Is anyone familiar with : Foundations of Evangelical Theology ? Thoughts ?
See:
Browse By Series: Foundations of Evangelical Theology
See:
Browse By Series: Foundations of Evangelical Theology
Foundations of Evangelical Theology
- Thread starter Mayflower
- Start date
- Status
DMcFadden
Puritanboard Commissioner
Donald Bloesch is the author of about 35 books and has to be counted as one of evangelicalism's most productive scholars (even if he doesn't always want to claim the identification as an evangelical). Bloesch's method is characterized by what he calls "revelational fideism" in opposition to "rationalism."
Bloesch’s rejection of rationalism appears even in his earliest writings. By 1971 he avered that his “position (was) much closer to fideism than to rationalism.” His self-identification places him in that tradition which includes luminaries such as the Apostle Paul, Irenaeus, Luther, Calvin, Pascal, Edwards, Kierkegaard, Forsyth, Emil Brunner, Helmut Thielicke, and Karl Barth. By the writing of his "Essentials," Bloesch added to his theological family tree the names of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Augustine, Spener, Sibbes, and Zinzendorf. Almost as significant are the people Bloesch singles out as excluded from his affinity family tree such as Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, Abelard, Socinus, Erasmus, and John Locke. In his Christian Foundations, Bloesch rejects the rationalism of theologians as diverse as Pannenberg, Gordon Clark, Edward J. Carnell, Carl Henry, Ronald Nash, and Norman Geisler. Indeed, for Bloesch, the Christian faith is anti-ideological and “opposes the pretension and vanity of reason.” One of his favorite descriptors for evangelical rationalism is “bane,” as in the “bane” of much conservative evangelicalism “is a rationalism that denies the mystery in faith and a sectarianism that breaks continuity with the catholic tradition.” Again, he opines: “The bane of much of modern evangelicalism is rationalism which presupposes that the Word of God is directly available to human reason.”
As much as Bloesch opposes the rationalism of fundamentalism and certain variants of evangelicalism, his other major concern rests with modern existentialism and theological liberalism. For him the chief evil with liberalism relates to its tendency to dissolve the faith in the spirit of the times (Zeitgeist). While liberals may use the vocabulary of evangelicalism, they do not use its dictionary. Such left leaning theologizing reduces to ethics, becomes translated into ontology, or melts into mysticism. It locates authority in some universal religious experience or religious consciousness (cf. Lindbeck’s experiential-expressive approach). As for existentialism, Bloesch faults its Renaissance lineage with an emphasis upon freedom rooted in human autonomy. It reduces the gospel to a breakthrough into freedom or involves a call to authentic existence. Furthermore, the existential program tends toward relativism because it denies the mind’s ability to grasp objective truth about God. With all of Bloesch’s objections to rationalism, he spares no scorn for the various relativizing theologies on the scene today. Whether older liberal theology with its “fatherhood of God” and “brotherhood of man,” liberation theology and its call to solidarity with the oppressed, or process theology and the power of creative transformation—they all are rejected as inadequate.
So who does Bloesch like anyway? Karl Barth and Brunner who he counts as another "manifestation of Evangelicalism." Bloesch’s program for theology begins with his diagnosis of the problem of much contemporary evangelicalism, namely rationalism. As has already been identified, rationalism represents for Bloesch a tragic misdirection. Relying upon Protestant scholastics such as Francis Turretin, Princeton theologians Hodge and Warfield, evangelical pioneers such as Carl F.H. Henry, and contemporary writers such as the popular theologians Wayne Grudem and R.C. Sproul, rationalists have dominated much of conservative evangelicalism.
For Bloesch, this is VERY bad as is the reliance upon propositional revelation. Again, for him, this represents “one of the banes of modern evangelicalism.” Such preoccupation with propositional theories of revelation treats human logic and knowledge as equated with that of God and the interpreter seeks to deduce true propositions from Scripture. Through processes of reasoning from first principles to conclusions, very much like Aristotelian philosophy, the theologian ends up cutting off God’s revelation in the Bible from the “living, dynamic being of God himself and his continual self-giving through Christ and in the Spirit.”
In order to deal with the objective and subjective elements of reality, Bloesch proposes a creative synthesis which can only be sustained by means of a continual reliance upon a dialectical method and generous use of the concept of paradox. Calling his approach “fideistic revelationalism,” Bloesch comprehends his method as a “theology of Word and Spirit.” It counters both descriptive views of theology (e.g., Lindbeck) and constructive ones (e.g., Schubert Ogden) with prescriptive affirmations carrying true metaphysical importance.
Bloesch has one of the most encyclopedic understandings of everything ever said about anything I have ever seen. He is worth reading (certainly NOT to agree with) if for no other reason than, like C.F.H. Henry, he seems to have read and remembered everything anyone ever said.
From the perspective of this board, Bloesch will frustrate you to death. He gives with one hand (Scripture is where we go to hear God speak his eternal Word) and takes away with the other (ideas of inerrancy and propositional revelation are the "bane" of Christianity).
Bloesch’s rejection of rationalism appears even in his earliest writings. By 1971 he avered that his “position (was) much closer to fideism than to rationalism.” His self-identification places him in that tradition which includes luminaries such as the Apostle Paul, Irenaeus, Luther, Calvin, Pascal, Edwards, Kierkegaard, Forsyth, Emil Brunner, Helmut Thielicke, and Karl Barth. By the writing of his "Essentials," Bloesch added to his theological family tree the names of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Augustine, Spener, Sibbes, and Zinzendorf. Almost as significant are the people Bloesch singles out as excluded from his affinity family tree such as Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, Abelard, Socinus, Erasmus, and John Locke. In his Christian Foundations, Bloesch rejects the rationalism of theologians as diverse as Pannenberg, Gordon Clark, Edward J. Carnell, Carl Henry, Ronald Nash, and Norman Geisler. Indeed, for Bloesch, the Christian faith is anti-ideological and “opposes the pretension and vanity of reason.” One of his favorite descriptors for evangelical rationalism is “bane,” as in the “bane” of much conservative evangelicalism “is a rationalism that denies the mystery in faith and a sectarianism that breaks continuity with the catholic tradition.” Again, he opines: “The bane of much of modern evangelicalism is rationalism which presupposes that the Word of God is directly available to human reason.”
As much as Bloesch opposes the rationalism of fundamentalism and certain variants of evangelicalism, his other major concern rests with modern existentialism and theological liberalism. For him the chief evil with liberalism relates to its tendency to dissolve the faith in the spirit of the times (Zeitgeist). While liberals may use the vocabulary of evangelicalism, they do not use its dictionary. Such left leaning theologizing reduces to ethics, becomes translated into ontology, or melts into mysticism. It locates authority in some universal religious experience or religious consciousness (cf. Lindbeck’s experiential-expressive approach). As for existentialism, Bloesch faults its Renaissance lineage with an emphasis upon freedom rooted in human autonomy. It reduces the gospel to a breakthrough into freedom or involves a call to authentic existence. Furthermore, the existential program tends toward relativism because it denies the mind’s ability to grasp objective truth about God. With all of Bloesch’s objections to rationalism, he spares no scorn for the various relativizing theologies on the scene today. Whether older liberal theology with its “fatherhood of God” and “brotherhood of man,” liberation theology and its call to solidarity with the oppressed, or process theology and the power of creative transformation—they all are rejected as inadequate.
So who does Bloesch like anyway? Karl Barth and Brunner who he counts as another "manifestation of Evangelicalism." Bloesch’s program for theology begins with his diagnosis of the problem of much contemporary evangelicalism, namely rationalism. As has already been identified, rationalism represents for Bloesch a tragic misdirection. Relying upon Protestant scholastics such as Francis Turretin, Princeton theologians Hodge and Warfield, evangelical pioneers such as Carl F.H. Henry, and contemporary writers such as the popular theologians Wayne Grudem and R.C. Sproul, rationalists have dominated much of conservative evangelicalism.
For Bloesch, this is VERY bad as is the reliance upon propositional revelation. Again, for him, this represents “one of the banes of modern evangelicalism.” Such preoccupation with propositional theories of revelation treats human logic and knowledge as equated with that of God and the interpreter seeks to deduce true propositions from Scripture. Through processes of reasoning from first principles to conclusions, very much like Aristotelian philosophy, the theologian ends up cutting off God’s revelation in the Bible from the “living, dynamic being of God himself and his continual self-giving through Christ and in the Spirit.”
In order to deal with the objective and subjective elements of reality, Bloesch proposes a creative synthesis which can only be sustained by means of a continual reliance upon a dialectical method and generous use of the concept of paradox. Calling his approach “fideistic revelationalism,” Bloesch comprehends his method as a “theology of Word and Spirit.” It counters both descriptive views of theology (e.g., Lindbeck) and constructive ones (e.g., Schubert Ogden) with prescriptive affirmations carrying true metaphysical importance.
Bloesch has one of the most encyclopedic understandings of everything ever said about anything I have ever seen. He is worth reading (certainly NOT to agree with) if for no other reason than, like C.F.H. Henry, he seems to have read and remembered everything anyone ever said.
From the perspective of this board, Bloesch will frustrate you to death. He gives with one hand (Scripture is where we go to hear God speak his eternal Word) and takes away with the other (ideas of inerrancy and propositional revelation are the "bane" of Christianity).
- Status
