9.2 Fundamental Articles and Errors
A. Premisses of the Discussion: Foundational Truths and their Opposites
1. Genuine belief and real error—objectively and subjectively considered. In view of these biblical distinctions, some conclusions can be drawn concerning various kinds of foundations or fundamentals in theology. First, there is the underlying foundation, identical with the
obiectum fidei, the object of faith or, in a formal sense, with the
obiectum theologiae, the object of theology.5<a href="#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title="">2</a> The
obiectum fidei, viewed in a general or equivalent (
aedequatum) sense is the
Verbum Dei, the written Word of God; viewed in a special and proper sense (
speciale et proprium), it is the doctrine concerning Christ (
doctrina Christi) together with the principal truths and promises of God (
capitibus et promissionibus Dei). We distinguish between the written Word in its entirety and its saving contents—just as in the doctrine of Scripture a distinction is made between the text of Scripture
quoad verba, according to its words, and
quoad res, according to the things or materials represented by the words.5<a href="#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" title="">3</a> Generally and in terms of the equivalence between the ordained means of revelation and its substance, Scripture is the
fundamentum and
obiectum fidei, but it is foundational in such a way that it directs us to Christ and to the promises of God as the special and proper foundation and object of faith. Fundamental articles of faith, therefore, are drawn directly from Scripture and teach of salvation in Christ.
As Voetius points out, these fundamental articles and corresponding errors can be understood from several points of view. It is one thing to discern an article or error at an objective level, a truth or error as such (
in se), quite another to identify and define faith and error subjectively as they arise out of the disposition (
habitus) or condition (
status) of believing or disbelieving, and yet another to grasp the patterns, manner, and degrees of judgment or tolerance, moderation, reception, or reconciliation possible in cases of belief and error.5<a href="#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" title="">4</a> In the first category, some distinction must be made between issues objectively necessary to the being of the church and those necessary to the well-being or salvation of believers, those concerning ritual or polity and those concerning rules or dogmas in the strict sense of the terms, those concerning doctrinal explanations and those concerning beliefs simply necessary in and of themselves, those related to Scripture generally and those concerning the stability of the basic biblical faith. In the second category, the subjective, errors of ignorance must be distinguished from errors arising from opposition to truth, the internal or mental error from the external error in formal assent and profession. Here too the condition or state of believers and church must be considered: the human condition before the fall is different from the condition after it, the human condition under Old Testament different from that under the New and, as the example of doubting Thomas indicates, the human condition can also be different before the resurrection and after. Different requirements arise from different states and conditions.5<a href="#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4" title="">5</a>
In the third category, distinction is made concerning patterns, manner, and degrees of judgment and tolerance—so that a difference must be recognized between the rules and judgment of particular churches and the general assent of the church universal, visible, and invisible. Moderation and some degree of tolerance is required in the first case, while firm judgment is necessary in the latter inasmuch as those who deny universal truths of the church are excluded from heavenly blessedness. Thus it is one thing to tolerate minor corruptions and infirmities with a longsuffering love and quite another to attempt reconciliation with pernicious heresies!5<a href="#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5" title="">6</a>
Three further distinctions can be made concerning the articles or dogmas of the faith (
dogmata fidei): they can be defined either as primary and immediate, or as secondary and mediate; as explicit and formal, or implict and virtual; and as positive or negative.5<a href="#_ftn6" name="_ftnref6" title="">7</a> The first of these distinctions refers to the difference between those doctrines which arise immediately from the reading of Scripture (e.g., the doctrines of the Trinity, of Christ as mediator, or of justification) and are primary to the Christian faith and those doctrines which arise by logical derivation as hypotheses or conclusions and which are mediate or secondary to the faith (e.g., the relationship of the two natures in Christ, the
communicatio idiomatum). This distinction follows the pattern of the Lutheran scholastic differentiation of constituent articles (
articuli constituentes) from consequent articles (
articuli consequentes) or, in the language of the “Lutherani rigidiores,” as Turretin calls them, the “stricter Lutherans” like Calovius and Quenstedt, primary fundamental articles (
articuli fundamentales primarii) and secondary fundamental articles (
articuli fundamentales secundarii). The question, of course, is the extent to which secondary or logically derived articles can be considered fundamental.5<a href="#_ftn7" name="_ftnref7" title="">8</a>
This question is answered in part by a second distinction, the distinction between the explicit or formal and the implicit or virtual articles. When a doctrine of faith is present in Scripture as an explicit and formal statement it is, of course, necessary. This necessary, foundational character extends, in addition, to those doctrines implied directly by the text and, therefore, virtually present. The implicit or virtually present doctrine, moreover, attains a fundamental or normative status when its formulation becomes an issue of debate between orthodox and heterodox Christians, and, in addition, the heterodox formulation leads to an erroneous and soteriologically dangerous understanding of the explicit and formal or primary and immediate doctrines. This argument can be extended to cover doctrines developed as logical conclusions from primary dogmas. Of course, a question arises here concerning the way in which logic, particularly syllogistic logic, can be applied to revealed doctrine and which logical conclusions are in fact essentially biblical and therefore fundamental in a secondary or derived sense.5<a href="#_ftn8" name="_ftnref8" title="">9</a>
The third distinction concerning the nature of fundamentals distinguishes between positive and negative articles and may be regarded as an extension of the previous two categories of doctrine. Positive articles include the doctrines previously noted as primary, consisting principally of affirmative statements of saving truth, such as “Christ is the Son of God” or “the death of Christ was the ransom paid for our sins.” Negative articles describe errors both of primary statement and of logical conclusion. Moreover, they specifically consist of falsehoods rejected by orthodox Christians—such as the doctrines of the mass and purgatory. These negative articles identify errors of two sorts, direct or immediate errors and indirect or secondary errors resulting from the application of incorrect logic in doctrinal matters. Blatant heresies fall into the category of direct or immediate error: they subvert primary, immediate fundamentals by overt, explicit contrary statement. Indirect or secondary error, however, is an indirect subversion of truth. For example, the popish doctrines of the merit of works and of temporal satisfaction through penance do not immediately subvert the doctrine of Christ’s satisfaction, but rather do so indirectly, by way of extension. So-called negative articles of faith controvert both sorts of error.6<a href="#_ftn9" name="_ftnref9" title="">0</a>
This identification of fundamental articles and their distinction both from the
principia and nonfundamental or consequent articles serves also to identify and distinguish the various kinds of errorist against whom polemic is to be directed. Those who deny the
principia theologiae are either classed as infidels or unbelievers. Those who accept the
principia but who err in fundamental articles are heretics. Those who accept both
principia and
articuli fundamentales but who separate themselves from the faithful over minor doctrinal issues are schismatics.6<a href="#_ftn10" name="_ftnref10" title="">1</a>
2. In debate with Rome: the fundamentals, the fathers, and catholicity. The Reformed identification and limitation of fundamental articles was also defined in conflict with the Roman Church over the question of the use of the church fathers as a norm of doctrine. From the Roman side, it could be argued that Protestants improperly distinguished between fundamental articles necessary to salvation and nonfundamental articles that were unnecessary—the correct distinction was between the fundamental articles that need to be known and believed by any and all for salvation and the nonfundamental articles that, in themselves, are not necessary to salvation and need to be known and believed only when proposed or debated, with the result that “sinfull denial” of any doctrinal point “sufficiently proved” by the church is destructive of saving faith and results in damnation.6<a href="#_ftn11" name="_ftnref11" title="">2</a> From the Roman perspective, one such “nonfundamental” article is the belief that there must always be a visible church on earth, identified in the succession of its bishops and in the administration of its sacraments, outside of which there can be no salvation. But this doctrine concerns the “essence and unity of true faith and Church.” When one denies this belief, which was understood by the tradition, one destroys saving faith.6<a href="#_ftn12" name="_ftnref12" title="">3</a>
In his preface to his treatise on “the use of the fathers in the decision of controversies,” Daillé argued the point that the debate between “the Church of Rome and the Protestants” was, at heart, a debate over “necessary articles” and “fundamentals of religion.” The Protestant churches, he argued, accepted as fundamental articles of belief those teachings that are “both clearly delivered in the Scriptures, and expressly admitted by the ancient councils and the Fathers; and … indeed unanimously received by the greatest part of Christians in all ages, and in different parts of the world.”6<a href="#_ftn13" name="_ftnref13" title="">4</a> Daillé’s argument in large part parallels that of Calvin in his response to Sadleto—perhaps because both writers assumed that the Protestant churches fully respect the standard of catholicity enunciated by the fifth century teacher, Vincent of Lerins, namely, what has been believed “everywhere, always, and by all.”6<a href="#_ftn14" name="_ftnref14" title="">5</a> Daillé notes the basic articles: that there is one supreme God who is the creator of all things; that he created human beings according to his image; that human beings revolted against the divine demand of righteous obedience and fell into sin; that redemption from sin is accomplished in Jesus Christ who is the eternal Son of God the Father, incarnate of the virgin Mary; that Christ made satisfaction for sin on the cross; that Christ ascended in to heaven and will ultimately return as the judge of all mankind; that Christ sent the Spirit, who proceeds from both the Father and the Son, for the sake of salvation; and that these three persons, Father, Son, and Spirit, are one God; that the Apostles preached this doctrine throughout the world, planted churches, and conveyed to the churches two sacraments—baptism, “the sacrament of our regeneration,” and the Lord’s Supper, “the sacrament of our communion with Christ; that Christians are obliged to love God and neighbor and to accept as true the teachings of the Old and New Testaments. Daillé concludes that these are the articles that Protestants accept as true and fundamental and that “if all other Christians would but content themselves with these, there would never be any schism in the Church.”6<a href="#_ftn15" name="_ftnref15" title="">6</a>
Not content with these fundamental truths, the “adversaries,” namely, the Pope and the teachers of the Roman Church, adds a series of doctrinal claims as necessary doctrines, without the acceptance of which “there is no possible hope of salvation.” Daillé enumerates: “that the Pope of Rome is the head and supreme monarch of the whole Christian Church throughout the world,” “that he, or at least the church which he acknowledges a true one, cannot possibly err in matters of faith,” “that the sacrament of the Eucharist is to be adored, as being really Jesus Christ, not a piece of bread,” “that the mass is a sacrifice, that really expiates the sins of the faithful,” “that our souls after death, before they enter into heaven, are to pass through a certain fire, and there endure grievous torments; thus making atonement for their sins,” “that none but the priest himself that consecrated the Eucharist is bound by right to receive it in both kinds.”6<a href="#_ftn16" name="_ftnref16" title="">7</a> Such doctrines are identified as fundamental by the Roman Church, despite the inability to draw them from Scripture, as necessary for salvation and as believed throughout the whole course of Christianity; but even here, Daillé notes, the Roman Church errs, inasmuch as these are hardly the universal teachings of the fathers, inasmuch as the fathers themselves often failed to agree on such questions, and inasmuch as the fathers, in any case, are not the final authority in doctrinal matters.6<a href="#_ftn17" name="_ftnref17" title="">8</a>
3. The varieties of fundamental error. The Reformed orthodox generally also note, in connection with the idea of fundamental articles, three kinds of doctrinal error: (1) errors directly
against a fundamental article (
contra fundamentum); (2) errors
around a fundamental or in indirect contradiction to it (
circa fundamentum); (3) errors
beyond a fundamental article (
praeter fundamentum). The first kind of error is a direct attack—such as those launched by the Socinians—against the divinity of Christ or the Trinity. The second is not a direct negation or an antithesis but rather an indirect or secondary error ultimately subversive of a fundamental—such as a belief in God that refuses to acknowledge his providence. The third category of error does not address fundamental articles directly or indirectly but rather involves faith in problematic and curious questions (
quaestiones problematicas et curiosas) that do not arise out of the revealed Word—hay and stubble!—and that, because of their curiosity and vanity, constitute diversions from and impediments to salvation.6<a href="#_ftn18" name="_ftnref18" title="">9</a>
This sense of several kinds or levels of error manifests itself in Stapfer’s massive
Institutiones theologiae polemicae. Stapfer’s system, as its subtitle indicates, adopts a scientific arrangement by moving from those adversaries who deny the
principia of Christianity (the infidels and unbelievers called Atheists, Deists, Epicureans, Pagans, and Naturalists), to those who accept either of the principia (Jews, Moslems, Socinians, and Latitudinarians or Indifferentists), to those who accept both principia but attack fundamental articles (Papists, Fanatics, Pelagians, Remonstrants, and Anabaptists), to those, finally, who agree on fundamentals but who differ on nonfundamental articles (the Greek Orthodox and the Lutherans). Stapfer feels close enough to the Lutherans to devote a separate chapter to “the consent and dissent of Protestants.”7<a href="#_ftn19" name="_ftnref19" title="">0</a> The latter two groups, the Greek Orthodox and the Lutherans, are not viewed as heretics but as schismatics from the Reformed faith.
Stapfer devotes the first two sections of each polemical chapter to the identification of the basic ideas of the heresy and, specifically, to the delineation of its
proton pseudos or false fundamental, the “primary hypothesis” of the heresy against which he must direct the force of his argument. Thus, the false fundamental of the atheist is that there exists “no self-existent substance beyond the world that contains in itself the reason for the existence of this universe.”7<a href="#_ftn20" name="_ftnref20" title="">1</a> Similarly the false fundamental of the naturalists—Stapfer singles out Matthew Tindal and Anthony Collins—is their assumption that reason alone is sufficient for salvation or ultimate blessedness.7<a href="#_ftn21" name="_ftnref21" title="">2</a> Both of these fundamental errors operate to exclude the biblical foundation or
principium of Christianity: those who hold them are infidels! When he turns to heretics, Stapfer recognizes, again, fundamental errors that mirror, like a “bad eminence,” the fundamental articles of the true faith. Thus, papists accept revelation and reason but hold as
proton pseudos the supremacy of the pope which leads to the founding of doctrine on an infallible church rather than on the Lordship of Christ.7<a href="#_ftn22" name="_ftnref22" title="">3</a> The Pelagian
proton pseudos, that fallen man can adequately obey the Law, stands over against the church’s insistence on the necessity of grace.7<a href="#_ftn23" name="_ftnref23" title="">4</a>
For Stapfer, the Greeks and the Lutherans represent the problem of errors around and beyond fundamentals; neither is to be classed as a heresy. The Greeks deny the doctrine of the procession of the Spirit from the Son as well as the Father, but they do not deny the doctrine of the Trinity. Stapfer here recognizes the historical problem of the insertion of the
filioque into the creed, but relies on biblical warrants to justify the doctrine.7<a href="#_ftn24" name="_ftnref24" title="">5</a> The Lutherans deny the language of double predestination but nonetheless affirm that salvation occurs by grace alone. Stapfer sees, in the first case, a danger of weakening the doctrine of the Trinity; in the second, a danger of falling into the Arminian error of losing the doctrine of salvation by grace alone.7<a href="#_ftn25" name="_ftnref25" title="">6</a>
52 See above,
7.1.
53 Cf. Turretin,
Inst. theol., I.xiv.8; with ibid., II.xiii.14; Voetius,
De articulis et erroribus fundamentalibus, in
Sel. Disp., II, pp. 514–515.
54 Voetius,
De articulis et erroribus fundamentalibus, in
Sel. Disp., II, p. 517.
55 Voetius,
De articulis et erroribus fundamentalibus, in
Sel. Disp., II, pp. 517–524.
56 Voetius,
De articulis et erroribus fundamentalibus, in
Sel. Disp., II, pp. 525–526.
57 Marckius,
Compendium, III.ix.
58 Cf. Turretin,
Inst. theol., I.xiv.8 with Baier-Walter,
Compendium, I, pp. 49–68.
59 Witsius,
Exercitationes, II.vi,xi.
60 Cf. Turretin,
Inst. theol., I.xiv.8, 10; with Rijssen,
Summa, I.xii–xiii.
61 Stapfer,
Inst. theol., I.36–38.
62 C. R. [Richard Smith?],
Of the Distinction of Fundamental and Not Fundamental Points of Faith (N.p.: s.n., 1645), pp. 37–38, 175–181, 190–191.
63 C. R.,
Distinction of Fundamental and Not Fundamental Points, pp. 201–209, 216–221; cf. William Chillingworth,
The Religion of Protestants a safe way to salvation (Oxford: Leonard Lichfield, 1638), III.1–4, chapter and answer.
64 Jean Daillé,
De usu patrum (1636); in translation as
A Treatise of the Right Use of the Fathers in the Decision of Controversies Existing at this Day in Religion, 2nd. ed., trans. T. Smith, ed., with a preface by G. Jekyll (London: Henry Bohn, 1843), p. xvi.
65 Calvin,
Reply to Sadolet, in
Selected Works, I, pp. 35, 37.
66 Daillé,
A Treatise of the Right Use of the Fathers, p. xvii.
67 Daillé,
A Treatise of the Right Use of the Fathers, p. xviii.
68 Daillé,
A Treatise of the Right Use of the Fathers, pp. xix–xx; cf. the discussion of Daillé’s views on the authority of patristic tradition in
PRRD, II,
5.5 (A.2).
69 Rijssen,
Summa, I.xiii; cf. Turretin,
Inst. theol., I.xiv.9.
70 Stapfer,
Inst. theol. elencticae, V.xx.
71 Stapfer,
Inst. theol. elencticae, II.vi, §8.
72 Stapfer,
Inst. theol. elencticae, II.x, §6.
73 Stapfer,
Inst. theol. elencticae, IV.xiv, §6.
74 Stapfer,
Inst. theol. elencticae, IV.xvi, §6.
75 Stapfer,
Inst. theol. elencticae, V.xix, §38–45; and cf. the discussion of the
filioque in
PRRD, IV, 7.4 (A.
2).
76 Stapfer,
Inst. theol. elencticae, V.xx, §80–82.
