Review of “A Concise History of Christian Thought” (Tony Lane)

A Concise History of Christian Thought, rev. & exp. by Tony Lane, Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2006, pbk, 336 pp., $19.99.

This is one of the most accessible histories of Christian doctrine I have seen. The author teaches Historical Theology at London School of Theology and is well regarded in the evangelical community. The method employed in the book is to survey the lives of the eminent theologians from East and West and connect them with the controversies or disputes which oftentimes brought forth their notable works. The book is divided into five parts, covering the early Fathers to AD 500; then the Eastern and Western traditions from AD 500 to the Reformation and the Enlightenment. The last part deals with the Modern world from AD 1800. The influence of Williston Walker’s famous A History of the Christian Church can be traced, especially in Part Four.

The treatment of each thinker is necessarily abbreviated, yet Lane knows what he is doing and therefore makes good use of his space. By viewing Christian thought through the lives of individuals the whole subject becomes less imposing and less abstract; qualities which should recommend this book as a textbook for senior undergraduate and first year graduate students.

Sadly Lane falls into the trap of departing from orthodoxy in giving space to the likes of Barth, Tillich, Bonhoeffer, Urs von Balthasar and others. I suppose this is inevitable in a work such as this, but this should have been redressed more than it is with better coverage of evangelicals such as Gill, Fuller, Darby, Machen, Van Til, Henry, and Lloyd-Jones. There is also a notable dearth of Dutch theologians in the book, both from the Further Reformation (Voetius, Cocceus, Witsius) and the neo-Calvinist movement associated with men like Kuyper, Bavinck and Dooyeweerd. These are important omissions.

But with that said this book does accomplish much and, therefore, deserves our recommendation.

Church History: Table of Contents

A Brief History of Biblical Interpretation - a paper.

Yesterday’s Giants

Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Jonathan Edwards

John Nelson Darby

A Brief History of Biblical Interpretation

The history of the interpretation of the Bible is a long and involved one. For many centuries people have approached the Scriptures supposing that it should be interpreted literally whenever possible, or that one ought to look deeper than the surface meaning to find its true spiritual center. Still others have believed that the Old and (to a lesser extent) the New Testament is opened up by means of three or four hermeneutical categories. In this paper we shall try to review the main schools of interpretation, especially throughout the history of the Church.

Yesterday’s Giants - part 3

John Nelson Darby (1800-1882)

J. N. Darby is not as well known today, as he should be. He was a movement leader, a missionary, a scholar, Bible translator, apologist, and, unofficially, “the father of Dispensationalism.” The respected preacher D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones once publicly referred to him as “the great Darby.” He was born in London on the cusp of the 19th Century, a time of spiritual decline in England after the revivals of the previous half- century. Educated at the private Westminster School and then Trinity College, Dublin, where he was the recipient of the gold medal in classics, he spent the next few years practicing law. Around 1824 he abandoned that career and went into the Church of England, spending two years doing pioneer work in southern Ireland.

Increasingly, Darby began to find himself disagreeing with the Anglican Church and became convinced that Christianity had bedecked itself with unbiblical customs. Together with other likeminded individuals he started “breaking bread” and Bible study, first in Dublin, and then in Plymouth in southwest England. From these “assemblies” came a movement known as the Plymouth Brethren. With a simplified view of the Church and emphasis upon the imminent appearing of Christ for the saints at the pretribulational rapture the movement spread rapidly, owing in no small way to the missionary endeavors of Darby, especially in Switzerland, France and Germany. Darby was no “sheep-stealer,” but was very effective as an evangelist and discipler. He also made successful trips to New Zealand, Canada, and the United States.
As “the father of Dispensationalism,” as he is sometimes called, he gave definite form to the teaching (which predated him) that God had dealt differently with man in biblical history (e.g. giving the Law to Israel, the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the Church – Jn. 1:14), teachings which relied upon a plain sense, literal (though not literalistic) interpretation of Bible prophecy. Perhaps his best known work is his five volume Synopsis of the Books of the Bible though his collected works total thirty-four volumes. He also produced accurate translations of the Bible in English, French, and German.

Yesterday’s Giants - part 2

Jonathan Edwards (1703-175

America has produced many great minds, many men and women whose intellects have made them notables in the history books. One whose name shines as bright as any that could be named is Jonathan Edwards. Edwards was contemporary with Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, but unlike them, he could not be called a child of the Enlightenment. He was a pastor of a medium sized Congregational church in New England, and one of the most remarkable things about him is that he was able to transcend the cultural outlook of those around him. Unlike even men like Charles Hodge and Benjamin Warfield, two of the greatest theologians of the next century, he did not buy into the widespread belief that Christians shared the same basic evaluation of the world as non-Christians. He saw clearly that Jesus Christ not only saves souls but can save minds too. His sermons, which were heard by farmers and ironmongers and millers, as well as by schoolmasters and physicians, were weighty, highly organized examples of forceful yet spiritual reasoning. For example, his sermon on “Christian Knowledge” (from Hebrews 5:12) he maintains, “There is no other way by which any means of grace whatsoever can be of any benefit, but by knowledge. All teaching is vain, without learning. Therefore the preaching of the gospel would be wholly to no purpose, if it conveyed no knowledge to the mind…If men have no knowledge of these things, the faculty of reason in them will be wholly in vain…Therefore a man cannot have his faculty of understanding to any good purpose, further than he has knowledge of divine truth.”

In our day of cozy sermonettes this sounds like a theological lecture, but Edwards was convinced that God had created man’s mind to hear God’s truth, so he could not shortchange the Apostles and Prophets. These weekly deliveries of solid doctrine did not dry his people up. In fact the very reverse is true. Edwards was at the center of powerful spiritual revivals on two separate occasions. His most famous sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” a fairly untypical message, was preached in the midst of revival in 1741.

As a writer Edwards showed himself to be a profound philosopher-theologian. He had a knack for close analysis, a skill he had honed by his notable investigating of spiders and their webs. Such a profound thinker was Edwards that he is rightly accounted America’s greatest theologian and one of her greatest philosophers – which brings us back to where we started. He died of smallpox in 1758, shortly after assuming the presidency of the College of New Jersey (Princeton).

Yesterday’s Giants - part 1

CHARLES HADDON SPURGEON (1834-1892)

When one is commencing a series of short “Bios” of Christians of former days whose lives advertised something of the glory of God, there are some names which almost force themselves upon us. Luther, Calvin, Tyndale, Wesley, Edwards, to name but a few. One who was able to stand shoulder to shoulder with such men is Charles H. Spurgeon, a preacher whose name is as respected today as it was when he was at the height of his powers over one hundred and twenty years ago. Raised by his grandparents in a lopsided old house, the young Charles was a precocious child, with rare abilities in math, art and speech. From his earliest memories he was an avid reader. His grandfather, who was a Congregational preacher and lover of the Puritan divines, had a well-stocked library in a room at the top of the winding staircase of the manse. And in it, more often than not, one might come across the young Spurgeon, engrossed in one of those old tomes.

Reading at a rate of about one page every ten seconds he stored away a prodigious amount of the best theological writing of the previous three centuries. This was to stand him in good stead when in later years he published Commenting & Commentaries, an annotated buyers guide for students at his Pastor’s College in London. In addition to its solid recommendations, the book exhibits some of Spurgeon’s biting humor. Of one Greek scholar’s deprecating portrait of the Apostle Paul he suggested that the famous academician’s comments showed only that he was unable to come to an accurate assessment either of the Apostle or of himself. Another learned volume from Germany could not receive any plaudits since, unfortunately, he was quite unable to keep awake long enough to form an opinion of its contents.

But it was as a preacher that Spurgeon’s star shone brightest. In an age notable for its galaxy of great pulpiteers, Spurgeon was the greatest of all. This assertion can be proven in any number of ways. If one were to look at it in terms of sheer popularity, there was noone who could consistently draw crowds of six thousand (and usually entrance was by ticket only) twice every Sunday, and ‘the wrong side of the Thames’ at that. Then again, Spurgeon’s weekly printed sermons outsold all others, circulating internationally for years after his death. And they are still hugely popular today. If it were a matter of natural ability it is almost universally admitted that Spurgeon’s remarkably expressive baritone voice had no equal. Finally, one might point to his consistency; his unwavering stand for the truth, even when, during the so-called “Downgrade” over Biblical authority, it cost him much personal heartache. Only when it came to exposition would he have to yield the field to his friend and fellow Baptist Alexander Maclaren of Manchester.

Spurgeon’s brilliance can be come across today in any number of books and sermons, many of which are available on-line. Those who have not yet discovered him will mark the encounter. Those who have read him already do not need our recommendation.