This  is  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  he  main- 
tains the  necessity  of  recognizing  the  distinction  between  theoretical 
and  practical  knowledge,  and  of  falling  in  with  the  modern  stress 
upon  the  latter.* 

With  Beth  we  discover,  as  has  already  been  pointed  out,  the 
Ritschlian  distinction  between  theoretical  and  practical  knowledge. 
That  sort  of  knowledge  which  experience  yields  us,  that  is  to  say, 
our  religious  experience,  is  not  capable  of  any  scientific  or  theo- 

1  Positive  Preaching  and  the  Modern  Mind,  p.    200   f. 
2Ut  supra,  p.  200. 
•Ut  supra,  p.  204. 

62 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  63 

retical  validation,  indeed  does  not  need  any  such  validation.  At  the 
same  time,  Beth  holds  to  the  necessity  of  recognizing  theoretic  or 
scientific  knowledge  in  theology;  that  sort  of  knowledge,  the  kind 
of  which  apologetic  makes  use,  must  ground  itself  in  the  modern 
world-view  and  validate  itself  to  the  modern  mind.  However,  as- 
surance rests  upon  religious  knowledge,  that  is,  the  personal  con- 
viction which  faith  engenders  in  experience  can  be  gained  in  no 
other  way.  Religious  knowledge  is  conditioned  simply  in  this  prac- 
tical way :  it  completes  itself  in  a  process  which  acknowledges  the 
primacy  of  the  practical  reason.1 

When  we  pass  to  the  sphere  of  theoretical  knowledge,  where  scien- 
tific theology  must  ground  itself,  we  discover  Beth's  position  to  be 
that  a  criticism  of  experience  yields  us  ultimate  reality,  that  we 
know  real  objects,  we  know  God ;  a  position  akin  to  that  of  Troeltsch. 

Troeltsch  says  that  the  most  such  an  inquiry  into  the  validity  of 
religious  ideas  as  is  proposed  by  the  theory  of  religious  knowledge 
can  yield  is  testimony  to  an  a  priori  law  of  the  formation  of  relig- 
ious ideas.  That  law  lies  in  the  nature  of  reason ;  and  the  religious 
Apriori  stands  in  organic  relation  to  the  other  Aprioris  of  reason. 
The  existence  of  such  a  religious  Apriori  does  not  immediately 
guarantee  the  existence  of  the  religious  Object  as  such,  however. 
It  validates  only  the  actual  content  of  consciousness,  and  offers  no 
basis  for  existential  judgments.2 

Very  important  is  the  question  concerning  the  origin  and  content 
of  the  religious  Apriori.  In  the  nature  of  reason,  all  values  are 
referred  to  an  absolute  Substance  as  source  and  norm.3  Among  the 
other  Aprioris  the  ethical  appears  next  after  the  religious,  and  the 
logical  and  aesthetic  follow  it  closely.  Consequently,  if  the  relig- 
ious Apriori  harmonizes  with  the  ethical,  logical,  and  aesthetic,  we 
gain  a  further  criterion  of  its  validity. 

Die  Giiltigkeit  einer  religiosen  Idee  kann  groszer  oder  geringer  sein,  je 
nachdem  sie  die  Harmonie  des  Bewusztseins  sich  einfiigt  oder  etwa  gar  die 
Fiihring  in  dieser  Harmonizierung  iibernimmt.  So  ergibt  sich  von  hier  aus 
auch  eine  innere  Beweglichkeit  des  Gultigkeitskriteriums,  das  dem  verschie- 
denen  Masz  von  Giiltigkeit  verschiedener  Religions formen  gerecht  werden 
kann.4 

1B€th,   Die  Moderne  u.   s.   w.,  p.   257. 
2Kultur  der  Gegenwart,   II,  p.  485. 
sUt   supra,   II,   p.   486. 
4Ut  supra,  II,  p.  486. 

63 


64  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

The  religious  Apriori  is  the  idea  of  God.  In  another  connection, 
Troeltsch  says  that  the  idea  of  God  is  not  gained  from  Jesus,  nor 
is  it  attained  through  deductive  metaphysics ;  it  yields  itself  with 
the  metaphysical  Aposterioris  which  arise  from  the  revision  and 
unifying  of  experience  into  final  notions  (letzten  Begriffen).  At 
the  same  time,  the  religious  value  of  the  God-idea  is  realized  for  us 
through  Jesus.1  A  metaphysics  of  religion  Troeltsch  regard's  as 
indispensable. 

Eine  streng  erkenntnistheoretisch-angelegte  Philosophic  wird,  wenn  sie  nicht 
in  Psychologismus  und  Skepsis  stecken  bleiben  will,  in  ihren  Begriffen  der 
Gultigkeit  und  der  "Vernunft  iiberhaupt"  immer  die  Ansatze  zu  einer  solchen 
Mataphysik  enthalten,  bei  der  nur  die  Frage  ist,  wie  weit  sie  fiihren  kann.2 

It  is  not  enough  to  reach  the  God-idea  by  the  road  of  religious 
faith ;  it  must  be  grounded  in  the  reality  of  a  transcendent  world- 
Reason  in  which  the  values  of  the  spiritual  life  of  man  find  their 
common  anchorage.3 

For  Conservative  Orthodoxy,  Ritschlianism,  and  Modern  Pos- 
itivism, in  one  way  or  another,  the  God-idea  is  confirmed  and  vali- 
dated by  revelation.  However  far  the  postulates  of  the  practical 
reason,  or  of  reason  in  general — whether  theoretical  or  practical — 
may  carry  us,  the  God  whom  we  know  is  made  known  to  us  through 
revelation.  To  be  sure,  what  we  gain  is,  on  the  one  hand,  held  to 
be  a  body  of  truths  about  God,  while  on  the  other  it  is  the  personal 
attitude  and  impress  of  God  himself  which  revelation  yields ;  in 
either  case,  however,  revelation  is  indispensable.  The  Religions- 
geschichtliche  group  make  no  such  fundamental  and  constructive 
use  of  the  concept  of  revelation.  Indeed,  as  we  shall  see,  revela- 
tion in  the  only  sense  in  which  they  recognize  it  at  all  is  quite  another 
thing  than  the  conventional. 

2.     The  Conception  of  Science  and  Reality. 

Conservative  Orthodoxy  has  a  sense  of  the  perils  involved  in  any 
thorough-going  acceptance  of  the  scientific-developmental  view,  and 
usually  insists  upon  rejecting  the  hypothesis  of  genetic  continuity 
with  which  science  works,  or  upon  some  modification  such  as  totally 
remakes  the  hypothesis.     Dr.  Orr  very  frankly  says : 

It  need  not  further  be  denied  that  between  this  view  of  the  world  involved 
in  Christianity,  and  what  is  sometimes  termed  the  "modern  view  of  the  world," 
there  exists  a  deep  and  radical  antagonism.     .     .      .     The  phrase  ("modern 

1Absolutheit  des  Christentums,  p.  xiv. 

2Kultur  der  Gegenwart,  II,  p.  487. 

8Cf.  Diehl,  Zeitsdhrifit  fur  T,  u.  K.,  1908,  p.  474  f. 

64 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  65 

world-view")  points  to  a  homogeneity  of  these  various  modern  systems 
.  .  .  their  refusal  to  recognize  anything  in  nature,  life  or  history,  outside 
the  lines  of  natural  development.1 

His  Note  D  on  Lecture  I  of  the  above  series  makes  the  scope  of 
the  scientific  claim  coextensive  with  the  aspiration  of  Mr.  Spencer's 
Synthetic  Philosophy.  Science  is  somewhat  darkly  pictured  in  the 
terms  of  Mr.  Huxley  as  engaged  in  "the  extension  of  the  province 
of  what  we  call  matter  and  causation,  and  the  concomitant  banish- 
ment from  all  regions  of  human  thought  of  what  we  call  spirit  and 
spontaneity."2  If  one  take  this  view,  instead  of  holding  that  science 
is  engaged  in  a  progressive  comprehension  of  reality  and  the  con- 
comitant elaboration  of  a  technique  by  means  of  which  the  highest 
human  values  may  be  achieved  and  conserved,  then  the  picture  may 
well  seem  dark. 

The  view  of  reality  to  which  the  ordinary  Conservative  Orthodox 
view  of  science  above  indicated  is  related  is  a  plain  dualism,  the 
belief  in  two  realms  of  existence — the  natural  and  the  supernatural 
— over  against  each  other  and  impinging  upon  each  other.  The 
issue  between  the  conservative  and  the  liberal  camps  is,  in  another 
definition  of  it,  just  that  of  the  supernatural. 

The  question  is  not  about  isolated  miracles,  but  about  the  whole  concep- 
tion of  Christianity — what  it  is,  and  whether  the  supernatural  does  not  enter 
into  the  very  essence  of  it?  It  is  the  general  question  of  a  supernatural  or 
non-supernatural  conception  of  the  universe.8 

To  the  Ritschlian,  especially  one  of  Herrmann's  type,  science  and 
religion  exist  side  by  side  as  separate  realms  of  knowledge.  Religion 
is  the  personal  and  individual  method  of  ordering  and  interpreting 
reality ;  science  deals  with  the  realm  of  demonstrable  and  universally 
valid  knowledge.    Both  of  these  branches  of  human  thought, 

the  normative  and  peculiar  life  of  selfhood,  the  demonstrable  and  experi- 
encable  reality,  one  must  hold  valid  as  the  two  interlaced  and  yet  widely 
distinguishable  forms  of  our  thought.  They  are  the  revelations  to  us  of  a 
hidden  whole.4 

In  keeping  with  this  view,  Herrmann  holds  that  nature  is  not  inde- 
pendent of  the  directing  and  even  altering  Divine  hand. 

Essential  to  this  view  of  the  separate  provinces  of  religion  and 
science  is  a  dualism  very  like  that  which  underlies  the  Conservative 
Orthodoxy.     Herrmann  argues  for  it  that  while  the  ardor  of  the 

1  Christian   View,   p.    10. 

aUt  supra,  p.   167. 

3Ut  supra,  p.   11. 

♦Zeitschr.   fur  T.   u.    K.,    1907,   p.    197   f. 

65 


66  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

scientist  may  impel  him  to  try  to  circumscribe  by  his  method  all  that 
he  conceives  as  reality,  yet  that  realm  of  reality  mocks  at  his  ardor. 
The  world  in  which  we  actually  live  is  quite  another  from  that 
which  the  scientists  shape  with  their  concepts.1 

Kaftan  says  that  science  aims  at  the  extension  and  correction  of 
our  common  knowledge ;  but  that  its  explanation  of  reality  does  not 
carry  us  beyond  the  knowledge  of  what  is  actually  given,  and  does 
not  give  us  the  "why"  and  the  "wherefore"  at  all.  Even  the  laws 
themselves  are  nothing  but  an  expression  for  the  actual  organiza- 
tion of  our  knowledge  given  us  by  scientific  technique.2  We  look 
in  totally  different  quarters  when  engaged  with  the  real  world  ex- 
tending in  space  and  time,  and  when  asking  the  cause  and  purpose 
of  the  world.3  Thus  religion  has  a  peculiar  province  of  its  own: 
the  meaning  and  value  side  of  reality.  But  religion  can  never  per- 
form this  function  without  the  aid  of  revelation.  There  is  a  super- 
mundane Kingdom  of  God,  and  a  special  revelation  of  that  King- 
dom in  history.4 

The  Modern  Positive  group  endeavors  to  meet  the  demand  of 
science  somewhat  variously.  Seeberg  holds  that  the  religious-his- 
torical development  is  not  purely  immanent,  but  is  conditioned  by 
transcendent  factors.  He  holds  that  the  naturalism  of  the  evolution 
theory  will  never  satisfy  the  human  soul.5  He  speaks  of  "the  iron 
laws  of  the  evolution  of  the  world"  as  over  against  the  free  develop- 
ment of  the  human  spirit.  The  order  of  nature  does  not,  however, 
stand  opposed  to  man  as  an  enemy ;  it  represents  simply  "the  columns 
and  chains  which  His  power  builds  in  the  world."  There  is  no 
motion  of  nature  nor  movement  of  the  human  soul  which  God  does 
not  work.  The  Christian  religion  changes  the  mechanical  causal 
order  into  a  spiritual  causal  order,  or  dependence  upon  nature  to 
dependence  upon  God.6  At  the  same  time,  nothing  willed  or  accom- 
plished  by  God  in  human  history  is  unnatural,  since  God  himself 
created  human  nature  as  the  organ  of  his  will.7 

From  Seeberg's  point  of  view,  Christian  theology  is  not  to  be 
isolated  from  the  rest  of  our  knowledge;  it  must  be  articulated 
with  the  rest  of  our  scientific  and  objective  knowledge.     Forsyth 

1Ut  supra. 

2Truth   of  the   Christian   Religion,   pp.    72,    114. 

8Ut  supra,  p.   150. 

*Ut  supra,   p.  395. 

5 Fundamental  Truths,  p.  63. 

6Ut  supra,  p.   165. 

7Ut  supra,  p.  267. 

66 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  67 

is  more  conservative  than  Seeberg,  and — while  holding  that  Jesus 
was  "grafted  into  the  great  psychology  of  the  race" — objects  to  the 
modern  theory  of  evolution,  and  to  the  liberal  theology  which  is 
interested  in  cosmology  and  not  in  redemption.1  He  explains  that 
he  has  no  quarrel  with  evolution  until,  from  being  a  method,  it  is 
treated  as  vera  causa,  serving  to  explain  not  simply  the  mode  of 
change,  but  the  principle  of  change.  Evolution  must  escape  from 
its  bondage  to  the  physical  sciences  and  its  mesalliance  with  monistic 
dogma,  and  then  it  may  well  serve  the  ends  of  the  Christian  church. 
With  both  Seeberg  and  Forsyth  there  is  the  postulate  of  an  ultimate 
dualism  of  world-view;  and  the  endeavor  to  harmonize  the  claims 
of  the  Christian  religion  with  the  claims  of  modern  thought  has,  at 
the  hands  of  both,  constant  recourse  to  this  postulate.  But  science 
receives  rather  short  shrift  at  the  hands  of  Forsyth;  he  is  interested 
in  the  realities  of  another  world. 

The  interest  which  Beth  has  in  science  is  not  essentially  different 
from  that  of  Seeberg,  the  apologetic  interest,  the  endeavor  to  justify 
Christianity  in  the  eyes  of  the  modern  world.  But  Beth  makes  a 
rather  more  specific  use  of  certain  aspects  of  science,  particularly 
the  chemical  and  the  biological,  in  order  to  show  that  the  scientific 
theory  of  evolution  is  distinctly  friendly  to  Christian  supernatural- 
ism.  This  resembles  a  much  more  strenuous  procedure  of  the  same 
sort  by  Griitzmacher,  which  puts  a  construction  upon  science  that 
the  scientist  could  not  accept,  and  alters  the  concept  of  revelation 
to  such  an  extent  that  the  only  other  school  of  theologians  who 
make  large  use  of  it — the  Conservative  Orthodox — would  not  recog- 
nize it.  Beth  is  not  a  mediator  in  any  such  sense,  but  in  his  use  of 
science  he  is  an  apologist. 

A  fundamentally  different  attitude  toward  science  is  assumed  by 
the  Religions geschichtliche  school.  There  is  no  attempt  to  wrest 
the  postulates  of  science  into  conformity  with  the  demands  or  pre- 
suppositions of  the  Christian  faith.  It  is  proposed  in  earnest  to 
proceed  scientifically.  The  change  in  world-view  which  the  progress 
of  science  has  brought  about  is  frankly  acknowledged.  History  and 
the  phenomenal  order  can  afford  us  no  absolutes ;  it  is  impossible 
longer  to  take  a  single  generation,  or  a  single  individual,  as  absolute 
norm,  over  against  all  time  and  all  cycles  of  spiritual  existence.  The 
age  of  the  anthropocentric  and  geocentric  has  passed.2     In  harmony 


1Positive  Preaching,  p.   239. 

2Die  Wissenschaftliche  Lage,  p.   53  f. 


67 


68  THE    BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

with  the  unity  of  reality  postulated  by  science,  Christianity  must  be 
studied  along  with  other  religions  by  the  aid  of  the  science  of  Com- 
parative Religions.  This  science  approaches  the  matter  of  the  es- 
sence of  religion  by  resolving  the  issue  into  four  problems :  psychol- 
ogy of  religion,  theory  of  religious  knowledge,  philosophy  of  relig- 
ious history,  and  the  metaphysics  of  religion.  Christianity  must  be 
submitted  to  the  same  tests  which  are  imposed  upon  the  religious 
phenomena  of  all  other  faiths,  and  must  stand  upon  whatever  merit 
the  process  reveals.  The  scientific  study  of  religions,  ending  with 
a  religious  metaphysics,  transforms  the  religious  God-idea  and  brings 
it  into  harmony  with  the  modern  scientific  world-view.1  So  much 
for  the  general  view  of  Troeltsch. 

Bousset  inclines  somewhat  to  the  Ritschlian  distinction  between 
science  and  religion  as  distinct  provinces,  limiting  science  to  the 
physical  and  material  universe.  Religion,  on  the  other  hand,  is  con- 
cerned with  the  meaning  and  value  side  of  existence.2  Religious 
ideas  are  not  scientific  theorems,  deducible  and  provable ;  they  are 
final  truths.  Science  relies  upon  what  can  be  measured,  counted, 
weighed : 

letzte  Wirklichkeit  ist  fur  sie  Substanz,  das  in  Raum  und  Zeit  Beharrende, 
der  Geist  kann  vor  ihrem  Forum  hochstens  als  Akzidenz  erscheinen — Re- 
ligion geht  auf  letzte  schopferische  Ursachlichkeit  der  Freiheit,  die  Wissen- 
schaft  laszt  uns  stecken  in  der  endlosen  Kette  der  Kausalitat.8 

Bousset  proposes  to  break  with  all  historic  supernaturalism.  At 
the  same  time,  religious  ideas  are  even  somewhat  antagonistic  to 
science,  and  they  far  surpass  its  province. 

Fiir  den,  der  Wissenschaft  und  Erkenntnis  der  Welt-Wirklichkeit  in  eins 
setzt,  gilt  Religion  iiberhaupt  nicht  und  kann  nicht  gelten.  Vielmehr  musz 
gegen  den  Versuch  wissenschaftlicher  Alleinherrschaft  das  Urvermogen  und 
tieftste  Empfinden  unserer  Gesamt- Vermin  ft  zu  Hilfe  gerufen  werden,  vor 
deren  Forum  dann  die  wissenshaftliche  Weltanschauung  ihrer  Beschrankt- 
heit  und  Bedingtheit  erscheint* 

There  is  thus  a  wide  range  of  view  in  the  handling  of  the  concep- 
tions of  science  and  reality  by  the  four  groups  of  theologians  under 
review.  Conservative  Orthodoxy  and  the  Ritschlians  quite  generally 
hold  a  rather  rigid  conventional  notion  of  science,  are  inclined  to 
attribute  to  it  a  somewhat  mechanical  notion  of  law ;  the  Ritschlians 
of  Herrmann's  type  yield  it  in  addition  the  function  of  producing 

"Cfc   Troeltsch,   Kultur  der  Gegenwart,   II,  p.   461   f. 
2Funfter  Welkongress :   Protokoll,  p.   300. 
3Ut  supra,  p.   301. 
*Ut  supra,  p.   301. 

68 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  69 

demonstrable  knowledge.  The  Modern  Positives  seize  upon  the 
main  postulate  of  science — that  of  continuous  process — and  seek 
either  to  effect  a  harmony  of  science  with  religion  through  a  modi- 
fication of  that  postulate,  or  to  show  that  upon  certain  terms  it  is 
possible  to  live  with  the  idea  and  at  the  same  time  retain  the  notion 
of  a  revealed  religion.  The  school  of  Comparative  Religions  means 
to  take  science  as  just  what  it  is,  to  make  earnest  with  its  claims 
upon  religion,  and  to  secure  thereby  a  reading  of  the  fundamental 
religious  phenomena  native  to  the  human  race  which  shall  be  truly 
scientific.  These  men  have  come  closer  than  the  representatives 
of  any  other  group  to  the  modern  conception  of  science  as  a  tech- 
nique for  the  mastery  of  reality  and  not  a  mere  apparatus  for  know- 
ing ;  as  a  method  which  proceeds  by  the  use  of  postulates,  but  which 
knows  nothing  whatever  about  "iron  laws."  However,  this  is  not 
quite  the  notion  of  Troeltsch  even,  though  he  makes  the  nearest 
approach  to  it. 

The  general  conception  of  reality  held  by  these  four  groups  is 
dualistic;  there  is  another  world  of  the  permanent  and  perfect  over 
against  this  transient  finite  world.  All  but  the  Comparative  Relig- 
ionists are  willing  to  call  it  the  supernatural ;  they  are  not,  they  will 
not  admit  Jesus  to  it ;  but  God  dwells  there,  thus  making  it  the  goal 
of  our  hope.  It  is  that  from  which  and  unto  which  the  process 
proceeds — the  realm  of  the  Absolute. 

3.     The  Idea  of  History. 

It  will  not  be  necessary  to  dwell  at  length  upon  the  idea  of  history 
cherished  by  Conservative  Orthodoxy.  There  is  a  divine  plan  of 
the  world,  and  history  is  merely  the  unfolding  of  that  plan.  That 
plan  provides  for  a  natural  unfoldment  and  for  supernatural  inter- 
ventions at  crucial  points — interventions  which  lift  life  to  a  higher 
plane  and  eventually  alter  the  whole  course  of  history.  God  chose 
to  create  a  universe  into  which  it  was  seen  that  sin  would  enter; 
the  Incarnation  was  a  part  of  that  plan,  indeed  the  very  pivot  of  it ; 
"creation  itself  is  built  upon  redemption  lines."1  This  is  the  con- 
ventional view. 

The  Ritschlian  idea  of  history  and  its  function  is  wholly  different. 
It  is  only  out  of  life  in  history  that  God  can  come  to  us,  Herrmann 
declares.     Just  in  proportion  as  the  essential  elements  in  our  his- 

^rr,  Christian  View,  p.   323. 


70  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

torical  environment  become  elements  in  our  consciousness  are  we 
led  into  the  presence  of  those  facts  which  reveal  God  to  us.1     Now 
Jesus  is  the  historical  fact  by  which  God  communes  with  us.     The 
question  how  a  tradition  subject  to  historical  criticism  can  yield  any 
certain  content  is  dealt  with  by  asserting  that  those  elements  which 
abide  are  just  the  more  general  features  of  Jesus'  life  which  all  hold 
to  be  correct.    This  portrait  is  a  part  of  the  historical  reality  amid 
which  we  live,  and  this  makes  us  independent  of  the  authority  of 
the  chroniclers.2     Repose  upon  the  work  of  the  historian  is  a  false 
repose.     All  are  willing  to*  admit  that  Jesus  really  appeared  in  the 
world  in  which  we  live.    This  historical  fact  of  the  person  of  Jesus, 
mediated  to  us  by  the  Christian  community,  is  the  great  basis  of 
our  Christian  certainty.8     It  is  quite  apparent  that  this  view  is  tied 
up  very  intimately  with  history.     If  the  historicity  of  Jesus  were 
disproven,  Ritschlianism  would  lose  its  platform,  its  basis  of  assur- 
ance.    Conservative  Orthodoxy  on  principle  sets  limits  to  the  prov- 
ince of  historical  criticism,  Ritschlianism  does  not  profess  to  do  so, 
but  as  a  matter  of  fact  must  if  it  would  tie  us  up  to  history  as  exclu- 
sively as  Herrmann  does.     Harnack  sees  the  point,  and  asks  the 
question  whether  it  is  possible  to  pick  out  a  single  phenomenon  and 
saddle  it  with  the  whole  weight  of  eternity,  especially  when  that 
phenomenon  is  past.4     But  in  his  answer  he  shows  much  the  same 
view  of  things  manifested  by  Herrmann,  declaring  that  in  history 
we  have  received  all  that  we  possess.    Even  though  all  history  is  a 
record  of  development,  it  does  not  have  to  be  understood  as  a  proc- 
ess  of  mechanical  change;   personality  brings   about  development, 
great  personalities  in  particular.     The  fact  of  Jesus  lies  open  to  the 
light  of  day  upon  the  page  of  history,  and  it  requires  that  he  be 
honored  as  unique.5     He  stands  at  the  end  of  the  series  of  messen- 
gers and  prophets ;  all  live  on  him  and  through  him.     But  alas  for 
us  if  our  faith  were  based  upon  a  number  of  details  established  by 
the  historian;  no  historian  has  ever  attained  such  a  goal.     At  the 
same  time,  the  spiritual  purport  of  the  life  of  Jesus  is  an  historical 
fact,  and  it  has  reality  in  the  effect  which  it  produces ;  this  is  the 
link  which  binds  us  to  Jesus.6 

1  Communion   with'   God,   p.    65. 

2Ut  supra,  p.  70. 

3Ut  supra,  p.   102. 

4  Christianity  and   History,   p.    18. 

°Ut  supra,  pp.  37,  38. 

•Ut  supra,  pp.  60-62. 

70 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  71 

When  we  pass  to  the  Modern  Positive  view,  we  find  a  large  em- 
phasis upon  the  historical,  due  in  part  to  the  Ritschlian  influence. 
Seeberg  says  that  God  has  revealed  himself  historically  in  words 
and  actions ;  and  that  even  today  we  experience  him  thus.  Yet 
Christ  does  not  speak  to  us  today  in  other  or  new  terms  as  opposed 
to  his  revelation.1  It  will  not  do  to  hold  that  the  whole  historical 
evolution  of  mankind  affords  deeper  insight  into  the  nature  of  God 
than  is  afforded  by  the  one  human  life  of  Jesus.  For  the  God-will 
that  guides  human  history  to  a  redemptive  goal  entered  into  history 
in  Jesus,  and  in  his  words  and  deeds  worked  after  the  method  of 
history.2  When  we  become  Christians,  a  historical  form  arose 
before  our  souls,  and  from  it  there  came  to  us  the  power  of  a  per- 
sonal life,  an  almighty  Will  which  subdued  us.  Jesus  alone,  among 
all  the  figures  of  life,  constrains  us  to  faith  and  love.31 

Forsyth  is  less  mediating  in  his  statements.  He  declares  plainly 
that  Jesus  is  an  insert  into  history.  To  be  sure,  he  comes  before 
us  through  the  medium  of  the  Christian  community ;  but  redemption 
is  not  evolution,  nor  is  the  Kingdom  of  God  mere  spiritual  progress. 
We  have  a  superlogical  revelation  in  Christ's  historic  person.4  A 
theology  which  places  us  in  a  spiritual  process,  a  native  movement 
between  the  finite  and  the  infinite,  depreciates  the  value  of  the  spir- 
itual act,  and  makes  us  independent  of  the  grace  of  God.5  But  this 
is  not  to  be  thought  of.  The  course  of  religion  is  not  an  immanent 
evolution.  Mere  process  ends  in  mechanism;  that  real  unfolding — 
which  is  an  infinite  concursus — demands  a  focusing  in  an  act  to 
constitute  actual  revelation ;  for  such  a  power  cannot  adequately 
reveal  itself  dispersed  through  history.6 

Beth  would  join  the  Ritschlian  movement  for  independence  from 
the  dicta  of  mere  historical  inquiry  concerning  the  person  of  Jesus. 
Faith  cannot  base  itself  upon  any  great  historical  figure  whatever 
which  historical  inquiry  can  pass  judgment  upon.7  What  insignifi- 
cance, then,  can  Jesus  have  for  our  present-day  faith  ?  The  question 
can  never  be  answered  by  a  reference  to  all  the  possible  features  of 
Jesus,  but  only  through  maintaining  the  image  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment Jesus.     This  is  the  Jesus  who  has  actually  wrought  in  Chris- 

iTruths   of  the   Christian   Religion,   p.    100. 

2Ut  supra,  p.  222. 

3Ut  supra,  p.  241. 

4Positive    Preaching,    p.    122'. 

5Ut  supra,  p.   214. 

6Ut  supra,  p.  235. 

'Theol.   Rundschau,    1912,   p.   9. 

71 


72  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

tianity.  Now  if  Jesus  never  lived,  all  relation  of  faith  to  him  is 
impossible;  we  can  use  neither  the  "symbolic  Christ"  nor  the  "his- 
torical Jesus."  These  great  ideas  stand  or  fall  with  the  historicity 
of  Jesus.  It  would  be  all  over,  not  only  for  orthodox  Christianity, 
but  with  liberal  Christianity — as  Christianity — if  Jesus  never  lived.1 

The  Religionsgeschichtliche  theologians  have  a  very  definite  view 
of  history.  Its  enormous  extent  leads  them  to  conclude  the  impos- 
sibility of  making  any  cross-section  normative.  There  may  exist 
besides  Christianity  many  other  religious  connections  with  their 
own  prototypes  and  redeemers ;  in  some  milleniums  to  come  new 
and  great  forms  of  religion  may  arise.  This  would  leave  Jesus  a 
relative  function  as  center  of  the  European-Christian  world.  But 
truth  for  other  spheres  and  ages  would  not  be  bound  up  with  the 
person  of  Jesus,  although  for  us  it  is  so  related.2 

This  brings  us  to  the  question  of  the  historical  Jesus.  Troeltsch 
recognizes  the  difficulty  of  the  inquiry,  but  he  believes  that  it  will 
make  progress,  and  that  when  the  dust  has  cleared  away,  the  old 
portrait  of  Jesus  will  so  far  remain  that  he  will  continue  the  source 
and  power  of  Christianity.  This  will  be  the  case,  even  if  the  his- 
torian cease  to  describe  him  as  the  absolutely  central  personality, 
the  opening  of  a  new  stage  of  humanity,  or  as  sinless  and  relig- 
iously complete.* 

Bousset  also  recognizes  the  difficulty  of  the  historical  question, 
and  asks  whether  we  are  willing  to  base  our  religious  certainty  upon 
the  instability  of  it.  The  belief  of  the  Conservative  Orthodox  view, 
as  he  points  out,  stands  or  falls  with  the  reality  of  the  God-Man, 
Jesus.  But  the  historical  view,  he  maintains,  is  one-sided  and  im- 
possible. Historicism  is  always  confronted  by  the  unsolvable  prob- 
lem: What  are  the  essential  elements  in  the  portrait  of  Jesus;  was 
Jesus  an  eschatologist  or  not?  Doubtless  there  is  much  of  eternal 
value  in  the  teaching  of  Jesus,  but  historical  science  lacks  the  meas- 
ure and  the  means  of  pointing  out  these  elements  with  any  convinc- 
ing power.  One  might,  then,  abandon  the  attempt  at  a  detailed  por- 
trait, and  keep  in  mind  the  personal  impulse  which  went  out  from 
Jesus  and  lives  in  the  Christian  community ;  but  that  is  to  abandon 
the  historical  attempt.  Another  way  would  be  to  take  the  whole 
movement  of  history  as  a  progressive  unity  of  revelation,  eulminat- 

1Ut  supra,  p.  19  f. 

2Funfter   Weltkongress :     Protokoll,    p.    339  f. 

•Zeitschr.   fur   wissenschaftl.     Theol.,    Vol.    51,   p.    123. 

72 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  73 

ing  in  the  individual;  but,  even  so,  the  historical  investigation  of 
the  life  of  that  individual — Jesus — leads  to  uncertainty.  The  out- 
come of  it  is  that  history  points  beyond  itself  to  another  founda- 
tion for  certainty.  That  foundation  is  reason;  the  religious  con- 
sciousness must  attain  clearness  concerning  itself.  It  does  not  need 
the  authority  of  history,  but  is  itself  a  standard  by  which  we  meas- 
ure mere  historical  events,  and  so  also  the  eternal  elements  in  Jesus 
of  Nazareth.1  As  a  matter  of  fact,  we  have  and  hold  our  faith  in 
God  in  the  spiritual  communion  created  by  Jesus ;  He  stands  tower- 
ing high  above  all  other  teachers  favored  by  God,  as  every  eye  can 
see.2 

Very  briefly  summarized,  the  Ritschlian  view  bases  assurance 
fundamentally  upon  history,  but  upon  history  which  centers  in  an 
ineffable  activity  of  God  in  the  person  of  Jesus ;  Modern  Positivism 
and  Conservative  Orthodoxy  rest  fundamentally  upon  revelation, 
which,  however  interpreted,  is  an  insert  into  the  natural  unfoldment 
of  events ;  while  the  Religionsgeschichtliche  view  is  grounded  in  the 
adequacy  of  human  reason  for  the  interpretation  of  the  divine  mean- 
ing in  history  and  personal  life. 

4.     Revelation  and  the  Supernatural. 

The  discussion  of  this  topic  has  necessarily  been  anticipated  in 
part  in  the  preceding  sections.  In  consequence  it  need  not  occupy 
us  long  in  this  connection.  With  the  Conservative  Orthodox  rev- 
elation is  found  in  nature,  in  history — especially  that  of  Israel — 
in  predictive  prophecy,  in  miracle  as  the  intervention  of  God,  but 
supremely  in  the  Incarnation  of  the  Son  of  God  from  heaven,  who 
alone  can  work  redemption — the  final  end  of  all  revelation.  The 
record  of  this  series  of  special  manifestations  is  also  revelation, 
being  the  work  of  inspired  men,  and  affords  a  system  of  divine 
truth  not  otherwise  attainable.  This  system  of  truths  conferred  by 
divine  revelation  is   fundamental  with  Conservative  Orthodoxy. 

Ritschlianism  of  Herrmann's  type  finds  a  positive  vision  of  God  in 
the  historical  Jesus,  through  whom  God  seeks  communion  with  us. 
This  revelation  is  not  to  be  identified  with  any  content  of  doctrines. 
We  value  the  human  elements  of  Jesus  according  to  this  view;  yet 
Jesus  is  unique — unique  in  achievement  of  his  ideal  and  in  his 
consciousness  of  being  humanity's  sole  Redeemer.    In  a  word,  how- 

1Funfter  Weltkongress :      Protokoll,  o.   295  f. 
2 Faith  of  a  Modern  Protestant,  p.   118  f. 

73 


74  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

ever  human  we  find  Jesus,  we  cannot  avoid  the  impression  that  in 
him  God  is  speaking  to  us.  This  revelation  is  a  special  divine 
activity,  limited  in  time,  positive,  sufficient,  final;  and  it  is  mediated 
to  us  through  the  Bible  and  the  Christian  community.1  Kaftan 
likewise  views  the  revelation  of  God  in  Christ  as  an  interposition 
of  God  in  human  history.2  He  argues  at  great  length  in  his  Truth 
of  the  Christian  Religion  to  show  that  the  Christian  idea  of  revela- 
tion is  perfectly  rational;  reason  and  revelation  meet  in  the  same 
conception  of  the  chief  good.  Both  Herrmann  and  Kaftan  distin- 
guish the  Scriptures  from  the  revelation  enclosed  therein.  Neither 
their  narratives  nor  their  doctrines  are  to  be  unquestionably  ac- 
cepted as  true ;  the  revelation  is  Jesus  Christ,  and  the  Scriptures  are 
simply  an  intermediary  between  him  and  the  faith  of  later  genera- 
tions.8 

To  the  Modern  Positive  theologians  revelation  is  by  action  rather 
than  in  any  sum  of  revealed  truths.  Yet  the  Modern  Positive  feels 
the  need  of  maintaining  certain  truths  which  are  certified  in  the 
revelation,  such  truths  as  the  supernatural  origin  and  resurrection 
of  Jesus,  his  deity  and  atoning  death.  These  are  considered  essen- 
tial by  Forsyth,  and,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  by  Seeberg  and  Beth  as 
well.  With  Seeberg,  Christ  is  God's  action,  or  God  in  action;  He 
is  thus  the  revelation.  Forsyth  singles  out  the  Cross  as  focusing 
the  redemptive  function  of  Christ ;  redemption  is  revelation,  and 
revelation  is  redemption.  Seeberg  states  the  matter  of  atonement 
in  other  terms — as  the  culmination  of  a  redemptive  career.  Both 
Seeberg  and  Forsyth  believe  in  miracle,  but  neither  makes  a  con- 
structive use  of  it.4  Seeberg  declares  Christ  both  God  and  man. 
Forsyth  sees  in  him  God  the  Son,  a  superlogical  revelation.8 

Both  Forsyth  and  Seeberg  distinguish  the  revelation  from  the 
Bible.     Forsyth  says: 

The  word  of  God  is  the  Gospel  which  is  in  the  Bible,  but  it  is  not  identical 
with  the  Bible.  .  .  .  Revelation's  compass  is  very  small,  smaller  than  the 
Bible;  simply  the  message  of  the  Christ  living  on  earth,  dying,  risen,  and 
living  in  glory,  and  all  for  God's  glory  in  our  reconciliation.6 
In  somewhat  similar  fashion,  Seeberg  declares  that  "Jesus  Christ 
is  the  content  of  Scripture."7     Yet,  with  both,  God's  doings  are  his 

lMoz1ey,  Ritschlianism,   Chap.  iv. 

2Truth   of  the   Christian   Religion,   I.   p.   96. 

"Kaftan,   Das  Wesen  der  christl.   Religion,  p.  437. 

4  Fundamental   Truths,   p.    230. 

6Positive    Preaching,    p.    213. 

"Revelation   and  the   Bible,   Hibbert  Journal,   October,    1911. 

'Fundamental  Truths,    p.    113;    cf.   also    Beth,    Die   Moderne  u.    s.    w.,    p.    199   f. 

74 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  75 

revelation.  Doctrine  is  not  given  directly  in  the  revelation,  but 
arises  when  the  revelation  is  made  an  object  of  reflection;  doc- 
trines are  not  the  revelation,  but  follow  it  as  a  consequence.  God's 
deeds  are  his  revelation.1  Christ  is  God's  working,  God's  action. 
Under  the  stress  of  the  Ritschlian  insistence,  both  Forsyth  and 
Seeberg  hold  that  revelation  yields  immediately  no  content  of  doc- 
trines;  yet  they  both  feel  the  conservative  pressure  for  a  specific 
interpretation  of  the  facts,  and  are  thus  led  to  the  immediate  se- 
quence of  doctrine  upon  revelation — yielding  it  a  far  greater  con- 
sequence that  the  Ritschlians  do.  What  we  finally  have  is  a  number 
of  cardinal  doctrines  which  make  clear  the  content  of  the  divine 
revelation;  and  to  this  content  of  truth,  faith  is  fundamentally 
related.  These  doctrines  must  be  adapted  to  the  current  world- 
view.2  It  is  just  this  nucleus  of  cardinal  truths  in  which  Beth  is 
really  interested,  and  he  endeavors  to  show  that  the  scientific  pos- 
tulate of  evolution  actually  opens  the  door  for  revelation. 

The  school  of  Comparative  Religions  really  makes  no  use  of  the 
conventional  conception  of  revelation.  Troeltsch,  to  be  sure,  does 
not  deny  the  ineffable  in  our  experience  of  reality,  and  he  does  in 
a  way  relate  Jesus  to  that  ineffable. 

The  fact  of  such  a  union  of  human  life  with  the  certainty  of  the  Divine 
is,  like  all  naive  experience,  a  final  and  insoluble  element  of  reality,  a  mystery 
like  the  mystery  of  all  that  is  real.  Thus  the  personality  of  Jesus  belongs  to 
the  great  basal  mysteries  of  reality.  For  him  who  bows  before  the  God  of 
Jesus,  it  is  the  greatest.8 

When  Troeltsch  uses  the  term  revelation,  it  is  with  a  different 
connotation  than  that  which  conventionally  attaches  to  the  term. 
Revelation,  in  his  sense,  is  a  product  of  the  religious  imagination. 
Even  so,  Jesus  is  for  us  the  high-water  mark  of  spiritual  attain- 
ment, the  embodiment  of  transcendent  religious  power.  Though 
not  in  a  different  category  from  other  religious  geniuses,  he  is,  for 
us,  the  divine  revelation,  reinforced  by  the  historical  process  of 
the  centuries.  From  the  fact  that  we  are  in  the  circle  of  light  that 
streams  from  him,  we  see  in  him  a  revelation  of  God;  for  us  he  is 
in  some  sense  Redeemer.4 

One  confesses  that  such  expressions  are  elusive  and  unsatisfac- 
tory.    The  fact  which  they  bring  to  light  is  that  Jesus  is  not  an 

1Ut  supra,  pp.    138,   139. 

2Ut  supra,  p.  281. 

8Absolutheit    des    Christentums,    p.    113. 

♦Funfter    Weltkongress.     Protokoll,    p.    337  f. 

75 


76  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

absolute  for  Troeltsch,  even  though  exalted  very  much  above  the 
rank  and  file  of  us.  Only  religious  mysticism,  and  that  always 
defies  analysis,  may  find  in  Jesus  a  revelation  of  God. 

Bousset  has  the  same  sense  of  the  ineffable  in  religious  experi- 
ence. He  declares  that  our  faith  credits  God  with  knowing  a  thou- 
sand ways  and  means,  within  the  limits  of  the  given  laws,  of  ap- 
proaching the  individual  and  surrounding  him  with  goodness  and 
care.1  And  he  even  admits  that  a  new  and  vital  element  came  into 
the  world  with  the  advent  of  the  Gospel.2  Jesus  brought  a  stream 
of  certainty  concerning  the  forgiveness  of  sins  into  the  world.  He 
towers  high  above  the  other  religious  teachers  favored  of  God,  as 
the  one  who  reveals  the  Divine  light  with  inward  certainty.8  What- 
ever matter  of  revelation  he  may  have  made,  it  is — in  the  view  of 
Bousset  and  Troeltsch — only  common  religious  truth  passed  through 
the  alembic  of  a  superior  personality;  it  is  no  disclosure  made  by 
one  in  whom  God  dwells  uniquely  because  he  is  different  in  kind 
from  us,  much  less  is  it  an  impartation  of  objective  theological 
truths. 

Coordinated  with  the  issue  of  revelation  is  the  question  of  the 
supernatural.  In  the  view  of  Conservative  Orthodoxy,  the  temporal 
and  eternal  stand  over  against  each  other,  two  distinct  orders;  and 
the  eternal  now  and  again  inserts  into  the  temporal  fresh  quantities 
of  energy,  new  forms  of  existence,  unique  modes  of  operation,  which 
— though  they  may  be  in  harmony  with  the  "law"  of  the  higher 
realm,  the  supernatural — nevertheless  constitute  a  break  with  the 
natural  order,  and  introduce  results  which  it  could  never  have  pro- 
duced. Revelation  is  only  a  single  aspect  of  this  intervening  activ- 
ity of  a  world  otherwise  beyond  experience.  The  whole  series  of 
theophanies  and  impartations,  of  miracles  and  inspirations,  falls  into 
this  general  setting. 

The  number  of  such  elements  which  one  system  or  another  ac- 
knowledges varies  greatly.  Conservative  Orthodoxy  finds  no  barrier 
to  and  large  need  for  a  great  number  of  them.  In  the  ancient  world, 
within  the  special  area  of  revelation,  such  happenings  were  not 
infrequent;  they  include  divinely-guided  history,  prophetic  inspira- 
tion, theophany,  miracle,  the  whole  series  of  events  which  consti- 
tuted the  life  of  Jesus  a  unique  phenomenon — especially  the  super- 


1  Faith  of  a  Modern  Protestant,  p.  58. 
2Ut  supra,  p.  81. 
«Ut  supra,  p.  118. 


76 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  77 

natural  conception  and  the  resurrection — the  peculiar  enduements 
of  the  Spirit,  and  the  ancient  and  modern  psychological  miracle 
of  regeneration.  To  this  list  one  might  add  marvelous  answer 
to  prayer — an  experience  not  quite  so  generally  insisted  upon  as 
regeneration. 

Ritschlianism  contents  itself  with  one,  or  at  least  two,  of  the 
series  as  constructive  elements  in  its  system.  To  be  sure,  miracle 
is  recognized.  Herrmann  makes  the  very  existence  of  such  a  tradi- 
tion as  that  Jesus  was  ideal  and  perfect  a  miraculous  fact,  seeing 
that  it  is  reported  by  men  who  did  not  have  that  ideal  experience 
in  their  own  lives.1  Only  a  miraculous  transformation  can  bring 
us  to  the  experience  of  the  sovereignty  of  God.2  There  is  a  unity 
of  Christ  with  God  which  is  not  describable  in  human  categories.* 
The  miracles  which  appear  in  the  evangelic  record  serve  no  real 
apologetic  purpose  with  the  Christian  man  of  today,  though  a  con- 
viction of  their  historicity  may  be  held  without  real  detriment  to 
faith.4  Miracle  is  used  in  a  new  sense,  and  yet  to  express  an  activ- 
ity and  results  which  are  uniquely  due  to  the  divine  operation.  It 
is,  however,  experienced  miracle,  not  recorded  miracle,  in  which 
Herrmann  believes.5  When  one  has  experienced  the  inward  miracle, 
he  knows  that  Christ  transcends  the  natural  order,  and  he  need  not 
then  doubt  the  miracles  of  the  Bible.  But  the  Biblical  miracles  are 
no  way  of  approach  to  Christ.  Herrmann's  is  the  most  extensive 
Ritschlian  handling  of  the  conception  of  miracle,  which  has  for  the 
Ritschlians  generally  no  constructive  significance.  Even  Herrmann 
has  nothing  to  affirm  concerning  particular  miracles,  if  the 
resurrection  of  Jesus  be  made  an  exception.8 

Among  those  who  define  themselves  as  Modern  Positivists,  For- 
syth is  the  most  outspoken  in  his  affirmation  of  the  supernatural. 
Men's  natural  resources  are  so  inadequate  that  they  need  not  only 
aid  from  the  supernatural,  they  need  a  Savior  (Positive  Preaching, 
p.  5)  ;  the  saving  act  of  God  is  an  invasion  of  us,  however  inward 
(p.  63)  ;  the  note  of  the  church's  message  is  the  note  of  the  super- 
natural (p.  122)  ;  the  preacher's  burthen  is  a  world  beyond  experi- 
ence (p.  200)  ;  he  preaches  a  real  rescue  by  a  hand  from  heaven 

'Communion  with   God,  p.   91. 

*Ut    supra,    p.    96. 

3Ut  supra,   p.    180. 

«Ut  supra,  pp.    233-235. 

•Der  Christ  und  das  Wunder,  p.  69. 

•Cf.   Die  Religion  im  Verhaltniss  z.   Welterkennen,   p.   386. 

77 


78  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

(p.  218)  ;  Christ  overrode  natural  law  (p.  223). x  There  are  two 
culminating  points  in  the  series  of  supernatural  communications : 
the  one  is  God's  final  redemption  of  us  by  a  permanently  superhis- 
torical  act  in  the  historical  Christ,2  the  other  is  the  advent  of  our 
personal  faith,  which  is  "the  uprising  in  us  of  a  totally  new  world."8 
Forsyth  is  really  favorable  to  the  acceptance  of  the  whole  series  of 
supernatural  phenomena  which  the  Gospels  report  as  accompanying 
the  career  and  ministry  of  Jesus,  and  he  lays  great  stress  upon  com- 
munion with  the  risen  Christ ;  he  is  not  simply  known  in  experience, 
but  as  the  creator  of  experience.4 

Seeberg  is  less  outspoken,  or  perhaps  one  might  say  less  conven- 
tional. He  is  much  concerned  to  temper  the  aspect  of  "invasion" 
and  to  put  his  view  into  terms  which  shall  make  it  scientifically 
acceptable.  Faith  has  nothing  to  do  with  isolated  miraculous  events 
(Fundamental  Truths,  p.  78)  ;  nevertheless  faith  is  always  faith  in 
the  marvelous  (p.  83)  ;  thus  faith  is  the  first  miracle  to  be  dealt  with 
in  the  miracle  problem  (p.  100)  ;  God's  doings  are  His  revelation 
(p.  138)  ;  they  appear  in  the  course  of  human  history,  but  with  such 
force  as  to  carry  the  immediate  conviction  that  they  are  divine ;  God 
is  in  fact  directing  the  whole  course  of  history  toward  the  goal  of 
redemption  (p.  150).  God  effects  all;  and  yet  somehow  it  becomes 
operative  only  through  ourselves  (p.  168).  Jesus  was  the  conscious 
servant  of  God  and  Lord  of  the  World  (pp.  205,  207).  He  had  a 
unique  soul,  a  peculiar  mode  of  perception,  thought,  and  speech 
(p.  281  f).  In  fact,  in  Him  the  God-will  that  guides  human  history 
to  redemption's  goal  entered  human  history  and  worked  after  the 
manner  of  history  in  His  words  and  deeds  (p.  222).  We  pray  to 
Christ  and  have  communion  with  Him  (pp.  245,  246).  Yet  there 
is  nothing  in  the  whole  revelation-redemption  series  which  is  not 
according  to  nature  (p.  267). 

Here  we  have  a  good  example  of  the  real  Modern  Positive  method 
of  mediation.  Beth  goes  about  it  in  even  more  thorough-going  fash- 
ion, yet  to  the  same  intent.  The  view  is  at  bottom  supernatural- 
istic,  and  the  end  of  the  mediating  process  is  to  gain  a  hearing  for 
the  gospel.     Forsyth  says  that  the  true  way  is  not  to  start  with  a 

*Cf.   also  p.   289. 

2Hibbert  Journal,   Oct.,    1911 :   Revelation  and  the   Bible. 

8Positive  Preaching,  p.   35. 

*Ut  supra,  p.  68. 

78 


RECENT"   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  79 

world-view,   but   to  begin   with   revelation,   which   is   autonomous, 
whatever  the  world-view  to  which  it  is  related.1 

Troeltsch  and  Bousset  both  have  that  dualism  in  which  God  is  set 
over  against  the  world,  a  dualism  which,  presumably,  is  at  the  basis 
of  all  non-monistic  religious  faith.  But  the  general  world-view  is 
rather  that  of  a  single  homogeneous  universe  the  fringes  of  whose 
reality  fall  back  into  the  ineffable,  than  of  a  dual  universe  of  natural 
and  supernatural  mutually  impinging  and  sometimes  interpenetrating. 
Evolution  is  the  universal  principle ;  knowledge  comes  concomitantly 
with  development  and  the  application  of  human  reason,  and  not 
otherwise.  Religion  is  an  original  endowment  of  human  nature,  not 
a  donation  from  the  other  world.  As  Bousset  says,  in  this  view, 
"one  will  have  to  break  with  all  historic  supernaturalism."2  Troeltsch 
holds  fundamentally  the  same  view ;  and  yet  both  feel  that  such  a 
type  of  Christian  mysticism  as  makes  large  use  of  symbol  is  not 
only  justified,  but  is  the  only  course  actually  open  to  the  religious 
man.  This  is  not  to  say  that  such  a  mysticism  can  afford  him  knowl- 
edge concerning  God  and  the  ineffable,  for  the  only  certainty  which 
remains  to  him  is  not  a  supernatural  certainty  at  all,  but  the  cer- 
tainty of  faith.8 

C.    Relation  of  These  Conceptions  to  the  Basis  of  Assurance. 

1.     Theory  of  Knowledge. 

In  this  discussion,  as  in  the  previous  section  where  the  theory  of 
knowledge  expressed  or  implied  by  each  particular  point  of  view 
was  discussed  (see  B  1  above),  there  is  no  attempt  to  maintain  the 
technical  distinction  between  epistemology  or  the  theory  of  knowl- 
edge and  metaphysics.  The  two  are  so  interrelated,  either  by  im- 
plication or  expressly,  that  this  is  scarcely  practicable.  The  theory 
of  knowledge  is  related  to  metaphysics  thus  immediately  in  all  the 
schools,  unless  an  exception  be  made  of  the  Religionsgeschichtliche 
handling,  where  it  is  sometimes — as  in  the  case  of  Troeltsch — very 
definitely  distinguished. 

The  three  other  types  of  theology  passed  under  review  make  no 
constructive  use  of  a  theory  of  knowledge.  Ritschlianism,  in  the 
form  set  forth  by  Herrmann,  will  permit  no  alliance  between  theol- 
ogy and  metaphysics — however  close  an  alliance  between  theology 

1  Positive   Preaching,   p.    250. 

2Funfter  Weltkongress,  p.   298. 

3Troeltsch,  Absolutheit  d.    Christentums,   p.    xiv. 

79 


80  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

and  ethics  may  be  insisted  upon.  Reality  in  Christianity  and  in 
metaphysics  are  for  him  two  essentially  different  things;  they  can- 
not be  mixed.1 

Kaftan,  on  the  other  hand,  regards  the  two  fields  of  thought — 
that  of  Christian  faith  and  that  of  rational  knowledge  of  reality — 
as  capable  of  combination.2  But  even  Kaftan  makes  no  thorough- 
going use  of  this  view.  The  'Value  judgments"  of  Ritschlianism 
are  distinguished  from  theoretical  or  existential  judgments — though 
some  later  Ritschlians  hold  that  value- judgments  have  to  do  with 
objective  truth.  Revelation  in  the  historic  Jesus  is  brought  in  by 
all  types  of  Ritschlianism  to  supplement  that  which  the  moral  intui- 
tion yields.  The  term  judgment  of  value,  which  is  falling  into  dis- 
use among  Ritschlians,  means  simply  to  express  a  conviction,  which 
Ritschlianism  has  by  no  means  yielded,  that  "proof  cannot  mean  in 
theology  what  it  means  in  natural  science,  but  that  in  theology 
knowledge  must  be  a  matter  of  personal  conviction  arising  from 
individual  experience."  The  path  to  certainty,  then,  can  be  no 
metaphysical  highway,  but  the  way  of  religious  experience  aroused 
by  contact  with  the  historical  Jesus  mediated  through  the  Christian 
community.3 

Conservative  Orthodoxy  forgets  its  theory  of  knowledge,  or  suf- 
fers it  to  be  swallowed  up,  by  its  confidence  in  revelation.  Whether 
the  philosophy  be  intuitional  or  deductive,  it  cannot  get  us  very  far. 
The  certainty  of  the  truths  of  the  Christian  religion,  which  is  essen- 
tial to  Christianity,  comes  in  through  revelation  and  contact  of  the 
soul  with  the  supernatural.  Though  a  psychology  of  this  knowledge 
process  is  more  elaborated  by  Modern  Positivism,  its  view  is  essen- 
tially one  of  the  creation  and  supplementation  of  human  knowledge 
by  revelation.  In  all  three  types,  Ritschlian,  Conservative  Orthodox, 
and  Modern  Positive,  revelation  brings  up  all  arrears  of  essential 
knowledge,  and — interpreted  by  experience — becomes  the  basis  of 
religious  assurance. 

The  School  of  Comparative  Religions,  especially  such  a  theo- 
logian as  Troeltsch,  makes  earnest  with  a  theory  of  knowledge  and 
with  a  metaphysics.  There  can  be  no  apologetic  grounding  of  the 
Christian  faith  without  the  development  of  both  a  theory  of  knowl- 
edge and  a  metaphysics.    A  theory  of  knowledge  will  show  us  how 


1Metaphysik  in  der  Theologie,   p.    21. 
2Truth   of  the   Christian   Religion,   p.    11. 
"Cf.  Mozley,  Ritschlianism,  Chap.  V. 


80 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  81 

the  God-idea  arises  as  the  religious  Apriori,  itself  in  relation  to  the 
other  Aprioris  of  reason.  But  this  affords  that  Apriori  no  ontological 
basis ;  and  it  must  have,  to  meet  the  demands  of  religious  faith,  an 
ontological  basis.  This  can  be  supplied  only  by  an  inductive  meta- 
physics, a  metaphysics  a  posteriori.  The  spiritual  values  are  an- 
chored in  the  world-ground  by  such  a  process.  This  will  be  the 
method  of  religious  apologetic;  but  it  is  not  the  route  which  the 
ordinary  Christian  will  travel  to  gain  his  confidence  of  God.  His 
confidence  will  come  from  contact,  either  mediate  or  immediate, 
with  great  revealing  personalities,  personalities  which  bring  to  light 
the  religious  and  moral  possibilities  of  the  soul,  and  in  whose  light 
we  see  light.  Bousset  manifests  the  same  confidence  in  natural 
reason  to  validate  the  content  which  religious  faith  gives  to  the 
God-idea.  He  holds,  likewise,  to  the  religious  significance  of  great 
personalities.  "Our  faith  in  God  is  entirely  based  on  personality ;" 
we  gain  it  from  the  mighty  ones  into  whose  consciousness  there 
flashed  the  certainty  of  God.1 

2.     Science  and  Reality. 

We  trace  a  very  similar  course  when  we  come  to  the  relation  of 
religious  assurance  to  science  and  to  the  conception  of  reality.  Con- 
servative Orthodoxy  denies  the  authority  of  science  to  form  postu- 
lates which  shall  determine  religious  interpretations.  Conservative 
Orthodoxy  challenges  the  fully  developed  form  of  the  chief  postu- 
late of  modern  science,  the  concept  of  evolution,  of  continuous  pro- 
gressive change.  Science  is  remanded  to  the  cataloging  business  and 
denied  the  right  to  advance  the  larger  and  more  ultimate  interpre- 
tations of  reality.  Thus  science  is  looked  upon  with  suspicion  to 
such  an  extent  that  it  finds  no  place  in  the  grounding  of  personal 
religious  assurance.  The  supreme  basis  of  assurance  is,  as  we  shall 
see,  the  direct  gift  of  interposing  divine  grace. 

The  Ritschlian  view  holds  that  man  lives  in  another  world  than 
that  which  science  shapes  with  its  ideas.  The  two  are  different 
modes  of  comprehending  reality,  standing  alongside  each  other. 
Consequently  religion  is  free  from  science  and  wholly  autonomous. 
The  two  somehow  fit  into  a  hidden  whole ;  but  for  the  present  they 
ought  not  to  be  mixed.2  "The  idea  of  a  living  God  who  through 
his  revelation  creates  true  life  in  man  cannot  be  related  to  the  uni- 

1  Faith  of  a  Modern   Protestant,  p.    118. 
2Herrmann,   Zeitschr.   f.  T.   u.   K.,   1907,  p.    197  f. 

81 


82  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

versally  valid  thoughts  of  science."1  Personal  assurance  does  not 
base,  at  all,  in  this  view,  upon  the  scientific  findings  of  any  age.  It 
is  even  more  independent  than  in  the  view  of  Conservative  Ortho- 
doxy, which  undertakes  to  say  what  science  ought  to  be,  while  this 
view  leaves  science  to  go  on  its  way  unimpeded.  Religious  certainty, 
to  put  it  in  a  word,  bases  upon  revelation  in  history. 

Modern  Positivism  of  the  Seeberg  type  is  distinctly  friendly  to 
current  world-views.  The  truths  of  the  Christian  religion  must  be 
harmonized  therewith.  This,  however,  is  a  big  undertaking,  and  the 
result  cannot  be  said  to  be  satisfactory  to  those  who  look  upon  Chris- 
tianity as  a  sum  of  truths,  or  to  those  who  understand  what  the 
modern  scientific  world-view  is.  The  matter  of  mediation  is  clearly 
an  apologetic  procedure.  The  path  to  religious  certainty  is  essen- 
tially the  Ritschlian  path  of  revelation  in  history.  More  is  made 
of  revelation,  i.  e.,  it  has  a  broader  scope.  The  kind  of  assurance 
is  different;  it  is  not  mere  assurance  of  a  gracious  God,  it  is  also 
certainty  of  the  truths  of  the  Christian  religion.  Because  the  person 
of  Jesus  has  so  overwhelming  an  effect  upon  us,  the  truth  of  the 
Gospel  which  proclaims  him  and  interprets  his  mission  is  certified. 

Troeltsch  and  Bousset  recognize  the  right  of  science  to  go  beyond 
the  mere  business  of  exact  causal  explanation  and  analysis  to  the 
formulation  of  comprehensive  hypotheses.  Just  this  right  it  is  which 
demands  that  the  study  of  Christianity  shall  be  undertaken  upon 
the  common  platform  of  a  study  of  world  religions  by  the  methods 
which  govern  the  science  of  Comparative  Religions.  No  theory  of 
religion  or  doctrine  of  validity  will  hold  which  is  not  based  upon  the 
view  of  the  world  established  by  science.2  This  is  the  way  to  the 
apologetic  certainty  of  truth.  Personal  assurance  comes,  however, 
through  the  illuminating  presence  of  great  personalities  and  that 
natural  religious  mysticism  which  is  enforced  thereby.  He  who  is 
confident  of  God  in  the  prophetic  measure  becomes  a  medium  of 
assurance  to  the  common  man. 

3.     History. 

Conservative  Orthodoxy  does  not  tie  up  assurance  of  the  good 
God  with  the  normal  unfoldment  of  history,  but  rather  with  super- 
natural interferences  in  the  course  of  history,  or  with  a  history 

*Ut  supra,  p.   199. 

2Troeltsch,  Die  wissenschaftliche  Lage,  p.  52  f. 

82 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  83 

which  is  the  product  of  a  combination  of  natural  and  supernatural 
elements,  such  as  the  merely  natural  could  never  have  brought  about. 
Ritschlianism  will  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  sort  of  supernat- 
ural activity  which  does  not  become  articulate  and  human  in  the 
course  of  history.  Religious  mysticism  is  foreign  to  the  genius  of 
Christianity,  and  faith  is  forbidden  to  base  thereon,  but  summoned 
to  ground  itself  upon  the  sure  historical  Divine  manifestation  in 
Jesus.  Ritschlianism  shuns  equally  the  path  of  pure  science  and  the 
path  of  mysticism,  if  one  for  the  moment  disregard  Kaftan's  con- 
cessions to  mysticism.  It  is  felt  that  history  keeps  us  close  to  experi- 
ence and  at  the  same  time  saves  us  from  mere  subjectivism.  Our 
assurance  is  thus  the  assurance  of  a  community  of  individuals  each 
of  whom  in  his  experience  of  moral  defeat  and  schism  has  met  with 
the  historical  Jesus,  through  the  mediation  of  the  community,  and 
has  been  overwhelmed  with  the  conviction  that  in  him  God  was 
seeking  communion  with  his  needy  spirit. 

Modern  Positivism  follows  somewhat  the  same  course  with  ref- 
erence to  Jesus  as  a  historical  personage  whose  influence  is  medi- 
ated by  the  community;  but  it  makes  a  place  for  communion  with 
the  risen  Christ  which  Ritschlianism  does  not  recognize;  so  that 
it  does  not  hold  sheerly  to  the  historical  Jesus,  but  through  the 
medium  of  the  historical  Jesus  achieves  a  super-historical  Jesus, 
who  is,  after  all,  the  real  Jesus. 

While  the  Ritschlians  hold  firmly  to  the  historical  Jesus,  this 
Jesus  is  for  them,  as  for  the  Conservative  Orthodox  and  the  Mod- 
ern Positives,  an  Absolute  inserted  into  the  relative  order  of  the 
world.    He  is  God's  final  word  for  them  all. 

With  the  School  of  Comparative  Religions  the  very  nature  of 
scientific  historical  inquiry  renders  it  impossible  to  tie  religious  faith 
up  with  historical  detail.  Even  the  Ritschlian  attempt  to  preserve 
an  effective  portrait  of  Jesus  is  subject  to  grave  perils.  What  we 
really  have  is  the  impulse  which  went  out  from  Jesus  and  lives  in 
the  Christian  community  of  our  time;  and,  in  addition,  the  Gospel 
portrait  or  portraits,  many  elements  of  which  will  always  have  an 
ideal  value  for  us.  It  is  the  Jesus  who  is  thus  interpreted  whom 
we  really  have ;  and  in  the  light  of  his  religious  genius  we  see  light. 
But  this  does  not  hold  for  all  time  and  every  cycle  of  existence; 
rather,  merely  for  us  who  are  the  heirs  of  a  Christian  tradition  and 
members  of  the  Christian  community. 

83 


84  THE   BASIS   OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

4.     Revelation. 

In  all  but  our  fourth  group,  personal  assurance  is  very  intimately 
related  to  revelation.  In  Conservative  Orthodoxy  and  Modern 
Positivism,  revelation  brings  both  a  new  experience  and  new  truths, 
however  the  latter  may  be  defined;  in  the  Ritschlian  view,  revela- 
tion occasions  a  new  moral  experience.  In  all  three,  it  is  revelation 
and  the  ensuing  experience  which  guarantee  whatever  religious 
truth  may  be  disclosed.  Personal  assurance  comes  in  each  case 
through  Jesus ;  in  Conservative  Orthodoxy,  through  Jesus  inter- 
preted very  definitely  as  redeeming  Son  of  God,  who  died  for  us 
and  arose,  and  with  whom  we  now  have  conscious  communion;  in 
Modern  Positivism,  interpreted  in  more  mediating  terms,  but  to  the 
same  intent;  in  Ritschlianism,  interpreted  as  a  man  with  a  unique 
religious  consciousness,  particularly  a  consciousness  of  sinlessness 
and  Lordship,  about  whose  state  beyond  the  grave  we  have  no  data 
in  experience,  but  who  awakens  in  us  the  consciousness  that  through 
him  God  is  seeking  us. 

While  both  Bousset  and  Troeltsch  use  the  term  revelation,  they 
do  not  mean  an  activity  of  the  Divine  different  in  kind  from  that 
which  inheres  in  all  religious  experience.  If  Jesus  towers  above  us 
— and  he  does — it  is  as  the  supreme  religious  genius  whom  our  own 
cycle  of  existence  knows.  He  sheds  upon  our  pathway  just  that 
light  and  imparts  just  that  certainty  which  always  arises  from  con- 
tact with  superior  religious  personalities.  He  kindles  a  kindred 
faith  in  us ;  but  there  is  no  justification  for  calling  it  supernatural 
certainty;  it  is  the  assurance  of  faith,  gathered  from  an  attitude 
toward  that  Reality  in  which  all  our  highest  values  are  grounded, 
an  attitude  which  we  see  exhibited  triumphantly  in  the  career  of 
such  a  supreme  personality  as  Jesus. 

Such  in  outline  is  the  bearing  of  the  fundamental  notions  distin- 
guished upon  the  problem  of  religious  assurance,  as  that  problem 
is  met — either  expressly  or  by  implication — by  the  systems  under 
review.  The  concluding  section  of  this  essay  attempts  to  indicate 
alternatives  to  which  the  tendencies  disclosed  point. 


84 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  85 


III.     ALTERNATIVE  VIEWS. 

The  pendulum  swings  all  the  way  from  supreme  distrust  of  the 
natural  order,  coupled  with  intimate  dependence  upon  the  arm  of 
supernatural  intervention,  to  a  religious  interpretation  of  the  natural 
order  and  a  unitary  view  of  the  world  which  renders  the  concept 
of  the  supernatural  superfluous.  Again,  it  swings  all  the  way  from 
dependence  upon  a  series  of  absolutes  over  against  the  relative  and 
conditioned  in  experience,  to  a  calm  acceptance  of  progressive  change 
as  the  one  order  which  rules  whatever  worlds  and  aspects  of  reality 
there  be;  so  that  there  are  no  absolutes  to  depend  upon,  but  only 
relatively  greater  magnitudes,  who  are  together  with  us  in  the  uni- 
versal flux;  so  that  the  religious  man  is  driven  back  upon  his  suc- 
cessful use  of  the  method  of  experimentation,  the  same  method 
which  obtains  in  the  scientific  realm,  as  basis  of  his  confidence.  That 
is,  however,  a  very  different  thing  from  personal  assurance  of  the 
forgiveness  and  favor  of  God — a  fact  which  needs  no  further  em- 
phasis. 

The  movements  which  we  have  traced  are  all  absolutistic,  the 
Conservative  Orthodox  view  maintaining  a  whole  series  of  absolutes 
grounded  in  the  one  Absolute — 'God,  while,  on  the  other  hand,  such 
theologians  as  Troeltsch  dispense  with  all  absolutes  intermediary 
between  the  individual  and  the  infinite  God.  Nowhere  has  the  idea 
of  a  God  who  is  also  himself  a  struggling  and  achieving  being  in  a 
universe  not  wholly  pliant  to  His  will  been  dealt  with.  Since  this 
view,  in  one  form  or  another  long  familiar  in  the  field  of  philosophy, 
has  begun  to  arouse  a  certain  speculative  interest  in  the  field  of 
theology,  it  presents  itself  as  a  possible  alternative  basis  for  the 
grounding  of  religious  life.  Beyond  this  a  world-view  could  not 
pass  and  continue  theistic,  though  it  might  continue  religious,  in  so 
far  as  religion  is  a  social  and  personal  phenomenon.  Every  theism, 
in  whatever  terms  defined,  is — if  it  preserve  the  idea  of  personality 
— a  positive  dualism.  With  the  idea  of  a  God  for  whom  the  universe 
is  an  adventure  and  its  mastery  a  goal,  it  may  become  pluralism. 
But  no  system  whose  Deity  is  less  than  the  Absolute  and  Infinite 
God  can  afford  the  individual  evangelical  assurance. 

85 


86 


THE   BASIS   OF  ASSURANCE  IN 


A.     The  Supernaturalistic  View  of  the  World  as   Ground 

of  Assurance. 

It  will  not  be  questioned  that  the  view  of  the  universe  which  the 
Bible,  whether  Old  or  New  Testament,  represents  is  a  dualistic  one, 
with  a  temporal,  created,  finite,  natural  order  on  the  one  hand,  and 
an  eternal,  creative,  infinite,  supernatural  order  on  the  other;  nor 
that  God  is  conceived  of  as  inhabiting  the  eternities  characteris- 
tically, and  as  now  and  again,  by  the  angel  of  His  presence,  by  a 
theophany,  by  an  incarnation,  through  the  dream  of  seer  or  the 
inspiration  of  prophet,  or  through  the  presence  of  his  Holy  Spirit, 
making  himself  known  in  the  temporal  order.  Nor  will  it  be  ques- 
tioned that  this  view  of  the  universe  obtained  during  the  long  period 
of  creed  and  confession-making  in  the  Christian  church.  It  is 
equally  certain  that,  with  some  adaptations,  it  is  the  characteristic 
view  of  the  Conservative  Orthodoxy  of  today.  The  modifications 
look  in  the  direction  of  a  doctrine  of  the  Divine  Immanence.  But 
Conservative  Orthodoxy  has  never  accepted  a  thorough-going  view 
of  immanence ;  for  it  conceives  the  characteristically  Divine  as 
somehow  being  brought  into  the  natural  order  from  without.  God 
may  dwell  in  nature  and  in  humanity,  but  when  he  wants  to  make 
us  sure  of  his  presence,  or  to  produce  any  momentous  alteration 
in  things,  he  must  make  the  approach  from  without  the  natural 
order. 

It  is  equally  true  that  this  dualism  of  the  natural  and  the  super- 
natural has  been  from  time  immemorial  coupled  with  a  moral 
dualism;  this  lower  realm  is  the  abode  of  evil;  the  perfect,  the 
ideal,  the  absolute  good  is  in  the  supernatural  realm,  and  can  enter 
the  natural  only  as  something  extraneous,  something  foreign,  the 
capacity  for  whose  reception  even  must  be  a  donation  from  the 
other  world.  In  such  a  view,  the  greatest  need  of  the  individual 
is  to  be  forgiven  for  his  sin,  and  to  be  assured  of  this.  This  is 
something  other  than  the  feeling  of  dependence  and  the  cry  for 
help;  it  is  the  feeling  of  guilt  which  many  aspects  of  this  general 
view  tend  to  impress  upon  the  individual.  Unless  adjustment  can 
be  effected,  eternal  ruin,  loss  and  death  will  ensue.  One  must  be  a 
great  stranger  to  both  Bible  and  historic  Christian  thought  not  to 
grasp  the  reality  and  gravity  of  this  situation.  The  power  of  all 
priesthoods  has  lain  here,  the  significance  of  all  penance,  the  mys- 
tery of  all  atonement.    Let  it  be  understood  that  God  so  loved  the 

86 


RECENT    PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  87 

world  that  he  gave  his  Son  to  be  crucified  as  the  substitute  for 
guilty  humanity — and  thus  Conservative  Orthodoxy  understands  the 
case — and  it  will  be  seen  that  no  man  can  treat  sin  as  a  light  matter. 
Besides  being  guilt,  sin  is  hereditary  and  entails  a  racial  vitiation, 
one  that  cannot  be  got  rid  of  by  anything  its  poor  inheritor  can  do. 
Only  God  can  forgive  the  guilty  and  cleanse  the  defiled,  and  memo- 
rable the  hour  when  He  does ! 

From  his  peculiar  abode  in  the  supernatural  realm  God  grants 
forgiveness,  and  from  thence  as  well  he  sends  renewing  grace  into 
the  sinful  heart ;  and  by  the  experience  of  this  grace,  by  the  promises 
of  his  revealed  Word,  by  the  witness  of  his  Holy  Spirit,  grants 
assurance  of  his  forgiving  and  restoring  favor.  Protestantism  has 
characteristically  made  the  witness  of  the  Word  of  God  the  chief 
basis  of  assurance  of  a  gracious  God;  the  promises  of  God,  the 
whole  history  of  redemption. 

Other  systems  than  the  Conservative  Orthodox  are  rather  vari- 
ously related  to  this  general  scheme.  Modern  Positivism  makes  the 
nearest  approach  to  preserving  it  intact,  its  chief  departure  being  in 
the  direction  of  immanence — making  all  that  happens  "perfectly 
natural."  At  the  same  time,  it  has  not  done  so  to  the  extent  of 
denying  that  the  act  of  redemption  is  a  divine  donation,  a  rescue  by 
a  hand  let  down  from  above,  or  that  in  Christ  the  God-will  that 
moves  history  toward  a  redemption  goal  entered  into  history. 
Ritschlianism  refuses  to  discuss  theories  of  the  universe,  but  mani- 
festly has  one — for  the  greater  part,  just  the  very  general  outlines 
of  the  one  we  have  been  discussing.  That  is,  there  is  the  same 
fundamental  dualism  of  absolute  and  relative,  infinite  and  finite, 
perfect  Good  and  sinner;  and  God  makes,  once  for  all,  in  history, 
an  absolute  revelation,  contact  with  which  brings,  as  it  alone  can, 
assurance  of  the  gracious  God.  The  view  which  Troeltsch  and 
Bousset,  with  some  differences  of  detail,  share  is  described  as  a 
fundamental  religious  dualism  (Troeltsch's  term).  God  is  the  Abso- 
lute Reason,  a  postulate  of  our  finite  reason.  But  both  feel  the 
pull  of  the  unitary  conception  of  science,  and  make  no  use  of  super- 
natural intervention.  What  God  brings  to  pass  he  does  by  the  use 
of  that  common  method  of  his  working  which  we  call  law.  The 
only  likeness  to  the  Biblical  world-view  which  this  scheme  mani- 
fests is  that  it  has  God  the  Absolute  and  unconditioned  over  against 
a  world  of  the  finite,  relative  and  conditioned.     It  makes  no  use  of 

87 


OO  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

theophany,  incarnation,  or  the  supernatural  in  general,  though  it 
allows  for  the  quest  of  the  soul  after  God,  and  a  response  through 
the  ordained  natural  means. 

It  seems  evident  that  no  mediating  scheme  will  be  able  to  bring 
about  an  improvement  of  the  biblical  view  by  its  modification  here 
and  there.  It  is  a  self-consistent  view,  in  its  general  outline ;  the  only 
question  being  whether  one  who  is  in  any  considerable  degree 
either  aware  of  or  a  sharer  of  the  common  scientific  world-view  of 
our  time  can  also  continue  to  hold  the  biblical  as  a  religious  view  of 
the  world.  It  may  as  well  be  recognized  that  the  elements  of  that 
static,  dualistic  world-view  belong  together  and  are  not  to  be  bar- 
tered away  piecemeal  for  a  little  evolution  here  and  a  bit  of  imma- 
nence there.  For  one  who  is  able  to  live  in  that  atmosphere  of 
Biblicism,  the  plan  for  gaining  personal  assurance  works  perfectly 
well.  In  the  same  way  the  Ritschlian  method  works  for  him  who  is 
able  to  keep  his  thinking  in  two  distinct  compartments,  his  science  in 
one,  his  religion  in  another.  Anyone  in  vital  touch  with  the  repre- 
sentatives of  either  type  knows  that  splendid  Christian  character 
has  been  attained  by  those  who  have  whole-heartedly  lived  out  its 
counsels. 

B.     The  Equivalent  of  Assurance  in  a  View  of  the  World- 
Process  as  Expression  of  Personal  Will. 

This  view  still  maintains  the  existence  of  the  Infinite  and  Abso- 
lute God,  unconditioned  except  by  the  method  of  his  creative  activity 
— an  activity  which  brings  his  will  to  expression  in  the  world- 
process,  and  which  as  a  unitary  conception  needs  no  supplementa- 
tion by  an  extraordinary  activity  interrupting  or  setting  aside  that 
process.  The  personal  will  of  the  Highest  is,  in  this  view,  known 
through  the  process,  and  not  by  means  of  something  spectacular 
breaking  into  it  from  without.  In  this  sense  of  the  term,  all  our 
highest  values  become  revelation.  In  this  view,  then,  it  is  not  exclu- 
sively the  rational,  but  the  ethical,  the  volitional,  the  aesthetic  as 
well,  which  proclaim  to  us  the  reality  and  nature  of  God. 

In  this  view,  however,  there  can  manifestly  be  no  such  doctrine  of 
evangelical  assurance  as  in  older  view  demands;  a  fudamental 
postulate  of  such  evangelical  assurance  is  belief  in  a  dualistic,  super- 
naturalistic  universe.  There  is  no  such  place  for  a  doctrine  of  de- 
pravity with  its  correlated  guilt,  in  this  view,  though  it  by  no  means 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  89 

excludes  the  concept  of  sin,  and  makes  a  great  deal  of  the  notions 
of  limitation  and  insufficiency. 

The  ethical  demand  is  not  defined  chiefly  by  the  sense  of  sin,  as 
in  the  Conservative  Orthodox  view.  In  so  far,  however,  as  a  sense 
of  sin  becomes  a  pronounced  element  in  the  moral  consciousness 
of  the  individual,  assurance  of  the  favor  of  God  will  emerge  with 
the  ethical  resolution,  and  in  so  far  as  a  loftier  or  perfect  ideal  is 
demanded,  a  sense  of  God  will  suffuse  that  ideal.  It  must  be  recog- 
nized that  this  view  allows  for  as  real  a  conception  of  God  and  as 
genuine  an  attitude  of  faith  in  Him  as  the  view  which  holds  a  static 
universe  with  "iron  laws."  In  such  a  faith  in  the  cosmic  process 
as  expressive  of  the  will  of  the  personal  God,  certainty  will  appear 
most  clearly  defined  in  connection  with  the  moral  and  spiritual,  the 
realms  where  our  highest  individual  and  social  values  lie;  nor  will 
it  be  confined  to  those  experiences  which  stand  out  as  associated 
with  a  crisis,  but  will  be  extended  to  those  capable  of  being  induced 
at  will,  or  practically  constant  in  experience.  Personality,  in  this 
view,  especially  in  its  higher  types  and  loftier  manifestations,  be- 
comes "revelatory."  Thus  Jesus  may  be  found  a  surpassing  center 
of  spiritual  illumination,  lighting  up  the  spiritual  pathway,  and  in 
so  far,  revealing  and  assuring  of  a  gracious  God  who  makes  pos- 
sible such  a  life  in  such  a  universe. 

This  view  of  the  matter  demands  of  religion  a  friendly  relation 
with  science,  not  only  for  the  reason  that  it  is  engaged  in  inter- 
pretation of  the  same  reality  which  religion  endeavors  to  read,  but, 
and  chiefly,  because — since  there  is  no  revelation  bringing  us  by 
supernatural  means  the  content  of  the  unexhausted  remainders 
beyond  present  experience,  and  the  unappreciated  reality  within 
present  experience — the  religious  interpretation  is  directly  condi- 
tioned by  such  a  world-view  as  science  justifies. 

Such  a  view  will  also  demand  a  stronger  rational  grounding  of 
the  God-idea  than  would  be  the  case  if  some  sort  of  supernatural 
revelation  were  affirmed.  At  the  same  time,  religion  will  not,  in 
this  view,  be  grounded  directly  upon  reason,  any  more  than  in  a 
supernaturalistic  view.  The  effect  of  the  rational  upon  the  religious 
view  will  be  mediated  chiefly  by  the  construction  of  a  scientific 
world-view.  There  will  still  remain  to  religion  the  function  of 
reading  the  higher  value-side  of  existence,  and  of  interpreting 
reality  to  us  from  this  point  of  view.     It  is  only  to  be  remembered 


90  THE    BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

that  religion  will  proceed  to  this  task,  under  the  present  view,  very 
much  more  closely  related  to  reason  and  to  science  than  if  the  super- 
natural mode  of  procedure  were  employed. 

The  method  of  proceeding  from  the  postulate  of  an  infinite  Per- 
sonal Will  whose  revelation  lies  in  the  world-process  goes  about 
its  business  of  gaining  a  religious  interpretation  by  a  process  of 
induction  from  the  data  of  religious  experience  and  the  observation 
of  the  phenomena  or  religion,  contemporary  and  historical ;  holding 
to  the  concept  of  continuous  progressive  change,  it  believes  that 
there  is  discoverable  a  teleology  which  discloses  the  religious  mean- 
ing of  the  world. 

In  general  this  is  the  view  of  the  school  of  Comparative  Religions. 
But  the  point  of  view  as  such  is  possible  independently  of  such  a 
relation  to  Kant  as  members  of  this  school  assume;  indeed,  it  is 
bound  up  with  no  single  theoretical  construction  of  reality,  but  is 
possible  from  any  point  of  view  which  combines  an  absolutistic 
postulate  of  reason  or  a  personalistic  postulate  of  religion  with  the 
application  of  the  inductive  method  in  interpreting  the  total  world- 
process.  The  confidence  which  it  permits  is  confidence  in  the  world- 
process,  through  which  the  personal  will  of  its  postulate  comes  to 
expression  for  our  experience;  this  confidence  is  both  limited  and 
reinforced  by  such  a  religious  experience  as  this  view  engenders. 
It  is  a  confidence  that  those  things  which  the  religious  conscious- 
ness recognizes  as  our  highest  values  are  themselves  expressions  of 
the  personal  will  of  the  Highest,  and  that  we  may  build  our  lives 
upon  them. 

C.     Non-Absolutistic  Confidence  in  the  Method  of 

EXPERI M  ENT  ATION . 

This  view  may  be  grounded  in  a  pluralistic  relativism,  or  it  may 
refuse  all  generalizations  in  the  realm  of  the  met-empirical.  Char- 
acteristically, it  takes  the  latter  point  of  view.  It  keeps  in  very 
close  touch  with  science,  at  the  same  time  being  aware  that  this 
method  which  it  proposes  to  employ  in  religion  is  just  the  method 
which  modern  science  is  employing  in  its  reading  of  reality.  Science 
no  longer  claims  that  its  laws  are  more  than  working  hypotheses; 
formulae  and  "laws"  are  a  part  of  the  scientific  technique  for  a 
successful  handling  of  certain  aspects  of  reality.  So,  also,  with 
the  religious  formulae;  they  are  not  held  to  be  photographs  of  real- 

90 


RECENT   PROTESTANT   THEOLOGIES  91 

ity,  they  are  related  only  to  certain  aspects  of  it.  And  with  both 
science  and  religion,  it  is  recognized,  in  this  view,  that  the  "law"- 
elaborating,  "truth"-discovering  activities  of  each  are  experimental 
procedures  for  the  achievement  of  certain  definite  and  specific  ends. 
Thus,  it  is  argued,  all  the  recognized  "results"  of  both  science  and 
religion  have  been  achieved,  as  means  to  specific  ends.  This  does 
not  at  all  mean  that  they  are  to  be  erected  into  forms  for  the  posi- 
tive government  of  all  future  investigation  in  these  realms.  Just 
as  science  feels  not  only  at  liberty,  but  obliged  to  overhaul  the  whole 
series  of  her  postulates  with  every  fresh  undertaking,  and  actually 
does  so  with  every  new  scientific  generation,  so  religion,  in  this 
view,  takes  the  same  attitude  toward  the  whole  series  of  values 
which  the  past  has  hallowed.  These  will  survive  and  be  employed 
just  so  long  as  they  contribute  to  the  conceived  needs  of  the  genera- 
tion making  use  of  them. 

The  method  of  experimentation,  by  its  very  nature,  must  keep 
pushing  out  the  fringe  of  reality ;  by  its  very  nature  it  must  reread 
that  portion  of  reality  already  supposed  to  have  been  adequately 
surveyed.  But,  whether  as  science  or  as  religion,  it  goes  about 
this  matter  not  at  all  with  a  view  to  a  compendium  of  universal 
knowledge,  but  rather  to  meet  certain  very  definite  and  acute  situ- 
ations. 

If,  then,  the  hypothesis  of  a  personal  God  yield  certain  very 
concrete  values  for  the  religious  life,  it  will  be  made  a  working 
part  of  such  a  religious  system ;  when  it  ceases  to  yield  such  results, 
having  been  made  an  impossible  postulate  by  virtue  of  the  religious 
or  scientific  movement  in  some  other  directon,  it  will  pass,  and  will 
be  replaced — should  that  time  ever  come — by  a  real  effective  hy- 
pothesis. So,  also,  with  the  belief  and  practice  of  prayer.  If  it  be 
found  a  sort  of  religious  technique  actually  ministrant  to  religious 
need,  it  will  be  maintained;  when  it  fails  to  yield  such  results, 
there  is  no  inherent  authority  of  the  practice  itself  which  can 
maintain  it. 

The  point  of  view  recognizes  religion  as  a  practically  universal 
factor  of  human  life  as  we  know  it.  It  is  a  social  fact,  as  well, 
and  not  a  mere  product  of  the  individual  religious  consciousness. 
As  a  social  phenomenon,  independently  of  its  origin  or  of  any  final 
interpretation,  religion  is  to  be  viewed  as  an  integral  constituent  of 
our  common  life.     As  such,  it  is  recognized  as  a  valid  method  of 

91 


92  THE   BASIS    OF   ASSURANCE   IN 

achieving  recognized  ends.  It  brings  certain  aesthetic  and  moral 
reinforcements  to  personal  life  which  would  otherwise  be  wanting. 
But  no  single  type  of  religion  can,  on  this  hypothesis,  be  prescribed 
as  of  universal  validity.  At  the  same  time,  this  point  of  view  recog- 
nizes the  intimate  social  and  genetic  development  of  all  religious  life, 
and  holds  that  no  generation  can  tear  itself  asunder  from  its  past, 
living  thus — so  to  speak — in  vacuo.  Ends  will  persist,  felt  wants 
will  survive,  like  will  beget  like — though  with  a  difference;  and,  as 
a  result,  each  succeeding  generation  will  take  up  and  use  much  that 
the  past  generation  has  wrought  out. 

The  point  of  view  thus  represented  is,  in  short,  that  since  we  get 
on  in  all  other  realms  by  the  method  of  experimentation,  we  can 
do  so,  and  must  needs  do  so,  in  the  field  of  religion  as  well ;  for  it 
holds  that  life  is  all  of  a  piece,  and  that  religion  has  to  do  with  the 
value  side  of  it.  Since  we  do  not  have  absolutes  in  science,  and 
are,  notwithstanding,  able  to  order  our  world  in  such  a  way  as  to 
achieve  a  Twentieth  Century  civilization,  may  we  not,  it  inquires, 
do  a  similar  thing  in  the  field  of  religion,  with  the  value  side  of  life, 
without  any  other  than  the  experimental  method,  with  no  postu- 
late of  the  supernatural,  and  with  no  hypothesis  of  the  Infinite  and 
Absolute  which  can  be  ereted  into  a  norm? 

It  is  not  the  object  of  this  study  to  decide  the  basis  of  assurance 
or  the  ground  of  certainty.  There  are  sincere  advocates  of  each 
of  the  above-indicated  points  of  view  and  it  is  quite  manifest  that 
what  would  satisfy  one  group  as  a  logical  demonstration  would  fall 
far  short  with  another.  At  any  rate,  there  can  be  no  assurance  that 
is  not  experimental ;  if  it  be  but  a  matter  of  theory  and  not  of  prac- 
tice with  a  working  place  in  one's  life,  it  can  never  serve  as  basis 
for  the  achievement  of  higher  religious  values.  Faith  arises  and 
makes  headway  through  the  actual  achievement  of  values. 


92 


LBAp'13 


Gbe  Tftntversit?  of  Chicago 

FOUNDED  BY  JOHN  D.  ROCKEFELLER 


The  Basis  of  Assurance  in  Recent 
Protestant  Theologies 


A  DISSERTATION 

Submitted  to  the  Faculty  of  the  Graduate  Divinity  School  in 
Candidacy  for  the  Degree  of  Doctor  of  Philosophy 

DEPARTMENT  OF  SYSTEMATIC  THEOLOGY 


By  HENRY  BURKE  ROBINS 


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