What is dogmatic theology?

C. THEOLOGY (cf. Kattenbusch, in the Schaff-Herzog Encyclopaedia, vol. xi:, pp. 394-397), concerned with systematic, logical development of TRUTH (see Fairbairn, p. 263), as a process collects and formulates religious ideas; in the form of "Biblical" Theology doing this for Revelation in the light of the periods during which that was vouchsafed; in the form of "Symbolic" Theology treating of the fundamentals of the Faith as these were investigated in the age of the first Church Councils, which issued "Catholic Creeds" (cf. note on Luke 18:8); whilst "Dogmatic" Theology has to do with the development of such doctrine in the light of spiritual experience; and so on.

May we not consider that the objection founded on this verse is effectually disposed of by such considerations, or, if difficulty remains, that it may yield to further study on such lines? It does, at all events, appear futile to seek light on it, or elucidation of the profound and mysterious question of how divine and human knowledge are united and were related to each other in the person of Christ in the days of His flesh, along the line of metaphysics or psychology. How much worse to found on this verse, and in this way, a denial of their co-existence! It is quite conceivable that we may never come to know the nature of the connecting link between the divine and human in Christ's person. His own declaration, "No man knoweth the Son but the Father," would prepare us for this. Many theories have been constructed to account for the relation between the two, many attempts made to forge an intelligible link between them. It was but to be expected that from the surveillance of theologians this would not long be omitted. Where the word itself had, with its usual disregard for mere mental perplexities, confined its testimony to the bare fact of the two natures in one Person, Christ Jesus, God and man, without concerning itself with explanations of the nature of their relation, dogmatic theology, which considers itself to have been bequeathed the task of thinking out, and construing to intelligence, doctrines implicit in the New Testament, has over and over again essayed to explain such relation. It was characteristic of that working of the human mind upon divine things which we call theology to make the attempt. Yet, the ingenuity of the various conjectures notwithstanding, failure is stamped upon them all.

By a "Theologian" in the narrower and strict sense of the term is meant one who is scientifically, as distinct from ecclesiastically, "dogmatic." Origen led the way among Christians; with him may be classed Maimonides amongst Jews. Origen has been followed by Athanasius, the Cappadocian "Fathers" (Basil and the brothers Gregory) and Augustine; by Calvin, Hooker, Jonathan Edwards, Newman, Martineau, Dorner, Dale, etc.

By "dogma" in the ecclesiastical sense is meant a truth to which submission is due (Kaftan, Gore, etc.); or, as expressed by Orr, "doctrine ecclesiastically sanctified." Harnack, its great living historian, calls it Doctrine which is held by the CHURCH as such. Those who conform to what is current in their own generation are by their contemporaries deemed "Orthodox." Höffding has observed that "within the Protestant Churches it is the laity, far more than any Church authorities, who control the orthodoxy of the preachers" (p. 320). They go by what they were taught in their youth and resist "innovation." There is, unhappily, an indisposition to view Truth like "a growing tree" (J. N. Darby).

The last words afford us a pre-eminent instance of what is meant by "dogma." "A truth which every one who would be a Christian is bound to believe" (Gore, "The Creed of the Christian" p. 16). But Creeds are, after all, "only human expositions" (Kinnear, p. 163). As to Dogma, see Green, iii. 165-185, Lotze, § 94 ff.

It may be desirable here to note the characteristics of theology, or reasoned development of Biblical doctrine, which it has been since the time of Origen. One whose writings are not sufficiently known shall speak. "When a man's mind apprehends the truth, and he seeks to give it a form, he does it according to the capacity of man, which is not its source; the truth as he expresses it, even were it pure, is separated in him from its source and its totality; but, besides this, the shape that a man gives it always bears the stamp of the man's weakness. He has only apprehended it partially, and he only produces a part of it. Accordingly, it is no longer the truth. Moreover, when he separates it from the whole circle of truth in which God has placed it, he must necessarily clothe it in a new form, in a garment which proceeds from man: at once error mixes with it. Thus it is no longer a vital part of the whole: it is partial, and thereby not the truth; and it is, in fact, mixed with error. That is theology" (J. N. Darby, Synopsis," vol. v., on 2 Timothy).

Happily, in that which we are studying here, a great deal of historical theology is avoided by little or no reference to the doctrine of the Trinity. This is unusual in any exposition of the creed, for there is generally much stress laid upon this, and here, if anywhere, some elaboration of the truth would naturally be looked for. On this occasion, however, it is at once to the Son of God incarnate, the historic Jesus, to use the modern phrase, that we are directed. A great deal of what is said regarding the doctrine of the incarnation may be left aside, especially so from the fact that the attempt to show that it is not an unfamiliar idea to man, and to justify it as a credible doctrine leads to the use of the more or less technical language of philosophy. We cannot be expected to follow there; but it may be permitted to remark on the use of that rather novel principle which New Theology has given such prominence to — "the immanence of God." Trust it not; especially when applied to the incarnation. "A mere philosopheme, absolutely fatal to a gospel" is not an unfair description of it. To many under the spell of philosophic reasoning on this doctrine of divine immanence, instead of the great mystery of godliness, God manifest in the flesh, "Christ Himself is," as a Roman Catholic has recently said, "resolved into a mere lay figure draped in a few attributes which have no other origin than the minds of those actuated by its baneful influence." There are those also who claim "with the help of the modern categories of immanence, evolution and personality, to construe more adequately than ancient theology, and still more adequately than New Theology," Christological doctrine. But in what does it result? Nothing but philosophical speculation, unsupported by scripture, where it is not indeed contradicted by it. This last, of course, may be of little consequence to those who hold that "the New Testament has left to dogmatic theology the task of thinking out, and construing to intelligence, such facts in regard to Christ as the apostles simply put side by side." But to those who accept the scriptures as something less nebulous, as God's revelation, in fact, of all we can know regarding the subject, all this shows with how great distrust the reasonings of philosophy on it must he regarded.

44 I recognize the existence of the evil which Mr. Scherer professes to assail. It is one of the commonest devices of the enemy to attack a corruption when it grows old and loses its power over the mind of man, in order to set up some other evil more in accordance with the state of men's minds. Thus the heathen mythology was assailed by the scoffs of infidelity, as soon as it had been shaken by Christianity. This is what the letter does; it attacks that lifeless dogmatic theology, which makes use of the name of God in order to put restraint, not on man, but on the Holy Ghost. But while doing this, instead of bringing us back to the authority of God, it sets up that of man; instead of restoring the liberty and the rights of the Spirit of God, it gives us up to the spirit of man, publishing its unbelief as to the word, and undermining, as far as it can, all that is certainly of God. When this is once taken away — when there is no more authority of God thus, says the letter (which alone secures true liberty to man) — when there is no other authority than that of him who speaks or of the church, who will then be free?

The intolerant attitude of the Vatican towards it is not surprising either. The Roman Catholic faith stands for a conception of things with which the new spirit can have nothing in common. The one recognises authority, the other the rejection of it. The nature of the authority in question can be taken into account later, but the present point is that Rome is based upon the recognition of an authoritative standard of truth, upon dogma, to use a common phrase. A famous statement of Harnack "Dogmatic Christianity, in the strict sense of the word, is Catholic" — would be just as true were the first and last terms transposed. Newman, the convert to Rome, became such, no doubt, because dominated by the thought that external authority was absolutely essential, and assuming that an infallible church provided it. "Dogma was the fundamental principle of my religion. I could enter into no other sort of religion." There is this in common then between Latin Christianity and true Christianity, that in each, truth is conceived to be absolute and unchangeable, capable of being presented in complete and perfect objective form. Wherein they differ is that true believers find this objective testimony presented to their faith in the divinely inspired Scriptures, which are perfect and sufficient in themselves, through the Holy Spirit's power, to reveal God's mind and will; whereas Rome teaches that in addition to the Bible the magisterium, or teaching authority of the church is needed, not only to interpret the Scriptures, assuming them to be obscure, but also to authenticate them to us, denying their authority, apart from the sanction of "the pillar and ground of the truth."

It is a fatal mistake for men to frame systems of divinity. You can no more systematize the truth of God than you can systematize God Himself. Let us abandon, therefore, all systems of theology and schools of divinity and take the truth. There is not a single theological system under the sun that contains the truth. All may contain some truth, not one contains all. And very often you find that whatever little truth the system contains is misplaced and turned the wrong way, to the serious damage of truth as a whole and the stumbling and injury of souls. Every day we live we are more and more struck with the vast difference between the dogmas of divinity and the heart of the Christ of God.

Here is another subject altogether; and its mixture with grace is the common vice of so-called "theology." Who can wonder therefore, that simple, sound, and intelligent Christians distrust and repudiate so unreliable a guide. They have good reason to beware, for it habitually darkens and perplexes many believers who, immature in the truth, thought themselves on the right line by listening to it. But systematic divinity is like what is called a hortus siccus; that is, flowers and leaves, or the like, plucked from the plant and dried, so that not a particle remains of freshness or life in one of them.

Such is "theology"; whereas Scripture is "spirit and life." So is the Lord Jesus, the living One who died but is alive again for evermore; and again the Holy Spirit who is the Spirit of truth that quickens, the One given not only for life but to keep every truth fresh and powerful; and so it is in the ever-flowing love of God the Father. Man makes, or strives to make, revelation into a science. Can two things more thoroughly differ? Who ever found life or peace in systematic divinity? It is always guarding this and guarding that with human weapons, and framing its uncertain and defective doctrines into imaginary fortresses of the faith, which must be Christ's working in us by the word and Spirit of God. Only in the Bible we have the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth; and we have the Holy Spirit who wrote all to guide us into all the truth. Therefore we have confidence in God and the word of His grace.