The Vacuum in Recent Theology

Current theories have lost not only an authoritative Word but God himself

Professor J. V. Langmead Casserley, of Seabury Western Theological Seminary (Episcopal), makes a devastating point when he indicts modern biblical scholarship for producing “a way of studying the word of God out of which no word of God ever seems to come.” And although he cannot agree with the fundamentalists, he sees them as men who “have tried to react against a real scandal.” His word is not too strong.

It is important to see that the modern critical method is, by its very nature, unable to give us a divine word. That no word from God has so far appeared is not simply an accident. It is inherent in the very method of modern scholarship that the divine utterance cannot be found. To a man, adherents of this method denounce propositional revelation. They pride themselves on employing an objective approach that should commend itself to every scientific observer, believer or not. By confining their appeal to what the unbeliever can accept, they effectively prevent themselves from making use of any idea they might have that there is some quality of inspiration about the Bible. Given their method, there cannot be a word from God; it is simply not there. The Bible contains words of prophets and apostles, but these are little if anything other than the thoughts that came to godly men of an earlier day as they wrestled with then-current problems. It is for us to heed their example and to grapple in the same spirit with the very different problems of our day. But we cannot say of any passage, “This is a word from God.”

Evangelicals do not agree completely on how inspiration and inerrancy are to be understood. Few would claim that any way of stating it is the last word on the matter. But at the very least, evangelicals have tried to give due weight to Scripture’s constantly repeated “Thus saith the Lord” and have seen in the Bible a book whose message is to be taken with full seriousness and proclaimed to the very ends of the world. In giving due emphasis to the human authors of the Bible, they have tried not to overlook the divine.

Not only has modern theology lost the authoritative word of God; it has lost God himself, for “God is dead.” Many who use this expression mean, of course, not that there is no God at all, but only that a wrong way of thinking of him is now seen to be false. But the result of much recent writing has been to rid theology of God’s presence. Bultmann speaks of substituting anthropology for theology, and Bishop John Robinson approves. Instead of seeing God as a person, Robinson prefers to think of “the Ground of our being,” though what that means he fails to make clear. Plainly, God can no longer be addressed as “Our Father,” and this is an immeasurable spiritual loss.

With the loss of God goes the loss of vital personal religion. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, with his demand for “religionless Christianity,” looked for a day when there would be no religion at all. For men “come of age,” he thought, religion is not necessary or even desirable. Such an approach stresses secular life and minimizes the place of the spiritual.

A marked feature of recent theological writing is the very slight attention given repentance. This should perhaps be qualified by adding, “as a demand upon the world.” The Church, it appears, should repent. Churchmen have been guilty of saying their prayers and reading their Bibles and singing their hymns when they might have been out in the secular world living out the implications of the secular gospel. They are rebuked and, though the term is not used, invited to repent and to reform their ways.

Through the centuries Christians have consistently called on the world to repent and believe in Jesus Christ. Until recently this has not appeared to be a course for which they should apologize. The call for repentance and trust has been considered a part of the message of the Gospel. Until they face and accept this radical demand, men have been regarded as not Christian. Today, while there is not an express repudiation of this, yet the thrust of the modern writers is clearly otherwise. Repentance and penitence have dropped out of their vocabulary, as has faith in Christ. Although they often seek a certain response of faith in the existential situation, this faith is featureless, without content.

Certainly such a faith is not faith in Christ crucified and risen as the Church has always understood it. One would have to be a wise man indeed to understand what some writers mean when they call Christ “the Man for others.” Their Christ is not the sinner’s Substitute standing between them and their sins. He is not “the propitiation for our sins,” as John describes him; nor was he made “a curse for us,” as Paul puts it. Evangelicals have sometimes interpreted the New Testament doctrine of the Atonement all too crudely; but despite all their errors they end up with a Christ who really did save men. They rejoice in a finished salvation available for men here and now. This gives them a Christian life they can experience for themselves and a Gospel they can preach with conviction. But the Christ of the modern critics does very little for men—so little, in fact, that it is difficult to say with any precision what he does.

It is perhaps fittingly trinitarian that just as God the Father has dissolved into “the Ground of out-being,” and God the Son into “the Man for others,” so God the Holy Spirit has gone into eclipse. He does not appear even to have a new designation. He is simply ignored. It is rare indeed in recent theological writing to see a reference to the enrichment of life and empowerment for service to be expected when the Holy Spirit comes into a man’s heart and life. This is all of a piece with the humanistic thrust of the whole new theology. There is no divine dynamic. How could there be, in a creed with so many negations?

Eschatology is one of the “in” subjects. We hear of “realized eschatology,” of “consistent eschatology,” of “reinterpreted eschatology,” of “inaugurated eschatology,” and much more. But somewhere in the multitude of eschatologies the personal return of the Lord Jesus Christ has been misplaced. “The blessed hope” has such a new look these days that we wonder why the noun is even retained.

Every generation must face the critical questions that arise out of the life of that generation. We are no exception. But when we are offered such husks as these, we must firmly refuse them. The spiritual hunger of today will not be satisfied with half-truths and negations.

There is room for criticism of evangelical theology. It is far from having met all the intellectual challenges that confront it. But with all its faults, it at least gives men something on which their souls can feed. It turns them to a heavenly Father who loves them and makes provision for them, to a Christ who loved them and gave himself up for them, and to a Holy Spirit who pours God’s love into their hearts and directs and empowers them so that they may be the kind of people they ought to be.

Doxology For The God-Slayers

We get more than a little weary of the many tributes paid the death-of-God theorists by religious spokesmen who are presumed to be guardians of the faith.

Altizer, Hamilton, and Van Buren, we are told, have “insights” that Christ’s Church dare not ignore; they fill an important apologetic role to the world in a secular age, it is said. Moreover, they have made faith in God a vital theme of discussion—so the tribute runs—in a day when spiritual concerns are widely neglected.

All this sounds much as if the case for theism gains its vitality in the long run from the activity of the devil.

It was curious indeed, some months ago, to hear the Anglican bishop of Woolwich, John Robinson, telling an audience at Indiana’s Wabash College that orthodox Christianity unwittingly undermined faith in the reality of the spiritual world by insisting on the reality of Satan. Yet, almost in the same breath, Robinson saluted God’s pallbearers. After describing the God-is-dead phenomenon as “a bubble that will soon burst,” he insisted that “this is the kind of protest we should listen to.”

A theology that no longer takes Satan seriously soon finds the shadow of the divine everywhere.

A theology that thinks the Living God gains vitality in the modern world through an affirmation of his demise is unworthy of Christian respect, however orthodox it professes to be.

A few weeks ago we were visiting with Elton Trueblood, who displayed his gift for the right comment in a reference to the paean of praise coming from theologians and denominational leaders over emergence of the death-of-God theology. “The immaturity of the response,” said Trueblood, “is almost as great as the immaturity of the attack.” We heartily agree.

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